Dance While You Can

by Susan Lewis

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Well, for one thing I’ve moved all my things into another room.’

  The following week I met Lord Belmayne at their home in Belgrave Square. It went off better than either Alexander or I could have hoped. Alexander teased his father because it was clear he had been expecting to see the gauche twenty-one-year-old he’d last confronted at Foxton’s. I showed him photographs of his grandchildren while Alexander boasted about how closely they resembled him. I was having such a good time I didn’t want the afternoon to end.

  At the Lord Chancellor’s invitation I went again the following week. He was waiting for me at the door; he had his coat on, and there was a car outside with its engine running. He had to rush off to a meeting, some crisis had erupted.

  ‘Alexander’s inside feeling extremely sorry for himself,’ he said. ‘He lost a case on Friday after locking horns with someone who’s better than he is – but don’t tell him I said so.’

  Alexander was standing in front of the fire beneath the portrait of his mother when I walked in. His hands were clasped behind his back, and with his long legs set slightly apart he looked every bit the viscount he would one day be.

  ‘How are you?’ he smiled.

  ‘Cold.’ And I went to stand beside him at the fire. ‘Your father tells me you lost a case on Friday.’

  ‘After locking horns with someone better than I am. I heard!’ He walked over to the record player in the corner. ‘He was getting his own back because I told him he had a meeting to attend.’

  I turned to look at him. ‘You told him . . .’

  ‘I can’t take any more of this, Elizabeth.

  I stood very still, feeling the colour seep into my face. ‘Remember this?’ he said, as ‘Sealed with a Kiss’ began to play.

  His eyes held mine, and I was dimly aware of my heartbeat beginning to race. The fire crackled in the grate. And then he was reaching out for me, pulling me into his arms. We danced slowly, until the music had finished. His mouth was so close to mine I could feel his breath on my face. He waited, then as I closed my eyes he gathered me into his arms and carried me up the stairs.

  – 25 –

  The scream shrilled through the house, waking me with a jolt, Groping frantically in the dark for my dressing-gown, I ran to the door. David was on the landing in his pyjamas and Canary was running down the hall, tucking her curlers into a hairnet.

  ‘What’s happened? What is it?’

  ‘It sounded like Christine.’ David crossed the landing and threw open her door. The room was in darkness, the bed hadn’t been slept in.

  ‘Where’s Edward?’ David asked.

  ‘I’m here,’ Edward answered. We all turned to see him coming up the stairs and I noted, with surprise – for we had gone to bed at the same time that night – that he was fully dressed. ‘Everything’s all right, you can all go back to bed now.’

  ‘But the scream,’ I protested. ‘What was it?’

  ‘It was Christine. She had a bit of a shock. Nothing to worry about.’ His face was haggard and as his eyes moved from mine, I saw him exchange a meaningful look with David.

  Canary offered to go downstairs and make a hot drink for everyone, but David put his arm round her and ushered her back to the nursery, leaving Edward and me on the landing.

  ‘Where’s Christine now?’ I asked. ‘Is there anything I can do?’

  ‘I think not.’ He looked over the banister into the hall. ‘David will go down to her in a moment.’

  We were all at Westmoor for the summer holidays, except for Charlotte, who was now fourteen and had gone to spend a week in the south of France with a schoolfriend and her family.

  At breakfast the following morning no mention was made of the night’s incident, and when Christine emerged from her room, much later in the day, there were no visible signs of damage. So I shrugged the whole thing off and started devising an excuse for going up to London the following week.

  In fact excuses were hardly necessary these days. Edward spent so much time in his study, or flying backwards and forwards between Cairo and London that he barely noticed whether I was there or not. I knew he was about to pull off some big deal he had been working on for years, but he never discussed such things with me and I had to confess to being guilty of complete indifference now that Alexander was back in my life.

  I was in the Blue Sitting-Room that afternoon when I heard voices in the dining-room. As far as I knew Edward and Christine had gone to the warehouse for a stock check, so I was surprised when I identified the voices as theirs, and was on the verge of opening the adjoining doors when something Christine said stopped me in my tracks.

  ‘. . . but for Christ’s sake, Edward, they killed him.’

  ‘Well, what was he doing there in the first place?’

  ‘They said he’d fallen asleep.’

  ‘And what about the . . .?’ I couldn’t make out what Edward said after that, but Christine’s answer chilled me.

  ‘Is that all you can think about? A man’s lying dead, and all you care about . . .’

  Edward interrupted. ‘I’ve been waiting too long for this to let anything get in the way now. Now, what else did they say? When are they getting it out?’

  They left the dining-room then. And when I went to look for Edward later, Jeffrey told me he’d gone out and didn’t know when he would be back.

  I waited for the rest of the day, but there was no sign of him and neither did he ring. Christine had disappeared too, though she hadn’t gone with Edward, Jeffrey said. Once or twice a foreign-sounding man telephoned, asking for her, but he wouldn’t leave a message or give his name.

  I drove up to London and found Alexander waiting in the flat we now rented in Chelsea. We’d been living our double lives for over three years now; it was easier for him as Jessica had all but moved in with Rosalind. Our own flat was small, cluttered with things we had bought together in antique markets and junk shops. The children’s school drawings were pasted all over the kitchen walls, and photographs of them were scattered about the sitting-room and bedroom. When I arrived Alexander was in the kitchen, an apron round his waist, starting the evening meal. I was too distracted by all that was going on at Westmoor to eat much, and as Alexander talked about his day in court the feeling of depression that had been lingering about me for so long seemed to reach him too. We snapped at one another, then yelled over the washing-up, broke a few plates and drenched one another in dishwater. We made up later, in bed, but the following morning I drove back to Westmoor early.

  Edward was in such a good mood I ventured to ask him about the conversation I had overheard. He didn’t even flinch.

  ‘Oh that!’ he laughed. ‘It was all a misunderstanding. You know what the Egyptians are like, they make a drama out of everything.’

  ‘But I thought I heard Christine say someone had been killed,’ I insisted. ‘How can that be a misunderstanding?’

  ‘Easily. As far as I can make out there was a fight and one of them fell and hit his head against something. The other one assumed he had killed him, panicked and ran. So apart from one Arab with a large bump on the head, no one’s any the worse for wear.’

  ‘But what were they fighting about in the first place?’

  ‘Money.’

  ‘That you were paying them?’

  ‘Yes. But as I said, there’s nothing to worry about now, everything has been sorted out, and within a few days the deal will be finalised and your husband will have pulled off one of die greatest coups the art world has ever known.’

  And that was as far as I got – until Charlotte told me something she had overheard the day after she arrived home from France.

  She came in from the garden to find me in her room, sorting out clothes for jumble. She sat down on the edge of her bed. ‘Mum, I’ve just heard the strangest thing.’

  ‘What was that, darling?’

  She giggled. ‘Well, it was like something out of a movie, except it happened right here, in ou
r garden.’

  It seemed she had been sitting against the wall under the parterre when Christine and David had walked out of the French windows. She hadn’t taken much notice of what they were saying until Edward joined them and David said: ‘I don’t want to know any more than I already do, I’m going in.’ Edward had laughed, and said to Christine: ‘So you’ve spoken to your husband, and I take it you’re satisfied it wasn’t him?’

  I interrupted Charlotte. ‘Husband?’

  ‘That’s what he said.’

  ‘But Christine’s not married.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘You must have misheard, darling. Is that all?’

  ‘No. Then Edward asked Christine where the plane was coming in, and Christine said it was landing at Greg Dunne’s airfield, the same as before, and that she’d given him the money.’

  I put my arm round Charlotte’s shoulders and tried not to laugh. ‘Edward’s always having things flown in from all over the world, you know that.’

  ‘I know, it’s just that, I don’t know, somehow this sounded different.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘Well, David wouldn’t listen, for one thing.’

  I thought about this for a moment. ‘Tell you what,’ I said, ‘why don’t we ask Edward what he’s expecting? I’m sure he’ll be only too glad to tell you.’

  And sure enough, he was. He was expecting a cargo from Hong Kong the following week, and Greg Dunne was going to call him when it had been cleared by Customs. No mention was made of the ‘husband’, as it was absurd to think Christine would want to hide something like that, so we just assumed Charlotte had misheard.

  Over the next few days I noticed a distinct change in Edward. He almost skipped around the house, his eyes brimming with excitement; he looked younger – in the last week he seemed to have lost ten or fifteen years. There was a great deal of activity in the Egyptian Room, painters going in and out, the old treasures being removed and carefully transported by lorry to the warehouse. At night Edward tossed and turned, keeping me awake, even though we now had separate beds. In direct contrast to Edward’s ebullience, Christine seemed annoyed all the time, and kept telling him to pull himself together. Then David announced abruptly that he and Jenifer were going to the house in Gstaad, and wouldn’t be back for at least a month.

  After David’s departure Edward’s behaviour changed again. Now he veered from melancholy to downright bad temper and seemed constantly on edge. On one occasion, when Jonathan answered the phone, Edward actually pushed him out of the way. It was his secretary, obviously asking him when he next intended coming to London as work was piling up. Edward barked that he would inform her of his movements when he knew what they were and slammed the receiver down. Then Charlotte came into the room, and the next thing I knew, Edward was shouting at her too.

  All this was quite untypical of our normal family life, and I found it so upsetting that I decided to go to London. Jonathan was all for going, but Charlotte wasn’t keen. I guessed this had something to do with Colin Newman who was playing Romeo to her Juliet in the village play, so I said she could stay behind, but Edward declared he was too busy to look after a lovesick teenager and she had to come. And so, with an eager son and a sulking daughter, I arrived in Priory Walk late one hot Wednesday night in August.

  It was these small details I had to remember later, when I was giving evidence at my own trial.

  Alexander called me from chambers the following afternoon. By the time we rang off, arranging to meet in the flat at seven-thirty, he’d got me so aroused I could have torn off my clothes and raped the milkman. I was still feeling flushed when the phone rang again twenty minutes later. It was Edward.

  ‘Elizabeth, I want you to get back here as soon as you can. Leave the children in London, Jeffrey can pick them up tomorrow.’

  ‘Edward, I can’t . . .’

  ‘For Christ’s sake, Elizabeth, this is an emergency!’

  ‘What do you mean, an emergency?’ But he had already rung off. I dialled the Westmoor number immediately, but the line was busy, and it remained busy. Suddenly all the warmth had gone out of the day and that cold feeling of dread was creeping over me again.

  Alexander was in a conference, so I drove round to the flat and left him a note.

  I arrived at Westmoor just after seven. Edward was waiting in the drive. As I pulled up beside the Rolls Royce, he tore open the door of my car. ‘Thank God you’re here.’ He gulped, as if he was trying to catch his breath. ‘Christine’s hurt her foot, I need you to drive the car. We haven’t much time.’

  He ushered me behind the wheel of the Rolls. ‘Where are we going?’ I said.

  ‘Just head for Dover, I’ll tell you when to turn off.’

  By the time we reached the A2 he had calmed down a little. I glanced at him, trying to gauge his mood, then asked again where we were going. He smiled. His eyes were too bright. ‘Just wait and see, my darling. Just wait and see.’

  There was a gnawing sensation in the pit of my stomach. I wanted to stop the car, demand that he tell me what was going on – but there was something about him that stopped me.

  Just after we passed the Aylesham turning we turned right, down a one-track road. The sun was sinking into the trees by this time, though it was still light enough to see without headlights. After several very rough miles, Edward told me to pull in beside a gate. As we came to a halt he looked at his watch. ‘We’re too early. We’ll have to wait.’

  ‘Too early for what?’

  ‘Don’t ask any more questions, Elizabeth, you’ll know everything soon enough.’

  His eyes were fixed rigidly ahead. This was so unlike any situation I had ever been in before that I couldn’t begin to imagine what was happening. What were we doing here, parked miles from anywhere, waiting for a rendezvous with God-only-knew-who? I started to tell him I was afraid, but the words dried on my lips as I realised it was Edward I was afraid of . . . .

  The sound of a light aircraft droned overhead. It came into view. Edward never took his eyes off it, but he didn’t say a word, and even when the plane landed about a mile away, the malignant silence continued. From time to time he looked at his watch, then at the horizon. Finally, when night was a black, solid mass around us, he told me to start the car.

  It was a hazardous journey, he made me drive in the all but useless beam of sidelights. I was amazed at how well he knew the road, every twist and turn. At last he told me to pull in through an opening in a hedge, and the road became smooth and straight – it was some time before I realised that I was driving along a runway.

  I was so shocked by what happened next that I could only sit in appalled silence and watch.

  A man stole out of the darkness and Edward, yanking the keys from the ignition, got out of the car. They spoke for a few minutes, pointing towards the aircraft that I could now make out in the dim moonlight, then back at the car. I watched them walk away until their figures dissolved into the shadows. I was alone.

  My ears strained into the silence, half expecting to hear a scream, a gun shot, feet running . . . . I looked about me, trying to fight down the nausea of fear. The bushes were great black clumps in the semi-distance and as I looked I thought I saw something move in the darkness. My nerve ends pricked, I could hear my heart thumping. Was there someone there, waiting to leap out of the shadows? Suddenly something moved in the back of the car. I spun round, my mouth open to scream.

  It was Edward. He took a small package from the back seat, then got out again. The man was still there; he took the package, then waited while Edward opened the boot. I heard something being lifted and placed inside, then the boot closed. The man walked away, and Edward got back into the car. He handed me the keys and, still mute, I started the engine.

  ‘Take it slowly,’ he said. ‘No lights until we reach the main road’.

  All the way back in the car I kept my eyes fixed on the road. I didn’t ask what we were carrying, I didn’t want to know.

 
; It was almost midnight when we pulled into the drive at Westmoor. Christine was waiting at the front door. Edward jumped out, again snatching the keys from the ignition. I followed him, standing back as he opened the boot and he and Christine eased the packing-case out. I looked down at Christine’s foot.

  ‘Put the car away, Elizabeth,’ Edward snapped.

  As I walked back from the garage I looked up at the house, knowing already that the lights would be on in the Egyptian Room. And suddenly I understood that whatever it was I had been afraid of for so long was here.

  I was in the front hall when Edward came down the stairs. His face was flushed, and he was trembling. ‘Elizabeth,’ he sighed, as if one of us had just returned from a long journey. Then walking towards me, he opened his arms and pulled me into them. ‘Oh, Elizabeth, today is the greatest day of my life.’ He took me by the shoulders, but when I looked up he was staring past me. ‘Today I have achieved what no other man will ever achieve.’ And then the insane, glazed look retreated and his kind blue eyes were shimmering, threatening any moment to spill tears on to his cheeks.

  He turned round as he heard Christine on the stairs. She nodded to him, then walked past us into the drawing room.

  I pulled back as he took my hand, but he only smiled, and like a father coaxing a child into doing something it was afraid of, he led me up the stairs.

  The lights were off in the Egyptian Room, but he didn’t turn them on. I could hear him panting as he positioned me at the door, and only then did he flick the switch, flooding the room with light.

  My breath caught in my throat. Gone were the ancient stone and alabaster treasures of Egypt, gone were the mummies, the reliefs, the hideous carved faces. In their place, its slanted ebony eyes staring straight into mine, while the headdress fenced blades of pure gold and turquoise which reflected like lasers from the same coloured walls and ceiling, was Egypt’s – the world’s – most priceless treasure: the Tutankhamun death mask.