Family Chorus

by Claire Rayner

  43

  Bessie had gone, gathering up her bag and gloves and scuttling away like a small frightened animal to sit with Molly. As she had gone hurrying past Max he had put out a hand to delay her and murmured something that made her look hastily over her shoulder at Lexie and then smile, an anxious little smile; and then he had looked at her too and she had closed her eyes.

  Now he was sitting beside her. She’d felt the table rock slightly as he’d pulled his chair closer to it, had felt the warmth of him near her and she could keep her eyes closed no longer. He looked tired, very tired; there was a heaviness under his eyes and his face looked thinner. But then he smiled, and at once he was the old Max and she smiled too; she couldn’t help it. Seeing him had made the whole excitement of the evening complete; it was as though his appearance at Sardi’s had been the climax of the show; the emptiness she had felt inside her had been filled, and she put out her hand and set it on his.

  ‘You’ll have to tell Bessie it’s all right, you know.’ He spoke as though he was continuing a conversation they had started ten minutes ago but which had been interrupted just for a second or two, rather than as a man who had not seen her for almost six years. ‘Bless her, she’s terrified. Convinced you’ll scalp her for her meddling. I told her you wouldn’t, that you’d be as glad as ! am, but she needs to hear it from you. You are glad, aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said after a moment. ‘Yes, I think I am. I — I feel a bit odd. I mean, to see you, with her, after all this time — it’s very odd. It’ll take some getting used to —’

  ‘It took me no time at all. Once I knew.’ He turned his hand over so that her own fell into his palm and he could hold it, closing his fingers over hers. ‘It was almost as though I’d always known, really, but hadn’t got round to thinking about it. She’s lovely.’

  ‘Oh, yes, Molly’s lovely,’ Lexie said and felt the little chill come back. ‘She’s got a marvellous face —’

  ‘I meant as a person,’ he said, almost reprovingly, and she blushed a little.

  ‘I can’t say what sort of person she is,’ she said. ‘I tried very hard to know her after the — when Barbie died. But she was very angry then, and she wouldn’t — well!’ She shrugged. ‘I dare say she’s told you all about that.’

  He shook his head. ‘No, Lexie. She doesn’t talk about you much at all. She won’t. There’s some mixed-up feeling there, I know that. She won’t talk about it to me. But —’ He tightened his grip on her hand. ‘But she agreed to come here with me today. I told her what I was planning to do, to come here to see you after the opening of the show, and she said she’d come. I met her in Chicago, after she’d come up specially from the coast last week, and we came in on the Twentieth Century yesterday. So you see, she loves you.’

  Lexie lifted her brows at him. ‘Does she? Because she won’t talk about what happened between us? Because she took a train ride? Is that evidence of love, Max? Lawyer’s evidence?’

  She hadn’t meant it to show, the bitterness and hurt; the last thing she had ever wanted anyone to know was how the anger had built up in her over the past six years. When Barbie had died and Molly had reacted as she had, she had understood, or tried to, but as the years had passed and the letters she had sent to Molly had gone unanswered, as her attempts to reach her by phone when she knew where she was filming had ended in total failure, the bitterness had curdled and now lay heavily in her. She had a daughter who wanted no part of her — was it any wonder she was filled with resentment?

  But Max was shaking his head. ‘Not because of the fact she came, Lexie. Because of the person she is. I’ve spent a lot of time with her these past years. We’ve made up for a lot of what we never shared. It’s been good, and I know her now. We have a lot of fun together, Molly and I. Whenever I come to Los Angeles — and that’s been a couple of times a year, ever since the end of the war, because I took on a couple of directorships of American corporations — whenever I come, we’re together. And she’s marvellous, Lexie, truly she is. She’s so straight — says what she has to say without any messing about and —’

  Lexie lifted her brows. ‘Is that a virtue? To blurt out everything without stopping to think what it might mean to other people? You admire that?’

  He laughed softly. ‘You are funny, Lexie. There’s a lot of that in you, for heaven’s sake! Directness, I mean. When you want something you want it, and nothing deflects you. When Molly wants to say something she says it and no one deflects her. What’s the difference?’

  ‘All the difference in the world,’ Lexie retorted. ‘I never set out to hurt people, or —’

  ‘But you did it all the same,’ he said quietly. ‘You never meant to, I’m sure, but you did. You had to do what you did, and Molly has to say what she says. And remember, Lexie — she says nothing about you. Even though there’s clearly something that — well, that isn’t quite comfortable between you. She’s straight, but she can bite her tongue when she has to. But look, let’s not just talk about her. Let’s talk to her. She’s here because she wants to talk to you, but —’

  ‘But what?’ She knew she sounded harsh, and couldn’t help it. It had been so good to see him, so comforting, but now all that was gone, all the pleasure and all the relief. The emptiness inside had come back. ‘She could have talked to me any time this past six years. We’ve been in the same country, for God’s sake, and if she was able to take the train from Los Angeles when you asked her, she could have taken it to find me. I wrote to her. I called her. All I ever got was a stonewall silence — and now you’re telling me that I’ve got to smile sweetly and talk to her, because she wants to? So that she can tell me these straight things you so admire, is that it? Do you want to sit and watch me suffer just because — just because —’ She had to stop, because her voice was rising and beginning to shake and the people at the next table were looking curiously at her.

  He was still holding her hand and again his grip tightened. ‘Want to see you suffer? Oh, Lexie, if you only knew! I’m here because I want you. You told me that you couldn’t marry me when I asked you, last time, not that you wouldn’t. Well, now you can, can’t you? You’re a success again. I saw the show — it’s going to be an enormous hit, you know that. So now you can marry me, and now you’re going to. We’ve wasted far too much time already. But Molly — she’s part of it too, isn’t she? Part of us. I’d have said as much that night at Golders Green Station if you hadn’t been so adamant that you couldn’t marry me. But you were, so there was no sense in telling you I knew about her. Even though you made a slip of the tongue and spoke her name to me.’ He grinned a little crookedly. ‘Anyway, I had to go and see her for myself. Suppose we hadn’t got on? Suppose she’d given me my marching orders? Why start a drama unnecessarily? But now it’s different. We’re going to be married, and our daughter surely is included in that —’

  She held on to his hand tightly, trying to stop herself from shaking. ‘But suppose she gives me my marching orders?’ she said. ‘She did once. She could again. Maybe this time, now you know her and — she’s so important to you, maybe this time it’ll be you who can’t marry me.’ Her eyes slid away from his. ‘Won’t marry me.’

  ‘You do want us to be together, then?’

  ‘Oh, yes.’ She said it impatiently, as though it were the most obvious thing in the world. ‘I wanted that even the last time when I told you I couldn’t. But I wanted the — I wanted what I’ve got now as well. I had to have it. Well, I’ve got it, that success. I’ve shown them I can do it. Twice. I’m fifty, and I’m a star again, and no one can change that. But now I’m tired and I can’t go on being the way I was. I want to stop wasting time — yours and mine — but now there’s Molly.’ She lifted her eyes to look in the mirror and saw that she was sitting there staring across the restaurant at her, as beside her Bessie chattered and laughed. Their gaze locked for a moment and then Lexie looked away, back to Max.

  ‘So there it is,’ she said wearily. ‘I do want to mar
ry you. I’m sorry I took so long about it, and I hope I’m not too late. But if you prefer to have Molly, I’ll live with it. Somehow.’

  ‘There’s no choice to be made!’ he said. ‘I didn’t have to make a choice, for heaven’s sake! She’ll be as happy as I am —’

  ‘You haven’t told her yet?’

  His face looked suddenly red, almost angry. ‘Told her? D’you think I’d tell anyone we were to be married until you knew? That’d be crazy.’ And then she laughed. His anger was so ridiculous that there was nothing else she could do. She was still laughing as Molly crossed the restaurant in response to Max’s signal and came to stand there beside him. Lexie looked beyond her to Bessie but she, in her usual self-effacing way, was hurrying across the restaurant towards the ladies’ room and Lexie looked at Molly and managed a smile.

  ‘Hello, Molly,’ she said and thought — God, she’s beautiful. Was I as beautiful when I was twenty-two? Was my skin as translucent as that, were my eyes so vibrant, did I have hair that gleamed like that?

  ‘Hello, Lexie,’ Molly said. Her voice was even richer, now, a deep huskiness that carried a trace of an American accent, just enough to make her sound intriguing to both English and American ears. ‘Congratulations!’

  Lexie went as pink as Max had and looked sideways at him, but he was looking at Molly. ‘I didn’t know you —’

  ‘It’s a great show.’ Molly was pulling out a chair, and Max hurried to help her. She settled herself at the table as coolly as any other table hopper in the place, as though she were just an old acquaintance saying hello after a few weeks’ break in a friendship. ‘The music is the best I’ve heard on a stage for ever. He’s good — has he done any films? If he hasn’t he should —’

  ‘Oh, yes, the show,’ Lexie said. She giggled suddenly and looked at Max, who grinned broadly back at her. ‘I’m glad you liked it. One way and another, I’d almost forgotten we opened tonight. It’s been an — well, it’s not been an ordinary opening night, has it?’

  ‘Hasn’t it?’ Molly said and looked up at Max. ‘Seeing us, is it that that’s made it different? Well, I can understand that.’

  ‘You never answered my letters,’ Lexie said after a moment. ‘Or came to the phone when I called. You must have got some of those messages. Didn’t you?’

  ‘I got them,’ Molly said. ‘But it was best not to answer.’

  ‘Best? How could that be best? I just wanted to —’

  ‘Because of Max,’ Molly said, as though that were the most obvious thing in the world. ‘If you’d talked to me, you’d know we’d met. And he said you weren’t ready yet to see him again. He didn’t say why —’ And she shot him a swift glance. ‘Just that it wasn’t time — so —’ She shrugged her shoulders. ‘So it was easier not to answer when you called or wrote. I’m sorry.’

  ‘Are you? Really?’ Lexie meant it to sound like a plea, wanting Molly to know the depth of her hurt, wanting her to love her, Lexie, as much as Lexie had loved Molly, but it came out as a sharp little bite of a phrase. Molly looked at her, her brilliant eyes showing no expression, and said, only, ‘Yes, of course.’ She turned to Max and grinned at him. ‘Hi, Max. Happy?’

  ‘Very,’ he said gravely. Lexie looked at them, saw the bond that lay there between them, and felt the sharpest bite of anger she had never known. They were there because of her, because of her, Lexie, yet they shared a closeness that excluded her, and she got to her feet so quickly that she almost stumbled. But Max was too swift for her. He was on his feet before she was, holding her elbow and keeping her close beside him. Looking down at Molly he said, ‘I’m happy because we’re tidying things up, Molly. Getting married. It was always supposed to happen, you know. We just got a bit out of synchronization, one way and another. What with wars and things like that —’

  Molly sat for another long moment and then she too got to her feet.

  ‘Well, well!’ she said to Max. ‘Out of synchronization — that’s a cute way to put it. When are you getting married?’

  ‘We haven’t got round to that yet,’ he said, and his hand was warm on Lexie’s arm. ‘There are things to sort out. This show’ll run for a while yet, obviously, and Lexie’ll be held here in New York, but there are plans we can make. I have to come to the States a good deal, and I dare say I can find other companies who need me here, and come to and fro more often —’

  ‘You’ll wear yourself out, doing that,’ Molly said sharply. ‘Toby does that flight sometimes. He says it’s a killer.’

  ‘Toby?’

  ‘A friend.’ She brushed that aside. ‘Eighteen hours — it’s exhausting.’

  ‘Better than five days at sea,’ Max said. ‘Aren’t you going to wish us happy, Molly?’

  There was a tiny pause and then she said, ‘Of course. Very happy.’ She leaned forward and kissed Max’s cheek and then after a tiny pause kissed Lexie’s. Her lips felt cool and dry on her skin and she was gone almost immediately, but Lexie touched her cheek and was startled to find it wet. She hadn’t realized till then that she was crying.

  ‘Molly,’ she said then, almost desperately, and not caring whether it showed or not. ‘Do you mean that? That you really want us to be happy?’

  ‘Of course.’ Molly smiled and her face took on a new set of planes and patterns and her eyes seemed brighter still, and a separate, dispassionate Lexie observing the scene from a distant corner thought, Oh God, but she’s beautiful. ‘Of course I do.’

  ‘Then you’ll have to stop being that way with me.’

  ‘What way?’ Molly lifted her brows slightly and looked at Max, amused, almost as though she were saying, what is she on about?

  ‘I don’t know what it is — but you’re cool — you don’t seem to be —’ She shook her head. ‘I can’t say, exactly. It’s just that I feel you aren’t happy about this. That you’re angry —’

  They were still standing beside the table as waiters and other diners eddied round them and Molly bent her head slightly and looked up at Lexie from beneath her lashes, a sharp considering look.

  ‘I wish you happy,’ she said levelly after a moment. ‘Make no mistake about that. I want you to be happy because I want Max to be happy. He’s — Max is a very special person in my life now. So, of course I wish you happy. But it’s no good thinking you can suddenly turn into a loving Mom, just like that, after all these years. We’re strangers, aren’t we? Barbie was my mother. Sure, I know you had me, I know that. But it’s Barbie I think of when I hear the word “mother”. I can’t change that in five minutes, can I? I’ll do my best to be what you want, but there’s no guarantee I’ll succeed. Personally, I think it’ll be difficult. But I’ll try.’ She lifted her chin then. ‘So there it is. I wish you very happy indeed, and if Max isn’t happy I’ll be very — well, disappointed, I guess. Yes, that’ll do. Disappointed.’

  She kissed Max again. ‘Settle for that, okay? It’s all I’ve got. Listen —’ She looked over Lexie’s shoulder to the table where she had been sitting. ‘There’s no sign of Bessie. I’d better go rescue her. You two love birds go. I’ll get Bessie back to her hotel. Where’s she staying?’

  ‘The Algonquin,’ Lexie said. ‘But, Molly —’

  ‘Great. I’ll take her there. So long, Lexie. Goodnight, Max. Take care of yourself —’ She walked swiftly away, her long legs moving under the satin of her dress in a way that made the men still lingering at the tables and the yawning waiters stare after her with a new alertness as her parents stood and watched her go.

  44

  In the event, they weren’t able to marry until the summer. The complexity of organizing a marriage in New York between a pair of British citizens was too tedious, Lexie said, to waste energy on. ‘As soon as the show closes,’ she promised, ‘I’ll come back to London. I’d sooner be married in London, anyway. Bessie won’t have to come back here then, and I can’t be married without Bessie to see, can I?’

  And it will be harder for Molly to be in London, her secret voice murmured in
her ear. Be honest; that’s why you don’t want a New York wedding. You’d be embarrassed to have your daughter there — but she stifled the idea, not wanting to admit the truth, and worked her way through the run of the show as patiently as she could. Now it was all agreed, she wanted to be married very much indeed, so much so that even her huge success in the show gave her small pleasure. She’d achieved what she’d set out to do, and now her patience was running out.

  She was frightened too, frightened of her own reactions. She would lie in bed at night, remembering the long years of loneliness without him, marvelling at her own stupidity. What imp of cruelty had made her turn her back on him so often? That she loved him had never been in doubt, yet how often she’d turned him away. Why had she been so captious?

  Because I’m greedy, she would tell the darkness above her head. Because I’m greedy and want the mindless attention of an audience more than I want the constant care and attention of one man; greedy and stupid. And then she’d argue back, passionately, that it hadn’t been like that; that her hunger for success hadn’t been just a vulgar longing for applause, but a need to prove to herself that she was a gifted person, that she could be what she wanted to be. That was all it was, she would cry wordlessly into the night, that was all it was — and I can’t trust that need not to come calling me again, making me turn away from him, making me miserable again — I must marry him soon. Please, let the show end soon, let me go home.

  He came to sec her almost twice a month while the show ran, going straight from the airport to work at his New York office all day before coming to her at the theatre, looking almost grey with the fatigue of the eighteen hours spent on the BOAC Stratocruiser, as well as the strain of the day’s dealings. She would hold him close and feel the taut muscles relax under her fingers and watch him sit half slumped in her dressing room as the exhaustion eased and his colour and energy came back. But she was worried all the same; he looked his age now, and he had never done that. She worked it out and it was a cold little shock to realize it. He’s almost sixty, she thought. Oh, God, how could I have been so stupid, how could I let myself waste both our lives like this? She would send Tina to fetch hot coffee for him before she went on stage for her next number and try to convince herself that she did have to finish the run, that it wouldn’t be right to break her contract and go home now — but she wanted to, very much indeed.