‘Lance has arrived,’ she said exuberantly to Kyle. ‘I’m just going to find out where he’s been. I won’t be five minutes.’
She had hurried off, still in her wedding dress and veil, and Kyle had frowned in annoyance and then had his attention taken by an Anderson aunt, eager to give him her congratulations.
Serena rushed into the room that had been the nursery. He was standing with his back towards her, staring down on to the grounds and the giant marquee and the milling guests.
‘Lance!’ she cried joyfully, running towards him. ‘Where on earth have you been?’
He spun toward her, his face a white, contorted mask.
‘You bitch!’ he snarled, seizing her wrist. ‘You stupid, whoring little bitch!’ And raising his free hand, he slapped her open-palmed across her face with all the force he was capable of.
Chapter Seven
Gavin wanted his date with Gabrielle to be special. He didn’t want to sit with her in a smoke-filled bar. He wanted a whole day with her, and he wanted the day to be spent far away from Montmartre’s steeply narrow streets and shabby nightclubs.
‘I’ll pick you up at ten on Monday,’ he said to her when she told him that Monday was her first day off.
‘Ça va.’ she said agreeably, hiding the disappointment she felt. ‘Okay. But I am not singing anywhere on Monday. I could meet you a little earlier if you wish.’
He had chuckled and hugged her, aware that for the first time he had met a woman who not only filled him with raging desire, but who also aroused in him the laughing affection that he had previously reserved only for his younger sisters. He was well aware that it was a lethal combination.
‘Ten in the morning,’ he said, grinning down at her. Even in her stiletto-heeled shoes she still barely reached his shoulder.
She groaned, affecting horror at the thought of facing the day at such an ungodly hour, but her eyes were sparkling and he knew that she was pleased.
‘We’ll go to Versailles or Fontainebleau or Chartres,’ he said, not really caring where they went, just as long as they were together and away from the pimps and prostitutes who thronged the area around the Black Cat.
They went to Fontainebleau. He had bought a battered old Citroën the second week after he had arrived in Paris, and as he swung out of Montmartre and on to the many-laned boulevard périphérique, Gabrielle noted with amusement that he drove with the panache of a native Parisian, blissfully unintimidated by the suicidally inclined drivers hurtling along on either side of them.
The leather of the Citroën seats was cracked and disintegrating and reeked of Gauloises and stale perfume. Gabrielle settled herself comfortably in the front passenger seat, aware that her own distinctive perfume was already mingling with the exotic odour left by past occupants.
Gavin headed south for Fontainebleau via the small town of Évry, and the villages of Fleury-en-Biére and Barbizon. The day was already hot, only the merest wisp of cirrus trailing across the brassy blue bowl of the sky as they skimmed down the white, tree-lined roads.
They lunched in Fontainebleau at a small hotel of the same name, and it wasn’t until the wine had been poured and the first course served that he asked the question he had been longing to ask from the moment he had first set eyes on her. ‘What nationality are you, Gabrielle?’
‘French,’ she said, and then, knowing that she hadn’t answered the question he had been trying to ask, she added, ‘But though I’m a French citizen, I’m only half French. My mother is Vietnamese.’
He had expected her to say that she was French-Moroccan or French-Algerian. He stared at her, his sunbleached brows rising comically. ‘No wonder you asked me what I knew about Vietnam when I said that I was eager to be sent there.’ He looked touchingly discomfited. ‘Do you know the country? Have you been there?’
‘I was born there,’ she said, taking a sip of her wine. ‘It was my home until I was eight.’
Mentally, he figured out that she’d left the country shortly after Dien Bien Phu. He looked slightly disappointed. ‘Then you were too young to have any real memories of it. I don’t suppose you know any more about the situation out there than anyone else does,’ he said regretfully, about to abandon the subject.
Gabrielle laid down her fork and leaned her elbows on the table, clasping her hands and resting her chin on them. ‘No,’ she said slowly. ‘No, I was not too young.’
The years rolled away; the memories were so vivid that she could almost hear the clicking of Mah-Jongg tiles; see the wide, lush avenues and the white stuccoed house with the many verandas that had been her home; smell the aroma of exotic spices, the fragrance of carefully tended tuberoses and gardenias, the dark, pungent scents of the encroaching bush. Homesickness, harsh and raw, swept over her. She had known, ever since he had told her he wanted to be seat to Vietnam to cover the war, where their conversation would inevitably lead. What she hadn’t known was the depth of longing such a conversation would unleash.
She had been looking beyond him, her eyes unfocused, registering nothing of her present surroundings, seeing only the past. Now she gave her head a tiny shake, the sun that streamed through the restaurant’s windows gilding her spicy red curls a burnished gold.
‘My mother’s family still lives in Saigon, and they write to us regularly.’ She paused for a moment. She had never spoken to anyone before of her Vietnamese aunt, and her uncles and cousins. Now she heard herself saying prosaically. ‘And one of my uncles, my mother’s youngest brother, is Viet Cong.’
If she had said that her uncle was Ho Chi Minh, Gavin could not have looked more stunned. He blinked and said unsteadily, ‘And are you in touch with him as well?’
‘No.’ She paused again and speared a button mushroom with her fork. ‘But my aunt is. Irregularly.’
Gavin signalled the waiter over and ordered a beer. He had been enjoying the wine, but if he wanted to think clearly, and assess what Gabrielle’s information might mean to him once he was in Vietnam, he needed the familiarity of a beer to help the process along.
‘How irregularly?’ he asked when his beer had been poured and he had taken a fortifying drink.
‘He left home in 1940 to join the Communists in Hanoi. For twenty-five years no one heard anything from him and then, two years ago, he visited my mother’s oldest sister, Nhu, who is living in Saigon.’ She paused again. Her uncle Dinh’s activities were something she and her mother never discussed with anyone, not even her father.
Her eyes met Gavin’s across the white tablecloth. She had known him for only three short days, and out of that time had spent only a few hours in his company, yet she knew instinctively that he would never betray her trust. ‘He had come south on an undercover mission for General Giap.…’
‘Giap!’ At the mention of the man who had led the Viet Minh forces to victory at Dien Bien Phu, every journalistic nerve that Gavin possessed screamed to life.
Gabrielle nodded. ‘He is now a colonel in the North Vietnamese Army, though Nhu said that he did not look like a colonel. He and his men had travelled every inch of the way south on foot, trekking through Laos and northeastern Cambodia and entering the South through the highlands. Nhu said that she scarcely recognized him, he had changed so much.’
Gavin’s breathing had become light and shallow. ‘And why had he come south?’ he asked, already seeing the headlines such a story would make.
She tilted her head slightly to one side. ‘General Giap wanted to infiltrate large numbers of his men into the south, and he wanted the situation assessed first, by someone he trusted.’
Gavin let out his breath slowly. The story she had told him, if corroborated by names and dates, would sell like hotcakes to Time or Newsweek or Le Monde. But if any of those magazines did publish the story, Gabrielle’s family in Saigon would suffer. Nhu, and Nhu’s children, would be considered Viet Cong. He would have his story and they would face interrogation and possibly even death. He wondered if Gabrielle realized how grave the consequenc
es of trusting him could be.
‘You know what could happen if I sell this story, don’t you, Gaby?’
It was the first time he had affectionately shortened heir name.
She nodded, her eyes holding his steadily. ‘But you will not sell it, will you, Gavin?’
They had been speaking in English, and her heavy accent, as she pronounced his name, sent shivers of pleasure down his spine. He reached across the table for her hands, trapping them in his. ‘No,’ he said huskily, knowing what her act of trust symbolized for them. ‘No, I shall never write anything that could harm you or your family. Not ever.’
‘That is good, mon ami,’ she whispered softly, and from that moment on both of them knew that they were going to be lovers for life.
They spent the afternoon hand in hand, wandering the great gardens of the palace of Fontainebleau.
‘Why did you leave Australia?’ she asked as they stood in the Jardin de Diana before the bronze statue of the goddess.
The crowds of sightseers who had crowded the gardens at the weekend had now gone. Only a few stray tourists remained, cameras slung over their shoulders, guidebooks in hand.
As a middle-aged American couple approached, intent on photographing the fountain-figure of Diana, Gavin gently steered Gabrielle away, walking in the direction of the old moat that rounded the north wing of the palace.
‘Restlessness,’ he said with a grin. ‘I was eighteen when I left and it seemed to me that London was where everything was happening, and London was where I wanted to be.’ His grin deepened. ‘I still haven’t got there!’
Gabrielle gave a little Gallic shrug. ‘There is only La Manche to cross. It is only a narrow ribbon of water. You could be in London by this evening if you truly wanted to be.’
‘It isn’t so easy,’ he said without regret. ‘Somewhere on the way between Brisbane and Paris, I discovered I really wanted to be a war correspondent. Landing my job at the press bureau is a major step toward that goal. I don’t want to hurt my chances by whining for a transfer to London when things are going so well here.’
‘Je comprends,’ Gabrielle said as they rounded the north wing and began to stroll, their arms around each other’s waists, towards the formal garden known as the parterre. ‘I understand.’
It was now mid-afternoon and behind them the sun-steeped stone of the palace glowed like gold, heat coming out of the ground in waves.
‘And then there is also the question of a certain nightclub singer,’ he said, pausing beside an ornamental pond and turning her around to face him. ‘She may not go with me if I go to England.’
Gabrielle looked up into his boyish, almost vulnerable face. He was not at all the sort of man she had envisaged herself falling in love with. He was ridiculously young, only four years older than herself, and she doubted if he owned much more than the clothes he had on and the battered old Citroën that had brought them to Fontainebleau.
A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. She knew that she was not being sensible and French. She was, instead, succumbing to a sense of destiny that was wholly Vietnamese.
‘I think your nightclub singer may very well go with you wherever you want her to, chéri,’ she said, and sliding her arms up and around his neck, she raised herself on to her toes and pressed her mouth softly, yet ardently, against his.
His response was immediate. His arms tightened around her and his mouth opened, his tongue sliding deeply and fully past hers.
The hair on the nape of his neck was crisp against her palms, his body hard and urgent as he pressed her into him.
‘Let’s go back to the town,’ he rasped hoarsely, ‘and see if the hotel has a room for the night.’
Gabrielle gave a deep-throated chuckle. She knew very well that they would have, as she had prudently reserved one while he had been paying the bill for their lunch. ‘Bien,’ she said, agreeing. She was happy for him to think that he was taking the initiative and knowing that as the patron was a Frenchman, her secret would be safe.
It was like being in bed with a good-natured and overeager young bear, Gabrielle reflected as Gavin collapsed, exhausted, beside her. She ruffled his tousled hair with her hand. Whatever sexual experience he had gained on the long trip from Brisbane to Paris, it had been neither expert nor profound. In her widely experienced past she had met who had a lot to learn, but she had never before met one who had everything to learn.
Gavin heaved himself up on to one elbow. ‘Are you all right?’ he asked, looking down into her dazed, disbelieving face, the concern in his voice indicating that he believed his enthusiastic and criminally swift act of copulation had caused the earth to move for her, and that she was still in the throes of recovery.
‘Oui,’ said Gabrielle lovingly, wondering which was the best way to handle a rather delicate situation. ‘That was—’ She paused, searching for a word that would do the experience justice. ‘That was incroyable, mon amour.’ She pulled him down towards her, the corners of her wide, generous mouth quirking into a smile. ‘As it is still only six o’clock, let us have a little sleep and then, afterwards …’ She settled his head comfortably on her breast. ‘Afterwards I will explain something to you, chéri.’
The task of explaining was a deeply enjoyable one, and one that was carried out with such skill that Gavin was happily convinced that most of what he had learned was his own idea.
Gabrielle surveyed the vast double bed and its crumpled sheets late the next afternoon and gave a little sigh. ‘Things will not be so easy to arrange when we are back in Paris, mon amour,’ she said regretfully, leaning back against the pillows. Her previous lovers had either been artists with their own studios or businessmen with their own apartments. Gavin shared decidedly basic accommodation in Montmartre with three fellow Australians.
‘Do you always have Monday night off?’ he asked her, an edge of panic in his voice as she glanced at the wristwatch that lay on the bedside table and then slid reluctantly from the bed.
She nodded, knowing very well the direction his thoughts were taking. Before he could suggest that they stay every Monday night at the hotel, she said apologetically, reaching for the wisp of black lace that served her as a bra, ‘But I cannot stay away from home all night, every Monday night, chéri. My parents would worry.’
For a moment he wondered if she was teasing him and then, with a mixture of amusement and incredulity, realized that she was telling him the simple truth. ‘But you’re a nightclub singer!’ he protested, laughing despite his disappointment.
‘But a nightclub singer with a very protective maman and papa,’ she said, laughing with him as she fastened her bra and reached for her panties.
He watched her in rapt fascination, intrigued by the combination of wanton and innocent that coexisted so happily in her sunny, uncomplicated nature.
‘Then we’ll drive out here every Monday morning and spend the day in bed,’ he said, solving the problem with devastating ease. ‘And in the evening, after a leisurely early dinner in the hotel restaurant, I will return you at a dutifully early hour to Maman and Papa.’
‘Bien,’ she said, her eyes dancing as she stepped into her skirt, ‘but next Monday I think we will have to forgo our dinner in the restaurant, chéri.’
‘Why?’ His face fell. He didn’t want to forgo one minute of the time they would have together.
She pulled her sweater down over full, lush breasts. ‘Because we shall be dining en famille, mon amour,’ and then, in case he had not understood her, she said with unmistakable clarity, ‘We shall be having dinner with my parents. Tu comprends?’
‘Je comprends,’ Gavin said with a broad grin and in an execrable French accent. She hadn’t said so, but he was fairly sure that the invitation was a rare honour and one that very few of her previous boyfriends, if any, had received.
That there had been previous boyfriends – a lot of them – he did not doubt. Even taking into account an inborn capacity for sexual enjoyment, her expertise and virtuosity coul
d have been gained only through practice. Strangely enough, the knowledge did not disturb him. Whatever the number of her previous lovers, there was something so pure and unsullied about her, something so joyous and generous, it made them unimportant. What mattered were the qualities he knew he could stake his life on. Her honesty and her loyalty and her greatness of heart. And for him, that was more than enough.
He had been correct to assume that few previous boyfriends had ever found themselves sitting at the Mercador dining table. In actual fact, none had.
Her mother had stared at her, her eyes widening, when Gabrielle had told her that she had invited Gavin to dine with them the following Monday.
‘But who is this … this Gavin?’ she had asked apprehensively. ‘Is he a new artist you are sitting for, chérie? Is he—’ She had hesitated, her apprehension deepening. ‘Is he a … a gentleman you have met at the club?’
‘Strictly speaking, I suppose that he is,’ Gabrielle replied truthfully, ‘but he isn’t remotely like the usual kind of patron. He’s Australian,’ she added as if Gavin’s nationality explained all.
Her mother sat down weakly. She had envisaged all kinds of horrors. An impoverished artist, a married businessman, the middle-aged patron of one of the clubs, but at least all her imaginings had been Frenchmen. An Australian was so foreign to her as to be almost beyond belief.
‘You will like him, Maman,’ Gabrielle said confidently. ‘He is one of life’s innocents.’
‘C’est impossible,’ her mother said faintly, imagination failing her altogether.
White Christmas in Saigon Page 14
