But her face made up for much of this: her wonderful hair, which was black and curled all over her head, her high cheekbones above which her grey-green eyes sparkled with curiosity and intelligence, and the mole that was set so well below her small but expressive mouth. She wore spectacles much of the time – couldn’t read without them – but the moment she took them off she appeared much younger and more vulnerable. ‘I sweat so much,’ she said, as she became aware of Louise looking at her. ‘Especially on my scalp.’ She smiled apologetically.
The talk moved on to what they were reading. Louise told her about Caterina Sforza, and Stella told her about the Florentine lady who had gone to France to marry the king and brought her cooks with her. ‘It changed French cooking for ever.’
‘How? By poisoning people?’
‘No. Well, she may have poisoned the odd person, but what happened was she taught the French that sauces were meant to bring out the flavour of whatever they were eating, whereas before they’d simply used sauces to cover up the taste of rotting meat.’
‘Are you reading about that, then? What an amazing—’
But Stella interrupted her: ‘I read it somewhere ages ago. No, I’m on Bertrand Russell’s History of Western Philosophy. My father was so incensed I hadn’t read it that he sent a messenger to the flat with a copy. Louise, I think I’ll have to go now. I must catch the train back in time for dinner. I’d better see your father to give him the money.’
So they piled up the tray and went back to the house. It was breathlessly hot, and the house was quiet as most of its occupants were having a siesta. Her father was snoozing in a chair in the salon. ‘Sorry, darling. I must have dropped off.’
‘Stella has brought you the money.’ She stood unforgivingly before him – willing him to be Dad-without-Diana. He was.
‘It’s extremely kind of you to come all this way. I’m most awfully grateful to you. Do you know how much it is? So that I can write a cheque – if that’s all right with your family?’
‘It’s the equivalent of five hundred pounds. And a cheque should be made out to my father. He’s Dr Nathan Rose.’
‘Right.’ He picked up his cheque book, which he had put in readiness on the table in front of him. ‘Could I also have his address? I should like to write and thank him.’
‘I’ve got his address, Dad. Stella’s got to go now to catch her train back.’
‘Well, at least let me drive you to the station.’
It was all right. He was being her charming, attractive father.
He put Stella in the front of the car and during the drive talked to her constantly, asking her about her holiday, inviting them both to dinner at his club in the autumn. At the station he walked with them both to the platform where the little train was already waiting. He shook hands with Stella, then leaned forward and kissed her cheek. ‘You’ve saved my bacon. I can’t begin to tell you how grateful I am. Please tell your family, won’t you?’
‘I will.’
She and Louise hugged. ‘See you at Mon Débris.’
‘Is that what you call your flat?’ he asked, when they were back in the car.
‘Yes. It does suit it rather.’
‘Are you short of furniture and things like that?’
‘Well, not really. We’ve got the basic stuff. Stella’s father gave her things.’
‘What could I give you?’
‘Well …’ She told him about their gas cooker, purchased for two pounds ten, but it had a hole in the oven door, and brown paper pasted over it didn’t last. ‘So we need to get a new one, a new second-hand one, I mean.’
‘I’ll see to that, darling.’ He squeezed her hand.
Later, he said, ‘Sorry about lunch. The thing is that Diana isn’t herself. Change of life or something.’
‘Oh.’ Louise made a resolution that when she got it – which wouldn’t be for years and years – she would be especially nice to everyone; it wouldn’t be an excuse.
‘How’s your love life?’ he asked, as they reached the villa.
‘It’s the same,’ she said. ‘It’s fine.’ But as she said it, she knew somehow that these two things were incompatible. ‘He goes away for ages in summer, to the south of France, as a matter of fact, and he hardly ever writes letters. I feel a bit blue then.’
‘Good thing you’re with us,’ he answered heartily. He hardly noticed anything, Louise thought.
‘I’m afraid that being a mistress is much more difficult than having one,’ he said. So he must have noticed some things, she realised.
Ten days later she was taken to the airport at Nice to fly home. ‘Dumped’ was her word for it. Diana simply didn’t want a repeat of two nights in hotels with costly meals, and said there really wasn’t enough room in the back for Susan, all their luggage and Louise. Her father gave her some money to buy scent at the airport, and she found her favourite, Bellodgia by Caron, and that made up for quite a lot.
On the plane she made a number of negative resolutions: never to have another holiday with Diana, never to go to dinner at their house, only to see Dad without her. They all seemed quite sensible, but they made her feel sad.
RACHEL AND SID
‘Eileen wants to know if you would like lunch in the garden.’
‘Would you?’
‘If you would.’
‘All right, whatever you say.’
She had been writing letters all that morning, all the week since the funeral, writing and often crying. So many people had written, she said, either saying what a lovely funeral it had been, or how sorry they were that they had not been able to come. She felt she must answer them all, but it had taken its toll, Sid thought, almost angrily. Her face was still pale and ravaged by grief and lack of sleep. Fresh air would be good for her, and after lunch she might be persuaded to rest. After tea, they might go for a walk. Sid was still feeling pretty ropey herself, but she’d finished the marvellous pills and was sure she was getting better. She must get better, if only to stop Rachel looking after her and worrying.
It was another beautiful day, the air full of lavender and bees and roses. The butterflies had come for the buddleia, which was only just starting. It could all be so idyllic if only …
Lunch was cold chicken and salad and raspberries, and each coaxed the other to eat well – to little avail. But Sid did manage to get a glass of sherry down Rachel, which had some effect. She longed to discuss their future, but Rachel was distracted, considering the desires of her brothers about Home Place, and much of their conversation was about that. Hugh definitely wanted them to keep the house, and Rupert had finally decided that he did as well. Edward was clear that he didn’t, and there had been talk about his simply passing his share to the rest of them. Rachel had been left a little money by her mother that had come to her on her marriage and been safely and dully invested in Cazalets’ to provide an income of four hundred a year. Otherwise, she had been left a large number of shares in the firm, which also produced an income. The Brig had left furniture and effects to the Duchy for her lifetime, thereafter to be divided into four parts for each child. Rachel seemed to have no idea how much money she had, and clearly did not care. Sid, on the other hand, owned the lease on her little house in St John’s Wood, and had a small pension from the school where she had taught all her life.
There was no comparison. They had been through so much, and apart when they had wanted to be together, that it seemed only fair that now they should subside into tranquillity, a safe harbour of some kind where there need be no deceit, no charade about aching desire professing mere affection. Although, in their case, affection was the breath of love. It was affection that had enabled Sid to be patient, to be gentle, to treasure those first faltering assurances that Rachel had felt able to give: ‘I’d rather be with you than anyone in the world’, said in a tea shop in Hastings on one of the few occasions when she had lured Rachel from family duties. But that had been either before the war or when it had just begun, and there had been ye
ars after that of longing and frustration, during which she had been unfaithful with that needy girl Thelma. She and Rachel had been brought up so differently: Rachel to believe in her duties as a daughter, an unmarried aunt, to think nothing of herself, never for one moment to consider herself interesting, or attractive, her opinions – when she had any – meshing completely with what she felt was expected of her, on and on like that; it had been pathetic and sometimes irritating. Sid had been brought up virtually as head of her small family: a father dead when she was still a child, a mother wanting all the time to be told what to do, and a younger sister envious of her talent as a musician, and heartless with their mother. Money had always been short; she had always had to supplement her mother’s pension, to try to find her sister jobs, to live with her and deal with her day-to-day jealousies. It was because of all this that Sid had had to renounce playing in an orchestra for a regular job teaching in a girls’ school, supplemented by private lessons. All this had lent authority of a certain kind so she had taken to wearing mannish versions of women’s clothes: the tweed skirts, the thick woollen stockings, the shirt with a tie, hair cut as short as a man’s.
Her face, which had never known any emollient, had settled to a weatherbeaten uniformity: she looked as though she had spent much of her life in a high wind, or at sea. Only her lively pale brown eyes had never changed, and when she smiled, she charmed.
‘It would be so sad for the children if we gave up the house.’ This was the kind of thing Rachel said when she wanted to stop talking about it.
They had finished lunch, and Sid had lit their cigarettes with the pretty tortoiseshell lighter that Rachel had given her for her last birthday. ‘You know what I’d like, darling.’
Rachel had been lying back in her basket chair, but now sat up. ‘What?’
‘I’d like to take you away somewhere for a quiet holiday. The Lake District, or anywhere you would like to go.’ Then she added, with some cunning, ‘I feel the need for something of the sort. To throw off this bug for good and all.’
She saw that this was having some effect. A flurry of little frowns puckered Rachel’s face; she bit her lip and looked at her anxiously. ‘How awful! Of course we must have a holiday – you need one. It really is bad to have a reputation for thinking of others and then not doing anything about it.’ She actually nearly smiled as she said that. ‘Where would you like to go, my darling?’
Sid wanted to get up and throw her arms round Rachel, but at that moment Eileen appeared with the trolley to remove the lunch.
‘That was delicious,’ Rachel said. ‘Will you tell Mrs Tonbridge?’ And Eileen said that she would. ‘I ought to find out when the children want to come before we make any plans.’
Oh, Lord! Sid thought. If I’m not careful she’ll say she can’t go because of the family. ‘They always come with parents,’ she said carefully, ‘and they know the whole place inside and out. I’m sure you could leave it to them to sort things out.’
‘Well, I’ll have to ask them.’
‘Of course you will. And now, my dearest, it’s time for you to have a snooze. Do you want it out here, or do you want to go to bed?’
‘I think out here.’
When Sid had fetched the rug and tucked her up, Rachel said, ‘We need to pick the sweet peas. You haven’t forgotten?’ Every evening, since her mother’s burial, Rachel had picked a fresh bunch of the Duchy’s favourite flowers and taken them to her grave.
‘Of course I haven’t. We’ll pick them after tea and I’ll come with you.’ She stooped to kiss Rachel’s forehead. ‘I’m for my bed. I’ll wake you at teatime.’
I’m almost back to square one, Sid thought sadly. She had spent one night in bed with Rachel during the last week, and Rachel had clung to her and wept and sobbed in her arms, until, eventually, she had cried herself out and fallen asleep. Physical contact of any other kind had been clearly out of the question.
When we go away, she thought, if we go away, things will get back to how they were before. It is simply a question of patience and love. Although why either of those things should be regarded as simple was not clear to her at all.
POLLY AND GERALD
‘If we sold another picture, we could.’
‘We can’t keep selling pictures.’ His newly filled pipe had gone out, and he examined it despondently.
‘We don’t keep selling them. We’ve only sold six, one for each of the children and three to make our bit of the house comfortable. You wanted to give each of the children the proceeds of a Turner, and we needed to make the house OK to live in. But none of that means any income. If we did up one or two of the big reception rooms, we could do weddings and birthday parties.’
He muttered something about not wanting people tramping all over the house, and she simply looked at him and started laughing, so he laughed as well.
‘Oh, Poll! How do you put up with me? Of course they wouldn’t be tramping, and it wouldn’t be all over the house. But do you honestly think that people would want to have their wedding party here?’
‘Yes. Most people hire somewhere for that. I’ve made a rough plan of what we’d need to do.’
‘You have? You’ve thought it all out. Darling, you are a marvel. How do you manage it?’
‘Well, with Nan hounding me to put my feet up every day, it was something to do.’
She was lying on the yellow sofa, wearing her peacock-blue kaftan with her small white bare feet crossed at the ankles. It was evening and the room was suffused with violet shadowy light, excepting the lamp at her end of the sofa, which illuminated her hair. She looked, he thought, like a charming French painting.
‘I’ll just read you what I thought and you say what you think. We could use the big drawing room and the old library that leads off it for receptions. The old morning room could be turned into a kitchen or at least somewhere for the caterers to put their stuff. The dining room could have all the food and drink in it. We’d have to put some lavatories in, but if we do them on the north side, that fits with the plumbing. The guests could come in through the old front door. That’s about it, really, but of course we’d have to get Mr Cossey to come and see what it would cost. What do you think?’
Of course he thought it was an amazing idea, but he still wasn’t sure how many people would actually want to hire the place and what he and Polly might charge. Also, what about a car park, and facilities for the bride to change before going away?
They could park in the forecourt, she said, but he was quite right about having a place for the bride to change. ‘We might be able to use that funny little room where Nan gave us our first lunch.’
‘Supposing by a staggering chance that it’s not raining or icy cold, won’t they want to have drinks, et cetera, outside?’
‘Oh dear, of course they would. But the garden’s a wreck on that side of the house. We’d have to sort all that.’ She sighed, then yawned.
‘It’s time for bed,’ he said. ‘I’m going to put a cloth on the parrot’s cage.’ He had once called her pretty Polly and she had said she certainly wasn’t a parrot any more than he was a frog.
He helped her off the sofa and they went upstairs holding hands.
‘I warn you, I’m getting fatter by the day.’
‘Of course you are. We want a full-grown baby …’
Later, when they were lying side by side, he murmured, ‘The parrot and the frog. It sounds like some ghastly craft shop kept by amateurs. Or a horribly twee story for kiddiwinks.’
‘But it’s all right for us – so long as it’s private.’
‘It is,’ he said. ‘All the best things about us are private.’ He put his hand on her neck and turned her to face him. ‘I’ve just thought of another private thing. How would you feel about that?’
‘Happy to oblige.’
But when he had finished kissing her, he said, ‘No – not tonight, Josephine. You’re whacked. You needn’t be so accommodating, sweetheart. I love you quite enough to be happy si
mply to have middle mornings with you.’
‘Oh, I do hope not. After a month or two of that, I should begin to feel rather left out.’
‘Spoons?’
‘Spoons.’
She turned on her side away from him and he put an arm round her. They went to sleep holding hands.
HUGH AND JEMIMA
‘She’s agreed to divorce him. Apparently, she agreed over a year ago, and it’s reached the decree absolute. And he’s said nothing about it.’
‘I suppose he just thought that you would try to argue him out of it. After all, Polly said that she’s had two of his children. You can’t really blame her for wanting to be married to their father.’
They were having supper on the small terrace outside the basement kitchen. Jemima’s boys, Henry and Tom, were playing Monopoly in the drawing room, and Laura had been put to bed. An afternoon at the Round Pond in Kensington Gardens ‘helping’ Tom and Henry sail their boats had over-tired her, and she had cried at tea owing to an absence of Marmite sandwiches. But Marmite, to Jemima, smacked too much of the years of rationing, and she always tried to make the children’s teas more varied and nourishing. The boys ate everything and always wanted more, like happy dogs, she thought, but Laura liked things to stay as they had always been, with the disastrous exception of the Kit-E-Kat: Laura adored Riley, the cat that Hugh had bought her, and was found trying to feed him and eating all the bits he scorned.
‘I really love his food,’ she had said, licking her greasy fingers, which she then wiped on her spattered frock.
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