But when she arrived at his chambers, white-faced and tearstained and trembling, accompanied by a rather nervous articled clerk, and seemed about to collapse into the doorway, he had found himself almost unbearably moved by her. And as he put his arm round her shoulders, thinking only to calm her and soothe her and lead her into his own room, he realised that he was actually coming to a sense of involvement with her that was both unprofessional and dangerously beguiling.
Eliza looked at Toby anxiously.
“I thought … I thought we could talk alone.”
“Mrs. Shaw, I can’t discuss your case without representation by your solicitor, however urgent; it would be rather … rather unethical. Unfortunately, Mr. Cowan can’t stay for very long—he has another appointment—but he can hear at least some of what you have to say and report back to Philip Gordon. Coffee?”
“Yes, please.”
“All the other barristers are in court, including Sir Tristram, so we shall be undisturbed. I will put the kettle on.”
She had imagined that to be a figure of speech, but there was a small anteroom beyond his office, a kitchen of sorts, containing a Calor gas ring, a kettle, a tin of tea and another of coffee, and a miniature fridge.
“They don’t like it—they claim it’s a fire risk—but I want to have my coffee when I want it, not wait for some girl to finish typing a letter or even a difficult bit in her knitting pattern, so I insisted. Tea or coffee?”
“Oh, coffee, I think. I’ve been awake most of the night.”
She looked as if she had, he thought, with eyes that were heavy and dark ringed, and she had clearly dressed without any thought at all, no sign of her usual style, simply jeans and sneakers and, over a plain white T-shirt, a rather scruffy denim jacket.
“Good choice. Now, go and sit down and drink this; it’s very strong.”
“Thank you.”
And she went over to a deep leather sofa and sank into it and put her hands round the mug and sipped it gratefully.
“It’s lovely. Thank you.”
“Good. Now tell me what all this is about.”
And, stumbling over her words at first, she had begun to talk.
It had been the last straw: having to get Mr. Horrocks to take the door off its hinges, recognising the extent of Emmie’s misery, so great that nothing could even begin to ease it.
Emmie had been hysterical for a long time, shivering and screaming that she hated them all, except Granny; she wanted to stay with Granny, and after a long time, Eliza said, “All right, darling, I expect you can stay, but I must ring Daddy first.”
Matt had been surprisingly subdued when she told him; then he asked to speak to Emmie, who refused.
“I don’t want to talk to him, or you; I want to stay here with Granny and you go away by yourselves. Go away, go away, go away; I hate you.”
And so it was agreed that she should stay at Summercourt for the final few days of her parents’ marriage.
By the time she reached Fulham, Eliza had made what felt like, then, a completely final and constructive decision. She would give Emmie to Matt, on the condition that she had generous access and the quarrelling ceased; at least then Emmie would know where she was, the fighting and the bargaining would be over, and they would all be able to go forward rather than sideways into this hideous ongoing tangle of recrimination and distortion and injustice. It would be the least she could do for Emmie, after tipping her small, secure world into chaos, and it would be amends, of a sort, for the wrong she and Matt had done.
She sat there now, occasionally taking a sip of coffee, her voice very shaky, her eyes frequently filling with tears, and told Toby Gilmour what she had decided.
“It’s too cruel, what we’re doing to Emmie. It’s horrible. She’s beside herself, so confused and really, really upset—last night she shut herself in the loo at Summercourt; Mr. Horrocks—he’s the housekeeper’s husband—had to take the door off its hinges. She’s still there, with my mother; she says she hates us both, and I would too, if I were her. I do hate us both anyway. Oh, God …”
She threw her head back and tried to catch back a sob; she failed.
“Sorry. Anyway, I just think if I give in it’ll be settled really quickly and she’ll get her new little life, and it will be difficult for her, but not as bad as this endless quarrelling and telling her we’re doing it so we’ll all be happier soon. God, if I hate that solicitor of Matt’s for one thing, it’s him making Matt stay in the house with me; it’s so cruel, so perverse.”
“Quite standard, though,” Gilmour said. “It happens all the time; clients are advised not to leave the matrimonial home … Mr. Cowan, I know you’ve got to go; thank you for your help; can you see yourself out?”
The clerk scuttled gratefully off. Gilmour smiled. “Proprieties observed. I’ll get one of my pupils in to join us in a minute.”
“Anyway, then at least I can move out. I suppose Matt will want the house, but I don’t care; I never liked it; we bought it when … after … Oh, God, sorry.”
“After your baby died?”
“Yes. How did you know that?” she said, staring at him.
“I didn’t. Call it male intuition. We are not entirely emotionally illiterate, you know, we men. Even we legally trained men.”
“No, I see.” She felt confused. “Well … well, Emmie should be in it; it’s her home, so that’s best, and this new nanny he keeps telling me is so wonderful can move in—it shouldn’t be a new one, you know; I might try to insist on Jennifer’s staying—and I think then she’ll be better quite quickly. Emmie, I mean. No danger of any crusty old judges asking her awful things, like whom she wants to live with, and as long as I can have Summercourt, then I’ll be all right and I can have her there at the weekends. I can go back to work more days, and once I know how many days Matt’s going to allow me, I’ll … I’ll work round … round … Oh, God, it’s all so … so horrible …”
And then she was crying hard, and looking at him in a sort of beseechment, as if he could make things better.
“I’m not going to get her anyway, and there’ll be all this horrible filthy stuff coming out about me in court, most of it not true, but who will believe that? Not even you probably; I mean, what must you think of me, smoking pot in the office, like I told you, and sleeping around and hitting my child … Oh, shit—how did I get into this, how, how, how? I’ve been so stupid, so epically stupid and selfish and cruel and …”
She looked at him then, thinking how cheap he must think her, how genuinely unfit to be a mother, and he put down the cup he had been holding and stood up, and she thought, He’s going to show me the door, tell me he’s dropping the case; he’s just realised what an awful creature I am; only what he actually did was come over to the sofa and sit beside her and, leaning forward, studying his hands, began to talk.
“Listen,” he said, and his voice was more patient than she had ever heard it. “I can’t let you do that. I think what you have just said shows the most generous and the bravest and the kindest heart I have met for a long time, and you deserve to get your little Emmie on the strength of it alone.
“Now, in the first place, the quarrelling wouldn’t stop, because you would still be, the two of you, on your own, working things out on your own terms, and after a very short time it would be worse than ever. You say Matt can have her as long as he agrees that you can see her fairly often. Eliza, who will decide what fairly often is, and who will make you agree on it? While you are both so hurt and Matt is so angry?
“You say if Matt says you can have Summercourt you’d be all right, but what makes you think he would, if a judge doesn’t order him to? You say you’ll try to insist on Emmie’s present nanny staying, but again, you would be powerless, and Matt would do what he thought best for her, and he is very against Jennifer. And yes, no crusty old judge, asking her what she wants, but who will decide in his absence? You think that suddenly you and Matt will become good and reasonable friends, but you won’
t. Once you’ve got over the nobility of your gesture and Matt the generosity of it, you’ll feel as resentful as hell, believe me, and he will take advantage. And he won’t quickly settle on some nice, fair distribution of days for you to have Emmie, so that you can get your work life in order; he’ll quibble and fiddle and argue; you’ll actually find it very difficult.”
“Yes, but—”
“No, no buts. I know what I’m talking about. That’s what you pay me for.” He smiled at her. “I’m nearly finished. The thing about the law, Eliza, is that it is, of course, very expensive and very dictatorial, but it thinks for itself and for you. And then it makes rules, which have to be obeyed. The week in court will be dreadful for you; I don’t deny it, and I am hoping, of course, that the judge won’t ask to see Emmie, but he might. But when it’s over, you will know where you are, and Matt will know where he is, and that will be it. The law creates order. Do you see what I mean? You and your husband are two very strong-willed people. Both of you are angry, disappointed, hurt, vengeful; you both love Emmie; you both want Emmie. If you dispatch all of us legal bods now, where do you think you’ll be in a week’s time? Exactly where you were, only probably much, much worse.”
She was silent, not even looking at him.
“Now, I am fairly confident you will get generous access at the very worst, and I am still hopeful, at least, that you may get custody. Although it will be a very tough week for you, of course. The law is of necessity gladiatorial as well as orderly. And the portrait Mr. Hayward will be painting of you will not be pleasant. Jezebel will appear a saint for those few days, by comparison with you. But you will survive. Because you are quite astonishingly strong. Not to mention brave. Now … have I managed to persuade you not to go down the rather dangerous path you seemed to be wandering towards earlier this morning? Because—and I hope you will believe me—it is for your own sake that I wish to divert you from it and not mine. Even though clearly I would benefit in some ways, not least—” He stopped.
“Not least what?” she said, and there was a charge in the atmosphere that she recognized and in spite of everything was excited by, and there was a silence and then—and she could feel him drawing back from something—“Not least the chance to conduct your case,” he said, his voice brusque again. “It is, as I said, an exciting prospect.”
“Well … I’ll think about what you said. Of course.”
“Please, Mrs. Shaw—Eliza—do more than think about it.”
“Yes, I will, I will. Oh, God. Look, it’s late. I’d better go; I’m supposed to be at work, holding meetings, organizing a fashion shoot.”
“There you are, you see,” he said. “You’re still able to think about your work in the midst of all this tumult. As I said, you are astonishingly strong.”
He escorted her to the door.
“You’ve been very kind,” she said. “I don’t know why you should spare me all that time.”
“I am not entirely inhuman,” he said, and then, quickly, as if he knew he should not say it otherwise: “And besides, you … you invite kindness.”
“Oh,” she said, and then, astonished at herself, she reached up and kissed his cheek.
“Thank you,” she said. “Thank you—Toby—very much.”
Matt had gone down to Summercourt to see Emmie. He had been afraid she would be hostile, refuse to talk to him, but when he got there and found her sitting on the terrace with Sarah, drawing, she flew into his arms with cries of “Daddy, Daddy,” and covered his face with kisses.
“How’s my best girl?” he said carefully.
“Fine. This is for you.”
He looked at it, blanched. It was a picture of a little girl with long hair, standing in between a man and a woman, and in front of a big house.
“It’s me, with you and Mummy. That’s Summercourt. Granny said it was lovely.”
They ate lunch together on the terrace. “I have to go soon, darling,” he said to Emmie, as she fed him ice cream, giggling. Normally such behaviour would not have been tolerated, Sarah thought. Emmie would become spoilt now as they vied for her favors; discipline would grow lax; rules would be waived—and she was naughty enough as it was …
“That’s a shame. Are you going home to Mummy?”
“To our house, yes.”
“I wish we could live here always,” she said, her small face serious suddenly. “It’s lovely here. You and Mummy and Granny and Mouse and me. It would be really, really nice. Can’t we do that, Daddy?”
“I’m afraid not, poppet. Mummy and Daddy have work to do. We have to be in London.”
“But sometimes then? You and Mummy together.”
“I’m afraid not, Emmie, no. We’ve explained to you; we—”
And then she jumped up, her small face working, huge tears in her blue eyes, and said, “I hate this. I hate you. Why not, why, why, why?”
“Emmie … darling …” He reached for her; she pushed him away.
“Don’t. I’m going back to Mouse. Mouse and Granny, they’re the nicest.”
And she was gone, running, her long hair flying, a small victim of their war; Matt sat watching her and dashed his hand across his eyes. Sarah noticed, reached out and patted his hand.
“Leave her,” she said. “Leave her to me. She’ll be all right.”
Driving back to London, filled with a new and savage remorse, Matt felt suddenly very afraid. Suppose he lost now; suppose Eliza did get custody? How could he stand it, a life without Emmie there every day? It would be unbearable; he would go mad. He felt half-mad now. He pulled over, sat trying to calm himself, running over the case. His case. Ivor Lewis was very confident, he said; they had superb witnesses, an excellent case. But there were things … things he had never told Lewis. Knowing it was crazy, but too afraid to confront them. About Gina. About hitting Eliza. That, more than anything, haunted him now: not just that it might come out, but that he had done it at all, that he was the sort of man who could hit a woman, and therefore a child. A man who should never, ever be left alone with a child, let alone be allowed to take it away from its mother.
But … Eliza had never told anyone. She bore her own shame about it. And Gina was the only other person on earth who knew. And had sworn she never would tell. But … she did know; she could change her mind.
Matt pulled out his cigarettes, lit one with hands that shook. How had he done that, hit his own wife? How? How had he done any of it, made Emmie so unhappy? But it wasn’t just him … was it?
“Eliza, Philip Gordon here.”
“Oh … hallo, Philip.” Now what?
“Interesting one here; your psychotherapist has refused to disclose your reports. However, I should warn you that I think the judge will demand to see them. If he does, and she persists in refusing, she could be charged with contempt of court.”
“Oh, no! That’s awful; she’s so lovely, and how brave of her. So what do I do?”
“I think we should warn her of that as a possibility. If she does get called, then you would have to waive patient confidentiality and the reports would be produced. But let’s not meet trouble more than halfway.”
“No. All right.”
Oh, God. Something else to worry about. Was it ever going to end?
Eliza had taken the week before the case off. Sarah had brought Emmie up from Summercourt on the Monday evening, despite the original plan to keep her there; she cried every night in bed, and often woke up in the middle of the night, having wet the bed and complaining of bad dreams. And when on the Thursday night Emmie was sick, Eliza decided that a long weekend at Summercourt would do them both good and drove down early the next day.
They arrived just after nine; it was a perfect morning, and Summercourt looked at its magical best; she felt herself comforted as always, felt her heart almost literally lift, watched, smiling, as Mouse cantered over to greet them, looking for the Polo mints Emmie always brought him, and she sank gratefully onto one of the old weather-bleached wooden seats, savouring th
e sound of Emmie’s giggles as Mouse nuzzled her hand, and wishing she could hold this moment still forevermore, this happy, sunlit, lovely moment, filled with the scent of the roses that climbed up the walls and the songs of the birds surrounding her, free from care, released from dread.
Toby Gilmour had called Philip Gordon that same morning to tell him the bad news: that the judge they had been allotted was to their case what the Miss World contest was to the feminist movement. “Couldn’t be worse; he might have been handpicked by Ivor Lewis and Bruce Hayward. He’s extremely partisan, has come out several times in favor of the husband in divorce cases, feels they get an increasingly raw deal, especially with all this bra-burning stuff that’s going on—his phrase, not mine—and—wait for this—lost his own two sons to their mother in his divorce ten years ago.”
“His divorce?”
“Yes. Oh, come on, Philip, you must know …”
“Oh, crikey. Not Clifford Rogers?”
“The very one.”
“Dear, oh, dear. That is bad luck. Are you sure?”
“Am I sure we’ve got him? Yes, quite sure, I was at a dinner with him last night. Am I sure about his divorce, yes; I met him at the Lincoln’s Inn garden party a couple of weeks ago; he was tight as a tick, and he held me in a corner like the Ancient Mariner while he told me all about it.
“I’ve been trying to work out tactics all night, very difficult. He really dislikes women. He’s also a grammar-school boy, one of the first judges to make it, and carries a banner for the new social order, so he won’t like our Eliza, and he’ll think Matt and Ivor Lewis, come to that, both should have whatever he can give them.”
More Than You Know Page 56
