A Fragile Peace

by A Fragile Peace (retail) (epub)

  ‘I almost certainly won’t be able to get away,’ her father interrupted brusquely.

  She looked at him in surprise. ‘But I haven’t told you which day it is yet.’

  He hesitated. ‘You said next week. I can’t possibly manage any day next week.’

  ‘Well, never mind. We’ll go by train. It’ll be splendid fun.’

  ‘I don’t expect I’ll be able to make it either,’ mumbled Allie. She had wandered to the shelf where the wireless stood and was twiddling the knobs, her back to the room. Atmospherics sang and whistled almost drowning the sound of a dance band. ‘I’ll be working, I expect.’

  ‘Oh, of course not, you goose. Sir Brian’s closing the office for the day – he and Lady Margery are going to Southampton as well. So there you are. What do you think of the idea, Mother?’

  ‘It sounds splendid.’ The radio blared suddenly. ‘For goodness’ sake, Allie, what are you doing with that thing? I can’t hear myself think.’

  ‘Sorry.’ Allie lowered the volume. ‘It’s Jack Hylton. I wanted particularly to listen…’ She adjusted the signal, and faintly a metallically light voice echoed in the room.

  ‘I’m not sure that I should forgive her, mind.’ Libby lifted her silk-sheathed legs and draped them across the arm of her chair. ‘It really is too inconsiderate of her.’

  ‘If the job depended on her getting there…’

  Libby pulled a face. ‘Well – couldn’t she – fly or something? People do, don’t they?’ She waved an exasperated hand.

  ‘Oh, don’t be daft.’ Allie was still fiddling with the knobs of the wireless.

  ‘Well, I still think it beastly that she won’t be at my wedding.’

  ‘My dear girl, there’ll be so many people around that I doubt if you’d notice if your father and I weren’t there,’ Myra said drily.

  Libby giggled, pleased. ‘You may be right at that.’

  ‘Do we have to put up with that racket, Allie?’ Robert’s voice was tight.

  ‘I’m listening to it.’ Stubbornly Allie ignored the strain that only she heard in his voice. ‘I’ve been waiting all evening.’

  ‘So that’s settled then.’ Libby was brisk. ‘Mother and Allie and I will go and see Celia off. For all that she doesn’t really deserve it. I must admit that I’ve always rather fancied standing on the dockside waving a damp hanky.’

  Allie was singing with the radio, her eyes half-closed.

  ‘Is that all right then, Al?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You’ll come with us. To say goodbye to Celia.’

  ‘I – no, I don’t think so.’

  ‘Why ever not?’ It was Myra, meticulously drawn eyebrows arched in surprise.

  ‘She – well, she won’t want me there, will she?’ floundered Allie. She could not look at her father.

  ‘But of course she will. She’s always been very attached to you. And I daresay that Sir Brian would be pleased if you made the effort, too.’

  Trapped, Allie could do nothing but surrender. ‘All right. If you like.’

  With an abruptness that made Allie jump and raised Myra’s head in slight surprise, Robert stood up: ‘I have to have a word with Browning before he leaves. I’m not happy with the way the soft fruit’s coming along.’ He strode to the door. In the garden he stood for a moment on the marble terrace breathing in the fragrance of fresh-cut grass and early summer roses. Behind him he could still hear the disembodied, taunting voice of the radio.

  * * *

  Two days before Celia Hinton left for the United States, Allie saw Ray Cheshire for the last time. It was an unhappy meeting, and Allie knew within minutes what the outcome would be. They met, by arrangement, at the tennis club on a bright, cool summer’s evening, and their conversation was held against a background of calls and laughter, and the sound of racquet striking ball. Ray had just come off court. He leaned against the bar, his damp hair plastered darkly against his narrow skull, his long, white-flannel-clad legs crossed, one hand fidgeting with the white pullover he had slung across his shoulders when he had finished playing. As Allie joined him, she saw the nervous jumping of the pulse at the base of his throat, revealed by the open collar of his white tennis shirt.

  ‘Hello.’

  ‘Hello yourself.’ The forced jocularity fell absolutely flat. ‘Drink?’

  ‘Thank you. A lemonade, please.’

  He called the barman and ordered her drink. As he handed it to her she saw that his hand was shaking slightly.

  ‘Shall we sit down?’

  ‘Why not? It doesn’t cost any more.’ He laughed, too loudly. Allie sighed.

  They did not touch as they walked out onto the verandah of the clubhouse and found themselves a table in a secluded corner which was formed by a trellis curtained with Virginia creeper. Neither, Allie noticed, was there any physical contact as he made a great show of pulling out a chair for her and settling her comfortably. She sat with her elbows on the table, nursing the tall, coldly misted glass, staring out through the screening leaves to the sunlit tennis courts beyond.

  ‘How—’ he cleared his throat, tried again, ‘how did it go? With the kid’s parents, I mean?’

  ‘Better than I deserved. They were very good about it. A damn sight better than I would have been in the circumstances.’ Allie’s expression was grim. The thought of what she had so nearly done still sickened her. She sat for a moment in silence, then lifted her head. ‘How’s the car?’

  ‘Oh, fine. Going to be as good as new. I must say that it was jolly decent of your pa to get it all in hand so quickly for me – in the circumstances,’ he said, stumbling a little, ‘and footing the bill, too…Frightfully decent of him…’

  ‘…in the circumstances,’ Allie repeated, drily, and for the first time looked straight at him.

  His thin face burned brick red. ‘I – well, yes.’ He was fidgeting with his hands, one bony finger picking at the nail of another. With an obvious physical effort he moved his hands apart and laid them flat on the table, one each side of his beer glass.

  Allie waited, running her tongue compulsively back and forth over her still very painful damaged lip.

  ‘Allie—’ he said, and stopped. She raised her brows. He said nothing, clearly embarrassed and struggling for words.

  ‘Perhaps I’d better warn you that Dad and I didn’t tell the exact truth about what happened,’ Allie said after a moment. ‘It seemed—’ she shrugged ‘—advisable to keep some of it quiet. Mother thinks that you were giving me a driving lesson when I had the accident. Dad called you an “irresponsible young puppy”. He was very good, actually. Lied as if he’d been doing it all his life.’ Her marked mouth drew down at the private irony of that. ‘He didn’t think it was necessary to tell her that he’d all but found us in bed together.’ She paused. ‘Frightfully decent of him, eh?’ she added quietly. ‘Under the circumstances?’

  Ray’s face was very red. ‘Allie, you aren’t making this any easier.’

  ‘Aren’t making what any easier?’ She sipped her lemonade.

  ‘Oh, for God’s sake – you must see – well, we can’t go on seeing each other now, can we?’ He was in an agony of embarrassment. Furtively he passed the back of his hand across his damp forehead. ‘I mean – your father – well, damn it, Allie, how could I face him – knowing – knowing that he knows that?’

  * * *

  ‘All ashore that’s going ashore. All ashore, please.’

  ‘That’s us,’ said Libby, brightly and unnecessarily.

  The flower-filled cabin buzzed and hummed with talk and laughter.

  ‘…Darling! Actually to live in New York. How absolutely divine! I’m mad with jealousy…’

  ‘…if you want to get into a gas mask, I told the silly little man, then you’ll have to catch me before I go to the hairdresser’s, not after…’

  ‘…what’s got into the gel I can’t imagine. New York indeed! And at a week’s notice! I don’t know what the young women of today are c
oming to, that I don’t…’

  ‘…all over bar the shouting, if you ask me, old man. Franco’s as good as taken Bilbao. Beginning of the end…’

  Allie pulled her mother’s sleeve. ‘Time to go.’

  ‘Yes, dear. But we haven’t had a chance to say goodbye properly yet.’ Myra put her tall champagne glass on a nearby table. ‘Let’s say our farewells and leave Celia to her family.’

  Reluctantly the girl allowed herself to be towed through the elegant throng to where Celia, pale and composed, stood by the door. The slim, neatly suited figure looked poised and calm. Allie hung back. It was the first time the two girls had come face to face since Allie had told her father that she knew of his liaison.

  ‘I wish you the very best of luck, my dear.’ Myra kissed the pearly cheek warmly. ‘I must say that I think you’re very brave indeed. It’s a great pity that Robert couldn’t be here. He wanted to, I know, but pressure of work…Anyway, he sends his love…’

  Over Myra’s shoulder, green eyes met blue. Celia held Allie’s look steadily.

  ‘Good luck.’ Allie felt gawky and a little stupid as she hung back, unwilling even to offer a hand.

  ‘Thank you.’ Celia’s smile was fleeting.

  ‘Cele, you’re an absolute beast, and I’m never going to forgive you!’ Libby, unknowing, eased the moment as she burst from the crowd and flung her arms about her friend. ‘Never, so there! Well, not unless you promise faithfully to write every single week. And let me and Edward come and stay with you for our hols next year.’

  ‘Of course.’ Celia’s arms tightened around Libby and at last her eyes left Allie’s. ‘Of course you must.’

  ‘Good luck, darling. Oh, the best of good luck.’ Libby’s voice was muffled against Celia’s shoulder.

  ‘All ashore…’

  ‘We must go.’

  ‘Thank you for coming. Thank you all for coming.’ The tremor in Celia’s husky voice was all but lost in the noise as the huge liner readied herself for departure. Allie steeled herself against it.

  Half an hour later, they stood on the dockside, the great vessel rearing above them, a streamlined monster decked in flags, bunting and streamers. A few yards away a brass band played, its sound almost lost in the hubbub of last-minute goodbyes and cheers. As the ship’s siren shrieked, another billow of streamers was tossed from the deck rails – a shifting, fragile, multicoloured web that for a last few moments tenuously linked the travellers on board with those they were leaving behind; then the dark stretch of water between dockside and ship slowly widened and the great liner, siren still sounding, made for the open sea, leaving in her wake a swell of oily water upon which floated, sodden and pathetic, the debris of celebration.

  It was full dark before the train neared London. Myra and her daughters had a First Class compartment to themselves. During the journey their conversation had petered out, and they travelled for the most part in silence. Myra and Allie were reading. Libby, one elbow on the table, chin on hand, was staring moodily into the night, watching the occasional lights which flashed past as the express sped on.

  ‘Damned stupid I call it, going away like that.’ She broke a long silence, speaking as much to herself as to her mother and sister.

  ‘I do wish you’d watch your language, dear. It really isn’t very becoming to swear.’

  Allie said nothing.

  Libby shifted her stance restlessly. ‘Jolly good job I’ve found someone that the maid of honour’s dress fits.’

  This was news to Allie. ‘You have?’

  ‘Yes. Jesse Warrington.’

  ‘But – I thought you didn’t like Jesse Warrington?’

  ‘I don’t very much. But she’s the only one the right size.’

  Her sister’s silence said more than words.

  ‘Well, I couldn’t have you standing there all on your own, you great clumsy lummox, could I?’ Libby snapped defiantly, half-turning. ‘You’re supposed to look after the little ones. You’re more likely to fall flat on your face. I wanted two maids of honour, and two I shall have!’ Angrily she turned back to the window. But not before Allie had seen the sheen of tears on her cheeks.

  * * *

  The morning of Libby’s marriage to Edward Maybury dawned, as if to order, fresh and sunlit with a lucently cloudless sky. Ashdown was pandemonium, filled – or so it seemed to Robert Jordan – with nervously giggling, scampering small girls in pastel-coloured frills and flounces, and their equally nervous if less disruptive elders who spent a great deal of time adjusting their own and each other’s dresses, hair, flowers and stocking seams. In the midst of this chaos, Libby, to everyone’s surprise, was the still eye of the storm. Serenely beautiful in her sweeping ivory satin, a small, pearl-covered Juliet cap anchoring the yards of delicate lace that clouded her slim shoulders and swept to the floor behind her, she was utterly composed, utterly happy. This was her day, her perfect day. Her amazing, unruffled calm held through the trying morning as the constantly ringing doorbell and telephone heralded telegrams, flowers, last-minute presents and endless numbers of unsolicited well-wishers. At two o’clock the procession of shining, flower- and ribbon-decked limousines began to wind its way down the drive, and Libby stood with her father at the drawing-room window watching the rest of the family and their guests leave, organized with smooth efficiency by Myra.

  ‘Uncle Bertie, you’re in the first car with Richard and Aunt Liz and the others. Sarah, do stand still, child, your ribbons are getting all tangled. Jesse, you’ll go with these three in the next car and Allie’s in the one behind with the rest of the little ones. Allie, do keep your eye on young Dora – if she loses any more petals from her basket, she’ll have none at all to scatter when the time comes. Wait just a moment, darling, your headdress is just a little – there, that’s better. Off you go…’ From apparent chaos, order emerged and the sleek black cars, glittering in the sun, rolled slowly one after the other down to the gate and out onto the road.

  ‘Right.’ Myra came, smiling, into the drawing room. ‘It’s my turn to be off now, my dears. I’ll see you at the church.’ She paused before her daughter, an extra brilliance in her sapphire eyes. ‘You look wonderful, darling. Simply beautiful.’ She leaned and, delicately so as not to disarrange the careful toilette, kissed Libby’s cheek. ‘I wish you all the happiness in the world.’ Briskly then she walked to the mirror, adjusted her rakish, wide-brimmed hat to a jaunty angle, straightened the jacket of her pearl-grey suit whose pale tartan lining matched exactly her soft silk blouse, then with another quick, determined smile she left them and, a moment later, Robert and Libby were alone in the unnaturally quiet house.

  ‘Nervous?’ asked Robert softly.

  ‘A bit, I suppose. But I’m truly too happy to care.’

  ‘Your Edward is a very lucky young man indeed.’

  ‘My Edward is the dearest, kindest and most wonderful man in the world.’

  They smiled at each other.

  ‘You really love him, don’t you?’

  ‘More than I can say.’

  He opened his arms to her then and, laughing, she went to him, resting her head lightly on his shoulder, the drifting lace of her veil enveloping them both. Very gently he rocked her, in these last moments that she would ever be entirely his.

  ‘Time to go,’ she whispered at last and, stepping away from him, lifted her arms and drew the misty veil over her face.

  Outside the church Allie waited, one gloved hand firmly grasping Dora’s restive paw, the other holding her own rose-decked and ribboned basket of petals. The church path, leading from the tiled lichgate, was gold-dappled with sunshine that showered through the sheltering trees like new-minted coins. She saw the last car draw up at the gate, caught glimpses through the yew hedge of the glimmering satin of her sister’s dress and the black and grey of her father’s morning suit. At the gate stood a small cluster of well-wishers from the village who ‘ohh-ed’ and clapped and called greetings as the bride and her father passed smiling t
hrough them. From within the ancient church, the rolling organ-sound died when, as if by magic, the news of the bride’s arrival was telegraphed to the organist. As Libby and her father joined the bridesmaids at the church door, there was a flurry of skirt- and veil-straightening, last-minute exhortations and stern warnings, and the little procession – its head the erect and lovely figure of the young bride, its body a pretty pastel spectrum of peach and apricot hues – entered the striking chill of the old church and made its way to the bright, flower-decked altar to the strains of Mendelssohn’s ‘Wedding March’.

  There was one moment during her sister’s wedding that Allie never forgot: as the ceremony neared its end, a shaft of sunshine, piercingly bright, and made into solid gold by the motes of dust that danced within it, fell through a small window high in the ancient walls and struck directly upon the couple as they stood at the altar exchanging rings that glinted in the light. It was as if some pagan deity blessed the union with gifts of promise. Edward looked proud and happy beside his beautiful bride and there was not a soul in the church who could help but be moved by Libby’s brilliant smile as her new husband lifted her veil and gently kissed her.

  Outside, with the bells pealing and the restraints of church lifted from half a dozen over-excited, self-important little girls, Allie had her hands full while the photographer tediously grouped and regrouped the principals and the guests, disappearing beneath his enveloping black shroud and then popping back, hair awry, like some eccentric jack-in-the-box. It was not until after they had arrived at the White Hart Hotel, where the reception and wedding breakfast was to be held, that Allie found a quiet moment to extend her own good wishes to her sister.

  ‘I hope you’ll always be as happy as you are today.’ She kissed her warmly.

  ‘I will be, Allie darling. What else could I be? And thank you – for your help, for everything. Young Dora would probably have dismantled the church stone by stone if you hadn’t been there!’