by Jane Green
‘What?’
‘She did,’ Beth says softly, pointing to the swollen cheek. ‘That’s when we had no choice but to call the police.’
‘Mum actually slapped her?’ Clemmie says in disbelief.
‘I was on my hands and knees trying to clear up the mess – your mother had dropped a full tray of glass and china – and I heard it. Beth screamed in pain and I immediately restrained your mother while Beth called the police. Honestly, Clemmie, we had no choice. I was terrified she was going to hurt us, or worse, hurt herself. She was a complete mess. I knew this was really bad. I’m sorry, darling, but your mother is really ill.’
‘I’m so sorry.’ Beth’s eyes are limpid, soft, completely empathetic as she holds her arms out to Clemmie, who allows herself to be held, numb at what is happening, still attempting to digest it all. ‘I’m so sorry,’ whispers Beth, rubbing her back. ‘I know how hard this must be for you.’
‘But why is she in the hospital?’ Clemmie murmurs into her shoulder. ‘Did she hurt herself? I want to see her. Where is she?’
Ted takes a deep breath. ‘She’s sitting outside the psychiatric ward,’ he says. ‘We’re waiting for her psychiatrist to arrive, Frank Ellery. Beth phoned him while I tried to restrain your mother and he immediately said he would admit her. They don’t want her seeing anyone until she’s been evaluated. I’m sorry, darling, but you wouldn’t want to see her now. She’s in no state to see you, and it wouldn’t be good for you. She’s babbling all kinds of things that just aren’t true.’
Clemmie sinks down on a chair as tears fill her eyes. ‘How can this be true?’ she whispers, but the only thought going through her head is, I want my mum.
I need my mum to make this all go away.
Grace has been hysterical since the moment she screamed. She was hysterical all the way over here, as they bundled her into an ambulance, so upset she was hyperventilating. They gave her a shot of something, which has made her feel stoned.
Now she is trying to be calm. If she can explain to someone what just happened, they will let her out of here. No one seems to be interested in listening to her; everyone keeps telling her that Dr Ellery will be here soon and she can explain to him.
Her bare feet are cold on the hospital’s linoleum floor. As the hours tick by, as the medication they injected into her starts to wear off, Grace becomes increasingly terrified. Things like this don’t happen to people like her. This is like being stuck in a horrific movie, one so dramatic, so terrible, you are sitting on the edge of your seat dreading the next awful thing you know is coming. Or, at least, you would be if it were happening to someone else.
Jack Nicholson in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest flashes into her mind. But that wouldn’t happen to her. Dr Ellery knows her. He knows that while she may be many things, a fantasist she is not.
Even when she explains what happened this evening, what made her snap, she realizes her life will never be the same. How can it be when she now knows what has been going on?
Her husband is obsessed with Beth – that much is obvious – and now they are having an affair.
But worse than that was seeing Beth – as Ted was on his hands and knees on the floor, picking up the pieces of glass from the crystal inkwell Grace hadn’t been aware of throwing, before she struck Beth – seeing the look of conquest on Beth’s face.
Grace isn’t a violent person. She cannot begin to explain what came over her, a rage, a fury so huge it had to come out somehow. She never thought she was capable of hitting someone, but without realizing what was happening, Grace had brought her hand back and had put all her weight behind it as she slapped Beth on the cheek.
The worst thing of all? How good it felt.
‘Oh my God!’ Beth had moaned, her hands flying to her eye. ‘She just hit me. Oh my God! Get away from me! Ted! She slapped me!’
‘Grace!’ Ted came towards her and took her arms, almost shook her in disgust. ‘Grace! I know you’re upset and I’m sorry, but control yourself. For God’s sake.’
‘I’m calling the police.’ Beth moved to the phone. ‘She assaulted me.’
‘Grace.’ Ted’s voice was soothing, conciliatory. ‘I know you’re not well, but you need help, that much is clear. More help than you’ve been getting. We’re going to get you the help you need.’
‘I don’t need help, you bastard,’ Grace hissed as Beth murmured into the phone at the other end of the room. ‘She’s the one who needs help. I walk in here and find my husband entwined with his assistant, and I’m the one who needs help?’
Ted ignored her, didn’t see Beth look at Grace with a look so cold, so detached from everything that was going on, Grace knew this was exactly what she wanted.
She looks triumphant.
I have won, it said. And Grace knew suddenly that Beth did steal her scarf. God knows what else besides. She knew suddenly that Beth had intentionally called the rental company before the event at Harmont House and cancelled everything. She knew that Beth came into their lives very deliberately to ruin them, or at least, to ruin her.
It all became shockingly clear. Beth had been systematically stealing Grace’s life for months. Finally she had got what Grace realized, with shocking clarity, she had come for: her husband. With a howl of rage, Grace broke free of Ted and ran towards Beth. Beth, younger, lighter, quicker than Grace, darted into the bathroom, locked the door, as Grace pounded on the door, yelling for her to come out.
This was how the police found her when they arrived. Beth locked in the bathroom with Grace banging on the door, howling her frustration as she collapsed, finally, in a puddle of tears.
‘Why?’ Grace calmed herself enough to turn to Beth, just as she was bundled into the back of the ambulance that accompanied the police car. She was looking directly into Beth’s eyes as she said it; only Beth had the answer.
‘Why?’
Beth said nothing. Ted couldn’t look Grace in the eye, standing next to Beth as his wife was taken away, but Beth looked at her. She stared her in the eyes until the ambulance door closed and Grace was driven off, with no idea why her life was suddenly going so completely, and utterly, wrong.
When Frank Ellery appears at the end of the corridor, Grace leaps to her feet, almost weeping in gratitude at her saviour finally having arrived.
‘Frank!’ She blinks back the tears as she stands. ‘Thank God you’re here! They wouldn’t let me talk to anyone, wouldn’t let me explain anything until you got here. I’m so sorry to pull you away from home so late.’
‘That’s all right, Grace,’ Frank says, in a tone similar to the one he uses when talking to very small children. ‘Why don’t we go somewhere and talk, and you can tell me all about it.’
‘Yes!’ Grace lights up. ‘Thank you!’ He excuses himself to have a short conversation with the nurses behind the desk, which Grace can’t hear, although she strains her ears in an attempt.
‘Let’s go in here.’ He shows her into a doctor’s office, where she sits in a wing chair, aware of her bare feet, her yoga pants and sleeping T-shirt; aware she is in clothes she only wears to bed; of how inappropriately she is dressed.
Grace takes a deep breath and explains to Frank what happened tonight. That she caught Ted and Beth in a clinch, that she admitted to dropping the tray and feeling rage, that she had done the unthinkable and lost control, shocked at herself for having lashed out at Beth.
Grace was mindful of keeping her voice calm, level, knowing her only chance of lending this incredible story credibility was to make herself credible. She explained that it all became clear to her tonight, how Beth had planned this, had orchestrated a deliberate series of moves to undermine Grace; in all probability to steal her husband. In fact, Grace added, Beth had probably orchestrated that Grace be brought here tonight.
‘Having me committed is probably the icing on her cake,’ she says wryly. ‘Thank God you’re here and you believe me. You know me, and you know I’m not a liar.’
There is a paus
e as Grace waits for Frank to say something, but he is silent, just watches her with that familiar empathetic expression in his eyes, as Grace feels a jolt of disquiet.
‘Frank? I know it sounds absurd, but there is no reason for me to make this up. You do believe me, Frank?’
Another silence. ‘I believe that you believe it to be true,’ he says softly. ‘Which is really the only thing that matters.’
‘No it isn’t,’ snaps Grace. ‘That’s psychobabble claptrap. If you don’t believe me, then you think I’m crazy. And if I’m crazy, you’re here to have me committed, which is exactly what she wants.’
‘Grace, no one’s talking about having you committed. I do think, however, that a stay here for a few days would be valuable. It will help stabilize you and get you to a better place. I think that whatever you think happened tonight, you will agree that you lost control, yes?’
‘Yes, I lost control, but anyone would have lost control. I caught my husband about to fuck his bloody assistant. How would you feel if you walked in on your wife about to fuck . . . I don’t know, your colleague? Pretty bloody angry, that’s how.’
‘We’re not talking about me, Grace. We’re talking about you. I think a few days here is a very good idea. We can always reevaluate when things are a little calmer.’
‘And if I refuse?’
‘I think you’ll find it’s in your best interests to agree.’
Grace stares at him, Jack Nicholson back in her mind. Oh shit, she thinks. It can happen to someone like me.
What the hell am I supposed to do now?
She is supposed to do exactly what she does. Reluctantly agree to Frank’s wishes, telling him she is agreeing because she trusts him, appearing to wait in the hallway, calmly, while he goes off to speak to her husband and have him fill in the necessary paperwork.
As soon as he is gone, she walks casually down the corridor, her heart pounding as she rounds the corner, smashing open the emergency doors at the back of the building and tearing through the car park on bare feet, adrenaline keeping her running until she reaches the end of the road.
Once outside, Grace crouches behind a car, her heart pounding. She has to get away from here, far away, and none of the places she considers safe – Sybil’s, Clemmie’s – are safe anymore.
Escape is the only thing she can think of. If she stays here, they will come to get her – Beth will make sure of it and there is no safety in her family anymore.
A couple walk out, chatting away.
‘Excuse me?’ Grace attempts to sound as refined as possible. ‘I’m so sorry, but my phone isn’t working. Would you mind if I made a call?’ The man is about to say no, but the woman hands over her cell phone, ignoring the reprimanding look she gets.
Grace phones Sybil then, instructs her to go to Sneden’s, grab her passport from the dresser in her bedroom, some shoes, her pills, her bag, and meet her by the bank. Don’t, for God’s sake, tell anyone. No one. Swear on your life.
Sybil swears on her life.
While waiting for Sybil to arrive, Grace is supposed to do exactly what she does: curl herself into a small ball in the corner of the parking lot and rock back and forth, her whole body shaking with tears.
Twenty-five
On the plane, Grace sits, shaking uncontrollably, unable to touch the food, unable to focus on the movies, unable to do anything other than sit and shake, accepting the wine on offer, in utter disbelief about the events of the past two days.
Her life, as she knows it, is over. That much is clear. This sense of Beth being out to get her, Ted being drawn in, is no longer, she realizes, in her imagination. England is the only place that feels safe to her, and even then, she has no idea where to go once there.
Lydia is safe, but how can she turn up at Lydia’s like this? She will spend a few days in London, in a hotel, a few days in which she will be able to get on her feet, calm down, get herself together enough to be able to be seen by people who know her.
She will go to Belgraves, the hotel she and Ted occasionally used to stay in when they were in London. She doesn’t need a suite, not on her own, but will take a small room, a bath, will go down to Knightsbridge tomorrow and get some basic clothes – they’re bound to have a Gap or somewhere inexpensive for some clean leggings and tops.
No luggage, she thinks, as the pilot instructs everyone to get ready for landing. A bag. That’s it. When has she ever taken a plane without, at least, a carry-on bag? Everything she owns is back at Sneden’s Landing and, with tremendous shock, she realizes she may never see any of it again.
No, she tells herself. I will not dwell on that kind of fear. If I need to send someone to collect my jewellery, the few things that have meaning to me, I will do so. This will blow over. In some shape or form, I must recognize this is a crisis, and as such it will resolve itself, and life will get back to some kind of normal.
At the airport she waits in line for a cab, forcing herself to make small talk with the chatty Cockney driver, almost weeping at the familiarity of it all.
She and Ted used to visit London regularly. He would come every year for a book tour, then fly home, leaving Grace to go down to Dorset to stay with Lydia for a few days.
They stayed at the best hotels. First Claridge’s, then, as Ted’s fame grew and he wanted something smaller, Belgraves. They were treated like royalty, hotel staff falling over themselves to help, baskets of fruit and champagne inevitably waiting for them in their suite.
Things have changed over the past couple of years. Grace is careful not to say anything, careful to continue giving the impression that her husband is still at the top of his game, one of the most successful authors in the world, but the sales of his last two books were terrible.
His publishers have tightened their belts. Everyone is doing it, they said. Publishing is down over thirty per cent, they said, explaining why they were no longer sending him on extended book tours. We are all suffering, they said, as they booked him into a Hilton, a world away from the Four Seasons or St Regises of old.
To an outsider, their lifestyle hasn’t changed in any real, noticeable way. Grace laughingly explains they are no longer going on holiday after Christmas this year because Ted is ensconced in a new book, or they will not be joining friends on a boat off the coast of Capri this summer because Ted will be on a book tour, but it has been a long time since they have stayed in a hotel as lovely as the ones they used to stay in as a matter of course.
‘I don’t have a room booked,’ she explains to the young girl behind the desk at Belgraves. ‘This was a last-minute decision.’ She smiles, hoping to charm, hoping she doesn’t look quite as much of a mess as she fears. ‘I’m in your system. Well, my husband is. Grace and Ted Chapman?’
The woman taps on the screen for several minutes before extending a smile. ‘Of course,’ she says. ‘Here you are. Are you interested in the suite you used to stay in?’
‘Not this time.’ Grace smiles. ‘It’s just me. A room is fine.’
‘May I have your credit card,’ says the girl, as Grace pulls out her American Express.
Minutes go by. The girl frowns. ‘I’ll try that again,’ she says. ‘I’m so sorry.’ She hands the card back. ‘I’m afraid it’s been declined.’
Grace flushes a deep red. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she blusters. ‘Try this.’ She hands over her Visa card, then her MasterCard. All are declined. The young girl is embarrassed for her, but not nearly as embarrassed as Grace is herself.
‘I don’t understand it,’ she says.
‘We could take a cheque, I think,’ the girl says. ‘I’d have to check with my manager.’
‘I have no cheques,’ says Grace. ‘Never mind. Thank you.’ And she walks out of the hotel, knowing Beth has stopped her credit cards, pausing on the corner to check how much cash she has left after the taxi ride.
Seventeen pounds.
Oh God. Why didn’t she take out money when she got to JFK yesterday? She feels sick with panic. What is she supposed
to do?
Take deep breaths, she tells herself. This is going to work out. I’m close to Victoria Station, she thinks. I’ll go and find a fleabag hotel there, somewhere cheap, and I’ll phone the bank tomorrow, get money transferred. Something. I will figure this out as soon as I find a warm place to sleep.
The Bellagio Victoria Hotel on Hugh Street is about as far from its Las Vegas namesake as it is possible to get. What might once have been an impressive white-stucco terraced house now has most of the white stucco peeled off, leaving it dirty and unkempt. The dirty glass of the door is covered in stickers advertising it as a budget hotel for the traveller on the go, as Grace hesitates outside, knowing how awful it will be, knowing she doesn’t have a choice.
It smells of old, dirty carpet and smoke, despite the NO SMOKING signs everywhere. The middle-aged woman who comes out from the back room when she hears Grace’s ‘hello?’ walks out scowling.
‘I’m so sorry to trouble you,’ Grace says in her most charming of ways. ‘I just arrived here from America and there seems to be a problem with my credit cards. I only have seventeen pounds, but I was hoping you might have somewhere for me to sleep tonight, just until I can sort this out.’ Grace, so used to people saying yes to her, looks at her expectantly, knowing she will help, for this is what people do for the Chapmans: they go out of their way to help.
‘Out!’ the woman commands. ‘I’m not a bloody charity. Out!’
I’m no one anymore. These words ticker-tape through Grace’s head as she stands, mutely, staring at the woman, unable to comprehend the world she has landed in, a dull buzzing in her ears as she turns on her heel and walks out the hotel.
Grace walks and walks. The hours tick by as she wanders through the streets of a town she used to know so well, no idea where she is going or what she is going to do.
Of course she must phone Lydia, must find a pay phone, if indeed they even still exist in this digital age. They must, she thinks. There has to be a way.
In Victoria Station, Grace sighs with relief at the sight of pay phones. Thank God. And when she approaches and discovers they take credit cards only, she howls in fury and bangs the receiver down, sinking her head in her hands.