The Perfect Happiness

by Santa Montefiore

  At three o’clock Olivier took Angelica home. “That’s the best party I’ve ever been to,” she said, climbing unsteadily into the waiting car. “And it was all for me!”

  “I’m happy you enjoyed it.”

  “I didn’t think you liked Kate.”

  “It’s not that I don’t like her. Just that I find her dramas exhausting.”

  “She’s a girls’ girl.”

  “Clearly.”

  “But you got together to organize this.”

  “For you.”

  “You’re so sweet, Olivier.”

  He kissed her as the car drove up Kensington Gore. “I love you, Angelica.”

  “And I love you, Olivier.” She sighed dreamily as she realized how much she really did.

  As the car drew onto the street a hunched figure lumbered drunkenly down the road, hugging his coat tight to keep out the cold. “Oh God!” Angelica gasped. “It’s Pete.” They both stared as they passed him, making his way to Kate’s. “I’m so pleased we’re not there to witness the scene.”

  “He really wants her back.”

  “If he hadn’t been such an idiot, she would never have kicked him out.”

  “I think he’ll find he’s missed the boat.”

  “People make their lives so complicated.”

  Olivier took her hand. “I’m lucky to be married to you. I see shipwrecks all over the beach and thank God that we’re still afloat, sails billowing.”

  Angelica snuggled up to him guiltily. “Still afloat,” she replied. Closing her eyes, she envisaged the leak in the timber and mentally patched it over. If it remained below the water-line, he might never notice it.

  30

  All things happen at the perfect time.

  In Search of the Perfect Happiness

  The following morning Kate was on the telephone at dawn to report the arrival of Pete banging on her door, demanding to see the children, begging her to take him back. By the excited tone of her voice she was thrilled that he cared and triumphant that he had been brought to his knees. “Why would I want him back?” she asked. “When I have Edmondo, who worships me? Who would have thought that I’d walk down the aisle again, me of all people? The Vera Wang dress is just too beautiful to leave languishing in a cupboard.” Angelica listened sadly, thinking of the children and the little one not yet born into the chaos of Kate’s dramatic life. It didn’t really matter who the father was, for Pete would gather him into his brood and give him his name and probably never suspect that he didn’t belong to him. As for Edmondo, if he ever made it down the aisle, he’d find Pete standing between him and the altar. Angelica suspected that Kate still loved him and that she probably always would. Pete wasn’t going to give her up without a fight.

  At the end of March, the children broke up from school, and the friends dispersed across Europe for their Easter holiday. Olivier rented a chalet in Klosters, where Letizia and Gaitano had an apartment with a splendid view down the valley. Letizia had managed to bribe Scarlet’s manny, Ben, to look after her boys for the fortnight, so while the children skied together with Ben and an instructor, Angelica and Letizia were able to enjoy long lunches on the Chesa terrace in the sunshine and gentle descents down the Klosters Path. Olivier was a powerful, experienced skier, but instead of disappearing with skins in his backpack to spend the morning climbing and the afternoon descending in untracked powder, he took time to ski with his wife and children and found, to his surprise, that the pleasure he derived from watching Joe and Isabel stem down the piste far exceeded the pleasure of yet another perfect turn of his own.

  They dined at the Wynegg on snails and cheese fondue and discussed Kate and the count. Letizia and Gaitano had many friends in the village, and they swept Angelica and Olivier into their social whirl, dining at friends’ chalets and dancing at the little Casa nightclub into the early hours of the morning. Angelica felt revitalized, her marriage rejuvenated, her memory of the robbery faded and shunted to the back of her subconscious. But her first waking thoughts were of Jack.

  She dreamed of him often, always with the same sense of loss. Awake in bed, recapturing the sense of him, she’d remember the sunset at Sir Lowry’s Pass and the gentle way he had looked at her. Above all, she remembered the way he had made her feel. But that woman was gone forever now, along with the future they had embroidered with the fine threads of delusion. A future had never been in the stars for them. Although her life had returned to normal, she carried within her a small part of Jack, like a warm nugget against her heart, comforting and grazing her simultaneously.

  The children returned to school at the end of April and the girls’ lunches resumed. Angelica settled into her writing groove and inspiration flowed. Her Troilers and Dazzlings took on lives of their own beyond the pages and began to dominate her thoughts. Dreams of her book on happiness were forgotten in the flurry of her new fantasy. She didn’t know what the secret was; if anything, her affair with Jack had left her more confused than ever. What she did know was that loving her work, her children, her husband, and her friends gave her a cozy sense of contentment. If it wasn’t for the little nugget rubbing on the tender tissue of her flesh she would have believed herself as happy as any person could hope to be.

  But then Anna gave her the news she had dreaded.

  Angelica was alone at her desk. The children were at school, Olivier at work. She had felt uneasy all morning, unable to write for a heavy sense of foreboding that strained every nerve, unable to decipher why she felt so low and so flustered. When the telephone rang, she knew. Her throat had constricted with grief even before she heard Anna’s voice.

  “Angelica? It’s Anna.” Angelica sensed her sorrow bleeding down the line from Rosenbosch, and tears rose from behind her carefully constructed dam and spilled freely onto her cheeks. “Jack passed away this morning.”

  “Oh God.” Angelica’s hand shot to her heart.

  “He was very calm and very submissive. I held one hand, the girls the other. We told him how much we loved him and that, although we wouldn’t be able to see him anymore, we’d feel his spirit here among the vines and in the sunsets he so loved. He smiled. He had no strength left, but he smiled, and I saw our old familiar Jack there for the briefest moment. Then he took his last breath, peacefully, without any pain.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “It’s worse for the girls. They loved their daddy so much. I knew you’d want to know.”

  “I should have called him . . .”

  “Don’t say that. Put your energy into positive things. Send him loving thoughts for he hasn’t gone far, just out of sight.”

  “I deserted him at his most needy.”

  “He understood.”

  “I think of him every day, Anna.”

  “And he thought of you. He talked about you often, but never with regret. So you must do the same. Treasure the memories. Your short time together was precious. Love and longing will be the forces that reunite you one day. Don’t worry about that. You will meet again.” She laughed in that light, untroubled way of hers. “I hope we do, too, Angelica. You’re more than welcome here at Rosenbosch whenever you feel ready. Jack would want you to come back.”

  She swallowed hard. “When’s the funeral?”

  “Tomorrow. We’re going to bury him on the hillside above Rosenbosch.”

  She knew it was impossible for her to be there. “Will you do something for me, Anna?”

  “Of course.”

  “Put a sprig of sage on his coffin.” She closed her eyes. “With that I’ll bid him good-bye.”

  Angelica spent the rest of the day crying into her pillow. She had accused him of selfishness, but her own selfishness was shameful. Would it really have hurt to have telephoned him once in a while and e-mailed her love? Surely, the wishes of a dying man were more important than her own. She had the rest of her life to give to Olivier and their children; Jack had had only months.

  At three she went to pick up the children. Candace was s
tanding talking to Scarlet and Letizia, waiting for the big doors to open and release their offspring into the bright spring sunshine.

  Candace hurried over when she registered Angelica’s stricken face. “What’s happened?” she demanded. “Who’s died?”

  “Jack . . .” Angelica could not speak.

  “Oh my God. Jack’s dead? Truly?”

  Angelica nodded and fell against her, sobbing.

  Letizia and Scarlet gathered round, concerned. “What’s happened?”

  “Jack Meyer has died,” Candace replied, wrapping her arms around Angelica.

  “Christ!” Scarlet swore, blanching. “I don’t believe it.”

  “Who’s Jack Meyer?” Letizia hissed.

  “A South African friend of ours,” said Scarlet. “The people Angelica stayed with on her book tour. I knew he’d had cancer, but I thought he was in remission.”

  “It came back,” said Angelica, pulling away and wiping her eyes. “He died this morning.”

  “You remember, he had the hots for Angelica,” Scarlet reminded Letizia.

  “But of course,” said Letizia emphatically, putting her hand on Angelica’s shoulder. “Why don’t you let me take Isabel and Joe?”

  “Let’s all go to tea at your house, the children can play downstairs and we can give Angelica a stiff drink in your sitting room,” Candace suggested. Angelica nodded gratefully, feeling the warmth of friendship envelop her like a beloved old rug.

  Candace gave Angelica, Joe, and Isabel a lift in her car, calling her housekeeper on her mobile to change the arrangements she had made for her own children’s tea. When they arrived at Letizia’s terraced house, Joe and Isabel were delighted to find themselves in the company of all their friends and rushed off in a rowdy gang to the playroom downstairs. Angelica flopped onto the sofa in the first-floor sitting room, curling her feet under her and hugging the mug of tea Letizia had laced with whiskey. Scarlet joined her on the sofa. Letizia was on the point of sitting down, having brought up tea and biscuits on a tray, when the doorbell rang. “That’ll be Kate,” she said, hurrying downstairs to open it. The girls glanced at one another in silence, listening to the slamming of the door and Kate and Letizia talking in low voices in the hall.

  “Not me!” said Candace, raising her hands.

  “Letizia, of course,” said Scarlet with a chuckle. “She was texting in the car.”

  “If I’m going to pour out my soul, it might as well be to all of you,” said Angelica, smiling feebly. “Save you from gossiping about it later.”

  “Don’t bet on it, honey! What you’re about to divulge will give us all months of gossip!”

  “I’m so sorry about Jack!” Kate exclaimed as she rushed in on a wind of perfume, her pregnant belly stretching the fabric of her vintage Mary Quant minidress. Since her love affair with the count, her dress had got more lavish, her jewelry more brash, and her scent overpowering. She sat down and crossed her long legs so that the gold buckles on her Roger Vivier shoes glinted in the sunlight streaming through the tall sash windows. “So who is he?”

  Angelica smiled through her tears. “He was my lover,” she said simply, and for once there was nothing Kate could say to bring the conversation around to herself.

  The girls listened, spellbound, as Angelica confessed to loving Jack. She told them the story from the very beginning. From the moment she had felt the frisson of attraction at Scarlet’s dinner party to the telephone call that morning, ending it all. They asked questions, probed into her feelings and her thoughts, and the strange thing was that the more Angelica talked about him, the less she hurt. Sharing her pain reduced the inflammation. Sharing the memories filled her heart with joy, for the love they had forged and the fun they had had. She trusted them to keep her secret: after all, they only gossiped to one another.

  “The irony is that my affair with Jack has made me appreciate Olivier more. Our marriage has been strengthened because of it, and I salute Jack for that. He taught me to live in the present, and that is what I’m trying to do. None of us knows what’s around the corner.” She looked at her closest friends sitting around her, listening without judgment, understanding with compassion, supporting with humor, and realized that there was nothing in the world more healing than friendship.

  “Oh my God!” Kate cried, holding out her teacup and staring down at her lap. “My waters have broken.”

  “Really? Are you sure?” Letizia asked, horrified.

  “I don’t know why else a torrent of water would gush out of me!”

  “I hope they haven’t discontinued that fabric,” said Candace, glancing at the William Yeoward armchair that was now drenched with Kate’s fluids.

  Angelica laughed at Kate’s immaculate sense of timing. “I didn’t think anything could upstage my story.”

  “Foolish woman, you should know better,” said Candace. “The time of reckoning is now upon us.”

  “Darling, do you want me to call Pete?” Letizia asked.

  “Do you have to?”

  “I think I should. It’s his baby, isn’t it?”

  Kate pulled an anxious face. “I’m still not sure.”

  Letizia shrugged helplessly. “Do you want me to call the other father?”

  “No,” Kate snapped. “I’ll call Edmondo.”

  “You can’t have Pete and Edmondo at the birth!” Candace exclaimed. “There’ll be a god-awful fight.”

  “What shall I do?” Kate wailed, suddenly ashen with panic. She grabbed Letizia’s arm. “You have to come with me. I’m not giving birth on my own. You must all come with me!” Kate demanded. Letizia pulled her up to stand shakily, holding on to Letizia’s arm as if it were her lifeline.

  “I’ll take you to the hospital,” Letizia volunteered. “Someone has to stay with the children.”

  “I’ll stay!” Candace put up her hand. “I’m not very good at childbirth. I don’t do pain.”

  “Pain? For God’s sake get me to the hospital quick. If I’m too late for an epidural, I might die.” Kate began to stagger down the stairs.

  “Where’s your overnight bag?” Scarlet asked, following after.

  “It’s in my bedroom. Take the key from my bag and let yourself in. Thank God my waters didn’t break in the Chanel department at Selfridges.”

  Letizia rushed Kate to the Portland Hospital, where she gave birth to a baby boy. Letizia was pale, having held Kate’s hand for the duration. “Now I know why husbands prefer to pace the corridor outside,” she said when Candace, Scarlet, and Angelica arrived armed with flowers and White Company bags of presents. “It’s a bloody battle scene!”

  The girls crowded into the small room. Kate lay serenely in bed holding Hercules in her arms, the two looking like the Virgin and Child. They gathered around curiously and gazed into the small face, searching for Pete in the squashed pink features of the baby. “He looks like you,” said Candace, disappointed.

  “He looks just like Pete,” Kate replied happily.

  “No, I can’t see Pete in there. He’s totally you.”

  “I’ve called him. He’s on his way.”

  “What about Edmondo?”

  “As Hercules is Pete’s, it’s only right that he gets to hold him first. A son. Imagine that! I’ve given Pete a son.”

  “You sound like Anne Boleyn,” said Angelica. The door swung open.

  “Ah, here’s King Henry,” said Candace, stepping aside.

  Pete walked through them to gaze at his child as if they weren’t there. His face flushed with emotion. “A son!” he exclaimed proudly.

  Kate handed him over. “Hercules,” she said.

  “Hercules?” Pete wasn’t convinced.

  “A suitably heroic name,” said Kate.

  “The poor little thing hasn’t done anything yet,” Pete argued.

  “Oh yes, he has,” said Candace under her breath, nudging Angelica. “I think now would be a good time to leave.”

  “Do you think it is Pete’s?” Angelica asked Candac
e and Scarlet as they descended in the lift.

  “Absolutely not,” Candace replied.

  “Oh, I think it probably is,” said Scarlet.

  “Doesn’t look anything like him.”

  “But it doesn’t look like anyone else,” Scarlet reminded her.

  “That’s because we don’t know what we’re looking for. Give it time. The truth always comes out in the end.”

  The birth of Hercules changed nothing with respect to Kate and Pete’s divorce. The lawyers fought it out, and Edmondo distracted Kate with promises of palaces and parties and a lavish wedding on the beaches of Mauritius, which had always been her dream. A year went by. Angelica finished her book and handed it in. Claudia called as soon as she had read it to say that it was even better than The Silk Serpent. Olivier read the manuscript and took her out for dinner to celebrate, raising his glass to his gifted, beautiful wife, and Angelica realized that, with time and love, it was possible for emotional scars to heal. Life went on like a train that waits for no one; she couldn’t alter its course, but she could alter the way she chose to travel.

  Then, one spring evening, as Angelica sat in the garden watching the blue tits fly in and out of the feeding cage that swung from the magnolia tree, Olivier came out with two glasses of wine, having just returned from work. The children were playing on the painted wooden playhouse, jumping off the roof, frightening the squirrels away from the bird food with their noisy chatter.

  “You’re home early,” she said, pleased.

  “I want to spend more time with my family.” He handed her the wine and a little blue book, the size of his hand.

  “What’s this?”

  “I was in Waterstone’s, buying a book on Roman emperors for Joe, when I saw a pile of these on the counter. The funny name and pretty cover caught my attention. When I read the title, I thought it was something you’d like.”

  She stared at the words, her eyes misting with the sudden cascade of memories. “Thank you, darling,” she replied. “How thoughtful of you.”