Wicked Pleasures

by Penny Vincenzi

  And she had to admit that Alexander did seem well, and on the whole relaxed. He was particularly delighted by Max’s more frequent visits to Hartest (usually with Gemma), and Max’s apparently increased warmth towards him; he would talk about them both when they had gone as if they had done something remarkable and even difficult, rather than simply driving down from London for lunch; Georgina found this especially irritating; she tried to tell herself she was being childish, that Max was a treat, something served up in great style every once in a way, while she was there every day, part of the furniture, nursery fare and of little interest – but it still stung her.

  Alexander had been talking to her about his new dairy on one of their walks one dark day a week later.

  ‘So I thought we could convert some of the old stables into a dairy,’ he was saying, ‘and start production in, say, April. There’s such a big demand for yogurt and so on these days, ice cream maybe even, and we could call it the Caterham Dairy or something like that, so that it had a bit of character. What do you think?’

  ‘I think it’s a wonderful idea,’ said Georgina. ‘Really I do. Have you talked to Martin about it?’

  ‘Of course. He’s very keen. As a matter of fact he’s coming to lunch today. Why don’t you join us?’

  ‘I’d like that.’ She smiled at him. ‘You know how much I love Martin.’

  ‘Yes, he’s a real charmer.’ He looked at her, and said, ‘Darling, I do think you ought to think about getting back to college now. I so appreciate how much you’ve done for me, but I’m fine now, and I hate to see you stuck down here wasting your life.’

  ‘I’m not stuck, Daddy, and I don’t see it as wasting my life.’ Georgina took a deep breath and looked at him. ‘Daddy, there’s something I have to tell you. Something you need to know.’

  ‘What’s that, darling? You’re not going to give up architecture, are you? It would be such a pity.’

  ‘Well – I don’t know. Maybe I’ll get back to it one day. No – the thing is – well, Daddy, you see, I’m – I’m going to have a baby.’

  He looked at her, and his face was more than expressionless, it was absolutely blank, white, as if someone had drawn it, drawn the features and then not put in any emotion whatsoever. His eyes particularly were lifeless: almost unseeing. Then finally he said, ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean what I say,’ said Georgina, puzzled. ‘I’m going to have a baby. I’m pregnant.’

  ‘Well it’s ridiculous,’ he said briskly, appearing to come slowly back to life. ‘Of course you can’t have a baby. You must – have it seen to. Like the last time. You’d better go and see that woman – what’s she called? Page? Something like that.’

  ‘Paget,’ said Georgina. ‘Lydia Paget. She’s moved back to Queen Charlotte’s now, but I’ve been going up to see her. She’s going to deliver the baby, I hope.’

  ‘Georgina, you’re talking nonsense. Nobody is going to deliver your baby. You’re not married and you’re much too young. Why hasn’t this Paget woman talked to me about it? I have to say I think it’s outrageous.’

  ‘Daddy, you’re talking nonsense,’ said Georgina. This wasn’t going quite as she had hoped. ‘I’m twenty-two. I can do what I like.’

  ‘And who is the father of this baby?’ said Alexander. He was beginning to look angry now, a flush rising in his pale face. ‘And exactly how pregnant are you?’

  ‘I’m six months pregnant,’ said Georgina, meeting his eyes, surprised and impressed at her own calm. ‘And –’ some swift, deep instinct warned her not to say, not to tell Alexander more than she absolutely had to –‘I would rather not say who the father is.’

  ‘Oh really? And perhaps you can tell me why he hasn’t married you, whoever he is, why he isn’t here supporting you?’

  ‘Because,’ said Georgina carefully, ‘we don’t want to get married. We’re not suited to one another, it wouldn’t have been a good idea.’

  ‘Well, I suppose I have to be grateful for that at least. So you’re going to raise an illegitimate child instead, without a father, simply because suddenly you find you’d made a mistake. I presume he knows about the baby, whoever he is?’

  ‘No,’ said Georgina, alarmed, ‘no he doesn’t. I – thought it best not to tell him. It would be better, I thought, to be on my own.’

  ‘Well, it sounds like a piece of extremely muddled thinking to me, Georgina, I have to say. And how do you think you’re going to support this child? Where are you going to bring it up?’

  ‘Well –’ She stared at him, beginning to be frightened now. ‘Well here, I thought. I mean it is my home, and Nanny would –’

  That had been a mistake. Alexander’s voice rose.

  ‘Nanny! I hope Nanny doesn’t know about this, and has remained silent also? Because if she does, if she has –’

  ‘No,’ said Georgina hastily. ‘She has absolutely no idea. I just thought – well, she’s here and the nurseries and – well, I thought you might agree –’

  ‘Georgina, I do not agree. Not to any absurd ideas you might have about bringing up your baby at Hartest. I cannot imagine how you could ever have thought of such a thing. You can pursue this insane plan if you must; I can see that it’s a little late to do anything else now. But you will not do it here, and you’ll get no help from me. I don’t want you or your baby at Hartest. Do you understand? I want none of it. None.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Georgina, ‘yes, I understand. Don’t worry, Daddy, I’ll remove myself, and the baby. Straight away. I’m surprised it’s what you want, but I’ll go.’

  ‘It is what I want,’ he said. ‘I’m appalled at you, Georgina, appalled, that you could behave in such a stupid, amoral way and that you could be so incredibly insensitive as to think I would welcome you and your child here. You are no daughter of mine.’

  ‘No,’ she said, looking at him very levelly, ‘no, I know I’m not. I never really believed it before. But I do now.’

  She couldn’t remember afterwards exactly what happened; she must have gone back to the house, packed, loaded up her car, gone to see Nanny, explained to her, and then driven to London, and moved into Eaton Place: because at seven o’clock that night, that was where she found herself, sitting in the drawing room, still numb, very calm, and listening to Nanny’s voice on the phone asking her if she was all right.

  ‘I’m fine, Nanny, really. Now promise me, promise you won’t tell anyone, or say anything to Daddy. He’ll just blame you. I’m only going to be here a few days, and then I’ll find a flat or something.’

  ‘He’s so childish,’ said Nanny crossly, as if Alexander had thrown a fit of pique over some trifle, rather than told his favourite child to leave his house. ‘But he will get over it, Georgina, he really will. You mustn’t fret. He’ll have you back, when he’s got over the shock.’

  ‘He won’t,’ said Georgina, ‘and I don’t want to be had back.’ She heard her voice wobble.

  ‘Now listen,’ said Nanny, ‘when are you going to see that doctor again? I don’t like the thought of you up there in London, with no medical help at hand.’ She made London sound like some remote Hebridean island.

  ‘I’ll see her tomorrow, Nanny, I promise. I’m fine. Honestly. Don’t worry.’

  She told Max first, the next day, after seeing Lydia Paget and getting herself booked into Queen Charlotte’s to have the baby.

  ‘I just don’t get it, Georgina. I think you ought to tell Kendrick.’

  ‘Well I may one day,’ said Georgina, ‘but I don’t want to yet. And you’re not to tell him, and if you do I’ll – well, I can think of all sorts of things I’d do to you.’

  She was grinning, but she could tell she’d struck home; Max scowled at her.

  ‘Are you going to stay here?’

  ‘No,’ said Georgina. ‘I most certainly am not. I don’t want to, and I don’t think Daddy would let me even if I did. I’m moving as soon as I can find somewhere.’

  ‘Let’s ask Angie,’ said Max. ‘She
’ll have lots of nice little nests for you, I’m sure.’

  Charlotte was very cross too: that Georgina had not told her, that she had not told Kendrick, that she had let things go so far.

  ‘He has a right to know, Georgina,’ she said firmly. ‘It’s positively immoral not telling him. Perhaps I’d better go over and see him.’

  ‘Of course you mustn’t!’ said Georgina, alarmed. ‘I don’t know why everybody thinks I can’t handle my own life. I’ve made a decision not to tell Kendrick and I’m not going to. And you’re not to. Anyway, I thought Grandpa would set about you with a computer terminal if he so much as set eyes on you in New York.’

  ‘Yes, I’m afriad he might,’ said Charlotte with a sigh. ‘He’s shown no sign whatsoever of forgiving me. Even so, Georgie, you ought to tell Kendrick. I really do think so.’

  Angie, greatly to Georgina’s surprise, disagreed with them all.

  ‘It’ll just cause a lot of hassle, if you tell Kendrick,’ she said briskly. ‘He’ll come over and start mooning about, and think he’s got to offer to marry you, and Mary Rose is quite likely to get involved, and who needs it? You’ll be much better off on your own, if you ask me. Much less complicated. Don’t let them bully you.’

  She had found Georgina a very nice little flat in Chiswick, which she said Georgina could have for nothing for the time being at least; Georgina argued, and said she must give her something for it, that she had some money from investments, but Angie told her to shut up, that she needed every penny she’d got, and that she could pay her back one day.

  ‘Bloody Alexander. What a pig,’ she said. She had gone round to the flat to see if everything was in order, the day Georgina moved in.

  Georgina looked at Angie, who seemed very upset and drawn, and altogether wretched. Well, it was hardly surprising; it was only a month since Baby had died.

  Georgina slipped into an oddly peaceful routine, and soon felt as if she had been living in Chiswick for ever. She took great care of herself, feeling that however irresponsible it might be to become an unmarried mother, and one moreover with no gainful employment at her fingertips, she owed it to her baby to see that they were both as healthy as possible. She ate all the right things; she rested every afternoon; she saw Lydia Paget regularly for her checkups and she went to antenatal classes at Queen Charlotte’s every week, and lay on the floor with a lot of other pregnant ladies, learning to relax and to do special breathing exercises.

  She had expected to feel bored and lonely, but she was neither; a curious tranquillity had taken her over. Everyone told her it was hormonal. She read a great deal, she walked for at least an hour a day and she redecorated the flat entirely, taking special delight in the nursery, which she painted white with huge golden sunflowers climbing up the wall, and a trompe l’oeil on one wall of a window looking out onto a child’s picture-book scene of blue skies, white cotton-wool clouds and rolling eiderdown hills, studded with sheep and horses.

  Charlotte and Tommy were her most frequent visitors: Charlotte to check on her and cluck over her and to put in at least ten minutes every time trying to persuade her to tell Kendrick, and Tommy just to chat (and also she suspected to check on her). So far the two of them had avoided arriving at the same time; it seemed bound to happen sooner or later.

  Charlotte was worried and distracted about the office. Freddy had been on a couple of flying visits with Chris Hill, ‘checking things out’. Bill Webb, the chief trader, had already threatened to leave, and so had Charlotte’s immediate boss, Peter Donaldson.

  ‘And I get to do the square root of nothing most of the time,’ said Charlotte disconsolately. ‘When I think of how fast I was getting on in New York – well–’

  ‘Any chance of getting back to New York soon?’ asked Georgina.

  Charlotte shook her head and sighed. ‘Absolutely none. Grandpa is still hardly speaking to me. I’m so sick of it, Georgie, I can’t tell you. I keep talking to Charles about going into law. I’m sure I’d be happier.’

  ‘And what does Charles say?’ said Georgina.

  ‘Well, he says I have to remember what I’ll be giving up, and how much I loved it in New York. And I suppose he’s right. Anyway, I’m hanging on for now. I don’t have much alternative.’

  When she had gone, Georgina sat and thought about Charles. She hadn’t met him, but he sounded incredibly nice. She wished she had a Charles: someone who cared about her, who she could talk about her future to, someone to advise her, someone who was hers. The nearest she had to such a person at the moment was Tommy, and he hardly came into the same category. Not that she wasn’t very fond of him, she was. She had told Max so, and he had laughed in a rather smug way and said he’d told them all Tommy was a good egg and now they were all coming round to the idea.

  ‘Charlotte isn’t,’ said Georgina.

  ‘Charlotte gets more like a head girl every day,’ said Max.

  She missed Alexander a lot; that was her only real sadness. She loved him, very much, and they had been extremely close; he suddenness with which he had thrown her out of his life had literally shocked her. She also felt an appalling sense of injustice, and anger, that after all she had done, given up for him, he had not supported her when she needed him. At first she had expected to hear from him, had thought he would phone or write and say he was sorry, ask her to come home; but he didn’t. Nanny phoned quite often to see if she was all right, and told her Alexander was still going round like a bear with a sore head, but that he never mentioned her. It hurt, Georgina found, exploring this piece of knowledge rather as if it was a sensitive tooth; it hurt badly.

  And as the child within her grew, larger, stronger, more vigorous, so did her interest in, her speculation about, her feeling of need for her other, shadowy father.

  Her other regular visitor was Mrs Wicks, who dropped in at least twice a week with a box of eclairs; she had heard about the baby from Angie, and she had always liked Georgina, so had taken it upon herself to play Mum, as she put it. The first time she came she asked Georgina if there was anything she fancied and Georgina had said promptly, ‘A chocolate eclair,’ and now they shared several over a cup of good strong tea each visit. Mrs Wicks was also knitting for the baby, and showering upon Georgina a vast number of bootees, bonnets and matinée jackets all in rather strong colours. She said she never could understand why babies had to be dressed in washed-out pinks and blues and had been particularly delighted when she had found some skeins of bright, rainbow-coloured wool at the Kilburn Market on her way to Clifford’s flat. Nanny, who had been to visit Georgina a few times, had found the drawerful of luridly coloured clothes; when she heard their source her lips had been drawn in so tightly they could not be seen at all, and she had said she hoped Georgina wouldn’t actually be dressing the baby in them, as you couldn’t be too careful these days. She was very jealous of Mrs Wicks’s regular access to Georgina, and told her not to take any notice of any advice Mrs Wicks might give her about the baby: ‘She’s an old woman, Georgina, she wouldn’t know what was what at all any more.’

  One afternoon towards the middle of December she was wandering round the Marble Arch branch of Marks and Spencer looking rather hopelessly for Christmas presents (and wondering whatever she might do for Christmas: clearly not go home, even if Alexander did ask her, which seemed increasingly unlikely, and the one on offer, to spend it with Tommy and Angie, didn’t feel quite right) when she bumped into Catriona Dunbar right by the thermal underwear. Bump was the word; her stomach met Catriona before anything else did. In just the last two weeks she seemed to have grown dramatically. (‘Carrying it right to the front,’ Mrs Wicks had said confidently, ‘got to be a girl.’ Georgina had been slightly puzzled by this as all babies seemed to her to be carried in the front, but she knew better than to argue with Mrs Wicks.)

  ‘Georgina!’ said Catriona, rallying swiftly from what must have been a considerable shock. ‘How nice. How are you? Your father said you’d gone back to university.’

 
‘Oh – oh, yes I have,’ said Georgina, not wishing to make Alexander appear a liar with all the attendant complications of such a scenario. ‘I’m just up here for some shopping. How are you? And Martin?’

  ‘Oh absolutely fine. Jolly busy, of course. Marvellous idea of your father’s about the dairy, isn’t it?’

  ‘Marvellous,’ said Georgina.

  There was a silence. Then Catriona said, ‘Well – I must be getting on. It’s so crowded, isn’t it, and I’ve hardly started. We’ll see you at Christmas, of course. You’ll come and have a drink or something, won’t you?’

  ‘Oh – yes, of course,’ said Georgina. ‘Thank you. Bye, Catriona.’

  The next day her phone rang. It was Martin Dunbar. Georgina almost dropped it, she was so amazed. He sounded hesitant, and was clearly very embarrassed.

  ‘Georgina. How are you?’

  ‘I’m absolutely fine, Martin, thank you.’

  ‘Good. Because my wife said – well – look, Georgina, please don’t think I’m interfering, but does your father know about – well, the baby? I mean you’re not – not – well, in any kind of jam, are you?’

  Georgina felt a rush of tenderness towards him: that he should have the courage and the concern to ring her and broach the subject of what he clearly thought must be a secret to be kept from her father. She smiled into the phone.

  ‘Martin, that’s so sweet of you. I’m so touched. No, I’m not in a jam, I’m living in a very nice flat and I’m being well looked after by everyone. And yes, Daddy does know. Honestly. He’s a bit upset about it, because I’m not married or anything, you know.’

  Martin sounded relieved. ‘Well, I was just – well, worried.’

  ‘You’re so nice to worry.’ She felt close to tears at his kindness. ‘Thank you. Um – how did you know where I was?’

  ‘Oh, well, I asked Nanny,’ he said, and sounded rather proud of himself at this piece of duplicity. ‘I thought she was bound to know, even if your father didn’t.’