‘Sebastian, don’t pretend to me. You know perfectly well. Demand another huge copyright fee for Meridian Times Two. When you know, you know perfectly well times are so hard. And Oliver has this worry about The Buchanans.’
‘Who told you that?’
‘Oliver. Of course. Paul Davis had written to him today. I just cannot believe it of you, Sebastian, cannot believe you would do that to us, after all Lyttons has done for you. Clearly the publicity and acclaim has finally gone to your head.’
‘Celia,’ he said, and his eyes were very hard, ‘I think perhaps you should check your facts before launching into an attack of this kind. Do you really think I would have instructed Paul Davis to demand a large fee from you? Do you? Because if you do, then we have very little to say to one another from now on. I find it extraordinarily painful that you should lay that charge at me. In fact, I think I would like you to leave my house at once.’
She was silent; panic rising in her. At yet another mistake, yet another misjudgement.
‘For what it might be worth to you,’ he said and his face was set, his lips white-rimmed with rage, ‘I told Paul Davis to tell Oliver I wanted no copyright fee at all for Meridian Times Two actually. Given that I do indeed know that times are hard. And that Lyttons need the book. I will of course try to establish why he chose to ignore my instructions; but I think you might have given me the benefit of the doubt, until such time as you were able to establish the facts. In England a man is innocent until he is proved guilty; perhaps, in your usual sublime conviction of your own rightness, you have not troubled to consider that. Good evening to you. I’m sure you can see yourself out.’
He got up, walked out of the room and up the stairs; Celia sat in the drawing-room for some time. Then moving very slowly and heavily, as if she was a old woman, she followed him.
‘I think,’ she said, ‘I have decided to leave Oliver.’
‘To live with this man?’ Lady Beckenham’s face was absolutely expressionless: like her voice. She had come up to London for a few days, to attend a couple of debutante balls and to go to Henley.
‘Yes. I can’t stand it any longer, Mama. I can’t stand the deceit, the endless betrayal. I want a divorce. I’m cheating, all the time, living a lie. It feels so wrong. It’s not fair on anyone, least of all Oliver—’
‘And I suppose it would be perfectly fair on Oliver to walk out on him. Not to mention the children. Living a lie, as you call it, is the price you pay for the pleasure, Celia. You don’t get anything for nothing in this life, as I’ve told you ever since you could understand anything at all.’
‘But it was different for your generation.’
‘Oh really? And why is that? Do tell me.’
Her dark eyes, so like Celia’s own, were almost amused.
‘Well – there isn’t the same need for keeping up appearances. For being respectable, doing the right thing. People live more openly now, nobody minds what anyone does any more—’
‘I have heard you talk some nonsense in my time, Celia, most notably on the subject of those absurd politics of yours, but that takes the biscuit. I think you would find a great many people would mind what you did, if you actually did it. Walked out on your husband, abandoned your children. Or were you intending to take the children with you?’
‘In time yes, obviously. But in the first instance – well I haven’t quite decided what to do.’
‘It may not be up to you to decide. If you do walk out. A judge might very well say they should stay with their father. Indeed I hope that he would.’
‘Mama, that is so unfair.’
‘I don’t think it is. Why should you remove Oliver’s children from him, as well as yourself? What wrong has he done them? Divorce is still an ugly word, Celia, and describes an ugly condition. It is not without reason that divorced people are not received by the royal family—’
‘Oh, really—’
‘I would suggest, Celia, that you move that stubborn mind of yours forward a few years – only a very few now – when you will want to bring Venetia and Adele out. You would not be able to present them at court yourself. Many of my generation would cold-shoulder you. You would not be invited into the royal enclosure at Ascot. To any garden parties or court balls.’
Celia looked at her; then she said, ‘If you think I would stay with Oliver, when I no longer love him, simply because I would be banned from the royal garden parties, then you don’t know me very well.’
‘I know you very well indeed, Celia. I know what matters to you and what doesn’t. You enjoy your place in society very much; you enjoy everything it entails. I haven’t noticed you actually refusing invitations to court balls, or dropping your title. There is, after all, nothing to prevent you doing that if you really want to. Anyway, let’s set that aside. Do you really think this honesty and openness, of which you speak so highly, is going to make up to Oliver for being abandoned, made to look a fool, do you think your children are going to feel happy and secure in the knowledge that you’re leading a more honest life, even though you’re not living at home with them any more? Or they are being dragged away from everything that is familiar to them, to live with some man they hardly know.’
‘They are very – fond of Sebastian,’ said Celia.
‘Oh Celia, really! The next thing you’ll be telling me is that they’ll accept him as your lover, say how marvellous for you both and they can’t wait to come and visit you. They won’t. They’ll be angry and bewildered and hostile and with good reason. I’m ashamed of you, Celia, and I want you to be in no doubt about it.’
‘I thought,’ said Celia, her voice shaking with anger, ‘I thought you supported me in this. That’s why I’m talking to you about it.’
‘Of course you didn’t. That’s a very dishonest piece of thinking. I supported you in your love affair; I could see life with Oliver was pretty miserable and unfulfilling at one time, probably still is very difficult. Most marriages are from time to time. I wouldn’t begin to argue with that. But I told you from the very beginning that the basis for such a thing, if it was to work, was absolute and scrupulous loyalty to what really matters in life: the status quo. For God’s sake, Celia, you’ve got a happy family, you’ve got money, you’ve got a very nice house, which, incidentally, your father bought so that you could live with another man you were madly in love with, you’ve got a career, what are you going to do about that incidentally, carry on working at Lyttons? A little difficult I would have thought. And you’ve got a good, if rather dull husband who worships the ground you walk on, and another man to go to bed with. What more do you want?’
Celia was silent; then she said very quietly, ‘I want to be happy again. I want to live with the man I love.’
‘Dear God in heaven. And how long do you think that’s going to last? Is this man you love so much never going to bore you at the dinner table? Is he never going to snore, or have bad breath? Or be bad-tempered or lazy, or take less than a one hundred per cent interest in you twenty-four hours a day? Are you going to continue to melt with desire at his touch and want to have intercourse with him at every possible opportunity for the rest of your life? I really do beg leave to doubt it, Celia.’
Celia sat staring at her mother for a moment; then she stood up and said, ‘I’m going to leave now. I should never have embarked on this discussion. I thought I might get some help and guidance from you.’
‘You’ve had the help and guidance, Celia. Just think about what I’ve said before you take any action. That’s the only other piece of guidance I intend to offer.’
‘Celia, darling—’
‘Yes, what is it? I’m just leaving, Jack, I really can’t—’
‘No, no, I don’t want to detain you. I just wondered if you wanted to come to the Berkeley tonight? Lots of us are going, it would be marvellous if—’
‘No, Jack, I can’t, I’m sorry, I have to work tonight. I’ve got to visit Lady Annabel about Queen Anne and then—’
‘Oh.
Well if you change your mind. We’ll be there till awfully late.’
‘I’m afraid I won’t. Change my mind, I mean. But thank you for thinking of your old sister-in-law.’
‘Not old at all, darling. Still only thirty-four – just. We’re just about the same age, remember.’
‘I do find that hard to remember actually,’ said Celia with a sigh, ‘but anyway, no, I can’t. Sorry.’
‘It’s us who’ll be sorry,’ said Jack.
He went home to change. Brunson met him in the hall, asked him if he would like a cocktail and whether he would be in for dinner.
‘No, not tonight, Brunson.’
‘Very well, sir. I will inform Cook.’
Jack went upstairs and lay in his bath, sipping his cocktail. He would miss all this. But he really did have to make the break. He had sent Lily an enormous bouquet of red roses, and gone to see her and told her he thought she was right and that he was already looking at houses and flats.
‘Some very jolly places in Sloane Street.’
‘About time too,’ Lily said; she hadn’t been over-enthusiastic, but she had agreed to go away for the weekend with him in between shows, which she’d always refused to do before, so obviously he had done the right thing. Guy had been right. Funny creatures, women. Very complicated.
Poor old Guy; he was in a hell of a state. Worrying about the book. He had been into Lyttons twice more for meetings with the solicitors; the second time Jack had met him in the lavatory and he’d seemed near tears.
‘I never meant to cause all this trouble,’ he said, ‘I never thought anyone would react like this.’
The manuscript had been sent off to the Lothians now; Jack had read the book and couldn’t for the life of him see what they were making such a fuss about. There was a bit about the master of the college, Anthony Buchanan, having an affair with some undergraduate, but if he hadn’t really, as Guy continued to swear, what did it matter? Unless he had, and Guy hadn’t known about it and even then, it was hardly Guy’s fault. And in which case also, it was pretty stupid of the Lothian chap to draw attention to himself.
He came out of his bathroom, whistling and bumped into Barty. She smiled at him and blushed and disappeared into her own room. Sweet kid, and getting so pretty now; she was going to be a stunner. He’d noticed a couple of Giles’s friends taking a great interest in her at the Fourth of June this year. When she came out – Jack wondered suddenly if she would come out. If Celia would have her presented. It was a bit complicated, all that. Might be difficult.
‘I had to see you,’ said Celia, ‘I just had to. I feel so – so confused.’
‘My darling, there’s nothing to be confused about,’ said Sebastian, kissing her. ‘I love you and you love me. We want to be together. We’re going to be together. What could be simpler?’
‘I know. I know. But—’
‘No buts. We’ve been butting long enough. We’ve made our decision.’
‘I know. I know.’ She was silent, thinking about the making of the decision; the night, after their row, when she had gone up to his room, and found him weeping.
Weeping that she could think so badly of him, weeping at what he saw was the loss of her. She thought about the extraordinary passion which they had found in one another then, the raw tenderness of his response to her, her remorse, her humbling, both so strange to her, so difficult. She had stood there, looking down at him, saying, ‘I’m sorry, Sebastian, I’m so sorry,’ the words coming out slowly and awkwardly and then there had been his own long silence as he waited, waited to see how he felt, for he had truly been hurt almost beyond endurance, not by her words, but that she could speak them, think the things which had prompted them. And then slowly, very deliberately, she had begun to undress, and had finally stood before him naked, utterly submissive, prepared for rejection. And even as he pulled her to him, reluctant still, in spite of wanting her, angry still, in spite of her apology, he knew he loved her more than anything, that she was dearer to him than he could have believed possible and that he could not contemplate life without her any more.
When it was over, when they had recovered one another, when they lay, shaking, weak, a long difficult climax finally reached, when he was smiling at her through his own tears, wiping away hers, he said, ‘Please, Celia. Please come to me. Fully. Join my life. You know it’s right, you know you have to,’ and she had stared at him, looking shocked and confused rather than joyful and delighted as he might have expected, but finally, through the silence, she had said, ‘Yes, Sebastian, I think probably I do.’
‘You’re not changing your mind are you?’ he said now.
She looked at him, looked down at her lap, and said, ‘I – don’t think so.’
‘Celia, please. We’ve been through this, we’ve decided, you’ve decided. We’ve discussed it all. You said you felt happy about it, that it was the only decision—’
‘I know, I know.’ She stared at him, trying to smile, to be calm.
Panic engulfed her hourly: at what she had said she would do, at the reasons for saying it; at her own doubts that it was right. Her mother’s words had affected her more than she would have believed; in the midst of her turmoil they formed a cool, considered centre. And yet – she knew her mother was wrong. She had never been more sure than the night before; she had come home late, from a genuine meeting with Lady Annabel, walked into the house and found Oliver, apparently collapsed at his desk. In fact he had simply been asleep. And distressed as she was, the dreadful, evil relief had come to her, that he had had a heart attack and died, that she would be free. Lying next to him later, listening to his steady breathing, she had forced herself to confront that relief again, the depths of selfishness and wickedness which she had reached, and wondered how it could possibly be considered right to live with a man she wished were dead.
She lit a cigarette, drew on it hard. ‘Sebastian—’
‘Celia, no. I can’t let you go through all this again. You have said you would leave Oliver and you will leave Oliver. It’s right – for all of us. Look at you, you’re ill with anxiety over it.’
It was true; she really wasn’t well. She had a severe cough – she supposed it must be partly smoking – she had no appetite, but a constant, nauseous stomach pain, and she couldn’t sleep. She was dreadfully thin. She looked ghastly, she knew; her hair and skin dull, her eyes heavy and shadowed.
‘I have brought you to this,’ said Sebastian, reaching out tenderly, stroking her cheek, ‘I’m so sorry.’
‘No, Sebastian, not you. I’ve brought myself to it.’
‘You do look absolutely exhausted. I suppose you’re working too hard as well.’
‘I have to. It keeps me sane. Sebastian, what would I do about Lyttons? If—’
‘When,’ he said firmly, ‘when you are with me. I don’t know. I’ve thought about it a lot. I suppose you can hardly go in there every day. It would not be a comfortable arrangement.’
‘No,’ she said. And thought of her work there, which was so much of her life, much of what was real in her life, thought of being without it, and found it very distressing. For some reason she had not properly confronted it before; before her mother had mentioned it. So central to her, indeed, was her work, that being without it was unimaginable, a life without light or food.
‘I thought,’ said Sebastian, ‘you could set up as a freelance editor. Half the authors and indeed half the publishers in London would come to you. You could still work for Lyttons of course; but not exclusively. You could work from home—’
‘From home?’ she said stupidly, thinking automatically of Cheyne Walk. ‘How could I work from home—’
‘We could make you a study. Plenty of rooms. You like that one upstairs, next to my bedroom.’
‘Oh. Yes. Yes, I see.’ A new home: in a house that was not hers. But that would become hers.
If she was brave enough.
‘And – the children?’
‘Celia, we’ve discussed the chi
ldren. I would love to have the children. Some of the time at least. They are not a problem.’
‘But at first—’
‘At first you will have to leave them. Until matters have been arranged.’
She was silent; thinking again of her mother’s words. ‘They’ll be angry and confused and hostile . . .’
She repeated them. Sebastian looked at her. ‘No doubt they will. And then they’ll recover. Resilient creatures, children. And it’s not as if they don’t know me, don’t like me.’
‘Oh, Sebastian. That’s so unrealistic. They know you and like you as a friend. Not someone who has stolen their mother, hurt their father. I—’
‘Celia. Consider the alternatives. Realistically. Continuing like this. Can you contemplate that? For very much longer?’
She contemplated it; then shook her head.
‘Or – giving one another up. You returning to Oliver. In all its unhappiness. Unhappiness and frustration. For the rest of your life. Could you find that bearable? Is that what you want?’
‘No. No, Sebastian, no, it isn’t. Of course it isn’t. It would be dreadful. But—’
‘But?’
‘But perhaps that is right. Perhaps—’
‘Celia, something that makes you so lonely, so unhappy, so unfulfilled cannot be right. And Oliver is unhappy too, you told me so.’
‘I know. But he was not made unhappy by me, but by the war, his own ill-health, his uncertainty about everything—’
‘You mustn’t see him as helpless, you know. Or dependent. He is neither. He has a formidable will himself, and he knows what he wants. And fights for it. He will survive, believe me. He wouldn’t treat you as he does if he couldn’t manage without you.’
She was silent again. He took her hand, raised it to his lips, kissed it. ‘Come live with me, and be my love. Please, Celia. You know it’s right. You know.’
‘Yes, I suppose I do,’ she said, and then, taking a deep breath, physically straightening, stiffening her back, ‘yes, Sebastian, I do.’
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