No Angel

by Penny Vincenzi

  Barty went down to breakfast, feeling upset. Celia and Wol were reading the papers.

  ‘Aunt Celia?’

  ‘Yes, Barty?’

  ‘Nanny says we’re to go to Ashingham.’

  ‘Yes, that’s right. You are. Next week. Just for a week or two. It will do you all good, some country air.’

  ‘But Aunt Celia, it’s the week of the concert. I’m playing in it—’

  ‘Oh, dear. I’d forgotten, Barty, I’m so sorry. I’m afraid you’ll just have to miss it.’

  ‘Miss it! But – but I can’t, I’m playing a solo.’

  ‘Barty, I can’t ask my mother to change all her plans, and change all of mine, because of a concert.’

  ‘Mummy, that’s so unfair.’ Adele’s dark eyes, so exactly like her mother’s, were brilliant. ‘Barty’s been practising and practising. You should have remembered. Anyway, we don’t want to go either, we’ve got a party, and we want to hear Barty play and—’

  ‘Adele, be quiet. Until you and Venetia begin to do better at school, there aren’t going to be any more parties, I can assure you of that. Now eat your breakfast, all of you. And be quiet.’

  ‘Celia, I really don’t think Barty should have to miss a concert.’ Oliver’s voice was unusually firm. He never argued with her about the children in front of them. Four pairs of eyes fixed on him. The children almost audibily drew in their breath.

  Celia stared at him; then she said, ‘Oliver, I’m sorry, but I would prefer that you didn’t confuse matters. This is all arranged.’

  ‘Then it must be unarranged. Barty can stay here.’

  ‘Of course she can’t. Nanny will be at Ashingham.’

  ‘And where will you be?’

  There was an absolute silence; then Celia said ‘I – I will be here. Obviously. But extremely busy. That is precisely why I want the children to be in the country.’

  Another silence. Then, ‘And where will Giles be?’

  ‘At Ashingham. Yes. Once he breaks up.’

  ‘Does he know this?’

  ‘Not yet. Oliver, can we please leave this until later?’

  ‘No. I don’t think we should. Barty is very upset and I can understand why. Whatever the twins may or may not do, I think she should stay here. However busy you are. I will be here; Barty and I can look after one another. And I can attend her concert, if you cannot.’

  ‘That’s not fair!’ said the twins, in unison, ‘we want to go.’

  ‘Well, maybe that is too difficult to arrange. When is it Barty?’

  ‘Next Wednesday,’ said Barty.

  ‘Fine. I shall put it in my diary.’

  ‘Oliver—’

  ‘Run along now, all of you. Daniels will be waiting.’

  As the door closed, and as she pulled on her coat and school beret, Barty heard Oliver say, ‘I have no idea what you are planning, Celia nor do I wish to know. But Barty should not have to miss her concert.’

  There was a long silence; then the door opened and Celia appeared, slamming it after her and started upstairs.

  ‘Temper, temper!’ said Adele under her breath. Not quite enough under her breath. Celia turned and ran downstairs again, raised her hand and struck Adele across the face. Quite hard.

  ‘It’s time you learned some respect,’ she said.

  And then went into the morning room and closed the door, very quietly this time and there was no more sound in the house at all.

  Barty sat in the car, trying not to cry, with her arm round Adele who was crying very loudly indeed.

  Everything was awful. Absolutely awful. And something was terribly wrong.

  ‘I can’t go on like this,’ said Celia. She was crying; she had taken a taxi up to Sebastian’s house at lunchtime, careless of the risk. In any case, what risk? Everyone knew, except for Oliver and he refused to know.

  Sebastian took out his handkerchief, wiped her tears away. ‘Come on. Tell me about it.’

  ‘I’m just being so dreadful to everyone. Everyone. Turning into a bad person. Well, I am a bad person.’

  ‘Nonsense. I don’t like bad people.’

  ‘Don’t joke. It isn’t funny.’

  ‘Sorry. What have you done?’

  ‘First I told Barty she couldn’t play in a concert.’

  ‘Doesn’t sound too bad.’

  ‘It’s very bad. She’s playing a solo and I’d forgotten. And then I said it didn’t matter. Sebastian, I would never have done that once. Never. Of course it matters.’

  ‘Well why can’t she play in it?’

  ‘Because I’ve arranged for them all to go to stay with my mother. As I told you.’

  ‘Oh yes. The courageous phone call.’

  ‘It was very courageous. Anyway, she’s agreed, that’s the point and it’s all arranged, and it means I can – well anyway . . . And then Oliver said she must play in the concert, and she could stay, which made me so angry, how dare he interfere?’

  ‘And?’ Sebastian’s face was a polite blank.

  ‘And then I lost my temper and Adele said something cheeky and I hit her.’

  ‘From what I can gather a few spankings would do those two good.’

  ‘It wasn’t a spanking. It was a hard slap across the face. In front of the servants and Barty and – it was dreadful. I shall have to apologise.’

  ‘Well, she’ll enjoy that. It’ll more than make up for any suffering, I’d have thought.’

  ‘Sebastian, it’s serious.’ She took a cigarette out of the silver box on his table, lit it, inhaled, and started to cough.

  ‘You should stop that,’ he said severely.

  ‘I will. When I – when I feel better.’

  ‘When you’re living with me, you certainly will. Now then, listen to me. I do feel sorry. For all of you. But it’s simply because you’re under such strain, Celia. When this is over, when things are in order again—’

  ‘But will they be? Will that be order?’

  ‘Yes, it will. It’s absolutely right, and you know it is.’

  ‘I don’t,’ said Celia, ‘I don’t know anything of the sort.’

  ‘Well I do. And if you really don’t, then I shall have to know it for both of us. Now come along, let me give you a big hug. It’s all going to be all right. When is this concert, incidentally?’

  ‘Next Wednesday. Oliver is going to go. He was terribly angry with me, when he got to the office. Terribly. I said I would like to go too, and he said he would prefer that I didn’t.’

  ‘Well in that case,’ said Sebastian, ‘perhaps that is the ideal day for your departure.’

  ‘Oh no, Sebastian. No, I couldn’t possibly do that.’

  ‘I think there are definitely grounds for taking out an injunction against publishing this book,’ said Howard Shaw. ‘The coincidences could be thought to be too many and too strong. And therefore the material about the affair could very well be argued to be defamatory.’

  Jasper Lothian nodded.

  ‘Of course – you must be prepared for some publicity. If they are determined to publish, and I suspect they are, then we must be very sure of our ground. Is that quite clear?’

  There was a fragment of hesitation; then Jasper Lothian said, ‘Yes. Quite clear. I shall, of course, be seen as standing up for my own good name.’

  Howard Shaw looked at Lothian; he wasn’t sure that he liked him. He was pompous, he lacked any kind of humour and he was clearly preposterously vain. He dressed rather like an ageing Rupert Brooke, in loose jackets, soft shirts, floppy bow ties; his hair which was silver, fell almost to his shoulders, in what were obviously carefully encouraged waves. Of course academia was full of such eccentricity: more than ever in this rather excessive age. Well, it didn’t matter in the least whether he liked him or not; this was an exciting case for him to work on.

  ‘You may have to produce witnesses who can testify as to your moral probity,’ he said.

  ‘That can be arranged. Of course.’

  ‘Good. Then I shall wri
te to the publishers.’

  ‘Saying?’

  ‘Saying, in the first instance, that we want the offending passages removed. That is an option they must be offered.’

  ‘Well – that would be the ideal obviously,’ said Jasper Lothian. ‘Do you think they would agree to that?’

  ‘I would rather doubt it. They are central to the story. But it might be possible. It could be better for them than having to withdraw totally. I would imagine a considerable investment has gone into this book.’

  ‘I see. Well – we shall no doubt see.’

  ‘Indeed we shall.’

  ‘Oliver, I shall be late into the office in the morning.’

  ‘Not unusual.’

  ‘No. No, I have to go and see Lady Annabel about her book. Foyles want her to do some readings and then—’

  ‘Yes, yes. I daresay Lyttons will continue to run without you for a few more hours. As you know I am going to Barty’s concert in the afternoon. I have suggested that Daniels brings her to the office; then we can go there together.’

  ‘I would still like to come—’

  ‘And I would prefer that you didn’t. If you don’t mind. This is our treat, mine and Barty’s. I have promised to take her out to tea afterwards, to the Soda Fountain in Fortnums.’

  ‘But Oliver—’

  ‘We don’t spend much time together these days. I am looking forward to it.’

  ‘Very well.’

  She made one last desperate effort.

  ‘Oliver I do wish you would let me talk to you about – about everything. Our lives together and so on. It is so very important.’

  ‘I’m sorry, my dear. I have a great deal to do this evening. Especially as I am going to be out of the office for much of tomorrow. I’m sure you will understand.’

  Celia gave up.

  The twins had gone earlier in the day, with Nanny. Barty was to go down the next day. Celia had said goodbye to them after breakfast. It was horrible. She apologised to Adele for hitting her; told her with raw honesty that she had had no right to do it, that she had been upset about something else. Adele, sensing an opportunity for drama, had started to cry again, and then threw herself into her mother’s arms and said she was sorry she had been upset and even more sorry if it had been about her bad report.

  Both twins had clung to her that morning, crying, before being put into the car by Nanny, who was not impressed by the performance, having heard them discussing the night before how jolly it would be in the country, with Jay and Billy and the ponies and how much they were looking forward to seeing their dog again. But Celia, who was not to know that, stood looking at their sorrowful little faces, their dark eyes huge and brilliant with tears, remembering the glowing May day when she had brought them home to Cheyne Walk for the first time, two identical shawl-wrapped bundles, seeing Oliver’s joyful smile as he ushered them all into the house, thinking how blessed she was – and thinking that she was not saying goodbye to them for a fortnight, but to the life she had shared with them and their father for ever.

  She went into her study to write the letter. It was extraordinarily difficult and very painful. She felt she was standing on a beach, watching the tide go out on her marriage, watching it moving relentlessly further and further away from her, out of touch, out of reach; she felt stranded in her misery and loneliness, utterly bereft. And wondered if what she was doing, leaving Oliver bereft as well, could possibly be the right thing. And then thought how intolerable life with him had become for both of them and told herself that in the end they would both be happier for it.

  She told him how happy she had been for most of their marriage, how much she had loved him, how much she still loved him.

  But I feel we have both moved on, and away from the two people we used to be. Mostly because of the war, but also through our now widely differing views of Lyttons and the direction in which it should be going. And, of course in our personal lives much has changed. I need someone who appreciates me for what I am, rather than what I should be. That is how I feel you view me these days, Oliver, as someone unsuitable in every way, to be in your life – both professionally and personally. I feel criticised at every turn, probably rightly. For a long time, I struggled to do better for you, but to no avail. You make me feel frivolous, selfish, and in no way your equal or your partner any more. This is very hard to bear, and I grow less self-confident every day and increasingly unhappy.

  There is someone else in my life now, and it will come as no surprise to you to learn this, I am sure. It is Sebastian Brooke, as you may also have suspected, and as I have tried to tell you many times. I am going to live with him. He is able to accept me for what I am, and consequently I have been able to feel better and happier. If only you had allowed me to talk to you about it, Oliver, we might have been able to avert a lot of pain. Or at least a little.

  I am leaving you with enormous grief and regret, for we have shared so much, survived so much. But I know it is the right thing to do. I cannot go on being dishonest with you, because you do not deserve it and I cannot bear it.

  I have not yet talked to the children; I felt we should do that together. If you could find that possible, I think it would help them. But that is why I wanted them to be with my mother at this particular time.

  Thank you for all the happiness you have given me; and although I do not deserve it, please, please try to forgive me.

  I will always love you, very much.

  Celia.

  She was crying quite hard when she finished the letter; she turned out the light in the study and sat in the darkness, staring at the trees outside the window. Remembering. Just remembering when she had been young and in love with Oliver; when all they had asked was to be together, when to talk, laugh, plan their lives, make love, had been absolute happiness, when finding anyone else, or anything even remotely more important to them had been unthinkable. And wondering that such love, such closeness, such tenderness could disintegrate so hopelessly and so thoroughly, first into indifference and then into despair.

  CHAPTER 25

  Janet Gould was walking down the corridor when she heard a crash from Oliver’s office; startled, she turned and walked quickly back. Oliver was sitting in his chair, his face frozen in despair, staring at a letter; the crash had been his father’s heavy cut-glass and silver ink stand which he had hurled across the room and into the corner. Physical violence – or indeed any kind of violence – was so unlike him, that she was shocked. She knocked gently on the open door.

  ‘Is anything wrong, Mr Lytton?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said, holding out the letter to her, ‘yes, it is. Read this, Mrs Gould. Now, what am I to do?’

  Barty woke up feeling very nervous, half wishing she had gone to Ashingham, where she would now be miles away from the concert hall in Wigmore Street where that afternoon she had to play her Chopin Etude. Miss Wetherhill, her music mistress, had told her, that at least two hundred people would be there. It would be absolutely dreadful. Two hundred people, all sitting listening to, staring at her. She felt extremely sick; she went into the bathroom and pulled her toothbrush and toothpaste out of her mug; her hands, as she did so, were shaking violently. How on earth could you play the piano with shaking hands? And there was no one to talk to, no one to distract her. She could never have believed she would miss the twins, but she would have given anything that morning to have them giggling and telling her stupid jokes and stories and saying she’d probably play so badly that everyone would walk out, so there was no need to be nervous. Or to have Nanny saying that as long as she had brushed her hair nicely and was wearing a pretty dress and her shoes were shiny, it wouldn’t matter how she played.

  She wished desperately that Aunt Celia was coming. She had helped her so much with her piano-playing: perhaps not quite so much recently, but she had always been so encouraging, terribly pleased when she had got distinction for her grade three examination. It didn’t seem right that she wouldn’t be there, sharing it. She had told h
er she was sorry about forgetting the concert so many times, that Barty felt quite guilty herself, and had begged her to come. But she had explained that Wol didn’t want that. He wanted it to be a treat for just the two of them. That’s what they both said, but Barty felt it was because he was cross with Aunt Celia, not just for forgetting the concert, but for something else as well.

  Only yesterday at breakfast, which was the last time she had seen him, he had said, ‘Our day tomorrow, Barty. How I am looking forward to it!’

  And Aunt Celia had picked up the paper and started reading it very intently.

  Barty had a bath, put on her old skirt and jersey, for she planned to spend the morning practising and going for a walk, and looked at the clock. Quite late. Nearly nine. Wol and Aunt Celia would have gone. The house was very quiet. She certainly didn’t want any breakfast. Although a cup of tea might be nice . . . She ran downstairs; the post had come. There was a card from Giles: ‘Good luck,’ it said. ‘You’ll be splendid. I wish I could be there.’

  That was so nice of him. He really was such a thoughtful person these days. It made her feel much better. She was so looking forward to seeing him. He had been furious, the twins said, about being sent to Ashingham the minute he broke up from Eton and having to miss her concert; they had read the letter he had written to their mother, which she had left lying on the dining table. They were extremely unscrupulous, the twins, they read everyone’s letters if they felt so inclined.

  She wished her mother was coming; both she and Aunt Celia had begged her to, but Sylvia had refused. She said she’d feel awkward, sitting there, with all the other parents, worrying about – well about not being one of them. Letting Barty down as she put it. Barty said she wouldn’t be letting her down, it was nonsense, but Sylvia had still refused. It seemed so unfair. She still wasn’t well; was having a lot of stomach pain. She had promised Barty to go to the doctor, but Barty knew she hadn’t been yet. If things had been different at home, she’d have asked Aunt Celia to organise something.