Old Sins

by Penny Vincenzi

  ‘I’m listening,’ she said, her resolve weakened by the urgency in his voice.

  ‘Good. Because it’s very important. Very important.’ He was silent for a moment. Outside, she heard a car pull up. Pete perhaps, back with the files she had sent for from the office.

  ‘Phaedria, I know we have problems. Difficulties. I can see we have to take our time, tread carefully. But I can’t go back to Roz now. I absolutely cannot.’ There was a pause. And a knock at the front door.

  ‘Phaedria. I am rather seriously in love with you.’ Another pause. Voices.

  ‘Phaedria, I think – no, for God’s sake, I know, I want you to –’

  ‘Good morning, Phaedria.’

  Phaedria slammed the phone down.

  Roz was standing in the doorway.

  ‘Good morning Phaedria,’ she said again. ‘Please don’t let me disturb your phone call. Was it important?’

  ‘No,’ said Phaedria. ‘No, not at all. Good morning, Roz. How are you?’

  ‘Very well, thank you. A little – tired, shall we say, but well. So this is the baby?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Very nice,’ said Roz, glancing dispassionately at Julia rather as if she were an ornament or a dress she didn’t like the look of very much, but felt forced to at least acknowledge.

  Phaedria looked at Roz steadily. She was pale but composed; she was wearing black, as she so often did, with a scarlet scarf knotted round her shoulders. She looked dramatic, fierce but not hostile, indeed she was smiling faintly.

  ‘Well,’ she said, ‘welcome back to London.’

  ‘Thank you. Roz, I’m so sorry about the news – about your father. I did try to ring you several times, but . . .’

  ‘I know you did,’ said Roz. ‘Thank you. I got the messages.’

  Phaedria stared at her, so effectively rebuffed she couldn’t even speak.

  ‘I – I think I’ll just take Julia upstairs,’ she said after a moment. ‘I’ll ask Mrs Hamlyn for coffee.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ said Roz. ‘I won’t be here long.’

  ‘Well, I’d like some,’ said Phaedria firmly. ‘Excuse me for a moment.’

  She put the baby in the cot and looked down at her for a while, then as if drawing strength from her, stood up very straight and walked back downstairs.

  Roz turned and looked at her, taking in the tanned skin, the glossy hair, the slender figure.

  ‘You look very well,’ she said. ‘But then I suppose you would. You have just had what amounts to a very long holiday.’

  ‘In a way, yes.’

  ‘But you are fully recovered at last.’

  ‘Oh, I am very fully recovered. It’s been Julia’s health that has kept me there, as you know. She was very frail.’

  ‘But she’s well now?’

  ‘Oh, very, thank you.’

  ‘And when are we to expect the pleasure of seeing you back at work?’

  ‘Oh, very soon,’ said Phaedria, ‘as soon as I have Julia settled with a nanny. I’m looking forward to it.’

  ‘I daresay you are. You must have been bored and – lonely over there. Or weren’t you?’

  A cold crawling chill invaded Phaedria’s body; she felt sick. So that was it. She swallowed hard and met Roz’s eyes steadily.

  ‘Not really. I made friends. I had Julia. I was at the hospital most of the time.’

  ‘Oh, good,’ said Roz, poisonously sweet, ‘and then you had visitors, I believe?’

  ‘Yes, I did. Several.’

  ‘Several?’

  ‘Yes, several,’ said Phaedria steadily. ‘My father, of course.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘And Susan came, and C. J. and David Sassoon, and your mother.’

  ‘So she did. How very thoroughly you have become a part of this family. Inveigled yourself into it.’

  ‘Hardly inveigled,’ said Phaedria, meeting her stormy eyes. ‘I did after all marry into it.’

  ‘You did. I tend to forget that. I somehow get the impression you do as well, from time to time.’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean, I’m afraid,’ said Phaedria.

  ‘Don’t you?’ said Roz. ‘Well, never mind. I believe Michael came to visit you?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Phaedria. ‘Yes he did. He came to see us.’

  ‘Us?’

  ‘Yes us. Me and the baby.’

  ‘How touching.’

  ‘It was very nice of him.’

  ‘Very. Extraordinarily nice. He stayed at your hotel, I believe?’

  Phaedria had not realized she had known this. She swallowed again, hoping Roz wouldn’t notice.

  ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘yes, he did.’

  ‘For two nights?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You slut,’ said Roz quite quietly.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘I said you were a slut. My father has only been dead six months, that child of yours is only just born, and you start sleeping around with anyone who takes your fancy. Who else has been consoling you in your widowhood down there? C. J.? No, he hasn’t got the balls. David Sassoon? You always did have the hots for him.’

  ‘Roz,’ said Phaedria, keeping her voice quiet with a huge effort, ‘please could we stop this. I’m finding it grossly insulting. I know it’s very hard to believe, I can see what’s happened is very unfortunate and difficult for you to accept, but nothing, absolutely nothing happened between Michael and me.’

  ‘I don’t find that hard to believe. I find it impossible.’

  Phaedria shrugged. ‘That’s your problem.’

  ‘Is that all you have to say?’

  ‘What else could there be?’

  Roz was silent for a moment.

  ‘I think you’re lying,’ she said.

  ‘You can think what you like,’ said Phaedria. ‘I really don’t care. I do care, though,’ and there was an icily warning edge to her voice, ‘if you share your thoughts with other people. I have not slept with Michael Browning, or indeed anyone else, nothing whatever happened between us and that is the end of the matter. Have you talked to Michael about it?’

  ‘Yes. He spun the same fairy story.’

  ‘Oh Roz,’ said Phaedria, ‘it’s not a fairy story. It’s –’ and her lips twitched, despite herself, into a half smile – ‘too unlikely to be untrue. Please for all our sakes take his word for it, if you won’t take mine. God, we have enough real problems, I would have thought, without manufacturing any more.’

  ‘Most of our problems,’ said Roz, ‘can be laid at your door. If you hadn’t set out to trap my father, to worm your way into the company, to get your hands on his money, there would be no problems at all now.’

  ‘Roz, I did not trap your father.’

  ‘Oh really? I suppose he fell madly and hopelessly in love with you, and just swept you off your feet. And his money and his position meant nothing at all to you. Because if that’s so, I don’t quite understand why you can’t just go away now, leave us alone, instead of hanging on for dear life, apparently totally set on getting your pound, or rather millions of pounds, of flesh. And anything else that might catch your fancy in the process.’

  ‘Roz, I think I’d like you to leave,’ said Phaedria. ‘I don’t want to listen to any more of this.’

  ‘I don’t suppose you do. Nobody else would say it, would they? They’re all so besotted with you, so totally deceived by your innocent face, and your little-girly ways, your grieving widow number. Well, I’m not. You make me want to throw up.’

  ‘Get out,’ said Phaedria, her eyes blazing. ‘Just get out. And shut up.’

  Roz looked at her consideringly.

  ‘All right,’ she said at last. ‘I’ll go. I don’t believe any of what you say but I can’t prove it, that it’s not true, so before you start threatening me with slander action again, you have my word I won’t share my thoughts. For now.’ She looked at Phaedria very intently, the hatred in her eyes almost a physical force.

  ‘Is th
ere anything else you’d like to consider trying to take away from me? she said. ‘First my father. Then my birthright. My lover. Well, I do assure you there’s something you are not going to get your hands on, Phaedria Blenheim, and that’s Miles and his two per cent.’

  ‘Well,’ said Miles, ‘you certainly are a good-looking family.’

  He was standing in the doorway of the drawing room at Regent’s Park; Phaedria had invited him to tea. Roz had gone straight to the office after her morning’s visit to Phaedria, and was consequently unable to keep him under her eye any longer.

  Phaedria inclined her head just slightly. ‘Thank you. I could return the compliment.’

  ‘Please do,’ he said, smiling. ‘A little flattery and I’m anyone’s.’

  ‘Are you really?’ She smiled. ‘Come in and sit down. Mrs Hamlyn is bringing tea up in a minute.’

  ‘Thank you. So this is the famous baby?’

  ‘This is.’

  ‘She’s cute.’

  ‘Isn’t she?’

  ‘Of course,’ he said, ‘she has a head start on most of the human race, beginning her life in California.’

  ‘I do have to agree with you,’ said Phaedria with a sigh, looking out at the greyness of Regent’s Park, the leaden sky, the dripping trees. ‘It seemed to me just the nicest place in the world. I was so happy there.’

  ‘Me too.’ He sat down. ‘And I plan to go back there just as soon as ever I can.’

  ‘Do you really?’

  ‘I really do. To Malibu. To the beach.’

  ‘My goodness,’ she said, ‘here you are, one of the most potentially powerful and rich young men in the world, and all you want to do is sit on a beach in California.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Don’t knock it.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘I’m not knocking it. I envy you. I think it would be marvellous.’

  ‘Well,’ he said with simple logic, ‘you could go wherever you liked, couldn’t you? You’re not exactly pushed for the fare.’

  ‘No, that’s true. But I have – well, things to do.’

  ‘It’s very odd,’ he said, dropping the argument, ‘to hear myself described as powerful. Or even rich. I’ve always been so hard up and so – well, unpowerful.’

  She smiled at him. ‘The correct word is impotent.’

  ‘Yeah, well,’ he said grinning back, ‘I’m not that. Thank heaven.’

  ‘Good,’ said Phaedria briskly. ‘That must be very nice for someone.’

  ‘I hope so.’

  ‘You must feel you’ve strayed into some kind of bad dream,’ said Phaedria suddenly.

  ‘Well,’ he said, ‘it’s not all bad. But it is pretty strange. I really want to get back soon, but I can see I have some decisions to make first.’

  ‘Not really,’ said Phaedria. ‘Surely they can wait.’

  ‘Oh, no,’ he said, ‘I’d rather get it settled. Stay maybe a week or two, and make up my mind. Then go home with a clear conscience.’

  ‘And you wouldn’t even consider staying and getting involved?’

  He looked at her and smiled into her eyes. Phaedria, who had not yet been on the receiving end of this particular experience, felt momentarily weak. She had no interest in Miles whatsoever, he was absolutely not the type of man she found attractive, and yet at that moment, had he chosen, he could have trawled her into a fairly immoderate level of sexual interest.

  ‘No,’ he said in answer to her question. ‘Not for a moment.’

  She was confused by him, and the tangle of her thoughts.

  ‘Sorry? Not for a moment what?’

  He smiled again, aware of what he had done to her. ‘Not for a moment would I consider it. Getting involved.’

  ‘So what do you intend to do?’

  ‘Sell up. Take the money and run. Initially I thought I’d just run, but Roz said that was silly.’

  ‘Did she indeed?’ said Phaedria thoughtfully. ‘That was very scrupulous of her.’

  ‘I think she is quite scrupulous,’ said Miles cheerfully, beaming at Mrs Hamlyn who had come in with the tea tray. ‘Here, let me take that from you, ma’am.’

  Mrs Hamlyn beamed back, and rolled her eyes in a rather extraordinary way; Phaedria was momentarily alarmed; then she realized Mrs Hamlyn was flirting with Miles.

  ‘Thank you, Mrs Hamlyn,’ she said briskly. ‘I’ll ring if we want anything else.’

  ‘I wondered if Mr Wilburn might like something more substantial to eat,’ said Mrs Hamlyn. ‘That’s not much of a tea there, not really.’

  ‘Oh, no ma’am, thank you,’ said Miles, smiling at her again. ‘I already had a huge lunch. But it’s really kind of you to think about it.’

  Mrs Hamlyn rolled her eyes again and walked reluctantly over to the door.

  ‘Well,’ she said hopefully, ‘there’s plenty of food in the kitchen.’

  ‘Maybe another time,’ said Miles. She looked up at him as if he had just suggested a weekend in Paris.

  ‘Maybe,’ she said with a last roll, and was gone. Phaedria looked at Miles and grinned.

  ‘You mustn’t flirt with my female staff,’ she said.

  ‘Am I allowed loose on the males?’ he said.

  ‘Certainly not. Now then, come and have some tea, and tell me again exactly what you want to do.’

  ‘Well,’ said Miles, ‘what I really want to do is get married.’

  ‘Anyone in particular?’

  ‘Yes, my girlfriend. She’s called Candy. Candy McCall. She’s eighteen.’

  ‘That’s young,’ she said, ‘to get married. And how old are you, exactly? You look quite young to be getting married too.’

  ‘Twenty-seven.’

  ‘Goodness. The same age as me.’

  ‘I don’t suppose anyone told you you were too young to get married.’

  ‘Well, they did and they didn’t,’ said Phaedria.

  ‘I guess they said you were too young to marry – Sir Julian.’

  ‘Correct. They did. Miles, my husband – or Hugo Dashwood, as you knew him – stepped in when your mother died, did he, and took you on?’

  ‘Yes and no,’ said Miles carefully. ‘We didn’t exactly see a lot of him. We never did. Not until my dad died, anyway. Or rather until my mom was ill. Then he came to see her a lot.’

  ‘And – how do you remember him?’

  ‘Well, he was very English, you know? A little formal. He was very generous, and real good to my gran. She thought a lot of him.’

  Phaedria looked at him thoughtfully. ‘Does that mean you didn’t?’

  ‘Well – yes and no. He was very clever and all that. And it was real good of him to put me through college. I appreciated that. But we didn’t have – well, a lot to say to each other.’

  ‘I’m surprised,’ said Phaedria, and meant it. ‘I would have thought you would.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I’m not sure. I just would have thought you’d get on.’

  He smiled regretfully. ‘Sorry. No. Of course, the thing I most minded about is all explained now.’

  ‘Which was?’

  ‘Well, I got mad because he wouldn’t give me a job in one of his companies.’

  ‘I can’t imagine you getting mad.’

  ‘I hardly ever do. But I was then.’

  ‘Well, as you say, it’s explained now.’

  ‘Yup. I suppose it is.’

  ‘And you studied at college? Maths . . . and you graduated summa cum laude, someone said?’

  ‘Yup.’

  ‘And you don’t want to use that?’

  ‘Nope. I just want to marry Candy. Buy a nice house in Malibu, maybe get a boat.’

  He leant back on the cushions, smiling at her. ‘I can see you all find it real hard to understand. But I find it hard to understand the way you live. Working, worrying, fighting as far as I can see. I mean Roz is a real nice person, she could be so happy, you know, and she makes herself wretched, fretting about where the next million’s coming from or going.’ />
  ‘No, you’re wrong,’ said Phaedria, adjusting with difficulty to the vision of Roz as a real nice person (hadn’t Michael said something similar a hundred, a thousand years ago?) ‘it has absolutely nothing to do with the next million. Or not a lot. What it’s about is seeing something work and knowing it was you that made it work. It’s very exciting.’

  ‘Uh-huh.

  ‘You and Roz aren’t too fond of one another, I gather,’ he said suddenly.

  ‘Really? How do you know that?’

  ‘Oh, I know she’s jealous as hell of you. I know she thinks you’re having an affair with her bloke –’

  ‘What!’ said Phaedria. ‘She told you that?’

  ‘Yeah, she did. More or less.’

  ‘Well, she’s wrong.’

  ‘I told her she was wrong,’ he said, leaning back on the sofa with an expression of some complacency on his face.

  ‘Well, thank you,’ she said, amused. ‘That makes two of us. And I don’t think she believed either of us. But how did you know, anyway?’

  ‘It just didn’t seem very likely.’

  ‘Why not? I’m intrigued. When you hadn’t even met me. Or him for that matter.’

  ‘I’m not sure. You’d just had a baby, and you were in a vulnerable position, weren’t you?’

  ‘Was I?’

  ‘Well, yes. She’d been able to do what she liked here for a couple of months. You wouldn’t have been so dumb as to upset her that much. She’s pretty strong stuff, after all.’

  Phaedria looked at him in silence for a minute. ‘Miles,’ she said, ‘are you quite sure you wouldn’t like to get involved with the business? It seems to me you have a real feeling for company politics.’

  Miles was lying on his huge bed in Claridge’s, feeling lonely and trying to ring Candy. He was missing her and he was missing home, and he hadn’t the beginnings of an idea what he was going to do about the situation he had landed up in. He was also being assailed by a fear of such proportions, such complexity that he could see that quite soon he was going to have to talk it over with someone or go mad. In the absence of having anyone to talk to he was trying to crush it, to ignore it, to push it to the bottom of his mind, but it went on rising up, ugly and threatening. In a desperate attempt to get away from it, he tried to occupy his mind with his dilemma.

  As he saw it, he had three, maybe four choices. He could sell his share to Roz. He could sell it to Phaedria. He could offer them one per cent each, which probably neither of them would accept. Or he could sell out to someone else altogether. Of all the choices, he most favoured the last, because it would involve him in the least emotional trauma, but it could be an almost impossible burden to offload. The sum of money involved – running into at least seven, possibly eight figures – would be considerable: but more relevantly perhaps, the buyer would have to be a person of quite extraordinary character, both personal and professional, hurling himself, as he would be, instantly into the eye of one of the most ferocious hurricanes in commercial history.