And then there were all the other benefits. Rich older women liked to show their appreciation in the most gratifying ways. Gifts of hand-tailored suits, leather jackets, silk shirts. He had already had those in abundance, and bonuses on his weekly wages in addition.
He judged that if he played his cards right there could be richer pickings still. Which was why he had got into the habit of scanning the motoring magazines for the perfect classic car to suit his taste.
Glancing into the mirror he saw that Georgiana’s eyes were closed. He permitted his fingers to stray onto a nipple. Georgiana gave a little groan – her consent to allow proceedings to develop.
Tullio lifted her from her stool and laid her on the bed. As he covered her and the bones of her greyhound-slender body stabbed into his muscle-toned bulk, he thought of his little Flora, a young Scottish nurse who comforted him on his nights off. Flora’s bones were hidden in a gorgeous cushion of springy flesh and she had no squeamishness about performing certain services a lusty young man found utterly enchanting.
Georgiana tilted her head back. She began to breathe faster, dainty shallow gasps. Nearly, nearly there, she whispered to herself. Sometimes it happened, sometimes not. Tullio should really have learned by now to arrange things so it happened for her every time.
But she liked hearing the groans announcing his own satisfaction and knowing she was still lovely and desirable.
She lay still and passive beneath him, reflecting on the curious way in which she had discovered the pleasures of sex at this stage in her life. She tried to pinpoint the beginning of this late awakening but with no success. She thought of the interminable naval-gazing group discussions in the exclusive and luxurious clinics she had attended up and down the country. Oh, she could remember all of those. They hadn’t helped a jot and quite frankly they had bored her to death.
And yet she retained the strange notion that there had been some definite moment of sudden healing. A puff of smoke, a flash of light, some magical process that had conjured up the realization that even she, the terrified, frigid Georgiana could let a man into the temple of her body – and take pleasure in doing so.
When she tried to uncover the mystery, her mind would dig deep into itself, curling its tail around buried sensations. Almost, almost. But the heart of the mystery had never yielded up its secrets.
Tonight as Tullio rolled from her to creep respectfully back to his own room she found herself thinking of Saul, recalling the sense of invasion that had used to terrify her during the latter years of her marriage.
But how would it be now - sex with Saul? There was a stab of intense excitement. To make love with Saul, to have him enslaved to her beauty. She could have him in her power as he had been, just a little, just for a while, at the beginning of their marriage. Then, as swiftly as it had surged up, the excitement faded. Anxiety prickled.
Georgiana frowned, bewildered and uneasy. As the night progressed to that cold point when a woman on her own can feel most cruelly alone she saw herself being swept remorselessly on into the future like a little particle of dust. Insignificant with no one to care for her. Her father was dead, her mother ageing and helpless. Saul was no more than a visitor; he had virtually gone from her life.
Saul gone, she whispered to herself. Maybe for ever.
Georgiana was suddenly convinced of the impossibility of going forward into the future alone. She needed guidance, the ear of someone who would listen, share and sympathize. Someone with a capacity to unravel the twisted threads of her doubt. Someone who would understand her hopes and help her to see the way ahead.
Her mind clicked down old pathways, making a series of connections. A fresh thought presented itself. And then a decision was made, and again there was a tremor of excitement. She smiled to herself in the darkness.
Beyond in the apartment she heard Tullio walking with the stealth of a cat through to the kitchen. He would be after the remains of the uncorked champagne. Well, he was welcome to it. He’d earned it. And who else would drink flat Bollinger?
Tullio was quite an agreeable boy all in all. He was not Georgiana’s first young lover. She rather fancied, however, that he might be the last.
Xavier waited at the stage door, standing back in the shadows so that he would be hidden. He had no wish to suffer the annoyance of being recognized and having to withstand the inevitable surprise and concern that would be forthcoming.
Eventually Tara appeared. To his relief she was alone. She walked forward, oblivious of his presence, her brisk steps firm and rhythmic. He moved towards her.
When she saw him an expression of huge relief came over her face, like that of a mother whose wayward child has run off and got lost and now is found.
‘Saul!’ she said. ‘Oh thank God!’
He placed his arm around her shoulder and his fingers pressed and caressed the flesh encasing her delicate bones. ‘So! How was your evening, little Maestro?’
CHAPTER 31
Saul had booked a ski lodge perched high in the hills overlooking the Grundlesee Lake east of Salzburg. An amphitheatre of mountains protected the lake, a deep and breathtaking blue under a cloudless daytime sky. At dusk, as the sun dropped behind the high walls of the hill, the water turned to the shade of blood as it sank into its own vast dying glow.
In the mornings the alpine slopes dazzled, white and crusty, zigzagged with a network of grey tracks left by the skiers.
The lodge was a long low wooden chalet built on a flat shelf of ground and girdled all round with a railed terrace which caught every minute of the sunshine.
Tara would stand on the terrace in the mornings, breathing in deeply and looking down through the empty slopes to the deep still lake. The bright sharp air smelled of pine and cold.
Inside the chalet all was warmth and comfort. Log fires, huge duck-down duvets on the beds, all the latest appliances. It was a situation which could be described as idyllic, something which Tara wished she could get across to Alessandra who, when not distracted with the sheer excitement of being perched on skis, mooched around the chalet wearing the look of one who is suffering greatly. And doing so in silence.
Saul had not fulfilled her prophecy of abandoning her in order to indulge his own skiing prowess. He had taken her off each morning to rendezvous with her instructor and had stayed around to observe and encourage.
Tara judged that he was pulling out all the stops to play the role of devoted and interested father. But perhaps his campaign of trying so hard defeated its own ends. Perhaps Alessandra was uneasy to be the focus of such close paternal attention. Or perhaps she was merely aching with longing for Tosca.
Whatever undercurrents were at work Tara had a sense of living with a barrel of unexploded gunpowder. She had made no attempt to ski herself, having long ago decided that the sport was far too cold, wet and hazardous for her liking. The days passed pleasantly enough sipping coffee at the wickedly expensive café at the summit of the ski lift and catching up on her reading and studying – a mixture of biographies and music scores.
Five days into the holiday, just as she was dressing before her morning patrol of the terrace and observation of the sunrise, she was interrupted by the trill of her mobile phone. It was seven-thirty in the morning. And the caller was Roland Grant.
‘Are you sitting down?’ he asked. ‘Because if not you should do so. Are you on your own?’
‘Yes. Roland, you’re making me very jittery.’
‘The Jupiter World Music Award short list was announced late last night. They have nominated you for your video disc of The Flying Dutchman. And on the grapevine I’m led to believe there are no real contenders.’
‘Oh,’ said Tara.
‘That is not the expected response,’ Roland observed mildly.
‘It’s the old dilemma of wondering whether to laugh or cry.’
‘Why should you cry? It’s news to make any normal mortal shout for joy.’
She made a nondescript little grunt.
‘
Is Saul about?’ Roland asked. ‘Just say yes or no.’
Tara held the receiver away from her ear. She could hear the hum of the shower heater, the hiss of hot water. ‘Yes, but I can still talk.’
‘Is that the problem for you? Are you wondering what his reaction will be?’
‘Of course I am.’
‘You’re worried he’ll feel his nose put out of joint. Oh, come on Tara!’
‘Come on, Roland. That video was his baby, until I snatched it from his hands.’
‘Until he walked out and virtually handed it into your safekeeping.’
‘Things can sound so beautifully simple when you phrase them like that.’
‘Tara, Saul will do nothing but applaud your achievement. And in any case, you had a great deal of input in the preparation and directing of this performance. Don’t put yourself down.’
‘No, no. Perish the thought.’ She laughed out loud now.
‘The important thing is that in the end you were the one who directed the final rehearsal and conducted the performance. You brought everything together and made it come alive, made it into a huge success.’
‘Thank you.’ Tara smiled to herself; an acerbic and ironic grin. Tara knew all about Roland when he got the bit between his teeth.
‘Saul will get full credit for the part he played,’ Grant insisted. ‘But when you get the award, which you will - it’s yours alone.’
‘Oh God! Tara thought.
‘Saul is too big a man to cast a shadow over this,’ Roland concluded.
‘Yes, of course you’re right.’ Tara thought it wise not to say anything directly to Roland about her growing anxiety on Saul’s account. Of how brittle he seemed, how his mood was occasionally so dark she felt she could no longer reach him at all.
Those things were deeply private. And if they turned out to be more than a passing phase Roland would soon sniff them out for himself.
‘I’m simply not used to being in the spotlight,’ Tara said eventually, hoping that would satisfy Roland.
There was a pause. ‘Ah well, that’s something I’m hoping we shall be able to put right at long last.’
Tara clicked off the connection, heartily glad that Saul had not been around when this particular call came through. Roland’s news had shaken her. Delighted, shocked, alarmed.
Her mind kept swerving back to Saul’s likely reaction. She had no doubt that he would display all the enthusiasm and warm congratulations appropriate to her achievement. But what would he feel in his heart? Would he judge himself to have been beaten at his own game by his young, inexperienced lover? Is that how he would view it? And if so how would he bear it? Would he even end up hating her?
She let out a sigh of dismay. She needed to get out of the chalet for a while, have some time to explore her feelings further. There was no question of facing Saul before she had time to think.
In the breakfast kitchen she scribbled a hasty note and propped it against the coffee pot on the breakfast table.
To my two dear ones. Gone for a pre-breakfast walk. Carry on without me. See you soon. Love, love, love…
She walked out of the north-facing door of the chalet, through the car parking space and out into the lane from which the snow was removed each morning and fresh salt put down. It wound its long meandering way down to the village below.
The morning was enlivened by the sound of cheerful birdsong. A luminous white haze hung over the lake like a giant cover. In an hour it would have cleared away completely and the sun would burnish the water to a coruscating copper brilliance.
Tara breathed in deeply, mindful that the majority of the world’s creatures were not so privileged as she to be a spectator of all this wonder. But even this reflection did not quell the drone of anxiety within her.
She stamped on, her boots making a ripe creaking sound in the powdery snow. She clasped her hands behind her, her gaze on the ground beneath as she pondered. Pictures paraded in the portrait gallery of her mind: Tara Silk in the glare of the spotlights and glory, running lightly onto a platform amidst a blaze of lights in order to receive a glittering trophy. Saul in the shadowy background, applauding - just one anonymous figure in the midst of an admiring audience. The great Saul Xavier’s name written in small letters at the back of the video display sleeve, just one more name swelling the credits list.
Was that how it would be? In her own view there was no comparison whatsoever between her talent and that of Saul. It was simply not an issue. She recognized that she was a good musician. Saul, however, was exceptional, unique and truly great. But would others see it that way?
After an hour’s trampling in the snow, she was still not sure what her feelings were about Roland’s news. She made her way slowly back to the chalet, feeling no sense of hurry. Saul and Alessandra would already have left for the morning’s skiing. There would be no need for any direct confrontations until she met up with Saul at lunchtime.
She stamped the snow from her boots at the rear entrance to the chalet, then made her way to the terrace. The mountains reared up in the background like rows of clenched white knuckles. Their snowy tips flashed platinum bright in the sunlight and in the basin of the valley the lake glistened azure blue shot through with gold.
Tara was surprised to see Alessandra sprawled on chair at the far end of the terrace. Completely ignoring the exquisite panorama rolled out before her, Alessandra was engrossed in the latest issue of Horse and Pony magazine. Her long blonde hair slid forward over her face and from time to time she tossed it back with an impatient thrust of her head, curiously reminiscent of Tosca.
‘I thought you’d be up on the slopes with Daddy by this time,’ Tara commented, surprised.
‘So did I.’ Alessandra did not look up; the equine head tossing continued.
‘So why aren’t you?’
‘He’s got better things to do.’
‘Yes?’ Tara struggled to keep calm.
‘He’s gone into Salzburg.’ Alessandra’s lips were tight. She flicked over the page of a magazine and assumed an expression of supreme detachment and disdain.
There was a lengthy silence.
‘Well, do you know why?’
‘Yes.’
Another silence. Dear God in heaven, was I like this too in my adolescent days Tara wondered, knowing the answer was sadly, yes. ‘Alessandra! Just tell me – in plain simple language.’
‘Something terribly, overwhelmingly important has come up.’ Raw bitterness threatened to break through the studied indifference.
‘Such as?’
‘The opportunity to conduct one of the world’s greatest orchestras.’ The mimicry of her father’s detached, measured tones were breathtakingly accurate.
‘The Vienna Phil?’
‘Something like that. Or was it the Berlin lot?’ Alessandra shrugged. ‘I can’t see why he’s so bothered. He’s had his evil way with both of them millions of times before.’
Tara could feel her daughter’s anger, frustration and deep hurt throbbing in the air around her.
‘Why do they need Daddy?’ Tara enquired calmly, playing for time and sticking to practicalities whilst she considered how to tackle this delicate situation.
‘The reigning baton-waving tyrant had a stroke in the night. Or was it a nervous breakdown? Something of that sort: the kind of thing which stops people being able to conduct orchestras. Daddy heard all about it on the early morning news. He was on the telephone like a shot, offering to gallop to the rescue.’
‘Blast!’ fumed Tara. ‘I wanted him to have a proper rest on this holiday.’
Alessandra looked up. Eyes flashing with fire, glinting with the prickle of tears. ‘Hope springs eternal,’ she mocked.
The two of them dug deep into their own thoughts for a moment.
‘He wanted me to go with him – breathe in the hallowed atmosphere, watch him in action. Listen, mark and learn,’ Alessandra commented.
Tara could imagine.
‘Well, I suppose yo
u have to look at it from his point of view,’ Alessandra continued. ‘You stood in when he stormed out of the Dutchman rehearsal. Anything you can do he can do better!’ This experimentation with sarcasm was still quite new, but Alessandra was going to be frighteningly good at it once she got into her stride.
‘Did you overhear my conversation with Roland this morning?’ Tara demanded sharply.
‘Yes. I was just coming to find you when he called. I couldn’t help hanging around to get the gist. Sorry.’
‘Did Daddy hear?’
‘No, and I didn’t breathe a word. You’ve been nominated for a big award, haven’t you?’
‘The Jupiter,’ she said. ‘Did you and Daddy have a row?’
‘No. He went off to his orchestra and I stayed here. Perfectly OK arrangement.’ Alessandra rattled the pages of her magazine.
Tara sank down on a chair beside her daughter and released a long despairing sigh.
‘And by the way, congratulations Mummy,’ Alessandra said warmly. ‘I’m really proud of you.’
Tara felt her daughter’s long fingers clasp her own hand and press it warmly. She roused herself.
As she sat up her eyes connected with the open note-book at Alessandra’s feet. Next to the beautiful sketch of a horse’s head was a carefully drawn chart – a brief diary representing the duration of the stay here in Grundlsee. Chunks of it were coloured in red, the days that had already passed. Alessandra was crossing off the hours and days, counting the minutes until she could return home.
‘Oh darling!’ Tara picked up the little book and stared at it in dismay.
‘I only came because he seemed to want it so much. I could have been at the riding centre’s end of winter show. And now he’s buggered off to do his own thing.’ Alessandra sniffed, suddenly child-like and deeply vulnerable. ‘He’s not bothered about spending time with me at all,’ she exploded.
‘That’s not true,’ Tara responded, but not with complete conviction.
‘Nothing can compete with the bloody music and all that buzz he gets from being Ruler of the World in the concert hall.’
The Maestro's Mistress Page 24