The Maestro's Mistress

by Angela Dracup

  What had he heard? Anything? Everything? She knew he would never demean himself by referring to it. She felt her eyes burning with grainy dry tears that refused to be shed.

  Later, when the guests had gone and she and Saul were undressing for bed, he began to talk calmly to her about plans for the future, spelling things out clearly and logically. There would be offers for her to take on the musical directing of an orchestra with national prestige. Build it up, forge new and exciting paths. How would she feel about that? It would be a marvellous challenge, though riddled with pitfalls. But he would be there to give her all the help she needed.

  She did not want the precious time with him eaten up on professional discussion. She wanted him close, their hearts beating in unison. She wrapped her arms about him, moved her hands over the line of his vertebrae. The hardness of him, the smell of his skin brought back sensations of their past love-making all its spinning intensity, its hypnotic enchantment.

  ‘We’ll think about it tomorrow,’ she murmured. And all the other things.

  She slid into bed, worn out, but eagerly awaiting him. Saul was pacing restlessly. He was often sleepless nowadays. She held her arms out to him. He bent to kiss her. ‘I think I’ll take a short walk,’ he said suddenly. ‘Clear the head of champagne.’

  She heard him go downstairs and the click of the front door. When did Saul ever go for a walk, she asked herself anxiously. A run maybe, a punishing game of squash, a whirling scurry down a mountain slope. Never a walk. And she doubted he had drunk more than half a glass of champagne.

  Sure enough after a short pause she heard the engine of his new Porsche Turbo roar and whine into life in the street below. It was a departure from his previous cars. No wraparound stripes - stark and black, more powerful than any car he had before. He said it made him feel young again. Well, at least he would be happy behind the wheel.

  The issue Bruno had raised wouldn’t leave her thoughts, even though she knew in her heart that there was nothing to be afraid of. She had no shred of doubt that Alessandra was Saul’s child. Maybe she should arrange a DNA test herself, and simply knock the whole matter on the head for ever. But then she would have to tell Alessandra. No way could she go in stealth and pluck hairs from her brush, or whatever was needed in order to provide a sample for analysis. And, of course, whilst Bruno would be only too ready to oblige, asking for his co-operation would flag suggest she, Tara, harboured doubts about her daughter’s parentage. It was all unthinkable.

  Exhaustion claimed her. Her muscles relaxed and she fell into a deep sleep.

  She was pulled back into consciousness by a relentless banging on the outer door. She rubbed her eyes, blinking away the tendrils of drowsiness. A thin grey light penetrated the curtains. Birds were shrilling out a dawn chorus.

  She went to the door, her heart dipping and swooping with premonition. Behind her, a white-faced Alessandra padded up on bare feet. Two police officers stood on the doorstep. Their faces were grave.

  ‘Mrs Saul Xavier?’ one of them said.

  Tara flinched. Sighed. ‘Well…yes.’

  ‘I’m afraid we have some bad news, madam. May we come in?’

  CHAPTER 34

  Tara and Alessandra sat together after the police had gone. Stunned. Numb. Temporarily suspended even from pain. That would come soon enough.

  Alessandra stared ahead of her. She began to comb the fingers through the long strands of her hair. Over and over, strong downward sweeps as though she were grooming Tosca’s mane.

  Tara sprang up. ‘We mustn’t be like this!’

  Alessandra’s compulsively moving hand stilled. ‘What? What do you mean?’

  ‘It’s not a death. We mustn’t behave as though it’s a death.’

  ‘His car has been found all mangled and burned. There’s no sign of him!’

  ‘Yes – but…’

  ‘For goodness sake, Mummy!’

  ‘You heard what the police said. Officially he’s simply missing.’

  ‘Who are they trying to kid?’’ Alessandra stared at her mother, furious and bitter. They won’t just say the word dead until they’ve got a body to gawp at.’

  ‘No,’ Tara moaned softly, covering her eyes with her hands.

  ‘Look, it was obvious what they were thinking. Why would they have kept banging on about all those other “cases” where drivers have gone missing and then been found in a river somewhere. Dumped by some drunken truck driver who didn’t want to find himself on a charge of manslaughter.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘That’s what they think has happened. The driver of the truck that crashed into Daddy’s car dragged him out of the mess and then…’ Alessandra faltered. ‘Mummy, don’t live in cloud cuckoo land!’ she finished, burning with fury and grief and impotence.

  Tara gasped as though Alessandra had punched her and crushed all the air from her chest. She sat down again and began to tremble, shaking uncontrollably.

  ‘Mummy. Oh Mummy!’ Alessandra panicked, feeling again like a little child, terrified that her parent might break down completely. ‘Don’t, don’t!’ She pulled Tara’s head down and held it against her neck and shoulder.

  In time Tara was calm and herself once more. She looked at her watch. ‘Eight-thirty. You should be thinking of school.’

  Alessandra sighed. ‘It’s Saturday. And we’re in London, not at home.’

  Home! The mock Tudor monstrosity. How Tara had come to love that place. She wanted

  to be back there in the big sparse drawing room: Saul’s room, filled with his music collection, his piano, his presence. She wanted to fly there and draw the atmosphere of the place around her like a blanket of comfort. She longed for the ministrations and refreshments of the kind and loyal Mrs Lockwood.

  Alessandra was watching her mother anxiously.

  Tara smiled. ‘Don’t worry, I’m not about to go to pieces. Look, if it’s Saturday that means you’ll be entered for dressage classes at the riding centre.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter. Not today.’ Alessandra’s eyes swivelled from side to side, not knowing where to look. Hating to be thinking of trivial pleasures when a black cloud of tragedy hung in the air. And yet longing for that pleasure as the only shred of comfort available.

  ‘Of course it matters,’ Tara said briskly. ‘Get ready. I’ll drive you there right away.’

  Tara helped Alessandra unload Tosca from the trailer. Alessandra got out her grooming kit and set about the horse with a will.

  Looking on Tara felt strangely comforted. It struck her that Alessandra was rapidly outgrowing her beloved Tosca. They would have to consider another horse. Saul would have a few words to say on that subject, she could imagine. She halted her thoughts in horror. Saul, oh Saul!

  Tara grasped one hand tightly over the other, praying that Alessandra had not heard her high-pitched mew of distress.

  ‘It’ll be ages until we’re in the arena,’ Alessandra said. ‘Don’t wait Mummy. Go and see Grandma. Come back later.’

  Friends drifted up to make horsey talk with Alessandra. Tara looked on with an uncertain smile, then slipped quietly away and drove straight to Rachel’s.

  ‘He’s a survivor,’ Rachel said with dry practicality, having served up coffee and listened to Tara’s long story without making any interruption.

  ‘But he’d have been in touch by this time. He wouldn’t leave me in this hell of uncertainty if he were alive,’ said Tara. She looked at her mother. ‘Would he?’

  Rachel picked up a biscuit from the plate in front of her, staring fixedly at her at it as she crumbled it into little pieces. ‘You don’t believe he’s dead - do you, Tara?’

  ‘No.’ Tara looked up with hunted eyes. ‘Oh, I don’t know. Alessandra doesn’t want to hope. She keeps saying that awful word: dead, dead, dead.’

  ‘Of course she does. If you tell yourself the very worst there’s nothing else to fear.’

  ‘Yes, I know that’s right.’

  ‘He always loved you,’ Ra
chel said to her daughter gently. ‘He was simply besotted.’ She recalled the journey with Saul to the hospital when Tara was fighting for Alessandra’s life. ‘And if he’s alive, he’ll still love you. But he’s one on his own. He has the capacity to think and act and feel in ways other men don’t.’

  ‘Do you think he did it on purpose?’ Tara asked suddenly. ‘Tried to kill himself?’

  ‘No, certainly not.’ Rachel judged this was a time to be firm, whatever uncertainties hovered. ‘Do you?’

  ‘The police said the HGV driver was well over the limit. The road surface was wet and slippery.’

  Tara kept reminding herself of this. It was an accident which had not been Saul’s fault. Not of his doing. Yet she couldn’t help thinking that if only Bruno’s wretchedly chatty wife hadn’t opened her mouth about Bruno’s bloody blond boyhood hair…

  She recalled her words to Saul when he had taken her for a spin on the motorway after Monica Helfrich’s master class. You believe your life is important. You would never put yourself at real risk. Words she had spoken fifteen years previously. Had they been crookedly, grimly prophetic? And was a particle of doubt about Alessandra’s paternity the final twitch on the trigger of a pistol which had long been cocked?

  She groaned out loud, thinking of her beloved, beleaguered Saul. The pain was cutting through the numbness now. She had to brace herself against the conjectures revolving in her mind, grinding relentlessly into her spirit.

  Rachel comforted herself with the thought that Tara was still young. Even if Saul were dead her sadness would not be forever. Rachel’s inner thoughts of the maestro were bitter. From his lofty pedestal he had dangled his adoring satellites, Tara and Alessandra, on strings of steel and they had danced around him in worshipful adoration, keeping in strict synchronisation with every tune he called. If he had gone, then now there was a chance for them both to be free. Fulfilled in their own way, on their own terms.

  Rachel got up and filled the kettle in preparation for yet more coffee. No, she thought. That’s not right. That’s just my way of looking at it. Tara’s will be quite different, and Alessandra’s different again.

  ‘You need your work,’ Rachel told Tara bluntly. ‘You need Roland Grant. You need an orchestra and a trunk load of music.’

  ‘I can’t. Not now. Not yet.’

  ‘That’s something he would never have said,’ Rachel stated brutally.

  The police had agreed with Tara that they would maintain an embargo on issuing any public statement for twenty-four hours. After that it would not be possible to maintain silence any longer. They had pointed out their obligation to publish details regarding missing persons. And of their hope that following the release of information someone might come forward with some fragment of knowledge regarding Mr Xavier’s disappearance, some scrap of enlightenment which would help towards his being found.

  Tara did not disagree. She knew, however, what would happen once the press got onto the story. She had wanted Alessandra to have at least one day of peace.

  A breathless quiet hung over the house at the start of Sunday morning, thirty hours after Xavier had set out in his car. Tara grimly braced herself for the storm which would roll over her and Alessandra once the news broke.

  Alessandra, worn out with grief, shock and the nervous elation of coming second in her equitation class with Tosca, slept on well past breakfast time.

  Tara walked out into the garden, her mind full of the man who had dominated her thoughts and her whole life for so long. The thin white cloud which had dominated the early summer weather for days seemed about to be banished by a luminous disc of sunshine. Tara looked up at it, her eyes dazzled and aching.

  She wandered underneath the dipping branches of the monkey-puzzle tree, past the lawns and down the driveway, idly touching the glossy leaves of the bordering bushes. At the gates she stopped, looking out into the road. The gates were standing open. She and Saul had long ago decided that security was a matter of taking care and trusting rather than alarms and searchlights.

  A silver Mercedes coupe rounded the curve in the road, signalling its intention to turn, passing between the gates. The driver, not noticing Tara, drove on, making for the house. But Tara had taken notice. As she ran up the drive she was conscious of a strong need to get to the front door before Georgiana announced her presence and was confronted by a half-asleep Alessandra.

  Surely, she said to herself in a rush of panic as she ran, it couldn’t be possible that Georgiana knows something of Saul’s whereabouts. A bolt of joy surged up. Maybe, just maybe, there was hope.

  Georgiana was still arranging herself prior to getting out of the car. Tara saw the blonde hair swing to and fro as its owner stroked fingers over cheeks and hairline whilst staring in the rear view mirror. A pale hand brushed at the shoulders of her dress. Eventually the car door opened and two slender legs swung out. The rest of the figure unfolded itself, standing erect, cat-walk svelte in dark navy silk.

  Tara called out. ‘Georgiana!’

  Georgiana turned, hesitated and then walked forward. Tara stood astonished and stone-like as Georgiana leaned forward and pressed her cheek against Tara’s.

  As she pulled back Tara looked into the big china-blue eyes of Saul’s wife and knew with a terrible rush of disappointment that Georgiana knew nothing. She came bringing no significant news which could bring Tara back into full life again.

  ‘Come in Georgiana,’ she said, cool but polite.

  Georgiana sat on the big cream sofa, crossing her legs with dainty precision, revealing smooth golden legs in sheer stockings. ‘I had hoped to see Saul,’ she said, calm and gently smiling.

  Tara had an urge to burst into hysterical laughter. ‘I’m sorry - he’s not here at the moment.’ She stopped. How to go on, she wondered. A wave of nausea seized her.

  ‘I’ve tried the London house, left messages on the answer phone,’ Georgiana said.

  Tara straightened her spine, marshalled her resources. ‘Georgiana, I think you might be able to help me,’ she said. ‘Will you help me?’

  Georgiana blinked. ‘I’ll try.’

  ‘Saul had a car crash in the early hours of Saturday morning. He’s missing. I’ve heard nothing from him.’

  Georgiana stared at her, then blinked. ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘Oh dear.’

  ‘You haven’t heard from him, have you?’

  Georgiana hesitated. ‘No – not for a week or two.’

  So he had still been visiting her. Tara had always suspected as much. The bastard she thought, vicious in her rage for a brief moment. The stomach-churning anxiety and despair welled up again. Oh, if only he were still alive. Even the thought of a blazing row was like some dream of bliss.

  ‘He will be all right,’ Georgiana said. ‘He’s never hurt himself in an accident. He’s a wonderful driver.’

  Tara winced. ‘He hasn’t been in touch. Not a word. Not a call. Nothing.’

  Georgiana finally caught the torment and hint of menace in Tara’s voice. Her hands fidgeted with the silk of her navy skirt.

  ‘Where might he have gone? Do you know?’ Tara asked urgently.

  Georgiana shook her head. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said looking helpless.

  Silence.

  ‘Dr Denton, my doctor, he would say…’ Georgiana paused, as though regretting having embarked on this line of thought.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘That anyone who goes missing is searching for their past.’

  ‘What?’ Good God, that old cliché. But then clichés were often born out of life’s truths. ‘And where is his past?’ Tara wondered. ‘I know he was brought up by his uncle. He never said much beyond that.’

  ‘No,’ Georgina agreed. She fussed with the big ruby ring on the third finger of her left hand. ‘I’ve heard the uncle was a very cultured man. He lived on his own, never married.’

  ‘And what about the father?’

  ‘Georgiana shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Saul never spoke about him.’

&n
bsp; But then Saul is very sparing with his confidences Tara thought.

  ‘Poor Saul,’ Georgiana said. ‘No loving parents, no family.’

  Tara looked at her curiously. She had the impression that Georgiana’s words carried genuine feeling. But then she had always understood that Georgiana loved Saul in her limited way, so that Tara had always felt herself something of a thief in Georgiana’s presence. ‘Why did you come this morning?’ she asked her.

  There was a hesitation. ‘I wanted to tell Saul that the divorce can go through. I want to remarry – my doctor.’

  Tara groaned aloud. The terrible cruel irony of it. And maybe at this moment Georgiana was in no need of a divorce from Saul.

  ‘Oh Tara, I’m so very sorry,’ Georgiana said.

  After that there was no longer anything to say. Some futile murmurings were made. Eventually Georgiana got up to go.

  In the hallway a pyjama-clad Alessandra was leafing through the Sunday press. She looked up. There was shivery pause.

  ‘Oh my dear!’ Georgiana exclaimed. ‘But you’re beautiful.’

  Alessandra’s eyes smouldered like a forest fire.

  Tara swiftly shepherded Georgiana out. ‘Good-bye, I’ll let you know if…’ She turned away and ran back into the house.

  ‘Oh, Mummy! Poor, poor Mummy!’ Alessandra cried, grasping at her. ‘That awful woman – coming waltzing in here. Oh, grotesque.’

  ‘Truly, I don’t think she meant any harm.’ Amazing, thought Tara. ‘Listen Alessandra, the press will be arriving soon. In droves.’

  ‘Yes, it’s OK. We’ll cope.’ Alessandra threw back her head. ‘We will!’ Suddenly she was strong again. She padded off into the drawing room.

  To her amazement Tara heard the piano begin to resound with a Schubert impromptu. Very pleasingly executed, bold and fresh in its interpretation.

  CHAPTER 35

  Alessandra came down to the basement to find her mother. She tried to avoid looking at the screen monitors where the image of her father’s face dominated in triplicate. It was more than eight weeks since he had disappeared.