Sheer Abandon

by Penny Vincenzi

  Just keep calm, Martha, just keep calm…

  “None of those women had left names.” Fergus Trehearn smiled at Kate. “And of course, no numbers or addresses.”

  “Oh,” she said. She wasn’t sure how she felt: disappointed, she supposed.

  “The thing is,” he said gently, “it’s a criminal offence, abandoning a baby. So they’re not going to be terribly upfront about themselves. Although they may not have understood that. But each and every one of them failed the nappy test. Most of them said it had been a disposable nappy, a few had apparently put a towelling one on you.”

  “Yes, I see.” She felt dreadfully bleak. It somehow underlined her poor, destitute, baby self, not just that she’d had no nappy on but that this fact was being used in this horrible mechanical way to catch her would-be mother out. All her would-be mothers.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, “this must be so difficult for you. But I think I can assure you that you haven’t missed your real mother. Whoever she is, she hasn’t declared herself.”

  “What about the first few? Before we thought about the nappy thing? One of them might have been her.”

  “Kate, if that is true, she will call again. She’s not going to give up at the first hurdle.”

  “She might. It might have taken all her courage to make that one call, and then when—when…” She fought back the tears.

  “That is a possibility, of course,” said Fergus gently. “But I think a remote one. And Kate, it is still possible that you will hear. Very possible. People behave strangely under pressure. Any sort of pressure. I’m no psychiatrist, but I would imagine that if you’ve kept something like this to yourself for sixteen years, it could be pretty difficult suddenly to acknowledge it. It might seem better to wait until the fuss has begun to die down. And then again, I suppose, she might not have seen the article immediately.”

  “Not very likely,” said Kate. “It’s been in most of the papers. And mentioned on the radio as well.”

  “Indeed. Now that is a relevant observation—Woman’s Hour are very eager to do something about it, to talk to you, Helen, and to Kate—”

  “No,” said Helen sharply.

  “Why not?” said Kate. “Just why exactly not?”

  “Because I don’t want this thing prolonged,” said Helen wearily. “You’ve been upset enough, Kate, and—”

  “So it’s over, is it?” said Kate. “I hadn’t realised that. What do you mean, Mum, for God’s sake? You don’t want it prolonged! How ridiculous is that? What about me? Yeah, I’ve been upset. But if anything good comes out of it at all, it’ll be finding my mother. And I think the radio would be good. I could say what I wanted, not what the paper said I had. Like I really want to see her still.”

  “It’s a very nice programme, Helen,” said Fergus. “Jenni Murray is a superb interviewer—she’s gentle with her interviewees and very sensitive about her material. If Kate still hopes to find her mother, then it could be a good way forward. There’s something honest about radio. As Kate says, they can’t distort your words. She could make a direct appeal to her mother. It could be very emotive. But Kate, if your mum doesn’t like the idea, then it would be wrong for you, too.”

  He moved into safer territory: both the Sun and the Mirror wanted interviews, but he thought not. “You’ll just get more of the sensationalism, and I think you’ve had enough of that,” and several model agencies wanted to see her, three of them really good ones.

  “And”—Helen hesitated, fearing another outburst from Kate—“are we sure about…about the modelling?”

  “Mum! What do you mean, are we sure? It’s something I can do, make lots of money, be successful, all that sort of thing!”

  “But Kate, what about your exams?”

  “Oh God! Mum, I’ll do my exams. Of course I will.”

  “And college?”

  “Well, maybe. I’ll see. Point is—”

  “The point is,” said Fergus, sweetly reasonable, “she can do her modelling in the holidays. Work round her college terms. A lot of girls do that.”

  “Do they?” Helen looked slightly less distraught.

  “Fergus,” said Kate suddenly, “will you be my agent? Do I have to go to one of these other places?”

  “I don’t know…” Fergus’s voice was heavily cautious. No one would have suspected that this was what he had been hoping for, ever since Gideon Keeble had contacted him, the long-term reward from this project: this and a good publishing deal for the whole story, when the mother turned up. As he was sure she would. It was a fantastic story; it could be a big money spinner. And the more famous Kate was, the bigger it would be. For the time being, that must be his goal. He smiled modestly. “I’m not familiar with the fashion scene, you know, and—”

  “Couldn’t you learn? It would be so much nicer. Wouldn’t it, Mum? We trust you, I feel like we’ve known you forever.”

  “I have to tell you, I think you might do better with a conventional agency, although there are precedents, of course. Twiggy—you’ve heard of Twiggy, I expect?”

  “Yeah, course. She was in a magazine the other day; she’s really old now, isn’t she? But she still looks OK.”

  “Well, anyway, she wasn’t with a standard agency. Her boyfriend managed her very successfully, and he was a hairdresser.”

  “There you are. Oh, Fergus, please, I’d like it so much and so would Mum, wouldn’t you?”

  “But there would be one important condition, Kate,” said Fergus, and his voice was quite stern. “You must do your best in your exams. They’re important. Very important indeed. You could regret throwing away your chances. Things change, and not every girl who is spotted by a fashion editor makes it big-time. I would be very unhappy if you started doing any modelling at all, until those are over. What would you say to that?”

  “I’d say cool,” said Kate with a shrug. “As long as they don’t all forget about me.”

  “Don’t worry about that,” said Fergus. “I won’t let them forget about you, Kate, not for a single moment. Now you and your mum have your conversation and let me know what you decide about Woman’s Hour.”

  Clio felt very tired when she got home: not sure if she was happy or not. The lunch with Beaky had been wonderful; he had told her how much she had been missed and how he hoped that she would apply for the consultant’s job.

  “I’ve got a very good team there,” he said. “Keen, clever, mostly young. I can hardly bear to think of leaving it. You’d fit in jolly well, Clio. We’ve got a couple of research projects going, we’re doing some trials with a new Alzheimer’s drug, and we’ve got a wonderful new psychiatric chap.”

  “It does sound wonderful,” she said wistfully, “but do you really think I’m up to it?”

  “Clio! Is this really the brightest new consultant in the department for years talking? You do put yourself down, dear girl, and you really mustn’t do it. I wouldn’t have invited you to apply if I didn’t think you were absolutely up to it, as you put it. As far as I can see, you’re the perfect candidate. You’re familiar with the hospital and the workings of the department, you did very well when you were here, everyone liked you—and from what you tell me, you’ve done a lot of geriatric work while you’ve been in general practice. I’m sure you can slot back into the rotation system, no one’s going to object on procedural grounds.”

  “Good,” said Clio. “I was worrying about that a bit.”

  “No need.” He patted her hand. “Not enough people going into geriatrics. We need you.”

  She smiled at him, promising to apply, and made her way to the solicitor’s office.

  She had been warned it would be wretched: it was. It was one thing to agree, however sadly, that your marriage was over; it was quite another to find yourself in an adversarial situation, picking over the balance sheet of that marriage. She had agreed that she wouldn’t contest the divorce and had expected a certain generosity in return; but Jeremy was even querying her right to a share of the
house, claiming she had walked out on a marriage that she had entered into under false pretences.

  “Don’t worry, Mrs. Graves, they all start like this.” Her solicitor, a very nice sympathetic woman, smiled at her encouragingly. “He’ll come down.” She passed Clio a tissue from the box on the desk between them. “It’s horrid. I know.”

  “I put so much work into that house,” said Clio, blowing her nose. “Sorry about this.”

  “It’s all right. I never remember having a preliminary consultation over divorce when the tissues weren’t needed. And of course you worked hard on the house.”

  “And I paid for a lot of the work on it,” said Clio.

  “I know. Don’t worry. We’ll get you everything that’s due to you…”

  “I missed you,” said Gideon. “Very much.”

  They were lying in bed; he had returned from Barbados, leaving an extremely contented Fionnuala behind him, the owner of three superb polo ponies.

  “She was so pleased,” he said, “and most affectionate. It was all very sweet.”

  “I expect it was,” said Jocasta and hoped her voice didn’t sound barbed.

  It was early in the morning; they were in his London house, in Kensington Palace Gardens. It had shocked Jocasta, that house: shocked and almost intimidated her. It could only be described as a mansion, a five-year-old Palladian-style mansion, complete with a ballroom, several vast reception rooms, a staff flat, and ten bedrooms. It was a strong statement, about its owner, about the sort of money he had and the sort of taste. Excessive, in all cases. Did a man with almost no family really need ten bedrooms?

  “I missed you too,” she said. “Terribly.”

  “I’m pleased to hear it. I would have liked to think you were terribly unhappy. Oh God”—he pushed the sheet back, sat up, and studied her—“you are the most beautiful thing. I can’t imagine what you’re doing with an old man like me.”

  “I love you,” she said, “old as you are. Believe it or not. I just love you. I can’t imagine how I got through even a week of my life without you, never mind thirty-five years. It seems most peculiar.”

  “I was thinking, while I was away,” he said, bending down and kissing first one breast, then the other, “thinking how you told me you loved me, and thinking how much I loved you, and that neither of us really knew the other at all.”

  “I thought that, too. But I feel I do. I feel I’ve known you always. I feel I know everything about you. How ridiculous is that?”

  “Very ridiculous. And very dangerous. You may have discovered some of my virtues. My vices are mercifully a closed book to you.”

  “Oh, I don’t know. I know you’re quite ruthless. I know you have a terrible temper. I know you can be stubborn—”

  “That’s quite enough. I don’t like this game.”

  “We can talk about my vices, if you like, if that’ll make you feel better.”

  “And what are they? I thought you had none.”

  “OK. I’m impatient. Self-centred. Cowardly. I dread pain. I’m easily bored. And then I’m vain—”

  “With good reason.”

  “Thank you. And generally rather silly.”

  “Silliness is not a vice. I encourage it in myself. Let’s do virtues now. You’re clever. Imaginative. Tenderhearted. Beautiful—”

  “That’s not a virtue. That’s a bit of luck. Let’s do yours. You’re generous and generous-hearted. Kind. Thoughtful. And I like the way you care about everything so much.” It was true: he sought the highest standards in everything; he said that was what life was for, to find the best. From the houses he lived in to the clothes he wore, from the food he ate and the wine he drank to the way he travelled and the people he employed, everything must meet not just his approval but his high approval.

  “Anyway, the States next week. Looking forward to it?”

  “Of course. I plan to shop for England. And Ireland.”

  “That’s my girl.”

  Martha got out of the cab, went into her building, pressed the lift button. She felt a little better: her life almost whole again. She’d had a very good meeting with Paul, she was on top of her work, her assistant and her trainee were well briefed for the following week, and the night before she had actually managed to sleep with only one sleeping pill.

  No journalist had rung her, and after—what—three days, it didn’t seem likely that they would.

  The only thing was, of course, how much she was still hurting over Ed. It was awful; it was like the pain of a burn, searing, shocking, beyond the reach of any analgesic. It woke her up, that pain; disturbed her as she worked, dug into her consciousness at the most unexpected times.

  But it would pass: of course it would. It had to. There was no alternative. And he seemed to have accepted it; there had been no phone calls, no appearances in reception, no e-mails. Just—nothing.

  She was leaving her apartment at five thirty in the morning, so that she could go to the gym; with twenty-one hours on the plane ahead of her, she would need that. She was actually looking forward to the trip now that she had it all properly under control.

  And going away now seemed, suddenly and surprisingly, what she needed.

  She poured herself a glass of mineral water and carried it into her bedroom, to finish her packing. She had just pulled fourteen pairs of pants (two for each day) out of a drawer when the doorbell rang. That would be the papers Paul had promised to have sent round, extra background information on Mackenzie, so that she could study them in bed.

  She went to her door, pushed the buzzer.

  “Yes?”

  But it wasn’t papers; it was Ed.

  “You can’t stay,” she said, staring at him as he stood in her hallway, thinking with complete irrelevance that he looked absolutely wonderful, wearing an open-necked white shirt and jeans, like someone in a film. “I’m packing, I’ve got a plane to catch.”

  “I don’t care if you’ve got a fucking rocket to catch,” he said. “I want to know what’s going on. Something’s happened, Martha, hasn’t it? I don’t care what it is, I don’t care if you’re in love with someone else, I don’t care if you’re terminally ill—well that’s bollocks, of course I care, but I’ve just got to know. I can’t stand it. You’ve got to tell me.”

  “Nothing’s happened,” she said, fists clenched, meeting his eyes with considerable courage, for what might he read there? “Nothing’s happened at all. I’m just—just terribly busy. I’m going to Sydney tomorrow.”

  “Sydney? How long for?”

  “Just a week. We have a client there. A very important client,” she added firmly.

  “Martha, for fuck’s sake, what is it? What’s happened to you? You’ve got to tell me, I’m not going away until you do.”

  “Nothing’s happened,” she said, and she was quite frightened now, he looked so desperate.

  “Martha,” he said very quietly, “I love you. I know you really rather well. I know every inch of you. Literally. I know how you are when you’re happy and when you’re upset and when you’re stressed and when you want sex, and I know when you want to talk and when you want to be quiet and when you’re feeling rotten and tired and mean. And I know something’s happened to you—I know it. This is not about you being busy. It’s about you being scared. What are you scared of, Martha? You’ve got to tell me. What have you done? Nothing you did could shock me, or upset me, unless it was falling in love with someone else. I’d have to get over that, but at least I’d know. Is that it, is there somebody else?”

  “No,” she said, very quietly, “there’s no one else.”

  “So what is it?”

  She was silent.

  “Martha, look at me. Tell me what’s fucking happened.”

  And for a moment she wanted to tell him. Just to get it over, to know that someone else knew, it wasn’t locked away, struggling to escape, this awful, dreadful shocking thing that she had denied for so long, managed to contain, this fearful obscene monster. Just to be able
to say to someone what should I do, where can I go, where shall I start? Instead of crushing it, endlessly, pulping it to—

  But she couldn’t.

  “Nothing’s happened,” she said finally and then: “You must excuse me, I don’t feel very well.”

  And she rushed into her bathroom, slammed the door, and was violently sick, over and over again, and then sat on the lavatory, shivering and shaking, awful pain driving through her stomach, wondering how she could ever go out of the room again.

  She heard him knocking on the door, very gently, calling through it; and she made a supreme effort, washed her face and cleaned her teeth and walked out, facing him, trying to smile into his concern.

  “Sorry,” she said. “I’m so sorry.”

  And that was when he had said it: the worst thing he could possibly have said.

  “Martha, you’re not pregnant, are you?”

  She started to laugh; weak hysterical laughter that turned, in time, to tears, shaking her head from side to side, avoiding his eyes. He helped her into the sitting room, sat her down on the sofa, watching her as she wept and wailed and keened, like some wild, primitive woman; and then finally as she quietened, he came to sit next to her and put his arms round her, drew her head onto his shoulder. She sat there, briefly sweetly at peace, where she wanted to be, and she picked up his hand and intertwined it with her own, then raised it to her lips and kissed it.

  “Thank you,” she said, “thank you so much. I’m sorry.”

  “Oh, Martha,” he said, kissing her hand in return, “I wish you could trust me. Whatever it is you’ve done, I would understand and I would forgive you. And I shall find out, you know. I’ll find out somehow. I won’t leave you alone until I do, and I won’t leave you alone, even then. I think you need me.”

  “No,” she said, summoning up all her will, releasing his hand, moving slightly from him, “no, I don’t. I don’t need you, Ed. And you certainly don’t need me.”