Chapter 55
Mariella had done it. Finally. After years of hard graft.
She was at the top of one of the best-dressed lists. In Women’s Wear Daily, the bible of the fashion trade. Probably the most important list of all. And she was therefore, all over the papers as well, the New York Times, the Daily News, and even The Times in London.
She received the congratulations of her friends, and the press, graciously but modestly: ‘It is nothing,’ she said, ‘just a little lucky moment.’
She knew of course it was nothing of the sort; a huge financial investment, an absolute dedication to her cause, a most careful attendance at the openings, the premieres, the charity dinners, the semi-private parties. Always slim, always glowing, hair and make-up perfect, dressed with wit and panache as well as perfect taste, always charming, always smiling, a shimmering star: the very brightest, for however brief a time, in the heaven she had set her sights upon.
Giovanni was less discreet, telephoning the world, throwing an impromptu party at the villa, boasting about her, showing her off.
A party was to be thrown for her in aid of one her favourite charities, by the American magazine, US Flair, to celebrate her triumph: in New York, at the Metropolitan Museum, long the home of such affairs.
All fashionable New York was to be there, of course: the fashion press, the designers, the photographers; but friends were invited too, from Milan, from Paris, from New York – and London. Among whom – of course – were Eliza Shaw and Jeremy Northcott.
‘Mariella, darling, so, so many congratulations!’
‘Eliza, cara, thank you. I am not a little bit pleased.’
‘Oh, you mean you are a very big bit pleased! And so you should be.’
‘Thank you, darling. Now you must, must come to the party. I will not hear of anything else.’
‘I’m afraid you have to hear of it, Mariella—’
‘Now cara, I cannot celebrate this without you. You helped make me more famous and I insist, insist you come. You can bring Matt, of course, I would not expect you to come without him, to leave him a hay widow—’
‘Grass, Mariella, grass.’
‘Well, but grass is young hay. Is that not right?’
‘I suppose it is,’ said Eliza, ‘but anyway, I’m afraid he won’t come either. And there’s something I have to tell you, I’ve been putting it off, because I can’t bear to talk about it, even to my friends but he’s – he’s divorcing me. I’m afraid I – well, I had an affair, Mariella. Well, not even an affair, just a – a—’
‘A one-night lay,’ said Mariella and she laughed. ‘Good for you, cara. How he does deserve that.’
‘Well,’ said Eliza, thinking how apt this mis-translation was, ‘he certainly doesn’t think so. And I’ve done a lot of other horrible things too.’
‘I cannot believe that—’
‘No, you have to. Horrible things, things I’m really ashamed of. Anyway, he’s divorcing me and – and – oh, Mariella—’ Her voice was shrouded suddenly in fright and tears. ‘He’s trying to – to get Emmie.’
‘What? He is mad. How can he get her, how can he make anyone think that is right?’
‘Well – he’s working very hard on it. And actually, Mariella, I have to ask you, and it’s a big favour, will you be one of my witnesses?’
‘You will have to produce witnesses,’ Philip Gordon said. He smiled at her gently. ‘It’s essential.’
‘Witnesses?’ said Eliza. ‘Witnesses to what?’
‘To your suitability as a mother. Several, in fact, who can speak up for you, give the lie to all the things your husband is citing as evidence to the contrary. Mrs Shaw – here—’
He pushed a large box of tissues towards her. He always had one, ready for the first meeting with a client.
Eliza blew her nose, wiped her eyes and smiled a watery smile at him. She liked him. Very much.
He had been recommended to her by a friend of Charles’s: ‘He appears very sweet and gentle, but don’t be fooled. He’s tough as the proverbial old boots and he gets – usually – very good results.’
Philip Gordon was a partner in a well-known firm of lawyers just off Chancery Lane. He was grey-haired, blue-eyed, slim and beautifully dressed, in a dark grey suit, a blue shirt that matched his eyes, and the red, navy and brown striped tie of the Old Wykehamist.
‘We like to live over the shop,’ he said to Eliza, taking her coat.
‘Sorry?’
‘The Royal Courts of Justice. Just over there.’ He pointed out of the window.
‘Oh, I see. It looks very grand from here.’ She felt rather alarmed. ‘Would – would this case really be held there?’
‘Oh, yes. Now – coffee? Or tea?’
‘Coffee, please.’
‘Excellent. I do like clients who want coffee in the afternoon, not just mid-morning. My preference precisely.’
He was very charming, Eliza thought; she suddenly felt a little better.
‘Right,’ he said, when the coffee had arrived. ‘Now let’s see. I’ve read your husband’s affidavit, of course, and I must say it’s very aggressive. Gloves off from Day One. These allegations about your being an unfit parent; now I’m sure you can defend them and we’ll go through them in a little while, one by one, but my first instinct on this is that several of them hardly hold water. Your going out to work – pretty standard these days, I’d have thought. But the other thing I would like to propose today, only for discussion of course, is that we should consider not defending the divorce petition, and putting all our energies into the custody case. Do you think you could defend the charge of adultery? Or would you want to?’
‘Well – no,’ said Eliza, living yet again the horror of that moment, of a naked, shaking Rob, handing her the phone across the bed, saying ‘it’s your husband’. ‘But – wouldn’t that immediately make me the guilty party?’
‘It would, insofar as you were admitting adultery, but not to the other charges, alleging your unsuitability as a mother. Do you think the – the other party would agree to your doing that?’
‘I’ll have to ask him, but I – I think so,’ she said, reflecting on Rob’s reaction when she called him to say what Matt had done.
‘Stupid bloody idiot,’ he said. ‘Well, I’ll do whatever you want, Eliza.’
‘Good. So there is no – no emotional complication?’
‘I – that is – no,’ she said, blushing. One of the worst things was the way she had been forced to view herself: as a slut, a good-time girl, sleeping with someone she hardly knew. She felt deeply and horribly ashamed of herself … maybe Matt was right … she didn’t deserve to have charge of Emmie.
‘Good. Then we simply fight the custody case only. I think you might do better that way. Judges get very weary of listening to couples bitching about one another, for want of a better expression, wasting several days of court time.’
‘Would that get it over more quickly?’ said Eliza.
‘It could. Yes.’
‘Because it’s so awful, what’s happening now, living with him in the same house, sort of pretending to Emmie – to my daughter – absolutely ghastly, you can’t imagine. I don’t know why he’s doing it, when he obviously hates me so much. Why doesn’t he move out into a flat or something?’
‘I’d quite like to move out,’ said Matt, to Ivor Lewis.
‘Why?’
‘Because it’s absolutely bloody awful, living there in the same house, pretending to my daughter—’
‘It’s a ghastly business, Mr Shaw. Look. You’re fighting for custody of that child because you say your wife is an unfit mother. You move out of the house, what do you think that says?’
‘I – don’t know.’
‘Think about it. It implies you’re happy to leave the child with her, in her care. Not a good point in your favour when it comes to court. Presumably you’re anxious that she’s going to neglect her further, leave her with unsuitable people, continue to undermine
your parenting wishes—’
‘Yes, of course I am.’
‘So you shouldn’t walk away from all that. Look – are you concerned that the child is in any physical danger. Has your wife ever struck her, to your knowledge? Because if she has—’
‘No,’ said Matt sharply, ‘no, I’m absolutely confident of that. She just – well, she wouldn’t. It’s out of the question.’
‘You wouldn’t care to – check up on that?’
Matt stared at him.
‘How, for Christ’s sake?’
‘Ask your daughter?’
‘Absolutely not. It would be an appalling thing to suggest to her. It would frighten her.’
‘Not if there had actually been violence. Children keep very quiet about it, you know, they feel ashamed, as if it’s their own fault. And of course that there might be retribution from telling on Mummy or Daddy.’
‘No,’ said Matt, ‘Eliza would never do that. And if she had, Emmie would have told me. She’s quite – quite manipulative. In her own way.’
‘Right. Well, anyway, I would advise you not to move out. Stick it out, Mr Shaw. Hopefully it won’t be for too long. Has your wife suggested moving out?’
‘No. No, she hasn’t. Apart from anything else, she doesn’t have any money, couldn’t afford a flat or anything.’
‘I thought she half owned your country pile?’
‘It’s a legal nicety. I paid for it, through the nose. To save her bloody family from penury. Or what passes for penury to those people. Her mother had to break a family trust to enable me to do it. Nice woman, we get along very well. She doesn’t approve of Eliza working, for a start.’
‘I’d like to look at the agreement,’ said Ivor Lewis. ‘If you don’t mind. And – do you suppose the mother could be persuaded to appear as a witness for your defence? Because that would be a very powerful point in your favour.’
‘Oh – no, I don’t think so,’ said Matt. ‘Blood thicker than water and all that.’
‘Well, if she’s not going to be a witness for you, she’ll certainly be one for her daughter. We can cross-examine in court. You never know. Something might come up.’
‘Darling,’ said Jeremy. ‘Sleeping on the job, so to speak. What a silly girl you are. Dear, oh, dear, Eliza, what a mess.’
‘Yes. I know. I’m sorry Jeremy. So sorry.’
‘Don’t apologise to me, sweetie.’
‘Well, it was while on agency business so to speak. And you must think so badly of me. It’s not as if I was passionately and deeply in love with him. He’s just – just a mate really. I thought better of myself, I really did.’
‘We all do things that take us by surprise sometimes,’ said Jeremy, ‘that we thought we wouldn’t be capable of.’
‘Not you, Jeremy, surely? You’re such a gentleman, always so – so perfectly behaved—’
‘I try,’ he said and sighed suddenly.
‘What have I done, Jeremy? It’s an awful thing that someone who once loved you so much, and thought you were wonderful, despises you and wants to hurt you … you’ve no idea how frightened I feel, the thought of losing Emmie is just – well, I don’t know what I’d do. It’s the one thing I don’t think I could bear. I thought Baby Charles dying was the worst, but losing Emmie—’ She started to cry.
‘Oh, my darling, you really have had such a cruel, horrible time, haven’t you? It’s so unfair and you’re so lovely.’
‘I’m not very lovely,’ said Eliza, sniffing, wiping her eyes on the back of her hand. ‘I’m bad. I’ve been really bad. You don’t know—’
‘Unwise, maybe. Hardly grounds for custody though.’
‘It depends on the judge, my solicitor says. Jeremy, you wouldn’t be a witness for me, would you?’
‘Darling, of course I will. But – I’m the person who tempted you back to work. And who was your lover for a long time. Not sure your barrister would find that very satisfactory.’
‘Maybe not. Oh, God, what a mess. What a filthy, horrible mess. If I could only go back a year. So much of it was me being brattish, Matt being stubborn—’
‘Is it really too late now?’
She looked at him and sighed. ‘Oh, Jeremy, yes. Of course it is. Absolutely too late.’
Chapter 56
‘Now you are not to be frightened, and remember I love you.’
She hadn’t got used to that yet. The sheer pleasure not just of hearing the words, but the way he spoke them. Very, very simply, and quietly and as if he was half-surprised himself to be saying them. Which, actually, he said he was.
‘I’ve led a very sheltered life, romantically,’ he said with a slight sigh, that first night, as they talked almost into the dawn lying in her bed, astonished at what was happening and its swiftness.
‘You could have fooled me, Mr Frost,’ she said, stretching luxuriously, her body still half-shocked at the new, gloriously sweet discovery of him.
‘Well – of course there has been the occasional encounter. Since – since Catherine.’
‘Who died?’ she said quietly.
‘Yes,’ he said, more quietly still. And then, ‘I mean – I do like – well—’
‘Sex?’ she said, and smiled at him.
‘Yes. But what just happened to us wasn’t exactly sex, was it? It was making love, in the truest sense. It was me, the whole of me, telling you I wanted you, the whole of you. It was – it was lovely,’ he said, kissing her gently. ‘Thank you.’
‘My pleasure. So – tell me about this sheltered life.’
‘Well – as you must have realised, I am rather – shy. I’m not sure why, I was just born that way. It’s hard to describe, it’s a kind of fear, I suppose. Of being judged and found wanting. A feeling you’re safer just with yourself. And quite early I discovered the best way was to stay just with myself. I was an only child, and I liked it. I dreaded every effort people made to help me as they saw it, to suggest friends, to invite me to play with other children, parties were a nightmare, I just stood in corners, watching while terrible mothers said “come along, Mark, join in the fun”.’
‘What about school?’
‘Oh, I didn’t mind school at all. School was all right, I had a role to play, I knew what I was meant to be doing and I could just get on and do it. I was quite – clever, I did well, got scholarships, things like that—’
‘Did you go to boarding school?’
‘No. My father thought I should go, but my mother wouldn’t allow it and what my mother said went.’
Scarlett had been afraid of that.
‘But day school was fine, it was a very academic place, there were other little swots, so, yes, I managed school, I did it quite well. It’s why I can give talks at those book launches and things, it’s having a clear role to play and playing it. But sitting next to some strange woman at dinner, expected to chatter and be interesting – oh, God. So just a couple of dalliances, over the past years—’
‘I can’t imagine you having a dalliance,’ said Scarlett.
‘Well – in both cases, they did the dallying. Very determined. Again, it meant I had a role to play, and they were both very nice, very attractive. It wasn’t difficult. And then – nothing. Till I met you. I saw you that first day, here on Trisos, all brown and beautiful and wild-haired, and everything lurched. I felt – physically unsteady. I thought you were the most desirable thing I’d ever seen.’
‘Goodness,’ said Scarlett. ‘Rejecting every effort I made to talk to you, scuttling away as fast as you could—’
‘Oh, I know, I know. But there was no role for me with you, clearly. Sophisticated, successful, independent woman – what truck could you have with me? It was very alarming.’
‘Well, lots of truck now,’ said Scarlett happily, leaning over and kissing him, ‘lots and lots of truck.’
‘Indeed. And the most lovely thing about you for me is that you are part of Trisos and how I feel about it, I could never think about it from that moment without thinking
also of you.’
‘That’s the nicest compliment I’ve ever had.’
‘I can’t believe that. You must have had a great many in your time.’
‘Only a few that ever mattered,’ she said.
They talked about David; it had to be confronted and simply. She was brutal, did not spare herself. Even about the baby.
Mark listened quietly, only interrupting when she told him about the blackmail.
‘How marvellous,’ he said, ‘what an absolutely correct thing to do.’
It was a novel interpretation; but she liked it.
She stayed a week: as she had planned originally. A wonderful, sun-drenched week, as they explored one another and their lives, and wondered that it had taken them so long to come this far. They were at once impressed and delighted by one another; every day a delight of discovery.
On the last night, as she prepared to leave Trisos, he told her he loved her.
And now she was to meet his mother.
Scarlett Shaw, half-educated, ill-read, ex-air hostess for God’s sake, being presented to this amazing woman who wrote poetry, who addressed festivals and lectured undergraduates, and not just in the ordinary course of things, not as a mere acquaintance, but as the object of his very great affection, as Mark put it – God, she loved his way with words – and by her only son. God, it was terrifying. She would have nothing to say, she would do the wrong things, she would fail the test completely, and Mark would abandon her …
And what did you wear to meet such a paragon of intellect? Did you look trendy or classic, did you wear colour or try to blend into the background?
‘Oh, God, oh, God,’ she wailed to her wardrobe mirror, looking round at her bedroom, littered with every sort of combination of clothes. And thought of the words of Eliza, whose sartorial opinion she had always relied on, ‘when in doubt dress down’, and she put on a little black dress and a long string of pearls, and some mid-height heels and very little make-up, and went out to slay the dragoness.
Who was a fairly pleasant surprise. She looked rather like Mark, with the same clear-cut features, the same grey eyes, and what had clearly once been the same dark hair, only thickly interwoven with grey and drawn back into a chignon. Her clothes were a little poetess-like, to be sure, a long skirt, a heavily embroidered Russian-style blouse, buttoned high on the neck, and a silk befringed shawl round her shoulders. She was pale, and very drawn-looking, no doubt because of the constant pain, but her smile when it came was dazzling. She lived in a rather dark large flat in Bloomsbury – where else could it be? Even Scarlett knew Bloomsbury was the centre of female literary London – every wall lined with books, every surface covered with papers. She was cared for day-to-day by a companion called Dorothy, who seemed both efficient and patient, and whose role was clearly not as subservient as Scarlett would have expected, she argued with her mistress quite frequently and eloquently indeed; but she was clearly fond of her and of Mark. ‘She’s like a rather strict nanny,’ he confided to Scarlett afterwards.
The Decision Page 64