The Wheel of Fortune

by Susan Howatch

  It also occurred to me, as I continued to observe her, that her rejection showed a lack not only of charity but of gratitude. A plain middle-aged woman should surely be so thankful to have a handsome successful devoted husband that she should make every effort to accommodate him. I remembered how my father never uttered one word of complaint about her nouveau-riche background and her appalling relations in Staffordshire. He had married beneath him when he had married her, and although her Midlands accent had long since disappeared and her more unfortunate social attributes had been ironed away by a formidable air of refinement, she could never be his equal in rank. The marriage had been arranged to save Oxmoon from bankruptcy. If my father had been older and if his mother and Owain Bryn-Davies had been less desperate for money, I had no doubt that my father would have looked elsewhere for a wife.

  However the marriage had been successful enough in its own way and my mother did have many virtues. Reminding myself how fond I was of her I made renewed efforts to be charitable.

  “What did you wish to speak to me about, Mama?” I said, knowing perfectly well that she had diagnosed the state of my heart with unerring accuracy and had resolved to advise me against marrying Ginette.

  “Well, dear,” said my mother, poking around in her jewel box, “I just thought we might have a little chat before Ginevra arrives tomorrow. Your father told me of the conversation he had recently with you in London.”

  “Ah yes,” I said; “I did wonder if you’d think his report needed clarification.”

  We exchanged smiles.

  “Oh no, dear,” said my mother. “You told your father, I believe, that you had every intention of behaving like a mature intelligent man. What sentiment could be more clearly expressed? I simply wished to reassure you that like your father all I want is your happiness, Robert. I wanted to reassure you of that in case you were harboring some suspicion that I had every intention of making you miserable.”

  “Far be it from me, Mama, to suspect you of such an unworthy aim.”

  We laughed politely together. There was a pause. I waited.

  “I do so disapprove,” said my mother, extricating a pair of jet earrings from the jewel box, “of mothers who meddle in the lives of their grown-up children, so you need have no fear that I’m going to meddle. After all, why should I? You’re a man of the world. You don’t need your mother to remind you of the hazards of marrying a widow of thirty-three with two growing sons and a somewhat … unusual past. Nor do you need your mother to tell you how much better you could do for yourself. Nor need I point out to you the danger of relying on illusions which bear no relation to reality—naturally you’re well aware of the dangers of carrying an adolescent infatuation forward into adult life. So all in all, Robert—bearing in mind that you’re a supremely rational man and thoroughly experienced in the Ways of the World—I have decided to say nothing whatsoever on the subject and to hold my peace in order to display my utmost confidence in the ultimate triumph of your good sense.”

  There was another pause. When I was sure I had my temper in control, I said, “Mama, it’s hard to believe you’ve never studied Cicero. One of his favorite oratorical tricks was to declare, ‘I shall say nothing about this’ and then to say everything in the most excruciating detail.” Standing up abruptly, I moved beyond the range of the triple looking glass before saying, “You seem to be implying I’m a complete fool.”

  “It’s a sad fact of life, dear, that not even men of a brilliant intellectual caliber are incapable of making a mistake where affairs of the heart are concerned. Indeed quite the contrary, I’ve always thought.”

  “I’m not interested in your opinion of some idiotic state of mind which as far as I’m concerned exists only in the pages of romantic fiction.”

  “Oh my dear Robert—”

  “I’m sorry, Mama, but really this skirmishing is exhausting my patience!”

  “Then let me be direct.” Leaving her dressing table, she moved swiftly to my side, gripped my shoulders and spun me to face her. “Let me speak straight from the heart. Your father believes you when you imply you’ve recovered from Ginevra, but you haven’t recovered, have you, Robert? I think you’re bound to see Ginevra’s bereavement as an opportunity for you to rewrite the past and wipe out the memory of that time when you were humiliated. You’re such a very clever man, but very clever men can be capable of such disastrous emotional naivety!”

  “Why are you so against Ginette?”

  “When she visited Oxmoon five years ago, I had the chance to sum her up and I saw exactly what kind of a woman she had become.”

  “A beautiful woman necessarily finds it hard to win the approbation of her own sex—”

  “Oh, don’t misunderstand me! I don’t disapprove of her because she’s the sort of woman who wouldn’t think twice about being unfaithful to her husband—such women often manage to sustain successful marriages. No, I disapprove of her as a wife for you because I think she’s a complex woman with all kinds of problems you couldn’t begin to solve.”

  “Mama—”

  “You see, I know you, Robert. I know you better than you know yourself. You’re like me. At heart your emotional tastes are really very simple.”

  “I’ll be the best judge, thank you, Mama, about what my emotional tastes really are. And if you think I’m like you then all I can say is that I can’t see the resemblance.”

  There was a silence. For a moment we stood there, inches apart, and stared at each other. Then she covered her face with her hands and turned away.

  “Mama …” I was immediately appalled by my cruelty. “Forgive me, I—”

  “It was my fault,” she said levelly, letting her hands fall and moving back to the dressing table. “I shouldn’t have meddled.”

  “I do have the greatest respect and regard for you, Mama—”

  “Oh yes,” she said flatly. “Respect and regard. How nice.” She found a garnet ring, shoved it onto her finger and snapped shut the box.

  “I have always entertained the very deepest affection—”

  “Quite.” She made no effort to respond as I stooped to touch her cheek with my lips. I had a fleeting impression of eau de cologne and anger. Her plump cheek was cold. When she said abruptly, “Hadn’t we better go downstairs?” I made no effort to detain her, and after opening the door in a formal gesture of courtesy I followed her in silence from the room.

  X

  UNABLE TO SLEEP THAT night I lay awake remembering the aspersions which my mother had cast on Ginette’s capacity for marital fidelity.

  In the old days Ginette had been conspicuous for her loyalty. I could remember her standing shoulder to shoulder with me in the nursery, writing to me at school every week without fail and even after her marriage keeping in touch with me when a less faithful friend would have permitted the relationship to become moribund.

  Yet although I did not question her capacity for loyal friendship I knew well enough that sexual fidelity was a game played to different rules. Friendship might be forever but people fell in and out of love, and marriage was far from immune to this well-known ebbing and flowing of desire. Would I blame Ginette for being unfaithful to Kinsella? No, of course not. A man like Kinsella deserved an unfaithful wife. But I wasn’t Conor Kinsella and my marriage would be played to different rules.

  Not only would I give Ginette no cause for infidelity, but I would make it clear to her from the beginning that she was to behave as a wife should. Like servants, women need to be told what to do; they like firm guidance, and that is why I am so unalterably opposed to votes for women. In reality it would not mean independence for females. It would mean that all the masterful husbands, lovers, fathers and brothers would have two votes instead of one. A woman’s talents are limited to managing a home and bringing up children. One can no more expect a woman to show independence of mind by casting an intelligent vote than one can expect a woman to debate an important issue in the House of Commons with implacable oratorical skill. />
  I thought of my mother reminding me of Cicero, the greatest orator of all time.

  But that proved my point. All my mother had ever wanted to do was to manage a home and bring up children. My mother was a clever woman, possibly the cleverest woman I had ever met, and she had no interest whatsoever in women’s suffrage.

  When I finally fell asleep it was well after midnight but by six o’clock I was already awake and picturing Ginette asleep in her cabin on the steamer that had been carrying her overnight from Dublin to Swansea. Would she be nervous? She had been nervous when she had returned for her visit five years before, although she had tried to hide her feelings behind a mask of exuberance.

  “Robert darling, how heavenly to see you again—give me a divine platonic kiss to celebrate our eternal friendship!”

  I shuddered at the memory and wondered how I was going to survive the inevitable sexual frustration which lay in store for me. She herself would be safe, locked up in her role of the bereaved widow, but what on earth was going to happen to me as she dabbed her eyes with a black lace handkerchief and succeeded in looking seductively haggard?

  I groaned, and then gritting my teeth I began to plan a debonair speech to welcome her home.

  XI

  FOUR HOURS LATER I was awaiting her imminent arrival. I had made some excuse to escape from the mob milling in the hall and was standing motionless at the landing window which faced the drive. As I nervously embarked on smoking a cigarette I wondered what to do with the ash, but in the end I was in such a state that I merely let it drop to the floor.

  Various inane remarks floated up the stairs.

  “Let’s all pose for a photograph!” Celia was calling breathlessly.

  “Celia, give me your camera!” That was the infant, being obstreperous as usual.

  “No, Thomas—no, Thomas—oh, Mama, do stop him—”

  “Edmund,” said John, intelligent enough to remain urbane amidst all this hysteria, “what about a quick game of billiards? I bet the steamer’s been delayed.”

  “But supposing it hasn’t?” Edmund, even though he was now nineteen, suffered from a constitutional inability to make up his mind.

  “I think she’ll be arriving at any minute,” said Lion, “and if you go off to the billiard room you’ll be fools. Lord, isn’t this a thrill? I keep visualizing this splendid creature swathed in black and looking unutterably sumptuous—”

  “Shhh! Here comes Mama.”

  “Boys, have you seen Robert anywhere?”

  “No, he’s gone off to be wonderful somewhere else, thank God,” said Lion, revealing that he was less than respectful when my back was turned.

  “That will do, Lionel. No, Thomas, you cannot have Celia’s camera. Edmund—”

  “Here’s the car!”

  “She’s coming!”

  “Quick, quick, quick—”

  “Papa—quickly, Papa, the motor’s here!”

  “Out to the porch, everyone—”

  “Come on, Celia—”

  “Come on, Edmund—”

  “Come on, everyone!”

  There was a stampede of feet below me. Meanwhile I had dropped my cigarette and was making the most intolerable mess. Having unforgivably ground the butt beneath my heel I drew back for cover behind the curtain as my father’s Talbot bore the bereaved widow at an appropriately funereal pace up the drive to the steps of the porch.

  “Hurray!”

  “Welcome home!”

  “Welcome back, Ginevra!”

  “Shhh, boys, a little less noise and a little more decorum, if you please—remember she’s in mourning.”

  My brothers fell obediently silent but as soon as the motor halted they rushed forward to catch a glimpse of the passenger. It was impossible for me and probably difficult for them to perceive her with any degree of clarity. The white dust from the Gower roads had once more laid a pale mask upon the windows.

  “Ginevra!” cried Lion, beaming from ear to ear as he flung wide the door of the motor, and then the next moment his mouth dropped open in astonishment. Everyone gasped. My father was suddenly motionless. My mother appeared to be rooted to the ground.

  Evidently our visitor was making some shattering impact but since I could see only the roof of the motor I still had no idea what was happening. In a fever of curiosity I flung up the window as far as it would go so that I could lean out over the sill, and it was at that exact moment that she began to descend from the motor. Then I understood. As soon as I saw her I too gasped, for she was not wearing mourning. The image of the widow swathed in black was at a stroke smashed to smithereens.

  “Darlings!” cried Ginette, gorgeously clad in a brilliant turquoise traveling costume and sporting a corsage of orchids. “How simply and utterly divine to see you all again!” And as everyone continued to stare at her in stupefaction she glanced carelessly upwards and saw me framed in the window above.

  A great stillness descended on her face but a second later she was blowing me a kiss with a smile. “Heavens, darling!” she called richly. “Just like Romeo and Juliet in reverse—all you need is a balcony! What are you doing up there?”

  “I was on my way to the kitchen garden to pick you some strawberries!” I said laughing, and at once saw the past recaptured in her dark and brilliant eyes.

  3

  I

  WE DRANK CHAMPAGNE IN the drawing room, a spacious room which Robert Godwin the Renovator had called a saloon and filled with eighteenth-century furniture. Unfortunately this elegant collection now lay under dust sheets in the attics, for my parents, whose aesthetic tastes could most kindly be described as eclectic, had long since decided to cram the Oxmoon reception rooms with overstuffed chairs, obese sofas and a bewildering jungle of bric-a-brac.

  Oxmoon was famous for its ready supply of champagne to complement important occasions. It was the only alcoholic beverage which my father permitted himself to enjoy; he would take two glasses and, very occasionally, a third. Now that I was older I admired his abstemiousness the more because his cronies among the Gower gentry were a hard-drinking bunch, and I knew from experience how difficult it was not to drink to excess when in the company of men determined to be inebriated.

  On this current momentous family occasion my father permitted himself a third glass of champagne. My mother, according to a custom which she never varied, took two glasses with enjoyment and declined another drop. Lion seized the opportunity to join my father in a third glass, John followed my mother’s example to show how good he was at drawing the line, and Edmund, as usual, could not make up his mind whether to continue drinking or to abstain. Celia, who had a weak head, was still conscientiously nursing her first glass while I, who could normally take my drink as well as the next man, was keeping pace with her. It is one of the idiosyncrasies of my constitution that under great stress my emotions are not soothed by the consumption of alcohol but exacerbated by it.

  Meanwhile in the midst of this studied moderation Ginette was drinking the champagne as if it were lemonade. As the celebration progressed we all stole uneasy glances at my mother to see how she was tolerating this further manifestation of conduct unbecoming to a widow, and although my mother continued to smile serenely the tension steadily increased. I was just wondering how I could abort this sinister emotional momentum when Ginette tossed off the remains of her fourth glass of champagne and said rapidly to my mother, “Margaret, you must be quite horrified, do forgive me, but I’m simply overwhelmed by the desire to rebel against the way I was treated in Ireland—everyone behaved as if my life was finished, and suddenly I couldn’t bear it any longer, as soon as I reached the steamer I wanted to throw all my mourning clothes into the sea …” She stopped. She was on the verge of breaking down.

  “Even your hats?” I said promptly.

  “Oh my dear, you know what I’m like about hats!” she said, laughing through her tears. “Even the black ones are much too gorgeous to throw overboard!”

  “You’d make any hat l
ook gorgeous!” said Lion roguishly.

  “Darling Lion, how adorable you are!”

  “Where did you get those incredibly vulgar orchids?” I said to put an end to this cloying exchange of compliments.

  “I forced poor Williams to drive up and down the main streets of Swansea until we finally found that very grand florist near the Metropole. No wonder I was late getting here!” She had recovered her equilibrium. Her hand moved automatically back to her glass.

  “Orchids and champagne!” said my father who became subtly more carefree under the influence of alcohol. “Good friends—amusing company—laughter—happiness! Yes, that’s the remedy I’d prescribe to anyone recovering from terrible times—and we know all about recovering from terrible times, don’t we, Margaret?”

  “Yes, dear,” said my mother.

  “Ginevra,” said my father, “I insist that you permit me to write a prescription for you: I propose a little dinner party for twenty-four as soon as possible!”

  Celia protested amidst the ensuing cheers: “But Papa, I don’t suppose Ginevra wants to see anyone outside the family just yet!” She glanced nervously at my mother.

  “And what would all the neighbors think?” said John, so driven by his desire to do the done thing that he failed to shrink from exhibiting a lamentably bourgeois cast of mind.

  “Oh, damn the neighbors!” exclaimed Ginette, and in the absolute silence that followed I was acutely aware of my mother straightening the garnet ring on her right hand.

  Ginette blushed, and in the panic-stricken glance she sent me I read a desperate appeal for help but I was already speaking. Moving to her side I said casually, “I expect women say ‘damn’ all the time in New York, don’t they? Autre pays, autres moeurs.”