by Carol Smith
Since her early teens, Georgy had been a nest-builder and her china alone, back home in Manhattan, was filling all her storage space and threatening to burst out into the rest of her rooms. One of Myra’s favorite jokes about her oldest daughter, not meant unkindly, was that when she did at last manage to snare herself a husband, she would be able to feed him on different dishes every night for a week and still have whole services over for special occasions.
The rest of Sunday Georgy spent rooting through the antique shops at the far end of the King’s Road and the auction rooms in Lots Road where she often saw bargains that made her want to weep—things she would swoop on and carry off without a thought if only she had a permanent place to put them. All of which led straight back to her basic loneliness and the real hunger that was all the time gnawing at her guts. Gus Hardy. And how in the world she was ever going to get to know him better.
He was just so beautiful. The first time Georgy ever saw him, at Juilliard where he was teaching part-time, she had flipped over his lithe, sensual body and silver-haired good looks, and her obsession had grown over the years so that she lived, breathed, dreamed Gus Hardy to the exclusion of practically everything else. Friends in New York had laughed and warned her off. Men that neat usually traveled solo, they said, and if at forty-something he was still unmarried, there must be a secret life she didn’t need to know about but which was unlikely ever to include her. But Georgy was tenacious, something she had inherited from her father, and what she set her heart on she meant to have. She followed Gus’s career as assiduously as any biographer and it was not entirely a coincidence that, when dancing let her down, she reinvented herself as a photographer specializing in theater and dance.
Gus treated her with a lazy tolerance, touched and amused by the intense, nervy girl with the Botticelli hair and the prominent nose that just stopped her from being pretty. He allowed her into his final rehearsals because he could see she had talent and could be relied on to behave like a pro. Other than that, he seldom gave her a thought and was only mildly surprised when she turned up in London, on a special assignment from New York Life, to cover the British production of his vast Broadway hit. Surprised and pleased because he knew she would do an excellent job which would help to promote the show. He was aware that she always arrived on time and lingered longer than she needed to at night, but his own life was so complex that he hadn’t the time or inclination to spare for hers. In Gus Hardy’s eyes, Georgy Kirsch was a little like a mascot—hardworking and pleasant to have around but in no way central to his life. She would have been devastated had she known how it was.
• • •
Autumn gave way to winter and still Georgy lingered on in London. Due to various problems with the cast, the opening of Autumn Crocus had had to be delayed but Georgy was lucky enough to have found other work and was still on a retainer from New York Life, which paid well and gave her an authenticity which led to other things. She managed to get in on an ambitious outdoor production of Aida at Earls Court and filled the gaps with one or two advertising jobs, courtesy of a New York acquaintance who worked at J. Walter Thompson.
Thanksgiving was looming and Georgy felt homesick. She still had no real friends in London. She had teamed up, to an extent, with a dancer from Gus’s company called Lindy. They started to hang around together and go to art galleries and concerts on weekends. Lindy lived in Paddington, in one cramped room in a down-at-heel lodging house, so Georgy invited her for Thanksgiving dinner.
“Who else shall I invite? Gus, do you think?”
Georgy could just about squeeze eight round her table and she loved to cook. Lindy seemed doubtful. She suggested a couple of other dancers but thought Gus would most likely be otherwise engaged. He was, after all, English and did have family here. Besides, Thanksgiving was not a British festival.
Nonetheless, Georgy phoned him. Gus was pleasant but regretful.
“Sorry, sweetie. With things running so late, we have to rehearse. And I rather think I have to go on to the Ambassador’s house with Vic and Marla and a bunch of the cast for late-night fireworks and dancing and all that jazz—boring, I know, but that’s show biz and we have to fly the flag. It was darling of you to ask me. Have a wonderful evening and be sure to raise a glass to me!”
In the end, five of them shared a turkey and a Harrods-bought pumpkin pie and Georgy found sparklers in a local shop and tiny American flags which she stuck in the pie. It was all quite jolly but her heart wasn’t in it. When they had left, in the small hours, leaving the table to be cleared and a stack of dishes to deal with, she rang Gus’s number again but no one answered. So she called her family instead, on Long Island, and found them all together and right in the middle of their dinner. They were thrilled to hear her voice, of course, and had planned to call her later when they’d finished eating, forgetting all about the time difference.
When she hung up Georgy cried. They had each other while she was here alone. For the first time she felt like throwing in the towel and heading home.
• • •
For the night of the opening of Autumn Crocus at Drury Lane, two weeks before Christmas, Imogen had a new velvet dress and Beth dug out her old Jean Muir and sent it to be dry-cleaned.
“Got to put on a show for the old man,” she told Jane. “Actually, I’m rather looking forward to it. He’s talked so much about it and it’s ages since I last had a glam night out. He’s putting us in the royal box. Très posh.”
Secretly she wished that Oliver could be there too but, of course, that was out of the question. He was off in Zurich on bank business so wouldn’t have been able to make it in any case. Ah, well. Beth was used to doing things on her own; it went with being Oliver’s bit on the side. And tonight, in any case, she’d be there to support her ex, which was as it should be.
• • •
Phoebe and Addison were in the third row of the stalls when Vivienne swanned in with Duncan, who was surprisingly suave and well groomed in a well-cut dinner jacket and ruffled shirt. Vivienne looked radiant and Phoebe was pleased; Addison’s little favor was obviously doing the trick and, once the operation was over, maybe she’d be able to rebuild her life. Though, from the look of the man at her side, Phoebe was surprised it was necessary.
“You didn’t tell me Oliver looked like Kris Kristofferson,” she hissed to her husband, and Addison turned his head in surprise, then grinned.
“That’s not Oliver,” he said. “Oliver’s a stiff in a suit. Goodness knows where she picked up that. Probably a gigolo.”
Phoebe giggled and squeezed his hand. She was really enjoying herself; evenings together like this were all too rare. Like Vivienne, she suffered from being married to a workaholic, though she felt that time devoted to the hospital was a lot more worthy than merely making money.
• • •
Serena, sitting beside Sally and trying to ignore her, saw Duncan too and let out a yelp of outrage.
“That’s Duncan Ross,” she said. “My bloke. I was going to ask him to come this evening but he said he wasn’t free.”
“He’s stunning,” said Sally sympathetically, taking a look. “But then, so’s she.”
Serena glared at Sally with hostile eyes and deliberately turned her back. She looked a right little slut, whoever she was, in her tawdry, semi-transparent nylon dress which looked like a slip and showed everything she’d got. Serena certainly didn’t want to be seen talking to the likes of her. To add insult to injury, she had one paw wrapped bulkily in a great white bandage which was none too clean. Really, Jeremy’s standards were slipping. If she’d known his party was going to be this raffish, she certainly wouldn’t have come. And who the hell was that devastating woman on Duncan’s arm? She wanted to storm across and make a scene but managed to restrain herself.
• • •
Eleanor Palmer, on the right of the fifth row and all done up like a dog’s dinner, was looking around the theater with an air of hauteur, waiting for recognition. She would h
ave preferred to be in the royal box, where everyone could see her, but that was already occupied by just two people, one of them a child, which seemed a terrible waste. She checked in case the woman was Diana or Anne, then lost interest. Her attention was caught instead by something far more riveting; she sat up straighter in her seat and trained her opera glasses on Addison Harvey, two rows in front and slightly to her left.
Even after all these years, there was no mistaking him. The hair was graying, the eyes were pouchy, and he had put on a lot of weight but Eleanor had an eye like a hawk and a memory as sharp.
Good heavens, she thought incredulously, there’s that frightful little upstart who practically ruined my daughter’s life! She glanced swiftly at Catherine, slumped despondently beside her, but she appeared not to have noticed him. Thank God. Eleanor prayed for the house lights to dim and her daughter to remain in oblivion. Secretly, she still had faint qualms about what had happened twenty years ago, but was damned if she’d ever admit it, even under oath. He’d been bad news, that was all there was to it. Eleanor was glad she had got rid of him before he could do more harm.
• • •
Gus found Georgy lurking backstage, though for once without her camera.
“What are you doing back here?” he said. “Your place is out there in the house tonight. You deserve it after all your hard work and I want you to see how it looks.”
Georgy confessed she hadn’t got a ticket; had forgotten all about it in the rush of the last few days. Gus grinned and took her gently by the elbow.
“Come with me,” he said mysteriously, propelling her through the door and up the stairs.
The orchestra was already tuning up when Gus opened the door and ushered in a stranger. Beth looked up from her program and smiled as Gus made the introductions.
“Georgy Kirsch,” he said, “ace photographer from New York. Meet my daughter and my former wife.”
Then he shot off out and left them together, sprinting down the corridor in order to get backstage before the action started. He had worked for months for this one night; his whole career and creative future depended on its success.
The overture came to an end, the plush curtains parted, and the magic of Gus’s musical began to unfold onstage. The audience was appreciative and in festive mood and the entire house, top and bottom, was packed with ladies and gentlemen in evening dress, like a gala performance at the opera house. Gus, hovering in the wings, began to relax; despite the setbacks, the grinding months of work and the last terrible panic when they’d been forced to put off the opening until this close to Christmas, he could see it was going to be all right. His toe began to tap as he lost himself in the music.
Serena sat glowering in the dark, miserable at seeing Duncan with another woman, while beside her Sally was making plans for putting the make on Jeremy once she got him alone. Her hand was still stiff and unusable but that shouldn’t deter her, and he must be more interested than she’d thought, to have asked her to this fancy do.
Vivienne was happier than she had been for months, safe with Duncan at her side and secure in the knowledge that soon her little health problem would be sorted out, and all without her husband’s knowledge. Georgy sat bolt upright in her box, impervious to the spectacle on the stage, unable to believe what she had just heard, all the while shooting little darting glances at Beth, to check that she was real.
Eleanor focused on the music, critical of the leading lady, who needed to shed a stone or two and whose voice she found excruciating; while beside her Catherine remained sunk in a stupor, feeling like death and dreaming, as ever, of Tom.
• • •
Now it was New Year’s Eve, and once more Georgy was alone. All the excitement of Autumn Crocus was over, at least for her. The show had been brilliantly reviewed and was playing to packed houses. Georgy’s photographs had appeared in magazines all over the world and received their own share of praise. Yet she’d spent Christmas Day alone, slumped in front of the telly with a tray of Marks & Spencer boned turkey and one mince pie, trying to get interested in the James Bond movie and longing to be with someone she really cared for.
She had booked a call to her father and Sylvia, on vacation in the Caribbean, but the lines were all busy and she never did get through. When she spoke to Myra and her sisters, she found them still celebrating—even more so now since Lois too had announced her engagement. This was undoubtedly Myra’s year, with two daughters down and only one to go, but Georgy couldn’t seem to care. She brushed aside her mother’s clumsy questioning and rang off. She hated to be mean-spirited but could see her life ticking away with the years and nothing at all to show for it.
Lindy and her friends were off to Trafalgar Square tonight, to see in the New Year in traditional London style, but Georgy had refused their invitation to join them. She was feeling a little off-color, with a dull pain in her stomach, and could not face the crowds and the noise, nor the prospect of the end of another year, so far away from her family and friends. She felt incredibly homesick and when her father called to say they were back and to wish her a happy new year, she was inches away from bursting into tears.
She spent the afternoon in the darkroom, finishing an assignment, but by nine could bear it no longer. She was only twenty-six years old; it was criminal to be sitting here alone, feeling sorry for herself as she listened to the distant laughter of New Year revelers. Time to get out there and grab life by the throat; she brushed her hair, slipped into the sable jacket her father had sent her for Christmas, and set off down the Fulham Road before she could change her mind.
• • •
Inevitably, of course, she ended up in Islington. It was almost midnight when Georgy stepped out of her cab outside the elegant town house that was ablaze with light and buzzing with the sounds of a party in progress. She had been there once before, but only on an errand; now she stood unseen in the cold street, gazing, through undraped windows, into a huge room packed with people. Lamplight picked up the silver sheen of Gus’s elegant head as he passed among his guests, a bottle of Bollinger held high in either hand, welcoming them into his home. He was giving a party for what looked like half of London but he hadn’t included Georgy. Even though they had worked together all these weeks and she was a stranger in this city on the one night of the year that really mattered. Among the crowd she glimpsed the fluffy curls and famous profile of Marla Henderson, and a cold hand clutched at Georgy’s heart. It was true, then, what she had long suspected yet tried so hard to suppress. That bitch of an actress was in there where Georgy longed to be.
All she ever wanted in the world was in that room, yet the door stood firmly closed and the sounds from within were muffled by expensive double glazing. Yet there was a holly wreath on the door and an immense welcoming Christmas tree in the window. Surely they must stand for something? New hope had filled her when she met the wife and daughter; if he had done it once, surely he could do it again? All her friends’ cynicism was suddenly devalued and Georgy was more determined than ever to conquer Gus and win his heart. If only she could work out how.
It was five minutes to midnight, almost the hour for first-footing, and who, on a night like this, would turn away a stranger? On an impulse, Georgy gathered the sable jacket close up against her chin and banged on the door with the huge brass knocker.
She waited for a while, but nothing happened, so she knocked again.
“Door!” shouted someone from inside, and “Get it!” in the authoritative tones of Gus. Georgy had her smile all ready and a suitable excuse on her lips—“Just passing, saw the lights, felt I must stop by to wish you a happy new year”—when the door opened and she found herself confronting a stranger.
The young man who stood in Gus’s lit doorway was graceful, ash blond, no more than twenty-two at the most and not smiling at all. He raised one eyebrow in silent inquiry and the greeting died on Georgy’s lips.
“Who is it?”
Gus, still wielding a bottle, appeared behind the
young man and draped one arm casually round his shoulders.
“Georgy Kirsch, what a surprise! Come on in out of the cold and join the merry throng. Karl, do your stuff, old boy, and get her a glass—chop, chop.”
Radiating that amazing smile, Gus swung back into the party, leaving Georgy still hovering in the doorway, facing the scowling stranger. Karl held out one stiff hand for the sable jacket but Georgy had turned away, sick to her stomach.
She made it to King’s Cross station, where the crowd was almost impenetrable. As she waited miserably for a tube train, the pain in her stomach grew worse and she was violently sick. Then she blacked out.
Hours later, feeling like death, she awoke to find herself in the hospital.
Part
Two
Chapter Twelve
Addison Harvey sat at the wheel of his silver Corniche and wished himself back in Gstaad, where he had left the family skiing. The traffic along the King’s Road was unusually light for a Friday morning but then it was early January and most of the world was still slacking off, enjoying the last few days of the extended holiday. Lazy sods. The older he became, the more reactionary he seemed, so that these days he occasionally heard himself sounding exactly like the older consultants whose blimpish attitudes he had, for decades, so much despised. As it was, he voted Conservative—something he kept to himself whenever he returned to Consett—and the fact that his boys were at Harrow only went to demonstrate how far he had strayed from those solid, old-fashioned, working-class roots.
But who the hell cared? He had worked damned hard for what he had achieved and was not about to apologize for it now. The house in Sunningdale, the lucrative private practice, the rich society wife who was the envy of all his associates—these were things he had labored for, and if the extra graft of two days a week in a miserable NHS hospital was the price he had to pay for the ultimate accolade, appointment as Queen’s Gynecologist, then so be it. It was almost within his grasp and he wasn’t going to risk ruining things now. He swung into the forecourt of St. Anthony’s Hospital and prepared for his ward round. At least there would be no bloody students present today, which was one small blessing for which he was devoutly thankful.