Friends for Life
Page 44
“And that’s not all,” added Duncan. “According to the press reports, a lot of strange accidents have happened over the years to other key people connected with her crimes. There’s absolutely nothing they can pin on Sally but an awful lot of people died in violent circumstances—the judge who committed her, the surgeon who sterilized her, the counsel for the prosecution, even one of the nuns. It’s like the curse of Tutankhamen . . . death appears to stalk everyone who crosses her path.”
“Thanks a lot!” said Gus, with a grin. “I’m sure that makes all of us feel a whole lot better!”
“Come along everyone!” called Vivienne gaily, back from her guided tour. “Upstairs to the studio, if you please. Time for the speeches!”
• • •
The room looked exquisite, full of evening sunlight and entirely empty apart from, in the very center, an enormous pile of furs. Vivienne’s coats and jackets. What on earth? She stood there, radiant with excitement, more beautiful than anyone had ever seen her, other than Oliver, hovering in the doorway, recognizing for the first time in years the young bride he had loved so much and gone to such extremes to win.
“Glasses, everyone, and let’s have a toast. To Georgy and to Beth—and to their continuing good health!”
“Georgy and Beth!” Everyone drank but only Oliver noticed that Vivienne was toasting them in orange juice.
“It’s a terrible thing,” said Eleanor dramatically, clutching at Duncan’s arm. “I still can’t believe it’s true, all those things they are saying about her. I suppose I’ll have to alter my will again, such a nuisance. And she was always so sweet and considerate.”
“You can probably write to her,” said Duncan. “She’d like that.”
“I’ve got great news,” continued Vivienne, triumphantly unfolding a foolscap document and holding it high for them all to see. “The World Wide Fund for Nature—formerly the World Wildlife Fund—are so impressed by Georgy’s photographs, they have given us a contract, exclusive for a year, to do all their advertising and publicity pictures, worldwide. And as Georgy already knows, Phoebe has got Cancer Research equally fired up, so it looks as though Georgy’s in for a busy winter, as soon as she feels well enough to start working full-time again.”
Everyone clapped.
“What about the coats, then?” asked Beth, looking at the luscious mass in the center of the room, where Ferdinand and Isabella were already asleep, stretched out luxuriously among all the priceless skins.
“Those,” said Vivienne portentously, with a fast glance toward her husband to see if he was going to object, “are my hostages to fate. The Fund has finally opened my eyes and made me realize how wrong it is to dress in furs, at the expense of living animals whose lives are more important than the cruel dictates of fashion.”
At the back of the group, Georgy groaned and her father squeezed her hand protectively.
“My sable,” she whispered.
“It’s okay. Keep it until you film in the Antarctic—or Russia. I’m sure that day is not far off. Looks as if you’re set to be quite a little globetrotter in future.”
“What are you going to do with them?” asked Beth practically. She thought Vivienne was acting brilliantly and she thoroughly approved, but there was a limit.
“That’s the problem,” said Vivienne. “Dorabella’s family have said no to them and even Oxfam won’t take them. So I thought we’d have a bonfire. As a symbolic act, to launch our partnership.”
Offstage, Oliver groaned. This was going altogether too far. He pushed his way through the onlookers and took Vivienne gently by the arm. She was a great girl and he had to admit he was astonished by what she was achieving, but there was a limit.
“The neighbors,” he murmured, “can you imagine what they would say? All that foul smoke, just when they’re settling down to cocktails on the terrace? Can we leave this for later and deal with it properly then?”
There was general applause, and everyone drank a large number of toasts, then they all drifted back into the garden to catch the last rays of the dying sun.
• • •
Addison arrived late, as seemed to be his habit, flustered and apologetic, held up, he explained, by something last-minute at the hospital. He looked immeasurably better, thought Beth; more relaxed and altogether healthier since Sally had been apprehended and the cases on both Catherine and Georgy officially closed. He greeted his hostess and kissed his wife, then wandered off to join Oliver by the fish pond, savoring the excellent vintage champagne the Nugents had so generously provided.
“Well, old boy,” he said, with admiration. “You’re quite the hero of the hour.”
Oliver smiled, embarrassed, and meekly studied his shoes. They’d talked already, at the hospital while he was being stitched up, but he wasn’t particularly proud of the way he had behaved that day. Overall, as commando activities went, all very commendable, but as far as he was concerned, the sooner forgotten, the better. The one good thing was that Sally was inside again and likely to stay there for the rest of her natural life.
“How is the little bitch?” asked Oliver, not without an element of regret.
“Surprisingly perky,” said Addison, “though you don’t need me to tell you that. I suspect she had the time of her life.” His grin was positively lascivious.
“Well, I hope that’s the last we hear of her,” said Oliver uncomfortably, wishing the subject would drop. One of these days he would have to face Vivienne about all that; he had no idea how it would affect their future but gloomily expected the worst. And as for Beth, well he’d always love her, he knew that now, but he’d just have to learn to do without. At least she was alive. For now that was all that really mattered.
• • •
At least, reflected Addison, motoring home with Phoebe, Sally’s apprehension had taken the heat off him where Catherine’s death was concerned. Having fixed the blame fairly and squarely on Sally, the police had closed their inquiries and Addison was finally, once and for all he hoped, off the hook. The truth was that Sally had administered a lethal dose of morphine sulphate before he ever got there that night and he, seeing that Catherine was already sinking into a coma, had instantly guessed what had happened.
Sally had left and Addison’s dilemma had been what to do for the best. The poor creature was mortally sick, in any event, and not likely to live for very much longer. What was the point of dragging her back just for a few more weeks of suffering when it would intensify the risk of his own involvement in her original health botch-up coming to light? He had set his heart on the royal appointment, which was only a whisper away; after all the years he had slaved for such a goal, he couldn’t bear to think of losing it because of one small error of judgment half a lifetime ago. Besides, he owed it to Phoebe. He glanced across at her dear face, sleeping now, and knew his decision had been the right one.
Eleanor could have proved a problem but he’d gambled and won where she was concerned too. Beneath the selfish hardness, there did lurk an element of compassion, and that had combined with her own small share of guilt at having wrecked her daughter’s happiness by keeping the two of them apart. Who knows what might have happened had she not intervened; that was a whole other story, one that would never be written. But, whatever she suspected about that fatal last night, Eleanor had remained silent—and for that Addison thanked her in his heart. He’d been lucky, he was well aware of that, but he put that down to the luck of the Harveys.
• • •
The kitten was making determined forays down the neck of Beth’s Victorian nightshirt, but she didn’t mind. Neither did Duncan sitting beside her, holding her hand and watching with envy the progress of those tiny scrabbling paws into her cleavage and down between her brown, voluptuous breasts. Her bandages were gone now and only the violet bruise on her forehead, the size of a golf ball, remained to remind them of the trauma she had managed to survive. She would always have a dent there—slightly rakish, Duncan said, like a fencing scar�
��but the hospital had cleared her and said there would be no permanent damage.
“It’s just as well it was only the omelette pan she grabbed,” said Beth with a grin. “If she’d had the sense to reach for the twelve-inch fryer, she’d probably have taken my head off.”
Duncan squeezed her hand and kissed her. He still felt overwhelmingly emotional whenever she joked like this. To think, he’d very nearly lost her and before he’d been able to tell her how he felt. He leaned across and kissed her again, this time with considerably more feeling.
“Have you got my cat?” asked Imogen accusingly, storming through the door and grabbing hold of the furry intruder. From behind her, in the hall, came the sound of much thumping and swearing as Gus and a couple of stalwarts lugged the new bed up the stairs.
“He’s awfully sweet,” said Beth, snuggling up, once Imogen and the kitten had removed themselves. “Fancy doing that. Buying me a new bed just because of what happened here?”
“Quite right, too,” said Duncan, wishing he’d thought of it first; irritated, as ever, that Gus had the knack of always doing the right thing at the appropriate moment. He could learn to hate him if he wasn’t so bloody charming. But the important thing, he told himself severely, was that Beth was safe. He drew her gently closer to him, careful not to hurt her head, treating her like cut glass when all he really wanted to do was ravish her.
Gus came wandering in to tell them the job was done.
“Everything shipshape,” he said with a smile. “It’s all yours, ma’am, whenever you feel like testing it.”
He grinned happily at Duncan and winked as he bent for Beth to kiss him.
“I’ll be off now,” he said tactfully, glancing at his watch. “I’m sure you chaps have got a lot of catching up to do.”
• • •
The new bed looked quite wonderful, with the moonlight streaking across the pale Scandinavian wood through the open, uncurtained window. Beth was still in her white Victorian nightshirt, heavily embroidered and trimmed with Brussels lace, bought at a market stall in the heart of the Dordogne and kept for just such an occasion as this. She looked quite breathtaking, Duncan thought, almost too good to spoil.
They stood, like ingenues, on either side of the pristine whiteness of the bed, and Beth suppressed a giggle as she saw that someone, undoubtedly Imogen, had left a freshly cut rose on each of their pillows. Duncan stood staring at her, in the muted light of the single bedside lamp, and felt like bursting with the weight of his emotion. But instead of speaking, he started to unfasten his shirt, and Beth, watching him closely, followed suit. The thing about these nineteenth-century ecclesiastical garments was all the buttons; she was still fumbling and only half there when she saw Duncan step out of his pants.
“Hang on a minute,” she said urgently, crossing the room.
And she firmly closed the bedroom door.