Secrets From the Past

by Barbara Taylor Bradford

  ‘You know you can ask me anything, Pidge. So go ahead. What is it?’

  ‘Why do you think that Dad kept those photographs? And why on earth did he leave them lying around the way he did?’

  ‘I’ve no idea why he kept the pictures, unless of course they were important to him. Or because he always kept his pictures from important shoots, and you know that he did.’

  ‘Of course I do, and he did keep everything. Copies, I mean. On the other hand, they were just there in the bottom of the filing cabinet, not even in a proper file. A bit careless, don’t you think?’

  For a moment Jessica did not answer, and then she said carefully, in a low voice, ‘No, not careless, Pidge. He forgot about them, I believe. In the last year of his life he became … forgetful.’

  I sat up, leaned across the coffee table, my eyes focused on hers. ‘Are you saying Dad had dementia? Or something like that?’

  ‘Dementia was starting to cloud his mind. In the last six months of his life he wasn’t the same Tommy; he wasn’t your magic man any more, darling.’

  Tears filled my eyes; I blinked them away, brushed my eyes with one hand. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

  ‘If you’d been about to visit us, we would have mentioned it, but you were in Afghanistan. Cara and I didn’t want to give you upsetting news when you were in the middle of a war. We didn’t want to worry you when you were in danger.’

  ‘You’re always thinking about me, Jess, and Cara, too. Caring about me. But you could have told me.’

  She shook her head. ‘No, we didn’t think that was the right thing to do.’

  ‘Did Harry know?’

  ‘Eventually. Because he was coming over to see Dad, to stay here, and we felt it was only right to prepare him.’

  ‘Was it that bad?’ I frowned, still focused on her intently.

  ‘No, it wasn’t. Most of the time Tommy was … Tommy. But he did have little lapses, and we needed Harry to be forewarned. For his own sake.’

  ‘I understand.’

  ‘Don’t be angry with us.’

  ‘I’m not.’

  ‘When are you leaving me, Pidge?’ she now asked, and there was a hint of sadness in her voice. I thought of Allen Lambert, glad that she now had a nice man in her life, who was seemingly devoted to her. I said, ‘I’ll be back in July with Zac. But he and I will be worker bees during the day.’

  Her pealing laughter echoed along the terrace. ‘What a lovely term, worker bees. Well, you’ve prepared me for that already. So what can I say but that you’ll have some lovely suppers to keep your strength up.’ My sister paused, and eyed me curiously. ‘You told me you and Zac will be getting married next year. I hope it will be here, that you’ll have your wedding here?’ It was a question.

  ‘Where else? A bride gets married from her family home, doesn’t she?’

  ‘That’s true,’ she murmured, her smile wide.

  Cara was suddenly back with us, carrying a large tray, which she put down in the middle of the coffee table. She handed Jessica her lemonade, and I reached for my ginger ale. This had been Dad’s antidote for a queasy stomach, and I hoped it still worked as I poured a little of it into my glass.

  After gulping down some of the bottled water, Cara announced in that gloomy voice I dreaded, ‘You can’t trust birth certificates, you know. They can be so easily altered, especially by a doctor, and even more especially if you’re a beautiful world-famous megastar with a certain amount of money to spend.’

  Jessica glared at her twin. She was furious, and said angrily, ‘What’s that supposed to mean, for God’s sake?’ She took a deep breath to steady herself. ‘What exactly are you getting at? What are you implying?’

  ‘Nothing, don’t get so het up,’ Cara answered in a sharp tone. ‘I think you should know that it’s quite easy to doctor all kinds of documents … I’m simply alerting you, that’s all.’

  Giving her a sharp look, Jessica snapped, ‘What we should do is burn all the photographs and the damned captions, and forget they ever existed.’ Now, turning away, ignoring Cara, her eyes were fixed on mine. Jess said slowly, in a solemn voice, ‘You’re our sister, do you hear, and Mom’s daughter. Forget about Val – she never existed, as far as you’re concerned.’

  I simply nodded. I didn’t trust myself to speak. Jessica was so warm and loving and loyal, I thought I might start to cry again.

  Jessica had spoken firmly, confidently, in a positive tone, and she sat back in her chair, looking like the wise eldest sister. Well, she was the first-born twin by ten minutes, and eight years older than me. The three of us were silent for a while, sipping our drinks, lost in our thoughts. I knew the twins were endeavouring to control their tempers.

  Suddenly, Cara spoke. She said, ‘You know, it’s so easy for a woman to get pregnant, as long as she’s got a man handy. All she has to do is lie down, open her legs and let him do the hard work.’

  Unexpectedly, I wanted to laugh out loud, but I didn’t dare when I saw Jessica’s face, noticed how she had cringed at Cara’s blunt words. I knew how she abhorred coarseness.

  I buried my laughter, took a sip of ginger ale.

  Cara, unconcerned, went on, ‘It’s no big deal at all. Nine months later she drops a baby, and that’s that.’

  ‘We’re all aware of the process,’ Jessica muttered, glaring at her again, swallowing her annoyance.

  Cara paid no attention; she got up and came and sat in the chair next to me, took hold of my hand, stared into my eyes earnestly.

  ‘Let me tell you what the big deal really is, Serena. It’s raising that baby, loving it unconditionally, nurturing it, cherishing it, giving it the right values, making it feel secure, loved, protected and important. It’s called being a good mother. And that’s the big deal. The biggest deal of all.’

  Leaning closer, Cara hugged me, then swiftly let me go. ‘I don’t give a damn whose womb you popped out of. It’s the woman who loved and raised you who counts. And that was Mom, and she’s your mother, and don’t you ever forget that!’

  Her words so moved and touched me I began to cry. So did Cara, and Jessica too. We sat together on the terrace and wept. And sniffled and dried our eyes with tissues and wept again, and then quite unexpectedly Jessica began to chuckle. And so did I, because her laughter was always so infectious. And a moment later Cara was joining in our hilarity. We laughed uproariously until we were exhausted, and needed to rest for a moment or two.

  I felt better. The gloomy mood lifted, and we relaxed with each other, knowing that we belonged. It was a moment later, as if inspired, that Jessica began to sing Mom’s favourite song, her signature tune, in a sense.

  Jessica’s voice rang out, clear, beautiful and melodious as she began to sing ‘Everything’s Coming Up Roses’, the Sondheim song from Gypsy.

  Cara and I joined in, and the three of us sang the tune to the very end, enjoying every minute and remembering so much of our lives which we had lived here together.

  Cara and Jessica had been right in their own ways, and I saw the sense of their words – I had to relax, forget the photographs and go on.

  And later that day, when I was my usual calm self, feeling normal again, I did call Harry in New York after all.

  The moment he came onto the line I told him about finding some pictures of Val Clifford taken in Venice, but I didn’t mention the nude shots or the captions.

  Before I’d even finished my story, he cut in. ‘I recall that day very well!’ he exclaimed, and began to chuckle. ‘Tommy and I both shot pictures of Val in a grand palazzo on the Grand Canal. She wore a chiffon dress, it was an odd colour, sort of greenish grey, and she danced around for all the world like a ballerina. The photographs were for her boyfriend, Jacques Pelliter. Why are you suddenly interested in those photos? They’re so old.’ He suddenly sounded curious – and wary, I thought.

  ‘It’s not the photographs we’re interested in but Val,’ I explained. ‘Jessica and Cara were wondering what happened to her. She
is our cousin after all – or rather she was Mom’s first cousin. I don’t remember her at all, but they do. Actually, I have no clue about her. It was Cara who suggested I ask you, Harry, purely out of curiosity.’

  There was a silence, and then he said rather quickly, ‘I don’t know, honey. I really don’t know what became of Val. She and Jacques did get married. They lived in Rome, and then settled in Paris, that I can tell you.’

  ‘Are they still alive?’

  ‘I’ve no idea, we lost touch. And now that you mention it, I realize I haven’t seen their by-lines for years. Why does this matter after all these years? My God, those photographs must have been taken well over thirty years ago!’

  ‘It doesn’t matter at all, Harry,’ I answered swiftly, brushing the matter aside, aware suddenly of a slight impatience on his part, a tetchiness echoing down the line. ‘Actually, the real reason I called is to tell you that I’m coming to New York on Friday. I’ve finished putting the Venice book together, and I’m sending it direct to Global by the same freight company.’

  ‘Now that is great news, Serena!’ Harry exclaimed, suddenly sounding happy. ‘How about Rao’s on Monday night? You and me for dinner? And Zac too, if he wants to come. I’m sure he can’t wait to see you.’

  ‘You’ve got a deal, Harry.’

  Something awakened me in the middle of the night, and I sat up with a start. As I lay propped up against the pillows in the dark, thinking of the day’s events, I had the feeling that Harry hadn’t told me the truth about Val. How I knew this I don’t know, but I was convinced he had lied.

  But why? I knew the answer to that easily enough. To protect Mom, Dad, and of course me as well. I focused on Valentina Clifford. What had she meant to Harry? More importantly, what had she meant to Mom? And to Dad? Had my father slept with her to get that much-wanted baby he and Mom had longed for? Had she actually been a surrogate? Had she been carrying the baby – me – for them? Mom had been suffering from that rare form of osteoporosis. Would it have been risky, even dangerous for her to get pregnant? I had no answers for myself … and I realized I must let all of this go. Everybody was dead except for Harry, and it wasn’t worth worrying about.

  And I did have certain answers. Jessica and Cara both saw me here in this house, in Mom’s arms in her bedroom, when I was two days old. Good enough for me. And as Cara had said, the woman who raised a child with love and devotion was the biggest deal of all. And certainly Mom had done that; she herself had been the biggest deal for me.

  THIRTY-FIVE

  When I arrived at the apartment in New York on Friday afternoon, I did three things immediately. The first was to go straight to the safe in the walk-in closet in Dad’s den.

  I had committed the code to memory when Dad first gave it to me, and now I punched in the numbers and the safe opened with a click. Looking inside, I found my birth certificate at once. When I took it out of the envelope, a quick glance told me everything written on it was correct. I relaxed, and read it again slowly.

  My mother was listed as Elizabeth Vasson Stone, my father as John Thomas Stone, and the place I was born was Jardin des Fleurs, with the full Nice address given. Listed as the obstetrician was Doctor Felix Legrange and the name of the nurse was Madame Annette Bertrand. My name and date of birth were also there in black and white, and obviously I was who I had always thought I was.

  I felt a sense of immense relief, and I knew that Jessica would feel the same way when I phoned her later. With this worrisome matter taken care of, I immediately called Zac on his cell phone and told him I was at the apartment and waiting for him.

  He was out on Long Island at his parents’ home. Elated to hear my voice, he promised to be with me as soon as possible, certainly within two hours. He added that he was leaving immediately.

  I next phoned Harry at Global’s offices on Sixth Avenue to let him know I was safely back in Manhattan, and that was all I said to him. Except that I was looking forward to seeing him on Monday evening at Rao’s, and that Zac was coming with me. Harry was obviously happy I was in Manhattan and said he couldn’t wait to see me.

  On the plane, crossing the Atlantic earlier today, I had contemplated telling Harry about the nude photographs of a very pregnant Valentina Clifford, but I suddenly changed my mind when we were on the phone. What was the point? The information on my birth certificate had eased some of my troubling thoughts, and confirmed what my sisters believed to be the truth.

  My third call was to Jessica in Nice. She was thrilled when I told her that she was absolutely right about my birth certificate, that all of the written details matched what she had told me.

  And I was thrilled when she said that her doctor had just given Cara the results of our bone density tests. Neither of us had inherited the osteoporosis that had so plagued our mother.

  Jessica was relieved and happy for us that we would not suffer from this awful disease, which she would unfortunately have to cope with for the rest of her life.

  With these matters out of the way, I unpacked, had a shower, got dressed in a pale blue cotton tunic with narrow matching trousers, and then wandered around the apartment, checking everything out as I always did. And as Mom had usually done when returning here from Nice or LA.

  Mrs Watledge had been in earlier, and everything was sparklingly clean, as pristine as ever, with flowers in the living room and plenty of food in the fridge. Including the Friday chicken from the butcher, I noticed, smiling to myself.

  I checked the messages on my machine, and there were none. Then I reached for the stack of mail and went through it. There was nothing of any importance, except for a few bills.

  Suddenly I was feeling hungry. I hadn’t eaten anything since I’d left Nice that morning, except for a couple of apples. I never ate the food on the plane because I didn’t like it; also, Dad and Harry constantly reminded me that the purpose of a plane was to get you somewhere, and that it was not a restaurant.

  Zac had told me he was going to stop off and pick up Chinese when he reached Manhattan, and that we’d have an early dinner. I knew I’d better wait for him to arrive with the food. But wanting to stem my hunger, I went into the kitchen, made a cup of tea, found a packet of plain cookies and carried everything to my office on a small tray.

  It was a glorious afternoon and the cream and peach room was filled with sunshine. The sky was the colour of delphiniums, littered with floating white clouds, and the city sparkled in the brilliant light. It had never looked better on this June afternoon.

  I put the tray on the coffee table and stepped over to the window, staring out at the East River, admiring the extraordinary panorama of Manhattan, suddenly happy to be back here.

  I was looking forward to working again – with Zac on Dad’s book Courage, and also picking up where I’d left off on the biography. Work was my pleasure, and it gave me enormous enjoyment, a sense of gratification.

  The moment Zac walked into the apartment, I knew that he had undergone a change. Harry had told me Zac was feeling much better, but I hadn’t expected him to look as if he had had a miraculous transformation.

  It was the old Zac who stepped into the foyer of the apartment, carrying a large bunch of pink roses, followed by one of the building’s porters pushing a luggage trolley. On it were numerous shopping bags, an open cardboard box with bottles of wine standing up in it, plus Zac’s backpack and camera bag.

  Grinning at me as I eyed the trolley, he leaned forward and kissed my cheek, then handed me the roses.

  ‘Thank you,’ I said as I took them from him, pushed my nose into them, smelled their scent.

  ‘Welcome back, Pidge,’ he said. ‘Where should we put this stuff?’

  ‘Right here is fine,’ I answered, smiling at the porter, who nodded and started to empty the trolley.

  Zac tipped him, and once we were alone, he grabbed hold of me and held me close, his arms tight around me. ‘God, I’ve missed you,’ he murmured against my hair. ‘I never thought I could miss anyone so muc
h – not even you, Serena.’

  ‘I’ve missed you too. You’re crushing the flowers,’ I told him, stepping away. ‘And thanks for the back-handed compliment.’

  He just grinned. ‘We’d better get the Chinese food into the kitchen.’ As he spoke he proceeded to pick up some of the shopping bags; I did the same.

  Within seconds I had emptied the two cartons of won-ton soup into a pan, which I put on the stove to be reheated later. I then looked at the other containers all marked with the contents: white rice, spring rolls, lobster Cantonese, chicken with vegetables, and sweet-and-sour pork. I placed everything in the oven on a very low light to keep all of it warm, thinking he had bought far too much food, just like Dad and Harry always did. But that was a man thing, wasn’t it?

  As I had been handling the cartons of food, Zac had put the three bottles of white wine in the fridge, had taken out a bottle which was cold, and opened it. Filling two glasses he said, ‘Come on, let’s have a quick drink before dinner. In your mother’s little sitting room.’

  ‘My office now,’ I corrected, and followed him out of the kitchen.

  ‘What a city!’ he exclaimed as he walked down to the end of the room where the windows overlooked the East River. ‘There’s nowhere quite like Manhattan anywhere in the world.’

  Clinking my glass to his, I said, ‘Cheers. And I couldn’t agree more, I’m glad to be back.’

  ‘So am I. But then you know it’s not the same without you.’

  Zac and I sat down next to each other on the sofa, and he went on, ‘In the last few days I’ve had a chance to spread out Courage in my apartment, and I think I might have to work over there, Serena, if you don’t mind.’ He threw me a questioning look.

  ‘That’s fine,’ I replied quickly, although I had been taken aback for a split second. ‘I think you’ll find it easier to write in a quiet place. I can always pop over when you’ve finished a section, glance at the final layouts, check things out. Anyway, I trust you, and I know we were on the right track in Nice.’