Acts of Love (34 page)

Ben found the message on the pad next to the telephone. He looked at his watch. It was now three o’clock. Arianne was out: no chance of further information from her. This was the first he had heard from Simone since he had walked out on her. He had tried to make contact on several occasions: letters were returned unopened, phone calls were rejected with the slam of a receiver. Now, all these months later, here was a message of some urgency. He knew Simone well. Urgent. That was a word alien to her
vocabulary. Simone took all things lazily, in her own time, never anyone else’s. She would not use that word lightly. He rang her at once. Her voice came on the line.

It surprised him, how pleased he was to hear it. He had after all had a year of very good times with her. He had always liked her voice, its soft seductive quality, the French accent. ‘Hello, Simone, it’s Ben.’

A moment of hesitation before she spoke. ‘Thanks for returning my call. I’d like to see you.’

‘I’m glad about that. I have tried so many times to make contact with you.’

‘I know. I wasn’t ready to see you. I’m not even sure I am now. But I need to see you.’

‘Simone, I can’t blame you for not wanting to talk with me. That night, I could have broken it to you more gently. I am sorry about the way I handled things with you.’

‘It’s best we don’t talk about that now. I do really need to see you today or I would never have called and intruded into your life. I had intended never to do that, not ever. But now I find we must meet. We can talk then.’

‘OK. Simone, is something wrong? Are you in trouble?’

‘We’ll talk.’

‘Shall I come to you?’

‘No. I don’t think I could bear to have you here. Too many memories. How about five o’clock at the bar at the Connaught? It’s always quiet and we can talk.’

‘Fine. Five o’clock then.’

‘What a relief!’

‘Something is wrong. Why relief?’

‘I was afraid you might not want to meet me, and it’s so important that you do. Goodbye, Ben.’

Perhaps Simone was not in trouble, but it certainly sounded as if she was. Ben found it difficult to concentrate on Simone. The year they had spent together had turned out to be a catalyst of some sort that had transported him into the condition of happiness he now shared with Arianne. Every day he loved Arianne that little bit more. Days and nights with her created something never achieved with any other woman. She, not Simone, was in Ben’s thoughts when he turned the corner from Mount Street into
Carlos Place, crossed the street and greeted the doorman at the Connaught Hotel.

The hotel had its own quiet elegance. It reminded him of a private club rather than a chic hotel. He walked through the hall, which suggested some stately home in the country, and was greeted by the concierge. In the bar, silence. Not a soul except the bartender, quietly preparing for the cosmopolitan Americans, upper-class Englishmen, French publishers, and Italian movie directors who sought this haven of peaceful elegance away from all things commercial. For those who frequented the Connaught bar, it was a private club with a patronage that filled the hotel year in and year out, and kept newcomers at bay.

Ben stopped at the bar. The bartender recognised him at once. After a greeting he presented Ben with a bowl of succulent homemade potato crisps – always irresistible to Ben. ‘You never forget anything. You always recognise your man, don’t you?’ He accorded the bartender a smile and ordered a martini, very dry, with a twist of lemon.

Ben chose a table in a corner of the room and sat on a comfortable velvet chair. She would be late – Simone was always late. Only as he was sipping his second martini did he remember how volatile she could be. He was thinking, she might still be angry, violent even. He looked up: she was striding towards him. She was extremely elegant in a white Chanel suit, its jacket dotted with gold buttons and trimmed with black silk braid around the bottom, the cuffs, the neck, and down the front. The jacket was open. Showing through it, was a gold, semi-transparent silk gossamer blouse, with frills that stood up around the neck. Her high-heeled shoes of gold kid, and a Chanel bag with a gold chain over her shoulder finished her outfit to perfection.

Ben stood up to greet her. He suddenly felt vulnerable.

‘I’m thinking of the scent of Joy. I’ve never been able to take it, not since you flung that bottle at me and it splattered the stuff every-which-way. No repeat performance with your champagne cocktail, I trust?’

‘I could have killed you with that bottle. I meant to, you know. You can feel safe. If I couldn’t kill you then, I won’t try now. Difficult, anyway, with a few bubbles of champagne cocktail.’

He smiled at her, feeling safer, took her hand and kissed her
cheek. She sat down next to him. A champagne cocktail arrived and was placed on the table in front of Simone. The waiter, pleased with himself for remembering what she drank, smiled at Simone, then vanished.

‘They know us too well here. I was handed crisps before I even said hello, and you have your favourite drink. They were good times then.’

‘Yes, very good times.’

‘I wanted to tell you that, Simone, and a great many other things, but you never gave me the chance.’

‘I don’t want to hear about that. Just tell me how you are. Well? Happy?’

‘Yes, very.’

‘Still in love?’

‘Will I offend you if I tell you, more than ever?’

‘No, it won’t offend me, but it will hurt.’

‘Why hurt, Simone? We made no promises to each other, no commitment, just mistakes.’

‘Sometimes you have to lose someone, Ben, to realise how much you love them, deeply love them. We were too clever, you and I, in keeping love out of our life together. We pretended abiding affection was enough. A big mistake, on my part, anyway. I fell in love, too late. And you fell in love elsewhere.’

‘Simone, I had no idea.’

‘How could you know? I didn’t know I loved you myself until you walked out on me. Then it was too late to tell you, let alone show you.’

‘Simone, I don’t know what to say.’

‘Don’t say anything. You found someone else. That says it all, Ben.’

‘And you, Simone, did you find someone else?’

‘No, but I will, when I stop loving you.’

She smiled at him and took his hand.

‘Ben, don’t look embarrassed. That’s about the best thing that’s come out of our year together. I learned about love, unfortunately too late.’

‘What can I say?’

‘There isn’t anything to say. I’ve put it down to “one of life’s cruel tricks”. I hated you when you walked out on me for another
woman. I could have killed you. For a long time I wished I had, until I realised why. It was because I really loved you, and you were as blind to that as I was. I never thought I would see you again, let alone ask you to meet me. But it’s because I do still love you that we’re here. Love has changed me, taught me that, even if it is unrequited, if you love someone, in times of crisis you don’t abandon them.’

‘Are you in some sort of trouble, Simone?’

‘No,
I’m
not. It’s you, my dear heart, my friend, who is in trouble. Can I have another?’ She held up her empty glass.

‘What’s this about?’ he asked her, feeling very concerned.

‘Ben, are you married?’

‘I will be soon. We’re returning to the States. I’ve bought a wonderful New York town house on the upper East Side. It’s in the process of being redone. When it’s ready, Arianne and I will be married there. But, Simone, you don’t want to hear all this.’

‘No, I don’t actually. I’m no masochist in love. But I had to ask that, Ben. Although we can never be lovers, we certainly can’t be enemies. And that’s why I’m here, in spite of not wanting to be. Something has happened, Ben. Something that might harm you. If I can prevent that, then I think I must. You see, if you really love someone and you can’t have them, difficult as it may be, you can’t deny them.’

At this point Simone covered her eyes with her hand. Her words were strained with emotion and somewhat muffled when she told him, ‘I don’t even know how to tell you this. The last thing I want to be is the bearer of such bad news.’ She removed her hand from her eyes and bit her upper lip. ‘You must believe that I have had nothing to do with this cruel joke. I don’t understand any of it, or why this information should have come to me. At first I thought it was the work of some jealous bitch trying to get back at me for something – one of my so-called friends, whom I might have offended, who wanted to put the knife in and turn it. A little torture for Simone. I am afraid I have made myself vulnerable because I haven’t been too clever in hiding my anger over having lost you. People have used it as a weapon against me. Or so it seems. But you must understand, the anger I once had is gone and I have accepted that I learned to love too late for us. I didn’t give you what you wanted or what you
needed. I take that now fully on myself.’

Simone actually wiped a tear from the corner of her eye and cleared her throat. Then, reaching for her handbag, she removed a cream-coloured envelope bordered with a thin line of grey. Written on the front in a neat hand, were her name and address. ‘Three days ago, this arrived at my Paris flat. I thought after first reading it that it was a prank someone was playing on me. Then, as it kept eating away at me, I thought there was something more sinister behind that letter being sent to me – that it was sent to me by someone who wanted that information passed on to you. I had no idea what to do. I almost tore it up. You were out of my life, I didn’t want to care one way or another about you and your happiness. I even said to myself, “Tough luck on Ben if it’s true.” I felt a moment of sweet revenge that you can’t have the woman you love, just as I can’t have the man I love. But revenge wasn’t sweet enough. It troubled me all that day and the following day that you might be unaware of someone looking to make trouble for you. That the contents of the letter might be true. I finally came to the conclusion that that letter had nothing to do with me and everything to do with you. Someone was trying to get at not me but you and your fiancée.’

Simone was putting on the best performance of her life. Her hand even trembled as she passed the envelope into Ben’s hands. The letter was short and to the point.

At the bottom of the page was a telephone number: presumably that of the monastery in Tangier.

Simone spoke again. ‘I’m a friend. You have to believe I’m not here for a second time around, Ben, or for revenge. I couldn’t bear you to think that. Whoever sent this note is a nasty piece of work if he thinks that’s what I might want. I’m here because I
realise this is not to do with me, it has to do with you, and that woman who I don’t even know. How cruel to involve me in it. The person who sent this wants to hurt me through you, to drag me into this so as to raise hopes in me only to dash them. I’ll not fall for that and be hurt again. One-sided love affairs are not for either of us. And that’s what we will always be, whether that man Jason Honey is alive or dead.’

Ben had not said a word. He had grown pale and silent. It was Ahmad’s threat come true. That ominous warning had been hovering in the background of their lives, for all their trying these past few weeks to forget it.

What an evil bastard, was all he could think to say and that was to himself. Handsome. Charming. And rotten right through.

‘Please don’t hate me, I couldn’t bear that, Ben. Don’t take it out on me for bringing the bad news. I promise you, I feel no relish in delivering this blow. For God’s sake, say you don’t hate me.’

Ben finally stirred himself to speak. ‘No, I don’t hate you, Simone.’

‘I didn’t know what to do.’

‘You did exactly what you should have done. You will understand that I must leave. I must go to Arianne. There were things I wanted to say to you, but they’ve gone right out of my head. Another time. I’ll call you or send you a note. If ever you need anything, you have only to call the château and leave a message. They always know where to find me.’

He touched her shoulder. It was a gesture of warmth and affection. Then he walked away from her to place a bank note on the bar. He left the room.

Simone ordered another champagne cocktail. She took a compact from her handbag and powdered her nose, dabbing the powder puff at the corner of her eyes.

LONDON,
TANGIER,
GLOUCESTERSHIRE

Chapter 24

Ben’s first inclination was not to tell Arianne. He would go directly to Ahmad Salah Ali and demand an explanation. He was not fooled by the elaborate way Ahmad had relayed his message of intent to destroy Ben’s and Arianne’s life. That letter had originated with Ahmad.

All the way home Ben could think only of Arianne, how this news was going to affect her. The fifteen-minute walk through Mayfair was hardly time enough to work out how to break it to her. But that only occurred to him too late, as he was placing the key in the lock of the front door of Number 12. For a brief moment, while pushing the door open and stepping into the hall, he tricked himself into thinking it was a hoax. There was no proof in that envelope that Jason Honey was alive.

He heard voices and Arianne’s laughter. It was Jaime. ‘Ben, we’re in the kitchen,’ called Arianne.

Ben found a smiling Jaime – and thought to himself, When is Jaime not smiling? – and a happy Arianne.

‘Look,’ she said, ‘who I found on our doorstep.’

The two men greeted each other with a handshake and a slap on the back, an elaborate manly hug.

‘He’s taking us to dinner at Le Gavroche.’ She held up a serving dish, a silver bowl with a moat of crushed ice surrounding a smaller crystal bowl heaped with caviar. ‘You know Jaime never arrives empty-handed. Open the champagne, Ben.’ Jaime brought party-time to London with him.

They filed through the hall and into the sitting room to drink champagne and eat caviar on triangles of hot, buttered toast. Ben tried to put out of his mind the contents of the envelope in his inside jacket pocket. Jaime was a
bon vivant
, a first-class polo player, gourmet and master chef, amusing and clever. He and Arianne were talking food, and what they would order at Le
Gavroche. That gave Ben time to deliberate exactly how to play that letter. His preoccupation was apparent to his companions.

Jaime turned from talking with Arianne. He snapped his fingers, ‘Come back, Ben, back from wherever you are. Ah, Arianne, he’s sulking because he doesn’t want to dine with the Roux brothers. Pierre Koffmann – I’ll settle for that, we’ll go to Tante Claire. It’s not too late to cancel our booking.’

It was no use, Ben knew he would never be able to carry off the evening. There had to be a limit to evasion. He must talk to Arianne alone. ‘Jaime, much as I’d like to, much as we’d like to, we can’t make dinner.’

Arianne knew they were free. Jaime was possibly Ben’s best friend, there was no other man whose company he liked more. Something was definitely wrong. Why else decline an evening out with him? Jaime too sensed calamity behind the refusal. He said, ‘Of course, Ben. Is there something I can do?’

‘No, Arianne and I will work it out.’

Suddenly the life seemed to go out of Arianne. She said, only just above a whisper, ‘Sorry, Jaime.’

‘Ben, I think maybe I should leave.’

‘Sorry about this, Jaime, do you mind?’

‘No. Something is clearly wrong, I’m here for you if you need me, Ben. I’m staying at the Ritz. Anything. You call me. I’ll check in with you tomorrow.’ He kissed Arianne.

Ben placed an arm around his friend’s shoulder and told him, ‘I’ll see you out.’

‘OK.’

‘Look, I’m sorry about tonight and Le Gavroche, we would have loved it. But Arianne and I have to talk.’

‘Listen, I understand. I don’t need explanations, we’re old friends. Call on me if I can help.’ And Jaime was gone.

Arianne formed a fist, put it to her lips and bit into her flesh. It was not mere distress she saw in Ben’s face. A hitch of some sort perhaps. He had blown it up out of all proportion, she told herself, all the time her heart sinking: she knew Ben never dramatised anything. She tried to calm her anxiety, to make light of the moment.

‘You’re going to leave me. Going to leave me for Simone. You met her and fell in love with her again. She worked her
French charm on you. She stole …’

‘Stop, Arianne.’

But Arianne wouldn’t stop. She was smiling at him, teasing him, poking his arm with her finger. ‘You did see her, didn’t you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Has she stolen you from me?’

‘No.’

‘But she wanted to. Well, fat chance. I’ll fight her for you.’ She placed her arms around Ben’s neck and told him, ‘I’ll never let you go.’

‘Thank God for that,’ he told her. ‘Now stop fooling around and come and sit down. We have a problem – we’re in trouble. I did see Simone and she was not the bearer of good news, although she could not have been nicer considering the impossible position she’d been put in.’

‘What’s this all about, Ben? You’re frightening me.’

He took her hands in his. ‘There’s no easy way to tell you this.’

‘Then just tell me.’

‘There is a possibility that your husband is still alive.’

Arianne began to laugh. ‘That’s ridiculous, Ben, it’s not at all possible.’ She pulled her hands away from Ben’s and stood up. ‘What a cruel joke, where did you get that from? Impossible. How many times have I prayed for that to be true, that Jason was alive somewhere and hurt, and that he would mend and come back to me. That was my fantasy for years. We buried him, Ahmad and I, we buried Jason. We buried him and we mourned him. Did you get that from your friend, Simone? What could she possibly gain by telling you a story like that?’

‘Nothing. And she didn’t tell me the story.’

He reached in his pocket and withdrew the envelope and handed it to Arianne. ‘Simone received this two days ago in Paris.’

‘I don’t want to read it. It’s a lie.’

‘Read it. We can’t ignore this, Arianne.’

She sat down, opened the envelope and read the letter. Ben stood by the window, staring at the sea of cars parked in the yard. He remained standing there with his back to Arianne as he told
her almost exactly what had happened at the meeting between Simone and himself.

There was silence in the sitting room for several minutes. Then Arianne spoke. ‘I must find Ahmad, I must talk to him.’

‘Then you believe it’s true?’ Ben turned to face Arianne. She was ashen.

‘I don’t know what to believe, I can only think of Ahmad’s last words to me. This is what he meant. I am not free to marry you. Why would he say that unless it was true? He knew it, Ben. He knew all along that Jason was alive. He would never have told me if you hadn’t come into the picture – had we not fallen in love and wanted to marry. Why would he have done that to me – known all these years and kept it from me? I’m jumping to conclusions. I must call Ahmad, I must see him.’

‘Whoah, stop. He may have nothing to do with this.’

‘Oh, he has to do with this. You don’t know him as I do. He’s playing with us, playing with our lives, yours and mine. And Jason’s. He’s toying with us. He sent that letter to Simone. Clever. Cruel. He placed her in your life again, another form of torture for me, giving you to someone you can make a life with.’

‘Then you believe this is true?’ he asked, taking the letter from her.

‘Of course it’s true. I see Ahmad’s hand in this. He owes me an explanation, I must go to him.’

‘Maybe it’s not true. Maybe he’s just playing with us.’

‘No, it’s true, and he
is
playing with us. This is his
coup de grâce
. What are we going to do, Ben? What are we going to do? Jason is alive and he abandoned me. Why? Was it a plot between them?’

‘Arianne, you’re out of control. Hysterical. And you’re grasping at straws. Stop it. We have to get control of ourselves, Arianne. I don’t give a shit about Ahmad Salah Ali or what he did or didn’t do. There’s no point in going to him. I doubt if he’d even see us. We’ve got to handle this rationally. We have now been dragged into playing games of power, seduction, the twisting and turning around of people’s lives. To hell with that. If we go to see him, we’ll get nothing. We’ll deal with this ourselves, with the information we have.’

‘Oh, Ben, what’s going to happen to us if Jason is alive?’

She walked into his arms and he held her close. Now at last, he too wondered what was going to happen to them if Jason was alive.

Together they walked to the sofa and sat down together to read the sheet of paper that threatened to play havoc with their lives.

Arianne began to cry. Tears streamed down her cheeks. She closed her eyes in an attempt to control emotions both high and confused. What if Jason were alive? And those years of love and happy times, passion, adventure, were offered to her again from him? Her years of deprivation after he vanished came flooding back to her. They mingled with her present happiness and the passionate love she felt for Ben, the excitement of genuine togetherness she felt with him. Her past was tearing apart her present. She could hardly bear it.

Ben thought his heart would break just looking at her. She was traumatised, severely shaking; her trembling hands gave her away. Ben folded the letter. As he tried to take the envelope still clutched in Arianne’s hand, it fluttered to the floor. A small white calling-card slipped from it.

‘What’s that?’ asked Arianne through her tears.

‘I don’t know. I missed it. I didn’t look in the envelope.’

Retrieving it from the carpet together, they read:
For further information contact Mike Chambers: 0101212 6660524
.

‘That’s a New York telephone number.’ Ben rose from the sofa.

‘Where are you going?’

‘To call this number.’

‘Why don’t we just call the number in Tangier and ask if Jason is there? They might say he is dead. And this entire nightmare will be over. Ben, if Jason was alive, he would have made contact. This whole thing is some sick joke.’

‘What if he’d been unable to make contact?’

‘Oh, God, it just can’t be. It’s all too fantastic. We buried my husband, Ahmad was there with me. He did everything, organised an investigation. He had detectives working round the clock. It’s thanks to him we were able to bring Jason’s remains home for a proper burial. Oh no, it’s all some sick hoax. Just call Tangier – they’ll tell you they never heard of a Jason Honey, and it’ll all be over with. We’ll be all right again.’

‘Arianne, I’m calling New York. You must trust me in this. Instinct tells me we’ll find out more by going the route that’s been laid out for us. Someone, probably Ahmad, plotted this very carefully, I suspect, for the sole purpose of destroying your happiness.’

She had quite worn herself out. So Arianne relented. She nodded her head in assent. ‘You’re right, of course.’

Ben called New York. Mike Chambers was not available. That was all he could learn from the contact number. Ben replaced the receiver, more puzzled than ever. He returned to Arianne.

‘What happened?’ she asked.

‘A man answered the phone. I asked for Mike Chambers. He asked who I was. When I told him, he said, “Mr Chambers is expecting your call. He is not here but will make contact as soon as possible. Your telephone number, please.” So I gave him my number.’

‘Call Tangier.’

‘No, I don’t think so, Arianne. I don’t think we should do anything rash. Let’s wait for the call from Mike Chambers. I’m going to follow intuition in this.’

The hours slipped by. Nothing happened. Arianne was far enough gone in anxiety and confusion to be able to block it out of her mind. This was an act of survival. Together she and Ben made supper. They talked about his drink with Simone, and then later about Simone herself, something they had never done before. The one thing they didn’t do was talk about Jason or Ahmad.

By midnight they realised Mike Chambers was not going to call back. They bathed together and made love, which somehow distanced the immediate problem that was haunting them. For Arianne, the scent of his flesh, the feel of his skin, the taste of him in her mouth, was reality. Coming together in exquisite sexual union was her joy. They dispelled every thought of Jason alive, made the past taking over the present an improbability. For Ben the sexual excitement, the passion, the love experienced with Arianne that night confirmed their togetherness. They could face whatever was challenging their future. They had each other. After sleeping fitfully in each other’s arms, they were awakened
by the incessant ringing of the telephone.

‘Will you get it or shall I?’ said Ben. Neither doubted the source of this call.

Arianne said nothing. The ringing seemed to compel her into silence. He placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder, kissed her forehead and told her, ‘Don’t worry, you’re not alone. We’re in this together.’

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. It might control the anguish she was feeling. Ben rolled over on his side and pulled himself up against the pillows. He took the call. Arianne could bear it no longer. She slid from the bed. She was naked still under her silk dressing-gown. She tied the sash and walked from the room. Now they would know for certain if Jason was alive. Waiting to hear had become unbearable. The very idea that he had survived that crash was drawing her closer and closer to him. He was coming alive for her. Certainty seemed superfluous. What power did Jason still have over her to be drawing her away from Ben whom she loved and wanted to be with for the remainder of her life? The mind playing tricks, she told herself.

She brushed her teeth, drew a bath, dropped her dressing-gown on the floor and stepped into the jasmine-scented water. She lay back in the bath. She must stifle the memories of life with Jason that intruded. Once she had done everything to retain those memories. No more. She had finally given them up, accepted Jason’s death and the love of another man. And now this. The damage was done, whether Jason was in fact dead or alive. He was back in her life again. He was competing with Ben for her love.

She had no idea how long Ben had been standing at the bathroom door, leaning against the jamb, watching her.

‘Hi,’ she said, half pathetically.

Ben walked over to the bath and sat on the edge. He placed his hand in the water – it had gone cold. He pulled the plug and turned the hot water tap on. The cold water swirled away as the hot steamed in. Neither Ben nor Arianne seemed able to break the silence. Arianne reached for the crystal bottle of scented liquid soap and added more to the bath. She dipped her hands into the newly warm water. It was liquid satin, with a crust of foamy bubbles. Ben replaced the bath plug. He and Arianne
seemed mesmerised by the sound of the water flowing from the tap, a distraction they were both grateful for. Ben sensed that Arianne was distancing herself from him, possibly even in spite of not wanting to do so. He felt compelled to stop it.