Dance While You Can (18 page)

As time passed and my confidence started to come back, I grew more and more attached to Edward. I looked forward to seeing his tall figure stride through the crowds, to hearing his jocular voice when he crept up behind me and asked if he could buy a ticket. I laughed when he was sad, because he was only sad when he remembered his age. He was old, he kept telling me, too old for me. What could I possibly want with someone who was fifty, past his prime, and ready to fall apart at the seams?

‘Then I’ll just have to stitch you back together, won’t I?’ I said. That was after the first time we made love.

Though I had been determined not to make comparisons, it was impossible not to. But Edward was here, and Edward loved me. Alexander was no more than a dream now. So why did I keep on believing that if only I waited just a little bit longer, he would come?

‘But he won’t, child,’ Violet May said, on the night Edward asked me to marry him. I’d told him no, as gently as I could, but the hurt I saw in his eyes almost tore me apart. He held me in his arms, and I despised myself for what I was doing to him, but he only wiped away my tears and told me he understood. In the end, not knowing what else to do, I had run to Violet May and asked her to look into the crystal ball for me.

I sat before her in the warm dimness of her caravan and searched her fleshy face, trying to get her to meet my eyes as she spoke, but she wouldn’t, and I knew she was lying.

‘You’ve got to tell me,’ I whispered. ‘Please, I want to know.’

‘I told you child, he won’t come.’

‘Look, I know you want me to marry Edward, but if there is any chance, any chance at all . . . Please, Violet May, tell me the truth.’

She peered into her crystal ball again, then with a gesture of impatience, pushed it to one side. ‘Give me your hand,’ she wheezed.

She studied it for a long time, until finally she looked up and I saw that her eyes were swimming with tears. She shook her head, slowly.

‘Violet May!’ I cried. ‘Tell me!’

Then she smiled, and the icy hand that had been pushing my heart into my throat seemed to draw back. ‘Did you see him, Violet May? In the future, was he there?’

She nodded. ‘Yes child, he was there.’

‘Does that mean . . .?’ I swallowed. ‘Does that mean I will see him again?’ I stammered.

‘Yes, you will see him again.’

‘When? Violet May, tell me when? Is it soon?’

She shook her head. ‘It is a mysterious thing, this love you share with him. It has a power beyond my understanding, but the seeds of fate have already been sown. There are still long roads to be travelled before you see him again. When you do, Elizabeth . . . Don’t do it, child. It will only bring pain. There is death and hatred, such hatred. And foreign lands . . .’ But I wasn’t listening. All that mattered was that one day, it didn’t matter when, we would be together again . . . .

Leaning against the side of my stall remembering the confidence I’d felt then, how happy I’d been as I left Violet May’s caravan, I could hardly hold back the tears. Like a fool I had waited, believing in my heart that he had meant it when he’d said he would always love me. But he was married now, and I was nothing more than a memory.

‘We got tired of waiting.’

I jumped – and Edward laughed as he held his hand out for mine. Charlotte was bouncing up and down beside him, wearing his deerstalker and pleading with him to play her new game. As I looked at them I knew in my heart it was time now to get on with my life. I put my basket down and let myself out of the stall.

Edward’s eyes were searching my face, and as the wind swept up my hair he brushed it back. ‘Why do I get the feeling you want to tell me something?’ he said.

‘Because I do,’ I whispered. ‘I’d like us to get married, Edward, if you still want me, that is.’ And seeing the way his mouth trembled, I wondered how I could have been so blind as not to have realised a long time ago how very much I loved him.

– 15 –

Slipping the ring on to my third finger I turned my hand to the chandelier and nearly gasped as tiny splinters of light shot between my diamond and the crystal above me. Edward was standing beside me, watching my face, waiting for me to speak. I put my arms around him and hugged him. ‘Darling, it’s beautiful,’ I said. I looked at the diamond again, then laughing, I threw out my hands. ‘I just don’t know what to say.’

‘Then don’t say anything,’ he said. ‘Just as long as I know you like it, that’s all that matters.’

Like it? I could hardly believe what was happening to me. After all, less than two years ago I had been just the girl from the fair. I’d always read about people who were wealthy then, though I’d seen them often enough, at the fair, and at Foxton’s too, but it was as if they belonged to another world. And now here was I living in that world, Edward’s world. He did everything he could to make me a part of it, but still at times I couldn’t help feeling like an intruder, as if I had borrowed someone else’s life and at any time it might be snatched back again. Violet May would tolerate none of that talk, though, and told me to grow up and mind when I was well off. It did me good to go and visit her from time to time, it brought me back to earth. I had no regrets at leaving the fair; once again my uncle had been glad to see the back of me. As for the others, I had always been ‘too hoity-toity’ for them anyway.

David clapped his hands. ‘Champagne!’ he called, and on cue the double doors that opened out into the West Hall were thrown wide and Christine, outrageously overdressed in her new Zandra Rhodes and a tiara, wheeled in a trolley laden with two bottles of Dom Perignon and four glasses.

Edward rolled his eyes, and Christine stuck out her tongue. ‘Mmm, very ladylike,’ he grunted, then laughed as she blew him a kiss.

‘Well, come along, David.’ She thrust a bottle of champagne at him. ‘What are you waiting for?’

Edward slipped his arm around my shoulders and waited until everyone was holding a glass. ‘It’s not often a man gets engaged two years after his wedding,’ he said, ‘but it was a good idea for an anniversary present, even if I say so myself.’ He gave me a gentle squeeze and as I looked up into his face I could see that his sister and his brother were for the moment, part of another world. ‘To you,’ he whispered.

‘To Elizabeth,’ Christine and David echoed, and the moment was broken.

After we had drunk the toast, and another to Edward, we sat down. Wanting to remain close to him, I curled up on the floor at his feet. He always sat in the same chair, the one on the left-hand side of the hearth. David’s was the chair on the right, and many was the night I had sat just like this, at Edward’s feet, studying the intricacies of the eighteenth-century fireplace, while the two of them discussed Edward’s next trip to Paris or Rome, a forthcoming auction or the needs of one of their many collector clients. I felt comfortable and safe, and smiled as I hugged my knees to my chest. I was almost happy.

The last thought slipped into my mind before I could stop it, and I tossed my head back, as if trying to shake off the introspection. It had come, not as a spontaneous, pleasurable thought, but as if it were struggling to establish its presence while at the same time denying me its sentiment. Feeling guilty, I rested my head against Edward’s knee and reached up for his hand.

Christine and David were arguing gently. ‘Oh do be quiet,’ Christine said, as she flicked David on the shoulder.

‘Your problem, young lady,’ he retorted, ‘is that you go looking for trouble.’ He was referring to the fracas Christine had become involved in at the village store that morning, and since Edward had been in London, it was David, the younger of the two brothers, who had had to go and smooth Mr Russell’s feathers. They were always dragging Christine out of one scrape or another. She had been only a child when their parents died, so the brothers had brought her up. She was devoted to them both, but we all knew Edward had a special place in her heart.

‘More champagne anyone?’ she said, holding up the bottle.

I held out my glass. ‘What time is Rupert arriving?’ I asked. Rupert was yet another in the long line of Christine’s escorts.

‘I didn’t invite him in the end, thought it might be nicer if it was just family.’ At the slight emphasis on the word family, I looked round, but no one else seemed to have noticed.

‘Quite right too,’ Edward said. ‘Not, of course, that I have anything against Rupert,’ he added quickly.

Christine laughed and dropped a kiss on his head. ‘
You
don’t have anything against anyone,’ she said.

‘What time are you setting off tomorrow?’ David asked, turning to me.

I looked at Christine. ‘We thought about nine-thirty, didn’t we?’

‘About that.’ She went to sit down again, and as she crossed one leg over the other I saw her looking at mine. ‘We all know you’ve got wonderful legs, Elizabeth, but please stop showing them off. Envy-green clashes with my dress.’

‘There’s nothing wrong with your legs, Christine,’ David remarked, ‘which is more than I can say for your navigation, incidentally. Are you sure you’re leaving yourselves enough time tomorrow?’

‘My legs are fat, I’m fat,’ said Christine – and David rolled his eyes in a here-we-go-again pantomime as Christine launched into another bout of destructive self-criticism. According to her she looked like a roundhead, with her mousey club-cut hair and circular face, but in fact she was rather beautiful, and her short fringe and round blue eyes made her look much younger than thirty. That was a compliment she had no time for, however. What really obsessed her were her freckles, and she spent hours soaking her face in lemon juice in the hope of getting rid of them. And if anyone dared to tell her that what she lacked in height she made up for in personality, they were sorry for it, especially David, since he was the one she resembled. Why couldn’t I have been tall and slim like Edward? she would ask pathetically.

‘You know,’ Edward said suddenly, ‘I think I might come along to the auction tomorrow after all.’

‘Oh no!’ Christine protested. ‘You said you were going to leave it all to us. Besides, it’ll be Elizabeth’s first auction without you – how’s she ever going to learn if you’re always there?’ She looked at me. ‘You’re mad, you know. Why you should want to get involved in all this wheeler-dealering when you can have a nice easy life at home here, I don’t know. Anyway,’ she said to Edward, ‘I shall be there if she comes unstuck – which she won’t.’

‘Then don’t forget, if you feel you don’t want to go through with it all you have to do is place your bid with the auctioneer before-the sale begins, he’ll do the rest.’

I smiled at the way he was trying to protect me, but Christine snorted. ‘As if she’s going to do that.’

‘We all know you wouldn’t,’ David said, ‘but you’ve had a lot more experience at this than Elizabeth has.’

The argument continued as Edward told us yet again how much he was prepared to go up to in order to secure the neo-classical Bullock sofa, one of the items being auctioned at a country house sale over in Sussex the following day.

I was becoming a little more used to this new world of mine now, but it had taken time. I had had no idea of just how wealthy Edward was, and at first I was overwhelmed by the lavishness of his generosity. My wardrobes were brimming with clothes flown in from the best couturiers in the world – and with alarming frequency they were packed into a fifteen-piece set of Hermès luggage as we flew off to distant, exotic places where Edward conducted his business and I explored and socialised. We both attended every royal function that Edward was invited to – and there were many – and were constantly entertaining clients, either in West End restaurants or our London home – businessmen, film stars, celebrities of all kinds. There were charity balls at least twice a month, some in London but most of them in New York, Dallas or Hong Kong. At these functions, Edward hardly ever left my side. He advised me, because I insisted, on how I should dress, how I should speak and how I should eat. He loved me, almost to the point of idolising me, and was never happy unless I was with him. He still couldn’t believe that I really did love him, when he was so ‘old and decrepit’, as he put it, and I was so young. His devoted attendance on me was his way of trying to hide this insecurity, and it was because of his insecurity that I loved him.

The pomposities and eccentricities of the people who belonged to Edward’s world of art and antiques also took me some time to get used to. But with time, and again a great deal of patience on Edward’s part, my knowledge of the business increased, and even in that most difficult of worlds I began to feel more at ease. Walters & Sons was one of the largest art dealers in the country. Nevertheless I was relieved that we rarely invited people down to our house in Kent. It was the family home, and David’s particular refuge. Since the accident had killed Edward’s first wife and left David’s face badly scarred he’d given up his post as a university professor and now lived in virtual seclusion.

Soon after Edward and I were married I had taken over the running of the household while Christine concentrated on carving herself a niche in the family business and joined the board of directors. She was almost as passionate about antique furniture and old masters as David was. Not that Edward wasn’t too, but anyone who really knew him knew that his heart had been captured long ago by the mysterious works of ancient Egypt. There was a room on the second floor of Westmoor – the Kent house – filled with limestone reliefs, faience bowls, broken grey granite faces and schist and marble statues. It was known simply as the Egyptian Room.

I often teased Edward about his passion for all things Egyptian, knowing that he was, in a way, made vulnerable by his obsession. Whenever he had spent some time in the Egyptian Room he would emerge looking dishevelled and child-like, almost as though he had been playing with a forbidden toy. I was reminded of my days at Foxton’s, when I caught one of the younger boys up to no good – and Edward was so like a boy, especially in the way he tried so hard to please me. It was impossible not to love him. His great passion was King Tutankhamun and his excavated tomb. On that he could wax lyrical for hours.