Dance While You Can (31 page)

The following Monday, when I saw Rosalind again, she made no reference to what had happened. Embarrassed as I was, I still felt great warmth for her. I was so accustomed to Jessica’s sneering if I made any show of weakness that Rosalind’s kindness touched me in a way that reminded me of Elizabeth.

Godwin was found guilty and received a two-year suspended sentence. Rosalind and I took him and his daughter for a quiet drink later.

When they’d gone, on impulse I invited Rosalind to come to the gallery where Jessica’s latest exhibition was opening that evening. I called Henry and arranged for Rosalind to go with him and Caroline – if she turned up with me, Jessica would throw a fit.

Jessica was in good spirits when I arrived, and busy sorting out last minute details. My father was already there, giving the benefit of his advice as usual, so I helped myself to a glass of wine and stood back to watch.

Jessica’s exhibitions were always well attended, and little red stickers found their way quickly on to frames. The theme for this latest one was rather sober for her, in view of her past excursions into surrealism and the abstract. We had spent a month in Tuscany that spring, and she had made the Italian hills and valleys the background for a series of paintings entitled ‘Child Lost in Tuscany’. The child, which had to be searched for in every painting, bore a striking resemblance to Jessica herself, though in one or two pictures it appeared only as a foetus. She’d taken me through the paintings some weeks before, in the belief that I would otherwise never understand their hidden message. The use of the foetus was pointed enough,’ I thought, without her having to add: ‘I like to think our child is somewhere beautiful, don’t you, darling?’

As I watched her now, excited, moving with ease among the guests, I was suddenly gripped by an overpowering desire to walk out. I didn’t belong in this world of hers, I never had. I hated the farce we staged every time she had an opening. People talked about us, even wrote about us, as a loving couple, when nothing could be further from the truth. It was only guilt that bound me to her now; all I really wanted was to get as far away from her as I could. . . . But she was coming towards me now, smiling and holding out her hand for mine. She whispered something in my ear that I didn’t catch, then planted a kiss on my cheek.

‘I’ve been neglecting you,’ she said. ‘But you must blame your father. He’s invited so many people and wants me to meet them all. Did you have a good day?’

I nodded absently, then looked down into her eyes. Successful Jessica might be, but I knew how fragile she was, too. There was still a long way to go before her shattered confidence could be completely restored. She needed me now in a way she never had before. It was as if she were afraid to do anything without me, even though she couldn’t stop herself hurting and resenting me.

‘Jess! There you are!’ My father clapped his hand on her shoulder. ‘The chap from
The Times
has arrived, come and say hello. Henry’s looking for you,’ he added to me, as he led her away.

I found Henry and Caroline – Caroline was more than halfway through her third pregnancy – standing next to the table that had been set up as a bar. I looked around for Rosalind. ‘Gone to the ladies,’ Henry whispered. ‘She tells me she’s dying to meet Jessica. Do you think that’s wise, old chap?’

‘I’ve got nothing to hide. Besides, I don’t think Rosalind is going to let on we already know one another.’

‘Got you. So who is she?’

‘A friend of yours, of course . . . .’

Half an hour later I noticed Rosalind standing in a corner with Jessica. They were looking at one of the paintings, and I could almost hear Jessica as she explained to Rosalind what she was trying to convey. I watched them for a while, touched by the similarity of their lives. One way or another both had suffered at the hands of the men they loved. I hoped they would become friends, they would be good for each other.

After the exhibition the six of us – Henry, Caroline, Rosalind, Jessica, my father and I – went to Langan’s. Jessica and Rosalind paid scant attention to the conversation going on round the table, they were too engrossed in one another.

Rosalind became a frequent visitor to Belgrave Square after that. She and Jessica hit it off so well that they sometimes made me feel like an outsider. Occasionally Rosalind and I would lunch together but she rarely talked about Jessica, except to say that she thought she was regaining her confidence. I had to agree. To start with, Rosalind had rekindled Jessica’s interest in the Women’s Movement. I was never sure which rally they were attending when, but each time Jessica returned from a march or a meeting, she was a different person. There was no bitterness in her fight for equality now; there was a new gentleness about her, which found its way into her paintings too.

Jessica’s part-independence, and part-dependence on someone else, had a strange effect on me. On the one hand I felt free and able to breathe again, on the other hand I missed her. I missed the arguments and the acrimony. I missed her being there when I got home at the end of a day. I missed the way she coped with my father. Most of all, perhaps, I missed the shock of her sudden, sadistic gestures – the cruel tricks, the drunken malice, the bizarre practical jokes. So often when I arrived home now, I would find a scribbled note saying, ‘Back in a few days,’ or she’d ring from Rosalind’s and say she was staying over. As she began to stand on her own feet, so I began to feel unimportant, unnecessary; in fact I must have been feeling something of what Jessica had felt during the year of our marriage. Of course, she had not left me. We still slept in the same bed, dined together occasionally, even went away for weekends together. But it was as if she had somehow outgrown our marriage, was learning to stand free of it.

‘I think things between us are better than they’ve ever been, don’t you?’ she said one day. ‘I mean, we don’t fight any more. I don’t hate you any more, and I don’t mind so much that you don’t love me.’

‘Don’t you?’

‘OK, I’m lying. I mind a lot, but I can handle it better these days. Rosalind’s been a marvellous influence on me, don’t you think? She’s helped me to come to terms with things. To think of myself as an individual; you know, as Jessica, rather than as Jessica-and-Alexander.’

‘Do I figure anywhere in the picture?’

‘Oh, don’t start getting sentimental on me, not now. I’ve fallen for that too often in the past. You’ll only end up hurting me again.’

‘I never meant to hurt you.’

‘I know.’

‘Do you love me, Jess?’

‘You know I do. And what about you? Do you think you might be able to start loving me now?’

‘I always did love you. Just not in the way . . .’

‘No. Don’t say any more.’

‘I miss you. When you’re not here, I miss you, you know.’

‘I miss you too. But it’s best this way.’

It was after that conversation, when she had flown off to Rome for the weekend with Rosalind that I realised I had been kidding myself. I didn’t miss her at all. It was Elizabeth I missed. I had deluded myself into thinking it was Jessica because for the past three years I had rarely allowed myself to think of Elizabeth – the memory and the longing were too painful. Now there was nothing to fill the hours of loneliness, no one demanding my attention, no one constantly reminding me how I had ruined her life. At last I was free to think, and all I could think about was Elizabeth.

My father picked up Jessica and Rosalind from the airport when they got back from Rome, and took them to Henry’s where we were all dining that night. But by the time I arrived Rosalind had left; she’d had a phone message to say that her son had been rushed into hospital with appendicitis. Jessica had offered to go with her, Henry told me, ‘but then she changed her mind. Wait ’til you see her, she looks gorgeous. If you ask me she’s fancying a bit of jig-a-jig later.’

‘You’ve got sex on the brain,’ I told him.

‘Me!’

‘Three children in three years, I rest my case.’

‘Two,’ Caroline corrected, as she waddled in through the door. ‘The third can’t make up its mind when to arrive. I wish it bloody well would, it’s no fun being this shape. Have you been up to say goodnight to your godson, Alexander?’

Two Rupert Bear stories later, I came down to find the table laid for dinner. After Sarah, Henry’s second child was born, Caroline and Henry had moved out of Eaton Square to a house in Chelsea, and my father, Jessica and I spent a lot of time there.

Henry was right, Jessica did look gorgeous. She’d had her hair cut in Rome, and it looked blonder, too. It was the first time I’d seen her with short hair; it made her eyes look bigger and her mouth fuller. She was wearing her normal jeans and sweater, but somehow tonight even they looked different.

When I kissed her she put her arms around me. ‘You look tired,’ she said. ‘Not been having too many late nights while I’ve been in Rome, I hope?’

I pushed her away. ‘Let’s eat.’

Her face darkened, but my father was already asking her to go on with what she’d been saying before I arrived. It seemed she and Rosalind were going to join a march the next day to Aldermaston, the headquarters of the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment. ‘A lot of women from our group are going, and we’ve arranged a meeting for Thursday to report back. In fact, Rosalind and I are thinking of joining CND on a permanent basis. Well, a girl’s got to protect the next generation and all that.’ She looked at me, but I didn’t react.

When dinner was over Henry asked me to go to his study with him, there was a brief he wanted my thoughts on. I saw him exchange looks with Caroline before we left the room.

Once in his study he took a bottle of brandy from his filing cabinet. He seemed in no hurry, and chatted for some time about Nicholas and what he was doing at kindergarten. ‘Well,’ I said eventually, ‘where’s this brief?’

‘There isn’t one,’ he answered shortly. ‘It’s something else, Alexander. I don’t know whether I should tell you this or not, but I’m going to. It’s about Elizabeth.’

I froze. ‘What about her?’

‘I’ve got her address. It’s written there, inside that envelope.’ When I made no move to pick it up, he handed it to me.

The skin felt so tight over my face it was difficult to speak. ‘How did you find it? Did she telephone you?’

‘No. I was picking Nicholas up from kindergarten a couple of days ago, I saw her then. She didn’t see me. She got into the car in front of mine and drove off. Nicholas and I followed.’

I stared down at the envelope.

‘There’s something else you should know, Alexander. The child she collected from kindergarten. It was a little boy, same age as Nicholas. His name’s Jonathan. I’ve seen him, Alexander . . . .’

‘Go on.’ My voice was hoarse.

‘There’s no doubt in my mind, and well, with his age as well . . .’

There was no need for him to elaborate. We looked at each other for a long time without speaking. In the end it was Henry who broke the silence.

‘It’s up to you now, Alexander.’

‘Why up to me? She’s always known where she could find me.’

‘For Christ’s sake, Alexander, you were the one who broke it off. You were the one who told her you couldn’t leave Jessica after the accident . . . .’

‘She could have told me. If he’s my son . . .’

‘And since then you’ve done nothing, have you? You could have gone to her once everything had calmed down, but you didn’t. You’ve done nothing . . .’

‘But things never did calm down, did they? Jessica’s still a mess. Am I supposed to walk out on her now, on top of everything else I’ve done to her?’

‘You’ve got two children out there. Don’t you think you owe them something too? Your marriage is a bigger farce now than it ever was. You make me laugh, you two, the way you go about pretending you’re over your difficulties . . . . If you ask me, it’s about time you stopped wallowing in guilt and got on with your life.’

I was out of my chair like a shot – but the door burst open before I could speak. It was Jessica. ‘Henry! It’s Caroline. The pains have started.’

Henry glared at me. ‘Just think about it, Alexander,’ he growled, then raced out of the door.

‘Don’t tell me you two were having a lovers’ tiff?’ Jessica scoffed. She stepped back as my eyes blazed into her.

‘I’m sick of you, Jessica! I’m sick of the damned sight of you. I thought you’d changed, but even tonight you couldn’t resist twisting a knife in my guilt, could you? Well, you’ve done it long enough, so do us both a favour and get out of my life before I do something we might both regret!’

‘Oh it’s too late for that, Alexander. You did it three years ago.’

– Elizabeth –

– 24 –

I watched Edward stalk off through the crowds. ‘It will be a most wonderful book Mr Walters is writing.’ Kamel was standing at my elbow – he seemed to have been standing beside me all the time we’d been in Egypt. Next to him was one of the museum’s curators, his round brown eyes dilated with something akin to worship as they followed Edward.

The Cairo Museum was seething with tourists. I’d known nothing about a book until we returned from Aswan to Cairo – Kamel had told me. Kamel was with us to protect us, though Edward had never told me from what. His presence unsettled me, as did the crowded streets and anonymous, staring eyes that seemed to follow me everywhere. From the moment we’d arrived the city had appalled me with its frightening pandemonium of noise and disorder; Cairo was a jungle of pungent, decaying streets and crowded alleys where modern hotels and ancient crumbling houses stood cheek by jowl. It was a bizarre, amorphous place that vibrated with an almost sinister extremism. As I got to know it better, the poverty and ignorance horrified me. I talked to Edward about it but he just patted my hand and told me there was nothing to be done. I know he didn’t mean to but he made me feel as if Cairo were his particular territory, and he was sorry he’d brought me.

Every day he went to the Museum to study the people and their reaction to the Tutankhamun collection. His fascination with it bordered on obsession. We’d come here for a holiday for Charlotte to recuperate, but ever since we’d arrived Edward had spent his time here. As well as doing his research, he was advising the museum authorities on the installation of an intricate alarm system. He was treated like a royal visitor, and behaved like one too. He wore his galibaya as if he had been born to it, ate nothing but Egyptian food, read Egyptian newspapers, and unless speaking to the children or me, always spoke Egyptian. He even had the heavy, musky smell of an Egyptian.