Pandora (59 page)

As the days passed he continued to behave in the same kind, sober but utterly brotherly fashion. Together they explored the cathedrals, the galleries, bought oysters in the market, ate far too much rich chocolate cake with apricot jam, wandered through the Vienna woods and went to the Vienna Phil in the evenings.

They also sketched each other incessantly. Jonathan disappeared a lot to delve around in dusty archives, not letting on to Emerald he was investigating Zac’s past as much as that of the Raphael.

At the end of the second week, Emerald started panicking she hadn’t got her period.

‘I know I’m pregnant, and Zac’s the father,’ she stormed. ‘I’m not going to be a single parent like Anthea, it’d ruin my life. Where can I get an abortion? You’re bound to know a good doctor,’ she added nastily.

Jonathan looked at her meditatively.

‘Dear, dear, dear, how can you be so dismissive of Anthea giving you up as a baby, when you’re not prepared to give yours even a chance?’

Emerald flushed.

‘Look what an awful life I’ve had. It would have been better if I hadn’t been born.’

‘It would have saved everyone a lot of earache. See you this evening.’

It irritated the hell out of Emerald that Jonathan’s friends were always ringing or texting him. Jonathan, in turn, was ashamed how jealous he felt when he learnt that David Pulborough was giving Trafford a big show next year and Trafford had also been shortlisted for a big prize for his video of a masturbating granny entitled
Oh Nan
. Jonathan vowed to stop squandering his talents, but all he wanted to do was to paint Emerald as they sat for hours in cafés or wine bars trying out bottles of the new vintage.

‘According to Giacometti,’ he told her, ‘who spent weeks painting members of his family, “The adventure, the great adventure, is to see something unknown appear each day in the same face.”’

And as the days passed, and yellow leaves began to cover the parks, and cold clear air could be felt again coming off the mountains, Jonathan noticed the little brackets on either side of Emerald’s mouth when she smiled, and the red patch in the left hollow of her nose, which she tried to cover with concealer, and the yearning melancholy in her eyes, which softened to sage green when she was caught off guard.

Bored with his curls one day, Jonathan had them cut off.

‘Trying to look more like Zac,’ Emerald was horrified to hear herself snapping, but only because she was so jolted by the beauty of his forehead and temples and the strength and grace of his newly revealed jaw and neck.

‘Sorry, that was bitchy,’ she moaned, ‘I’m only frantic about not coming on. I need some Prozac.’

‘You need some anti-Zac,’ drawled Jonathan, ‘you’re just suffering from PMT.’

Predictably, when her period arrived the next day, Emerald made a fearful fuss about having desperately wanted Zac’s child.

‘At least I’d have something to remember him by.’

‘Don’t be fatuous,’ snapped Jonathan, ‘you’ve got what you wanted.’

‘You’ve no idea how important it is for adopted children to have their first blood relation. And I’m so late I’ve run out of Tampax. Jonathan,
Jonathan
,’ but he had walked out, slamming the door.

Returning twenty minutes later, he found her in tears and chucked a packet of Tampax on the bed.

‘Here you are. A long stop between two short legs.’

‘My legs are
not
short and I’ve got the most terrible cramps.’

Jonathan flicked on the kettle and filled a hot-water bottle, then he got a little bottle of gin out of the mini-bar. Having emptied it into a glass, he added tonic.

‘Don’t need lemon, you’re quite sour enough.’

‘Why are you so vile to me?’ moaned Emerald as he tucked her up in bed and gently began to rub her rigid tummy. ‘Aaah, that’s so nice. How d’you know so much about women?’

‘I had to try and be a mother to Sienna. Poor darling had her first period at ten. Anthea hadn’t bothered to tell her about them. Jupiter, Al and I were all away at school when it happened. Sienna came screaming out of the loo convinced she was bleeding to death. Mrs Robbie had to cope. I know Sienna can be difficult, and it’s debatable whether she or Anthea have given each other the harder time,’ he added, his hands kneading and caressing away the pain, ‘but her life’s been pretty good hell.’

The gin was kicking in. Jonathan noticed Emerald’s eyelashes, lying on her blanched cheek like ragged rooks’ wings.

Oh, please make his hands creep downwards or upwards, Emerald was shocked to find herself praying, as sleep rolled over her. When she woke, Jonathan was gone and it was dark outside. Under her door he’d shoved a drawing of her on her deathbed and underneath had written,
Period Peace
.

When Jonathan returned long after midnight to his room, a page of Emerald’s sketchpad had been shoved under his door. On it was an exquisite drawing of Christ with Jonathan’s features, complete with halo and Diggory under his arm, instead of a lamb. Underneath, Emerald had written,
Self Portrait by Jonathan Belvedon
.

Jonathan could hear her television on next door, and instead of watching the porn channel, he poured himself a large whisky, and lay on his bed smoking and gazing into space. He wished Diggory were here to cheer him up. Who the hell could have taken the Raphael?

He left the hotel in the morning without making contact, but when he returned he found all his clothes had been beautifully washed and ironed with a note on top: ‘Sorry I’ve been a complete cow. At least I’ve learnt the Austrian for launderette.’

Emerald felt herself in more and more of a muddle.

‘Do you find me attractive?’ she demanded.

‘Quite,’ said Jonathan, then, when she looked boot-faced, he smiled and added: ‘Quite exceptionally attractive.’

But he made no pass. It was like living with a vegetarian wolf. And as August moved into September, she found herself increasingly drawn to him, and when he vanished to his archives, she missed him dreadfully.

One warm afternoon, he took her to the Central Cemetery, another splendid park where two and a half million people are buried, and where the Viennese come to walk, chat, and feed the squirrels and sparrows.

‘Only when you’re dead in Vienna have you really made it,’ explained Jonathan, who was watching the exquisite shadows dappling the tawny leaves scattered on the grass as the tree ceiling grew thinner.

In the musicians’ graveyard, they found buried many of the great composers: Johann Strauss, father and son, Beethoven and Brahms. Jonathan drew Emerald’s attention to a lichened monument, which showed a bespectacled Schubert arriving in heaven, bewildered that a smiling angel was laying a laurel wreath on his dishevelled curls.

‘Needs a haircut like yours,’ mocked Emerald.

‘Schubert never got any recognition during his lifetime,’ said Jonathan, ‘he had to wait till he got to heaven, like Alizarin probably will.’

Glancing round, he saw tears, for once not of frustration nor self-pity, filling Emerald’s eyes.

‘That is so sad. Is Alizarin that good?’

‘One day he’ll be regarded as one of the greats of all time.’

‘So could you be,’ protested Emerald, suddenly serious.

‘Me?’ said Jonathan in amazement.

‘You just squander your talent and fool around.’

She looked so sweet and fierce, he had to clench his fists not to take her in his arms.

Instead, gazing at the miles of graves, he said, ‘Terrifying how many people are alleged to be buried alive. It’s rumoured the Viennese used to have a rope inside the coffin attached to a bell, so they could alert the outside world.’

Then, when Emerald shivered, he added, ‘Tomorrow we’re going to visit the Von Trapps’ house.’

‘How fabulous,’ squealed Emerald, ‘
The Sound of Music
’s easily my favourite film.’

‘I know it is.’

‘How?’

‘Because it’s Anthea’s too.’

Sometimes they discussed what had happened to the Raphael.

‘What were you doing during the fireworks?’

‘Taking Lily home, she fell in the pond.’

‘Are you sure it wasn’t you that fell in the pond? You were drenched when you got back to the house.’

‘I’ve always been wet.’

‘Don’t be silly. The frame of the Raphael was found in the rushes. Are you sure you didn’t nick it as a practical joke? And how come you’re so cash rich now?’

‘I had a good win at the casino,’ said Jonathan blithely. ‘Actually, I’ve almost run out.’ He glanced at her sideways. ‘I’ve got to go back to London to finish Dame Hermione in time for the Commotion Exhibition.’

‘When are you leaving?’ gasped Emerald.

‘Tomorrow. The next day.’

She really minds, he thought in ecstasy as the colour drained from Emerald’s face. His backing-off had worked.

‘Bloody Jupiter,’ she stormed, ‘if he’d paid me for that head, we could have stayed another week.’

On the last night, they went to their favourite restaurant in the Schwarzenberg Palace overlooking the park. Watched by everyone, they were oblivious of everything except each other.

‘I don’t want to go back to London,’ moaned Emerald.

‘D’you remember the first time we danced, I kissed you and you slapped my face?’ asked Jonathan.

‘You were so drunk, I nearly knocked you over.’

‘What did you think of me?’

‘That you were an irrelevance, all I could think about was confronting Anthea.’

Jonathan couldn’t prevent his hand reaching out to stroke her face, but just managed to turn it into a summons for the bill.

As they wandered home guided by a huge gold moon floating above the green domes, the rearing horses and the floodlit goddesses, Emerald asked, ‘Why were you so gratuitously bloody to me at my birthday party?’

‘I thought Dad had given you the Raphael to make up for being adopted and not brought up by him and Anthea. It was the sort of stupid, quixotic thing . . .’

‘You were panic stricken about losing your inheritance.’

Jonathan’s head was bowed, his face in darkness.

‘Well?’

‘I was panicking that if you became that rich, Zac the fortune-hunter wouldn’t be able to resist marrying you.’

‘What a bloody horrible thing to say.’

‘I was so terrified of losing you,’ muttered Jonathan.

‘W-what?’

Emerald was so busy gazing at him in disbelief that she tripped over a paving stone. Jonathan caught her and she melted into his arms, pleading: ‘Please, please kiss me,’ then, when he didn’t, trying to make a joke of it: ‘I t-t-thought sisters were your speciality.’

Jonathan shoved her roughly away, throwing back his head, banging his clenched fists against his chest.

‘I am not laying a finger on you until you have that DNA test.’

‘Why are you so sure I’m not a Belvedon?’

‘Because I can’t bear you to be,’ he said despairingly.

He took her face between his hands, caressing her cheekbones with his thumbs, watching the silvery light playing on her adorably bewildered face.

‘I’ve loved you since the moment you walked into the marquee at Dad and Anthea’s silver wedding party,’ he whispered, ‘but I know too how important it is for adopted children to have their own kids. I’ve also screwed up one sister by getting too close to her. The moment you’ve had that test and proved you’re not my sister’ – his voice broke – ‘I’ll never let you go again.’

Full of hope, they returned to England.

Sienna, meanwhile, had been in Rome and Florence, gazing at Raphaels, wrestling with her demons. In mid-September she returned to the East End to work and in early October flew to New York where the Commotion Exhibition, which had earlier in the year outraged and excited the British public, was about to go on show.

Three huge rooms of the highly prestigious Greychurch Museum off Madison Avenue had been given over to eighty-four exhibits by forty young British artists. Among the most outrageous were not only Sienna’s installations,
Tampax Tower
and
Aunt Hill
, but also
Millennium Buggers
, in which, as promised, Jonathan had included Casey Andrews, Somerford Keynes, his brother Jupiter, and a number of Tory grandees whom Jupiter was wooing. A large alcove had been set aside for Jonathan’s installation of Dame Hermione Harefield, which was due to be flown in at any minute.