Sheer Abandon (67 page)

“I don’t know,” she said, and suddenly started to feel rather bad again, shivery and miserable. “It’s all…horrid. Isn’t it?”

“Mmm. You look a bit green, actually.”

“I feel green,” she said. “Oh, God—excuse me!” And she bolted into the toilet and was very sick.

“Poor old you,” he said when she emerged. “Here, I’ve got some water for you. Have a sip, that’s right. Look, tell you what, I just happen to have rather a lot of money on me—my dad cabled me some extra. Why don’t we treat ourselves to a night in a hotel? To be honest, I don’t feel exactly great myself.”

And indeed he didn’t look it; he was suddenly pale under his tan and sweating.

“Sounds lovely. But I don’t have any money. You’ll have to go on your own.”

“I don’t want to go on my own. I want you to come with me. I might have nightmares. Don’t look at me like that. Two rooms, no hidden agenda, honest. There’s a really cool luxury beach resort near Chaweng—Coral Winds. And let’s get a cab, none of your bus rubbish.”

Martha still felt terrible; she knew he was rich—it was patent from various things he had said—and their shared adventure had indeed made her feel as if he was an old and extremely close friend, or even a relative. She suddenly had a sense of total unreality.

“It sounds wonderful,” she said. “Thank you.”

There is something about being in a very expensive hotel that is the opposite of character forming. There is a strong sense, born at the reception desk, that the servility and cosseting on offer are an absolute right, to be maintained at all times, and from which the most momentary lapse is an outrage.

Martha, who had been brought up to regard frugality as the ultimate virtue and arrogance as the ultimate vice, found herself settled by the flower-and fern-fringed pool at the Coral Winds Hotel a mere sixty minutes or so after unpacking her rucksack (while picking her way through the bowl filled with peaches and grapes supplied to her room by the management and sending down her crumpled and grubby shorts and T-shirts to the hotel express laundry), waving at the pool boy and asking, just slightly irritably, if her second cocktail was on its way.

Having received a profuse apology, along with the cocktail, she sipped it briefly and then stood up, walked to the edge of the pool and dived neatly in, swam a length or two, and then walked languidly back to her place and lay down again, aware that she was being watched appreciatively by most of the men sitting around the pool. The fact that they were mostly middle-aged and for the most part accompanied by young Thai girls—or boys—increased her pleasure; it felt rather good to be the only Western girl there and to have a novelty value.

“Hi,” he said, appearing from inside the hotel. “You OK now?”

“Absolutely OK,” she said, “thank you.”

“Excellent. Me too. What’s that you’re drinking?”

“A Bellini.” She spoke as if she drank them quite often; she had only ordered it because it was at the top of the menu. It was extremely nice.

“Ah, one of my favourites. I’ll join you. I thought we’d have lunch here. They do a very good club sandwich, I’m told. Would that suit you?”

“Perfectly,” she said, “but”—conscience cutting briefly in—“couldn’t we just go to the beach or something?”

“No, I really don’t want to move. It’s awfully hot. We can eat there tonight.”

“Fine,” said Martha, “my treat.”

Lunch was brought and they ate it in a companionable silence, watching one of the men taking endless photographs of his Thai boyfriend.

That evening they wandered along the beach in the soft darkness; every hundred yards or so was a restaurant, candlelit tables set on the sand, a stall of fresh fish laid out on ice, and a barbecue alight to cook it. They sat down, ordered barracuda, and while they waited for it, drank iced beer and watched the water lapping on the shore.

“This is the life,” she said. “What a lovely day it’s turned out to be. I feel quite different.”

“You seem quite different,” he said, “different from how I remember you.”

“Oh really? Well, I’m the same.” Really she wasn’t; she had become, just for the duration of the fairy tale, careless and confident, another sort of girl altogether, no longer Cinderella but the princess, and until the clock struck and they left in the morning, so she would remain.

After dinner they walked slowly back to the hotel; there was a jazz singer in the bar, and they sat and listened to her, while drinking more cocktails.

“Honestly,” said Martha, “I’ve drunk more today than I have in the last three months.”

“It suits you,” he said. “Have another, have a Bellini, that’s what you’ve become, a Bellini girl. I’ve enjoyed the transformation.”

“Thank you.”

“No, it’s been huge fun altogether. Thank you! It’s been a very nice interlude. And tomorrow I fly up to Bangkok—so come on, one more drink and then I think we should go to bed.”

That was what had done it, that one more drink. One more Bellini. She had become tipsy, silly, more and more confident.

So that when they were walking to their rooms and he leant forward and kissed her very gently, saying, “It’s been really fun,” she responded rather more enthusiastically than she had intended. She sensed his slight shock, then his pleasure; and he took her hand and led her along the wooden, palm-fringed walkways towards their bungalows and said, “Tell you what, shall we have yet another last drink? I’ve got half a bottle of champagne in my mini-bar and I’m sure you have too, so why don’t we enjoy them together?”

Which they did; and then, somehow, it seemed really rather a good idea to sit down on the bed and let him kiss her again; and after that, it was just the shortest step to continue being one of those carelessly confident girls who took sex, along with all the other pleasures, not especially seriously.

“You’re absolutely gorgeous,” he said, “really absolutely. I had no idea, I had no idea at all…” And it was so wonderful to be told that, and by someone so beautiful himself. She really wasn’t about to become boring, buttoned-up Martha again, until she absolutely had to.

Her last thought, as she lay down and watched him pulling off his clothes, was one of gratitude to a boy who had relieved her of her virginity in the north, in the elephant village near Chiang Mai. That might not have been a beautiful experience, but it meant she could really enjoy this one. Well, concentrate on enjoying it, anyway. As she did. Very much. And even more the following morning, just before dawn, and before he left for the airport in one of the hotel limos, and she became Cinderella again. It had been fun while it lasted, and so very unlike her. But now it was over. Completely and absolutely over. She had no illusions whatsoever about that.

Chapter 36

         They’d had another row.

Gideon had a call from a chain of food stores he owned in the southern States; there was a crisis over redundancies, the unions were getting heavy, and he said he really needed to go to Seattle the next day and sort it out.

“Is that OK?” he had said, putting down the phone. “I’m sorry, my darling. You can come too, obviously, and then we’ll go down to San Francisco for a couple of days if you like. I’m sure I can fit it in.”

She hesitated, then said, “I can’t. I really feel I must be around London for the next few days. Kate’s rather depending on me at the moment. She keeps calling. And I’m the link with Martha. I feel I can’t let her down. Especially if the story comes out.”

“I’m really worried about her,” Helen had said when she’d called on the Friday evening. “She’s very withdrawn, just stays in her room, won’t even talk to Nat. I think, really, she ought to meet this…this woman, but she says she doesn’t want to, ever, that she hates her. She’s not going to get over it that way, is she?”

“No,” said Jocasta. “Oh, dear. I’ll give her a call, Helen, see if I can persuade her. Even if she never sees her again, she’s got to confront her. However painful for everyone.”

But Kate wouldn’t. “She’s a stupid cow. Sorry, Jocasta, but I don’t see the point.”

“OK. But if you change your mind, let me know. I’ll come with you. If that would help.”

“It wouldn’t help, because I’m not going,” said Kate. “But I might just call for a chat. I’m so glad you’re around, Jocasta. It’s difficult to talk to Mum about it.”

So how could she go running off to Seattle?

“Quite easily I should say,” said Gideon now. “I think you’re getting this thing a bit out of proportion, Jocasta. She’s not your child, she’s not your responsibility—”

“But I feel she is. I’m so involved with her, Gideon, you don’t understand.”

“No,” he said, “it seems I don’t. We’ve only been married a few weeks and I’m beginning to feel marginalised. Already.”

“Well, you’re a fine one to talk,” she said. “Since we got married we’ve hardly been together. You’re always away, I’m always alone.”

“Don’t be absurd. There is absolutely no reason for you not to come with me, whenever you want. Clearly you don’t.”

“That’s crap!”

“It’s not crap. My life is hugely complex, you know that, I have commitments all over the world.”

“Yes, and they’re the ones that count, aren’t they? Yours. Mine are of no importance whatsover, it seems—”

“You’re being childish,” he said. It was already one of his favourite taunts. Jocasta went out of the room and slammed the door. Later they made up, magnificently, in bed. But it still meant being alone. For at least a week. She decided to call up some of her old friends, see if she could spend some time with them. They were all delighted to hear from her, and she fixed up a Saturday lunch in Clapham, and a couple of her girlfriends asked her to go clubbing that evening. But somehow that didn’t feel right anymore, married to Gideon. How could you get drunk and dance the night away in some club, being eyed up by blokes—even if you had not the slightest intention of having anything to do with any of them—if you were a married woman and your husband was thousands of miles away, alone in some hotel room? You couldn’t. Better to be alone. Anyway, there was this other wretched business. Maybe she could talk to Clio about that.

But Clio was unavailable; she and Fergus were going to Paris for the weekend.

“Isn’t that romantic? He booked it for me as a surprise. Of course I could cancel it but—”

“Clio!” said Jocasta. “Of course you can’t cancel it. Don’t be ridiculous. Enjoy.”

She drove herself back to Kensington Palace Gardens, after her lunch on Saturday, feeling depressed. Even lunch had been not entirely satisfactory; already a gap was opening between herself and her friends. She was not of their world anymore, no longer a career girl about town with a fun boyfriend, but a rich woman with a middle-aged husband.

Jocasta knew whose company she would have preferred herself. She was just parking, when her mobile rang. “Jocasta, hi, it’s Nick. Are you busy?”

“I’m going to go and ask her. Will you come with me?” Nat looked at her; her face was very set. “Yeah, if you want. Course I will. Give her a ring. See if she’s in. You got her number, haven’t you?”

“Yes.”

She put out her hand, grabbed his. “Right. Here goes.”

Martha had been about to leave for Suffolk when her mobile rang. She knew she had to do it: tell her parents. She couldn’t risk it any longer. Just because the story hadn’t been in the paper today, or yesterday, it didn’t mean it wouldn’t be tomorrow. Nick was being wonderful, but there were other papers, and Janet wasn’t going to wait forever.

She felt very bad. Ed had not come back. He had called, saying he needed time to think, that he did love her, but he really needed to know more. “It’s not fair, otherwise. You’re asking me to take too much on trust. This is pretty basic stuff, Martha.”

“But Ed—”

“No, it isn’t but. I’ve backed you every inch of the way; I think I’ve a right to know who this bloke was. I’m the person who loved you, but I can’t hack it. Give me a bell if anything changes. I’m not going anywhere. But I do need a bit of help over this one.”

So she had phoned her parents, said she was coming, that she needed to talk to them.

“Well, that’ll be lovely, dear,” Grace had said. “We weren’t expecting you this weekend. When will you be here?”

“Oh quite late, around nine or ten.”

“Lovely.”

No, it won’t be lovely, Martha thought, it will be dreadful. But there seemed absolutely no alternative. It had to be done. Too many people knew already, quite apart from the press. There was no knowing what Kate might do, for instance.

And then she rang.

“This is Kate Tarrant. I’d like to come and see you. In about an hour. I presume you’ll be there?”

“Yes,” said Martha rather weakly, “I’ll be here.” And rang her parents and told them she’d be much later, to go to bed and she’d see them in the morning. It would be far better anyway: better than telling them late at night.

“I’ve just had another call from Frean,” Nick said. “She says she’s going to give the story to the
Sun
, if I haven’t run it by Monday. Honestly, Jocasta, this is a nightmare.”

“Did you speak to her?”

“No, my phone was on message.”

“God, what a filthy mess. But I’m sure there must be something clever we could do. Look—what are you doing now?”

“Nothing. Fretting.”

“Well, why don’t you come round and we’ll have a brainstorming session. I’ll order a takeaway—”

“What, give staff a night off? Very democratic of you. Where’s Gideon?”

“He’s away,” she said.

“Then I don’t think I should come round.”

She knew he was right, and the thud of disappointment she felt proved it. It was completely impossible to have had the kind of relationship she’d had with Nick—absolutely close, very sexy, and for the most part extremely happy—and suddenly just be friends. And the fact that he was being so good about Martha was testimony to his extraordinary niceness.

But she didn’t actually love him anymore. Did she? No, of course she didn’t. She maybe never had. She’d loved his company and their life together, but was that love? What she felt for Gideon was overwhelming and extraordinarily intense. Yes, he was spoilt, he could be difficult, he could be filthy-tempered, and he liked his own way, but he was, above all things, generous-hearted, thoughtful, and immensely, tenderly loving. And he loved her as she loved him: absolutely.

He was worth being lonely for. And she mustn’t let it happen again; he was right. It really was up to her. Once this wretched business with Martha and Kate was settled, she’d never let him go away without her again.

“Hi,” said Kate. She was dressed in jeans and a T-shirt that showed a great deal of her flat stomach. Her hair was tied back, and she wore no makeup. She was a lot taller than Martha. Martha tried to feel something, but couldn’t: except discomfort.

“This is Nat Tucker,” said Kate. “He’s a friend of mine.”

“Hello, Nat,” said Martha. “Do come in, both of you. What can I offer you, a drink or something?”

“Nothing, thanks,” said Kate. She walked in, looked round. Nat followed her.

There was a long, frozen silence; Nat broke it.

“Very nice,” he said. “Very nice indeed. Good view.”

“Thank you,” said Martha. “Would you—would you like to sit down?”

Nat dropped onto one of the low black leather sofas; Kate stayed on her feet, turned to face Martha.

“I want to know who my father is,” she said. “That’s all. Nothing else.”

Martha had not really been expecting this; not at this stage.

“I’m…sorry?” she said.

“I said I want to know who my father is. Unlike you, he might actually want to meet me.”

“I’m afraid I can’t tell you that.”

“No? Why not? Don’t you know?” The dark eyes were very hard. “Was it, like, a one-night stand?”

She’s bound to be angry, Martha thought, bound to be hostile. “I just can’t tell you,” she said.

“Yeah? Are you still in touch with him, then?”

“No. I’m not. But he has no idea. And I don’t think it’s right to…to tell him now. After all these years.”

“Oh, you don’t think it’s right? I see. You think it was right to leave me though, do you? Just left, along with a bit of cleaning fluid.”

“Kate—”

“And you thought it was right not to come and see me, when it was in the paper and everything, and you could have done it so easily. That was fine, was it? Funny idea of right and wrong you’ve got! You left me there, a newborn baby, all alone, I could have died—”

“I waited,” said Martha. “I waited until I knew you’d been found, that you were all right—”

“Oh, you did? Well, that was really good of you. I s’pose you thought that was that, did you? You never thought how I might feel, later on. Knowing my mother, my own mother, just wasn’t interested in me. What do you think that’s like? To be so not wanted. So not important. Don’t you think that must be totally horrible? Anyway, luckily for me, I’ve had a real mother, a proper mother.
She
cared about me. She still does. I reckon I’d have been better off with her, anyway. I don’t know what kind of mother you think you’d have been, but I can tell you, you’d have been shit!”

“Kate,” said Nat mildly, from the depths of the sofa.

“She’d have been shit,” said Kate looking at him briefly, then turning back to Martha. “So I should be thanking you, really. For getting out of my life. Anyway, I don’t want to carry on with this, it’s totally pointless. But I do want to know who my father was. So if you’ll just give me his name, I’ll leave you in peace. Which is what you’ve wanted all along, obviously. Sorry to have had to disturb it.”

“Kate, I’m really sorry, but I’m not going to do that. I can’t.”

She looked at her steadily, trying to equate this girl, this beautiful grown-up creature, with the tiny baby she had left behind, trying to make sense of it, to believe that she had carried her around inside her all those endless months, actually given birth to her, pushed her out of her body. She couldn’t.