The Lorimer Legacy (31 page)

‘I trust you approve of Alexa,' Margaret said. ‘Your son will find her the most affectionate wife possible, but I know that she hopes to continue her career for a few years, while her voice is still at its peak. I imagine that they have discussed this together, and found it no obstacle. I hope that you –'

‘I leave Frank to make his own decisions,' said Greg. ‘He is twenty-one, he has some money of his own from his mother, and I rely on his good sense. As for Alexa, I have hardly had time to know her.' He had seen her for the first time on the stage, forty-eight hours earlier, in fact, and the effect was disconcerting. She was so convincing an actress that he had half expected to be introduced eventually to a vivacious, sensual gypsy. It came as a shock – although a delightful one – to find himself later, at the ball, meeting a tall, slender young woman, dressed with an elegance which put the ladies of San Francisco in the shade, and with her fair, delicate skin and beautiful face set off by a crown of reddish-blonde hair. It would be no exaggeration to say that her loveliness had for a moment taken his breath away.

‘It would hardly be honest of me to pretend that I have thought of you every day since we last met,' he said abruptly as they walked. ‘But after the opera, as I watched Frank and Alexa dancing together – so happy, and so much in love – I
did
think of you. I remembered the ball which you and I attended in Bristol.' He knew
that Margaret would not have forgotten the occasion he meant. ‘I remembered how happy
we
were that night, and how lovely you looked. And for a moment I found myself overcome with hatred of your father, who wrecked it all for us. A useless emotion: I imagine he must have died many years ago.'

‘Yes. Soon after you left Bristol,' said Margaret quietly. ‘The letter you left behind made his conviction certain. He killed himself rather than go to prison. Did you not hear of it?'

The words brought Greg to a halt. He turned to stare into Margaret's eyes and shook his head. ‘So it is I, and not you, who need to ask for forgiveness.'

Still holding his arm, Margaret walked on, so that he was forced to continue beside her. ‘What you wrote was the truth,' she told him. ‘He was my father: I loved him and I shall always love his memory. But I understand that your feelings must be very different.'

‘I have lived on my hatred of him for many years,' admitted Greg. ‘My strength very largely came from it. I worked to build myself a fortune that would be larger than his, and more worthy of pride because I started from nothing. My house is grander than Brinsley House, and the treasures it contains are greater.' He checked himself, laughing ruefully. ‘At least, that was the case two days ago. There are more ways than one of being deprived of possessions. But even if the house has gone, I can afford to replace it. I was always ambitious, but hatred of John Junius Lorimer has been the fuel of my ambition ever since I arrived here. That is another reason why now, when I am successful, my children may marry whom they choose. Without conditions, without manipulations.'

The outburst was hardly a tactful one, but he needed to express his feelings once in order that Margaret should
understand them. They had both suffered greatly in their youth from lies and deceptions imposed on them by others. Now, in control of their own lives, they could afford to indulge in sincerity. His pleasure at seeing Margaret again was so intense that he could feel happiness bubbling to the surface of his emotions even in such a time of disaster. They would be friends again – indeed, they were friends already, for he felt confident that Margaret's reaction to their meeting matched his. Time, and the relationship between Frank and Alexa, would draw them even closer together. She was a widow, she had said, and he was a widower. There was no need to make plans, to put anything into words. It was enough that they should share these impressions of instant sympathy.

In the meantime, he was anxious to learn everything he could about Margaret's life in the years they had spent apart. His mind teemed with questions. He began with the one which came nearest to home.

‘Tell me,' he said. ‘How did you come to be Alexa's guardian?'

Contentment is quickly punctured by interrogation. A moment before, Margaret had been so happy that she had completely forgotten how weary she was, and how terrible were the circumstances in which she had met her one-time fiancé again. The speed with which they fell into sympathy with each other after so many years apart warmed her heart with a peacefulness which could not be disturbed by their unusual surroundings. And then all this was shattered by a simple, inevitable question.

‘How did you come to be Alexa's guardian?'

Margaret found it incredible that she had given no previous thought to the problem. From the moment when she caught sight of the man whom she must now remember to think of as Greg, she had been conscious only of the need to talk out her own relationship with him, so that the events of the past should not be allowed to come between them again. She had made no attempt to relate Alexa's situation to her own – indeed, she had hardly acknowledged that any relationship existed.

The unnerving events of the past two days no doubt excused her lack of thought, but did not help her to answer the question. Too many points needed to be considered. Because Alexa used her mother's name, nothing until now could have prompted Greg to connect her with the Lorimers of Bristol. It would not endear her to her future father-in-law when he discovered that she was the daughter of John Junius Lorimer. Doubtless he would be fair-minded enough not to hold it against her, but it was not a fact to be announced without thought. And then there was the minor difficulty of Alexa's lie about her age. A young woman who was only twenty-four years old could not be the daughter of a man who had died twenty-seven years ago. Margaret – although reluctantly – had promised not to disturb what seemed at the time to be a small social lie: but a truthful answer to an apparently unrelated question would quickly reveal that Margaret's information could not be reconciled with Alexa's version of the facts.

Without realizing it, Margaret groaned aloud. The question was simple, the answer should have been straightforward: it was ridiculous to find herself prevented from answering it by a careless promise. It might have seemed equally simple to answer in a different way; telling Greg only that Alexa was the daughter of an old
friend, her music teacher, and had been orphaned while she was still a child. But one thing was clear to Margaret. Enough trouble had been caused in her marriage to Charles by her concealment of the details of Alexa's parentage. She did not intend to let the same situation arise again in this unexpectedly renewed friendship. In no circumstances would she lie to Greg. But before she actually told the truth, Alexa had the right to know what the danger was, so that she could prepare herself to meet it. Greg's question could be answered tomorrow; but not today.

Margaret's groan – which she was hardly conscious of having made – was caused by her dilemma. But Greg, who could not have known the complicated thoughts aroused by his straightforward query, must have assumed that her sudden appearance of collapse was caused by exhaustion, or by a natural reaction as an intensive period of work came to an end.

‘When did you last sleep?' he demanded.

‘I don't remember.'

‘You've been working ever since the earthquake?'

‘There were so many broken bones to be set,' she murmured. ‘And then burns to dress. I was just on my way to rest when I was called to deliver the baby.' Until he asked her, she had not realized how tired she was. Now, suddenly, her weariness overcame her. She stood still, unable even to put one foot in front of the other. She felt Greg's arm move to encircle her waist, steadying her for a moment lest she should fall. Then, without warning, he picked her up and began to carry her towards the lines of tents.

Once upon a time, Margaret remembered through a haze of weariness, she had longed for the day to come when this man would pick her up in just such a way and carry her on her wedding day over the threshold of the
home in Bristol which they were to share. It was odd, it was very odd indeed, that it should take an appalling series of calamities before she could at last allow her head to sink on to his shoulder, and sleep.

She was awakened next morning by Alexa, who came to tell her that breakfast was being prepared outside the tent. Margaret looked with distaste at her own dirty and crumpled clothes, but there was nothing to be done about them. As she tried to comb her tangled hair into some kind of tidiness, she asked Alexa about her state of health, and Robert's.

Alexa shrugged off the enquiry. ‘Why did you not come to the opera ball?' she asked instead. ‘I needed you there.'

‘I'm sorry.' Margaret hesitated. A good many explanations were needed, but these surroundings, so lacking in privacy, did not provide the right place to start.

Alexa accepted that she was not to have an answer at once. Her second comment suggested that she had been giving a good deal of thought to Margaret's behaviour and was trying to connect the various puzzles suggested by it. ‘Mr Davidson brought you here last night,' she said.

‘Yes, I know. I was most grateful to him. I was very tired – too tired to walk.'

‘But how did you and he know that you were both looking for the same place, that you both knew me? I had had no opportunity to introduce you.'

‘We had met before. A long time ago, in England. It's a coincidence – a happy one, though. I'll tell you the whole story when we have time.'

‘I still don't understand –'

‘Later,' said Margaret firmly. She was stiff and aching and her head swam with tiredness, but it was time to take a grip on the new day. When today's history was being
made all round her, it was no time to begin explaining what had happened almost thirty years ago. ‘Is Mr Davidson here now?'

Alexa shook her head. ‘No. He had to go early to supervise the rations again. But he's just sent Brad back with a message. A friend of his, who lives on the other side of the bay, has sailed his private yacht over. It's waiting to take us all across. So we shan't need to queue for the Oakland ferry.'

‘I can't leave here, Alexa. You and Robert must go, of course, but I must stay.'

‘I told Mr Davidson that you'd argue. He laughed and said he betted you would. He said it in an odd way. That was what made me think that you knew him already. Anyway, he said to tell you that the same yacht is already loaded with five women who are expecting babies in the next few days, and the owner proposes to make as many further trips as are necessary to pick up any more pregnant women. So you can make yourself useful organizing a maternity ward as soon as we get to the other side.'

‘Will that be anywhere near where Cassie lives?'

‘Not very; but nearer than here, of course. We can take a train from Oakland to Napa. Once we're across the bay, we'll be able to telephone ahead, and Cassie will send horses down to the railroad station.'

As Greg had correctly guessed, the pregnant women were enough to sway Margaret's decision. Every factor -of hygiene, food, warmth and peace of mind – combined to make it wise for anyone in need of medical care to escape from a refuge area which was becoming steadily more crowded and insanitary as the city continued to burn. She had already decided to go as she renewed her acquaintance with Miss Halloran and greeted Robert and
Brad, enjoying the meal of bread and beans which they had prepared.

‘Where's Frank?' she asked Alexa.

‘I don't know. He went down into the city yesterday, and he hasn't come back.' Alexa's voice was tense.

‘He'll be all right,' said Miss Halloran. The broadness of her Irish accent seemed to have increased as all other social conventions ceased to be observed. ‘They're saying that every fit man in the streets has been rounded up to bury the dead. Frank's grandfather made his start in life digging canals. The boy will come to no harm using a spade for a day or two. And he'll know that we'll be making for Cassie's place.'

Margaret was watching Alexa's face, and noticed the anxiety it showed. But perhaps, she thought, it was not entirely on Frank's behalf. Everyone by now was feeling the strain of the past few days; and Alexa, in particular, who always took such pains with her appearance, could not be expected to look as calmly beautiful as usual when nothing but a great deal of dirt and a very small amount of water had been applied to her complexion.

At the slow pace made necessary by Miss Halloran's presence, the little party made its way down to the pier. The air at the lower level was so hot that even with scarves across their faces they felt their throats burning with each breath, and the very earth underfoot was smouldering. Camping on the Presidio, there had been a sense of devastation but not of actual danger. Amongst the ruined streets, by contrast, fire darted unpredictably, as though from the mouth of a roaming dragon – exploding through the roof of a house apparently unaffected, or roaring through a narrow gap as if the flames were arrows shot by a bow at random. Margaret was relieved when they reached the yacht. To her surprise, she found that as well as the five pregnant women, Greg was already on
board. The military authorities had taken over his food station, he told them, leaving him free to escort his elderly sister-in-law and the rest of the family out of danger. Cassie's house was not easy to reach, and conditions on the eastern shore of the bay might well be chaotic. He would feel easier in his mind now that he could accompany them.

Margaret made it her first task, as the yacht slipped away from the pier, to examine the five women and estimate the likelihood of any immediate action being necessary. Robert and Alexa were used to seeing her at work, but she was conscious that the three Americans were looking at her curiously. Miss Halloran seemed hardly to approve, although realizing that the circumstances were unusual. Brad was fascinated. As for Greg, she several times caught sight of him smiling, but could not quite determine whether it was with pleasure or amusement.