Whirlwind (10 page)

Laird was sauntering into the house behind them. He threw his car keys to the other man. 'Park it, will you, Jimmy? Thanks.'

Anna didn't look back, her eyes busily absorbing everything she saw, shaken by a new realisation of how different their life-style was from her own. The contrast was painful. Her dreams of wealth and fame had never been this concrete. The gleam of polished panelling, the oil paintings hanging on walls, the bowls of flowers everywhere and the magnificent furniture they passed made her even more self- conscious about her plain black dress and cheap shoes, but when they walked into the conservatory and Mrs Montgomery looked up her smile was immediate and very warm.

'Oh, there ^ou are, Anna. How nice of you to come! Please, sit here—I was just going to ring for coffee, will you have some?'

Anna said she would love some and they sat in the leafy sunlight talking for quite a time; all around them potted plants whose tendrils swung or climbed, ferns in white glazed pots, rambling ivy, cacti and spring flowers. It was a pleasant place to sit; the air warm and scented.

'Lunch should be ready soon,' Mrs Montgomery said, glancing at her watch.

'I'll go and check,' offered Patti, jumping up in a flurry of vivid blue pleats. Her mother looked after her as she vanished, her skirt almost the colour of Mrs Montgomery's blue eyes.

'We weren't very happy about the idea of Patti going on the stage,' she murmured. 'I expect she told you that?'

. 'She did mention it,' Anna admitted carefully.

'Laird encouraged her.' Mrs Montgomery's mouth was impatient. 'He's always spoilt her, right from babyhood. Over-compensating, I think. He wanted to show me he didn't resent me, so he made a big fuss of my baby.' She smiled at Anna. 'Funny creatures, boys. He was at the awkward age when Patti was born—seventeen and shooting up like a beanstalk, every time I saw him he'd grown another inch. He was very vain at that age, though, and obsessed with how he looked.'

'You're fond of him,' Anna said, and the other woman laughed.

'Oh, of course! I knew I was too young to be a mother to him, but I was scared he would be jealous of me and his father, and Hugh was very fond of him, it would have been difficult if Laird had resented me. I didn't really know how to treat him, but he had surprising commonsense, even then. He . . . set the tone, I suppose you could say. He treated me like a big sister, not a stepmother, and I took my cue from him.'

'What happened to . . . ' Anna bit the question off before it emerged, but Mrs Montgomery was quick.

'His own mother?' she guessed. 'Divorced, oh, years before I met Hugh. When Laird was quite small. I'm afraid she wasn't a very affectionate mother. In fact, I don't think she cared a damn about him.'

'Did he see much of her after the divorce?'

'Almost nothing. She went off to South America with the man she'd married, and she died out there —the climate didn't suit her. She had rather delicate health. I don't know how upset Laird was; children can hide things rather well. My husband tried to keep the boy with him as much as possible.' Mrs Montgomery smiled wryly. 'My husband believes in over-compensating, too! They were very close, and I tried not to come between them, I wanted us to be a family. Funnily enough, it was Patti who made us one in the end, although I'd been so worried about Laird's reaction.'

'I realised he was very fond of her,' Anna said, glancing down in brief embarrassment as she remembered her own suspicions about them. She could hardly tell Mrs Montgomery that she had believed Laird was trying to seduce Patti.

'They're fond of each other. It's entirely mutual, but I wish Laird wouldn't intervene between her and us. He made it easy for her to get into the theatre and I would have preferred it to be hard. How are we to know if she really has the stamina and the dedication to get anywhere if Laird hands her a part on a plate?'

Anna stiffened, her eyes fixed on the other woman's face. 'Is that what he did?' Laird had said that Patti had got the part without any help from him, Joey and Patti-had insisted it was true—had they all lied to her?

'In a sense—he introduced her to that director —what's his name? Joe?' Mrs Montgomery's smooth brow wrinkled.

'Joey Ross?'

'Yes, Laird introduced Patti to the man and that's how she got the part. If Laird hadn't made sure she met him, the director wouldn't have thought of her, would he?' Mrs Montgomery looked impatiently at Anna. 'It's a very hard life for a girl, I'm sure you've found it so, Anna. So much competition and so few jobs . . . I wish you would tell Patti just what she'd be letting herself in for if she persisted with this silly idea.'

Anna looked at her gently, not wishing to argue with her, but feeling she must be honest. 'I've already told Patti quite a bit about the dreary side of the job.' She didn't add that Patti had seemed entranced by those little cameos of life in stage digs: grey provincial theatres, disgusting meals, arguments and feuds between the cast, everybody helping to move scenery or even paint it, outbursts of hysteria or wild laughter over accidents on stage.

'I really think she knows what sort of life it is,' she stressed, feeling sorry for the other woman. Mrs Montgomery was looking depressed; Anna's answer had not been what she wanted.

'How long do you think this play will run?' Mrs Montgomery asked gloomily, her mouth turned down at the edges.

'Ages, I hope,' Anna said, laughing. 'But, afterwards, don't you think that . . . ' She broke off, wondering if she ought to offer Mrs Montgomery advice. After all, they had only just met.

'Yes? Go on, Anna, what were you going to say?' The other woman looked eagerly at her.

'Well, the best possible training for the theatre is at one of the top London drama schools. If Patti went to one of them, that would give her time—three years of hard work, and believe me, they really drive you hard there! I know, I went to one—Patti would have plenty of time to work out whether she had the guts and the talent for the job.'

While Mrs Montgomery was digesting this, there was a step on the tiled floor and they both looked up to see Patti joining them.

'Lunch in five minutes,' she said, her eyes moving from one to the other. 'You've been talking about me,' she accused, her smile rueful.

'Is your father still in his study?' Mrs Montgomery asked, ignoring the accusation. 'I'll go and wake him up. He pretends to be reading the Sunday papers, but he's really having one of his catnaps.' She smiled at Anna, her eyes full of warmth. 'He keeps his energy level topped up with little naps every hour or so, but he'll never admit as much.'

When she had gone, Patti asked: 'What were you saying?' but Anna dodged the question, teasing her.

'It's a common delusion that people are talking about us when we aren't there,' she mocked, and from the doorway Laird laughed, making her jump. It infuriated Anna to feel her pulses racing at the sound of his voice; he had a disastrous effect on all her senses and she must do something about it, but what?

'Have you been talking about
me?
he enquired lazily.

'Why on earth should we do that?' Anna retorted, shooting a sarcastic smile in his direction.

'Because I'm so fascinating?'

'Modest, too,' she murmured, eyes lowered.

'Oh, he's as vain as a peacock,' said Patti, giggling.

Anna didn't smile at that; she was wondering if it was true and then crossly asking herself why she should care, if it was. Laird was no concern of hers. Her only concern was herself and her stupid feelings for him, and the sooner she cured herself the better.

'There's no subject as interesting as ourselves,' Laird said with amusement, but it wasn't true, thought Anna, watching him as he picked a leaf from a plant and rubbed it between his fingertips to release a pungent lemony scent. There was one subject far more riveting than oneself—if you were in love, that was! Then, all you thought about, cared about, was the other person; they occupied every waking minute, a driving obsession making you want to find out everything you could about them.

It was a relief to Anna when they were summoned to lunch and she could concentrate on talking to Mr Montgomery for a while. He asked her endless questions about herself, the play, her reasons for wanting to be an actress. She felt a little as if she was in front of the Spanish Inquisition, although his voice was gentle and his smile benevolent. She could see why he had been a success in business; he had a genius for gathering detail and assimilating it.

Laird said little, but he watched and listened intently, his grey eyes hooded and unreadable.

Patti said nothing much, either, except when Anna answered one question about her family with the brief admission that she had none at all.

'Oh, Anna, I had no idea!' Patti burst out, her eyes distressed. 'I mean, I realised your parents were dead, but I didn't know you had no relatives at all.'

'You get used to it,' Anna replied tersely. When she was a child it had made her miserable, but it no longer bothered her quite so much. She had made work the centre of her life for years; work didn't fail you. It didn't die, either, nor could it hurt you.The man called Jimmy whipped away her plate a moment later as she finished the last morsel of the delicate vanilla cream. The meal had been delicious, but under Mr Montgomery's grilling Anna hadn't enjoyed it quite as much as she would have done if she hadn't been so distracted.

They took their coffee in the drawing-room, then Mr Montgomery slowly made his way back to his study, leaning on his wife's arm, and Laird stood up, too, looking at Anna.

'Let me give you a guided tour of the house—I want to show you some theatre prints I bought last year.'

Anna gave Patti a quick look. 'Coming, Patti?' The last thing she wanted was. to find herself alone with Laird.

As they were beginning to climb the wide, polished stairs, however, Mrs Montgomery came out of a room and called Patti. 'I won't keep her a moment, but we want to talk to her,' she apologised to Anna, who had halted.

'We'll start in the night nursery,' Laird told Patti as she went towards her mother. 'And work our way down from there—join us when you escape.' He grinned at his stepmother, who shook a reproachful head at him.

Anna reluctantly followed Laird up several floors. The thick carpet gave way to a more hardwearing variety, the stairs became narrow and badly lit. Laird pushed open a door on the very top floor and Anna - looked around the small, square room. It had tiny windows which shed little light, an old brass bed occupied one corner and around the room, dozens of toys—a delightful Edwardian dolls' house completely furnished and with tiny occupants frozen in chairs, at table's, even in a bath; a battered old wooden rocking horse with a red leather saddle with real stirrups; a row of bears and stuffed toys; a wooden fort with soldiers and cannon arranged around it and some dolls with fixed glass eyes and faded dresses, all shapes and sizes from a demure Victorian in poke bonnet and many petticoats to a mass-produced doll wearing red trousers and a black leather jacket.

'Oh, how lovely!' exclaimed Anna, her eyes lighting up. 'But it's rather sad, as though it was all waiting for a child . . . '

'Patti was the last, she was much kinder to her toys than 1 was—I regularly broke them.' Laird walked over to the nearest wall. 'These are the old prints—there were some here already, but I added to them.'

Anna reluctantly dragged herself away from admiring the dolls' house and joined him. The prints were very funny; one or two were after Hogarth, wickedly libellous cartoons of famous actors. She wandered around, laughing, while Laird showed her each one, but her eyes kept moving back to the toys. As they halted by the rocking horse she put a hand on its threadbare mane, wistfully stroking it, and Laird watched her with a crooked little smile.

'He's called Dandy.' Suddenly his hands shot out and got her by the waist, and Anna gasped, staring up at him for one second before she felt her feet leave the floor.

The next minute she was on the rocking horse, riding side-saddle, with Laird setting the horse in motion.

'I'm too heavy for it!' she protested, but he wouldn't let her climb off.

'You were dying to have a ride, don't pretend you weren't.' His grey eyes were gently teasing. 'Some children are a bit older than others, that's all.'

She went pink, but couldn't deny that she had badly wanted to ride the old wooden horse with its staring eyes and dappled grey coat, the paint wearing thin, fading, but so gently that one felt it had been worn down with generations of loving arms and hands.

'My father kept all this stuff up here for my children,' Laird said, watching her rocking, her head now above his own. 'Now it will go to Patti's, I suppose.'

Anna looked at the red leather reins she was holding. 'You don't plan to have children?'

'It's unlikely.' His voice was flat and terse. There was a silence, then he said, 'I was married years ago, did Patti tell you?'

'She mentioned something,' Anna whispered, unable to meet his eyes in case he read her expression.

'My wife went off with one of my friends.' He laughed shortly. 'Some friend! He wasn't the first, though—Merieth wasn't faithful to me for long, we'd only been married a few months when I found out she was seeing someone else. We had a very nasty row and she promised to give him up. She did, but it wasn't long before there was another man, and another—it was a pattern. She had men like someone eating sweets, unable to stop. By the time she ran off with the last one I was glad to see the last of her. I was sick of knowing people laughed at me behind my back, sick of wondering which of my friends had had her.' He walked away to the window and stared out at the pale blue spring sky. 'I swore then that I'd never marry again.'

'Did you ever see her again?' Anna asked huskily.

'No. She died a few years ago—overdose, I gather. She was on drugs by then. Merieth had most of the vices, she was as weak as water.'

Anna stared at him, her eyes burning, absently aware of the power of his lean body in the beautifully cut suit. Something quivered inside her like a plucked harp string, a high, resonant note. Had he loved his wife very much? The bitterness in his voice suggested he had, and she grew angry with herself because it hurt to think about that. She had no right to be jealous of his ex-wife. If Laird was haunted by the other woman that was his affair. She swallowed, her throat rough, her skin icy. It was crazy stupidity to let herself care about him.