Into Temptation (Spoils of Time 03) (22 page)

Izzie was to meet him that very evening, as a matter of fact; school was out for the summer, and Barty and Jenna had moved out to South Lodge for several weeks. Izzie and Mrs Mills were to be in charge of Jenna if Barty had to go in to Manhattan.

‘Which I’m trying not to, I deserve a vacation for God’s sake, but I may have to. Things aren’t entirely easy at the moment.’

Izzie was delighted. ‘I can at last earn my keep, I’ve been here for weeks and done nothing except chat, and meet all your lovely friends.’

She especially liked the gently beautiful Felicity Brewer and her son the still-dashing Kyle: growing a little portly in his middle age.

‘If he wasn’t so old, I’d think there could be a romance there,’ Barty said. ‘He’s clearly very taken with you, and he’s never remarried after his divorce.’

‘Oh, Barty no, he’s not my type. But it’s not because he’s old. I’ve realised that I like older men. Apart from – well, apart from once of course. I’m like my mother, obviously. I just find them so much more interesting and sensitive and – well, more fun. But Kyle is a bit jolly for me. Although I do agree, awfully handsome.’

Kyle had become very close to Barty over the years, an integral part of her life. He was now a hugely successful literary agent, writing, as he put it, half the contracts in New York. His twenty-year background in publishing had provided a superb bank of contacts and company knowledge; the business instinct, inherited from his father, had provided the remaining skills.

Barty had asked him years earlier to be one of the trustees of a fund she had set up. Uneasy at what she called the ‘untrammelled money’ running around, the income derived from both her Lytton shares and those left her by Laurence, she had put half of them into a trust fund for Jenna. ‘She’s so alone in the world. She needs taking care of. If anything should happen to me I want everything very carefully organised. And I want Lyttons’ interests properly represented as well; a set of stuffy old lawyers isn’t going to understand what’s best for them. Please Kyle, will you do that for me, be a trustee? I’ve asked Jamie as well, he’s agreed.’

Kyle had kissed her and said it would be an honour.

‘Only I don’t want to find myself in a position where I actually have to do anything very much. You take care of yourself.’

Charlie Patterson was driving out to South Lodge that evening to collect Cathy, who he was taking to visit her grandmother – against a background of tantrums, sulks and threats to kill herself if he made her leave Jenna.

‘I’m afraid she’s picked up some of Jenna’s tendency to histrionics,’ Barty said apologetically as they were forced to witness a performance from Cathy that would not have disgraced Cleopatra when the trip was first mentioned.

‘Oh don’t believe it,’ he said grinning. ‘She’s always had a great talent in that direction.’

‘So you’ll meet him,’ Barty told Izzie, ‘and you can see what you think. I mean, he is just so charming and nice and we get on so well, and he makes me laugh and he’s good-looking and attractive and I like him very much and—’

‘Well, what on earth are you waiting for?’ said Izzie, laughing. ‘He sounds perfect.’

‘I know. He does. But – I suppose what I’m waiting for is feeling easy. Not with him, which I do, but about him. There’s just something – I don’t know, see what you think.’

‘So you must be Izzie. Daughter of the famous Sebastian Brooke. Your father is a genius. And he’s got me through many a long night with Cathy, when she’s been ill or unhappy. Do please tell him that.’

‘I will,’ said Izzie who had been given this message to pass to her father countless times. ‘He’ll be so pleased.’

‘And how do you find New York?’

‘Oh I love it. I’ve been before, actually.’

‘Oh, you have? I hadn’t realised.’

‘Only once. When I was just sixteen.’

‘Too young to appreciate it properly. And – out here, to Southampton?’

‘To Southampton, yes. And this bit especially – ’ she gestured towards the shore and the ocean ‘ – seems to me the nearest I’ll ever get to heaven. Until it’s the real thing and then I suspect it won’t quite match up.’

‘It is glorious. Oh, Barty, bless you. Just how I like it. She mixes the best Martini in Manhattan, you know,’ he said to Izzie, raising his glass to her.

‘Charlie, don’t be absurd. Anyway, Laurence always said no woman could make a Martini.’

‘Well Laurence is – was wrong.’ He took a sip. ‘So, you lucky girls are staying here, are you? While we swelter in Manhattan?’

‘Yes,’ said Barty, and even as she smiled, Izzie thought she looked uneasy. ‘Yes, we are. Anyway, I thought you were going up to the Heights.’

‘No, I’m leaving Cathy behind with her grandmother.’

‘I’m not staying,’ said Cathy. ‘I hate it there, I hate her too, she’s horrible and boring and that horrible poky little—’

‘Cathy, be quiet, please.’ His voice was light, but his eyes were suddenly quite hard. He’s quite tough on her, thought Izzie; rather like Father was with me. The thought warmed her towards Charlie Patterson.

He stayed for an early supper, then left, packing the wailing Cathy and her bag into the battered old T-bird.

‘Come back soon or I shall die of misery,’ wailed Jenna, as the door was finally closed.

‘I will, I will if I’m allowed.’

‘Of course you’re allowed,’ said Barty and Charlie in unison, then laughed. He bent to kiss her briefly.

‘Thank you again.’

‘My pleasure – again. I’ll see you soon.’

‘If you do come into the city, call me. We’ll have dinner.’

‘I will. Now enjoy the trip on your own,’ she said quietly. ‘Are you going up to Connecticut?’

‘Where?’ he said and looked puzzled.

‘To – to Connecticut. I thought that was the idea.’

‘Oh – oh yes.’ he smiled at her quickly. ‘Yes, yes, that’s the idea. Now Izzie – goodbye. It was just delightful meeting you. I look forward to seeing you again.’

‘Me too,’ she said, allowing him to kiss her cheek.

‘Barty,’ Izzie said, as the car went out of sight and Jenna fled sobbing noisily to the den, ‘Barty, he is just heaven. I can’t think why you’re not madly in love with him. He obviously is with you.’

‘Oh don’t say that, Izzie. Don’t.’

‘But why?’

‘I’m – frightened by people being in love with me. I can’t help it. But – you really like him?’

‘I really like him.’

‘Would you trust him?’

‘Oh absolutely,’ said Izzie. ‘He seems transparently nice and kind and gentle. He’s terribly attractive. And he’s a wonderful father. You can see that.’

‘Well, I can. But at the same time, Cathy is – ’ she looked warily at the door of the den, beckoned Izzie into the kitchen, ‘ – Cathy is a horror. I find it hard to like her. Oh, I know she seems very sweet, and her manners are lovely and she’s bright and cute. But she’s so manipulative. Terribly bad for Jenna. I’ve tried to break up the friendship just a bit, encourage Jenna to have other friends too, but it’s hopeless. And she’s secretive, which I hate. Almost sly in fact. That has to come from somewhere.’

‘Oh, I don’t know. She’s had a tough time. I feel for her, I must say. And then of course you don’t know what her mother was like.’

‘Maybe. That’s what I keep telling myself. But – so is Charlie, just a bit. Manipulative, I mean. He always says the right thing, never trips up.’

‘Well what’s wrong with that?’ said Izzie laughing.

‘Nothing. Of course. But somehow – oh, I don’t know. It’s too right. I can’t fault him, can’t ever catch him out. I feel he tries just a bit too hard to please. And to appear too good as well. But, yes, you’re right, he is a wonderful father. And he has a hell of a struggle, has to fit in working around Cathy. He manages marvellously, works short days, stays home when she’s ill.’

‘But isn’t that nice?’ asked Izzie.

‘Yes of course. But he does like to make sure I know about it. Oh, I’m being horrid, why shouldn’t he?’

‘And – do you find him attractive?’

‘I suppose I do. Of course he’s not Laurence. That was kind of blinding, you know. But yes, Charlie’s certainly the first man I could even contemplate fancying, as they say over here. So – oh Izzie, I don’t know.’

‘I do,’ said Izzie. ‘I think you really, really like him and you’re frightened of it. Think it’s disloyal to Laurence.’

‘Maybe. But whatever the reason, I do feel it, I can’t help it. Anyway, none of it matters, we quite suit each other and he’s fun to have dinner with and so on. Now – another woman-made Martini, before we turn in?’

‘No, I don’t think so. I’m a bit tipsy.’

‘Cup of tea?’

‘Now you’re talking,’ said Izzie, smiling.

Later Barty sat in bed, pretending to read, thinking about Charlie. There had been something that evening, something that had troubled her, something tangible this time. He had clearly not known why she had mentioned Connecticut, his own ‘special place’, the one he had talked about so movingly, where he and Meg had been so happy. Oh, she was just being silly. It had come at him unawares, she had probably spoken out of turn anyway. Why couldn’t she just enjoy him, accept what Izzie said? Instead of turning her back on a piece of happiness?

Keir was having trouble getting a teaching post. The younger headmasters who interviewed him agreed with him that the comprehensive ideal would solve the educational problems of the country at a stroke, but disapproved of his deep conviction that the old disciplines were best applied to early reading and mathematics; while the older ones, who found this music to their ears, were inevitably in favour of grammar schools and eleven-plus selection. This combined with the fact that he was very inclined to express criticism and to be incapable of arguing a case without becoming first excited and then belligerent, meant that he left every interview emptyhanded. By the start of the new school year he still had no proper job, only some supply teaching which left him frustrated and miserable. Elspeth tried to comfort him, and indeed to offer help.

‘I can’t understand it,’ he said gloomily, when she arrived to stay with him and his parents, ‘I even did as you said, and managed not to talk about the comprehensives, listened politely while he went on and on about the scholarship, and how several boys moved into the grammar school each year. Then I discovered the boys weren’t doing any proper games, just a bit of PE with an old biddy in the playground twice a week and—’

‘And—’

‘Well, I told him boys of that age needed a lot of physical exercise and should be taught football properly, that it was a vital part of education.’

‘And—?’ she asked again. She refilled her teacup from Mrs Brown’s large earthenware pot; the tea was treacle-strong. They were sitting in the kitchen, which the Browns had tactfully vacated. She could hear their radio turned up to full volume in the next room; it was hard to concentrate.

‘So, he said, “I am most interested to hear your views, Mr Brown, but perhaps you would be kind enough to tell me where I might find the budget for a full-time games master. We are not in the private sector here, you know.” As if I thought that was the ideal. I’m afraid that did set me off on the comprehensives and – well, he told me he didn’t think I was quite right for his school.’

‘Oh Keir,’ said Elspeth, ‘you really have to learn to keep your mouth shut. The thing is once you’ve got a job, once you’re in a school you can put your theories into practice. But till then—’

‘Well it doesn’t look as if I’m going to get a job,’ he said gloomily. ‘I’m a failure, Elspeth, a bloody failure.’

‘Of course you’re not,’ she said fiercely. ‘It’s just a matter of time. A matter of finding the right school and the right head. Why don’t you come down to London, try there? There must be more schools, and it would be so nice if you were nearer me.’

‘Oh yes? And where do you think I would live? At least I get cheap board and lodging up here with Mum and Dad.’

‘You could live with me for a—’

‘No. Oh no. I’m not going to take the Lytton shilling. I’ll pay my way, whatever I do. And anyway, what would your family think?’

‘They needn’t know,’ she said rather feebly.

‘Oh, don’t be so bloody stupid. Of course they’d know. And anyway, I’d know. And I wouldn’t like it.’

‘Well – well, all right. Now I have some news,’ she said, unable to keep it to herself any longer. She could see it might be tactless, but it was so important; and he was supposed to love her, he should be pleased for her.

‘Yes? What?’ He scowled at her.

‘I’m – well, I’m going to be an editor. A junior one, of course.’

It had been the most wonderful surprise; Celia had called her in and told her that she thought she showed considerable talent and she wanted her to start immediately, under her personal supervision.

‘There’ll be a lot of proof correcting, of course, a bit of cover copy, all the dogsbody tasks. But you will also start editing. On the fiction side. And I have a particular idea in mind for you,’ she had added, ‘but you’ll have to wait for that.’ And she refused to be drawn any further.

‘Oh yes?’ said Keir now. His tone and expression were non-committal. ‘Granny fixed that for you, did she?’

‘Keir, that was horrible. Apologise.’

He did: half-heartedly. But it was an empty apology; for they both knew the truth behind it. Elspeth might be very talented: but she was also a Lytton. To say it was an advantage was an understatement of considerable proportions.

Keir refused to discuss it any further, to share her happiness, to acknowledge her cleverness, just returned to the subject of his own lack of employment, the stupidity and blindness of the teaching profession. His voice went on and on against the background of Elspeth’s hurt and the nine o’clock news in the next room. She felt near to tears. She had come a long way to visit him, had taken Friday off from work, and so far it had been a complete waste of time.

They weren’t even going to get a chance to go to bed together as far as she could see. She was in his bed and he was banished to the couch in the front room. Although she liked Mr and Mrs Brown very much, and they treated her as if she was made of china, she didn’t really want to spend the whole weekend with them. And then Keir was so self-obsessed always, she thought, so ungracious. So uninterested in her, diminishing her own achievements. All right, he’d had a hard time, had failed at getting into publishing and whatever he might say about it being a second-rate profession, he must still care about that. But at least he was doing what he wanted now.