Into Temptation (Spoils of Time 03) (74 page)

‘No,’ said Izzie. ‘No, I didn’t.’ And thought, smiling, how much Nick would like this particular piece of advice. She left Mary Desmond’s consulting rooms feeling comforted. And stopped at a chemist on the way home to buy a thermometer.

Part of Mary Desmond’s advice – to have sex often – was easy. Relaxing and not worrying about it, was not.

Three months had passed now, of careful temperature taking, careful timing; three periods had come and gone, three sets of raised hopes, sometimes for just a few hours, sometimes a few days, once a whole week. Nick didn’t know, of course, she hadn’t told him, it somehow made it worse, she didn’t want him knowing how important it had become to her; all she had done was make a hole the size of a dime in her dutch cap. After all they still hadn’t got a proper apartment, they still couldn’t afford a baby; not really, not easily, not comfortably. He’d just laugh her anxieties away, tell her they had all the time in the world. And now, even the advice to have sex often was becoming difficult. She would take her temperature, find it was exactly the right time, and then set about seducing Nick. Without telling him why, this was often difficult. He worked erratic hours, they all did, often staying at their desks at Neill & Parker until midnight or later; then they would unwind with some wine, go and eat, then fall into bed at two or three in the morning. Izzie’s ardour (usually feigned by this point) did not find a very enthusiastic response.

‘Not now, honey,’ he would say, kissing her, turning over away from her, ‘tomorrow, that’d be great. Night, darling. Love you.’

And tomorrow would come and there would be another late night and by that time the precious lowered temperature would have risen and the priceless ready-to-go egg would have escaped so that when finally Nick did feel like making love to her she was disappointed and irritable.

‘I’m sorry, Nick,’ she said quite sharply one night, as he took her in his arms, started kissing and caressing her, ‘I just don’t feel like it.’

‘But Princess, you felt like it last night.’

‘Last night, yes, night before, yes, tonight I don’t. OK? Now I’m really tired. Sorry.’

And then she would hear him, first silent with surprise, then snoring loudly and she would lie there, wide awake, grieving for yet another baby not conceived, already anticipating the pain both physical and mental that awaited her two weeks hence.

She went back to Mary Desmond, who had tried to reassure her, told her not to worry, studied her temperature chart, said she was obviously ovulating, that time, she was sure, would produce a baby.

‘Yes, but you don’t understand, I feel so miserable all the time, I can’t think about anything else. And except when it’s the right time, I don’t even want sex. And I’m really snappy and horrid to Nick.’

‘Have you discussed it with him?’

‘No, I can’t. He doesn’t even know I’ve been trying.’

‘I think you should. He’ll be more understanding. Have you told him about the abortion?’

‘No,’ said Izzie in horror. ‘He’d be so shocked, you don’t understand. He’s a really, really good person.’

‘So are you. I would say.’

Izzie hesitated; then she said, ‘No, I couldn’t possibly. He’d – well, he’d never feel the same about me again. He’d think I’d been deceiving him all this time and—’

‘Well, you have,’ said Mary Desmond. Izzie looked at her; she was smiling. ‘It’s not a very serious deception, in my book. Perfectly natural, perfectly understandable. It was a horrific experience for you, you’d want to keep it from anyone. But I think perhaps you should tell him.’

‘I can’t,’ said Izzie again, ‘I simply can’t.’

‘Well, look. We still haven’t investigated those tubes. Perhaps we should do that soon. We’ll give it a couple more months and then have you in for a couple of days. But – try to relax, Miss Brooke. You’re very young, you know.’

Izzie thought of twenty-six-year-old Elspeth with her two babies, of twenty-four-year-old Amy, pregnant with her second, and knew that she didn’t feel in the least bit young.

Elspeth had decided to have a last try. If Celia was right, and Keir felt threatened, thought she didn’t love him, then maybe she should try to convince him she still did. Maybe that would make all the difference. She waited until he seemed to be in a moderately good mood – as opposed to the really bad one that had become the norm, tried not to chatter through supper, cleared away while he read the paper and then went in with a jug of coffee. He frowned at her.

‘I don’t think I want any coffee. I’m sleeping very badly as it is.’

Not an auspicious start. She managed to look sympathetic – somehow.

‘I’m sorry. Well, I shall have some. You know how well I sleep.’

‘Indeed.’

‘Keir, can we talk?’

‘We can,’ he said, putting down his papers. ‘By which I presume you mean can you talk?’

‘Keir,’ she said, the easy tears rising, ‘I’m trying to be – constructive. Please!’

He sat back in his chair, folded his arms, sat looking at her in a parody of patience.

‘It seems very sad to me,’ she said, ‘that we can’t talk any more. We used to talk all the time.’

‘We did indeed. You had the time in those days.’

‘So did you.’

He thought for a moment, then nodded. ‘Aye. That’s true.’

She was encouraged.

‘You see – I think that’s all that’s wrong. Really. I still – love you.’

‘You do?’ His expression was dispassionate, almost disinterested.

‘Yes. Very – ’ this was hard ‘ – very much, Keir.’

‘I see.’

‘Is that all? All you have to say?’

‘For the moment.’

‘Don’t you believe me?’

He sighed. ‘I don’t know what I believe any more. About anything.’

‘All right. Try this. I really, really want our marriage to be a success. So much. Not this awful cold, dead thing.’

‘Is that how you see it?’

‘Well, yes. Don’t you?’

He said nothing.

‘I think back to the early days, when we were so – so together. When—’ She stopped. She was beginning to feel humiliated. When you wanted me, she had been going to say, when I wanted you. She did still want him; she wanted him a lot. She could hardly remember now when they had last made love, when she had known that strong, healing, complete pleasure. She sighed.

‘Well, we were together then, Elspeth. We wanted the same things, we cared about the same things. It’s rather different now, isn’t it?’

‘It is, yes. That’s what I—’

‘I’ll tell you why it’s different, shall I? Because now we want different things and care about different things. You want a career, you want success, you care only about yourself—’

‘That’s so unfair,’ she said, and she was almost shouting, ‘I do want a career, success is less important, but I care about the children—’

‘So much that you’re prepared to leave them every day.’

‘That is a filthy distortion. I’ve already said—’

‘Oh, you’ve said a lot of things. A lot of pretty things. You’re not prepared to act on them though, are you? You say you love me. If you loved me Elspeth, you’d do what I wish, you wouldn’t go against me all the time, belittling what I hold most dear. You wouldn’t try to make me feel a fool, an old-fashioned fool for having ideals, about marriage, about where men and women should stand in marriage—’

‘I have never tried to make you feel a fool.’

‘You might not have tried, Elspeth. You’ve certainly succeeded. Oh, it was very clever, that plan of your grandmother’s, forcing me to accept you working. Well it’s not forced me. Don’t talk about loving me, Elspeth. It makes me feel sick.’

He stood up, glaring down at her; she sat in her chair, crying, frightened by the passion she had apparently unleashed, hurt beyond endurance.

‘I’ll tell you what you’re doing, you’re destroying me. Me and everything I stand for and believe in. I loved you once, more than I can say. I fought it, you know, I fought loving you—’

‘Why?’ she asked, her tears halted.

‘Because I knew it would lead to trouble. We’re too different, our roots are too different—’

‘Oh Keir! Really! That is just so absurd.’

‘Oh, it’s absurd, is it? I don’t think so. My standards were not your standards, my ideals were not yours. They could never be. I should have seen that, I was a fool—’

‘I see,’ she said, very calmly. ‘Well, I’m glad you realise it now. Clearly I was a fool as well. Good night. What a very interesting conversation this has been.’

She went to bed then, in the spare room; she fell asleep at once exhausted, and then woke at three and spent the rest of the night staring into the darkness, hurt and bewildered beyond anything, and wondering if there was anything she could do except give up on her marriage. Since Keir so clearly didn’t love her any more.

She could never remember feeling so lonely. Not even in the flat in Glasgow.

‘Darling, you seem awfully unhappy. Tense. Not the girl I used to know. Is there anything you ought to be telling me?’

‘No. No, I don’t think so.’

‘You sure?’

‘I’m sure. Yes.’

‘Absolutely certain sure?’

‘Oh Nick, for heaven’s sake. I’m quite sure.’

‘Good. Because I was beginning to wonder if there was something wrong with me. If I had BO or some other unmentionable thing.’

‘Of course not,’ said Izzie, ‘don’t be silly.’

‘I’m relieved. You may be my sunshine, as the song said, but the clouds seem to be covering you over quite a lot of the time just now.’

‘No,’ said Izzie, ‘no really. I’m fine.’

‘And you still love me?’

‘Of course I do.’

‘Good. Because I have a little idea. Which just might make you happy.’

‘What’s that?’

‘I think we should get married. And settle down to making babies. How’d you feel about that?’

Izzie burst into tears and rushed out of the room.

CHAPTER 39

‘Oh my God!’ She could hear her own voice, shaky, shocked, disbelieving. ‘Oh my God!’

It couldn’t be possible. Absolutely couldn’t.

She sat down at the kitchen table, holding the letter, realising her fingers were trembling. In fact, she was trembling all over, she felt sick, she was going to—

Jenna, calm down. Just calm down. Nothing’s happened yet. It was probably a mistake, a stupid, ridiculous mistake.

But – here it was. A letter addressed to Charlie, from some legal firm, about her. Lying on the top of the great untidy heap of stuff on his desk, where she’d been looking for a letter to school he’d promised to write about her doing extra riding next term; they’d phoned to say they hadn’t had the letter yet and it was important.

Saying – she forced herself to be calm, to read it very slowly, half aloud, so that it made more sense – saying that she was entitled to one third of her father’s estate. Or at least, that seemed to be what it was saying:

. . . just to confirm my advice to you as a result of our second meeting of July 9, 1959, re. the estate of the late Laurence Elliott:

1. That his afterborn child is entitled to an equal share of this estate, under Section 28 of the New York Decedent Estate Law. Provided, of course, that the mother did not waive any rights to a claim.

2. That we would need to take two actions in the Supreme Court. The first to establish that the claim is valid, and that Jeanette Elliott is the afterborn child, the second an order to account.

In plain language, that would mean that the trustees of the late Mr Elliott’s estate, and the beneficiaries of that estate, would be called to account. This would be decisive in terms of Miss Elliott’s entitlement. Perhaps you would be good enough to let me know whether you wish to proceed with the first action, and if so, when you could come in to see me again, so that you can acquaint me more fully with the details of the case. I sympathise with your reasons for the delay over the past six months, but in answer to your last question, I see no need for Miss Elliott to be involved until we have established the merits of this case.

Yours truly

Jonathan Wyley

Jenna put her head in her hands and burst into tears.

She had been feeling so much better. So much stronger, quite happy, even, a lot of the time. She couldn’t help it; her life was moving on, and very pleasingly so. She felt guilty at first, feeling happy; like when they were all sailing out at the Hamptons, or having a barbecue with friends on the beach; or when she and Cathy were getting on well, instead of squabbling as they did a lot of the time now; or when she went back to school that summer and it was so great to see everyone and to be welcomed back and to realise how many good friends she had.

Then, she had been in the end-of-term play and that had made her happy too; she got the lead part in a musical called
Love From Judy
(based on
Daddy Long Legs
, one of her favourite books as a child). Of course there was some sadness in there as well, thinking of how proud her mother would have been, of how she’d have been cheering her from the front row, but Charlie had been cheering in the front row instead and that had been pretty nice.

Charlie had continued to be great: really great. So kind and loving, and for a whole year after her mother died, had never even gone out once without her, not even to have a drink or to the movies. She had dreaded him getting another girlfriend, it was one of the things which had most frightened her. Although she could see that it probably had to happen and maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. He was, after all, very good-looking and very sweet, and he was clearly lonely. She and Cathy were away a lot, he was bound to want female company sooner or later. He had been out with one girl, who he’d met through his business, just for a drink; Cathy and Jenna had teased him so much about it, he said if he ever did it again, it would have to be in deepest secrecy.

‘You couldn’t do anything in secrecy,’ said Jenna, giving him a hug.

But – it seemed he had.

They had come back from Southampton to get ready for the return to school. Charlie was out, at his small office – the showroom had gone – Cathy was away with a schoolfriend, and Jenna was at home alone, waiting for some friends to call. They called; she told them she couldn’t make it that day.

She waited: for a long time. Finally, well after lunch, he came in; she heard him whistling as he threw his coat on to the chair in the hall – her mother had always got so cross when he did that – then running up the stairs. He was clearly on his way right up to the top floor to his study, but he saw her, sitting in the drawing room, watching him, and stopped.

‘Hallo, sweetheart. I thought you were going out?’

‘I – was. But then I needed to talk to you.’

‘Oh darling. Well, I’m here. Want a drink or anything? Have you had lunch?’

She shook her head.

‘No, I’m not hungry. Thank you.’

‘Well, want to tell me about it? What’s the matter?’

‘Charlie, why did you go to see those lawyers? Wyley and whatever. About me? Without telling me?’

‘Ah.’ He sat down on one of the deep, lush sofas opposite her, and stared at her. He looked very pale, very shocked. He was clearly struggling to find an explanation. ‘Yes. Well – well, how did you find out?’

‘The lettter was just lying on the top of your desk. I saw it.’

‘Jenna, you shouldn’t go to my desk.’

‘You never minded before. You always said it was fine. I was looking for a letter about riding lessons, they called to say they needed it. You shouldn’t be so untidy, Charlie,’ she added with a ghost of a smile.

‘You’re right. I shouldn’t.’ He returned the smile; more ghostly still.

‘Well – I’m waiting. What is this, what is it all about?’

‘Jenna, I don’t even know how to begin. Where to begin. I feel – just so terrible that you should have found the letter. I must look sucha – so devious to you.’

‘Just a bit.’

‘The thing is – oh hell, do you mind if I have a drink?’

‘Of course not.’

She watched him as he poured himself a stiff bourbon and sank heavily on to the sofa again.

‘It goes like this,’ he said slowly. ‘The thing is, I read a case, it was about someone like you, someone who’s been born after their father dies.’

‘The afterborn child,’ said Jenna. Her expression had changed now; it was tougher, more thoughtful.

‘How did you—? Oh, of course, you read the letter—’

‘I read the letter.’

He waited, then said, leaning forward, his eyes fixed on hers, very candid, ‘The thing is, sweetheart, I’ve always thought it was so unfair, those two getting all the money when you had nothing—’

‘Hardly nothing, Charlie.’

‘Nothing of his. Jenna, that estate must have been worth millions. Millions and millions—’

She said nothing.

‘You have a right to it. An absolute right. I remember telling your mother that.’

‘And—’

‘She didn’t want you to have it. She had her reasons, of course. But – it felt wrong to me. Anyway, I’d always thought there was nothing that could be done about it. The money was gone, willed away. And then – well, like I said, I read this article. I decided to do some research on your behalf. Jenna, there is no doubt. No doubt at all. As you could see from that letter. The money is yours. For the taking.’

‘Yes,’ she said, ‘so you say. So Mr Wyley says. But the thing is, Charlie, I don’t want to take it.’

This was the test, she thought, looking at him for the first time with suspicion; if he pressed it now, then his motives were not entirely unselfish. He was hoping to get his hands on at least some of the money. If only vicariously. He was very extravagant; that much she had observed.

Charlie looked at her and smiled; his sweetest smile. He held out his arms to her.

‘Then, darling, of course I’ll drop the whole thing. I wouldn’t dream of pushing you into something you don’t like. I was only thinking of you, I swear. We’ll write to Mr Wyley together, right now, and tell him we don’t want him to do anything. And you can post the letter,’ he added, as she moved into his arms, sat next to him on the sofa, rested her head on his shoulder. ‘So you know I’m not going to cheat on you.’

‘Charlie! Of course not. Well – yes, let’s write. I’d like that, like to get it settled. And – I’m sure you meant well, please don’t think otherwise. It’s just that – I so hate money.’

‘I know you do,’ he said.

But before they wrote the letter, the phone rang; and it was forgotten.

Izzie was lying on the bed when Nick came back; he had stormed out, they had just had a row. Another row. They kept having them these days; she was so edgy and miserable, and the sex thing had got worse not better, all she could think about the whole time was conceiving. She was tense and awkward where she had once been relaxed and joyful, and somehow every little thing just blew up first into bickering and then into a full-blown row. That night had been specially bad, he had come in with some flowers and they weren’t very nice flowers, he had clearly bought them at the drugstore, not a florist. While once she wouldn’t have given it a thought, today it irritated her; she’d tried, pretended, but as she was getting a vase, he bent to kiss her and she just couldn’t help it, she’d turned her head away, and – well, he’d just gone. Stormed out. And now he’d come back; looking at her for the first time in their entire relationship with something close to distaste.

‘Hallo,’ she said.

He didn’t even answer, but walked over to the sideboard and poured himself a drink. Then he turned and looked at her, his eyes hard.

‘Who is he?’ he said.

‘What?’

‘I said, who is he? Who’s the other guy?’

‘Nick, I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘Oh, please,’ he said, ‘can we just get this over? Clearly, there’s someone else. I’d kind of like you to tell me who it is, then I can clear out of here and not take up your time any longer. Maybe I should do that anyway, maybe I don’t need to know. It’s up to you, I guess.’

‘Nick, there isn’t anyone else. I swear to you.’

‘Oh yeah? Is that really so? In that case, why have you gone off me? Why do you kind of cringe when I get into bed? Why do you make love to me, which isn’t exactly frequent, as if you were fulfilling some tedious duty? Why don’t you talk to me any more? Really talk, I mean? Why do you look at me as if you disliked me half the time? If all that doesn’t add up to screwing someone else, Izzie, I seem to be seriously bad at arithmetic all of a sudden.’

‘Oh God,’ she said, sitting up, putting her arms round her knees, burying her head in them, ‘Nick, don’t. Don’t talk to me like that.’

‘But why not?’ he said. ‘Why shouldn’t I?’

‘Because it hurts,’ she said, and she was shouting at him now, her voice harsh and angry. ‘You don’t know how much it hurts. I can’t bear it, Nick, I really can’t.’

‘
You
can’t bear it!’ he said. ‘Oh, now that is really rich. How about me, how about what I’m having to bear?’ He stopped suddenly, stared at her. ‘Is it that creep MacColl? Is it? I swear to God I’ll kill the bastard if it is—’

‘No,’ she said. ‘No, no, no. It isn’t anyone, Nick, it isn’t. It’s you I love, really, really love, can’t you get that into your head?’

He looked at her in silence for a moment, then, ‘It’s very hard,’ he said, ‘hard to get it into my head, I tell you that.’

‘You’ll have to try.’

He lit a cigarette, walked over to the window, turned to look at her. ‘I am trying, for God’s sake,’ he said, ‘just try telling me about it, huh?’

‘I’m – I’m just feeling very tired,’ she said, finally. ‘Tired and upset.’

He shook his head wearily, walked over to the cupboard, and started dragging his things out of it.

‘What are you doing?’

‘What does it look like I’m doing? I’m packing. I’m leaving. Being tired and upset, that isn’t enough. It just doesn’t make a person act like you’ve been acting. Sorry.’

‘But – but Nick, I told you. I love you. And there isn’t anyone else.’

He sighed . . . pulled his suitcase out from under the bed, put a few things in it, then stopped suddenly and looked at her, his eyes infinitely sad.

‘You’ll have to do better than that,’ he said.

Izzie stood up, facing him; her eyes were very large and dark, her hands twisting together behind her back.

‘All right,’ she said. ‘I’ll try.’

He sat and listened in absolute silence while she told him her sad, sorry, difficult story, standing there as if before a judge and jury, not flinching from anything, too frightened to meet his eyes. And when she had finished, he said, ‘Look at me,’ and his voice was different from anything she had heard before, somehow louder and harsher. Taking all her courage, she had looked at him, expecting to see anger and distaste, and saw instead only absolute tenderness and sorrow and saw, too, the reason for the changed voice: he was struggling not to weep.

‘Come here,’ was all he said, and she went to him. He put his arms around her, and kissed her, very tenderly, kissed her mouth and her eyes and her hair and finally said, ‘And you went through all that quite alone?’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Of course I did, I had to, there was no one else who could help me,’ and he said, ‘Dear, dear God, Izzie, and you thought I would be angry with you?’

And then somehow they were lying on the bed, and she was wanting him more than she had ever wanted anything in her entire life, and something happened between them then which was very swift and absolutely overwhelming.

In a flood of relief and tears and even laughter came love, love expressing itself more beautifully than she could ever remember: in a glorious softening and welcoming, reaching and flying and a bright intense explosion, then falling, falling into peace, and through the peace, Nick telling her how much he loved her.