Little White Lies (54 page)

‘Ma, I
do
call you. Every day.’

‘Not true. Always I call you.
Dushen’ka
, I want ask you something.’

‘What?’

‘Let’s go Moscow, you and me. I want show you grandparents.’

Tash almost dropped the phone. Lyudmila scarcely mentioned them. ‘Eh?’

‘Why not? You big success now. And,’ Lyudmila added slyly, ‘maybe you gonna open Russia branch? Maybe I can help you do that?’

Tash held the receiver away from her in disbelief for an instant. And then she began to laugh.

REBECCA
Tel Aviv

She shut the door to the nursery quietly and tiptoed backwards, praying the boys wouldn’t wake up. Her mother’s driver was waiting for her downstairs.

‘Are they asleep?’ The au pair stood in the doorway.

Rebecca nodded. ‘Yes, they’ve both dropped off. I’ll be back around eleven. If there’s anything, just call.’ She smiled her thanks and hurried out the door. Lingering would only tempt fate. She took one last look at her reflection before the lift doors closed. Her hair was coming loose. She tucked a few stray tendrils that had escaped and fished in her bag for some lipstick. It was the second anniversary of her father’s death. The Israel Philharmonic was putting on a concert in his honour. Julian should have come, she thought to herself distractedly as she climbed into the waiting Mercedes. He’d begged off . . . some deal or other that he was pushing through.

The big car pulled out into the traffic. She wrapped her coat around her, watching the city flash past in a blur of coloured lights. It was her biggest regret. Lionel hadn’t lived to see the twins. He’d died before they were born. He’d never got to hold them, talk to them, play with them. Towards the end he was crippled with arthritis and practically deaf. Only the eyes remained. Those large, expressive eyes that had seen so much, with their magnificent, impossibly dark brows. She felt the lump in her throat thicken. She blinked rapidly. The last thing she wanted to do was turn up at his memorial concert with reddened eyes and a handkerchief clasped to her breast. She thought of the twins. She thought of their two blond heads, Joshua’s marginally darker than his brother’s, and her heart lifted immediately. Both had come out favouring Julian, the fair, blond side of the family. Speaking of blonds, she suddenly thought to herself, where on earth was cousin Adam? The last she’d seen or heard of him had been at her wedding, some five years earlier. He’d arrived with yet another miniature blonde in a miniskirt and left without her, or so she remembered hearing.

‘Here we are, Miss Harburg. Shall I drop you at the front?’ She jumped. She’d forgotten all about the driver. For some she would for ever be ‘Miss Harburg’, never ‘Mrs Lovell’.

‘Yes, that’s fine.’ He pulled the car to a smooth halt right outside the entrance. She got out, pulling her coat even more tightly around her. It was freezing. ‘Thanks.’ She nodded at the doorman and hurried into the warm foyer. She looked around, spotting her mother almost immediately. Embeth was already surrounded by friends and family. She’d cut her long, thick hair shortly after Lionel’s death. Now she wore it very short, expertly layered and a lovely, silvery-grey colour. It suited her. She was still slim, with the same olive-toned skin and handsome features, every inch the elegant, gracious widow of one of Israel’s favourite sons. Lionel was buried in the prestigious Mount Herzl cemetery, just west of Jerusalem. His headstone was only a few rows away from Golda Meir’s. Rebecca had to smile when Embeth told her. Golda Meir was the only woman after his mother, his wife and Margaret Thatcher whom Lionel considered more than his equal. It would have pleased him no end.

‘Ma,’ Rebecca came up to Embeth, kissing her on both cheeks. ‘Sorry I’m late. I kept the driver waiting.’

‘Rebecca! Look, it’s Rebecca!’ Half a dozen people immediately clustered round. ‘We haven’t seen you in ages! Where’ve you been hiding? And where’s that lovely husband of yours?’ Rebecca squared her shoulders and began the slow dance of meeting and greeting people, half of whom she either didn’t know or didn’t recognise.

The gong sounded once, twice, ushering people into the auditorium. Murmuring excitedly, casting their eyes around to take stock of who’d been invited and who shunned, the guests began to file in. The last time she’d been here, it was Lionel’s ninetieth birthday and it was where she’d met Julian for the first time. Now Lionel was gone and she and Julian were married with two children. Annick was back in their lives. Tash had become a multi-millionaire. Everything had changed.

And yet nothing had. The faint whiff of unhappiness that came upon her from time to time descended upon her as they took their seats. She stole a quick glance around her. The women on either side of her were practically identical. Slim and beautiful, tanned or not tanned, stylishly dressed, immaculately made up, knees and ankles crossed elegantly, hands placed patiently in their laps. She was at home amongst them; her life was no different. Au pairs were on hand to take care of their children. Housekeepers ran their various homes; money was never spoken of. The woman to her right whose name she’d already forgotten, if indeed she knew it at all, chattered away happily. Rebecca listened with half an ear.

Their host appeared on stage and there was a sudden burst of enthusiastic applause. She spoke eloquently in English, praising ‘the late and dearly missed Lionel Harburg for his gifts, his insights, his commitment and passion to the qualities of leadership, innovation, creativity’. Rebecca listened distractedly, as if they spoke of someone she didn’t know. The sense of alienation that had crept up on her deepened slowly, intensifying as the orchestra struck its first notes, swelling alongside the music, rousing the blood to a heavy drum-roll in her veins. She shifted uncomfortably in her seat. She was sweating. She put up a hand to push back the damp tendrils of hair that clung to her forehead and neck.

‘Are you all right?’ Embeth whispered, looking sideways at her in concern.

She swallowed. ‘I’m a bit hot,’ she whispered back. ‘I feel a bit faint, actually.’

‘D’you want to go outside?’ Embeth asked, laying a hand on her arm. ‘
Mi amor
, you’re
boiling
. Do you have a fever?’

Rebecca shook her head. People behind them were beginning to tut in disapproval. ‘I’ll . . . I’ll just pop out for a minute. I won’t be long.’

She got up quickly, excusing herself as she squeezed past those same elegant knees and legs. She hurried up the aisle and burst through the double doors into the lobby, fanning herself furiously with the programme. The bar staff were busy putting the finishing touches to the refreshments. A long table, covered in snowy white linen and piled with plates and wine glasses, stood at one end of the foyer. There were white spray roses everywhere and enormous bouquets of pink-and-white lilies, Lionel’s favourites. A photograph of Lionel and Embeth had been placed on the wall opposite. Rebecca glanced at it, then looked away. The strange, heavy mood that had crept up on her needed no fuelling. She ignored the waiters’ curious glances and headed for the main doors. They slid soundlessly apart at her approach.

The cold night air revived her instantly. She drew in a deep breath, thankful to be outside. She reached into her handbag for the packet of cigarettes she kept hidden away in the side pocket. She’d given up as soon as she found out she was pregnant but occasionally, like now, she found herself longing for one. She walked across the forecourt to one of the sculptural stone benches tucked away to one side and sat down, already feeling better. She lit up, waving the smoke away from her face, and leaned back against the smooth, cool stone. Across the lawn, behind the tall, wavering palm trees, Tel Aviv’s night traffic streamed past. It had been months, perhaps even years, since she’d been somewhere alone like this, nothing and no one around her, except the sound of traffic and the wind ruffling the tops of the trees. She felt a slow tug, as though she were being dragged backwards to another time and place . . . before Julian and the children. She resisted for a moment – how could she possibly think of life before Joshua and David? – and then she surrendered herself to it, selfishly, almost voluptuously.

Her mind drifted back to her student days, to standing in front of Mortimer’s painting of Harold Pinter at the National Portrait Gallery, listening to the lecturer describe the finer points of . . . she stopped suddenly. Jeremy Garrick. She hadn’t thought about him in years. She felt the heat of embarrassment creep up through her face and cheeks. That look of triumphant disdain he’d thrown her as he opened the front door for his wife and child . . . she put up a hand to her burning cheek. She wondered where he was now. With some other, confused, doe-eyed student,
sans doute
. She finished her cigarette and stood up, irritated by the direction her thoughts had taken. That was the trouble with thoughts. The mind could wander off anywhere, without control or caution. She tossed away the butt and walked back towards the concert.

There was a man standing with his back to her just in front of the auditorium doors, rocking lightly on his heels, as though waiting for something. She came up beside him and put out a hand to open the door.

‘It locks, unfortunately. Automatically, from the inside.’

‘Oh.’

‘To prevent people interrupting the performance,’ he added. ‘People like us.’ He looked down at her with a faint, rueful smile.

Rebecca looked up at him. ‘So what shall we do?’ she asked.

‘Well, we can wait until someone else comes out, or go in during the intermission.’ He had the air of someone patiently explaining something to a child.

Rebecca looked at him more closely, frowning. He looked vaguely familiar. He sounded American but looked Mediterranean. He was deeply tanned, with smooth, olive-toned skin, hazel-green eyes behind black, rectangular glasses. His lips were full and his thick, curly dark-brown hair was swept back off his face. She struggled to place him. Had they met? Then at last, recognition dawned. ‘You work with Barenboim. You’re the Palestinian.’ She clapped a hand to her mouth. ‘I’m sorry, that came out wrong. I’ve forgotten your name, I’m afraid.’

‘Tariq. Tariq Malouf.’

‘You’re a musician, aren’t you?’

He nodded. ‘A conductor, at any rate.’

‘Why do I get the feeling you know me?’ Rebecca said, feeling suddenly and inexplicably shy.

‘Because I do.’

She opened her mouth to respond but just at that moment, the auditorium door opened suddenly and someone walked out. He pulled a face, as if to say, ‘Shall we?’ and held the door open for her, waiting for her to pass through. She blushed and slipped in underneath his arm. He walked off to his own seat and she hurried back to hers.

‘Feeling better?’ her mother murmured. ‘You were gone for quite a long time.’

‘The door was locked. From the inside,’ she whispered back. She put up a hand to touch her cheek. It was still hot. Tariq Malouf. How did he know her?

‘The Maloufs? Surely you must remember them?’ Eighty-four-year-old Aunt Bettina, the last of Lionel’s surviving siblings, peered at her through her gilt pince-nez spectacles. ‘One of the oldest and most respected families in Jerusalem, my dear. You and Tariq were
such
good friends.’

‘An
Arab
family?’

‘But of course. They’ve been mayors and muftis of this city since the Ottomans, you know. Old Faisal was on the
Waqf
. Tariq’s great uncle. A terribly cultured man,
terribly
cultured. Very good-looking, too. Met him several times with Lionel.’

‘What’s the
waqf
?’ Rebecca pronounced it with difficulty.

Aunt Bettina lowered her pince-nez and glared at her niece. ‘The
Waqf.
The Islamic Council. They’ve managed the buildings around the Al-Aqsa Mosque for centuries. I thought you’d been to university, my girl.’

‘They didn’t teach us anything about that,’ Rebecca muttered.

‘Well, Tariq runs the AAC now. It took them nearly fifty years, mind you, but they managed to get back the old house in Talbiya. That’s where it sits.’

‘Where what sits?’

‘The AAC, of course.’

‘What’s the AAC?’

Aunt Bettina lifted her spectacles once more. ‘Rebecca Harburg. I do
not
believe I’m talking to one of Lionel’s offspring! The Arab Affairs Committee! Your father was one of its patrons. How can you pretend to be so ignorant?’

‘I’m not pretending,’ Rebecca protested, frowning. ‘He never talked about any of it.’ Her head was spinning. In the past forty-eight hours, another side of Lionel had been opened up. She had no idea how to even think about it. Her father . . . a patron of Arab affairs? ‘Where’s Tal-what-d’you-call-it?’

‘Talbiya. Oh, the name’s changed. It’s Komemiyut now. Such a beautiful neighbourhood. I still remember the first time we went there—’

‘We?’

‘Lionel and I. And Georges, of course. Dear, dear Georges.’

Rebecca struggled to keep up. Aunt Bettina’s conversations could go anywhere, she’d noticed, a by-product of her advancing years. She jumped from topic to topic, wholly lucid, but often with enormous gaps in between and the assumption that Rebecca could simply keep up. ‘Who’s George?’

‘Georges Haddad. He was a friend of your Great Uncle Paul as well as Lionel’s. You won’t remember him, I shouldn’t think. He was already ninety when you were born. They lived long, those Harburg boys. Like me,’ Aunt Bettina gave one of her great, whooping cackles, followed by a coughing fit.

Rebecca struggled to place it all. ‘You said I knew Tariq?’

Aunt Bettina nodded. ‘Yes, yes. You used to play with him and his sister, Maryam. The three of you were very close, practically inseparable. It was dreadful when she died, just dreadful.’ Aunt Bettina’s voice grew soft and her hands began working against each other in distress.

Rebecca’s eyes grew wide. Why didn’t she remember any of it? ‘Wh-what happened to her?’

‘Leukaemia. Poor little thing, she was so sickly, so sickly. Lionel took her to New York, of course, but there was nothing they could do. She was buried here, right here in Jerusalem, in the garden at Talbiya. That’s why Tariq fought so hard to get the house back.’