The Orchid House (60 page)

‘You shouldn’t,’ said Julia uncomfortably. ‘As you said, it was an accident.’

Madelaine drew back from her and stared at her with glazed eyes. ‘Honey, I so admire you. You are so forgiving!’

‘Forgiving that it was an accident?’ Julia said, a little bewildered.

‘Why, yes! We all told Xavier he should stay the night, but of course he wouldn’t listen.’

‘Why?’ Julia managed.

‘Because, honey, we all knew he wasn’t fit to drive. Not that any of us were,’ she added, swaying unsteadily.

The information slowly began to compute in Julia’s brain.

‘Are you saying Xavier was drunk?’

‘Surely you knew? He told us when he came over for lunch a few weeks ago, he’d explained that to you. And that you understood and forgave him.’

The look on Julia’s face must have registered with Madelaine and she clapped her hand to her mouth. ‘Jeeze, I hope I didn’t say anything out of church. I mean, we all like a drink now and then, don’t we? Look at everyone tonight.’ She swept her hand around the noisy, drunken crowd. ‘I bet most of them haven’t got a chauffeur home! Anyway, it could happen to any of us. And I’d be the last one to cast stones. You are reunited with the guy you love,’ she said fondly. ‘Come and see us real soon, honey, y’hear?’

The party carried on as Julia packed what she could into the one small holdall she had arrived with. Xavier was on the piano, entertaining the remaining guests with his brilliance.

He wouldn’t even notice she had gone until later.

She left her holdall by the bedroom door, then tiptoed across the landing and into the room she had not yet had the courage to enter. The smell of him hit her instantly, bringing tears to her eyes. Ignoring the many reminders of her little son’s life, Julia walked over to his cot.

Lying there on the pillow was Pomme, Gabriel’s beloved teddy bear. She picked Pomme up and hugged him to her. Then she went to the small wardrobe and took out one of Gabriel’s T-shirts.

As she walked towards the door, she blew a kiss to the memory of what this room had been. Then she stowed her two treasures in her holdall, walked down the stairs and left the house.

57

I lean over the arm of my comfortable seat and look out of the window at the world below. Even though I’ve flown constantly, I still marvel at the miracle of it, and find it helps me put my thoughts in perspective.

It is almost dark and, from the flight path on my screen, I can see we are passing over Delhi. It is a mass of twinkling lights, indicating the countless lives packed into the space beneath me. Each with their own story to tell, their own tapestry at some stage of being woven. The strength of each of the individual specks of life humble and amaze me.

The last lights of Delhi disappear as the aircraft moves on over the vast empty tracts of the Himalayas, and the world becomes black beneath me.

Just now, I think sadly, I am the plane, free to cross the world and land anywhere I choose. I only wish someone could set my flight path for me. Just a few weeks ago, I was so sure that, finally, my life was following the right route, but now it has been blown violently off course yet again. Currently, I feel the wreckage is all that remains.

At least I know I have the strength to cope this time. There will be no self-pity for what might have been. I have said a final goodbye to the physical memories of my son, knowing I will carry Gabriel and the pain of losing him in my heart for as long as I live.

And as for Xavier … the pedestal I had always put him on has come crashing down. In retrospect, I know it was fatally cracked when he returned and told me his story. The denouement a few days ago only confirmed what I already knew: Xavier is a weak, selfish man, who cares for no one more than himself, not even his precious child.

He disgusts me.

I feel no regret for turning my back on our life and walking away from him. I understand it was impossible for me to stay.

And now, once more, I am returning to the past to try and discover my future.

After dinner, I close my eyes and sleep, as the aircraft carries me safely East.

When Julia emerged from Arrivals, she saw her name being held up by a smartly dressed representative. She pushed her trolley through the crowds towards him.

‘Welcome to Bangkok, Miss Forrester. I take you to car now, please.’ The representative took her trolley and she followed him out into the breathtakingly hot, humid air of the city.

Moments later, Julia was ensconced in a comfortable limousine. Her liveried driver attempted to make conversation in his stilted English, but Julia wasn’t interested and gazed out of the window as the car sped along the modern highway. She was intrigued by the mixture of tower blocks, interspersed with the glinting gold roof of a Thai temple and battered wooden shacks bedecked with washing strung on lines. She thought it strange that, although she had travelled far and wide and had performed in both China and Japan, Bangkok had never been on her list.

The car came smoothly to a halt by the leafy entrance to the Oriental Hotel. As Julia was handed out of the car by a porter, she breathed in the distinctive smell of the city – the sweet aroma of exotic flowers, underlaid with a hint of rotting vegetables – and the scent was somehow familiar to her.

When she entered the lobby, a beautiful Thai girl handed her a jasmine garland. ‘Welcome to the Oriental Hotel, Miss Forrester. I will take you to your room.’

‘Thank you,’ Julia said, admiring the elegant lobby with its stunning array of orchids spilling out of a vast pot, and the huge Chinese-style lanterns hanging from the high ceiling.

Up in her room, she opened the door on to the balcony and looked in wonder at the majestic river below, stretching as far as the eye could see on either side of the hotel. It was peppered with boats of all shapes and sizes, and the cacophony of sound was continuous.

Julia ordered some coffee from room service and sequestered herself on the balcony, relishing the atmosphere. She had always loved warmth, could stand the most humid conditions, and the temperature here felt just right.

She leant over to her left and saw that the Oriental was a small, but perfectly formed oasis of calm alongside its more grandiose hotel neighbours. The oldest part of the building, the part her grandfather would have known, was now called the Authors’ Lounge, according to the directory she was flicking through. It stood on the river front, a hundred yards away from her, beyond the beautifully kept tropical gardens and the swimming pool. Its pretty, colonial façade was dwarfed by the tall buildings around it, but Julia could imagine these as wooden shacks on stilts in the river – just as Harry would have seen it.

When she had finished her coffee, Julia found herself yawning. She delved into her handbag for the address Elsie had given her and stared at it. She needed to sleep first, have a clear head before tackling the last leg of her journey into the past.

She slept for much longer than she meant to, and woke, fuzzy-headed, at a quarter to five. She sat on her balcony with a glass of cold white wine, watching Bangkok turn from day to night. Below her, twinkling white lights festooned the trees on the terrace overlooking the river. The terrace was already full of guests having dinner, and Julia realised she too needed to eat. She took the elevator down to the lobby, smiling in surprise that the lift attendant already knew her name, and went over to the concierge desk.

‘Yes, madam, may I help you?’ another exquisite Thai girl smiled at her.

‘Yes.’ Julia handed over her piece of paper. ‘I was wondering whether you could provide me with a car to take me to this address.’

‘Of course. It is not far away. Would you like car now?’ the girl asked.

‘No, tomorrow morning, please. At eleven.’

‘I will arrange it for you, madam. Is there anything else I can help you with?’

‘No, thank you,’ said Julia, and walked across the lobby, pausing to listen to the string quartet playing Schubert in the corner.

She was ushered to a candlelit table right on the river front at the far end of the terrace, and ordered another glass of wine and a green curry. She glanced around at the elegantly clad guests, listened to the soft chugging of boats on the river and felt a sudden sense of calm.

Even if she didn’t succeed in finding her grandmother, or discovered she was dead, as Elsie suspected, Julia felt very glad she had come. This was a special place; if nothing else it was the perfect setting in which to take stock and think rationally about her future. She felt cocooned by the gentle staff and the tranquil atmosphere of the spot where her own story had begun.

*

Surprisingly, Julia slept through the night, for once having no need of the pills she always carried with her to ward off jet-lag. She took a breakfast of mango, papaya and rose-apple, washed down with strong coffee. At five to eleven, she was being escorted out of the lobby to her car.

Her driver turned round and smiled at her. ‘This is private address, yes?’ He indicated the piece of paper.

‘I think so.’

‘Okay, madam, we go.’

She sat in the back of the car, wishing she could have contacted Lidia by telephone to give the old lady some warning that her granddaughter was about to appear on her doorstep. But, with no surname to go by, that had not been possible. Elsie had only ever addressed the photographs to ‘Lidia’.

‘You sure it’s a good idea?’ Elsie had asked, when Julia called her from Paris and said she was travelling to Thailand to search for her real grandmother. ‘Stirring up more of the past, when you should be looking to the future?’

Elsie might be right, Julia thought, but perhaps she had to go back to her roots before she could move forward.

The car wound its way through the streets of Bangkok and Julia noticed the driver raise a surprised eyebrow when she opened her window to breathe in the air and the atmosphere. The overcrowded pavements with residents spilling out of their houses, the alleyways filled with food stalls busily serving customers, and the streets themselves packed with cars, ancient buses and motorised tuk-tuks were a cacophony of activity. A jumbled meeting of East and West, yet so real, so vibrant and alive.

‘We nearly there, madam. House is on river, yes?’ asked the driver.

‘I have no idea, I’m afraid. I’ve never been here before.’

‘Do not worry, madam. We find it, okay?’

Julia nodded. ‘Okay.’

A couple of minutes later, he turned off the busy street into a pretty, residential road. They reached the end of the cul-de-sac and the driver pointed to a gate.

‘This is right
soi
and that is house you want,’ he said.

‘Thank you.’ Julia made to open the door, but the driver was already there, tipping his gold-braided white cap as she climbed out.

‘You want me wait?’ he smiled.

‘Yes, please. I don’t know how long I’ll be.’

‘No worry, madam, you be as long as you need. I be here,’ he smiled.

‘Thank you.’

Julia took a deep breath and made her way up the path. The house was very pretty, built in Thai style, with wooden-clad outer walls, a veranda that ran all the way round the ground floor, and topped with an inverted V-shaped roof which curled up at the edges.

She walked up the steps to the veranda. Finding no bell, she knocked on the front door, waited several minutes, then knocked again, and then again. Just as she was about to turn away in disappointment, the door opened.

A pair of ancient gimlet eyes appeared in the small crack.

‘May I help you?’ the man’s heavily accented Thai voice asked.

‘Yes, I’m looking for Lidia.’

The gimlet eyes surveyed her, then filled with fear.

‘Who are you? Why you want her?’ he asked accusingly.

Julia was wrong-footed by these questions, not wanting to reveal her identity until she had established who the man was.

‘I am from England – a friend of Lidia’s asked me to give her a message. Is she in?’ Julia asked.

The man shook his head. ‘No, she out. Bye bye.’

He tried to close the door but Julia held it open.

‘She will come back?’ she asked, unconsciously falling into the man’s pidgin English.

The man shrugged through the tiny crack. ‘Maybe.’

‘She is … well?’ Julia wanted to say ‘alive’, but felt it was inappropriate.

‘She is well,’ the man nodded. ‘Now, you go away, okay?’

‘When she comes back, can you tell her that a friend of Harry’s wants to see her. I am staying at the Oriental Hotel and will wait for her there.’ Julia enunciated the words slowly and carefully.

‘Harry,’ the man twirled the name on his tongue, then nodded. ‘Okay, I tell.’

The door was slammed in her face and Julia went back to the car.

She spent the afternoon by the pool, filled with anxiety that the old man had not understood and would not pass on the message. But at least she knew Lidia was alive. And, for now, there was little more she could do except wait and use the time to contemplate her life.

And face up to her feelings for Kit.

Julia knew it was doubtful her marriage to Xavier could have survived after what she had learnt about the accident, but as she lay in the heat of the tropical sun, she forced herself to admit that her feelings for Kit had also played a part in its demise. And Kit’s love for her, his quiet strength and lack of insecurity, neediness or jealousy, had made her see Xavier – and her relationship with him – much more clearly.

There was no doubt that Kit had marched into her life at an inappropriate moment, when every emotion she felt was muddled. But the very fact that she had found such happiness with him – when she was so grief-stricken over her son, and ashamed for moving on so soon after losing her husband – was testament to the strength of what they had shared.

She knew it was love. In its purest and most simple form.

In the past few months, she had also learnt one of the most crucial lessons of life: everything depended on timing. If she had met Kit under different circumstances, at another moment, perhaps they would still be together now.