The Rich Are Different (84 page)

‘You mean you think it would be better for him to be brought up in the company of two parents who never spoke to one another and made no secret of the fact that they hated each other’s guts? I’m sorry, Emily, but I can’t agree with that. If you can accept that Vivienne and I are finished – and we are – then for the baby’s sake you should also accept that it’s in his best interests that we should live under different roofs.’

I gave her a handkerchief and put my arm around her while she dried her tears. Eventually she said yes, she supposed I was right, but she still felt sad.

‘There’s only one other thing I want to say, Cornelius,’ she said as she stood up to leave, ‘and that’s this: see Vivienne – please! It’s cowardly not to face her and she deserves at least one honest conversation with you.’

‘All right,’ I said. ‘I’ll see her, but after that I never want to discuss this subject with anyone again. It’ll be closed, finished and dead.’

‘You’re very
hard, Cornelius,’ was Emily’s parting reproach, but she was wrong. Beneath my protective shell my emotions were no more well-ordered than pulp in a paper-mill, and when Vivienne arrived to see me it was a full five minutes before I could steel myself to face her.

[3]

She was haggard with dark circles beneath her eyes. She looked well past forty.

‘I guess you heard that conversation I was having with Greg,’ she said. ‘I managed to figure out that much.’

‘Uh-huh’

‘I shouldn’t have discussed you sexually with him, but I only did it to show you in a good light, and Cornelius, I didn’t just marry you for your money! I could never have married someone who didn’t attract me, and when the baby started I realized just how much I did love you! Cornelius, please – I know we can start again – I’ll be the best wife in the world to you, I swear it, and you’ll never regret coming back.’ She broke off. She was twisting her rings round and round on her wedding finger. There was a coffee stain on the bottom of her maternity smock. ‘Please!’ she said desperately. ‘Please!’

I was silent. She tried again. ‘I know we had a problem recently in bed but it was only because I found it a little uncomfortable – I still wanted you just as much. After the baby comes everything’ll be just as wonderful as before, I know it will.’

‘I can never sleep with you again,’ I said politely. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘But—’

‘It would be impossible. I’d never even get an erection. No man could want a woman who speaks of him with such patronizing contempt behind his back.’

‘But I was singing your praises!’

‘You called me a little boy,’ I said. ‘You said I was easy to manage. You referred to me as a dog-lover might refer to a pet poodle. You made it very, very clear what you really thought of me.’

‘But I – I—’ She started to weep. Tears streamed down her face.

‘It’s finished,’ I said. ‘It’s over. I have nothing else to say.’

‘But the baby—’

‘Of course he must stay with you while he’s an infant. I won’t be unreasonable about custody, and I’m sure our lawyers will be able to work out a civilized divorce because I’m even willing to be generous about alimony. Since you married me for my money I’d just hate you to go away empty-handed.’

I had gone too far. Her mouth hardened. She dashed away her tears.

‘My God!’ she said. ‘You cold-blooded little bastard, I’m going to sue you for every penny I can get!’

And she did. It was the messiest divorce New York had seen in years. The
scandal ricocheted up and down Manhattan from the Battery to Spuyten Duyvil, and photographers made my life such a misery that I became more of a recluse than ever. I did manage to commit the adultery required by the State of New York before divorce proceedings could start, but before I began I looked under the bed to see how closely I was being observed by the press. There was no one there, but I would hardly have been surprised if I had discovered Maury Paul, known as Cholly Knickerbocker to the millions who read his society columns. Mr Paul did not treat me kindly in his articles, and referred to me constantly as ‘the farm-boy from Ohio’.

My partners maintained a strained silence although once Lewis said it was a pity there was so much talk. Fortunately it was the height of summer, and since I could retreat to Bar Harbor without losing face I rented a thirty-room cottage and walled myself up with my secretary, my aides, two bodyguards and a synopsis of
War and Peace
. Sam came up later to see me but he stayed with his parents, just as he always did when he returned to his hometown. Other people tried to see me too, but Sam was the only one I could face.

‘There are a couple of girls I know …’ he began helpfully, but I shook my head. I had lost interest in sex, food, drink and exercise. I was grieving, as if for someone who had died, and presently I managed to confide to him that I had burnt all my wedding photographs. Then I cried. Sam was appalled, and thinking I would be ashamed of myself afterwards he tried to leave in order to spare me embarrassment, but I wouldn’t let him go. Clutching his sleeve I forced him to listen to a long dreary rambling monologue about how much I had loved Vivienne and how money never brought anyone any happiness and how my life had ended at twenty-two.

‘God, I need a drink,’ said Sam when I paused for breath. ‘You’d better have one too.’

‘No, it’ll destroy me!’

‘Well, you’re so destroyed already I can’t imagine one drink will make much difference. What would you like? Martini, Bronx, Alexander, Sidecar, Three-Mile-Limit, Whisky Sour or a Whoopee? You look as if you could do with a Last Resort.’

We had a couple of Whoopees apiece. The lemon juice and honey were soothing on the throat and the applejack and gin were soothing on the soul. I began to feel better, and when the drinks were finished we went for a swim and lay in the sun. I started to maunder on about Vivienne again but Sam interrupted to describe a merger he was working on between General Baby Foods and the Canadian-Atlantic Grocery Stores and presently I was suggesting an interesting flotation which avoided any hint of common stock. Later we played tennis and I won. By this time I felt hungry so we ate broiled Maine lobster, very fresh and succulent, followed by blueberries with ice-cream.

‘Now I’ve got a surprise for you,’ said Sam, glancing at the clock as we finished our coffee. It was still early in the evening. ‘There’s a very special lady coming to see you.’

I was
aghast, thinking he had been fool enough to summon Vivienne, but he said this was someone who had returned to New York from overseas the day after I had left for Bar Harbor.

In bewilderment I followed him to the window. A car was crawling up the drive and when I saw who my visitor was the tears filled my eyes again because Sam had produced my strongest link with Paul.

I ran into the hall, elbowed my bodyguards aside and flung wide the front door. She was already walking away from the car, but when she saw me she stopped and held out her arms.

‘Cornelius!’

‘Sylvia?’ I said, hardly daring to believe she was really there, and overcome with an enormous feeling of comfort I stumbled towards her down the steps into the driveway.

[4]

‘Paul would have been so disappointed in me.’

They were the first words I said to her when we were alone. Outside the sun had set, and when I glanced beyond the window I was reminded of my conversation with Paul which had also taken place at Bar Harbor at dusk.

‘Cornelius, Paul’s first marriage must have been very like yours. He would have understood.’

‘But he warned me …’

We talked for a long time. Her dark hair glowed red whenever she leant forward into the last fading shaft of light, and her face, quiet in repose, was still luminous with that mysterious inner radiance whenever she smiled. To me she would always represent peace and tranquillity, an oasis of perfection in a world of false glitter and bitter back-chat, and whenever I saw her I knew why Paul had wanted her to be his wife; he might have had to work all day in the savage tundra of Lower Manhattan, but once he came home to Sylvia he could be sure of crawling out of the cold.

‘If only there were no child,’ I burst out at last. ‘You can’t imagine how guilty I feel, how much I hate myself for having made such a mess of everything.’

‘Paul felt that way about Vicky at first. Yet later he said Vicky had made sense of the whole disaster of his first marriage.’

We started to talk about Paul, but stopped. We both knew our thoughts were identical.

‘I don’t believe I’m going to have a son,’ I said. ‘I’m going to have a daughter. Did I ever tell you that Vivienne and I often discussed names and she said how much she liked the name Vicky because it was so cute and unusual?’

‘Cornelius …’ She rose impulsively to her feet. I was already pacing around the room.

‘Paul and I both had intellectual mothers and older sisters,’ I said. ‘Our fathers both died before we were grown up. We both had delicate secluded
childhoods. We both had to fight for survival on Wall Street when we were very young. We both had disastrous first marriages. Sylvia, I’m beginning to think Paul passed on to me more than his money and his position. I’m beginning to think he gave me his whole life to live again.’

She said that was impossible. I had never heard her speak so strongly, and as she walked right up to me I saw her tranquillity was destroyed.

‘Paul’s dead,’ she said. ‘His life is finished and the door which leads to his life is closed. Don’t try to open that door, Cornelius. Paul had his own special demons which died with him. Let them be.’

‘But the likeness—’

‘It’s a mirage. An illusion.’

‘But I want to be like him!’

‘You’re yourself. Be thankful.’ She kissed me and held me close. We were silent for a long time, and when she spoke again it was merely to invite me to stay with her after I returned to New York.

Aware that I had trespassed too long on Sam’s hospitality I accepted her invitation with relief, but when I reached New York in September I found all offers of hospitality were unnecessary. My house on Fifth Avenue was empty. Vivienne had moved out with the Georgian silver, the Coalport china and all the Renoirs, and was staying with friends in Tuxedo Park.

At first I was delighted, but within days I was reconsidering Sylvia’s invitation to stay. I had never lived alone in my house before and I hated it. The huge rooms were lonely and the endless corridors depressing.

At the beginning of October I called Sylvia.

‘Cornelius!’ she exclaimed warmly, so much her old self that it was hard to believe I had seen her so agitated at Bar Harbor. ‘I was just about to call you! I’m having a little reception at home next Thursday for the French consul with dinner afterwards – I won’t ask you to the dinner because I’m sure you’d hate it, but do stop by at the reception. It’ll do you good to get out, even if you only stay ten minutes. I hate to think of you all alone in that house.’

I dithered about whether to go but finally, having nothing better to do, I went. Besides I wanted to see Sylvia again and thought that during my brief appearance I could invite myself to stay.

The reception was held in the floor-through drawing-room on the second floor of Sylvia’s brownstone, and a collection of immaculate footmen served some impressive champagne in addition to the inevitable cocktails. ‘St Pierre et Miquelon!’ whispered Sylvia, naming the Canadian islands where the liquor-smugglers picked up the best French wines. In addition to the champagne there was a generous selection of hors d’oeuvres, a varied collection of diplomats, dowagers and dilettantes, and, unfortunately, a small but beady-eyed bunch of debutantes. I saw them eyeing me as soon as I entered the room.

I was late. Sylvia introduced me to a plump contralto who talked about Wagner and a British tea-planter who talked bafflingly about South
American coffee, but then she was diverted and I was on my own. Seconds later the debutantes were closing in.

‘Cornelius, how are you?’

‘Cornelius, remember me? Leonie from Tarrytown!’

‘Why, Cornelius, I haven’t seen you in ages!’

A dowager festooned in diamonds outflanked them slickly. ‘Mr Van Zale, I was just devastated to hear about your recent misfortune …’

The plump contralto stopped talking about
Tannhäuser
and pricked up her ears. Other people too turned to stare, but when I looked frantically for Sylvia I saw she was talking to her guest of honour, the French consul. Abandoning all hope of rescue I began to edge away from my pursuers.

In the far corner a girl was sitting quietly, a glass of orange juice on the little table beside her. Her face was averted from me as she gazed out of the window but I did notice that she was wearing a maternity dress. The one certainty of my present situation, I thought feverishly, was that a pregnant woman would make no attempt to seduce me.

‘Excuse me, please,’ I said to the vultures, ‘I’ve just seen someone I have to talk to.’ And showing them my back before they could argue with me I wove my way through the crowd to the far side of the room.

‘Good evening,’ I said to the girl. ‘I don’t believe we’ve met. My name is Cornelius Van Zale.’

She turned to look at me. Grey-green catlike eyes, cool and restless as some remote northern sea, sent a glance which flicked over me from head to toe. Pale lips parted for a second over small white even teeth as she smiled in acknowledgement. She wore no make-up and no jewellery and her black dress was so plain it was stark. She was beautiful.

‘No, we haven’t met,’ she said. ‘I’m Alicia Foxworth.’

‘May I join you, Mrs Foxworth?’

‘Please do, Mr Van Zale.’ She seemed to have no trouble with my name but it was impossible to tell whether the name was familiar to her or whether her hearing was perfect. She spoke in one of those bloodless Eastern accents which only the most expensive education can buy, and her conversation was conducted in a low hypnotic monotone.

‘Did you pick this corner because you wanted to escape from everyone?’ I asked, anxious that I might have been intruding.

‘No, but I can see you did. I’ve been watching your reflection in the glass.’