The White Marriage Read online

  ‘I am in a bit of difficulty, Mr Abel.’

  He returned to behind his desk and sat down, hands put together in a praying position.

  ‘I am very sorry to hear that, Mrs Fortescue.’

  Leandra knew this to be true. She knew that Mr Abel would be very sorry to hear of her difficulties. He had provided her, at every turn, with furniture both for Maydown, and her London address, always at hand, always seeming to understand just what she wanted, just what was needed. It had not been easy. Leandra knew that it had not been easy, because apart from anything else she had what he would call ‘the eye’, and nothing would go by her.

  ‘Besides Lady Mountbatten, and Queen Mary, I know of no one who has such an eye as you, Mrs Fortescue.’

  It was no empty compliment. Mr Abel was not one to flatter. He could spot a fake, whether it was a human being or a piece of furniture, from fifty yards. His predecessor had made a practice of passing off fakes to even the most discerning, but faking was not something of which Mr Abel was capable. He was not known as Able Abel for nothing.

  Leandra knew all this, and she appreciated it, but she also appreciated that Mr Abel was a businessman. He could not buy back the furniture he had sold her for the same price that she had given for it. It would be impossible. Nevertheless, she could not help hoping.

  ‘I wonder if it would be possible, without going to auction, for you to buy back some of the pieces that you found for me, which are presently at Maydown, Mr Abel?’

  ‘I will certainly make sure that the company offer for them, Mrs Fortescue. Which particular pieces have you in mind?’

  ‘There are the two matching gilt inlaid and marble-topped scagliola tables which you found for the end of the drawing room by the French windows, if you remember?’

  Mr Abel reached into the drawer of his desk and pulled out the relevant folder. He had heard the rumours of the Fortescues’ impending misfortune on the grapevine, and while, in common with the rest of the world, he could not stand Dilke Fortescue, he would do as much as possible to help his beautiful wife. Beautiful women should never be humiliated, and it was his rule to try to see that it never happened.

  ‘I have in front of me now the sketches we prepared for your drawing room, Mrs Fortescue, and I see where we placed the Italian marble-topped tables. Very elegant too, if I may say so. Most appealing to be able to look down the room and see them, and that extraordinary mirror that we were able to find for you – that too is most attractive.’

  ‘It is extraordinary, isn’t it?’

  Leandra stood up and went to his side of the desk to look at the specially prepared watercolours that had been done of the main rooms at Maydown. As she did so, her scent preceded her, and Mr Abel became aware, as every red-blooded man must, that her skirts were lined with silk, and her skin was a most beautiful hue. He quickly rang the bell under his desk.

  ‘Ah, Miss Jenkins,’ he said, careful to keep the relief out of his voice, ‘can you have a table brought to Mrs Fortescue, so that she may study the sketches in this file more closely?’

  He stood up, leaving Leandra to stay standing the other side of his desk. It was not unusual for patrician ladies in financial distress to proposition him; what was unusual was for him to feel even remotely tempted. Just at that moment he had actually felt that he might be tempted, which for a happily married man who always took care to go home at lunch-time was most distressing.

  ‘There we are,’ he said happily, as Miss Jenkins placed a slim table under the window for Leandra. ‘I must say,’ he went on, all of a sudden brought into a nostalgic mood as he gazed at the watercolours done by his men, ‘ours was a most happy association at Maydown, was it not, Mrs Fortescue? The sun always seemed to be shining during that year, really it did seem so.’

  Mr Abel instantly regretted what he had said, loose words that could after all be open to all sorts of interpretation, and indeed when he looked up and saw that Mrs Fortescue’s beautiful blue eyes were brimming with tears, he could have taken his paper knife from the top of his desk and cut out his tongue.

  ‘And shine again it shall, Mrs Fortescue,’ he said, looking away. ‘Shine again it shall.’

  From the offices of Messrs Abel & Beddows, Leandra took a taxi to Madame Charles. If there was one thing upon which she and Dilke were determined, it was that they should, in the next few weeks, be seen to be carrying on as usual. It was essential, for many reasons. The London flat may already have been plundered, but Maydown, having been secured by Dilke in the past week and placed in Leandra’s name, was, as yet, untouched by their disastrous downturn in fortune.

  ‘We must go to the Melburys, as always. We must be seen at all our usual haunts, just as if nothing has happened. In this way people will begin to doubt the rumours. After all, at present, only tradespeople are in the know. None of our friends is aware of what has happened, Dilke darling.’

  Leandra could hear her own voice lecturing poor Dilke, even as she stepped out of the taxi and down the steps to Madame Charles’s establishment. She could only hope that Dilke would keep up the pretence, at any rate until such time that she had married Gray off to the Little Puppy, when they found her. She knew that when they did find her she would be hard put not to wring her neck, but that, in the event, it would not be practical. What she did have to do would be to bring such pressure to bear on her that she would marry Gray at once, by special licence in Scotland, or on a boat, anywhere, just as long as they tied the knot, and Gray finally came into his thankfully vast inheritance.

  Once upstairs, with Madame Charles busily greeting her, and the familiar mirrored room ready and waiting, the heads of the old-fashioned felt models bearing all her new hats, Leandra was more than happy to forget about Gray and the tiresome Little Puppy.

  ‘You have so much elegance, Madame Fortescue. Only you can carry off such a cartwheel worn on the side of the head. Truly, it needs your height and your beauty. So many of my customers, they are short and stumpy comme des dachshunds, and we place this chapeau on them and they disappear, only the legs showing!’

  With her forefingers she imitated two legs moving over-swiftly across the room, at the same time making a vaguely musical running noise.

  The vendeuse, Madame Charles, and of course Leandra, all laughed. Very few women could wear hats in such an elegant and perfect manner as Mrs Leandra Fortescue, the famous beauty now standing in the small room that acted as a salon.

  Leandra stared at herself in the mirror, reassured. She was still beautiful, she was still the beautiful Leandra Fortescue; she had known misfortune before, she would carry the day, and the night, no matter what.

  The hat for the York races having been duly admired, it was time to remove it, wrap it in tissue paper, place it in its perfectly sculpted, gold-embossed box, and turn to the next item on the list.

  ‘With the John Cavanagh wedding for Wednesday of that following week, if you remember, madame, we chose this large wavy-line hat.’

  Leandra stared at herself. Madame Charles had lined the inside of the hat with the identical yellow silk of the dress. All at once she knew she would look stunning. She would be photographed by everyone, as she so often had been. Nothing would change. No matter the temporarily annoying business of Dilke’s misfortunes, life, her life, would go on as it had always done.

  ‘And now we have the cartwheel, to be worn absolutely centre, which will carry you through from the luncheon to the cocktail party, and dinner. This is to be worn with the Dior. I love the Dior you have chosen, Madame Fortescue; I love the two tiers he has created for the dress. Such a beautiful idea, it seems to me, to put the camisole dress, and then to top it with the long tunic top, so flattering, and with this hat, I think you will be the toast of the day, as always, madame.’

  Once again Leandra stared at herself. It was wonderful to look so beautiful. It made her once more believe in the fitness of things, forget the humiliation of the contents of the London flat disappearing, almost before her eyes, forget the lo
oks in the creditors’ eyes, the glee in that of their bank manager. How people like that loved to see people like them humiliated. Dilke had always said that bank people were chosen most especially for their chips. They loved to take possession of the houses of the rich, destroy their luxurious, easy way of life, which they saw as being an insult to themselves, not something to aim for nor indeed something beautiful which added to the value of civilised life, but something, once thankfully destroyed, which they could happily forget, reminding them, as it must, of their own failure, their own lack of taste.

  ‘You have made me look more than I am, more than I could possibly hope for, as always.’

  Leandra’s glove passed lightly over Madame Charles’s surprisingly careworn hand, for if her face portrayed her well-fed life, her enjoyment in her art, her love of and ease with the fashionable world, her hands betrayed a youth spent in long hours sewing.

  ‘I am content that you are happy with what we have done, madame. We love all our customers, do we not?’ she added, turning to her vendeuse. ‘But most of all we love the so-beautiful Madame Fortescue.’

  They walked together across the room, laughing and talking. Madame Charles stopped by the window, looking out, as she always did for her customers, to see what the weather might be like.

  It was not an entirely altruistic habit, for the truth was, since her customers often insisted on wearing her hats as they left her premises, she could never bear to see the brand-new creations rained upon.

  ‘Tiens, the sky is clouding over. We will call a taxi for you, madame.’

  ‘No, really, I have an umbrella. I can find a cab outside.’

  ‘You can find one, but you must not. Enfin, with so many boxes, no. I will not allow it. All might be ruined if you are caught in the rain.’

  Leandra stood by the window, her expression tolerant, her mood mildly irritated. She loved Madame Charles, but really – the sun was still shining, hardly a cloud in the sky – what was she fussing about?

  She stared out into the square, thinking of Gray and wondering if they could meet up for a perfectly delicious cinq-à-sept in his apartment. Or whether the fear of his father’s arriving from the country might prevent such a meeting? The truth was that the further her fortunes had fallen, the more she longed for him.

  She watched a couple crossing the square, arm in arm. He was tall and handsome, very correctly dressed, so he must be on his way back to his job. She, on the other hand, was more simply attired; plain dress, hair flowing, the sleeves of her cardigan rolled up. They stopped once they had crossed the road, and she stood looking up at him, both of them laughing and talking, until she reached up and kissed him chastely on the cheek. But it was a kiss that could fool no one. It was a kiss of a girl in love, and the girl was the Little Puppy.

  ‘Got you!’ The two vulgar words making up the whole cinematic vulgarism flashed into Leandra’s sophisticated mind, astonishing her, repelling her, and at the same time determining her.

  ‘Madame? Madame?’

  Madame Charles looked round for Leandra, but she had gone, carrying the string of the hat boxes in pairs twisted over her suede-gloved fingers.

  Once below, Leandra blocked the doorway just as Sunny stepped down into it.

  ‘Sunny!’

  Sunny paused. She paled, and then she recovered. The last person she had wanted to see just at that moment was Leandra Fortescue.

  ‘My dear, I didn’t know you were – in London?’

  Sunny gave a lopsided smile. She knew it was lopsided because she saw that Leandra could not only sense her embarrassment at seeing her, but see it.

  ‘Oh, am I?’ she joked.

  Leandra laughed, lightly and beautifully. She knew it was a light and beautiful laugh because she could hear it quite clearly. It was as if it did not come from her; not a top C of a laugh, a modulated laugh, perfectly pitched.

  ‘How long have you been in London, Sunny?’

  ‘Oh, just a little bit. I am working here in the sewing room. You know, earning enough to pay for my rent, and a meal or two. I can’t imagine what my mother will think. She always said I would never make a seamstress, that I haven’t the patience, but Madame Charles hasn’t complained so far, so I can’t be that bad.’

  ‘I am sure you are quite brilliant,’ Leandra replied smoothly. ‘But my dear, Gray is looking for you. Don’t you know that? He is desolated that you have disappeared from his life, albeit temporarily, of course.’

  It was because she sounded so smooth, so affable, so completely at ease with the idea that Gray’s fiancée was to be found in Madame Charles’s sewing room that all at once Sunny knew, for certain, that somehow Leandra knew about herself and Hart. She didn’t know how she knew, she just knew.

  ‘Yes, of course, I was going to get in touch with him, once I had settled down here in London. I was going to surprise him, actually,’ she lied.

  ‘He is longing to see you, my dear,’ Leandra told her, leaning forward and speaking in a lowered confidential manner. ‘He is falling in love with you, you know. I am sure of it.’

  Sunny was silenced. The truth was that having spent the last few days with Hart, doing nothing more sophisticated than travelling to work together, and meeting for lunch, and having supper with all the gang in the basement, she had quite forgotten Gray. Well, at least, she hadn’t actually forgotten Gray, but she had forgotten that she was meant to be engaged to him, and that being so, it was now rather a shock to hear that he was falling in love with her, because that was not what she had understood would happen.

  Seeing the confusion on Sunny’s face, Leandra’s suspicions were now confirmed. Sunny must have forgotten that she was meant to be engaged to Gray.

  ‘I must have your address, my dear.’

  Sunny went to tell her and then stopped.

  ‘I don’t have one at the moment, Mrs Fortescue. I just work here, and then I sleep – on people’s floors.’

  She had no idea why she had said something so ludicrous.

  ‘In that case you must stop sleeping on people’s floors,’ Leandra replied smoothly. ‘At least tell me which floor you will be sleeping on tonight?’

  ‘I don’t know yet, Mrs Fortescue.’

  Leandra smiled, and touched her lightly on the cheek, at her most beguiling. ‘You must know that Gray is waiting for you. Please get in touch with him, Sunny. You can imagine, for a man like him, it is not easy to be hurt.’

  Sunny felt terrible, as she was meant to do.

  ‘I really must go back to work,’ she said, turning towards the door. ‘Madame Charles has been so kind, I really must go back to work.’

  ‘Of course, of course.’

  Leandra leaned forward once again, but this time she kissed Sunny lightly on the cheek. ‘I know you will not let poor Gray down.’

  ‘“And shall Trelawny die?”’

  ‘What did you say?’

  ‘Oh, sorry, Mrs Fortescue.’ Sunny paused. ‘It’s just something that my father always says, but I’m afraid I don’t really know what it means, truly I don’t. It is just something that he always says if he’s – um, feeling—’ she was just about to say ‘cornered’. And then realising it would sound far too reflective of her own feelings, she stopped, and quickly changed. ‘When he can’t think of what to say next, he always says that, if there is a pause. “And shall Trelawny die?”’

  Sunny thought of Rushington and her father, of Clem Arkwright, and the village green, of the flowers and the trees, the calmness of it all, while Leandra remembered John Chantry murmuring just that phrase when he had come to luncheon with her at Maydown.

  Leandra smiled. ‘My dear, I can’t wait to tell Gray the good news that we have all found each other again. He will be overjoyed, truly he will.’

  She waved a taxi down, and stepped into it, the driver putting the hat boxes in front of her.

  Sunny turned towards Madame Charles’s premises. She did not know why, but even as she waved goodbye to Leandra, she had a feeling of
foreboding.

  Up in the workroom she settled down to her sewing with some relief. The feathers that she was using were specially dyed for Madame Charles in Paris. They were so beautiful, and so special that they arrived wrapped in several layers, from velvet cloths to black tissue paper.

  She fully expected the talk around her to be, as always, of who had given birth, who was about to give birth, and who was about to get married, and who would presumably, in nine months’ time, be also giving birth, but for once fecundity seemed to have run into a blank wall, and the conversation turned to the winter Season, and who would be wearing what, and who was going to be seen in what, and the rival attractions of the new British designers as against the older more established French designers. It also, inevitably turned from there to the stars of the day, to women like Lady Docker and Mrs Leandra Fortescue, well known for either their extreme wealth or their fabulous looks, or both.

  Sunny bent to her work, listening, always listening. For obvious reasons the talk had become a great deal more interesting to her, moving on from lactation to proper gossip, to innuendo and rumour.

  ‘Madame Fortescue, she—’

  No one in the room would know that Sunny knew Madame Fortescue, and of course she would be the last to tell them, for a great many reasons, most of all, because it might stop them from being indiscreet.

  With increasing fury Leandra realised that the taxi driver was taking the longest route to her flat.

  ‘Stop here, please!’ she called to him, but not because of his silly cheating ways.

  The taxi stopped, and the driver turned back to Leandra, his old walnut face attempting surprise. Rich ladies carrying shopping bags, hat boxes, bags from Aspreys in Bond Street did not usually mind him putting a few pennies on the clock, taking what was known in the trade as the ‘scenic route’.

  ‘Wait here, please!’

  Somehow the ‘please’ at the end of her commands did nothing to ameliorate the imperious tone of his passenger, but the driver, mindful only of a large tip, did as she ordered, and stopped.

  ‘I have your number so don’t drive off with my hats, will you, please?’