The Rich Are Different (22 page)

This was my fault, not Elizabeth’s. I was being too sensitive for, like Paul’s mother, Elizabeth had always approved of me, and even in the awkward early days of our acquaintance she had made it clear that she wished me well.

When Paul’s health deteriorated again after Jay Da Costa’s suicide it seemed only natural that I should once more turn to Elizabeth for advice.

‘I know it’s right that he should make another visit to Europe,’ I said, ‘but should I go with him or not? You know how I feel about Europe, Elizabeth! Of course I want to be with Paul, but maybe I should try not to be so selfish and let him go alone. I don’t want to spoil his trip, and maybe if I went along he wouldn’t be able to relax because he’d be afraid I wasn’t enjoying myself. What do you think?’

‘Let him go by himself,’ said Elizabeth. ‘I think he needs to be alone to sort himself out. The Salzedo affair coupled with Jay’s suicide has been a severe drain on him.’

I accepted the advice of the oracle thankfully, and for at least three months congratulated myself that I had made the right decision. Paul
became involved with European politics at the Genoa Conference, he reorganized the office of Da Costa, Van Zale in London and he wrote spirited happy letters home to say how much he was enjoying himself. He even had this new mistress, a young English girl called Dinah Slade. Later I saw a photograph of her in the rotogravure section of the
Sunday Times
. I was surprised she was so plain, but when I heard she owned some ancient manor house in Norfolk I immediately understood Paul’s interest in her. Paul had a weakness for ancient manor houses. I could imagine him poking around Mallingham Hall with great enjoyment, and of course the fact that the lady of the manor was hospitable would have been an additional attraction to him.

When the affair showed no signs of wilting I did begin to wonder if I had been right in taking Elizabeth’s advice, but by then there was nothing I could do but wait for the inevitable end. I was certainly surprised he stayed so long with Miss Slade, but I knew Paul too well to be seriously alarmed. I wondered if she thought – as I had thought before her – that she could change him, and if I had not long since trained myself to feel no emotion on the subject of Paul’s women I might even have pitied her when in November he left her so abruptly to come home.

But I did not pity her. I was too busy being grateful that Paul always kept his word to a woman, no matter how brutal that word might be. I knew he would have said to Dinah Slade: ‘I can never marry you,’ just as he had written to me in July: ‘I give you my word that I shall return,’ and now I saw his honesty was unchanged. I had trusted him to keep his word; he had not failed me, and now all that mattered was that we were together again to resume the partnership which meant more to me than all the conventional marriages in the world.

[3]

We had no time alone together at first. Steve Sullivan arrived at the house soon after we had stepped into the hall and Paul immediately took him to the library. It was futile for me to speculate on the nature of the crisis which absorbed them. Paul never discussed his work with me and I had long since realized that the world of his bank at Number One, Willow Street, was a world I could neither enter nor share with him.

Later they left the house for a partners’ meeting downtown and Paul said he did not know what time he would be back.

‘Don’t delay dinner for me.’

‘As you wish. Don’t work too hard, darling.’

At least, I thought as I watched him go, he looked fit enough to cope with his work. I remembered how haggard he had been after Jay’s death, and shuddered. That had been a terrible time for Paul. Jay had somehow managed to involve the firm in a major scandal – I never fully understood the details of the Salzedo affair, but a regular loan had been used to finance a South American revolution with the result that everyone, from the White
House to the poorest American investor, had called for an explanation. I did not believe Jay had deliberately aligned himself with revolutionaries, but it was obvious he had been negligent and would have to resign. The fact that he had preferred suicide to resignation was the first hint I had that the balance of his mind had been disturbed by the disaster, and when I heard he had accused Paul of engineering the whole episode to disgrace him I knew he had taken leave of his senses. Paul never demeaned himself by repeating this accusation, but Jay’s sons had behaved outrageously at the funeral and had bandied the slander around as if it were gospel truth. Stewart and Greg Da Costa had always been wild. Jay had been too busy to spend as much time with them as a father should, and a succession of stepmothers, all barely older than they were, had hardly helped the situation.

If Dinah Slade had helped Paul forget Jay’s suicide I was going to be the last person to deplore her lengthy presence in his life. Finishing my dinner I glanced at my watch and wondered when he would be coming home from Willow Street.

It was eleven o’clock when I heard the automobile draw into the courtyard, and pulling aside the drapes of my boudoir I looked down as the Rolls-Royce halted by the steps. Paul sprang out with alacrity even before Wilson could open the door for him, but Peterson was slower and O’Reilly lagged behind in obvious weariness. When Paul was fit he exhausted all the people who worked for him.

Leaving the window I put my book aside, turned out the boudoir lights and retreated to the bedroom to brush my hair. I was still toying with the brush five minutes later when I heard Paul enter his room next door and start talking to his valet. I listened, my fingers curled tightly around the brush’s handle. Wardrobe doors opened and closed. Finally the valet left. There was a silence.

Remembering I had barely begun to give my hair its traditional hundred strokes I brushed so furiously that the hair crackled, but before I could count to ten Paul had opened the communicating door and was strolling across the threshold. He was wearing his favourite bath-robe – his ‘dressing-gown’, as he sometimes called it in the English fashion – and reeked of such casual elegance that I felt both too formal in my Parisian peignoir and too dishevelled with my hair still flying from the brush. I suddenly realized I was immensely nervous, and desire, resentment, anger and love were all twisted together in my mind in a heavy emotional knot.

‘I thought you’d gone off to Europe again,’ I said lightly, patting and smoothing my hair into place.

‘I’ve no doubt you did. It’s been a hard day.’

For me as well as for you, I thought but managed not to say the words aloud. ‘I do understand,’ I said instead to my hairbrush, ‘that there must have been so much to catch up with at the office.’

He sighed. He was lounging gracefully against the mantel of the fireplace and as I glanced at him in the mirror I saw him straighten the Dresden ornaments. ‘Do you think I wouldn’t rather have spent the time with you? However’ – his glance
met mine in the mirror and he gave me his brilliant smile – ‘tomorrow I shall make amends. Can you meet me for lunch? I’ll book our favourite table at the Ritz-Carlton in belated celebration of our anniversary and afterwards we’ll go to Tiffany’s to choose our presents.’

‘That would be nice,’ I said levelly. It was an event I had dreamed of during the months of our separation and I could not understand why I now felt so angry. I felt I was being unreasonable and I was just willing myself to smile at him as he deserved when he abandoned the fireplace to move closer to me.

‘Sylvia …’ He took a strand of my hair, and as he curled it around his finger I felt the gesture was symbolic of our relationship. My body became rigid with tension.

‘Do you want to be alone?’ he said at last.

Oh, how I wanted him! As I shook my head violently I tried without success to sort out my confused feelings but fortunately he understood me better than I understood myself. As my eyes filled with tears he drew a chair close to the vanity stool where I was sitting and prepared to take infinite trouble to set matters right.

Ironically this small evidence that he cared was enough to make me feel better, and even before he began to speak I had conquered the desire to cry.

‘My dearest, I hope I’m not so insensitive as to suppose I can come home five months late after you’ve been obliged to tolerate God knows what kind of gossip and expect you to fall willingly into bed with me with no questions asked, no reproaches given and no explanations either sought or received …’

He was giving me back a little dignity, allowing me to recover my self-respect. I fought against feeling grateful to him and lost. He was saying what I wanted to hear, and he was saying it with the charm which had overpowered stronger, angrier women than I. I allowed myself one last resentful thought: how clever he is! And then my resentment became admiration and my anger mellowed into amusement at his ingenuity. I felt quite recovered now, strong enough to grasp the dignity he was offering me and scoop up my self-respect. As I turned clear-eyed to face him he said with all the honesty I loved: ‘Ask what you want – say whatever you like. After all these months you should at least be entitled to freedom of speech.’

All I had wanted was his acknowledgement that I had a right to be angry and now that I had it I had little interest in asking the routine questions. However, since my new dignity obviously did not allow me to let him escape unscathed I did my best to assume the role of inquisitor.

‘Why did you stop writing in August after you went to Norfolk?’ I said at last.

‘Because I was ashamed,’ he said without a second’s hesitation. ‘Do you think I didn’t feel guilty about indulging myself with a lengthy European vacation when I should have been on my way back to America to join you at Bar Harbor?’

I fidgeted with my hairbrush. ‘What finally brought you back?’

A less
honest man would have said: ‘You.’ But Paul said: ‘I would have come back anyway, as you know, but my actual decision to return when I did was prompted by a business difficulty in New York. That was why I had to spend all my time away from you this evening. There was a matter which required my immediate attention.’

‘I suppose I guessed that when Steve insisted on coming with me to meet your ship.’ I fidgeted with the hairbrush again.

‘Go on,’ he said.

I did not know what to say. It was no use asking him why he had stayed so long in England. His obsession with Europe was a matter best not discussed since I could not understand it and he was incapable of giving me a rational explanation. Groping for a safer subject I remembered Dinah Slade with relief.

‘This girl,’ I said, ‘the girl you met there. It’s over?’

‘Of course.’

It was the answer I had expected and I felt sure he was telling the truth. I had filled up a few more seconds, but I was tired of my role of inquisitor and was about to tell him I had no further questions when he said unexpectedly:

‘I was attracted to her for what she represented to me. You know what a sentimental fool I am about Europe.’

I stared at him. At last my voice said: ‘She represented Europe to you?’

He saw his error. I had never seen Paul make such a slip before and part of me watched with detached interest as he bent all the power of his personality on redeeming it.

‘Well—’ He shrugged, smiled, made a careless gesture with his hands. ‘Forgive my poor choice of words but it’s been a long day. What I meant was that the world she lived in had enormous appeal for me. She had this old manor house – the hall was really a perfect example of medieval architecture complete with hammer-beamed ceiling … well, I won’t bore you with the details. I’d like to go back there one day but I doubt if I shall – in fact I doubt if I’ll go back to Europe for some time. I’ve too much to do in New York, and besides America does have certain attractions which Europe can’t offer.’ He smiled at me. His hand smoothed my hair and drifted to my shoulders but I did not lean against him.

‘Sylvia, there’s something I want to say—’

‘Yes?’ I turned to him at once, my heart beating more quickly.

His voice was low, little more than a whisper. ‘I was so sorry last June … your miscarriage …’

‘Oh Paul!’ In my agitation I rose to my feet. I was disappointed that he had not told me he loved me but at the same time I was moved by this unexpected reference to the baby. In the second after he spoke I told myself I was a fool to be disappointed because he had not told me a truth he was incapable of expressing in words, and that I should be grateful he was not angry about my third attempt to give him a child he had sworn he did not want.

‘I expect
you thought I didn’t care. But I did feel for you so very much. I’m sorry I could only write you that cold empty letter—’ He too had risen to his feet, and when I saw his distress was genuine I moved unquestioningly into his arms.

We kissed. He held me very tightly and at last I heard him say: ‘You of all women deserve a child. There’s no justice in this world, is there? None at all.’

Although the subject was a sad one I felt illogically happy that we should be so close.

‘“God moves in a mysterious way,”’ I quoted lightly, trying to steer the conversation away from past unhappiness by making him smile, no matter how wryly, at my deliberate choice of cliché.

I was successful. ‘Why, Sylvia!’ he said amused. ‘How Victorian!’ And then the expression of amusement faded from his face and his eyes became darker as if mirroring some intense inner pain.

‘Paul—’

‘It’s nothing.’

‘But—’

‘Don’t say anything else. I need you, Sylvia,’ he said, reaching for me blindly. ‘I want you very much, more than I’ve ever wanted you. Help me.’

I did not answer him in words. I simply drew his mouth against mine until finally, all anger forgotten and all passion fired, I shut my mind against the past and we went to bed.

[1]

When I awoke the next morning I stretched out my hand to touch him but he had gone. It was already half past seven and he would have left the bed an hour ago to swim in the pool before dressing for breakfast. In the hope of catching a glimpse of him before he left for the office I rang for my maid and had just put the finishing touches to my appearance when he swept into the room to look for me.