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  The dining room had the mellow light of a few lamps and the dinner candles. They sat at either end of the dinner table, the way that Gerald liked it, and Ashby the butler came round to serve them in the way he had served the gentlemen of the Travellers Club on Pall Mall. It was this record of excellence that had made Gerald hire him. Although Gerald hadn’t managed to be put up for any of the most exclusive clubs yet, he had hopes that he might one day be a member. Until then, having Ashby put chops in front of him the way they had been put in front of lords, bishops, MPs and any number of other grand people made him very pleased indeed.

  ‘How is that sister of yours?’ he said as they started on their vichyssoise.

  ‘Which one? Is there any more wine, please, Ashby?’

  ‘Oh. Jemima, of course.’ Gerald spooned some soup into his mouth.

  ‘Of course. She’s fine. The same as she was yesterday, I suppose.’ Gerald had a mild obsession with Jemima that Tara found irritating. Any other wife might worry that her husband was entranced – and why not? Jemima was a beautiful woman who gave out an extraordinary buzz of active sexuality, even Tara could see that. But she was fairly sure that it wasn’t Jemima’s curves, long legs or honey-blonde hair that interested Gerald. In fact, it wasn’t even Jemima herself. Gerald loved the fact that Jemima was a proper lady, married to a proper lord, and he was always trying to get closer to Jemima in the hopes of sucking up to Harry. He could never really understand why Harry didn’t seem to want anything to do with him. His greatest desire was to be invited to Herne on one of Harry’s shooting weekends, but it seemed very unlikely to happen.

  When they were first married, Tara had been quite blind to Gerald’s monumental social climbing. She hadn’t seen his pompous side at all. Instead he had seemed warm and caring, and had enveloped her like a great blanket, making her feel cosy and secure. He had also taught her to enjoy sex in a way that had been entirely new to her. None of her previous boyfriends had been able to arouse her very much at all, she had always felt far too painfully self-conscious. She longed to be voluptuous and naturally sexy, like Jemima, instead of thin and boney, and had never been able to relax enough to get much satisfaction from the whole thing. It had been enough, she hoped, to lie back and let it happen, and the boys didn’t seem to mind it that way. Gerald, though, had been a whole different story. He wasn’t happy unless he had raised her to heights of enjoyment she had never known existed. Once he had made it clear to her that he couldn’t be satisfied unless she was, and that seeing her in ecstasy gave him the wildest pleasure of all, she was finally able to feel liberated in the bedroom.

  Watching him slurp up his soup now, his cheeks flushed from the whisky or three he had enjoyed in his study, his hair brushed forward over his bald patch, she could hardly believe that he was the same man who had sent her into such wild delight. It didn’t happen much these days.

  I can’t really blame him, she thought. I’m exhausted most of the time. And he works so hard as well. No wonder neither of us is ever in the mood. Yes, that’s it. We’re just never in the mood.

  She didn’t want to look at the darker truth that lurked below the surface.

  10

  MEET ME AT the Ritz, 3 p.m. for emergency meeting read Tara’s text message.

  Standing in the entrance of her Eaton Square mansion block, Jemima jammed her dark glasses on then made her way quickly down the front steps, her head bowed. She’d learned various tricks for avoiding any paparazzi who happened to be around, and one was to present a very dull picture: show hardly any face, have a neutral expression, give nothing of any interest. She’d heard that Madonna reduced the value of her unwanted paparazzi pictures at a stroke by cleverly wearing the same outfit all the time: a very unglamorous tracksuit, shades and a cap. The result was that she was often left in peace as she went about her daily life as endlessly identical photographs were worth very little.

  Jemima didn’t think she could quite manage the tracksuit routine, but then, she didn’t suffer to quite the same extent. The pursuit had been terrible a few years ago when she’d been going out with a very famous and very druggy rock star. She hadn’t been able to go anywhere without a posse of photographers trailing her every move. They printed pictures of her wherever she went, from Glastonbury, where she watched her lover and his band on stage while wearing ripped-off blue denim dungarees over a tight pink T-shirt and turquoise lace-up wellington boots, to high-octane society occasions. She was pictured looking elegant in white Ralph Lauren and a classic Lock of Saint James’s straw hat at Ascot, or in a Donna Karan little black dress and black cashmere wrap, leaving Le Caprice or the Wolseley. Her fashion sense was hailed in dozens of magazines, her luxurious life envied and pored over. If she and Billy walked down the street together, it was always with a pack of photographers backing away from them, snapping and shouting, and the next day they’d be plastered over the papers and gossip mags.

  Will she take Cocaine Billy to Royal Wedding? screamed the tabloids when they discovered she’d been invited to the same nuptials as Prince William. She didn’t take Billy – they were already on the verge of breaking up. Jemima had never been one for drugs; she’d done her fair share of experimentation and still enjoyed dabbling from time to time – plenty of Kensington, Belgravia and Notting Hill dinner parties ended up with crystal bowls of white powder being passed round after the main course instead of pudding – but luckily for her, she had avoided being sucked in. Watching Billy’s raging coke habit spiral out of control, she saw all too clearly how quickly the enjoyment of a party buzz could turn into a dangerous obsession. For a while, she didn’t want to do any drugs at all and once that happened, there was no future for her and her famous boyfriend, who was so deeply into drugs, moving from cocaine to crack and heroin, that it was becoming apparent he would probably never escape his addiction before it destroyed him. Even so, it was he who dumped Jemima.

  ‘No offence, love, cos you’re a fackin’ great bird, yeah? It’s just that you’re a bit fackin’ borin’ these days. And I was born to party, yeah?’ Billy had slurred.

  ‘OK, Billy,’ Jemima said, hiding her relief. She patted his hand. ‘You take care, all right? And you know where to find me if you ever need any help.’

  ‘Help?’ Billy stared at her with his hugely over-dilated pupils. ‘What kind of help? You mean, if I need to score?’

  ‘Oh, no, darling. Quite the opposite.’

  Billy looked blank, as he did so often. Jemima kissed the top of his head and left, hoping that he might somehow elude the clutches of the early death that she feared must await him.

  She’d assumed that once she and Billy had broken up, the press would lose interest in her. They did, to an extent. She no longer had to face packs of press photographers wherever she went, but the interest was still there, flaring up whenever she was spotted at some society gala, charity fundraiser or fashion show, looking stunning and fabulously well groomed. Every now and then, she would hear the whirr of the shutter or see a battery of flashes in the darkness and know that she’d been papped. The next day, she’d see her image on a gossip website or a tabloid page, always describing her as Billy’s ex and heiress to the Trevellyan millions.

  Her marriage, called the society event of the season, had reawakened the press attention and turned into a media scrum. From the moment the engagement was announced, the media worked itself into a tizzy about the beautiful heiress and the lord who lived in a castle – it was too good a fairy story to miss.

  Ironically, she met Harry at the very wedding that the press had been so interested in, when they’d assumed she would be taking Billy. Something about him had attracted her at once. Perhaps it was because he was different to the louche, monied crowd she’d been hanging about with for too long. He arrived looking formal and proper in a morning coat, unlike so many other guests who’d taken to disregarding the dress code and turning up in whatever took their fancy: bottle-green velvet lounge suits, pinstriped numbers with open-necked shirts, even
jeans. Harry stood out, handsome in his exquisitely cut coat and dark charcoal striped trousers, the sober grey tones brightened by his jewel-coloured embroidered waistcoat. He was tall and fair with piercing blue eyes and an air of robust good health that only comes from hours striding outdoors in the countryside. There was also the unmistakeable set of stubbornness about his chin. He evidently knew his own mind.

  All through the wedding, Jemima had been aware of him, watching him from the corner of her eye even when she’d been holding court at her table, surrounded by the all usual hangers-on and a few new ones, mostly red-faced old duffers who’d had a couple of glasses of champagne and fancied chatting up that gorgeous young thing they’d read about in the papers.

  Harry wasn’t like that. He didn’t seem the least bit interested in her, which only served to fuel her curiosity. Did he have a girlfriend? She couldn’t see him with anybody. Was he gay? She didn’t think so. Men like him weren’t gay, in her experience, though there was always a chance she was wrong. He was sitting at a nearby table, and during the speeches she watched him carefully. His serious face suddenly lit up with laughter when the best man cracked a joke, and she loved the way it transformed him. Then and there she made up her mind to have him.

  It was much later, on the dance floor, that they got close to each other. Close up, she was overwhelmed by his masculinity. Most of her friends were fey: skinny artists or boys who took too many drugs to be hungry. The ones who were most well built tended to be gay guys who went to the gym to work lovingly on their six pack and biceps. Very few of her straight male friends were like this: he towered over her, solid and muscular, and she loved how vulnerable and feminine that made her feel. Knowing what she now knew of Harry, it was pretty amazing that she’d managed to score with him. But by dint of Herculean flirting, at one in the morning, they were standing behind the marquee, its white walls dotted with blue, yellow and red from the lights, the boom of the discotheque pounding round them, snogging as fiercely as teenagers. Harry tasted so damn sweet – she’d never forgotten it. Perhaps she was too used to kissing guys who’d just smoked a packet of cigarettes, downed a bottle of Jack Daniel’s and put away a few tabs of this or that, but Harry seemed so fresh and clean. It was delicious, just kissing away, feeling her stomach swoop over with lust.

  She’d expected him to come back to the hotel with her that night but, as dawn rose over the big house where the wedding was held, he kissed her hand, took her phone number, murmured goodbye into her ear and saw her safely off in a taxi.

  ‘Hey, Jemima, you scored last night!’ crowed one of her friends who’d been at the wedding and who called as soon as was decent the next day.

  ‘I know. He’s rather hunky, isn’t he? I never knew I could fancy a blond. I mean, Billy had blond streaks, but you know … all dyed. But this chap was so deliciously old-fashioned, you just wouldn’t believe it!’ Jemima rolled about in her hotel bed, thrilled by the memory of her kissing session the night before.

  ‘Yes, but …! I have to say congratulations, darling.’

  ‘Really? Why?’ Jemima sat up, pulling the sheet about her chest. She was more used to people being congratulated for getting off with her, rather than the other way round.

  ‘Don’t you know who that was?’

  ‘His name’s Harry.’

  ‘Yeah, Harry Calthorpe.’

  ‘So? I’ve never heard of him. Who is he?’

  Her friend laughed. ‘He’s Viscount Calthorpe. He owns a fuck-off great castle in Dorset, darling! He’s the real thing. Eton, Oxford, running the estate – he’s one hundred per cent genuine aristocracy. You’ve only gone and bagged a lord! God, Cressida will be bloody green, her mother’s had him earmarked for her since birth. But he’s so hard to get at because he never goes to anything, he’s a complete recluse. Hates parties. Hardly ever comes to London and when he does, he locks himself away at Whites where no girls can get at him. He hasn’t been out with anyone since he broke up with Meredith Buckley-Squire at the Caledonian Ball five years ago. So, well done, Jemima. We were all beginning to think no one would manage to snare Harry Calthorpe.’

  ‘Oh.’ Jemima frowned and twirled her finger in the rumpled quilt.

  ‘Well – aren’t you pleased?’

  ‘I don’t know. I don’t care either way, to be honest.’

  When the call was finished, Jemima lay back down and stared up the ceiling. So her mysterious paramour was a lord. She’d met plenty of braying boys in her time and not cared much for them. But after a while, most of them had disappeared into corporate City life, and out of her glitzy, artistic, beautiful-people orbit. Of course she met various titled people at the society bashes she went to – Tatler’s Little Black Book party, at which she was a star guest, was full of them – but she was sure enough of her own importance not to need the social boost of being associated with some Lord this, or the Earl of that.

  Of course, after the wedding, Harry didn’t call for ages. It was not at all what Jemima was used to. She was quite tempted to track him down and make the first move herself, but something told her that it wasn’t the best way to handle someone like Harry. She had the feeling that if she tried to pursue him, he would freeze and vanish, like a hunted fox. So, for once, she had to be patient. When he finally called, it was to invite her out for dinner.

  ‘I thought we’d go to Rules,’ he said, ‘my father’s favourite restaurant.’

  Jemima, who dined out almost every night, had never been there but she had a sneaking feeling of what to expect and, sure enough, Rules turned out to be an extremely traditional restaurant where the waiters wore black tie and every table groaned with stark linen, heavy silver and wine glasses engraved with the restaurant’s name. The walls were ornamented with hunting prints and antlers, some with old tweed hats hanging off them. The menu was classic – lobster bisque, oysters, ribs of beef, game, and old-fashioned rib-sticking puddings.

  ‘Is this your favourite too? As well as your father’s, I mean,’ she asked, looking round at the other diners, who appeared to be either tourists or old chaps. Her Prada dress, vertiginous heels and highly groomed appearance looked very exotic here – it was not at all what she was used to. The restaurants she went to had the paparazzi outside, not the hoi polloi inside.

  ‘Well,’ said Harry, smiling, ‘perhaps it’s seen better days. My pa used to love it here but that was a while ago now. He was a big Graham Greene fan, and apparently one of the novels has a scene or two here, so don’t be surprised if you see some bookish types staring about. Food looks good, though.’ He looked worried. ‘Don’t you like it? We can go somewhere else if you’d rather.’

  ‘Don’t be silly, it’s lovely. Of course we should stay.’ Jemima leaned over towards him, raising an eyebrow flirtatiously over the top of her menu. ‘On one condition. Afterwards, we go to one of my favourite hang-outs. Deal?’

  ‘Deal. As long as it’s not too racy.’

  ‘You’ve already said deal so you can’t back out now. Don’t worry, I’m not going to frighten you.’

  Two hours later, full of roast beef and sticky toffee pudding, they arrived at Annabel’s, the Berkeley Square nightclub.

  ‘Oh,’ Harry said, obviously relieved. ‘This is all right. My old man used to come here as well.’

  ‘Yes – but that was then, and this is now. Annabel’s is so wonderfully private. We can have fun in peace.’ Jemima grinned at him.

  So they went in to dance and drink and talk cosily in a discreet corner. Harry was recognised by some old school friends who could scarcely believe that they had just seen Harry Calthorpe dancing in Annabel’s with a beautiful society girl. Then, when the night was over, he saw her into a taxi home, just as he had after the wedding, courteously refusing her purred invitation to come back to Eaton Square with her.

  My God, she’d thought in the taxi on the way home, high on champagne and that curious mix of hormones that fizz through someone who might be about to fall in love, he’s playing hard to get!
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  She was fascinated by him – by his impeccable manners, his peaceful life, his attitude towards the things that so absorbed her. He was completely uninterested in London life and parties and who was who, who was sleeping with whom, who was richer than whom, where the perfect holiday destination was this year, who had been invited out to so-and-so’s private island. It washed over him. As Jemima told her friends, ‘Darling, he simply doesn’t give a shit.’

  Everyone loved the romance of it: the beautiful party-loving girl and the old-fashioned lord who would prefer to wade thigh-deep in an icy river and fish than to go to the most exclusive parties or the grandest society events.

  ‘You’ll change him, Jemima,’ they told her. ‘What an amazing couple you’ll make!’ And she believed them. That was the trouble.

  It had all seemed so perfect; even the first time they slept together had been a whole new experience for Jemima. Because Harry hadn’t leapt into bed with her at the first opportunity, as every other man she’d met had, she’d assumed he was inexperienced and probably a rather clumsy lover, but she’d remained hopeful.

  They’d been seeing each other for about six weeks when, at the end of an intimate evening in a small but delicious restaurant near her flat, he’d leaned across the table, taken her hand and said quietly, ‘How about if we have our coffee back at your place?’

  Her stomach had somersaulted. At once she felt nervous, self-conscious and deliciously excited. ‘Yes … yes please,’ she said, stuttering a little.

  ‘Good.’ With a discreet gesture, he summoned the bill, paid it and the next minute they were walking together in the cool Belgravia night, strolling to her flat and to the moment she’d been waiting for. She could hardly speak as they went back, his large hand holding her small one.