Deceptions (2 page)

'I don't want to go to Athens,' Stephanie wailed. 'I like Madrid. I like my friends. And we were going to get the best sixth-grade teacher in the school!'

'You'll make new friends in Athens,' her mother said calmly. 'The American school will have good teachers. And Athens is full of wonderful things.'

'Athens is full of ruins,' Sabrina grumbled.

'Which we will explore,' said her mother, fitting the wrapped vase in a carton and stuffing crumpled newspapers around it. 'I'm sorry, girls, I know you don't like it, but we don't either. It's just something we have to—'

'Daddy likes it,' Sabrina said stubbornly. 'Every time we move he gets more puffed up and important.'

'That's enough, Sabrina,' her mother said sharply. 'The two of you go upstairs and start sorting your clothes and books. You know how.'

'We've had enough practice,' Sabrina muttered to Stephanie as they went upstairs.

In fact, she was already beginning to be excited about Athens, but she couldn't admit it because Stephanie was so

miserable. Stephanie wanted to stay in one house and one school with one set of friends for years and years; she hated it when things kept changing around her.

But even if Sabrina was silent, Stephanie knew how she felt; they almost always knew what the other was thinking. 'I get excited by new things, too,' Stephanie said, throwing sweaters onto the bed. 'But wouldn't it be wonderful to have a real home for awhile?'

*I don't know,' Sabrina said honestly. 'Since we've never had one.'

She didn't think the rented houses had been so bad; Mother would walk in like a magician and make them beautiful and comfortable and soon they could hardly remember their old house. And that was exactly what happened when they moved to Athens in August. In a two-story white house that sparkled in the sun, with a garden and separate rooms for Sabrina and Stephanie, Mother filled the rooms with their furniture and rugs, putting everything in just the right places. Then, while their father went to the embassy to meet the staff and move into his new office, the three of them were driven in a limousine around Athens and its suburbs.

As they drove, the city crept through the windows of the car, making Sabrina quiver with anticipation. Everything was spread out, waiting to be discovered: strange smells and sights and sounds, new words to be learned and new songs to sing, folk tales to hear from the servants their mother would hire, new friends to trade stories with. She could hardly wait.

But Stephanie's unhappiness kept her quiet and even made her excitement fade away. She drooped and picked at her dinner their first week in Athens, just as Stephanie did, until their father put down his fork with a clatter, saying, 'I have had enough of this. Laura, I thought you talked to them.'

She nodded. 'I did, Gordon. Several times.'

'Evidently not enough.' He turned to face them. 'We're going to get a lecture,' Sabrina whispered to Stephanie. 'I will explain this one more time," Gordon began. 'Our State Department rotates members of the diplomatic service to a new post every two years. We do not question that policy. Do you understand?'

'It's stupid,' Sabrina said. 'You're always starting over and then you can't do a good job.'

'I hardly think,' her father said diyly, 'that an eleven-year-old girl is in a position to pronounce the US State Department "stupid". Or to say that her father cannot do a good job. I've told you before that rotation prevents our getting personally involved in the affairs of other countries. Our first loyalty must always be to America.' He looked seriously at Sabrina and Stephanie. 'I might add that it is good for you, too. How else would you get to know so many countries?'

'You mean,' said Sabrina. as seriously as her father, 'it's good for your career, so we'd better decide it's good for us, too.'

'Sabrina!' Laura snapped, and held Sabrina's eyts with her own until Sabrina looked away.

'I'm sorry,'she said.

Laura picked up her wine glass. 'Tell us about your new school. You too, Stephanie. No more pouting.'

As Sabrina obediently described their maths and science teachers and Stephanie listed the books they would read in literature and history, Laura watched them, frowning. They were becoming difficult to control. She was proud of them - her vibrant, spirited daughters, already beautiful and quick-witted - but too often they were also impudent and secretive, banding together in their struggle for independence. She had no idea what was the best way to handle them.

The problem was, she didn't have time. Her time belonged to the diplomatic career of Gordon Hartwell. She had vowed silently at their wedding to push him and help him until he became an ambassador, perhaps even Secretary of State, and nothing in the years that followed had stopped her, not even the unplanned birth of twin girls.

She was Gordon's partner, taking his place at meetings and receptions he was too busy or bored to attend; being at his side night after night at intimate dinners, banquets, tours for American senators, and entertaining American businessmen; and sitting with him in his study when he was thinking out loud to solve a problem.

He needed her. Once he had been poor and anonymous, a

history professor in a small college in Maine. She had brought him her beauty and style, which added to his prestige, and also her wealth and sophistication, which eased him into the presence of the rich and powerful. Even now, when he had developed the smooth skills of a polished diplomat and had forged his own reputation as an expert on European cultural and political agreements, he needed her. They still had a long way to go, and he knew she would not let anything stop them.

Nothing ever stopped Laura when she made up her mind. She managed Gordon's career, their nomadic hfe in Europe, their social life and her daughters' upbringing. She concentrated on Gordon, but she made sure that competent servants cared for Sabrina and Stephanie and whenever possible took a few hours to guide their growing up herself.

From the first, she insisted they be brought up as separate individuals. Why should they be peas in a pod simply because they were identical twins? So their bedrooms were furnished in different styles, they dressed differently from each other and were given different presents to help them develop separate interests.

And once again Laura got what she wanted: her girls were different. She thought Sabrina was most hke her, always eager to tackle the unknown, while Stephanie resembled Gordon: calmer and more cautious. Gordon saw that, too, and though he didn't spend much time with them, when he did it was Stephanie who got most of his attention while Sabrina watched with dark, somber eyes.

But they were not quite as different as Laura liked to beheve. Even she could not deny that their minds worked together, often in startling ways, and the instinctive bond between them was so strong she knew no one could break it unless they did it themselves.

But that made their restlessness even more difficult to handle: two adolescents, not one, pushing for independence.

'Why can't we explore the city by ourselves?* Sabrina asked. 'We've hardly seen any of it.'

'You've had those school field trips,' Laura said. She was

brushing her hair at her dressing table and red glints flashed in the mirror.

'Ugh.' Sabrina made a face. 'We've seen every statue and church between here and heaven, but in a whole year we haven't met one real live person except at school - and they're Americans! Just let us go for a httle walk. Just around the embassy. We never get to do anything!'

'No,' Gordon said. He was adjusting his black tie at the triple mirror. They were going to dinner at the king's palace.

'Why not?' Sabrina wailed.

*Sabrina,' Gordon said sharply. 'Keep your voice down.'

Stephanie stood beside her father. 'Why not, Daddy?'

'Because there are dangers,' he said, ruffling her hair. 'For young girls, and especially for American girls whose father is a member of the embassy.'

'What kind of dangers?' asked Sabrina. 'Mother goes out alone; she's a girl and she's related to you. Is she in danger? Why can't—?'

'Sabrina!' Gordon warned again. 'If I tell you there are dangers, you will trust my word. I can tolerate the refusal of the premier of Greece to take my word for something, but I will not tolerate it in my daughter.'

'But what can we do around here?' Sabrina ignored Stephanie's cautioning hand on her arm. 'You go out and leave us stuck with the servants, you get to see Athens and meet people and have fim ... Everybody gets to be with you but us!'

Laura fastened jeweled combs in her hair. 'We do spend time together—'

'We don't!' Sabrina burst out. 'Mostly it's just when you're showing us off to old people from America!' Before Laura could make an angiy response, Stephanie drew her anention away.

'Most of the time you're with Daddy or doing your own shopping. And Daddy's always working. Other families aren't like that. They have weekends together and they eat together and have a real family.'

'The only family we have is us,' Sabrina finished. 'Stephanie and me - we're our whole family!'

•Silence, both of you!' Filling his pipe, Gordon spoke to their reflections in the mirror. 'Some professions take the cooperation of a whole family. We work for our country. It would be selfish to think of ourselves first.'

'You think of getting promoted,' Sabrina flashed, and then shrank back firom her father's look.

'You know nothing about what I think and you will not comment on it here or anywhere else. Is that clear?'

Sabrina met her father's look. 'If you talked to the Russians like you talk to us we'd have a war.'

Laura stifled a laugh. Gordon flung down his tobacco pouch and Sabrina watched the shreds of tobacco fall like skinny worms all over the rug. 'Leave the room,* her father said.

'Just a minute, Gordon.' Laura stood, tall and magnificent in black silk and long white strands of pearls. Sabrina hated her for being so beautifiil and distant, and at the same time she wanted to crawl into her arms and be loved. But the only person who ever hugged her was Stephanie. Sabrina wondered if her parents ever hugged and kissed. Probably not. They'd wrinkle their beautiful clothes. But then her mother surprised her. 'The girls do need more attention,' she said. 'I'm going to take them on some of my shopping expeditions.'

'Oh—!' cried Stephanie.

But Gordon shook his head. 'I think not.'

Laura sighed deeply. 'Gordon, I am doing the best I can. I know you don't approve of the places I go, but I assure you they are simple working-class neighborhoods, not dens of terrorists. And I have to go there to find the best buys.'

'What terrorists?' Sabrina asked.

'There are no terrorists,' said Gordon in exasperation, but he looked at his watch, and Sabrina knew that meant he had lost interest in them. 'Take them if you insist, but use the limousine.'

'Of course.' Laura fastened her silk cloak. 'Shall we go?'

The shopping expeditions began the next day after school. Trailed by neighbourhood children who called them the three beautiful American ladies, they hunted for antiques and works of art in shops, markets and private homes. Laura

called it her hobby, but it had long since become her passion. She studied in libraries, talked with museum curators, attended auctions and watched furniture and art restorers at work. Over the years their rented houses became showplaces of her purchases: gleaming woods and mosaics, sculptures and paintings, leaded glass and finely woven fabrics. By the time she began taking Sabrina and Stephanie with her, Laura had become an expert appraiser and bargainer, supreme in her own world, where Gordon never came.

She also had become an advisor to fiiends and the international set that mingled socially with diplomats. They called on her so often that, had she not been Gordon Hartwell's wife, she could have made a different life on her own. But she loved the glittering social life Gordon gave her, so she kept both her passions and taught them to her daughters.

Sabrina and Stephanie, eleven years old, for the first time became friends with their mother. They shared her private world; they spoke her private language. She poured out her knowledge and they absorbed it hungrily, as if it were love.

The three of them browsed in dingy shops where old people gossiped in comers and dust tickled their noses, and they visited homes where whole families gathered to show them rugs and paintings that had been theirs for generations. But best of all were the open-air markets, with row after row of stalls hung with rugs, baskets, tapestries, vases, even furniture, and standing in front of each someone shouting, 'Buy this! Buy here! Such a bargain!' Sabrina and Stephanie wanted to buy everything, but their mother ruthlessly separated the fake from the genuine, brushing aside protestations from vendors who expected Americans to be gullible. Laura was in control, absolutely confident, and Sabrina and Stephanie watched her with wide-eyed wonder: this was a different woman from the one they knew at home, where she was Gordon's wife.

But those afternoons came only once or twice a week, and by spring Sabrina was chafing to see more of Athens. 'Let's ask if today we can shop somewhere new,' she said as they climbed into the embassy limousine afrer school.

Theo, the chauffeur, spoke to the rear-view mirror. 'No shopping today, miss. Your mother told me to bring you to the embassy.'

'Oh, no!" Stephanie cried.

Sabrina struck her schoolbooks in frustration. 'Daddy probably wants to show us off again. Well, I won't do it. I'm going to do my buck-teeth smile.'

Stephanie brightened. 'And I'll cross my eyes.'

Grinning grotesquely, Sabrina hunched her right shoulder to her ear.

Eyes crossed, Stephanie stuck out her tongue and licked her chin.

They studied each other's demonic poses and imagined their father, tall and proper, saying to solemn visitors, 'Meet my daughters,' and they collapsed on the back seat in a fit of giggles.

'Damn, damn,' grumbled Theo, and they looked up; what did they do wrong? But he was cursing a traffic jam caused by an automobile accident ahead. 'We'll be here an hour,' he said, throwing up his hands.