Palace Circle (11 page)

Sylvia lifted a perfect eyebrow. “It wasn't quite such a surprise to me, Delia. Ivor needed to remarry—and to remarry a young woman—in order to have the son Olivia failed so spectacularly to give him. I had no desire to see him wed the debutante daughter of one of my friends—and English society is such a closed circle I am on terms with almost everyone. My last words to him before he sailed for America were that a New York heiress would solve our problems admirably. What I didn't expect was for him to marry a Virginian who, no matter how well regarded her family, could in no way be termed an heiress—and a Virginian who, instead of being disconcerted at finding herself plunged into an alien way of life, threw herself into it with bewitching self-confidence.”

For the first time she moved, pushing herself up against the pillows. “Having no family or contacts in England was supposed to ensure you would have no option but to be malleable when you discovered why Ivor married you.” Sylvia's voice was withering. “Olivia was never malleable. She made life as difficult as possible for Ivor—and for me. God, what a bitch that
woman was! She made me suffer endless public humiliations. Not for one minute did she allow anyone to forget that my background wasn't as good as hers. By the time she died, Ivor could barely bring himself to speak to her.”

Her eyes held Delia's with chilly frankness. “And nothing could have suited me better. I didn't want Ivor to be in love with Olivia. Even on the day he married her, he wasn't. You, however, are different.”

She paused, breathing in deeply, her finely drawn nostrils whitening. “From the moment I met you at Sir Cuthbert's birthday ball I knew Ivor was more than a little in love with you. You weren't quite what he had wanted in a second wife, but you are so shatteringly beautiful and amusing, and you handle your relationship with him with the skill of a far more experienced woman.”

Her eyes hardened. “But you won't win him, Delia. What happened last night, in that filthy, murderous water, makes not one iota of difference. Ivor may love you a little, but he loves me more. And that's the way I intend it to remain.”

She closed her eyes, unable to continue talking. Delia rose to her feet. “There's just one thing before I go, Sylvia,” she said quietly. “It's about last night.”

With great effort Sylvia opened her eyes, the expression in them wary.

“Gwen told Ivor that we were together when the storm broke and that our horses threw us into the broad. Unlikely though it may be, it's a version of events I'd like to stick to. I've no desire to become known as a heroine. Especially in these circumstances.”

The faintest of smiles touched Sylvia's beautifully shaped mouth.

“That's fine by me,” she said weakly, closing her eyes again. “I don't want the whole world knowing I owe you my life.”

As Delia opened the door, Sylvia said, “And you were very
brave, Delia. I'll give you that. We call it spunk in England. Is it something all Virginians have?”

“No, but I'm a Chandler, and all Chandlers have it.”

On that note she closed the door behind her.

Half an hour later Ivor's Rolls swept up the drive. Delia's bedroom windows were open and within a second of the car coming to a halt she heard Ivor sprint across the gravel.

Thanks to Ellie, she knew exactly what Gwen had told him and since he believed both her and Sylvia to have suffered similarly, whom would Ivor rush to see first? Her, or Sylvia? He always behaved with the utmost propriety in front of servants and, as they all would know if he strode to Sylvia's room first, that alone was reason enough for him not to do so. He would also have to take into account the fact that Gwen was in the house. If he were to hurry to Sylvia's side first, even Gwen would finally realize the true nature of their relationship. Last but by no means least, Delia was pregnant—and according to the doctor, still at risk of losing the baby.

As she heard him take the stairs two at a time, she was certain he would come to her door. She couldn't see how, in all conscience, he could do anything else.

He rounded the head of the stairs and began striding swiftly along the corridor toward her room.

He reached it.

And passed it.

Seconds later, without even pausing to knock, she heard him throw open Sylvia's door.

Very slowly, Delia let out her breath. At the window, muslin curtains fluttered gently in the May breeze.

For four years she had lived in the hope of Ivor returning the love she felt for him. It was a hope often dashed, but it had never died. Only days ago, when he suggested that they spend time together at Shibden, she had felt certain that her long battle was almost won.

Now, with terrible finality, she knew she had lost. He loved her, but not enough. With Ivor, Sylvia came first, and, even pregnant, Delia came a very poor second.

But she didn't come second with everyone.

She didn't come second with Jerome.

She heard Sylvia's door open and then close. Ivor's footsteps strode down the corridor toward her, but she no longer cared about him or their marriage.

She was thinking of the letter she would write when she was next alone. The letter she would send to France. The letter she knew Jerome had given up all hope of ever receiving.

At Christmas Delia gave birth to a second daughter after a prolonged and difficult labor. This time she had no name waiting. This time, like Ivor, whose disappointment was profound, she hadn't even entertained the thought that the baby might be a girl.

“We could name her after your mother,” she said hesitantly, so weak from the birth she didn't truly care what name the baby was given.

A shutter came down over Ivor's austerely handsome face at the mention of his long-dead parents.

“No,” he said shortly. “I think not.” He paused and then said, “What about naming her after her mother?”

“Bedelia? I don't think so. I found the name hard enough to live with until I insisted it was shortened to Delia, and two Delias would be highly confusing.”

“You truly don't have any preferences?”

She shook her head, her mane of hair glowing like fire against the ivory-silk pillows.

“Then we'll call her Davina May. Davina as a mark of respect to David Lloyd George—who is certain to replace Herbert as prime minister within the year—and May after Queen Mary, who was christened May and is still known as May by everyone on intimate terms with her.”

Delia closed her eyes. To name their daughter after a bullish, fiery-tempered Welshman was ridiculous, yet the name was both pretty and unusual and she liked the way Delia and Davina rolled off the tongue so easily when spoken together.

Eight weeks later, just as she was finally regaining her strength, news came that Jerome had been badly injured. He wrote to her from a field hospital.

“He's mad,” she said, when she next had lunch with Mar-got. “How can he say
with luck
he'll be back at the front? And how can there be talk of a final push when things are at such a stalemate? Month after month men are gassed, mined, and mutilated with no appreciable ground taken. Things are just as bad as they were this time last year.”

Margot, her face white and strained, remained silent. Afterward, when they parted, Delia regretted saying things which, though true, could have been taken as criticism of the prime minister's handling of the war.

A month later and Jerome was in a military hospital in Sussex. Wearing a sea-green bolero, a matching ankle-length skirt, and a stiff white shirtwaist, Delia took a train and taxi to see him. Though she'd had two children, rigorous corseting ensured she still had an elegant hourglass figure, and the admiring looks she received from men in uniform—and every fit man of military age was in uniform—were considerable.

It wasn't merely her deeply waving fox-red hair—topped by a saucy straw boater—that attracted attention, or the fact she was taller than most Englishwomen. It was her breezy American manner, her disarming self-confidence, and her unpretentiousness that set her apart.

When she walked into the hospital ward all eyes turned toward her.

“Whom are you visiting?” the ward sister asked, swiftly coming to greet her.

“Captain Bazeljette.”

“Ah.” The sister called a nurse away from settling an amputee more comfortably. “Nurse—please escort Mrs. Bazeljette to Captain Bazeljette's bedside.”

Delia cleared her throat. “Lady Bazeljette is unable to visit on this occasion. I am Viscountess Conisborough—a close family friend.”

Though the ward sister's eyebrows rose only the merest millimeter Delia knew that the loving greeting she had intended was out of the question.

As the nurse led her down the long ward full of injured officers she was sickeningly aware that very few of them would ever walk again without the aid of crutches or an artificial limb. With rising panic she wondered whether Jerome had lied in his letter to her. Perhaps he had not told her the extent of his injury. Perhaps he, too, had been maimed.

As the nurse came to a halt Delia steeled herself for the worst. She mustn't let horror show on her face in case he registered it as repugnance. She must be brave, as he had been for so long.

“Captain Bazeljette, you have a visitor,” the nurse said sunnily, her manner completely different from that of the ward sister. “And can I ask you not to stay any longer than half an hour, Lady Conisborough? Wounded men tire easily.”

With a flick of her starched skirt she was gone. With relief
that made her weak at the knees, Delia saw that though Jerome's left arm, shoulder, and leg were heavily bandaged, none of the bandaging ended in a stump.

“God, but you're a wonderful sight,” he said as she sat down as close to the bed as she could get.

Speech was beyond her so she took hold of his hand and pressed it against her cheek.

His hair, far longer than army regulations allowed, tumbled low over his brow and curled tightly at the nape of his neck. A livid wound knifed down through his left eyebrow.

He read her thoughts and said gently, “It could have been worse, Delia. I could have lost an eye. Of all the men in this ward I'm probably the one least grievously injured.”

“I know,” she said unsteadily. “And I'm grateful. But such luck can't last, Jerome. You've been at the front for almost eighteen months. The next time you could be … could be …” She couldn't finish the sentence and instead said thickly, “I want you to apply for a staff posting. You have influential friends.” Her voice was urgent and pleading. “It could easily be managed. And it isn't as if you haven't done your bit. You've been mentioned in dispatches for exceptional bravery. As a staff officer you could …”

“… Remain well behind lines and never be able to live with myself?” His voice was still gentle, but mulishly firm. “No, Delia. It isn't an option.” He squeezed her hand. “Tell me about the new baby. Ivor didn't seriously name her after Lloyd George, did he?”

Still distraught at the prospect of his returning to the front she managed only a glimmer of a smile. “Yes, he did. Despite being so different in character, he and Lloyd George have become very close, though not so close that he has asked him to be her godfather. That position is reserved for you—and we're goin' to delay the christening until you can attend.”

“Thank you.” He paused and then said in a different tone of voice, “And Petra, Delia? How is Petra?”

Her smile deepened. “Very sassy. She's walkin' and talkin' and is full of mischief. I wish you could see her, Jerome. I wish I'd been able to bring her with me, but babies ain't allowed.”

In spite of the pain he was in, an answering smile split his swarthy face. “And is her hair still red?”

“Yes, but not Titian, like mine. It's more a russet. And though her eyes are green, they're a hazel, not emerald. I've brought a photograph.”

There was a locker by his bed and she propped the photograph against a jug of water, wondering if he would keep it there—and if he did, how he would explain it to Sylvia.

As if reading her thoughts and with his eyes on the photograph, he said, “I haven't seen Sylvia yet. She's in Scotland with the Girlingtons. Jack's been, though. My father brought him down.”

He dragged his eyes away from the photograph. “He wasn't at all fazed by the bandages—not when I told him I still had an arm and a leg beneath them—and he was very admiring of the wound through my eyebrow. He said it made me look like a pirate.”

Laughter fizzed in her throat. “It does. Not an evil Captain Hook. A handsome swashbuckling pirate.”

“Your sort of a pirate?” An amber flame burned deep in his eyes.

“Oh, yes,” she whispered. “Very much so, Jerome.” And, uncaring of who might be watching, she leaned forward and kissed him long and tenderly on the mouth.

Three months later he was back in France. A month after that the Somme campaign opened. It was the biggest British army
ever sent into battle and the country held its breath. Delia received regular postcards from Jerome, but the censor saw to it that they told her nothing except that, at the time of writing, he was alive. And the battle that had been meant to be so decisive simply went on and on and on, for month after month, in a seemingly endless series of partial actions. The casualty lists were catastrophic.

In September, as a second big push on the Somme began, Margot's stepson Raymond was killed leading his men.

Margot's grief was deep. “What a waste, what a waste,” was all she could say, ashen-faced, when Delia went to 10 Downing Street to pay her condolences. “Raymond should have had a staff job where he could use his brains, but no one of any sensitivity will take a staff job anymore—it arouses both jealousy and the suspicion of cowardice. There's another kind of cowardice, too, Delia.”

She clenched her hands. “Too many of Henry's friends are no longer loyal to him. Not Winston. Not George. Not Ivor. All the three of them ever do is praise Lloyd George—and that's tantamount to pushing Henry out of office. The consequence is that I'm losing all my friends. I had a dreadful altercation with Clemmie—she, of course, can only see things from Winston's point of view. I do hope the same kind of thing isn't going to happen with you, Delia.”