Summer's Awakening (44 page)

Summer had expected the much-married Mrs Rathbone to be like the rich women she had seen shopping at Altman's and Bergdorf Goodman and Henri Bendel who, in their terror of looking old, had had repeated face-lifts; who had their hair styled several times a week; who thought of little but their appearance and seemed to have no idea that their painted faces had become macabre masks.

However, as soon as their hostess joined them she saw that Cordelia Rathbone was nothing like this preconception of her. In both looks and manner she bore a certain resemblance to Congresswoman Millicent Fenwick whom Summer had seen on television and thought a striking exemplar of how to age gracefully.

Mrs Rathbone came into the room with the light, brisk step of a woman who keeps in shape by her own exertions rather than those of her masseuse and beautician. Her warm smile emphasised the lines that time and perhaps too much sunbathing had engraved on a fine, dry complexion. Her once-dark hair was now brindled to iron grey. She was wearing a dark red shirt-dress with a wide suede belt of the same colour, a single strand of large matched pearls and pearl ear-studs.

'Miss Roberts... how do you do? I'm
so
sorry I was detained.' She took Summer's hand and held it while she gave her a friendly but searching look.

'And Emily.' She turned to her first husband's grandchild. 'How do you do? James tells me you share his passion for computers. I'm determined to live at least to ninety because I want so much to see how the electronics revolution affects our lives in the next twenty years. Thank you, James'—this as he brought
a
glass of champagne to her.

They had all risen as she entered. Now Mrs Rathbone seated herself on the sofa beside Emily, and went on, 'I feel I was lucky, in some ways, to be born when I was. When I was your age'—with a gesture towards Summer—'travelling was much slower but more interesting. Each country was quite different from its neighbours. I saw Dresden before it was bombed in the Second World War, and Jerusalem before it was ruined by terrible apartments, and the Costa Brava in Spain when it was still a wild coast without hundreds of holiday villas and camping grounds spoiling its beauty. But everything has its price, and the price
of
being privileged to see those places at their best was
a
very restricted set of options if you were
a
girl. Unless you were extremely clever and extremely strong-minded, which I wasn't, you had almost no choice but marriage. Whereas you'—patting Emily's knee—'can be anything you want.'

'And what's the price
of
that privilege, Cordelia?' James asked her.

'The price is that, if she chooses
a
career which demands a great deal of time and energy, she'll either have to forget marriage and motherhood or accept the strain of leading two lives,' Mrs Rathbone replied. 'Up to now men with exacting occupations have had wives to look after them and let them concentrate their energy. Some husbands are beginning to accept a share of the domestic responsibilities. But there's a long way to go before those burdens fall equally on
a
husband and wife. I don't know that they ever will.'

'What would you have liked to be if you had been born when I was, Mrs Rathbone?' Emily asked her.

'Strangely enough, after my marriage to your grandfather, which wasn't
a
success, I was content to be a wife. I always enjoyed doing up the many houses I've lived in, and I liked entertaining and bringing together people whom I felt would enrich each other's lives. You mustn't suppose that all my generation were frustrated career-women. That isn't so. To make a house comfortable and beautiful is an art, and a very satisfying one.'

She turned to Summer. 'James tells me that those delightful
trompe-l'oeil
paintings in the Octagon Room as
Baile de Sol
were your father's work. You may be interested to know that I have friends in Virginia who commissioned him to create the illusion that their dining room is a pavilion on an island in the centre of a lake. I'm sure if you'd like to see it they'd be delighted to have you stay with them.'

'I'd love to see it. I once had the idea of trying to trace all his murals and writing a monograph on them,' Summer replied.

To her surprise, James said, 'That's an interesting idea. If you expanded it to embrace other painters of murals, you might have enough material to make a book. I know a publisher who specialises in books on art. If you like, I'll ask him if modern murals are a genre which hasn't been documented, and if he'd be interested in publishing a work on the subject.'

She guessed the publisher was someone he had met through Loretta Fox.

'It's good of you to suggest it, but I have no qualifications for doing a book of that kind, nor have I the time to research it,' she answered. 'It would involve a lot of travelling.'

'In the later stages—yes. Not initially. Anyway, I'll call my publishing contact and ask what he thinks of the project.'

'I
could help you, Summer. With me as your secretary, you could write the book on
Oz,'
said Emily.

They had dinner in the hotel's Café Pierre restaurant. Summer had eaten sparingly the day before and had had only fruit and yogurt for her lunch in order to eat freely tonight.

Her precautions proved to have been well-advised because Cordelia had decided in advance what they would eat and her choice of menu was definitely not what Weight Watchers called legal. The first course on its own—chicken liver
timbales
served with a red wine sauce—was as much as Summer would normally eat in the evening.

After the
timbales
came a very special kind of seafood chowder called
marmite dieppoise
which Cordelia said she had first eaten at Prunier's, the famous fish restaurant in Paris. As well as prawns and mussels, it contained fillet of sole and sea bass baked with leeks and cream and black truffle.

Finally they had a wonderfully light coffee soufflé flavoured with rum.

While all these delicious things were being consumed, accompanied by a fine French white burgundy for the adults and Perrier for Emily, Cordelia displayed a talented hostess's flair for drawing out her guests. From time to time she contributed an amusing anecdote from a life which had clearly been full of interesting experiences and personalities.

She had beautiful hands adorned with several unusual rings which Summer longed to look at more closely. Cordelia must have noticed her interest in them, because when they returned to the suite, she slipped one ring off and handed it to her, saying, 'As you're designing jewels, this may interest you. I found it in an old-fashioned jeweller's shop in a small town in England. At that time the stones were in a brooch, not a very pretty one.'

Summer studied the ring which consisted of a cloudy bluish stone polished to the dome shape called cabochon and surrounded by a nimbus of diamonds.

Cordelia said, 'There are some matches on the table, James. Would you light one and hold it directly above the stone for Summer, please.'

He did as she asked and, as the tip of the match flamed, something came to life in the depths of the cabochon.

'Oh, it's a star sapphire,' Summer exclaimed. 'I've read about them but never seen one before. Did the jeweller know what it was?'

'Yes, but he told me there's less interest in them in England than here.' She slid off another of her rings. 'This, which is one of my favourites, was originally a ruby button from the
achkan
of an Indian prince.'

'What's an
achkan?'
asked Emily.

'That slim-fitting, high-buttoned coat which Indian men wear,' said Cordelia. 'You'll have some beautiful things to wear when you're older, Emily. There are several exquisite pieces among the Lancaster jewels. I remember a magnificent emerald necklace which I never wore myself but which will be perfect with your colouring. But I must say that, although I've had the chance to wear some wonderful jewels in my life, I've never liked
grande toilette
jewels as much as unusual stones like these rings... and your intaglio ring, Summer. May I see
it?'

When she had examined the rose quarz in Raoul's setting, she said, 'Next time you go to Switzerland, James, you should take these two with you and let Summer visit Marina B's atelier in Geneva. Marina B's full name is Marina Bulgari Spaccarelli. The Bulgaris are jewellers in Rome with branches in Monte Carlo, Pans and Geneva. The New York branch is in this hotel. I've always admired their designs and some time ago James gave me a beautiful old silver coin in a Bulgari setting. I don't have it with me or I'd show it to you.'

So Cordelia, not one of his mistresses, had been the recipient of that lavish gift, thought Summer, remembering how she had read about it during their first winter in Florida.

'As a matter of fact I'm thinking of sending them to Switzerland for the summer,' said James. 'I've been offered a chalet at Wengen for them for the hot weather. They could fly to Geneva and go the rest of the way by car.'

That night, before she went to bed, Summer wrote a note to thank Mrs Rathbone for including her in the dinner party. Next morning, knowing that James would be seeing her again that evening when he and Emily went to the theatre with her, she asked him to deliver it.

'Certainly. What did you think of her?' he asked.

'I don't think she's the tremendous snob you described her as being. Or the bigoted person I imagined. I think she's a delightful person. I hope she will sponsor Emily—if her health allows it. Although she doesn't look ill and she has a good appetite,' said Summer.

'Her generation were brought up to hide their afflictions,' he answered. 'When I called her a snob I didn't mean she would ever be anything but courteous to people she considers her inferiors. But don't let her considerable charm blind you to the fact that, as did my mother, she married a man she didn't love, or even like, for the dubious
éclat
of being a marchioness and mistress of Cranmere.'

'Perhaps they were pushed into it by their parents. Mrs Rathbone admitted last night that she wasn't strong-minded as a girl.'

'I doubt that either her parents or my maternal grandparents would have forced their daughters into the marriages if they'd shown any serious resistance. I like Cordelia. She's an interesting, amusing woman. But although she was fond of her second and third husbands, there was never any question of the world well lost for love,' he said sardonically. 'She would think that a ridiculous concept. It's my sex who tend to lose their heads over a pretty face. Not many women lose sight of the practicalities of life.'

'I don't think that's true. I'm sure most women marry for love and don't give a thought to the man's position or his income.'

He didn't argue but the cynical lift of his eyebrow expressed his opinion.

'Think of all the girls who have supported their husbands or boy-friends while they trained to be doctors or lawyers,' she persisted.

'A tiny minority outnumbered by the thousands who, having divorced a man, have lived comfortably on his alimony,' was his caustic reply.

'If you feel like that about women, I think you'd do better to forget marriage and stay a bachelor,' she said shortly. 'Is it worth having heirs if it means spending the rest of your life with a member of the sex whom, in general, you despise?'

She made this retort without pausing to consider the unwisdom of touching on the subject of marriage. The moment the hasty words were out she regretted them.

Fortunately, at this point they were joined by Emily, which put an end to a conversation which might have got out of hand.

It was mid-afternoon when Raoul arrived in a taxi to take her to Grand Central Station to catch a train to Old Saybrook, on the opposite bank of the Connecticut River from Old Lyme.

In the taxi, he took her hand in his and kissed her knuckles, smiling at her.

She smiled back at him, relieved to have escaped for a few days.

Escaped from what?

From the cat-and-mouse feeling she had when James was around. She thought of the shell in its box in her dressing-table drawer.
Lyropecten nodosus.
The lion's paw. That was how it was under his aegis; like being a gazelle aware of a lion near at hand.

As they drove downtown on Lexington, she pushed James to the back of her mind and began to tell Raoul about Cordelia Rathbone's rings.