“Did he take you to Murenburg?” Antoinette asked, fighting a sudden sense of betrayal. How was it that they had done all these things together without her knowledge? Climbing, traveling, skiing . . . She swallowed back tears as the secret suddenly became so much bigger.
“No, he took me to Whistler in Canada for my birthday. We also played cards. He was a wicked bridge player.” Antoinette recalled the various times George had tried, and failed, to teach her bridge. She watched Phaedra across the table and wondered whether George had found a soul mate in his daughter, someone who loved all the same things that he loved: all the things
she
hated.
“Was he very surprised when you appeared, claiming to be his
daughter?” Roberta probed deeper. “I mean, did your mother really keep your birth secret from him? I find that very unlikely.”
Phaedra couldn’t help but admire the girl’s perseverance, although she didn’t relish having to answer her questions. Her heart was thumping wildly, and her hands had begun to sweat. Everyone was staring at her, which was daunting. “My mother didn’t want anything from George, Roberta. It was a brief love affair that ended. Telling him she was carrying his child would not have resurrected it. Besides, she soon married Jack, and we became a family for a while. I grew up believing Jack was my father.”
“Why did she leave it so late to tell you the truth?” Roberta asked.
Phaedra lowered her eyes and seemed to wilt for a moment beneath the pressure of Roberta’s questioning. “Jack died. She wanted me to know then that he wasn’t my real father.”
“Dear girl, how ghastly for you to lose two fathers in such a short space of time,” said Rosamunde.
“Jack was a father to me for the first ten years of my life, and I felt bereft and betrayed when he left. He settled in New Zealand and raised a family there. He didn’t keep in touch. When he died, I felt nothing. I barely remember him now.”
David noticed that Phaedra’s eyes had begun to glitter and pushed back his chair. “Right, let’s eat. I’m ravenous!” Harris had brought in the food on large china dishes and placed them on the sideboard at the end of the room. “Phaedra, why don’t you come and help yourself,” he suggested quietly.
But Roberta wasn’t finished. “Did you see a lot of George over the eighteen months that you knew him?” she persisted.
“Yes. He was a busy man, but he made time for me. We skied and trekked together. I lived in Paris but spent a lot of time traveling in Asia, which is where he loved to be, too. I’ve been working on a big photographic book of the Himalayan communities, you see. George was helping me. He knew the area well. I moved to London only very recently to see more of him.” She lowered her eyes and fingered her fork nervously. “I’ll be moving back to Paris now, as I have to finish my book and there’s no reason for me to stay.”
“Why Paris?”
“I’ve lived all over, Roberta, but Paris is the city I feel most at home in,” Phaedra replied, trying to remain composed as Roberta fired one question after another. “I speak French and have many friends there.”
“Did George introduce you to people? How did he keep you secret for all that time?”
“He didn’t have to. We were climbing mostly. Just us and a few sherpas and porters. It was irrelevant.”
“But when you were skiing in Whistler, for example? How did he keep you secret there?”
“He didn’t. He kept the fact that I was his
daughter
secret.”
Roberta crinkled her nose. “So how did he introduce you?”
“As a photographer,” Phaedra replied simply, placing her napkin on the table and standing up. “He didn’t feel the need to explain to anyone.”
Just then the door swung open and Tom stood in the doorway, his hair standing on end like a monkey. “Sorry I’m late. I came all the way down from London with the roof off. Fast as I could. Mmmm, what’s for dinner?”
8
P
haedra was relieved that Tom had arrived in time to deflect the conversation from her. She was uncomfortable talking about George. She felt exposed having to field questions about their relationship. As far as she was concerned, they all missed him—and that was all that mattered.
She wished she hadn’t got involved with his family, but she had been determined to attend the funeral. Julius did warn her of the consequences, but she had insisted. Now she understood why he had advised her to act with caution. The sooner she could return to Paris and put this all behind her, the better.
Antoinette was relieved to see Tom. The constant churning of anxious thoughts in her head was momentarily stilled as her son bent down to kiss her. “Sorry, Mum. I overslept.”
“That’s okay, darling. I’m just glad you’re here.” She watched him greet Phaedra, happy that Roberta’s badgering had come to a halt. Perhaps they could all enjoy a nice family dinner now.
“And I’m glad
you’re
here, sis,” he said with a chuckle. “I’m loving the sound of that—sis—it has a nice, cozy kind of ring to it.” Roberta rolled her eyes and sighed heavily.
David glowered at her from the sideboard. “If you don’t tell your wife to back off, I’m going to,” he hissed at Joshua, who was now helping himself to roast potatoes.
“She’s suspicious, that’s all,” Joshua replied.
“Well, she can keep her conspiracy theories to herself.”
“Go and get some dinner, darling, or it’ll get cold,” said Antoinette to Tom, noticing how tired he looked around the eyes. His lifestyle was dreadfully unhealthy, but apart from a general weariness, he
looked well. Tom helped himself to a large portion of salmon crêpes then sat beside his mother. He entertained the table with the latest drama from his nightclub. An employee had been selling stories about their celebrity clients, and they had trapped him by giving him an invented piece of gossip then waiting to see whether it came out in the papers. He was full of excitement because it had appeared in the
Daily Mail
the following morning.
“I fired him,” said Tom. “We can’t have that sort of thing going on in the Red Lizard!”
Phaedra chatted to Joshua. He didn’t ask her about George; what interested him was the person she was, not her relationship with his father. It seemed that only Roberta needed to know details, as if she suspected her of lying and was intent on catching her out. Phaedra felt very safe sandwiched between Joshua and David. She felt the same sense of security as when she’d been in their father’s company, and she relaxed and enjoyed the dinner because she was now part of something stronger than herself.
After dinner she played bridge with Tom, David, and Joshua at a small table set up near the large bay window at the other end of the drawing room. Roberta disappeared upstairs to check on Amber, but Phaedra suspected she didn’t want to remain in her company and was using her daughter as an excuse to get away. Antoinette sat beside the fire with her sister and watched the four siblings interact. “This is what it might have been like if I’d had another child,” she said softly to Rosamunde. “George so wanted a little girl.”
“Yes, it would have been nice to have had a daughter. There’s not a hint of pink anywhere in the house.”
“I was worried that Roberta was going to frighten her away, but judging by the sight of the four of them now, playing bridge so happily together, I think my fears are unfounded. Phaedra is made of sterner stuff.”
“Roberta is unforgivably rude,” Rosamunde agreed. “I don’t know why she’s taken it upon herself to be the family sheriff. The jewels were never going to belong to her, but to David. Margaret would know.”
“Yes, she would, of course, but George has changed all that now. I really don’t care about them at all. In fact, I’d say they’re very ostentatious, the sort of thing Margaret likes to wear. But they’re a part of our family history. It would be a shame to watch them vanish down another family line.” She thought of Phaedra disappearing to Paris with the sapphire suite, never to be seen again, and her chest grew tight. “However, you’re right, it’s not Roberta’s place to represent the family,” she added. “Whatever anyone thinks, George’s wishes must be honored.”
“She should remember that she’s a married-in, not blood.”
“She’s just jealous, Rosamunde. Phaedra’s far more beautiful and charming than she is.”
“
And
she’s blood.”
“Yes, she’s blood. I still find it hard to get my head around that. It’s astonishing to think that all those years she grew up not knowing that George was her father. And George never knew he had a daughter.”
“It’s not a surprise that he loved her instantly. There’s something vulnerable about her, don’t you think?”
“Yes, she rather makes me want to mother her. I could have killed Roberta when she started firing questions at her. It’s as if she’s desperate to expose her as a fraud.”
“A DNA test has been done, and that’s final. Roberta’s not going to find anything there.”
“It’s all about money, I’m afraid,” said Antoinette with a sigh. “She came into the family with nothing and was suddenly very rich. She’s lucky we’re not questioning
her
motives for marrying Josh.”
“Perhaps her suspicions about Phaedra reveal more about herself than she realizes.”
“Yes, I hadn’t thought of that.”
Antoinette watched Harris place the tray of coffee on the low table in front of her. “Now, I wonder whether Roberta will come down again, or whether we’ve seen the last of her for tonight.”
* * *
Phaedra was a gifted bridge player. Tom was happy to partner her when he realized how cunning she was. They won without any difficulty and laughed all the way through the postmortem. Phaedra sipped peppermint tea and recalled wistfully how it was George who had taught her to play during a three-day stopover at Annapurna base camp when they were held back due to bad weather. Climbing would never be the same now that George was dead. That chapter of her life had closed forever.
David watched Phaedra across the table. The more he got to know her, the more he admired her, and every now and then, when those astonishing gray eyes locked into his, he sensed that she admired him, too. There was something intimate in the way she looked at him, as if their dinner in London was a secret they shared. He wanted her all to himself, but she was Joshua and Tom’s sister, too. By the nature of her birth she belonged to the three of them equally. However, David couldn’t help but feel superior, for she was coming back to
his
house that night, and he would take her off and show her around the estate in the morning. She had asked him to look after her, and he was going to do everything in his power to do exactly that.
Roberta did not appear again. Joshua retired upstairs soon after their bridge game had ended, and Antoinette and Rosamunde went to bed a little later. Tom, David, and Phaedra sat around the fire sharing stories, laughing at jokes, and Tom opened another bottle of claret.
It was well past one when David drove Phaedra through the park to his home. It was only a ten-minute walk from the main house, but it was too dark to walk across the field. Phaedra stared out of the window as they drove along the farm tracks and savored the intensity of the country night. The moon was a bright crescent, the sky as black as ink, the stars twinkling like tiny chips of broken glass. In the city the stars were barely visible and the sky never turned this deep velvet color. “Oh, I do love the countryside,” she said with a yawn.
“You’re ready for bed.”
“I know. It’s been a lovely evening, David. I’ve really enjoyed hanging out with your family.”
“
Our
family,” he reminded her.
“It’s going to take a while for me to feel that I really belong.”
“I’m sorry about Roberta.”
“Don’t be. She’s unhappy about my suddenly horning in.”
“You’re not horning in, Phaedra. You’re a Frampton.”
“Thank you. You’re very kind.”
“I know, like Ratty.” They both laughed. Then David grew serious again. “Roberta can be very mean-spirited.”
“It’s understandable that she’s suspicious. She thinks I’m an opportunist, slipping into your family to steal all your money.” She looked at him steadily. “I’m not interested in George’s money, David. I’m not going to touch it.”
“Don’t be silly. It’s yours.”
“No, it isn’t. You’re very kind, and I’m grateful for your support. But really, I don’t want the money. I earn my own living, and I’m happy with my life. I’m not acquisitive. I have simple tastes. George was way too rash, including me in his will out of guilt . . .” She paused and stared out of the window. “He shouldn’t have done it . . . and perhaps, had he lived, he might have changed it back.”
“Well, we’ll never know. Just accept things as they are, Phaedra. Whatever you feel about it, you’re a Frampton. There’s no changing that.”
The car pulled up in front of the picturesque little house. “Home sweet home,” he said, switching off the engine.
“It’s divine!” she enthused, running her eyes over the old weathered brick and gently sagging roof. It was as if the building had grown tired of sitting up straight and had dropped its shoulders to rest. They both climbed out. “Your house looks almost sleepy, don’t you think?”
“I can’t say I do,” he replied, glancing up at it.
“Oh yes, it does. I imagine it’s hundreds of years old. Poor old thing, having to remain strong for all that time, resisting winds and rain. No wonder it wants to droop a little.”
“Are you telling me my house is drooping?”
She laughed at the bewildered look on his face. “Well, it is, in a kind of sleepy way. It’s adorable, David.” She made for the door. “I’m looking forward to meeting Rufus.”
David opened the boot and lifted out her bag. “He’ll love you. He has an eye for the ladies.”
“Does that mean if he doesn’t like me, I’m no lady?”
“Trust me, he’ll like you.” He carried her bag to the door and unlocked it. A very excited Rufus bounded out of the kitchen and leapt up at Phaedra. “Hey, steady on, Rufus!”
But Phaedra was delighted. “He’s gorgeous,” she gushed, wrapping her arms around him. “Hello there, Rufus!”
“You see, he likes you.”