101 Pieces of Me (10 page)

Fairyland indeed. And full of witches, like any children’s story.

I
sighed. Perhaps a little too loudly, because Godfrey turned his head, concerned. “Are you well, Clara dear?”

“Yes, perfectly, thank you.” I tried to brighten my expression. “I was just … Godfrey, don’t you ever think that the way we do a film, cutting it in bits, then sticking them together, is just … lying?”

His elegant features disappeared under a beaming smile. “Oh, Clara, you are wonderful! It is not lying, it is
illusion
, which is the essence of entertainment! Audiences don’t care if what they see is authentic. They only want to be moved, to tears or laughter or both. So that’s what we do for them: we give them what they want. And it’s not cutting up and sticking together, it’s called
editing
. Here, let me pour you some more bubbly. Good for a weary soul, don’t y’know.”

I put my hand over my glass. “No, thank you, Godfrey. And my soul is not weary, but I’m afraid my body is. Would you be so good as to call me a taxi? I simply must go back and get some sleep.”

This speech was worthy of Jeanette or Simona or even, I supposed, Marjorie. It came out in a high, clipped tone I did not recognize as my own voice. Yet when I was with these people I could not help copying their speech. David’s “stuff and nonsense!” and Godfrey’s frequent unquestioning question, “don’t y’know”, would never find their way into the mouths of anyone at home, yet they seemed natural to me now.

I was half proud and half ashamed. I longed to be accepted by these people, yet I did not feel comfortable in their world. I admired and despised them simultaneously. Even my infatuation with David did not smother the knowledge that his behaviour was erratic and sometimes unfathomable. And yet I wanted him desperately, as desperately as I wanted to be in, and yet not of, this topsy-turvy out-of-sequence world.

“Oh, come on, Clara,” called Robert, who had overheard my request. “This place serves after hours. It’s got good strong doors and an excellent warning system, so don’t worry about the police and their silly licensing laws.” He raised his glass. “We’ll be here till dawn and go straight to Sheppers in the morning!”

I used my new voice again, giggling apologetically. “But I need my beauty sleep!” I trilled, leaving unsaid the reason, but knowing it was implied:
after all, I am the star!

Aidan shot me an amused look, the first look of any kind he had given me that evening. “Better do as the lady wishes, Godfrey. When Miss Hope speaks, we obey.”

Godfrey whispered something to a waiter, and we said our goodbyes, kissing cheeks as was the fashion in Paris, and therefore in London. Robert and Godfrey expressed their regret that I was leaving so early, but Simona said nothing. I was glad she was jealous of me. And if Aidan was truly what she wanted, she was welcome to him.

A
s soon as I got back to the hotel I went to my room and slammed the door. And then, I am ashamed to admit, I sprawled on the bed and cried. I had been so certain that David liked me. I had even persuaded myself that he would fall in love with me and that we would be married and live on the French Riviera, or wherever film stars lived. But his attentions to me might as well not have happened. It was as if we had acted a scene, and now that it was over he had forgotten all about it.

He was interested in people like Marjorie Cunningham and the jewelled women who had greeted him at the Ritz, who hovered around the actors who hovered around me. But I did not care about any of these people with their shiny cars and cigarette holders and slicked-down hair, who looked like puppets when they danced that stupid dance that involved putting your knees together and kicking up your legs. I only cared about David.
He
would not make a fool of himself doing that dance, I was sure. He was sensible, grown-up and clever, and so beautiful that my heart raced whenever I looked at him.

These thoughts brought on a new bout of tears. When I had recovered a little I went to the basin in the corner of my room, washed my face and gave my reflection a stern talking to.
Of course he likes sophisticated women. He knows tons of people. He’s a well-known film director. He has a house on an island and is a member of a London gentlemen’s club. He is so much older and wiser and more desirable than you, Sarah Freebody. However can you think he might love you?

But lecturing myself did not stop my love. Love is beyond logic; it is a kind of lunacy that rationality cannot penetrate. David had shown me attention, but he had given no sign of being in love with me. That was no barrier to my longing, though. I yearned for more nights like the one at the Ritz, when he had been so attentive and called me “princess”. And such fervent longing is so deeply painful, it is as close to madness as love itself.

I dreaded the darkness. Summer was fading; leaves were thick on the lawns in the hotel grounds and on the roadsides. Tomorrow morning I would rise before dawn, and tomorrow evening I would return in a different, dusky September darkness. But every day, I lived in a darkness of my own making, at the bottom of a deep well of impossible, irrepressible love.

“C
lara, dearest, are you free this evening?”

It was a murmur, close to my ear as I stood in the area behind the camera, watching Aidan and Robert do the same scene they had done five times already. But it was a moment of revelation, as if the studio lights had been switched on and shone with sudden, blinding brilliance. I stiffened with anticipation. David was so close to me I could smell the cigarette smoke and perspiration in his shirt. “Yes,” I whispered.

“It seems so long since I’ve managed to get any time with you,” he said, still keeping his voice low. “But you are my best girl, you know. Did you miss me?”

“Very much.”

I did not ask why he had ignored me until now, when the film was almost finished. I did not ask why he had not come out in the evenings with me and the others. I did not ask where he went when each day’s work was done. The moment he spoke, it had ceased to matter. A girl in love is gloriously selfish, thinking only of the strength of her own feelings and anxious for a sign of his. He gave it in the form of a squeeze of my hand and a flash of a smile. “Shall I come to the hotel? You are not going out to dinner, are you?”

“No, I am quite free.”

“Then let us order dinner in a private room so that we can be together with no distractions.” He looked at me with the almost amused look I knew well. “You do not object to spending the evening alone with me?”

My heart swooped. “No, of course not.”

“I assure you, I am a gentleman.”

“I know that, David.”

“Then I will arrange it all. Shall you meet me in the foyer at eight o’clock?”

I nodded and stood there trembling as David turned calmly back to the rehearsal. “All right, everybody, let’s try a take. Maria, where are you? Aidan’s nose is shining like a lighthouse. Bernard, get the board.”

While Maria was powdering his face, I sensed, more than actually saw, Aidan’s eyes slide in my direction. He had probably noticed my whispered conversation with David. Well, I thought carelessly, if he wished to spend his time being jealous, then he was at liberty to do that. The notion made me smile. Having made Simona jealous of me and Aidan jealous of David, why should I not be amused? The entire thing was folly of the first order.

D
avid had ordered champagne cocktails. “You like these, don’t you?” he asked, raising his glass and smiling at me across the table in a charming first-floor room the hotel hired out for private parties. It had swagged curtains and a view of the river. I realized it must be above the main dining room, where I had eaten that uncomfortable meal with Aidan.

“I
love
champagne cocktails!” I raised my glass too, watching the sugar lump at the bottom sending its spray of bubbles towards the surface. “They are so pretty!” I took a sip. “And sweet, too!”

“Are you speaking of the drink or of yourself?” asked David archly.

Thrilled by this gallantry, I laughed. “I do not consider myself pretty, or sweet. But if you care to think I am, that is your business.”

“Then I will cherish that belief.” He drank some of his cocktail. “As I cherish your company, my dear.”

I drank too, and we grinned at each other. I had never known such happiness. I was full of an energy and restlessness I could not explain. I felt as if I could spread my arms wide and fly out of the window on a cushion of pure contentment. David – my darling, beautiful David – was here with me instead of somewhere else, with someone else. My feelings had no boundaries; the certainty that
I did not love in vain
filled the universe. “And I yours,” I told him.

As we began our meal, which I scarcely ate, David explained why he had been so busy. “I had things to deal with at the house,” he said, “you know, this place I’ve recently bought. It needs renovating and modernizing. The bathrooms are a nightmare. I’m living there, but it’s not fit for visitors.”

I dismissed the memory of Aidan telling me that David held parties there. Jealousy again. Aidan lived in a flat in London. I did not know what it was like, but it could not possibly be as smart as a house on an island with, apparently, more than one bathroom. The houses in Haverth, I reflected uncharitably, had no bathrooms at all.

“So now, thankfully,” David was saying, “those infernal architects and insurers and heaven knows what have left me alone, at least temporarily, and I can devote this evening to my favourite pastime: having dinner with a beautiful girl.” He twinkled at me, sipping wine. “Now that the filming is almost done, and I shall be shut up in that stuffy editing room with those tedious men and their little machines for God knows how long, I must get my fill of my dear Clara while I can, must I not?”

I smiled shyly. I never knew how to behave when he said such things. “Um … so how much longer will filming last, do you think?”

“Well, the money men are satisfied with progress so far, and I
think
I’m satisfied with what we’ve already done. There’ll be a break over Christmas and New Year, of course, but we’re scheduled to finish at the end of January, and provided nothing goes drastically wrong, I think we will.”