A Perfect Obsession (18 page)

‘I know you’ve been busy with the Lloyd’s case,’ Anthony said, closing the door, ‘but I really need to talk to you.’

There was silence for a few seconds. Leo nodded. ‘I know.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘Sit down.’

‘I don’t want to talk here.’

‘Right. Let’s go for a drink.’

They went to the same quiet pub that Leo and Sarah had gone to weeks before. At five o’clock, it was still deserted.

Anthony bought a double Scotch for Leo and a pint for himself, and brought them to a corner table where Leo was sitting, tapping a beer mat thoughtfully. As Anthony approached, Leo glanced up and smiled, and the unmistakable warmth of it made Anthony’s heart rise. Perhaps he had been mistaken about the silence of the past few weeks. Leo had been busy with the case, after all. He pulled up a chair.

Anthony was about to ask how the case was going, but stopped himself. It wasn’t what he had come here to talk about. He drank some of his beer and said, ‘I had the idea we might have seen more of one another before now.’

‘I’ve been busy with this case. You know how it is.’

‘It’s more than that.’ He waited, but Leo said nothing, merely sipped his drink. ‘Don’t you think I deserve better than that kind of evasion?’

‘It’s not evasion, Anthony.’ Leo passed a weary hand over his face.

Anthony shook his head slowly, uncomprehendingly. ‘Aren’t I more important than one of your casual pick ups?’

Leo tilted his glass reflectively. ‘What do you want me to say? Of course you are. You’re very dear to me, in every way.’ He looked up at Anthony, his gaze intent. ‘There was a time when I thought our relationship could be the single most significant thing in my life. But both our situations are altered now.’ He paused for a few long seconds. ‘Do you remember, the morning after, you said to me that I sounded as though I regretted what had happened? Well, in a sense I do. Because you want it to alter your life, or the way things are between us. It can’t.’

‘Don’t say it can’t,’ said Anthony in a low voice. ‘For me it already has. It’s changed everything.’

‘It’s only sex, Anthony.’ Leo gave a shrug and pulled out his cigar case.

Anthony stared at him, appalled and bewildered. He hadn’t ever truly believed that Leo was as utterly amoral as he professed to be, but perhaps he was. Yet, could he be so callous as to detach all emotion from what had happened between them?

‘Do you think only about yourself? Only about the significance of things in relation to yourself?’

‘I’m afraid so – yes. One of my many faults.’ Leo lit a cigar and blew out a small cloud of smoke. ‘I don’t want you to think I don’t care for you, that I don’t want you as a lover – you can be, any time that’s convenient. But I haven’t room in my life for what I suspect you want.’

‘And that is?’

‘Time. Attention. Exclusivity.’ With each word Leo gave his cigar a little tap against the ashtray. He raised his gaze and looked steadily at Anthony. ‘Am I not right?’

For a moment Anthony could say nothing. He felt almost choked by hopelessness, and his sense of rage at Leo’s cruelty. When he spoke, his voice was a little hoarse.

‘Didn’t you know all that before you let me stay? Didn’t you know how everything that happened between us would affect me? How important it was?’ He gazed at Leo, searching for some trace in his eyes of guilt and shame. Leo looked away. Anthony went on, his voice stronger, ‘People are not like you, Leo. I see now that I’m not. For me love means warmth. Closeness. It means trust.’

Leo lifted his cigar to his lips. ‘Like screwing Sarah while Camilla was away?’

‘You bastard,’ said Anthony slowly.

‘I’m just trying to root out the hypocrisy,’ said Leo. ‘I’m not the only one who can divorce sex from love, you see. Love means whatever you choose it to mean. Perhaps my variety is a little more free and easy than you’d like, but you can take it or leave it. It’s always there if you want it. I’m always there if you want me.’ His gaze, as he said this, was frankly sensuous, and Anthony felt helpless stirrings of desire, adding to his bewilderment.

‘Do you mean it’s that simple for you?’

Leo shrugged. ‘It can be for you, too. Now, if you like. This evening I’m not busy.’

‘My God – you sound like …’ Anthony shook his head. ‘I can’t reduce things to your terms. I don’t understand you. Maybe I’m glad I don’t.’ He rose and picked up his coat. ‘I’m sorry I bothered trying to talk it through. I just had the idea it meant something more to you.’

‘Not really,’ sighed Leo. He watched as Anthony left the
pub, then went to the bar to buy himself another drink. He sat down again, wondering if Anthony would come back, hoping he wouldn’t. It had gone against his true feelings to behave so brutally, but in the long run it was probably best for both of them.

Outside, Anthony stood on the cold pavement for some moments, wishing he could bring himself to accept Leo’s casual invitation, to submit to his terms. But he knew in his heart that it would be the beginning of a degradation from which he would never recover. Whatever Leo might think, there had to be love. Slowly he walked back to chambers.

It was a balmy Thursday morning in mid April, and Gideon had spent an hour drinking coffee at his desk and trawling through the papers for stories which might be of moment to the Ministry for Artistic and Cultural Development. Thursday mornings, when Tony Gear attended Cabinet meetings, were always something of a welcome break. Glancing at the diary, he saw that his lord and master was lunching that day with the political editors of both
The Independent
and
The Times.
Tony, unlike many in his party, was a politician who enjoyed food, drink, and the company of journalists. He wouldn’t be back in his office until well into the afternoon. Time, thought Gideon, to slope off and attend to a little business of his own.

Twenty minutes later, in the aftermath of a light shower of spring rain, Gideon was stepping from a taxi in Curzon Street. He cut a debonair figure as he sauntered up through the streets of Mayfair, sidestepping puddles, admiring the
breaking buds on the trees in Berkeley Square, pausing occasionally to glance in the windows of shops and galleries. When he reached a particular gallery in Hay Mews, he stopped, pressed the bell, and was admitted. Half an hour later, he emerged, his business satisfactorily completed. He had negotiated a price for the seven works by Germano Lehrman which he had seen at Leo’s flat, and whose titles he had, with quick assiduity, committed to memory and shortly thereafter to paper. It was a price which Leo, given his admitted disenchantment with the Lehrman works in his possession, would undoubtedly jump at. He would realise enough from the sale to buy himself one or two larger works much better suited to his present tastes – say, some Mapplethorpe photographs, or a Nadelman sculpture. If this all went smoothly, and Chay’s museum then bought the paintings from Gideon’s gallery-owning acquaintance (a friend of long-standing from their years together at Eton), Gideon stood, to make a healthy little percentage from the deal, of which Leo would naturally know nothing. Not for a while. But that small profit was only the beginning – it was as nothing compared to that which Gideon hoped would eventually come his way.

Gideon took a taxi back to Whitehall, and there spent the rest of the morning dealing with various junior officials anxious to know if Tony Gear had signed their letters and documents. When these and other routine matters had been disposed of, Gideon called Leo in chambers. Told he was engaged on a case, Gideon left a message to say that he would call on Leo in chambers at half six that evening.

The afternoon passed and, true to form, the Minister for
Artistic and Cultural Development returned to his office a little after three, slightly flushed, with the air of one who has dealt masterfully with the press. Gideon glided into the inner sanctum to remind the Minister that he had a meeting at half past with the Chief Secretary to the Treasury to discuss next year’s funding for regional ballet, and watched as Tony went into a ten-minute fluster and bluster, casting about for figures and memoranda. Gideon didn’t know why he bothered. They both knew that it was Gideon who would steer the meeting on Tony’s behalf, allowing it to appear to the Chief Secretary that it was, of course, the Minister who was master of all the relevant facts and figures, while Gideon merely murmured on the sidelines. It was an elegant deception practised by both of them with many a delegation and policy forum, and Gideon often felt that he had elevated his own role in these little pieces of theatre to something approaching high art.

When the meeting ended, Gideon departed with the notes he had taken in his fastidious hand, to be written up later, and set about the daily task of making up the Minister’s box with the correspondence clerk. From the corner of his eye he saw Kelly, Tony Gear’s diary secretary, enter the Minister’s office. He glanced at his watch. She emerged three-quarters of an hour later, after the other staff in the office had gone home, and just as Gideon was putting the final letters for signing into the box. Forty-five minutes was far longer than was strictly necessary to inform the Minister of his next day’s movements. Gideon gave her a smirk, which Kelly tried to return with an airy smile. Gideon thought he could read those smiles of Kelly’s very well. They had been a touch nervous
in the early days, but now they had a trace of hauteur about them. She didn’t like Gideon. She was a little afraid of him. Gideon knew this, and was well content.

When Gary, Tony Gear’s driver, arrived to take the red box, Gideon was careful to have a friendly chat with him. For all that he had bought Gerald Kaufman’s book, Tony Gear had failed to read past Chapter One, and so had never taken on board the salutary advice that
a Minister should, if he is sensible, do a great deal to please his driver.
From the very beginning, Tony Gear had made the fatal error of rubbing Gary up the wrong way. Gideon had divined this, and had every intention of profiting from the Minister’s mistake. There was much that Gary knew, and was prepared to tell – to the right person.

Gideon bade the Minister goodnight, put on his coat, and left the office. A warm, rainy spell had set in, and the early evening air in Whitehall was damp and pleasantly fresh. Gideon decided to walk all the way to the Temple.

He reached Caper Court a little before six, just as Henry was about to leave. Henry buzzed Leo and showed Gideon up to his room. There Gideon found Leo in his shirtsleeves, desk stacked with documents, going through papers. They greeted one another, Leo fetched a bottle of claret from the case standing by his door, opened it, and poured them both a glass. They sat there, the room lit only by the glow from Leo’s desk lamp, and discussed the case briefly. Gideon knew most of what had happened so far, since Lady Henrietta was in attendance at Chichester Rents most days and regaled Gideon with the details every evening. After a little while, Gideon made casual mention of his friend who ran the Mayfair gallery, and who happened to be interested
in acquiring works by Germano Lehrman. He mentioned the typical price his friend was offering. Would Leo be interested in selling the few he had? Leo said he certainly would, reckoning up in his own mind the profit he would make since he had first acquired the paintings in the early eighties. It was too good an offer to refuse, and he didn’t care for the things any more. He supposed Gideon, acting on his friend’s behalf, stood to take a cut of some kind, but that was hardly Leo’s business. They toasted the deal, and arranged a time when the gallery could collect the pictures and settle up. Far easier, Leo observed, than putting them up for auction. Gideon, with a smile, agreed.

When the bottle of claret was empty, Leo suggested dinner at his club. Gideon regretfully declined, saying that he had work to attend to. He left Caper Court and took a taxi to a busy, but discreetly tucked-away restaurant in Islington whose name Gary had mentioned to him earlier. As he came in, Gideon saw the bar was crowded, and that he could stand there safely unobserved from the restaurant. He ordered a drink, and from a discreet distance scrutinised the tables and the diners. He picked them out quickly at a table at the far end of the room. Although Tony Gear had his back to him, Gideon recognised Kelly, deep in intimate conversation with the Minister. Not, thought Gideon, that there was anything wrong with that. Tony Gear could dine with whom he pleased. Of course he could. Gideon finished his drink, and took a taxi back to his mother’s house in Pimlico. There, as his mother watched
Newsnight
and dozed, Gideon made a telephone call to Chay, who had given Gideon his London number on the evening of the museum
launch. Chay happened to be in New York, but Gideon left a message to the effect that eight works by Germano Lehrman were available for purchase, if Chay and the museum were interested. He didn’t mention a price. That would come later, when Chay called back, as Gideon knew he would.

Because of the routine, dragging nature of the Lloyd’s case, the time Leo spent with Sarah had settled into something of a pattern. He thought little of it, regarded it as nothing more than a useful release of sexual energy and a way of having someone cook dinner for him two or three times a week. Sarah, however, attached greater significance to it than that. She felt she could read something into Leo’s behaviour. He was getting older, work tired him, he liked having her around, he liked making love to her. Surely it was just a matter of time before Leo realised that the pattern was a comfortable one, that they were good for one another – in short, that he might as well marry her and have done with it. Then she could forget all about the boring slog of being a barrister – or of ever having to work again. She could have a comfortable, secure life, and do exactly as she pleased while Leo earned ridiculously large fees and took them both further up the social ladder. It was the marrying bit that was tricky. Even Sarah could see no immediate reason why Leo should alter the status quo and actually bother marrying her. She toyed with the idea of getting pregnant but decided that not even Leo was worth that sacrifice. No, she might want Leo and his money and everything else that marriage to him might usefully bring, but she wanted her freedom, too. Otherwise there was no
point. It was something she would have to talk him into eventually, in a roundabout way. She was pretty sure she could. It was just a question of time, letting the pattern develop until she was a fixture in his life – that meant every part of his life, including the time he spent with Oliver. She might not care much for small children, but Sarah knew that that was an area where she had to make her mark. She would have to start sacrificing a few weekends.

The opportunity to show her nurturing side came in late April. On one of the routine evenings spent at Leo’s, as they ate the dinner she had cooked, Leo mentioned that he would be going to Stanton with Oliver that weekend.

‘Given the stage this case has got to, it means trying to divide my attention between Oliver and a large pile of work. The other side are going to start calling their witnesses next week, and that means I have to prepare my cross-examination.’

‘Why don’t you hire my services for the weekend?’ said Sarah. ‘I’m moderately child-friendly, as you know, and my rates are very reasonable. Just a warm bed, regular meals, and the odd glass of wine.’

Leo eyed Sarah speculatively. There must be some hidden agenda, one that went with the routine she had established lately, the meals she cooked, her easy availability. It wasn’t like the Sarah of old. That Sarah had a price for everything, and a reason.

‘You’ve become very domesticated, all of a sudden. What’s happened to your late nights, your hedonistic weekend lifestyle?’

‘I’m simply offering to help out. I do like the occasional weekend away from London, you know.’

‘Well, your offer is very kindly accepted.’ He poured her another glass of wine. ‘Do you think you could throw in a spot of gardening as well? The place could do with tidying up.’

Sarah gave a weak smile and took a gulp of wine. Child-minding
and
gardening, not to mention other attendant chores that a weekend at Stanton would bring. She sincerely hoped this was going to pay off in the long run.

By the time the weekend came, the frequent showers which had dogged the early part of the month had disappeared, and the weather was warm and sunny. Sarah drove to Stanton in fairly good humour, despite the fact that she had had to turn down a last-minute dinner invitation from Hugo. Still, plenty of time for amusements like that once she had achieved her aim. Being the wife of Leo Davies would bring money and enough spare time to indulge any number of fancies. When she finally reached Leo’s house, she had painted a delightful picture of her future life, one in which she and Leo lived free lives and in which Oliver didn’t figure too prominently.

By the time Saturday evening came, Sarah would cheerfully have obliterated Oliver from the picture altogether. She’d spent all day with him, while Leo worked on the case, and had discovered that keeping a lively toddler amused was an exhausting business. At half past six, when Leo abandoned work and gave Oliver a bath, Sarah slumped in an armchair with a drink. She thought regretfully of Hugo, and hoped he
would keep. Was this all going to be worth it? There was no guarantee at the end of the day that it would pay off, and she couldn’t spend too many Saturdays like this. She felt so tired she didn’t think she could be bothered with sex later on. Besides, even with the ever-inventive and energetic Leo, it had become somewhat routine of late.

Leo came down with a clean and sweet-smelling Oliver in his arms, and found Sarah brooding over her gin and tonic. ‘You look exhausted. I’ll cook supper tonight.’ Sarah gave him a weary and grateful look, then hastily set her drink down as Leo put Oliver on her knee. ‘Just read to him for twenty minutes or so while I start cooking. He should be ready for bed soon.’ Leo turned as he reached the kitchen door. ‘Thanks for making a start on the garden. I’ve done most of what I need to do, so I should be able to help you tomorrow.’

Tomorrow, thought Sarah, as she turned the first pages of
Thomas and the Magic Railway.
She could hardly wait. Gardening, and looking after Oliver. Things at Stanton had certainly changed since that first wild summer she had spent here with Leo, James, and whatever like-minded friends Leo had cared to invite for weekend parties. Perhaps that was what parenthood did for you. In which case, Sarah decided, she was having none of it. She began to read aloud to Oliver, wondering what the crowd at the Met Bar were talking about right at that moment, and where they were going afterwards.

The following day was better, because Leo took Oliver for a walk to see some horses in a nearby field, leaving Sarah to read the Sunday papers for an hour or so. Then they
had lunch at a pub in the village. It was only when they got back to the house that Leo discovered that Oliver’s supply of nappies had run out.

‘I’ll have to go to the supermarket in Oxford,’ he said. ‘The village shop will be closed by now.’

‘What about the nearest petrol station? They usually have things like that.’

‘Good idea. I won’t be long.’