Jewels (52 page)

“People always say things like that about princes, because they’re jealous,” she said innocently, but still too frightened to enter into armed combat with her mother. Besides, she knew instinctively that she would lose this one.

“What makes you think so?”

“He told me.”

“He told you that?” Sarah looked horrified. “Doesn’t it occur to you that he is saying that to you to cover himself, in case people say things about him? That’s a smoke screen, Isabelle. For God’s sake, you’re not stupid.” But she was about men, she always had been, and particularly this one.

Julian had made several more phone calls that afternoon, and everyone said the same thing about Isabelle’s new friend. He was trouble.

“This is not a nice man, Isabelle. You have to trust me this time. He’s using you.”

“You’re jealous.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“You are!” She shouted at her, “Ever since Daddy died you don’t have anyone in your life, and it makes you feel old and ugly and you are … and you just want him for yourself!…” It was a torrent of words, and Sarah stared at her in amazement, but she spoke to her calmly.

“I hope you don’t believe that. Because we both know it’s not true. I miss your father terribly, every moment, at every hour of the day”—tears filled her eyes at the thought of it—“but not for a moment would I replace him with a fortune hunter from Venice.”

“He lives in Rome now,” Isabelle corrected, as though it mattered, as her mother pondered the overwhelming stupidity of youth. Sometimes it absolutely staggered her what a mess they made of their lives. But on the other hand, at the same age, she hadn’t done much better with Freddie, she reminded herself, trying to be reasonable with her daughter.

“I don’t care where he lives.” Sarah was beginning to lose her temper. “You will not see him again. Do you understand me?” Isabelle did not answer. “And if you take my car again. I’ll call the police next time to bring you back. Isabelle, behave yourself, or it won’t go well with you! Do you hear me?”

“You can’t tell me what to do anymore. I’m eighteen.”

“And a fool. That man is after your money, Isabelle, and your name, which is much more powerful than his. Protect yourself. Stay away from him.”

“And if I don’t?” she taunted her. But Sarah had no answer. Maybe she should send her to stay with Phillip at Whitfield for a while, with his incredibly boring wife and children. But Phillip would be no better an influence on his sister, with his secretaries, and his tarts, and his little games. What was wrong with all of them? Phillip was married to a woman he didn’t care about, and probably never had, except that she was respectable, and Julian slept with absolutely every woman and her mother, if possible, and now Isabelle was half crazy over this four-flusher from Venice. What had she and William done, she asked herself, to create such unreasonable children?

“Don’t do it again,” she warned Isabelle. And then she went upstairs to her room, and a little while later she heard Isabelle’s door slam.

Isabelle behaved herself for a week, and then she disappeared again, but this time in the Peugeot. She insisted she went to see a friend in Garches, and Sarah couldn’t prove otherwise, but she didn’t believe her. The atmosphere was tense until she left for Cap Ferrat, and after she did, Sarah heaved a sigh of relief, though she didn’t know why. The Côte d’Azur was hardly on another planet. But at least she was staying with friends, and not with that cretin from Venice.

And then Julian sent her the newspapers from Nice and Cannes and Monte Carlo when he was there for a weekend. They were full of stories about the prince of San Tebaldi and Lady Isabelle Whitfield.

“What are we going to do with her?” Sarah asked him in despair.

“I don’t know,” Julian answered her honestly. “But I think we’d better go down there.” They did the following week, when they both had time, and they tried to reason with her together. But she refused to listen, and she told them bluntly that she was in love with him, and he adored her.

“Of course he does, you little fool,” her brother tried to explain to her. “He can only guess at what you’re worth. With you in his hand, he can sit on his ass forever.”

“You make me sick!” she screamed. “Both of you!”

“Don’t be so stupid!” he shouted back. They took her to stay at the Hotel Miramar with them, and she ran away. She literally disappeared from the face of the earth for a week, and when she returned, Lorenzo was with her. He apologized profusely to both of them for being so thoughtless, for not calling them himself… as Sarah’s eyes shot daggers at him. She had been sick with worry, and didn’t dare call the police, for fear of the scandal. She knew Isabelle had to be with Lorenzo. …

“Isabelle was so upset …” He went on … and now he humbly begged their forgiveness…. But Isabelle interrupted him, and addressed her mother directly.

“We want to get married.”

“Never,” her mother said bluntly.

“Then I’ll run away again. And again. Until you let me.”

“You’re wasting your time. I never will.” And then she turned her attention to Lorenzo. “And what’s more, I will cut off every cent she has.” But Isabelle knew better.

“You can’t. Not all of it. You know that what Daddy left me comes to me when I’m twenty-one, no matter what.” Sarah was sorry she had ever told her, but Lorenzo looked extremely cheered by the news, and Julian looked sick. It was so obvious to everyone. Except Isabelle, who was too young to understand it. She was an eighteen-year-old girl with no experience about life, and hot pants, it was a hell of a combination. “I’m going to marry him,” she announced again, and Sarah was intrigued that Lorenzo said nothing. He was letting his bride-to-be fight her own battles and his, an omen of things to come, Sarah wanted to remind her.

“I will never let you marry him.”

“You can’t stop me.”

“I’ll do everything I can,” Sarah vowed, and Isabelle’s eyes blazed with anger and hatred.

“You don’t want me to be happy. You never did. You hate me.” But Julian deflated her balloon this time.

“Try that on someone else. That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.” And then he turned to his future brother-in-law, hoping to appeal to his reason, or his sense of decency, if he had either, but clearly he didn’t.

“Do you really want to marry her this way, Tebaldi? What’s the point?”

“Of course not. It tears at my soul to see you all like this.” He rolled his eyes, and looked ridiculous to everyone but Isabelle. “But what can I say … I adore her. She speaks for both of us … we
will
be married.” He looked as though he were about to break into song and Julian didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

“Don’t you feel foolish? She’s eighteen years old. You could be her grandfather, or almost.”

“She is the woman of my life,” he announced. And actually the only remarkable thing about him was that he had never been married. It had always paid to keep moving until now. This time the profits were a lot bigger, if he could land little Lady Whitfield, whose family owned the biggest jewel business in Europe, as well as their lands, and tiles, and original holdings. It was quite a purse. No prize for an amateur. But Lorenzo wasn’t.

“Why don’t you wait, if you’re both so sure?” Julian tried again, but they both shook their heads.

“We can’t … and the disgrace …” Lorenzo looked as though he were about to cry. “I just spent a week with her. Her reputation… and what if she gets pregnant?”

“Oh, my God.” Sarah sat down heavily in a chair. The mere thought of it almost made her sick. A child of his in her family would be even worse than poor Cecily’s two colorless children. “Are you pregnant now?” she asked Isabelle directly.

“I don’t know. We didn’t take any precautions.”

“How wonderful. I can hardly wait to hear the result of that in a few weeks.” There was always abortion, of course, but that wasn’t the issue now. The issue was marriage.

“We want to get married this summer … or at the very latest, at Christmas. At the château,” she said, as though he had schooled her, and he had. He wanted a big lavish wedding, so they couldn’t get rid of him easily. And they couldn’t anyway. Once they were married, it was forever. He was Catholic, and he was going to marry Isabelle in the Catholic Church in Rome, after they were married at the château. He had already told her it was his only condition. The only thing that mattered to him, he said, was to be truly married in the eyes of God, and he had even cried when he said it. Fortunately, Sarah hadn’t had to hear him.

They had fought and discussed and argued and shouted well into the night, until Julian was hoarse, Sarah had a headache the size of the hotel, and Isabelle almost fainted, as Lorenzo called for ice and smelling salts and damp towels. And finally Sarah gave in. There was no choice. They would elope anyway, if she didn’t. She was sure of it. And Isabelle swore they would. She tried to get them to wait a year, but they wouldn’t do that either. And Lorenzo kept insisting that it was better to do it now, in case she really was pregnant.

“Why don’t we wait and find out?” Sarah suggested calmly. But they wouldn’t even agree to wait till Christmas, by the end of the evening. Lorenzo had accurately gauged the full measure of their hatred, and he knew that if he didn’t force the issue soon, they would find some way to get rid of him and it wouldn’t happen.

So before the night was out, they all agreed to late August, at the château, with a handful of close friends, no one else, and no press. Lorenzo was disappointed not to have the big wedding they deserved, but he promised her a fabulous party in Italy, which her mother assured her he wouldn’t pay for.

It was a bitter night for her, and for Julian. But Isabelle left the room, and went to stay at Lorenzo’s hotel with him. There was no stopping her now. She was hellbent on her own destruction.

The wedding was small, but tastefully done, at the Château de la Meuze, with only their close friends in attendance. And Isabelle looked lovely in a short white dress by Marc Bohan at Dior, and a big picture hat to go with it. And Sarah was deeply grateful for the fact that she wasn’t pregnant.

Phillip and Cecily came from England for the wedding, Julian gave her away, and Xavier carried the ring, while Sarah wished he would lose it.

“You look thrilled,” Emanuelle said in an undertone, as they sipped champagne in the garden.

“I may throw up before lunch,” Sarah said mournfully. She had watched them be married in her own garden, by a Catholic priest and an Episcopal bishop. It was doubly official then, and doubly disastrous for Isabelle. And throughout the day, Lorenzo gushed, and grinned, and charmed everyone, and made toasts, and talked about how he wished he could have met the great Duke, Isabelle’s father.

“He’s a bit much, isn’t he?” Phillip said, for once making his mother laugh with his understatements. “Pathetic.”

“And then some.” In comparison to him, Cecily was Greta Garbo. That was two now she didn’t like. But Cecily only bored her. Lorenzo she hated, which broke her heart as well, because it meant that she would never be close to Isabelle while she was married to Lorenzo. It was no secret how they felt about her husband.

“How can she even think she loves him?” Emanuelle asked in despair. “He’s so obvious … so greasy …”

“She’s young. She doesn’t know about men like that yet,” Sarah said with infinite wisdom. “Unfortunately, she’s going to learn a great deal in a very short time now.” It reminded her again of her experience with Freddie Van Deering. She would have liked to spare Isabelle that, and she had tried, but it was no use. Isabelle had made her choice, and everyone in the world but Isabelle knew it was a poor one.

The wedding party stayed till the end of the afternoon, and then Isabelle and Lorenzo left. They were going to Sardinia for their honeymoon, to a new resort there, to see his friend the Aga Khan, or so he said. But Sarah imagined there were a lot of people whom he said he knew who were going to disappear into thin air over the next few years, if he lasted that long. And she hoped he wouldn’t.

After they left for the airport, in a hired Rolls-Royce with a driver, the family sat gloomily in the garden, thinking of what she’d done, and feeling that they’d lost her forever. Only Phillip seemed not to care too much, as usual. He was chatting quietly with a woman who was a friend of Emanuelle and Sarah. But for the rest of them, it was more like a funeral than a wedding. Sarah felt somehow as though she had failed not only her daughter, but her husband. He would have been devastated if he could have seen Lorenzo.

Sarah heard from her very briefly when they reached Rome, and then not a sound from her until Christmas. Sarah called once or twice and sent several letters, and Isabelle never answered. She was clearly angry at all of them. But Julian spoke to her once or twice, so at least Sarah knew she was all right, but none of them had any idea if she was happy. She didn’t come home at all the following year, and she didn’t want Sarah to go there, so she didn’t. Julian flew to Rome to see her once. He said she looked very serious and very beautiful, and very Italian, and according to their mutual bank, she was spending an absolute fortune. She had bought a small palazzo in Rome, and a villa in Umbria. Lorenzo had bought a yacht, a new Rolls and a Ferrari. And as far as Julian could see, there was no baby on the horizon.

They came back to the château for Christmas after the first year, but grudgingly, and Isabelle said nothing to any of them, but she gave her mother a very pretty Buccellati pearl-and-gold bracelet. She and Lorenzo left on Boxing Day to go skiing in Cortina. It was difficult to fathom what was happening with them, and she didn’t even open up with Julian. But it was Emanuelle who finally ferreted out the truth. She flew to Rome, after a business trip to London to see Nigel and Phillip, and afterwards she told Sarah that she thought Isabelle looked dreadful. She had circles under her eyes, she was rail thin, and she never laughed anymore. And each time she saw her, Lorenzo wasn’t with her.

“I think there’s trouble there, but I’m not sure she’s ready to admit it to you. Just be sure to leave the door open, and eventually she’ll come home. I promise.”