Liberty Silk (7 page)

And now, as she lay on the couch in the artist’s studio, Jessie realized that she had never had any real idea of what had been going on in her husband’s mind. She had had no idea what horrors Scotch had seen in the years before she had come to Rouen to play at war work in the library; and no idea that every time she spoke of her privileged Cambridge education it might have irked him – really irked him. She had had no idea each time she rattled on about London and her shopping trips to Liberty or Harrods, and afternoon tea at the Savoy and visits to the West End to see the latest Somerset Maugham play, that it just might have had the effect of a chisel blow to the cement of their relationship.

Madame Saprasti! Diseuse de bon aventure!
The fortune teller’s chant recalled her to the here-and-now.

‘I’m sorry – did you say something?’ she asked the painter. ‘I was miles away.’

‘I asked you who he was. The artist you sat for.’

‘I don’t remember his name,’ Jessie said quietly. ‘He was nobody, after all. He was nobody very special.’

BEFORE BABA EMBARKED
for Hollywood, Richard Napier took her to tea in the Palm Court, in the Ritz Hotel.

‘I
love
this place!’ said Baba, smiling at the waiter who had just finished pouring Lapsang Souchong. He returned the smile, made a small bow and backed away. ‘It has the most soothing atmosphere of anywhere in London – and it has the most beautiful clientele, too. Even dog-faced women don’t look so bad here – did you know that? It has something to do with the lighting, apparently. Dorothy told me that the Palm Court has the most flattering light of any tea room in Europe. Ha! No wonder she spends so much time hanging around here.’

Richard smiled at her indulgently as she reached over and selected a titbit from the three-tiered cake stand piled high with finger sandwiches, scones and miniature pastries.

‘So, tell me. What do your grandparents have to say about you haring off to Hollywood?’

‘They’re quite keen on the idea, funnily enough. What with all the talk on the radio about evacuating children, they’re glad that I have the chance to get out of the country.’

‘But you’re not a child. Don’t you think you should stay and volunteer for ambulance work?’

‘Richard! It’s the opportunity of a lifetime! No girl in her right mind would turn down a chance to go to Hollywood.’

A pained expression crossed Richard’s face. ‘Hollywood! Even the name has a tawdry ring to it. You really want to be an actress that badly?’

‘I don’t want to be an actress, Richard,’ said Baba. ‘I want to be
somebody
. I want to wear shoes by Salvatore Ferragamo and evening gowns by Madame Grès and hats by Schiaparelli. I want to wear diamond earrings and dance Cuban rumbas and Hungarian waltzes. I want to be a star.’ She bit crisply into her cucumber sandwich.

Richard put on his best sympathetic voice. ‘I know you want to be somebody, darling, and I understand the reasons behind your compulsion, truly I do. Any little girl forsaken by her parents would—’

Baba looked away as if she’d just been slapped smartly on the cheek.

‘I’m sorry. I’m sorry.’ Richard put his head in his hands, sighed, then looked up again and tried another tack. ‘I hate to drag you back to earth, my darling, but don’t you think you’re being a little naïve? There are millions of girls all over the world who have the same idea.’

‘This isn’t an
idea
, Richard. It’s my dream. And it’s not as if I’m going out there with no friends and no money. I’ll have an income, and I’ll know at least some of the crew members who are going, and Sabu will look after me.’

‘Sabu! He’s little more than a child himself! You need someone mature to look out for you, someone responsible.’ Richard fiddled with his earlobe – a habit of his when deliberating. ‘I can let you have a letter of introduction to a friend of mine.’

‘
You
know somebody working in Hollywood? Who?’

‘A chap called Niven. He was at Stowe with me, in the same house. We were in the chess club together – did a bit of beagling, too. I understand he’s doing walk-on parts out there.’

‘Niven! Not
David
Niven?’

‘That’s the fellow.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me before?’

‘It didn’t seem important.’

‘But don’t you know he’s doing more than just walk-on parts? He had a supporting role in
The Prisoner of Zenda
, and now he’s starring in
Raffles
! Oh – could you please get in touch with him for me, Richard? That would be just peachy!’

Richard gave Baba the kind of indulgent smile you might reserve for a pet. Then he leaned back in his chair, steepled his fingers, and looked at her over his beautifully manicured fingernails. This made him appear even more grown-up than he already was, and Baba was convinced he did it deliberately.

‘I don’t mean to put a damper on things,’ he said, ‘but the odds of you being plucked from the ranks and given a speaking role are infinitesimal, darling.’

‘Richard. I know you don’t understand, but the movies are my
future
! I
have
to do this.’

‘You have such a theatrical streak, Baba. It’s really rather endearing.’ He gave her that indulgent smile again. ‘You do know that I’m fearfully fond of you, don’t you?’

‘Of course I do.’

‘And that I probably know you better than anyone?’

Baba bridled a little. ‘Allow me a modicum of mystique, please!’

‘And allow me to remind you that I’ve lived next door to you nearly all my life. I’ll never forget the day I first saw you – up a tree in Grosvenor Square, hanging upside down like a monkey, with those funny sticky-out plaits.’

‘And you shouted “Hey, you! Get out of here! It’s private land!”’

He had the good grace to look abashed. ‘Oh, Lord. I was a pompous little boy, wasn’t I?’

Baba took a sip of her tea to hide her smile. The truth was that Richard still had plenty of pompous moments.

He continued to regard her over his steepled fingers. ‘Heavens. Who would have thought to look at you back then that you’d turn out to be so . . .’ For once, he appeared lost for words.

‘Grown up?’ supplied Baba.

‘Grown up. That’ll do.’

‘Is that a compliment, Richard?’

‘It most certainly is a compliment.’

‘Thank you!’ Since Carole Lombard had said in her ‘Introduction to Charm’ in
Film Pictorial
that it was always more seemly to acknowledge a compliment than not, Baba gave Richard a winsome smile, then lowered her eyes and surveyed the cake stand. She’d have loved to scoff one of the delicious little chocolate éclairs that the Palm Court did so well, but she had her figure to think of now that Hollywood was on the horizon, and her girdle could only achieve so much. She’d be better off sticking to sandwiches, and the miniature smoked salmon ones were irresistible.

She popped one into her mouth. When she raised her eyes, Richard was still looking at her: immediately she knew what was coming. She felt her heart go into a kind of skid as he reached into his pocket, produced a box, and set it on the table in front of her.

‘You know what that is,’ he said.

Baba nodded. It would have been disingenuous to pretend she didn’t.

‘What is it?’ he asked.

She chewed and finally swallowed her sandwich with an effort. ‘Why – it’s a ring.’

‘Aren’t you going to open the box?’

Baba sent him a pleading look. ‘No, Richard. Please don’t ask me to.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because I can’t marry you.’

‘You say that now. But we’re living in troubled times. This war is going to be fast and furious, Baba, and the most stable institution that we can cling to will be the institution of marriage.’

Oh, God! How could he describe marriage as an ‘institution’? The words just didn’t belong together.

‘But—’

‘Listen to me! Just hear me out. If you marry me, Baba, I can offer you all the security you need. I’m wealthy, and I have prospects. As you know, I have my own Chambers – and I’m extremely well connected politically. I’m in negotiation with the diplomatic corps; I intend to make politics my career. At the highest level. I don’t want to appear arrogant, but I know that one day there will be a place in the Cabinet for me.’ He smiled. ‘How does the idea of being Prime Minister’s wife appeal to you?’

Baba floundered around for a spanner to jam into the works. ‘But – but how could a Prime Minister have an actress as a wife? It’s unheard of.’

Richard reached across the table and took her hands in his. ‘That would be the one sacrifice I’d have to ask you to make,’ he said. ‘I don’t expect you to give up your dream of going to Hollywood – of course I don’t – but when things don’t work out for you there you may be very glad to give up any notions about going into films, and decide to return home and marry me.’

‘But I—’

‘Shh!’ Richard touched Baba’s lips with a forefinger. ‘Don’t say anything just yet. Just think about what I’ve said. And open the box.’

She shouldn’t have. She knew she shouldn’t have opened it, but she couldn’t resist it, any more than she had resisted that smoked salmon sandwich.

It was a diamond. It was the prettiest darn diamond she had ever seen – set in platinum – and she knew that it must have cost Richard a great deal of money.

She looked at the diamond, and then she looked back at Richard, and steeled herself to form the words, ‘I’m sorry, Richard, I just can’t.’ But there was such a happy, puppy-dog look about him that was so at variance with the grown-up way he usually looked that Baba felt a sudden great tug of sympathy for him – sympathy, and something else. Neither ardour, nor lust . . . just a profound, sisterly affection. ‘Why do you want to marry me?’ she asked, genuinely curious.

‘Because I love you.’

‘
How
can you love me?’

Richard smiled at her. And then he did something that was so un-Richard that Baba was completely taken aback. He took her hands between his and began to recite Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s ‘How Do I Love Thee?’

‘How do I love thee?’ he said. ‘Let me count the ways . . .

I love thee with the breath,

Smiles, tears, of all my life! – and, if God choose,

I shall but love thee better after death.’

And all the while, his eyes never left her face. She felt that nobody in her life before had spoken to her with such artless sincerity, and her tears took her by surprise.

‘Oh! Now look! You’re making me cry. My mascara will run.’

Without hesitation Richard produced a pristine handkerchief from his breast pocket, and Baba couldn’t help but laugh at how quickly he had resumed character. She blew her nose and dabbed carefully at her eyes, and then she looked down at the monogrammed handkerchief between her fingers, twisting it and thinking very hard about what to say.

What
to say? The last thing she wanted to do was hurt this man, who had always been there for her. He was her friend, her confidant, her stalwart. Baba pictured herself as a married woman in a dream kitchen wearing a frilly apron and pureéing baby food, and she pictured herself at some dreary state dinner surrounded by dignitaries, and she pictured herself in bed in a Winceyette nightgown, Richard in stripy pyjamas, both of them reading their books, and she knew that, while this might be a vision of domestic bliss for another girl, it simply was not for her. What she craved was fun and adventure and glamour, and a life free from responsibility. She would not find it with Richard.

Finally she looked up at him and said: ‘I can’t promise to marry you, Richard. But I can promise you that I will think about it.’

‘Thinking about it is a beginning,’ he said with a smile.

And before she could say anything else, Richard took the ring from her and raised her left hand to his lips before sliding the gleaming circlet onto the third finger. As though on cue, the two ladies at the next table pitter-pattered their hands together and beamed affably at the happy couple.

‘How lovely,’ said one, ‘to know that love’s young dream continues to flourish even in the face of war!’

Baba had the decency to blush, a little.

EVERY DAY JESSIE
got dressed, walked across the river to the studio in Montmartre and disrobed. Every day she struck an ever-more challenging pose, and every day her muscles grew stronger while her spirit grew feebler. She knew her despondency showed in her demeanour, and she suspected that if she didn’t buck up her artist would soon send her packing: but the grim irony was that the more he exhorted her to smile, the more she felt like crying. After several hours she would put her clothes back on, pocket the twenty francs the artist counted out and go back to her room in the Hôtel des Trois Moineaux. She walked the two miles quickly, with her head down, taking care to avoid the eyes of the prostitutes she passed on the streets in the Latin Quarter – those raddled absinthe girls who were suspicious of her youth and beauty, and keen to see her off their patch. Some evenings she’d go and sit by a statue in the Jardin du Luxembourg that lovers tended to use as a meeting point. Jessie persuaded herself that perhaps,
perhaps
Scotch might turn up there, looking for her. Once she had thought she’d seen him striding along an avenue, that distinctive rangy silhouette moving swiftly through the shadows cast by plane trees. Her heart had somersaulted and she’d leapt to her feet to call out to him – but when the gentleman raised his right hand to tip his hat at a passing lady, Jessie had turned and blundered her way through the congregation of courting couples, back to the rue du Coq d’Or. Some evenings she’d buy something to eat from one of the street vendors on the way, some evenings she’d boil up macaroni or potatoes on the little meths stove she kept in her room, and some evenings she’d skulk in a corner of the bistro, hoping that yellow-haired Adèle wouldn’t drop by.

She was wary of Adèle. The woman had befriended her on the very first day she’d moved into the hotel, and always greeted her with a jocular ‘Bonjour, Mam’zelle!’ when they passed each other on the street. But there was something – something
bogus
about her that made Jessie want to keep her distance . . .