Men of Intrgue A Trilogy (29 page)

Sophia examined her daughter speculatively, and Helen stared back, unruffled. She had been dealing with these confrontations for years, and there was a certain familiarity about them now, a ritual pattern that had to be observed.

Sophia’s hair was frosted and neatly coiffed, her makeup perfect in the eighty-six-degree heat. She was wearing a beige watered silk summer dress of understated elegance, which must have set the bonbon king back a few francs, with matching Charles Jourdan pumps and Hermes bag. In her ears and around her bare throat she wore the Demarest pearls, a wedding gift from Helen’s father, worth ten thousand dollars at last estimate—Sophia had them appraised yearly. On her left hand the pigeon’s blood ruby that the chocolate baron had given her as an engagement ring flashed like an exit sign. She was wealth incarnate. The mugger fortunate enough to stumble across Sophia on any given day would have instantly acquired his retirement fund.

“That won’t be necessary,” Sophia finally said, sitting on the edge of the paper strewn sofa and crossing her gleaming legs. “Well, Helen, I must say that pregnancy was the last condition I ever expected you to develop. Malnutrition, certainly. Cabin fever, possibly. But this...” She waved a manicured hand expressively. “It’s just too depressing.”

“I’m not depressed,” Helen said, going to the kitchenette and taking a pitcher of iced tea from the refrigerator. “I’m very happy. Happier than I’ve ever been in my life.”

Sophia nodded sourly. “Just like you not to say a word to a soul until it’s too late to do anything about it.”

“I would not have done anything about it,” Helen said firmly, holding her mother’s gaze. “I want this baby.”

She poured tea for both of them, and when she gave one glass to Sophia she realized that the older woman was looking at her in a way she never had before. She guessed that, purely by accident, she had finally done something to impress her mother. And she knew why. Pregnancy in most cases required the active participation of a man, and the subject of men was one of consuming interest to Sophia.

Sophia’s next question confirmed Helen’s suspicions. “So who’s the father?” she asked.

“No one you know,” Helen answered, sipping her tea.

“That’s not an answer. Is he one of those scruffy students you’re always hanging around with, some graduate assistant in obscure literati?”

“No.”

“Not, God forbid, a professor?”

“It’s not a professor and it’s none of your business.”

“I beg your pardon. I’m your mother and it is my business.”

“All right, fine. The father is a Central American revolutionary, and when I took that vacation last spring I really spent the time in his guerrilla camp, as his lover.”

Sophia tapped her dainty foot.

“Helen, you are getting on my last remaining nerve with this. Now is not the time for jokes.”

Helen shrugged. “Okay.”

Sophia waited a beat. “So you’re not going to tell me?”

“I just did.”

Sophia held her glass up to the light and examined it before she took a drink. “It’s so hot for September, don’t you think?” she asked conversationally.

“Boston is always like this in September,” Helen answered, recognizing the old sidestep maneuver. Sophia would make chitchat for a while, then circle back to the salient topic.

“Your father and his wife just bought a chalet in Aspen,” Sophia said, fingering her necklace.

“That’s nice.”

“It’s ludicrous. Neither one of them can ski.”

“Daddy can ski,” Helen pointed out. “He never has time for it.”

“His wife can’t. She just wants to give
apres
ski parties and ogle the blond European instructors.”

“She can do that if she wants. I don’t think you have to pass a skiing test to buy property in Aspen.”

Sophia tired of the repartee and glared at her daughter.

“Helen what are you going to do?” she said in a strong voice.

“Well, I’m finishing my thesis, and then I thought I’d get my teaching certificate.”

“Teaching?” Sophia said, as if Helen had suggested prostitution.

“Yes. And after that I’ll look for a job.”

“A job?” Sophia gasped.

“Sure, why not? I’m not going to live on the trust fund forever. I was just using it until I got out of school.”

“And what about the... baby? ”

“Sophia, people with children work all the time. I’ll figure something out; don’t worry about it.”

Sophia took a bigger drink of her tea, then set the glass down. She folded her hands on her knees and Helen knew that the main volley was coming.

“Look,” Sophia said, “I have a solution for all of this. Claudia and Roberto will be in New York next week.”

“And?” Helen said warily.

“And you know how gallant Roberto is. He would never be able to see you in such dire straits without wanting to help.”

“Help,” Helen said, beginning to get the picture.

“Yes. I’m sure we could work something out. You have to legitimize the child. After the baby is born, well, we could arrange...”

“A payoff?” Helen said thoughtfully.

Sophia glared at her.

Helen couldn’t help it. She burst out laughing.

“I fail to see anything funny in your situation,” Sophia observed uncomfortably.

“You can’t honestly be suggesting that I
marry
Roberto Fierremonte?”

“Why not? It would only be for a few months.”

“I am not going to fight Roberto for space in front of the mirror, not even for a few days,” Helen said, still grinning.

“You are an ungrateful brat!” Sophia burst out, and Helen stopped cold, staring at her mother.

“Sophia, have you already contacted him about this?” Helen said, certain of the answer before she asked.

Sophia picked up her glass again, jingling the ice cubes. “Well, I just happened to be speaking to Claudia on the phone, and I mentioned your possible predicament—”

“I am not in a predicament!” Helen yelled, losing patience. “Now you get back on the phone and tell Claudia, or Roberto, or whoever you arranged this little deal with, that the bribe will not be handed over after all. What’s wrong with those two anyway, don’t they have enough money?”

Sophia didn’t reply, and Helen sighed. “Silly of me,” she said. “No such thing as enough money, is there?”

“I don’t understand why you have to see it in such crass, materialistic terms. There’s nothing wrong with Roberto wanting to help out a friend.”

“He’s your friend; let him marry you!”

“I,” Sophia said imperiously, “am not about to become an unwed mother.”

Helen counted to ten. She took a deep breath and said, “You know that Roberto has been trying to get his hands on some of Daddy’s money for years now. He’s running himself into debt with all the gambling and the high living. Do you really want to give him an excuse to stick his mitt into the till?”

Sophia’s fingers knotted and unknotted in her lap. “But Helen, what is going to happen to you?” she said miserably, and for the first time Helen saw that her mother was genuinely worried about her. Of course she wanted to avoid a scandal among her uptight, hypocritical friends, but she also thought her only child was in terrible trouble. The fact that Helen didn’t see it that way only exacerbated Sophia’s concern. It confirmed her lifelong suspicion that Helen was a flake who couldn’t take care of herself.

Helen sat next to her mother and put her hand on Sophia’s shoulder. “Mother,” she said, deliberately using the title, “I have been with a man. A real man, who believes in something and who has dedicated his life to it. A man who loved me. I can’t go from that to Roberto, not even for the sake of your precious reputation.”

“And where is this wonderful man when you need him?” Sophia sniffed. “I don’t see him, do you?”

“He doesn’t know about the baby.”

“When do you propose to tell him?” Sophia demanded, outraged.

“I’m not going to tell him. There are reasons why it isn’t a good idea.”

“Such as?”

“You’ll just have to trust me on that,” Helen said, smiling. “Besides, unwed motherhood as you so quaintly put it is
in
right now. All the movie stars are doing it.”

“The Demarests aren’t,” Sophia responded dryly.

“They are now,” Helen said, and even Sophia had to smile.

“So,” she said, drawing out the vowel, “there’s nothing I can say that will persuade you to change your attitude about this?”

“Nothing.”

“Well, I don’t know what I’m going to tell your father.”

“Sophia, don’t be ridiculous. He’s so wrapped up in his mergers he wouldn’t notice if I gave birth to the Bronx Zoo.”

“He might disown the child,” Sophia cautioned.

“Let him. I have enough money in my own right to support myself and the baby.”

“He might disown
you.”

“He can’t touch the trust fund that Grandfather left me; you know that.”

“But you’ll be entitled to a lot more when your father dies. This sort of thing is not exactly going to encourage him to leave it to you.”

“I don’t care,” Helen said flatly, and Sophia sighed.

“I know you don’t care, and I will never understand why. Your whole life I have tried to guide you, advise you on how a person of your status should behave, and you have done nothing but disregard every word I’ve said. When I think...”

“We’re not going to play that tape again, are we?” Helen asked gently.

Sophia pressed her lips together, swallowing her words. “No, I guess we’re not. But I would like to know if any pressure can be brought to bear on the father. If you don’t marry Roberto I assume you’ll marry him.”

“Pressure? Are we talking about money again?”

“You’ll find that it can be very persuasive to people who don’t have it,” Sophia commented dryly.

“It might interest you to know that I have already offered him money, not to marry me, but to use for something that’s very important to him. He refused it.”

“That sounds like someone who would fascinate you,” Sophia said despairingly, and Helen chuckled.

“Cheer up, Sophia, that’s good news. I wouldn’t pressure him if I could. For once in my cautious, circumspect life I took a chance. Do you know what that feels like? And I’m not sorry; I’m not sorry at all. I had a wonderful experience with the man I love and I’m going to have his baby.”

“And the identity of this paragon is going to remain a mystery,” Sophia stated.

Helen didn’t reply, aware that reiterating the truth was futile.

Sophia nodded. “I can see that my mother will never be dead as long as you’re walking around. She was as stubborn as you are.”

“A bad trait that skipped a generation as we all know.”

Sophia stood, tucking her bag under her arm and patting her hair with her other hand. “We’ll have to make plans,” she said. “You’ll have to have a shower, of course.”

“No shower,” Helen answered quickly. “For once, bypass an excuse to give a party.” Sophia was amazing; in almost the same breath she could complain about the scandal of an illegitimate child and then plan a fete to celebrate its imminent arrival.

“You really want to do this all by yourself?” Sophia asked doubtfully.

Helen could understand her mother’s incomprehension. She had never taken a step in her life without a husband, her family and an army of servants to back her up.

“I’m not by myself. The baby is with me.”

Sophia shrugged. “I really don’t know what I hoped to accomplish by making this trip. You’d think I would understand by now that I can never persuade you to do anything you don’t want to do.”

Helen smiled. “But you wouldn’t be my mother if you didn’t try.”

“That’s true,” Sophia said, and they both laughed.

“Can I offer you something to eat?” Helen said politely, anxious to end the discussion of her dubious future.

“No thank you,” said Sophia, who counted calories with anorexic intensity. She glanced at her Piaget watch, a gift from spouse number two; Sophia parted with the husbands, but not the perks. “I have to be running along, I’m meeting Richard Worthington for dinner.”

“How is Richard?” Helen asked about the man who had been trying to get her mother to marry him for twenty years. Poor Richard, he just never had enough assets to interest Sophia on a serious basis.

“Divorced again,” Sophia replied. “I hear she ran off with a tuba player.”

Helen managed not to laugh but her grin was roguish.

“Yes, I know,” Sophia said airily, “we’re all very funny to you, aren’t we? You think you’re so superior, with your principled phantom lover and your precious little bundle on the way. I can’t wait for you to become a mother. Then maybe you’ll know what it’s like to have your child reject you and everything you represent. Maybe you’ll understand my pain.”

Helen was shocked to see that there were tears in Sophia’s eyes. She went to her mother and put her arm around her shoulder, hugging her close.