Princess Daisy (64 page)

“No. I’m free. I’d like to have dinner.”

“What time shall I pick you up?”

“Eight-thirty at Claridge’s.” She’d be back from spending the day with Dani by six-thirty. That would give her two hours in which to get ready. She wondered if they were going to be dining alone or would he produce yet another couple of Supracorp strangers for her to meet.

“Well … I’ll see you then,” Shannon said awkwardly as he backed out of the trailer.

That moment on the wall yesterday, interrupted by that total bastard, North, had left him in a condition he didn’t have any reference points to explain. He was buffeted by shivers of crystalline delight, filled with impatient, precarious joy, conscious of an excess of something vital and valuable but yet unidentified that was invading his spirit.
Altogether a most intemperate state to be in, and thoroughly disconcerting. He scarcely knew his own name. Damn, but he was happy!

Usually a reservation at the Connaught for Saturday night has to be made almost a week in advance. But, since Shannon stayed at the Connaught on his frequent business trips to England, he had no trouble getting a table. He had given a lot of thought to the question of where to take Daisy for dinner, and the honeyed hum of the Connaught dining room appealed to him more than the high-priced, hurried atmosphere of London’s many fashionable Italian restaurants or the solemn elaborations of its best French restaurants.

Daisy was waiting in the lobby of Claridge’s when he arrived, and they spoke only a word or two on the brief drive around the corner. She was emotionally drained by her reunion with her sister. It had been a difficult day, long, and both sad and happy as she saw that Dani had not changed, had remained eerily beautiful and untouched by time, a happy five-year-old in Daisy’s body. She felt frail and vulnerable tonight, disconnected, muddled, at once very old and very young.

As the chauffeur stopped the car in front of the familiar entrance with its elaborate glass canopy, Daisy only said, “Oh,” so quietly that Shannon didn’t hear the note of shock in her voice. She stepped into the lobby in a dream, and walked the familiar route to the restaurant, not stopping as she used to, to inspect every dish on the laden trolleys, but looking straight before her, biting the inside of her lower lip so that it wouldn’t tremble as the sounds and smells and light of a never forgotten paradise surrounded her again. As she and Shannon waited to be seated, standing for a moment in the entrance to the room, a headwaiter suddenly stopped taking an order at a table near the door. He looked only once. He left an astonished duke, who was inquiring about the family tree of the
fois gras
, and walked swiftly, much too swiftly for any self-respecting mâitre d’hôtel, to the door.

“Princess Daisy,” he cried in astonished joy and then abandoned all professionalism entirely as he enfolded her in a great bear hug. “Princess Daisy—you’re back! Where did you go? Everyone missed you so much—but no one knew what had happened—you disappeared!”

“Oh, darling Monsieur Henri, you’re still here! I’m so glad to see you!” Daisy cried, returning his hug with all her might.

“We’re all still here—you were the one who left,” he said, rebuking her in his surprise, ignoring the fact that all the diners in sight of the door had abandoned their food to watch the unimaginable sight of a Connaught headwaiter hugging a Connaught customer, as if she were a long-lost daughter.

“I didn’t want to, Monsieur Henri, but I’ve been living in America.”

“But when you came back to visit? Why did you never come back to see us, Princess Daisy, during all those years and years?” he said reproachfully.

“I haven’t been back to England,” Daisy lied. “This is my first time home.” She couldn’t tell him that on her trips to see Danielle she didn’t have the money to eat at the Connaught.

Shannon coughed. The mâitre d’hôtel abruptly reentered the real world. Within seconds they were seated. He had, without thinking twice, given them the same table Stash Valensky had always requested, central yet private. Shannon looked at Daisy carefully. She was holding back tears, the struggle visible on her face.

“I’m sorry … I had no idea,” he said. “Does it bother you to stay? Wouldn’t you rather go somewhere else?” He took one of her hands and covered it protectively.

Daisy shook her head, and gave him the beginning of a smile. “No, I’ll be fine. It’s just … memories. I’m glad to be back, truly. Some of the happiest moments of my life were spent right here at this table.”

“I don’t know anything about you!” Shannon burst out. He felt overwhelmed by jealousy of her mysterious past. What a terrible way to start the evening—reunions, memories, tears. What next?

“It isn’t fair, is it?” she asked, reading his mind.

“No, it isn’t. Every time I see you, you’re different, damn it. I just don’t know what to make of you. Who the devil are you, anyway?”

“This from the man who’s so sure of my identity that he’s going to blazon it all over the world? If
you
don’t know who I am, how can ‘Princess Daisy’ exist?”

“You’re laughing at me again.”

“Do you mind?”

“I like it. Anyway, you’re right. ‘Princess Daisy’ has to
do with Elstree, not you. And I still don’t know who you are.” Entreaty, as loud as trumpets, shone in his eyes.

“I used to come here with my father, for lunch, almost every Sunday from the time I was about nine until I was fifteen. Then he died and I went to college at Santa Cruz in California. After that I worked in New York for North.”

“Except when you were painting pictures for fun on the weekends?”

“For
money
. I painted every single picture for the money,” Daisy said gently, “and I worked for North for the money and I’m doing the commercials for the money. If you want to know me, you have to know that.” As she heard herself speak, she realized that she had just told Shannon more about herself than she had told any man. Yet she wasn’t surprised, nor was she dismayed at what she’d revealed. Perhaps it was the result of her day with Dani, but her emotions were close to the surface tonight and she knew, with a profound, bright certainty, that it was safe to tell this man things she had muffled in shrouds for so long.

“Why do you need the money?”

“To take care of my sister.” As she spoke, Daisy felt a wave of relief so strong that it made her give a great shuddering sigh and slump back in her chair, but her hand didn’t move from under his.

“Tell me about her,” he asked softly.

“She’s very, very sweet and good. She’s called Danielle. Today, when I saw her, she remembered me perfectly even though it’s been several years since I could come to visit her. The teachers there, at her school, told me that she talks about me often—she says, Where Day?’ and she looks at all the photographs of us together,” Daisy said in a dreamy voice.

“How old is she?” Shannon wondered, at sea.

“She’s my twin.”

Two hours later, dinner finished, they sat still talking over brandy in the restaurant which was now more than half-empty.

“Something went wrong way back in my life,” Daisy said. “I’ve never been able to be sure what it was exactly.”

“Was it when your mother died?”

“Nothing was ever right after that. But I think it went
wrong long, long before that, perhaps even when I was born … born
first.
”

“You can’t remember back to when you were born,” Shannon said, startled. “How do you know you were born first?”

Daisy looked at him in astonishment. “Did I say that? Did I really say ‘born first’—say it out loud?”

“Whatever it means, you did.”

“I didn’t realize,” she murmured. Since they had started talking, as with the first faint lilt of a waltz played at a distance, she had begun to feel a dancing pace lift her heart. It was as if that stubborn stone she had carried there for so long had begun to dissolve into music.

“Daisy, what are you talking about? Up till now you’ve made sense, but suddenly you’ve lost me. I don’t understand.”

He looked at her in bafflement. She seemed to be talking out of a deeper dream than the one she’d been in when she first told him about Danielle.

“All my life I’ve been trying to repair the damage, trying to make it unhappen, to solve it, to pay for it somehow, and, of course, it hasn’t worked.”

“Daisy, explain—what do you
mean?
” he begged. “You’re still talking in riddles.”

She hesitated. She had broken the taboo her father had placed on any word about Danielle, she’d told Shannon all about the way in which she’d been brought up, about Rolls-Royce and why she had no money, about Anabel’s leukemia, about
La Marée
—she’d told him everything except about Ram. She never, never in her life would tell anyone about Ram.

“The only reason Danielle’s retarded is because I was born first.” Daisy took a deep breath before she continued. “She got less oxygen—I got everything I needed and she
didn’t
. If it hadn’t been for me, she would have been perfect.”

“Jesus!
You’ve lived with that all your life!
My God, Daisy, that is the craziest thing I’ve ever heard! Nobody in the world,
nobody
, no doctor, no thinking person would agree with you. Daisy, you simply
cannot
really believe that.”

“Of course I don’t believe it logically—but emotionally … I’ve always felt … 
guilty
. Tell me, Pat, how do you unthink something you
feel?
How do you forget something you heard when you were a little child, something that
explained everything you didn’t understand, something you couldn’t tell a single other person about, something you lived by for so long that
whether it was right or wrong didn’t matter
, because it has an inner truth for you that is stronger than any logic?”

“I don’t know,” he admitted slowly. “I’d give anything to know. Perhaps you have to replace the truth that is wrong with the truth that is right? Does that sound possible? Or am I getting too metaphysical? I’m not used to this sort of problem. I wish I were,” he added humbly.

“Come on,” she said, mirth changing her face, “the metaphysical Mr. Shannon—if they could only see you in the boardroom now.”

“It would make a lot of people happy—Pat Shannon without an answer.” He studied the sweeping line from Daisy’s forehead to the tip of her straight, fine nose and thought that it had a particular determination he had not properly taken into account before. The furrow between her nose and upper lip was a deliciously shaped shadow, full, suddenly, of lurking laughter.

“I have a sneaky feeling that the waiters, adoring as they are, wouldn’t be unhappy if we left now—there’s no one here but us,” he said.

“You may have to carry me out. I’m exhausted. I can’t remember when I’ve been so tired,” Daisy said. “But I feel, oh, I feel …”

“Yes?” he asked anxiously.

“Like the crazy title of a song Kiki picked up somewhere—it’s called The Name of the Place Is I Like It Like That.’ ”

“I know what you mean. Now listen, I’m taking you back to your hotel so you can sleep. Tomorrow, are you going to see Danielle again?”

She nodded.

“And Monday? Will you be here Monday?” he asked.

“No, Monday I have to go to Honfleur to see Anabel.”

“Let me go to France with you,” he blurted.

“But you have business in London,” she reminded him gravely.

“Did you really believe that?”

“That comes under the heading of leading questions.”

“Well, can I come?” he asked again. He had never felt so much at risk.

“I think Anabel would like to meet you,” Daisy said slowly. “She’s always had an eye for men. Yes, that’s a fine
idea. And unless you’ve been to
La Marée
, you can’t really understand when I talk about it. But what will Supracorp do without you?”

“Who?”

In the early days of July the ivy which covers
La Marée
begins to turn red in streaks. By the end of the month the entire sprawling
manoir
is hidden by rippling flames of shouting color and the huge-headed dahlias in the garden are in full flaunting bloom, each one of them worthy of a Fauve canvas all to itself.

Anabel was standing at the front door when Daisy and Shannon drove up. As she kissed her, Daisy inspected Anabel carefully for signs of change. There was an expression of resolution on her loving face which had never been there before. Perhaps it was a sign of the price she had paid for acceptance, for knowing the truth. And there was a new and unfamiliar shallowness in the color of her eyes. But her gaze with its supreme pragmatism had not changed, nor had her eternal amusement at life.

“What have we here?” she exclaimed, looking Shannon over. “A distinctly tall and rather gorgeous American? That does make for a pleasant change. Why is his hair so black and his eyes so blue? But, of course, it’s Irish blood. I must be getting old not to see that immediately. Daisy, couldn’t you find an American who looked like an American—rather blond and bland? I’ve always heard about them, but I’ve never seen a specimen. Perhaps they don’t exist? Never mind—we’ll make do with this nice, big, beautiful one. Come in, children, and have some sherry.”

“You’re a terrible flirt,” said Shannon.

“Nonsense, I’ve never flirted in my life. I have always been dreadfully misunderstood,” Anabel said, with that laugh that had half-seduced every man who heard it. The red of her shiny hair was fading and she had grown thinner but, as she led them through the salon out to the terrace overlooking the sea, it was uncanny to see with what gentle strokes time seemed to have touched
La Marée
and its owner. Daisy’s heart leaped as she thought how this place, this haven, at least, could never be taken away from Anabel.

That evening, after dinner, Shannon took himself off to read in one of the balcony window seats above the salon while Daisy and Anabel sat together in the chairs around
the dining-room fireplace. On this summer night there was no fire, but the memory of the many holiday fires of childhood still lingered there.