Quentins (9 page)

“Will we go through separately?” Ella asked at Dublin airport.

“Why?” Don was mystified.

“Well, in case anyone sees us,” Ella said.

“Like who?”

“Like Margery,” she said.

“But how could she see us? Isn't she still in Spain?” he asked, confused.

So she had been right. Margery
had
been in Spain after all.

“Ella, it's your mother,” Don called out.

Usually he didn't answer the phone in her apartment,
but he had been waiting for an urgent call and given the number.

“Thanks, Don. Hi, Mother.”

“Oh, Don is there, I gather.” Her mother sounded both doubtful and disapproving.

“Yes, we were just about to go out to a reception together. He said he'd pick me up. Well, what's new?”

“When will you be on your own?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Can I talk to you when you are alone?”

“Talk away, Mother.”

“Call me back when you are free to talk.” She hung up.

“Shit,” Ella said.

“Something wrong?” Don raised his eyes from the computer.

“No, just a mad mother. You don't ever talk about yours.”

“Nothing to say. She's quiet, lives her own life. Lets other people live their own lives.”

“How admirable of her!” Ella began dialing her mother. “Listen, Don's gone out to get his car. What did you want to say?”

“Have you seen tonight's evening paper?” her mother asked in clipped tones.

Ella pretended she needed to get some milk and coffee. She went around to the convenience store. The evening paper had a big gossip column spread over two pages, and specialized in lots of photographs. “Who is the blonde on Don Richardson's arm as he comes back from Spain? The tycoon from the troubled R and R firm doesn't look as if he is suffering any of the anxieties that their customers report. R and R need not mean Rice and Richardson, maybe Rest and Relaxation.” There was a picture of Ella and Don laughing happily together at Dublin airport.

Ella felt the energy drain out of her as she leaned against the doorway of the shop. She read the whole paragraph again.

She was there in full view of the whole of Dublin described as a blonde in the same tone as you might say she was a tramp. What would people say or think?

But more frightening than any of that, what did it mean that Rice and Richardson was a troubled firm? Could they seriously be in any financial difficulty? Could Don be in danger? The newspapers always exaggerated about things, but surely it was dangerous to imply that a company was in trouble unless it was true? The newspaper could well be sued.

When she got back to the flat, Don was still bent over the computer. She laid the newspaper on the table and went into the kitchen. She needed tea or coffee, something to stop her trembling.

“Anything you'd like, Don?” she called, forcing her voice to sound normal.

“Oh, peace of mind would be nice,” he said with a hollow little laugh.

“Two of those on toast, then!” she said, trying to laugh. But she wasn't laughing at all.

He left the computer and came across the table, where she put a large whiskey and the paper folded in front of him so that he could see the picture and caption.

“This is what caused the alarm bells with your mother, I suppose?” he said.

“You've seen it?” she said, shocked.

“Yeah, Ricky got an early copy.”

“Why didn't you tell me?”

“I told you before, Angel. Let me worry about the work side of things.”

“But this isn't about the work side of things,” she said, bewildered.

“What else is it about, Ella? Once clients read that
other clients report difficulties, there'll be a run on the place. Ricky and I have to get our strategy right.”

She looked at him, dumbfounded.

“What is it, Ella?”

“The picture, the picture of you and me.”

“That's not important.”

“What?”

“I mean, compared to all the rest that could be going down.”

“But your wife, your father-in-law, my parents, everyone . . .” Her voice was shaky.

“Listen, Angel, believe me, that's the least of our worries.” His face was white and strained. He looked really ill and it alarmed her. So, it was true. Something was wrong. What was happening? But Don was so on top of everything.

“Don, you are going to be able to sort all this out, aren't you?”

“Oh, yes. There's always plan B.” He gave a mirthless little laugh.

“What's plan B?”

“It's an expression. If this plan isn't working, we have to turn to another. It's just a phrase.”

“Do you have a plan B?” she asked.

“There are loads of plans, but I didn't want to have to change to one of them. I like things the way they are.” He looked around the room almost wistfully.

Ella felt herself shudder for no reason.

He downed his drink and became all businesslike. “I have to go out to Killiney.”

“I thought you said she was in Spain.”

“I go out there for a lot of other reasons than to see my ex-wife, as I tell you over and over, Angel.”

“Will you be coming back tonight, Don?”

“No, but I tell you, I'll take you to a big treat lunch tomorrow in Quentins.”

“We can't, not after the picture of us . . .” She indicated the evening paper.

“Nonsense. Everyone will have forgotten that—yesterday's news. Once they know their money's safe, they won't mind how many blondes parade through airports with Ricky and myself.” He saw her face. “Joke, Angel.”

“Sure.” She saw he was packing his few things in a suitcase. “Getting rid of the evidence?” she said, and wished she hadn't.

“Should be ready for whatever hits the fan.” He smiled.

“I thought you said she was in Spain.”

“
Please
, Angel, I'm stressed out enough as it is. Tomorrow, Quentins, one o'clock. I'll tell you everything then.”

He was rushed and fussed. Calm, cool Don Richardson, who always moved languorously, wasn't moving like that now. Twice he put down his briefcase, his coat, his overnight bag, the evening paper. Twice he picked them all up again. She must not allow him to leave thinking she was in a sulk.

“Come on over here and kiss me good night, then, if I'm not to have the pleasure, the great pleasure, of you tonight.” She ran hands all over him and he began to respond.

But he pulled away. “No, Ella angel, that's not fair, that's using weapons that haven't been invented yet . . . Let me get out of here before we end up in the sack.”

“Nothing wrong with that,” she said into his ear. But he escaped her clutches and ran out the door.

Then suddenly with a shock she saw his briefcase.

She heard his car start up. She sat unmoving at the table and looked across the desk they had shared for so many months. He had left his laptop. Did that mean he was stressed or what? He never parted from it for a moment. But at least it meant he was coming back. She had
been so nervous when she saw him packing his things and looking wistfully around the room.

Ella wasn't hungry. She put away the food she had been about to cook. She called her mother and said that it was idiotic to get into a tizzy about what a stupid paper wrote. And that it was just a picture of friends who had met at the airport or on the plane or whatever.

“Or on a holiday in Spain,” her mother said.

“Or that,” Ella said.

“Your father and I wondered.”

“It's a mistake to wonder too much,” Ella said.

“Don't be offensive, Ella.”

“I'm sorry, Mother. I'm just worried about something else, as it happens.”

“Is he still there? In your flat?” her mother whispered.

“No, Mother, I'm all on my own. Come round and check.”

“I only want what's best for you. We both do.”

“We
all
want what's best. That's the problem,” Ella said with a great sigh and hung up.

Then she phoned Deirdre. It was an answering machine. “It's Ella, Dee. Be very glad you're not at home. I was going to groan and grumble and complain for a bit at you, but well, now I can't. You must have seen the paper. It's not all as bad as it looks. Don is very confident about it all, and I'll know much more after tomorrow lunchtime, so I'll tell you everything then. Do you remember when we thought that life was a bit tame and dull? Wasn't it nice then?”

She hung up and sat at the table for a long time. She knew she wouldn't sleep, but she had better go to bed and try.

At three she got up despairing, and made tea. At four she opened the laptop computer. She typed out the word “angel” that he had said was the password. It
didn't come to life as it had when he typed it. It just said Password Invalid. She closed the machine and waited until dawn. Then she dressed carefully and went to the school. She supposed that she must have taught her students normally, on some kind of autopilot. But she couldn't remember a word she had said. Then it was lunchtime, and she drove to Quentins.

M
s. Brennan ushered her to a table for two. “Will you have a drink while you're waiting, Ms. Brady?”

“No, thanks. I have to teach this afternoon. Better not be breathing fumes over them. One glass of wine with lunch will be my limit.”

Brenda Brennan laughed. “They're not all as wise as you are, Ms. Brady. They often go back to run big companies or indeed the country after considerably more than one glass of wine, I tell you.”

“You'll have to write your memoirs,” Ella said.

“No, I want to go on serving meals for a long time. No point in closing us down.” She moved on to other tables, always a pleasant word here and there, never staying too long anywhere. She was amazingly elegant, Ella thought, and gracious. No wonder the place was so successful.

Brenda Brennan could make generalized remarks, but she would never say anything specifically indiscreet. Brenda would have known that Ella was meeting Don Richardson, known family man. She might even have seen the photo in yesterday's paper. But she would give no hint. Of course, she had an easy life, Ella thought enviously. She was married to the man she loved, the chef Patrick Brennan. Lucky Brenda, she had no nerve-racking lunch ahead of her.

Ella wondered if she should take a brandy, but decided against it. Whatever he said, Ella would take it. She would not be like she was last night, whimpering and talking about herself and her picture in the paper. Clearly he had his problems. She could have kicked herself for behaving so badly when he needed her most.

At one-fifteen he wasn't there. It was very unlike him. At one-thirty she began to worry. Quentins was not the kind of place that hurried you or told you that the kitchen would be closing. But at twenty minutes before two, Ella went to the ladies' room. Brenda Brennan
hated
cell phones at the table, and she had to try and phone him.

There was no reply from his cell phone. And no message record service. This was very unusual. She would order something to eat. Or should she call the school first? Or should she telephone the house in Killiney? Or the office of Rice and Richardson? Don't fuss, Ella, she spoke to herself aloud. She decided she would order food, something cold for both of them, and then when he eventually arrived there would be something to eat.

As she returned to her table, she noticed that Brenda had ordered her things moved to a private booth. Her book and glass of mineral water were there, waiting for her. Also, what looked like a small brandy.

Ella looked around her in surprise. Mon was nearby.

“Here you are, Ella. Much more cozy setup if you're meeting a fellow.” Mon had a huge smile and two jaunty little bunches of hair which stuck out at angles from her head.

“Yes, but . . .”

“Listen, compared to most that come in here, Ella, you don't have anything to worry about. That fellow's mad about you, we often say it behind your back, so why not to your face?” Mon was eager and reassuring.

“Did Don ring and ask to change the table?” Ella asked Mon.

“No idea.” Mon was cheerful. “Mrs. Brennan said do it double quick, so it's done.”

Ella felt a great sense of alarm. Whatever he wanted to tell her must be terrible if it had to be told in a secluded booth. Then she noticed Brenda Brennan slipping in opposite her. She carried an early copy of the evening paper for today.

“Ella,” she said urgently.

What had happened to all the “Ms. Brady” bit of an hour ago?

“What is it?” She was full of fear.

“One or two customers recognized you. I thought best you be in here.”

She opened the paper, and there it was again—the picture of Ella laughing at Don at the airport. But why had they printed it a second time?

“When he comes in, he'll explain.”

“He's not coming in, Ella. It was on the news at one-thirty. We heard it in the kitchen. He's gone to Spain. He left on the first plane this morning.”

“No!”
Ella cried. “No, he can't have gone away.”

“He has, apparently. He was out there setting it all up. He has his wife and children there already, his father-in-law went yesterday through London . . .”

“How do they know . . . ?” Ella's voice was just a whisper.

“When all the clients went around to the office today to check on their assets, they couldn't get in. The place was locked up. They called the Guards and the Fraud Squad . . . and apparently he was on the eight
A
.
M
. plane.”

“This is not happening.”

“I took the liberty of getting you a cognac.”

“Thank you,” she said automatically, but she didn't reach for it.

“And I could call the school for you if you gave me the number and told me who to call.”

“That's kind of you, Ms. Brennan, but I actually don't believe any of this. Don is coming in. He keeps his word.”

“It's important how you behave now, for your own sake. You don't want to be running into a rake of journalists and photographers.”

“Why would I?”

“This idiotic paper said he had a love nest with you in Spain. Gives your name and where you work.”

“Well, see!” Ella was triumphant. “
They
know what you don't, that he'd never leave without me, never.” Her voice was getting high, shrill and very near hysteria.

Brenda caught her by the wrist. “The news program on the radio knows what this crowd and the newspaper didn't know. They spoke to neighbors in Killiney about the house being closed up. They spoke to Irish people living in Spain, who were all very tight-lipped, as you might imagine.”

“He couldn't, he couldn't.” Ella shook her head.

Brenda released the girl's wrist. “There's an explanation. He'll get in touch, but the main thing is to get you out of here before someone sneaks a call to a journalist.”

“They wouldn't!”

“They would. Don't go home and don't go to your school.”

“Where will I go?” She looked pitiful.

“Go upstairs to our rooms. We literally do live over the shop. Drink that down, write out the name and number for your school and then go straight over to that green door there near the entrance to the kitchen . . .”

“How will you know what to say to the school?”

“I'll know,” Brenda said. She didn't add that it would hardly be necessary to say anything. They would all have read the paper and heard the lunchtime news. They would not be expecting Miss Brady back to classes this afternoon.

Ella was surprised to see the big, handsome brass bed with the frill-edged pillows and rose-pink coverlet. It looked too luxurious, too sensual for this couple, somehow. She took her shoes off and lay down for a moment to get her head straight. But the sleepless night and the shock worked more than she believed they would. She fell into a deep sleep and dreamed that she and Don were carrying a picnic up a hill, but everything was in a tablecloth and getting jumbled together. In the dream, she kept asking why did they have to do it this way, and Don kept saying, “Trust me, Angel, this is the way,” and all the time there was a rattling of broken china.

She woke suddenly to the sound of a cup and saucer being placed beside her by Brenda Brennan. It was almost six o'clock. There was no picnic. She couldn't trust Don Richardson anymore. But was there the slight probability that he might be back at her place waiting for her? She began to get out of bed.

Brenda said she was going to have a shower. Perhaps Ella might like to look at the six o'clock news on television. “I'll be in the bathroom just next door if you need me,” Brenda called.

Ella turned on the TV and found the news. She watched without thinking until the story came on. It was worse than she thought. Don had gone. That much was certain. And he had been in Spain last week setting it all up. There were interviews with people who had lost their life savings. A man with a red face who had given money to Don Richardson every month so that he could buy a little retirement home in Spain, because his wife had a bad chest and needed good weather. “We are never going to see Spain now,” said the man, twisting his hands to show how upset he was.

There was a tall, pale woman who looked as if she were too frail to stand and talk to the man with the microphone. “I can't believe it. He was so charming, so
persuasive. I believe he will be back to explain everything. They tell me I don't own any apartment in that block. But I must. He showed me pictures of it.”

Mike Martin, a man she knew, a friend of Don's and described by the newscaster as a financial expert, came on next. Ella had had a drink with him several times. He knew all about her. Don had said he was a bit of a smart aleck, always in something for what he could get out of it, but not the worst. Mike looked horrified by it all and said that it couldn't have come as a greater shock. Don and Ricky were such a pair of characters, of course, and everyone who flies near the sun gets their wings burned now and then. But then he went on:

“It looked as if they must have known for about six months. But I still can't believe it. Don Richardson is such a decent fellow, he'd help anyone, you know, fellows on the street, people he met in bars. He was always generous with advice. Other guys in his line of business would say: if you want my advice, come into the office and consult me. But never Don. I can't imagine him spending months plotting this runaway life, knowing he's leaving people in the lurch. He cared about people. I know he did.”

Ella watched, openmouthed.

The interviewer asked: “And will he miss people, friends, a lifestyle that he had in Dublin, do you think?”

“Well, of course, when all was said and done he was a family man, he loved his wife and boys, they went everywhere with him.”

“Wasn't there a rumor that he had this blond girlfriend, a teacher who was photographed with him?”

“No. You better believe one thing,” Mike Martin said. “I may not know a lot about Don, and I sure as hell didn't know what he'd been up to in the last six months in terms of his clients . . . but one thing shines out. He never looked at another woman. Come on now. If you were married to Margery Rice, would you?”

And then they cut to a picture of Margery Rice presenting prizes at a youth charity, very tiny and immaculately groomed, watched by her husband with pride.

Ella put the cup down.

Brenda came back into the room in her slip and put on a fresh black dress and arranged a lace collar in position.

“He knows about me and Don,” she said. “I've met him many times.”

“Well, isn't it just as well he kept his mouth shut?” Brenda said.

“No, it's not, it's better people knew the truth. Don loves me. He told me so last night.”

“Listen to me very carefully, Ella. I have to go down and serve a room full of people who will be talking about nothing else. I will have a polite, inscrutable smile on my face. I will say it's hard to know and difficult to guess and a dozen other meaningless things. But I know one thing. Only
you
must survive this, you must call your parents, tell them you're all right, decide what to do about your job and then go and find some of your friends, your own friends, not his. He has only business friends.”

“You don't like him, do you?”

“No, I don't. My very close friends have lost their savings. Thanks to Mr. Charming.”

“He'll give them back,” Ella cried.

“No, he won't. Fortunately it's not very much. She and her fellow don't
have
very much, but they were saving hard and Mr. Richardson told them how to double their money. They believed him.”

“He often said people were greedy,” Ella said.

“Not these two, if you knew them. But that's neither here nor there. Survive, Ella, and rejoice that he may have loved you. Well, at least enough not to let you or your family lose any of your savings in his schemes.”

“No.” She stood up. Her legs felt weak.

“What is it, Ella?”

“It's just my father. He's always going on about ideas Don gave him, hints here, a word there . . . he wouldn't have been so foolish . . .”

“When were you talking to your parents?”

“Yesterday, but they said nothing. They were going on about my picture in the paper. If there was anything to say they'd have said it then.”

“Nobody knew the extent of the scandal then. People only began to know it this morning.”

They looked at each other in alarm.

“Ring them, Ella.”

“He couldn't . . . he didn't.”

“You heard what they said on the television . . .”

Brenda Brennan pointed to the white phone beside the bed.

Ella dialed. Her mother answered. She was in tears. “Where
were
you, Ella? Your father thought you'd gone to Spain with him. Where are you?”