The O’Hara Affair (33 page)

The old lady emerged from her reverie, and adopted an imperious expression.

‘Yes. That’s me. What do you want?’

‘I thought you might like to look at some old photographs.’

‘Yes.’ She waved a dismissive hand at the television screen. ‘Turn it off.’

Dervla zapped the DVD player, then drew a chair alongside Daphne’s and set the album on her mother-in-law’s lap, open at the first page.

‘Look!’ she said. ‘It’s a picture of you! Isn’t it extra ordinary! What a beauty!’

The photograph was a studio-type portrait, taken when Daphne could have been not much more than sixteen or seventeen. Her unlined face was a perfect heart shape, her mouth curved in a demure Cupid’s bow. Her eyes were luminous below sleekly groomed brows, the glossy mass of her hair was held back with a simple ribbon. Her bone structure was exquisite: the nose aquiline, the cheekbones high, the jaw as defined as that of a Modigliani drawing. This face bore no resemblance to the parchment-covered skull that Dervla saw lolling on the pillow every time she entered Daphne’s bedroom.

‘Yes,’ conceded Daphne graciously. ‘I was extraordinarily beautiful.’

‘Let’s look at some more.’

Dervla turned the page to reveal picture after picture of Daphne. Daphne in a feathered cartwheel hat; Daphne modelling Dior’s New Look; Daphne looking haughty in a pleated satin evening dress.

She reached for another album. This contained mostly snapshots. They showed Daphne playing tennis; Daphne larking on a beach in a swimsuit; Daphne hiking with a rucksack on her back; Daphne with a party of girlfriends – linking arms and smiling to camera. As Dervla turned page after page she saw more images of a vibrant young woman, the picture of
joie de vivre
.

A third album was devoted to married life. Daphne on her wedding day, decked out in white mousseline; Daphne on a cruise ship, dining at the captain’s table, surrounded by much older people; Daphne kneeling before an exquisite doll’s house with a little girl; Daphne holding a baby. Christian?

Daphne confirmed it. ‘My son, Christian,’ she said, gazing at the last page. ‘I wish…’

‘What do you wish, Daphne?’

‘I wish I had been a better mother to my children. I didn’t want to marry, you see. I didn’t want to marry my husband.’

‘His name was Maurice, wasn’t it?’ prompted Dervla.

‘Yes. His name
was
Maurice. My parents wanted me to marry him. And in those days you did what your parents thought best. I wanted to marry…’

‘Who?’

‘I forget.’

‘But were you happy with Maurice?’

‘Happy? No. I was never happy with him. Maurice was old, you know. He was the same age as my father. And I was quite young when I married him – just twenty. I was a virgin, of course.’

‘That must have been difficult for you.’

‘Yes. I didn’t know anything. My mother had told me nothing. All she told me was that I had to do exactly what my husband wanted, no matter how odd it seemed. And it
was
odd.
Very
odd.’

Dervla watched as Daphne turned over a page of the album. There was a photograph of her standing on a terrace, her arm linked with that of a barrel-chested man with a ruddy face and a comb-over, dressed for golf in checked plus fours and a pullover that strained against his paunch.

Dervla felt a sudden surge of pity for the young girl who’d been married off against her wishes, the girl who had missed out on her twenty-something years when she should have been testing her wings, flirting and partying and falling in and out of love every six months or so. This girl who had instead ended up in a marital bed offering her virginity to a man who looked – and possibly behaved – like a bull.

No wonder she had had affairs later on in her marriage. No wonder she had become bitter and twisted. No wonder she had sent the evidence of her intimacy with her husband – her two children – off to boarding school at the earliest opportunity. But, Dervla calculated – Josephine and Christian had been born very late into the marriage. Christian had been just twelve when his father had died. Did that mean that Maurice had not been their real father, that someone else had sired the Vaughan children? Or did it mean that Daphne had mellowed, and that there had been some
rapprochement
between the ill-matched pair? It might be easy to find out. It might simply be a question of leafing through the diaries that Daphne had concealed in the volumes of Dickens…

Daphne had turned another page. The photograph on this one showed her with a lean, blond Adonis. He had an arm around her shoulders and was looking into the camera with an amused expression; she was gazing up at him with adoration writ clear on her face. Was this the man she had wanted to marry, the dancer who had died in a fire? Was this her first love? What had happened to him? Had she written about him in her diaries?

‘Did you used to keep diaries, Daphne?’ asked Dervla.

‘Diaries? Yes, yes – I did. But I destroyed them. They were dreadful diaries, really. I was an unhappy creature when I wrote them.’

‘Why did you write them?’

‘It eases unhappiness, to put things into words. But nobody else should ever be privy to those words. Diaries are not written to be read. That is why I destroyed them.’

‘Are you sure you destroyed them?’

‘Oh – I hope I did!’ Daphne looked anxious now. ‘I certainly hid them away somewhere no one could find them.
Dear me – how dreadful that would be, if they ever saw the light of day. I should die of shame.’

‘Don’t worry, Daphne,’ Dervla reassured her. ‘If they still existed, Nemia would have found them when she was moving all your stuff from London.’

‘Stuff ? What is
stuff
?’

‘I mean, your things.’

‘I think you mean my personal
effects
, don’t you?’

‘Whatever,’ said Dervla, sotto voce.

‘Speak up!’ commanded Daphne. ‘You’re a dreadful mumbler, you know.’

Oh, sweet Jesus!
Plus ça change…
thought Dervla.

Her eyes went to the bookcase where the complete works of Dickens were aligned neatly on their shelf. She’d take their contents up to her office in the Old Rectory later when Daphne was sleeping, and put them through the shredder. Allowing her mother-in-law to die of shame simply wasn’t an option. The diaries had been a record of her life, they had been for her eyes only, and Dervla had no right to pry.

A movement beyond the window caught Daphne’s attention. ‘When the red, red robin…’ she sang.

Once, to have added the line about ‘bob bob bobbin’ along’ would have made Dervla feel foolish. This time, she joined in con brio. Christian would have been proud of her.

In the library on Shakespeare Island, ScarlettO’Hara Sahara was behaving very cautiously. She hadn’t spent long talking with Hero last night because he was going to the theatre, he’d told her. It had disturbed her that he and Bethany were still consorting in Second Life, but she was glad to see that they were consorting openly, rather than in that Disneyesque cottage. Bethany had clearly been nonplussed to have Scarlett O’Hara muscle in on her man – Fleur assumed that that was why she’d teleported away last night – but Fleur was determined to protect her. If this man was as toxic as she suspected, she didn’t want any of that toxicity rubbing off on a girl who could so easily be frightened, living as she was on her own in that cottage down in Díseart.

This evening Hero was nothing other than gentlemanly. She half-expected him at any moment to come out with some obscenity or display his priapic prowess as he had done when he’d lured Flirty LittleBoots to his cottage, but so far he’d been perfectly mannerly. Maybe it was because Shakespeare Island was a public place, whereas his cottage was private. She knew that people could be expelled from Second Life for abusive or obscene conduct in public places, so it was likely that Hero was on his best behaviour, in case she reported him.

This public Hero was charming, educated, and interested in the things she was interested in: walking, art, music, travel, theatre. He had a GSOH, he loved dogs, he ticked all the boxes. This Hero was very, very clever, and Fleur was determined to let slip no personal details.

Where do you live?
he asked her.

Not Sydney, not Paris. Definitely not Lissamore.
Elysium,
she said.

LOL. Nice
.
What made you choose Scarlett O’Hara?

I’m a big fan of Vivien Leigh.

Me too. Those forties film stars were the most glamorous of all
.

I couldn’t decide between Vivien, Rita Hayworth or Veronica Lake.

Sad women, all three of them
.

He knew his film stars! Forties film stars were Fleur’s passion – she could be a
Mastermind
contender on the subject.

Veronica Lake was the saddest case of all
, he told her
. She was so broke in the end that she couldn’t even cover the cost of her own funeral
.

He really
did
know his film stars! Fleur was impressed, despite herself. She was just about to volunteer some interesting facts of her own about Veronica Lake, when her phone rang. It was Dervla.

‘Hey, Dervla,’ said Fleur. ‘What’s up?’

‘I just wanted a chat. I’m feeling a bit lonely.’

‘Oh – of course! Christian’s gone, hasn’t he?’ Fleur cradled the phone between her jaw and her collarbone, and typed,
Gotta go. RL phone call.

Adieu, Ms O’Hara
, came the response.

‘Yes,’ said Dervla morosely. ‘Christian’s gone, and Nemia too, and now I’m all on my own with Daphne.’

Closing over her laptop, Fleur topped up her wineglass. ‘You’ve moved in with her?’

‘Yes.’

‘How are you getting on?’

‘It’s tougher than I thought.’

Dervla’s voice sounded slightly slurred. Fleur remembered how Río had used to do a lot of drunk dialling when Finn first departed on his travels and she was suffering from Empty Nest syndrome. She hoped the same thing wasn’t happening to Dervla. She was glad she’d picked up, glad she was here for her friend when she needed her.

‘What age is Daphne now?’ she asked, conversationally.

‘Eighty-five, and suckin’ diesel, as they say. I hope I never get to be that old.’

‘Well, “Old age ain’t no place for sissies.” Bette Davis said that – and she was younger than Daphne when she died. Still, I guess Bette had a better innings than poor Veronica Lake.’

‘Veronica Lake? Who she?’

‘Oh, don’t get me started on forties film stars, Dervla! I’d rather we talked about you.’

‘No – go on please. I mean it. It’s good to listen to somebody sane for a change. Daphne was reciting nursery rhymes earlier.’

‘Well, Veronica Lake was known as the Peekaboo Girl on account of her hairstyle. She was only fifty when she died, destitute.’

‘What killed her?’ asked Dervla.

‘She was a chronic alcoholic. A lot of those forties film stars drank heavily, or were mentally unstable. Frances Farmer’s addiction got her locked away in a mental institution, even though she was one of the most intelligent actresses in Hollywood. Tallulah Bankhead died yelling for codeine
and bourbon. Vivien Leigh suffered from bipolar disorder, which wasn’t helped by her drinking. She died – alone on the floor of her bedroom – at the ripe old age of fifty-four.’

‘Vivien Leigh? She was Scarlett O’Hara, wasn’t she?’

‘Yeah. She was quite exquisitely beautiful, but strangely unsexy. The sexiest of them all had to be Rita Hayworth. She was the ultimate temptress – the Angelina Jolie of her day.’

‘How did she die?’

‘Alzheimer’s and alcohol – at sixty-eight. Most of those stars had dismal private lives, you know.’

‘Mine’s pretty dismal right now. I’ve started hitting the bottle, too.’

‘Oh, do be careful, Dervla! You ought to be taking care of yourself, as well as Daphne.’

‘Don’t worry, Fleur. I’ll be all right if I keep off the gin—’

‘Gin! You never drink gin, Dervla!’

‘I know, I know. I’ll stick to wine from now on. But that hit of alcohol at the end of the day is such a sweet feeling, I tell you.’

‘I feel guilty. I should have been in touch with you before now. Maybe I should call in some evening?’

‘No. I’m brain dead by the evening. But you know what would be great, Fleur? If you could come and take me and Daphne out for a drive, or something. I really feel like getting out of here, but there’s no way I could manage to get Daphne in and out of the car on my own.’

‘Of course I’ll come. When would suit? Name your day, and I’ll ask Angie to take over in the shop.’

‘God – you’re so kind!’

‘I’m your friend, Dervla.’

‘Oh – I’m excited already about being sprung! I feel kind of entombed here.’

‘Then you must get some fresh air. We’ll go for a walk.’

‘Oh. You’re forgetting something. Daphne can’t walk.’

‘She can’t walk at all?’

‘Well, she can kind of stumble between rooms, but that’s the extent of it.’

‘No worries. I’ll organize a wheelchair. We’ll go somewhere glorious, like Arnoldscourt. We can have lunch, and then wheel Daphne around the gardens.’

‘I’d love that!’

‘I’ll book a table for…let’s see. Sorry – tomorrow’s not good. I have a delivery. How about the day after?’

‘Can’t wait. You’re a pal, Fleur.’

‘Yes, I am, and don’t you forget it. Phone me any time you need me, day or night.’

‘I will. Thank you.’

‘And stay off the gin.’

‘Yes, Fleur,’ said Dervla, sounding meek.

‘Goodnight, Dervla.’

‘’Night, Fleur.’

Fleur put down the phone, and took a thoughtful sip of wine. What was the word Dervla had used to describe how she felt? Entombed. Oh! What must it be like to be entombed with a demented eighty-five-year-old? She could understand why Dervla had taken to the gin.

Old age ain’t no place for sissies…
Bette Davis had been one of the lucky ones, Fleur supposed. She thought of all those tragic stars, burned out and abandoned as soon as their looks began to fade. Suicide blonde Carole Landis made her final exit aged twenty-nine. Lupe Velez’s Seconal overdose led to her vomiting into her toilet bowl and drowning. Mae Murray ended up sleeping on park benches; June Duprez kept herself alive by eating dog biscuits, and Louise Brooks found work as a salesgirl in Saks Fifth Avenue before turning
to prostitution. Beautiful women, all: all victims of ageism. Was it, Fleur wondered, better to get out while the going was good, or to grow old disgracefully? Hadn’t Sophia Loren appeared in the Pirelli calendar recently, aged seventy-two? And what about Madonna, several years older than Fleur? Or Tina Turner, who had been strutting her stuff for fifty years? Whatever fate had in store for her, Fleur decided, she ought to live each day as though it were her last. She lunged for the phone and punched in Jake’s number.