Palace Circle (22 page)

“I wanted to talk to you about my separation from Sylvia,” he said as they began walking again. “There is a lot of ugly gossip flying around and it concerns me that you might …” This time he was the one to stop walking. “It concerns me that you might…”

That a man she had known since her birth—a man she was so deeply fond of and who was so effortlessly sophisticated—should be struggling so hard to say something to her, filled her with fear.

“It concerns me that after listening to some of the things that are being said, you might be disappointed in me,” he said at last.

The fear ebbed. She opened her mouth to answer, but couldn't. She tried again. “Be disappointed in you? I could never be disappointed in you, Uncle Jerome. Not ever.”

It was the first time in more than two years that she had called him “Uncle.”

The relief in his dark eyes—eyes that were so like Jack's— was so vast it brought tears to her throat.

Impulsively she tucked her hand in the crook of his arm.

Her reward was to see his familiar, infectious smile.

“I'll walk you to the academy,” he said, patting her hand with such affection she knew that when Jack told him of his plans to marry, they would receive his blessing in spades.

It was only two days later that she realized she might become crushingly, overpoweringly disappointed in Jerome.

The blinding revelation came when she accompanied Aunt
Gwen, who never liked going anywhere by herself, to a jeweler in Hatton Garden. Gwen was picking up a tiara she had left for cleaning.

It was an old-fashioned jeweler with little booths closed off by curtains, where customers could shop in complete privacy. As they waited for the salesman to bring Gwen's tiara from the vault they heard voices from a nearby booth. Voices Petra recognized.

Bewildered, she left Gwen and stepped back into the main body of the shop where she could see the adjoining booths. There was only one other occupied and the curtain was not fully closed. Magda, dressed in lavender-blue silk, a peplum emphasizing the luscious curve of her hips, was holding her wrist high, entranced by the beauty of the diamond bracelet adorning it.

“Do you like it, sweetheart?” she heard Jerome say.

“It's
wunderbar, Liebling.
Absolutely
wunderbar!”

Jerome took hold of her hand to kiss the back of it, and as he did, his shoulder edged the curtain even farther to one side. Petra could see him clearly.

Filled with emotions she couldn't even begin to analyze she stepped back into her own booth, pulling the curtain behind her and, grateful for the length of time Gwen always took over any transaction, didn't leave the shop until Magda and Jerome were halfway down the street.

Petra was in a dilemma as to whether or not to tell Magda what she had seen. In the end she decided that she couldn't. If Magda put into words that she was sleeping with Jerome—and knowing Magda, Petra had no doubt at all that she was—it would be just too stomach-turning. She couldn't have felt worse if it had been her father and Magda who were having the affair.

During the next few days, one question gnawed at her. Was Jerome having a onetime fling, or was he in the habit of indulging in such liaisons? If he was, it certainly put a different light on his willingness to act the part of the guilty party in his divorce from Sylvia—and made his doing so far less of an admirable act.

The more she pondered, the more she had to have answers. And the only person she could possibly ask was her mother.

Choosing her moment wasn't easy, for the season was now so far along that her mother no longer acted as a chaperone. It was something she was deeply grateful for, but taken together with her mother's own hectic social life, the opportunities for intimate conversation were few and far between.

She caught Delia at an unconscionably early hour one Saturday morning as she was slipping into the house after having been a guest at one of the last balls of the season. Her mother,
still in a negligee, was arranging a bowl of pink and white roses in the drawing room.

“What's the matter, Mama?” Petra asked, dropping her swansdown wrap from her shoulders. “Couldn't you sleep?”

“No.” Her mother looked as if arranging the roses was taking all her concentration. “I seem to have gotten out of the habit.”

Petra wondered how to broach the subject of the affair. Since there didn't seem to be an easy way, and as it was in her nature to be direct, she simply took a deep breath and said bluntly, “I wonder if you'd mind me asking a rather odd question about Jerome?”

Her mother ceased what she was doing and turned to face her. There were dark shadows beneath her eyes and Petra realized Delia hadn't exaggerated about her inability to sleep. “If it's about him and Sylvia, honey, I don't think it would be appropriate—”

“It isn't,” she said quickly before her mother could finish her sentence, “or at least not directly.”

“Well, then …?” Her mother's forehead puckered into a frown.

“I just wondered if he had a bad reputation where women were concerned. It's just something I overheard.”

Her mother stared at her for a long time, not really seeing her, and then said, “He used to have. Years and years ago, before you were born. Perhaps now Sylvia has left him so publicly he's just reverting to type.”

“Oh, I see.” It wasn't the answer she'd been hoping for, but she tried to look as if it was of no importance.

Her mother showed no desire to continue with the conversation and so Petra forced a bright smile and said, “I must go to bed and get some sleep. I've a garden party to go to this afternoon.”

As she opened the door to leave, her mother said, “The
something you overheard. Did it include the name of one of your friends?”

Petra half turned, one hand on the glass doorknob. “Yes,” she said. “It did.”

Her mother's face was blank of all emotion. “And was the friend Magda?”

Petra nodded, and then, not wanting her mother to question her any further, closed the door behind her.

She deliberated about whether to tell Jack of his father's liaison with Magda. It was as difficult as deciding whether to tell Magda that she knew. In the end she resolved to keep the knowledge to herself. Magda would soon be returning to Berlin and the affair would no doubt fizzle out; plus, she felt Jack had enough on his plate where his parents’ sexual activities were concerned. Surviving the revelation that his mother was hell-bent on divorce and marriage to a man twenty years her junior was difficult enough without also having to tackle the knowledge that his father was having an affair with a girl Jack regarded as one of his own chums.

Any doubts she may have had regarding her decision vanished completely when she met Jack at the refreshment kiosk in Hyde Park. He was jubilant, having just received a letter from her father—a letter in which Ivor said he was delighted to hear they wanted to marry.

“He's given us his blessing and, rather than sending Delia a letter, he's leaving it to me to break the news to your mother.”

“Oh!
Fantastic!
.” She threw her arms around his neck, kissing him full on the mouth.

An elderly gentleman walking past them, a bulldog at his heels, cleared his throat censoriously. Neither of them paid him an iota of attention.

“When will you do it?” she asked. “Oh, please say you're
going to do it straightaway, Jack! I can't wait another minute before telling the whole world that we're in love and going to get married!”

“What are your mother's plans today? Do you know?”

With their arms around each other's waist they began walking across the park in the direction of Knightsbridge.

“She's lunching with Wallis or Baba. I can't remember.”

“Baba Metcalfe?”

Petra nodded.

Jack looked bemused. “I wonder what your father is going to say when he learns that your mother is so firmly entrenched with the Prince of Wales's set? They're all at least twenty years his junior, aren't they?”

“Thirty years in the case of Baba. And they all nightclub like mad. I'm sure other debs don't run the risk of running into their mother when they go to the Embassy or the Kit Kat Club. Haven't you noticed how difficult it makes things?”

As they left the park and crossed the busy main road, she said, “I think it would be best if I made myself scarce for the next hour or so. I don't think the hopeful bride-to-be should be within earshot of the conversation you're about to have with my mother. And
please
remember to tell her we don't want a long engagement. A wedding at St. Margaret's, Christmas week, would suit perfectly.”

“Followed by a honeymoon in Cairo?”

She hugged his arm tightly. “Oh, darling Jack! A honeymoon in Cairo would be
bliss
.”

“I thought it would be proper to ask Ivor's permission first.”

Jack smiled broadly at the woman who had been almost a surrogate mother to him ever since he was five. He drew Ivor's letter from his inner jacket pocket.

“Permission?” Delia was in the drawing room, waiting for
Harrison to bring the car around. She fumbled in her lizard-skin clutch bag for her cigarette case. “Permission for what, Jack?”

“Permission to ask for Petra's hand in marriage.”

The clutch bag slid from Delia's knee to the floor. A gold compact rolled across the carpet toward his feet.

He made no move to retrieve it. Her reaction had left him rigid with shock.

“Marriage?” The blood had drained from Delia's face. “You've written to Ivor asking for Petra's hand in marriage?”

“Under the circumstances … his being in Egypt … I thought that was the proper thing for me to do.” His smile had gone. All he felt was fast-escalating concern. “He was very pleased, Delia.” He proffered Ivor's letter. She didn't take it.

Realizing he should have taken more notice of Petra's warning that her mother was likely to be highly irrational about their relationship, he said, “He's given us his blessing and asked that I break the news to you …”

He trailed off lamely, appalled by the obvious depth of her distress.

She was still holding the unopened cigarette case, her knuckles white.

“You can't marry Petra.” Her voice was hoarse. “You can't, Jack. Trust me. It's impossible.”

“But why?” He'd never been more baffled in his life. Delia looked like a woman who had been dealt a deathblow.

“Because … because … because you
can't
.”

Against her Titian-red hair, her skin was almost translucent.

He took a deep breath. “That's obviously not the case, Delia,” he said reasonably. “Once Petra is twenty-one she can marry with or without parental consent. Ivor has already given us his blessing. We can marry at any time. We wouldn't, however, wish to while you are so opposed to it. I just don't understand
why
you are so violently opposed to it. Have you heard some gossip about me? Because if you have, let me assure you it's untrue. I've never done anything dishonorable in my life.”

Delia gave a barely suppressed sob. “Oh, Jack! I'm
sure
you haven't—and I've heard no gossip about you. None at all.”

“Then why …?”

She fumbled to take a Sobranie out of her cigarette case. He reached over and helped her.

“Thank you,” she said, her hand trembling violently as he offered her a light.

She inhaled deeply and then, cupping her elbow with her free hand, her arm pressed hard against her body, she said unsteadily, “My objections have nothing to do with you personally, Jack. No woman could hope for a finer young man as a son-in-law. It's just that Petra has known you all her life. When she was a baby you often came with us when I took over from the nanny and walked her in the park. All through the years Petra was growing up, you visited regularly. I think that somehow Petra has grown up
expecting
to marry you—and that isn't the best basis for a marriage, Jack. Especially when the girl in question is only eighteen years old.”

“We're in love, Delia,” he said flatly. “I love her. She loves me. What better basis for marriage is there than that?”

She caught her breath. “You're not lovers already, are you?”

“No.” His reply was quite unequivocal, though he was deeply shocked by the frankness of her question.

“I want you to break off your relationship. I want you to break it off until she is twenty-one. If, when she has had the opportunity to meet lots of other eligible young men, she is still of the same persuasion … well, we'll have another conversation about it. Until then I think it best that you don't meet. Not even as friends. Is that understood?”

He nodded, knowing that it was useless to argue with her
further. His nod wasn't one of agreement to the terms she had set. It merely signified he understood quite clearly what her terms were.

There was a light knock on the drawing-room door.

Bellingham entered. “Harrison is out front, my lady,” he said, mindful of the time she was expected at the Ritz.

“Thank you, Bellingham.” Still distraught, she looked around for her clutch bag.

Jack bent down and retrieved it, along with the spilled contents.

As she took them, she said, “Being in the Foreign Office will make it easy for you to arrange for another posting abroad. I think you should do so, Jack. And until then, perhaps it would be best if you spent time abroad. France, maybe? Or maybe even America.”

Without kissing him goodbye as she usually did, she walked from the room, leaving him more crushingly disappointed than he had ever been in his life.

Petra was waiting for him in the gardens in the center of Cadogan Square. The instant she saw him leave the house she knew the kind of news he was bringing.

“She can't have objected!” she cried, running toward him. “She can't have! Not when Papa has given us his blessing!”

“She has,” he said heavily, holding her close. “And for the craziest reason.”

“That you're not yet earning enough money? That your position at the Foreign Office isn't yet one with enough status? That—”

“That I've been a part of your life for too long for you to be able to judge whether or not you are really in love with me. She wants you to meet more young men—and she wants me to go
away for at least three years—after which time if you still feel the same way about me, she says the subject can be discussed again.”