Peach (28 page)

Leonore had meant never to see him again, but Ferdi had
begged her, saying she was the only person who could help him. They arranged to meet at an old hotel in Provence. Arriving before him, Leonore sat nervously on the edge of a chair in the hall, reluctant to go up to their room in case he had changed his mind. But he hadn’t.

In their pretty bedroom they drew the flowered curtains across the sunny afternoon, holding each other naked in the vast four-poster bed that seemed to Leonore to seal them in their own private world. She left her hair loose, even brushing it the way Lais had, so that it fell over one eye, and she’d brought a nightdress in a soft sea-green chiffon. She didn’t know whether she was deliberately playing the role of Lais so that she could keep Ferdi with her, or whether he wanted her only because she looked like Lais. All she cared about was that she wanted him. She wanted Ferdi’s firm hands on her breasts, she wanted to stretch her nakedness against his, she wanted to run her tongue along the groove of his stomach, and take him in her mouth. “Anything,” she murmured, as he thrust himself into her, “do anything you want with me.” Her body curved to his rhythm exploding into crescendos of trembling excitement that she never wanted to end.

Ferdi never said he loved her. And he never called her Lais. But he was always tender and gentle, considerate of her needs. Over dinner he talked and talked—about himself and about Lais, the past and the future. He was thinking of taking his place as head of the war-shattered Merker steel mills. Soon he would do it, soon.

They met every week at the little hotel and the flowery room overlooking the park became their room, the curtained four-poster, their bed. And Leonore, the cool businesswoman, lived for those hidden sensual weekends.

Ferdi had said he would never return to the Hostellerie. He had been gone a month now. His letter crackled in her
pocket. “My dear Leonore,” it said, and “Yours Ferdi”, at the end. In between was a report of his progress at work, and a brief, “I’m missing our talks.” No one could mistake it for a love letter, no matter how hard they tried, thought Leonore bitterly. But she had known that from the beginning. Now she must write and tell him it was over.

Peach bounded along the terrace towards her, waving madly. Her long russet hair swung in a thick glossy pigtail and she looked very tall. “You’re growing up,” accused Leonore smiling.

“Hello, Leonore,” Lais’s voice was different, deeper. Sexy.

“W … w … wel … welcome home,” stammered Leonore, a guilty blush staining her cheeks, as Lais eyed her quizzically. “W … welcome home, Lais.”

Peach wound her way slowly up the hill at the back of the villa, Ziggie at her heels, both of them wilting in the summer heat. Flinging herself into a patch of shade, she turned over on her stomach, resting her head on her arms and watching a little trail of ants march determinedly up the gnarled olive tree and disappear into the hole in the bark—just like the escapees into the cellars beneath the hotel. It was odd how life then had continued so normally on the surface when beneath were such dangerous secrets. She had to admit that helping the Resistance had leant an undercurrent of excitement
to her schoolgirl life and she had quite enjoyed the game—until that awful day when it was a game no longer.

Peach buried her head in her arms, shutting out the memory. She didn’t want to go through the pain of it again,
and the everlasting guilt!
She never talked about her feelings to anyone, but she thought that perhaps Grand-mère understood. It was Grand-mère who stopped her from devoting all her time to Lais, forcing her to find company her own age. “There are lots of young people at the Hostellerie,” she said, “put on your bathing suit and go to the pool, you’ll soon find some young companions.”

School would be starting soon back home in Florida but Peach didn’t want to return. If only Maman and Papa would let her go to the school in Switzerland. In the prospectus she’d sent for, it sounded exciting. There were students from many different countries and they skied in the winter term and swam and sailed on the lake in the summer. If only, if only … Peach jumped to her feet, her mind made up. If anyone could persuade her parents, Grand-mère could.

The past forgotten in her plans for the future, Peach began to jog back down the hill, slithering down the steeper bits and jumping the rocky areas until she came to the chalky path that snaked its way back to the villa. And then she and Ziggie ran, leaping every few steps. It was fun to be alive on a day like today.

Jim arrived back from a tour of the de Courmont automobile plant looking worried. Production was way down on prewar levels and the new designs lacked the flair and imagination of their Italian and American competitors. Tools and machinery in current use in the plant were old-fashioned and there was no money available to invest in up-to-date tooling, which in turn meant that the cars coming off the
line were using virtually the same technology as before the war. Yet in the States, Ford’s famous V8 engine was revolutionary and the body designs from US Auto, Chrysler and Great Lakes Motors were new and exciting.

Fiat and Citröen had cornered the European market on the small car scene leaving de Courmont’s long-bodied, heavy cars with only the upper end of the market. Competition from Rolls-Royce, Aston Martin, Bristol and Jaguar was strengthening in Britain, and Mercedes were already pushing to regain their top-of-the-line market from Germany. The future for de Courmont did not look good.

Worried telephone calls to Gerard had produced an indifferent, “Do whatever you think necessary, put in new management if you wish. Take the company public.” Gerard didn’t care. With memories of his father’s devotion to the pursuit of power and gain at the expense of family life, Gerard had opted out of the de Courmont industrial empire. “I held out against all my father’s bribes and bullying years ago,” he told Jim on the phone from Florida, “so nothing you can say now will get me into the business. Do whatever you want with it all—the rolling mills, the foundries, the automobile plant … I don’t give a damn.”

“But it’s Peach’s inheritance,” protested Jim, “you should protect it for her sake.”

Gerard’s laugh boomed down the phone. “Somehow I don’t see Peach at the head of an automobile empire. She’ll have enough money to make her happy, Jim. I’ve never seen any reason for having more.”

Jim discussed the problem with Leonie as they prepared for bed that night.

“I understand,” said Leonie, remembering Monsieur’s fanatical devotion to building his automobile empire. And she knew, too, that Gerard had always held his father to blame
for the faulty design that had led to his brother’s death in a car crash on Armand’s twenty-first birthday.

“I’ll have to sell factories off at a loss to raise money but it’s better than letting the automobile plant slip out of the family’s hands,” decided Jim. “We must do what we can to save it for Peach.”

“It’s about time that someone thought of Peach,” said Leonie, dabbing scent behind her ears and on her throat.

Jim looked at her surprised.

“Do you realise that that child has taken a back seat most of her life? You know that Peach longs to go to this school in Switzerland, L’Aiglon? I think we should persuade Amelie and Gerard to let her go.”

“It won’t be easy,” said Jim. “First they’ve had to let Lais go, and now Peach. But if you think that’s what’s best for her they’ll listen.” He was watching Leonie brushing her hair, fascinated by the way it sprang out in a golden halo of energy around her face. “Such beautiful golden hair,” he said touching a strand gently.

“As much silver as gold now,” said Leonie truthfully.

“Still beautiful,” Jim murmured, burying his face in the scent of it. “Do you know how much I love you, Leonie Bahri Jamieson?”

Leonie turned into his arms.
“I think so,”
she murmured teasingly, “I think I do.”

The sprawling chalets that made up L’Aiglon bordered a lake of smooth polished steel under a leaden autumn sky. Blue-grey mountains soared behind, tipped with mist, and terraced gardens, planted with precise Swiss neatness in symmetrical blocks of bushes and flowers led to a jetty with a dozen kayaks drawn up on its wooden planks. On a clear day, of which there were many, you could see the urban sprawl of Geneva at the far end of the lake.

Peach fitted into the life of the school as though she’d been there for years instead of just one term, making friends quickly with the other girls. There were two other Americans, Nancy and Julie-Anne, but mostly they were French or English. And it was Melinda Seymour, an English girl, who soon became her best friend. They were room-mates and doubles partners in tennis, they sat next to each other in the dining hall and Peach helped Melinda with her French prep and Melinda helped Peach with science. They exchanged life stories and secrets and Peach was thrilled to have someone her own age at last who “understood” her. They often walked to the village together to buy delicious Swiss chocolate bars which they devoured in their rooms at night along with the latest flimsy paperback romance, an endless supply of which circulated around the school, filling their heads with dreams of tall, ruggedly handsome men with smouldering dark eyes and firm passionate mouths. “Do you really think men like that exist?” asked Peach, hugging her old teddy to her chest as Melinda turned out the lamp.

“Of course they do,” replied Melinda sleepily. “I know one.”

Peach shot up in bed. “Melinda! You
know
a man like that?”

“Well,” yawned Melinda, “maybe he’s a bit younger than the ones in the books, but he’s divine.”

“Who?” demanded Peach. “Melinda, don’t go to sleep. Tell me, who is he?”

“His name’s Harry,” murmured Melinda burrowing down beneath her eiderdown.

Peach fell back against the pillows clutching her teddy closer, a smile on her lips. “Harry,” she whispered, “Harry.” He’d have dark wavy hair and smouldering eyes like the man in
Passion’s Playground
, and an intense serious
face with a firm jaw. He’d be as tall and broad-shouldered and passionate as the hero of
Dangerous Kisses
. And his name was Harry. She dreamed about him that night.

Romance filled the heads of all the teenage girls at L’Aiglon. On Saturdays they would take the little lake steamer into Geneva or sometimes Montreux to do their shopping, and would loll around in cafés, eating enormous ice cream sundaes and examining each man intently, discussing his potential as a lover in whispers and giggles, and blushing furiously when they received an amused stare back.

Julie-Anne was petite and cute with soft dark hair that fell over one eye in what she assured them was a very sexy manner. Julie-Anne was a true flirt, and knew
everything
. Melinda and Peach would trail after her on their trips into Geneva as she ogled the boys on the steamer, the waiters in the cafés, and the sales assistant in the jeweller’s where she took her watch to be repaired. “But how do you do it?” they said, baffled by the mystery of why, when Julie-Anne opened her eyes wider and brushed her soft hair from her eyes with graceful fingers, smiling a tremulous little half-smile, she should get such electric response.

“It’s sex,” said Julie-Anne loftily.

Peach found herself wondering about sex in the middle of classes, while staring at bewildering algebra equations on the blackboard, or absentmindedly boiling bubbling liquids over a bunsen burner in the science lab, or while reading Shakespeare’s sonnets. “I think I like romance more than sex,” she admitted finally to Melinda. “I mean it all sounds so complicated and silly, doesn’t it?”

There seemed to be no answer to that one.

When the first snows came they packed excitedly into the school bus for a week on the ski slopes. Julie-Anne in figure-hugging blue ski-pants and a scarlet fair-isle sweater soon
had a host of willing young men eager to help her up if she fell and to carry her skis back to the chalet at the end of the day.

It was the ski-pants, decided Peach and Melinda, heading into the village to purchase some. But somehow they didn’t look quite the same, Peach simply looked all long skinny legs and Melinda looked dumpy. “Let’s face it, Peach,” commented Melinda, “I’m too fat and you’re too thin. No boys in their right minds will ever look at us twice.”

Every afternoon after skiing they went to the café where Peach drank giant mugs of hot chocolate floating with cream, consuming enormous fattening pastries in an attempt to gain weight while Melinda, tightening her belt, dawdled over a cup of black coffee, trying not to look. But at the end of the week they weighed just the same. “So much for that,” said Melinda, tucking thankfully into an enormous wedge of chocolate cake, “I’ve had enough of romance and sex, give me food!”

“Peach?”

The masculine voice had a familiar ring as Peach looked up.

“Tom,” she said, surprised.

“Tom Launceton,” echoed Melinda.

Tom pulled up a chair, laughing. “It seems we all know each other,” he said cheerily. “Peach and I met on the
Queen Mary
last spring. I must say you’ve grown up a bit since then,” he said, eyeing her appreciatively. “And Melinda and I are country neighbours.”