“I know he’s not right for you. I am.” When she didn’t reply, he said, “Are you happy with him? Is this the life you want for yourself? To be a prisoner in a gilded cage?”
“I’m not a prisoner. Don’t be ridiculous.”
“You just can’t see it.”
“No. That’s how you want to see it. Larry isn’t a bad man.”
“You can’t see it yet, Jenny, but you’re going to become more and more unhappy with him.”
“Now you’re a fortune-teller as well as a hack?”
He still felt raw, and it made him reckless. “He’ll squash you, extinguish the things that make you you. Jennifer, the man’s a fool, a dangerous fool, and you’re too blind to see it.”
Her face whipped around. “How dare you? How dare you?”
He saw the tears in her eyes, and the heat within him dissipated. He reached into his pocket for a handkerchief, made to wipe her eyes with it, but she blocked his hand. “Don’t,” she murmured. “Reggie might be watching.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t want to make you cry. Please don’t cry.”
They sat in an unhappy silence, staring at the dance floor.
“It’s just so hard,” she murmured. “I thought I was happy. I thought my life was fine. And then you came along, and nothing . . . nothing makes sense anymore. All the things I’d had planned—houses, children, holidays—I don’t want them now. I don’t sleep. I don’t eat. I think about you all the time. I know I won’t be able to stop thinking about that.” She gestured toward the cloakroom. “But the thought of actually leaving”—she sniffed—“it’s like looking into an abyss.”
“An abyss?”
She blew her nose. “Loving you would come at such a cost. My parents would disown me. I’d have nothing to bring with me. And I can’t do anything, Anthony. I’m no good for anything but living as I do. What if I couldn’t even run your house for you?”
“You think I care about that?”
“You would. Eventually. A spoiled little tai-tai. That was what you first thought of me, and you were right. I can make men love me, but I can’t do anything else.”
Her bottom lip was trembling. He wished, furious with himself, that he had never used that word against her. They sat in silence, watching Felipe play, both locked in thought.
“I’ve been offered a job,” he said eventually. “In New York, reporting on the United Nations.”
She turned to him. “You’re leaving?”
“Listen to me. For years I’ve been a mess. When I was in Africa, I fell apart. When I was at home, I couldn’t wait to get back there. I could never settle, could never escape the feeling that I should be somewhere else, doing something else.” He took her hand. “And then I met you. Suddenly I can see a future. I can see the point of staying still, of building a life in one place. Working at the UN would be fine. I just want to be with you.”
“I can’t. You don’t understand.”
“What?”
“I’m afraid.”
“Of what he’d do?” Rage built within him. “You think I’m frightened of him? You think I couldn’t protect you?”
“No. Not of him. Please lower your voice.”
“Of those ridiculous people you hang around with? You really care about their opinions? They’re empty, stupid people with—”
“Stop it! It’s not them!”
“What, then? What are you afraid of?”
“I’m afraid of you.”
He battled to understand. “But I wouldn’t—”
“I’m afraid of what I feel for you. I’m afraid to love somebody this much.” Her voice broke. She folded her cocktail napkin, twisting it between her slim fingers. “I love him, but not like this. I’ve been fond of him and I’ve despised him, and much of the time we exist reasonably well together and I’ve made my accommodations and I know I can live like this. Do you understand? I know I can live like this for the rest of my life, and it won’t be so bad. Plenty of women have worse.”
“And with me?”
She didn’t answer for so long that he almost repeated the question. “If I let myself love you, it would consume me. There would be nothing but you. I would be constantly afraid that you might change your mind. And then, if you did, I would die.”
He took her hands, raised them to his lips, ignoring her whispered protests. He kissed her fingertips. He wanted to take her whole self into him. He wanted to wrap himself around her and never let her go. “I love you, Jennifer,” he said. “I will never stop loving you. I have never loved anyone before you, and there will never be anyone after you.”
“You say that now,” she said.
“Because it’s true.” He shook his head. “I don’t know what else you want me to say.”
“Nothing. You’ve said everything. I have them all on paper, your beautiful words.” She pulled her hand from his and reached for her martini. When she spoke again it was as if she was talking to herself. “But that doesn’t make it any easier.”
She had withdrawn her leg from his. He felt its absence like a pain. “What are you saying?” He fought to keep his voice under control. “You love me, but there’s no hope for us?”
Her face crumpled a little. “Anthony, I think we both know . . .” She didn’t finish.
She didn’t need to.
Chapter 10
DECEMBER 1960
She had watched Mrs. Stirling disappear from the office party and Mr. Stirling grow increasingly agitated until he had slammed down his tumbler and strode out into the hallway after her. Almost vibrating with excitement, she had wanted to follow, to see what was happening, but Moira Parker had enough self-control to stay where she was. No one else seemed to notice he had gone.
Finally he walked back into the party. She watched him over the rise and fall of people’s heads, utterly marooned. His face betrayed little emotion, yet she saw strain in his features that even she had never witnessed before.
What happened out there? What had Jennifer Stirling been doing with that young man?
An almost indecent spark of gratification burst into life within her, feeding her imagination until it was glowing. Perhaps he had been forced to see his wife for the selfish creature she was. Moira knew that when the office reopened, just a few words would cause the woman’s behavior to become the talk of it. But, she thought with sudden melancholy, that would mean Mr. Stirling would be too, and the prospect of that brave, dignified, stoic man as the butt of flippant secretarial gossip made her heart constrict. How could she humiliate him in the one place he should be considered above everyone?
Moira stood, helpless, on the other side of the room, afraid to attempt to comfort her boss but so far removed from the revelry of her coworkers that she might have been in a different room. She watched as he went toward the makeshift bar and, with a grimace, accepted a cup of what looked like whiskey. He downed it in one gulp and demanded another. After a third, he nodded to those around him and went to his office.
Moira made her way through the throng. It was a quarter to eleven. The music had stopped, and people had begun to go home. Those who were not leaving were evidently taking themselves somewhere else, away from their colleagues’ eyes. Behind the coat stand, Stevens was kissing that redhead from the typing pool as if nobody could see them. The girl’s skirt had ridden halfway up her thighs, and his pudgy fingers plucked at the flesh-colored garters now exposed to view. She realized that the post boy had not returned after taking Elsie Machzynski to fetch a taxi, and she wondered what she might say to Elsie later to let her know that she was aware of this, even if nobody else had noticed. Was everyone except her obsessed with matters of the flesh? Were the formal greetings, the polite conversation of every day, simply a cover for a bacchanalian nature that she lacked?
“We’re going on to the Cat’s Eye Club. Fancy joining us, Moira? Let your hair down a little?”
“Oh, she won’t come,” Felicity Harewood said, so dismissively that, for just a moment, Moira thought she might surprise them all and say, “Why, yes, actually, I’d love to join you.” But the light was on in Mr. Stirling’s office. Moira did what any other responsible personal assistant to a chief executive would do. She stayed behind to clear up.
It was almost one in the morning by the time she finished. She didn’t do it all herself: the new girl in Accounts held a bag for her when she collected the empty bottles, and the head of sales, a tall South African man, helped collect the paper cups, singing loudly from his spot in the ladies’ cloakroom. Eventually it was just Moira, scrubbing at the stains on the linoleum that might yet be removed, and using a dustpan and brush to pick up the crisps and peanuts that had somehow become trodden into the tiles. The men could move the desks back when they returned to the office. Apart from a few fluttering foil streamers, the place looked almost workmanlike again.
She looked at the battered Christmas tree, its decorations broken or missing, and the little postbox, which had become rather squashed since someone had sat on it, the crepe paper peeling away forlornly from the sides. She was glad that her mother wasn’t alive to see her precious baubles tossed aside so carelessly.
She was packing away the last of it when she caught sight of Mr. Stirling. He was sitting in his leather chair, his head in his hands. The table near the door supported the remnants of the drink, and almost on impulse, she poured two fingers of whiskey. She walked across the office and knocked. He was still wearing his tie. Formal, even at this hour.
“I’ve just been clearing up,” she said, when he stared at her. She felt suddenly embarrassed.
He glanced out of the window, and she realized he had not been aware that she was still there.
“Very kind of you, Moira,” he said quietly. “Thank you.” He took the whiskey from her and drank it, slowly this time.
Moira took in her boss’s collapsed face, the tremor of his hands. She stood close to the corner of his desk, certain for once that she was justified in simply being there. On his desk, in neat piles, sat the letters she had left out for signing earlier that day. It felt like an age ago.
“Would you like another?” she said, when he had finished it. “There’s a little more in the bottle.”
“I suspect I’ve had quite enough.” There was a lengthy silence. “What am I supposed to do, Moira?” He shook his head, as if engaged in some ongoing internal argument that she couldn’t hear. “I give her everything. Everything. She has never wanted for a thing.”
His voice was halting, broken.
“They say everything’s changing. Women want something new . . . God knows what. Why does everything have to change?”
“Not all women,” she said quietly. “An awful lot of women think a husband who would provide for them, and who they could look after, make a home for, would be a wonderful thing to have.”
“You think so?” His eyes were red-rimmed with exhaustion.
“Oh, I know it. A man to make a drink for when he came home, to cook for and fuss over a little. I—it would be perfectly lovely.” She colored.
“Then why . . .” He sighed.
“Mr. Stirling,” she said suddenly, “you’re a wonderful boss. A wonderful man. Really.” She plowed on. “She’s awfully lucky to have you. She must know that. And you don’t deserve . . . you didn’t deserve . . .” She trailed off, knowing even as she spoke that she was breaching some unspoken protocol. “I’m so sorry,” she said, when the silence stretched uncomfortably beyond her words. “Mr. Stirling, I didn’t mean to presume . . .”