Lovers and Liars Trilogy by Sally Beauman
“I haven’t thanked you, Mr. Malone, for bringing in all those lovely flowers for me.”
“My pleasure, ma’am.”
“You’re new, aren’t you? I know I haven’t seen you before.”
“I am, ma’am. I flew in from Washington two days ago.”
Mary looked at him in astonishment. In her experience, these men never volunteered any information whatsoever. They spoke in two-word sentences. They said “No, ma’am” and “Yes, ma’am.”
“Usually, when John comes here, Frank is with him…”
Mary looked at the man hopefully. Since he actually spoke fully formed sentences, a fishing expedition was justified. She would have liked to know just how serious this current security alert was, and whether Frank’s absence and Malone’s arrival signified anything. John Hawthorne would certainly never tell her. And something was going on, she could sense it. All evening its effects upon Lise had been only too obvious. She glanced into the drawing room; Lise was standing by the fire, alone. Lise never drank alcohol. Now she was holding an empty glass that had contained Perrier. She was staring into space, turning the glass around and around in her hands.
Malone, Mary realized, had not replied. She turned back to him. One more try. “Still, even you have to take a break sometimes. I expect Frank was due some leave?”
“Yes, ma’am. He’s not on duty this weekend.”
“How nice for him…”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“I always think it must be so exhausting for you,” Mary continued with a vague and incoherent gesture of the hand. “Always on the alert. Ever watchful…”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Rather like Cerberus, you know…” She broke off. This was not the most tactful comparison, the dog Cerberus, eternally standing guard over the gates of hell. She attempted to cover her confusion, told herself that Malone was unlikely to be well versed in Greek mythology, had probably never even heard of Cerberus…and then realized that he had. She saw amusement way back in his eyes, then the bland, blank look they all assumed.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“You wouldn’t like a drink or anything, Mr. Malone? Some Perrier, perhaps?”
“No, thank you, ma’am.”
He had moved away a few steps. He was doing another thing they all did, something at which they were all skilled. He was making himself invisible. He was fading into the wall.
“Well, yes, of course, indeed,” Mary said, feeling flustered, feeling she had just made an idiot of herself. She glanced down at her watch. Ten-thirty: Gini and that Lamartine man would be here any minute. She felt suddenly very anxious, but her instincts as a hostess came to the fore. Going back into her large drawing room, she edged past her other guests, around the backs of the two remaining bores, and crossed to the fireplace. Lise was still standing there alone.
“No Dog?” she asked as Mary bent and put another log on the fire. Lise held out her hands to the flames. Mary saw that Lise was shivering, although she was three feet from the fire and the room was warm.
“No. He’s been banished upstairs.” Mary smiled. “He will beg for tidbits. Besides, I have to face facts. I may adore him, but he’s old and he smells.”
“He’s sweet,” Lise said, without great conviction. Lise had never liked dogs. “Terribly sweet. So…” She stopped. Apparently she could think of no appropriate compliment. Her eyes met Mary’s in mute distress, then Lise looked away.
Mary took her arm. “Lise,” she said firmly. “Is something wrong?”
“Wrong? No, of course not. I’m having a perfectly lovely time.”
Mary regarded Lise carefully. She looked very beautiful tonight in a white dress, which, like all Lise’s clothes, was austere in design. It was long-sleeved, high-necked, plain. As the right frame sets off a painting, so this dress by its simplicity, by its exquisite cut, emphasized Lise’s loveliness. She wore the necklace that had been her birthday present from John, and very little other jewelry; her black hair, worn loose, framed her face. That face, with its large dark blue eyes, now wore an anxious expression, like that of an apprehensive child. Today was Lise’s thirty-eighth birthday. She was approaching forty, had admitted to Mary on numerous occasions that this watershed filled her with dread, and she looked, Mary thought, no more than twenty-five.
Except…she was looking strained. She was becoming painfully thin, and her long, beautiful hands, adorned only by her wedding ring, were still clasping that glass tightly. Her knuckles were white. As Mary looked at her, she shivered again.
“Come on, Lise. Don’t pretend, not to me.” Mary patted her arm. “You’ve been on edge all evening. I know there’s something wrong.”
Lise bit her lip like a little girl, lowered her eyes, then gave Mary a shy sidelong glance. “Oh, Mary. All right, I’ll admit it. I know it’s very stupid, but I worry so about John. All this horrible Middle East business. I just know they’re on a high-security alert, though, of course, John will never admit that. There was a bomb, you know, outside our embassy in Paris. They defused it tonight.”
“I hadn’t heard that. It wasn’t on the news.”
“It will be tomorrow. John told me this evening, when we were getting dressed to come here. There’s a news blackout, I think. But, you see, if the Paris embassy, why not here?”
“You mustn’t think like that, you know, Lise. I’m sure John’s perfectly safe.” Mary gave her an encouraging smile. “Look at his security! Men everywhere—that nice Mr. Malone outside in the hall…”
“Is he nice?” Lise gave her an odd look. “I don’t think he’s nice, not at all. They’re all so grim and silent. I hate them. Especially Frank. He’s the worst of all.”
“I thought you liked Frank?” Mary looked at her in surprise. “Don’t you remember, Lise, when we had lunch before Christmas? You said then how much you liked him. You said he was very efficient and polite.”
“Did I say that? I don’t remember.” Lise shivered again. “Well, if I did, I’ve changed my mind. He’s too efficient. It’s like some horrible shadow, always following me around.”
“Well, you don’t have to worry about him anyway,” Mary said in a comfortable way. “It’s his weekend off, I gather, so—”
“It is?” Lise swung around to look at her. “Who told you that? John? Where’s Frank gone?”
“Lise, how would I know?” Mary stared at her in surprise. “That Malone man mentioned it just now. I don’t know where they take off to—I can’t imagine. Maybe they get drunk for two days. Chase girls. Ring up their aged mothers in Omaha. God knows.” Mary smiled. “What do ex-marines do with their free time? Parachuting? Target practice? Fifty-mile runs?”
“Ex-marines? Frank isn’t an ex-marine. What made you think that?”
The question was sharply put, but Mary was distracted. Across the room there were some new arrivals, she saw—the more entertaining guests, who always started to arrive around this hour. She made out the features of a well-known poet; there was someone else with him. Really, she must get some glasses. …But no, it was not Gini, or that Lamartine man. A couple of actor friends, and—yes—that amusing little journalist man, editor of one of London’s more scurrilous magazines. She must remember to keep him well away from John.
“I’m sorry.” She turned back to Lise. “I was just looking for Gini. What did you say, Lise?”
“Nothing. It doesn’t matter.”
“No, what was it?”
“Oh, just Frank. He isn’t a marine. He was never a marine.”
“Oh. I thought they all were….” Mary looked back across the room. The two remaining bores were now by the hall. Time to detach them…
“Frank used to work for John’s father. Didn’t you know that?” Lise was now staring at her in a fixed, almost suspicious way, as if she thought Mary was hiding something from her.
“No. No, I didn’t,” Mary said, frowning.
“Oh.” Lise shivered again. “Well, he did. John’s father wasn’t sat
“I do indeed.”
“He insisted the official security people be supplemented. Frank was one of the ones who came over.” She stopped, and looked directly into Mary’s eyes. “John never mentioned that to you?”
“No, Lise. He didn’t.”
Lise gave a tremulous sigh. Her gaze fell. “Oh. I just wondered. It’s just…you and John are such good friends. You see each other all the time.”
Mary stared at her in astonishment. For a moment she had sounded almost jealous. “Lise,” she said firmly. “I’ve known John since he was ten years old. I’m a fat, frumpy old widow, and John’s been very kind to me since Richard died. When he comes to see me, he does it to cheer me up. Which he’s very good at, incidentally. We don’t sit here talking about his security people. Why on earth should we?”
Lise sensed the reproach at once. She gave Mary a shy smile, and took her arm. “Oh, Mary, Mary, I’m being such an idiot tonight I didn’t mean—I’m so glad you are John’s friend. He gets very tense, and he needs someone to talk to.”
“He has you to talk to, Lise.”
Lise did not reply. Her dark eyes met Mary’s, and for one appalling moment Mary thought she was about to cry. Mary watched her fight back the tears, then Lise moved away with an odd, defensive gesture of the hand. She was carrying a small evening purse under her arm. She opened it, and began to fumble inside.
“Actually,” she said. “Actually, I think I have one of my headaches coming on. Those hideous migraine things…”
“Are you sure you’re all right? Would you like to go home? Let me have a word with John—”
“No! No. Don’t do that.” For a second Lise looked terrified; she almost dropped the purse. “No. He’d be so cross. I know he’s looking forward to meeting Gini properly. And, of course, so am I. I have these wonderful little pills. My miracle pills…Ah, here they are. Truly, Mary. One of these and a glass of water, and I’ll be just fine.”
Her manner had grown hectic, and her hands were shaking. Quietly, feeling troubled, Mary fetched her some water. She glanced back toward the hall, checked the room as she did so. The last bores, thank heaven, had left—and without saying good-bye. Bores and bad-mannered, she thought. John was talking to the two actors; she heard the words Academy Awards. Everyone was occupied, had a drink; someone else was just arriving now.
She handed Lise the glass of Malvern water. Lise appeared calmer now. She swallowed the small white pill and gave Mary a grateful glance. She too looked across the room.
“Is that Gini?” she said. “Oh, yes, it must be—how pretty she is, Mary. What a lovely dress. And who’s that man with her?”
Mary sighed. “He’s a photographer, I gather,” she said. “He’s French. His name’s Pascal Lamartine.”
“How nice. I love France. I must talk to him later.” Lise was now moving off in the direction of the editor of the scurrilous magazine. Mary took her firmly by the arm and redirected her toward the poet.
“You remember,” she said. “You’ve met before, Lise. Stephen. He has a new collection of poems just out….”
“He has? What’s it called?” Lise said, and Mary smiled. Lise was already recovering, her instincts reasserting themselves.
“Reflections.”
“Thanks.” Lise gave her a sudden amused glance, a sidelong smile. She approached the poet and held out her hand.
“Stephen,” Mary heard. “How lovely. I was hoping you’d be here. Reflections is wonderful. John and I both love it. No, really, we were reading it together, this evening. Yes, before we came here…”
“So, tell me, Monsieur Lamartine, are you staying in London long?”
“I’m not sure. Maybe a few more days only. Maybe a few weeks …”
Pascal looked down at Mary, this stepmother of Gini’s. She was not, somehow, what he had expected. For no very good reason, he had imagined that any woman previously married to Sam Hunter would be tall, elegant, and forceful. This woman was none of these things. She was short, no more than five feet four, and she was far from elegant. She was plump, and badly dressed in a very English way, in that she was wearing an unflattering dress of some pale material that needed ironing. She had white hair that stood up around her face in a fierce tufty halo. She had a superb English complexion, was wearing no makeup, and she was smiling at him. The smile, as yet, did not reach her eyes, which were a clear blue and had been fixed upon him since he’d entered the room not two minutes before. Pascal’s immediate impression had been of vagueness and slight eccentricity. That impression was now being revised. She had greeted Gini and himself with warm affection and a blizzard of words. There had been a flurry of hand gestures. Nevertheless, he noted, Gini had somehow been detached from him with speedy efficiency, and was now talking to John Hawthorne. He himself, he realized, had also been detached, and was now backed into a corner by the fireplace. To his right was the fire, to his left was a huge, ancient, sagging chintz-covered armchair, and in front of him, cutting off all possible means of escape, was this fierce, plump little woman. Pascal looked down at her, puzzled. Then he began to understand. She reminded him, suddenly, of his mother, and he had seen just that expression on his mother’s face in times past. It was how she had looked—exactly how she had looked—whenever as a young man he’d brought girls home. Pascal smiled.
Mary looked up at him. It was, she thought, a disarming smile, but she had no intention of being disarmed. True, this Frenchman was not what she had envisioned—not at all. For a start, he didn’t look right Mary had a vivid imagination, and she had had twelve years in which to summon up this man in her mind’s eye. She had not examined the material John Hawthorne had given her at all closely, and so the image of Lamartine conjured up at the time of Beirut was unimpaired. A French womanizer, Mary had decided twelve years before; she knew the type only too well. Good-looking, smarmy, with ghastly come-to-bed eyes. Mary had never actually met a Frenchman like that, but she was perfectly certain that’s how they were. Apart from the fact that he was good-looking, very good-looking—though he could have done with a haircut and a much closer shave—this Lamartine was none of these things. His manner was, if anything, slightly cool and distanced. His behavior to Gini as they entered had been charming and correct. He had entered at her side, one hand at her elbow, to help steer her past the crush of other guests. On being introduced to Mary he had shaken her hand, bent his head slightly in that rather delightful way some Frenchmen had, and said politely, Madame.
Not smarmy, Mary decided. She blinked. And not in his forties either, which he would have been had Sam given her his correct age. He was considerably younger, in his mid-thirties, she judged. Damn Sam, she thought, and damn my wretched eyesight. She peered up at Lamartine. He did not look in the least like some cheap womanizer. He did not have ghastly come-to-bed eyes. In fact, now that she looked more closely, he had rather good eyes, of a smoky gray color. Their expression was ironic, quizzical, as if something were amusing him. …With a start, Mary realized that she was inspecting him in a quite unforgivable way. She took a step backward. Lamartine smiled. He had, she thought, a really rather wonderful smile.
“I’m sorry,” she said, speaking with great rapidity and waving her hands. “It’s just…you’re not what I expected at all….”
“And you are not what I expected,” he replied.
“You see,” Mary continued, rushing on, and trying to avoid the conversational pits and traps that suddenly seemed to surround her on all sides. “You see, that is, Gini told me you were a paparazzo—” This did not please him. The smile disappeared. “Oh? That was what she said?”
He glanced across the room to where Gini was now deep in conversation with John Hawthorne. Mary swallowed and thought fast.
“Maybe I’ve got that wrong. I expect so. I’m such a scatter-brain. I muddle up things all the time, and—”
“No. She was perfectly correct. That’s
This was said seriously, but with a detectable edge. Mary took a large swallow of her wine.
“Well, there you are,” she went on idiotically. “I’m sure it’s most exciting. Rushing around the world, that kind of thing …” She pulled herself together. “So tell me, have you known Gini long?”
Pascal hesitated. “No,” he said carefully. “We’ve met a few times.”
Mary paused. Here was her perfect opportunity. Now was the moment to draw herself up, give him a withering stare and say, Come, come, Monsieur Lamartine. You once knew Gini very well, I think. In Beirut. Twelve years ago. Mary looked up at this man and found the words would not come. She could not possibly say them. In the first place, he was quite formidable, and she simply didn’t dare; in the second, she could see they would be an unpardonable intrusion, rude, wrong, and possibly unfair. I know nothing about what happened, she realized, nothing at all. All I know is what Sam told me.
She met Lamartine’s eyes again. Every instinct she possessed told her that some aspects of Sam’s story must be wrong. On the other hand, she was not always a good judge of character; people could take her in. …John was right, totally right, she thought. I shouldn’t trespass. I should say and do nothing at all. This decision brought with it an enormous relief. Suddenly she relaxed.
“And meanwhile, you’re working for the News too, I think Gini said?”
“Just briefly. Yes, I am.”
“Well, you’d be doing me a great favor,” she continued more warmly, “if you could make Gini see she should leave. It’s a perfectly horrible newspaper now, an absolute rag—well, I suppose not entirely, but I don’t like its tone. And that ghastly new editor gives Gini the most pathetic stories. Before he came, she was doing so well. Did she tell you, a couple of years ago, she won two awards….”