‘Then you w-won’t send me away?’
Cory shook his head. ‘The children would be desolated. Anyway, it’s me who ought to apologize, I’ve behaved like a bastard the past few days.’
He picked up Simon’s photograph by Harriet’s bed.
‘I’ve been so bound up in my own private hell. I’ve been impervious to anyone else’s. Poor little Harriet.’ He touched her cheek gently with his hand. ‘Do you still miss him so much?’
Harriet flushed.
‘Yes. . no, I don’t know. Why don’t you tell your wife not to come tomorrow? It’s not too late,’ she blurted out.
‘I’ve got to see her and Ronnie Acland together some time,’ he said, going towards the door.
In the doorway, he paused and turned. ‘And please tie your hair back again when Noel comes tomorrow. You look far too pretty like that, and I don’t want her to start cross-petitioning.’
The moment he’d gone, Harriet, carrying a protesting William, raced to the mirror. He’d called her pretty. Cory had actually called her far too pretty! He’d never paid her a compliment before. She put her hand to her face where Cory had touched it, and just for a second wondered what it would be like to be loved by him, to see the haughty, inscrutable face, miraculously softened, to hear the detached voice, for once passionate and tender. Then the great shadowy owl of shame at her own presumption swooped down to overwhelm her.
Even so, after she had put William to bed, she washed her hair, and was just drying it, when a note was thrust under the door.
On it was written ten times in huge childish scrawl: ‘I must not try and seduce Harriet.’ Then the writer had reverted to normal handwriting. ‘Darling Harriet, Cory wants me to write this line a thousand times, but my hand is aching and I want to go to bed. So please forgive me. Love, Kit.’
Harriet giggled. You couldn’t be angry with Kit for long.
Chapter Nineteen
Noel and Ronnie Acland arrived at least an hour late the next day, by which time the children were frenzied with frustrated excitement, and Harriet had run upstairs at least a dozen times, to re-tie her ribbon and powder her nose.
But when she saw the figure smothered in squashy blond furs getting out of a large Rolls-Royce, she realized that her efforts had been to no avail. For Noel Balfour was undoubtedly the most beautiful woman she had ever seen. She had a gold, breath-taking, erupting beauty, and she swooped down on the family with a rasping cry of love like a bird of paradise.
‘Cory, darling, you’ve lost far too much weight! Chattie, baby, what a beautiful dress! Jonah, my angel, how tall and handsome you’ve grown!’
When Harriet had recovered from the shock, she made out that Noel’s face was thin and oval, her skin of a thick magnolia creaminess, her eyes tawny, clear and restless, and the impression of gold came from her marvellous mane of hair. She was tall — almost as tall as Cory — but her body was as supple as silk. Underneath her furs, she wore a saffron wool dress which clung to every curve.
As soon as she had hugged the children, she turned her dazzling smile on Harriet. ‘We’re horribly, horribly late. There’s no excuse. Well, let’s all go and have an enormous drink,’ she said, putting her arm through Harriet’s. ‘I can’t tell you how relieved I am you’re looking after the children — I’ve heard such marvellous reports about you. After lunch I want to come and see your little baby, and you must tell me all about yourself.’
Harriet, expecting indifference, hauteur, antagonism, was completely disarmed by such friendliness. In the drawing room, they found Ronnie Acland talking to Cory about shooting.
Harriet was further surprised to find herself liking Ronnie Acland, who was a tall, handsome, rather florid man in tweeds, with a loud voice and excellent teeth. He seemed to be smiling all the time, probably from embarrassment.
Cory had completely regained his sang-froid. He gave the impression of being slightly bored by this intrusion. Not once did the aloof, unsmiling face betray the turmoil that must have been raging within.
God, he’s cool, thought Harriet in admiration. I could never behave like that if I suddenly had to face Simon.
Noel took her drink from Cory, running a caressing finger along his hand as she did so, and then wandered round the room moving ornaments and straightening pictures.
‘When did this fire start smoking?’ she asked Cory, kicking a log with a blond suede shoe.
At that moment, Kit wandered in, wearing obscenely tight strawberry pink trousers.
For a moment Noel stiffened. She hadn’t bargained on Kit.
‘Whatever are you doing here?’ she said, trying to keep the hostility out of her voice.
Kit stared at her insolently for a minute, then yawned so hard that Harriet thought he was going to dislocate his jaw.
‘I’m visiting my brother Cory — your husband, if you remember. And laying siege to this steaming girl,’ he said, putting an arm round Harriet’s shoulders and kissing her on the cheek. ‘But you’ve put that bloody bow back on again,’ he added.
And once again he pulled off the ribbon that tied back Harriet’s hair, letting it spill in a dark cloud over her shoulders. Leaving her scarlet with confusion, he turned and smiled at Ronnie Acland.
‘We haven’t met,’ he said amiably, ‘but I gather you’re going to be Mr Noel Balfour Number Two. Or is it Three? I can never keep track.’
Harriet escaped to the kitchen to find Mrs Bottomley red-faced over the duck.
‘Whew, it’s tense in there,’ she said. ‘Do you think I have to have lunch with them?’
‘Yes,’ said Mrs Bottomley. ‘Mr E’ll expect you to keep an eye on the children. She’s very hot on manners, Mrs E.’
‘Oh God,’ said Harriet. ‘By the way, I put some more salt in the soup.’
‘So did I,’ said Mrs Bottomley.
Lunch for Harriet was a nightmare. Beneath the idle chatter, the tinkle of glasses, the exclamations of pleasure over the food, the ultra-civilized behaviour, lay the jungle.
She was amazed that these people could act as though nothing was the matter, that they could discuss friends, swap gossip, with such apparent amicability.
Noel never stopped talking — the rich, husky voice flowing on and on, about Paris and parties given in her honour and the film she’d been shooting in Africa, and what the man at Cartier’s had said about the ring Ronnie had bought her.
Kit, having downed three large dry Martinis on an empty stomach before lunch, was thoroughly enjoying himself.
‘Marvellous soup,’ he said to Harriet. ‘I always think there are two things a woman should do instinctively. And one of them’s cooking!’
Noel took a mouthful and immediately asked for a glass of water.
‘That’s a soup spoon, not a trowel,’ she said sharply to Chattie. ‘Why do my children always eat as though they were gardening? I suppose it’s the influence of television.’
‘What a clever woman you’d have been, Noel, if you’d have been to University,’ said Kit.
‘I hear you hunt a lot,’ said Ronnie hastily to Cory, before Noel could think up a crushing reply.
Her beautiful tawny eyes had taken on a dangerous smouldering look, which increased as Ronnie and Cory got into a discussion about different packs. She obviously didn’t like to be out of the limelight for a second. When the duck arrived, she took a mouthful and this time immediately asked for the salt and then rained pepper down onto her plate.
Next moment a diversion was caused by the arrival of Sevenoaks, straight from the stream at the bottom of the garden. He greeted Harriet rapturously and then bounded up to Noel. She drew away from him in horror.
