Doubtless this was the opinion Romily now held of him after his behaviour today. He should have apologised straightaway and stopped her from leaving, but he hadn’t been able to bring himself to do it. That would have been the decent thing to do, the polite way out. But he’d taken the coward’s way. Just as he had once before in what felt like another life. But a life that would always haunt him.
Suspecting that Romily had seen through him and identified him for the fraud he was was one thing, but being confronted with the certainty of it, quite another.
Who’s hiding in there?
Those were her words. And it was a question to which she would never know the answer. Because if she did, she would despise him even more than she did now. The pretend him was so much better than the real him.
Being a writer meant he could create characters who had far better qualities than he possessed, and it didn’t take too much figuring out to conclude these were people he wished he could be. Brave, decent and genuine.
A genuine apology to Romily would have been all that was required of him and Gabe wouldn’t be making threats. But no. He’d blown it. He’d bailed out just as he always did when things got too emotionally sticky.
Slumped in a chair, he stared at the mountain in the distance. Already the light was beginning to fade and Mount San Jacinto was taking on its familiar brooding presence. No matter the pain in his leg, he would fill a rucksack and take off for a few days. He’d lose himself in the desert and forget what a bastard he was.
He’d forget Romily too. And he’d erase forever that look of cool contempt on her face when he’d agreed that she should go. Another woman would have flown off the handle and said exactly what she thought of him – a state of affairs he’d encountered many a time, thereby making the job of getting rid of the woman so much easier. Nothing but a shrew, he would tell himself afterwards, thereby justifying his behaviour. But Romily, and without a word of admonishment, had left him feeling as worthless as a cockroach.
In the gathering dusk Mount San Jacinto glowered back at him as though the very spirit of the desert was questioning him. ‘What are you staring at?’ he felt like saying. ‘Don’t you go judging me. Not you as well.’
Chapter Thirty-Three
Melstead Hall, Melstead St Mary
October 1962
Julia
‘What did you think you were doing?’ Arthur demanded.
‘I . . . I don’t know what you mean,’ stammered Julia as she fumbled to undo the buttons on her overcoat. Although she knew exactly what her husband meant. She should never have allowed Ralph to talk her into drinking a second and then a third glass of the fruit punch. Poor Arthur had every right to be angry with her.
All the way home from the party he had been ominously silent. Not a word did he utter, despite Julia’s nervous attempts to make conversation. His jaw set as he drove the Rolls along the lanes in the dark, he had kept his gaze fixed ahead of him. It was as if he were deaf to her voice.
It would have been different had Ralph left the party with them, he would have made conversation with either his father or Julia. But Ralph had been having too good a time to leave. He’d told his father he would find his own way home, and that there was no need for anyone to wait up for him. Yet even as she had wished for Ralph’s company in the car, Julia had known it would only have been putting off the reckoning she was in for. It was what she deserved after all. She had not been a good wife. She had neglected Arthur, had barely seen him all evening. Worse still, she had made an exhibition of herself. Was it any wonder he was cross with her?
Handing his coat to their housekeeper, who could not look down her nose at Julia with any more disapproval if she tried, Arthur said, ‘Go to your room, Julia, I’ll speak to you after I’ve poured myself a whisky.’
Still in her coat, and clutching her handbag to her, Julia did as she was told and climbed the stairs.
‘How was the party, Mr Devereux?’ she heard Miss Casey ask.
‘It would have been better had my wife not embarrassed me.’
‘Quite so,’ murmured the housekeeper, and in a consoling tone that implied Arthur had her full sympathy.
Thoroughly humiliated, Julia closed the bedroom door behind her and after removing her coat, she began to undress, folding and hanging her clothes with care. Looking at the rip in her dress and hoping she would be able to mend it, tears welled in her eyes. She brushed them away. She must not cry. Arthur hated it when she did.
She must learn to be a better wife. To do her duty. Her father’s voice echoed in her head. ‘Duty, Julia, you must remember always to do your best and not let people down.’
She was in her nightdress when the bedroom door opened and Arthur came in, glass of whisky in hand.
‘I know you’re angry with me,’ Julia said, ‘and I just want you to know that I’m sorry. Very sorry. I’ll do whatever you want me to do to make amends. Just don’t keep being annoyed with me.’
‘I’m not annoyed with you,’ he said, crossing the room towards her. ‘I’m disappointed. You let me down this evening. You drank too much and made a spectacle of yourself. I expected better of you.’
‘It won’t happen again,’ she said. ‘I promise. It’s just that Ralph was very sweet and asked me to dance with him and I didn’t realise how much punch I had drunk, and—’ She broke off, unable to speak, tears filling her eyes and spilling down her cheeks.
‘Don’t cry!’ he snapped. ‘It only makes you look even more pathetic.’
At the harshness of his voice, she trembled.
‘After all I’ve done for you,’ he went on, ‘this is how you repay me.’
The tears really flowed now.
‘You disgust me,’ he said. ‘Just look at the state of you.’ He shook his head. ‘Go and wash your face and pull yourself together.’
Again she did as he said, desperate for him not to be angry with her. Standing at the basin in her bathroom, she splashed cold water onto her face, then dried herself with a towel, dabbing gently at her skin so as not to redden it further. She had annoyed Arthur enough, she mustn’t add to his disappointment in her. She must remember to be a better wife. To please him. To do her duty.
She took a deep shuddering breath and reminded herself that her husband was a good man. He only wanted the best for her. Just as her father had. She had done everything wrong this evening, she had drunk too much and danced too much. It was when Ralph had grabbed hold of her and said he’d teach her how to do the twist that she had really misjudged things. That was her real mistake.
‘Let yourself go, Julia!’ he’d said above the band playing ‘Let’s Twist Again’.