"Not so bad," he said, but he still looked defeated.
He gave me a drink. He knew where the gin was, and the tonic. He said Berenice and he had been going to marriage guidance sessions, but he didn"t know that they were doing much good.
"You can get vasectomies reversed sometimes," I said.
"Yes, but I don"t really want to. Suppose I did, and we had another girl? Unless Berenice can get over not having sons, I"m going to leave her again. I told her."
I gazed at him, awestruck. "What did she say?"
"Nothing much. I think she"s afraid of me, really."
As long as it didn"t go to his head, I thought that might not be at all a bad thing.
I went to see Gervase and Ursula soon after. The change in Ursula, who let me in, was like unwrapping a brown paper parcel and finding Christmas inside. The old skirt, shirt, pullover and pearls had vanished. She wore narrow scarlet trousers, a huge white sweater and a baroque gold chain. She smiled at me like a shy conspirator and came with me into the sitting-room. Gervase, if not overpoweringly friendly, seemed ready for neutrality and a truce.
"I told Gervase," Ursula said sweetly, "that now that I can afford to leave him and take the girls with me, I"m staying because I want to, not because I have to. I"m staying as long as he gets help with this ridiculous fixation about his birth. Who cares cares that Malcolm wasn"t married to Alicia at the time? I certainly don"t. No one does. Ferdinand doesn"t. Ferdinand"s been very good, he"s been over here several times giving Gervase advice." that Malcolm wasn"t married to Alicia at the time? I certainly don"t. No one does. Ferdinand doesn"t. Ferdinand"s been very good, he"s been over here several times giving Gervase advice."
Gervase, who in the past would have shouted her down, listened almost with grat.i.tude. The bear that had run himself into a thicket was being led out by compa.s.sionate hands.
Ferdinand, when I called, was in rocketing good spirits. He and Debs had moved immediately from their small bare bungalow into a large bare bungalow with a tennis court, a swimming pool and a three-car garage. Affluence was fun, he said; but one of the new house"s rooms was also his office. He was going on with his job.
"I took your remarks to heart, you know," he said. "Took a look at what Alicia had done to us. I don"t listen to her any more. She won"t get rid of Debs and she won"t get rid of Ursula. Have you seen Ursula? Transformation! I"ve told Gervase he has a wife in a million and a mother who"s nothing but trouble. I"ve been talking to him about illegitimacy... isn"t that what you wanted?" He punched my arm lightly. "Stay to dinner?" he said.
I didn"t go to see either Alicia or Vivien. I stayed a few nights with Joyce.
"Darling, how"s that old fool getting along?"
"He spends a lot of time at Quantum with the builders."
"Don"t let him catch pneumonia. It"s bitter outside."
"He does what he likes," I said.
"Darling, when did he not?"
Joyce rushed busily away to a bridge tournament in Paris, kissing my cheek, patting me with approval, telling me to be careful not to break my neck in those frightful races I insisted on riding.
I gave her the a.s.surances and went back to Lambourn, now my home instead of Epsom. I"d asked the trainer I"d been riding exercise for if he knew of anyone needing a second-string stable jockey, if I should take the giant step of turning professional.
He stared. "I heard you don"t need to. Didn"t you come into money?"
"Forget the money. What chance would I have?"
"I saw you win that race at Kempton," he said. "If you turn pro, if you come to Lambourn, I"ll give you plenty of rides."
He was as good as his word, and George and Jo, astonished but happy, entered their few horses to fit in.
I bought a house in Lambourn and Malcolm came to live in it while Quantum was rebuilt. Malcolm loved Lambourn. He went often up to the Downs with the trainer I was riding for to watch the horses work, and far from losing interest in racing, grew more and more involved. When I won my first professional race, the Bollinger ran through Lambourn like a river.
By the day the following November that we all went to the house for the Grand Re-opening (with embossed invitation cards and an army of caterers), everyone"s lives had settled into the new patterns.
Malcolm had been to the "Arc" again, and round the world with Ramsey Osborn. Chrysos had won the Futurity at Doncaster and was tipped for the next year"s Derby. Blue Clancy had gone to stud, syndicated for millions.
I had ended my first professional season with a respectable score and at the start of my second had become the chief retained jockey for the stable. I would be a trainer in the end, I supposed. Meantime, I felt alive and fulfilled as never before.
Lucy and Edwin were still eating healthily in the cottage. Lucy, coming to terms with not writing more poetry herself, had started on a scholarly biography and commentary on the Life and Work of Thomas Stearns Eliot. Edwin was still doing the shopping.
Donald and Helen, arm in arm, wandered round the garden like lovers.
Ferdinand fussed over Debs, who was pregnant.
Gervase had recovered most of his bullishness, which seemed to rea.s.sure Ursula rather than cow her. She came in a mink coat, laughing with pleasure.
In Berenice, the fire had gone out: in Thomas, it had been faintly rekindled. No longer needing a job, he was learning to play golf. Berenice was house-hunting, with Thomas"s approval.
Alicia came looking girlish, trilling away in a voice like an echo of Serena"s, and everyone made polite remarks to her with closed teeth.
Vivien complained that Malcolm had re-done the house too much in Coochie"s taste. Joyce made diplomatic friends with the married couple he had engaged to look after him. He - and they - had been living in the house for a week.
All of the grandchildren were there, re-exploring the place: children"s voices again in the garden. Robin, far away, had fallen silent once more and had never since that violent day wanted me to blow up balloons.
Malcolm and I walked out through the new sitting-room windows and from the lawn looked up at the house. It felt whole again, not just physically, but at peace.
I don"t feel Serena"s here, do you?" Malcolm said.
"No, she isn"t."
I was afraid she might be. I"m glad she"s not."
We went further down the lawn.
"Did you notice I"d taken the golden dolphin and the amethyst tree and so on out of the wall and put them in the sitting-room?" he asked casually.
"Yes, I did."
"I sold the gold too."
I glanced at him. He looked quizzically back.
"The price rose sharply this year, as I thought it would. I took the profit. There"s nothing in the wall now except spiders and dust."
"Never mind."
"I"m leaving the clause in the will though." The family had been curious about his leaving me the piece of wire, and he"d refused to explain. "I"ll buy more gold, and sell it. Buy and sell. Forward and backward. One of these days ..." his blue eyes gleamed "... you may win on the nod."
Books by d.i.c.k Francis
THE SPORT OF QUEENS (autobiography)
DEAD CERT.
NERVE.
FOR KICKS.
ODDS AGAINST.
FLYING FINISH.
BLOOD SPORT.
FORFEIT.
ENQUIRY.
RAT RACE.
BONECRACK.
SMOKESCREEN.
SLAY-RIDE.
KNOCK DOWN.
HIGH STAKES.
IN THE FRAME.
RISK.
TRIAL RUN.
WHIP HAND.
REFLEX.
TWICK SHY.
BANKER.
THE DANGER.
PROOF.
BREAK IN.
LESTER: The Official Biography BOLT.
HOT MONEY.
THE EDGE.
STRAIGHT.
LONGSHOT.
COMEBACK.
DRIVING FORCE.
DECIDER.
WILD HORSES.
COME TO GRIEF.
TO THE HILT.
IO-lb PENALTY FIELD OF THIRTEEN.
SECOND WIND.
SHATTERED.