honest, she had been using people all her life. Jemima began to think of both the Stovers and Kevin John in rather a different light. Chloe had come as an upsetting force - 'out of the blue' as Mr Stover had put it - into the Stovers' neat sad lives last week; that much was clear. Chloe, who had ostentatiously abandoned the name of her youth, thus taking from the couple who had brought her up the consolation of her public fame, had first threatened the unvisited Stovers with a visit and then withheld it for reasons of her own which were doubtless connected with her new romance.
Isabelle Mancini now - the enthusiastic patron of Chloe's work through all the years when Chloe was lovelorn and financially desperate: how had she been repaid except, it seemed, by some fairly ruthless portrait in Chloe's new novel?
For Kevin John, it was possible to argue that he had been a promising young painter, his violent impulses confined to his canvasses where they properly belonged, until Chloe like Pandora had let out his evil spirits of drink and assault.
Taking the thought further, Jemima had to admit that she too had been just a little deceived by the precision and irony of Chloe's work. Yet all Chloe's friends, most recently Guthrie Carlyle, were fond of commenting on the contrast between the work and the woman. There was pride involved too: her own. Only yesterday she had been describing Chloe to herself as fundamentally candid. Jemima, who was a professional judge of character, had made a bad mistake about one of her oldest friends. Jemima thought again of that pale bedroom in which hung the scarlet picture. Symbolic of all the violence she intended to eliminate from her life, had been Chloe's breathless comment. Was that not yet another piece of deception?
'I don't believe it.' But Valentine's story did make a kind of bizarre sense. He had recounted it to her in the British Museum with some relish after his original revelation about Chloe's whereabouts. He related how Chloe, caught up in a passionate but secret love affair with Sir Richard Lionnel, had sought his, Valentine's, advice.
'Why me?' he had enquired in his airy rheto rical manner. 'Simple. Because I found out about it by chance, sloping round to Adelaide Square one day on a publisher's rounds. Chloe needed a confidant of course and I know Lionnel since he lives near Helmet. More to the point I also know the dread Francesca Lionnel, who's a great buddy of Mummy's but also a first-class candidate for the role of Medea. Already she exudes wronged beauty with every pore, without, so far as I know, anything specific to exude it about. So I can advise on that score. Besides, Chloe is a story-teller. She positively enjoyed telling me all about it.'
'Scheherazade.'
'Scheherazade in reverse, since I believe the ambition of that lady, being married, was to hold off the evil day of her own death. Chloe's ambition was, as I shall tell you, to achieve the first stage of the process.'
To herself Jemima commented: I suppose that the original Scheherazade told some pretty tall stories too, as the Arabian Nights wore on. Still, that was self-preservation.
'You see, dearest Jemima, our Chloe's decided to settle down. She plans to become the second Lady Lionnel.'
'What? She must be mad!' Several tourists jumped.
'There I personally entirely agree with you. Marriage - what a ridiculous aim! Babies, children, an establishment, ugh - you know how resolutely I have avoided the former, babies absolutely horrify me, and the latter, of which I do have first-hand experience, is pure purgatory. Why not carpe diem , Accept the free flat and any lolly that's going, the new car - he gave her that, naturally - and enjoy, enjoy . . . I begged her to forget about marriage. But Chloe wilfully didn't agree. A strong sexual attraction - I was assured in terms much stronger than those of Chloe's novels that this is the case. Plus that essential in all Chloe's plans, novelty. Lionnel offers her the
Isabelle Mancini now - the enthusiastic patron of Chloe's work through all the years when Chloe was lovelorn and financially desperate: how had she been repaid except, it seemed, by some fairly ruthless portrait in Chloe's new novel?
For Kevin John, it was possible to argue that he had been a promising young painter, his violent impulses confined to his canvasses where they properly belonged, until Chloe like Pandora had let out his evil spirits of drink and assault.
Taking the thought further, Jemima had to admit that she too had been just a little deceived by the precision and irony of Chloe's work. Yet all Chloe's friends, most recently Guthrie Carlyle, were fond of commenting on the contrast between the work and the woman. There was pride involved too: her own. Only yesterday she had been describing Chloe to herself as fundamentally candid. Jemima, who was a professional judge of character, had made a bad mistake about one of her oldest friends. Jemima thought again of that pale bedroom in which hung the scarlet picture. Symbolic of all the violence she intended to eliminate from her life, had been Chloe's breathless comment. Was that not yet another piece of deception?
'I don't believe it.' But Valentine's story did make a kind of bizarre sense. He had recounted it to her in the British Museum with some relish after his original revelation about Chloe's whereabouts. He related how Chloe, caught up in a passionate but secret love affair with Sir Richard Lionnel, had sought his, Valentine's, advice.
'Why me?' he had enquired in his airy rheto rical manner. 'Simple. Because I found out about it by chance, sloping round to Adelaide Square one day on a publisher's rounds. Chloe needed a confidant of course and I know Lionnel since he lives near Helmet. More to the point I also know the dread Francesca Lionnel, who's a great buddy of Mummy's but also a first-class candidate for the role of Medea. Already she exudes wronged beauty with every pore, without, so far as I know, anything specific to exude it about. So I can advise on that score. Besides, Chloe is a story-teller. She positively enjoyed telling me all about it.'
'Scheherazade.'
'Scheherazade in reverse, since I believe the ambition of that lady, being married, was to hold off the evil day of her own death. Chloe's ambition was, as I shall tell you, to achieve the first stage of the process.'
To herself Jemima commented: I suppose that the original Scheherazade told some pretty tall stories too, as the Arabian Nights wore on. Still, that was self-preservation.
'You see, dearest Jemima, our Chloe's decided to settle down. She plans to become the second Lady Lionnel.'
'What? She must be mad!' Several tourists jumped.
'There I personally entirely agree with you. Marriage - what a ridiculous aim! Babies, children, an establishment, ugh - you know how resolutely I have avoided the former, babies absolutely horrify me, and the latter, of which I do have first-hand experience, is pure purgatory. Why not carpe diem , Accept the free flat and any lolly that's going, the new car - he gave her that, naturally - and enjoy, enjoy . . . I begged her to forget about marriage. But Chloe wilfully didn't agree. A strong sexual attraction - I was assured in terms much stronger than those of Chloe's novels that this is the case. Plus that essential in all Chloe's plans, novelty. Lionnel offers her the
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