She had a couple of baby nightdresses and some booties amongst her other shopping. Half an hour in Selfridges’ baby department, cooing over all the pretty things, had made her feel very soft, almost woozy. She was hoping this might be a sign she really was pregnant; that would make her happiness complete. But if not, they’d do nicely for Ellie.
Now she was going to order some special treats to have delivered at the house in Somerset. John had suggested this in his latest letter and indeed listed certain items – strange-sounding things like brie and Gentleman’s Relish, along with the more familiar Bath Olivers, Dundee cake and York ham.
A liveried doorman opened the doors for her and Bonny swept in, hoping she looked as if she were accustomed to shopping in such a place.
Never before had she seen so much food, so beautifully arranged. To her right was a huge display of hampers and picnic baskets set amongst straw and flowers, to her left, a glass-fronted counter with handmade chocolates. Further back in the store were marble slabs on which hung brilliantly feathered birds, rabbits, hares and chickens. Another counter had fish curled around wonderful sculptures made of ice, prawns and shrimps and a monstrous-looking, huge fish with fearsome teeth.
Bonny had no idea how to make a start. Her apprehension was increased by the sight of elegant-looking women talking knowledgeably to the assistants in straw boaters.
She stopped by the chocolate stand and watched while a gentleman in a grey morning suit was making his choice, and her mouth watered as one by one chocolates decorated with tiny violets, roses and lemons were placed in a magnificent gold box, as if there were no such thing as sweet rationing.
‘Good morning, madam.’ A man who looked far too dignified to be a shop assistant came towards her. He wore a green frock-coat and he had an oiled moustache. ‘Can I be of assistance?’
The very fact that he considered her worthy of speaking to made her feel a little less intimidated and she flashed him her most winning smile. ‘My fiancé asked me to come and order some things,’ she said. ‘I have a list; we’d like them to be delivered to our house in Somerset after our wedding.’
Bonny was relieved when he took the list from her hand: she couldn’t pronounce many of the items. John, meticulous as ever, had put all his personal details, the address and the date they were required for, at the top.
The man glanced through the list and smiled obsequiously. ‘We have all these items in stock, madam, perhaps you’d just like to look around and see if there’s anything else you’d like added?’
Bonny had a slight sensation of being tested. As she had no wish to appear unused to shopping in such a place, she agreed to look around with him.
‘Perhaps a selection of chocolates,’ she said airily. ‘I prefer soft centres.’
Several different kinds of preserved fruit went on to the list, chosen more for their appearance than anything else, as well as tins of biscuits and a large cheese in a lovely blue stone pot. But as Bonny approached the wine counter she stopped dead in her tracks, suddenly feeling faint as she recognised an all too familiar back view.
It was Magnus. He was tucked away in a corner, studying a wine label.
‘That’s everything,’ she said dismissively to the assistant. ‘You’ll make certain it arrives on time?’
‘Certainly madam.’ The man made a little bow, but Bonny was unaware of anything but Magnus and the hammering of her heart.
Bonny had stored so many memories of him away in her mind, but she rarely let herself open the closed doors and look at them. Now, seeing him again, dressed in a very smart grey suit, his thick, fair hair gleaming under the shop lights, everything she’d ever felt for him came back with a fierce rush of pain.
She had expected to see Jack in Amberley: in her heart she knew she would have searched him out if she hadn’t run into him by chance. But she had never expected to see Magnus again, ever. She felt his presence was fate; or maybe the ultimate test.
Taking a step forward, she watched him. He was unaware of her gaze, squinting a little as if he needed glasses to read the small print. He was no longer bronzed as she remembered; the hands cradling the wine bottle were smooth and pale and his face had a few more lines. But his sensual lips, the firm line of his jaw, were just as she remembered.
‘Remember me?’ she said, reaching out to touch the sleeve of his jacket, unable to walk away, although she knew she should. ‘How are you, Magnus?’
Chapter Twenty-Nine
June 1949
Ellie stepped back and looked at her friend in her cream satin wedding dress, and her eyes prickled.
For perhaps the first time in her life, Bonny had understood the principle of ‘less is more’. Her dress was simple: a demure high neck, long tight sleeves, the only decoration the seed-pearls along the hem and train. Nothing to distract the eye from her lovely face, perfectly framed by a fluffy halo of curls.
‘Just a touch more rouge,’ Ellie suggested. ‘You’re a bit pale. If I didn’t know you better I’d think it was nerves!’
Ellie had managed to put aside her guilt in helping to deceive John when in the last few days she’d seen his excitement and happiness at the forthcoming wedding. Bonny seemed different too, as if she’d finally turned into an adult. Maybe the end would justify the means.
‘I’m terrified,’ Bonny admitted. ‘I don’t know if I can go through with it.’
‘It’s too late to change your mind now.’ Ellie laughed: she wasn’t used to seeing Bonny with stage-fright. ‘You’ll be fine once you get to the church. Now go careful with the rouge and I’ll fix your veil.’
Bonny bent towards the dressing-table mirror and carefully puffed on just a hint of pink. ‘Better?’ she asked, looking at Ellie’s reflection next to her in the mirror.
They had always complemented one another, black hair against blonde, pink and white skin against olive. Today in their roles of bride and bridesmaid, the effect was even more dramatic. Ellie’s dress was a deep blue, an Empress style which concealed her slightly thickening waistline. Bonny thought her friend had never looked more ravishing. There was a new bloom to her complexion, and her dark eyes were more lustrous than ever.
‘You are perfection,’ Ellie grinned. ‘But then you know that! Now let’s get the veil on.’
‘I wish—’ Bonny murmured, as Ellie anchored the small seed-pearl head-dress to her hair.
‘You wish what? That it was me instead of you?’ Ellie joked. For the last couple of days she had forced herself to forget her own predicament, spending her spare time with Bonny in last-minute preparations. An understudy was filling in for her tonight and she relished an evening off from the show.
Her only anxiety today was centred around Sir Miles and Lady Hamilton. She hadn’t realised until she learnt they were to be guests that they were such close friends of John and his godmother. Although she was pleased to be able to meet Sir Miles on a social level at last, she wished she hadn’t confided to Bonny about him.
‘Oh, I don’t know what I wish.’ Bonny moved her head impatiently as Ellie arranged the veil over her face. ‘I suppose I’m a bit ashamed.’
‘Can I see you now dear?’ Mrs Phillips’s voice rang out from behind the closed bedroom door, cutting short any further discussion. ‘It should be me helping you. I’ve washed up the teacups and straightened up in here. Is there anything else I can do?’
‘You must let her in,’ Ellie whispered. The Phillipses had arrived at the flat some two hours ago. Doris was a terrible, neurotic fusspot, but it seemed very callous of Bonny to exclude her mother from helping her only daughter dress. ‘Don’t spoil her day, Bonny. She’s so proud of you.’
Bonny stuck out her tongue in the direction of the door, but she called her mother in with saccharine sweetness.
Ellie stood back watching mother and daughter, bemused at how Bonny came to be so sparky and vivacious with such a dull, plain mother. Doris had no conversation except about the most mundane things – the continuing food rationing,
her knitting, and of course, Bonny. She wondered what the more illustrious wedding guests would make of Bonny’s parents. John had made no comment about his meetings with them, but then he was a very tolerant and understanding man.
It was clear Doris was an excellent dressmaker, yet all the work she’d put into her wedding outfit was marred by her choice of a style which merely emphasised her roly-poly shape. The blue crêpe de chine dress had a gathered waist, and the short-sleeved bolero jacket stopped short of a roll of fat. Bonny had been about to tell her this, and only Ellie’s timely intervention with enthusiastic compliments for Doris’s blue organza hat had averted a potential battle.
‘Oh Bonny, you look so lovely.’ Doris dabbed at her eyes with the hanky that was permanently in her hand. ‘My little girl!’
‘You look lovely too,’ Bonny said crisply. ‘The car will be here any minute, so powder your nose. But please, Mum, don’t tell people at the reception embarrassing things about when I was a kid. I hate it!’
A ring at the bell cut short any protest from Doris. She snatched at her daughter’s hand in the absence of finding any other part of her accessible and pressed it to her lips.
‘Bye my angel,’ she whimpered. ‘Good luck.’
‘I have to go too,’ Ellie said as Doris rushed out. Even through Bonny’s veil she could see her friend’s eyes were wide and frightened, but there was little more she could say to reassure her. ‘You’ll be all right with your dad. Take a few deep breaths.’
The flat seemed suddenly deadly silent to Bonny once her mother and Ellie left. She walked into the living-room to discover that her father was in the bathroom, yet again. He was nervous about making a speech later, but Bonny was sure he’d be fine when the moment came, and she’d checked it out to make sure he wasn’t going to say anything potentially embarrassing. She was glad of a few seconds alone to compose herself, because today guilt was crowding in at her from every direction.
She hadn’t really considered her wickedness at fooling John, or even felt guilt at her night with Jack, not until after her encounter with Magnus.
He had taken her to lunch at the Ritz following their meeting in Fortnum and Mason’s. At first it was just an innocent and happy reunion. He’d had another son called Nicholas and proudly got baby snapshots out of his wallet to show her. They had one bottle of wine, and then another, both comparing notes on all that had happened since they parted.
She made him laugh with all her best funny stories about the shows, and told him about her forthcoming wedding. He told her of a large old derelict house he’d bought, and his plans to convert it to a luxury country house hotel. They both told each other things had worked out for the best.
Maybe it was because they drank too much that they lapsed into sentimentality. But why did she cheapen herself by persuading Magnus to take her to his room? It would have been enough for most women just to see love still smouldering in his eyes! But no, she had to lure him into bed to test him further. There had been no satisfaction in discovering she could still tweak his chain and make him perform; it was an empty and shallow act which merely shamed her. Magnus had cried when it was over, saying that he hated himself for betraying Ruth again, but most of all he pitied John.
Later that same evening, alone in her flat, Bonny saw herself as she really was: a scheming, faithless floozy without any redeeming qualities. The living-room was strewn with the wedding presents that had been arriving daily. Every one of them came from John’s friends, because she had none of her own, save Ellie. John paid her rent, bought her food and clothes and loved her above all else. She was only twenty, with everything any girl could possibly want before her, yet suddenly all the excitement she’d felt for the wedding plans and her dreams for the future were as flat as a two-day-old glass of champagne.
Suppose she was pregnant? Whose baby would it be? Was she going to have to wait for the birth, not knowing whether it would be dark like John, red-haired, or blonde?
That night, the tears she cried were real. For her parents who loved her blindly. For Aunt Lydia who’d given her so much, for Jack, Magnus and all the lesser men she’d cheated and deceived. And for Ellie, that rock in her life who’d supported her, laughed and cried with her, the one and only true friend who was now in deep trouble herself.
She knew she had wounded them all, using their love and twisting it for her own ends. She hadn’t even got the courage to break off this wedding, which was built on trickery and lies. John deserved better than her.
Then John had come home a week later, his lean, usually serious face bright with smiles. Excitement, joy and love bubbled out of him as he produced perfume, silk underwear and a pair of diamond earrings for her from his luggage. All his customary caution was thrown to the wind: he’d arranged a honeymoon in Paris, he took her round antique shops in Bond Street to buy pieces for their house in Somerset, and every plan he made was for her and their baby. She wished she was all he believed her to be.
‘Penny for them?’
Bonny was startled out of her reverie by her father coming out of the bathroom, resplendent in a new navy-blue suit and a striped tie. She ran to him, just the way she had as a child.
‘There, there.’ He held her and stroked her back, his face warm against her veiled cheek. ‘Everyone gets last-minute nerves, lovey. John’s a fine man. You couldn’t have done better, not even if you let me choose him.’
‘I’m sorry, Dad,’ she whispered. She wasn’t ashamed of her father today. He might have no hair, bad teeth and stooping shoulders, but she loved him. ‘I haven’t give you and Mum much back for all you’ve done for me, have I?’
He moved her back from his chest, his hands on her shoulders and just looked at her, his lined face and faded blue eyes glowing with love. ‘Listen to me, Bonny. You were the best thing that ever happened to me and your mum,’ he said, his voice husky with emotion. ‘We had given up hope of ever having a child, and when you was born we saw it as a gift from heaven. It’s a privilege having a child, you don’t expect no thanks, or reward. Love’s about giving, not receiving, you just remember that.’
‘But I’m so awful sometimes,’ she said in a small voice, teetering on a confession.
Arnold didn’t view his daughter through the same rose-coloured spectacles as his wife, and at the same time he knew Doris was more than partially responsible for some of Bonny’s failings. ‘Yesterdays don’t matter,’ he said firmly. ‘Tomorrow is what counts. You go into that church and promise before God to keep the vows you’ll make today. Now chin up, and no looking back.’
As Bonny walked down to the waiting car holding her father’s arm she made a vow to herself. She would start all over again, as from today. She would become the kind of wife John deserved. Faithful, loving and truthful. He would never have cause to regret marrying her.
John turned from the altar to look at Bonny as the organ burst into the first chords of the wedding march. St Michael’s was a dank, plain church, still suffering from war damage, with many boarded-up windows, but the profusion of flowers and candles camouflaged the gloom, and his guests in bright colours and pretty hats made it festive.
A lump came up in his throat at Bonny’s ethereal beauty. They were all wrong, all those well-intentioned friends who had tried to dissuade him from marrying her.
Mrs Phillips was dabbing at her face already. Miss Wynter, in peach silk, had trembling lips, and Mr Phillips, walking beside his daughter, was bursting with pride. Ellie looked so gorgeous as bridesmaid; it said something about Bonny that her friendship with such a well-balanced, talented girl had endured for so many years.
There might be few people on Bonny’s side of the aisle – half a dozen friends from the theatre, that was all – but her life so far had been spent in transit. Soon all his friends would come to know her and love her as he did.
Bonny sat by the bedroom window, staring out on to the rain-washed garden, trying very hard not to cry. It was September, and the three months since their wedding had
been the happiest time she’d ever known. Since returning from their honeymoon in Paris, John had been working here in England, rarely staying away for more than a couple of nights at a time and they’d worked together on turning The Chestnuts into a real home. But now John had to go to America for six whole months and she was consumed by guilt, sadness and a feeling that all her lies and trickery were gathering together like a sword above her head which at any minute could come slashing down and destroy everything.
The Chestnuts was a Georgian villa surrounded by a six-foot stone wall and the gigantic trees from which it got its name. The tiny village of Priddy was a mile away, down a winding, narrow lane; Wells, the nearest town, some nine or ten miles further. John’s father, an antisocial man who had supplemented his small private income by writing nature books, bought the house in 1900 because of its remote position. Until John was sent away to Sexus School at the age of eleven, he and his brothers rarely went beyond the village, and the rolling hills, woods and heathlands had been their playground.
Bonny had fallen in love with the house on sight, although she had been dismayed at first by its total isolation. While she and John were making wedding plans and taking their honey moon the builders had worked hard to get it ready for them. By the time John carried her over the threshold, the parquet floors downstairs had been sanded and varnished, a new boiler put into the kitchen, the sitting-room, diningroom and kitchen redecorated. But of all the extensive work John had organised it was this bedroom and its adjoining luxurious bathroom which thrilled Bonny most. She hadn’t fully grasped then that the pink and cream decor, thick carpet, heavy drapes, fitted wardrobes and the vast film-star-like bed were the work of an expensive London designer, and that quiet, staid John Norton had understood his young bride’s character so well that he had cheerfully spent a small fortune to indulge her fantasies.