The Last Letter From Your Lover

  "Oh, you'll need to send them to him directly," she said. Around them, the tearoom of the Regent Hotel was filled with women, retired gentlemen, anyone diverted from shopping by a wet Wednesday afternoon.

  "I beg your pardon?"

  "I no longer live with my husband. We communicate by letter."

  That floored him. The grin disappeared, and he snatched at the papers on his lap, as if he was trying to regroup his thoughts.

  "I believe I have already given you his home address. There." She pointed to one of the letters in the folder. "And we'll be able to move in next Monday, will we? My daughter and I are wearying of hotel living."

  Outside, somewhere, Mrs. Cordoza was taking Esme to the swings. She came daily now, during the hours that Laurence was at his office: "There's so little to do in that house without you," she had said. Jennifer had seen the older woman's face light up when she held Esme, and sensed that she far preferred being with them in the hotel than in the empty house on the square.

  Mr. Grosvenor's brow knitted. "Ah, Mrs. Stirling, may I just establish . . . Are you saying you will not be living in the property with Mr. Stirling? It's just that the landlord is a respectable gentleman. He was under the impression that he would be letting to a family."

  "He is letting to a family."

  "But you just said--"

  "Mr. Grosvenor, we will be paying twenty-four pounds a week for this short let. I am a married woman. I'm sure a gentleman like you would agree that how often, and indeed whether, my husband resides there with me is nobody's business but our own."

  His raised palm was conciliatory, a flush staining the skin around his collar. He began to stutter an apology: "It's just--"

  He was interrupted by a woman calling her name urgently. Jennifer shifted in her chair to see Yvonne Moncrieff stalking across the crowded tearoom, her wet umbrella already thrust at an unsuspecting waiter. "So you're here!"

  "Yvonne, I--"

  "Where have you been? I've had absolutely no idea what was going on. I got out of hospital last week, and your ruddy housekeeper wouldn't tell me a damned thing. And then Francis says--" She stopped, having realized how far her voice had carried. The tearoom had hushed, and the faces around them were agog.

  "Will you excuse us, Mr. Grosvenor? I do believe we've finished," Jennifer said.

  He was already standing, had gathered his briefcase, and now snapped it shut emphatically. "I'll get those papers to Mr. Stirling this afternoon. And I'll be in touch." He made his way toward the lobby.

  When he had gone, Jennifer put a hand on her friend's arm. "I'm sorry," she said. "There's an awful lot to explain. Have you got time to come upstairs?"

  Yvonne Moncrieff had spent four weeks in hospital: two weeks before and two weeks after the birth of baby Alice. She had been so poleaxed by exhaustion when she'd returned home that it had taken her a further week to work out how long it had been since she had seen Jennifer. She had called twice next door, to be told only that Mrs. Stirling was not there at present. A week later she had decided to find out what was going on. "Your housekeeper just kept shaking her head at me, telling me I had to speak to Larry."

  "I suppose he'll have told her not to say anything."

  "About what?" Yvonne threw her coat onto the bed, and sat down on one of the upholstered chairs. "Why on earth are you staying here? Have you and Larry had a row?"

  There were mauve shadows under Yvonne's eyes, but her hair was immaculate still. She already seemed strangely distant, a relic from another life, Jennifer thought. "I've left him," she said.

  Yvonne's large eyes traveled over her face. "Larry got drunk at ours the night before last. Very drunk. I assumed it was business and went up to bed with the baby, leaving the men to it. When Francis came up I was half asleep, but I heard him say that Larry had told him you have a lover, and that you'd taken leave of your senses. I thought I must have dreamed it."

  "Well," she said slowly, "part of that is true."

  Yvonne's hand flew to her mouth. "Oh, Lord."

  Jennifer shook her head, raised a smile. "Yvonne, I've missed you awfully. I so wanted to talk to you . . ." She told her friend the story, bypassing some of the details but allowing most of the truth to come out. It was Yvonne, after all. The simple words, echoing in the still room, seemed to belie the enormity of what she had gone through over the past weeks. Everything had changed; everything. She finished with a flourish: "I'll find him again. I know I will. I just have to explain."

  Yvonne had been listening intently, and Jennifer was struck by how much she had missed her acerbic, straight-talking presence.

  Finally Yvonne smiled tentatively. "I'm sure he'd forgive you," she said.

  "What?"

  "Larry. I'm sure he'd forgive you."

  "Larry?" Jennifer sat back.

  "Yes."

  "But I don't want to be forgiven."

  "You can't do this, Jenny."

  "He has a mistress."

  "Oh, you can get rid of her! She's just his secretary, for goodness' sake. Tell him you want to make a fresh start. Tell him that's what he has to do, too."

  Jennifer almost stumbled over the words. "But I don't want him, Yvonne. I don't want to be married to him."

  "You'd rather wait for some penniless playboy reporter who might not even come back?"

  "Yes. I would."

  Yvonne reached into her handbag, lit a cigarette, and blew a long plume of smoke into the center of the room.

  "What about Esme?"

  "What about Esme?"

  "How is she going to cope, growing up with no father?"

  "She will have a father. She'll see him all the time. In fact, she's going to stay there this weekend. I wrote to him, and he has written back, confirming it."

  "You know the children of divorced parents get terribly teased at school. The Allsop girl is in an awful state."

  "We're not getting divorced. None of her school friends need to know anything."

  Yvonne was still pulling determinedly at her cigarette.

  Jennifer's voice softened. "Please try to understand. There's no reason why Laurence and I shouldn't live apart. Society is changing. We don't have to be trapped in something that . . . I'm sure Laurence will be far happier without me. And it doesn't have to affect anything. Not really. You and I can stay the same. In fact, I was thinking perhaps we could get the children together this week. Perhaps take them to Madame Tussaud's. I know Esme's desperate to see Dottie . . ."

  "Madame Tussaud's?"

  "Or Kew Gardens. It's just that the weather--"

  "Stop." Yvonne raised an elegant hand. "Just stop. I can't listen to another word. My goodness. You really are the most extraordinarily selfish woman I've ever met."

  She stubbed out her cigarette, stood up, and reached for her coat. "What do you think life is, Jennifer? Some kind of fairy tale? You think we don't all get fed up with our husbands? Why should you behave like that and expect us just to carry on around you while you gad about as if--as if you weren't even married? If you want to live in a state of moral degeneracy, that's fine. But you have a child. A husband and a child. And you can't expect the rest of us to condone your behavior."

  Jennifer's mouth opened.

  Yvonne turned away, as if she couldn't even look at her. "And I won't be the only one who feels like this. I suggest you think very carefully about what you do next." She tucked her coat over her arm and left.

  Three hours later, Jennifer had made her decision.

  At midday the Embakasi airport was a melee of activity. Having picked up her suitcase from the stuttering conveyor belt, Jennifer fought her way to the lavatory, splashed cold water over her face, and changed into a clean blouse. She pinned back her hair, the heat already moistening her neck. When she emerged, her blouse was stuck to her back within seconds.

  The airport was teeming with people who stood in unruly queues or in groups, shouting at one another in place of conversation. She was briefly paralyzed, watching brightly clad African
women jostle with suitcases and huge laundry bags, bound with rope, balanced on their heads. Nigerian businessmen smoked in the corners, their skin shining, while small children ran in and out of those seated on the floor. A woman with a small barrow pushed her way through, selling drinks. The departure boards revealed that several flights were delayed and gave no clue as to when that might be rectified.

  In contrast to the noise in the airport building, it was peaceful outside. The last of the bad weather had cleared, the heat burning off any remaining damp so that Jennifer could see the purple mountains in the distance. The runway was empty, except for the plane she had arrived on; beneath it, a solitary man was sweeping meditatively. On the other side of the gleaming modernistic building somebody had built a small rock garden, dotted with cacti and succulents. She admired the carefully arranged boulders, and wondered that someone should have taken so much trouble in such a chaotic place.

  The BOAC and East African Airways desks were shut, so she fought her way back through the crowd, ordered a cup of coffee at the bar, grabbed a table, and sat down, hemmed in by other people's suitcases, woven baskets, and a baleful cockerel, its wings bound to its body with a school tie.

  What would she say to him? She pictured him in some foreign correspondents' club, perhaps miles from the real action, where journalists gathered to drink and discuss the day's events. Would he be drinking? It was a tight little world, he had told her. Once she got to Stanleyville someone would know him. Someone would be able to tell her where he was. She pictured herself arriving, exhausted, at the club, a recurring image that had kept her going for the last few days. She could see him so clearly, standing under a whirring fan, perhaps chatting to a colleague, and then his amazement at the sight of her. She understood his expression: for the last forty-eight hours she had barely been able to recognize herself.

  Nothing in her life had prepared her for what she had done; nothing had suggested she might even be capable of it. And yet, from the moment she had climbed aboard the aircraft, for all her fear, she had felt curiously elated, as if this might be it: this might be the business of living. And if only for that moment of intense feeling she felt a curious kinship with Anthony O'Hare.

  She would find him. She had taken charge of events, rather than allowing herself to be buffeted along by them. She would decide her own future. She banished thoughts of Esme, telling herself that this will have been worthwhile when she'd be able to introduce Anthony to her.

  Eventually a young man in a smart burgundy uniform took a seat at the BOAC counter. She left her coffee where it was and half ran across the concourse to the counter.

  "I need a ticket to Stanleyville," she said, scrabbling in her handbag for money. "The next flight out. Do you need my passport?"

  The young man stared at her. "No, madam," he said, his head moving briskly from side to side. "No flying to Stanleyville."

  "But I was told you ran a direct route."

  "I'm very sorry. All flights to Stanleyville are suspended."

  She gazed at him in mute frustration until he repeated himself, then dragged her suitcase across to the EAA desk. The girl there had the same answer. "No, ma'am. There are no flights out because of the troubles." She rolled every r. "Only flights coming in."

  "Well, when are they going to start up again? I need to get to Congo urgently."

  The two staff members exchanged a silent look. "No flights to Congo," they repeated.

  She hadn't come this far for blank looks and refusals. I cannot give up on him now.

  Outside, the man continued up and down the runway with his threadbare broom.

  It was then that she saw a white man with the upright posture of the civil service walking briskly through the terminal, carrying a leather folder. Sweat had colored a deep triangle on the back of his cream linen jacket.

  He saw her as she saw him. He changed direction and strode toward her. "Mrs. Ramsey?" He held out a hand. "I'm Alexander Frobisher, from the consulate. Where are your children?"

  "No. My name is Jennifer Stirling."

  He closed his mouth and seemed to be trying to gauge whether she had made a mistake. His face was puffy, perhaps adding years to his true age.

  "I do need your help, Mr. Frobisher," she continued. "I have to get to Congo. Do you know if there's a train I can catch? I'm told there are no flights. Actually, nobody will tell me very much at all." She was conscious that her own face was glowing with heat, that her hair had already started to come down.

  When he spoke, it was as if he was trying to explain something to the unhinged. "Mrs. . . ."

  "Stirling."

  "Mrs. Stirling, nobody is going into Congo. Don't you know there's--"

  "Yes, I do know there's been some trouble there. But I have to find someone, a journalist, who came out perhaps two weeks ago. It's terrifically important. His name is--"

  "Madam, there are no journalists left in Congo." He removed his glasses and steered her to the window. "Do you have any idea what has happened?"

  "A little. Well, no, I've been traveling from England. I had to take a rather tortuous route."

  "The war has now dragged in the U.S. as well as our and other governments. Until three days ago we were in crisis, with three hundred and fifty white hostages, including women and children, facing execution by the Simba rebels. We have Belgian troops fighting it out with them in the streets of Stanleyville. Up to a hundred civilians are already reported dead."

  She barely heard him. "But I can pay--and I'll pay whatever it takes. I have to get there."

  He took her arm. "Mrs. Stirling, I'm telling you that you will not make it to Congo. There are no trains, no flights, no roads in. The troops were airlifted. Even if there was transport, I could not sanction a British citizen--a British woman--entering a war zone." He scribbled in his notebook. "I'll find you somewhere to wait and help you book your return flight. Africa is no place for a white woman on her own." He sighed wearily, as she had just doubled his burden.

  Jennifer was thinking. "How many are dead?"

  "We don't know."

  "Have you their names?"

  "I only have the most rudimentary list at the moment. It's far from comprehensive."

  "Please." Her heart had almost stopped. "Please let me see. I need to know if he's . . ."

  He pulled a tattered piece of typed paper from his folder.

  She scanned it, her eyes so tired that the names, in alphabetical order, blurred. Harper. Hambro. O'Keefe. Lewis. His was not there.

  His was not there.

  She glanced up at Frobisher. "Do you have the names of those taken hostage?"

  "Mrs. Stirling, we have no idea how many British citizens were even in the city. Look." He produced another piece of paper and handed it to her, swatting with his free hand at a mosquito that had landed on the back of his neck. "This is the latest communique sent to Lord Walston."

  She started to read, phrases leaping out at her: Five thousand dead in Stanleyville alone . . . We believe that there remain in rebel-held territory twenty-seven United Kingdom citizens . . . We can give no indication as to when the areas where British subjects are, even if we knew them with any degree of exactness, will be reached.

  "There are Belgian and U.S. troops in the city. They are taking back Stanleyville. And we have a Beverley aircraft standing by to rescue those who want to be rescued."

  "How can I make sure that he's on it?"

  He scratched his head. "You can't. Some people don't seem to want to be rescued. Some prefer to stay in Congo. They may have their reasons."

  She thought suddenly of the fat news editor. Who knows? Perhaps he wanted to get away.

  "If your friend wants to get out, he will get out," he said. He wiped his face with a handkerchief. "If he wants to stay, it's perfectly possible that he'll disappear--easily done in Congo."

  She was about to speak but was cut off by a low murmur that rippled through the airport as, through the arrival gates, a family emerged. First came two smal
l children, mute, with bandaged arms, heads, their faces prematurely aged. A blond woman, clutching a baby, was wild-eyed, her hair unwashed and her face etched with strain. At the sight of them a much older woman broke free of her husband's restraining arm and burst through the barrier, wailing, and pulled them to her. The family barely stirred. Then the young mother, crumpling to her knees, began to cry, her mouth a great O of pain, her head sagging onto the older woman's plump shoulder.

  Frobisher stuffed his papers back into his folder. "The Ramseys. Excuse me. I must look after them."

  "Were they there?" she said, watching the grandfather hoist the little girl onto his shoulders. "At the massacre?" The children's faces, immobilized by some unknown shock, had turned her blood to ice water.

  He gave her a firm look. "Mrs. Stirling, please, you must go now. There's an East African Airways flight out this evening. Unless you have well-connected friends in this city, I cannot urge you more strongly to be on it."

  It took her two days to get home. And from that point her new life began. Yvonne was true to her word. She did not contact her again, and on the one occasion Jennifer bumped into Violet, the other woman was so plainly filled with discomfort that it seemed unfair to pursue her. She minded less than she might have expected: they belonged to an old life, which she hardly recognized as her own.

  Most days Mrs. Cordoza came to the new flat, finding excuses to spend time with Esme, or help with a few household tasks, and Jennifer found she relied more on her former housekeeper's company than she had on that of her old friends. One wet afternoon, while Esme slept, she told Mrs. Cordoza about Anthony, and Mrs. Cordoza confided a little more about her husband. Then, with a blush, she talked about a nice man who had sent her flowers from the restaurant two streets along. "I wasn't going to encourage him," she said softly, into her ironing, "but since everything . . ."

  Laurence communicated in notes, using Mrs. Cordoza as an emissary.

  I would like to take Esme to my cousin's wedding in Winchester this coming Saturday. I will make sure she is back by 7 p.m.

  They were distant, formal, measured. Occasionally Jennifer would read them and wonder that she could have been married to this man.

  Every week she walked to the post office on Langley Street to find out whether there was anything in the PO box. Every week she returned home trying not to feel flattened by the postmistress's "No."