A Fall from Grace - Maggie Ford (have you read this book TXT) 📗

much tanned flesh as was decently acceptable in the newest fashion of sleeveless, calf-length, flat-busted evening dresses with deep neckline back and front.

Summer seemed to her to have lasted forever. Now autumn was creeping by and she had never felt so alone. Every now and again there came a letter from Anthony, saying that he was feeling a lot better but felt it hard to come back to London yet awhile. He still missed his mother and returning to London just yet would only bring it all back to him; he had put a manager in charge of the bank and was in touch by telephone and telegram should the man need to consult him, and so far all seemed to be going smoothly. Not one letter to her personally, her name hardly included in his letters to James except to hope she was well. It hurt, but more, it worried and distressed her. There was no longer any doubt that he had done with their association, their year of love over. Any minute she expected to hear of his becoming engaged, happy to marry and settle down, herself forgotten – that wonderful love they had shared a mere passing phase, never to be revealed. Anthony, everything having been left to him by his parents in their will, was a wealthy man; whoever married him would want for nothing.

She wanted for nothing, materially, James saw to that. But she ached for love. The memory of it haunted her, kept her awake at night; followed her around in whatever she did. Christmas and New Year found her striving to concentrate on throwing her usual parties. People thought they were as wonderful as ever, commented on her beautiful thin figure, she having lost so much weight that her bust had all but disappeared – such a perfect figure they said enviously as she smiled, smoked endless cigarettes at the end of an ivory cigarette holder and danced until dawn and hardly ate a thing. James, noticing the change in her, had become worried.

‘I think you ought to see our doctor,’ he told her. ‘Such a drastic weight loss cannot be right. You could be suffering from something of which you’re not aware, my dear.’

But she’d always been slim and told him so.

At other times, should she happen to give a natural little cough, he would study her gravely with a worried look on his round face. He never said the word, but she knew what he was thinking: ‘consumption?’

She would smile confidingly and say, ‘If I had anything wrong with me, James, I wouldn’t be as energetic as I am.’

But hers was a nervous energy, not stemming from health, for at times she felt all she wanted to do was lie abed and dream of Anthony, of him making love to her so fiercely that she would cry out in ecstasy, finally to lie limp in his arms, utterly fulfilled. And having known such sensations, her life had become unbearable now they were no longer there for her.

Seventeen

Dull weeks, never-ending weeks, counting each day as though it was in itself a week. An effort to find any pleasure in her normal rounds of social visiting, planning social dinners, going to the theatre with James. It was becoming an effort to maintain her reputation for throwing excellent parties for which she had been and still was, surprisingly, seen as the most exciting of hostesses in a long time, with people hanging upon her invitations. Yet it all seemed so superfluous, pointless.

This February morning, James having gone off to his office, she sat at her bureau, writing to Anthony, unable to contain herself any longer. She had written countless letters at first. But he’d never replied, not to her personally, writing only to his uncle, maybe including her, almost as an afterthought it seemed, merely by hoping she was well, as any nephew might enquire of his aunt.

It hurt, worse than if he hadn’t included her at all. How could he have put her aside so easily, those wonderful times together, how they’d made love, how they would lay in each other’s arms afterwards, utterly fulfilled. Now he was behaving as if it had never been. A whole year since she’d last seen him, how could he put aside those times so easily – as if they had never been?

Madeleine finally gave up writing letters he apparently refused to answer, and she struggled through this lonely time, surrounded by her social friends, throwing her soirées; she had tried to put her whole self into her Christmas and New Year celebrations, finding no joy in them even though all declared them a huge success, as always. No one noticed how lacking she was in spirit, for she had become adept at hiding her loneliness from the eyes of her world.

Time should have healed the hurt. Instead, it had built up and up, like a child’s building blocks. His silence was having another effect, turning her mind inward to another loss: questions that were keeping her awake at night, more now than ever they had before – where was the baby taken from her all those years ago? How had she fared and what sort of life had she been forced to lead?

In the past she’d had dreams in which she would find her child only to lose sight of her again, would wake up weeping, grateful only that she still slept alone, James in his own bedroom, unable to hear her and tell her in his patient tone that she must try to get over it. As the years passed, the dreams had subsided, but memories of Anthony leaving had begun to return and in full force; almost like nightmares, finding herself running through the streets, people staring at her, and she not heeding them, seeing ahead of her, her baby. Yet no matter how fast she ran, the baby – always a baby – would recede at the same pace even though not