Moth To The Flame

‘What utter nonsense!’ her sister snapped. ‘I’m the same weight as I’ve always been. Do you think, in my job, that I don’t watch myself like a hawk?’

‘I’m sorry.’ Juliet cursed herself inwardly for tactlessness, but Jan had never used to be so touchy.

After a moment’s pause, Jan smiled with an effort. ‘I’m sorry too. I don’t usually blow up like that, but some of the girls I work with can be such utter bitches.’ She gave a rather unsteady laugh. ‘I suppose I look for the knife in the back from even the most innocent remark nowadays. Thank the Lord I …’ she broke off suddenly.

‘Yes?’ Juliet prompted gently.

Jan shrugged. ‘Thank the Lord I can always go back to England to work if things get too bad,’ she said non-chalantly, but again Juliet had the uneasy feeling that that was not the remark she had intended to make. But the next moment Jan was chatting away again, relating anecdotes about some of the famous people who went to Di Lorenzo to shop for their clothes, mimicking some of the rich women for whom she modelled, and Juliet’s uneasiness passed.

As she lay in bed that night, listening to Jan’s gentle breathing in the next bed, tired, but too excited to fall asleep immediately, she told herself that she was going to have a good time in Rome. Jan would be working most of the time, but she’d promised to get some time off that was owed to her to take her sister round some of the sights and perhaps do some shopping, and the evenings, she’d said, would be a different story.

While she had been clearing away the dinner dishes, Juliet had seized the opportunity to telephone her mother briefly and reassure her that everything was fine, and that she would write in more detail during the next couple of days.

She had tried to hint to Jan as they were getting ready for bed that Mrs Laurence needed the reassurance of regular letters, but Jan had responded almost petulantly and Juliet had hastily dropped the subject.

Probably when you were miles away from home and leading a hectic working and social life, such obligations as letter-writing tended to get overlooked, she thought. And Jan was certainly in demand. The telephone had rung twice more during the evening, and although Jan had not vouchsafed any information about the callers’ identities, Juliet had no doubt that they were men. There was something intimate and caressing in Jan’s voice as she spoke, although Juliet could not have followed the conversation even if she had wished to do so, as her sister always spoke in Italian.

But when you were as young and as lovely as Jan, there was little wonder that men were in constant pursuit of you, Juliet thought, and it was while she was wondering a little wistfully what it must be like to be so sought after that she eventually fell asleep.

When she awoke the following morning, Jan’s bed was empty, although it was still relatively early. She got out of bed and reached for the broderie anglaise dressing gown that matched her nightdress, pulling the sash securely round her slender waist before padding out on to the gallery. But as she went towards the bedroom door she heard a familiar but distressing sound coming from the bathroom. Immediately she crossed over and tapped on the door.

‘Jan, love, what’s wrong? Are you ill? May I come in?’

There was a pause and then Jan herself opened the door. ‘Oh, hello.’ Her tone was ungracious. ‘There’s really no need to bother. I’m fine. I must have eaten something that disagreed with me. Perhaps it was that melon—it does upset me sometimes.’

‘I’ll make some coffee.’ Juliet gave her an anxious glance. ‘Do you want to go back to bed? You look pale.’

‘Of course I’m pale, I’ve just been throwing up. For God’s sake, don’t fuss. You’re as bad as Mim,’ Jan said impatiently.

But by the time the coffee was made and they were sitting on the balcony with fresh rolls and butter on the table, Jan had regained her colour and her good temper with it.

‘Wonderful!’ she exclaimed, reaching for the glass of freshly squeezed orange juice which Juliet silently extended to her. ‘You are an angel. I should have invited you over long ago.’

Her eyes moved rather challengingly over Juliet’s tight-lipped expression.

‘Well, go on, darling. Ask me if it’s true.’

‘Do I really have to?’ Juliet could not suppress the bitterness in her voice.

‘I suppose not.’ Jan finished her orange juice and set the glass down on the table. ‘As a schoolmarm, I imagine you’re more than capable of adding two and two together and achieving the correct result. I might have managed to keep you at bay over my weight, but I knew I couldn’t hope to fool you over this foul morning sickness. I merely hoped it wouldn’t happen while you were within earshot.’

Juliet met her eyes squarely. ‘Were Mim and I never supposed to know?’

Jan shrugged. ‘Let’s just say that your visit at this precise time was—inopportune.’

‘Then why on earth didn’t you tell me not to come?’ Juliet tried not to sound as hurt as she felt and her voice sounded flat in consequence.

‘Because I was afraid that if I started putting you off with footling excuses Mim might take it into her head to come in your place. And while I might be able to fool you for a while, I knew I wouldn’t escape her eagle eyes. And as you can imagine, she’s the last person I want to know about this. Not until I have everything sorted out anyway.’

‘What are you going to do?’ Juliet asked unhappily. ‘Are you going to—get rid of the baby?’

Jan’s eyes opened to their widest extent. ‘An abortion in Italy? You have to be joking! No, far more conventional than that. I’m getting married. In fact if you’d delayed your visit for another week or so, I probably would have been married already. All problems solved, all Mim’s most romantic hopes for me gloriously fulfilled, and after a discreet interval, the promise of her first grandchild. Everything perfect.’

‘I see,’ Juliet said rather drily. ‘That being the case, may one ask why you didn’t simply get married in the first place and avoid all these rather hasty and hole-and-corner arrangements?’

Jan poured herself some coffee. ‘There were reasons,’ she said, frowning. ‘There still are, for that matter. Mim isn’t the only relative that we’re keeping in the dark about our plans. Mario has a brother who’s been causing us some grief.’

‘In what way?’ Juliet spread butter on a roll and bit into it, although she had little appetite. Jan’s news had left a sick, hollow feeling in the pit of her stomach. Mim’s premonition had been well founded, it seemed.

Jan shrugged again. ‘Big brother feels that he should have a major say in Mario’s wedding plans, and needless to say, he doesn’t approve of my part in them,’ she answered rather carelessly. ‘Not that we’ve ever actually met, of course.’

‘But is Mario likely to be influenced by his opinions?’ Juliet could not conceal the anxiety in her tone. ‘Italians are supposed to have this incredibly strong sense of family and …’

‘Well, the brother holds the purse strings for a start,’ Jan broke in, spreading her hands gracefully. ‘And you’re right about the family feeling. They come from the South—Calabria actually, where such things matter a lot, although they don’t actually live there now. Santino—that’s the brother—is some kind of industrialist in the North now, and has his finger in any number of financial pies from what I can gather, including tourism.’ She leaned back in her chair, lifting her face to the sun. ‘I think—in fact I know—he hoped Mario would make a sensible marriage, in other words marry some other industrialist’s daughter and bring about another kind of merger as an added bonus. I don’t figure in his scheme of things, naturally.’

‘But that’s terrible,’ Juliet said heatedly. ‘Arranged marriages are a thing of the past, anyway.’

Jan lifted her eyebrows. ‘Apparently they’re still very traditional in the South. Santino’s ideas aren’t as extraordinary as you think.’

‘But—but does he know about the baby?’

‘Lord above, no!’ Jan raised her eyebrows exaggeratedly. ‘As a matter of fact, in view of his open hostility, we haven’t told him very much at all. Mario feels it’s best to maintain a low profile and just present him with a fait accompli after the wedding.’ She sounded almost bored. ‘Once we’re married, there’s very little he can do about it, and I doubt if he’ll actually carry out any of his threats.’

‘Threats?’ Juliet pushed the remains of her roll away uneaten, and stared at her sister.

Jan laughed. ‘Not aimed at me, silly, although I’ll admit he’s made some damned unpleasant remarks in the past. No, he’s told Mario that he’ll cut him off with the proverbial shilling—or lira, I suppose, to be exact. But he’ll soon relent. For one thing Mario’s his heir, and Santino himself isn’t married or likely to be. He’s far too busy making money and having a good time—the damned hypocrite! His strait-laced views on morality don’t exactly extend to his own conduct,’ she added on a little flash of petulance.

‘I thought you didn’t know him.’

‘Only by repute,’ Jan said. ‘And I did see him once—at a safe distance in a night club. And once seen, never forgotten.’

‘What is he like?’ Juliet’s curiosity was aroused almost in spite of herself.

‘Very tall. Towered head and shoulders above everyone else around him and knew it. And as dark as Satan,’ Jan said after a moment’s thought. ‘That’s as much as I noticed, because Mario hustled me off at the speed of light out of harm’s way.’ She gave a faint giggle. ‘Actually, I think he’s a bit jealous of him. I said quite casually that I thought he was very attractive and Mario simply exploded. And he’s never taken me up on any of my offers to beard the lion in his den and convince him what a simply wonderful and suitable addition I’ll be to the Vallone family.’

Juliet stared at her wonderingly. Jan’s tone seemed almost to be one of relish. She did not seem to care that her future brother-in-law’s attitude to her was an insult. All that seemed to matter was the fact that he was an attractive man, and according to the hints she had dropped, an accomplished rake.

‘I wonder why not?’ she said a little grimly.

Jan smiled again rather smugly. ‘As I said, I think poor Mario has always been just a teeny bit in the shade. Perhaps he was afraid that Santino might try to cut him out yet again.’

Juliet compressed her lips tightly together. ‘I see,’ she said with sarcasm. ‘Your future relationship with your husband is obviously going to be founded on mutual trust.’

‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, don’t be so damned suburban,’ Jan said crossly. ‘We don’t all suffer from the same romantic illusions as you seem to. They may sing “O Perfect Love” at weddings, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it exists. Mario suits me very well in a number of ways, and it’s time I was thinking of getting married anyway. Modelling’s fine while you’re young, but people are too fond of relegating you to the scrap heap once you’re over twenty. All these schoolgirls, just waiting to claw their way over you on their way up the ladder. It’s almost worth the prospect of being fat and hideous for months to think that I’ll be kissing all that goodbye.’

‘I thought you loved it.’ Juliet stared at her. ‘Mim and I always thought that this was your world—your life. You could always have come home.’

‘To what?’ Jan demanded. ‘This is all I know. I’m not trained for anything else, and I can’t imagine things are any different in London from what they are here. Or do you imagine that I’ll get some kind of second-rate job showing dresses in some tatty provincial department store? Thanks, but no, thanks. I’ll settle for Mario instead and put up with whatever I have to from his family.’ She glanced at her plain and very expensive-looking gold wristwatch. A present from Mario? Juliet found herself wondering. ‘Lord, I must fly, or I’ll have that Di Lorenzo bitch breathing down my neck.’ She gave a slight giggle as she rose. ‘I might offer to model maternity gear for her, just for the pleasure of seeing her face. ’Bye, love. See you tonight.’