One Way or Another(85)

“Give it a rest, Ahmet,” Martha had said to him. “You can’t be rich all the time.”

Ahmet supposed not, but when you came from his background it was the only security, showing it off so no man, or woman, might ever think he had been poor. They’d believe that he was born into this, knew how to behave, just like them. Actually, women didn’t seem to care much either way, only that he was rich, that he was generous, that, in fact, he was pleasant to be with. Most of the time. It was only later at night alone with him that women found he might become a little over-demanding. Not every woman was willing to feel the lash of the whip as well as the lash of his tongue as his anger against them spilled from his mouth. Ahmet was two men. He knew this was the truth and he liked it that way. He could be everyman. He could be his own man.

Music swelled from the drawing room that was big enough to have been called a ballroom, only Martha would not allow it. “Keep it small,” she had warned, “or else they’ll think you are showing off.” Well, forgive him but he was showing off; he wanted them all, all these people he did not really know and who certainly had never invited him into their homes, to see who he was tonight. They shook hands and smiled into his eyes, said how lovely the house looked and wasn’t Martha clever, while the orchestra played “Strangers in the Night” with a nice extra touch of violins that somehow made his house seem more intimate.

He glanced over his shoulder, searching for Mehitabel. She should have been there, she was his assistant, goddammit, she should be working, not cavorting off somewhere, acting like she owned the place. In that red dress that had cost him a fortune. As had the dress for Angie, the secret woman he could not bring himself to dispose of. Maybe later tonight after the party, when everyone had gone, the parking valets, the waiters, the cooks, the dishwashers who took care of all that expensive tableware by hand, the cleaners who vacuumed and wiped and tidied and cast out the wilting cow parsley. Then, he would deal with Angie. It was so convenient that the house stood on marshland.

And then there was Lucy. His own darling little Lucy, the innocence in his life. He had not yet dared buy a ring, he didn’t want to rush her, but he had bought pearls, the real thing, a chest-length string of natural pearls clasped with a round eighteenth-century old-cut diamond. No glitter for his young girl. Gentle was what she needed. And, anyhow, where was she?

He pushed back his cuff, checked his watch, glanced round for Martha. She was nowhere in sight either. Goddammit, where was everybody when he needed them? Didn’t he pay enough for them to at least be at his side ready for his orders?

The house felt suddenly quiet: no one was coming through the door. He stood next to his portrait, which he was not the least bit satisfied with though everyone had remarked how like him it was. He didn’t see it himself; thought he looked old, worn, hard even, when the truth was so different. He was kind, caring. When he was in the right mood, the right personality. He thought of Cairo, of his childhood, of his hated mother, and immediately wished he had not. This night was a celebration, not a wake. He had never mourned her, never would. He touched the pearls in his pocket, slipping them through his fingers, imagining fastening them round Lucy’s slender young neck, how pleased she would be. The image made him smile.

As though he had summoned her, Lucy came through the door on the arm of a blond young man so good-looking he might have been her brother. Anger flashed in Ahmet’s eyes as Lucy came up to him, holding the young man’s hand. Ahmet put his arms round her possessively, felt her draw back, turn her cheek as he went to kiss her on the mouth, breathed in the scent of her before she got free.

She introduced the young man. “My pizza guy,” she explained, her eyes laughing into the boy’s with the sexual understanding, the togetherness Ahmet recognized. She might be f*cking him, he wasn’t sure, but still, right at that moment, he wanted to kill him.

“This is Phillip,” Lucy said. The young man held out his hand then took a quick step back when he caught Ahmet’s cold glance.

“Uh, great portrait, sir,” the nervous boy said. “Good to meet you in person. You’re famous, and all that.…” He retreated quickly, leaving Lucy still standing there, smiling uncertainly.

“You look beautiful,” Ahmet said. And she did, so young and slender in her black velvet dress. “I have something for you.”

He took the strand of pearls from his pocket, held them for her to see. “Now, bend your head.”

Lucy did so. He lifted her hair, slipped the necklace on. She put up a hand to touch the pearls. “They’re cold,” she said. Then, “I know they’re fake and all but still I can’t accept them.”

Ahmet laughed. “Why not, after all, they’re only fake. And they look so good with that black dress.”

Still uncertain, Lucy said thank you, as she reached back for the young man’s hand, then turned and walked away wearing a fortune in pearls she couldn’t even tell were real. But then, Ahmet thought, who could, except an expert like the jeweler he’d bought them from, or he himself, because he had paid too much for them. It took a seventeen-year-old girl to put him squarely in his place. It made him smile, a regretful kind of smile, but after all, she was still so young.





62





ANGIE


Burning silk has a particular odor, a frizzled almost metallic smell, like when you use the electric hair straightener too long, and your hair comes out all crisp. Smoke was already drifting from the window. Pieces of curtain broke off and flew after it, beacons of flame, attracting the attention of the visitors in the garden below.