Lady of Hay

37

Nick stretched slowly on the bed and looked up at the sunlight sliding through the curtains and playing on the plaster frieze around the bedroom ceiling. He smiled. It was a long time since he had awoken at Jo’s on a Monday morning. He brought his wrist up in front of his face and stared at his watch. Christ Almighty! It was eight-fifteen. He was due at the office at eight-thirty. He leapt to his feet, then he stopped in his tracks.

The bed beside him was empty, the bedspread still in place, save where it showed the imprint of his sleeping body. And he was fully dressed.

Slowly, with a leaden heart, Nick walked up the passage to the living room. Jo lay where he had left her, on the sofa, very still beneath the blanket he had tucked around her.

“Nick? What time is it?” She opened her eyes slowly.

“After eight.” He went and sat down beside her.

“What happened? Why did I sleep here? When did you arrive?” She pushed the hair out of her eyes.

Tenderly Nick leaned forward and kissed her forehead.

“Jo, I’m flying back to the States this morning.”

She sat up. “Why?”

“I have to go, Jo. I have to get away from you, don’t you see?”

Pushing herself up onto her elbow, she stared at him. “But why the States?”

“Because it’s far away. I came here last night, Jo. I hypnotized you. I don’t even know how, but somehow I frightened you into a trance against your will. I made you tell me some more of the story, Jo, knowing it was dangerous for you, knowing you were afraid. By rights I should be locked up!”

“Nick, that’s not true.” Jo stood up shakily. “I don’t remember-”

“You don’t remember because I told you you wouldn’t remember. You were crying, Jo. You started to cry as you talked, and it brought me back to sanity. I told you to go to sleep and I told you to forget.” He clenched his fists. “Until this is over I am not going to trust myself even in the same city as you. Somehow I’ve got to find Sam and get him to straighten out this mess, if he’s capable of doing it. I’ll see if he’s still down in Hampshire.” He strode grimly to the phone and glanced without comment at the pad with his mother’s number on it, then he began to dial.

Dorothy Franklyn answered at the second ring.

“He’s just left, Nick,” she answered in response to his curt inquiry. “He said he had to get back to town later today. Is anything wrong, Nick? He really was very on edge all weekend.”

“Nothing’s wrong, Ma.” Nick drummed his fingers on the desk. “I’ll call you again soon.” He hung up. “He’s on his way back to London. Jo, I don’t want you staying here alone. You’ve got to keep away from both of us.”

Jo bit her lip. “There’s no way I’d ever let him in.” She gave a tired smile. “Ceecliff is coming to stay with me tonight.”

Nick’s face lightened. “That’s good news. I wish I could see her.”

“So do I,” Jo said sadly. “So do I.”

The apartment was empty. Nick walked around it twice, alert for any sound, before he slid the deadlock on the front door and went toward the phone.

He booked a flight on the afternoon jumbo jet, then he called Jim Greerson.

Jim was desperate. “For crying out loud, old son! You were supposed to be here!”

“I’m sorry, Jim. I’m sure you are handling everything brilliantly.”

“I doubt it. And if it’s screwed up, it’s no one’s fault but yours! Mike Desmond was furious when you didn’t turn up again. I’ve told him you will personally go over to his office tomorrow and grovel and lick his shoes.”

Nick stared up at the ceiling. “Jim, I’m flying back to New York this afternoon-”

“Like hell you are!” It was the first time Nick had ever heard Jim sound really angry. “This is your firm, Nick. If you want to save it, you fucking will show up and pull your weight! There are other people’s jobs on the line too, you know. You’ve got twenty people working for you, in case you’ve forgotten, and they all rely on you!”

Nick passed his hand over his forehead. “Jim-”

“No. No more excuses, Nick. Just get here, fast.” Jim slammed down the phone.

“Damn!” Nick looked down at the memo pad on the desk where he had written down his flight number, then he ripped off the page and, screwing it up, flung it into the wastepaper basket.

As he did so something lying in the bottom of the almost-empty basket caught his eye. He stooped and picked it up. It was a cheap wooden crucifix with, nailed to it, a plastic figure of Christ.

Bet looked up from the flat-plan on her desk. “You want to work here? In the office?”

“Just today, Bet. Please. I have a reason for not wanting to be at home. I can finish the article off and leave it with you.” Jo hitched herself up on the edge of Bet’s desk. She leaned over and picked up the box of cigarettes lying by the telephone. Her hand was shaking slightly.

Bet marked up a couple more sections on the plan, then she threw down her pen and stood up. She went over to the coffee and poured out a cup. “You’d better drink this.” Deftly she took the unlit cigarette away from Jo and tucked it back into the box. “I’m sure I can find you a desk here, love. In fact, there’s one here permanently for you if you want it. You know that.”

Jo shook her head. “Only for today, Bet, thanks all the same. Then I’m going home. And I’m going back to Matilda. I’ve finished all the research I’m going to do.” She took a deep breath. “Now I want to write it all down quickly and get it out of my system once and for all.”

Bet smiled. “I’m glad you’ve changed your mind. It would have been the end of a beautiful friendship if you’d let me down on that one. I’ve provisionally scheduled you three main feature slots starting in March. That gives you three months to write it. Will that be enough?”

“It’ll be done in three weeks.” Jo’s voice was dry.

“Whenever.” Bet raised her hands in an expansive gesture of compliance. “I’ve spoken to Tim. He’s sending all the photographs to you direct before he leaves.”

“Leaves?” Jo glanced up.

“He’s going to Sri Lanka on Sunday, for six months or so, with the delectable Caroline.” Bet carefully avoided Jo’s eyes. “It’s best, Jo. He’ll destroy himself if he stays here.”

Jo looked away, taken aback at the sudden, suspicious prickling behind her eyes.

“He’ll get over it,” Bet went on gently.

“Of course he will.” Jo forced herself to smile.

“Will you put him in the articles?”

“No.”

“But he is part of the story-”

“So is Nick, but I won’t include him either.” Jo stood up suddenly. “Don’t worry, you’ll get your money’s worth. I shall pillory myself for my avid readers, but not my friends.”

Bet shrugged. “As you wish, but you’re omitting some of the most extraordinary parts of the story, Jo. And don’t forget, the big bad world has already read about Nick and Sam.”

“Then let them make their own connections.” Jo picked up her file of notes. “I’m working on the Clements story now, so please, tell me where I’ll find a desk, and I’ll start.”

Ceecliff paid off the taxi and walked slowly up the steps to ring Jo’s bell. It was several seconds before the intercom buzzed into life.

“It’s me, dear.” She stooped toward the disembodied voice in the wall.

“Are you alone, Ceecliff?”

Celia Clifford stared around her carefully. “Totally. And I haven’t been followed! I changed taxis twice to make sure,” she said solemnly.

There was a gurgle of laughter from the wall. “Enter then and be recognized!”

“What on earth is all this about?” Panting after her climb up the stairs, Ceecliff watched as Jo bolted the front door behind her and fixed the chain.

“Nothing. I’m just being careful.”

Ceecliff divested herself of her lightweight coat and dropped her handbag and shopping bags on a chair. “Have you locked Nicholas in or out?”

“Out. Oh, Granny-” Jo threw herself into the older woman’s arms.

“You haven’t called me that since you were quite tiny, Joey,” Ceecliff murmured gently. “My goodness, look at you. If you cry like that, you’ll dissolve, child.” She led Jo to the sofa and pulled her down beside her. “Best let all the tears out first, then you can tell me everything.”

It was eight-thirty when Ceecliff opened the front door to Nick. She smiled at him and gave him her cheek to kiss, then, taking his hand, she led him into the living room. “Joey is in the kitchen, Nicholas, fixing us some paella, so we can talk in here.”

Nick put the bottle of wine he was carrying on the coffee table and sat down obediently. “I thought I might not be coming here again,” he said slowly. “I had arranged to go back to the States this afternoon.”

“Running away is not going to solve anything.” Ceecliff sat down on the edge of the sofa beside him. She reached forward and took his hands in hers. “That’s why I called you. Joey told me everything this evening. The whole story.”

“Including what I did to her last night?”

“Including everything.” She gave a small wistful smile. “Nicholas, amid all your problems, your anguish and your fear for Jo and for yourself, has it ever crossed your mind to acknowledge the fact that your spirit, the kernel of life inside you that is the essential you, has loved one woman for eight hundred years? That is some love story, Nicholas, and the way Jo tells it, it sounds as if there are three of you who have been given a second chance to redeem the mistakes you made all those years ago. A chance to fulfill your love, Nicholas, not repeat the terrible mistakes you made before. A chance for your brother, if he was this dreadful man, William, to prove he isn’t a coward any longer, and for Richard-” She shrugged. “I don’t know what Richard did, except perhaps grow old. But maybe there is to be another chance somewhere for him as well.”

“You don’t really believe all this?”

“Wait, I haven’t finished.” Ceecliff tapped him on the knee reprovingly. “I know nothing about psychology, or this frightening hypnosis business, but it does cross my mind that your brother has been practicing some kind of mental isometrics on you. He is using your resistance and your fear to fight yourself, within yourself.” She paused, searching his face gravely for a reaction. “Have you thought of admitting to yourself that you were once another man? That that man made some terrible errors, for which his soul has lived in torment, and that a kind, not a vengeful, deity has given him the chance, through you, to make amends?”

Nick let out a deep breath. “No, I hadn’t thought about it that way.”

Ceecliff laughed. “You can say I’m gaga if you like, but I haven’t lived nearly eighty years without learning something. And one of the things I’ve learned is that anything is possible, Nick. Why do you think you met Jo? It cannot have been coincidence.”

“Sam introduced us.”

“Perhaps that act was his first step on his own road to salvation.”

“Perhaps.” Nick looked skeptical. “Look, Ceecliff, I’m sorry, I’d love to believe this, I really would-but I can’t.” He stood up and began pacing up and down the carpet.

“But you do believe in your brother’s power over you?” Ceecliff looked up at him, not moving from the sofa.

He stopped. “I’ve had proof of that.”

“And you have had proof that your love for Joey is stronger than his evil intent. You nearly hurt her, Nicholas. You had it in your power to hurt her, even to kill her last night, but you didn’t actually do it.” She reached up toward him. “You were ungentle and ungentlemanly.” She gave him a smile. “But you did not actually harm her, did you?”

Nick shook his head slowly.

“You could have forced her to tell you her story to the end last night, Nick. You could have forced her to experience once more the moment of death. But you didn’t do it. You could have killed her, Nick. And if you were going to, if that was what you really wanted, you would have done it then. But you didn’t !” She pulled herself up off the sofa and went to her shopping bags, which still lay on the chair near the door. “I bought us a nice bottle of Amontillado in Harrods before I came. Why don’t you open it, Nick. And pour Jo one as well.” She glanced at him with a gentle smile. “Think about what I’ve said, won’t you? Don’t just dismiss it out of hand.”

Jo was in her bedroom, lying on the bed, her arm across her face. Nick sat down on the bed beside her. “I’ve brought you a sherry, Jo.”

She turned and looked at him, her eyes still swollen from crying. “What do you think of Ceecliff’s theory?”

He smiled. “I’ll buy it. Anything is better than mine, and I hear John is next after Richard III for reappraisal and reinstatement by historians.” He reached forward and pushed her hair gently back from her face. “I want to believe Ceecliff’s love story, Jo.” He leaned forward and kissed her on the lips. “I want to very badly. It would mean that at the end of the story you will marry your handsome prince and live happily ever after.”

Jo gave a snort. She pushed him away and reached for the sherry glass he had put down on the bedside table.

“Don’t overdo it, Nick.” She swung her legs over the side of the bed and stood up. Her smile faded. “What about Sam? He’s not going to want a happy ending, Nick.” She couldn’t hide the sudden tremor in her voice.

“I’ll deal with Sam.” Nick put his arm around her. “But you mustn’t see him, Jo. You are too susceptible, and you do realize, don’t you, that you must never, never go back to Matilda’s world again? You know as much of her story as you need to know. There must be no more.”

She nodded. “I had already decided that. I didn’t want to know any more anyway. It was you who forced me to go on last night, Nick.”

He grimaced. “God forgive me. Jo, just for a while, I still don’t want you ever to be alone with me either. Not yet. Ceecliff has said she’ll stay with you for a few days, if you want. I think you should let her.”

Jo nodded. “I’d like that.”

He grinned. “Good. It’ll soon be over, Jo, I promise. It will soon be over now.”

“Why so formal, Nicholas?” Sam eyed his brother across the table with grim amusement. “And so extravagant. Claridge’s, no less!”

Nick was looking at the wine list. “I wanted to talk to you somewhere quiet.”

“Then why not the apartment?”

“Because I don’t trust you.” Nick ordered a bottle of claret, then he leaned back in his chair and looked Sam straight in the eye. “It hasn’t worked, Sam. You’re a devious bastard, and I’ll admit you had me shit-scared for a while, but it hasn’t worked.”

Sam smiled. “Pity.” He put his elbow on the table and rested his chin in his hand, looking at Nick through narrowed eyes. “You are quite sure, are you?”

Nick felt a prickle of unease stir the small hairs at the nape of his neck. “I know it,” he said firmly. “But tell me one thing. Why? Okay. You despise me. Fair enough, I suppose: a brother’s prerogative. But why Jo? Why hurt her?”

“It amused me to see you both dancing like puppets at my command.” Sam stretched his long legs under the table. “You and that wimp, Heacham. His memories are genuine, you know. He’s a real sensitive, poor bastard.” He sat back in silence as Nick scrutinized the label on the wine bottle and then sipped thoughtfully from his glass.

With a curt nod at the wine waiter Nick watched the two glasses slowly poured, then he picked his up and extended it toward Sam. “I’ll drink to your speedy and permanent return to Scotland.”

Sam clinked glasses with him amiably. “It will be within the week,” he said. “I have only one or two things left to do in London.”

“Just so long as they don’t involve Jo.”

Sam smiled. “Jo barely exists for me any longer,” he said cryptically. And he took another sip from his glass.

Nick reached into his pocket. Silently he laid the crucifix on the table.

Sam looked at it. He set down his glass. “Where did you find that?”

“In the wastebasket. Is it a symbol of discarded belief or a prop you don’t need anymore?”

After picking up the cross, Sam held it in his hand for a moment, staring at it expressionlessly, then he slipped it into the pocket of his suit. He glanced up at Nick, who was watching him closely. “Oh, I need it,” he said softly. “I’ll need it for another week at least. What’s wrong? Did you think I would shrink back like a vampire and disappear in a puff of smoke when you confronted me with it?” He laughed out loud. “You are rattled, little brother.” His eyes had grown suddenly very cold. “Rattled and rather stupid.” He turned to the food that had been put down before him.

Nick fought back a wave of nausea. Doggedly he picked up his knife and fork. “Just keep away from Jo,” he said again. “And just in case you feel like looking her up, I warn you, her grandmother is staying with her, so she won’t be alone, ever.”

Jim Greerson sat back in his chair and began to fill his pipe slowly. He glanced at the man opposite him. “Nick won’t be too keen on us pursuing this King John business,” he said with an apologetic smile. “It’s one hell of an invasion of his privacy.”

Mike Desmond smiled. “Privacy is there to be invaded, Jim. Look.” He handed him a piece of paper. “One of your fellows slipped me this.” It was an unmistakable caricature of Nick with, on his head, a lopsided crown.

Jim whistled. “You’d better not let Nick find out who drew that. He would be for the bullet.”

“Or a raise. Look.” Mike produced a second piece of paper. “See this? Get something along these lines on TV at peak time and it’ll be worth a few bob on your account.”

Jim shook his head slowly. “Nick will kill us if we suggest it.”

“You want our account, Jim? Look, for Pete’s sake! I’ve done all the work for you! There can’t be a paper in the country that hasn’t picked up that story about Nick. Everyone in the country knows what he does. They’ll all recognize him. It will sell, Jim, you know that. But for God’s sake get your skates on. I want to be topical! Hammer out a storyboard fast. It will be worth it.”

Jim grimaced. “You’re the boss, I suppose.”

“Right. I’m the boss. I pay your fat salaries and supply the fuel for that car of Nick’s. Besides, you’ll be boosting all your other clients by implication, so if it means Nick Franklyn has to lay his head on the block for a few nights, I’d say it was worth it, ten times over.” He stood up. “Tell him that from me, Jim. I’ll expect to hear from him this afternoon.”

Jim walked over to the window and threw it up, letting in a blast of hot traffic fumes and noise. He ran his fingers rather desperately through his hair, then he walked over to his desk and pressed the buzzer.

“Jane? Where is Nick?”

“He’s not back from lunch yet.”

Jim glanced at his watch. “It’s after three, for Christ’s sake! Where was he going, do you know?”

“He was meeting his brother at Claridge’s.”

Jim sighed. “Okay, Janey, love. The second he appears wheel him in here. It’s double desperate.” He sat down and drummed his fingers on the desk top. Then he pulled the two sketches toward him and studied them critically. He grinned. They were really rather good.

The house lay bathed in moonlight. It was completely silent, the undrawn curtains turning the windows into dark pools, reflecting deeply into the interior of the building. Slowly the figure tiptoed up the grass on the edge of the drive and made its way around to the back. It crept up to the back door and tried it gently, before skirting the dustbins and pushing at the small rear window. That too was locked.

Systematically the dark-clad shadow tried every downstairs window before shining a powerful flashlight up at the second floor. The light beam slid over the wisteria around the front door, playing among the fronds, almost lovingly caressing the weeping greenery until it found what it was seeking, the blue, square box on the wall that marked the burglar alarm.

There was a quiet chuckle in the silence as, slowly, he bent and picked up one of the large granite lumps that marked the flowerbed edge. After raising it above his head, he hurled it through the front window on the left side of the door with a deafening splintering of glass.

For a moment the wailing alarm seemed deceptively quiet in the black, back-lit moonlight of the garden as, without a backward glance, the figure slipped into the bushes and out of sight, but already, next door, the lights were beginning to come on.

Jo and Ceecliff were planning a visit to the watercolor viewing day at Sotheby’s when the phone rang. Jo answered it, then, with a frown, passed it over to her grandmother. It was several minutes before Ceecliff hung up. Her face had gone pale.

“That was Julian Frederickson who lives next door,” she said slowly. “My house has been burgled.”

Jo stared at her, shocked. “Oh, no. Was much taken?”

Cecliff shrugged. “They don’t know. The alarm went off in the middle of the night and they’ve found a broken window. Julian is a key holder and he’s been in and looked around. He says there’s no damage as far as he can see, but-” She caught Jo’s hand. “I’m going to have to go back.”

“Of course.” Jo gave her a hug. “I’ll drive you down.”

“No, dear. I know you have another meeting with your editor to choose your pictures this afternoon. You can’t possibly come.” Ceecliff smiled. “Julian would have known if anything had been touched. He knows the house well enough. It sounds as though that beastly alarm scared them off. I’ll get dressed quickly and catch the first train I can get hold of.”

Jo rummaged in her bag and produced her car keys. “Here. At least take my car. Please. By the time you’ve crossed London to Liverpool Street and found a train and made the connections to Sudbury it will be midnight. Take my car and I’ll come up at the weekend and collect it.”

“You’re sure, dear?” Ceecliff stared at her doubtfully.

Jo nodded. “I’m sure.”

“And can you get someone to come and stay with you? You mustn’t be alone.”

“I’ll be okay.” Jo kissed her on the forehead. “There are loads of people I can ask.”

She stood on the pavement waving as Celia Clifford expertly slotted the blue MG into the traffic and disappeared, then she walked back slowly inside, feeling curiously bereft.

After shutting the door, she slipped the bolt automatically and fixed the chain. She glanced at her watch. It was just after ten. Plenty of time to call someone a bit later, but first there was something she wanted to do.

Ceecliff had been with her since Monday. Now it was Thursday. She’d finished the Clements article but started nothing new. She stood and ran her fingers over the pile of books and tapes and documents on her desk. Three weeks to write the three articles, she had said to Bet. But what about the book? The biography, the quest for her past existence. What of Matilda?

She sat down and pulled the first notebook toward her. Then she inserted a sheet of paper into her typewriter.

Once upon a time…

It was the way all the best stories started.

She worked steadily right through the day, commanding her brain to answer questions, marshaling memories, holding her emotions in an iron grasp as she wrote. It was hard to dissociate herself from the story. Her fingers would race more and more quickly over the keys, filling in detail she never knew she possessed, till, cramped and exhausted, she had to rest them. The time of her meeting with Bet had come and passed. Apologetically she called the office, promising to come in first thing on Monday, then she wandered into the kitchen for a glass of milk before going back and switching on the tape of one of her earlier regressions and listening intently as she sat down and put her feet up on the cushions.

At five Ceecliff called. “Just to let you know all is well, dear. They must have been scared off. Julian organized someone to mend the window for me, so I’m snug and safe. Let me know when you’re arriving. You’ll find my car in the station parking lot…I only hope it will start after a week.” She paused. “Is there someone there with you, Jo?”

Jo started guiltily. She had forgotten all about phoning someone to come and be with her. “Don’t worry, everything is organized,” she said. “Now take care. I’ll call you tomorrow and let you know when I’m coming.”

She broke the connection and then she dialed the office in Berkeley Street. “Please come this evening, Nick.”

“Is Ceecliff still with you?”

“No, she had to go back.”

“Then I shouldn’t come, Jo.”

“We have to believe her, Nick. We have to trust ourselves. Please come. I need you.”

Nick sighed. “It’s you who have to do all the trusting, Jo.”

“I’m prepared to risk it. I don’t want to be alone.”

“Then I’ll come.” As Nick put down the phone he pressed the intercom button. “Jane, tell Jim I’m leaving in twenty minutes. If he wants me to countersign those documents he’ll have to bring them now. And Jane, did you check the orders for tomorrow’s champagne?”

“Have done.” Jane’s voice echoed lightly in the room. “Will there be anything else, Your Majesty?”

He cut off the peal of laughter with a good-humored curse. Was it really worth it? Allowing himself to be made a fool of for the sake of the firm. He deliberately put the thought out of his mind. This time tomorrow Mike Desmond would have signed the contract and the team going to the States would be three quarters of the way across the Atlantic.

Until then, there was Jo.

She met him at the door dressed in a soft silk dress of plum-red. He stared at her for a moment, unmoving, before he entered the apartment.

“What is it?” Nervously she fingered the skirt. “Don’t you like it? Ceecliff helped me to choose it.”

He smiled. “It’s quite lovely.” He took her in his arms and buried his face in her hair. It was loose, he noticed. No scarf, no ribbon. How could he tell her he had seen a life-size picture of her in Tim Heacham’s studio, wearing a gown of just that shade of red?

He closed the door behind him and slipped on the chain. “Why did Ceecliff go so suddenly?”

“She had a phone call that someone had tried to burgle her house. They didn’t get in, but obviously she had to go and check.”

“And she’s not afraid of being there alone?”

“Apparently not.” Jo looked away suddenly. “That’s my weakness at the moment.”

“Not a weakness. It’s common sense. You’d be a fool to be alone as long as Sam’s around.” Nick pushed her away reluctantly and walked through into the living room. “I had lunch with him the day before yesterday. The good news is, he’s going back to Edinburgh at the weekend.”

Jo sighed. “I hope he never comes back.”

“Or not for a very long time. You’ve decided to go on and write it, then?” Nick was standing looking down at her desk. He picked up one of the books from the pile.

She nodded wearily. “It’s the only way I’ll be free,” she said. “Otherwise Matilda is going to haunt me for the rest of my life.” She hesitated, glancing at him. “Bet wants me to mention you in the story, Nick. Do you mind?”

He laughed. “ W I A is about the only periodical that hasn’t mentioned me yet. But isn’t the story a bit over the top for them? I’d have thought such a tale of love and despair and unmitigated male chauvinism would have turned all those Women in Action readers off for good.”

Jo smiled. “Perhaps. Bet thinks it will turn them on. But in fact, all it does is prove that some women at least were just as capable in those days, and had enormous managerial responsibilities, and that men were male chauvinist pigs every one, as ever. The readers will love it.”

“And my role? The arch MCP, I suppose?”

Jo busied herself in the drinks cabinet, holding up empty bottles to the light.

“I shall be suitably diplomatic about your role. Would you rather be the villain or the romantic hero?”

“You decide. As long as you know which I am in real life.” Nick looked down at her as she raised her eyes to his. For a long moment they stared at each other, then he reached down and took her hand. “That is empty,” he said, firmly closing the cabinet. “If ever I saw an empty cabinet, that is it. I’ll nip up to the liquor store and get something.” He gave her a rueful smile. “While I’m there, glance at this. It’s the storyboard for the TV ad Desco wants us to put on.”

As the door closed behind him Jo stared at the sketches he had put into her hand. She felt numb. It was all reduced to a stupid, cheap joke. John. Handsome, powerful, malicious John, pilloried by a tatty TV advertisement; reduced to a trite little sketch, to be screened between Coronation Street and the evening quiz show. She shivered unhappily as she put them down.

Nick was back in ten minutes with a bottle of gin, four bottles of tonic, and a carafe of chianti.

Jo let him in silently.

“I take it you don’t like the idea?” He glanced at her as he produced a lemon from the pocket of his jacket. “Is there any ice?”

She nodded. “It just seems rather…small.”

“Jo, Mike has laid it on the line. He wants this idea or out. Our boys think it will work. It’s an amusing script even for the people, if there are any, who don’t know what the hell we’re talking about. If I veto it, we lose the account.”

“Then it must go on.”

“Is it any worse than what you propose to do with your articles and your book?” He took her hands gently.

Jo shook her head.

He gave a small smile. “Jo, don’t you think it’s what we need? To send ourselves up a little bit? Humor is an awfully good anodyne.”

“I know. It’s just…”

“I know what it is, Jo.” Releasing her, Nick turned toward the kitchen. “I’ve been there, remember?” He changed the subject abruptly. “Are you going to come to New York with me-” He broke off with a curse as, behind them, the phone rang. Swinging back into the room, he picked it up.

“Hello?” There was complete silence on the other end of the line. They both heard the connection go dead.

Nick slammed down the receiver.

“Wrong number,” he said cheerfully. “Now, where was I?” He put his hands gently on Jo’s shoulders. “Well, will you come?”

She nodded slowly. “Yes.” She moved back slightly. “Will we ever be able to forget all this, Nick?”

He turned away and, picking up the bottles, led the way into the kitchen. “In time it will distance itself like a bad dream, I expect. I hope.” He gave his boyish smile. “Till then we must just make sure nothing else happens-apart from the happy ending.”

They ate their supper in silence, neither suggesting they turn on any music, watching the light fade in the room as darkness came.

The phone rang again. After a moment Nick stretched across and lifted the receiver. Once again, when he spoke the line went dead. “It’s Sam,” Jo whispered into the silence. He sat back, not looking at her, his eyes on the open French doors onto the balcony. The streetlights gave a pale, false moonlit wash to the stone of the balustrade. He did not dare move. He did not dare even think about her. Suddenly danger crackled in the atmosphere between them, held at bay only by the quiet.

Then it was gone. Nick turned and looked at Jo covertly. She was sitting uncomfortably, drawn to the edge of her chair by the urgency of the phone bell, her shoulders tense, the angle of her head defiant as she stared past him, as if she were listening to something far away inside herself.

Nick was suddenly galvanized into movement. “Jo! Jo, for Christ’s sake, don’t do it! Jo! ” He caught her shoulders and shook her hard. “Jo, can you hear me?”

Her hands had come up automatically and she clutched convulsively at his shirt front. “Nick-”

“Hold on, Jo. Don’t let it happen. Fight it, Jo. Fight it!”

She let go of him abruptly and clapped her hands to her head.

The blackness was whirling around her; there was a roaring in her ears, waves of sound annihilating her, like torrents of angry water toppling over onto a beach. There were chains on her wrists and rain, rain in the shadows, rain in the wind howling around her, tearing at the huge red-and-gold standard with the clawing leopards of England as it strained high in the darkness, tearing her clothes, and above all the sound of thunder. But Nick was still beside her. She could see his mouth moving. He was talking to her, his hands outstretched to hold her. It was Nick…Nick…

The telephone bell cut through the sound, echoing in the room for the third time that night. Neither of them took any notice of it. To Nick it echoed obscenely in the silence, for Jo it drove the whirling noise away. As suddenly as the dislocation had come, it passed, leaving her shaking like a leaf.

She collapsed into Nick’s arms, tears pouring down her face. “It wanted to happen again, Nick. I was at the castle at Carrickfergus. You were there too…”

“But you fought it, love.” He gathered her tightly against his chest. “You fought it.” Behind them the phone fell silent. “It won’t happen again. You know now you can fight it. You can. It’s all right, Jo. It’s all right. You’re safe.”

She was still clinging to him desperately. “Don’t go, don’t leave me-”

“I won’t leave you, Jo.” He smiled down at her reassuringly. “Come on. It’s all over now. You’re safe.”

“Make love to me, Nick.”

He tensed slightly. “You know I want to, but-Jo, I have my own demons to fight too. I’m afraid of what I might do.”

She was shaking her head, still clinging to his neck. “You won’t hurt me, Nick. You won’t. Just make love to me. Make me part of you. Please. You have to-” Her voice rose suddenly. “Please, Nick. Now. Here.”

“No, Jo.” Gently he held her away from him. “Not here.”

He led her through into her bedroom and, closing the curtains, turned on the bedside light. She was standing quite still, looking at the floor. Her shaking had stopped. He put his hands on her shoulders. “You’re sure this is what you want?”

She nodded. “Undress me, Nick.”

He frowned. She was standing before him completely submissive, no longer hysterical, not moving as he raised his hand tentatively to the zipper at the back of her dress. The soft red silk slid to the floor. Beneath it she wore nothing but a black lace slip. He pulled the straps down over her shoulders and the slip followed the dress, leaving her quite naked. Keeping an iron control over himself, Nick led her gently to the bed and pulled back the covers, watching as obediently she turned to climb in. Across her shoulders was a fading welt, the mark of Sam’s belt. At the sight of them Nick felt a wave of blind fury sweep over him. For a moment he did not move. He clenched his fists, feeling the icy drench of perspiration across his shoulders as he closed his eyes.

“Nick?” He heard Jo’s whisper from the bed.

She had pulled the sheet over herself and was staring at him. He could see the sudden fear behind her eyes.

He forced himself to smile. “It’s okay, Jo.” He sat down beside her. “It’s not you. I just had this tremendous urge to kill my brother.” He touched her face gently, then slowly he began to unbutton his shirt. “I won’t hurt you, Jo. I promise.” He reached out to turn off the lamp. Then he pulled her into his arms.

She slept lightly, waking twice in the night to reassure herself that Nick was still there, snuggling against his warm, relaxed body before drifting back into a restless, dream-haunted sleep. Once she cried out and Nick turned to her without waking and held her close against him. They both woke early. Jo was pale and there were dark rings under her eyes as she made their coffee and toast while he was shaving. He glanced at her once or twice as they had their breakfast, concerned at her unnatural quietness.

“Jo, are you all right?” he asked at last.

She nodded. “Tired, that’s all. I didn’t sleep very well.”

He smiled. “Not my fault, I hope.”

“No, not your fault.” She made herself smile back over her coffee cup. “Nick, Ceecliff took my car. If you don’t need yours, would you lend it to me this morning?”

He glanced at her sharply. She was taut as a wire again, her knuckles white on the handle of her cup.

“Of course you can borrow it.” He reached into his pocket for the keys. “Where do you want to go?”

“I’ve got one or two things to do.” She made a visible effort to pull herself together. “I’ve been away so much. If I’m going to Suffolk tomorrow, I must get some things sorted out today.”

“Okay.” He finished his toast, drained his coffee, and stood up. “I’ll call you later. If you’re very good, there might even be a glass of champagne for you at the office this evening.” He paused as he was about to put on his jacket. “Do you want me to come back here this evening?”

“You know I do.” She stood up and reached up to kiss him. “I want you to come back here always, Nick.”

As soon as he left she showered and dressed in a blue linen skirt and blouse. She straightened the apartment, put her camera and notebook in her bag, and picked up the keys to the Porsche. Then she hesitated. She looked at the pile of books on the table.

She knew what she had to do. She had to find out where Matilda had died. No more trances, no more hypnotism. Just plain fact, to finish the story off. When she got there she would know. She opened the notebook and stood staring down at the scribbled lines of writing; notes taken so many weeks ago, which had meant so little then. Now they were a shorthand mockery of a lifetime of love and hate and hope and fear.

She ran her finger down the page. “Matilda and her son were sent from Bristol to a dungeon at Windsor”…Windsor or Corfe. She gazed across the room unseeing. Windsor or Corfe. She would know at once. She would feel Matilda’s fear. That would be enough. There would be no last trance; no more. Just the final stark sentence in her story.

She closed the notebook resolutely and, picking up her bag, let herself out of the apartment.

The Porsche ate up the miles to Windsor, streaking down the fast lane of the M4 without regard to the speed limit. From far away the huge towers of the castle showed from the road, shimmering in the haze that hung over the willow-lined water meadows which bordered the Thames. Jo swung the car into the old town and parked it in a side street below the massive castle walls. For a moment she did not move. She rested her forehead against the steering wheel and closed her eyes, trying to steady the uneasy pounding of the pulse beneath her ribs. Then, taking a deep breath, she swung the car door open and pulled herself out. The town was very crowded and she was jostled back and forth on the pavement as she made her way resolutely toward the gatehouse at the entrance to the castle.

The lower ward was thronged with people. Gray stone; walls; towers; the flying buttresses of St. George’s Chapel; emerald grass, clipped as if by nail scissors. Up toward the hill on which stood the huge round tower. Cameras; children; everywhere people staring; people laughing; people talking; people only superficially aware of the ghosts that walked around them. Hitching her bag up higher onto her shoulder, Jo stared up at the vast bulge of the gray walls. High above, rippling from the flagpole, was a flag. She felt her stomach tighten as she stared up, half expecting to see again the snarling leopards of John’s standard against the stormy sky. Her mind made a tentative shadowy probe toward the dream, rejected it, and drew back. It was not John’s standard. She could see the brash red, white, and blue now of the Union Jack with, behind it, wisps of high summer cloud and sunlight.

Slowly her hands unclenched in the pockets of her skin as she walked around the castle perimeter, expecting nothing now, the moment past, the ancient stones absolved of her particular nightmare.

It was after five when she got home. She threw down the keys on the table and went straight to the phone.

“Jane? Is Nick there? It’s Jo.”

Over the line she could hear the sound of laughter from the office. Suddenly she felt cut off and very lonely.

Jane came back on the line in seconds. “Sorry, Jo. You’ve just missed him, but he was only going to the apartment. You’ll catch him there.”

Jo sat still for a moment feeling strangely let down. He had promised to return to her. She wanted to tell him what she had done. She wanted to tell him what had happened.

She leaned forward slowly and flipped her notebook open. “Matilda and her son were sent to a dungeon at Windsor…” Jo picked up her pen and crossed out Windsor and wrote Corfe.

Half an hour later she redialed Nick’s number. It rang for several seconds before it was picked up.

“Hello?” It was not Nick’s voice that answered.

Jo felt herself tense nervously. The receiver slipped slightly in her hand as perspiration started out all over her palm.

“Sam?” Her voice was husky.

“Hello, Jo. How are you?”

She couldn’t reply for a moment. Neither could she put down the phone.

“I thought you’d gone back to Scotland,” she managed to say at last.

“I’m on my way.” She could hear the amusement in his voice. “Nick and I had a long talk about things on Tuesday and we agreed that perhaps I should go home.”

Jo found she was pressing the receiver closer and closer against her ear. “I want to talk to Nick.”

“He’s not back yet, but I’m expecting him any second.” His voice was very calm.

“I see. Look, Sam, I’ll call back in a few minutes.”

“There’s no need, Jo,” he said slowly. “He’ll be back very soon. Talk to me instead.”

“I don’t want to, Sam,” she replied in a panic.

“You do want to. You’ve been wanting to speak to me for days; you’ve been needing to speak to me, Jo.” His voice sunk a semitone. “That was why you called, because you realized how much you needed to see me, because of your headaches, Jo. I want you to listen to me very carefully now. Can you hear me, Jo?” He paused for a second. “When you speak to Nicholas he is going to ask you to come to his office party. You are going to tell him you are too tired. You have a headache and you don’t want to see him. You don’t want to see him at all tonight, do you, Jo? You are going to sit down quietly at home and watch television, and later this evening I shall come to you and make your headache better. You do have a headache, don’t you, Jo?”

“Yes.” Her whispered answer was barely audible.

“Then you need me, Jo.”

She stared at the phone for several minutes after she had hung up, a puzzled frown on her face. Why had she talked to him? Why had she listened to him for even a single second? She never wanted to see Sam again, and yet it was true, she did have a headache. It would do no harm, surely, if he came, just for a few minutes, to help her relax…

When Nick called her she was firm and slightly distant. Her headache was worse, like a blinding ligature around her eyes, throbbing incessantly as she tried to focus her thoughts. “I’ll be all right, Nick, really. I just need an early night.” She hadn’t congratulated him on the signing of the contracts with Mike Desmond. That was the reason for the party. She groped for the right words, painfully conscious that the room was beginning to spin.

“You are sure you’ll be okay?” His voice came from far away. “Jo, I’ll look in later. If you’re asleep I won’t disturb you. Take care, my darling…” Darling. He had never called her that before. Smiling in spite of her pain, Jo felt her way almost blindly to the television and turned it on, then she sank onto the sofa in front of it and sat back, her eyes closed, letting the waves of crushing agony beat one by one against the back of her eyelids.

Sam came sometime after seven, inserting in the lock of the street door a shiny, newly cut key. It stuck slightly, then it turned and the heavy door swung open. The second key fitted perfectly. He held his breath slightly as he turned it, wondering if she had bolted the door, but it swung open silently and admitted him to the quiet apartment.

He listened. Yes, the TV was on softly, as he had known it would be. After closing the door carefully he slid the bolt home and slotted in the chain. Then he turned into the living room and stood looking down at Jo. She was lying back against the cushions on the sofa, her face white, her eyes closed, oblivious of the violent fistfight between two men going on on the screen before her. Her body was taut with pain.

“Hello, Jo.” Quietly he walked into the room.

She opened her eyes wearily and gave him a faint smile. There was a quick shiver of apprehension, then it was gone. “Are you going to make my headache better?”

Sam nodded. He stood between her and the TV. “You know what I’m going to have to do, Jo.”

“You’re going to hypnotize me again.”

Sam smiled. “Isn’t that what you want?”

She nodded slowly. “But I don’t want to go back into the past, Sam. I don’t want to regress any more…”

She wanted to stand up, but her limbs were too heavy. They would not obey her. She looked up at him helplessly.

“Were you really William?” she asked slowly. “Or did you just choose him?”

Was there a hint of a smile behind his eyes? Sam was feeling in his pocket. He produced a cassette and, moving across to the stereo, he inserted it into the player. The soft strains of the flute cut across the muted wail of a police siren on the screen in the corner.

“We do not choose our destinies, Joanna. They are given to us,” he said. He folded his arms. “It’s time to take you back. You shake your head. Poor Jo. You are already halfway there. You hear the music? You cannot resist the music, Jo. It takes you into the past. It takes you back to John. It takes you back to the king who has ordered you to be shackled like a common criminal and brought before him on your knees…”