Spy Sinker

Tessa had discovered how undemanding and convenient it was to play the established role of younger child, and let Fiona fulfil, or sometimes fail to fulfil, her father's expectations. Tessa was always the one of whom little was expected. Fiona went to Oxford and read Modern Greats; Tessa stayed at home and read Harold Robbins. Temperamental, imaginative and affectionate, Tessa could turn anything into a joke: it was her way of avoiding matters that were demanding. Her own boundless generosity made her vulnerable to a world in which people were so cold, loveless and judgemental. In such a world did it matter too much if she indulged in so many frivolous little love affairs? She always went back to her husband and gave him her prodigious love. And what if, one casual night in bed with this silly drunken lover, he should confide to her that he was spying for the Russians? It was probably only a joke.

'Describe him again,' said Fiona.

'You know him,' said Tessa. 'At least he knows all about you.'

'Miles Brent?'

'Giles Trent, darling. Giles Trent.'

'If you'd stop eating those damned nuts I might be able to understand what you are saying,' she said irritably. 'Yes, Giles Trent. Of course I remember him.'

'Handsome brute: tall, handsome, grey wavy hair.'

'But he's as old as Methuselah, Tessa. I always thought he was queer.'

'Oh, no. Not queer,' said Tessa and giggled. She'd had a lot of champagne.

Fiona sighed. She was sitting in Tessa Kosinski's elaborately furnished apartment in Hampstead, London's leafy northwestern suburb, watching the blood-red sun drip gore into the ruddy clouds. When, long ago, London's wealthy merchants and minor aristocracy went to take the waters at regal and fashionable Bath, the less wealthy sipped their spa water in this hilly region that was now the habitat of successful advertising men and rich publishers.

Tessa's husband was in property and motor cars and a diversity of other precarious enterprises. But George Kosinski had an unfailing talent for commercial success. When George bought an ailing company it immediately recovered its strength. Should he wager a little money on unwanted stock his investment flourished. Even when he obliged a local antique dealer by taking off his hands a painting that no one else wanted, the picture – dull, dark and allegorical – was spotted by one of George's guests as the work of a pupil of Ingres. Although many nonentities can be so described, Ingres' pupils included the men who taught Seurat and Degas. This, the coarse canvas and the use of white paint so typical of the Ingres technique, was what persuaded the trustees of an American museum to offer George a remarkable price for it. He shipped it the next day. George loved to do business.

'And you told Daddy all this: Trent saying he was a Russian spy and soon?'

'Daddy said I was just to forget it.' Idly Tessa picked up a glossy magazine from the table in front of her. It fell open at a pageful of wide-eyed people cavorting at some social function of the sort that the Kosinskis frequently attended.

'Daddy can be very stupid at times,' said Fiona with unmistakable contempt. Tessa looked at her with great respect. Fiona really meant it: while Tessa – who also called her father stupid, and worse, from time to time – had never completely shed the bonds of childhood.

'Perhaps Giles was just making a joke,' said Tessa, who now felt guilty at the concern her elder sister was showing.

'You said it wasn't a joke,' snapped Fiona.

'Yes,' said Tessa.

'Yes or no?'

Tessa looked at her, surprised by the emotions she had stirred up. 'It wasn't a joke. I told you: I went all through it with him… about the Russian and so on.'

'Exactly,' said Fiona. 'How could it have been a joke?'

'What will happen to him?' Tessa tossed the magazine on to a pile of other such periodicals.

'I can't say.' Fiona's mind processed and reprocessed the complications this would bring into her life. She looked at her younger sister, sitting there on the – yellow silk sofa, in an emerald-green Givenchy sheath dress that Fiona – although the same size – could never have got away with, and wondered whether to tell her that she might be in physical danger. If Trent told his Soviet contact about this perilous indiscretion it was possible that Moscow would have her killed. She opened her mouth as she tried to think of some way to put it but, when Tessa looked at her expectantly, only said, 'It's a gorgeous dress.'

Tessa smiled. 'You were always so different to me, Fi/

'Not very different.'

'The Chanel type.'

'Whatever does that mean?'

Teasingly Tessa said, 'Tailleur, with a jacket lined to match the blouse, chain belt and gardenia; everyone knows what a Chanel type looks like.'

'What else?' Sometimes Tessa's manner could be trying.

'I knew you would end up doing something important… something in a man's world,' said Tessa very quietly as she waited for her sister to pronounce on what might happen next. When Fiona made no reply, Tessa added, 'I didn't ask Giles what he did: he just came out with it.'

'Yes. He works in the Department,' said Fiona.

'I'm sorry about all this, Fi, darling. Perhaps I shouldn't have troubled you with it.'

'You did right to tell me.'

'Sometimes he can be so adorable,' said Tessa.

'Why did you ever get married?' said Fiona.

'For the same reason as you, I suppose. It was a way of making Daddy angry.'

'Making Daddy what?' said Fiona.

'Don't pretend you didn't know that marrying your pigheaded tough-guy would make Daddy throw a fit.'

'I thought you liked Bernard,' said Fiona amiably. 'You kept telling me to marry him.'

'I adore him, you know I do. One day I'll run off with him.'

'And was marrying George your way of persecuting Daddy?'

She didn't answer for a moment. 'George is such a lovely man… a saint.' And then, realizing that it wasn't the accolade a husband would most wish for, added, 'Only a saint would put up with me.'

'Perhaps George needs the opportunity to forgive.'

Tessa gave no heed to that idea. 'I thought a second-hand car dealer would lead an exciting life. It's silly I know, but in the films they are always in the underworld with gangsters and their molls,' she grinned.

'Really, Tess!' Delivered wearily it was an admonition.

'It's rather gruelling, darling, living with a man who gets upset when ladies use naughty words, and who gets up at six o'clock to make sure he doesn't miss Mass. Sometimes I think he would like to see me slaving in the kitchen all day, the way his mother did.'

'You're a complete fool, Tessa.'

'I know. It's all my fault.' She got to her feet suddenly and excitedly said, 'I know! Why don't we go and have dinner at Annabel's?' She stroked her beautiful dress. 'Just the two of us.'

'Sit down, Tessa. Sit down and calm down. I don't want to go to Annabel's. I want to think.'

'Or I've got a home-made chicken stew in the freezer; I'll put it in the oven while we go on talking.'

'No, no. I'll have to eat something with Bernard.'

Tessa dropped back into the sofa, grabbed her glass and drank some champagne. 'You're lucky not to live in Hampstead: it's full of eggheads. My bloody cleaning woman phoned up and said she couldn't come today: she has a conference with her script editor! Script editor; Jesus Christ! Do have some more booze, Fi. I hate drinking alone.'

'No thanks, Tess. And I think you've had enough for one night.'

Tessa put the glass down and didn't refill it. Being in her sister's bad books made her feel wretched. Fiona was the only one she had, after George her husband, and she couldn't go to George with all her troubles. Most of her troubles came from these silly little love affairs she was always becoming caught up in: she couldn't expect George to help her with those.