“Gordon thinks I did something in the pregnancy that caused him to be premature. The doctor says it would have happened anyway, but I've never been able to convince Gordon of that.” Which only confirmed the unpleasant things Bill thought of him.
Bill hadn't liked Gordon on the two occasions they'd met. He had found him pompous and overbearing and arrogant, and the sarcastic way he spoke to Isabelle had made Bill's skin crawl. He treated her like a child, and publicly dismissed her with sharp words, open criticism, and a wave of the hand. But he had gone out of his way to be nice to Bill, because he was impressed by him, while all the while seeming to ignore his wife. Gordon was charming when he chose to be, with people he thought were important or could be useful to him, but it was almost as though he needed to punish Isabelle for who she was. All her kindness and compassion and decency only seemed to inspire his contempt. Bill suspected that underneath it all Gordon was impressed by her family, and felt inadequate somehow, perhaps because of her ties to the royal family, and he needed to put her down to reassure himself. It wasn't a style, or a point of view, that warmed Bill's heart. But for Isabelle's sake at least, he feigned a moderate amount of respect when she spoke of him. He didn't want to put her in the position of defending the man. Her loyalty was evident, and he was her husband after all. But she no longer pretended to Bill that she was happy with Gordon, she simply accepted their marriage as her lot in life, and refused to complain about the way things were. She was just grateful to have Bill to talk to, and listen to her, and she loved the fact that he always made her laugh.
There was a big crowd at Harry's Bar that night, they could hardly get in the door, there were women in evening suits and cocktail dresses standing elbow to elbow at the bar, with men in dark suits, white shirts, and dark ties. The crowd looked sophisticated and fashionable, and Isabelle fit in perfectly in her black lace dress. Bill looked distinguished and elegant in a double-breasted dark blue suit he had just bought before the trip.
Their table was waiting for them, and the head-waiter acknowledged him instantly, and greeted Isabelle with a smile. He gave them a corner table he knew Bill liked, and they both recognized faces at the various tables all along the walls. There were several actresses, a major movie star, some literary figures of note, a table of businessmen from Bahrain, two Saudi princesses, and a table of fashionable Americans, one of whom had made a fortune in oil. It was a noticeably distinguished crowd, and several people stopped to say hello to Bill. He introduced Isabelle without hesitation simply as Mrs. Forrester, and offered no explanation as to who she was. And halfway through dinner, she noticed a well-known French banker she had met years before, he knew Gordon certainly, but he paid no attention to her, and never acknowledged either of them on the way out.
“I wonder who people think we are,” she said, looking not worried, but amused. Her conscience was clear, even if it was unusual for her to be in London and dining with a man at Harry's Bar.
“They probably think you're a French movie star, and they think I'm some boorish American you picked up.” He laughed as the waiter poured Cristal with their dessert. They had had a fabulous meal, and two excellent wines so far. But neither of them was drunk, just sated and happy and relaxed.
“Hardly,” Isabelle looked amused. “Everyone knows who you are, Bill. In spite of the fact that you think no one does. But they have no idea who I am.”
“I could make an announcement if you like. Or we could go table to table on the way out, and I could introduce you to everyone, and then I could tell them you're my best friend. Do you think that would tell them what they want to know?” What they could see was an extremely attractive couple, enjoying each other's company. Watching them made people smile.
“It might. Do you suppose Cynthia would be upset if she heard you were dining out with another woman?” Isabelle was always curious about her.
“Honestly?” he asked, smiling at Isabelle. He was always honest with her. It was a promise he'd made himself a long time ago, that he would never dodge the truth with her, no matter how awkward the truth was. And as far as he knew, she had done the same with him, and she always assured him she had. She cherished the candor and openness they shared. “In all honesty, Isabelle, I don't think she'd care. I think she's long past that now. As long as I don't make a fool of her, publicly at least, I think she figures what I do is my business. She wouldn't want me asking her questions about her life. And she has a lot more to hide than I.” He had heard rumors about her for years, and only the first couple of times had he questioned her, after that he had decided that he didn't want to know.
“That strikes me as sad somehow,” Isabelle said, looking at him. “That isn't what marriage is about.”
“No, it's not. But marriage seems to cover a broad spectrum of possibilities. Yours and mine are not exactly the stuff that people dream about. We have what people settle for, for a variety of reasons, after a long time.”
“I suppose you're right,” she said pensively, as the waiter poured them each a glass of Chateau d'Yquem. “Is that good enough for you, settling I mean?” The wine she'd drunk so far made her a little braver than she normally was.
“I don't have a choice. If I don't settle, my only choice is to get out. And for very different reasons, neither of us wants that. Cynthia wants the aura of respectability I provide for her, and the way of life. And I don't want the shock waves it would cause if we got divorced. So here we are. And besides, if we got divorced it would upset the girls. I don't see the point. I've never seen anything or anyone I wanted more.” Nothing that was available to him, at least. He had made his peace with his own situation, as Isabelle knew, a long time before. But sometimes she wondered why. At fifty-two, he was young enough to start another life, and he deserved happiness, she thought, at least more than most. He gave so much, and got so little back. But Bill thought the same of her.
“You're never going to find anything or anyone else, as long as you're tied to her,” she said as she took a tiny sip of the Yquem.
“Are you suggesting I get divorced?” He looked surprised, she had never said it as directly before, and he couldn't help wondering why she was saying it now.
“I'm not sure. I just wonder sometimes if we're wasting our lives. I have no choice because of Teddy, and I wouldn't get divorced anyway. No one in my family ever has. And at my age, it's too late to start over. But it's different for a man.” It surprised him to hear her words, he didn't think she'd ever thought of leaving Gordon, and this was the first hint of it he'd ever had.
“It's not different for a man,” he said quietly, “and you're eleven years younger than I. If anyone should be thinking of a new life, it's you, Isabelle. You and Gordon haven't been married in any real sense for years. You deserve a lot better than that.” It was the first time he had ever been that blunt with her, but she had opened the door for him to say it to her, and he was glad he had.
“I couldn't do that, and you know it,” she said calmly. “Everyone we know and are related to would be horrified, and I couldn't disrupt Teddy's life. He's too frail to survive a major change like that. Besides which, Gordon would never tolerate it. He'd kill me before he'd let me go. I have no doubt of it.” Divorce wasn't even remotely an option in her mind. She sounded sobered as she said it, but tonight for the first time, she realized that she felt like a prisoner on parole. She had never allowed herself to realize how depressing the house in Paris was, how limited her life, how totally absent Gordon was. And suddenly, sitting at Harry's Bar with Bill, she was totally aware of what she had never had. But much of that, she insisted to herself, was because her life revolved around a sick child. She was not ready to see that the lonely life she led was in great part due to the fact that she had been emotionally abandoned years before by the man she'd married.