‘Candida?’ The voice cut through me like a bacon slicer. I knew it as well as I knew my own without turning round, and I could not believe I was hearing it, in this ancient sea capital so far from home. ‘Candida, what on earth are you doing here?’ At this we all turned to greet Serena as she walked across the square, dragging a rather hot-looking Lady Claremont and the dreaded Lady Belton in her wake. In their party too the men were not interested in politics. Seeing all our faces, Serena let out a short scream. ‘My God! What is this? I don’t believe it! Why on earth are you all here?’ We then embarked on an explanation and it turned out that, by an unbelievable coincidence, her own parents had taken one of the other villas in the development where ours lay, that they had invited Andrew’s parents, that they’d arrived the day before and they would be staying for the coming week, and… wasn’t it amazing?
I need hardly tell you that, as it turned out, it was not amazing. It was not in the least amazing. It was not even a coincidence. The scheme, which I did not uncover for some time after this and then only because I ran into George Tremayne at a race meeting three or four summers later, had originated with Serena, who wanted to see Damian again. Even when I heard the truth from George I didn’t understand quite why (although I do now), but it was anyway important to her. John had been asking Candida to bring out a group of friends for some time, that bit was true, and they decided that if Candida could get Damian into the group, Serena and Andrew would, by coincidence, take a villa nearby. Obviously, Damian would not come if Serena were to be in the party, nor would Andrew if Damian was, so the subterfuge was necessary, once you accepted the intention. Where the plan might be said to have gone awry was that Serena’s parents, perhaps suspicious in some way, had announced they would bear the cost of the trip and join them. This Andrew would not allow Serena to refuse, since it was such a saving. The final button came when Lady Belton suggested that she and her benighted husband also come along, as she would ‘welcome the chance to know the Claremonts better.’ I never found out what would have happened if Damian had refused when I asked him. I imagine the whole thing would just have been cancelled. However, at the time, I suspected nothing. I thought the chance meeting was genuine chance, a heavensent miracle that Serena Gresham – correction, Serena Summersby – should be standing in a sun-drenched, southern square, also wearing ill-fitting, borrowed black and waiting to pay homage to a dead tyrant alongside me. I allowed myself to wonder at her properly. ‘How are you?’ I asked.
‘Frazzled and worn out. Take my advice. Don’t travel with your parents, your in-laws and your two-month-old baby, in the same party.’
‘I’ll remember that.’ I looked at her. She was quite unchanged. That my golden girl was now a wife and mother seemed more or less impossible to believe. ‘How are you getting on?’
She glanced swiftly across at Lady Belton, but the old trout was busily snubbing some tourist who’d attempted to strike up a conversation and enjoying it too much to notice us. ‘All right.’ Then, sensing that her answer had not sounded like the voice of love’s young dream, she smiled. ‘My life’s terribly grown up now. You wouldn’t believe it was me. I spend the whole time talking to plumbers and having things covered, and asking Andrew whether he’s done the sales tax.’
‘But you’re happy?’
We did not need to exchange a glance to know that, with this question, I was pushing my luck. ‘Of course I am,’ she said.
‘Where is Andrew?’
She shrugged. ‘Back at the villa. He says he’s not interested in history.’ ‘This isn’t history, it’s history in the making.’
‘What can I tell you? He’s not interested.’
To the fury of the people behind us, we stuffed Serena, her mother and her motherin-law into our group, and together we all staggered up the cathedral steps. From there we passed into the cool, shadowed interior of the great church, where the sounds of crying were more audible and, as they echoed through the aisles and cloisters, curiously haunting. Grief is always grief, whether or not the deceased deserves it. At last we walked past the coffin. The head was covered in some sort of scarf, but the hands, waxy and still, were pressed together as if in prayer, raised and resting on the chest of the corpse. ‘I wonder how they do that,’ said Serena. ‘Do you think they’ve got a special thing?’
I stared at the body. It was dressed, as are all dictators in death apparently, in a rather nasty, lightweight suit that looked as if it had come from Burton Tailoring. ‘What I can never get over,’ I whispered, ‘is the way the moment people are dead, they look as if they’ve been dead for a thousand years. As if they were never alive.’
Serena nodded. ‘It’s enough to make you believe in God,’ she said. Once outside again the plan was made. The Claremonts, the Beltons and the Summersbys would go home now to change, and they would all join us for dinner in a couple of hours back at the villa. Full of this pleasant scenario, we climbed into the waiting vehicles.
I now think I must share a little of the blame for what happened later as, for some reason which in retrospect seems completely inexplicable, I never mentioned to Damian that we had run into Serena. In my defence, I knew very little, if anything, of what I have since learned had gone on between them. I knew they’d kissed once and I genuinely thought that was about it, but even so it does seem odd. I did not consciously conceal it, because when we got back Damian was nowhere to be seen. He had not, we heard from Lucy, slept well the previous night and he’d retired to catch up so as to be on form for dinner. ‘Don’t let’s wake him,’ said Dagmar firmly and we didn’t. Clearly, I should have gone to his room, propped his eyes open and told him what I knew, but I was not aware of the urgency and I suppose I imagined I would catch him before the others arrived. Then, a little later, Lucy volunteered to go and tell him, and before we could discuss it she’d vanished, leaving Dagmar biting her lip. At the time I did suspect Lucy’s ultimate purpose in going to Damian’s bedroom, but not that she would make no mention of the meeting at the cathedral, the dinner that was planned for that evening, or Serena. Which proved to be the case.
There was one more surprise in store, on this most surprising of all days – before the Big Surprise later that is – which John greeted us with when we got back. ‘There was a call from a friend of yours,’ he said as we walked out on to the terrace. Naturally I, and presumably the rest, thought this would be from Serena, making some change to the evening’s schedule. John disabused us: ‘Joanna de Yong? Is that the name?’
Candida was astonished. ‘Joanna de Yong?’ she said. ‘Where was she ringing from?’
‘She’s here. She’s staying with her husband and her parents quite nearby. They arrived today.’ He was smiling as if he were bringing us glad tidings, but the response was not what he’d anticipated.
We all looked at each other in silence. Wasn’t this too mad? Was Estoril the only holiday destination of choice? It was developing into a Russian play. I do vividly remember the oddness of all this, which later got buried beneath the horror. Dagmar commented at the time that it seemed as if we had arranged a modest reunion, and Fate had decided to get in on the act and bring everyone of significance from that period on to the stage at once. In other words she was as innocent as I was about what was taking place behind the scenes. At last Lucy spoke. ‘What did she want?’ She was always less a fan of Joanna than some, as I remembered well.