Airs Above The Ground Part 2

And now Timothy appeared to be distracting me with cheerful small talk from the approaching terrors of landing.

"I meant the six sorts of cancer you can get from smoking."

"Oh, I remember," I said. "Well, I expect there are, but don't take it to heart, if you're worrying about your father. I dare say he can take care of himself."

"I wasn't worrying about him. At least, not in the sense you mean."

There was something in his voice which told me that this was not, after all, merely a bit of distracting small talk. On the contrary, the carefully casual remark dangled in front of me like bait.

I rose to it. "Then what are you worrying about?"

"Is your husband meeting you at the airport?"

"No. He-I'm to get in touch with him after I get there. I've booked a room at a hotel. So, if I may, I'll beg a lift into town with your father and you. Unless, of course, you want to shake off your nursemaid before you meet him?"

But he didn't smile. "Actually, he's not meeting me."

"But your mother said-"

"I know she did. But he's not. I-I told her he was, it made it easier. It was a lie."

"I see. Well then-" Something in his expression stopped me. He had pushed the thick hair back and was half turned to face me, no longer sullenly ambushed, but cornered, committed, ready to defend himself.

The seat belt holding him down helped the impression of something trapped and at bay. "Does it matter all that much?" I asked.

"That's not all." He cleared his throat. "It's-I thought it would be all right, but now it's come to the point I'm beginning to wonder. I dare say," he added with a sudden, fierce bitterness that disturbed me, "I dare say she's right, and I'm a stupid kid who shouldn't be out loose, but I-" He swallowed. "Did you say you'd got a hotel?"

"Yes. It's right in the center. On the Stephansplatz, opposite St. Stephen's Cathedral. Why? Would you like to go there first with me?"

"If you don't mind."

"Fine," I said briskly, "we'll do that. Look, have you room in your holdall for these magazines?"

"Yes, here, let me. Mrs. March-"

"Vanessa, please. You know, you don't have to tell me anything you don't want to."

"I think I'd better."

"Here, Tim, relax, it can't be as bad as that. What have you done? Forgotten to tell him which day you're coming?"

"It's worse than that. He's not even expecting me. He didn't ask me to come at all. I made it all up, to get away. In fact," said Timothy desperately, "he hasn't written to me since he left. Not once. Oh"-at something which must have showed in my face-"I didn't mind, really. I mean, we were never all that close, and if he didn't want to, well, it was up to him, wasn't it? You're not to think I told all those lies to Mummy about him writing because I-because I felt he should have done, or something. I only did it so that I could get away."

He finished the terrible little confession on a note of apology. I couldn't look at him. It was all I could do not to state loudly and clearly just what I thought of his parents. "In other words," I said, "you're running away?"

"Yes. In a way. Yes."

"And now that you're stuck with a nursemaid who looks like handing you over personally, you've had to tell her?"

"It wasn't that." He looked grateful for the calm neutrality of my tone. "I could have got away from you easily. It just didn't seem fair, when you'd be the one to be left with all the row."

"I see. Thank you. Well, we'll have to think this out, won't we? How are you off for money?"

"I've got about twenty pounds."

"If your father didn't send you the money for the fare, where did you get it?"

"Well, I suppose I stole it," said Timothy.

"My poor Tim, you are breaking out, aren't you? Who from?"

"Oh, n.o.body. It was my Post Office account. I was supposed to leave it alone till my eighteenth birthday.

That," said Timothy clearly, "is pretty soon, anyway."

"Am I to take it you didn't intend to get in touch with your father at all? Did you only use the fact that he lives in Vienna as an excuse to get away?"

"Not really. I've got to live somewhere till I get the job, and twenty pounds won't last forever. I expect there'll be a bit of a turnup, but you get over it."

He spoke without noticeable apprehension, and I was rea.s.sured. Perhaps he was tougher than I had thought. It seemed as if he might need to be.

I said: "Well, we'll go together to my hotel first, shall we, and have a wash and so forth, and ring your father up. I expect he'll come for you. . . . That is, if he's home. I suppose you don't know if he's in Vienna now? It's August, after all; he may be away on holiday."

"That's what the twenty pounds is for," said Timothy. "The-well, the interregnum."

I got it then, with a bang. I turned to stare at him, and he, back in ambush behind the heavy lock of hair, eyed me once again warily, but this time-I thought-also with amus.e.m.e.nt.

"Timothy Lacy! Are you trying to tell me you've lied to your poor mother and gone blinding off into the blue without having the foggiest idea where your father even is?"

"Well, he does live in Vienna, I know he does. The money comes from there-the money to pay for school and so on."

"But you don't actually know his address?"

"No."

There was a rather loaded silence. He must have misunderstood my half of it, for he said quickly: "Don't think I'll be a nuisance to you. If it's too late to get hold of Daddy's bank or something, I'll just take a room at the hotel till Monday. You don't need to bother about me at all. I'll be fine, and there's ma.s.ses of things I want to do. When's your husband joining you?"

"I don't quite know."

"You'll be telephoning him tonight?"

Another pause. I took a breath to speak but I didn't need to. The grey-green eyes widened. The lock of hair went back.

"Vanessa March!" It was a wickedly perfect imitation of the tone I had used to him, and it crumbled the last barriers of status between us. "Are you trying to tell me that you've lied to my poor mother and gone blinding off into the blue without having the foggiest idea where your husband even is?"

I nodded. We met one another's eyes. Unnoticed, the Caravelle touched down as smoothly as a gull.

Outside the win-dows the flat fields of Schwechat streamed past, lights p.r.i.c.king out in the early dusk.

The babel of foreign voices rose round us as people hunted for coats and hand baggage.

Timothy pulled himself together. "The orphans of the storm," he said. "Never mind, Vanessa, I'll look after you."

CHAPTER THREE.

In all the woes that curse our race There is a lady in the case.

W. S. gilbert: Fallen Fairies

In the event, Timothy's father proved very easy to locate. He was in the telephone book. It was Tim himself who discovered this, while I, sitting on my bed in the large, pleasant, and rather noisy room of the Hotel Am Stephansplatz, was telephoning our first tentative inquiries down to the reception desk about banking hours in Vienna.

"It must be him," said Timothy, pus.h.i.+ng the directory page under my nose. "Look, there it is. Prinz Eugenstra.s.se 81. The telephone number's 63 42 61."

"And the banks are shut now, so he may be there, or someone'll be there who knows where he is. He'll have a housekeeper, surely?" I cradled the receiver and swung my legs down off the bed. "Well, if only Lewis is as easy to find, all our troubles will be over by dinnertime. At least," I amended it, "some of them. Go ahead then, it's all yours . . . and the girl at the switchboard speaks English."

"It's not that. My German's not bad, I did it for A levels; and as a matter of fact I'm panting to try."

"Well, then?" And, as he still hesitated: "Be your age, Tim."

He made a face at me, then grinned and lifted the receiver. I went into the bathroom and shut the door.

Under the circ.u.mstances it seemed a remarkably short conversation. When I went in again he had put back the receiver and was leaning on the window sill, watching the crowds thronging the pavement outside St. Stephen's Cathedral.

He said, without looking round: "He wasn't annoyed."

I opened a suitcase and began to lift my things out. "Oh, he was there, was he? Good. Well, that's one trouble on the way out. I'm very glad. Is he coming for you, or will you get a taxi?"

"He was just going out, as a matter of fact," said Tim. "He won't be in till pretty late. He's going to a concert with his fiancee."

I shook out a dress rather carefully and hung it away. "I suppose you didn't know about her?"

"No. I told you he never wrote. Her name's Christl. I think it's short for Christina."

"Oh? Austrian?"

"Yes. Viennese. It's a rather pretty name, isn't it?"

I lifted another frock from my case. "I don't suppose he'd tell you much about it on the phone."

"Not much. I told him you were here. He said he couldn't get out of the concert, but would we meet them afterwards for supper at ... I wrote it down ... at Sacher's Hotel. It's by the Opera House. Eleven o'clock in the Blue Bar."

He had turned back now from the window and was watching me. His face gave no clue to what he was thinking. I raised an eyebrow. "Flying high on your first night out of the nest. 'Eleven o'clock in the Blue Bar.' It sounds like something out of Ian Fleming. What price the ap.r.o.n strings now?"

"Well," he said, "it's what I wanted, isn't it?"

"My dear," I said, "do you mind?"

"To be quite honest, I don't know. Should I?"

"It would be very understandable if you did. It's rather a thing to have thrust at one just like that, a parent marrying again."

"Yes. My mother's going to marry again too."

It was one of those things to which there seems to be no reply at all. I couldn't think what to say. I just stood there with my hands full of stockings, and probably looking as stupid as I felt. "I had no idea," I said at last.

"Oh, it's not official, and as a matter of fact she said certainly not when I asked her flat out, but I'm pretty sure. In fact I'd take a small bet."

"Do you like him?"

"He's all right. It's John Linley, the publisher; do you know him?"

"No, but I remember your mother did mention the name." I hoped I hadn't sounded as relieved as I felt: compared with some of Carmel Lacy's 'men around town,' a publisher sounded the height of respectability. Not that it mattered to me what happened to Carmel Lacy, but I was beginning to find that I rather cared what happened to Timothy.

He didn't pursue the subject. He said: "What does this hotel charge for bed and breakfast?"

I told him. "I suppose your father won't have had time to make arrangements for you? I was wondering whether we'd have to take your case along to Sacher's, or call for it here later."

"Well," said Timothy, "that's rather the point. He didn't say anything about my joining him. In fact, I got the impression that it was the last thing he wanted. Oh, I don't mean my coming to Vienna, he took that in his stride, after he'd got over the surprise; and as a matter of fact he was rather decent about it. He-well, he obviously isn't going to send me back or anything, and I've got- a feeling he might even be pretty helpful about the job. There wasn't time to talk about it, because he was in a hurry getting ready to go out, and he just said something about work permits, and thinking it over later on, but why not simply have a holiday to start with, and was I all right for cash."

"I like the sound of that last bit," I said. "Well, anyway, I expect you'll get things fixed up when you see him tonight. He'll probably want you to move in there tomorrow."

"That's just what I wouldn't bet on," said Timothy. "I told you he was pretty nice about my suddenly turning up like this, but I think it rather threw him. He wanted to see me, all right, but I'm certain he didn't want me staying with him, and that's one reason why he was so dashed forthcoming about money." This wasn't cynicism, but merely a matter-of-fact observation of the kind that would paralyze most parents if they could know what their children know about them. "Actually," he added, "I got the impression that he has someone living with him already."

I looked at him for a moment, was satisfied with what I saw, and said: "Then let us hope, Tim dear, that it's Christl, or things will begin to get altogether too complicated."

"Poor Father," said Timothy unexpectedly, and laughed. "I've put him in a spot, haven't I? I expect he's sweating on the top line now. Well, I'd better see if I can book that room. I hope they've got one; they've probably only got suites, or something with private bathrooms and all that jazz."

"Well, it's a bit late for you to find anywhere else, and I gather your father's prepared to finance you. I'd go ahead. Dash it, he owes you the night's lodging at least!"

"Dead right he does. And then there's always blackmail. I've a golden future, haven't I?" And Timothy crossed to the telephone.

Well, I thought as I stowed away the last pair of shoes, this was indeed what he had wanted. But there must be easier ways of growing up than tearing oneself loose from the ap.r.o.n strings, and then being thrown into the cold and foreign winds by a careless male hand, with a few coins flung after you. It was surprising, really, how normal and nice Timothy appeared to be. . . .