Read Online The Mistress of Alderley by Robert Barnard - Free Book Online

bit ancient for that, aren’t they?”
    â€œShe’s forty-three. And there’s no question of ‘they.’ It’s not Marius’s. He thinks it’s by some younger, casual boyfriend.”
    â€œSo why isn’t she getting rid of it?”
    Caroline couldn’t think why she hadn’t asked Marius the same question.
    â€œI suppose because she doesn’t want to or doesn’t believe in it.”
    â€œSeems the most sensible solution if your marriage is falling apart and your husband is screwing a gorgeous actress he’s set up in a bijou stately home two hundred miles away.”
    â€œYou put things so sweetly, Stella. Perhaps she thinks a baby will give her an interest, fill a gap in her life.”
    â€œA man would do it better, and be much less trouble.”
    â€œ Some men, ” said Caroline, with deadly emphasis. “A lot of the men I’ve had to do with wouldn’t. Maybe she doesn’t know anybody suitable. You can’t just buy a man over the counter at Harrods.”
    â€œI bet you could if Mr. al Fayed had the bright idea of stocking them. Anyway, what was the decision you both came to?”
    â€œTo let things go on pretty much as they are, for the moment anyway.”
    â€œProbably sensible,” said Stella, with all the worldly wisdom of fourteen. “You’re happy as you are, and, if Marius is unhappy, he’s certainly not showing it. You’d probably notice if he was getting itchy.”
    â€œItchy? You do use the most awful words, Stella.”
    Stella opened her mouth, but at that moment Marius’s car was heard on the graveled drive, and the weekend resumed its normal course.
    Olivia came as usual on Sunday. This time Caroline spotted Colm Fitzgerald’s car as it came through the gates, and she went out to meet him and invite him in. Olivia, she could tell, was not pleased. Colm had tea and cakes, met Marius, and was given a tour of the house and gardens. It was Caroline who gave him the tour, followed a few feet behind by Stella, who seemed taken by the large yet somehow forlorn tenor. When they got back into the house Olivia was practicing: great arcing phrases, unaccompanied, proceeded from what they now called the Music Room. Colm asked to use the lavatory, and two minutes later, coming back into the hall, Caroline caught Stella watching him from the security of the study while he himself, motionless halfway down the stairs, was watching Olivia—singing great swathes of glorious melody to cloth-eared Marius through the open door of the Music Room.
    â€œShe’s in wonderful voice,” said Caroline, to make him realize she was there.
    â€œShe leaves me for dead,” he said, and he seemed to be summing up their personal rather than their vocal relationship. He reluctantly tore himself away from the sound, and went toward the front door.
    â€œI’ll drive Olivia to the station tomorrow morning,” said Caroline. Colm seemed about to protest, but then he just nodded miserably and went out to his car.
    As the first night of Forza approached Olivia was getting jumpy. Two minutes after Colm drove away she broke in midphrase and announced: “It’s not right yet.” Two hours later she was practicing again. Stella accompanied her. She was doing rather well out of these sessions, but she looked as if she would rather be doing something else. The next morning when Caroline drove Olivia to Doncaster station she was still in a taciturn mood. Caroline understood. She had been through it all in a milder way at high points in her stage career. She had the impression that opera singers did what actors did, but in an aggravated form.
    â€œAnother idyllic weekend over,” said Stella to Alexander as they walked toward the bus stop on their way to school that same morning. “And Marius on his way back to his other woman.”
    â€œHis mysteriously pregnant wife,” said Alexander,