A Rather Curious Engagement (6 page)

I glanced up to see how Jeremy was doing. He was very, very quiet, gazing out the window. His handsome face, with those blue eyes and dark lashes and dark hair, looked quite serious. And I realized that while I had been scratching away on my pad, he had made barely a sound. I surreptitiously craned my neck to steal a look at his pad. Not much written, indeed . . .

“You’re not supposed to peek,” came his scolding voice, even though he was still looking out the window.

“Aw, c’mon, let’s compare,” I said.

“I’m not ready yet,” he said.

So I waited. And I waited and I waited. I made tea. I made a nice tray of little sandwiches with no crusts, and cookies, and a few slices of the miniature orange pound cake we’d picked up on the way home, and little dishes of jam. And then we nibbled on the food and drank the tea. And the sun started to slip down in the sky, casting a burnt-orange glow across the room. And still, he didn’t write.

“Jeremy,” I said finally, in what I thought was a tone of infinite patience, “time is going by. Our
lives
are going by. It’s fish-or-cut-bait time. Let’s compare.”

“You really are a nosey woman,” he said, but he put his pad down on the table. “You go first,” he insisted.

“The best I could come up with,” I admitted, “is that I definitely want to fix up the Dragonetta.” That was the vintage 1930s auto that Great-Aunt Penelope had bequeathed to me. “After all,” I explained, “it got her safely out of wartime Italy, and it’s where she hid the painting. She said it brought her luck. And Denby says it has a great engine . . .”

Denby was the mechanic on the Riviera who had assessed the car as valuable and certainly worth fixing up; he was just waiting for me to give him the go-ahead.

“Of course, that would also mean repairing the garage,” I warned. “That roof is askew, and there are holes in one of the walls; you saw what mice did to the car’s upholstery.”

“Fine, fine. You don’t have to convince me,” Jeremy said approvingly; he’d been an auto buff since he was a boy, and he loved that car so much that he even had a modern replica of it. “What else did you come up with?” Jeremy inquired.

I blushed a little. “Um, clothes,” I said. “Nothing hysterically expensive. I just want to have enough well-made, beautiful items, so I can actually wear them instead of just saving them for special occasions.”

“Perfectly all right,” Jeremy assured me. “Clothes make the woman. But I consider things like the car and clothes just upkeep. What Martin called our year’s expenses.”

“Right,” I agreed. “We should set aside money for them, but I don’t really think it’s what Martin and my dad meant about our great Splurge.”

Jeremy leaned forward, and actually took my hands in his.

“Penny,” he said in a serious tone. “I just want to say one thing. I know that we agreed to make this little hiatus of ours an experiment, to see what we really care about in life, and what we want to do with our future. Well, I want you to know that, sure, as far as career and all that are concerned, yes, I am exploring my options. But when it comes to love—”

He paused here, a trifle embarrassed, but then he pressed on resolutely, “When it comes to
you
, well, I’m not feeling experimental at all. I know how I feel about you, and that won’t change. I just don’t want to rush what I feel is happening naturally all on its own, between us.”

He said this so earnestly, so gently, that I could scarcely believe such a beautiful moment in my life had come so effortlessly, as if we’d been flying on the back of a white swan that just made the downiest, softest of landings. I was actually choked up, and I couldn’t speak right away. When I did, all I could say was, “Ah, babe . . .”

“I told your father so, too,” he said, “when you were in the kitchen.”

I was shocked. “You told him what?”

“That we’re not fooling around, that we’re serious,” he said matter-of-factly, picking up his pencil again and squinting at his pad. “He knew what I meant. He also knew what it meant for me to say it aloud, to him, especially.”

“My God,” I said, awed. “How very medieval, yet chivalrous of you.” I kissed him, then peeked at his face teasingly. Now he did become self-conscious and a bit stern, as if dealing with an unruly student.

“Chivalry, nothing,” he said briskly. “Fact is, I was merely getting my dibs in early. No other man will stand a chance with you now, at least where your father is concerned. Can we put these pads away?”

“No way, pal!” I cried. “What’s
your
big wish?”

He cleared his throat, trying to look casual. “Well, along the lines of fixing up the estate, I, too, would like to make some repairs. On the villa in Antibes.”

“Definitely,” I said. “Repairs and upkeep for living expenses. What else?”

“A wine cellar,” he said, looking a little sheepish. “I always wanted a good one. Not the ridiculously expensive ones that investors buy. Just good wines to drink over time, so I can be a generous host and we can have great parties. Remember that wine cellar in the basement of Aunt Pen’s villa? Empty racks now, but it looked like she kept plenty of good stuff down there. I’d like to fill it up again.”

“Fine. Also goes into the year’s expenses,” I said, because I suspected that there was a much bigger fish lurking in this pond.

“Good, done,” Jeremy said briskly, moving as if to put his pad away, as if the meeting was adjourned.

“Wait a minute,” I said. “You’ve got something else on that pad.”

I craned my neck, trying to read what it was. He’d written it so faintly, and it had a big question mark after it.

“I haven’t finalized this one,” he said, looking a bit panicked.

“Oh, come on,” I said.

“No, really,” he said.

“Jeremy!” I coaxed in my sweetest, most supportive, most soothingly feminine voice. “I won’t hold you to it, if you change your mind. But it’s ‘no-fair’, not to tell.”

I could swear he held his breath for a minute, like a pearl diver about to leap off a cliff and plunge to great depths below, into a churning sea where most mortal men dared not go.

“We-e-ell,” he said uneasily.

“Jeremy,
What-is-it?
” I almost whispered.

And that was when he confessed about the Big Splurge, the Toy, as he called it.

“A yacht,” he mumbled. “And if you laugh, I’ll wring your neck.”

I wasn’t even sure I’d heard him correctly. “A yacht?” I asked sincerely. But Englishmen always think you’re laughing at them, even when you’re not. I don’t know what they do to kids in those boarding schools, but his ears turned bright red.

“I am not talking about some run-of-the-mill, show-offy monster tub made of stainless steel and epoxy and loaded with plasma screens and jacuzzis and strapped with jet-skis,” he said defensively. “The one I want is a classic motor yacht, built in 1926, an absolute beauty made of teak and mahogany, totally dignified, I assure you.”

“The ‘one’?” I echoed. “You mean, you have a specific yacht in mind?”

“Well, of course, my dear girl,” he said. “I am not given to idle dreams.”

“Where is it?” I asked. “Can I see it?”

“You can. And, more immediately, I can show you a picture of it. Would you like to see a picture?” he asked. I picked up a small pillow from the sofa and threw it at him.

“What do
you
think?” I shouted. He grinned, got up, went out of the room and out the front door and down into the street. Mystified, I went to the window, and watched him go to his car at the curb, open the trunk, rummage about and then return with what looked like a thick glossy magazine. When he came back into the apartment, he tossed it on the table next to me, laying it open to a dog-eared page. It was actually a fancy catalog for an upcoming auction to be held in Nice, France, for the benefit of an organization that raised money to protect the world’s oceans and marine life. The catalog had been well-thumbed, and the page he pointed to was for:
Lot #28. A “classic motor yacht.”

“Oh, Jeremy!” I breathed, examining it closely. “It really
is
gorgeous! ”

That’s all I had to say to encourage him to plunge ahead enthusiastically. “It’s 35 meters long . . .” he began.

“I can’t do meters,” I complained.

“Really, what’s so complicated about counting in tens?” Jeremy countered. “As opposed to twelves, what’s the good of that?”

“Just translate,” I ordered.

“All right, it’s—” He took out his mobile, did a calculation, and said triumphantly, “It is one hundred fourteen point eight-two-nine feet. Say 115 feet. Anyhow, its weighs 170 tons, and can do a maximum speed of 15 knots—which is about 17 miles per hour,” he translated, seeing the blank look on my face.

“And,” he went on, “it’s already been refitted with new 250hp engines. The cockpit can seat eight people comfortably, and the cabins can accommodate six guests, still leaving room for five crew members. Which is just about right, so that you still have plenty of privacy. Of course, it does need some upgrading; but the great thing about it is that it’s had the same owner for years and years, and he’s just feeling too old to keep her anymore. He’s got a berth in Nice for it, which he’s selling along with it.”

He’d been reeling off numbers and speaking so quickly that I could barely keep up, but it was plain to see that he’d harbored this passion for some time, keeping it hidden while he turned it over and over in his mind, in that eager but self-controlled way of his.

“Does it have a name?” I asked, looking closer. I read it aloud. “Oh . . .
Liesl’s Dream
.”

“We could call it anything we want,” Jeremy said absently. But looking at the catalog brought him back down to earth. “Except . . .” His voice trailed off.

“What?” I prodded.

“Well,” he said, resuming his old cautious tone, “it’s just that we haven’t a hope in hell of getting it.”

“Why not?” I asked.

“Because people get crazy at auctions, and sometimes, just to keep the other guy from getting it, they drive the price up. I don’t want to throw our money away if that happens. There’s only one thing worse than chasing a dream, and that’s coming really close, only to watch somebody else take it away from you.”

“Oh, swell!” I exclaimed. “Following that philosophy, Columbus wouldn’t have sailed the Atlantic, and Babe Ruth wouldn’t have hit a single home run, and Noah wouldn’t have built his ark ...”

“Do stick with baseball, and stay away from the nautical motifs, ” Jeremy suggested. “Anyhow, this is supposed to be something we both want, and I’m not sure I should drag you into it—”

“
I’m
sure! It’s a great idea. Come on, brace up!” I said, imitating my English mother’s pull-yourself-together scolding tone. “If you don’t take a chance on this dream of yours, I guarantee you that you will spend the rest of your life wondering what would have happened if only you’d showed up for this auction. Where are they holding this clambake, anyway?”

“At an hotel in Nice,” Jeremy said. “It’s a charity auction, which means there will be all kinds of politicians, collectors, celebrities, you name it.”

“Perfect! It’s all for a worthy cause. Are they selling other yachts? And don’t holler, I know this is the one you want,” I said hastily.

“It’s the only yacht in the auction,” Jeremy said darkly. “They’re selling a lot of other fancy stuff, none of which interests me in the least.”

Then I said the magic words. “Hey, this would be just the right way to do our ‘time off’ that you wanted. In a yacht! Travel all round the ports and islands of the Riviera. Imagine how liberating it would be for us to see the coast from a boat, just like the ancient Greeks! We could go in the summertime.”

Jeremy looked intrigued. “You could look the yacht over,” he said thoughtfully. “With your expertise on history, antiques and art, you could tell me if it’s really as good as they say it is. They allow viewing of it before the auction, by appointment, of course.”

“Fine,” I said briskly. “We’re going. Buy your ticket or do whatever you have to do, and get two, because I’m going with you to the auction. It gives us a target date for you to wrap up all your business and get us out of London.”

Well, getting The Lawyer Who Never Takes A Vacation to arrange for time off is a job for Wonder Woman. I got some unexpected help from Jeremy’s mother (she’s my Aunt Sheila, because, after Jeremy’s father died, she married Uncle Peter, Mom’s brother).

Aunt Sheila lives in a pretty, modern apartment in Chelsea, and one evening, when we stopped in to see her, Jeremy told her he’d just been accosted outside his office by a guy who tried to convince him to spend his money taking “gladiator lessons” (very expensive, and requiring one to wear a toga.) It was then that Aunt Sheila offered her advice about how to put some distance between us and the aggressive salesmen who accosted us on a daily—and nightly— basis.

“Become a moving target, darlings,” she said. “Take the
whole
summer off. You’ll always remember having had a few months of being fancy-free, while you’re young enough to really enjoy it. Don’t tell anyone where they can find you. Let the office field your calls.”

"We’re not students anymore,” Jeremy reminded her. “Taking a ’gap year.’”

He always pretends to faintly disapprove of his mum, who grew up in the music scene of the Swinging Sixties, and who nowadays still manages to look top-drawer yet bohemian, her hair and figure still pretty much as it was circa 1964. She still wears the style of moderately short, A-line dresses and pale stockings and flat shoes of that era.

“All I’m suggesting,” she said mildly, “is a gap
summer
. If you can’t spare a whole summer at this juncture of your life, more’s the pity.”

I think it was the idea that he’d reached a “juncture” which finally got Jeremy on board, as if the whole world was telling him that he’d come to an important crossroads. So, Jeremy said that if summer was our target gap time, then in the springtime months before it, he’d work like mad to clear his schedule, preparing his clients to work with Rupert, the young guy in his office who was being groomed by Jeremy anyway.