An Immoral Code (13 page)

Certainly, after his first glass of wine he was. ‘There’s much truth in that “hair of the dog” thing,’ he remarked to Leo, as they sat at a snug table in the rear of the little Italian restaurant.

‘You mean you’re using this quite excellent Chambertin merely as a means of topping up your alcohol level? I wouldn’t have ordered it, if I’d known.’

‘Oh, it’s by no means unappreciated, I assure you,’ replied Anthony. ‘I don’t think I’d better have too much more, though. I think I’ll order some fizzy water as well. You want some?’

‘No, thanks,’ said Leo. He had finished his
osso buco
and now leant back, looking at Anthony. ‘So, what were you up to last night?’

‘Don’t ask,’ sighed Anthony. ‘I went to Grand Night at Middle and, for some reason which I can’t now fathom, got completely slaughtered.’ This wasn’t true, he reflected. He could fathom the reason only too well. He just hadn’t had the time or the inclination since last night to address the matter of Sarah. She was a pretty poor reason to get drunk, he decided. That was all over now, in any event. He certainly wouldn’t be seeing her again. He glanced up and met Leo’s eye. Leo was looking at him speculatively, half-smiling.

‘Was that why you were looking so sheep-faced when you were talking to Camilla this morning?’ he hazarded.

‘God, you don’t miss a trick, do you?’ said Anthony. He put his knife and fork together. The food here was excellent, and had cheered him up considerably, but he couldn’t finish it. He signalled to the waiter and asked for some mineral water.

‘I have known you for some years,’ Leo reminded him. ‘And that charming face of yours still gives a lot away.’ There was a pause as Leo lit one of his cigars. His words brought back to Anthony the extraordinary intimacy of the first few months of their relationship. It seemed long ago and far away now, but little remarks like that still reverberated. Leo looked up from
his cigar. ‘So, may one know what indiscretion you perpetrated with Miss Lawrence while in your cups?’

Anthony groaned. ‘No. It was all a horrible mistake. I can’t bear to talk about it.’

Leo nodded. ‘I wouldn’t have thought she was quite your style,’ he remarked, then added, ‘Do you want anything else, or just coffee?’

‘Just coffee, thanks,’ said Anthony. He stared blankly at the tablecloth. ‘No, she’s not, as a matter of fact. Well … she’s a very pleasant girl. I mean, she’s quite good fun to be with, and so forth.’ He suddenly thought of Sarah, and decided it might do him good to confide in Leo. He poured himself a glass of water, sipped it, and sighed. Leo sat regarding him, smoking, waiting. He could always tell when Anthony was about to tell him something. ‘There’s this girl I’ve been seeing,’ said Anthony. ‘Sarah. She’s a student at Bar School. I’ve been going out with her for a few weeks now.’ Leo suddenly remembered the blonde girl whom he had seen that night with Anthony, how she had seemed familiar, and a little chilly shaft of fear struck him.

‘Sarah?’ he said, his expression entirely unconcerned.

Anthony glanced up. ‘Yes. Sarah Colman. Do you know her?’

Leo blew out some smoke, tapped the ash from the edge of his cigar. ‘Now that you mention her surname – yes, I do. Vivian Colman’s daughter, isn’t she? I met her at some party of Sir Basil’s last Christmas. Remember her quite well. Very pretty.’ He hoped that his voice sounded as nonchalant as he endeavoured to make it. He had no intention of revealing to Anthony that Sarah had once shared his house and his bed for a whole summer, along with a most attractive, but – as it had turned out – dangerous young male friend of hers. That had been quite a summer. But, he thought regretfully, all that kind of thing was well in the past. The fact of Rachel had seen to
that. He was not happy to hear that Anthony had fallen into the company of that particular young woman, however. He had a protective instinct where Anthony was concerned, and knew exactly what Sarah was capable of. Anthony might think himself grown up, worldly, but where the likes of Sarah were concerned, he was a mere babe.

‘Anyway,’ went on Anthony, ‘I found out last night that she’s been seeing someone else as well. Not a big deal, you might suppose—’

‘You mean, she’s been sleeping with someone else, as well?’ interrupted Leo.

Anthony shrugged, vaguely embarrassed. ‘That’s what it amounts to. And letting all her friends know that she’s been two-timing me.’ How absurd that expression sounded, he thought, as he said it. It had an awkward, adolescent quality, but there was no other way of putting it. ‘Some of them were in the mess next to ours at Middle last night – I’d taken up a spare ticket that Camilla had, you see – and they began to talk about it.’ Anthony paused and had another drink of water.

‘Rather poor taste,’ remarked Leo. The waiter set their coffee in front of them.

‘Oh, they had no idea who I was,’ said Anthony. ‘Camilla knew them, though. She and Sarah seem to be part of the same crowd. Apparently they were at Oxford together.’

Leo considered this, faintly surprised. From the little he had had to do with Camilla in chambers, she seemed to be a pleasant, frumpy girl, very sharp but rather eager to please, and certainly not Sarah’s type at all. He drank a little of his wine and idly stirred sugar into his coffee. ‘What happened after that?’

‘Oh, I was … I was pretty hacked off, frankly. I mean, it doesn’t do one’s ego a lot of good … Anyway, I suppose I drank a bit too much, as one does.’

‘As one does,’ agreed Leo.

‘And afterwards I recall behaving rather badly with our Miss Lawrence.’ He sighed and raised his eyebrows, staring at his untouched coffee. ‘Actually,’ he added, ‘she looked extremely nice last night. She’d made quite an effort.’ Leo smiled faintly at the unconscious condescension of the younger man’s remark. ‘I think it was just my baser instincts coming to the surface.’ He gave a brief, rueful laugh. ‘But she’s not the type to take it too well. You know.’

‘Hmm. Given that she is wildly infatuated with you – or so chambers gossip goes – it probably wasn’t a very good move on your part.’

‘God knows, it wasn’t exactly calculated!’ Anthony drank some of his coffee. It was hot and pleasantly bitter, and he immediately felt better for it. ‘So, naturally, I felt a bit of a fool this morning, and I also have to face the unpleasant fact that Sarah is not what I thought she was.’

‘And what did you think she was?’ asked Leo musingly, intrigued to know just which one of her many guises she had assumed in the seduction of poor Anthony.

‘Well, I was beginning to wonder, actually. It was never going to go the distance, I knew that. We’re too different.’

Leo saw his opportunity and seized it. There was potential danger to himself in Anthony’s relationship with Sarah. She knew far too much about him for comfort, and if he could help to put any distance between Anthony and that young woman, he meant to do it. ‘I’d get rid of her,’ he said decisively, stubbing out the remains of his cigar, and lifting his gaze to meet Anthony’s.

Anthony nodded. ‘Oh, you’re right. I’ve no intention of seeing her again.’ Leo felt an instant relief. It was bad enough that Sarah was now part of their world, that next year she would become a barrister, and a constant, living threat to his peace of mind. On the other hand, he knew quite a few things
about her, too, which she might not wish to be made public. ‘I just sometimes wish,’ Anthony went on, ‘that I could see things coming. That I didn’t keep on doing these appallingly stupid things. Like last night.’

‘Oh, put it out of your mind,’ said Leo easily, signalling to the waiter for the bill. ‘It’s probably all for the good. If it’s put Miss Lawrence off you, that is. Your pride may suffer, but these chambers infatuations aren’t good for the atmosphere, you know.’ He suddenly recalled his own infatuation with Anthony years before, and smiled. What he had just said was perfectly true. ‘Come on,’ he added, ‘finish that coffee and we’ll get back to chambers. Time to start settling a few pleadings, I think.’

When the phone rang in his flat that evening and Anthony picked it up, his heart sank at the sound of Sarah’s voice. He had not yet worked out quite how he was going to end things between them – he had half-hoped she might simply not call him again, and the whole thing would fade away, though he knew that was unrealistic – and had no idea what to say to her now.

‘Hi,’ she said, her voice cheerful, languid. ‘I wondered what you were up to this evening. Whether you wanted some company.’

‘Ah – no, I don’t think so, thanks.’ He hesitated. ‘Actually, we won our time-bar point, so we’ve got the full hearing coming up in a couple of months’ time. There’s quite a lot of work we have to do before then.’ It sounded lame, he knew.

‘Hmm. You and your precious Leo.’ When she said this, Anthony immediately remembered what Leo had said at lunchtime, that he knew Sarah, had met her at Sir Basil’s.

‘By the way,’ he said suddenly, ‘why didn’t you tell me that you knew Leo?’

There was a pause, and then Sarah, her voice sharpening
slightly, replied, ‘I didn’t know I did.’ She rose from the armchair in which she’d been sitting and paced across the room, holding the telephone, waiting. What the hell had Leo told Anthony? She felt her heartbeat quicken.

‘Apparently you met him at a party given by our head of chambers last Christmas.’ Anthony wondered why he was bothering with this. It was quite irrelevant to what he really had to say.

Sarah gave an artificial yawn. ‘Oh, did I? I went to so many parties and met so many people, I honestly don’t remember.’ She wondered whether Anthony believed this, or whether he appreciated how unlikely it was that any woman should forget meeting the charismatic and attractive Leo Davies.

But Anthony was too concerned with other matters to give it much thought. ‘Anyway, as I say, I’m probably going to be busy with this case most evenings—’

She switched her attention to the evasive, faintly pompous tone in Anthony’s voice. ‘What on earth’s up?’ she demanded. ‘You don’t exactly sound very friendly. What have I done?’ Had Leo told Anthony more than he was letting on?

‘Look—’ Anthony paused, trying to think how to put it. Sarah waited, tense. At last he said, ‘I found out – and you needn’t ask how – that you’re seeing someone else. Someone called Ferguson. And, frankly, I don’t like being messed about with. Or talked about. So I think we’d better call it a day.’

She felt a lurch of fear and anger. She had never intended to let him find out. Who on earth had told him? No matter – he knew now, and he was giving her the push. The realisation appalled her. No – if a relationship was to end, she was the one who ended it. Nobody dumped her. Not Sarah Colman. Her mind veered quickly between the various tactics which she could adopt, and she opted for dismissive nonchalance. She laughed. ‘Oh, come on! Who’s been spinning you lines? I
haven’t been seeing anyone else. Rollo Ferguson is just a chum, there’s nothing going on.’

Anthony sighed. He had learnt enough about her to guess when and why she might be lying, and although he knew she might be telling the truth, he chose not to believe her. It was simpler, in the long run. This thing was going nowhere, anyway, and this was as good an excuse to end it as any. And when he cast his mind back to what those people had said last night, there was little doubt that it was true.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘Whatever you say makes no difference. I think it’s about time we called it a day.’

His tone was so colourless, so final, that Sarah knew better than to put up any more resistance. The last thing she was going to do was abase herself. But she was as human as anyone else, for all her petty deceits and hard little ways, and she felt a pang at the thought of losing Anthony, whom she genuinely liked. He was amusing, good-looking, and he spent more money on her than Rollo Ferguson ever did. But this brief sense of loss was swiftly eclipsed by the anger she felt at his rejection of her.

‘Fine,’ she said simply, coldly. ‘I’ll see you around.’

Anthony heard the click as the line went dead, and stood holding the receiver for a few seconds before replacing it. He recalled with regret the pleasant, languorous hours of their lovemaking. That was at an end, now. But it was probably all he would ever remember about the relationship. He was, he realised, relieved at the thought that he wouldn’t have to have any more to do with her.

But for Sarah, as she sat staring fixedly at the blackness of the night beyond the window, it was not so simple. He had made her feel humiliated, had done something no one else had ever done, not even Leo, and she certainly had no intention of letting it pass, just like that. Not until she had exacted a little revenge.

‘Congratulations.’

Fred Fenton looked up and saw Rachel standing smiling in the doorway of his room. The frown of concentration on his face cleared and he sat back, pushing away the papers in front of him.

‘Thanks.’ He grinned at her, thinking how immaculate she looked in her grey suit and pink silk blouse. Always beautiful, always unruffled. ‘Actually, your husband did most of the work.’

She raised her eyebrows, coming into the room and sitting down in the chair opposite Fred’s desk. ‘He certainly spends enough time working late in chambers, or locked away in his study.’ There was a pause, in which she looked away awkwardly. The things one said … She supposed everyone thought that her home life must be bliss, the happy couple in their first year of marriage, with their baby son, their carefree existence. She smiled at Fred. ‘Anyway, why don’t you let me take you out for a drink and a sandwich at lunchtime to celebrate? I feel like a break from these boring Japanese.’

‘Great,’ said Fred. ‘Actually, I’ve got more than just one thing
to celebrate.’ He hesitated momentarily. ‘I might as well tell you … everyone will know sooner or later, when it’s official.’

‘What – you’re not getting engaged at long last, are you?’

Fred laughed and shook his head. ‘No, though this might help in that direction. Actually, they’ve made me a partner.’

‘Fred, that’s great! Well done!’ Rachel was genuinely pleased for Fred. He was not a spectacular lawyer, but he was a grafter, and clients liked his unassuming manner, his quiet efficiency.

‘Not equity, mind – just salaried.’

‘Same as me,’ said Rachel. ‘Hmm. Maybe they’ll give us a slice of their profits one day, if they think we deserve it.’

‘One can dream. But I’m happy enough with this. I was beginning to wonder, slogging away for this lot, whether it was ever going to happen. Frankly’ – Fred glanced in the direction of the open door and lowered his voice slightly – ‘the difference between the forty-five thousand I was earning, and the sixty-five I’ll be getting at the end of the month is pretty crucial. Linda wants us to sell the flat and put down a mortgage on a house.’

Rachel tried not to show her surprise. ‘Sixty-five – that’s what they’re paying you?’

‘Yup.’ From the look on Rachel’s face, Fred knew instantly that he had made a mistake in mentioning the money, that they had strayed into that landmine territory of salaries. The way she’d asked the question meant that Rachel must be earning less than they were offering him. Yet she’d been made a partner when she joined the firm, a whole year ago. Still, he told himself, watching her with faint embarrassment as she digested this information, what did Rachel have to worry about? Leo must be making a complete fortune. Fred knew only too well how much he was getting for the Capstall case, with his daily refresher on top. Nichols & Co probably realised that blokes needed to be paid more. And Rachel would no doubt be swanning off in another few months to have another baby. Still, it might be
better if he didn’t mention that he was getting a car as well. After a pause of several seconds he said, ‘Anyway, since I’ve got two causes for celebration, I’ll be buying at lunchtime. Do you want to make it just us two, or shall I see if Murray’s free?’

Rachel had originally intended that she and Fred would lunch alone – Fred was easy-going, amusing, and she needed the lift to her spirits which he always gave her – but in the light of what he’d just told her, it might be awkward. ‘No, ask Murray, by all means.’ She glanced down at her hands, then looked up again and smiled. ‘I’d better let you get on.’

‘Sure. See you about one.’

She closed Fred’s door behind her and walked slowly back to her own room. She knew that if it hadn’t been for the fact that she and Fred were good friends, she’d never have found out. Naturally Rothwell and the rest of them never intended that she should know – know that they put her value below Fred’s, and probably any other male partner. What was eight thousand, anyway? She’d been happy to earn fifty-seven thousand a year. It was a good salary, and since she had married Leo she hardly thought about money, anyway. Until recently.

She sat down at her desk, clasping her hands together and resting her chin on them. That had been the whole point of coming back to work. To regain her independence. After all, the day might come when she and Oliver were on their own. The very acknowledgement of such a possibility caused her to bury her face in her hands. Just a year ago, such a notion had been the furthest thing from her mind, and now the pain that it evinced was almost physical. When she had married Leo, she had been very happy. She had meant it all. She loved him, they were going to be together for the rest of their lives. But their lives, in just a few short months, were already far apart. Reality – both present and possible – had to be faced. The day might come when maximising her earnings was crucial to
herself and Oliver. Learning that Fred was to be paid more than her had momentarily shaken her confidence, but she had to be hard-headed about this. She had returned to work to regain a life of her own and she wasn’t bloody well going to be sidelined by Rothwell and the rest of those chauvinists. In fact, while she was thinking about it, what was the point in merely demanding to be put on a par with Fred? She had been made a partner a year ahead of him. She was worth a few thousand extra on that basis alone. Rachel lifted the phone and made the brief internal call, asking Mr Rothwell if he could find fifteen minutes for her at the end of the afternoon, as there was a personal matter which she wished to discuss with him.

‘No,’ said Leo. ‘Let’s do this with a bit of style. Take a set of private rooms in Upper Brook Street. Much better than your offices. After all, it is Christmas in a couple of weeks. I know an excellent firm of private caterers who can lay on something simple, guarantee us some decent wine.’

Murray raised his eyebrows. Did Leo think Nichols & Co were made of money? Oh, well, in the interests of servicing the clients, he supposed they might as well do it properly. The idea of a drinks party here in the office was a bit basic. He sighed. ‘I suppose you’re right. There’ll be more than just the committee coming, anyway, so we’ll need some space.’

‘Good. I don’t know about your diary, but Friday looks good for Anthony and myself. Have a word with Basher and see what he and the rest of them think.’

When he had put down the phone, Leo swivelled in his chair and gazed out of the window. It was late afternoon and already growing dark. Lamps glimmered throughout the Temple and a chilly winter haze had descended over the river and the Embankment. He gazed at the shirtsleeved figures moving about in the brightly lit rooms of the chambers opposite and
deliberated whether or not to seek out Michael and go for a drink. No, he should really go home. He had spent too many evenings working late, using this case as an excuse. It wasn’t fair to Rachel. But then, nothing was fair to Rachel. He had very little idea, these days, of what she felt about anything. After he had told her about Francis, he had expected – had half-hoped for – some confrontation, some decisive change in their ill-matched lives. But none had come. Perhaps, when he had told her that the affair with Francis was over, she had assumed that things would get better. No – she couldn’t possibly believe that. The manner in which they behaved to one another, the uneasy small talk and the refuge they sought in domestic trivia, was such a sham. The deadness of their condition together was constant, unacknowledged. But there was Oliver, too. Sometimes the thought of Oliver – Oliver damp and clover-smelling from sleep, small and aggressively alive, darting his looks and smiles at the world – touched him more deeply than anything else he had ever known. But he was baffled by the fact of his son, uncertain what to do for him, about him. He could not see a future in which he and Rachel brought the boy up together, but he could not imagine being without him. Did the way he felt have something to do with the absence of his own father throughout his life? He supposed it must, inevitably.

Leo sighed and turned back round to his desk. Whatever might happen to the three of them was, he felt, beyond his control. They would just have to see how matters developed. Much depended on Rachel, he realised, and on what she decided to do. He himself felt inert. It was just a question of waiting for Rachel to do something.

James Rothwell sat behind the safety of his large desk and eyed Rachel uneasily. He was a tall, well-built man in his late fifties, one of those lawyers who owed more to circumstance and a
run of successful cases early in his career than to any special talent. He had become senior partner of Nichols & Co by default rather than particular ability, and had been careful, over the last ten years, to surround himself with a group of young, aggressive partners, members of the new breed of solicitor, more ruthless and greedy than he himself had ever been. They were the strength of Nichols & Co. Not that he was lazy or cowardly, but he preferred to leave the hard-nosed business to them. He had become a solicitor in those not-so-distant days when women were a rarity in the City and, despite the fact that women presently accounted for more than half of the new recruits in the ranks of solicitors, he still tended to regard them as lightweight, unlikely to go the distance. He had been happy, when Rachel Dean had joined the firm over a year ago, to make her a salaried partner. All the other firms in the City had plenty of them. She was extremely good at her job, too. But he had no long-term expectations of her. She was far too beautiful, if rather reserved, to stay single for long, and he hadn’t been in the least surprised when she had married and left to have a baby. What
had
surprised him was the fact that she had come back. Why any woman with a husband who earned as much as Leo Davies did should want to graft away from nine to five when she could be at home lunching and playing tennis with other well-heeled wives was quite beyond him. Still, there she was, sitting on the edge of her chair with a set, formal look on her face which told him that some sort of confrontation was coming. He felt unhappy at the prospect. James Rothwell wanted nothing more than an easy life, really.

‘So, here we are, then. Now, what was it you wanted to talk about?’ he asked, smiling and settling back in his seat, trying to look avuncular.

Rachel did not smile back, but merely glanced down at her hands, which were folded in her lap, and then looked up at him
again. ‘I wanted to know why there is apparently a disparity between my salary and that of someone like Fred Fenton,’ she said. ‘I want to know why, as a partner, he is to be paid more than I am.’ Then she did smile, briefly, enquiringly.

Mr Rothwell took a slow breath and swivelled his chair rapidly from side to side. ‘I – ah – I thought you understood, Rachel, that it is not the firm’s policy for members of staff to discuss salaries.’ He knew this was a poor stalling tactic, but could think of nothing else to say immediately.

Rachel gave another small, dismissive smile. ‘That’s really neither here nor there. The point is, why should I be paid less than Fred?’

Mr Rothwell took another breath and was about to speak when the door opened and John Parr looked in. Mr Rothwell glanced up at him with relief. If there was anyone who could handle this kind of thing, it was John.

Mr Rothwell smiled and motioned him in. ‘John, do come in. I think perhaps you can help here.’

Rachel glanced up at John Parr. He was a thin, humourless man in his mid forties, the least liked of the partners, with a tenacious, unbending character which gave him a reputation amongst other solicitors as a formidable negotiator. Rachel didn’t welcome his involvement in the discussion.

As John Parr paced slowly across the room, glancing enquiringly at Rachel and then at his senior partner, Mr Rothwell went on, ‘Rachel has come to me with a query regarding the disparity in her salary with that of Fred Fenton’s.’ He clearly expected John Parr to take over, and was not disappointed. Parr rested himself easily against the windowsill and folded his arms.

‘I don’t quite see what the issue is,’ he lied, frowning in mild puzzlement.

‘The issue is,’ said Rachel, feeling her heartbeat quicken at
the new, antagonistic element which Parr’s presence brought to the discussion, ‘why you should imagine I am worth less than Fred. I have been a partner for a year now, and yet I understand that you propose to pay him eight thousand a year more than myself.’ No matter how she put it, Rachel realised, she sounded like a child complaining that she had been given fewer sweets than another. That was what John Parr’s faintly patronising look made her feel, at any rate.

‘Well, that’s quite simply explained,’ replied John Parr easily, as though he couldn’t see what the fuss was about. ‘We naturally expect more of Fred in terms of commitment and responsibility. I would have thought that was obvious.’

James Rothwell nodded at this, as though he himself would have said exactly the same thing.

Rachel glanced from one man’s face to the other. ‘Commitment and responsibility? I don’t think I quite understand. Are you suggesting that Fred somehow works harder than I do, that he gives more to the clients than I do?’ She tried hard to keep the anger from her voice.

Parr laughed and eased himself from the windowsill, pacing slowly round the room. Rachel felt at a disadvantage having to look up at him from where she sat.

‘No, of course not. We all regard your work very highly.’

‘But you don’t seem to value it in the same way,’ retorted Rachel quickly.

John Parr sighed. ‘The fact is, we expect someone like Fred to give much more than you – we expect him to make himself available in a way that we wouldn’t necessarily expect of you. To work late, to take calls in the middle of the night, to be prepared to go abroad at short notice for varying spells of time. You know the kind of thing.’

‘But I’m just as prepared as he is to do any of those things,’ protested Rachel.

‘Well, come now. We appreciate that you have certain domestic ties – we hardly expect you to do any of those things any more.’ The tone of his voice was now so overtly patronising that Rachel could hardly control her temper. She allowed it to cool for a few seconds before replying.