Primula Bond - The Diamond Ring

‘Absolutely I do.’ Gustav takes a step nearer, then pulls back as if she might burn him. But now he’s too close to the fire. ‘You are capable of murder.’

Margot falls back in her chair theatrically, fanning herself with the feather. She even glances across at me, finally catching my eye with an exaggerated expression of conspiracy, as if to say, did he really just accuse me of something so dreadful?

‘Amazing that you boys both emerged from the same womb. Pierre Levi isn’t worth the effort. I’ve dispensed with him, but that doesn’t mean I’ve killed him!’ She rests her finger thoughtfully on her chin as her eyes fix on my golden locket. ‘The last time we were face to face he was alive and well and extremely rude. You were there, too. I surprised him at his scruffy little backstreet theatre, but under cover of the music and lights he told me yet again that he couldn’t do it. He told me the deal really was off this time. He wasn’t involving Tomas or anyone else. Finito . He said he’d fallen for his brother’s girlfriend. And then he went off on a date with her.’

‘Not a date. He and Serena had a business meeting, which ended with an over-affectionate farewell. His own admission.’ Gustav allows himself a grim smile as he folds his arms. ‘I must say I never thought Pierre would have the balls to tell you to take a hike!’

‘That boy doesn’t have balls, Gustav. Not like you. He’s weak, and he’s bitter. That delicious spunk of his has all dribbled away. You know how I like my lovers. Obsessed. Besotted. Enslaved. Not half-cocked or lusting after someone else. I mean, how insulting is that!’ She snaps her eyes back to Gustav. ‘Oh, for God’s sake. He’s gone. OK? My information is that he’s slunk off to LA.’

‘Now he can leave us in peace!’

It’s out before I can stop it. I clasp the back of the velvet sofa blocking my way into the over-furnished room. Gustav’s black eyebrows draw together as if he’s forgotten I’m there. He turns at last to stare at me.

‘Bravo! Spoken like a woman with a very guilty conscience!’ Margot’s catlike eyes and mouth tilt up in a triumphant smile which seems to stretch her skin until it looks too tight.

And there’s something different about her face. I’ve committed that face to memory, God knows, with and without such heavy make-up, but even allowing for the passage of time, something structural has changed.

‘He hasn’t slunk anywhere. He’s in LA for work.’ Gustav clears his throat, but he still sounds as if he’s chewing on pebbles. ‘He hasn’t sent the feather. He’s done nothing wrong. So he’s probably just delighted to have escaped from you.’

‘He’s done plenty wrong, Gusty.’ Still smiling, Margot starts to count off on her fingers. ‘Ask your precious jailbait.’

I stare at those bony older-woman’s fingers. The same fingers I saw at the burlesque theatre when I was filming the finale. Margot was reaching out of the wings to grab Pierre. I remember now that he didn’t looked pleased or even surprised to see her. Just hypnotised as they sketched a tango before the lights snapped out again.

But if he was terminating their arrangement as they danced, then something he said to me later that evening doesn’t ring true.

If Margot was here, I’d take her right now in front of you. I mean it. And she’d go with it. She doesn’t care where, when, who, what.

Margot’s voice punctures my thoughts. ‘The idea was to isolate your little plaything by drip-feeding terrible things about your past, dangle juicy young Tomas in front of her, whatever, all the while staying squeaky clean himself, but instead Pierre ripped up the agenda.’

‘Agenda? You make it sound like a committee planning world domination.’

‘There’s no other way of achieving your goal. You know that. But a plan is only as good as its execution and its fulfilment. Pierre lost his head. No amount of brotherly love was going to stop him from having a crack at this girl once the opportunity arose. And voilà ! The two of you unexpectedly part, she storms off to Venice, he loses all loyalty except to his loins, and he goes in for the kill. All his own idea. And to be fair, even though I had no active part in it, his scheming in Venice nearly succeeded in toppling Saint Serena off her perch after all. Except the spineless little shit didn’t follow through.’ She stops, clamps her bright-red lips shut and closes her eyes as if in pain. ‘If you need a job doing well, just finish it off yourself. Which is why I am here.’

Gustav walks over to the fireplace and runs his finger along the mantelpiece, empty save for the horrible little vase and a trio of oversized black glass candlesticks. His hand is shaking. His black hair falls over his face as he stares into the fake flames for a moment.

‘Just so I don’t have to stay in this room a moment longer than necessary, let’s get this clear. You are saying this rapprochement with Pierre started off as a ruse? He came to find me in London, pretended to end our estrangement, purely on your instructions?’

Margot’s eyes snap open. Even her false eyelashes seem to radiate gleeful evil.

‘He’s changed a lot in the last six years, Gustav. A consummate performer! All that time he spends hanging round in theatres has paid off, fondling those petticoats, trying on those masks, watching how others make a profession out of lying.’

‘Not to me. He hasn’t been lying to me.’

‘ Especially to you! If he was in this room with us now he’d be lying to save his sorry scorched skin.’ Margot lifts her chin in the air and presses her hand to her breast to imitate a pretentious actor. ‘He’s weak, like all of you. He couldn’t keep it up in the end. Either the act, or his cock.’

Gustav stares up at the ceiling, his mouth drawn tight. I follow his gaze. The ceiling has the same ornate cornicing as the lobby downstairs, but there is a large, urine-coloured stain running across it.

‘I don’t buy it. My trust in him has been right. You may have cooked up this situation, and I suppose I should thank you for that, but you’ve lost your touch. In fact, all of this has backfired. I knew it was genuine, however shaky it felt initially. Pierre and I have been building bridges. We’ve talked about things nobody else knows about. It’s meant the world to both of us. You can’t fake that.’ Gustav coughs and tries again. ‘Thanks to you, we’re closer than ever.’

‘And so will you and I be. See? What goes around comes around. It was only ever a matter of time. No one else matches up to me, and you know it!’ Margot puckers her lips ready to take a sip of red wine but pauses, waving the glass in front of her mouth. ‘Remember when we bought this dear little place? How we celebrated the purchase in front of this fire? You were my true love, taking me up the arse , as you put it in your charming English-gent way just now. Ooh, so rough and hard, just the way you always did. Just the way we liked it. I was on all fours for you, I was your dirty little bitch. Right where you’re standing!’

‘Don’t change the subject!’

Gustav clenches his jaw as I let out a stifled cry, but he can’t look at me. It’s as if by pinning her down with his glare he will find a way of shutting her up.

But she’s said enough already. It can’t be unsaid. We are all her puppets.

It’s all here, in a fragile nutshell. Their marriage. The damage Margot did when she made enemies of the two brothers. The chaos she’s caused and is still causing, whether or not Pierre has followed her lead. The ugly exchanges between the brothers, the stammered confessions, Gustav’s weary acceptance of his own guilt, his desperation to have his brother by his side again, Pierre taking matters into his own hands in Venice, his clumsy apology to me on the phone at the gallery, everyone trying to hold the fragile peace together. Even though it hasn’t gone according to her plan, it’s still blindingly clear.