in their tubs either side of the door.
As they entered the restaurant India noticed at least half a dozen famous faces and repressed a small sigh. In many ways she would far rather have eaten in the cheerful family-run Italian restaurant round the corner from her flat, but she recognised that Mel probably thought he was giving her a special treat, which was merely another pointer against their relationship, she reflected. If he really knew and understood her, he would have known that she had little liking for the trappings of success.
She studied her reflection critically for a moment in the cloakroom while she waited for the girl to take her cloak. The black velvet dress accentuated the creamy pallor of her skin, her neck rising slenderly and elegantly above the crisp lace, her eyes deeply and intensely green, almost too large for the delicacy of her face. But India saw nothing of the delicate beauty of her features; all her concentration was focused on her dress. Most of the other female diners were wearing evening dresses of one sort or another, the majority of them baring vast expanses of flesh. Was she prudish? She shrugged the thought aside, but it was not quite as easy to dismiss the memory of the manner in which Simon Herries had commented on the contrast between her clothes and the sheer silk stockings she had been wearing with them; almost as though he had been accusing her of deliberately trying to project a false image of school-girlish innocence. Drat the man! What did it matter what he and his kind thought?
They were shown to a table discreetly set aside from the majority of the others in a small alcove, but which by its very ‘apartness’ negated its intimacy by making it almost a focal point of the room.
The restaurant had not been open for very long, and had been designed to represent a Victorian conservatory, the marble-topped tables set among a profusion of indoor plants, cleverly illuminated in the evening.
With such a vast expanse of glass the restaurant could have been cold, but fortunately the owners had had the foresight to install an efficient central heating system.
‘All we need is for a parrot to come flying down out of the foliage,’ Mel commented jokingly to her as he studied the menu.
‘Either that or Tarzan,’ India agreed.
‘Don’t you like it? We could go somewhere else. This place is all the rage at the moment and I thought…’
‘It’s fine. Give me a quick nudge if you see me staring round open-mouthed—the last time I saw so many stars was on television, at a Royal Command Performance.’
‘Umm, it does seem to be patronised rather heavily by the acting profession. What do you fancy to eat?’
‘I think I’ll start with the seafood platter, and then perhaps chicken in white wine.’
Mel gave her order to the hovering waiter, adding his own. He was a very traditional male, India reflected; not a male chauvinist, but a man who genuinely believed that women were the frailer sex and needed protecting. He reminded her in many ways of her father; she felt comfortable and safe with him, or at least she had done until recently.
He waited until their food arrived and the wine had been poured before mentioning the reason for his invitation, for once his normal businesslike self-control deserting him.
‘India, you know how I feel about you,’ he blurted out without preamble. ‘Oh, I know you refuse to take me seriously, but you aren’t either a fool or insensitive, I know that. I also know how you feel about my marriage, and it’s to your credit, although there have been times when I’ve wished that you were less… old-fashioned.’
‘Old-fashioned?’ India queried lightly.
‘Moral,’ Mel submitted, ‘even though in my heart of hearts I wouldn’t have you any other way. I only wish I’d met you ten years ago, before I married Alison. Even if you were willing to have an affair with me, I don’t think I could. I don’t think I’ve got it in me to destroy that shining look of self-respect you always seem to have about you. India… If I divorced Alison would you marry me?’
She had known it was coming, but nevertheless it was a shock. Her face went white, her hand trembling as she reached for her glass. Her fingers reached for the stem, her emotion making her clumsy, and as the glass overturned she stared helplessly at the wine flowing across the table and on to the floor.
Unfortunately she had barely touched it, and while a waiter discreetly mopped up, Mel tried to reassure her that it didn’t matter.
‘It happens all the time—and you didn’t even break the glass,’ he joked. ‘Even if you had it isn’t the end of the world!’
India herself didn’t really know why she should be so distraught, unless it was because she was so rarely clumsy. Fortunately the wine had not gone on her dress, but her fingers were a little sticky, and it was as she bent down to open her handbag and find her handkerchief that she became aware of being watched. She raised her head slowly, disbelief mirrored in her eyes as she glanced across the restaurant and encountered the hard, inimical grey eyes of Simon Herries. Her heart started to thump uncomfortably, her mouth dry with a tension which owed nothing to the contretemps with the wine glass.
Melisande was with him, but as yet the actress seemed to be unaware of India’s presence, and it was as though the two of them, India and Simon Herries, were locked in some primaeval conflict, which excluded the other diners as though they simply did not exist.
‘India…’
‘Oh… I’m sorry,’ she muttered.
‘You look as though you’ve seen a ghost.’
‘I wish he was. Oh, I’m sorry,’ she apologised, seeing Mel’s worried frown. ‘It’s just Melisande’s latest man. She brought him to the salon this afternoon, and for some reason he rubbed me up the wrong way, I don’t know why.’
‘Who is he?’
‘Simon Herries—you must have heard of him. He’s always appearing in the gossip columns… Are you all right?’ she asked, noticing the sudden jerky movement he made, his face oddly pale. ‘Mel…’
‘I’m fine… It’s nothing, India,’ he began with a kind of desperation, ‘Would you… would you marry me if I divorced Alison?’
She reached across the table, touching his hand with hers, her expression compassionate.
‘I admire you, Mel; I value your friendship, and there’s no one I would rather turn to in a crisis, but…’
‘But you don’t love me,’ he supplied heavily. ‘Well, I guess I knew what the answer was going to be, but a man can’t help hoping.’
‘I wish I could love you,’ India surprised herself by saying. ‘Sometimes I wonder if I’m capable of love—the kind of love which burns so fiercely that nothing else matters.’
There was understanding and pain in Mel’s eyes as he looked at her.
‘You are, my darling,’ he told her huskily. ‘It’s just that as yet you haven’t met the right man, but never doubt yourself in that way, and never demean yourself by giving yourself to someone without it.’
It was an oblique reference to the fact that she had never had a lover, and India was a little surprised by his astuteness. It was not a subject she had ever discussed with him—or indeed anyone, and she could only
