Betrayals

5

I t was inevitable, of course, that Janet should compare the preparations for her wedding to John Sheridan with those for her wedding to Hank, and she was secretly uncomfortable that this time there seemed to be more excitement and anticipation. Her memories of the first relationship and the first marriage were that everything had happened gradually, almost without planning or arrangement. Her recollection was that they paired up at university without any positive decision to go together, and that it had then seemed natural but not overly dramatic to move in with Hank in Oxford and natural again when he suggested she come over to America to visit his now-dead parents, by which time the eventual marriage was an obvious and unavoidable culmination of everything. Everyone-their friends and their families-would have been shocked if it hadn’t happened, as they themselves would have been. Janet could not actually recall Hank asking her to be his wife. Without her being able to pinpoint the moment, their conversation had suddenly become about what they would do and how they would do it and where they would do it when they were married, almost as if the actual nuptial had been decided upon by other people who knew best, and all they had to do was comply.

This time was quite different.

Harriet was the first person she told-ahead of her parents-and Harriet whooped her instant agreement to be Janet’s maid of honor and immediately bustled in to take over the arrangements. Together they bought every fashion book and wedding magazine they could find, to choose the absolutely right gown for Janet and the absolutely right gown for Harriet. Still undecided about either, they extended their reading to house publications after Sheridan said he wanted to sell both their apartments and buy a house whose location and furnishing and fittings were to be entirely her choice. The day after Sheridan told her that, Janet put her name on the mailing list of every agent in Washington and the immediate suburbs. Sheridan had laid the boat up for the winter, so every weekend they scurried around Maryland and Virginia in the Volkswagen, assessing distances and convenience and prices.

Her parents foreshortened their trip to the Middle East and flew directly from Cairo to Washington to meet Sheridan. Janet was more nervous of that encounter than she had been about the meeting with Harriet, but once again, as they always seemed to be, her fears were unfounded. Sheridan’s effort was not so obvious to Janet as it had been with Harriet, but the impression upon her parents was the same, if not better.

Janet’s mother was clearly surprised and delighted that until their marriage they were maintaining separate homes, a reaction which Janet found curious, since her openly living with Hank had brought no criticism. The fact meant, of course, that her parents could stay with her, and on the night of their arrival she introduced Sheridan simply over early evening drinks, to enable the elderly couple to recover from their jet lag. The following night Sheridan took them out to the Virginia inn. When they went to the restroom, Janet’s mother said she thought he was an extremely pleasant man-which for Janet’s mother was a high accolade-and much later, after Sheridan left the Rosslyn apartment after his usual solitary brandy, her mother said she was very happy that Janet was getting together with such a nice man, and her father admitted to being impressed with Sheridan in every way. He added that Sheridan appeared extremely knowledgeable about a wide spectrum of international affairs, including the Middle East. From his career her father regarded himself as something of a Middle East specialist. Janet remarked that it was hardly surprising, considering that Sheridan was a State Department analyst, and her father said he’d met dozens of State Department personnel, including supposed analysts, whose grasp was very weak. He’d tried hard to find people who knew Sheridan at various embassy postings but there hadn’t been a single one, which the old man regretted. He told his daughter he intended asking around at the next reunion.

“They like you,” Janet reported to Sheridan, when they were by themselves.

“I like them,” Sheridan said.

“Mother’s campaigning for the wedding to be in England.”

“Why not?”

“What about your friends? Won’t it be difficult for them?”

Sheridan shrugged. “There are none close enough to worry about. And there’s no family to ferry across.”

“You’re sure?”

“Tell her it’s fine.”

“I love you,” said Janet.

“I love you,” he said.

Her parents’ visit lasted a week, and by the end Janet believed Sheridan and her father to be firm friends. Before they left they’d agreed on having the ceremony in England in March, which gave Janet and Sheridan five months to decide upon a house, dispose of their own apartments, and make the purchase.

Throughout Janet remained working at Georgetown University from which she called him most days because it was difficult for him to get her when she was in class. It was often a problem for her to reach him at the State Department, too: there was usually a connection delay. When she mentioned it to him, Sheridan agreed it was a nuisance but explained he spent more time in committee meetings, verbally analyzing situations and events, than at his desk, working on papers and reports.

“Their concentration span is limited,” he said, mockingly. “They’d rather hear opinions than be forced to read an assessment. I think it’s all the fault of television: a hundred years from now no one will be able to read.”

At Christmas, during the university break, Sheridan had time owing for a holiday. When Janet suggested it, he said he thought it would be terrific to spend the time in England with her parents. Janet wrote suggesting it and her mother was so excited that she telephoned.

“I never thought I could be like this again,” Janet said, to Harriet. “Not this happy.”

They were having an early dinner in Chinatown, so it was still only ten o’clock when Janet got back to Rosslyn.

Sheridan, who had had a key to her apartment for several months, was waiting as she entered, sitting forward on a couch, grave-faced.

Janet was stopped by his expression, remaining just inside the door. “Darling!” she said. “What is it?”

“I’ve been posted,” said Sheridan. “Overseas.”

“But…” started Janet, confused. “Where overseas?” she managed.

“Beirut,” he announced, simply.

Janet stayed where she was, her mind and body frozen into incomprehension. The images and the thoughts flustered through her head, all half-formed and refusing to become whole. Not Beirut! That was inconceivable! There’d been U.S. embassy bombings by suicide squads and the kidnapping of U.S. embassy staff and Reagan’s Irangate fiasco, and the apparently insoluble conflict between Christian and Moslem formed part of practically every lecture that she gave at the university. John Sheridan- her John Sheridan-couldn’t go there; couldn’t become involved in a situation like that! It was murderous, for God’s sake! People had been murdered! Janet shook her head, disbelieving despite having heard him say it. She said: “No… no it’s got to be a mistake.”

Sheridan stood and came to her, holding her to him. Without knowing why, Janet was rigid, almost resisting. Sheridan said: “I don’t want to go… you know that. Who would? I’ve tried to get out of it but I can’t.”

Janet pulled back from his embrace. “But you told me… a long time ago… that you weren’t going to travel any more… that you were always going to be here, in Washington…”

“I know,” he agreed. “I thought I was. They think I might be some use there.”

“NO!” she wailed, finally confronting what he was saying.

Sheridan led her into the room and sat her where he had been sitting, kneeling at her feet. “Shush now,” he said. “Now listen. There’s no way I can get out of it: like I said, I’ve tried. No way. But it won’t be for a long time. Six months; a year at most…”

Janet sat shaking her head, consciously-determinedly-refusing to absorb the words.

“It’s an unaccompanied posting, obviously. I couldn’t take you with me, even if we rushed the marriage through,” Sheridan pushed on. “But we won’t be apart all the time. We can spend our vacations together. Cyprus. Anywhere you like in the Mediterranean.”

“But we’ve made plans,” she said, in weak protest.

“It’ll only mean delaying things a few months,” assured Sheridan. “I promise. As soon as I’m reassigned-and don’t worry, the time limit is a firm commitment-we’ll get married. That’s all it means, really. Putting the wedding back a month or two.”

“That’s not all it means!” Janet argued, recovering further. “You’re going to Beirut, for Christ’s sake! Beirut! You hear the name I’m saying?”

“We keep everything there as safe as it can be now,” Sheridan tried to placate her. “No one takes any chances.”

“Bullshit!” yelled Janet. “And you know it’s bullshit. How can you be safe in a place where there’s no law, no government! Beirut is a bunch of rival gangs, everyone fighting everyone else and stealing and kidnapping and killing. It’s not religion any more: hasn’t been for a long time. It’s gang warfare: I’ve taught little else, for years, and I know!” She had to stop, breathless, but then blurted off again, extending her fingers and then collapsing them as she counted. “William Buckley, American, murdered. Peter Kilburn, American, murdered. Alec Collet, Briton, murdered.”

“I know…” he tried to stop her but she wouldn’t stop.

“… Seven slaughtered, in all,” she said. “Four Russsians, too. At least seventeen still held. Nothing’s been heard of Terry Anderson, the AP bureau chief, since 1985. Terry Waite, the Archbishop of Canterbury’s envoy, has been missing almost two years.”

“I’ve got to go,” he said, simply.

“No way of refusing!” she pleaded.

“None.”

“When?” she said, dully.

“Two weeks.”

“Two weeks!”

“Everything is being done in panic.”

“That’s not fair… not enough time…”

“It gives me an edge, to get back.”

“Why, when everything was so good!” Janet demanded, allowing herself the briefly forgotten self-pity.

“It’ll be all right,” Sheridan said. “Everything will be all right.”

They changed their vacation dates so they could spend the final week completely together, which they did at the Rosslyn apartment. They stored what furniture and effects he wanted to retain from the Columbus Circle flat and sold the rest and Sheridan assigned Janet power of attorney to act on his behalf to dispose of the property. They drove again out into Virginia and Maryland, house-hunting but it was impossible in the circumstances so they abandoned the pretence. They made love every night but anxiously, as if it might be the last time, and when he suggested a farewell dinner at their Virginia inn Janet said no, because that was a place to celebrate good times, not bad.

“There’s something we haven’t done,” Sheridan announced, the night before he was due to leave.

“What?”

“I haven’t bought you a ring,” he said.

Janet looked down at the hand where she still wore what Hank had bought her. “No,” she agreed. “It isn’t right to go on like this, is it?” As she spoke Janet realized that to remove the rings would be the final cutting off, the final parting from one to another.

They only had time to get to two shops but in the second Janet saw a sapphire surrounded by diamonds and said it was beautiful, then tried to pull back when she learned the price. Sheridan insisted on buying it and she sat for their final lunch with her hand before them, proudly displaying it.

“I love you,” said Sheridan.

“I love you, too.”

“You mustn’t worry. Everything is going to be fine,” he said. “Trust me.”

“I do,” said Janet.