Whiteout

5:50 PM

TONI came out of the bathroom naked and walked across the hotel room to answer the phone.

From the bed, Stanley said, "My God, you look good."

She grinned at her husband. He was wearing a blue toweling bathrobe that was too small for him, and it showed his long, muscular legs. "You're not so bad yourself," she said, and she picked up the phone. It was her mother. "Happy Christmas," Toni said.

"Your old boyfriend is on the television," Mother said.

"What's he doing, singing carols in the police choir?"

"He's being interviewed by that Carl Osborne. He's telling how he caught those terrorists last Christmas."

"He caught them?" Toni was momentarily indignant, then she thought, What the hell. "Well, he needs the publicity-he's after a promotion. How's my sister?"

"She's just getting the supper ready."

Toni looked at her watch. On this Caribbean island it was a few minutes before six o'clock in the evening. For Mother, in England, it was coming up to ten o'clock at night. But meals were always late at Bella's. "What did she give you for Christmas?"

"We're going to get something in the January sales, it's cheaper."

"Did you like my present?" Toni had given Mother a cashmere cardigan in salmon pink

"Lovely, thank you, dear."

"Is Osborne okay?" Mother had taken the puppy to live with her, and he was now full-grown, a big shaggy black-and-white dog with hair that covered his eyes.

"He's behaving very well and hasn't had any accidents since yesterday."

"And the grandchildren?"

"Running around breaking their presents. I must go now, the Queen's on the telly."

"Bye, Mother. Thank you for calling."

Stanley said, "I don't suppose there's time for a bit of, you know, before dinner."

She pretended to be shocked. "We just had a bit of you know!"

"That was hours ago! But if you're tired… I realize that when a woman gets to a certain age-"

"A certain age?" She leaped onto the bed and knelt astride him. "A certain age?" She picked up the pillow and beat him with it.

He laughed helplessly and begged for mercy, and she relented and kissed him.

She had expected Stanley to be fairly good in bed, but it had come as a surprise to her that he was such a pistol. She would never forget their first holiday together. In a suite at the Ritz in Paris, he had blindfolded her and tied her hands to the headboard. As she lay there, naked and helpless, he had stroked her lips with a feather, then with a silver teaspoon, then with a strawberry. She had never before concentrated so intensely on her bodily sensations. He caressed her breasts with a silk handkerchief, with a cashmere scarf, and with leather gloves. She had felt as if she were floating in the sea, rocked gently by waves of pleasure. He kissed the backs of her knees, the insides of her thighs, the soft undersides of her upper arms, and her throat. He did everything slowly and lingeringly, until she was bursting with desire. He touched her nipples with ice cubes, and put warm oil inside her. He carried on until she begged him to enter her, then he made her wait a little longer. Afterward, she had said, "I didn't know this, but all my life I've wanted a man to do that."

"I know," he had said.

Now he was in a playful mood. "Come on, just a quickie," he said. "I'll let you be on top."

"Oh, all right." She sighed, pretending to feel put-upon, as she adjusted her position over him. "The things a girl has to do, nowadays-"

There was a knock at the door.

Stanley called out: "Who is it?"

"Olga. Toni was going to lend me a necklace."

Toni could see that Stanley was about to tell his daughter to go away, but she put a hand on his mouth. "Just a minute, Olga," she called.

She detached herself from Stanley. Olga and Miranda were coping well with having a stepmother their own age, but Toni did not want to push her luck. Best if they were not reminded that their father was having hot sex.

Stanley got off the bed and went into the bathroom. Toni pulled on a green silk robe and opened the door. Olga strode in, dressed for dinner in a black cotton dress with a low neckline. "You said you'd lend me that jet necklace."

"Of course. Let me dig it out."

In the bathroom, the shower ran.

Olga lowered her voice, an unusual event. "I wanted to ask you-has he seen Kit?"

"Yes. He visited the prison the day before we flew out here."

"How is my brother?"

"Uncomfortable, frustrated, and bored, as you would expect, but he hasn't been beaten up or raped, and he isn't using heroin." Toni found the necklace and put it around Olga's neck. "It looks better on you than me-black really isn't my color. Why don't you ask your father directly about Kit?"

"He's so happy, I don't want to spoil his mood. You don't mind, do you?"

"Not in the least." On the contrary, Toni was flattered. Olga was using her the way a daughter would use a mother, to check on her father without bothering him with the kind of questions men did not like. Toni said, "Did you realize that Elton and Hamish are in the same jail?"

"No-how awful!"

"Not really. Kit's helping Elton learn to read."

"Elton can't read?"

"Barely. He knows a few words from road signs-motorway, London, town center, airport. Kit is teaching him 'The cat sat on the mat.'"

"My God, how things work out. Did you hear about Daisy?"

"No."

"She killed another inmate of the women's prison, and she was tried for murder. A young colleague of mine defended her, but she was convicted. She got a life sentence added to her existing term. She'll be in jail until she's seventy. I wish we still had the death penalty."

Toni understood Olga's hatred. Hugo had never completely recovered from the beating Daisy had given him with the blackjack. He had lost the sight in one eye. Worse, he had never regained his old ebullience. He was quieter, and less of a rake, but he was not so funny, and the wicked grin was rarely seen.

"A pity her father is still at large," Toni said. Harry Mac had been prosecuted as an accomplice, but Kit's testimony had not been enough to convict him, and the jury had found him not guilty. He had gone straight back to his life of crime.

Olga said, "There's news of him, too. He's got cancer. Started in his lungs, but now it's everywhere. He's been given three months to live."

"Well, well," said Toni. "There is justice, after all."

MIRANDA put out Ned's clothes for the evening, black linen trousers and a check shirt. He did not expect her to do it but, if she did not, he might absentmindedly go down to dinner in shorts and a T-shirt. He was not helpless, just careless. She had accepted that.

She had accepted a lot about him. She understood that he would never be quick to enter a conflict, even to protect her; but, to compensate for that, she knew that in a real crisis he was a rock. The way he had taken punch after punch from Daisy to protect Tom proved that.

She was dressed already, in a pink cotton frock with a pleated skirt. It made her look a bit wide across the hips, but then, she was a bit wide across the hips. Ned said he liked her that way.

She went into the bathroom. He was sitting in the tub, reading a biography of Moliere in French. She took the book from him. "The butler did it."

"Now you've spoiled the suspense." He stood up.

She handed him a towel. "I'm going to check on the kids." Before she left the room, she took a small package from her bedside table and tucked it into her evening bag.

The hotel rooms were individual huts along a beach. A warm breeze stroked Miranda's bare arms as she walked to the cabin her son Tom was sharing with Craig.

Craig was putting gel in his hair while Tom tied his shoelaces. "Are you boys okay?" Miranda asked. The question was superfluous. They were both tanned and happy after a day spent windsurfing and waterskiing.

Tom was not really a little boy anymore. He had grown two inches in the last six months, and he had stopped telling his mother everything. It made her sad. For twelve years she had been all in all to him. He would continue to be dependent on her for a few more years, but the separation was beginning.

She left the boys and went to the next hut. Sophie was sharing it with Caroline, but Caroline had already left and Sophie was alone. She stood at her wardrobe in her underwear, choosing a dress. Miranda saw with disapproval that she was wearing a sexy black half-bra and matching thong panties. "Has your mother seen that outfit?" Miranda said.

"She lets me wear what I like," Sophie said sulkily.

Miranda sat on a chair. "Come here, I want to talk to you."

Reluctantly, Sophie sat on the bed. She crossed her legs and looked away.

"I'd really prefer your mother to say this but, as she's not here, I'll have to."

"Say what?"

"I think you're too young to have sexual intercourse. You're fifteen. Craig is only sixteen."

"He's nearly seventeen."

"Nevertheless, what you're doing is actually illegal."

"Not in this country."

Miranda had forgotten they were not in the UK. "Well, anyway, you're too young."

Sophie made a disgusted face and rolled up her eyes. "Oh, God."

"I knew you'd be ungracious, but it had to be said," Miranda persisted.

"Well, now you've said it," Sophie rejoined rudely.

"However, I also know that I can't force you to do what I say."

Sophie looked surprised. She had not been expecting concessions.

Miranda took the package out of her evening bag. "So, if you decide to disobey me, I want you to use these condoms." She handed them over.

Sophie took them wordlessly. Her face was a picture of astonishment.

Miranda stood up. "I don't want you getting pregnant when you're in my care." She went to the door.

As she went out, she heard Sophie say, "Thanks."

GRANDPA had reserved a private room in the hotel restaurant for the ten members of the Oxenford family. A waiter went around pouring champagne. Sophie was late. They waited a while for her, then Grandpa stood up, and they all went quiet. "There's steak for dinner," he said. "I ordered a turkey, but apparently it escaped."

They all laughed.

He went on in a more somber tone. "We didn't really have a Christmas last year, so I thought this one should be special."

Miranda said, "And thank you for bringing us, Daddy."

“The last twelve months have been the worst year of my life, and the best," he went on. "None of us will ever completely get over what happened at Steepfall one year ago today."

Craig looked at his father. He certainly would never recover. One eye was permanently half-closed, and the expression on his face was amiably blank. He often seemed just to tune out, nowadays.

Grandpa went on, "Had it not been for Toni, God alone knows how it would have ended."

Craig glanced at Toni. She looked terrific, wearing a chestnut-brown silk dress that showed off her red hair. Grandpa was nuts about her. He must feel almost the same way I do about Sophie, Craig thought.

"Then we had to relive the nightmare twice more," Grandpa said. "First with the police. By the way, Olga, why do they take statements that way? They ask you questions, and take down your answers; then they write out something that isn't what you said, and is full of mistakes, and doesn't sound like a human being at all, and they call it your statement."

Olga said, "The prosecution likes things phrased a certain way."

"'I was proceeding in a westerly direction,' and so on?" Yes.

Grandpa shrugged. "Well, then we had to live it all over again during the trial, and we had to sit and listen to suggestions that somehow we were at fault for injuring people who had come into our house and attacked us and tied us up. Then we had to read the same stupid innuendoes in the newspapers."

Craig would never forget it. Daisy's advocate had tried to say that Craig had attempted to murder her, because he had run over her while she was shooting at him. It was ludicrous, but for a few moments in court it had sounded almost plausible.

Grandpa went on: "The whole nightmare reminded me that life is short, and I realized that I should tell you all how I felt about Toni and waste no more time. I need hardly say how happy we are. Then my new drug was passed for testing on humans, the future of the company was secured, and I was able to buy another Ferrari-and driving lessons for Craig."

They laughed, and Craig flushed. He had never told anyone about the first time he had dented the car. Only Sophie knew. He was still embarrassed and guilty about it. He thought he might confess when he was really old, like thirty or something.

"Enough of the past," said Grandpa. "Let's drink a toast. Merry Christmas, everybody."

They all said, "Merry Christmas."

Sophie came in as the first course was being served. She looked wonderful. She had put her hair up and wore small dangling earrings. She looked so mature, at least twenty. Craig's mouth went dry at the thought that she was his girl.

As she passed his chair, she stooped and whispered in his ear, "Miranda gave me some condoms."

He was so surprised that he spilled his champagne. "What?"

"You heard," she said, and she took her seat.

He smiled at her. He had his own supply, of course. Funny old Aunt Miranda.

Grandpa said, "What are you grinning at, Craig?"

"Just happy, Grandpa," he said. "That's all."