Duel of Passion Read online

  She and Helene had eaten in the mobile canteen, in the courtyard of the rambling old boardinghouse where they'd been filming. the two of them had been alone at a table, under an umbrella to shade them from the morning sun.

  Helene had had the chicken salad, and Sophie had had a pie and chips. She'd been asking Helene for some precious advice about her role, and Helene had said something about Maisie being a crow ...

  Òf course it's a challenge for you, darling,' Helene had said. 'Maisie Wilkin is a crow, and you're a swan.'

  Ì don't feel very swanlike at this moment.'

  `You're not meant to, darling. You're meant to be a very plain, overweight, dim -witted, nasty-minded housemaid. It's a part I would have given my eye-teeth for at your age.'

  Sophie smiled. Slim, elegant, and looking ravishing in the s suit she'd worn for that morning's filming, Helene le Bon was luminously beautiful as she studied the menu.

  The mobile canteen wasn't renowed for its cuisine, which w as why some of the cast chose to eat in restaurants in Brighton. Sophie and Helene, however, always ate in the canteen—Helene because she was utterly indifferent to food, and Sophie because she was too shy about her appearance to venture far from the set these days.

  Like Helene, she was still in costume. If you could call a shabby pinafore, wrinkled stockings and a lumpy grey cardigan a costume.

  Unlike Helene, she hadn't been dressed that way by choice. The trouble with having put on thirty pounds was that almost nothing of her own fitted her any more, which meant that she was forced to wear Maisie Wilkin's clothes around the set.

  She certainly wasn't going to equip herself with a whole new size eighteen wardrobe just for the duration of The Elmtree Road Murders, because the first thing she was going to do once the last foot of film was in the can was go on a crash diet.

  A diet which didn't include a single ounce of any fat, oil or carbohydrate.

  Ì'm going to have the chicken salad,' Helene decided. She glanced at Sophie with a glint of amusement. 'You'd better have the pie and chips, Maisie. Don't want you losing your figure.'

  `Do I have to?'

  `You're starting to melt away, unless I'm much mistaken.'

  Sophie wriggled in her grimy beige pinafore. It was certainly looser on her these days.

  If she lost any more weight, Percy Schumaker, the director, would start complaining again.

  `You're right. I definitely have trouble identifying with Maisie's diet,' she smiled, sitting back in the chair.

  `W hat exactly is worrying you about your performance?'

  Ì don't really know, Helene.' She fidgeted with her ring. Even that was tight, these days. 'I just feel I'm not getting to the depths of my part. Maybe I'm simply not experienced enough an actress to cope with a role like Maisie.'

  Òh, nonsense. You're doing a marvellous job, darling. But if you feel you're not getting deep enough down into Maisie, perhaps the answer is that you're not ...' Helene le Bon frowned as she searched for the word, her slim eyebrows drawing down in a V over luminous brown eyes. '...perhaps not compassionate enough towards her.'

  The waitress brought their food, and Sophie contemplated her pie, which was swimming in gravy and surrounded by glistening chips, with distaste. Feeling eyes on her, she'd looked up, and met the gaze of a handsome blond man a few tables away.

  He was one of the extras, and she'd noticed him several times. He had the kind of rugged looks that appealed to her, and a fine, athletic figure.

  But as her eyes met his he looked away hastily, and started talking animatedly to the woman next to him

  Sophie, flushing, tackled her pie and chips with the true Maisie Wilkin spirit of grim doggedness.

  Men never used to look away from her. In fact, the looks she used to get were downright appreciative. And now...

  She brought her mind back to acting. 'Not compassionate enough?' she echoed.

  `Yes,' Helene nodded. 'I don't mean pity. That's something else. I mean understanding.

  During the scenes

  we're shooting here, it isn't that important. But once we're back in London you'll certainly have to dig a little deeper into Maisie.'

  Within a fortnight they were due to conclude the location filming here in Brighton, and take the circus back to London. The climax of The Elmtree Road Murders, the trial and the emotional courtroom scenes, would be done in the studios after the boardinghouse scenes were over.

  `The trial is the real heart of the film, you see. It's where we get to see what Patricia and Maisie are really like inside, and the deep-down reasons why they acted as they did. The focus is very much on character and motive. This is your time to shine, Sophie. Those final speeches of yours—well, I think you can see how effective they could be if you treated them right.'

  Sophie concentrated. Advice from Helene le Bon was worth rubies. 'How do you mean, treated them right?'

  `W ell, up until now your part has been all motiveless malignity,' Helene had said. 'After all, Maisie has been really rather vicious. Blackmail, betrayal, hypocrisy. The audience isn't exactly captivated with her morals.' She leaned forward. 'But in those courtroom speeches, you can give a real cri de coeur. You can make the audience feel what it's really like to be someone like Maisie Wilkin—ugly, slighted, disadvantaged, the kind of person nobody really bothers to understand until it's too late. You can leave them with a feeling of compassion, almost of wonder...'

  Helene was, by her own admission, pushing forty-five. A deeply experienced and much-loved actress, she could have been a very intimidating person for Sophie, twenty-three and in her first significant role, to play against. But Helene had taken her under her wing from the start, and Percy Schumaker was a good enough director to let Helene guide Sophie through the part without contradicting her judgements too much.

  Sophie listened in attentive silence as Helene outlined the emotional peaks and valleys of the scenes that lay ahead. Though she knew the script backwards, it always astounded Sophie how much light Helene could shed on characters other than the one she herself was playing. She had the true actress's ability to empathise with all the roles in a script, and she made Sophie feel hopelessly amateurish at times.

  She'd been listening so intently to Helene that she hadn't noticed the tall figure that had approached their table, and was now looming over them.

  That was when Kyle Hart had first appeared in her life.

  Despite the Caribbean warmth, a shiver of goose-flesh now swept across Sophie's tanned skin as the memory flooded back.

  Her eyes, which had lost their focus while she'd thought back, now flicked to the tall figure of Kyle Hart, stooping twenty yards away from her with the child.

  That moment would stay with her for a long time. The recognition that she was looking into the eyes of one of the most beautiful men she would ever meet.

  Not that she'd been conscious of the rest of his face at first. It had been Kyle's eyes that had electrified her.

  Though he hadn't been as dark in Brighton as he was now, his skin had been tanned enough to make those tawny-green eyes as cool and startling as lake-water in some sandstone desert. They had held a directness that was animal, shocking. Utterly sure of his own strength.

  For a split second, Sophie had met that heart-stopping gaze with unthinking, wide-eyed shock. Then she'd remembered what she looked like, and how he must see her, and embarrassment had washed over her in a tide that had flushed her plump cheeks crimson.

  `Kyle!' Helene had risen to give him a hug and a kiss, then had introduced him to Sophie as Kyle Hart, a financier in the City, and one of her oldest friends.

  The fact that he was smiling at them both had softened the lines of what she'd instinctively known would be a merciless face in repose, darkly virile. His self-assurance went with not having to question his own sexuality, mastery or wealth.

  Sophie had felt a keen sense of frustration. If only this magnificent male had chosen to arrive in her life a few weeks earlier, he would have met a reasonab
ly pretty woman, reasonably poised, and reasonably attractive.

  As it was, those green eyes had glittered with inner amusement at a frightful, overweight frump with greasy black hair and owlish glasses, wearing the most unflattering garments ever devised by a satanic wardrobe-mistress, and quailing into her seat with embarrassment and shame.

  Not that Kyle Hart had betrayed his contempt in any way then, or during the days that had followed.

  Kyle's relationship with Helene was warm and intimate; though she was older than he was, they were evidently good friends, sharing a lot in common. He had been in Brighton on business to do with the merchant bank for which he worked, and had dropped into the set regularly, watching the filming from the sidelines. Obviously a connoisseur of acting, he had complimented them both on their performances.

  He'd also been very kind in other ways. He'd taken them both out, twice to lunch, three times to dinner, invariably at the best restaurants in town.

  Sophie had done the best she possibly could to eradicate Maisie on those occasions, but no amount of make-up could have hidden the extra pounds, the lank black hair, and the awful clothes she'd been forced to wear. Even the heavy black glasses had had to go with her: she needed them for reading, and she'd got into the habit of twitching them on and off nervously.

  In any case, they had been finishing off the Brighton episodes, and there was no way she could have got too

  far out of Maisie's character and still kept the integrity of her performance in front of the cameras.

  And, despite all that, she'd let herself nurture those crazy delusions. Delusions that it was herself, and not Helene, that Kyle was really interested in. That it was by his wish that she went everywhere with them, rather than through Helene's kindness. That he could look under the surface of her less-than-beautiful image, and see the woman beneath.

  Not exactly experienced with men, she had found her contact with this devastatingly handsome, sophisticated, witty tiger dazzling. He had had an impact on her emotions that had bowled her over.

  What was so exciting was that it went beyond a physical attraction. They shared so much in common, it seemed. They both loved the theatre, the same kind of music, had the same views about so many things. Kyle was amused by the same odd moments that made her laugh, and they shared an off-beat sense of humour, so that they two had sometimes been helpless with laughter at things that had made Helene only smile in puzzlement.

  Kyle, in fact, had been flatteringly attentive towards Sophie, and so apparently interested in her, her views and her work that her stupid head had been utterly turned.

  Oh, the fluttering heart, the shallow breathing, the hot, mad dreams!

  Sophie's fingers clenched into tight fists, her nails digging into her palms as if to punish herself for her incredible stupidity. Had she really imagined that a man like Kyle could have been seriously interested in someone like Maisie Wilkin?

  Yes, she had. She forced herself to conjure up the misery all over again.

  She'd fallen into an infatuation swifter and deeper than anything she'd known before.

  Dreaming of the day when she could cast off Maisie, and present herself to Kyle as she really was, she had been drawn into something she'd

  never had as a schoolgirl—a schoolgirl crush. And the fact that her emotions had been as yet largely untried had made the crush all the more fierce, all the more hopeless.

  She'd been like a convert exposed to a new religion, embracing her passion without thought or logic. Like a teenager in the front row of a matinee, dreaming an impossible dream.

  Until the memorable afternoon of her disillusionment.

  Then, as now, they had been on the beach. Taking a break during the late afternoon filming, she and Helene and Kyle had walked from the set down to the beach with a party of the crew and the cast.

  It had been a mild, warm autumn day, with no hint of the winter that was to come.

  Helene and Kyle had gone off for a walk on their own. After twenty minutes, Sophie had followed, hands thrust into the pockets of her housecoat as she trudged barefoot across the warm pebbly beach, her thoughts happy and free.

  She'd come upon them sitting on a pair of deck-chairs, facing the sea.

  The stiff breeze had been flowing inland, from them towards Sophie. Which was how they hadn't heard her approach.

  And why she'd caught every word of their conversation.

  Òh, come on, Helene,' Kyle had been saying, his voice somewhere between frustration and amusement. 'Why don't you speak to the girl about her appearance?

  She's like an overweight owl!'

  Sophie had frozen where she'd stood, the blood draining away from her heart.

  `Sophie isn't that overweight,' Helene had rebuked. `Well, she's not exactly sylph-like.'

  `She's a splendid young actress, and she's doing an excellent job with a difficult role.'

  `Maybe so, but her appearance is absurd. She wears such terrible clothes, not to mention her hair—how could

  any young girl let herself go like that? She must have no pride in herself whatsoever.'

  `You don't understand, Kyle.' Helene's voice had been patient. 'Sophie isn't normally like that. She hasn't "let herself go", as you so crudely put it. She's supposed to be unattractive, for the part. You'll understand why when you see the film.'

  `W ell, if she's supposed to be unattractive, she certainly fits the bill.'

  Ìs she getting on your nerves?'

  `She does rather irritate me, snatching those glasses off and on like a railway signal the whole time.'

  `W ell, she's embarrassed about them.' Helene had lit a cigarette, and Sophie had numbly watched the smoke drifting towards her. 'Sophie's had to put on nearly three stones to play Maisie,' she had explained. 'So, naturally, her own wardrobe doesn't fit her any more. She has to wear Maisie's clothes. The hair's dyed, of course. And she's even gone to the length of having her own lenses fitted into those heavy black frames.

  That's why she looks like an owl to you. You're really looking at someone in heavy disguise. If you can't see that underneath it all she's a very intelligent, pretty girl —'

  Ì'll grant you the intelligence. She's good company, poor thing. But pretty?'

  `Yes. She has a beautiful face.'

  Ìf you think suet pudding is beautiful.' Kyle's laughter had been soft, mocking.

  `You're cruel,' Helene had said. 'I've rather taken her under my wing, you see.'

  `Yes, I've noticed. Another of your lame ducks. She doesn't benefit from the comparison, I assure you. Do you know what she looks like, next to you?'

  `Kyle, don't. Sophie Aspen is very far from being a lame duck. She's just young, and rather inexperienced. It's good for her to be around a sophisticated man like you.

  That's why I like to have her along with us. And

  you've been very sweet to her so far. Think of it as a charity.'

  `Yes, well, I've been a little too charitable, I think'

  `You can't mean you haven't noticed?' Kyle had demanded, the husky laugh drifting back to where Sophie had stood like stone on the twilight beach. 'The poor girl is falling in love with me'

  Òh, dear,' Helene had sighed. 'I think you're right. I have noticed her being rather moony in your presence'

  `There's no doubt about it. I know the signs. It would be amusing if it weren't so pathetic.'

  `W ell, you're used to that, at least,' Helene had smiled. Ànd I can assure you that you've had less worthy women than Sophie Aspen in love with you.'

  `Have I? I've certainly had slimmer.'

  Ì just hope that you're not going to—'

  `Laugh in her face?' Kyle had concluded for her. 'No, Helene, I'll restrain myself from that. Though it won't be easy. She looks like ...'

  Kyle had gone on to describe exactly what she'd looked like. He had a talent with words. He could make them glitter like surgeons' knives, could make them stab and slash and puncture the flimsy bubble of vanity and illusion.

  B
ut Sophie hadn't stayed to hear the end of it.

  She'd willed her paralysed legs to start moving, to turn around and carry her bleeding soul back towards the others, where she'd come from.

  There wasn't any way she could describe how she'd been feeling. The pain and humiliation had been glowing in her, like coals in a stove. It had been something she'd known she would never forget.

  To see ourselves as others saw us—a gift that could be terrible. But he hadn't needed to be so cruel! The frivolous, superficial, callous pig—If she could have confronted him there and then, and thrown it all back in his face, she would have done. But

  the awful thing was that everything he'd said about her had been true.

  She had been infatuated with him. And she had been an absurd sight. It was just that she'd forgotten. And had forgotten how much value the world placed on images. She'd known that she'd looked less than ravishing, but she hadn't known just how important appearances were to people.

  Kyle hadn't known her at all. That was what had really hurt her. He'd never looked beneath the surface. He'd never bothered to see beneath the exterior, to the real person she was under the dyed hair and thick make-up, the ugly glasses, the extra weight, the shabby clothes.

  He'd never bothered to find out that she wasn't absurd inside, that she wasn't some kind of freak. To him, she'd never been Sophie Aspen at all. She'd only been Maisie, a physically unattractive woman whose so-obvious infatuation with him had been laughable, a thing to hold in contempt ...

  Well, pain was valuable to an actress. It was like raw stone to a sculptor. And this pain was Kyle Hart's own special contribution to her development as an actress. He had

  changed her, had shown her a great deal about the world, and the way the world was obsessed with appearances. And for that, she felt a kind of bitter gratitude.

  But, for the rest, he was a man she would loathe for the rest of her life.