A Question of Trust Read online

  Penny Vincenzi, internationally bestselling author of No Angel, has dazzled readers with her intricately crafted novels for nearly twenty years. She unleashes her signature narrative prowess once more in A Question of Trust.

  In 1950s London, Tom Knelston is charismatic and charming, with a passion for politics and reform. He is a man with ambition—and someone to watch. His wife Alice, a former nurse, shares his ideals. It seems they are the perfect match.

  Then, out of the blue, Tom meets an old childhood acquaintance, the beautiful and unhappily married Diana Southcott, a fashion model. In many ways, she is everything Tom fights against, but she is also irresistible and so, flirting with danger, they embark on an affair that is potentially damaging to both. And when his child becomes ill, Tom is forced to make decisions about his principles, his career, his marriage, and, most of all, his love for his child.

  A Question of Trust is a vintage Penny Vincenzi novel: rich characterization, life-changing decisions, love, desire, and conflict. “Seductively readable” (The Times), it is a luscious, page-turning read about a precarious situation—both utterly compelling and hugely rewarding.

  By Penny Vincenzi

  By Penny Vincenzi

  Wicked Pleasures

  An Outrageous Affair

  Another Woman

  Forbidden Places

  The Dilemma

  Windfall

  Almost a Crime

  No Angel

  Something Dangerous

  Into Temptation

  A Perfect Heritage

  Copyright

  This edition first published in hardcover in the United States in 2018 by

  The Overlook Press, Peter Mayer Publishers, Inc.

  141 Wooster Street

  New York, NY 10012

  www.overlookpress.com

  For bulk and special sales, please contact [email protected], or write us at the above address

  Copyright © 2017 Penny Vincenzi

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who wishes to quote brief passages in connection with a review written for inclusion in a magazine, newspaper, or broadcast.

  ISBN 978-1-4683-1615-5

  Contents

  By Penny Vincenzi

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Character List

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Epilogue

  For the Magnificent Nine: William, Jemima, Ollie, Honor, Grace,

  Ellie, Niamh, Samuel and Beth: my grandchildren.

  Acknowledgments

  Acknowledgments are really thank you letters – a record of extremely heartfelt gratitude to all the people who have helped to create a book, to give it interest and colour, and to make the characters creatures of substance, with ambitions and passions beyond the personal. And writing them is to travel through the book again, from beginning to end, and realise what a journey of discovery it has been.

  In writing A Question of Trust, I have relied hugely on many people, kind, generous people, all hugely knowledgeable in their fields, who gave me their time and attention and I really do thank them from the bottom of my heart.

  From the very outset, I was lucky enough to have a brilliant and fascinating ally in Barbara Hosking, former Whitehall ‘Spin Doctor’ with an encyclopaedic memory, an ongoing passion for politics and, as a very welcome bonus, a brisk sense of humour about the political scene. She worked for such mighty legends from the forties and fifties as Harold Wilson, Nye Bevan, and Barbara Castle and the hours I spent either with her or reading her emails were both awesome and immense fun. She was also very helpful in creating situations for me that my hero, Tom Knelston, might find himself in, thus extending the plot neatly more than once. I quite simply could not have written the book without her.

  I was led to Barbara by the redoubtable Sue Stapely – no stranger to my acknowledgment pages! – who also contributed on the political front, having not only been a political candidate in the eighties, but Head of PR at the law society. She proved as always a rich source of knowledge on both political and legal procedures and on the divorce process in the fifties – astonishingly different from today.

  And Lorraine Lindsay-Gale, County Councillor for many years, who gave me a nail-biting description of the tension of polling day – and The Count!

  For information on the medical front, I was incredibly fortunate to find one Professor Harold Ellis, (still lecturing on anatomy as he marches briskly through his nineties – he says it keeps him young) who was actually working for the NHS on the day it was launched. His memories of that day and indeed those preceding it, and his life as a young surgeon, were totally fascinating.

  I was introduced to him by another doctor, Anthony Rossi, retired consultant plastic surgeon and lifelong personal friend; he dredged his considerable memory and introduced me to a medical condition, absolutely crucial to the plot, of which I had never heard, patiently explaining it to me in all its complexity at least three times.

  I met Dr Herbert Barrie, a paediatrician in the fifties, working at Great Ormond Street among other places and whose stories of caring for sick children then were both moving and fascinating. He has, very sadly, now died; but the morning I spent with him, hearing of his work and the passion he felt for it, is still a most vivid and happy memory.

  Professor Ray Powles, the distinguished Head of Blood Oncology at the Cancer Centre London, gave me a most hilarious account of his days as a medical student in the fifties and a slightly more sober one of his early days as a doctor; I could have listened all day, and actually did for several hours.

  I must also thank most profoundly Alexandra Annand, who hostessed a wonderful tea party for me and two ladies who had
trained at St Thomas’s Hospital from 1947 onwards. Their stories were absolutely riveting, right from their very first day, under the iron rule of Sister, (prayers in the ward at eight sharp, probationers having cleaned polished and ‘hot dusted’ first). Alexandra herself trained at Thomas’s in the sixties, rising in rank to Night Sister in the seventies. Her stories were equally fascinating; I might have to write another book, just to accommodate them! This one would have been much the poorer without her help.

  Then huge thanks also to Walter Merricks CBE, former Chief Ombudsman, who was so helpful in giving me background into the life and training of a young solicitor taking his articles in those far-off days, as he lunched me most generously in the splendid Law Society building in Chancery Lane.

  And many thanks to Sheila Sharp, old friend from the same girls’ grammar school as me in Totnes, South Devon, who provided invaluable background information on grammar school entry, in those far-off days.

  Immense help on the military front; Christopher White-Thomson, another lifelong friend, recounted wonderfully vivid stories from his military family archives of the taking of Monte Casino, and the events surrounding it.

  Two of the old soldiers I met wished to remain anonymous, but I am able to thank one beloved old friend, Neil Mills, who recounted in enormous detail and with great relish, tales of his war experiences in a series of torpedo boats in both the Atlantic and the Med, two of which he commanded. Neil has, very sadly, died now, and I miss him a lot; and deeply regret that he will never know of my gratitude for what was a crucial chapter in the book.

  The stories from these men, boys really, straight from school, of the horrors they endured, and the courage that was called upon them to show, all recounted with cheery dismissiveness, were exceedingly humbling.

  On the glamour front, as you might call it, fascinating stuff from Liz Smith, one of the great Fashion Editors of my own era, who had worked with some of the legendary photographers of an earlier age, as did my heroine; and from Felicity Green, OBE, Grande Dame of fashion and fashion journalism in newspapers from the fifties onwards, a true visionary and pioneer of some of the new trends in fashion photography and presentation.

  Closer to home, and in the here and now, I have so much to be grateful for.

  Especially at Headline, my publishers; I have a wise and wonderful editor, Imogen Taylor, patient and appreciative, who never seems to pressure or hurry me in any way, while somehow miraculously getting me to deliver copy when she wants it, and then to reassure me that it is not the load of rubbish I had convinced myself I’d produced. She is also given to sudden lightning flashes of inspiration herself which add to the story considerably. Truly an editorial magician.

  Immense thanks to Jo Liddiard, Head of Marketing, who has picked up the book and run with it, ensuring its image is perfectly honed and recognised in all manner of brilliant ways; to Becky Bader, Sales Director, who has, quite simply, ensured A Question of Trust is to be found in every shopping outlet in the land and indeed in space, if you count the internet; and Georgina Moore, Communications Director, who has sprinkled news of the book like fairy dust, in her inimitable way, into just about every facet of the media it could possibly be.

  If you can judge a book by its cover, then A Question of Trust is the most glamorous, dazzling and beautiful ever; huge gratitude to Yeti Lambregts who designed it. It has left everyone who has seen it gasping.

  I don’t think we’d have seen the book on the shelves for many a long moon, and certainly well past its proper date, without the calm, tireless efficiency of Amy Perkins, Editorial Assistant, who has somehow managed to see the manuscript in its various stages is always on time, wherever it’s supposed to be, when it’s supposed to be there.

  A thousand thanks to my brilliant agent, Clare Alexander, who, apart from the more obvious agent-y gifts which she possesses in spades, has a kind of eighth sense that has her ringing me when I am a despairing, limp heap, and leaves me feeling lit up, freshly inspired and like a million dollars.

  And finally, my four lovely, lovely daughters, Polly, Sophie, Emily and Claudia, who even after all these years and all these books, know how much I need cossetting and encouraging from time to time and in spite of all the other calls on their time and attention, like husbands, children and careers, never ever fail me.

  Character List

  Tom Knelston, a young left-wing solicitor, with political ambitions

  Jack Knelston, his father, the postman in West Hilton, a small Hampshire village where Tom has grown up

  Mary Knelston, his mother

  Colin and Arthur Knelston, his brothers

  Jess Knelston, his eldest sister

  lsobel Parsons, Tom’s godmother

  Alan Parsons, her husband and heir to Parsons, a large department store in Hilchester, the nearby town

  Miss Rivers, Tom’s teacher at primary school

  Tristram Sherrin, history master at the grammar school

  Angela Smithers, Tom’s first girlfriend, a salesgirl at Parsons

  Pemberton & Marchant, firm of solicitors where Tom works as a trainee

  Gordon Pemberton and Basil Marchant, the two partners there

  Nigel Pemberton, Gordon’s son, also a trainee

  Betty Foxton, secretary to the two partners

  Mr Roberts, chairman of the Hilchester branch of the Labour Party

  Ted Moore, Labour Party member and Tom’s champion there

  Laura Leonard, a teacher and staunch member of the Labour Party

  Edith, her mother

  Babs, her sister

  Brigadier Sir Gerald Southcott, local grandee, living at West Hilton Manor

  Caroline, his wife

  Diana, their beautiful, spoilt daughter

  Michael, their elder son, a medical student

  Richard, their younger son

  Ned Welles, a fellow medical student and friend of Michael Southcott

  Sir James Welles, his surgeon father, a consultant at St Peter’s, Ned’s first hospital

  Sir Neil Lawson, chairman of the board of governors of St Luke’s, Ned’s second hospital

  Sir Digby Harrington, on the board of governors of St Luke’s

  Phillip Harrington, his son and a registrar

  Jennifer, Ned’s secretary at his private practice

  Persephone Welles, Ned’s beautiful mother who ran away with an artist when Ned was very young

  George Tilbury, a boyfriend of Persephone’s

  Susan Mills, a young patient of Ned’s

  The Hon Johnathan Gunning, who Diana marries

  Jamie, their son

  Sir Hilary and Lady Vanessa Gunning, his parents

  Piers and Timothy Gunning, Johnathan’s brothers

  Catherine, a girlfriend of Johnathan’s

  Sir Harold Morton, Diana’s obstetrician

  Hugh Harding, her solicitor

  Wendelien Bellinger, a socialite and Diana’s best friend

  Ian Bellinger, her husband

  Ludo Manners, good friend to Ned Welles and part of the Bellingers’ set

  Cecily Manners, his wife

  Betsey Southcott, married to Michael after the war, also one of the Bellingers’ set

  Donald Herbert, a rich and successful businessman, and important power behind the throne of the Labour Party

  Christine Herbert, his long-suffering wife

  Robert Herbert, his brother, Islington solicitor, and Tom’s employer

  Colin Davidson, Tom’s constituency agent

  Alice Miller, a young nurse at St Thomas’ Hospital

  Alec and Jean Miller, her parents

  Philip Jordan, a doctor, her boyfriend

  Kit, Lucy and Charlie, Alice and Tom’s children

  Mrs Hartley, Tom and Alice’s kindly neighbour

  Dr Redmond, their GP

  Jillie Curtis, Alice’s best friend at boarding school, and a medical student

  Geraldine and Peter Curtis, her rich and well connected left-wing parentsr />
  William Curtis, her uncle, a prominent obstetrician

  Mrs Hemmings, cook and housekeeper to Jillie’s parents

  Eleanor (Nell) Henderson, a young novelist

  Julius Noble, her fiancé

  Seth Gilbert, editor at Eleanor’s publishers

  Patrick Brownlow, suitor of Jillie’s

  Harry Campbell, the editor of the Daily News

  Jarvis McIntyre, the proprietor

  Clive Bedford, the political editor

  Josh Curtis, his assistant and cousin of Jillie

  Philippa Parry, the women’s editor

  Blanche Ellis Brown, fashion editor of Style magazine

  Esmé, Diana’s agent when she becomes a model

  Freddie Bateman, an American photographer

  Miss Dickens, the editor of American Fashion

  Ottilie, her fashion editor

  Leo Bennett, the diary editor of the Dispatch newspaper

  His brother Marcus, a garden designer

  Mark Drummond, proprietor of the Dispatch

  Fiona Jenkins, a journalist on the Dispatch

  Ricky Barnes, a keen young trainee reporter on the Daily Sketch newspaper

  Christian Greenfell, a vicar

  Chapter 1

  1936

  Tom Knelston was very fond of saying that the first time he met Diana Southcott he had been up to his waist in shit.

  And it was literally true; he had indeed been standing waist deep in a blocked drain outside his parents’ cottage and she had come riding up the lane on the rather fine bay mare she had just acquired and was putting through her paces before taking her out next time she rode to hounds.

  ‘Oh,’ she said, pulling the mare up. ‘Hello. That looks fun.’

  Tom had looked up, trying to muster a smile in response to what she undoubtedly thought was a joke, thinking at one and the same time how beautiful she was – and how enragingly pleased with herself – and said, ‘Yes, it is. Want to join me? I could do with some help.’

  ‘I’d love to, but unfortunately I’d be late for luncheon. Good luck with it, though.’ And she pressed her heels into the mare’s sides and trotted on up the lane.

  Tom looked after her for a moment – at her gleaming dark hair tucked neatly under her riding hat, at her perfectly cut hacking jacket, at her long slender legs encased in cream jodhpurs which, despite being spattered with mud, looked somehow immaculate – and returned to the drain.