A/N: Betaed by Jen.
Part Seventy-Four
On Easter Sunday, two days before Karen was to officially take over Larkhall, George cooked lunch for herself, Karen, Jo and John. George thought that she hadn't seen anywhere near enough of Jo recently, and she wanted an opportunity for John to get used to seeing her and Karen together. He hadn't mentioned it, but she knew that he was still very insecure about the situation, and she wanted to reassure him that Karen didn't pose any threat. John and Jo arrived at about twelve, Jo looking very relaxed and utterly sated. There was still a good hour until dinner would be ready, so John said that he would take Mimi for a walk. When he'd gone, George began peeling and chopping some carrots. "Can I do anything?" Jo asked, following her into the kitchen. "You could pour me a drink," George replied. When Jo put a glass of very cold, very dry Martini down next to the chopping board, George took a close look at her. "You look like you had a good night," She said with a smirk. Jo smiled broadly. "Yes, you could say that. What about you?" "No, not this week. I might not believe in God and the whole seven day burst of inspiration thing, but whoever made it possible for men to have sex every day of the year, definitely was a man." "Yes," Jo said with a wry smile. "John has absolutely no idea how lucky he is." "I asked all three of you over, because John needs to get used to seeing me with Karen." "I don't know if it'll be that easy, George." "No, neither do I, but I had to start somewhere. We both managed to get used to each other being with John, so John can come down off his high horse and do the same with Karen." "You're really happy with her, aren't you?" Jo said wonderingly. "Yes, and though it sounds terribly soppy and adolescent to say it, I haven't been this happy for a long time. I don't think I'll quite get it out of my head, that John agreed to this arrangement because it meant he could go on being with you. I suppose I sometimes wonder if he would have stayed with me, if there wasn't a far stronger motive." "Don't think like that, George," Jo said, feeling a twinge of sadness that George still had so little confidence in how much John loved her. "John wouldn't give you up for the world." "He might," George said philosophically. "If you ever asked him to. With Karen, I feel like I've got someone there who is with me because they really want to be, not because it keeps them on a leash and gives them a quiet life."
A while later, when John had returned, and the dinner was approaching that hectic stage of everything coming to boiling point at the same time, Karen arrived. "Jo, could you let her in for me?" George called, as she opened the oven door to check on the beef. Karen was pleased to see Jo, not having had much contact with her since Lauren's trial. "How are you?" She said, as Jo closed the door behind her. "I'm fine. How's Lauren getting on?" "Okay, trying to help me and Yvonne keep Denny off drugs, generally taking over where her mother left off, you name it." Then, they exchanged a knowing smile as they heard George's slightly harassed voice. "John, will you please get your wayward animal out from under my feet?" "Sounds like a recipe for disaster," Karen said, walking passed Jo towards the kitchen. After replacing the beef in the oven, George looked up to see Karen smiling at her. "Honestly," She said, walking over to give Karen a hug. "Why does everything insist on being ready at the same time?" Karen laughed and then kissed her. "I'd have come over earlier, but I overslept." "That's what Sundays are supposed to be for," George said, kissing her back. "I've needed that all week," George added in a low, meaningful drawl, clearly wishing they could abandon dinner in favour of more inviting delicacies. "Have you been drinking already?" Karen said, after kissing her some more. "You taste of Martini." "That's what cooking Sunday dinner drives me to," George said, giving Karen one last, hard kiss before disentangling herself. When she looked up, George saw John, standing in the kitchen doorway, staring at them. He cleared his throat a little uncertainly. "Mimi," He called, bringing her reluctantly out from under the kitchen table. "John, do you feel like opening the wine?" George asked, trying to find a neutral topic. "Do you want me to do anything?" Karen asked, also trying to get them back onto safer ground. John just managed to resist the urge to say that it looked like she'd done enough already, and deposited Mimi in the lounge, before returning to open the wine. "Is John all right?" Jo asked Karen when she went to sit down on the sofa. "He was scowling." "He's just had his first sight of me kissing one of the lights of his life, so I'm not surprised he was scowling." Karen said this in a slightly lowered voice so that it wouldn't reach either John or George, who were still in the kitchen. "Ah," Jo said in understanding. "He'll get used to it, in time." "He'll have to," Karen said succinctly, showing Jo that she definitely wouldn't stand for John giving George anything like the things he'd said to her.
"Have you seen much of Yvonne lately?" Jo asked Karen, when they were working their way through roast beef and all the trimmings. "I saw her a couple of weeks ago," Karen replied, after taking a swig of wine. "She seemed a lot happier. I think she might at last have got herself someone new." John almost choked on a piece of roast potato. Karen surely didn't know about that glorious Sunday afternoon he'd spent with Yvonne, did she? "She looked like she'd definitely been seeing someone," Karen added, at last feeling that perhaps she could begin to let go of some of the guilt she had over finishing with Yvonne. "Man or woman?" George asked, clearly intrigued. "I haven't got a clue," Karen said with a smile. "Probably a man though." John was doing his utmost to keep a thoroughly blank, well and truly uninterested look on his face, but he wasn't entirely sure he was succeeding. He could remember her beautiful body, the way she'd clung to him as she came, the way she'd not wanted him to go, but had done her best to hide it. He knew it would never happen again, but that didn't stop him thinking about it. But he was suddenly brought back to the present, by Jo saying his name. "John," Jo said, when he looked up at her. "You were miles away." "I'm sorry," He said, feeling a complete and utter fool, and thinking that he would have to be more on his guard than this, if she wasn't going to find out what he'd done. "Were you thinking about last night?" George asked, a wicked little smirk on her face, knowing this would embarrass him. "No, as it happens, I wasn't," He said, predictably rising to the bait. Looking closely at John, Karen could see that he really had been somewhere else entirely. No, she thought in dawning comprehension, surely not. Yvonne's new lover, it couldn't be John, could it? Staring at him intently, her theory was confirmed when he refused to meet her gaze. "I asked you," Jo repeated. "If you'd told George about the bar counsel's idea of team spirit." "No, not yet," He replied, extremely relieved at the change of subject. "What outlandish idea have they come up with now?" George asked, not altogether interested. "Their idea of a team building exercise," John said slowly to grab her attention. "Endorsed I might add by your father, is for those of us who can, to put on a performance of 'The Creation.' They seem to have the thoroughly misguided notion, that it will persuade us to be nicer to each other." "Some hope," George said on a laugh. "Trust daddy to get involved with something like that. He always did want to play at being Simon Rattle." "What John hasn't told you," Jo said, a light dancing in her eyes. "Is that they want you to sing Eve." George, who had been about to take a sip of wine, put her glass back down on the table. "No chance," She said without any hesitation whatsoever. "Oh, come on," John cajoled. "You'd enjoy it." "Enjoy making a complete fool of myself? I don't think so." "I promised your father I'd try and persuade you," John persisted. "John, you should know by now, that my father wanting me to do something, has never worked all on its own. The fact that daddy didn't ask me himself says it all. I'd have asked him over today, but he said he was going away this weekend. I know why now." "Didn't you sing Eve in your last year at school?" John was determined to succeed. "John, that was thirty years ago," George said in disgust. "You talk as if it was at least in the last decade." John knew exactly what she was doing, putting on her mask of indifference, and flatly refusing to consider it, because the idea terrified her. It was extremely rare that he heard George sing, far less now than in the days when they were married and she was happy. Singing was something George held very dear to her, something she regarded as utterly personal and entirely her own. John wasn't the only one aware of George's defense mechanism. Both Jo and Karen could see it a mile off. Somewhere deep inside her, George longed to do what John was asking of her, but the fear of failure in front of so many people was preventing her. "I didn't know you could sing," Karen put in, trying to appeal to any ego George had left. "I can't," George replied tartly. "At least not to the kind of standard something like 'The Creation' demands." "Yes, you can," John insisted. "I'm not doing it, John, and that's final. You'll be waving your bow, I suppose?" "And Jo will," John said proudly, letting her digress until he could return to the attack. "I didn't know you played," George said in surprise. "The cello, for my sins," Jo said with a fond smile, not for the first time wondering just what she'd got herself into.
When they'd finished eating, and Jo and Karen had cleared away, Karen made some coffee and they sat down in the lounge. When the other three had lit cigarettes, John began again. "You know," He said, almost as if by accident. "If you don't sing Eve, we're going to be lumbered with Vera Everard." "You've got to be joking," George said in disgust. "Gilbert and Sullivan's Katisha perhaps," She said, referring to the very unattractive octogenarian, who's lust for a man in his twenties led her to make a very public fool of herself. "But Eve?" Seeing far too many similarities in the comparison, John laughed. "She's not that bad," He said with a grin. "Oh, John, she's vile," George said with utter sincerity. "She makes Myra Hindley look attractive and motherly." Jo laughed. "Actually, that's not a bad description," She said, smiling broadly. "Who's playing Adam?" George asked, not yet revealing that she was considering saying yes. "We don't know as yet, though one contender is Monty Everard." "Play Eve opposite Legover's Adam, no way. He'd be forever trying to rip off my fig leaf." "Okay, so what if we cast Monty as the tenor." "Actually, that would suit him," George said with a smile. "He'd have to be in a big, self-righteous sulk at the end. He'd love that." "Would it help if I said please?" John asked, now almost desperate because he was running out of persuasory tactics. "Not on this occasion, no," George responded with a smirk. "What do you think about this?" She asked Karen, who so far hadn't offered up an opinion. "I'm not taking anyone's side," Karen replied, eager to avoid any arguments. "But I know that if you really want to do it, you will." George was incredibly touched by Karen's words of encouragement. "George," Jo said, suddenly having a burst of inspiration. "Why not try something from the score, something not especially taxing, and see what you think after that." "I don't know if I've still got a copy of the score," George said contemplatively, forced to admit that Jo had her over a barrel. "Yes, you have," John said in triumph. "I looked earlier." "Bloody typical," George replied in irritation. "You'd better go and get it then, if you're so sure you know where it is." Taking her at her word, John got up, and returned in an infuriatingly short time, having seen it earlier on the top shelf in George's office across the hall. "You had this all planned out, didn't you?" George said, as he handed her the slightly battered score. "Of course," He said matter-of-factly.
As George began to flip through the score, the margins full of her eighteen-year-old handwriting, the other three watched her. John knew George well enough, to be well aware that she was gradually cracking. All it would take was a little more persuasion and a shove in the right direction, and she would submit as easily as she did to his sexual advances. "Do you have any idea what you're asking of me?" She said, looking up from the page. "The very first soprano solo goes up to top C. That's sixth octave C, John. There's no way I can get up there." "Oh, I don't know," He said with a wink. "I'm sure you've hit that pitch at the point of orgasm before now." Karen laughed, Jo smiled, and George blushed. Thumbing the pages until she came across the second soprano solo, George looked suddenly wistful. She could vividly remember her eighteen-year-old self, playing Eve in a performance of 'The Creation' at the end of the spring term. She could remember her father, sat in the audience, taking in every word she sang. John came to look over her shoulder. "Why not try that one?" He said, seeing what she was looking at. "No," George replied, dragged back to the present. "'With Verdure Clad', was always my favourite. I'm not about to ruin it just to please you." John was a little disconcerted, to see a broad, thoroughly evil grin spreading over her face as she continued to flick through the pages. When she began to laugh quietly, he knew he was in for it. "I know," She said, almost gleefully. "If you really want to see if I'm capable, then I'll try one of the love duets." "But..." He said, and then it dawned on him. "Oh, no." "Oh, yes," George insisted. "You can sing Adam for me. After all, if you want a thing badly enough, you'll do anything to get it, won't you?" Karen and Jo were quietly impressed at George's methods. "Play the violin I might," John insisted. "But sing, I definitely don't." "Have you ever heard him sing?" George asked Jo. "Only in the shower, when he thinks I can't hear him," Jo said with a smile. "George, you can't be serious," He protested, seeing his dignity disappearing into thin air. "You will, if you want me to even consider playing Eve," She said firmly, getting up and moving over to the piano. "Besides, this one has an accompaniment I can probably sight read." "Are you really sure you want me to do this?" He asked, admiring her tactics but desperate to maintain his dignity all the same. "Yes," George said firmly. "I'm not going down on my own, John." "I've never heard you complain," Karen said quietly, provoking a laugh from George and a smile from Jo. "I didn't need to know that," John said disgustedly, now unable to get the vision of George giving Karen oral out of his head.
As George began playing the very slow waltz-like accompaniment of the first love duet, John moved to stand behind her, so that he could read the music. Vowing not to make a fool of himself, he examined the words and the notes he had to sing, finding to his surprise that it wasn't too difficult. When George opened her mouth, the voice that emerged, wasn't one she'd heard in far too long. It was pure, a little feeble until she found her nerve, and when she eventually began to relax, with a touch of vibrato. John's voice, though a little uncertain to start with, surprised both Karen and Jo. They could tell he was a little rusty, but as his confidence grew, so did the sound that emanated from him.
"By thee with bliss, oh bounteous Lord, Both heaven and Earth are stored."
When George heard John begin to falter, she added his bass line into the accompaniment she was playing, giving him a much-needed helping hand. As they moved into the words,
"This world, so great, so wonderful," The triplet quavers made the music softly swing, giving the impression of a boat, gently drifting on a tide of love coming from these very first two of God's people. George found that she was able to rise to the G and eventually the A with almost no difficulty at all. The words she was singing seemed to give her courage, her voice pouring out of her, as the sun out of the departing storm clouds onto a rain drenched lawn. George's emerging confidence seemed to give John the extra encouragement he needed, both of them soaring up and down their respective registers, for the moment united in their single endeavour. Both Jo and Karen immediately felt the feeling of togetherness that seemed to surround John and George. Their eyes met, exchanging a brief look of combined pride and wonder, but with a tinge of hurt lurking somewhere in the background. Never had John and George looked so complete, so in their own league of united strength, in so little need of another's interruption. But this moment was only a fleeting one, both Karen and Jo feeling a certain awe at what John and George were doing.
When the piece came to an end, George realised that her eyes were full of tears. But she couldn't help it. A part of her, which she'd thought she'd buried a long time ago, had just resurrected itself, emerging to shine out of her again. She could do this, she really could do this. She could make her father, and John, proud of her again. All three of them could see her emotional reaction to the re-discovery of what had once been one of her most prized assets. "I never knew you had it in you," Jo said, her own voice a little unsteady. "Neither did I, until now," George replied, slightly ashamed of her tears. "I knew I could do it once, a very long time ago, but I thought it would have gone, what with all the smoking and shouting I've done over the years." John laughed softly. "Now do you see why you have to do it?" He said, determined to get a final yes out of her. "Okay," She said. "But if I screw up, don't say I didn't warn you." "You're not going to screw up," John said, putting his arms round her as she stood up from the piano. "On the contrary, I think you're going to put all the other singers to shame." It felt right to kiss him, as if to affirm the words they'd just bestowed on each other. George knew she shouldn't, not with both Jo and Karen watching her, but she couldn't help it. What she'd just done with John had touched her soul, made her see just how much she still loved him. To her astonishment, Jo found that seeing George and John kissing each other didn't bother her. They looked beautiful, utterly serene, and not in the least bit wrong.
When they parted, John went to make them all some more coffee, needing a moment to emotionally regroup. Doing something so personal with George had touched him too. He had helped her to release the voice she had forgotten she had, and in doing so had maybe brought her even closer to him. "That was beautiful," Karen said, taking and squeezing George's hand. "I wish you could be a part of this," George said, not knowing how to respond to the compliment. "What do you play?" Jo asked. "The viola, when I've got the time." "Do you think there might be a spare viola part going?" Jo asked, as John came into the lounge with their coffee. "I'm not sure," He said, putting the mugs down on the coffee table. "I don't see why not. If it'll make your viola come out from behind your bedroom door for once in it's life, I'll see what I can do." There was a long, awful pause. Just how was John going to explain, that he knew that this was where Karen kept her viola? Karen gave him a look of pure irritated anger. Couldn't he control his tongue, just for one afternoon? "Don't look at me like that," He said, seeing Karen's glare. "Jo and George both know I once slept with you, so why hide it?" "A little word called diplomacy, John," Karen said carefully. "As John says," Jo said to Karen, trying to reassure her. "It's not something I didn't know already." To give her some thinking time, George lit a cigarette, not expecting this to break the ice in the way it did. "You can give those up for a start," John said, removing the barely smoked cigarette from her hand and stubbing it out in the ashtray. "Cut down, perhaps, but you will not find me giving up altogether. My secretary would resign." Jo laughed, thinking that even with George cutting down on her nicotine habit, her secretary would have her work cut out as it was. "Why don't you cut down with me?" George said pleadingly to Karen. "You want me to get through my first week as Governing Governor, without the highest level of nicotine I feel necessary to keep me sane? You must be joking."
They managed to move away from the subject of John and Karen's one night together, but Karen couldn't entirely relax. When she and Jo eventually left, as John was staying, Karen offered Jo a lift home, they having come in John's car. They'd been driving for a few minutes, when Karen decided that she couldn't leave things as they were any longer. "I'm sorry, Jo, about John." Jo had wondered how long it would take Karen to do this. She'd felt her guilt and discomfort all afternoon. "There's really no need to be," Jo said quietly. "I know it happened a long time ago, and I know it happened before John agreed to what he now has with me and George. You forget, that John has been doing this to me for more years than I care to remember." "That doesn't mean I should have done it," Karen said regretfully. "It's funny," Jo continued. "But when Fenner's body was found, George accused John of believing you because he wanted to sleep with you." Karen laughed. "I don't think even John would go that far." "No, he wouldn't," Jo said seriously. "But you mustn't underestimate his determination to succeed, both in court and out of it. If he wants a woman, there isn't much he won't do to get her." "I didn't mean to hurt you, Jo." "I know you didn't. If it happened when I think it did, I suspect you slept with John for very similar reasons as I began sleeping with him all those years ago, to get away from what was happening at the time. There isn't anything wrong in that. I used to think there was, but I've lived long enough to know it doesn't always work like that." After a few moments of companionable silence, Jo said, "Does it sound selfish of me to say that I felt left out when they were singing together?" "You felt it too?" Karen asked, briefly taking her eyes off the road to glance at Jo. "Yes, and I know it sounds silly, but I suppose it hammered home to me that John was once married to George, lived day in and day out with her, knew every little detail about her." "They could never again live together, you know that." "Yes, I do, I just wish I could be more certain of it."
When Jo and Karen had gone, George made them some more coffee, and they went back into the lounge. They moved by mutual consensus towards the enormous armchair where Jo had been sitting, John sitting down and pulling George down onto his lap. He loved having her in his arms, her small frame fitting easily against his chest. George always felt safe when she was like this with John; the position making her feel that little bit more protected. "I think we need to talk," George said slowly, finally biting the bullet. "What about?" He asked carefully. "About Karen, and about why you looked so frightfully insulted when you saw me kissing her." "I didn't," He protested, but knowing he had. "Darling, I'm not blind," George said gently. "I just didn't expect it, that's all. Being told a thing, and actually witnessing it, are really quite different." "I know, but it is something you're going to have to get used to. I'm not going to apologise for who I am, or refuse to acknowledge something that's part of me, just because it makes you feel uncomfortable." "I don't expect you to," He insisted, hating the fact that she could see right through him. "You might not expect me to," George replied seriously. "But I know that part of you would like me to. It would be far easier for you if you didn't have to acknowledge that I find women sexually attractive as well as men. You think it gives you a type of rival that you can't compete with." "I suppose that's what it feels like sometimes," He admitted. "And do you really think I don't occasionally see Jo as something I can't compete with?" "Why should you?" "For any number of reasons, John, most of which I'm not going to bother to go into now. The point is, I got used to Jo's presence in your life, and Jo got used to mine. You don't know it, but it was an uphill struggle for both of us. You will begin to accept that Karen is part of my life, because that is the only way we can all be happy. I do love you, and I will always love you. Nothing will ever change that. But with me, for now, comes Karen as well. She's part of the package, and that's how it's going to stay."
Part Seventy-Four
On Easter Sunday, two days before Karen was to officially take over Larkhall, George cooked lunch for herself, Karen, Jo and John. George thought that she hadn't seen anywhere near enough of Jo recently, and she wanted an opportunity for John to get used to seeing her and Karen together. He hadn't mentioned it, but she knew that he was still very insecure about the situation, and she wanted to reassure him that Karen didn't pose any threat. John and Jo arrived at about twelve, Jo looking very relaxed and utterly sated. There was still a good hour until dinner would be ready, so John said that he would take Mimi for a walk. When he'd gone, George began peeling and chopping some carrots. "Can I do anything?" Jo asked, following her into the kitchen. "You could pour me a drink," George replied. When Jo put a glass of very cold, very dry Martini down next to the chopping board, George took a close look at her. "You look like you had a good night," She said with a smirk. Jo smiled broadly. "Yes, you could say that. What about you?" "No, not this week. I might not believe in God and the whole seven day burst of inspiration thing, but whoever made it possible for men to have sex every day of the year, definitely was a man." "Yes," Jo said with a wry smile. "John has absolutely no idea how lucky he is." "I asked all three of you over, because John needs to get used to seeing me with Karen." "I don't know if it'll be that easy, George." "No, neither do I, but I had to start somewhere. We both managed to get used to each other being with John, so John can come down off his high horse and do the same with Karen." "You're really happy with her, aren't you?" Jo said wonderingly. "Yes, and though it sounds terribly soppy and adolescent to say it, I haven't been this happy for a long time. I don't think I'll quite get it out of my head, that John agreed to this arrangement because it meant he could go on being with you. I suppose I sometimes wonder if he would have stayed with me, if there wasn't a far stronger motive." "Don't think like that, George," Jo said, feeling a twinge of sadness that George still had so little confidence in how much John loved her. "John wouldn't give you up for the world." "He might," George said philosophically. "If you ever asked him to. With Karen, I feel like I've got someone there who is with me because they really want to be, not because it keeps them on a leash and gives them a quiet life."
A while later, when John had returned, and the dinner was approaching that hectic stage of everything coming to boiling point at the same time, Karen arrived. "Jo, could you let her in for me?" George called, as she opened the oven door to check on the beef. Karen was pleased to see Jo, not having had much contact with her since Lauren's trial. "How are you?" She said, as Jo closed the door behind her. "I'm fine. How's Lauren getting on?" "Okay, trying to help me and Yvonne keep Denny off drugs, generally taking over where her mother left off, you name it." Then, they exchanged a knowing smile as they heard George's slightly harassed voice. "John, will you please get your wayward animal out from under my feet?" "Sounds like a recipe for disaster," Karen said, walking passed Jo towards the kitchen. After replacing the beef in the oven, George looked up to see Karen smiling at her. "Honestly," She said, walking over to give Karen a hug. "Why does everything insist on being ready at the same time?" Karen laughed and then kissed her. "I'd have come over earlier, but I overslept." "That's what Sundays are supposed to be for," George said, kissing her back. "I've needed that all week," George added in a low, meaningful drawl, clearly wishing they could abandon dinner in favour of more inviting delicacies. "Have you been drinking already?" Karen said, after kissing her some more. "You taste of Martini." "That's what cooking Sunday dinner drives me to," George said, giving Karen one last, hard kiss before disentangling herself. When she looked up, George saw John, standing in the kitchen doorway, staring at them. He cleared his throat a little uncertainly. "Mimi," He called, bringing her reluctantly out from under the kitchen table. "John, do you feel like opening the wine?" George asked, trying to find a neutral topic. "Do you want me to do anything?" Karen asked, also trying to get them back onto safer ground. John just managed to resist the urge to say that it looked like she'd done enough already, and deposited Mimi in the lounge, before returning to open the wine. "Is John all right?" Jo asked Karen when she went to sit down on the sofa. "He was scowling." "He's just had his first sight of me kissing one of the lights of his life, so I'm not surprised he was scowling." Karen said this in a slightly lowered voice so that it wouldn't reach either John or George, who were still in the kitchen. "Ah," Jo said in understanding. "He'll get used to it, in time." "He'll have to," Karen said succinctly, showing Jo that she definitely wouldn't stand for John giving George anything like the things he'd said to her.
"Have you seen much of Yvonne lately?" Jo asked Karen, when they were working their way through roast beef and all the trimmings. "I saw her a couple of weeks ago," Karen replied, after taking a swig of wine. "She seemed a lot happier. I think she might at last have got herself someone new." John almost choked on a piece of roast potato. Karen surely didn't know about that glorious Sunday afternoon he'd spent with Yvonne, did she? "She looked like she'd definitely been seeing someone," Karen added, at last feeling that perhaps she could begin to let go of some of the guilt she had over finishing with Yvonne. "Man or woman?" George asked, clearly intrigued. "I haven't got a clue," Karen said with a smile. "Probably a man though." John was doing his utmost to keep a thoroughly blank, well and truly uninterested look on his face, but he wasn't entirely sure he was succeeding. He could remember her beautiful body, the way she'd clung to him as she came, the way she'd not wanted him to go, but had done her best to hide it. He knew it would never happen again, but that didn't stop him thinking about it. But he was suddenly brought back to the present, by Jo saying his name. "John," Jo said, when he looked up at her. "You were miles away." "I'm sorry," He said, feeling a complete and utter fool, and thinking that he would have to be more on his guard than this, if she wasn't going to find out what he'd done. "Were you thinking about last night?" George asked, a wicked little smirk on her face, knowing this would embarrass him. "No, as it happens, I wasn't," He said, predictably rising to the bait. Looking closely at John, Karen could see that he really had been somewhere else entirely. No, she thought in dawning comprehension, surely not. Yvonne's new lover, it couldn't be John, could it? Staring at him intently, her theory was confirmed when he refused to meet her gaze. "I asked you," Jo repeated. "If you'd told George about the bar counsel's idea of team spirit." "No, not yet," He replied, extremely relieved at the change of subject. "What outlandish idea have they come up with now?" George asked, not altogether interested. "Their idea of a team building exercise," John said slowly to grab her attention. "Endorsed I might add by your father, is for those of us who can, to put on a performance of 'The Creation.' They seem to have the thoroughly misguided notion, that it will persuade us to be nicer to each other." "Some hope," George said on a laugh. "Trust daddy to get involved with something like that. He always did want to play at being Simon Rattle." "What John hasn't told you," Jo said, a light dancing in her eyes. "Is that they want you to sing Eve." George, who had been about to take a sip of wine, put her glass back down on the table. "No chance," She said without any hesitation whatsoever. "Oh, come on," John cajoled. "You'd enjoy it." "Enjoy making a complete fool of myself? I don't think so." "I promised your father I'd try and persuade you," John persisted. "John, you should know by now, that my father wanting me to do something, has never worked all on its own. The fact that daddy didn't ask me himself says it all. I'd have asked him over today, but he said he was going away this weekend. I know why now." "Didn't you sing Eve in your last year at school?" John was determined to succeed. "John, that was thirty years ago," George said in disgust. "You talk as if it was at least in the last decade." John knew exactly what she was doing, putting on her mask of indifference, and flatly refusing to consider it, because the idea terrified her. It was extremely rare that he heard George sing, far less now than in the days when they were married and she was happy. Singing was something George held very dear to her, something she regarded as utterly personal and entirely her own. John wasn't the only one aware of George's defense mechanism. Both Jo and Karen could see it a mile off. Somewhere deep inside her, George longed to do what John was asking of her, but the fear of failure in front of so many people was preventing her. "I didn't know you could sing," Karen put in, trying to appeal to any ego George had left. "I can't," George replied tartly. "At least not to the kind of standard something like 'The Creation' demands." "Yes, you can," John insisted. "I'm not doing it, John, and that's final. You'll be waving your bow, I suppose?" "And Jo will," John said proudly, letting her digress until he could return to the attack. "I didn't know you played," George said in surprise. "The cello, for my sins," Jo said with a fond smile, not for the first time wondering just what she'd got herself into.
When they'd finished eating, and Jo and Karen had cleared away, Karen made some coffee and they sat down in the lounge. When the other three had lit cigarettes, John began again. "You know," He said, almost as if by accident. "If you don't sing Eve, we're going to be lumbered with Vera Everard." "You've got to be joking," George said in disgust. "Gilbert and Sullivan's Katisha perhaps," She said, referring to the very unattractive octogenarian, who's lust for a man in his twenties led her to make a very public fool of herself. "But Eve?" Seeing far too many similarities in the comparison, John laughed. "She's not that bad," He said with a grin. "Oh, John, she's vile," George said with utter sincerity. "She makes Myra Hindley look attractive and motherly." Jo laughed. "Actually, that's not a bad description," She said, smiling broadly. "Who's playing Adam?" George asked, not yet revealing that she was considering saying yes. "We don't know as yet, though one contender is Monty Everard." "Play Eve opposite Legover's Adam, no way. He'd be forever trying to rip off my fig leaf." "Okay, so what if we cast Monty as the tenor." "Actually, that would suit him," George said with a smile. "He'd have to be in a big, self-righteous sulk at the end. He'd love that." "Would it help if I said please?" John asked, now almost desperate because he was running out of persuasory tactics. "Not on this occasion, no," George responded with a smirk. "What do you think about this?" She asked Karen, who so far hadn't offered up an opinion. "I'm not taking anyone's side," Karen replied, eager to avoid any arguments. "But I know that if you really want to do it, you will." George was incredibly touched by Karen's words of encouragement. "George," Jo said, suddenly having a burst of inspiration. "Why not try something from the score, something not especially taxing, and see what you think after that." "I don't know if I've still got a copy of the score," George said contemplatively, forced to admit that Jo had her over a barrel. "Yes, you have," John said in triumph. "I looked earlier." "Bloody typical," George replied in irritation. "You'd better go and get it then, if you're so sure you know where it is." Taking her at her word, John got up, and returned in an infuriatingly short time, having seen it earlier on the top shelf in George's office across the hall. "You had this all planned out, didn't you?" George said, as he handed her the slightly battered score. "Of course," He said matter-of-factly.
As George began to flip through the score, the margins full of her eighteen-year-old handwriting, the other three watched her. John knew George well enough, to be well aware that she was gradually cracking. All it would take was a little more persuasion and a shove in the right direction, and she would submit as easily as she did to his sexual advances. "Do you have any idea what you're asking of me?" She said, looking up from the page. "The very first soprano solo goes up to top C. That's sixth octave C, John. There's no way I can get up there." "Oh, I don't know," He said with a wink. "I'm sure you've hit that pitch at the point of orgasm before now." Karen laughed, Jo smiled, and George blushed. Thumbing the pages until she came across the second soprano solo, George looked suddenly wistful. She could vividly remember her eighteen-year-old self, playing Eve in a performance of 'The Creation' at the end of the spring term. She could remember her father, sat in the audience, taking in every word she sang. John came to look over her shoulder. "Why not try that one?" He said, seeing what she was looking at. "No," George replied, dragged back to the present. "'With Verdure Clad', was always my favourite. I'm not about to ruin it just to please you." John was a little disconcerted, to see a broad, thoroughly evil grin spreading over her face as she continued to flick through the pages. When she began to laugh quietly, he knew he was in for it. "I know," She said, almost gleefully. "If you really want to see if I'm capable, then I'll try one of the love duets." "But..." He said, and then it dawned on him. "Oh, no." "Oh, yes," George insisted. "You can sing Adam for me. After all, if you want a thing badly enough, you'll do anything to get it, won't you?" Karen and Jo were quietly impressed at George's methods. "Play the violin I might," John insisted. "But sing, I definitely don't." "Have you ever heard him sing?" George asked Jo. "Only in the shower, when he thinks I can't hear him," Jo said with a smile. "George, you can't be serious," He protested, seeing his dignity disappearing into thin air. "You will, if you want me to even consider playing Eve," She said firmly, getting up and moving over to the piano. "Besides, this one has an accompaniment I can probably sight read." "Are you really sure you want me to do this?" He asked, admiring her tactics but desperate to maintain his dignity all the same. "Yes," George said firmly. "I'm not going down on my own, John." "I've never heard you complain," Karen said quietly, provoking a laugh from George and a smile from Jo. "I didn't need to know that," John said disgustedly, now unable to get the vision of George giving Karen oral out of his head.
As George began playing the very slow waltz-like accompaniment of the first love duet, John moved to stand behind her, so that he could read the music. Vowing not to make a fool of himself, he examined the words and the notes he had to sing, finding to his surprise that it wasn't too difficult. When George opened her mouth, the voice that emerged, wasn't one she'd heard in far too long. It was pure, a little feeble until she found her nerve, and when she eventually began to relax, with a touch of vibrato. John's voice, though a little uncertain to start with, surprised both Karen and Jo. They could tell he was a little rusty, but as his confidence grew, so did the sound that emanated from him.
"By thee with bliss, oh bounteous Lord, Both heaven and Earth are stored."
When George heard John begin to falter, she added his bass line into the accompaniment she was playing, giving him a much-needed helping hand. As they moved into the words,
"This world, so great, so wonderful," The triplet quavers made the music softly swing, giving the impression of a boat, gently drifting on a tide of love coming from these very first two of God's people. George found that she was able to rise to the G and eventually the A with almost no difficulty at all. The words she was singing seemed to give her courage, her voice pouring out of her, as the sun out of the departing storm clouds onto a rain drenched lawn. George's emerging confidence seemed to give John the extra encouragement he needed, both of them soaring up and down their respective registers, for the moment united in their single endeavour. Both Jo and Karen immediately felt the feeling of togetherness that seemed to surround John and George. Their eyes met, exchanging a brief look of combined pride and wonder, but with a tinge of hurt lurking somewhere in the background. Never had John and George looked so complete, so in their own league of united strength, in so little need of another's interruption. But this moment was only a fleeting one, both Karen and Jo feeling a certain awe at what John and George were doing.
When the piece came to an end, George realised that her eyes were full of tears. But she couldn't help it. A part of her, which she'd thought she'd buried a long time ago, had just resurrected itself, emerging to shine out of her again. She could do this, she really could do this. She could make her father, and John, proud of her again. All three of them could see her emotional reaction to the re-discovery of what had once been one of her most prized assets. "I never knew you had it in you," Jo said, her own voice a little unsteady. "Neither did I, until now," George replied, slightly ashamed of her tears. "I knew I could do it once, a very long time ago, but I thought it would have gone, what with all the smoking and shouting I've done over the years." John laughed softly. "Now do you see why you have to do it?" He said, determined to get a final yes out of her. "Okay," She said. "But if I screw up, don't say I didn't warn you." "You're not going to screw up," John said, putting his arms round her as she stood up from the piano. "On the contrary, I think you're going to put all the other singers to shame." It felt right to kiss him, as if to affirm the words they'd just bestowed on each other. George knew she shouldn't, not with both Jo and Karen watching her, but she couldn't help it. What she'd just done with John had touched her soul, made her see just how much she still loved him. To her astonishment, Jo found that seeing George and John kissing each other didn't bother her. They looked beautiful, utterly serene, and not in the least bit wrong.
When they parted, John went to make them all some more coffee, needing a moment to emotionally regroup. Doing something so personal with George had touched him too. He had helped her to release the voice she had forgotten she had, and in doing so had maybe brought her even closer to him. "That was beautiful," Karen said, taking and squeezing George's hand. "I wish you could be a part of this," George said, not knowing how to respond to the compliment. "What do you play?" Jo asked. "The viola, when I've got the time." "Do you think there might be a spare viola part going?" Jo asked, as John came into the lounge with their coffee. "I'm not sure," He said, putting the mugs down on the coffee table. "I don't see why not. If it'll make your viola come out from behind your bedroom door for once in it's life, I'll see what I can do." There was a long, awful pause. Just how was John going to explain, that he knew that this was where Karen kept her viola? Karen gave him a look of pure irritated anger. Couldn't he control his tongue, just for one afternoon? "Don't look at me like that," He said, seeing Karen's glare. "Jo and George both know I once slept with you, so why hide it?" "A little word called diplomacy, John," Karen said carefully. "As John says," Jo said to Karen, trying to reassure her. "It's not something I didn't know already." To give her some thinking time, George lit a cigarette, not expecting this to break the ice in the way it did. "You can give those up for a start," John said, removing the barely smoked cigarette from her hand and stubbing it out in the ashtray. "Cut down, perhaps, but you will not find me giving up altogether. My secretary would resign." Jo laughed, thinking that even with George cutting down on her nicotine habit, her secretary would have her work cut out as it was. "Why don't you cut down with me?" George said pleadingly to Karen. "You want me to get through my first week as Governing Governor, without the highest level of nicotine I feel necessary to keep me sane? You must be joking."
They managed to move away from the subject of John and Karen's one night together, but Karen couldn't entirely relax. When she and Jo eventually left, as John was staying, Karen offered Jo a lift home, they having come in John's car. They'd been driving for a few minutes, when Karen decided that she couldn't leave things as they were any longer. "I'm sorry, Jo, about John." Jo had wondered how long it would take Karen to do this. She'd felt her guilt and discomfort all afternoon. "There's really no need to be," Jo said quietly. "I know it happened a long time ago, and I know it happened before John agreed to what he now has with me and George. You forget, that John has been doing this to me for more years than I care to remember." "That doesn't mean I should have done it," Karen said regretfully. "It's funny," Jo continued. "But when Fenner's body was found, George accused John of believing you because he wanted to sleep with you." Karen laughed. "I don't think even John would go that far." "No, he wouldn't," Jo said seriously. "But you mustn't underestimate his determination to succeed, both in court and out of it. If he wants a woman, there isn't much he won't do to get her." "I didn't mean to hurt you, Jo." "I know you didn't. If it happened when I think it did, I suspect you slept with John for very similar reasons as I began sleeping with him all those years ago, to get away from what was happening at the time. There isn't anything wrong in that. I used to think there was, but I've lived long enough to know it doesn't always work like that." After a few moments of companionable silence, Jo said, "Does it sound selfish of me to say that I felt left out when they were singing together?" "You felt it too?" Karen asked, briefly taking her eyes off the road to glance at Jo. "Yes, and I know it sounds silly, but I suppose it hammered home to me that John was once married to George, lived day in and day out with her, knew every little detail about her." "They could never again live together, you know that." "Yes, I do, I just wish I could be more certain of it."
When Jo and Karen had gone, George made them some more coffee, and they went back into the lounge. They moved by mutual consensus towards the enormous armchair where Jo had been sitting, John sitting down and pulling George down onto his lap. He loved having her in his arms, her small frame fitting easily against his chest. George always felt safe when she was like this with John; the position making her feel that little bit more protected. "I think we need to talk," George said slowly, finally biting the bullet. "What about?" He asked carefully. "About Karen, and about why you looked so frightfully insulted when you saw me kissing her." "I didn't," He protested, but knowing he had. "Darling, I'm not blind," George said gently. "I just didn't expect it, that's all. Being told a thing, and actually witnessing it, are really quite different." "I know, but it is something you're going to have to get used to. I'm not going to apologise for who I am, or refuse to acknowledge something that's part of me, just because it makes you feel uncomfortable." "I don't expect you to," He insisted, hating the fact that she could see right through him. "You might not expect me to," George replied seriously. "But I know that part of you would like me to. It would be far easier for you if you didn't have to acknowledge that I find women sexually attractive as well as men. You think it gives you a type of rival that you can't compete with." "I suppose that's what it feels like sometimes," He admitted. "And do you really think I don't occasionally see Jo as something I can't compete with?" "Why should you?" "For any number of reasons, John, most of which I'm not going to bother to go into now. The point is, I got used to Jo's presence in your life, and Jo got used to mine. You don't know it, but it was an uphill struggle for both of us. You will begin to accept that Karen is part of my life, because that is the only way we can all be happy. I do love you, and I will always love you. Nothing will ever change that. But with me, for now, comes Karen as well. She's part of the package, and that's how it's going to stay."