It was a curious thing to have done, so unconsciously.
Or was it?
She was extraordinarily like Sue.
"Do you sleep with many women?"
"It depends what you mean by many?"
"Well, are you one of those men who has a different girl every time?"
"No."
He wanted to turn over, back up against her and go to sleep. First of all he wanted to take his arm from under her where the cramp was beginning.
"Are you turning your back on me?"
That was like Sue, needing attention at all times. But then most of them were like that.
She pulled the bedclothes back, sat up on one elbow and ran her fingers up his arm and down his thigh and his leg.
"You've got a marvellous body for a man of your age."
"Thanks."
"How old are you?"
"Forty-three."
"Old enough to be my Daddy."
CHAPTER ONE
"Darling, can you come and sit on the suitcase?"
He sat on the suitcase, the largest of the three matching pigskins. She got down on her knees and clicked it shut.
"I suppose that's it?"
After twenty-four hours of weeping and drama it was about time. In just a little while it would be all over. The everlasting peace and tranquility and bachelorhood would follow.
He'd never get involved again. Never.
"Will you be all right by yourself?" She put her arms round his neck as she pulled herself up.
"I'll manage." The irritation was going to show through if he wasn't careful.
"I'm going to miss you terribly. Are you going to miss me?"
He got up, gently broke away and handed her her crocodile handbag.
"We've been through all that. Don't make it harder on yourself or on me. You know I'll miss you."
"I'm sorry," she said.
He picked up the three suitcases. They were heavy but somehow he was going to get them all to the car at once. When the door was closed she wasn't going to have any excuse to go back.
"You've got my address?" she asked.
"Of course."
"But I'll write first anyway. God ... to think I'll have to sleep with Jacques tonight."
Poor Jacques.
No. That wasn't fair. Sooner or later he would miss her there, in bed. But he needed a rest.
God he needed the rest!
He put the suitcases in the boot while she looked back at the villa. She went into a drama bit about leaving it for ever, about how happy she had been there, about how happy she was that he was buying it, then noticed he was holding the door for her, so got in.
"Do you think I ought to take the pills now?"
"Not yet. Wait till we're at the airport. You'll have time enough."
They were off then at last. Down the short black tarmac drive to the dusty stony track, the olive trees on either side bending in the sudden wind.
"Paris'll be murder after this."
He would let her talk. He would just drive. He would drive and concentrate on the road and not get involved in any argument, in any sentimentality.
Onto the straight but bumpy main road to Malaga now with the blue green sea and small deserted beaches on the left and the rocks and sugar cane fields on the right and the mountains beyond. Algarrobo, Benajarafe, Rincon de la Victoria, the square, one-storied houses, whitewashed monthly, the brand-new aluminum street lights, the plastic bar signs everywhere, all taking the eye off the more rewarding palm tree or mule, or coupled oxen. It would all be built up soon, holiday villas all the way, holiday blocks instead of fishermen's boats on the beaches, and he would be responsible for some of it.
"It's been a long time," she said.
"Mmmmmmmm."
"Since I saw Jacques. Seven months. It's a long time."
She was already in Paris, in her apartment with its fifteen bedrooms, twelve kitchens, ten bathrooms and a hundred servants, or whatever it was.
"Perhaps I should have got there before him. Like yesterday I mean. Do you think arriving the same day is wrong?"
"No, I think it's right. He can take you out to dinner and you can hold hands and talk over the past and the future from the same starting point. Neither of you will have had time to get more established than the other in your old home."
And she started crying again.
He didn't have to ask why. He had just opened up the very box of tricks he had successfully managed to close three days ago. He would have to think up something really clever now to shut her up till they got to the airport.
"The main thing to think about is the sort of life you'll be leading which you really enjoy. The new collections, the cinemas, theatres, friends "
"Oh, shut up!"
Her momentary anger dried the tears and he overtook a lorry on a bend which was risky, but it took her mind off the situation. It took his off it, anyway.
Two hours more to go at the most. There'd be the checking in and the last drink at the bar, the buying of magazines and papers. He would waste five minutes in the servicio, and there was the parking of the car. He'd make it.
"When will I see you again Jey?"
"October when I come to Paris." It was a lie. He wasn't going to go.
"You're so matter-of-fact about it. Do you care?"
He slowed the car down deliberately and turned to look at her.
"You know I care. Let's not make it worse than it is."
"I'm sorry."
He switched on the radio and the inevitable hand-clapping, heel-tapping flamenco jarred the nerves a bit more, but he left it on. An hour and twenty minutes to go. She'd be through the customs barrier, pigskin cases, wet handkerchief and all. How could he be so impatient to get rid of someone he'd loved? How long could he have gone on pretending he was happy with her?
"Oh, Jey, I've got awful news. Jacques has been promoted and is going back to Paris and wants me to join him. I can't refuse...." And he had suddenly been made aware of his release. "It was a promise, if he got a new post and had to put up a respectable front I'd go back ... so I've got to." And he'd pretended from then on that it was a shock.
He'd miss her of course. He'd miss her in ways he couldn't imagine. Something would happen tomorrow or the day after that would make him want her. But he'd had enough for a while. He'd really had enough. The jealous scenes when it wasn't necessary, the unawareness when annoyance would have been understandable, late nights when he wanted to go to bed early, and her insecurity, her guilt, her need to state her position in the social scale as though it mattered. Her incessant talk of money. Well, she'd have that now.
"Are you going by the harbor or through the centre?"
"Don't know. Why?"
"Go through the centre, I love those trees so much."
Malaga at last, past the bullring on the left, the fountain and the central avenue of trees, the promise of heat and coolness in the shadows, the colorful buggies with horses wearing funny straw hats. He'd be seeing them in an hour again. It was nice to be staying.
Fifteen minutes later, the airport, the stubborn policeman in blue uniform, helmet and black boots, prohibiting parking to make it difficult to get near the departures entrance. He ignored the waves as everyone did, got out, signalled a porter to get the luggage out of the boot.
From now on it would be downhill.
And it was all quicker than expected. She was as anxious as he was to get it over. Maybe she had been pretending all along too. Maybe she was delighted to go back to Jacques and be rid of the comparatively dull life he led.
But then the tears.
Was she that good an actress?
The check-in, the flight number called unusually promptly. A quick gin and tonic to swallow the tranquillizers. Would he be on the roof? He didn't have to stay if he didn't want to.
The nervous squeezing of hands, passport clutched with ticket and gloves, an awareness of tears in his own eyes, of unwanted sorrow.
"Goodbye Cherry."
Christ, did he want her to stay?
A wave, dark glasses down. Stamp, stamp from the insensitive customs official who saw the same thing every day a hundred times.
No looking back.
He turned on his heels and walked down the marble hall, up the stairs to the terrace bar. The sun, the powerful breeze, the deafening jets. KLM, Iberia, Lufthansa and Air France.
Eventually the passenger bus and her slim figure appearing below and looking up and waving. In control now. Dressed beautifully of course, chic, men turning round to look at her, at her legs. And the unexpected pride that she was his.
Had been his.
So soon? The feeling that he would miss her. Perhaps he only loved her when she was dressed.
The bus off, the figures bobbing up the gangway, the scream of jets, the stream of exhaust and a dot in the sky.
All over.
The end of the affair.
And he was surprised to find himself in need of a stiff whisky before driving back. Unusual for him. Unusual to have to ward away the thoughts that were coming in on him. Cherry in Paris hugged and kidded by a husband he did not know, rich, successful, her life not his, much more her life, one he couldn't possibly offer her, if he wanted to?
There would be contact with her of course, the very contact he thought he would not want, the house. The nearly necessary letters to ask about boundaries or drainage, the payments over five years, and after a while she might come back. How strange to want her so quickly, to miss her, to fear the lonely drive back and the empty house.
Then he caught the smile of an air hostess who wanted to be vulnerable, and he put his empty glass down and realized that maybe, maybe, it was for the best.
The villa was full of reminders of course. Her scent in the bedroom and the labels of her new sweaters in the empty drawers of the cupboard, the painting she had bought in Marbella, and the gold lighter that did not work.
The bed was made, Esperanza had been and the breakfast things were washed up and put away. It was evening, six o'clock, the time of day he liked least. There was nothing to do but wait for tomorrow, the plans he had of moving the furniture around to make the place more lived in, more his, would have to wait. He was too tired now.
A bath, a long deep bath and maybe another drink, and maybe a stroll down to the town, alone, a visit to the old bars he hadn't visited for months, that was what he would do.
The first feeling of freedom came when he turned on the taps without having to tell her what he was doing. She would have asked "What are you doing?"
"I'm having a bath," and there would have been a comment. Nothing much, nothing meaningful or important, just a remark, like "Early isn't it?" or "I'll have one after you." That was the one that jarred.
He watched the steam coming up from the water. He started to undress, and just the feel of himself, just the sight of himself in the mirror brought home the intimacy he was going to miss. She really loved him. She really loved being near him.
Perhaps she loved being near Jacques just as much?
He got into the water, stretched the taut muscles, lay back, relaxed and closed his eyes.
A bachelor again.
After twenty years of emotional disasters, a bachelor again.
It was just past ten when he parked the car in the small square in front of the church. He got out, watched by the youths of Reina-del-Mar waiting outside the cinema opposite where posters promised blood and violence in an ancient film, and paused to look up at the tall palm trees shining white against the black night sky.
He avoided the Paseo where the locals walked up and down before going to bed and where the majority of foreigners sat at cafe tables sipping their last gins, and decided to have a walk around the town.
Up Calle Generalissimo Franco then, with its one remaining town house and beautifully wrought iron gate leading to an inner courtyard filled with potted plants, and next to it the new Moroccan shop selling kaftans and jelahbas, brass trays and leather work, run by a wild-eyed hairy artist from Casablanca. To the right the Mexican restaurant owned by the couple from East Side, New York, and further up the electrical shop, the shoe shop, the Spanish haberdashery displaying plastic egg cups and musical boxes, and into the narrow street leading to Palamino's, the oldest bar in town.
Whitewashed houses, tiled roofs, the tin drain-pipes cut to look like simple gargoyles, the recently finished Banco de Iberia all glass and marble fascia with leather armchairs, silence and peace inside. The souvenir shop next to it, overcrowded with postcards and sunglasses, Kodak film to suit every camera in the world and last week's newspapers from London, Paris, the States.
Round into the quiet residential street, no commerce here, true Andalusia with its ground floor iron window grilles sticking far out into the street forcing the pavement pedestrian into the road, and sudden shouts, sudden laughter as two boys on bicycles in bright Carnaby Street T-shirts, one with a hamburger stuck in his mouth, the other precariously balancing a small guitar across his handlebars, came racing down, the privileged foreigners followed by Paco and Manuel, Manolo and Sebastien, Miguel, Sanchez and Emilio running behind, screaming.
And in the doorways the quieter girls, so beautiful with their large wide eyes, black hair in pigtails, short skirts, mini-faldas, spotless, the older ones sporting slacks daringly, no jeans, jeans were only for the hippies.
And the aged grandmothers and great-grandmothers, buns of grey hair, dressed in ever black, shouting for help from in front of the television-Carmen! Rosario! Pilar! Angelita! go and get your brother, your cousin, your uncle, your father.
He walked down Calle Granada, not sure where he was going, but aware that he was enjoying the feeling of Spain, what was left of it. At certain hours of the day it was still Spanish, when the foreigners went home prior to going out on the town, or around now when they were in the bars busy drinking. The old fishing village came back to life then, the mules came back from the campo and were walked through the front rooms to the stables at the back, the housewife energetically mopping up whatever dirt was left on the way.
A new estate agency where the old house had been pulled down, German this time, it made a change from the English and Belgian. And he went into the Mar-y-Sol for the first copa of wine.
Tapas? The free snack with every glass. He had a fried sardine and a leaf of lettuce soused with vinegar, each served on a separate little white oval plate.
The bread man was there, and the postman's brother, a few fishermen who knew him by sight, the man who sold motorcycles on the main road. What a very different life they led. Where were their horizons? Where was his? And who was better off? Happier?
He did the round after that, the Spanish round, the Mariscos, Pepe Gomez, the Tavema Toledano, the Piscina, the one without a name where they served pinchitos and chicken livers in wine sauce, the Casino, small and noisy, and finally, well past midnight, into the more sophisticated surroundings of the Aquarius Bar after collecting the car.
He had a brandy, sipped it slowly, felt pleasantly tired and now knowing he would easily go to sleep, decided to call it a day.
Then the American girl came in.
She was eighteen, maybe twenty, a little shorter than him, slim, freckles, chestnut hair. She wore the standard uniform for young American travellers, the well-worn Levis, the faded T-shirt with no bra, Moroccan beads, leather purse. There was nothing original about her, nothing special to rave about, except her blatant sexiness.
"What do people drink around here?"
Innocence itself. Did she really imagine that he would think she wanted to know.
He didn't answer but just looked at her.
"I'm sorry. You don't speak English. Habla es-panol?"
Delightful.
"I speak English," he said.
It sounded plummy. Maybe he had had more than he thought.
He sat up.
"I don't mean to be rude," he went on, "staring like this, but you remind me of someone ... , but I can't think who."
She smiled.
It was true, however banal it sounded, she reminded him of someone, and he couldn't think who it was.
"You're the man with the blue Citroen and the beautiful wife," she said.
"The Citroen yes, the wife no. That is, she's not my wife and she's gone."
"I'm sorry."
He was about to say he wasn't, but that wasn't true, so he said nothing.
"What will you have?" he asked.
"What are you drinking?"
"Brandy."
"I'll just have a red wine."
He ordered her the wine, handed it to her and got off the bar stool.
"Shall we go and sit over there?"
He led the way to a quiet comer where they could sit comfortably together. He was just going to let things happen. If they happened, they happened. He wasn't going to push in any direction.
"Where are you staying?"
"I thought I'd try the beach."
"You've just arrived?"
"Yes."
"You can come and stay at my place if you want."
She smiled, a trifle victoriously.
"I'd like a bath."
Very casually, as though a contract had been signed, as though an irrevocable agreement had been reached, she put her hand on his and squeezed it very gently.
Then she got up, crossed the room to speak to a girl he had not noticed before, a girl like her, but smaller, plumper, less attractive, and came back apparently ready to go.
"Does your friend want to come too?"
"No. She had a bath last night."
CHAPTER TWO
It was all too quick and too sudden.
She drank her wine in two gulps, rather as though she wanted to leave with a prize she had won before someone could claim it back, stood up, and waited for him to finish his brandy.
That's how he felt. Like a prize. He had made the opening move, but the way she had accepted his invitation made him feel as though she had tricked him into it.
Perhaps she had?
She was very pretty, standing there being stared at by the hungry Spaniards in their bright orange open neck shirts and baggy trousers. Every male in that room wanted her, and she knew it, was working at it.
He held a note out to the barman, but looked at her. She was very feminine, overdoing the coy look now, then aware of it and moving off towards the door. There was intelligence there, a sense of timing, an actress if there ever was one. She wouldn't reveal herself for a long time, it would be a short but very intense relationship, he would give nothing away and once he had found out what she was about, what she enjoyed, he would probably get bored; as he always got bored.
The barman handed him his change and he joined her at the door.
It was working out well. He was sufficiently primed to feel amorous, she obviously had a very beautiful body, the legs long, the breasts young, he would drive slowly, impress her with the house, with the pool if she wasn't an heiress and had seen it all before, take her to bed ... and face a new life tomorrow.
The car reminded him of Cherry, and he realized that he had managed to forget her, that he would get through-the night happily after all, that she might herself be in bed with Jacques.
He smiled at that.
It was that sort of closeness with Cherry which would haunt him for ever of course, the ability to laugh with her, and only with her at the rest of the world. Did he imagine then that they would one day be back together and talk of this night? How he had taken a teenage American chick to bed to forget her?
"How about going to another bar, or a disco or something? I'd really like that," the teenage American chick said. She had opened the oar door herself and was getting in.
A commanding little bitch.
He closed her door and walked slowly round to his own side. So she was going to play with him a little. Having hooked him she was going to make him pay for the enjoyment to come. However young, however liberal they were, they always wanted to get paid one way or another. Straight-forward unceremonious fucks were only for the super-sophisticated.
He got into the driver's seat, lowered the window his side and started the engine.
"What sort of atmosphere would you like?" he asked.
"There's a choice?"
"Yes. There's a Spanish bar with fishing nets and bullfight posters, there's a green and black circular bar run by a couple of English queens. There's a German bar, an Italian restaurant, an old-fashioned night club with red carpets on the walls, or a discotheque which plays Tom Jones and has the feeling of the London underground-subway to you."
"What would you like?"
"I'd like to go to bed."
He said it casually, truthfully, because right at that moment he suddenly felt tired and just wanted to go to bed.
"O.K."
She said it just as casually and he had to make an effort not to show his surprise, not to give away the fact that under the youthful forty-year-old front and the mask of total sophistication there was a truly forty-three-year-old man who was always a little surprised by the brazenness of the young.
He put the car into gear and they moved off.
Jesus he was so hypocritical! Because now of course his mind was racing ahead and planning on the lead in, the soft lights and sweet music. What record would he put on, LP, whatever they called it now. Eighteen, nineteen ... who would it be? Cat Stevens? They were so fussy and so destructive in their criticism. Who had Rose liked to much? Richard Harris? Was she a Richard Harris girl?
"I don't know your name," he said.
"Julie." Then a strange hesitation. "I don't know yours."
"Jey," he said.
Well they knew each other's names.
He turned into the main street and accelerated down the short straight mile before turning down the beach road.
"Where are you from?" he asked.
"California."
"You've been in Spain long?"
"Just over a week."
"What made you come down here?"
"Thinking of going to Morocco."
"With your friend?"
"Oh she's no friend. I mean, we haven't been travelling together. Just happened to meet in Granada."
"She from California too?"
"Maryland."
Which seemed to be the end of her.
He changed gear to go down the hill onto the rough track, and then accelerated up the tarmac drive to the villa.
The headlights caught the chrome of the swimming pool steps.
"Oh, you have a pool! Wow!"
"It's not very big."
"Can I have a swim?"
"You can have anything you like."
He pulled up and they both got out. She ignored the house and went straight to the edge of the pool, and he followed.
She kicked off a sandal and dipped a toe in the water then looked over her shoulder at him in a very familiar way. She definitely reminded him of someone, but he still couldn't pinpoint it Rose had had that sort of movement, but it wasn't Rose. Someone further back. She was really a very attractive girl, long hair, a little matted, lean arms, long hands, long fingers.
She dropped her leather purse, undid her belt, crossed her arms to take off her T-shirt from the back and over her head-that unbelievably feminine and sexy mannerism they all had-the great disrobing, the first veil, and for a moment she stood with her back to him apparently nude from the waist up, then she slipped out of her jeans and dived into the pool, naked.
He didn't move. He watched the dark hair flowing out over her back, he watched the regular foamy beat of feet as she swam to the other end. She duck-dived, disappeared, reappeared, turned, just floated there in the dark water. He could make out her white breasts, the darkness between her legs, she was quite unselfconscious, completely unaware of him, of the effect she was having on him. Or was she?
He moved away, walked round to the terrace under the bedroom balcony, and switched on the pool lights.
"Oh, wow! I'm a bit grubby you know, and came here for a bath to wash!"
Her voice broke on the last word. For a moment he had thrown her, but she duck-dived and came up again smiling.
He switched off the lights, not for her sake but simply because the Guardia might be looking down from the neighboring hills and then make it their duty to call just to make sure that what they had seen was not what they had seen.
"Why don't you come in too?"
In the nude? He was too self-conscious for that. Or right now he was. Later. After. After he would.
"Not right now. I'll get you a towel."
He unlocked the front door and walked into the house geared to expect Cherry's scent, but there was just the smell of lavender polish. He went up the broad tiled staircase to the bathroom, took a large bath towel from the linen cupboard and went back down. The towel felt soft and smelt of the perfumed sea and sand, cherry-red of course, like all the towels in the house. He could make something pf that if he wanted to, but it would be leaning over backwards to be sentimental, and a little sick.
She was waiting in the water at the shallow end by the steps, shivering, shaking her head backwards to get the water out of her hair. She was quite beautiful and he wanted to take hold of her there and then, but checked himself and just swung the large towel round onto her back and moved slightly away.
She didn't appreciate the gesture which was a pure sacrifice for the sake of decorum, so he picked up her jeans, T-shirt, sandals and purse and led the way into the house.
"This all you've got?" he asked.
"No, I have a haversack."
"Where did you leave it?"
"At the Pension Moreno."
If she hadn't hesitated on the last word then looked up and smiled guiltily he might not have thought too much about it, but she had suggested earlier, by saying she was going to sleep on the beach, that she had nowhere else to go. So he wasn't the hunter, but the hunted. For all he knew she had already cased the house, knew he had a pool, planned it all in advance. But why? Because he was an attractive man in his forties and attractive men in their forties instinctively fascinated young girls? It was a fact he had taken years to understand, or at least the years since he had been forty. Girls invariably liked him because he made the decisions and gave them a sense of security, because he was nice to be with, after which he had to take the consequences.
But he liked a fight, strangely enough, liked women to play hard to get, liked to go through the old romantic conventions. The easy girl was all very well when you were starved of their company, but he wasn't, and hadn't been for too long.
He showed her into the bedroom, unhooked Cherry's discarded bathrobe from the back of the bathroom door, and threw it on the bed.
"Thank you," she said politely.
"I'm going to make myself an egg and bacon sandwich, and some coffee ... want any?"
He turned at the door.
She was standing in a tiny pool of water, dripping and shivering, holding the large towel close to herself. She nodded affirmatively. With her hair wet and tight back off her forehead she looked younger than ever. He stepped towards her and kissed her very gently on her cold lips, then left the room.
Well, what was it all about?
There he was supposedly tired out, longing for the last three months to get shot of all involvements, longing for freedom, the life of the single man, and now he was allowing himself to be seduced by a teenage girl.
What would be the outcome? She'd stay of course, for several days. The pool, the villa, the sea, the beach, it was all too good to be true. He'd have to invent a few problems, a few drawbacks: like having to go to Madrid on Tuesday? Then she'd probably be going to Madrid too.
He put two pieces of bread in the toaster, butter in a frying pan, bacon under the grill and got four eggs out of the refrigerator. As far as kitchens went there were few to beat this one, it had been carefully planned in advance and built accordingly. Tiled in blues and greens with saucepans and accessories to match. He liked it. There was an arch at one end that served as a food hatch and bar to the long sitting room running the length of the house on the side overlooking the pool and the beach and sea half a mile or so away.
After cracking the eggs and turning the bacon over he went into the sitting room and switched on the soft lights but decided to let her choose the sweet music.
As he popped two more pieces of bread into the toaster, she came in and stood by the door.
"You live here alone?"
"It's a long and complicated story, but yes."
She was in the beach robe, just the beach robe and nothing on her feet.
"You ought to put your sandals on, you get sore throats standing on cold tiles."
"You sound very fatherly."
"I'm a very fatherly type." He was certainly fatherly towards little girls right up until he got them into bed. He chuckled inwardly. Ogre. Dirty old man.
"Have you any children?"
"No," he lied, and then realized who she was like. Sue, his first wife. His only wife. He'd managed to avoid another marriage after her. She'd had a daughter. His. God knows where they were now.
When he looked up she had gone and was wandering about in the sitting room.
"The LPs are in the corner by the fireplace."
"What would you like?"
"What you'd like."
There was a good choice, ninety to a hundred collected over the years. Gifts many of them, some returned. Only two in fact. He never played those. It had hurt. Strange how everything tonight was leading back to the past. Natural perhaps after the emotional tension of the last few days, all the unwanted thoughts free to roam in his head now.
The past!
He slapped the bacon down on the buttered toast, the eggs on top and the other bit of toast on top of that. What a great cook! She'd probably treat it like a hamburger and put mustard and tomato sauce and marmalade all over it.
Then she surprised him by putting on a piece of Mozart, or rather didn't surprise him at all.
Because he was old and because a quick glance through the records told them that he had more classics than pop, they decided he was a classics man, and if there was one thing not conducive to a first seduction it was Mozart; what was needed was someone like Errol Gamer.
"Do you like that?" she asked.
"Not mad...."
"I thought it would be right for you."
"I know you did."
"Something else? Let me guess."
He put the two plates of sandwiches on the bar, with a bottle of white wine from the fridge, the salt, pepper, tomato ketchup and mustard, and a bowl of fruit.
"Sarah Vaughan? Julie London? Ella Fitzgerald?"
"You've been to bed with too many old men." He was pouring the wine in the flute glasses.
"I haven't been to bed with any."
A virgin? He looked at her surprised.
"Old men," she added. "So far only young, virile, sporty graduates who fuck around to talk about it afterwards."
"You sound a little disappointed." Here it was coming, the verbal seduction-what can you expect with young men baby, why not try a mature experienced male like me?
"Older men must be more fun," she said.
Who was seducing who?
"Eat your sandwich like a good girl," he said.
So she took the plate and went and sat down in the comfortable leather chair near the music, leaving him alone at the bar. He Would have put his hand on her leg, would have enjoyed feeling lecherous doing so, but she was going to play hard to get.
So would he.
He took a bite of his sandwich, and went into the kitchen to make the coffee, after which he remained on that side of the bar. Games people play. If she was going to seduce him, then he'd make it hard for her, and enjoy it.
"Black or white and do you take sugar?"
"Black please. And one."
She was standing up now, hands in the pockets of Cherry's bathrobe, looking a bit like Cherry. She was starting at one end of the bookshelves and working her way along. Art books and architecture, furniture and antique books, the odd memoir, biography, not much fiction.
He put the coffee on the bar top, sat down on the kitchen stool and started stirring his.
"Would you like a brandy, or something?"
I'd love an anise."
And she sat down with a look deliberately ignoring the coffee on her side of the bar.
So he was now obliged to take her anise and her coffee over to her, and once on that side of the bar he would naturally stay. So she had won that round.
Clever, subtle-unless she was completely innocent and all this was going on in his head. But she was too perceptive and intelligent a girl and too aware of a woman's potential for her aloofness to be anything but deliberate.
He put her coffee and the liqueur glass on the table next to her, and sat down with his opposite.
She was looking at a book on medieval armor and he decided, quite suddenly, that he didn't want to know anything about her. Either she was a student of history and genuinely interested in the subject, or she was trying to project an intellectual image. Either way, all he wanted to do now was go up to bed, slip well down between the sheets and feel her warm comfort next to him. He no longer felt amorous, just pleased that he wouldn't be alone.
She closed the book and stretched her arm out to take her coffee. She stirred it and sipped it a little, blew on it and looked at him over the rim of the mug. Then she put it down and opened the book again, and studied the first page, reached for her sandwich and took a bite.
"Who's Sue?"
He didn't answer straight away. As she asked the question she had looked up at him much as a school mistress looks up from a pupil's exercise book when a stupid mistake has been made. It was a pure "Sue' look, and it was very unnerving.
"My wife. We were divorced after two years."
"I'm sorry."
"No need to be. The feelings were mutual."
She glanced at some of the colour plates but he knew that she wasn't really looking at them.
"It's her you remind me of as a matter-of-fact. When I said you reminded me of someone, in the bar, I meant it."
"Is that nice, do you think, to remind someone of his first wife?"
"She was very pretty."
"Thank you."
She closed the book and concentrated on finishing the sandwich. She then drank her coffee aware that he was looking at her, but not looking up at him, then took a sip of the anise.
"D'you know what I'd like to do?" she said. "I'd like to have my bath now, and sip this while I'm having it"
"Of course."
He got up, wondering if in fact she was older than she looked, her mannerisms were remarkably mature, then he noticed that her hand was trembling.
"Are you all right?"
"Yes, fine, thanks."
And she got up to make it look all right.
To save her any embarrassment, he left the room and went upstairs to the bathroom to turn on the water.
Somewhere along the way this girl was going to give him trouble. She was playing it very cool, but inside she was only just under control. Was it because she had committed herself and couldn't get out of it?
He suddenly felt sorry for her. Maybe he was taking too much for granted? Should he offer her the guest room, the other bathroom? He was forcing the pace maybe.
"What colour bathroom would you like?" He shouted down the stairs. "Red and white tiles, or dark blue with beige overtones?"
"Yours!"
He was off his head. Little girls nowadays did not come back to men's places expecting to be ignored. They never had. Why was he always so unsure of himself?
He went into the bedroom, into the cherry-red and white bathroom and turned on the hot water. There were clean towels, new soap, cosmetics, scent bottles still lined up on the glass shelf, everything perfect except maybe the sheets in the bed. He'd have to change those while she was having a bath.
He turned and nearly collided with her in the doorway, she was holding out her empty liqueur glass.
"Could I have some more?"
He took the glass.
Half an hour before in the same room he had kissed her lightly and amusingly on the mouth, now it would be impossible. A gulf had widened between them for no apparent reason. He knew that within another half an hour he would be in bed with her. Emotions changed, he just had to expect it.
Downstairs in the bar he poured out another glass of anise, and a glass of brandy, French brandy, for himself. The Spanish brandy was all right with water, but hardly what he wanted to relax the tension in his stomach. His stomach, right now, was in an extraordinary state. She was twisting it around. Either he was very tired, on the point of exhaustion, or he had an uncanny premonition that he was heading for disaster. A tranquillizer might be better than a brandy but he hadn't taken a tranquillizer since ... God? Since Celia.
Bloody women! It was extraordinary what they did to him.
He took the glasses up to the bathroom. She was already in the bath, her back a dark brown except where her bikini had stopped the sun. He put her glass down on the comer.
"There are various bath oils, if you want them."
"So I see."
"I think Jasmine might be nice tonight," he said looking at the selection.
"Jasmine it is then," and she reached for the bottle of Jasmine essence and poured a good measure into the water.
"What colour sheets would you like?" he asked.
"You're a great man for giving one choices. What's wrong with the ones on the bed now?"
"I slept with someone else in them last night."
"The attractive sophisticated woman who's not your wife?"
"Yes. Her name was Cherry."
"Was? It's that final?"
"Yes," he said after a moment. He was looking at the choice of sheets in the linen cupboard. Cherry had a great fad for colour, and there was everything there the rainbow could offer.
"I don't mind," she called out.
"You don't mind what?"
"I don't mind sleeping in her sheets."
"How about yellow?"
"Jasmines are white."
She had a lively mind.
He chose olive green.
He drew back all the bedclothes and started making the bed. One way or another he spent a good deal of time stripping beds, making beds, and lying in them. An occupational hazard.
She got out of the bath as he changed the pillow cases, perfect timing because he didn't want to get into bed before her-just in case she swept out of the room asking where she was going to sleep. The amorous feeling was coming back now, the feel of the bed probably, and the thought that she might not, at the last minute, want to.
"Can I use your toothbrush?"
"Yes. It's the blue one."
"There is only one."
Of course. Cherry had taken hers. The intimacy of the toothbrush. Marriage was when your toothbrushes shared the same mug. A love affair was when you shared the same one.
She came in, dry, nude as the day she was born, hugging herself and acting out a false little shiver which saw her across the room and quickly into bed.
Now it was up to him.
He went into the bathroom, brushed his teeth like a good boy, took off his shirt, sponged himself with cold water, dried himself, sprayed a little deodorant all over, closed the door and washed some more, then walked back into the bedroom holding his stomach well in. He could do that without much difficulty, the craving to be an Adonis at forty had started him on a series of stomach exercises that had proved successful. When he wanted to he could look slim, even if it meant talking in short, breathless sentences.
He undid his belt, took off his trousers and took down his briefs.
He too could play the nude scene without batting an eyelid and a glance in the mirror told him she wasn't daring to look anyway.
He switched off the main light, the stair light, opened the Venetian blinds so that the moonlight came streaming in, and got into bed beside her. It was unbelievably unromantic and clinical. He hadn't even kissed her or held her in his arms. Her fault; she shouldn't have displayed herself so brazenly, making him feel lecherous and so forcing him to hold back.
"I'm frightened," she said in a small voice from the depths of her pillow.
"And so you should be," he answered.
But nothing felt right. It had all happened to quickly.
There was silence for a long while and he didn't move, and he felt she wasn't moving either.
Then he pulled back the bedclothes and got out of bed.
"For Christ's sake let's go and have a swim!"
"God, yes!' she said. "I couldn't believe it was going to be that awful."
CHAPTER THREE
He led her down the stairs in the dark to the hallway, then further down to the dining room which he had been using as a study. The moonlight, a half moon, was bright enough to show up the refectory table and the chairs. He avoided them, feeling more sensitive about pieces of furniture than usual, reached the door and walked out into the warmer air outside.
The villa faced south down a narrow valley leading to the sea, and to the left on the ridge of a hill there were several smaller villas, suburban constructions housing the bourgeois beiges who overlooked the pool, though at a distance. To come out of the house the front way in the nude holding a girl by the hand could be asking for trouble, specially as he had been indiscreet before with the lights. By using the back way now they could slip unseen in the water and enjoy a midnight swim in privacy.
On the edge of the pool he let go of her hand and dived in. The water was warm, the small squares of the mosaic bottom familiar to the touch even in the dark. A rush of white bubbles swept past him and he saw Julie's feet beating the water above him. He came up, reached for her legs and drew himself up alongside her. She swam on her back and he, like a spawning fish, swam over her putting his arms round her cool slippery body, squeezing her and pulling her down under.
She put her hands round his waist, then down his thighs, they then parted and swam as though in a water ballet.
"Oh ... isn't it marvellous?" Her voice broke on the "oh'.
He dived again, losing her, losing himself, and when he came up she was right behind him, playful and unexpectedly strong. She put her hands on his head, and her whole weight then pushed him under. It caught him unawares and the water went up his nose. He struggled. She stayed on him. He needed air. He had to fight back. He twisted, reached out for something, his hand slid up the inside of her leg into the hair, her legs tightened round his hand, a drowning man clutching at a straw, he thought. Then he felt her hand clutching at his straw. The agony and the ecstasy. He just made the surface in time to take the essential breath and she was really gripping him. His feet felt the bottom, they could stand, so they stood, and they kissed shoulder deep in the water.
Then she started to shiver.
"Let's go in."
In the dining room she disengaged her hand, rushed round the table, opened the door and laughingly closed it in his face. He opened it and found himself alone in the dark at the bottom of the stairs.
"Julie?"
No answer.
So it was going to be hide and seek.
He though of putting on the light, but that wasn't fair, so he tip-toed into the sitting room and stood still to listen to any tell-tale breathing.
Not a sound.
He went into the kitchen, she wasn't there.
He felt the tiled stairs and they were wet. She had gone up then.
To bed?
Of course.
Slowly he went up, quietly slipped into the bedroom. The moonlight cast slatted light through the Venetian blinds onto the bed. Not there.
The guest room?
No.
The bathroom? No.
Up to the roof terrace then?
The door was open. The roof terrace overlooked by both sides of the valley, by all the bourgeois beiges, and she was there leaning on the balcony rail looking at the distant beach and the sea sparkling in the moonlight.
He stayed in the shadows of the studio room aware of his nakedness.
"The whole world can see you there," he said.
"Does it matter?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"It's a respectable residential area, with retired people who shock easily."
"That's fun. Let's shock them some more."
"What for?"
"I like shocking people."
"So you're a schoolgirl after all."
She didn't like that and turned round to look at the sea again. At the same moment a car drove along the ridge and its headlights caught her and showed her up white and very naked against the black sky.
Instinctively she covered her breasts with her hands then turned and came towards him, darted a dangerous lunge between his legs and slipped through the doorway.
So she was young, so they couldn't play hide-and-seek on the roof, so they'd play it in the house. The chase was on again.
She ran down the stairs at a dangerous speed while he had visions of slipping and bruising himself. He heard her go into the sitting room, the door squeaking slightly as she touched it. So he was quick and he was in there behind her in the centre of the room. He grabbed hold of her and she struggled, not pretending but really trying to get away. He gripped her more tightly, edged her towards the long leather sofa, toppled her and fell on her.
She shook her head from side to side violently refusing him. It was as near rape as he had ever been. She was strong, and still struggling, and he was pushing her arms back and trying to get a knee between her legs. Then she suddenly relaxed and gave in, as all good girls should.
Victory.
He bent down to kiss her.
"I'm sorry," she said turning aside. "But I've got to go to the bathroom!"
He got off her and released her.
There was a lavatory downstairs so he went to that one. The light was cold, the tiles colder,, his hair wet from the swim, flat on his head making him look like a 1920s roue.
He had sobered up considerably, to the point perhaps of not wanting it any more. The whole business had lost momentum, for him anyway, though it was still possible she was excited.
A strange girl. He now kept his aim on the "o' of "Roca' the sanitary engineer's name and hit it mercilessly for as long as it lasted. Men had such power at their disposal!
When he came out she was in the kitchen wearing Cherry's bathrobe.
"I'm making us some coffee. Would you like a drop of brandy in it?"
"Yes."
The light was bright in the kitchen and it wasn't for quite a while that he realized he wasn't wearing anything and she was, and she was looking at him, surprised perhaps that he was so uninhibited. Score of ten, he read in her eyes.
"I'll get you the bottle."
He went into the sitting room, put the bottle on the bar.
"You look cold," she said. "Go to bed, I'll bring this up. D'you take sugar?"
"Two."
And he went upstairs and got into the comfortable bed between the warm sheets and watched her come in with the coffee, and watched her put his cup down on his bedside table and her cup on hers, watched her take Cherry's bathrobe off, and watched her get in beside him.
Visually, anyway, they knew each other as much as they ever would. She then leaned towards him and kissed him and they sank deeper together in the bed.
"Why did you call me Sue?"
"What?"
"Why did you call me Sue?"
"Did I?"
"Right in the middle you said "Sue" and sighed."
"I'm sorry."
It was a curious thing to have done, so unconsciously. Or was it? She was extraordinarily like Sue.
"Do you sleep with many women?"
"It depends what you mean by many."
"Well, are you one of those men who has a different girl every time?"
"No."
He wanted to turn over, back up against her and go to sleep.
First of all he wanted to take his arm from under her where the cramp was beginning.
"Are you turning your back on me?"
That was like Sue wanting attention all the time. Strange how he was drawn to the same types. Cherry had been like Celia in some ways, Clare like Sue, Rose like Sue, and now this girl. Physically and characteristically they were the same.
Who was he like? Jacques?
She pulled the bedclothes back, sat up on one elbow and ran her fingers down his arm, down his thigh, his leg.
"You've got a marvellous body for a man of your age."
"Thanks."
"How old are you?"
"Forty-three."
"Old enough to be my Daddy."
He hadn't thought of it this time. It was a boring thought. He had slept with girls young enough to be his daughter before, it was like an old music hall joke, and they didn't usually enjoy the idea that much either, but this one did. She seemed to relish the thought "We didn't drink our coffee."
"It'll be a bit cold now."
"Won't it! You certainly know how to make it last."
He didn't say anything. Part of him had gone numb in the brain somewhere, a deliberate blocks It was something to do with Sue. He had a daughter didn't he? He hadn't calculated how old she would be now and he wasn't sure he wanted to, but somewhere across the ocean there was a girl about Julie's age ... and her name was Juliet.
"When's your birthday?" he asked.
"June 5th."
He didn't even know Juliet's birthday. Had never seen her. Sue had left before the child was born which had made it easier for him.
"Where did you say you came from?"
"California. Santa Cruz."
"What's your father do?"
"My uncle's a Certified Public Accountant."
"What about your father?"
"I haven't got one."
He didn't know what his expression was but he didn't want her to see it, so he switched off the light.
The feeling he had in his stomach was something he had last felt when Rose had told him her husband knew and they couldn't see each other again. The hopelessness of something that had been done which couldn't be undone. His mind was fuzzy of course, he was exhausted. It was something like three o'clock in the morning now and he had been up since seven, packing Cherry off which he had been doing emotionally for a whole week.
He would have to think about it all in the morning.
"Is he dead?" he asked. His throat was a little tight.
"Who, my father? No. I just never had one. At least I had. Mummy was married, I mean I was legal. They just got separated before I was born. Divorced."
Ask the question. Don't be a coward.
"What's your mother's name?"
"Camilla."
Well that was it then, twenty-four hours non-stop sleep from now on. All conscience clear. It was a brave question, my God what a brave question, but then on reflection what an unrealistic fantasy. His own daughter in his own bed, after eighteen years. He turned over, towards her this time, and put his hand on one of her breasts, slipped down a little and kissed it. She was a beautiful girl, a really beautiful girl, and she had been really marvellous. There could be a great future there, great potential. He wouldn't mind having her around for a while, she'd be a welcome change from Cherry. At least he'd be able to shut her up.
Then out of nowhere, out of absolutely nowhere came this quite clear picture of Sue's passport, the one he had seen two days before they'd got married. Susan Camilla Hales, with the awful photograph and her description. He had looked at it for a long time, wondering what he was letting himself in for, what marriage really meant.
Susan Camilla Hales, soon to be Susan Camilla Maudran.
"What's your surname?" he asked.
"Collin."
And he sat up and switched on the light.
"What's the matter?"
"Your name is Julie Collin?"
"Yes."
"And your mother's name is Camilla ... what?"
"Collin. Camilla Collin."
"That was her husband's name?"
"No. It's my uncle's name. She changed it by deed-poll."
"What was her married name?"
"I don't know. Why?"
And at that moment he realized that he must keep cool, keep quiet, make her forget the whole incident, because if it was true, then it was she who needed protection from the truth, not him.
CHAPTER FOUR
He fell asleep when the sun was quite high; about seven it must have been. He spent a good deal of the restless night before that looking at Julie, wondering if it were possible.
The features were there one minute and gone the next. The name Collin didn't mean anything; an accountant made sense: Sue's brother-in-law, her sister's husband. He'd heard through his mother a good many years back that Sue had moved from Toronto, maybe had gone to America. So her brother-in-law had carried his family? Unless it was all one great big huge fantasy.
He'd find out. Subtly, very subtly, over breakfast he'd ask her the odd question. There had been that business of her and the heraldry book, questioning the name "Sue'. And on that he had fallen asleep.
He woke up with a nice feeling between his legs, her long fingers holding him. He turned over and allowed her to slip over him. Morning love; trying to avoid breathing over her, his mouth not feeling fresh; realizing she had pulled up the blinds so that the sun blazed in warming them both. And not for a long time, not till he had rolled over and they were both breathing hard, not till he was about to let go, did he remember, and he shut the thought out very quickly, and allowed it to happen again.
"I hope you're on the pill," he said, flat on his back now, relaxed, at peace with the world.
But how imprudent could he be? Why hadn't he asked her last night? An eighteen-year-old chick. Just how adolescent was he?
"Two a day, just to make sure."
"That doesn't sound very wise. Can you do that?"
"I don't, silly."
Funny how affectionate a word like silly was. He liked it. He liked being silly, irresponsible. Young. She was going to be a lot of fun, once he'd got rid of all that rubbish in his head. It just wouldn't feel sexy with his own daughter, it was ridiculous.
"You didn't sleep very much."
"How do you know?"
"I didn't sleep much either."
"You slept like a log."
"I was pretending. You're very worried about something. Is it me?"
"Not particularly. Should I worry about you?"
"Your sophisticated woman friend?"
"I expect so." He stretched out to get a cigarette and offered her one.
"Why did she leave?"
"She's married. Felt she should go back to her husband." He wanted her to go back to her husband! Why not tell the truth?
"How long were you together?"
"Two years, on and off."
"What happens now?"
A good question. What happened now? Her? Did he want someone around so soon? A bad moment to decide. Post-coital depression. And that was a myth, he always felt happier afterwards.
"Have you lived in California all your life?"
"Nearly all my life. I was born in Canada."
He got up and went to the bathroom.
He closed the door, pulled up the blind to let the sun in and looked at himself in the mirror.
She reminded him of Sue. One.
Her name was Julie, short for Juliet. Two.
She was born in Canada. Three.
She was about the right age. Four.
She was the offspring of a broken marriage. Five.
So somewhere there was a fool-proof question. He would have to find it and attack. Her passport would reveal nothing. What would they have in common? His parents. Her grandparents; and he realized he was shaving, the electrical buzz had helped him to think, helped him to control the panic inside.
Looking at his face helped him anyway. There was an extraordinary confidence in his eyes which helped him. It had helped other people part with their money too. Just a good face. Laughing eyes, mocking perhaps, challenging? A dare-devil expression and the white sideburns, grey anyway. Greying hair. Homme mur.
So maybe he had slept with his own daughter.
Who would he tell that to? Cherry? He'd hardly tell her, yet she was more capable of appreciating the situation than most other people.
If it were true.
It could be. It just could be. Hundreds of American girls came to Spain, came to Refna, hundreds came from California. She wasn't unique. It could happen. His daughter, end of school holidays in Europe, educational tour, the Grand Tour, it followed a pattern. If he'd not been in the bar, if Cherry hadn't left, he might never have met her.
How long had she been here?
He opened the door.
She wasn't in the bed. Gone?
He switched the shaver off, put it back in its wall clip and gripped the washbasin tight.
For God's sake!
Now he wanted her to stay. He didn't want to face the day without her. His mind raced. The girl's gone, skipped it, worried that he was worried, concerned for his concern about Cherry-the other woman. What he needed was a harem. A hundred fail-safes.
He put his bathrobe on and started down the stairs.
She was in the kitchen, cooking breakfast. She was nice to look at, tanned legs, long tanned legs, long chestnut hair curling on the shoulders now. No makeup. A few freckles.
"Do you mind?" she asked.
"You cooking breakfast?"
"Yes."
"Why should I?"
"It's ... well ... it's sort of taking over."
"Only in your mind, my lovely. To me it's just having breakfast cooked for me."
He smiled and went into the sitting room, opened the windows wide onto the terrace and pulled out the breakfast table and wicker-work chairs.
Why were the scenes always at breakfast time? Not this one, not yet, but the breakfast table, its surface reminded him of Cherry, the fork mark made when he had said something about not really minding her going back to Jacques, followed by the back pedaling to help heal the wound. Why hadn't she realized that he was generous, protecting her from the obvious truth? He hadn't been able to stand her any more.
"I've burnt the toast and there's no more bread."
"There's some Ryvita in the cupboard. Did you find everything you needed?"
"Couldn't miss. She was a very tidy woman."
"No. I'm a very tidy man."
A nice smile, but he wasn't sure what it registered. They sat down at the table like a thousand other perfect couples along the coast.
"I've got to go to a building site about eleven, back there on the hill. Don't know if you want to come. Bought a couple of houses, which aren't built yet. Perhaps you'd rather stay here?"
"I'd like to come, but, what about me staying, in the house I mean. Would you like me to go?"
She didn't want to go, that was clear. She liked him, she liked the house, naturally enough.
"How long are you in Spain for?"
"I have a six-month return ticket. Which expires in five months, one week."
He didn't want that.
He didn't want her through the rest of the summer and autumn. He'd want to feel free before that.
And it was all too soon. Too quick.
"Well, stay a couple of nights more, anyway," he said jokingly. "We could pick up your things on the way back."
Maybe something would give her away in the luggage. A label, a possession, a photograph of her mother? That was possible.
When he'd drunk his coffee he switched on the filter unit; watered a few plants while she washed up. Instant domestic life. He set the pace, but at least she followed. She had been well trained. By whom? Sue?
Or Sue's sister, Molly?
He hadn't thought of asking about her.
He wasn't believing it.
He was fantasizing.
It was all pure fantasy, a pretty sick one too, and there was a new lemon coming up on the far tree. Maybe that was the message. The answer was a lemon.
He turned in through the gate of the Urbanizacion Lazaros and parked the car outside the main office. It was all new houses built to look old, with small paved alleyways between and a recreation complex in the centre, swimming pool, terrace cafe and a little wooden bridge and gardens and trees, the theatre decor for another Barber of Seville.
"This is horrible, why did you buy something here?" Julie said.
"Why d'you think it's horrible?"
"It's kitsch. All false. Why not buy something in the real old villages?"
"Because Major and Mr.s. Smith, Herr Von Sclineider, Monsieur et Madame Dupont, retired, won't want to live in an old mountain village, they'll want to live in familiar surroundings with gas and electricity and constant hot water, and the safety of straight floors that look crooked, straight walls that look as though they slope but are steel reinforced, and I only buy to resell."
"The house you're in now as well?"
"Yes. But not for a few years."
Why did he say that? He didn't want her to stay. He just didn't like the idea of parting with the house, that was all.
He got out of the car and went into the office. Enrique was there, small cigar in mouth, dark glasses on the end of his nose.
"Hola, amigo que tal?" He was wearing a sad expression for someone's benefit. "La senora, she's gone?"
"Yes," he said through a smile. So the sad expression was for him then. He should have been wearing black of course. To lose a woman and a woman with legs like Cherry's, it demanded mourning. Enrique fancied her. Enrique fancied everyone.
So did he for that matter.
Enrique looked out of the window and saw Julie getting out of the car, leaning against it and shutting her eyes to the sun on her young face.
Enrique turned and raised an eyebrow.
"I don't understand. Where do you get them from?"
"The Bar Aquarius." It was the pick-up bar of the town.
"I saw her. She's been there for two, three nights. But why do you get them, why not me?"
"I'm not married. I don't have four children, nor my wife's mother living with me."
Enrique let out a long sigh.
"Anyway Manolo isn't coming till tomorrow," he said. He was referring to an architect they were going to discuss another project with. Of course he wouldn't come till tomorrow. Manana. He should have expected it.
"Never mind."
"Today he's in Malaga," Enrique said with the inevitable shrug of the shoulders.
"Today I don't mind."
"I can understand that." And Enrique saw him to the door, stood there looking at Julie.
She was wearing one of his shirts, sleeves rolled up, ends tied round her waist so that her young stomach showed nut brown and beautiful above her tight jeans. She was edible.
"A very pretty girl. A very pretty girl. I'm glad for you Senora Cherry is not here."
Enrique had seen Senora Cherry in a bad mood once, and once had been enough.
Well the Julie bird had passed the acid test. The being-seen-with-her test. She'd got a high rating. He liked to be envied. He'd been envied with Cherry. It mattered.
At the Pension Moreno he let her collect her own bags and went to buy some cigarettes. When he got back there was a haversack on the back seat and a canvas hold-all. On the first floor balcony was the girl she had been with, smiling, not envious but somehow thrilled.
"Would you like her to come?"
"For a swim and a meal, but not today. Tomorrow if that's all right."
He would have to have a rest, a long rest, a long siesta by himself. He hadn't recovered from Cherry, and he hadn't had time to think. There were all sorts of things he wanted to do, small but essential things, like sticking the rubber pad back on the brake pedal, painting the filter unit, mending the light switch upstairs. He would have to settle her down somewhere and just make use of her. And he'd have to go to Malaga later in the week to collect the shelves for Ids study.
"Where are you from originally? Your family I mean. Are you English, French, German, Polish?"
"English."
"On both sides?"
"My father was part French. My mother English."
He was part French. Very much part French. His father, in fact, was entirely French. And Sue was English. He wanted a negative answer, that was all. But then eighteen-year-old girls always had some foreign part in them, it made them more interesting.
"Would you like a drink on the Paseo?"
"Yeah ... "
That, of course, was a mistake. The Paseo was the Ramblas of Reina, the Champs Elysyes in miniature. A somewhat less sophisticated and diminutive Via Veneto, but all the same the meeting place of the town. Everyone would be sitting out at the cafe tables along the promenade that jutted out to sea, and everyone would work it out very quickly. Cherry gone. New replacement. It didn't matter to him, but it was unkind to Cherry, someone would write to her and tell her. Toothy Ruthy, and so would Sergeant Beryl. They had nothing better to do and hated her guts anyway.
They managed to get to the fourth table without stopping to say hallo to anyone, then they hit the crowd. Bob, Carol, Ted and Alice. Harry and Jean, Melvin and Cary. He took Julie by the elbow and led her on past after the usual greetings and the talks of hangovers the night before, right onto the end of the Paseo to look at the rocks and the beach below.
"D'you mind if we don't have a drink there after all. I don't think I can cope with that lot this morning."
"You mean you made a mistake walking down there with me so soon after she left?"
"Right."
Astute, sharp, admirable, but not what he needed right now. What he needed right now was total peace of mind and maybe undisturbed sleep for a week.
On the pretext of doing some work he left her alone by the pool to sunbathe, to listen to some music and read.
He shut himself up in the dining room and sat there in one of the large chairs at the head of the refectory table and tried to think of what it would look like when he had turned it into a study. Then he remembered her haversack, and the hold-all he'd carried upstairs.
He left the bedroom door open to hear if she was coming, unbuttoned the various pockets and found her passport which gave nothing away. Juliet Collin, born June 5, 1953, height, coloring, nothing he didn't already know. There was a wallet, which he opened and in it he found two photographs, both dog-eared. One was of a young man with long hair, a moustache and beads, her boy-friend? The other was of Sue, her mother-his wife.
She was older, had shorter hair, was crouching on a lawn with a dog. Standard snapshot of middle-aged mother. The smile was there, the familiar eyes. A pretty girl, woman, Julie's features were there, he couldn't mistake them. Sue, older, trying to look young and succeeding. Sue.
He put the photos back in the wallet, put the wallet back in the hold-all and walked over to the window looked down at the terrace-and his daughter.
Well she was a lovely girl, a sexy girl, a girl he could be proud of, and now what sort of relationship was he going to have with her?
He went and sat down on the bed. It wasn't any use pressing the panic button over this one. She didn't know, and that was all that mattered. No one would know, he would just have to get her out of Reina before she found out too much.
But then why should she find out? What was there to connect him with her? The photograph album? The books from Sue, she had hit on that one straight away, but nothing else. Marriage certificates, birth certificates, all that was back in a bank in London, safe as safe could be. The only danger was himself, and tonight. Christ he couldn't go to sleep with her again.
And that was going to be hard.
Because he still wanted to.
The rest of the day passed quietly. They had a snack meal on the patio after which he went to have a siesta in the spare room and actually slept He did a little gardening while she washed some clothes. He made a plan in his head and it was going to be no problem at all. He would wine and dine her and tell her that she would have to go. It was a mistake him going to bed with her, he was really in love with the sophisticated woman and he was very sorry but ... please would she go And of course she would.
Julie was a little longer in the leg but otherwise the same build as Cherry, so she chose Cherry's white jeans, and one of her sweaters. She looked older now, maybe because the hair was fluffier, maybe an association of ideas with her in those clothes. But he was proud to be with her, and she smelt of Cherry's scent.
When they entered the restaurant he realized it was another mistake. It was owned by an Italian with whom he saw eye to eye about women. Both appreciated the other's women, and to dine at Giulio's with a new female friend was another test. If Giulio approved, score of ten. And Giulio approved of Julie just as much as Enrique had earlier in the day, but he had lived in the sophisticated world, and his opinion meant a good deal more. He almost enjoyed other people's affairs more than his own and instantly noticed that Julie was wearing Cherry's clothes. He sat them down at Jey's and Cherry's usual table with a smile and an air of discretion and innocence that merited an Oscar. Jey was being envied. That was the mistake. How could he tell this girl to go and maybe have her stay in the town with someone else after this? He was far too proud, and knew it.
"We'll have the pate, the fish and a bottle of the usual white," Jey said before a menu could be brought. He invariably ate the same thing each time knowing it was excellent, and thought he'd order for both of them.
"I'd like a melon and a steak au poivre. Red wine."
She said it sweetly but with a slight touch of anger to Giulio looking at Jey. After which she smiled at both of them knowing she had put them both in their place.
Giulio, uncertain for a moment, hesitated, looked at Julie, then at Jey, questioningly.
"Melon, steak au poivre and a bottle of red," he said.
Giulio's eyebrows went up. He had certainly picked an exciting one this time.
"I'm sorry," Jey said, "I should have asked you."
"That's all right. I don't happen to like fish. I never have....
"It's good for you." He sounded like her father, and it jarred.
"How do you know what's good for me? Fish makes me come out in spots."
"Where?"
"All over my breasts."
"Steak's very good for you too."
She smiled, stretched a hand across the blue tablecloth and squeezed his. It was a very mature gesture for a girl of her age, but it didn't quite come off. She knew it, and bit her lower lip.
"How long can I stay?"
He wasn't going to say anything till coffee. Business meals were to be enjoyed and used as a soporific before launching out into the difficulties of a proposed contract. Maybe she sensed what the dinner was all about. Maybe she was being clever.
"I have someone coming to stay this weekend," he said.
It was a lie, but there was no reason why it shouldn't be the truth.
"Is she staying long?"
"I don't know."
He smiled at her presumption.
"Maybe I should leave tomorrow."
It had hit her hard, an unexpected reaction. Perhaps she cared for him? All he had to say then was "Yes, maybe it would be best." Instead he said "They're not coming till Saturday." And because her expression changed very slightly, because her eyes seemed happier, more loving, he added, "I didn't in fact say it was a woman." And then because she smiled, "Which is maybe why I'd like you to go. I don't like competition."
"I'm pretty faithful."
"You haven't had a chance to be. How many lovers have you had?"
"Three. You're the third."
It pleased him. Not as the lover. It pleased him as the father. And that brought him heavily down to earth. She would have to go. He wouldn't be able to cope with that sort of problem.
He was silent for a very long time.
He looked around at the other tables, at the guests who came on package tours, lobster-red in summer frocks, open-neck shirts, plastic sandals.
She looked down at the tablecloth, at her knife and fork, at her bread plate, the salt cellar.
"I'll go if you want me to," she said quietly.
He had been silent for too long, but the melon and the pate arrived and it wasn't till they had both started eating that he looked up.
"I don't want it to become serious. You're too young and I'm too old."
"That's wrong in both cases."
"I wouldn't say it if I didn't think so."
"You're just scared."
It was said with a mocking look and an I-dare-you-to expression. It surprised him.
"Scared? What of?"
She looked at him, looked straight at him, an unsettling, penetrating look which he had experienced a long time ago from Sue.
"You're either scared that you won't be able to handle it, or that I won't be able to handle it. I think we can both handle it and have a fantastic time."
He wasn't at all sure what she was talking about, but he didn't want to appear dumb. It was getting remarkably near to the bone, and he had to have everything clear in his mind.
"Handle what?"
"Incest," she said sweetly, popping a piece of melon into her mouth, then, staring at him penetratingly, added, "Daddy."
CHAPTER FIVE
Her expression changed quickly and she smiled at someone behind him. She had timed it perfectly, seen Giulio coming. It eased the shock.
Giulio smiled radiantly, the Italian maitre d' hotel at his most professional. Was everything all right? Madame's melon satisfactory? Not Mademoiselle, Jey noted, she was too young to be called that. "Madame' would flatter her, bringing her into the mature world of men, as though this particular kid needed that. Jesus!
"It's delightful, but I think it would be nice to have some Champagne. We have something to celebrate."
"Champagne?" said Giulio, looking from one to the other.
He could have no idea at all. He could guess that the young girl had told him she was expecting, that she was married and was going to tell her husband, that she was going to take him for every cent he had for doing whatever he had done to her, but he could not possibly guess the truth.
He breathed out very slowly, very deliberately, leaned well back in his chair and smiled at Giulio.
"We have, indeed, something to celebrate, something really quite astounding."
And she cut in.
"We're not getting married. We met only last night and he thought I was very young and he was extremely worried that I might take him seriously. So we're going to celebrate my permissiveness."
Giulio did not know what to say. He was a romantic, he wanted the moonlight, the conquest, to have a girl so young, so quickly, was nothing to celebrate.
"El senor always has the luck," he said, but he didn't mean it. In fact it seemed he suspected that the truth had not really been told.
"El numero cuarenta y ires, habitual," he said over his shoulder to a waiter, then backed discreetly away.
"I don't think you should tell anyone the truth," she said, a little nervously. "It would be terrible for both of us."
"Why?"
"Because we've been lovers, Daddy, that's why, and because you enjoyed it, and so did I. More than anything I've ever enjoyed before."
He was going to be able to cope. He knew. He was going to sail right through this extraordinary experience and just accept it. This blatant little girl, this brazen little bitch was a fiend; his daughter, his lover and he could see in her expression his very own feelings. Boredom he had known, the fear that nothing would ever excite him again had been experienced, she knew it, and she was offering danger and merciless fun at society on a plate. He wouldn't be able to resist it.
"Exactly how old are you?"
"Nineteen and I don't care a fuck about anybody but you."
"You don't know me."
"I've known you since I was eight years old, since Mummy said to me "You're just like your father," and that was after I had done something really enjoyable which she didn't like one bit."
"What was that?" He dreaded to think.
"I was devious."
"In what way?"
"I wanted to know what little boys were about so I begged her to let me help a neighbour bath her four-year-old, which wasn't at all like me; I'd never wanted to help anyone. Then Mummy caught me exciting him."
He saw the scene, recalled Sue's expression of shocked disgust when he'd told her what he was really going to do in France. He understood Julie. She didn't have to say any more.
Her steak arrived, his fish, then the Champagne, all at once. He was hungry, despite the news, he was hungry, not nervously, but pleasantly. Though she had dropped him in the middle of an unknown and rather wild forest he could see through the trees, he could see that with her he could protect himself from further involvements, further intrigues. She was his daughter, she would naturally live with him and he could still have the occasional affair. How it was possible to go to bed with one's daughter and not feel evil, he wasn't sure, but right now he wanted her again.
"Well, here's to us," he said, raising his glass. "Blood is thicker than water."
"But water is crystal clear," she smiled, a little too wisely.
Sue had been intelligent and analyzed everything, she was probably the same.
"You tell me what you know about me, and I'll tell you what I know about you," she said.
"I'm a year and a half out on your birth date, which isn't a good start, on the other hand it gives you an idea of what you've meant to me."
"Nothing?"
"Quite a lot to begin with, but I made a decision to forget you and your mother, for her sake as well as mine, and after a year, it was all over. We'd separated in very unpleasant circumstances anyway. She wrote me very unnecessary letters when she need not have done, and if I had any feelings for you, I just had to make up my mind to forget them. She was very possessive and determined to be hurt."
"Oh, she still is."
"Hurt? Over me?"
"Not over you. Just hurt. She gets hurt by everyone and everything. I'm hurting her now. She doesn't know where I am."
Maybe there was a net in the forest somewhere, a trap, maybe Sue would come after her daughter and reclaim her, and blame him again. Strange how deep down he was still afraid of her, afraid of those scenes, of her anger.
"We're not getting very far, are we? I haven't got to your birth yet."
"There's plenty time. I mean you're not going to kick me out just yet. Who is it coming this weekend anyway. Anyone?"
"No. No one."
"Useless Daddy....You'll have to remember that I'm like you."
"And you'll have to remember not to call me Daddy."
"What shall I call you?"
"Try Jey."
"Jey isn't a very lovable name, and you're a very lovable man. How about "darling"?"
"You're too young, it sounds theatrical and possessive."
"I'll think of something. Jeysie? How about that? Jeysie. Youthful, affectionate, humorous. Jeysie it is, Jeysie."
It was going to be ridiculous, the whole thing. From start to finish.
"Go on," she said. "You're supposed to be telling me what you know about me."
"I know that your mother went to Toronto to live with her sister, Molly. That Molly then got married to an accountant who had three children, and later, through my mother, your grandmother, that you had gone to America, but I didn't know where."
"California. Mummy got a job in a school for backward boys. A hundred and eighty of them, all about sixteen. Backward in the head, but not anywhere else."
Extraordinary, what that idea did to him. The thought of her with a hundred and eighty boys.
"Was that where it first happened?"
"Yes." Pause, as she cut into her steak and collected the peas and carrots together in one comer. "Want to hear about it?"
"Not now. It might excite me."
"I'd like that."
"I'm your father Julie, surely it's going to make a difference?"
"I don't see why? You may think so because the idea's new to you. I knew all the time."
"I don't think I really understand you."
"You're just a very sexy man Jeysie, that's all. Nancy thought so."
"Your friend? Does she know who I am?"
"No. Nobody knows. Nobody but you and me."
He changed the subject.
"Does your mother ... Sue ... work?"
"Sure. She's a laboratory assistant now. Lives with the man she works for."
"How long has that been going on?"
"Six years. I don't think they're too happy."
"Why not?"
"He's dull. Baseball, fishing holidays in Canada. Canada's about all they have in common."
"She's lively then?"
"Livelier than him, but that's not saying much. She's got a lively mind. She's into the Women's Lib thing which doesn't interest him a bit. She's always wanting to go on protests."
That was Sue. Protest. Stand up for other people's rights, help other people but only those beyond your own doorstep where you don't really get too involved, where you could always pull out if too much was demanded of you.
"Is she attractive?"
"She would be if it wasn't for Molly. Molly has a great hold over her, naturally. If it wasn't for her, Mummy would have had a hard time. You didn't exactly keep us going."
"She never asked, Never made contact after the divorce."
"Pride. They're very proud, Mummy and Molly. They'd rather starve than ask for help. Not like me. I don't mind asking. You rich?"
"No, why?"
"I've got seven dollars left."
"You want an allowance now, or something?" he said it jokingly.
"Wow! How about that? Back-dated?"
"You'll have to decide whether you're going to live off me as my daughter or as my mistress?"
"Mistress, Jeysie, mistress. Can I have a cigar?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"I don't like women smoking cigars, not in public anyway. And at your age it would be very juvenile and immature."
"Fuck."
"And I'm not sure that I like you using that word."
"Shit, Jeysie, you wouldn't ever say that to me if I was just a new girl-friend."
"But you're not."
"But you must think of me as such."
"I don't think that'll be possible."
They had a coffee and he drank some of the red wine, and she showed signs of being a little drunk and it was nice in a way because she was relaxed and childish and he could see things more clearly, see her as his daughter.
He would just help her along. He wasn't rich enough to do much, but he could sell Cherry's house and use that to help her. Strange how he had bought that house as security against the unexpected and knew it the moment it came.
"His name was Chet and he had me one hot summer's afternoon in the boys' bathroom, on the floor. I was sixteen," she said in a loud whisper, leaning towards him.
"I don't want to know."
"If you didn't think of yourself as my father you would. D'you know you've aged about ten years since I told you? Maybe it was a mistake."
"You didn't tell me, I found out."
"Right."
The wine had definitely gone to her head. She was holding her forehead, leaning heavily on one elbow, her eyes a little out of focus.
"Shall we go home?"
"Mmmmm." She smiled sleepily.
He asked for the bill, had another glass of wine, realized he was drinking it because somewhere inside him he was afraid of something. Himself? Going home? Not knowing how to tell her to go to bed in the guest room? Not knowing if he wanted her to. Maybe if she was drunk she would just fall asleep. He could give her more, make her sick.
He should have let her have the cigar.
He walked out, a few steps behind her and watched the heads turn, the men's heads first, then the women's to see what their husbands were looking at.
Julie. Knock-out bird.
Julie, his daughter.
Proud father?
No. Fathers were proud of achievement and sheer beauty. Right now he was proud that he had gone to bed with her, that he was envied for that.
But what a cock-up.
In the car she put her hand on his leg and he didn't say anything. He didn't say anything because he didn't know what to say. In the restaurant he had been protected by the waiters and the other guests. Now they were alone, and it was different and her hand moved up and stayed there.
"I'm going to have a swim," she said getting out, when they got home. And she went to the pool as she had the night before, stripped off and dived in.
He sat in the car and watched and couldn't get himself together at all.
What did one do?
What psychology book did one turn to for help?
"You must stop it at once, it's unwholesome."
She'd sober up in the cold water, be more awake when she came out, more everything. And he was feeling the warm glow and the liberty of the wine.
He looked up at the stars and the moon and God up there looking down, and he smiled. He had been innocent. He really hadn't suspected her of being his daughter till after. Now, of course, he could do something about it, now he could put things right.
But what for?
Conscience?
Because someone somewhere had said it was wrong? The people in the old Andalusia villages were always doing it. Mothers with sons, fathers with daughters, brothers with sisters. "Hey sis, you're much better than Mummy. Yes, that's what Daddy said."
"Aren't you coming in?"
The young schoolgirl voice with the American accent and the break on the last word. Delightful. "Thank heaven for little girls.,.."
"No. I'm going to bed," he said.
Into the house and the twenty-two steps to the great decision. He'd counted the steps of the stairs and remembered. I didn't help. He could go into his bedroom or into the double guest room, or the single guest room. He went down the passage to it and switched the light on. The truth was there right in front of him. The bed wasn't made and he was pleased.
Why pretend?
Why?
He was fascinated by the situation and wanted to sleep with her once more.
No.
The truth, Jeysie.
He did not want to sleep alone and if he slept with her once more, with the full knowledge, then he was doing something positive, something towards finding out something. He had to sleep with her again, knowing. It made sense.
He hoped to God it wasn't just an excuse.
No he didn't. He didn't hope at all.
It was an excuse.
And somehow he was back in his own room.
He undressed and got into bed without putting the light on. He was drunk, or had drunk a lot and his head felt fuzzy. The sheet came up further than usual and he remembered that she had made the bed. At least she was domesticated.
And then she came in, nude, still wet, and got right in beside him.
She lay dose to him, her cold body making him aware of how warm he was. He didn't move, he lay there on his back and thought of La Mouche in Cannes who had been so demanding. He had really tired of her, was repulsed by her, then after telling her so, though not in so many words, they had gone to bed for the last time and she had got wilder and he even more excited. The drinks they had had below in the Bar Clemenceau had had much to do with it, and the fact that he hadn't slept with her for more than ten days. She had gone to see her sick mother in Arles and he had realized he didn't want to see her any more, she just didn't turn him on, and then, because of the drink, because he needed someone, like an animal, she had been wonderful, and it had lasted another six months.
And now he was just as excited.
Impossible not to be.
She was a young girl, a young full-bodied woman, and he put his arms round her back and squeezed her and she moved onto him and kissed him and no thought entered his head but that it was going to be fantastic.
Over him, she arched her back, his hands on both her breasts, up behind her neck, massaging the back of her ears.
She had a nice feel to her head, familiar, like his own. This is my daughter, he forced himself to think. I am being incestuous. It is forbidden.
But it meant nothing.
Forbidden by whom, and why?
It wasn't to reproduce. It was to enjoy.
We have the pill now, you know. We are lucky. We have the pill, and the pill protects us against reproduction and protects us against evil.
And he gripped her in the small of the back and rolled her over, for a moment lay on his side with her on her side, then he was above her and she was gasping a little, and so was he and she knew what to do, instinctively she knew what to do.
Or she had been taught by some degenerate.
Some wild degenerate.
The wine had gone from his head and was pulsating in the rest of his body and she was moving about, pushing him away, then rolling him over on his back and disappearing suddenly to the end of the bed and holding him now, gripping him, eating him.
And he sat up and held her head in his hands, and pulled her up and kissed her open mouth that tasted sweet, and rolled over with her under him.
And far away in the night he heard the church clock strike a hah hour, a half hour in the night with the moon and the warmth of this beautiful girl, this beautiful girl whom he loved completely because she was his.
My God!
Wasn't she his?
He had made her for heaven's sake. Made her in his own image!
And she suddenly gasped and for a few seconds it was more beautiful than anything else he had ever known and he swore to remember this moment because this was the truth, this was the truth of nature and if it was forbidden by nature, if it had not been allowed, then why, oh why, oh why, or how could it be so enjoyable?
"My God, Daddy, I'm just never ever going to let you go. "
And the last person who had made the same promise, the same threat, was Cherry.
CHAPTER SIX
He woke up to the smell of coffee.
Julie was sitting on the bed next to him, dressed in her jeans and T-shirt and she was stirring a large cup. He looked at his watch, it was eleven and he realized he had slept very heavily.
"You slept heavily," she said. "I didn't know whether to wake you up or not. You might have an appointment or something."
Thoughtful.
Thoughtful all round.
"How long have you been up?"
"An hour or so. I had a swim, switched on the filter too, was that right?"
"Mmmm," he sipped the hot coffee. It was good.
"How far does the garden go?" she asked.
"To the edge of the drop, and over there to the left down the slope to the road. The olive grove is nice."
"It's beautiful. So peaceful. Is that why the olive branch is a sign of peace?"
"I don't know." He put his hand on her wrist. She was very sweet, very lovable. It would be all right. It would all be perfectly acceptable in his mind and it was only what was in the mind that mattered after all If no one knew, then no one could make him feel guilty.
"I have to go to the bank and do some shopping, we could have a drink in town."
"That would be great."
He sipped his coffee some more and imagined them walking down the Paseo, imagined the people who would be there, imagined the boys in the bank looking at her, he was usually in there with Cherry.
"I have a problem," he said.
"What?"
"In the mornings I'd like you to be my daughter, I'd be proud to introduce you as such. This is Julie, my daughter, you know ... and everyone would be surprised and congratulate me on having such a beautiful offspring. But at nights I'd like you to be you."
"Well that's a dead give away, isn't it?"
"What is?"
"At night you want me to be me. I'm not your daughter in your mind at all. But I'm going to be."
"How d'you mean?"
The bottom dropped out quite quickly. He felt it. She was going to be good. She was going to tell him that she'd decided to behave. He wouldn't be able to go against that. Worse, he'd have to suffer her around ... without.
"If you tell everyone I'm your daughter, then there won't be any problem. No one is ever going to know that we sleep together, whereas some day one of us may slip up and behave like daughter and father by mistake, like me calling you Daddy. I mean, I feel like your daughter when I think of possessions. It's mean, I know, but, well, somehow I think differently about the pool, and the car and this house and you, to how I would feel if I was just a lay-like I'm supposed to be."
He knew exactly how she felt. Nothing had to be said.
"Besides," she went on, "if you get fed up with me, in bed I mean, or I get fed up with you, then no one will think it odd if we're seen with someone else, or separately. I mean, if a frantic woman comes along and you want to, I wouldn't really mind because I've got you for ever, more than if we were married."
"You wouldn't mind?"
"Would you?"
"I don't know."
"Well I don't know either, but we could have a pretty cool time, if you wanted someone else, I could still be around, as your daughter, naturally, living in the house. I could have the top room upstairs as a sort of pad." She smiled a little guiltily and added, "You don't seem to be using it."
"You're being devious. You don't care what people think, you just want to have a room."
"Can I have it?"
"It's very hot. The sun shines into it relentlessly all day, and there are no blinds."
"We can get some."
"Julie, don't be taken in by appearances. I haven't got a regular income. Money only comes in when I sell a bit of land, or a house. And I haven't, in fact, bought this one outright. I'm paying for it over two or three years, a sort of private mortgage arrangement I have with Cherry. I originally intended to sell it for a profit."
"Where would you live if you sold it?"
"My flat. I have an apartment on the other side of the town which I rent sometimes."
She didn't seem disappointed, but rather bored.
"We could put up some of that cane lattice-work they do down here, that's cheap and keeps the sun out."
"Cana. Split bamboo wattles. Yes, we can get some on the beach."
"The beach! Let's go on the beach today. I haven't been on the beach since I got here."
And he thought of the beach and he thought of walking along it hand in hand with his daughter and saying to people "This is my daughter' and that made more sense than anything, and he thought of her as a child. Maybe they could catch up with the never-experienced past.
"We could build a sandcastle."
"Drip sandcastles! Does the sand drip well here?"
"I've never tried."
And they went to the bank and the Super Mercado where they bought a week's supply of food and soap and detergents and toothpaste and things she wanted and didn't need, and they met only one person he knew who wasn't interested in them and so no formalities had to be gone into and no introductions were made.
Down on the beach she was surprised by the merendero, the beach restaurant, and the elaborate way it was set up with its bright awning and plastic table-tops and the pedalos and gondolas, the water skiing and the beach mattresses and umbrellas and the civilization of it all for only a hundred or so people, because the season hadn't yet begun.
He pointed out various people by nicknames he and Cherry had given them, the Wolves, the Clocks, the Gordon and Booths, the French Pilot, and so on, and then without any warning, Dutchy came up from behind them as they sat at a table sipping wine, half pirouetted and sat down on one of the vacant chairs.
"May I sit down Jey? And who is thees?"
"This is it," he said to Julie. "This is the moment of truth. Are you sure you're right in your thinking?"
The blatancy with which he questioned her outright on the subject in front of this stranger appealed to her.
"Yes," she said, thrilled.
"Well, this is Dutchy, the biggest gossip along the coast and, thank God, the funniest. So if we have something to tell the world, he's the one person to tell."
"You have news? You have gossip?" He spoke English well, but with a Dutch accent which he exaggerated to good effect. He wore a red swim slip, was very brown, bald but for some very well distributed grey and blond hair, and sported a red ribbon round his forehead, which made him look like a Red Indian, without a feather.
"This girl, Dutchy, is my daughter."
"Your what?"
"My daughter, from my first marriage."
Dutchy got up, half curtsied, took Julie affectionately by the hand, leaned over to embrace her tenderly, and when he came out of it he had tears in his eyes, tears of joy because this was a delightfully unexpected and very romantic moment. Jey, like every man, but especially good-looking ones, was his best, best friend, and for Jey to be re-united with a daughter he had never heard of was something he could not have made up if he had tried.
"When did she arrive? I saw you at the Aquarius the other night, last week, you never said, Jey, you never said."
"I didn't know. The whole thing was a surprise."
"Did you know he was here?" Dutchy asked Julie.
"Oh yes, I tracked him all the way from a meatpacking factory in France."
"From a what?"
And the rest of the conversation was lost to him, lost and clouded by his thoughts, trying to work out why what she had just said should matter so much, should be a shock.
She had tracked him down from Orthez, so she must have come from the States with the deliberate intention of finding him.
"Why so pained, Jey?" Dutchy said gripping his arm. "Why so serious? Your daughter is beautiful. I could even sleep with her! Me! It calls for Champagne, not serious looks."
"It's because of Champagne last night that I have serious looks," he said, and got up to go to the bar to order a bottle, not because he wanted any, but because he needed an excuse to get away.
Last night, in bed, it had all seemed right if no one knew. This morning he had allowed himself to tell the world. It didn't feel right, it didn't feel safe, and the tranquility he had hoped for without Cherry now seemed very remote.
When he got back to the table, three other people had joined Dutchy and Julie and everyone was talking loudly. Smiler, a big all-American college boy with blond moustache and perfect teeth was already moving in. It annoyed him, and he realized that he would just have to take a lot of demonstrated love from Julie to others without reacting, or he would seem to be a stupidly jealous father.
It was going to be uphill all the way with probably no view at all from the top.
"Did you hear about Lewis and Sonia?"
"No."
"He bought John's guitar, so she left him."
He was aware that this was news indeed for the hippy community who lived out of each other's pockets, he liked Lewis, a fast-talking New Yorker who blatantly lived over others in exchange for his amusing personality, whether they liked it or not, but right now it didn't seem to matter all that much. So Sonia was making a stand for independence which wouldn't last, in a day or two she would be seen again sitting at Lewis's feet admiring him, loving him even more. He was a stud and, presumably, a good one. It happened all the time. Every summer a new crowd came in from nowhere, just like Julie had, looking poor but spending money like water. After two months couples would split and re-unite, money would become short, letters were sent to Maw and Paw in Philadelphia, Chicago and New York asking for help and bringing happiness to the community if answered. Otherwise it was acceptance of fate, acceptance of free drinks, cigarettes, meals, of anything from anyone who gave, without necessarily being grateful. They were mistrusted because they were generous themselves and wanted to share possessions they didn't own, not fully understanding that to give one first had to have.
Smiler was really edging up on Julie now and Jey watched the pantomime. He had the sneaking feeling that maybe Julie didn't like that sort of approach, and Dutchy was talking ten to the dozen about an affair he was going to have with a Danish boy who was staying in his block with his mother, did anyone know him-he looked exactly like Warren Beatty.
Julie was answering questions put to her quietly by Duff, a muscle man and a drunk. Oh, they were all likeable but sometimes irritating because they were totally unaware of how tolerant other people were of their bad manners, their boorishness.
Francisco, the waiter, came dancing down the sand between the tables, pad in hand, ready to take the orders. The menu was simple, five dishes on offer and Jey always had the same thing because it was safest.
"I have a lovely merluza today," which meant the fishermen had had a good night's catch. "Really good. You like very much." He sounded like an Italian. Stem, proud, the nail of his little finger on the left hand long and uncut for months to tell the world that he wasn't an aristocrat but badly wanted to be. "It's really good, you like it senor." The hard sell and the respect. He was always senor, the others were Dutchy, Hank, John, Kurt, Smiler. He was older, had a clean car, didn't come down that often and didn't allow familiarity. It didn't really breed contempt, but Francisco had brothers and sisters and cousins and uncles and aunts and some of them worked on building sites and if anything went wrong, if anything was in doubt; it was always best to seem aloof, distant, uninvolved.
"Ees your daughter, senor?"
Dutchy was like a proud mother hen, introducing Julie to everyone in sight. Jey's daughter, beautiful, and Julie loved it, loved Dutchy. Who didn't? He was the most natural flatterer in the business.
The table grew, people came in from the sea and from along the beach, Mick and Ruth from the village up in the mountains, refugees from a bad time in New York, drag victims who had survived, resting now, neurotic to some but probably more down to earth than most, re-reading the great esoteric books by candlelight, fired by Ouspensky and Gurdjieff. "Did you know Zook, did you meet Zook? Anyway Zook actually met someone who worked with Gurdjieff, can you beat that? That's really being in touch with the man, though he would have laughed to hear me saying that wouldn't he?"
"He was a homosexual," Dutchy threw in.
"He was everything. He was the greatest."
A glance at Julie. Did she know what they were talking about? Just how much did she know? How educated was she? And how did one judge? He knew nothing about her at all, and he wouldn't learn any thing about her with these people around because the conversation wasn't conversation but gossip. The Alcalde had stopped the local Mafia Godfather from putting a tennis court on the roof of a new hotel, the open air discoth�que next to the cinema was going to re-open, rumors had it that there was going to be a purge on the drug scene, which hardly existed except for a minimum amount of hash coming in with the occasional traveller from Tangiers. Gus had got through Moroccan customs without cutting his hair. Did you have to have injections against cholera?
Then the funny little couple from Germany who didn't belong at all but weren't aware of it sat down too. Dutchy had spoken to them very early one morning and had regretted it ever since.
The sudden roar and revving up of a motorbike and long-haired Gus on his Bultaco and Rusty riding pillion, the all-ginger, all-Scottish mechanic, the genius of the spanners. Everyone waited for them to hear how it was going, bikes were something to talk about, but the Scotsman and Gus didn't come for a long time, stopping at the bar for a beer and adjustments had to be made, and Julie was oblivious to all this, she was into her second tall glass of wine and gazing out to sea, somewhere inside her, he felt, there was a worry. Someone she had left behind? A realization that maybe Daddy was older than the people she preferred to be with?
Then she saw him looking at her, and for a moment they both forgot their true relationship and looked at each other like lovers, and Dutchy picked up on it straight away.
"That was nice, father and daughter looking at each other like that. You make a beautiful couple."
"You're a sexy bastard Dutchy," Jey said unnecessarily.
"Oh I didn't mean that, I just thought it was beautiful, the look she gave you. She really loves her Daddy."
"You can say that again!' Julie said, happy.
"Oooh!' And Dutchy fired everyone with the enthusiasm he felt for the whole situation, and yet, despite his own life full of intrigue and perversions, he obviously could not see the truth. Father and daughter, romantic and pure. They'd get away with it, and Julie would get the best of it all, surrounded by boys and men who would eye him with paternal respect, and as the thought passed through his mind, two cold hands closed over his eyes. He struggled, turned and looked up to see Bunny, forty, from Washington D.C., three times divorced and looking for the right man, losing out to Cherry; she'd heard the path was clear and was coming in to attack again. Or was she?
She kissed him too affectionately on the side of the mouth.
"I don't time it right, do I Jey?"
"No," he said.
A few feet behind her was a tall handsome German who had moved into her flat only the week before. He had money, but not as much as she had. She couldn't throw him out now, or stop the affair so soon, or she could if Jey had really wanted her to, but that had all been gone into. They had reached a certain degree of intimacy after a party and had talked into the night, but it hadn't grown from there. They were right for each other on the face of it, the same generation, the same background, but she wanted young men, and he...? So they had just been good friends ever since and, in a way, fail safes to each other. The fail safe was important. They both understood that.
"Who's the new conquest?" she asked eyeing. Julie with certain approval.
"My daughter."
Bunny considered it for a long time, stared at Julie and maybe guessed, maybe guessed by the way Julie looked back at her, for there was jealousy in Julie. And this, though maybe a little dangerous, put the balance right. If she could flirt and be admired by men, he could always summon up a few women.
After lunch he left Julie on the beach with the crowd and drove up to the centre of Reina alone to get his mail. He enjoyed the solitude of the drive up and the town was hot and completely empty. In the little box, Apartado 48 in the cool deserted post office, there were two letters, one from his bank in France, the other from Cherry.
He had not expected that.
"My darling, I didn't think I would miss you so much, but I do. Jacques got here three days ago because of an alteration in his schedule, but left this morning for Stockholm. He was so cold and ungrateful for me coming back as though, after all, he didn't need me. Moods and customs have changed since he was last here-the permissive society has infiltrated diplomatic circles and apparently it was more of a surprise to his friends and colleagues that I was back than if I wasn't. Do you remember Claus? A tall Dane who was at the Bergers' party in Marbella that night when I swam in the pool with nothing on and someone pushed you in?
He was a friend of Jacques, so my reputation was made, and yours too. You can have me back. Do you want me? Please say you do. And please, God how awful to have to ask, please don't sell the house to anyone else. I want it back. Is that terrible? And are you alone? Or have you already found someone else? I'd like to think it impossible in such a short time, but I know that with you it is possible, I mean you work at it so hard my darling-"not being alone"-and you are very attractive.
I love you.
Cherry."
Shattering.
One step forward, three steps back.
How did he feel now?
He felt terrible.
He wouldn't answer it just yet. He'd give himself time. But she was impulsive enough to just come down, to arrive, for him to turn round and find her there-again. She had done it once and had stayed for two years. He would forget the letter, go back to Julie without saying a word, let Julie help him live this day through. And tomorrow, when he knew his own mind a little more he would write to her.
He liked being loved by her. He didn't want to spoil that. She was the fail safe now, then, and Julie the fun girl.
The fun girl!
When would he be mature enough not to think in phrases like that?
By the time he got back to the beach the love sting of Cherry's letter had gone down a little and was replaced by a sudden anxiety because Julie wasn't at the table, nor were any of the crowd, and he couldn't see them lying on the beach close by.
Then he saw Dutchy some distance along the sand and Julie standing by him watching the water skiing. She turned, as though sensing him.
"Can I go Jeysie?"
"Can you ski?"
"Yes, of course. But I haven't any money."
He laughed.
She had called him Jeysie, not Daddy, which was nice. In her mind, at least, he was still the lover, even when she wanted money.
After an elderly Frenchman feathered in expertly, but then fell over on his back spoiling the display, it was her turn.
She got the skis on as though she'd done it all her life, strapped on the regulation life belt with reluctance, and got into the water. One of the two boats came in at speed with a German at the wheel. She was thrown the rope, floated inelegantly in the water for a while, her legs wide apart, her skis sticking out like ducks' feet, then the boat roared off and she was pulled out and up and away.
For a moment she faltered, but two seconds of tugging at the rope and she knew what it was all about, veering to one side, back to the centre. The boat cut an elegant semi-circle on the horizon and she was out there for all to see, an athlete, a beautiful athlete, a sportswoman, healthy and magnificent, everything in one glorious package. Proud he was, of being her father, and proud too of being the other. Cherry wouldn't have been able to do that, she wouldn't have wanted her hair messed up, and couldn't swim that well anyhow. She didn't much like the beach, not this beach. Why she had ever come to Reina he didn't know. She was a Marbella woman, really, through and through.
"Why you never telled me you had a daughter Jey?"
"I'd forgotten, Dutchy." It was true.
"You don't forget things like that, man."
"I did. I certainly didn't think I'd fathered a girl quite like that."
"She is very funny, very quick. I have already matched her with Lewis."
"I'd much rather you didn't."
"Oh, now you can't play the heavy father with her. She is too independent."
"I'd rather have something better than Lewis for her, wouldn't you?"
"Of course. But who's here?"
"You. You take her out and protect her."
"I would like that."
"Keep me posted, anyway."
"What you say?"
"Keep me informed. I'm not going to lock her up, but I wouldn't like to lose her, not too quickly."
"Did Cherry know she was coming, is that why she left?"
"I didn't know she was coming."
Julie now came skimming across the water in against the sun from the west, the boat nearly turning over on the turn. She let go of the rope at the right moment and jumped out of the skis into the air and onto the sand, timing it all perfectly.
The small crowd clapped, they had enjoyed someone new and a beautiful performer.
"Oh wow! That was terrific. I haven't done that for years, and the view of the town from out there, it looks so Arab! Have you got a towel?"
The basket was by the table where Lewis was sitting now and he started moving to go and get it before he realized why. He didn't want her to meet him, but then she obviously already had.
"I'll go," she said. And ran off on the burning sand ahead of him, and he let her go.
He watched. She got the towel out of the basket, exchanged a word with the Scotsman who joined Lewis at the table with a glass of beer, and came running back.
What was he worried about? Just what was he worried about? Maybe he was tired. Exhausted?
"I'm going to have a lie down under the cam," he said.
"Daddy. You O.K.?"
"Yes...? "
"It's going to be O.K. isn't it? It's such fun here."
He wanted to kiss her, wanted to squeeze her. Instead he just smiled, and looked into her eyes.
"Wow. You feeling randy or something?"
"No more than usual."
"You look it. You're really very popular with the women, aren't you?"
He liked that. He wanted more. He liked the flattery from her.
"What makes you say that?"
"I just heard. That Washington chick, she's really hung up on you."
"She's hung up on everyone."
"Not what I heard."
"What did you hear?"
"That she gave up a millionaire to be with you, and then when she got here you were with Cherry."
"Who told you that?"
"Dutchy."
"Dutchy'll tell you lots of things. They're not always true."
"I like Dutchy."
She spread the towel out on the sand and lay straight down on it, unclipped the back of her top, and closed her eyes. Nature girl, dark and beautiful.
He eased himself down on the chaise-longue under the cam, looked at the sparkling sea and decided he would write to Cherry and tell her what had happened. That Julie was with him and that he had to have time to think. He would ask for a month, and after a month maybe she would find someone else in Paris, or else settle down with Jacques. He didn't want her back, he knew that now.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Some elderly American clients he had known b France arrived unexpectedly at the house when they got back from the beach and he had to take them out to dinner.
Julie was lively with them, acting the part of the hostess to perfection, but over the meal, at the Parador, she grew tired and obviously bored and he had to release her from the endless chat about house-hunting b Europe. She said she would meet him at the Aquarius Bar, she wanted to see her friend.
A polite hour followed during which he became restless, wondering what Julie was doing, whom she might meet. If she was anything like him, she wouldn't wait long before casting an eye around. One advantage of falling in love with your own daughter was that you knew how she would react in certain circumstances. Either she was like Sue, or like him. He figured that she was more like him. Hopelessly changeable.
"Would you say that a villa down here was a better investment than a good-sized luxury apartment overlooking the sea?"
He would say so, yes, because apartments weren't letting that much nowadays, and it was difficult to get money back on them and the real truth was that he knew of more villas for sale than apartments, the commission was better and would they never go?
Then he realized that he had the trump card because though they were his guests he was in their hotel and they were yawning away, so he said goodbye and drove like the devil to the Aquarius and she wasn't there.
There were four places to try, El Caballero, the Velasquez, Markos or Bar Abelardo. He tried Markos and got her first time.
She was with Dutchy, Barbara and Smiler and John. No Lewis. She was drinking red wine, and looked very young, maybe fifteen. She smiled at him, threw her arms round him nearly falling off her stool doing so.
"Hi, Daddy "
He had a wine too, and then suggested bed, but by then she had drunk another glass and couldn't take it, so he and Dutchy helped her to the car.
Back at the villa he put her to bed, and fell asleep next to her, at peace with the whole world, only just remembering Cherry's letter as he turned over for the final comfort.
Julie had a hangover the next day and didn't feel at all well, so they both stayed at home.
She mooned about the house looking at everything and asking all sorts of questions. Why had he bought a French car? Why not a convertible? Why was the bathroom so small? Why was he having an office downstairs? Why did the mail only get there at three o'clock. Did he always collect it himself, why no postmen?
It made him feel old. He cooked the lunch, that is he prepared a series of cold snacks from various tins in the larder-egg mayonnaise, peas and mayonnaise, ham, tomato-decoratively presented on the table on the patio, but she wasn't hungry.
Her moodiness reminded him of Sue, her silence an accusing silence. He wanted her to read, or get interested in something, but she seemed lifeless. Maybe it was going to be that time of the month? Should fathers know about such things? Lovers should. Lovers especially. Pill or no pill.
There was a difference coming out of the situation now too. If she had been an ordinary girl, a girl-friend, he would have gone upstairs for a siesta after lunch, laid on the bed, gone to sleep with her beside him, but he didn't want to do that. He wanted a siesta alone. So he went into the guest room, which was cool and a little damp, a mothball feeling about it, and he just lay there in the semi-darkness in a mid-day wine stupor aware that he wasn't really enjoying life.
Downstairs, Julie put on an LP, a John Lennon album with screams and shouts and a desperate message. He hated it. It made him feel old, the fact that he had a daughter who liked a noise he couldn't accept. And then, as though it irritated her as well, she switched it off and put on some Bach harpsichord and the world became peaceful then, and he closed his eyes.
He would write to Cherry tomorrow. He would have to work out more carefully how he should manage his life with Julie. He'd like a week to do that. He could perhaps just drop Cherry a card, a short word. But with what excuse? "Got your letter darling' but that was a commitment. How should he start? She had conveyed an abundance of love and affection, but then that is how she felt. He didn't.
His thoughts were becoming blurred and he felt himself falling asleep; then felt a presence and opened his eyes.
Julie was standing at the door, in her swimsuit
"Are you angry with me?" she asked.
"No. Why?"
T
"You're being distant."
He sat up, leaned on one elbow.
He wanted to talk to her, that's what he wanted to do.
"I'm trying to sort things out. You've come as a bit of a shock, you know."
"I know. Why don't we go and sit in the other room, it's not very nice here."
So they went to sit in the other room which was all summer but still cool.
"Would you like an iced tea, or coffee?" she asked.
"Iced tea would be lovely."
She went down and came up again, straight away it seemed, while his thoughts wandered to a problem he was having with one of the new villas. Cracked walls had appeared after only three months, it meant endless arguments with the architect, and more with the builder.
"What now?"
Confessions of a mature daughter to her adolescent father.
"I read Cherry's letter."
He had left it on the dining room table, not thinking she would go in there, or read it, not thinking that it might matter if it was read. He wasn't surprised. He would have read anything left lying around.
He said nothing but just looked at her.
"She's very much in love with you, isn't she?"
"Apparently."
It was going to be a female inquisition.
"What are you going to do about her?"
"I don't know."
"Do you think she'll come back?"
"It depends what I answer."
"Well surely she won't come back if you don't want her to...? "
"What I want doesn't motivate Cherry. If she wants to come back, she will."
"Do you want her to?"
"At the moment, no."
"What does it depend on? Me?"
"I don't know. I suppose so. It's all happened too quickly. I've got to sort myself out."
"Would you like me to go?"
He thought about it, sipped the cold tea, played with the slice of lemon, pushing it to the bottom with the spoon, the lemon flakes floating to the top.
"No. I think I want you to stay, but I'm not sure why. I have two affections for you," and he couldn't say it. He couldn't say to his daughter-the affection of a lover. He could be her lover in the deep of the night, but he couldn't admit to it in words.
He shook his head.
"I really have to get my head together on this."
"Darling Cherry," Julie said after a while, "my daughter Julie arrived out of the blue the day you left, Susan's daughter, offspring of my first marriage-I am upset by the circumstances I suppose, and would like to write you my feelings more clearly, but can't...."
It sounded very good.
"You write well," he said.
"I majored in English, and I was editor of the college magazine."
So he had a thinker on his hands. Sue again.
She was silent for a while, dreaming up something ghastly, no doubt.
"I know," she said at last, "you ought to get laid by someone entirely new, that'll sort you out. I did a survey on men's relationships with women for the school mag, and found that men only know who they really care about when they go to bed with a complete stranger. Right in the middle of it they wake up to the fact that they are being unfaithful to someone, and whoever that turns out to be is where their heart is."
"You were a complete stranger, and I didn't feel I was being unfaithful to anyone."
"That's because you weren't, then." She smiled and looked too lovingly at him. "You got it bad, maybe."
"For you?"
"For me."
The sound of a motorbike in the driveway stopped him thinking further. It roared up onto the tiles surrounding the pool.
It annoyed him partly because he knew who it was, partly because the noise was unnecessary. He got up, went to the windows, opened them and stepped out on the balcony. Below, getting off the bike with some difficulty was Dutchy, driven by Lewis.
Lewis looked up, then Dutchy looked up.
"Oh, man, have you ridden on one of these?"
"Hi," said Lewis, "nice place you got here." What else could he say anyway?
He signalled them to come in below, and went downstairs. Julie was ahead of him, excited, maybe just by the relief of something happening. He didn't want these people up here, he hadn't had anybody up here for a year. Now it was going to become public property with motorbikes cluttering up the drive-and whatever he had had last night was certainly making him feel liverish. He must forget everything and be nice, or retire. Today was a write-off, forget it, let things happen.
"Daddy, they're thinking of having a party at Dutchy's place tonight."
"Yes?"
"I thought maybe we could have it here instead."
"Oh, fantastic Joolie, with the pool. I have a suckling pig we are going to roast. I'm doing some Indonesian side dishes....You don't have anything to do at all."
"Can we?"
He'd missed it all hadn't he? The growing up, the imploring, the please-may-I-have? He'd seen it with other parents, with the twelve-year-olds on the Paseo demanding five pesetas for a Coke or a cake or an ice cream. He hadn't had any of that. Was it all going to come to him now? All in one big package? Please Daddy may I have a party, car, house, three husbands, five lovers, a double bed and blinds to hide the sun out?
He shrugged his shoulders.
"As long as nothing's expected of me and nobody treads the flowers into the ground." Jesus how old, old, old that sounded. Mind the flowers, mind the grass in the front drive dear, your friends left tyre marks on the lawn you know, did they have to, can't they be more considerate ... and the rest of the afternoon was just a build up of all things past.
He wandered around, not feeling wanted, not knowing what to do except get in the way. Julie was him at eighteen, back at Brenda's house, the Victorian gabled in Woking, Surrey, England.
Watching Julie and Dutchy preparing the great feast was like watching himself with Brenda thirty years previously. Brenda his first love, who had not loved him back. Forty-eight hours' leave from Aldershot during the year and a half of penal servitude in the RASC. He had taken over the house, and her parents, bewildered, had just watched. This strange young man, well spoken, well behaved, about to go up to Chester for OCTU, intelligent, apparently half French but holding a British passport, ex-public school, all right. Popular with girls even then, he had not been handsome enough to compete with the accepted image of male attraction. Men had to look like Van Johnson, Jean-Pierre Aumont or Stewart Granger, the Lee Marvins and Ringo Starrs hadn't broken the ice. If he's got polished shoes that's at least a good sign, my dear.
He had not known English society and had totally misjudged it. Woking and stockbrokers' suburbia was as high as he had ever been, and they had tried to make him feel it but he had this theatrical flare for organizing people and parties and he had got it all together for Brenda's 21st and Brenda had ended up on the couch with the arrogant officer. He had only been a private, not letting anyone know. He had moved the sitting room furniture, the dining room furniture, he had cleared everything for dancing. Dancing was the order of the day, the Samba, Conga the Hokey-Kokey with the old 78s, gold needles and silver needles, and this character who came in from the barracks to play the drums as though marching down the Mall. But it had lent atmosphere, the big thump, and the girl who couldn't really play the piano, but tried awfully hard. Beer and cider, sausages and potato salad. Mother had done that with Brenda's sister whose name he couldn't remember. Julie was so much older than that. They all were now. The same age but so much more mature. Imagine Brenda on the pill. She would never have stopped sleeping around. In the summer house after the parents had gone to bed. It was a miserable time then, knowing he could be nice to girls, knowing that he could tickle them where they liked, but none of them wanting that from him. He hadn't been bitter, he had just wanted to be loved, and Brenda had admired him, had treated him like her boyfriend, till the midnight hour when she wanted to get fucked by a man.
Lewis was taking all the records out, one by one, taking them out and examining them and considering them and putting them aside in no special order. It was pointless feeling annoyed by the untidy; they had no sense of order like others had no sense of direction. Did it matter that they were going to be in the wrong place? He'd even enjoy putting them back the right way.
He watched Lewis choose one and put it on the turntable. He knew about record players, probably had a great big stereo set back home in Dallas Texas, or wherever. It was Abbey Road, the only Beatles he had, the sure fire for everyone.
"Your Pa got anything newer than this?"
He thought of going out on the terrace where Dutchy and Julie were re-arranging the tables. It wasn't Julie's idea, Dutchy had taken over now, the whole evening was going to be very smart, very chic and very camp and the pool would have candles on pieces of cork all over the water. He liked that idea. Dutchy was a romantic, was he a romantic himself too?
The motorbike kick-started and roared around and away. Lewis off on some errand no doubt, maybe to make sure he had his kilo of hash to smoke. He presumed it would end that way. He had no great thoughts about the smoking bit, he had smoked and felt nothing, but others did, so that was all right by him. And Cherry had smoked away for a whole week experiencing all sorts of things which he couldn't share because he never let himself go enough. He wondered why she liked him. He could only remember criticism from her. His body. She loved his body and his smooth skin. She put oil on it most days. She was vain for him. Had been.
He decided that a gentle swim in the pool would be nice before Dutchy covered it with melting wax, so he went out and looked for Julie, but couldn't see her.
"I tell you man, they are a fine match."
She had gone on the bike with Lewis then. A quick one in his pad? Wherever that was.
"They have gone to get Kurt's records, he has all the latest Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin."
It was going to be a great evening! One minute of Janis Joplin and he would be away.
"Who's coming?" he asked.
"Everybody. Sam, Naomi, Wendy, Skylar, Peta, Paul, Mary-you name them, they come. Lala, Avril and her mother."
Avril and her mother? Well that might prove interesting.
Maybe young Julie was right, a little night with someone new could decide him. Avril or mother? And a tiny little something connected with his conscience and with Julie had made him dive quickly into the water.
He lost himself at the bottom of the pool, felt the blue tiles here and there where they looked green or brown, unsettled the beginning of bacterial growth, more chlorine and a clean filter was needed then, so he got out and changed the filter and the whole business, once he had started, took him a happy hour during which his thoughts wandered from Woking and Brenda to Julie who had really stirred up the past, and the strangest affair of them all, Madame Bachot.
Avril's mother was a little like Madame Bachot, slimmer (nobody could be fatter-no that wasn't true, but he had been surprised at the room she had taken up in the bed); and Julie had, naturally, reminded him of Sue, and Sue had not been unlike Brenda. One stuck to types. Funny.
"You are very pensive. Is all well Jey?" It was Dutchy exhausted but pleased with himself.
"I was thinking about women," he said. He was netting in the drowned wasps and the leaves and the dust on the surface of the pool.
"You think of little else."
"I was thinking how one tends to stick to types, about three or four. Do you?"
"Of course. You knew Carl, and the English boy Robin, it was you who said they were alike. And you never met Brute." And Dutchy talked of Brute who was apparently just that, eighteen with the strength of five exciting oxen and an innocence that made the angels weep.
And in the middle of an apparently exciting description of a picnic with Brute, he heard the sound, far away, of the motorbike and stopped himself from turning and looking round. He really didn't want to be an anxious father.
Nor the other.
The motorbike roared up and stopped short of the patio and Julie got off the back with a plastic bag from the super Mercado bulging with goodies. She handed it to Lewis who didn't want it, ran over and kissed him wholesomely on the mouth. She tasted of wine.
"That's a kiss for a father?" Dutchy was beginning to be suspicious, but his mind was taken off everything by Julie screaming out "yippee" and letting herself fall backwards into the pool with a great big splash, jeans, T-shirt, sandals, watch and all.
"Oh!!' he exclaimed delighted. "What a girl! What a girl! Life man, so much fife, she bubbles."
"Isn't anyone else coming in?"
"Oh yes, I join you!"
But Dutchy didn't plunge in with his clean white jeans and Moroccan shirt. He took everything off, very carefully, folding all his clothes on the bamboo chair, laying his beads on the folded trousers, his ribbon on the beads, then holding his nose and his red swim slip, jumped in feet first.
"Harry's bringing his bongos and Lewis's got his guitar; Freddie plays the flute, Dutchy you're going to do a flamenco dance, what are you going to do Daddy?" She was lying on her back in the water her shirt and jeans billowing out around her.
"I'm going to watch and drink myself into the ground," he said.
"Wheeee!" she screamed and then; "Fuck! I've got all this paper money in my pocket." And she duck-dived to come up the steps, pulling her pocket inside out with all the damp 100 peseta notes stuck together.
"Do you do any work at all?"
She was unpacking one of Cherry's old suitcases looking for something exotic to wear, and he was lying on the bed quietly sipping a long whisky.
"Yes, quite a lot"
"When?"
"In fits and starts. Depends what I'm buying or selling. It's a sort of in-between period at the moment."
"How did you make all your money?"
"What money?"
"Well I know you say you're poor, but you own this place and an apartment, you must have bought them with something."
"One borrows from banks you know. You use other people's money to make some for yourself."
"How did you start?" She sounded more polite than interested.
"I ... ' and he hesitated. Madame B loomed up in his mind, bosoms and all. He forced himself to think a few years beyond her. "I first of all bought an apartment in a new block in Nice, and sold it very quickly for a profit. That was luck, or rather recognition of an opportunity when it presented itself. With that money I invested in a villa in the north of Spain, sold that and eventually came down here."
"Oh wow! How about this?"
It was a simple white kaftan made of see-through cotton, embroidered with a motif in bright green, gold, red and yellow, which Cherry had bought in Morocco. She had never worn it.
"Very nice," he said.
"It's like new!"
"It is new."
"What are you going to wear?"
"White jeans and blue shirt."
Julie opened the cupboard and looked at all his clothes. He had seventeen suits, twice that amount of shirts, shoes, ties; a well-dressed man's wardrobe.
"Wow, you're really a smarty boots."
And she tried on a suede hat he never wore and he went into a deep and unexpected sleep watching her, because things were happening around him which were none of his concern and he was happy surrounded by busy people and felt secure and also exhausted.
When he awoke it was dark and there was music below and people swimming in the pool, and he got up and it was all very pleasant. He stayed in the bathroom a long time, showering and shaving and cleaning his teeth and choosing what to wear, and he came down the stairs feeling rich, aware that the house was ideal for entertaining and realizing that when he came to sell it he should invite the prospective buyers to a party, possibly a little more elegant, for already people were sitting on the floor, leaning against walls and sipping beer and Coke out of the bottles.
The lady of the house, Julie, was talking to starry-eyed hippies, but she got up and brushed them aside when she saw him coming.
"You had a great sleep."
"Obviously needed it," he said. He kissed her briefly, paternally.
"You probably know more of the people here than I do, but you should meet Barbara."
He was astonished at what she and Dutchy had managed to do. The setting was quite beautiful. As well as candles floating on the water, there were candles burning inside pumpkin shells, lights shone up at the house through the coral coloured bougainvillea. There was more than a touch of elegance, there was theatre and romance and the guests were also a surprise.
The Bartlettes and Moorheads, the Godlins and Wailds, the Os and the Ps, the Qs and the Rs, were all there sporting shirts and clean trousers, long dresses and jewelry. The man from the Moroccan shop was there with a pearl in his beard and everyone seemed to be honoured to have been invited by the way they thanked him.
Summers and summer holidays were all very well in Reina-del-Mar, but few people had sophisticated parties. Wine, or bottle parties in plenty always with the same people, but tonight the cliques were mixing. The strange alignment of cafe tables on the Paseo on either side of the flower beds made a natural demarcation between the rich residents or older tourists and the poor residents and the passing hippies. They did not mix. One group was as boring as the other was rude. Occasionally an uninformed retired bank manager might make the mistake of sitting next to a table of long-haired students and be showered with a volley of "fucks' and move to a more secluded table in distress, but here, tonight it seemed the groups were mixing, the bank manager was here with his friend the stockbroker, and he was talking to the poets from Tenerife and the artists from Ibiza.
He had no idea why they had come or who had invited them, then, on reflection, he realized it was obvious. Cherry's house had been talked about, one of the larger villas no one had entered so far.
"Just how many goddam rooms have you in this place?"
The question came from a very tall, white-haired sun-burnt psychiatrist from Rome, who originally hailed from Kentucky and liked buying anything he set his eyes on.
"Six bedrooms, three bathrooms, studio, three reception, kitchen, usual offices."
"And it's yours?"
"Oh yes."
"I thought it belonged to the French diplomat's wife."
"It did. I bought it from her."
"To re-sell?"
"To keep and live in."
Why not play it rich tonight? Yet it wasn't as enjoy able as it should be. Julie was there somewhere but with these people who had known Cherry, seen him with her, he was alone. She was his other half, and she had left and everyone knew it, so, daughter or not, he was alone. Maybe he needed a drink.
He would like to play it like this all the time, play the aloof, not have to smile and ingratiate himself and think of selling, think of parting with what he liked. Maybe he didn't really have to. Maybe it was all in his mind...?
Behind the bar Dutchy's friend was serving drinks; sitting on the back of the leather sofa, Lewis was playing the guitar. It was about eleven o'clock and things were just beginning to get going. He wandered into the kitchen and was surprised to see the amount of food. He had no idea where it came from. He picked up a mussel seasoned with chopped onions, parsley and a little mayonnaise and slipped it into his mouth. It was delicious.
"Halloo Jey ...!' It was Avril's mother.
"Hallo."
"At last you've invited me to your house." She had large mauve eyes, well-trimmed blonde hair and a sun-tanned skin, a good-looking woman, with whom it might one day happen.
"I am with Kurt tonight," she said by way of explaining that it would not happen tonight, "but I have my friend Yngvild," and Yngvild appeared from nowhere on cue, a tall, very tall, taller than him, blonde quite obviously Scandinavian.
It was an offering. I am not available, but here is my friend who is.
"Hallo Yngvild," he said, opening the fridge door for something to do. "Where are you from?" She was probably about thirty-five, but demanded to be treated like a teenager.
"Norway."
Kurt appeared, ready to protect Avril's mother from the obvious fate that awaited her if she was left too long with the host, and suggested a dance.
Alone, Yngvild had no idea what to do or say, and he wondered whether he could be bothered.
She was perfect, considering her height, and quite different from anyone else he'd known. "You really ought to have a new affair and then you'd know who you were being unfaithful to." Maybe. But later.
"Have a mussel," he said, and pressed a mussel shell to Yngvild's mouth, tipped it and spilt a little of the liquor down her front. She was wearing a yellow dress, but the liquor dribbled down her tanned skin.
"I'm sorry." He found a clean dishcloth and wiped it off. She liked that, and smiled. And he very gently kissed her on the lips, as they both moved out of the kitchen.
All too easy. The declaration had been made. Get him quickly because he's a popular man. Or Scandinavian women were just over-eager all the time.
He smiled at his own conceit. Fanfaron!
The music boomed out, the guitars and bongos played, the voices rose higher, motorbikes and cars came and went. In the olive grove Dutchy's pig was being roasted and guests dived into the pool. Then another character turned up with a guitar and Lewis really got going. Steel strings, jangling, a good rhythm coming out now of the bongos and everyone moving, some alone, some in front of partners, the guitar boys really giving it all they had and it just felt good to have movements coming out of the body to the rhythm, the music getting faster, the limbs loosening, the dancing more exotic. Someone brought a long pole and held it two or three feet above the ground. The limbo dance.
Julie went under successfully, he tried and hit the pole and fell back. Laughs all round. He retired. Julie and Dutchy, then Yngvild and another girl, dark headed, wild. Yngvild failed the second time, too tall, and it was between Julie and the wild girl and Dutchy. The pole got lower, five inches at a time, unsteadily held by two guests who shook with laughter. The wild girl went under, right down, she was really good, then Julie slipped and fell. Dutchy, high now on the adrenalin tried hard, just made it; the dark girl again; Dutchy again just managing, exceptionally supple for his build; the girl again; then Dutchy fell and Julie tried once more and made it to applause; her and the wild girl, split skirt up the side, fat ankles but strong muscles there, exciting watching from the front. And Julie so nimble. The wild girl hit the pole, they tried together again and both fell, they called it a draw and danced together, holding hands, holding each other, something very sensuous about watching them both. Then a sudden understanding glance from Julie, a movement of the eyes upwards at him, suggesting what? Upstairs? With the girl? Was he drunk or did she mean that? A look at the girl, a raise of the eyebrows. In whose mind was the perversion? Then a hand in the small of his back, feeling up his spine, round his waist. Yngvild, lonely, wanting attention, and Julie making a face as much as to say-if it's her you want then up yours.
"They're swimming in the nude and the Guardia are here," Yngvild whispered.
He turned. The Guardia had come up the driveway, one fat, one thin, straight out of a musical comedy.
He knew them by sight, quite well. They had talked to him some time back, an enquiry for a lost foreigner, a lost dog, they hadn't understood why it mattered.
"Buenos noches?" he said. "Una copa?" and to Yngvild in a whisper, "Could you tell them in the pool while I keep them busy?"
"Mucho ruido," they were saying. Much noise. Hardly. Had they already been to the pool? He handed them a glass of whisky each. Whisky was always worthwhile.
"Salud."
They talked to him, amicably, he couldn't hear what they were saying, but they didn't seem particularly interested in stopping the proceedings. A friendly visit, a something to do while on the beat to ease the boredom.
"It's all right, they were seen coming, and everyone got out." Yngvild into the secrecy bit. If it hadn't been for her he wouldn't know about them, he could rely on her to look after his needs, all of them.
"Salud," said the Guardia eyeing her. They fancied any body, any time.
"Oh Daddy, have you been arrested?"
"Mi hija," he said. "My daughter."
"Su hija?" They were certainly surprised. They bowed and nearly saluted eyeing her loose kaftan and the shape of her breasts showing through the thin cotton. In their eyes you could see the envy for the foreigner, just to be surrounded by such women, to be in a society that allowed one to be surrounded by them.
And then Julie took one by the hand and started dancing with him. She'd chosen the senior of the two, so the other could not object, and the dark girl took the other and started dancing, and the guitarists went into a bit of flamenco and everyone clapped and they really let themselves go, but somehow with dignity, not losing the respect, not letting the uniform become comic.
Julie kissed her partner, on the forehead, and he kissed her hand back, and both, with great pride, left. Their timing was perfect, everyone appreciated it. One up to the Guardia Civil. He walked down to the gate with them, and shook hands.
It was a hot night....
He peeled off his shirt, took off his trousers and dropped into the pool with his briefs on, striped red and blue, perfectly respectable for the bank manager and retired stockbroker who were sitting under the beach umbrellas as though it were sunny. They were enjoying the party, enjoying the enthusiasm and energy of the young. And then, splashing in feet first right next to him, the slim nude figure of his daughter.
"Chicken, why don't you take them off?"
"Because I don't want to display my prick to old men and women who aren't used to seeing that sort of magnificence."
She laughed and disappeared.
He wanted to ask her not to swim in the nude, but what the hell. And then Dutchy came in from above, very drunk, wearing only his beads and his Indian ribbon, then the dark girl, huge bosoms flying, and the pool was a mass of naked bodies, and the lights went out and a few candles burned on, and he got out and looked at the satyricon in the pool, and around he saw that the respectables had vanished. When boobs begin to show it's time to go.
He was fresh now, fresh and energetic and really wanting more of something good to happen. Julie came out all wet and beautiful, and he wanted her.
"Let's go upstairs," he said.
"Just us?"
"Why, do you want someone else to come?" He'd been right, she wanted to do everything.
"Barbara would join us, I think."
But then Barbara screamed with delight as two men fell on her in the shallow end. It was getting on for orgy time.
"Maybe she's busy," Julie said. "I'll be in the bedroom."
And she rushed into the house.
He stayed a moment just to make sure nothing cataclysmic was happening, and went in after Julie.
Without seeming to, without even admitting it to himself, he made sure that no one was looking, that no one was noticing who he was going up with. Then on the stairs Yngvild barred his way. She was wearing a yellow two-piece, so he tried to pull her top off, but it was securely strapped.
"Is the water warm?"
"It's beautiful. Join you in a minute." Any lie to get rid of her. He liked her, but Julie was waiting.
But then Julie wasn't. She was wrapped in a small red towel and standing outside the closed bedroom door.
"There's someone in there," she said.
"Who?"
"Don't know."
"That's a bit naughty."
"We could see if we went up on the terrace and dropped down on the balcony."
She went up, excited by the idea, so he followed.
There was no one in the top room, or on the terrace, and she leaned over the wall, then climbed over it and dropped down like a cat burglar on the balcony.
She signalled him down.
He dropped, a little more heavily, and looked unbelievingly at what was happening on his bed. Avril's mother and her boyfriend. All the lights were on and the blinds sufficiently wide open to allow a front row seat There was something about it all he really didn't like, and he realized that he didn't want to be seen, didn't want to be caught looking, so he stepped back against the wall, out of sight, and looked at Julie.
She was just interested. She watched like a child might watch television for the first time. Puzzled, surprised, more than fascinated. To his astonishment she then opened the door and pushed back the blinds.
"Oh sorry," she said, "I didn't know there was anyone in here."
Politely, she backed out.
"I think he was just about to come."
"That's cruel."
"Well, I want the bed."
"You should have let them finish."
She was just about to get hold of him, when there was a noise above them. It was Dutchy on the roof terrace.
"What goes on down there?"
"Friends of yours are fucking."
"Ooh ... she is terrible. Her language."
"Well they are!"
"But a young girl like you doesn't say things like that. Making love is prettier."
"I didn't think they were very pretty."
And Avril's mother came out onto the balcony patting her hair as though she had just come out of a hairdresser, eyes wide open and looking as though butter wouldn't melt in her mouth.
"Was everybody out here looking?" She was brazenly facing the obvious.
In the room Kurt was trying to find his trousers.
"Not everybody," said Julie. "Just twelve of us, we got a good shot with the Polaroid, would you like to see?"
And Avril's mother seriously said "Yes," which was honest of her, and Julie laughed which then made it bad for everybody. Then Kurt, zipping up his flies, came out to see what everyone was talking about.
"You were great," Julie said with a certain amount of admiration.
Kurt looked at her, looked at him, a little surprised, a little shocked. Did his daughter have to treat him like some sort of performing stud?
"Come on, our turn now, Daddy," and taking him by the hand Julie pulled him into the bedroom, at the same time dropping her red towel on the balcony.
She closed the door and locked it.
"Are you mad?"
"No, why?"
"We can't now. Open the door. We can't now."
"We bloody can." And she side-stepped him, crossed the room to the other door and locked that. He was aware that she had both keys in her hand.
"I've never felt so randy in my life," she said. "I've never watched a couple doing it like that. He's got a big prick."
He took a deep breath, watched her lying down on the bed, spreadeagled on her back, ready. Outside he could hear Dutchy talking to Avril's mother. He had come down from the roof terrace to see what was happening, so there were three of them out there trying to look in, wondering what was going on.
"Julie, please."
"Oh come on Daddy-they don't care what we do. I care what we do. With Dutchy out there the whole world will know. Come on, be intelligent."
"You can have the key and you can go ... after. You do it quickly, redly quickly, then they'll never believe it happened."
He turned his back on her, looked at the Venetian blind, made sure no one could see in.
"No Julie," he said. He couldn't "Please give me the key."
"Come and get it."
He turned round and went over to the bed. If he had to use force, then he would. But both her hands were wide open, palms upwards.
"Where is it?"
"Guess."
Her legs were crossed. He looked down. He guessed.
He sat down on the edge of the bed, aware that a strange sort of anger was building up inside him. No doubt, outside on the balcony, the party was building up, five, seven, ten, twenty people, by now everyone was out there for all he knew. He had to do something. The longer he waited, the more he was implicated.
"Can't you understand," he said, "that it's got to be a secret ... if everyone knows ... "
"They'll leave us alone and we can fuck away until it drops off."
He'd had enough. Suddenly. He just wanted to get out of there.
"I'm sorry, but I just don't feel like it," he said getting up.
He wanted to open the blinds to show everyone that nothing was happening, but she was in the nude. It was an impossible situation.
And when he turned, she was lying back, playing gently with the key, and herself.
"Oh for Christ's sake Julie!' His voice was surprisingly loud, stem, and angry.
"Oh fuck you then!' And she pulled the key out and threw it across the room, got off the bed, found the other key under the pillow, unlocked the main door and opened it wide.
"I want a lay Daddy-O, and if you won't give it to me, then I'll find someone who will ... chicken!"
And she went out and slammed the door shut after her.
He turned slowly to the blinds and opened them.
There was no one on the balcony, they had all left discreetly.
Or in disgust?
He found some trousers, slipped them on, a shirt, and feeling sickened, really low, unable to sort out his thoughts, he went downstairs hoping to find Julie, hoping to find someone to talk to, to explain, that nothing had happened, that she was drunk, joking, a practical joker. But the only people around were a couple of hippies he didn't know hugging each other to the ticking sound of a record that had come to an end long ago.
No one else.
No Dutchy. No Yngvild.
Everyone had left.
No Lewis.
He sat down in a wicker-work chair on the patio and tried to close his eyes to the thoughts that were coining in on him.
But they came.
Julie on the bed with the key.
Himself putting it to his nose before putting it in the lock.
Where was she now?
Where was she?
And, oh God, who with?
CHAPTER EIGHT
He slept for three hours and got up around nine. There was no one about.
He didn't feel angry any longer, he didn't feel anything, except perhaps amused. He had drunk a lot, obviously, and so had she, they had behaved stupidly, no more, no one would remember, or if they did, maybe they didn't care. She was probably right there.
He tidied everything up and enjoyed doing so, thinking all the while that Julie would come back to help him, if nothing else. But she didn't, or hadn't by the time he had dried the last glass.
Clearing up after parties had always been a masochistic pleasure. He liked to survey the scene of battle, and then put everything right All the empty bottles in one comer, the ashtrays in another, the glasses in another and a dustbin in the middle. Orange peel, banana peel, apple cores, ash covered cheese, wine soaked biscuits, all into a bin.
The pool was a mess, melted candle wax all around, a bottle at the bottom that could have proved dangerous, but considering all that had gone on, there was little damage. Two glasses broken, one plate, and one picture frame. Upstairs no problems, everyone had behaved very well.
When he heard a motorbike down on the beach road he went out on the balcony to see, hoping it would be her, but several times it wasn't, then eventually she walked in from nowhere, not looking her best, but still very beautiful.
"I'm sorry about last night," she said quickly to get it over. "I drank rather a lot."
"So did I."
He wanted to hug her, kiss her, tell her that he was grateful they could get back together without ill feelings.
She sat down and he noticed she had nothing on her feet.
"Did you walk all the way like that?"
"Yes."
"Was it far?" A genuine question.
"I'm not going to tell you who it was Daddy, so don't pry."
He said nothing. He hadn't been prying, he really hadn't, and that was the first little bit of injustice that crept into their relationship.
"You've got to stop being jealous Daddy."
"I'm not jealous. I'm just mixed up."
"Well, you've got to stop being mixed up. I nearly didn't enjoy myself last night because of you. I did, but I nearly didn't."
"Why?"
"You were orientated towards me all the time. You didn't think for a moment of enjoying yourself with someone else, and then when we could have got together you were only concerned about what other people would think."
"Well that was natural, surely?"
"People don't care what you do at parties Daddy."
"It's a bit different Julie. You're my daughter."
"Then you should have behaved like a father and chased after someone else! Didn't you fancy anyone but me last night? The Norwegian chick? She liked you."
"I was tired."
"Didn't anyone turn you on?"
"Maybe that wild girl, the one you did the limbo dance with...."
"Barbara?"
"Yes, Barbara."
"She went with Lewis."
Barbara went with Lewis?
Who had she gone with then?
"I'm not going to tell you Daddy," she said, smiling as she read his thoughts.
"Oh for Christ's sake, what are you, a mind reader or something?"
"Well it's obvious isn't it. I know you thought I was with Lewis, he's the one you're jealous of, but he's not my type."
"Who is your type?"
"Quite a number of men, but not him. You're my type, one of the strong ones."
"Why won't you tell me?"
"Because it'll upset you. It upsets everyone. Everyone pretends that they don't mind, that they're liberal. The fact that I've been laid by some guy last night is acceptable, even that's a bit hard at first, but if you knew who it was ... three people become involved, me, him and you. It's not necessary."
She was right.
"If I said to you, look I've had it off with a guy called Harold in New York, or Paris or something, it wouldn't matter-if you don't know Harold. It's just a name. But when you meet Harold ... it changes....For one thing, one has this awful image of people together with their trousers down."
She was right again. Cherry with Jacques. Fine. He had no idea what Jacques looked like, but imagine if he was someone he knew, like Enrique.
"It's hard not to be curious though, isn't it?" he said. "I'm now going to look at every man in the street and wonder if he was the one."
"It's better than knowing, because after a couple of days you'll get bored with that sort of thing. You'll even get bored if you know, in fact."
They both sat in silence with their own thoughts for a while, his being what she might be thinking.
"It's kinda fun though, the coupling game."
Well there it was, his daughter was playing a game. He couldn't be hypocritical, he played games all the time, but now he'd have to play her version, he'd have to learn her rules.
"I'll tell you who it was when you've been with someone else," she said.
He said nothing.
It was unsettling, it was dirty book stuff, yet here she was blatantly saying these things, meaning them, making them sound so matter-of-fact that it was acceptable. Was this what the generation gap was really about? Only she was more blatant than most? Pow! Zap! Call a spade a spade Daddy. What about morals?
"What about morals?" he asked.
"Oh they're frightening if you get caught up in that scene. There are so many."
"Have you none at all?"
"Have you?"
Had he?
"Well, I wouldn't kill anyone," he said lamely.
"Oh shit Daddy we're talking about relationships, and you probably would anyway, given certain circumstances."
She was more adult than he. She had questioned everything and found out there was no answer. He was learning from her.
"What are your morals?" she asked.
"I don't know. I feel guilty about having gone to bed with you."
"Well I don't. Does that ease the pain?"
"A little."
"Then you're feeling guilty about something you think I should care about. You're being moral for me, not for yourself."
Should she be telling him these things? Should he be allowing her to tell him these things. How could she know? Christ, he should be correcting her, he should be telling her she was wrong, that she ought to lead a better life, a more moral life. He ought to have been shocked.
"Anyway yours isn't an essential morality."
He wasn't sure what she was talking about.
"It's conventional. You haven't grown up."
"Thanks," he said.
"It's true. There are certain things which I can do because they don't affect me, don't mean anything morally wrong to me. You'll try and go along with them, but won't be able to because you have conventional morals. I mean, I don't see anything wrong in me going to bed with another woman's husband, it's not my responsibility. It's his. If he can take it, if he can be "immoral" with me that's fine, but it's a great drag if he starts making me feel guilty because he thinks it's wrong. That's immoral. And it's immoral of you to go to bed with me and make me feel guilty about it because you're all hung up. Either you can cope with a situation or you can't, and if you can't then you shouldn't get into it."
"So I'm being immoral."
"Oh shit Daddy, what I think is immoral is to go into something for the instant fun knowing that you may not be able to cope with the obvious results. Have now, pay later, sure! But you must know that you can pay. I don't think it moral to go into it unless you know you can pay."
"What if you know that you can't pay but you also know that you can cope with not paying?"
She stuck the fingernail of her thumb against her top teeth and bit hard.
"Yeah. I think then it involves other people doesn't it? Those that are expecting payment. I mean, I don't think it particularly immoral to sign a contract saying you're buying a television set and promise to pay twenty dollars a month and miss out if it's a big company-no one particularly suffers-but if you're buying the set from a small man whose living depends on it, then I'd feel a moral obligation. I don't expect other people to have the same feelings as me, but that's how I feel."
"So how do you place that in the coupling game?"
"Oh, the television set's a guy who really turns me on and he's got a wife. If she's fucking around and he knows it, it doesn't matter. No payment. If he can cope with the affair, cope without hurting her feelings, then there's no payment. If there's a risk of her finding out but he can cope and has done so in the past and gives me confidence then I guess he's like a big corporation, there'll be some hassles to go through, but one can defer them. If he's nervous and obviously needs support, then he's like the little guy: I've got to make sure I can cope with his problems, see him through. It's a joint responsibility, and if I'm not sure I can cope, that's like not being sure I can pay, so I should stay clear."
"What am I? Corporation or little guy?"
"Oh, you're a free gift offer."
"What?"
"I don't have to buy you, you were given me the day I was born. You're family."
"But it's because I'm family that what we've done is immoral."
"Only as far as society and religion are concerned. What the hell is wrong in doing something that you enjoy if it hurts nobody else's feelings?"
"I don't know. It's what I was taught I suppose. Incest isn't nice."
"I think it's wonderful," and her voice broke again, laughing. "I wouldn't have gone to bed with you if you were still married to Mummy."
He closed his eyes. She was going to trot them out, they were just going to come out and hit him, zap! all day long every day. She'd been sent to try him.
"If we go on talking like this," he said, "I'm not sure I'll be able to go to bed with you again."
"You'll go to bed with anyone who turns you on Jeysie. You don't really care about anything else but relationships, and they've got to be spiced pretty high to excite you."
She was right again but this time he knew why. She was talking about herself. She was his daughter, was from the same mould, she'd inherited his traits.
"Have you been to bed with a man?" she asked. She lit a cigarette and leaned forward eager for the answer. He was lying full length on the sofa now, the relationship was dangerously close to psychiatrist and patient.
"No ... well, when I was at school."
"Tell me about it."
"Look Julie," he sat up, "you've got to have some control over this sex thing, that's all it's been about since I met you. Do you have any other interests?"
"Yes. I'm interested in lots of things," now she sat back far more relaxed than he. "But the whole sex thing is just more important and I admit it. Others don't. You don't. You're just not letting yourself go. You're holding back. I saw you last night holding back. Worried about people naked in the pool. They were enjoying themselves, not doing it to shock society. That's all you thought about. What's the bank manager going to think? Those people are dead for Christ's sake. Every book, film, play, magazine, newspaper, all are sex oriented now and there's this great big hypocrisy thing going on. Ali MacGraw and Ryan O'Neal in Love Story, what was that a game of, ludo? People don't love each other unless they're sexually attracted-why doesn't everyone admit it? I was born because you fucked Mummy."
He winced.
"Why the suffering?"
"It's your use of words my darling, couldn't you say it more genteelly?"
"For whose sake? Yours? If there were other people in the room we wouldn't be talking like this, but we are alone and we've done it and I don't see the point in being genteel. Who are we offending?"
"Me. Because I'm not used to talking like that."
"You mean you can do things but you can't talk about them."
"I mean I was brought up to be aware of other people's sensibilities. It's called decorum. It's one of the rules of the game I play."
"What happens if you break the rules?"
"It spoils it for the other player."
And she looked at him for a long time, bit her lower lip and nodded.
"Yeah, I understand that. I'm sorry."
He was about to go on, about how easy it was to spoil things for other people by not considering their way of life, but a figure cut across the window, then appeared at the door. It was Yngvild.
"Oh hallo. All alone both of you?"
"Alone," he said, and got up.
He glanced at Julie as he did so. She smiled at him He was being gentlemanly, not a Woman's Lib man, he'd never be that.
"Come in," he said.
"I think I left my swimsuit here last night."
"Yes. I hung it on the line." He had.
"Oh...."
"Have a drink."
And Julie got up as though suddenly bored.
I'm going to change Daddy, I'm going out. Hope you don't mind." And she deliberately minced out of the room, turned, and behind Yngvild's back made a rude sign encouraging him to do his best with Miss Scandinavia.
CHAPTER NINE
"What would you like?"
"Oh anything. White wine? Or whisky if you have it?"
He would have to be moral, wouldn't he? And not get involved if he couldn't handle it. Could he pay for the television set?
"Are you married?" he asked her.
"Me? Good heavens no."
"Well, you could be."
"But I am not. I have no ties, if that is what you are asking."
That was what he was asking.
She was attractive, very attractive, he could be seen with her and she would flatter him. Why not then?
"Why don't we have dinner together?"
And she was thrilled because she didn't expect to get a dinner out of it too.
He took Yngvild to the Parador and wined and dined her well. Her conversation was limited, but maybe that was due to her speaking English. She was film-magazine beautiful, knew how to use make-up, but something was lacking. She didn't really turn him on. They had gone home after the meal and he had taken her to bed and been completely incapable, because his thoughts were with Julie and where she was and why he preferred her to Cherry. He had fallen asleep and woken up the next morning with Yngvild still trying to arouse him and though of course it worked to begin with, as it always did first thing, he had not been able to keep it up and she had frozen and his mind had drifted again to Julie, comparing her to Cherry, trying to work out the difference and realizing that Julie was simply more adult.
Julie had learned to think.
He didn't remember when he had learned to think, awareness had come to him fairly early on, but later than Julie. That was what had separated him from Sue, and he had not understood. He had not understood her fears when he had told her what was involved in the Orthez proposition. But she had seen ahead, she had seen that if he did it, if he got involved, it would either break him or make him quickly and either way she would lose the security. He hadn't seen it that way then, he had just seen middle-class fear of risk-taking, but then she hadn't been able to explain it to him, she had just got angry and slammed the doors and it had taken the form of self-pity. She should have seen that that didn't help either.
The Orthez business was so remote now and the people involved so remote too. If he'd been able to think then, if he'd been aware, he would never have met Jack and Harry, he would never have been working in the estate agency, never even married Sue. The whole business of marriage was so strange. She had obviously fallen in love with his way of life, with his apparent freedom, the tattiness and laissez-faire of his whole bachelorhood. How many girls did that? How many girls embraced the freedom of their men without realizing that the very moment they moved in, the pattern changed? And how many men thought that by marrying their wives they would instantly gain the girl's background, the security of her parents? He had. He had liked middle-class comfort. The rectory house in the village, the sitting room with sitting room furniture and french windows leading out onto garden laid out to lawn with a sun dial and a paved path and a weeping willow overlooking a pond with goldfish, and a garage with a polished saloon car mainly used on Sundays to go to the local fete.
He had loved that. He had especially loved Sue's room, a young girl's room, twenty years old; old enough to be independent, to live in London, to share a flat, but middle-class girls didn't do that quite as easily in those days, and it was 1950 and there weren't that many jobs. Sue still clung onto her school books, her school chums, Myrtle for one. If Myrtle had got a job in the naughty city Sue might have shared a flat with her, but Myrtle was in love with a Naval Officer and wanted to go to Portsmouth, so in the end never went anywhere. Young men were still in the army, navy or air force then, older men were still coming out. There was still rationing and he still homed to Tante Louise at weekends, which was how he had met Sue, of course. A dance, a party in Myrtle's front room, with parents looking on. It was a wine cup party and he had brought a hip flask of gin and orange. That was daring. That was revolutionary. Sue had liked that. He had dared to do it and he had brought a new record. Nat King Cole, "They try to tell us we're too young' and everyone behaved as they should. And he had walked her home, though her parents were away for the weekend and she was supposed to be staying with Myrtle, and they had gone upstairs to her bedroom, pale blue, blue curtains, one teddy bear, but no other female frippery. She was into a rebellious period, and they had lain down on the bed and he had tried and she hadn't let him, and he hadn't made a fuss but accepted that the first time of meeting was not the time to push it, besides he was shy, and wasn't sure he would know how to handle the situation. She wasn't exactly adept. She wasn't rushing off to the bathroom to fit herself up with coils or anything, and he hadn't come armed either. Christ, things had changed, hadn't they? The whole business, carrying preventatives in the back of the wallet, or those fizzy pills that sometimes worked.
They'd gone through the ritual of being clandestine lovers. He'd been asked to leave by the back door at four in the morning after a cup of coffee in the kitchen, as though it was a late party, or it might have seemed to the neighbours that he had stayed the night and that would never do. The cold night air, the frost on the ground as he sneaked up the garden path and into the fields beyond and so round to the road and back to his car, a black Standard he'd bought for 35 pounds. He was training to be in respectable insurance. Then he'd visited Sue the following weekend, and her mother and her Rector father of all things had approved, and they had gone in the car to a Thames-side pub near Oxford and had had a good time and he had suggested staying the night because of the non-existent fog and she had said that it wasn't the right time of the month and he had believed her and then she had said it wasn't true but that she had this fear that if she went with a boy too quickly he wouldn't look at her again, and some of them still thought that, and they were absolutely right.
So he had invited her to a theatre in London the following week and the surprise had come when she had asked whether he could put her up. Of course she'd tell her parents she was staying with a friend, but that she had been capable of lying and making it plain that Thursday night was going to end in bed, that had been a surprise, and very exciting. And he had only been able to half concentrate on the show, South Pacific, because of what was in store, and he had taken her to Hatchett's afterwards where Chappie D'Amato was playing the Blue Tango, and then they had gone back to the flat in Kensington behind Barkers which he shared with two friends, and they had girls that night, and the girls all got together in the bathroom and giggled and Sue had come out looking a little superior, and he had wondered whether she could stand his room after her parents' home comfort and of course she had loved it because it was untidy. A single bed, an electric fire on the wall shining down, an oversized chest of drawers and it had been very exciting. He had been to bed with three girls before that, not counting his first experience ever with a prostitute, and he hadn't been shy, had known how to excite, how to thrill, and she had been wonderful and loving, so loving that he had fallen in love.
More theatre evenings had followed, then a weekend dinner at the Rectory and going out en jamille, meeting their friends, leading their lives. Point-to-points, bridge parties in the evenings, sometimes a game of chess with the "old man'. And at a cocktail party he had met someone who suggested he should work in an estate agency, the money was better, the prospects were better and it had all been arranged by the Rector who thought he was a nice boy and quite suitable for his daughter providing a position could be found for him nearby.
Change of life followed, the acceptance of the job, the leaving of London and living with his Aunt in Pangboume and working in the estate agency in Reading. Six months' probation was considered suitable. Why not try it? What could he lose? Leaving the flat had been nothing and he had been given a small office of his own instead of a desk in a draughty hall in Holbom, and he had been coddled by his Aunt, and had made more money and saved, and everybody had loved him. Suddenly he had become a bigger fish in a smaller pool.
His mother dutifully met the in-laws-to-be, the only real hurdle, but she had seemed content by the match (he was her responsibility till he got married), and his Aunt and Sue's mother visited each other and a whole new way of life was created by the proposed marriage.
Then the slow but sure and happy progress of the young married. Sue losing her rebelliousness at the sight of her own refrigerator, her own cooker, her own choice of curtains; six months in a small flat in Reading, because he was training in the main office after being unexpectedly promoted due to someone leaving; taking over the responsibilities of a new industrial estate, a higher salary, improvements all round, popularity and of course the first to hear of the ideal cottage in the Thames-side village five miles away, and everybody being even more delighted. The survey, the exchange of contracts, mortgage, Sue wanting the cottage and suddenly it had become theirs, two small bedrooms with dormer windows, woodwork painted blue, roses, a quarter of an acre garden, no garage, but lyrical and romantic. Downstairs a beamed sitting room with ingle-nook fireplace, a small dining room or study and the addition, the kitchen and the bathroom, the only drawback, downstairs. But who cared? A place of their own, better than the awful Victorian flat that overlooked the back of the hospital at the top of the town, Sue working in a photographer's shop, not really a receptionist, not really a secretary, a sort of assistant, an acceptable enough title for status-conscious parents.
And because his car didn't look too good on the Rectory drive and didn't fit the successful image, father-in-law offered to lend the deposit for a new one, providing the family could choose the car. It took a patient week for him to find something that would make everyone, including himself, happy, so a two-tone Hillman Minx was purchased, priMr.ose yellow with a red roof, new, exciting, daring, younger than the family saloon in the garage but just as shiny and a Rootes car which was very reliable.
And so they could have lived happily ever after except that he met the Gregory brothers who were only five years older than himself but so much wealthier and more established and more adult. They admired his salesmanship, his wit, and the fact that he was bilingual. He sold them a factory site, pointing out the obvious advantages of buying now at that particular spot where the main road was going to pass eventually, where they could extend, expand. They were in food manufacturing machinery, and he had been surprised to find how interested he was to be in on the plans of a revolutionary mixer which would enable meat packers to mix their recipes under vacuum. The site had been bought, and he had helped them get the architect and the builder and he had got young people all around and they had liked that. They had liked Sue too, and the inter-wife entertainment and morning coffee rounds had started to everyone's advantage. Then Sue had learned to drive, and drove him to work when she wanted the car and there was even talk now of getting another car. But they would wait a year. Save up for it. After all, the first still had to be paid for. And if there were disagreements in the family they were so quickly swept under the carpet that they never showed. He never said anything about her parents though she criticized their way of life, their snob values not in fact far removed from her own; and he never mentioned his mother or the way she continually complained about not having enough money yet went off and bought extravagant clothes. She had little else to do. And there was his father, the black sheep. That was something no one ever talked about.
Then one day in the pub near the estate, over beer and sausages which they all examined for their consistency, their mass, the Gregorys, Jack Gregory, said, "Why don't you come and work for us?"
And they had offered half again what he was earning. Half again. That was immediately, for training. They wanted him for export sales, for France, perhaps for America, if all went well. He would become Export Manager, then eventually a director of the company.
It was exciting, the offer of a new job, of promotion. And he had talked to Sue and she had been a little apprehensive about what her father would say because it was not really as respectable as an Estate Agency, but they had all met the Gregorys and all had said what brilliant business men they were, and he had had a week to think about it, and he had needed a week. He had needed the weekend anyway to talk about it to Father-in-Law to whom he owed the deposit on the car.
"Been offered a job by the Gregorys," he thought he'd start over a drink after dinner, or over a game of chess, but he hadn't even had to do that. While daughter was talking to mother in the kitchen over the Sunday roast and they were reading the Sunday papers in front of the sitting room fire, the morning room, November rain pouring down outside, Father-in-Law relaxed after a successful sermon, read something about hotel and club kitchens needing more machinery because of the new catering wages act, and without prompting had said, "Those Gregory boys know what they're doing, my goodness they're well informed." And he had told him how the factory was going and a little bit more about what they had in mind, and the Rector was fascinated and he had just dropped it in gently. "They've offered me a job, actually."
"You, a job? Really, what sort of a job?"
"Export sales manager, because of my French."
"Good heavens. I take it you're accepting."
"I've got till Wednesday to think about it."
"Cut in salary I suppose, but it would be worth it."
"No, up by 500 pounds."
"You're not serious?"
"Perfectly serious. They want me to join them as soon as possible, go to France, learn the business there, all expenses paid so I can start with them when they open."
"Congratulations my boy. Mother!"
And mother, who had already heard the news from daughter and was just as doubtful about its reception as Sue, was delighted and a bottle of Champagne had been opened.
He had given notice to the Estate Agency and had started reading the Food Manufacturer and Caterer and Hotel Keeper, and a week's holiday was planned before he joined and they decided to go to London for three days and redecorate the bathroom the following three and London, in a way, was a mistake, because he felt he belonged there more than in Reading, but the future was good, and there was France to look forward to.
The last week, a love week, they decided to start a family, and then decided not to. He was going to be away for three months, which was a ridiculously long time to be without her, so after a month she would come and live with him and maybe then they would talk about a family seriously, but to travel while pregnant would be stupid.
And the parting had been such sweet sorrow, and he had actually cried, which he hadn't done for a long time, and France was not what he had expected, but cold and not too friendly at first. He had got a room in a commercial hotel and, through a friend of the Gregorys, this job as a trainee factory manager. He had been told not to mention that he was working for the Gregorys, that indeed he was not in light engineering at all, but in the food trade. And he had started work, mixing and grinding pork meat and in a room where a beautiful pote-de-joie was made he eventually saw a machine which was nursed and guarded like a robot. It was spherical and made of stainless steel and purred and hummed. The room was a laboratory, and it was in there that the French manufacturers of the machine were carrying out their experiments, and it was the door of that room which was always closed to him and indeed to anyone else but the Chef, who thought the whole thing a joke for he was of the old school and preferred to make a good p�t' with a mincer and a knife and his hands and a big bowl.
After a month in the small town he had got into the way of life, the cinema twice a week, the drinking in the bar, the drives out to the country fishing with the Chef, and he went to a party where there were lots of pretty girls, and though they were all very protected he had managed to use his charm, and had kissed one of them in the darkness of a porch and he realized that his tears and his love for Sue were perhaps not as permanent as he had imagined, that there was a lot of fun to be had away from home and the Hillman and hypocritical church on Sundays.
And he had dated the girl and had had a romantic day with her just walking in the mountains, and he was sort of half in love with her and she learned that he was married and she was completely shattered and wouldn't see him again and he was ostracized by all the young people of his age for being married. Married people were quite different, apparently; they belonged to another group, but as he was alone and without a wife he wasn't welcome in that group either, and then Sue had come down and the French society was forgotten and he showed her around but she was indifferent to the things he found interesting. She didn't like the hotel, or the cooking, she thought it cold and didn't like the cinema seats, there was a language problem and she did not enjoy shopping and they had their first argument because she said that he was stooping to conquer, it was not necessary to be quite so much with the workers; she thought the fishing on Sundays with the Chef eating salami and drinking straight from the bottle vulgar, and she didn't like the fried trout. Then he had received the registered letter from the Gregorys who spelt out something very clearly which he had suspected and which he found very exciting. So he had taken Sue out to dinner in a romantic and fashionable restaurant, and over the hors d'oeuvre had told her what was going to happen.
The Gregorys were using him as an industrial spy.
He showed her a check for nothing less than 500 pounds and he showed her the letter with the promise of a further 500 pounds if he pulled it off within three weeks. And she had looked at it and read it twice and looked up at him in disbelief and had said, "But it's dishonest."
"What is?"
"What they're asking you to do."
"In a way, yes. So what? Look what I'm going to get."
"But it's dishonest Jey, you can't do that sort of thing."
"Of course I can. All businesses are dishonest."
"Not as blatant as that. They're using you to take someone else's idea and not paying for it."
"They've got to now. They're committed. It's whoever gets that type of machine out first that succeeds."
"But don't you see, some poor little man has probably spent his whole life working on this idea and you're just going to take it off him, steal it ... it's stealing!"
"But if the Gregorys don't get it, all their investments will go and so will my job."
"Your job doesn't matter that much. I don't want to live with someone who can't see that it's dishonest. And I don't want him to be the father of my child!"
He had laughed and scoffed because she was being ludicrous and he hadn't wanted her, of all people, to run around telling him at this stage in the game that he couldn't go on with it. He had a five-year contract with the Gregorys, he was committed to them, he could make or break them and he could make or break himself. Also, though he could not explain this to her, they trusted him and he trusted them and to betray that trust by not going through with the job would be far worse than indulging in a little skullduggery at the factory.
"I'm pregnant," she had said then, and burst into tears.
An elderly waiter was serving them at the time and had looked sadly at her and at him.
"Il parait qu'elle attend un bebe," he said humorously, and the elderly man had looked at both of them again and shrugged his shoulders and had simply said, "Then you'll have to marry her."
"We are married."
And he had beamed and a bottle of Champagne had been offered on the house and she had taken a sip and been sick because she was one month gone and psychologically that was when she felt she should be sick, or so he thought unkindly because he was irritated.
He spent the next day with her, a whole day out of the precious three weeks admitting that she was probably right and agreeing not to go through with the deal. He would send some information back which would satisfy the Gregorys but which would in no way be dishonest, and please would she forget the whole business?
He managed to pretend that his now genuinely concerned look was for her state of health and for her return journey. In fact he was wondering how he would get to have a close look at the machine or the plans themselves. It would not be a simple job at all.
And Sue, after one more day of mooning around decided to go home; there was no point in hanging about, and anyway he'd be back in a few weeks, and the little thought that occurred to him then, the thought of going back to the cottage with Ma and Pa hovering about was suddenly not comfortable. It was no more than that, it wasn't oppressive or unbearable, it was just a little bit uncomfortable. And when he saw her off at the station, first class, he had a tiny feeling of relief when the train drew out, and a tiny feeling that she felt relief too, which was an unsettling thought for the future, in a strangely pleasing sort of way.
"You don't like me," Yngvild cut in.
He came out of it, away from the Gare de Toulouse, away from the guilt and the emotions and looked at the sad frustrated blonde next to him.
"It's nothing to do with you. I'm getting old and I'm afraid I'm rather tired." He sighed a little too dramatically, but he did feel weary.
"It's also very psychological," he went on, "since I know you think it's your fault it makes me feel guilty and the moment I feel guilty it doesn't work."
"But if I'm making you feel guilty, it is my fault."
"If you want it to be. But it isn't."
And then Julie's voice sang out from downstairs.
"Are you still fucking, Daddy," or can I come up?"
And when he had recovered from that one he sat up to see his daughter, the child born of the great disaster, at the foot of the bed.
"Is he any good?" she asked Yngvild.
"No good at all," he replied in case Yngvild said something he couldn't take.
"Old age, I expect," Julie laughed. "He needs vitamins. Actually he likes fat women with huge boobs." And because Yngvild wasn't too well endowed and right then very frustrated, she burst into tears, which was a great start to the morning.
He got up, strode naked to the bathroom, leaving the two women to cope with each other, and locked the door.
Peace.
Shave, deep bath, relaxation.
The train of past thoughts had started again of course and he was happy to go back to Orthez. He had taken a taxi from Toulouse station after seeing Sue off, a little extravagant but whenever low he always found that a little luxury, a little self-indulgence, spurred him on to greater things, reminded him of what moneyed life could offer, making the necessary effort worthwhile.
Orthez, of course, had been dull and because he had nothing else to do he had gone round to the Chefs house to see whether they would go fishing on Sunday, and for the first time he met the Chefs wife who was thirty-five years old, a handsome and sensuous woman, and the long look she gave him before he even stepped into her parlour conveyed that a good deal of fun could be had if he played his cards right.
Chef Gaston had shuffled in from the kitchen in his slippers and had immediately and rather urgently said, "Ah, Jerome, mon petit, tu veins pour parler de di-manche, tres bien." And Jey had been made aware that somewhere along the way he was being used, and when Gaston mentioned the glorious day they had had fishing the Saturday before, when in fact he had been shopping with Sue, a penny started to drop, and when Gaston winked and pointed at his lush wife putting a finger to his lips behind her back, the penny dropped completely. Jey was Gaston's alibi for a crime worse than death.
After making him taste a wine of his own making, and a brandy of his own making, Gaston took him to the gate and put his arm round him and squeezed him a little.
"Dimanche, la peche avec toi, non," and in a very broken English so that his wife could not possibly understand if she was within earshot. "For my wife, I fish with you, yes. For me, no. There is another. Tu comprends?"
"Parfaitement," he had said, and then he had added, because he thought so at the time: "But your wife is very attractive."
"You can have her any time you like."
And Jey had walked away up the country lane thinking that maybe, maybe, it would be an idea.
And that night and most of the next morning, while he cut up lean pork and pork fat into little cubes with a huge knife at the butcher's bench in the factory, it occurred to him that if the Chef had a mistress, another woman, then he could be blackmailed, and if he could be blackmailed, then wanted information could become available.
No doubt the Chef thought along similar lines, for at lunchtime, as Jey was coming out of the factory to go to his hotel for the "pension' lunch, Gaston stopped him and offered him a lift in the Peugeot, and instead of going to the hotel, headed out to a little auberge where the food was reputedly delicious.
Over moules mariniere the Chef unloaded the terrible and beautiful plight he was in and asked for a very great favour.
"Ma petite Michelle, tu comprends, je suis fou d'elle. Mad about her. Un beguin fantastique. Et ma femme, difficile, tu veux, toi?"
"Me?"
"Yes, why not. Tu lui plais."
He raised his eyebrows. Young man with older married woman, and with husband's approval. How traditionally French could you get?
"If you have an affair with my wife, and I find you together, then it leaves me free, it allows me to have my little Michelle, sans souci."
Jey looked astonished, somewhere during his thoughts he had missed something vital.
"I pay you, of course. I pay you because it must be a plan that works, and quoique Marie is quite ... how do you say ... generous in figure, hm? The part I am asking you to play needs nerve, which you have, or you would not have crossed that stream like you did the other day just to get a fish."
"I couldn't accept any money, I'd do it as a friend."
The whole thing was straight out of a Pagnol film. La Femme du Chef au Saucisson.
"Non. You must be paid, otherwise, later, you could blackmail me. Marie is a woman first and a body second you know, she could make you fall in love with her, and if you fall in love with her she would get the truth out of you. So I must have something to hold you by, and money is always good, eh?"
Chance of a lifetime? Three glasses of wine, a good meal, little rash perhaps, but he went headlong into it.
"What if I refuse?"
The timing was good. The man was already in bed with Michelle fourteen times a week.
"Of course, if you could get me all the information you can on the vacuum mixer, I'll do anything you want."
"The mixer? You are joking? That fiasco?"
"That's what I want."
And maybe imprudently, he explained what he wanted and why, and the Chef laughed, and he laughed because everything was going his way, and after the meal, in the car, Gaston told Jey just how much he loathed the people he was working for because they were idiots, hated the German Doctor who had invented the machine even more, and would give him anything he wanted, anything.
And back at the factory, in Gaston's office which he had only visited once, the door was closed, greasy recipe books swept aside, an old rusty safe opened and a new folder taken out.
DELMACO II, it said, and inside were copies of all the correspondence that had gone on about the machine since it had first been proposed to the directors, the plans, the alterations suggested and carried out, the statistics, the cost-all the data, all the information he could possibly want.
Gaston smiled as he stared at Jey's eyes which must have been popping out of his head, then he very gently took the file back, took one plan out, and gave it to him.
"You get the rest, after. That plan is enough to incriminate me if you say I gave it to you, a sort of contract between us. And tonight, you go to my house at ten, and you stay in her bed until I arrive and surprise you."
"Tonight?"
"Tonight, mon ami, because I am supposed to be playing cards with my friends, and when I am supposed to be playing cards with my friends, which I am not of course, she is having a lover when she can find one. I happen to know there is no one in her life at the moment, and I happen to know that the time of the month is good for love ... so, ce soir!"
"But what if you come too early? It might take time, she might not want to."
"With her, it will happen before you get into the house."
"Well, what if you're late then, she may ask me to leave."
"I will be just in time. I know her, and I must leave some element of surprise or you will not react naturally."
"What if ... what if ... I can't?"
"At your age? She knows what she is doing. She is a love hungry woman, anyway you can think of Signoret, or Bardot, she was like Bardot when I first married her."
"How ... how old is she?"
"Young enough, mon ami. Age does not matter, it is the caresses...." and he chose that moment, quite by coincidence Jey preferred to believe, to pick up a salami and slip it gently into his pocket.
"For Sunday, when we go fishing."
"Are we going fishing?"
"This Sunday, yes. One must have a rest, n'est-ce pas?"
And so with the Delmaco II plans folded inside his jacket pocket and the sight of the file in his head and memories of Sue leaving the station the day before, and the thought, the thought of Marie, specially after he had been refused so stupidly by Sue because she was expecting and it might upset things, he lay on his hotel bed for a rest after the day's work aware that for the first time in his life he was going to be a stud, was going to prostitute himself.
Fantastic.
If this was what it was like to be a pro, then he wished he were a girl.
He was very wise and only had one stiff brandy before leaving the hotel. His plan was simple, he would just go to the house at ten and ask for the Chef. Though he had a generous travel allowance which allowed for the hire of a car whenever he really needed one, he had bought a new Solex, not the expected transport for a future director of an up and coming export company, but a diplomatic means of transport for working on the factory floor.
The Chef lived some three miles out from the centre of the town and he timed the journey well enough, arriving a few minutes before ten.
On such an occasion it was better to be late, so he toured the district. Autumn, wet leaves on the damp road, a warm wind blowing down the tree-lined avenues and large clouds flying across a crescent moon. A dramatic night if ever there was one.
Gaston's house was a single-storied French bungalow built of large grey blocks with a low-tiled roof, a substantial garden all round in which he cultivated every kind of vegetable, kept chickens, and had winemaking equipment in a shed.
At seven minutes past he decided to go in. The garage was open and empty, no Peugeot, so Gaston was definitely out. There was a light in the kitchen at the back.
He did not give himself time to think, but just walked straight up the path and knocked on the front door. A light within, through the frosted glass, a shadow, soft sound of slippered feet. It opened.
Marie looked at him for a second then stood aside to let him in.
"Entrez, entrez. Gaston est sorti une minute," which was a strange lie but one that made sense if she was really interested in him.
"Donne-moi ton manteau, yor cote....
It annoyed him the way many of the locals who had a small inkling of English insisted on speaking it to him. His French was perfectly good, but maybe the fact that he was foreign was part of his charm as far as she was concerned.
A young Englishman, it could be an experience. The only others she probably knew about were Prince Philip and Peter Townsend. "Ton manteau' she had said, so they were on intimate terms already.
She led him to the kitchen and asked him to sit down and offered him a drink. Had he eaten? Would he not like to try some of her tarte aux pommes?
The glass of kirsch was a good measure and the slice of apple tart was a large slice and it amused him to think that she was going through a form of seduction, low lights and sweet music being replaced by the cooking and the nursing and the drink. It was all the same.
She sat down next to him, at the comer of the table, and watched him eat. She had large amused eyes, a good face, once very pretty, now attractive, heavy lips, heavy cheeks. She wore a black dress which was tight across the breasts, and the cleavage left room for something to drop down. Her hands were working hands, but young and very clean. She smelt of expensive soap rather than cheap perfume, and she was very sensual.
"It's good?"
"Very good," he said, chewing away. The apples were delicious and the pastry melted in the mouth.
"You need a feed. You are thin." And she felt his arms, then put her hand under the table and felt his legs, his thighs.
"But strong," she added with a smile.
She left her hand on his knee. It was funny, really, the whole process reversed, dirty old woman and ingenu young man.
"You'd like to go to bed with me, no?"
He looked at her.
It couldn't be that easy, and yet why not? Why play about? She didn't have time to waste and knew that any man would want to go to bed with her, specially a young man like him who was alone in town.
He didn't say yes, but leaned over and kissed her very gently on the mouth. It was a nice gesture he felt, perfectly executed, but after the initial contact she pulled away and glanced over her shoulder.
"You are mad! Les voisins. Such impulsion ... and you, English." She loved it. The English bit was obviously romantic.
He finished the apple tart and finished the kirsch, burning his mouth, nearly coughing but taking breath in time.
"More?"
"No thank you."
"Come."
She led the way out of the kitchen and into the first room on the left which he had not seen. It was a spare room and smelt of moth-balls.
"This is Janine's room."
And she turned and put her arms round him and drew him to her and kissed him, her large mouth and tongue swallowing his whole face, it seemed. She was a very liquid woman.
"What of Gaston?" he asked, pushing himself out of it.
"He is playing poker and won't be back for three hours at least. We have plenty time."
And she closed the door, switched on a very dim bedside lamp and began to undress.
He stood there looking at the room, the double bed, the suitcases in the comer, the step ladder, the old sewing machine. It was a guest room and box room.
"You want to, no?"
"Yes, yes," he said eagerly, and started to undress too.
She was fat, there was no doubt about that, her thighs were massive, but tight and not flabby, and she wore a black corset and a black chemise. She took her bra off and her corset and slipped into the double bed, naked. He kept his briefs on, but already he had half an erection which was encouraging.
She was on him before he could draw the sheet over them, grabbing him and getting on top of him. He struggled to get into a more comfortable position but she moved about and was above him and she was squeezing his head in her arms and she was groaning with pleasure though nothing could have happened. It was all anticipation.
Suddenly she sat up and knelt next to him and pulled the sheet back and pulled down his briefs exposing him to be very proud indeed. She gripped him and bent double and swallowed him up and found his hands and put them on her massive breasts and moved around some more and suddenly he found himself on top of her which was like lying on a vast and very warm air-cushion and she guided him in and it was ail liquid warmth all around him and she moved and moaned and sighed and moved very slowly and suddenly he felt he couldn't hold back and he let out a sort of wail, too high a pitch, a gasp of ecstasy which would have suited a choirboy more than the man he thought he was being. He uttered something to convey that it was all going to be over very quickly-and it was.
She went on writhing about for a long time after he had died down completely, because she had only just begun to get excited, then did some sighing and a bit more moaning and apparently gratified, sank down, all of which didn't fool him a bit.
"lln peu vite," he said apologetically.
"Mon amour, tu es jeune; et une jemme aime ga, tu sais. Qu'un homme vient vite, vite, vite. Mais tu peux encore, non?"
And eagerly he had said yes yes, and she had started moving all over him again and to his astonishment he had got excited very quickly and they had made la'mour for half an hour non-stop if not more before, finally, in a sort of crisis, in a surge of blubberful energy, at a peak, at her climax, she had enveloped him completely and crushed him like a vast contracting womb and he had twitched about in spasms like a Chinese firecracker and finally swooned into her, and the door had opened a few seconds after and the light overhead had been switched on and she had hurled him off her and covered herself with the sheets and blankets and sat up to look in horror at Gaston who was standing there shaking his head as though defeated by the shock of it all.
"Et bienl cette fois-ci, ma petite, tu pourras pas me mentir," with which he had turned on his heels, gallantly switched off the light and closed the door.
"Gaston! Amour!' It had been a cry from the heart and she had leapt out of bed and slipped on her chemise and in tears screamed after him. "Gaston, Gaston! Ne me laisse pas, ne quitte pas ... sans parler ... Gaston." And she had gone out into the street after him yelling her head off and crying and imploring and he, still on the bed, had heard the car start up and drive off, had quickly found his clothes, got dressed and found her sobbing in the kitchen as though the end of the world had come, which perhaps it had as far as she was concerned.
He hovered about not knowing what to do. In England, obviously, he would have made her a cup of tea, but this was a French situation. What on earth did the French do in a crisis? He had put his hand on her shoulder and she had suddenly grabbed it and squeezed it and sobbed some more and made noises he didn't understand, and all he wanted to do was go. Then he had seen people in the neighbour's garden looking in and had felt embarrassed and had tried to say something, but she had said it didn't matter if the whole world knew of her misery, of her wretchedness and something about the Virgin Mary came into it and he had wondered how long it would all last and was he expected to stay all night to comfort her?
He really did prefer the English way of dealing with crises. "You'd best go now," an Englishwoman would have said, but no, he was still being gripped. If he didn't get away she might want him again, and he wasn't at all sure he could cope with that idea.
Then a car had drawn up outside and she had leapt up and looked at him in a panic.
"I'd better go," he'd said, and she had nodded, unable to speak with the fear and the drama filling her throat, and he had left by the kitchen door, fled by the kitchen door and only paused long enough to see that it was not Gaston's car but the neighbour's that had helped him out of the dilemma.
Back in the hotel, alone in his room, he had felt remorse. The poor woman. It would have been nice to spend the night with her, to be cuddled and mothered by her and given breakfast and more apple tart, and he had got into the cold bed and realized he couldn't sleep at all, so he had got dressed and for the first time had wandered the streets of Orthez alone, till he had come to the thumping music of the night club. The Ascot.
And inside two prostitutes had looked him up and down and smiled warmly and he had bought one of them a drink and had gone back with her to another hotel bedroom. He had bored her, taking too much time, being too much of a good lover, but he felt the exhaustion he needed to be able to sleep alone, and the next day he had gone to the factory and Chef Gaston had winked at him and asked him to come in the office and had given him the whole file, just like that, and at lunchtime when no one was about, he had been taken into the laboratory and he had looked at the Delmaco II and had taken measurements and seen it work and his mission was complete.
"How is Marie?" he had asked.
"Merveilleuse. The best breakfast I have had for years, and now home to the best lunch, and the best dinner, and this weekend I spend with my Michelle. You have been a good friend, but do not try to see Marie, do not go near her, she is a little angry."
"Why?"
"I had to tell her the truth, that I knew you would be there."
"But why?"
"It's all right for you to deceive her, but not for me. I love her."
And it made him feel used.
The homecoming had been beautiful for about three hours, but Sue was very tired and maybe not too strong with the pregnancy advancing. He had gone to bed with her and the contact had not been good. He had wanted to be enveloped. He had woken up in the morning not knowing where he was, thinking he was in the hotel in Orthez and hating it for a vital second when he had found he was not.
He had gone to the Gregory office the following morning and delivered the file and they had congratulated him heartily and told him to have a few days' holiday and then they would all have a meeting.
And for a few days he had done nothing but potter about the house and the garden feeling unsettled, feeling that something had gone between himself and Sue, feeling he didn't belong any more. And when he had gone to the Gregorys they had paid him the five hundred pounds, and then apologized-the plans he had got were right but things had changed, they were selling the business, a take-over, and wouldn't be requiring his services in the future.
And over dinner that night, in a state of semi-shock, he had spoken too much, and had drunk too much, and had gone too far because of the whisky, and he had mentioned Gaston and Marie and his sense of humour, too cynical, too face-saving, had turned into a farce and he had got dangerously close to the truth and Sue had guessed what he had done and questioned him, and at first she had thought it as hilarious as he did, and then suddenly had found the whole thing repulsive. She had wiped her hands on her dress as though she had been soiled for ever and she had gone upstairs to get her coat and come down and gone out slamming the door.
He had drunk the rest of the whisky and had been sick, he had found his way to bed and taken aspirins, and the next day he had woken up to the sound of the doorbell and found an incensed father-in-law, dog-collar and all, standing there.
No time to think, no time to prepare a story. The attack had started before he could close the door. Spying, industrial spying! Womanizing! The sack! Disgrace to the family. Sue distraught, she was going away with mother to Lyme Regis. Despicable! The rage, the outrage was coming out, and he was in his dressing gown unshaven, not even wearing pyjamas, and that was pretty low.
"Would you like some coffee?" His voice had come out high, boyish; he had no control over anything.
"No thank you. I think, Jerome," use of full Christian name, worse to come, "I think it was a great mistake allowing you to marry so young. You are obviously very unstable. I am very disappointed in you."
"Don't you think her being pregnant is coloring the whole business a bit too much?" He had dared speak his unrepentant mind, but obviously the expected child was playing a part in their attitude-break now, before it's too late and becomes even more complicated, we could have him on our hands for the rest of our lives!
And father-in-law had blown up.
Decency! Honesty! Morals! It had all come out. Forty years of practiced sermons. The indignation of the bourgeoisie had been scratched and the punishment would have to be lifelong longing of mother and child since death was against the law.
And Canon Herbert Hales had left in icy British anger on the fatal words "It would be better if you did not see Susan till the child is born."
And then he had felt angry and resentful at the whole hypocrisy of it for he knew that Canon Herbert Hales had bought shares in the Gregory project and would benefit from a take-over, and he had gone to London, away from it all, and tried to get lost in a small hotel in Pimlico, but it had been awful and lonely and after a brave telephone call to the in-laws, speaking to the Canon who had told him that Susan was away with mother and didn't want to see him, he had received a letter from the family solicitor.
Divorce.
No move towards a reconciliation.
The family didn't want him.
The blissful marriage over.
He couldn't believe it.
CHAPTER TEN
He got out of the bath, which was cold now, and dried himself and unlocked the door.
The bed was made, no one was about.
He went onto the balcony and looked down. Julie and Yngvild were swimming in the pool, laughing. Julie had managed to get Yngvild out of her depression. Good old Julie. She saw him and pulled her tongue out and duck-dived.
He thought of joining them but somehow didn't really like the idea. He wanted to be alone, think a little more, so he made his way to the top room, Julie's studio to be, and the terrace and sat down in the faded deckchair.
What was it about Julie that reminded him so much of Sue? The cheeky smile. Sue would pull her tongue out at her mother behind her back. She liked her father best, the actor in him. He played the local vicar well but was at heart a business man, sitting behind his large leather-topped desk in the study lined with theological books. He would ring up his broker every day and play the stock exchange. He had come from a traditional landed family, with two brothers in the army, so he had gone into the church, and his wife was the daughter of a suffragette, had joined the Fabian society, had met Bernard Shaw but now spent her time in the huge rectory kitchen making pastry or puddings for the Women's Institute and church fetes.
His own mother, in contrast, widowed during the war, unable to hide the relief she felt at losing her husband, his father, shed the responsibilities of the home and lived as much by herself as possible with a poodle in a flat in St John's Wood. They had never really connected. She treated him like a shadow of his father whom he now hardly remembered, and had only made one great effort on his behalf when he had suggested he should have a flat of his own, and she had got lists and lists from the estate agents, on the other side of London.
She had a lover, someone very respectable, a Harley Street doctor, he suspected, but he had never been interested enough to pry or ask. She had been a nurse during the war which was when she probably met him. After his father's death? Before? He didn't know.
It was in the middle of the Christmas term, 1941 at his prep school where he was miserable. Rationing, the windows painted thick royal blue for the blackout, only thirty-five boys looked after by three old masters and their wives and a matron who had trouble with her teeth.
He had been summoned to the drawing room just before the dreaded Latin class and was perceptive enough to feel that something awful, yet exciting, had happened. "Sit down Jerome," he had been told, and he had sat down in the middle of the large sofa feeling thin and small and inadequate.
The headmaster had slowly lit his stinking old pipe and flapped about generally looking for ashtrays and then, surprisingly, Mr.s. Hubbard had come in with some tea, and biscuits and for a brief moment he had gone into a lovely fantasy that it had been discovered that he was really heir to the throne and that he had inherited the whole school and had been nominated master himself.
But it wasn't that.
"Would you like a chocolate biscuit?" Mr.s Hubbard had asked, and he had noticed that her hand was trembling when she offered him the plate. So he had taken one. A chocolate biscuit, with rationing! And he had guessed it very quickly, and stopped himself thinking. Old Hubby had cleared his throat, and smiled.
"Well Jerome ... I've had some rather sad news from your mother."
And unable to control herself at the sight of this poor lonely little boy in the middle of the sofa, Mr.s Hubbard had burst into tears and had had to leave the room.
"Women are very emotional about these things," Hubby had said, clearing his throat again and again. "She lost her brother recently, in the Navy. Many of us are losing those near and dear to us...." And he had cleared his throat once more and little Jerome had bitten into the chocolate biscuit, and Hubby had gone on, "Your father was a very brave man," and then he had burst into tears, not because he felt anything very real about his father's death but because Mr.s Hubby had cried.
"Would you like me to read you your mother's letter?"
And he hadn't wanted him to at all, but realized it was a way out for old Hubby who was having an awful time, and as he hated being responsible for putting people in an awkward position, he had quickly found his handkerchief, stoically wiped his tears and his chocolate smeared fingers and listened.
"Dear Mr. Hubbard, I learned last night that my husband, Henri Maudran, was killed in France during an air raid on Dieppe. I will be unable to come to Berryford before the weekend due to my nursing work and would be very grateful if you could break the news to Jerome. I feel such news may come better from you than from me anyway. I will come Saturday noon and perhaps you will be good enough to let Jerome have the Saturday night and Sunday off so that we can be together."
And he had seen a clear picture of the Grange and doughnuts and cream and raspberry jam, and maybe a film in Reading, or even a theatre, a variety at the Palace, and he had thanked Mr. Hubbard very much and left and for the next two days all the staff were very kind to him and the boys envied him the attention, the excitement of having a father die a war hero, and he had started making up stories about how his father had died because he didn't really know that he had been in France even, and he tried very hard at night to imagine his father, but all he could remember was a tall balding man with a large mouth and thick lips, drinking wine, laughing with friends and his arm round a woman who wasn't his mother.
Then on Saturday he had waited all morning for his mother and she had finally come in the village taxi with its blacked out headlights and there was someone with her in the back but he could not see who, but a man he was sure, and his mother was in black and he had never seen her in black before.
She went into the school and he waited another twenty minutes before being summoned to the headmaster's drawing room again. The meeting was British and did credit to the preparatory school system, a brief kiss, a smile for the headmaster, a motherly arm round the narrow shoulders.
"Well darling, where would you like to go and have lunch? The Grange? You like the Grange don't you?"
And they had walked down to the village, his mother wearing sensible shoes and they hadn't talked about his father at all but how pleased Mr. Hubbard was with him and how pleased she was and that if he liked they could go to Reading and see Elsie and Doris Waters at the Palace Theatre, and he had said "Oh yes please."
Then she had casually mentioned that he would sleep back at the school because she couldn't get a room at the hotel, and that was disappointing because what he really liked most of all was sleeping away from the school, but he hadn't really thought much of it till they had been met by this man at the theatre who was tall and very impressive in an officer's uniform with the red tabs of the medical corps, and he had treated Jey very kindly, had even said, "I'm sorry about your father," which was a very brave thing to do. And he had even asked, "What exactly happened, sir?" And the man, whom his mother called Michael, and sometimes "darling' had explained that, as far as he knew from reports received, he had been working for the French underground movement and had had to fight to the death in a small village called Poitoux, which didn't tally with the raid on Dieppe, but was more exciting. He learned this during the interval, after the Volterras, trapeze artists, and his mother hadn't sat next to him but next to Michael Darling and put her hand on his and whispered something about not overdoing the story. And they had laughed a lot at the comedians' jokes that he didn't think very funny and he had suddenly felt very sad and very lonely, maybe because it was instinct as his father was dead, or maybe because he felt, somehow, that he wasn't really wanted any more.
The Sunday had been awful, eating lunch at the Grange in brown Windsor silence with his mother and Michael Darling not talking but saying an awful lot with their eyes, not noticing that he was noticing. And the afternoon had been spent going for a walk and he had led the way and he had taken them for a boring old school ramble because he didn't know where else to go, and his mother and Michael Darling had held hands and when he turned to look at them they quickly disengaged making him feel guilty for being there at all.
It had been so awkward that he had lied about the time he had to get back and had actually longed to be back for evening prayers, and while praying, kneeling on the scrubbed floor, he had suddenly realized that probably he wanted to be a priest, that there was a God after all and Jesus Christ to look after him, and the following day he had gone to see the school chaplain who was also the local vicar and had told him he wanted to be in the choir, and be confirmed, and the chaplain knew all about his father and had helped a lot and was very understanding and gave him a lot of hope, which is maybe why later he found comfort in the presence of Sue's father and the rejection so upsetting.
Holidays with Tante Louise had followed, in Pang-boume, then the new school in Sussex, the Public School, and the letter from his mother saying she had got married to Michael Darling, just like that, and the same night, because he had felt that loneliness again, he had allowed Merrick, the House Captain, to get into his bed and rub his huge uncircumcised penis against his young white leg, and the next day things had changed a little, he was treated by the bigger boys with a sort of respect, and he didn't get any lines and Merrick appointed him his fag and he combed his hair more carefully and always wore a white shirt because it showed up his dark complexion to advantage, and polished his shoes, and Beeznees the history master sat on his desk more often than on Gunther Minor's now and when the seniors looked him straight in the eye he looked straight back. "Maudy's French, that's why," he heard one senior tell another. He'd acquired the nickname Maudy Maudran which was also pleasing. And when he went for a walk behind the squash courts with Harvin, Merrick was very annoyed and questioned him as to what had happened, and had made it very clear that he wasn't go to with anyone else. But then Harvin, who was more fun and more daring, suggested he should spend some of the summer holidays with him at his father's farm, and everybody had been delighted, Tante Louise, mother, Michael Darling. Five weeks it had been and he had had the best holiday ever, sharing a room with Harvin whom he called John at home, sharing his bed, doing things together, like reading Forever Amber and a book John had with nude men and women doing it.
And a year went by and his voice had broken and he had become a senior and fallen in love with Fielding who had very black curly hair and large blue eyes, and Fielding hadn't been at all bright and not understood as he had understood and hadn't taken advantage of a senior's protection and so he had befriended Moore instead who knew what it was all about, much more than he himself had done, and through Moore, who had been in Mr. Skanley's study after evening prayers, he learned that Walker, Braddon, Clegg Major and Mclnnes "were' and that Mr. Skanley and Mr. Duff would help with marks and exams if he was friendly, and what surprised him most was that he hadn't been aware of what the older boys did. He'd thought that spotty adolescence ended the game, but no, the fifteen year olds were much more powerful, the game shifted from Seniors' room to Masters' Common, and so instead of looking at the little boys in Chapel, he looked up at the masters instead, and though Duff was fat and rather red he was a senior master and in charge of sport, so when he came to talk to Jey about his tennis while Jey was undressing to take a shower in the changing rooms, he had gone on undressing and taking his shower, and talking to the old sod which was all he was required to do, and he got his colours for Tennis when nobody else thought he deserved them and he did get better marks from other masters and he was made a prefect when he was seventeen.
"Duff must have got his prick up Maudy's arse," a House Captain had said looking at the promotions board, and he had been right behind him and felt very angry.
"Better come and see me Browning, in my new study," he'd said, pulling authority. "You realize I could have you expelled for that remark?"
"Yes Maudran."
"What do you suggest we do?"
"Well I didn't mean it. I mean it was only said as a joke."
"It's my first day as a prefect, Browning, and if you're going to go around spreading rumors like that you and I aren't going to be friends."
"I'll never say it again, Maudran, promise."
"I don't suppose you will, but if I hear it from any other source, any other source, I will hold you personally responsible. Do you understand? So if I were you I'd have it put around, since you're a knowledgeable gossip, that Duff is not a fairy and nor, for that matter, am I."
And three days later he heard, to his satisfaction, that he had been caught by matron with Jenny, one of the kitchen maids, in the cricket pavilion, which was not of course true but made him a hero anyway.
The army, OCTU, Chester, strings pulled by stepfather Michael Darling, the RASC, Germany for a year, beer, love for a ginger girl called Monica who wrote to him every week; then coming home to his mother who liked him in his uniform and was proud to be seen with him; not getting on so well with Michael who worked in a hospital somewhere. And the next time he came home on leave she said she was getting a divorce because Michael Darling was rather boring and she was moving into a St John's Wood flat and he'd suspected there was someone else, someone important, someone clandestine, and he guessed it was the eminent surgeon in Harley Street because one night someone rang and asked for Mr. Summers about an emergency at the clinic, and when he had told his mother on her return at one in the morning she had got into a flap and rung a number from behind closed doors, and the following day had suggested that maybe it was time he lived a life of his own and got himself a secure job and aflat!
So he had got a flat with a fellow officer and gone into insurance which was dull and terrible and then he had married Sue.
Julie had got out of the pool and was lying down sun bathing. She had a beautiful figure, far better than Sue. Inherited from himself then? He had a good figure, so they kept telling him.
He sighed.
It could still be re-lived, re-felt, the heaviness in the stomach when he had gone back to the Rectory after a month in London alone. He had walked the long way round from the station to avoid the village, paused by the river and looked at the familiar scenery. He was not sure at the time what he had wanted. The idea of a baby appealed to him in a way, to be able to say he was an expectant father would have had its kicks, to join the army of parents with all their problems wasn't that appealing, but he couldn't desert Sue at the moment, he couldn't say OK, if that's how you want it and just leave. He had to make sure that she was sure, that it was her decision not her father's or mother's. And he had gone up the drive and stood in front of the door not knowing whether he should go in as he always had, or ring.
Humiliating himself in front of the power of the church, he rang the bell and the Canon himself came to the door. It was possible that the door might be slammed back in his face so he blurted out the rehearsed line quickly.
"I've come to say goodbye to Sue."
The Reverend Herbert Hales said nothing, but turned on his heels and walked away. As he turned to go into the study he pointed to the drawing room, "She's in there." And disappeared.
She was sitting in an armchair reading the Daily Express, smoking and having a cup of coffee. She looked up and put the paper down, surprised to see him.
If he had not felt humiliated by the father, he felt something close to it from her. A hardness somewhere, a sneer, a resentment, a holier than thou expression. She was in a position to be high and mighty about the whole Gregory affair, she had the comfort and security and tradition of her family behind her.
She won the staring match and he looked down, then quickly out of the window.
"May I sit down?" he asked. It didn't come out as sarcastically as he meant it to, it sounded more as though he was begging.
"It's over Jey, if that's what you've come to discuss. Mother and father think I'm dreadfully upset. I am, but not in a maudlin way, not in any way you can come along and comfort. I'm upset because I'm disgusted by the whole business. I'm going away. I'm probably going to Canada to live with Molly, and I'll probably have the baby there. You can get a divorce on the grounds of desertion if you're clever enough, but Daddy's solicitors aren't exactly the worst, so maybe your friends the Gregorys can help you out of this one. You've got money to fight if you want to fight, but you've had me ... or rather I've had you."
He sat on the arm of the sofa and just thought how easy it was all going to be then. No tears, no wanting to come back. It was freedom on a plate. It wasn't her father or mother talking now, it was her. This is what she wanted. And the Molly-Canada trip made a great deal of sense, it was the one thing she envied her sister for, living in Canada.
Various questions went through his mind, like "are you sure you don't want to think about it some more," or "perhaps it's because you're pregnant that you feel like this," or "let's meet in a month and talk some more' but none of this came out.
He had sighed and looked at the floor between his suede shoes. He remembered that clearly. They were in good shape, well brushed, she'd urged him to buy them; Sue, his wife who no longer wanted to be.
"I'm going to sell the cottage. Your share will cover what Daddy paid for the car once the mortgage's been settled. You can keep the car as it's in your name."
She had worked it all out. Sue was sharp, she knew what she wanted, efficiency all the way.
Bang.
She had seen it all very clearly, the marriage had been a mistake, and now the mess must be cleaned up as quickly as possible. Chop the head off with one stroke, this way there's less suffering.
And then he had suddenly wanted a pint of beer, the taste had come into his mouth, an intense desire to down a bitter, and he had stood up, looked at her once more, watched her stub out her cigarette in an irritated manner, shrugged his shoulders and said, "Well, goodbye, then."
She had just stared at him.
For a moment he thought there was pity for him in that look, but it could have been hate.
He had turned, walked out of the room, out of the house and out of her life.
Curtain.
Dramatic entrance.
Dramatic exit.
And two days later he had sailed straight into more stormy seas with his eyes wide open.
Ceha.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
"OK Daddy, I know you're up there!"
He only just had time to grab the towel and cover himself before Julie appeared followed by Yngvild. It didn't matter of course, both of them had seen him, but there was an instinctive need for modesty and Julie was his daughter.
He smiled at them broadly.
"Painful if it gets sunburned isn't it?" Julie said. She was very funny really, her complete disregard for convention, her sailing so close to vulgarity. He stood up and casually arranged the towel around his middle. The intimacy of having women around and being able to undress, dress, wash without concern, they being able to do the same, was pleasant. He understood the harem life perfectly. He should have been born a Sultan. The idea appealed to him, excited him, and funnily enough, or not funnily enough at all, the sight of Julie's leg, just the one, as she sat astride the wall, just this one leg, nut brown, smooth with a few golden hairs, excited him some more. He could feel it. If Yngvild left now he would make love to Julie. He wanted to, he'd wanted to all night, maybe that was what had blocked him. The need for her.
"We're driving Norway back, Daddy."
"Who? What?"
"Yngvild ... we're driving her back."
"Oh ... right," he said. He had no plans for the day. He just wanted to be with her.
"So's you can get on with your work," she added as a reason. She said it smilingly, helpfully, it wasn't meant sarcastically, it was meant as a service. She knew he wanted Norway to go.
He smiled a thank you, a little uncertain. "We' are driving Norway back. Who? And he looked down and leaned out to peer round the comer and saw a car.
It was Manolo's car and Manolo was in it. His heart sank a little. Would she want him? Manolo was the foreign girl's expected Don Juan. He owned a chemist shop and also ran one of the restaurants on the beach, so he first got to know which girls were on the pill, directed them down to eat at his place and charmed the pants off them by candlelight with a free meal in the evening. He had it made.
He couldn't object to Manolo, he had a charm all of his own, obviously, and he had a car and a motorbike, so he really gave the girls a fantastic time, but somehow, for Julie to go with him would be cheap. She could really do better.
"Where did you meet Manolo?" he asked.
"The chemist," she said naturally.
"When?"
"Yesterday. I'm having dinner with him tonight at his place, he has a restaurant on the beach."
It hadn't happened yet. Maybe he could dissuade her, but then if she hadn't been with him, who had she been with? It shouldn't matter. It really shouldn't matter. There was such a mix-up going on in his head, as a lover he cared about her being with anyone else. As a father he had to allow it but wanted to choose. So he would choose and let her be. But then he didn't want her to go today, not today, he wanted to be with her. How then could he get rid of Yngvild?
He went inside, put on his trousers and a shirt, and kicked his sandals further under the bed.
"Julie, have you seen my sandals?"
She came in knowing that it was an excuse.
"What?"
"I thought we'd drive up the coast, thought we'd go to Almeria, see the Western film town, sleep there maybe, I want to get away from Reina for just a couple of days. Don't think I'll really get to know you otherwise."
"Wow! Yes! Just the two of us?"
"Of course."
"I'll tell Norway."
"Well, I don't want to be rude."
"You can't be ruder than you have been. I mean, you know, she really wants to get out of here, you gave her a bad time."
"No I didn't, she gave herself a bad time. I'm forty-three and it doesn't always work, things like that get unreliable as you get older."
"It's not exactly unreliable with me, Pappy."
"You turn me on. She doesn't."
"That's why she's upset."
"Tell her I'm upset too and that it's nothing to do with her. Does she know Manolo?"
"Not yet."
"Can you give an excuse for tonight. If you want to?"
"You're joking. Sure! I'll tell him you want me to have dinner with you, you're my father, I can't refuse, and he won't smell a rat, will he?"
That was true. He smiled.
"See what I mean? We've got it made. Anyone, any time, but always you for me and me for you first."
She kissed him on the mouth, and squeezed him where she shouldn't, and backed away with a delighted squeal.
God must have meant it this way, he thought, or it wouldn't be so much fun.
The rest of the day was perfect and so was the evening.
They stopped on the way to Almeria to have lunch, and talked about her most of the time. Her scene unfolded, slowly, pleasantly. She had had a tough but fairly rewarding childhood, sporty, with little home love, but plenty of action. Small town California. She didn't remember Canada, or only because of a photograph of herself with a snowman; she came to life at the Elementary School, Santa Cruz, till 8th grade; then Soquel High, Freshman, Sophomore, Junior, Senior, 12th grade; the Cabrillo Junior College at Aptos, majoring in English.
It was six o'clock by the time they reached Almeria but they went on to the film location which was off the main road to Murcia running through Colorado landscapes and hidden by hills; a small wooden bridge "Prohibido El Paso' but they walked through and there they were in deserted Dodge City, Sin City, Dead Gulch, with the sun setting and the place looking believably unreal. Instead of cowboys lounging on the bar frontage sipping beer, there were two guardias sipping Cokes, their Vespas parked where horses should have been. He walked towards them, ready with some explanation that he knew Carter de Carter of Metro-Columbia, but it wasn't necessary. From the look they gave him they seemed to think that if he had known where it was and how to get there he was in some way connected with the business. Any man with a chick as sexy as Julie was bound to be in the business.
He turned to see what Julie thought of it all, but she had disappeared.
"Julie?"
"A la derecha," one guardia shouted, amused by something.
He took the turning to the right, saloon bar, Wells Fargo, Barber, Hardware and suddenly the doors of the Bank burst open and Julie, legs well apart holding two fingers of each hand pointing like guns, screamed out, "OK Doc, I was expecting you. Pow pow!"
He reeled backwards clutching his stomach, found his gun, fired back, but she had leapt over a wall and was galloping away towards the Diamond Saloon.
He chased after her.
The doors of the saloon were still swinging so he knew she was in there. He flattened himself against the wall, and slowly edged into the darkness of the building. Half of it was real, the front half, the roof was real, corrugated iron, but the back and the stairs and balustrade were plywood and plaster.
"I have a whole posse waiting for you outside, Cisco, so don't think you'll get away with it."
Then, a little overdramatically, a loud tearing sound, a cracking of wood, and a dull thud.
"Julie? You all right?"
A faint, "No...."
"Where are you?"
"I think it's the cellar."
He pushed a painted door which failed to open because it was solid brick.
"Where?"
Then she appeared, the right trouser leg of her jeans tom from the knee up, and blood seeping through the cloth.
"What've you done?"
"One of your men found a real gun and shot me I guess Doc. Shit, it's fuckin' painful."
"What happened?"
"The floor wasn't a floor. Somewhere up there. I was going to drop down on you from that beam."
He looked up, the beam she was talking about was a thin rod. Somewhere in her head intelligence was lacking when it came to acting out dramatics.
"What did that, a nail?"
"Think so."
"Well we'd better get you a tetanus shot straight away, that leg's too beautiful to waste."
"I've got another."
"You need two, believe me. I've lived longer than you and I've found it essential. Can you walk?"
"What if I can't?"
"I'll carry you."
"Oh yeah! Please carry me, I'd like that."
She wasn't exactly light, but it was nice having his daughter hanging round his neck, and it looked good walking across the dusty main street towards the guardias who both got up at the sight of the obvious tragedy. They weren't a bit interested in the tragedy itself, but Julie's trouser leg was tom pretty high up and a true reward for the deadly monotony of guarding this ghost town every afternoon.
"Qut pasa?"
"Pequeno accidente."
"Sangre ... malo . ... "
They had a first aid box in the grocery store, with cotton wool, bandage and the red stuff, melcromina, they used instead of iodine. One of the policemen was a male nurse, a doctor, a surgeon, a trained dentist, a veterinary surgeon, he also wanted to get at Julie's leg. So she let him.
She sat down on a Coca-Cola crate, put her foot on his lap and allowed him to part the tom jeans, feel the nut brown skin and dab it with the antiseptic.
"Do you think he's getting a rise?"
She grated her teeth and sucked in air. He dabbed more gently, it was the best afternoon he'd had since entering the service.
"Mas alto?" suggested his colleague.
"I'll mas alto you, Pepe," she said.
"No me llamo Pepe, mi nombre es Gonzalez ' "Gonzalez? Hi. My name's Carmen."
"Carmen? Carmen es espanola."
"Si. I am Spanish, but born in America."
The blood had stopped and so she took her leg off Ithe guardia's lap and walked around a bit, with a suitable limp, and said, "Gracias."
They offered her a Coca-Cola, a cigarette, a game of cards, anything to keep her there.
"Sure," she said to the Coke and the cigarette.
They looked around for a glass, but she drank it straight from the bottle like a trooper. Jey drank from the bottle too.
"Es tu marido?" they asked her looking at him. "Marido? What the hell's that?"
"Husband. Am I your husband?"
"Marido no. Es mi padre!"
"Ha. Padre!' Their eyes bulged out. Anything could happen now. Bored American chick of Spanish descent with padre. So he suddenly looked stem and said, "Must take you home now, it's way past bedtime."
"Oh goodie," she said, handed them the empty bottle and smiled radiantly and walked limply away.
They didn't hold hands, it wouldn't have looked good, but they waved back every hundred yards, then she ran off, turned and shot Doc in the belly again.
"It's a ghost town kid, and I'm a ghost. You can't shoot me."
He walked on towards her, slowly as though weighed down by heavy boots, spurs, ectoplasm.
"That means you can go through things Doc?"
"Just that kid, just that. Through things."
"How 'bout goin' through me, then, Pappy?"
"All in good time, kiddy, all in good time."
And when he reached her she flung herself at him and planted a juicy kiss on his mouth and he grabbed her and they kissed for a long time, then both, at the same time realized that they were being watched by the guardias so they disengaged, turned, waved at them once more and ran for the car. The guardias shrugged their shoulders, waved back. So he wasn't her father after all, just a dirty old man, just a lucky dirty old man.
They didn't stay in Almeria because it didn't seem to have much to offer. The main street with its cafes on both sides presented well, gave an impression of Bar celona, but only an impression, so they went on, driving along the coast eastwards till they reached Mojacar and stopped.
A hotel, not in the hill-top village but at the bottom near the sea, had a room, a nice room, typical of Spanish hotels: luxurious large bathroom, beautifully tiled, ornate beds, ornate furniture, ornate carpets, paintings, candelabra, and it was beautiful because he was so tired with the journey, the driving, the excitement of the whole day and he was thankful, in a way, that there were two single beds. A night's sleep was what he needed after the Yngvild fiasco.
"There's water," she shouted from the bathroom, "but it's cold."
All he wanted was a hot bath. Not much to ask. He should have known better than to allow himself to anticipate.
He decided to have a cold shower instead, not the same thing but better than nothing, and when he came back into the bedroom, treading on tip-toe because the tiles were cold and so was he, she had put the beds together and was sitting cross-legged on the pillow of one of them, in the nude and looking at him with an imitation of his own mournful expression.
"No peace for the wicked," she said.
"We haven't eaten yet."
"Oh. Are you hungry?"
"No."
"Get into bed then, there's a good Daddy."
He got into bed and she switched off the light and slipped down next to him and let her hand stray up his leg. Another Mouche. Another exhausting Mouche.
"Didn't Norway do anything then. I mean, didn't she try to excite you?"
"No. She just lay there like a log. No training."
"Tragic. So what did you do?"
"Nothing. I tried to get excited by exciting her, but I must have been too tired."
"Didn't you fancy her at all then?"
"Not really."
"You should have tried imagining you were with
"I did."
"Didn't that work either?"
"No. She smelt different."
"How did she smell?"
"Clinical. Sneaking feeling she washed in ether."
"That's a trip, ether. You should have tried imagining you were with a nurse."
A flash of long forgotten one-night-stand Joyce. She'd smelt of camphor.
"Did you hear of the couple that went at it endlessly?" she asked. "Endlessly, endlessly, just going on, and nothing happened, I mean she couldn't get an orgasm and nor could he and they were sweating away at it and then she said to him "Can't you think of anyone either?"
"That's sick."
"It's true though. You can still love someone and they can still turn you on, but after a while you need a change of scenery, of face, in your mind."
"Who do you think of when you're with me, then?"
"I don't have to with you....I just say to myself, fuck! he's my father. That really turns me on."
He turned over.
He couldn't believe it.
Yet it excited him.
The whole forbidden idea excited him.
"It's exciting you, isn't it?" she said.
"No," he lied.
And he turned round and let his hand stray.
And that reminded him of Celia, because with Celia, he was always the one to start.
He had met her in the comer gloom of a cottage drawing room in a village not far from Woking and Brenda's old home. She was sitting alone, rather deliberately solemn, on the arm of a chair in a long Victorian dress, which had then been very original. She had long dark hair, a long fringe which fell over her eyes, and a sweet innocent face and long slim arms. She wore no jewelry, and looked extremely feminine.
"You look cheerful," he'd said jokingly, and she, taking him seriously or just being bloody-minded had said, "Well I'm not."
So he had taken her empty glass, gone to the dining room where the bar was, filled it up with the inevitable wine cup and given it to her.
"Do you think that that's the answer to all problems?"
She had tried to draw him into a stock pseudo intellectual party conversation.
"Drink? No, it just delays having to find the solution," he'd said, then quickly: "What's your name?"
"Celia," she'd said defiantly, and looked at him as though he was going to slap her and she was going to show him just how much she could take it. But there was something very fascinating about her, she was crying out to be protected from imagined assailants, and he wanted to defend her. Well, he wanted to go to bed with her.
So he had started seducing her verbally and the questioning and mock interest had turned to genuine interest because she was in fact interesting. She had just got news of her own divorce, she was bitter about it, but had no right to be. She knew she looked younger than she was, she was twenty-nine, older than him, was a commercial artist working for an architectural magazine on very boring layouts. She lived in London, had her own car, knew of the estate agency he had worked for, was staying at this cottage for the weekend to get away from it all, but was hating it. The party, believe it or not, was for her, and the hostess came in and looked so pleased that at last Celia had met someone she could talk to, coming from London she didn't mix easily with the local set, rather with determination.
It was obvious Celia was a bit of a burden.
He still wanted to go to bed with her.
They had gone into the dining room to enjoy the delights of the buffet and he had asked her to dance and she had refused saying it wasn't necessary, then she had asked where he lived and suggested they go back to London, she was so bored with all the artificiality.
I'm going for a drive," he had heard her say to her hostess and then she had added: "Don't worry if I don't come back."
He had allowed her to drive him back in her Morris Minor because it was silly going in two cars. She sat well back in her seat, cigarette in one hand, driving as though driving a bumper-car, her feet hardly reaching the pedals. She was a sort of doll in her long dress.
She lived in a basement flat that smelt damp and seemed airless, but her bedroom was very comfortable and expectedly feminine. Over a large cup of black coffee sipped on the double bed he'd told her his story, and she'd brightened up, and got closer.
"So you're completely free?"
"At this moment in time, yes."
And she had said, "Shall we go to bed," and he had said yes, and they had gone to bed and fallen asleep in each other's arms, exhausted, drunk, emotionally very much in need of company during the long night.
She'd made him Sunday breakfast and had treated him gently, as though he were ill, which in a way he felt he was. Shock. The last few weeks had been a strain, and he relaxed reading the Sunday papers, free of worry, free of guilt.
"I've got two weeks' holiday owed me, why don't we go somewhere?" she'd suggested.
"Where?"
"Anywhere. Let's just go."
Unorganized, unplanned. No efficiency. It seemed forbidden, but he'd gone along with it, and she'd helped him pack a bag, a suitcase, and they had gone to Cornwall, a small hotel by the cliffs. It had rained, and had been cold, but they had spent most of the time in bed. She had listened to the Marie-Gaston episode and understood what he had done, why he had done it. She was older, more aware than Sue, had lived more, and then he had moved into her flat and then she had given up her job and they had bought a house in Devon, using his money, her income, his talents as a handyman, her knowledge of architecture, to convert it. They had sold it soon after, moved to another, converted that, gone in for interior decorating, opened an art shop, it had lasted six years, six whole years, faithful, hard-working years. Then Tante Louise had been taken seriously ill and he had gone back alone to Pangboume and learnt that the Reverend Herbert Hales had died and all the family gone; that there was a new vicar; that the cottage had been pulled down to make way for a road widening scheme; that a whole way of life he had known had gone. And he had stayed in Tante Louise's house until her son Geoffrey had arrived from Australia. Fifty-two, heavy, unaccustomed to England now, not liking its ways, needing his wife. A married man if ever there was one. Not like himself who, after one night alone in the house, two nights away from Celia had wondered how he could put the situation to advantage, woman-wise of course. Hell-bent on an escapade to while away the boredom, he had nearly taken the barmaid of the White House to bed, but then had not liked her teeth, or her mouth, and if there were any respectable daughters or wives ready to err, they were all secretly hidden away behind drawing room curtains by nine o'clock.
And he had gone to the hospital to take his leave of Tante Louise now that Geoffrey was back to look after her, and he had not known what to say in the room with the flowers and get-well-soon cards. She had looked at him, tired, exhausted, and said, "You look like your father sometimes, when he was your age, he would have been successful but he married the wrong woman, so he did the wrong things."
"How did he die?" he had asked for the first time ever of anyone.
"A bomb. During the blitz."
"In France?"
"No. Not in France. In London."
"I thought he was in France."
"That is what we were all meant to think. He never went. He and your mother had not been getting on for a long time so he made the excuse. He made sure that you were safe, that you were far away in the country, then he pretended he had been called up by the Free French, the Gaullists, but he was not. He was on reserve, he worked for them in an office in Bedford Square at the Consulate, but he never went away. I knew, but no one else did. I think your mother knew, which is why she was not too tearful. He was with a woman, in a house in Earls Court. He was like that, mon petit frere, always with a woman, could not resist the intrigue. I hope for his sake that the bomb dropped while they were making love, that would be a much better way to go than this." And then tears started welling up in her eyes and he realized that she was afraid of what would happen to her during the operation.
"You were always more understanding about people than Geoffrey. He is like his father," and she let out a sigh because her life had been one of deaths, her parents, her husband, her brother, a daughter at an early age, she had been connected with death and was now dying herself, and he suddenly did not want to know. Some families lived for ever, others died like flies. It was strange.
Then, luckily, the nurse came in and suggested he should go, and he had kissed Tante Louise lightly on her powdered cheeks and said something about good luck and see you tomorrow, and the following day she had died, nothing to do with the operation, just of a weak heart, of exhaustion, and he had immediately taken the dog and the cat to the vet for them to be put to sleep as promised, and funnily enough had cried in the car driving back to the house. Soft, so soft. No tears after the hospital had called, no tears when he had accompanied Geoffrey to the hospital, but he had felt the sadness for the two innocent animals which she knew would miss her and not understand.
So he had left, aware that Geoffrey would far rather be alone in the house with his mother's things than have him around, and he had driven back to Devon thinking of his father getting killed by a bomb on the job. How old had he been? Thirty-eight? And those stray thoughts led him to his life with Celia and when he had got home he had been critical, not admiring, and irritated by her fussing, and she noticed and thought it was his liver. So gave him a watercress, lettuce, raw carrots and date salad when he really wanted a big fat steak, after which the relationship had started going downhill.
They had done well, four houses in six years, bought, renovated and sold for a profit. A happy life. The peaceful years, looking back, compared to what followed. Funny that, Celia having provided the peaceful years. She had been wise, was still wise probably, still in her funny little shop, an old-fashioned lady before her time, longing for the small garden, the small terrace house, the lavender, a childhood love for her grandmother resulting in an intense desire to be like her. The Victorian dresses, the velvet ribbon round the neck, the cameos, the little knick-knacks, the crucifixes and madonnas. That was really when he had started not to fit in. The religious period followed by the vegetarian period, the astrological period, the classics. She fired herself and everyone else with an extraordinary enthusiasm, and, he supposed, looking back, he had been a period in her life like the others, and it had come to an end.
The "sex thing', as she had come to call it, didn't mean much any more, just as it had begun meaning a lot more to him, and the day of reckoning, the day of truth had come when he had deliberately turned down a young girl's advances at the wedding party of a friend, had come home, been proud that he had managed to be faithful and it had meant nothing to her, his sacrifice. Little talks had followed, trying to find out just how much she cared for him, but he'd never got a direct answer. She loved their way of life, the acknowledgement by friends that they were successful in their field, a little avant-garde, but then when he had gone to London to see solicitors about Tante Louise's estate and had come back filled with enthusiasm for the younger generation, the flower power movement, the pop groups, Carnaby Street, Kings Road creativity, what the real avant-garde were doing, she had backed down, covered up her inability to compete by changing tack. He had suggested building a new house to do something really original, but she had dampened that idea completely. She was too much into the health food business and dieting and the people that gathered around her were full of self-preservation ideas, full of old wives' tales, and he had felt old. They talked about it, they had always been able to talk, self-criticism, self-analysis, and she had said, quite blatantly, "Jey you are younger than me and you should be more adventurous, and before we quarrel, which will be inevitable some day soon, you should make sure you have a fail safe." And he had asked her if she had a fail safe and she had answered, "Of course," and he had spent a sleepless night wondering who it was before he had realized that she was in a religious phase again, and that her fail safe was the Infinite, was God, and she was looking down on him now as a mere mortal, not only because he occasionally wanted physical contact with her, but because he also ate meat.
And so he had deliberately looked for and found Clare who had needed love, security and stability, and all he had managed to give her was a baby.
For two days he completely forgot he was with his daughter and enjoyed the full romance, the full flattery of being with a vivacious attractive girl, the full physical relationship with no hang ups and no holds barred. To her, it seemed, the relationship was exciting because he was an older man first, her father second.
She mentioned their relationship more than he thought of it, which was the only slight disturbance in his mind. He was not sure that they had been right to tell the world, Reina was not exactly the sort of town where you could indulge in any form of relationship without the person at the next table knowing and embroidering on the whole situation. Peyton Place, Sodom and Gomorrah, that was Reina. When two innocent American couples had rented a house for the summer the year before, they had immediately been named Bob, Carol, Ted and Alice, and by the time they had left, six months later, they had split, one of the ladies in question finding it necessary to live up to her reputation for fear of losing prestige among the gossips.
He had managed to stay clear of what was said about him. He'd heard he was homosexual, a pervert, liked schoolgirls, was a bigamist. It wouldn't take long before rumour had it that he was sleeping with his daughter, though Manolo had apparently already asked her if it was true that she wasn't his daughter at all, but Cherry's.
So, away from it all, was more pleasant. If ever he settled in another place it would happen again, but it took a year to hear what people said about you. The only way to enjoy the gossip was to be one step ahead of it, to keep a secret that would dumbfound the most imaginative.
On the drive back, a tape of Feliciano filling the car with music, enjoyed by him, tolerated by her, he wondered what the future could hold now. What he should do, what he wanted to do? Where they were going to live. How? Should he sell the house and buy another like it somewhere else? The expense involved wouldn't be coming at the right time, and he wasn't sure that there was any point. And what plans did she have?
"What are you going to do?" he asked.
"When?"
"When we get back."
She shrugged her shoulders. "Life-wise you mean? In the future?"
"In the future."
"I haven't any plans. D'you want me to have plans?"
"I'd like to have some idea of what's in your mind. You've come into my life, somewhat unexpectedly, I have some adjusting to do."
"I wasn't going to plan anything for a year."
For a year?
Was it possible to live a whole year with her and keep the secret?
"Will you be happy just to live with me? Don't you think you'll want to run off with a younger man now and again?"
"Not if you keep up your present performance Daddy."
It would have been better if she'd called him Darling. She had, once or twice the night before, and that had helped.
"So you'll five for a year with me?"
"Please." She had her hand between his legs.
"For better or worse?"
"For better, anyway."
Well, maybe this way he'd have his peace after all, and she would be useful all round, attracting male buyers, dealing with them, brightening his life, he could learn from her, and she certainly from him. He'd be the best father ever, teach her everything.
They were on the Almun car road with its five hundred hairpin bends, overhanging cliffs to the right and precipitous drops to the rocks and sea to the left. Round one comer he had to brake sharply and go very close to the edge to avoid a car which had skidded right across the road. It was damaged in the front, glass on hot tarmac, and a crowd of people looking over the edge.
"Wow! Someone gone over?"
They both got out to have a look.
It was a tomato lorry. Some men were just going down the steep path to see what had happened to the driver, but there didn't seem to be much left of the cab.
Traffic started piling up one way, then the other, the road would be blocked for miles. No hurry, they weren't expected anywhere. The traffic guardia would come along in due course, the ambulance, more people would gather, and smoke cigarettes and shrug their shoulders. It happened too often along this stretch.
"Guff!"
He turned round to see who she was screaming at.
He was tall, gangling, had long blondish hair, moustache, ample beard, shoulders bent, thick leather belt, beads, peace sign, leather straps on wrists, sandals; he looked like Jesus Christ.
"Hi Julie, what'ya doin' here?"
They threw themselves at each other like ex-lovers and at just the same moment, when he turned round to avoid seeing the embrace which might hurt his feelings, they chose to pull the driver from the cab below, what remained of him.
"Shit man, look at that," he heard Jesus say.
They could have been looking at stevedores unloading a truckload of carcasses.
"Hey, how did you make out in Barcelona?"
"Got a lift to Alicante, then across to Malaga."
"Far out. Who you with now?"
"Oh ... ' as though she had forgotten; "My Daddy."
"Shit!"
"This is him here."
Daddy pretended to be engrossed in the terrible scene. Normally he would have looked away, instead he stared down at the limp disjointed body, and the bloody legless trousers and to the left, to help matters, one of the men who had gone down to help was leaning against a tree and vomiting.
The crowd slowly backed away as the body started coming up. But then they went back to the edge as they laid the remains of the man down on the road.
Maybe there was someone else in the cab?
"Shit man, look at all that blood."
"It's tomatoes," he heard himself say. He'd have to be careful, there was too much sarcasm in his voice, unable to stand fools, even less those who admired someone he loved.
"This is my Pappy."
"Hi."
We're all Americans at heart, shake hands, turn round again to look at the gore, it didn't seem that anyone else was in the cab and now the guardias were arriving on their motorbikes with their shiny helmets and boots and black shoulder straps. He had been close enough to the accident to be questioned, one of the first on the scene, what had happened? Who was responsible? There was a drunk peasant being held up by a friend near the edge, maybe he had walked across the road. Who owned the car that had been hit?
"We've just been to Almeria, they make Western movies there," Julie said.
"Any extra work?"
"No. We also went to this village up on a big hill. Every other house is a bar and there's this fairy from Omaha who thinks he's a fakir or something, with tattoos all over his forehead and talks of nothing but "grass" but hasn't got any."
She was like a child talking, like a child coming back from holiday, totally different. And Gruff, or whatever his stupid name was, had his arm round her. Possessive. And she was looking up at him. He was tall, very tall.
"Where're you heading?"
"Morocco."
"Oh great."
"Want to come?"
He didn't hear the answer. It wasn't spoken, maybe she had just pointed at him, pointed at Daddy's back.
He could imagine her expression. You know how it is with parents, got to stay a while, haven't seen him since I was born, we fuck like kids every night but I can't really just up and go to Morocco. He's jealous anyway, doesn't like other fellas fingering his daughter's pussy.
Thoughts like that with a dead man bleeding a few yards away.
The distant sound of a hooter, police Landrover, blue light flashing in the sun. They were going to put in the carcass.
He wanted to move on, move away, but it was impossible till the traffic had cleared. You could see the cars a mile away now, piling up round the bends, both ways. It was going to take two hours to get home, if not more.
Seven cars back there was a Volkswagen van, pink with yellow flowers and a green dragon, the occupants were craning their necks to see what was happening. Two Red Indian girls and another Jesus freak.
Calm down.
There were enough women to go round, Mishi Nah-ma, the darker of the two looked quite good, he wouldn't invite them home, he'd let her do that, let it go, let it all go, let her take over completely, let himself float along on her tide, under her bridge, if he didn't like it he could always swim to the shore, he was still strong enough for that.
The traffic guardia came towards him, nodded at his car. Not difficult to sort out the drivers when you were on the coast road every day. The elegant middle-aged man with greying hair, well-cut trousers, suede shoes, light blue shirt-obviously the owner of the blue Citroen.
"Es su coche?"
"SV
"Usted es el causante del accidente?"
"No. Vengo dos minutos despues."
"Bueno."
Not interested in details or witnesses, not foreign ones anyway.
Move on.
"Julie, we've got to go."
"OK. See you Guff. Come round if you've time. Next town on. Follow us."
She didn't ask him if that was all right. Why should she? It was natural. She was being natural, why should she ask his permission? Her friends are his friends, get it into your head dummy. Her friends are-your friends, whether she's been laid by them or not.
"Guff and I met in Limoges, he gave me a lift down to Barcelona, took me to see the Gaudi cathedral."
What did he do for a living? Rich father? Heir? Artist? Writer? Guitarist? At least he'd taken her to see something cultural.
"What's he do?" Couldn't resist it. Had to know.
"What? Oh, I don't know."
It doesn't matter to them you see. It just doesn't matter. You live man. You just live.
But who the fuck pays for it all?
Who, who, who?
Someone. There'll always be someone devoted enough somewhere.
I'll be paying for her from now on, won't I? She'll wander around all over the world, and I'll devote, I'll hand out. And the moment they hit Reina he started feeling bad, not bad-bad, but pretty gloomy, aware that a depression might come, aware that he was ill at ease.
He turned left down the dirt track, was happy to see the house ahead, made him think of Cherry. He knew where he was with Cherry. Marvellous wasn't it? He courted adventure, got it, it exhausted him and he wanted peace and tranquillity. He wanted everything.
He was tired. That was all. The Almunecar drive was always a killer, and the accident hadn't helped. Then in the rear view mirror he saw the flowers and the dragon. The van was following them. Food, beds, booze. Another party.
"Do you mind them coming?"
"No," he lied.
But then maybe he didn't really mind, not really.
He had often thought that that was what he was missing, not having any children, their friends, their enjoyment of what he had built up. He hadn't thought the friends would be boring, or dull, or not stimulating, or that he would be jealous. So maybe he did mind.
It would have been nice to have a little time to settle down, to go and clean up, to see if there was any wine, or milk, or whatever, but then they wouldn't expect anything would they, they wouldn't expect him to play host. No one did. You just did your own thing, man.
Julie got out of the car to greet her friends before he swung into the garage.
Happy reunion.
He sat in the car, door open, watching the scene in the driving mirror. The garage was hot, the back of his shirt wet and sticky, his legs and his neck ached, he was uncomfortable, wanted to get out, have a shower, sleep.
He watched.
An embrace. A kiss. On the mouth.
In the mouth.
Why did it annoy him so much?
Obvious.
CHAPTER TWELVE
"I want to tell them."
"You want to tell them what?"
"I want to tell them we sleep together."
"Why?"
"I'm proud, I suppose, I'm proud that you're my lover."
Jesus! The plot was thickening. It was more than that, it was beginning to turn in an unexpected direction. The whole dinner hadn't been expected. The way she had sat next to him, held his hand, kissed his neck.
Embarrassing.
And he had been cold, so cold and Guff had sat there opposite him, staring, legs wide open, hands between legs, staring, vacant, no thoughts of his own except to contradict.
"This part of the coast is more pleasant than west of Malaga."
He'd tried something else, threw it in to see what would happen. "Did you see Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?"
"Yes. They were better in The Taming of the Shrew."
Julie noticed it. Saw it as a game and baited Guff even more. He didn't notice, neither did Mishi Nahma.
"Battle of Waterloo. 1817."
No comment. No correction.
Maybe he'd never heard of it.
"How do you stand them?" he'd asked.
"They're gentle."
"It's not enough. Is it enough?"
She'd shrugged her shoulders.
They went out on the town, did the bars, the six of them. Everyone got high on drink, he paid, didn't mind, she was enjoying herself. She belonged to him and made it clear. Too clear. Even Guff noticed it. The woman who ran one of the bars did, her eyes narrowed, lips pursed, evebrows lifted, was that a way to behave with one's daughter? It was gossip already then? The daughter thing. He didn't care, that evening he didn't care, and nor did she, and in the discotheque, they danced like lovers and the only thing he minded was her trying to feel him all the time, making it too obvious, like La Mouche.
She'd been an experience. Old Mouche.
After Claire, she'd pulled him right out of the English rut, the Celia influence, the Clare disaster. Three weeks alone in a not over comfortable hotel in Cannes to get away from it all, and he had got away completely, totally friendless, then he'd met a few, on the fringe of being "in the theatre'. They had seen in him things he hadn't seen for years, a humour, an ability to make people laugh, and he had been invited to a dinner party by a queer and there met flamboyant people who, when scratched a little, turned out to be poor, neurotic and craving for attention. He had enjoyed listening to everyone's problems, had analyzed some, suggested solutions, he had had the practice with Celia, and they had set about telling him why he was unsettled: Sex, they said, was what was missing. He was too English about it, too English and Victorian, he must have had a number of unpleasant encounters to believe that other people thought it was taboo. And at another dinner party, which turned out to be a highly spiced goulash on crossed legs on the floor, everyone had laughed when he had mentioned meeting La Mouche, and he had laughed with them not knowing at all what it was all about till four days later at the Coupole, this strange little figure had marched in at great speed on high heeled shoes wearing a dreadful imitation leopard-skin coat and a sort of turban. She was an Arab who insisted that she was descended from Cleopatra. She'd sat down next to him straight away and intimately put her hand on the inside of his leg and laughed at him for no reason, and ordered a Ricard. She was dancing in some dubious night club as a go-go girl and loved it. He ought to come and see her. Everyone thought she was a lesbian but of course she wasn't, she said. Just slept with girl-friends because that was the only way she could get a bed. He'd sat there and listened to her chatter, half-English, half-French, no control of either, aware that he was fascinated. She had drive. Enthusiasm. So he'd come to the night club, alone and there she was on the red-lit stage jerking to the music, obviously enjoying herself, in a sort of trance. It had been a Sally Bowles 'I Am a Camera' situation. Jerk to the left, jerk to the right, two steps forward, two steps back, it went on endlessly. She wasn't paid, she'd said, just there to pick up customers, but she didn't. She liked the music and the atmosphere. She was an exhibitionist. Occasionally she went home with a man, but never asked for money. She wasn't a professional. And he met her afterwards, wearing a ridiculous red wig which didn't suit her and a sort of Mexican poncho which didn't suit her either and asked her if she'd like a coffee and she said, "Ow yes," in what she thought was swinging American, and she had amused him, and the men had turned round as they walked. She was a doll, and it was somehow flattering to be with her.
She'd asked for a sandwich with her coffee, and he'd suggested a meal and she'd said "Ow yes' again and so they'd gone to a brasserie and the waiter hung around the table because of her, and he was made aware that she had one of those body-personalities that radiated warmth and sex to nearly everyone, and he liked to be with it, and part of it.
He asked her back to his hotel room, and she said yes, with less enthusiasm than she had for the meal, and they took a taxi and he was afraid he wouldn't be able to cope. But he had coped. He had coped all right. The fact that when standing barefooted on the floor the top of her head reached the middle of his chest, was of no importance, somewhere along the way length of bodies lost or gained the necessary measurements, no back bending, no doubling up, it all worked out, and it worked all night, every night for the first week, she even missed three days of her go-go dancing to be with him, it was so remarkable.
They didn't talk much but ate and slept between bouts, and then when they emerged to join society everyone accepted them, was pleased for them and she never stopped feeling him, in private, in public, mostly unconsciously, her hand was always finding its way to the inside of his leg, and after a while he found this irritating so he told her to stop it but she couldn't. Even in her sleep her hand would find its way and her fingers would caress, pull at, squeeze, and nothing would happen and he had started to worry that he was impotent, but it hadn't worried her.
One day he had had enough, a bout of fever induced by exhaustion had committed him to bed, and lying there drenched in sweat, working it off, drugged, she had got into bed with him and insisted on the caresses. If he did not die, if he was ever able to walk again, he was going to leave, go away, and he told her so, made excuses of course, made the excuse that he had to see a friend on business, with no intention of returning he hated her so much, and he had gone. And after two days of living the lie, he needed her so badly that he had gone back to the night club and on the small stage dancing with her in an identical costume of blue and green sequins was a tall coloured man who moved even better than she did. She'd had her arms round his neck when he came in, and she'd had her arms round his neck when he had left after seeing her intimate little movement of the hand fluttering down. And he'd realized that he had lost her, and accepted that and had never seen her again.
"Julie," he said, "I don't think you should do that."
"What? Grab your balls? It's fun."
"It's not how a daughter should behave."
"Nobody's looking."
Luckily the music stopped and the party broke up, the place was closing and people were dispersing. How her friends got back was of little interest to him, he wanted to walk home via the beach, so they walked through the empty streets in the heat of the night, hand in hand, arm in arm, occasionally stepping in each other's way, holding each other up. Down the fishermen's street, to the long beach, past the new block of flats, unfinished, like all the blocks of flats all along the coast.
Home, and a need to pretend, a need to make excuses, because Guff and the others had driven back and were sorting out which beds to take, not sure where Julie slept. She told them the top room and slipped down on the balcony when everyone had gone to sleep.
The friends left the next day for Morocco with scissors to cut the men's hair if the aduana insisted. No Jesus freaks allowed in Mohammed's country, wear a turban, stick it all under a hat, buy some petuli, kaftans, jealahbas, bangles and beads.
"We'll bring back some hash, man," and they would probably never see them again.
Julie got into a book after that and didn't stop reading it till it was finished. He went about his business suggesting certain landscaping round a villa for an American, checking that the architect was doing what he said he would do on another project, advising someone else to stop the drains going behind the house. Payment wasn't always sure, but the contacts usually led to something. He had a rake off from an agency for letting flats, and that was easy enough. Two weeks of boredom before the winter season, being nice to fat Belgian ladies who were always talking food, always talking clinics and of their infirmities. They were all hospital rejects from the north who came to recuperate in the sun, who came to convalesce in peace. No one told them that they would hear each other snoring, that the Spaniards never went to bed before one in the morning, that the whole of Reina was being drilled from dawn till dusk with jack-hammers for new drains, new electric cables, new telephone cables. It was a good enough life, buying and selling a flat, one project allowing him to live comfortably alone for two years, and he had saved a good deal with Cherry. Two could live as cheaply as one, she'd said, and paid. She hadn't found him expensive to run and he'd done his share for his keep.
"I've got a Belgian couple coming this evening interested in one of Enrique's villas. If I sell that we can go to Morocco."
"Shall I lay him?"
He looked at her, a little surprised. They were having breakfast.
"I'm a whore at heart, Daddy. You know that."
"I think you pretend to be, but I'm not sure you are."
"Yes I am, I can prove it."
"Well, not with him. They're in their sixties and probably very respectable."
"Will I be your daughter, or your mistress then?"
"Daughter. A sweet, polite, well-behaved daughter."
"Can I go out tonight Daddy, after we've sold them the house. Where're you taking them?"
"Giulio's."
They were waiting in the cocktail bar with an attractive daughter in her twenties who said very little.
They were duller than expected, and he excused Julie when they started talking business. He didn't worry this time as he had last, no jealousy. He was sure of her now, she'd be in the Aquarius or he'd find her easily enough and they'd go home.
But he was wrong.
She wasn't in any of the bars and in the Aquarius a kind female friend lifted her eyebrows and said with certain pleasure, "Maybe I shouldn't tell you but she left with Guff."
"They're back?"
Tie's back."
"Where's he staying?"
She shrugged her shoulders. "Pension Moreno?"
And he stood outside in the warm street for some time not at all sure what to do.
The woman had the tongue of an asp and could not be believed. Maybe she was wrong. Maybe Guff hadn't come back, maybe she was mistaking nights, and yet....Then he realized that with Guff she would probably have gone home, so got into the car.
The house was dead and black and empty.
He didn't like it at all.
He got back in the car, not sure what he was going to do. He drove back to the Pension Moreno, hung around outside, then sat in the car again just looking at the empty street.
What could he do? Knock on the door, ask the owner if his daughter was in bed with Guff? What if he was?
So he went back to the house and spent the night by himself, alone, hating it, unable to sleep.
He turned over imagining her all brown and tanned in a narrow squeaky bed with Guff and his grey skin under grey jeans. He'd lose her one day, that was obvious, but he didn't want to lose her yet.
He'd eaten too much, had indigestion, so he went down to make himself some tea. He'd never sell the Enrique villa to the Belgians, not at that price and shit! he was alone, really alone. He could pick and choose anyone who came to Reina, but that wasn't what he wanted, he wanted her.
He wandered around the house, sipping the hot tea from a glass that burnt his fingers. The night was hot. He went from room to room switching on the lights, switching them off again. She might have had an accident, might have got lost, might have gone to a party? He'd have known, he'd have heard, everyone knew everything. And he'd been told by that bitch she was with Guff.
He went back to bed.
How to control her? How to stop her doing it to him? He minded. He'd have to ask her once and for all whether she cared for him as a father or as a lover. It had to be one or the other and they'd have to stick. Impossible to go on. Impossible for him. And he fell asleep and woke up at seven and waited for the black thoughts of the morning to overwhelm him.
He'd had a rest from them since Cherry had gone and Julie had come, but now they were back. They started simply with an imagined question. "Where were you?" and then the scene followed. She lied, he argued, and the argument got out of hand and they parted, or he felt mean, or she cried, or whatever it was it was bad, and made him curl up inside.
So he got up and make himself some more tea.
English upbringing, it helped, the tea.
He sat in the early morning sun by the pool waiting for the heat to start burning, and he sat there looking at the water, listening to the hum of the filter, listening too to every sound that might bring her back, the motorbikes, the cars, the footsteps, even the mules.
And another argument started.
"I told him."
"What?"
"That you were my father and that we ... did." What would follow? He wasn't sure, so he went on. It was Lewis this time bringing her back on his Bultaco, she walking into the house, dressed in white, virginal, innocent, pure, and Lewis standing there in leather looking at him. "That's shitty, man, real shitty. How dare your generation stare us in the face? I'm going to Morocco, India, Chile, Argentina, and I'm taking her with me, she's not safe with you."
And he came out of it at the sound of a van coming up the drive.
He didn't turn round, he was just going to let it happen.
The van stopped, a door opened, closed. Let them talk, let them explain. Footsteps, not hers, too heavy. He turned.
It was Guff, alone.
"You're back?" he said, amicably.
"Never went man." Blue eyes. The innocence of Jesus Christ in them. A host wouldn't melt in his mouth.
"Julie around?"
"No. Thought she might be with you."
"Nope. Not with me. Maybe with Mac."
Mac was the silent one of the foursome who had stayed. He'd serviced Mishi Nahma.
"None of you went then?" he questioned.
"The girls did. Wanted to see Fez. Not really our scene. Mac wanted to write, rented a place in the mountain pueblo. Guess Julie's with him."
"Get yourself a beer, in the freezer," he said. He couldn't not play host, but he wasn't going to wait on him.
Guff disappeared into the house and returned with a frothing can. No glass. Drink straight from the sharp hole. Serves you right if you cut your tongue.
"Rumour around town that you're not really her Dad."
He didn't say anything.
Deny or encourage?
"Lots of rumors in this place. The town's built on them. What do you think?" Clever, crafty, subtle, ball in your court, mate.
"I guess you're not. You don't behave like father and daughter."
"How do we behave then?"
"Well, more like you were secret lovers. Which is bad news for me 'cause she really turns me on, man."
The pride rising, father's pride, lover's pride. And then someone on the drive, turn around, Julie, walking, tired.
"I walked all the way down. Taken me two hours."
She ignored Guff completely, sat down on Jey's knee and planted a big kiss on his mouth.
"I can't stand that, I'm going," Guff said, getting up.
And father and daughter watched him go, get into the van, reverse, drive off.
"Did you go to bed with her?" Julie asked.
"With who?" He hadn't any idea what she was talking about.
"Oh don't give me that. With Francine, or whatever her stupid name was?"
"Francine?" His mind didn't register. Then he remembered the Belgian daughter. He was staggered.
"Of course not."
"That's why I left."
"What d'you mean, why you left?"
"Well, it was obvious you weren't going to charm the parents into buying it, but the daughter, a walkover. She was drooling into her soup over you."
"It never occurred to me."
"Truth?"
"Of course, truth."
"Shit Pappy, you're no good as a salesman at all. All you had to do was take her up there by moonlight, fuck her in one of the bedrooms and she'd have got rich Daddy to buy it for her."
"There's a retired admiral living in the house right now, and, as I said, it never occurred to me."
"You need a good agent."
She got up and walked to the edge of the pool.
"How did you make out then?" The language was beginning to come to him more easily now. If you can't lick them, join them.
"Smoked, and pooped out. They're a real drag. Nice place up there though. Overlooks the whole valley and the sea."
"Dona Fernandez's. I lived there for two years."
"Yeah? Well I didn't get laid if that's what you're worrying about. But I nearly did, just out of spite."
"Spite? You're making the rules, not me."
"Let's not have rules. Let's not have anyone else. Just you and me. I really dig you." Pause, then, "I'm going to cook you lunch."
Three days later, because she said her parents might buy it for her and because Julie had said she drooled over him, he took the Belgian daughter to his apartment. He didn't really want to sell it, but a sale was a sale, and an afternoon with a golden body like that could do no harm at all. It was a straightforward little afternoon affair, blinds down, windows open, noise of traffic way below, iced white wine before, during and after, and delight on both sides.
She was a pin-up girl, plump, sleeping around to have something over bourgeois parents. Twenty-five she was, and looked twenty-four. No comparison to Julie, but just different. Afterwards he didn't like her shade of lipstick, or her shade of nail polish, or her shoes, or indeed her dress, and he didn't want to be seen with her or sell her the flat, and the fear hit him that she might take him for a big ride. "I'm pregnant." Mama and Papa could all be conning him. Doing the coast with their daughter, prey on the rich, conceited-looking men, they could make a fortune. "You'll have to pay for the abortion. Five hundred thousand pesetas."
What an idiot he was, and Clare's telephone call rang in his ears. Strange of course but she had panicked, her of all people. Stable Clare. A teacher. He'd gone to see a house in Highgate and she had opened the door. A pale girl with short-cropped hair, boyish in her way, vulnerable. She had shown him round when he had said something about maybe being the new landlord. She shared the house with five other girls, two of whom were pretty, the others untidy, worn out, grumbling about their secretarial work and cost of living, but it had been a break in the monotony, and there had been a good deal of giggling about panties hanging in the bathroom, stockings and a terrible pudding one of them was trying to make.
Because she had opened the door, he was her property, and because she was sweet and unbelievably disorganized, unable to find the tea, or the sugar or milk or the kettle, and had not been nervous of him, he had wanted to impress her. He had asked her out to dinner and she had refused, and he had known she had only refused to play hard to get. So he had shrugged his shoulders and left, but because he was alone and couldn't bear the thought of going back to an empty bed, he had rung her from the comer phone booth and asked again, and told her his real thoughts. Yes he wanted her, but that was not why he was offering dinner, he was offering dinner because he enjoyed talking to new people intimately, and as he said it he realized that that was true, he really enjoyed talking to new people intimately and becoming part of their lives, for a short while. And when she finally accepted, first making him promise that he would not press her to go to bed, he put the phone down and wondered how he did it, bow he managed to smooth talk himself into believing that bed was not the primary interest.
So he walked back to the house and there had been more giggling as he waited in the kitchen and she came in wearing a short black skirt and black leather boots and a black sweater and a chrome watch. She looked neat and tidy but nothing to shout about, nothing to make men's heads spin round which is what he had always thought essential.
She suggested an inexpensive restaurant within walking distance and they had had a very pleasant meal, and the wine had worked on both of them, and the coffee and the brandy, and they had walked back arm in arm and he had decided that he would not press, not break his promise, and in a way he looked forward to the traditional good-night kiss on the door step, but then she had asked him in for a coffee, and taken him upstairs to her unbelievably untidy bedroom because she knew he didn't want to sit and watch television among the hair curlers, and he stared at the picture of Paul Newman and the travel poster of Athens and at the single bed covered with odd clothes, shoes, books and a plate sticky with yolk of egg. She had taken off her black sweater and revealed a see-through bra, an intimate little scene exposing herself like that, tantalizing, and she had looked at him and he at her and she had said, "Sorry, I shouldn't have done that," and he had said, "No," and smiled, then she had said, "Oh well ... I suppose you can stay if you really want to," which was possibly the least enthusiastic invitation he had ever had.
He'd seen her every time he went to London after that and grew very fond of her, too fond, finding it hard to adjust to the double life, always expecting Celia to find out. Then Clare had panicked, or if it wasn't panic then she had got so low that she really needed help. Of course he went through the doubts, wondering whether Clare was being cunning, working out that if something bad happened between him and Celia she would benefit, but Clare wasn't cunning. She had needed help, so she had rung, an unexpected call as he and Celia were watching No Hiding Place. He seldom got calls at that hour of the night, she had the friends, not him, so she had got up to go and answer it and had come back in and just said, "It's for you." Surprised. "Oh? Who?"
"I don't know. A girl."
Innocent, puzzled, he had picked up the receiver.
"I'm going in tomorrow. I thought I'd let you know."
"Oh."
"Was that her?" Clare questioning. Celia the other voice, the other woman.
"Yes."
A pause. What to say? How to comfort?
"You all right?"
"Suppose so." She wasn't all right at all. She was frightened, scared, sick, alone. She didn't play games like Celia: She needed him.
"I'll come up first thing. What time...? "
"It's in the afternoon. I'll meet you at the station, something to do."
"O.K. It gets in, usually about one-thirty."
"I'm sorry," she said, and hung up.
The tears burnt their way up and he squeezed his eyes shut. She was crying at the other end, the exhaustion, the waiting; the money had helped, his support had helped, but it was there inside, a life, for the first time, a duty, a gift. He'd thought about it, tried to understand what it must be like. He wouldn't give it up that easily either, something growing there, and for a moment he'd thought of Sue and the child he'd never seen. He'd thought of ringing back too and asking her to marry him, but he had turned and seen Celia leaning there against the door, her eyes little black dots in the white face and the mouth tightly drawn.
"Well, what was all that about?"
He didn't think. "I got a girl pregnant in London, she's having an abortion tomorrow."
She couldn't have invented it herself. All the masochistic thoughts she had ever dreamed up couldn't top that one. She, unable to have children, supporting him since he divorced his wife who had a child, now had to learn that he had got another girl pregnant and was approving an abortion.
It was all in her eyes, in the thinner line of her mouth. She started to speak, but couldn't. And he couldn't move. He was rooted.
"How could you?" The voice was incredulous, high pitched, taut.
He shrugged his shoulders.
"How could you do this to me?"
And that was the relief line. Back to square one. Back to why it had happened. To me, to me, to me ... always. Things never happened to other people, they only happened to her. If he was guilty of getting Clare pregnant he was not guilty of getting her pregnant to make Celia suffer, to make anyone suffer. Luckily, luckily, luckily, the anger rose in him and choked him and stopped him saying anything he might have regretted later. Instead she said it all.
"You're despicable. What you've done is despicable. And to tell me."
"I didn't tell you. You were eavesdropping."
"In my house?"
"In our house."
Oh no ... not sink to that level, my house, your house, my front lawn your back lawn, my curtains your carpet, split the piano you have the black notes I'll have the white ... which LPs, which books. No no no.
She switched off the television, stubbed out her cigarette and folded her arms and stood there, eyes blazing, mind racing to find out how she could hurt him, and in so doing hurt herself, because that was half the pleasure.
"What are you going to do about it?"
He was pouring himself a whisky, and one for her too. She needed it, whatever they were doing to each other didn't mean the pleasantries had to stop.
"I'm going to London tomorrow to be with her."
"I don't mean for her, I mean for me!"
She stamped her foot and had dug her hands deep in her dressing gown pockets.
"Nothing until you calm down." It was extraordinary what effect another person out of control had on him. He had just handed her the whisky and she had lashed out, the back of her hand hitting his wrist, and he'd held on, only the whisky surging out of the glass, but the wetness on his hand had been the instant irritant. "For Christ's sake pull yourself together!"
"You get another girl pregnant ... and I can't have children and you get another girl pregnant "
He'd stopped himself just in time, protesting, not her fault. It was his fault. If he was a man it was his fault. It always was. Men took the blame, for ever. Women were never guilty. They slept around, bred the unwanted, but it was the men who were guilty.
"I'm sorry Jey, but you can't treat people like this and think you can get away with it."
He'd wanted to get away, he'd wanted to get out of the house and get right away, go to Clare, be with her, maybe talk the abortion over, maybe let her have the child. He thought of the car, of driving to London, five hours, he could be there by three in the morning, better than a train, thinking for two hours in the train. Conscience now, not wanting to leave Celia in the state she was in. He loved them both didn't he? He loved them all and didn't want to make anyone unhappy.
"When did you go to bed with her?"
"How do you mean?"
"When did you go to bed with her? You must have gone to bed with her to get her pregnant! Or did you do it against a wall?"
That was horrible. He said nothing.
"How long have you known her? What is she like? How often? I want to know. What's her name? Her age? Her height? Her measurements? I want to know!"
Into the analysis now, sitting down, sipping another whisky.
"Her name's Clare, she's twenty-three, your height, thin, mouse-coloured hair. She's a teacher."
"Why?"
"I'm not sure. I suppose I was bored and was stimulated by the thought of an affair."
"An affair! It's an affair? How long have you known her?"
"Two months "
"Two months! What makes you think it's yours? She's probably been giving it around to everyone."
It wasn't an original thought, it was the first thought, always. Is it mine? And then the strange inner knowledge that it couldn't be anyone else's.
"Does a remark like that help?" he'd said. "It's bitchy and unworthy of you. What hurts you most? What gives you the most pain? The fact that I slept with another woman, or that she's going to have a baby? What's the best of those masochistic ideas?"
He had never accused her of it before, he had never said anything quite so nasty. He was surprised himself. She had looked at him and smiled, a sort of admiration that he had had the guts to find her Achilles heel and say so.
"Losing you, I suppose," she'd said, then, with genuine tears in her eyes, she had blinked at him, looked at him lovingly, as though for the last time, and said through a tight throat, "You'd better go to her. She obviously needs you more than me."
And she had left the room.
The exit line had been quietly spoken, and meant, but it left a little drama in the air. She couldn't help it, "she needs you more than me," poor me, alone, childless, alone, unmarried; she'd never win, she'd never understand that every time she said anything about anyone it was always orientated towards her self-pity, which is why she lost.
He'd sipped his whisky and looked at the faded green carpet with its small brown coffee stains. The fire had gone out, the room had got cold, outside black ice, frost certainly, clear sky, moon? What was he going to do? Moment of truth. Leave? Drive off? Leave her crying upstairs whether it was self-pity or not, whether it was self-indulgence, masochism, warranted or not, he hadn't liked leaving her sad like that, so he had gone up.
She'd gone to bed, back towards the door, her light out, his light on, obviously expecting him to get into bed, not go. And in the morning it would have been all reproaches, all accusations about not caring for Clare. God! why was it that the threat of the illogical mind made him run?
"What are you doing?"
"Putting my shoes on."
"Are you going out?" Sitting up, afraid, red eyes, rubbed rather than cried through. She'd tried to cry some more but hadn't made it. The self-pity hadn't been worked up enough.
"I'm going to London. As you said, she needs me more than you right now. I can't make you happy, I can stop her being miserable."
"Would you do the same for me?"
Wallet in pocket, polo sweater on, sheepskin coat on, hat on ... pause at the door.
"No, of course not." He'd smiled down at her, shook his head as much as to say goon, twit, fool, of course I would, but she'd turned away.
Perhaps it hadn't been the best moment for that sort of humour.
Down the stairs he'd gone, quickly before he could change his mind, before she could say something to stop him. Out, into the crisp cold night air, into the car, and away.
He remembered Clare opening the door, she'd looked terrible, pale, distraught. Did he want coffee? And they'd had coffee in her untidy room.
"I'm sorry about this," she'd said. "I just can't get myself together, I feel it's so wrong."
She wanted him to make the decision, wanted him to say have it, or have some very good excuse why not.
"You're too young," he'd said.
"I'm twenty-two, thousands of girls have babies at --twenty-two. Probably every mother has had a baby by the time she's twenty-two."
"You have respectable parents who respect you. You want that, you need it. If you lose their respect you lose your own, and if you lose that you'll lose mine. You can always have other babies, it isn't the end you know."
"It bloody well feels as though it's going to be."
They had got into bed and slept uncomfortably, he not wanting to feel any of her, not wanting to be near it in case it moved, and she had fallen asleep and snored while he had lain awake till six and seen the dawn light through the thin cotton curtains and wondered why he was worrying so much when she wasn't.
The morning was the slowest he had ever spent. A walk in the park, the convalescence before the operation, cinemas were impossible from the timing point of view; neither felt hungry. Then he decided on the National Gallery and they had gone in by a side entrance and found themselves looking at portraits instead. That had taken her mind off everything. She had a good head for history, was surprised how Walpole looked, that Congreve was so fey, Johnson so surly; she had stayed a long time in the Kit-Kat room for some reason looking at every picture in turn and he had sat down tired by his sleepless night and the anxiety, and she had sat down too in her black plastic coat, black leather boots and white knees.
"None of them care a damn," she'd said talking of the portraits, "I've asked them all. Is it all right? And none care. It doesn't really matter you know, in history, it doesn't matter. Clare Ablett aborted on the 10th November. One bastard less to feed."
He let her go on, just put his hand on her hand, aware that it was a kind gesture, a comforting gesture, but one with little feeling. The truth had been that he didn't care for her anymore. Just like that. He didn't care. He didn't care for Celia either, he just wanted to be alone, just wanted to be free of all emotional upsets, the tantrums, the tears, the relying on him for their happiness, because that is what it had become. Celia had needed him for all sorts of things, Clare had needed him because she was in love. As soon as he could, as gently as he could, he would end it.
And suddenly half-past two.
A taxi there.
"Don't wait."
"What happens?" he'd asked at the eleventh hour.
"Nothing. I just rest for a couple of hours after, then home. Jean had one a year ago." Suddenly tough, suddenly the school prefect about to run the hundred yards for her house on which the cup depends.
"G'bye." Out of the taxi, into the anonymous block of flats.
And he had gone back to her place to wait.
When she came, half an hour earlier than expected, she had bought a chicken and a bottle of wine. She ate most of it, drank most of it, and that night was sick. Jean had said how nice of him to have come, to have stayed, to have been there at all, her boy-friend had buggered off fast and she'd never seen him again. For a moment he'd had the thought of going to bed with Jean, and maybe Jean had had the same idea, but the coffee had boiled over and someone had come into the kitchen and he had gone back to Clare's room. He'd slept the whole of the next day in Jean's bed the moment she'd gone off to work, and Clare had made the breakfast and woken him up with a tray of goodies as though he had been the one who'd been ill, and the day after she'd gone to work as though nothing had happened and he had rung Celia.
"You might have rung before."
"I'm sorry."
"And how's the mother of your dead child? I presume it's dead by now."
And he couldn't take that and had put the receiver down. He'd just put it down and listened to the phrase again and the bitter voice repeating it in his mind.
He couldn't go back to all that. It would go on for ever and ever. Tomorrow, in a week, next month, next year. She'd build on it, if that was possible, she'd probably rehearsed the line. She must have done.
So he wrote her a letter. A short one. Sorry, can't go on, this is where I am if you need to contact me, but I don't think I'm necessary to you any more. I don't care what you do with the house, you can have all the contents, but I'd like my share of it if you sell. Possessions? They didn't mean anything any more.
A week later she had arrived with his clothes and Jean had opened the door and taken the wave of abuse because Celia thought she was Clare, then had had to apologize. "She was obviously very unsettled by something," Jean had said later.
Then the letters had started coming, three a week, two a week, one a week, one a month, then none, all making the distance wider, easier. He didn't open the last but two he received for several days, and he never opened the last one.
And after another month Clare asked him whether he intended staying with her because if so they should get something bigger, but at the same time she said something about going on holiday with Jean, unless you want to go with me, and he had detected the subtle question behind it all. Are we together or aren't we? Because if we're not then I'd rather not see you again because I can't settle down. So he had said something about thinking of moving and she had quickly said she thought it was a good thing, and they had both made excuses not to see each other for the following five days, and then she had rung and said she was going to France with Jean next week.
Painless, friendly, in years to come they would see each other for tea or a drink in a pub, and they had, warmth, a love there, an interest in each other's lives, a friend for life. He liked her, still.
And he came out of the past to see Francine getting dressed because it was six o'clock and her parents would be expecting her back from the beach.
And that night, for no reason that made sense on reflection afterwards, he told Julie.
He told her rather proudly, over a dinner she had cooked, what had happened, and got a volley of abuse from which it took him two days to recover.
During those two pensive days he was faced with a number of facts, none of which he liked. One, Julie was in love with him and therefore jealous of any other woman. Two, he wanted other women or at least the thought of the possibility of other women; not to allow himself that was prison. Three, he wanted her respect, as a father. Four, shades of Susan had grown into shadows and he wouldn't be able to live comfortably with those.
Telling Julie was making the same mistake he had made with Sue. "Know how I got the secrets of the machine? Slept with the chefs wife." Grief! "Know how I sold a villa, slept with the daughter." Idiot! And he hadn't sold a villa.
And Julie's look, exactly the same, astonishment, tightening of lips, flaring of nostrils. Sue, nineteen years ago. Hurt and hating Sue had said, "Why did you tell me? It's so low, such an awful thing to do, as though you were proud." And Julie had looked the same and said, "Today? Did you? Why tell me? She's so cheap. It cheapens me." And his reaction had been the same. Why had he done it? For them, strangely. In a roundabout way, he had done it for them, the first time to get the plans, to get the money, the other to sell a flat or a villa. Wasn't it true?
No.
He hadn't done it for those reasons at all, he had just wanted to sleep with women he knew were very easy to sleep with.
Why had he had to have excuses?
It had been enjoyable. Both times. Joy was sin then? Still. Fire and brimstone?
And he had left the house and gone for a walk down to the beach, furious with himself and the whole situation, realizing that he was back at square one. He had to be faithful to his daughter then?
The relationship would have to stop, it was unhealthy, bad for her, bad for him, ruining her chances of a good marriage. Jesus! Did he care about that? Victorian father.
But it did. It did matter. He would have to cool the whole thing down, put her in the apartment or go and five there himself and leave her in the house.
He could afford to state his resolution out loud. "I am not going to sleep with her again!' addressed to the waves. He could afford to make a promise like that because the Belgian daughter hadn't in fact been bad, and she was staying in Reina for another week.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
That night he wanted to, but didn't.
He and Julie slept in the same bed but she was distant.
At breakfast she did not look her best, bored rather than tired, tied to him by imagined strings, annoyed with him for what he had done and yet much of it was peevishness because she had missed out.
"I don't think we're going to be happy the way we're going," he said.
She said nothing but lit a cigarette and looked into space.
"I'd like you to go and live in the apartment for a trial week, give me a chance to sort myself out"
"She's leaving today."
"Who?"
"Francine."
"The Belgian girl?"
"Don't tell me you can't remember her name!"
Woman defending woman. It was so illogical.
"You don't have much respect for women, do you, you just use them."
He wasn't going to enter into that one. Use them? It was mutual, it took two for God's sake. He didn't rape, tie down, drug, bludgeon. He went back to the apartment idea.
"Would you mind moving?"
"No."
She looked rejected. Looked downhearted. Maybe he was hurting her feelings more than he realized. But he had to start somewhere.
"I've got to start somewhere," he said aloud.
"Start what?"
"Sorting things out. I don't want to hurt your feelings, I don't want to mess myself up. I've done that too often in the past, and I know the symptoms. I'm not sleeping, I'm having ugly thoughts, arguing with you in my head over trivialities, and I know why."
"Why?"
"Because it's all happened too quickly. I don't know whether I want you as a daughter or as a lover."
"You want both Jeysie. but when it suits you." She looked up and straight at him. "So do I."
"Well maybe we can't have both, so why not separate for a while and give ourselves a chance? Perhaps you'd like to go to Morocco?" That was a good idea.
"No thank you."
"Why not?"
"Because I want to be with you."
She stood up, walked to the edge of the pool, and dived in.
He wasn't sure. The break in the voice had been there, but it could have been anger, or tears being held back.
He had to go through with it.
He knew that. Hard now, much harder later.
Don't allow tears, don't allow delay. He wasn't throwing her out, he was requesting peace for a week.
Maybe it was the pool and the house and the whole comfortable scene she liked.
He watched her swim, on her back, the crawl, floating, duck-diving, she was still beautiful to watch, and her expression was sad, for the first time since he'd met her.
As she came out, he took her towel over and put it on her shoulders.
"Would you like to stay here and I'll go to the apartment?"
"Look, for Chrissake understand Daddy, I don't care where I am, I don't care! I just want to be with you." It was sad anger, hurt anger. "I love you, I don't know why or how I love you, but I love you."
He didn't want to hear it, he didn't want to hear it at all. What was it that made him so lovable, what was it that made them cling and never let go?
"I can't return your love until I know which it is you're giving," he said.
"Both!' It was nearly a scream.
"Can't it be clearer? I can't play the double game."
"It's not a game," she protested.
"Oh, they're words. Sit down and stop being angry. Why are you angry?"
"Because you're so adolescent. You're just spoilt. You must know by now that you can't just do what you want."
"I'm not sure that you can't just do what you want."
"I'm not sure I know what I want."
"Well I know what you want. You want the excitement of a new relationship for as long as it stimulates you. The moment it gets boring, the moment the smaller details of living with someone else starts showing through, you want out."
She was right. And she went on.
"The only reason you want to put me away for a week is so that we can start a new affair. Same person, but new. You're the sort of man who ought to have four women for each season of the year. Women are a bit more stable you know, a bit more considerate. I am anyway."
He was being told off. The smaller details of living together were definitely showing through.
"What difference is it going to make, me living on one side of the town and you living here?" she went on.
"It will establish in my mind, and other people's, that you are my daughter, that we are not living together, that you are free and I am free. That we are independent."
"Is that really what you want?"
"I think it's what I'd like you to be."
"OK Daddy, independent I'll be, but don't come crying round saying you're lonely, or wanting my company when I don't want to give it."
"It's just for a week ... till I sort myself out."
"What if I sort myself out and decide I don't want to come back?"
"That's what I want you to find out. What we've both got to find out."
She said nothing else, but moved slowly away and went indoors.
Rejected?
He wondered what had happened in her mind.
His privilege to say yes, or no? Who decided?
The older? The wiser? The one who needed people less. People, people who need people, are the luckiest people...? Wasn't it better to be able to stand one's own company? To be able to find someone else quickly, to have the confidence of being able to do that?
He slipped his bathrobe off, went to the edge of the pool and dived in.
Streak of blue all around, the familiar friendly spots at the bottom, the cool pressure all around, he was always happy down there.
Air, he needed air, five feet to the surface, a half second of doubt as to whether he'd make it, swim to one end, turn and three lengths at the crawl, stretch out, full stretch, splash, cool clear water, the wall suddenly, the underwater turn as he had done at school, not quite as fish-like any more. One more length, slowing down, ten feet to go, out of condition, too much of the other. Not a bad life though, out, drying, lying in the sun.
Into the house to get papers, down into the dining room where all the contracts were and the sudden awareness of silence.
Back up again, into the sitting room, Julie not there.
Upstairs, not there either, bathroom empty. Check the guest room, no haversack.
She'd gone.
He hesitated for a second then went right upstairs to the roof terrace. She was on the road, walking up the hill, vexed, hurt, wanting attention. Let her go? What of the key to the apartment? Intelligent enough to take it of course, but just check.
Down, cold now, he stopped in the bedroom to put a sweater on and dry briefs, and noticed the piece of paper on the bed.
"I know you're right. I just don't like leaving you. So please don't give chase straight away. I've taken the key. Love J."
He didn't give chase. He sat on the edge of the bed and looked at the note, read it and re-read it, realizing that this was the first time he had ever seen his daughter's handwriting.
"Just what am I doing?" he said out loud, standing up, then heard a noise downstairs. Esperanza coming to clean. He knew it was her by the snort and the Spanish sigh, the "ayh," practiced from childhood and copied from mother and grandmother throughout Andalusia.
Julie would probably go on the Paseo and meet some of her friends, their friends, just like being married, but being married the right way, not one partner taking on the life of the other as he had with Sue, taking on the mother, the father, the village, the whole of her environment, he hadn't had a chance. Couples should always move right out and start on their own, from scratch, discover themselves through the other. He was family. So what would it mean? It would mean he would gauge her moves with more accuracy, it would mean that he would understand her. They were birds of a feather.
Esperanza appeared at the door, mop and bucket in hand ready to splosh water all over the place regardless of furniture and fittings.
He smiled, exchanged a greeting and moved out and down to the pool again. He sat in the wicker chair with a building contract and realized that this was probably the day, the lonely day he had managed to put off. Could he live through a week without company? Was it necessary to do so? Yngvild? Dinner with Yngvild as a sort of apology, and see what happened afterwards? She was flattering to be seen with. A nice dinner at Giulio's.
But what if Julie was there?
Best to avoid the encounter. Take her out of Refna. Go to Almunecar, Malaga. Torremolinos. A night club, the Barbarella or Tiffany's. He'd never been to them, just seen the posters. A Chinese restaurant? That would be nice. Nicer to go with Julie. Now that would really have been a nice thing to do, go to a Chinese restaurant with Julie.
What did he want?
And what of lunch? Where would she eat? Did she have enough money? She'd probably use her checks, money of her own. He knew nothing about her. All the little details of her life he had let slip by. One did that in Reina, whole summers and autumns slipped by with nothing happening. The building contract should be read but it didn't have to be, not till the eleventh hour, and that was always manana. No one to push him, no one to push, on his own. He knew he wouldn't be able to sit there and read the contract and think of the meeting with the notario the next day. That was death. Five hours in a small office with cigar smoke and slow, slow progress, if any. The secretary would be doing nine things at once, and a tenth person would come in and he'd start helping them and forget the other nine. At the end of the day there would be forty people waiting for him to finish one thing, and it would happen in six months, if ever. Why complain? Why be irritated by the lack of discipline, the lack of efficiency? He didn't have to do anything if he didn't want to, no one would worry him for weeks; when they needed his signature, his knowledge, they'd come for it. Wait. Let things happen. Sit in the sun, read a good book, listen to records, relax; no one cares a fuck about you except Cherry and Julie and Yngvild and maybe the Belgian daughter. He could write to Cherry of course, sit down and answer her letter. He wouldn't though. He wouldn't bring himself to do it. Maybe he was lazy? He'd go to the bank and cash a cheque instead, that would give some momentum to the day, buy a newspaper, read it on the Paseo, meet a few friends, take it from there.
She wasn't on the Paseo, tourist side or hippy side, but Yngvild was, alone.
Fate.
He went over to her table, sat down more or less asking permission to do so at the same time. She was smaller than he remembered, more helpless, prettier.
"How are you this morning?"
"Fine."
Which meant that she wasn't. There was no smile, no sweetness. She made him feel that he had been unpleasant to her. He had been, but it couldn't be helped.
"Doing anything tonight?"
"Yes, of course."
He was put out. It shook him, and she seemed surprised.
"Aren't you?"
"Not particularly," he said.
"Not Julie's party?"
"No ... ' he managed to say. "I don't think fathers should be around all the time."
"That's silly. You're a nice father and very young for your age."
He needed the flattery like other people needed a drink.
"Where is the party?" he asked.
"The beach. Why don't you come?"
"I think it would be better if I didn't, besides I may have to go to Malaga."
"You said you weren't doing anything."
"It's not essential. A client to see. Why don't you come?"
"I said I'd go to the party. Besides ... I have a friend now."
"Oh."
Get up, get out, leave, you've been rejected. Don't be surprised, don't be hurt, you deserve it, you do it to others all the time, you did it to her, there's no reason why it shouldn't happen to you more often than it does. Take it on the chin, be a man.
He wasn't sure if he could be.
He needed her suddenly. "Norway' he was about to say, "come with me, I'm better, I wasn't the other night, not well," but he wasn't that conceited, wasn't that sure of himself deep down. He didn't like being refused, felt like a kid who was peeved because he wasn't given the ice cream he declined. Not in control at all.
Paco came, tray full of empty glasses, singing, then knitting his eyebrows at a vacated table without the pay slip, without the money, without the tip.
"I have the money Paco," Yngvild said.
Relief for Paco. It hardly ever happened but he lived in the fear that someone one day would just get up and go without paying.
"Quiere usted, senor?"
"Cinzano bianco. What would you like?" To Norway.
"No thank you. I have to go."
Paco away into the bar and Yngvild getting up and leaving. He'd be at the table by himself, not even a paper to read. The lonely, rejected bachelor. It must show on his face.
"See you then, try and come."
Yngvild walked away in her long colourful kaftan, thin, still rather lifeless, but pleasant to be with. Better than no one.
How did people just sit alone by themselves all day with nothing to do? Were they all drunk? Dulled by the sun and the wine, memories burnt out?
Party on the beach, full moon, or nearly. He hadn't been to one for a long time, the last with Cherry but it had been a bit rough for her, the fishermen smelling of fish and the incessant clapping of hands in amateur flamenco.
"Haloo, are you alone?"
Dutchy.
"Where is your lovely daughter? I hear she has a beach party tonight but I was not invited."
"Nor me." That sounded a little hurt, so he added, "Feel I shouldn't go, that is-older generation."
"Oh you are mad Jey. You have the best relationship going. What has been happening? I have been to Sevilla and I see no one."
"Nothing. I went to Almeria, so I can't tell you."
Nice to have him around, reliable friend, maybe he'd like to have dinner in a Chinese restaurant? But he'd be going to the party, invited or not, and he was saying something....
"I am not surprised but I don't think it will last."
"I'm sorry, I was far away just then, who were you talking about?"
"Jackie and Perry. Together again. Stupid."
Perhaps he was bored by it all, by the whole way of life. Two weeks, two months, fine, but every day for ever? Away with Julie, away to Greece or Italy or somewhere new. Where would she want to go? She probably didn't know Paris, or London even. Travel with his daughter, show her the sights of Europe. Sell the house, spend on her education. Mad not to.
Two Dutch people joined them and the chatter went off at a Dutch tangent, then the two historians passed by, the happy husband and wife team who came to write for four months of the year, aloof without, but warmed within by the acquaintances they shared from the eighteenth century.
"How it goes?" Dutchy asked.
"It goes well," she replied regally. "We met John Churchill, First Duke of Marlborough, last night after he had been reinstated as Captain General and Master of Ordnance."
"Give him my love if you see him again."
"We should be meeting him at St Albans tomorrow at about five."
"We'll never get that far by then," the husband said, concerned. "It's something like fifty pages!"
And they sat down to drink a more expensive wine and gazed into each other's eyes, seeing a romantic environment of the past all around them that nobody else could share.
"Met your daughter this morning. Very attractive."
"Thank you."
"We're going to the party."
Perhaps she'd done it on purpose. Invited everyone, and he wouldn't be there, or would be. Was it a way of forcing him to come to her? It was getting pretty unbearable.
"I have to go," he said rather suddenly, and nobody was surprised, or particularly interested.
He put the money for his drink on the table, and left, unnoticed, not minding that, but minding that he was the only one to know that he wasn't going anywhere.
Into the safety of the car, and away.
On the main road he turned left and started on the way to Malaga. He was free, no one to hold him back, no one to go home to. He'd have a night off, by himself, maybe go and see what Torremolinos had to offer. Why not? Torremolinos then.
And it was a mistake.
The town was packed with people and none were alone. Perhaps an odd pale youth on a charter holiday, but no girls; all couples, all happy, all stimulated by the hot night to come and the sunny beach all day.
He roamed all the bars, or at least went from one bar to another saying to himself, "I am roaming the bars." The drink had no effect on him and one girl, walking a little ahead, looked like Julie, which didn't help.
He stopped and stared vacantly at the smart window-dressing of a leather shop where Cherry had bought herself a suede skirt, and that didn't help either, so he decided to pack it in and see if he could beat the world record from Torremolinos home.
He did it in fifty minutes which was no surprise, parked the car in the garage, decided to make himself a drink of some sort, went out to switch on the filter and heard the singing and the guitars down on the beach.
Join them?
Why not?
If she was alone she'd be pleased. If she wasn't, he'd skirt the party and leave.
What was the risk?
No risk at all. Rude really not to turn up. She'd be expecting him. Maybe she'd even been in and left a note, so he went into the house pretending to himself not to look but side-glanced everywhere. Why the pretence? Why the kidding? Fear of anticipating. What was he hoping for? He wanted to be wanted, but on his own terms, whatever they were. There was no note anyway.
He changed his trousers, his shirt, put a little shaving lotion on and slipped on his sandals. Warm night, he'd slow-walk down and look-see who was there.
He left the house and went down the track that was parallel to the beach behind the wall of sugar cane, he walked right along it till he was level with the bonfire. There was hand-clapping, endless as always, but in the background some good guitar-playing and a soft deep voice singing an American folksong. Guff? Lewis?
He started into the cane but realized he'd never get through without making a noise, so he went back along the track and took the path to the beach.
The moon was up, nearly full, reflected on the sea, it gave a great deal of light. He realized he'd put on his white jeans and he showed up in the dark like a beacon.
He walked straight to the edge of the sea, the group round the fire on his left, then he turned and started heading for it, as though he had come along the beach, for a night walk, casually.
People were swimming, a couple, together in the surf, blowing love bubbles at each other, pretending to be porpoises, duck-diving, grabbing under the water. The girl squealed and the voice was too familiar.
She stood up and waved at him.
"Hi, Daddy. Thought you'd come. Have some wine, food, if there's any left."
He sat down behind the circle of people, behind Dutchy who was very drunk, moaning under the impression he was singing a flamenco dirge. He dug him in the ribs and Dutchy turned slowly with a sexy smile, a "what took you so long' expression of satisfaction on his face, then he opened his eyes wide in surprise.
"Oh, it's you. I thought it was my new boy-friend. You cannot rely on them. A Sicilian from Palermo you know. Beautiful. When did you get here?"
"Just now."
"Julie is fantastic, she did a dance and exposed herself, you know. The fishermen couldn't believe it, one started getting very excited, but the others calmed him down. What a girl! She's swimming out there now in the nude. If the Guardia come...."
He glanced over his shoulder concerned about Julie. The Guardia could lock her up for the night, send her out of the country for indecent behaviour. That didn't matter, it was what might happen while she was in the cell, they had little respect for girls who did that sort of thing, how could they be expected to have? Three years ago bikinis had been forbidden.
He saw her coming out of the sea, holding hands with a well-proportioned youth. She stopped and picked up Cherry's white kaftan and slipped it on. It clung to her. He had to take a deep breath.
"Who's the boy?" he asked Dutchy.
"A Dane. Good-looking. Nice blue eyes. Doesn't talk much. I think he's gay."
"You think they're all gay."
"They all are."
The Dane started towards the party, but Julie led him away down the beach in the opposite direction.
He was going to have to pay for wanting the time to sort himself out. The best thing then was to leave her to it. Why stand audience on what he really didn't want to see, what he didn't want to know?
He was tired now, thank God. His eyes were tired, he felt heavy, he would walk back, get into bed and go straight to sleep. He cut out thoughts of Julie when they started coming at him, visions of her in wet kaftans, the young Dane with his hand around her somewhere. He managed to keep those thoughts away by looking up at the steep hill and the Parador Hotel, thinking of what was going on in there, the respectable . Spaniards, hush-walking in luxury, the only place in Reina where there was no noise.
When he reached the house he stood in the silence of the living room, decided to have a whisky, a nightcap to make sure of sleep, poured himself a good measure in the dark, added water and sat down in the leather chair and looked out at the moonlight sparkling on the great expanse of dappled water.
The first night alone.
Big house. Hum of the filter, glow of the beach fire far, far away. If he could have anyone in the world beside him now, who would it be? Julie?
Strangely, unexpectedly, he thought of Cherry.
They had sat in the dark on the sofa often before, listening to music, aware that their little world was comfortable, a true marriage of people, the security of knowing what the other liked and being able to supply it. That is what had gone wrong, when one day he had not been sure what she wanted, and she had been unable to explain. The start was always easy. "I want you, therefore give me you." No problem. But what followed. Money, luxury, mink coats and cars. Always, relentlessly. I love you, I want you. Then the love waned, the "want you' became the "have you'; the partners reliable, always there, taken for granted.
He drained the glass, disgusted with the self-pity that was welling up inside him. He had no reason for self-pity at all. But none. He was manipulating his own life, no one else. Cheny need not have gone, Julie need not have come or gone, he need not have said anything to her, he had caused her to behave in the way she was behaving.
He went up to bed, took all his clothes off and slipped between the sheets Esperanza had brought. They smelt of the sea, washed by hand, aired, rough. He felt dozy and felt the sleep come all about him, arranged his pillow, lay in the centre of the bed, stretched out like a patient in hospital, comfortable, cool. He closed his eyes, but the floating sensation did not last and he knew that he was in for a long, lonely, sleepless night.
He dropped off a little, maybe for five minutes, maybe for an hour, but awoke with a start, a nerve, a cramp, God knows. He lay there for an endless hour waiting for sleep to come, but instead the thoughts surged in, all of them. Reality, then the imaginings. Julie alone in the apartment, unable to sleep herself. Would she be? Of course not. What did she want? Him. She'd said so and he wasn't going to allow it. Why not? Because it wasn't right. Back on the circuit, back to it again, round and round. So, up and out of bed, back aching, the tiles cold on the soles of the feet, the bright light of the bathroom, the water not flushing away as well as it should. A thick tongue, a bad taste, the whisky on an empty stomach after the Torremolinos gin. Idiot. To drink like that for no reason, he didn't enjoy it that much either.
The small cupboard behind the mirror. His face was blotched, hair receding, he looked like a tough Irish laborer. He'd never looked like that before. Parts of his cheeks were blotchy with red patches and white, a little blue, and the chin dark with beard, sticky. What a mess. How could anyone love a face like that. The eyes were good, bit narrow, the mouth, the lips were OK. He smiled, pulled his tongue out, not to see its colour but to be rude to himself. Maybe he was still drunk.
The Alka Seltzer packet was determined not to be opened. Why was it necessary to struggle so much for simple things? Teeth trying to tear the sachet, impossible. Buy a bottle next time. At last, the pill into the blue glass, not two. He didn't like the blue glass, it didn't help his mood. Fizz, fizz, lights off, fizz fizz, across the room back to the welcoming bed, under the sheet, a little cold. Fizz fizz. The first taste. Good. The bubbles going up his nose, the rest straight down, cleaning, clearing the way. Glass down on the floor where he'd step on it in the morning, never mind. Then the distant sound of a lorry on the main road. That was comforting. The comfort of early morning lorries. Five, six o'clock. They'd like to be where he was, the drivers. Where had they come from? Out of a warm bed with a fat, warm woman next to them, frozen foods for Malaga, sugar cane for Almunecar, tomatoes for Madrid. Some of them wouldn't see the end of the day.
Black thoughts in the morning again, he must stop himself. What risks the hitch-hikers took. He'd never asked Julie about her journey with Guff. Where had she been? How nice to travel with her, to drive up to Barcelona and to France and to Italy. He could afford that, and wouldn't it be a good idea? He'd have to wait till he sold a house though. Just one, and he fell asleep at seven o'clock and awoke two hours later with the sun blazing into the room. A bad day ahead, the notario and the boredom.
On the way to the notario he was too close to the apartment not to call on Julie, so he parked the car outside the lawyer's block and walked back up the street where two years ago fields lay on either side. Now it was flanked by tall edificios, some still on stilts, the ground floors unoccupied by the shops that were planned, to make Reina a city.
Lift to the fifth floor, a dull block, cool in summer, freezing in winter, no creature comforts, the passages as in hospitals. Number Four. Buzz, buzz, and instant scuffling behind the thin wooden door. She was in the kitchen then, maybe she'd offer him coffee.
"Hallo."
It was Mishi Nahma.
"Oh ... Julie's still asleep. We didn't get in till seven this morning. Shall I wake her?"
"No. Just came to check that you had gas."
"Wow, yeah. We've got everything."
"Sure?"
"Sure. Why don't you come in?" She was eating bread with peanut butter.
"No. I have an appointment with the notario, thanks. Give her my love...." He hesitated.
Mishi Nahma hesitated too.
"She did say...." she started.
"Yes?"
"No money."
"Oh "
Delighted to be of help, he dug into his back pocket, five hundred and two one hundreds. He gave her the five hundred.
"That should keep her going for a couple of days."
"Gee, thanks."
It was for all of them. The commune. He hadn't seen anyone else, but he felt there were several of them. Movements in the sitting room, a smell of feet, leather, old jeans, there were probably a hundred of them in there.
Lift down. A for Alarm. S for Stop.
Out into the warmer street with the hot wind.
"Daddy!!!"
From above, a squeal, a joyous shout.
He looked up. She was on the balcony in the kaftan waving the five hundred vesta note.
"Thanks!!!"
He waved back at her, and walked on down.
Two male feet were sticking out beyond the railings, bare feet. The Dane's? They might not have been, but they probably were. The Dane's. He hated them.
Clear the mind.
Time for discussions on the contract. Into the notario's office. Five other people waiting. He'd be there till two o'clock.
And he was there till half past.
When he came out, having discussed only half what had to be discussed, he found a note on the car under the windscreen wiper.
"It wasn't the Dane', it read.
It annoyed him.
He realized she was a child, an eighteen-year-old child, was aware that he liked her because she was like that, but after wasting so much time in the notario's office and having to go to the building site afterwards to check, knowing that the architect who was supposed to turn up probably wouldn't, and not expecting the window casings to have been delivered either, he was in no mood for her games.
As it happened the architect's car was there, and so were the casings, so he calmed down and spent the rest of the day going over details. The bathroom had to be on the east side because the owner wanted the morning sun when he shaved. A perfectly understandable demand for a man who was retiring and who was building his dream house. So the water pipe would have to be longer and circumnavigate the sitting room to reach the kitchen. He wasn't going to have any pipes going across the tiled floor, which of course had been prematurely laid. Why hadn't they told him they were going to finish the sitting room before the rest of the house? Don't ask. They never thought ahead.
The architect was a friendly man, enjoyed life and they always had a drink at the El Caballero before he drove back to Granada. Routine, no problems, he was his usual amicable and joyful self. But at the end of the bar was Julie with Manolo.
Manolo was clearly embarrassed and smiled weakly at him. Julie had a sad expression he did not know, which vanished the moment she saw him.
"Hi, Pop. What's the score? Mine's three since last night. The Dane, Max you don't know and I guess I can lay this bum within the hour."
She was slurring her words and was having trouble with her focusing.
He left the architect and went up to her slowly, put his hand on her shoulder and whispered in her ear.
"You drunk?"
"Yep."
"This early?"
"D'you have special times for being drunk?"
"It's a pity, that's all."
Her voice was pretty loud, and over her shoulder Manolo was looking doubtful, shrugging his shoulders as much as to say "Not my fault, I didn't get her into this state, that's how I found her."
"Are you following me around to see how I'm behaving? The idea is that we're separated, so go and talk to your boy-friend and I'll talk to mine."
It would have been amusing two hours later, in the night during a party, but right now it was too early.
He went back to the architect who smiled at him. "Such beautiful girls the Americans, but they have no sense of decorum."
He didn't say anything but drank his glass of wine and ate the tapas that went with it.
Manolo led Julie out while he was discussing the kitchen layout, and before he had time to think what he should do about her, the Fenmores, who lived up the hill, came in and said they'd been looking for him for the last two days and would he join them for dinner as they had a Frenchman coming and they didn't speak the language too well and he was a lot of fun.
The Fenmores lived in the first villa he had bought and sold on one of the new estates, and he was under some sort of obligation to be sociable as they had been his first clients in the district and invariably introduced him to other possible customers, so he went home, changed and arrived at the villa at sundown.
The meal was good, if a little plain, the wine flowed after the whisky, and the brandy after the wine. The Frenchman from Lyons had a lot to say about the future boom along the Costa del Sol and everyone talked of the investments they should make, and when it was time to say good-night, he realized he was sleepy and pleasantly tired and really looking forward to being on his own. Maybe the bachelor fife was beginning to suit him.
He drove home happily, was surprised to see a light on in the house, realized that maybe Julie had come home and was waiting for him, which would be a pity because he didn't feel like having a heart-to-heart talk right now, but there was no one downstairs.
He went up to the bedroom, switched on the fight and saw Julie fast asleep in his bed in the arms of a man he had never seen before in his life.
The man shielded his eyes and looked at him angrily.
He wasn't annoyed, just surprised, and he knew he didn't want a row, didn't want a scene, so he quickly switched off the light, said "Terribly sorry', walked out and closed the door quietly.
He went into the first guest room, pulled back the bed cover, found a pillow in the cupboard, undressed, got under the cover on the mattress and switched off the light. His last thought was that it was a good thing for a house owner to sleep at least once in every room so that he would be aware of what his guests had to put up with. In this case it seemed to be a regular throbbing in the wall due to the vibration of the refrigerator below in the kitchen, and the incessant sound of the crickets outside. They sent him to sleep, however, without a further thought of Julie.
He awoke at ten the next morning, refreshed and instantly aware of his good health. He was not surprised to find himself where he was, remembered the night before clearly, got up and tip-toed to the main bedroom. The door was open, the room flooded with sunlight, the bed was made, nobody there.
He put on his bathrobe, tip-toed downstairs, but there was no one about. No evidence of the kitchen being used, no note, nothing.
The lovers had vanished. He was pleased he had managed to be an understanding host.
At ten a builder who had worked for him on another villa called and asked for his advice about an American couple who wanted a house built. He was becoming a regular consultant, cut from the builder, cut from the foreigners. They drove to the site and met the Americans and discussed the whole business of building and costs. He had it all at his fingertips, and the afternoon was spent at the notario's again, this time successfully, and the next day in Malaga buying bathroom fittings and tiles.
He didn't see Julie the day after that either because he was again occupied, but he could have done with someone around on more than one occasion, not just someone-Julie.
Not Cherry. That had sorted itself out, strange how Cherry had been a weight, stopping him doing what he wanted to do by just being there. She was demanding because she was bored, and there were so many things she didn't like. The Spanish scene, the local bars, the people, the mountains and even the beaches. He had never been for a walk with her, she didn't like walking. He could do that with Julie, go for walks way back into the sierras, sleep out under the starlit sky without planning it. He could go to Morocco. Imagine going to Morocco with Cherry, the Rabat Hilton it would have to be, or the Sheraton in Marrakesh if there was one, from one swimming pool and cocktail lounge to another in an air-conditioned car and no taste of the spiced air. How different with Julie. It would be a pleasant future with her, Morocco, Tunis, drive along the North African coast, ferry across to Italy, come back through France. What a marvellous idea.
With such a plan in mind he went out that evening to find her. He walked across the Paseo to sit down at a table for a glass of wine, when there was a loud hoot on a horn and someone waved at him from an open car.
It was a white car, brand new, with French plates.
The person waving was Cherry.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
"I went to the house."
He opened the car door for her, she swung her long legs out, new shoes, new outfit, totally out of place here. She had got into her new car in a Paris street and was down here now not having noticed the change of environment.
He was speechless. His mind was racing, he wasn't sure whether he was pleased or not, whether her visit was disastrous or not.
She flung her arms round him as soon as she could, hugged him and gave him a big kiss.
"I walked right in and tidied myself up. Bit risky, I suppose, you might have had someone living with you, but I saw the bed wasn't made and slept in only on one side."
He just held her hand, squeezed it. She looked like a million dollars.
"Do you want to have a drink, or go back? It's pretty crowded."
"Let's go back. No, let's have a drink, get a bit of the old atmosphere sitting on the Paseo. It's been cold in Paris and it's beautiful here."
"Is it a good trip, or a bad trip?" he asked.
"What do you mean?"
"Did you have to leave, or are you here on holiday?"
"How's Jacques, you mean?"
"Yes."
"I think it's over between us, definitely."
His heart sank.
A clear indication of what he wanted.
Or rather didn't want.
So she was back for a long time, needing help, needing company, needing comfort, and he had Julie. Or did he? He wanted Julie, he knew that now, now it would be hard to get her.
"What happened?" he asked.
"It just didn't work out. We've grown apart. It was all very amicable, all very civil and diplomatic, but it was cold. So we're getting a divorce."
"What of his career?"
"It doesn't matter now. Divorces are accepted, they've become fashionable in diplomatic circles. I think they always were, but he disapproved. I think there's someone else."
"How do you feel about it?"
"Relieved. And richer."
She swung her new handbag up in the air, her gold bracelet heavy with chunky fobs rattling.
They found a table far from anyone who might overhear. Paco came out, dancing on seeing her, shaking her warmly by the hand. She always tipped generously, but that wasn't all that pleased him, he liked the air of luxury she radiated.
"Hola! Como estas, senora? Que quiere?"
"Gin and tonic."
"Two."
"Are you pleased?" she asked, whispering in his ear.
"Yes." He managed to say it as though he meant it. An important hurdle. He also breathed an inward sigh of relief that he had been alone for the last few days. It had occurred to him that this might be his last night alone, the empty bed was beginning to get lonely. It would be filled tonight, but not by the person he had expected.
"What have you been doing?"
"Nothing much, no change here, except Julie."
"Julie! Where is she?" She seemed to have forgotten about Julie, not had her in mind at all. Then she was concerned.
"Is she at the house?"
"No, I gave her the apartment. I thought she could live there more happily with her chums. She's only eighteen you know."
"Is she pretty?"
"A lot of people seem to think so. Pretty, no; she has sex appeal." His voice quavered a little, a slight giveaway, but Cherry was miles from the truth.
He watched her light a cigarette, the gold flashed everywhere, the rings, the lighter, the clasp on the handbag. How could he not be proud to be with her.
"Was it a shock?"
"Seeing her?"
"Mmmm."
"It's made me feel older." Lie. Big lie. It made him feel younger.
"She bright?"
"Sharp. Has a good sense of humour."
"How long is she staying?"
"Dunno. A month, maybe more. Student travel, you know. She's a hippie."
"You look more content. Met anyone since I went?" She was smiling but the answer mattered.
"You want to know the truth?"
"Yes."
She gave him the first real stare, looked into his eyes and he was able to take it, he just thought of the last few nights alone. The lying was easy.
"I'm surprised. Three weeks is a long time for you."
"I needed the rest."
"How much longer could you have gone on?"
"Two more days."
She laughed.
"Tell me about you and Jacques and Paris and your trip."
"Oh well, the arrival was pretty awful. He'd got there a day before, had it all neat and tidy, a new maid, organized, efficient. He had a colleague in for drinks when I got in, so we got to know each other again over a glass of champagne and talk about Nicaragua." She waited for Paco to put the drinks down before going on, she was looking in the distance, recalling something unpleasant.
"I think he must have had it planned, even the colleague. I excused myself from their presence after the formal greetings, couldn't embrace passionately in front of his guest, which is why I think he was planted, and he helped me with my suitcases and took me to my bedroom. "I wasn't sure you were coming so I've settled in the spare room," was what he said, and left me. That was a really cold greeting."
She took a sip of her gin.
"We went out and he primed me. I was exhausted, the wine went straight to my head, the food was really good, he knew what he was doing. Then when we had a silence, the sort of silence that precedes the big truth, he smiled and said, "I've bought you a car."
Now he took a sip of his gin. How to get rid of a wife in four easy hours. You could do anything with money.
"He timed the delivery cleverly too, the following morning, Sunday, when we would have had to spend the day together before him going to the office on Monday. So Sunday was pretty good, driving round the Bois, we had lunch at the Cercle, and in the evening he insisted we go and visit Helen and James, at Croissy. It was she who hinted that there was someone else."
"Was that a plant too?"
"Probably. Helen's a good friend, but she's James's wife first, and Jacques is James's boss. All a bit sick isn't it?"
He shrugged his shoulders. If that was sick what on earth did she think she was coming back to? What on earth was he going to do? If she ever found out. She was part of the place though, more so than Julie; she had more right to be there. He hadn't finished paying for the house anyway.
"I had dinner with the Fenmores the other night, they asked after you."
They had met because of the Fenmores.
He was living in his apartment at the time, hadn't been there long when she had called unannounced, unexpected, two-piece summer suit, crocodile handbag to match crocodile shoes.
"Your name was given me by the Fenmores who bought your house and I wondered "
"Come in, come in."
She had reminded him of a frisky race-horse, or an alert antelope. Long, long legs, long hands, manicured nails, black hair, sun-tanned face with freckles, a slightly heavy jaw her only defect, pale eyebrows, fast moving, smiling eyes.
"This is nice," she'd said, and had sat down on the obvious seat, the two-tone beige sofa.
"Can I offer you a drink?"
"Have you any gin? A gin and bitter lemon."
In the kitchen he was aware that he was excited. She had a good laugh, rather loud, a good voice with a light grate in it, largish mouth. Money. What could she want?
He sat down opposite her and made no bones about looking at her legs. She knew how to use them, crossed, but somehow tucked to one side against the sofa. Jewelers, difficult to say whether genuine, but good. The diamond ring was real, no other stone would sparkle like that in the dull evening light. He was glad he had wiped the glasses clean. She needed spotless surroundings.
He went back to get some peanuts, the full bit for this one. No expenses spared. Didn't know her name, hadn't really given much time to introductions, had he been a bit swift sitting her down and shoving a glass in her hand? She didn't seem to mind. She was relaxed, as though bored with the outside world. Married? Obviously. Divorced? Ding dong, about to be divorced, looking for co-respondent. Tread carefully for you tread upon my freedom.
"I didn't catch your name," he said.
She laughed. She thought it all very funny.
"You didn't give me much time to tell you."
"A bit quick, wasn't it?" he said. "I wanted to make sure you'd stay here for a bit," he paused, and added; "So that I can look at you."
She acknowledged the compliment with a broader smile and dip of the head to the left, her hair bobbed on her ear as she did this. He wanted to touch her behind that ear. That's where she was going to have the least resistance.
"Well, my name's Cherry."
"My name's Jey."
"I know."
"Have you any other names?"
"My husband's."
"That figures," he said.
"The Fenmores said you sold houses."
"Well, I sold them mine, and I have sold houses in the past, yes, but I'm not an agent."
She looked disappointed.
"I want to sell mine, I can't be here to do so, and I was hoping you could do so for me."
"Probably. What sort of house is it?" A long and beautiful association could be built up from little words like that.
"It has four bedrooms, a swimming pool, a large living room, several terraces, a garden, driveway. It was built just over a year ago."
"And it's still standing?"
"Oh yes. We had a French architect supervise the building, none of your local fiascos, thank you."
"Is it here, in Reina?"
"You know the east beach, it overlooks it, a house with a circular front."
"Oh," he said. He knew who she was, had heard of her, Englishwoman married to French diplomat, flew down from Paris for two days and disappeared for six months. "You're la francesa rica."
"The what?"
"The rich Frenchwoman."
"Well I'm not French and I'm not rich, but I understand what they mean. You know it?"
"Yes, from the outside."
"D'you think you could sell it?"
"Depends how much you want, and how quickly you "No great hurry."
"May I ask why you want to sell it?" want it."
"It was a folly, and I think it may turn out to be a white elephant. I was left some money, wanted to invest it and Jacques said-Jacques is my husband-he said invest it in property in Spain. It's mine, not his, we're splitting up, but I don't want to live here because I find it dull, but need to be financially independent ... so...."
He was about to say "If you wait you can probably sell it for double in two years' time' but he didn't and had congratulated himself on his discretion many times.
So they had gone to see the house in her car, a sensible little Renault which turned out to be hired. They drove through Reina, onto the main road, she drove fast, turned right rather sharply down the beach track with its crevices and potholes and trenches made by the torrents when it had rained and the lorries in the following mud. She changed into the wrong gear twice when taking a steep slope, and stalled.
"Fuck!' she said, which was a surprise coming from a lady. It was also a subtle admittance of a growing friendship.
The car made it the second attempt and they pulled up on an overgrown gravel and stone area in front of the villa.
For a house in Spain of the type found along the coast it was elaborately furnished. Much furniture had come from France, the Spanish additions could be spotted a mile off, stained whitewood occasional tables and sideboards made to look like oak. Bed backs in the same material reserved for the two back bedrooms.
They had a drink at the bar which opened behind into the kitchen, holiday home of diplomat's wife, no servants to cook or bring in the food, the kitchen was too intimate for that.
They discussed prices over a drink, discussed the way he would go about it, what he would want as commission. He was very business-like when necessary, he was also charming, treading carefully, aware that he did not want to miss out on her, aware that it would be worthwhile taking his time.
"Are you staying here for a while?" he'd asked.
"Not if I can help it. I really don't see what Reina has to offer. I don't have any friends here. They come for long weekends, some live in Marbella, but that's a trot. What does a lovely man like you do all alone?"
After two gins he was already a lovely man. He didn't want it to be easy. He wanted the conquest to be hard, not too hard, but he wanted the little fight, the little bit of romance.
"I work, I suppose. Buying a house, renovating it, selling it; read, I read a lot; I five a sort of half-retired life."
"A bit young for that."
"I he on the beach a good deal."
"No wife?"
"Not for a long time."
Sitting in her own home she was commanding, she had poise, he had become aware that she was making him feel small. He had got it all wrong, of course, the conceit of Celia, Clare and La Mouche had gone to his head. This was not an immature twenty-five-year-old, this was a sophisticated woman who lived in Paris, married to a diplomat. He wasn't even dressed properly.
She loosened a clip on her bracelet and clicked something shut, somewhere in the gold coral was a little watch.
"You'll have to excuse me, but I have to change. I'm going to Marbella, can I drop you home on the way?"
He stood up. He actually stood up. From how far back that motivation came he had no idea, but it was something very basic, something very instinctive, and as bad as calling someone "Sir'.
"No, I'll walk. I'll walk back along the beach."
"Please don't do that. I won't be a second, and we can arrange to meet tomorrow. Help yourself to another drink."
Then she had got up, saving his face in a way, and showed him the rows of bottles. He could not refuse, did not want to refuse and sensed that she knew he didn't want to refuse. He wasn't sure where he was with her, didn't know how he was going to tackle her, if he could.
She disappeared upstairs.
He helped himself to another drink, sat down, got up, looked at a few books, French novel paperbacks mainly, bought at airports, fashion magazines, looked back at the length of the room, well designed, good proportions. He didn't have the money but he played his cards right he could pay her over two years, or rent it, borrow from someone else, it was possible, he'd learnt that, where money was concerned everything was possible providing you took time, lots of time, and thought big.
She came back down dressed in a white tight-fitting dress, very simple, very plain, it had probably come from one of the top houses. She smiled, passed him to get a new packet of cigarettes from a drawer, overwhelmed him with her scent, knew it, smiled, looked at him for a moment, critically, very critically then asked, a little doubt creeping into her voice, was she doing the right thing? "Would you like to come too?"
"I can't I'm afraid, I had a dinner date at nine." It didn't ring true, it was half-past eight, and he looked at his watch at the wrong moment.
She looked at him critically again, smiled broadly, dipped her head to one side and said, "I don't believe you. You're just playing hard to get."
He'd looked up surprised.
"Yes," he'd admitted and she'd dipped her head again and smiled.
"Why?"
"I'm shy and retiring, I suppose. I'm not sure I like parties."
"These are very old friends of mine, you won't be gate-crashing. It's a sort of buffet supper."
"I think I ought to change."
"Come on then."
And they had gone back to his flat and he had changed and they had taken his car because it was faster and they had chatted all the way to Marbella so that neither noticed the long dreary drive along the bumpy road. Malaga, the airport, Torremolinos, Fuen-girola, Benalmadena. He asked questions, she answered and by the time they got there they knew each other's past, each other's present, and their hoped-for future.
The party was typical, Kensington cocktails in white, outside, with sun-tan lotion perfuming the air. A number of Americans, Germans, French and the conversation mainly concerned with who had gone, who had come, who was coming, who was going. Her friends were in their fifties, English, truly believing that the coast had been built round their house afterwards, truly believing that England was the only country that interested anyone, unable to understand that other nationalities felt the same about their own country. Personal questions were not asked, only: Where do you live? Are you here on holiday? Reina, where's that? The other side of Malaga? and an unawareness that Malaga had another side. There are fashions set everywhere.
He weathered the storm excellently. He was born to it. The Americans liked him as they were richer than the hosts and therefore drew attention to themselves, the hosts became interested in him, through them. They eventually got round to speaking to him, though not hiding the fact that it was rather a case of having a closer look at Cherry's new-boy-friend-one-must-presume. He told them about the coast, what he knew of it, what he'd done, what he knew about the natives which they had ignored, he had a story or two relating to the building of houses which was always compulsive listening to anyone wanting to settle in the area, and he made them laugh. He was new, a find, and the hostess put her arms through his at the end of the evening partly to steady herself and partly to thank him for making the going good. Cherry, he noticed from the comer of his eyes, rejected two younger, more handsome, more wealthy looking males, and kept coming back to his side, proud of him.
On the way back they stopped for coffee in Malaga in a dimly lit Spanish bar where the men in their check shirts smelt of fish and behaved like boors, but had nice smiles and meant no offence. She didn't like it much, and he became protective, and driving back on the road parallel to the moonlit sea he said, "I have one double and six single beds. That's two doubles and nine single beds. Where shall we sleep?"
She was lying rather than sitting, head well back.
"I don't think we should."
"Because it's the first night?"
"Probably." And after a pause, "It matters you know. It matters afterwards. It makes me feel cheap. I can't help it. I know it's ridiculous, I know we're going to go to bed with each other, but I'd rather you helped me not to, tonight."
At the "I know we're going to' he had felt the warmth, the muscles tightening, the excitement beginning. It didn't take much to get him excited. He had delayed the anticipation until now for fear of failing, now he had to get used to the idea that it wouldn't happen tonight.
He drove a little faster, concentrated on the road, became aware that he was in fact tired, that he wouldn't mind not having to find more energy. He thought of his own bed, the soft sinking mattress, the peace, the freedom when and where he wanted, he'd have a cup of tea in the dark, listen to the cicadas, drop off, wake up in the morning. He felt very pleasantly tired. Then she put her hand on his leg.
"That doesn't help," he said.
She took it off.
"I must say I don't like being alone in that house."
"I could sleep in another bed."
"That would be silly."
And after a while, after a mile or so, she asked, "Why does it make me feel cheap?"
"Because you were brought up to believe that women were a gift to men and this gift had to be paid for. The longer you make him wait the more you think your value goes up. Women are not gifts to men, men are not gifts to women, both need each other, always and without bargaining, without bartering. Are you on the pill?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Because I don't want to have babies."
"If you don't want to have babies all you have to do is not sleep with men."
"But I like sleeping with men."
"Then don't think of yourself as a gift. Think of them as a gift. The problem tonight is not whether you should, but whether I should."
"For men it's different."
"Myth. It's exactly the same."
"As frightening?"
"As thrilling."
"You're very convincing."
"It's called verbal seduction."
And she had put her hand on his leg again and he had driven faster and forgotten about the tea and the pleasures of his peaceful lonely night and the cicadas and the waking up in the morning, and had found all the energy that she needed which, looking back, had sealed his fate for the following two years.
Had he not been a good lover that night she might have cooled the next day, but he had been a good lover and in her life, at that moment in time, that is what she had wanted more than anything else.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
He had his back to the mainstream of people coming and going so couldn't see what was happening at the other tables, and didn't particularly want to turn round, but something was attracting Cherry's attention. One eyebrow was lifted slightly, and her eyes focused on someone close behind him. Then two cold hands closed over his eyes.
"Guess who?"
He put his hand on Julie's wrist. There was a warmth in the movement, in the contact.
"Hallo Julie, where've you been?"
"Hi," said Julie to Cherry, and put her hand out. "I'm Jey's daughter."
The elegant hand out, with long manicured nails and chunky jewelry took the young hippy's. It was a formal handshake.
"You certainly don't lose much time Daddy-O, guess that evens up the score. In fact I'd say you've hit a bull's eye." She didn't look at Cherry at all, but looked straight at him. There was a terrible sadness in hers, a look he'd never seen before and couldn't have imagined. An explanation was needed, an apology.
"Cherry just arrived out of the blue."
"In a white car. It's yours? Clappy was admiring it."
"Who?" It was Cherry.
"Clappy, my latest. It's not a very nice name, he got it being a hypochondriac, thought he'd caught you know what."
She was a little girl behaving like a little girl. She was unable to handle Cherry, she could handle him, handle other men, but she couldn't take on Cherry.
And Cherry didn't know what to say to her. There was a great silence, it lasted too long, and no one looked at anyone else.
"Could I have a sip?" Julie, reaching out for his glass, hand shaking. It was really a shock.
"I hear you're staying in your father's apartment?"
"Yes. Oh yes."
That made it clear then. You're in the apartment, and we're in the house.
He had visions of Cherry's clothes in the guest room, all spread out, one didn't have to be a genius to sense the intensity and dislike these two women would have for each other. He'd have to say something bright to cheer them both up or there would be a disaster sooner or later. But he couldn't think of anything to say.
"Have a drink?"
"No. I guess I'll join the crowd. You've got things to talk about. Maybe we could have a meal together some time."
Innocence itself. How about a dinner? Let's sort it out. Is she back for keeps? Eyes searching his face for clues. He aware that Cherry was watching them both.
"Cherry's just arrived. How about tomorrow?"
"Sure."
She turned, unable to hide the fear of loneliness, the fear of rejection, the fear of not being able to compete. Francine, Yngvild were nothing, she knew that now.
"I think she was expecting to be invited out tonight," Cherry said, feeling sorry for her.
"Yes, but...." He couldn't say it, whatever it was. Something like "She wants to be independent," or "I want her to be independent," or "I've been sleeping with her and you coming back has upset things a bit." It was obvious that tonight they would have got back together. And the sinking feeling came again as he thought of driving through Madrid with Julie. For some reason an image had stuck in his mind of him driving her through Madrid. "That's the Prado, and there's the Puente de las Cibeles." What on earth was he going to do? How the hell was he going to cope with Cherry.
Then he heard Julie laugh, turned and saw she was enjoying herself. Maybe she didn't care, maybe she didn't care a damn what he did. After all she'd been batting around quite a bit.
"She's got more than sex appeal," Cherry was looking at him a little too deeply. "I think we're going to have trouble with her."
We are? So she was settling in, taking up where they had left off.
"I want to buy the house back. I want you to live with me. When the divorce is through I'd like to get married."
She'd forgotten all he'd said then? Or she hadn't taken him seriously. She was attractive now, she was offering him a life of leisure on a plate, for ever, but he knew what it would be like within a few days. Or would she have changed, now she was really free? It was possible.
"You're looking very down, Jey. Aren't you pleased to see me back?"
"I'm sorry," he said brightening up, "my thoughts were not with you, but Julie, she reminds me of her mother so much, the moods. It's very odd."
He could play it well, instinctively the right words came out. Julie, like her mother, Sue the old enemy, Cherry's face changed, it made sense to her. He needed help, had been lonely, desperately lonely without her, then his daughter had come, a responsibility and a reminder of the past. Of course. He was delighted she was back.
"Does her mother know she's with you?"
"I haven't asked. The relationship is rather strange." Christ! He could say that again. How devious would he have to be. Chances were good that Julie would play it well, but God, who was he going to side with? Siding with Cherry, looking down on the irresponsible daughter, siding with Julie, looking down on the unwanted mistress.
Cherry finished her drink rather quickly and suggested going. So he finished his drink, got up and paid Paco.
They walked past Julie's table, and everyone looked up. He had to say something to her, but wasn't sure what, so Cherry said it for him, remarkably motherly considering she wasn't a mother and never had been. She put a hand on Julie's shoulder, admired the Moroccan beads and suggested, "How about coming round tomorrow morning early, for a swim. Lunch. Only tonight ... you know, your father and I have a lot to talk about."
Julie didn't say anything. All he was aware of was that Cherry had summed up the danger very quickly. Father falling in love, platonically, with daughter, a danger to her, a female companion which was all he thought he needed. She was on the defensive, putting up barriers, showing the enemy the cannon.
He would have to be very careful.
"I suppose you told her about me?"
"She saw you before you left."
"Oh. ... We'll take my car."
They got into the new car. It was small, compact, feminine, luxurious.
She started it up, revved up to let the world know, to let Julie know that she had the power. She backed and drove off.
"What did she mean, you've scored a bull's eye?"
"Obvious. She thinks you're beautiful."
What else could it mean? That in the game he had floored her with someone she couldn't compete with? Christ how long would it be till he saw her again and could explain what it was all about. She'd be in the apartment tonight with Clappy. The thought repelled him. He presumed Clappy was the bearded character at the table with the check shirt.
Cherry braked suddenly and pulled into the curb. Dutchy was mincing along towards them.
"Halloooo. You're back so soooon!"
Exchange of kisses, greetings, admiration for the car, for the new clothes, the jewelry. See you on the beach tomorrow. Yes of course we can all have lunch on the beach how marvellous.
On the main road, as she gathered speed and the warm air beat against his face, he decided that he must forget Julie, must make himself understand that this in fact was for the best, the relationship could not have continued, was dangerous for her, dangerous for him and maybe fate had brought Cherry back. He put his arm round her shoulders, looked at her, her mouth, and she glanced at him and put her hand on his leg. He could cope with her tonight, and tonight was all he was going to think about. Tonight he'd get drunk if necessary, he'd forget the plans, forget the going to France and Italy and the drive to Madrid, forget him and Julie standing hand in hand in the Mall and him saying that's Buckingham Palace and Julie being tickled pink, and looking at the Eiffel Tower, or standing in St Peter's Square; he'd forget all that, he'd enjoy tonight and wait till morning to hint to Cherry that maybe, maybe, as good as her offer was, as good as her plans were, he didn't want to marry her. But then what would happen to her? The drink again? The bottle and glasses swept off the bar, the hate and viciousness he had seen once, which had been enough never to want to see again?
She turned sharply down the road, up the drive and stopped the car. Her scent wafted over him. He would have to make sure that it wouldn't be like old times, the old times that had not been that good, not in the end.
"I should have let you know I was coming back."
"Why?"
"You're all on edge. As taut as a drum."
They were lying on the bed side by side. She had wanted him immediately like she had in the past. It hadn't been too successful. All he could think of was Julie's sad face, Julie going home alone, Julie feeling rejected. However much she had played him up and played the game, wanted to show she could be independent, she had not expected a turn of events like Cherry. Nor had he. So he had thought of her, and worse, imagined himself with her, and even worse, when Cherry had been at the height of her excitement, wrestling and fighting in, the bed, tearing into him with her long nails, he had heard Julie's laugh ringing in his ears and her voice whispering "Can't you think of anyone else either?"
Thank God he hadn't been tired, and had in fact been very excited straight away. That had helped.
"Is it Julie?"
"Is what Julie?"
"Troubling you."
"Partly."
"She won't be here for ever, and you hardly feel responsible for her."
"One does." Spoken like a true father.
"It makes me feel old."
"Makes you feel old?" There was something about Cherry that was very discerning. Of course it made her feel old, the waves were all around them, the vibes, man. He had slept with someone younger. Maybe he was reacting that way.
What was she doing now? Drinking? Dancing? Singing round a camp fire? Sitting on the edge of her bed thinking of him and Cherry together? He loved her and felt she loved him and the last week of games had been ridiculous, he should never have allowed it, and yet....
"Did she trace you down here?"
"Yes."
"She must have been pretty determined to find you."
They had gone over the business of how he and Julie had met, the surprise, the not letting him know straight away, he had told her most things, everything except the small matter of going to bed.
"It wasn't that difficult. A lot of estate agencies have my name."
Then Julie had been forgotten. The familiar body, pressing against his, the hand, instinctively caressing where it was nicest, the way she moved, her scent, it all worked with the drained drinks and the pate sandwiches. It was one thing he hadn't done with Julie, the camping on the bed, the picnicking, the feeding, one of the other. The white wine, best, to celebrate, not cheap Champagne, but a good white, it all worked, and there was love for her somewhere, easily found, and she loved him more maturely, less nervously, not a young girl's love, a mature woman's love, dependably warm, making him feel younger in a way; he did not have to prove himself with Cherry, he knew what she wanted, what she liked, very quickly or for ever into the night, both excited her just as much.
He felt sleepy, emotionally worn out, but it was pleasant.
"You never slept with Jacques, then?"
"No. I tried. I tried to tempt him, just to see, but he was clearly uninterested."
"Did he mention me?"
"No. He's far too much of a diplomat. But he made me feel cheap. One night we sat down and watched television, a programme he had to see, some Ambassador arriving somewhere. I put my hand on his knee, as in the pictures, and he very gently, very politely took it off, but got up to fetch something he didn't want so that I wouldn't have a reason to react. A true gentleman, and very considerate."
"Why didn't he want you?"
"I don't turn him on."
"I don't believe that. You turn everybody on." Did it sound false, only because he had said something similar to Julie. Two women at once, could he cope? Where would he have a chance of sleeping with Julie now? Visit her in his own apartment? A mistress, and a mistress. Jesus!
"I think it was a way of punishing me. The whole trip, the whole generosity with which he got rid of me. I felt very alone when I left."
"When did you leave? How?" he asked.
"He took me out to dinner again and just got on with it. "I've decided it would be best for us to divorce. It is clear we do not love each other, the magic has gone...." and so on. Then before I could answer, put my view in, he said he had seen his lawyer, had arranged for me to have a different one, that it would all be taken care of, that I would have such and such an income. I never said anything. I said nothing at all, toyed with a dover sole, took the bone out very carefully as he talked, very carefully, ate without tasting, drank without tasting, aware of only one thing...."
-'What was that?" It was a naive question. He realized it the moment he said it.
"You."
He squeezed her arm. It was poor recompense.
"Then what happened?"
"We went home, said good-night politely in the corridor, I went to my room, he went to his. I think I heard him sigh with relief."
She sighed then, a re-living it sigh, the sort of sigh that comes out unexpectedly at the thought of a jaux-pas.
"I didn't sleep," she went on, "I just lay in bed bewildered, shattered, and then it all came to me. I was free, free to come back to you. It never occurred to me that you might not want me."
It wasn't said sadly as though she could believe it to be true, it hadn't occurred to her that it might be a fact.
He said nothing.
"I took a sleeping pill, slept, and when I awoke he'd gone. So I packed my bags, and left him a note."
"What did you say?"
"'Can't stand it here now I'm afraid. Don't think you can with me around either. I won't come back, I won't surprise your new way of life." Something like that. "Will write and we can arrange all the property things by letter. Am returning to Spain, of course."
"
Of course.
He turned over and sighed and felt very content and very wanted. This rich woman all the way from Paris for him, envied, offering him a life style everybody else dreamed about. Why not? Why not take it? After three days he'd forget Julie. Daughter or not, she was a girl. Why even consider wrecking a comfortable future for something which wasn't even sane?
Julie would have to go.
Cherry would help him sort it all out.
In the early hours of the morning Cherry woke him up saying there was someone at the door downstairs.
Startled, he didn't understand at first, but heard the sharp knocking. It was an unkindly dramatic sound. He switched on the light, grabbed his bathrobe and went down the stairs.
At the door, Guff.
"Julie's tried to kill herself."
Wham.
Straight out.
It didn't hit him at all. It sailed way past him, he noticed the beard, the mass of blondish hair, the nervous twitch at the mouth, the smell of wine, but the words didn't register. He acted on them however, said something like "Hold on, I'll get dressed," and rushed upstairs. Only when he repeated them to Cherry did they take on any meaning.
"Julie's tried to kill herself."
"How?"
How? He hadn't asked. It wasn't necessary. Christ! How? Trousers half on, he shouted down.
"How, what did she do?"
"Oh ... mmm ... she's taken pills."
"It's a try on," Cherry said getting up. She was furious. Her eyes were narrow the anger welling up in her. "You're going to have a lot of trouble with that girl and this is only the beginning."
He didn't want her to come, he really didn't. He stopped buttoning his shirt and looked at her.
"I'd like you to stay here."
"What if she's really ill?"
Instinct, sheer instinct told him that the conclusion Cherry had jumped to was right. It was a try on, but there was the possibility that it had gone too far. It happened, the stupid accident. Would he want her? He thought of hospitals, driving to Malaga.
"Where is she?" he shouted again.
"Apartment, they're pumping her out."
"Stay here," he said to Cherry, "I'll need someone reliable to come back to." Clever, the word coming in there, reliable. She stopped dressing, helped him find a shoe under the bed.
And she gave him the keys to her new car.
Mishi Nahma was waiting at the lift.
"They've taken her to Malaga, doctor thought it best."
"Is she all right?"
"She will be."
"What did she take?"
"Sleeping pills. But nobody knows how much. Empty bottle."
"Any note? Reason?"
"Yes," she hesitated, looked embarrassed, looked at the floor. "I kept it, didn't tell anyone, thought it best." She handed him a folded piece of paper. On the top fold was the word "Daddy'. Inside "I love you'.
He breathed out.
The tense was important. It was a try on. If she'd meant it to work she would have written "loved'.
"You want to come?"
"Please."
The excitement of a dawn drive to a hospital, be in on the scene. He didn't know why, but he wasn't worried. He just wasn't worried.
He changed cars, took his own, left Cherry's in the parking place behind the cinema, hoping it wouldn't get spoilt, left open.
Mishi Nahma and Guff came, she in the back, he in the front. He drove fast, really fast, knew the road well, got some doubtful glances followed by admiring ones from both of them.
"Why did she do it, do you think?"
"Dunno at all. Dunno. Can't make it out. Never could make her out."
"Know the name of the doctor?"
"No. Just said get her to the hospital quickly, couldn't get the ambulance so drove her himself, with Lewis."
"Lewis was there?"
"He just happened to drop in."
"What happened exactly? I mean where was she?"
"Oh well," Guff started. "We all went to the Aquarius for drinks you know, and Julie left pretty early, saying something about being tired and that, and when we got back Mishi Nahma made us some food, called out to Julie did she want some but she didn't answer so we let her sleep on. Then when Mishi Nahma went to bed, she and Julie share the back room ... she found her sort of limp...."
He was astonished, Julie sharing a room with Mishi Nahma.
"Who's in the front room?"
"Me and Nina. Hope you don't mind."
Nina was a girl he hadn't seen before. He'd got it all wrong then, or had got it all right and it had changed.
He just drove on. None of this really mattered except that suddenly it seemed that Julie was alone, had been lying maybe about all the affairs.
"Name of Clappy mean anything to you?"
"No."
"She hasn't been around with a character called Clappy?"
"No. Not that we know. We know most people."
"Who has she been with in the evenings?"
"No one. We've been home the last four nights playing poker and Dylan. Had some pot till Thursday."
"Who's we?"
"Julie, Mishi Nahma, Nina and me."
"No men?"
"Lewis, occasionally, but only for a smoke."
"Who's he with?"
"Nobody steady right now. He likes Julie a lot, we all do I guess. But she's not interested, not in anybody." He hesitated, then started to add, "I guess...."
"Yes?" Something was going to come out.
"Well, I guess, just my opinion mind you, but I guess she's got some boy-friend somewhere who's let her down."
The Malaga cement factory was in sight now, not much longer; he had really done some good speeding. Half an hour, barely and the cement works like a giant fairy castle, grey and blue neon lights, smoke belching and grey dust clouds. A grey fairy lived there, a neither good nor bad fairy, inside all the gnomes would be ashen, everything grey. They shot past, round the sharp bend, down, view of the sea, view of Malaga stretching round the bay, more speed, no traffic at all, and the road improving.
The town itself, suddenly provincial, empty.
"Which hospital?"
"Hospital Civil."
They said nothing. He shot two sets of lights, pedestrian crossing lights. If the Guardia stopped him he had an excuse, he didn't care, it had suddenly gripped him, the fear, he had managed to keep it down until now, but the thought seeped through: she might be dead.
Left, right, down a main street, brightly lit by the rich shops, wealth on the Costa del Sol exposed to view in the window displays.
The large gates, drive through, brakes on, up the steps, two at a time and into the silence.
White everywhere, spotless, a garden with tall, tall trees like a jungle. Regency balconies overlooking the palms, the green foliage, dense. A nun, a white nun floating by like a ghost, young, smiling, then another, older, smiling, not to anyone in particular, just smiling because God was with her all the way.
They walked in, anywhere, into a ward, no one stopped them, but then a male nurse appeared, tall for a Spaniard, all in white, silent shoes. What did they want?
"Mi hija, daughter, aqui con doctor de Reina."
Follow him, into an outer office, narrow corridor, squeeze by the theatre trolleys and stretchers, through double glass doors, whispers beyond a screen. Male nurse back holding up his hand. She's here, yes, one moment. And Lewis standing there, shy.
Then the sound of vomiting and Mishi Nahma in her mauve kaftan turning away, feeling sick herself, a strong smell of ether, more vomiting, sighing, retching.
Male nurse smiles, makes a sign, this is what is wanted, the vomiting, the throwing up, get it all out, all the poison with its thoughts of death.
More.
It was beginning to affect him now. In England he would have been given a cup of tea, but parents and relatives were not treated for shock here, besides nothing had happened. A silly student girl attempting to go against nature's will.
The doctor came out, shook his hand.
She would be all right. A precaution to bring her here, he had to come anyway, a patient of his had appendicitis earlier on, no trouble to bring her. She should stay the night, she needed a little fuss, and yet a little sternness from those who knew how to give it. Make her aware that she was taking up valuable time. He would put her near the labor ward, the noises of women in labor would keep her awake, which would be good, and make her think a little more about life than of death.
Could he see her?
Of course. When they had cleaned her up. Mean-. while why not a coffee and a little brandy at the all-night cafe opposite? His patient wouldn't be out of the operating theatre for an hour anyway.
So they all went and drank black coffee and had a cognac, and he talked to the doctor about the buildings going up in Reina and how best to invest money in property and how there were plans for a clinic and a main avenue to link the main road with the sea, and how common suicides were in the town, sleeping pills and hangings. The men hanged themselves, the women took drugs, the men always died, pills always gave them a second chance, which everyone knew. Boredom, sudden wealth, sudden changes of environment, the inability to cope with husbands who were unable to cope with the new life. From campo and mule to city office and car in the space of two years. Doctors had had difficulty in getting a car three years before, now he had two.
Coffee finished, brandy finished, the doctor insisted on paying, they were his guests. No arguments, it was rude to refuse the offer.
Back at the hospital a sister in white floated towards them and then led the way to a silent lift large enough for a car. Up and up, Mishi Nahma, Guff and Lewis waiting for him downstairs.
Third floor, fourth floor, gates opened, silence, pad pad, left down the long balcony overlooking the trees which still towered above them, then a door into a ward.
Dim lights, groans, low walls separating every other bed, like horses' stalls in a luxury stable, the one immediately on the right, Julie, pale, eyes closed, mauve lips, hair combed, white linen night-shirt, lying quite still." Ophelia.
"Julietta!' Mother Superior to the child.
Julie opened her eyes, a faint smile, then the biting of the lower lip.
"Sorry Daddy."
The sister left them, and he sat on the bed, had no idea what to say, but there was a lump in his throat and tears coming up, clouding his eyes. He held her cold hand.
"This is a labor ward," she said. "They have babies here. Funny, don't you think?"
He smiled. He didn't know why she thought it funny.
"I feel all fuzzy."
"I'm not surprised. How many did you take?"
"Not many."
"Just show then, was it."
"Sorry."
A moan from a few beds down.
"It's white here isn't it, all white and virginal."
"Mmm," he agreed. He liked the atmosphere. Manufactured peace, he didn't know it existed.
"It's probably a hospital for immaculate conceptions," he said.
She smiled at that and he grinned. It was just like that with the nuns floating about like angels.
"What you going to do?" she asked, her eyes closed.
"What d'you mean?"
"What are you going to do with me?"
"I haven't thought. What do you want to do?"
"Come home. Be with you."
"So you'll come home and be with me."
"What about her? What about Cherry?"
"Is that why you did it?"
"Wouldn't you have done? I was only teasing about those other men. I never did. Then you brought her down."
"I didn't."
"Promise."
"Cross my heart. I promise. She just arrived. I never answered her letter."
"But you want her back?"
"I don't know...."
"Is she going to stay?"
"I don't know that either."
She took a deep breath and sat up a little more. Then the sister came back and asked him to leave.
Dawn was breaking, she should have some rest, and he could come back and get her in the afternoon.
He kissed Julie lightly on the forehead, she whispered, "I love you," and he whispered, "I love you too," squeezed her hand and tip-toed out.
A few seconds later a breakfast trolley swung round the corner and down the corridor, cups, glasses and plates rattling, doors swung open, shutters were pulled up, the silence of the night was over, the noise of the daily hospital could begin. A baby cried, an old man moaned. So it was.
It was half-past seven when he got back to the house after dropping off Mishi Nahma, Guff and Lewis at the apartment, all three having slept most of the way.
Cherry hadn't slept but was waiting for him sitting up in bed, a full ashtray next to her and two empty coffee cups.
She just looked up, not sure whether it would be bad news or not. She closed her eyes on seeing him and relaxed.
"She's perfectly all right, will be out this afternoon."
"Why did she do it? How?"
"I don't know why. Sleeping pills, a small overdose."
"Silly little girl."
He didn't like that. He didn't like that at all, and it occurred to him then that what he needed and what he was not going to get was a few hours all by himself to sort out the mess that was obviously going to come out of it all. He needed to sleep for an hour or two, then he needed to be allowed to think. Knowing Cherry she would run around getting him comfortable and in doing so disturb him even more. He lay down on the bed beside her and said, "I'm very tired. Would love a cup of tea, then a little sleep. I'm fetching her back at about five."
"She's coming here?"
"Yes."
He closed his eyes, heard her put her slippers on, her dressing gown, and go out of the bedroom. A truly promising time was ahead.
"It's three o'clock," she said, "thought I'd better wake you."
He had gone straight to sleep and she had had the sense not to wake him up for the tea.
"Would you like me to go and get her?"
What did she really mean? Why was she offering? Instant suspicion and instant realization that he was slipping right back to the old ways of analyzing and going through with a fine tooth-comb everything that was said. He didn't want that any more, but it was going to be with him.
"I think I should, don't you?"
"We can go together."
He couldn't refuse, not this time, and yet it was so wrong, and she knew that it was wrong. He could see what it was about. If he went to get Julie by himself and drove back alone with her, then Julie could establish a position with him. If Cherry accompanied him, then Julie would be made to realize, immediately, what the situation was going to be.
It would start very quickly and simply with who was going to sit in the front seat next to him. The front seat of the car established in everyone's mind whom the driver belonged to. He had time to think about it. As long as it took them to get to the hospital.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
She was waiting on the steps of the hospital, jeans, T-shirt, sandals, nothing else. She was sitting on the balustrade in the sun, apparently recovered.
He stopped the car and sighed.
He'd had a swim and Cherry and he had had lunch, quietly, not saying very much, the calm before the storm, parents unsettled by erring child. His relationship with Cherry would change simply because she now saw him as a father.
"Could you drive back?" he said, stretching.
His back ached, he'd driven to Malaga and back and back again, it was a reasonable request. It put everything into perspective, or rather stopped everything being put into perspective.
That was the idea he had come up with. Quite clever.
He got up, Julie came down the steps, Cherry moved over into the driver's seat.
"How d'you feel?" he asked.
"Reprimanded, embarrassed, guilty."
"Go and sit in the car, I'll go and see if there's anything to settle."
"How is she?" Julie asked, looking at Cherry in the car.
"Aware of what you're up to. You'll have to be a lot more subtle next time."
"It wasn't an occasion where subtlety was called for." She smiled, gave him a peck on the cheek and walked over to the car.
He stood for a moment in the hospital entrance to see what would happen. It was quick, it was very quick, Julie moved towards the front passenger door, Cherry saw she would sit next to her, so very quickly opened the door for her-her invitation therefore, her move. If they were going to be on this level of awareness all the time then a very stimulating time would be had by all, a very exhausting time, and possibly a very destructive time for him, because he was going to be King Pawn. He had never taken tranquillizers, but realized that maybe the time was getting near to start.
The sister said there was nothing to worry about, a childish caprice, he should try and question her when she had settled down again at home, he or her mother, and try to find out what was troubling her and why she had thought it necessary to make such a "show'. In most of these cases the fault could usually be found with the parents she was sorry to say, but it had to be said. Maybe he knew what the trouble was.
He said he thought he did, did not tell her that it might be something to do with him sleeping with Julie, smiled, thanked her, paid the hospital bill at the desk and walked out into the sun.
He got into the back of the car as though he always did, in fact this was the very first time he had ever sat in the back. He waited for his two ladies to stop their amicable chatter before saying something appropriate, like, "Well, that's that."
"Julie and I thought we'd like to do a bit of shopping. She hasn't any clothes and a change of clothes would probably do her more good than anything else."
"Anything you like. I just want to be driven, and the less decisions I have to make the better."
In a way, if he was cool about it, if he was capable of relaxing, the whole situation might be very enjoyable. Two women to look after him. All he had to do was shut his ears to the din of jealousy.
They did not get back home till after midnight, Cherry taking Julie literally by the hand round all the boutiques in Torremolinos and Malaga, fitting her out as she would fit out her own daughter. He had followed, been asked his opinion, given it, had it ignored, had then decided to wait quietly at a cafe and drink coffee to keep awake and dulce to keep calm. He read the newspaper in the sun, moved table three times to keep in the shade once he'd got hot, suggested a Chinese meal for a change, so they had ended up in an Italian restaurant.
The subtlety was not really so subtle, the buying of clothes was a "There, there my child admit when you are beaten pointless to make further protests I am older and wiser than you and ten times richer but as I understand you here is a little recompense' ploy, and maybe Julie realized that after what she had been through she would not be strong enough to fight, which is why, on reaching home she did not wait to be told, but went straight up to the front guest room and settled in there with an "I'm going to bed, I'm feeling really rather ill', making her own bed, using the guest bathroom and closing the door discreetly to let the adults get on with whatever adults got on with at night, and for the following three days behaved like an idyllic child.
Each morning she got up early, made the breakfast for both of them, brought it in on a tray, did the shopping with Cherry, established herself as the daughter of the house, not the hostess, took second place everywhere, at table, in the sitting room, by the pool, went for long walks by herself and didn't once make any comment that could upset either of them.
She and Cherry chatted amicably while preparing the meals, about clothes, about films, about America, about London and Paris. Cherry imparted her knowledge of fashionable Europe, Julie talked of student America, they had arguments on politics and philosophy and music and literature, and everyone proved themselves to be totally equitable, but then, as everyone knew perfectly well, deep down, in the bowels, something stirred.
The peace was broken, if not completely shattered, by two simple little mistakes.
He sighed.
That was all.
He sighed with relief.
He and Cherry had gone to bed as usual and he was lying close to her, but not as close as usual, a discreet distance of a few centimeters, not putting his hands on her breasts, not thigh to thigh, and she was instantly aware of it and asked why.
"I saw the Tampax cartridge in the bathroom," he said.
"Not mine darling."
"Whose then?"
"Julie's, I presume. You don't use them."
And he had sighed.
After that it worried him all night. It started his mind racing and he couldn't sleep. Why had Julie used their bathroom not hers, a discreet way of letting him know all was well? It might have occurred to him that the fear of a pregnancy, pill or no pill, was why she had tried to take her life, it hadn't until then, but it might have, and she might not have wanted to mention it. And the thoughts escalated. If she was telling him she wasn't pregnant, then would Cherry guess that that was the message? He had to cover up.
"Perhaps it's a subtle way of telling us she's not pregnant," he said in the dark after too much time and too many thoughts.
"Is that what's keeping you awake?"
Wasn't it what was keeping her awake? The pit of his stomach twitched.
"Not really, no," he said. It meant yes.
"The reason she used our bathroom is quite simple, if you think about it. She had no Tampax, found mine in the bathroom cupboard and used it there and then."
Of course.
"What's keeping you awake?" he asked.
"Something you said at breakfast this morning."
"What?" The pit again, getting ready to twitch, to convulse. What had he said?
"When Julie came in with the breakfast tray, with the posy of flowers, and the orange juice, you said ... ' and she paused, her throat getting a little tight, "you said, "We didn't get any service like this before Cherry came."
"
He held his breath and waited for more. It felt as though the temples should be banging, the head filling with foam cotton, but his eyes were open and what he could see in the darkness he could see clearly.
"Julie laughed," she continued, "and so did you. It was a private joke between the two of you ... and neither of you realized what had been said."
"What had been said?" He didn't understand, was on the defensive however, far too aggressive.
"What had been said was that there was no one to come and bring you breakfast when you were in bed together. A good joke, typically you, obviously no one could bring you breakfast since there were only the two of you here. It was funny, which was why Julie, who is normally sharper, didn't notice the full implication. Then your preoccupation tonight with a simple white paper cylinder in a wastepaper basket rather confirms my worst thoughts. Did you sleep together?"
Christ oh Christ oh Christ!!
He was mute, cold fingers, cold feet. Cold feet! The expression so real. He was fearful, frightened. Admit, then what?
"I'd rather hear it from you," she said.
The silence was too long again, the answer too long delayed. What could he pretend now? That he was shocked by the accusation? That the shock stopped him talking.
He said nothing. Could say nothing.
"Oh God!' Her voice was strangled. She threw back the sheets and got out of bed, found her slippers in the dark, her dressing gown, went out into the hall, switched on the lights.
"What're you doing?"
"I'm going to ask her."
"Now? She's asleep."
He heard the door handle rattle open, another light being switched on.
He got out of bed, found his bathrobe, pulled it on. Followed.
Cherry was standing at the end of Julie's bed waiting for her to wake up. She was coming out of a deep sleep, holding her hand against the light.
"What's happening?" she asked.
"Did you sleep with your father?"
"What?" Astonished, shocked. "What?"
He took a deep breath, thanked himself for having kept silent, maybe Julie would pull them through. Wrong timing, Cherry, my darling, wrong timing on this occasion. A waking person always has a built in denial factor, always protests.
Cherry turned, aware that she had made a mistake, not necessarily about what she thought but in the way she had gone about finding out. She had moved in anger, acted in anger, acted while tired, and sleepless, exhausted by her own thoughts.
She side-stepped Jey and went downstairs to the kitchen.
"About the service in bed? I noticed, I didn't think she had."
"Jesus!"
"Just deny Daddy. It's such a ludicrous idea if you think about it."
He looked at her, wanting her. "Is it?"
"No...." She kissed him in the air, and fell back on the pillows, hands behind head, laughing.
Cherry became nervous after that, restless, her thumbnail always stuck in her mouth when she wasn't smoking, looking at him, wondering, unable to settle down.
Julie managed to make her presence felt without ever being present, she took possession of the roof terrace, a deckchair went up there, a mattress. She appeared to swim and to eat, she wrote letters to her friends, she received more mail than either of them, but always helped. A lot was said without words being spoken, and every morning when he woke up he wondered whether they would all get through the day without a fracaso. But they did, more or less, avoiding each other.
"Why don't you go on the beach with your friends?" Cherry attempted once.
"I'm happier here. Do you want me to go?"
An accusing question. Cherry hotly denied any such idea, the whole way of life was becoming oppressive. The afternoon by the pool supposedly reading, Julie up on the roof getting browner and more beautiful by the hour, was like a year, the week since she had come back from hospital was like five.
And then Cherry cracked.
"I don't think it can go on."
He said nothing. He had sworn himself to silence. He had once lived through a month of silence with Celia during one of her puritanical holier-than-thou periods, and he knew he could do it again and that it eventually paid off.
Defend, defend, take attack after attack, and at the end of it all be ready to compromise, after any quarrel things can never be the same again. Accept it.
"The trouble is," Cherry said, "I like her. She's got spirit, and I can understand that it could happen. What I can't understand is that you can still like each other."
"She loves me," he said through a sigh. It sounded just right, as though this was the world's worst weight to carry. "And she's my daughter, therefore I have a natural love for her."
"Natural or unnatural?"
"It happened once Cherry. It was a mistake. An accident."
And briefly he told her how it had come about, omitting the fact that he had slept with Julie only a few hours after she had left, that Julie knew all the time who he was, that they had slept together a lot more than once.
"What you've got to get used to is the idea of me having a grown-up daughter who attracts the men you want to attract."
"That's unnecessary."
"But it's true. Our first day out in Torremolinos together was enough to show what the future could be like. We go out, the three of us, and instead of you knowing for certain that men are coming to talk to me because they really want to sit next to you, it's possible that they might be wanting to sit next to Julie. So you're femininely jealous."
"Fuck you Jey!"
"Sorry, but it's all part of growing up. I know that much of my charm has been a reflection of yours, but now it's also a reflection of Julie's, and you don't like it. I know how popular I really am, I'm very popular when in the company of attractive women, and less so when alone."
He had the upper hand suddenly, he was the man, not the mouse. He went on.
"It's a cold war anyway and I want it to end. What happened was an accident, it's best forgotten and what I ought to do is find someone for Julie and I think we should all go out tonight, Marbella somewhere, get her to dress up a bit, see the more sophisticated world than the one she inhabits. English Literature and Philosophy are all very well, but you have to know how to drink with Lord and Lady Muck as well, to get on."
So they went out in their Marbella finery, himself in his light-weight tropical suit and flowered silk shirt, supple moccasins, the thinnest leather. Cherry wore a long red dress with gold embroidery, Julie, unbelievably beautiful with her eyes made up by Cherry, in white, a long dress, simple.
"She is really very attractive. Anything like her mother?"
"Softer round the mouth, much more gentle, though Sue was very gentle when I first met her."
"You changed her?"
"Not as fast as I seem to be changing you."
"Oh don't Jey, please." He had never been hard on her, had never said anything unpleasant, but lately he had managed the edge, the sharp backlash to her remarks. It frightened her.
Their entrance into the Casablanca with the blue restaurant overlooking the sea and onto the terrace bar for cocktails greeted by the Fergusons and Bradleys and Van der Zinns was pleasingly elegant. The Caprinis were there and they marvelled at his daughter. He glanced at Cherry continually to see her reaction, but she seemed genuinely pleased, suddenly aware that she could in fact bathe in the younger glamour, for she could hold her own very well.
A party was formed for dinner, ten altogether, by chance, unplanned, the best, and it went beautifully. There was a Persian prince, they said, who sat next to Julie, and she was neither dazzled nor bored. He watched her watching Cherry, he watched her drinking a glass of cold water, while Cherry drank another glass of wine, he could see that she knew where Cherry's weakness lay. Time was on her side. A lot was on her side.
"Santa Cruz College ... he heard her say. "Oh Ma and Pa were divorced long before I was born. Well a few months anyway. I hardly know him."
"I must say you seem to get along very well with Cherry," Angelita Caprini trying to dig for gossip.
"Any reason why not? She's very attractive," from Julie, eyeing Cherry, and suddenly the pit again, Julie and Cherry eyeing each other lovingly, admiringly anyway, over the coffee, compliments flying from one to the other over the liqueurs. Julie would try anything. But Cherry?
To the discotheque downstairs, the blue lights, the red lights, and romantic music for Cherry and him, the pop for Julie. She moved well, she moved beautifully, something to do with bare feet, never having worn high heels, a totally different way of moving from Cherry.
Holding hands with Cherry now, over the table, and Julie's hand on his knee. Then the unexpected sight of Cherry and Julie holding hands, heads muzzy, very muzzy. Who would drive home safely?
"I think we ought to find her a rich playboy darling."
"I don't want a rich playboy."
"What do you want?"
"I'm very happy as I am. But gee, I'm smashed." Good-nights all round, three in the morning. Smashed indeed.
The sober moment, able to walk to the car. Driver's seat, safe, secure, safety belts clipped on, all three in the front, Cherry in the middle, but Julie's arm stretching round the back as far as his neck. Tickle, tickle.
"What a very cozy threesome we are," he said, taking the first bend successfully, "if we live that long."
They sang, they had the cassette going, they hummed, they all kept remarkably awake. He slowed down at the distant sight of a Guardia patrol, he drove too fast through Torre del Mar, braked too heavily round another bend, it worried him, he slowed down.
"I'm more drunk now than I was when we left."
"It's filtering through to the brain Daddy-O."
"And it's hot, darling."
"Daddy, stop the car."
It was urgent, so he stopped. Five foot drop to a moon bathed beach, all deserted.
"What's the matter?"
"Nothing. I'm going for a swim."
The door opened, she partly fell out, ran down to the beach, took her dress off and dived into the sea, naked.
"I really like that kid, she makes me feel young." Cherry, following her, kicking off her shoes, but throwing them back in the car, walking unsteadily across the sand, taking her dress off.
"To hell with this!' Himself to himself. Kicking his shoes off, taking off his shirt, his trousers, his briefs, into the sea after them. Squeals of delight. A car coming, the Guardia? All in jail for indecent exposure. The car drove on, a van. The water ice-cold four feet down, too refreshing, sobering him up considerably, then the hot touch of a hand. Julie, smiling, pulling her tongue out. "I want you."
Cherry, not out of earshot, ignoring, duck-diving.
It was going to end up in a disaster, he knew it.
Out of the sea, onto the beach, standing, enjoying the nakedness for a moment with the warm breeze, briefs on.
"Is anyone coming?" Cherry, wanting to come out, inhibited compared to Julie.
"No."
Cherry out, larger breasts bobbing up and down, bending to pick up dress, running in a feminine way to the car, arms up and slightly behind, like a bird flapping its wings, wet hair, great figure, great hips, into the car, covering herself with the red and black silk.
Then Julie defying the world and the moon and all the stars, brazen and young and even more beautiful, pausing to look at him, pausing again to pick up her dress, drying herself with it, picking up his clothes.
"I'll always look after you, Daddy." Score one to Julie.
In the car all three of them dripping, shivering, then drying with the heater and booster fan blowing hot air at them. More music. He and Cherry hadn't had such an exhilarating time since they'd met. He guessed she'd never had such an uninhibited swim and he knew that she knew it was all due to Julie, the catalyst.
There was a little bit of hesitation before they went to bed, their three wet bodies shivering in the hallway, he in his briefs and shirt aware that the fabric of the former wouldn't hold his shape for much longer with the girls naked waist up looking at each other, looking at him, looking at themselves in the mirror.
Julie made it easier for them by going up to her room, but she didn't close the door.
He and Cherry went into the bedroom, Cherry throwing herself on the bed, he lying down beside her not closing the door either, not wanting to cut Julie off just like that.
Then fuzzy muzzy time, the brain swaying, the memory clouding, the past, the present gelling, and only an awareness of a warm body next to him, the feeling hands, the delight, his briefs off, release, hers off long ago, caress, cold recently wet skin getting warmer, then a voice somewhere above them.
"Can I join you?"
Julie naked, kneeling on the bed, watching them.
"Oh no, no, no. NO!' Cherry screaming, getting up off the bed, off him, nearly wrenching him, a hand swinging in the air, catching Julie across the face.
He backed away, somehow he withdrew from the bed, found something, his shirt to hold up, and watched, a struggle, a fight, they were fighting on the bed, Julie on top, digging her knee in between Cherry's legs, trying to pin her arms down, and Cherry mad, pulling Julie's hair.
"Jey, get her off!"
"Julie!"
"Oh fuck off Daddy, it's me she wants. She's as randy a dyke as Gerty Schneider."
"Who's Gerty Sclineider?" Who cares? Impossible to gauge reality from fantasy, impossible to control his thoughts. Cherry was giving in, Julie on top of her, moving on her, her hand reaching for something between them.
Could it happen? Julie and Cherry together?
What should he do, watch?
"You bloody bitch!"
And a scream, a scream of sheer agony. Julie tearing herself away, rubbing her left breast, blood on her hands.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry Julie, but you're drunk. You can't behave like that."
And Julie running off, slamming the doors.
"What did you do? What happened?"
"I had to Jey, I had to. I bit her. She's mad, she's completely mad."
But my God how stimulating!
He was still holding the shirt over himself, trying to control the warmth, the straight muscle. Women fighting naked. Arms lashing out, bums in the air, flashes of pubic hair, breasts. He wanted more.
"I'm very drunk," he said.
I'm not too sure that either of you are very sane."
Maybe not. Maybe he was oversexed like his beautiful, beautiful daughter. He wanted her now. Could he go to her now? Bleeding breast and all? Vampire bite. She'd probably enjoyed it. Christ he wanted her. Why didn't Cherry go for a walk?
"Well I don't think I've ever sobered up more quickly in my life." Cherry got back into bed, pulled the sheet over her, turned her back to him and started shivering and shaking.
"You all right?"
"No."
"What ... what's the matter?"
"I feel I've been assaulted by some sort of fiend. I honestly think she's evil."
Julie evil? She was just oversexed, that's all. La Mouche would have loved her, they would have leapt all over each other licking away like two kittens.
Julie! Jesus he wanted that girl. He stood up.
"I think I ought to go and see how she is."
"Don't you dare!' Serious. Dead serious. Sitting up, staring at him. "That's just what she wants, don't you understand. Put me in the wrong so that I feel I have to leave."
"You hurt her, I'm going to see if she's all right."
Sterling stuff, barking straight back at the opposition like that.
He put his bathrobe on for respectability, went out into the hallway, gently opened Julie's door. She was lying flat on her back, light on, cotton wool under the hand on her breast, no pool of blood, but suffering on her face. She was fast asleep, dead to the world. He switched off her light, closed the door, returned to Cherry.
"She's asleep."
Light off, into bed and unexpectedly the familiar body moving close to him, familiar hands in familiar places. English hypocrisy at its best, she was more excited by the whole business than him.
"Can't you think of anyone?" rang in his ears. Of course my lovely I can think of you, blood on white breast, the biting and scratching, the bodies tight and naked in combat.
And he made love to Cherry that night as never before, and he knew that it was a mistake because now she would want him even more and he didn't want to be wanted more, not by her.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Julie, not very cleverly, tried to pretend that she had been so stoned the night before that she could not remember how she had suffered the inconvenience of a blue left breast with teeth marks in it, and he sat silent at breakfast not knowing how to explain it either, and Cherry said, very pleasantly and diplomatically as was her upbringing, "We all went bathing darling, and you rolled around in the surf which was very silly because it wasn't all that sandy a beach and some of the stones were very sharp."
Explanation satisfactory, apologies unnecessary, apologies meaning an acceptance of what had actually happened which was distasteful to everyone the day after.
For a brief moment, when they were alone Julie said, "Christ I wanted you last night," and he wanting her just as badly right then said, "Me too...." which he realized was unwise.
Later that morning he went and sat alone in the olive grove to try to work things out.
So he was one of those strange beings, one of those strange men with whom women fell in love and who found it difficult to stop them loving him. Celia still sent him Christmas cards, always with a bitter little word like "If you remember who I am' and for some unknown reason Clare sent him a birthday card on the right day of the wrong month, which was always pleasant.
He had managed to lose Cherry once, to Jacques, but it would have to be. He wanted Julie, or at least he wanted to be with Julie and take her on the Grand Tour. Meanwhile he had to tell Cherry what he had in mind. She could stay in the house perhaps, he'd be away for three months. It was a fair deal. If she loved him that much then why couldn't she wait that long? And if things went wrong with Julie then at least he'd have someone to come back to. Extraordinary how simple the solution was, sensible, peaceful, a little bit one-sided; the olive branch he had been toying with helped.
He would have to choose the right moment to broach the subject, the whole plot, but it would be soon, maybe he could go when Cherry's brother came. If he came.
That had been a surprise, her brother's letter, yesterday lunchtime, airmail from England.
"A letter from my brother Peter," twenty-seven, unmarried, dull, bachelor with no idea that she had come and gone, no idea that his sister was living with someone other than her husband. "Understand you're in Spain, thought I might come down for a little sun. Mother and Father send their love."
Daughter had done well marrying Jacques, she had done well when she had bothered to go to France to learn French. A bright girl, Cherry, vivacious, careful with her appearance always, Father in the Royal Navy, an Admiral, retired now, growing roses in Devon, not far from Celia maybe, her background had helped impress young Jacques, but she had embraced the French diplomatic life courageously, obviously five years in Algeria could not have been that much fun when he was learning the business. But it had paid off in cash. No children, often spoke of that, didn't want any now, that was why Julie was a little trying. Lots of reasons why Julie should be trying. So, brother might come down, he hadn't made the Navy, he'd gone into farming alone, chickens and eggs, successful battery feeding, spoke of little else apparently, he'd complain about the chickens in Spain, criticize, he'd want his Daily Telegraph on the right day. Tiresome, but it would help to have him around, and maybe, Julie and he could leave?
He said nothing to Cherry or Julie, and they had visitors that evening, which helped, and Julie went out just to have a drink, Cherry generously lending her the new car; generously or rather cleverly, young girl with open car, what young man would resist that? Anything to get her out of the house. Out of her hair.
He slept well, reasonably content that he had both his women under control, but he woke up early and felt restless. It was hot, sounds from the sea, the fishermen's chugging boats. He got up and decided to go for a walk down to the beach before breakfast. Ideal day, misty, placid, the water silver-grey and pink as the sun rose. He stood on the shore watching the fishermen pulling in the empty nets. The nets were always empty, a few pulpos, a few calamares, jelly, repellent, they picked them up and allowed the tentacles to wrap themselves round their hairy arms, then they turned them inside out. Not too pleasant to watch, and yet, men had been doing this for hundreds of years on these beaches, the Moors, the Romans before them, the Carthaginians no doubt. And out there, white and noiseless, the Christopher Columbus heading for the Greek Island. That would be fun too, more fun maybe than Rome or Paris, a quiet cruise with his daughter, but they'd pretend they were man and wife. Why pretend? Why say anything?
The sun was beginning to get hot, time for breakfast. Who would make it today, Cherry? Or Julie. Breakfast came in two moods, Cherry's with My Fair Lady or Cabaret, Julie's with Led Zeppelin or the Soft Machine. Cherry didn't like it, maybe that's why she had started making breakfast.
Life in a Spanish harem. He wasn't doing badly, from an onlooker's point of view he was leading a fabulous life, but inside his stomach, in the pit there, there was a little fear, round every comer, in the next minute, there could be a flare up, there could be real viciousness and pain inflicted. He didn't want that, he didn't like it. He was all for peace, a pacifist until he really had his back to the wall.
Up the white-stoned track, Julie there on the terrace roof waving. He waved back. Now Cherry would appear at the bedroom window and wave, thinking he was waving at her. He'd wave at both of them and each of them would think he was waving at her only. He smiled. It was laughable.
Cherry didn't appear at the window and as he went up the drive and came level with the garage, he saw her car was out. Cherry gone?
He was hot, clammy, a dip in the pool, or a shower. Maybe a shower then a dip. He couldn't make up his mind.
Half way up the stairs Julie shouted from her room, "Cherry's gone to Malaga, got a telegram from her brother, he's arriving today."
"Oh really?" Things would have to be tidied up then, though they were pretty tidy. He'd have to adjust.
"Bit early isn't it?" he said.
"Mmmmm?" She was in her bedroom, nude, looking at herself in the mirror. There was a blue mark on her left breast which she held up a little for him to see.
"I might get cancer from this."
The room smelt of perfume. She was radiant, the sun catching the down on her back. She moved towards him very slowly, sexily, not for one moment pretending that she wasn't going to seduce him, and she put one arm round his neck and the other between his legs.
They kissed.
Her hand up into his shirt, unbuttoning it, caressing his chest, pulling at the hair.
"We've got all day ... ' she whispered, "and it may be our last chance for a long time."
The same thought had occurred to him, he was ahead of her, he felt her hand undoing his belt, unzipping the zip.
Why not? The path to the palace of wisdom is paved with excess.
Indulge, indulge.
Esperanza's day?
No. All stations go, count down, five-four-three-two-one. Rocket up! God. They were on the bed, just on the sheet with the sun streaming in. He held her, squeezed her, her body was so young, so firm, supple, smooth, delicious. He could eat her, wanted to eat her. He sucked her breast, the good one, kissed the other gently, it wasn't ugly, comic really, the red marks and the blue, veins showing through the pale skin and the dark swim suit line and the Ambre Solaire colour. Nuzzle, love, get lost behind the ears, her hair all round his mouth, breathing in her scent, her hands active everywhere, caressing, gripping, guiding. God! How different the shapes felt, not like Cherry at all, easier somehow, Adam's rib, the perfect fit, the interlocking, round peg in round hole, a noise downstairs? It couldn't matter now, nothing could matter now. Her, the bed, she was feverish, nails in the back of the back, round the shoulder blades, the young sigh, the young maiden's sigh, virginal, tied to the stake, helpless, crying for help, fearing the torture, fighting it, the red hot iron, thrusting furiously, the heavy breathing, he had her locked in a vice grip, the rape, the violence, the fighting, the loving it, the wanting more and more. She was sighing loudly, crying, gasping, nearly too much, and he lifted himself off a little to study her, to tease. She had the look of a hunted, fearful yet beautiful animal. Catch me and make it worthwhile. And then he saw her looking wide-eyed and beyond him.
He turned.
Cherry was standing in the doorway.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
His immediate reaction was to cover his arse.
Arse was exactly the right word.
It felt like the word being looked at from behind in the position he was in.
He knelt over Julie and desperately looked for a towel, a sheet, a garment, anything within reach.
Nothing.
So he had to swing himself off the bed and face Cherry, and the first thing that came to hand on the chair by the window was Cherry's white kaftan.
She didn't move away.
She was either rooted or deliberately standing there looking at them each in turn. In one hand she held her long red leather purse, in the other her keys, dangling from the key ring.
She looked at Julie, then at him. At his eyes for a long time, then turned on her heels and went into the bedroom.
Jey looked at Julie who sat up, held out her hand for the kaftan and pointed at a towel on another chair.
She got up, slipped on the garment while he tied the towel round his waist. Two things were on his mind, one that he was shaking because he had been interrupted at the worst possible moment, and two that something even more disastrous was going to happen.
He didn't know what to do or say, so he turned to look out of the window, aware that Julie was sitting down on the bed lighting a cigarette. There was a movement by the door and Cherry's voice cut the silence.
"What you must understand Jey is that she arranged it all, wanted you to be caught in the act by me. What I must understand is that she proved the point she wanted to make. You couldn't wait to have her again."
"What do you mean arranged it all?"
"Tell him Julie, if you have the guts."
"Oh, I have the guts. I lied Daddy. I'm sorry."
He didn't want to look at her, but could imagine her there, two feet behind him brazenly looking at him through a cloud of smoke.
"You lied? How?" His voice was completely out of control, throat tight, nerves stretched.
"Cherry didn't get a telegram from her brother."
"Is that what you told him?" Cherry not really surprised. "She told me there was a telegram waiting for me at the post office."
There was a pause. He couldn't work it out at all.
"She ought to be congratulated, her timing was perfect."
"I don't understand," he said.
"She told me there was a telegram at the post office, said that the post boy had been to say it was there but that I must go and sign for it, so of course I went. She, I presume, told you I'd be out all day, so you thought you had plenty time, while she knew perfectly well you hadn't."
He tried to think about it. It wasn't all that important, all that he could think of was looking over his shoulder and seeing Cherry in the doorway and being aware of his nakedness. Is that what it had been like in the Garden of Eden? God looking down on Adam's arse? And being shocked? In his own image?
"You must have seen him coming up from the beach," Cherry said. She was more concerned by the timing of the whole incident.
Julie had planned it quite well of course, she'd seen him coming up from the beach and waved to him. Cherry had already gone. Things could have gone wrong, but he had fallen for her seductiveness straight away. She must have been very sure of herself.
"You must have been very sure of yourself Julie," Cherry said.
He was beginning to feel angry.
I'd like you to leave Cherry. I'd like you to leave now. Leave me and Julie alone. It raced through his mind. I'd like you to leave. Nothing good can come of you staying now. Besides we're going away together on a sort of honeymoon. We're going to the ... Canaries....
"I honestly think, Jey, that you should ask Julie to leave."
He just looked out at the flat silvery sea, it had no blue in it at all, heat haze, white sky, reflection of the white sun, like staring at a giant arc lamp.
"She's evil," Cherry went on. "Evil and destructive. If she doesn't go she will destroy you, and me."
"Why don't you go?" It was Julie, simply, no aggression.
"Because I happen to be in love with your father."
"So do I."
"You have no right to be, not in the way you pretend."
"It's happened Cherry. He prefers me to you. Just accept it."
"Is that true Jey?"
He had his eyes closed, it was all a dull red inside the eyelids, and pleasantly hot on the surface of the eyes. He could hear without listening, had got lost somewhere out there in the heat above the ocean.
He turned, holding the towel in case it slipped.
I'm going to get dressed."
"Is it true?"
"Is what true?" The anger was rising steadily. Need for control. Need for calm.
"Is it true that you prefer her to me?"
"I have no idea. I haven't thought about it."
"Well think about it, because you'll have to make up your mind which one you want. I'm not staying with her around."
Either she goes or I go. Classic threat, offering him freedom on a plate. Five or six hours of hell while she packed again, screams, tears, injustice, loneliness, no one to go to, it would all come out. All he had to do was say "Goodbye'.
"Why are you hesitating, Daddy?"
"Because he's not sure. He'd trying to imagine himself stuck with you, and that can't be too pleasant."
"Oh that's sharp. Rapier wit they call that."
"Do you realize what you two have been doing? It's incest. Incest! You could go to prison."
"Oh big deal. You going to go and tell them? Excuse me officer but my lover's been pulling his daughter and I don't like it. If you don't like it, if it's so repulsive, why don't you just go? We're perfectly happy with our little sin."
There was a long silence after that and he looked up to see what was happening. Julie had mocked, rightly, and Cherry was biting her lower lip.
A good time to make a move.
"If you'll excuse me I'd like to go and get dressed." Cherry stepped aside and he went into the bedroom. He found his trousers, a shirt, his sandals.
What now? Where do we go from here?
"The trouble is Julie, the truth is, that it's neither of us he really cares about," Cherry said, calmly, reasonably, apparently in control now.
He stopped in the middle of the room to listen.
"Who does he care about?" Julie, curious.
"No one. It's the situation you've presented him with. The whole nitty gritty bit, the dirty talk under the sheets. He wouldn't bother with you if you weren't his daughter. You know that."
Silence.
He wanted to get out of the house.
"I've thought quite a bit about your relationship Julie, quite a bit. That it happened at all is pretty hard to understand, that you made it happen is even harder, you're eighteen, you're from a generation that needs kicks, it's no worse than heroin I suppose, but for him to go on wanting you and not even realizing why, that's really sick. He's a pervert."
Silence.
"Are you in fact his daughter?"
An incredible pause.
The thought of that sort of lie had never even occurred to him.
"Yes. I'm his daughter. I wish I wasn't."
Relief.
"I suppose it's in the blood," Julie, a small voice, rather frightened.
"What's in the blood?"
"The perversion. I'm not sure I'd fancy him that much if he wasn't my Daddy."
"God!' And Cherry turning away, coming into the bedroom.
Julie admitting it then. The honest generation, no hypocrisy, come out with it, face the truth, better than the lies invented to protect society.
Braver than him. Would he enjoy it as much if she wasn't his daughter. God, he didn't know. Had he had too much in life then, too much excitement, did he need that sort of thrill? The secret of it all?
He started to leave the room, cold, sweating, wanting to get away, but Cherry was just in the hallway.
"Oh Jey, Jey, please send her away, please."
She was on him, round him, sobbing, hugging. He patted her on the back. It was no comfort, she broke away as though remembering whom he had touched last, went into the bedroom.
He moved on, paused outside Julie's room and looked in. She was sitting on the edge of the bed, her back to him, but he could tell she was crying too.
So now what did he do?
He wanted both, they wanted him, was he big enough to control that sort of scene? How would he sort it out? One week with one, one week with the other? They could always stay in the apartment on their off weeks, or live together and visit him?
He wasn't being serious, inside him he wasn't being serious, and yet those were real tears of sadness, of fear of losing happiness.
He decided to make a cup of coffee for everyone and go out in the sun where the brightness and warmth would clear the head and take him back to reality.
He went down to the kitchen, took the cups out of the cupboard, reached for the kettle and heard talking upstairs.
He moved silently out into the hallway, stood at the foot of the stairs. Eased himself up three or four steps to hear more clearly, the thrill of eavesdropping, of overhearing what wasn't to be heard.
"We've got to resolve it between us Julie, he doesn't know what he wants."
"He wants me. I know."
"You think you know. Men like him always make you think you know, they always make you think that you are the one they love most. He doesn't love you any more than he loves me, or he loved Celia, or Clare or your mother and the hundred others. They have big hearts, huge hearts, adore the world, adore life, and mess everyone up because they cannot hurt, cannot break, cannot ever do the decent thing and leave you alone. I know I shouldn't have come hack, but he never told me not to, never told me he didn't want me back. Maybe he doesn't want me back, but he doesn't really want me to go either. But you're different. You're really different Julie, and this isn't one woman fighting with another: you're his daughter and cannot allow him to love you as he does."
"Why not?"
"Because it's sick! And it's the sickness he likes. And I'll tell you something else about your Daddy, the reason he stuck to me for two years, the reason he stuck to Celia for so many years. We weren't his responsibility. We had money. And that's all he's about. You're a toy Julie, a fantastic new toy, but for only as long as he doesn't have to be responsible for you."
Silence.
Movement.
One moving away from the other? One comforting the other?
He couldn't stand the thought of that, just wanted to be out of it. Wanted to be far away, didn't want to see either of them. Cherry, diplomatic, kind, trying to be understanding, right in every way, really, and Julie? Julie still crying?
He tip-toed back to the kitchen, left the mugs, the kettle, went out of the back door into the shade of the garage, into the garage, got into his car.
And he started the engine.
His guardian angel took over.
He drove, mechanically, but his mind was elsewhere all the way. The road was familiar, bend after bend after bend to Almunecar, to Motril, to Granada, the ceaseless winding road, death inviting a visit every comer, but he was careful, saw the beautiful mountains, the gorges, the peaks, the holidaymakers stopping to gasp at the views, they meant nothing to him, or they meant only that he felt they should mean something.
Sim, heat and sea, blue skies, nothing should go wrong, but everything was. A hippy to give a lift to might have helped, but there were none. Muleteers, staring vacantly at their local countryside, rotund little women in black, children, children everywhere, meaningless, the whole of humanity meaningless and his whole life becoming more and more meaningless too. Music could be at his fingertips, but what would that bring? Memory of Cherry with the New World, memory of Cherry with Erroil Gamer, memory of Cherry with Johnny Mathis, memory of Celia with Sergeant Pepper. So much for cassettes, no music there to remind him of Julie ... except that she'd plugged in Beethoven's Fifth on their way back from Marbella before the bathe. Would it remind him of her? He stuck it in. It came out too loud, nearly blew his head off on a dangerous bend and didn't remind him of Julie or Cherry, it reminded him of his mother. Another laugh. The London flat, new LPs and new husband trying to improve her mind. It had reminded him of the same scene when Julie had slapped it in, Julie the American chick, the hippy, the easy lay for a night which might be sleepless. Some easy lay!
Into Granada, the irritating cobbled roads, the even more irritating poverty of the ghetto flats on the ring road, shattered dreams of Granada. He let the car drive itself, on up North, Madrid the sign said, why not? Why not get lost in the big city, why not lose himself in the cinema, a theatre, a bar, the streets?
Jaen, Bailen, the ribbon of tarmac, hot, black, smooth, at speed now, unaware, the sun going down, a desert atmosphere; La Mancha, no one on the road, loneliness, tiredness, forgetfulness of what it was all about, then a thought of Julie so far away. He was deserting her, leaving her to Cherry. So it was her he cared for, it was coming out clearly: Julie he feared for, Julie to be eaten up by Cherry, and he realized he was sweating again, his hands wet, and his foot flat down and passing cars, his slipping between oncoming ones, lights flashing now, the sun right down, a moon somewhere making its mark, headlights on, dipping, flashing, aggressive driving. Julie, Christ, he'd send her a telegram in the morning. Love, love for his daughter. Check that. Why did he want her so? For everything. He admired her, respected her, she had a sense of humour, liked the fight, enjoyed it all, enjoyed him, respected him. Was he disappointing her? Blare, sounds, horns, dip, drag to the left, to the right, near miss, lorry, screech of brakes behind him, no follow up sound, just lights flashing, foot less down now, clear of a near mess, must be more careful, drive more slowly. A glance at the clock that worked, nearly eleven, time to stop, time to eat and sleep and sleep and sleep. What did he have to put him to sleep? Nothing. Wine, wine would do it. A bottle, with food. But he wasn't hungry.
Aranjuez, after Ocana, he knew it well, had stayed there often on the way down. The Paloma Hotel opposite the big garage. He'd go there, it was safe there, he wanted safety, wanted security, and it was there with its green lights and familiar doorman. Of course they had a room, they always had a room. A double for one man. Sadness at the empty bed next to his, wash and brush up, feeling terrible, lonely and cold alone in the dining room. Couples outside in the false green light. God he wanted Julie, or Cherry, or someone. Ages for the food to come, the menu, force it down, soup, fish, meat, fruits, wine, coffee and brandy, another brandy. Dead to the world now, completely dead. Into bed, the single-only-for-him-lonely-bed, light off, and it came on him, the wave of sleep, he enjoyed that, the knowledge that it wouldn't fail him tonight, that tomorrow he'd be better, be able to face his cowardice, explain why he had run away.
But it wasn't to be.
At five he awoke sweating and the fever took him. Temples hot, wet forehead, wet sheets around him, a panic not having anything at hand at all, not even aspirin. Five, it was dark till seven, two hours of hell and his thoughts. Nothing to read, nothing to distract, nothing but the white walls and tartan bedspread on the empty bed next to him.
Exercises, mental exercises to keep sane, a walk, drive off? Without paying? The porter had his passport, drive anyway, just get into the security of the car and drive. But his back ached, his muscles ached. The grippe? The 'flu and no one to pity him, look after him. Perhaps it wasn't, perhaps it was just a hangover, he'd drunk a lot; a mirror, the bright light, white light, the old face with young expression, not so bad, sense of humour on the mouth. "Cunt," he said out loud to the reflection and it smiled back happy. He was still drunk. Back to bed, sleep it off, bury the head in the pillow and sleep it off. Leave the fight on, it was made to tire.
And he awoke at ten and felt better and didn't move, only his eyelids, comfort, no responsibilities. So Julie loved him and Cherry loved him, so he would make no decision, he would go to Madrid, or maybe stay here, or maybe go back, or go to Salamanca where he'd never been. Why not Toledo? Visit the Casa d'El Greco. Long hands, long feet, long expressions. He could do without that. Madrid? There must be a red fight district. He was obviously feeling better. Hungry even. Get the car cleaned, fill her up, take a trip. Nice to have Julie, and he fell a thousand feet, two thousand feet. Alone. Do it alone, for what? Back then. Back to her. That is what he wanted. Julie. But then Cherry.
The round again, the problem. He'd work something out on the way. At least he knew it was Julie now.
The drive back, fast, in control, watching the clock, the speedometer all the way, he did it by six in the evening. Home! Empty. No Cherry, no Julie, no car. Rooms tidy, the pool dirty, filter not switched on, then a car in the drive. Cherry.
"Where's Julie?"
"I sent her back."
"Where?"
"Santa Cruz where she belongs. I gave her the money, bought her a ticket, one way. She lied about her return fare. I also wrote to her mother, Susan, your first and only wife telling her all about it."
"All about what?"
"I told her who I was, your devoted mistress, and that I thought you were corrupting your daughter."
"You told her I slept with her?"
"Yes."
He didn't put on an act, but she suddenly looked very concerned and he felt very faint.
He was just numb, aware only of the sun and of the very white tablecloth.
"Are you all right?" he heard her say.
And suddenly, to his own surprise, he felt tears run down his face, and he sobbed. He let it go, it was self-pity, it was pity for everyone in the world, it was for the distant Julie, it was for everything, and he let go, and Cherry took him by the arm and led him to the sofa, asked him if he had a handkerchief, and he just sat there and cried.
For twenty years he hadn't cried, sobs shook his whole body, and he let it go.
"You really loved her then?"
"She's my daughter, Cherry."
"But you loved her like you loved me!' There was shock there, disbelief.
"Yes," he paused, thought of Julie, saw her on the bed upstairs again, wanted her. "That was what was so perfect."
"It's horrible."
And he sat there in the middle of the sofa and allowed the tears to dry in his eyes and on his face, aware that he was exhausted by the drive, by the emotions, aware that Cherry was moving about upstairs, packing, aware that he should do something, but not moving, not moving at all.
And he slipped into a stupor and awoke when a door closed and her car drove off, and still he didn't move.
And some time when it was really very dark, in the middle of the lonely night, he got up to go to the bathroom.
And he saw that Cherry had left, with all her luggage, and without leaving a note.
A week later at about eleven o'clock in the morning, he stepped out on the bedroom terrace to stretch after a good night's sleep.
He looked down at the garden and saw a girl standing by the pool looking at the clean clear water.
Small, red hair, slightly hooked nose, large blue eyes, freckles, a great amount of freckles, jeans, sandals, probably well-proportioned legs (he couldn't tell), open-neck shirt, small breasts, small altogether, leather belt, bag, watch strap, usual decorations.
He went down in his bathrobe.
"Hi," she said. "You're Julie's father I guess?"
He nodded.
She put out her hand. Small, firm, a good little hand, a nice little grip there.
"My name's Patty. Julie said to look you up if I got to this area, said you could let me have a bath."
THE END
-About the Author
Andre Launay is French but was born and educated in England.
At the age of eighteen, while serving an apprenticeship in a luxury food factory in the South of France, he started singing in cabaret in the evenings as a change from the atmosphere of the cold storage rooms. Inventing English lyrics to suit French songs led him to writing and, after the publication of his first crime novel, the eventual job of copy chief in a London advertising agency.
In 1958 he won an award for a television play and had a production at the Edinburgh Festival following which he started writing professionally, publishing more than twenty books on subjects ranging from humour and antiques to travel and history of aeronautics.
Widely travelled, he has for the last three years mainly lived in Southern Spain (the setting of this novel) and most recently has written the screenplay of his last book "The Girl with a Peppermint Taste" which was also published in the United States.
