Imogen

by Jilly Cooper

  Imogen nodded. ‘We’re doing the kiss of life tomorrow. I do hope Mr Blount doesn’t use me as the model. Finish me off altogether.’

  ‘I say,’ said Gloria, lowering her voice, ‘Judy Brighouse’s just been in and taken out Understanding Cystitis. She only came back from her honeymoon last night. Bet they’ve been at it all the time. Oo, look, he’s back.’

  A good-looking man in a green velvet jacket came through the swing doors and up to the desk. ‘I think I left Richard Strauss behind,’ he said.

  ‘You did,’ said Gloria, giving him the book and the benefit of one of her hot stripping glances, which sent him crashing back against the doors, nearly falling over the fire bucket on the way.

  ‘It says pull, not push,’ said Gloria, smirking at the effect she’d had on him. ‘Wish he’d try and pull me. He’s lovely.’

  ‘No good to you, lass,’ said Mr Clough, on his way to a NALGO meeting. ‘He’s on his third marriage, and he’s already got four children to support.’ He turned to Imogen. ‘Tell your Dad I’ve just got that gardening book in. If he’d like a quick look before we put it into circulation he can keep it until Wednesday.’

  ‘There’s something rather attractive about Cloughie,’ said Gloria, shoving a couple of requested books into a side shelf. ‘Here’s just the thing for you, Imogen: How to Stop Feeling Depressed and Inadequate.’

  ‘I am inadequate,’ sighed Imogen.

  ‘Oh come on,’ said Gloria. ‘Do cheer up. We don’t want you dripping over everyone like a Chinese water torture all week.’

  A man in dungarees came reeling up to the desk. ‘Where can I find books on starting one’s own business?’ he said.

  ‘Over there,’ said Gloria, adding in an undertone, ‘Absolutely reeked of drink, didn’t he?’

  ‘Expect he’s just been fired,’ said Imogen. ‘Oh look, Mr Passmore’s fallen asleep over the Financial Times.’

  ‘No one’s allowed to sleep in a library,’ said Gloria. ‘It’s in the by-laws. Go and wake him up.’

  ‘Telephone, Gloria,’ said Miss Nugent, bustling up. ‘Reader with a query. It’s come through in my office. Can you go and man the issue desk, Imogen? Miss Hockney’s gone to tea and there’s a queue waiting.’

  Gathering up her papers, Imogen went and sat down at the desk at the entrance of the library and began to check people’s books in. Once she’d dealt with the queue she went back to her overdue list. Susan Bridges had kept Colloquial German and Scaling the Matterhorn out since February, when she met that Austrian ski instructor. She picked up the telephone and dialled Miss Bridges’s number, but there was no answer – probably at work. She looked at the pile of cards in front of her. ‘If you have returned the books in the last few days, please ignore this letter.’ The words blurred before her eyes. Outside the sky was darkening. Oh Nicky, Nicky, she thought desperately, will I ever see you again? She looked at the red bracelet on her wrist, tracing the pattern of the flowers with her finger, shivering at the memory of that day on the moor.

  ‘Thus have I had thee, as a dream doth flatter,

  In sleep a king, but, waking, no such matter,’ she whispered sadly. Nicky was the black Rowntree’s fruit gum everyone wanted. How ridiculous to think that he could ever have fancied her for more than a moment.

  She was so deep in thought she didn’t see a large bad-tempered woman in a trilby with a snarling boxer on a lead, until they’d come pounding through the door.

  Imogen steeled herself for a fight.

  ‘I’m terribly sorry, you can’t bring dogs in here.’

  ‘Where am I supposed to leave him?’ snapped the woman.

  ‘There are dog hooks provided outside the door. You could tie him to one of those.’

  ‘He’d howl the place down and break his lead. It’s not safe in this traffic. I’ve come all the way from Skipton. I’ll only take five minutes.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said Imogen nervously. ‘Shall I hold him for you?’

  She advanced towards the dog, which bared its teeth and growled ominously. She backed away.

  ‘Have your hand off,’ said its owner. ‘Now are you going to let me in, or do you want me to go over your head?’

  Imogen had a lunatic vision of the woman and dog taking off and flying over her head through the room.

  ‘I’m sorry. Dogs simply aren’t allowed,’ she repeated.

  ‘I need the books for my work. I’ll complain to the council. I’ve got fines on all these books.’

  Imogen looked hopelessly round for help. Miss Nugent had disappeared, Gloria was on the telephone, Miss Hockney was surreptitiously making wedding lists on the request desk.

  ‘If we allowed one dog in, we’d have to let the whole lot,’ she said firmly.

  ‘That’s what’s wrong with this country,’ snapped the woman, straightening her trilby and storming through the doors. ‘Bloody civil servant,’ she shouted back at Imogen.

  ‘I must not cry,’ said Imogen, gritting her teeth. ‘I must not drip like a Chinese water torture.’

  ‘I say,’ said Gloria, rushing up and patting her hair, ‘that Richard Strauss man in the velvet jacket’s just phoned up from a call box and asked me out. Goodness, what’s up with you?’

  ‘A woman with a boxer just called me a bloody civil servant.’

  ‘Old cow, she’s not allowed to swear in a library, it’s in the by-laws too, and anyway we’re not civil servants, we’re local government officers.’ She switched back to the Richard Strauss man. ‘He didn’t even know my name, just asked for the “glamorous one”,’ she said, squinting at her reflection in the glass door. ‘Didn’t think I was looking very good today either.’

  Imogen went wearily back to her overdue postcards, laboriously filling in the computer number of each book.

  ‘I say,’ breathed Gloria, ‘get a load of him.’

  ‘Don’t bother me,’ said Imogen. ‘I’ve got to finish these beastly things. Anyway I’m not interested in men any more.’

  ‘You’ll be interested in this,’ said Gloria faintly.

  ‘No I won’t ever again. My life is over,’ said Imogen. Then a familiar husky voice said very softly:

  ‘Have you got a book called “Would the Assistant Like to Come out to Lunch”?’

  Imogen looked up and gave an unbelieving cry. For there, resplendent in a white suit and dark blue shirt, was Nicky. She gave a whimper and a gasp and, getting clumsily to her feet, ran round her desk and crashed into him, burying her face in his shoulder.

  ‘I can’t believe it,’ she said, her voice thick with tears.

  ‘Hey, hey,’ said Nicky, lifting her chin with his finger, and smiling down at her. ‘There’s no need to cry, little one. I said I’d come back, didn’t I?’

  ‘I didn’t think I’d ever see you again.’

  ‘Didn’t you get my postcard?’

  ‘Yes, I did. It was lovely.’

  Nicky shook his head. ‘Oh ye of little faith,’ he said gently and, well aware that there was now a gaping audience, including Miss Nugent, watching him, he bent his head and kissed her lingeringly.

  ‘But what are you doing here?’ said Imogen, wiping away her tears with the back of her hand, ‘I thought you were in Edinburgh.’

  ‘Got a walkover. Chap I’m playing pulled a muscle. Wants to rest it for Wimbledon. I don’t have to play till tomorrow afternoon. Can I have a bed for the night, preferably yours?’

  Imogen laughed joyfully, ‘Of course you can. I’ll ring Mummy. The only problem is the boys have been home for half term, so the place’ll be in a bit of a shambles.’

  Nicky was stroking her face now, tenderly smoothing away a smudge of mascara with his thumb. ‘Can you get out for some lunch now?’ he said softly.

  Imogen eyed a disapproving and approaching Miss Nugent.

  ‘Not really. I’ve already eaten and I’m on till eight. Oh, isn’t it a drag?’

  ‘Well, that works out quite well,’ said Nicky. ‘I’ll go and have a work-out down
at the club, and then I’ve got to do a short interview for Yorkshire Television. This afternoon seemed a good opportunity. I’ll be through by eight. I’ll come and pick you up and we’ll go and have dinner somewhere.’

  ‘But I’m not dressed for it,’ wailed Imogen, conscious of her old grey sweater and jeans.

  ‘You look beautiful,’ said Nicky who only noticed how her grey eyes shone at the sight of him and how the stitches of the old sweater gaped over her bosom and how, with no make-up on, she looked about fourteen. ‘You could never look anything else.’

  There was a disapproving cough behind them. Nicky turned a dazzling smile on Miss Nugent.

  ‘You must be Imogen’s boss,’ he said. ‘I’ve heard so much about you.’

  He was so lovely to everyone thought Imogen as she introduced him. Miss Nugent was now patting her crenellated curls, and simpering like a schoolgirl. Even Miss Hockney had put down her shopping list. Gloria was smouldering so hard she’d burst into flames any minute.

  ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ she said.

  Nicky shook his head. ‘I must get down to the club.’

  Outside the swing doors he kissed Imogen again.

  ‘It’s been a very long three weeks,’ he said. ‘I’m glad you’re still wearing my bracelet.’

  Funny, he thought, as he drove down the High Street, how pleased he was to see her. If Painter hadn’t nagged him about not winning his bet, he doubted if he’d have bothered to look her up again. But now he had he was glad. He felt all the satisfaction of a dog with a number of bones buried round the garden, who suddenly unearths one unexpectedly and discovers it’s matured much better than he had hoped.

  He’d liked to have taken her straight up on to the moors and screwed her now, but he didn’t particularly want to cover his new suit with grass stains before the interview. Anyway, there’d be plenty of time tonight, and it’d be more of a turn on pulling her under the old vicar’s nose.

  It was quite an achievement washing oneself from top to toe with gritty soap and a face towel in the ladies at the library but Imogen managed it. She also nipped across the road and bought a new pair of black pants which cut into her. And now she was sitting in the Dog and Duck enveloped in a cloud of Gloria’s Babe being eyed by Pikely locals, drinking champagne with Nicky and wondering if she’d ever been happier in her life.

  ‘This is the first champagne I’ve had this year,’ she said.

  ‘Then you must wish,’ said Nicky.

  Imogen shut her eyes, and took a gulp. ‘Oh please,’ she wished silently, ‘give me Nicky.’

  Nicky laughed and kissed her cheek. ‘You’ll get me if you play your cards right,’ he said.

  ‘How did you know what I was wishing?’

  ‘You’re totally transparent. That’s what I like about you.’

  ‘Did you think Gloria was pretty,’ said Imogen wistfully.

  ‘Who’s she?’

  ‘The sexy one in yellow shorts who offered you a cup of tea.’

  ‘Didn’t notice her, but then I only have eyes for you.’ He filled up her glass. As they worked their way down the bottle he told her about Rome and Paris, but she was so longing and longing to have his arms round her again, and yet panicking where it would all lead to, she could hardly concentrate.

  ‘And what have you been up to?’ he said, ordering another bottle.

  ‘Nothing really.’

  She told him about Juliet having to write out the 23rd Psalm ten times for saying bugger. But she didn’t really think he’d be very interested in hearing about the second-hand book stall she had to organise for the church fête in aid of a new spire, and even spires seemed so phallic at the moment.

  ‘How is your dear father? Still on the one day week?’ said Nicky.

  Imogen giggled and knew she shouldn’t.

  ‘Oh come on, darling, you know he’s a pig.’

  ‘Only to me,’ said Imogen.

  Nicky emptied the remains of the first bottle into her glass.

  ‘Who’s at home this evening?’ he said carefully.

  ‘No one,’ said Imogen without thinking. ‘Juliet’s staying the night with a friend, and Mummy and Daddy are taking the boys back and stopping for dinner with the vicar of Long Preston.’

  Nicky picked up the unopened bottle of champagne.

  ‘Let’s go then.’

  Outside it was pouring with rain, street lamp reflections quivering in the cobbled streets. People huddled in the dorway of the fish shop. The smell of frying fat wafted towards them.

  ‘Are you hungry?’ asked Nicky.

  ‘No,’ said Imogen.

  The powerful headlamps of his car lit up the cow parsley flattened by the deluge. The rain rattled against the windscreen. In the light from the dashboard she could see Nicky’s profile.

  ‘I went for that drop shot at the right moment,’ he was saying. ‘I was beginning to get the right length, and make friends with the ball again.’

  A vast pile of unopened letters and cables were scattered on the back seat. ‘Goodness, you get a lot of post,’ said Imogen. ‘It’s last week’s fan mail,’ said Nicky.

  As he swung up the moorland road leading to the vicarage, he put his hand on her thigh, caressing her through the thick stiff material. She lifted her legs slightly off the seat, hoping to make them seem thinner.

  The house was dark and empty except for Homer who welcomed them ecstatically, charging off upstairs and, returning with a pair of old grey pants Imogen had been wearing yesterday, deposited them at Nicky’s feet.

  ‘Extraordinary pants,’ said Nicky. ‘Not yours, are they?’

  ‘Goodness, no,’ lied Imogen. ‘They’re probably jumble.’

  ‘Look as though they belonged to your grandmother,’ said Nicky. ‘Go and get a couple of glasses, sweetheart.’

  As Imogen threw the offending pants into the dustbin, she heard the champagne cork pop. She felt like a gas fire that had been left on unlit for too long – Nicky’s touch would be like a lit match, making her explode in a great gushing blue flame, singeing everything around including Homer’s eyebrows.

  They sat drinking on the sofa. Nicky had turned off all the lights except one lamp in the corner. She was shaking with nerves again, quite unable to meet his eye.

  ‘It’s been awfully wet the last few weeks,’ she said.

  ‘It’s been awfully dry abroad,’ said Nicky, picking up the bottle.

  ‘No,’ squeaked Imogen putting her hand over her glass.

  ‘Don’t be silly,’ said Nicky, so the champagne trickled through her fingers, and spilled icy cold down her sleeve, meeting the rivulets of sweat that were coming the other way. Desperate for something to do, she drained her glass and felt slightly dizzy.

  ‘Let’s get down to business,’ said Nicky and took her in his arms. ‘You like me, don’t you?’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ she stammered, ‘I haven’t thought about anything else for a single minute since we met.’

  She was achingly aware of him, his mouth over hers, his hands in her hair.

  ‘Come on,’ he whispered. ‘Let’s go upstairs, much more comfortable. We’ve got hours of time. Homer will bark if anyone comes.’

  ‘Not at Daddy and Mummy, he won’t.’

  ‘They won’t even have started dinner yet.’

  Imogen gazed up at Nicky with huge troubled eyes.

  ‘It’d kill my father.’

  ‘Hooray,’ said Nicky. ‘I’ll come and sell tickets at his funeral.’

  Imogen tried and failed to look shocked. He put his hands round her waist. She came towards him, dissolving into him. He moved his hand under her sweater, and closed it over her breast.

  Imogen started to struggle.

  ‘It’d be so awful,’ she muttered, ‘if I got pregnant.’

  ‘You’re not fixed up?’ he asked sharply. ‘When are you due?’

  Imogen swallowed. She’d never discussed things like this with a man. ‘Tomorrow or the next day.’

  ‘
No problem,’ said Nicky, relaxing, launching into the attack again. ‘That’s why your tits are so fantastic at the moment.’

  She was glad to be able to hide her embarrassment in his shoulder. Now she felt his hand on her back. She’d never known anyone with such warm hands. Next moment he’d slipped it under her jeans, and was stroking her bottom.

  ‘You must stop,’ gasped Imogen as he pushed her back on the sofa, and removed her sweater. ‘I’ve never done it with anybody before,’ she said, emerging from the fluff.

  ‘I’m not just anybody,’ said Nicky. ‘And you can’t stop, sweetheart, any more than I can.’ Oh, help, thought Imogen, what’s happening to me. But next minute she froze with horror as the back door opened and Homer bounded out with a crash.

  ‘Yoo hoo,’ said a voice. ‘Anyone at home?’

  ‘Ker-ist,’ said Nicky, then with incredible presence of mind he seized Imogen’s sweater, turned it right-way out and pulled it over her head.

  ‘Keep cool,’ he murmured, kicking her bra under the sofa and tucking in his shirt.

  ‘We’re in here,’ he called.

  ‘Hullo Nicky,’ said her mother, walking into the room carrying a large marrow. ‘Hullo darling, what a beastly night. Isn’t it a shame, poor Mrs Westley’s got shingles? They tried to ring us but we’d already left. We didn’t stop to dinner, and came straight home. They gave us this.’ She waved the marrow. ‘Daddy’s putting the car away.’

  ‘Well, have some champagne to cheer you up,’ said Nicky.

  Imogen rushed off to get more glasses, her heart hammering, feeling quite faint with horror. Just think if her father had found her and Nicky at it on the floor, in front of Homer too, she thought with an hysterical giggle. Thank God it was her mother who’d come in first.

  As she went back into the drawing-room she heard her mother asking Nicky, ‘Do you think there’s any hope of Virginia Woolf winning Wimbledon?’

  The rest of Nicky’s visit was disastrous. They’d all gone to bed early and Nicky had whispered to Imogen on the stairs, ‘Courage, ma brave. As soon as all’s quiet on the West Riding Front, I’ll creep along to your room.’

  But alas, the vicar, suffering from one of his periodic bouts of insomnia, had decided to sleep – or rather not sleep – in his dressing-room, which was equidistant between Imogen’s room and the spare room. There he lay with the light on and the door ajar, pretending to read Donne’s sermons, but actually brooding on former glories, a row of silver cups on the chest of drawers and framed pictures of muscular men with folded arms round the wall.