by Jilly Cooper
The heat of the sun was as fiery as yesterday’s. But a fierce wind was raging. It tore the parasols out of the ground, blew sand in everyone’s faces, and ruffled the green feathers of the palm trees along the front.
‘It’s called a mistral,’ Matt told Imogen. ‘It makes everyone very bad-tempered. Have you noticed how the nicest people become absolute monsters with too much spare time on their hands?’
Yvonne was moaning at James, who was hiding his pink burnt body under a huge green towel. Cable was as snappy as an elastic band with Matt, and Nicky didn’t deign to recognise Imogen’s existence.
A black poodle with a red collar came scampering by, scattering sand. James whistled and made clicking noises with his hand.
‘Don’t talk to strange dogs, Jumbo,’ snapped Yvonne. ‘They might easily have rabies.’
Cable, in an emerald green bikini with a matching turban to keep the sand out of her hair, had never looked more seductive. Matt retired behind Paris Match. Yvonne put on a cardboard beak to protect her nose from the sun, which made her look like some malignant bird. James got out his Box Brownie and went on a photographic spree which consisted mainly of front approaches on large ladies. Nicky went off to hire a pedalo.
Three handsome muscular Frenchmen playing ball edged nearer Cable, then one of them deliberately missed a catch, so the ball landed at her feet. With laughter, and voluble apologies and much show of interest, they all came to retrieve it. Cable gave them a smouldering look. They smiled back in admiration. Next moment another catch was missed and the ball landed on her towel and, with a flurry of ‘Pardons’, was retrieved again. Cable smirked. Matt took no notice and went on reading. Imogen suddenly thought how infuriating it must be for Cable that he appeared so unjealous. Maybe it was an elaborate game between them. She picked up a copy of Elle that Cable had abandoned which said ‘une vrai beauté sauvage’ would be fashionable this autumn. The glamorously dishevelled mane of the model on the front cover bore no resemblance to Imogen’s awful mop of hair which was now going in ‘toutes directions’. The heat was awful. Imogen, who was burning, picked up a tube of sun lotion and began plastering it over her face.
Yvonne gave a squeal of rage and snatched it away from her. ‘How dare you use my special lotion!’
Matt lowered Paris Match. ‘Stop beefing,’ he said sharply. ‘One oil’s the same as another.’
‘This one was specially made for me at great expense, because of my sensitive skin,’ said Yvonne. ‘Because I’m a model, it’s absolutely vital I don’t peel. This stuff is . . .’
Matt got up and went down to the sea leaving her in mid-sentence.
‘He’s the rudest man I ever met,’ Yvonne said furiously as she re-adjusted her cardboard beak. ‘I don’t know why you put up with him, Cable.’
Cable rolled over and looked at Yvonne, her green eyes glinting. ‘Because, my dear,’ she drawled, ‘he’s a genius in bed.’
‘What a disgusting thing to say,’ said Yvonne, looking like an enraged beetroot.
‘Once you’ve had Matt,’ said Cable, ‘you never really want anyone else.’
‘Then why are you fooling around with Nicky Beresford?’
Imogen caught her breath.
Cable grinned wickedly. ‘Because Nicky’s so pretty, and I must keep Matt on his toes or, shall we say, his elbows.’
‘You’re going about it the wrong way,’ said Yvonne. ‘You should occasionally sew a button on his shirt or cook more. Modelling’s not a very stable career, you know.’
‘Neither’s marriage,’ snapped Cable. ‘Your husband made the most horrendous pass at me last night.’
And getting up in one lithe movement, she made her way down to the sea to join Nicky on a pedalo.
Yvonne turned on Imogen as the only available target. ‘I don’t know why you came out here with Nicky and then let him get away with it,’ she snapped, and, spluttering with fury, went off to find James.
Imogen got some postcards out of her bag. She had bought them to send home to the family and the office, but what on earth could she say to them? They had all been so excited about her going. How could she tell them the truth?
Dear everyone, she wrote very large. How are you all? I arrived safely. None of the gardens here are as good as ours. Suddenly she had a vision of the vicarage and Pikely. Juliet and the boys would be at school now, her mother would probably be getting ready to go down to the shops, flapping about looking for her list while Homer waited for her, impatiently trailing his chain lead around like Marley’s ghost. At such a distance even her father seemed less formidable. A great wave of homesickness overwhelmed her.
Matt strolled lazily up from the sea, water dripping from his huge shoulders, heavy-lidded eyes squinting against the sun. There was poor little Imogen in that awful bathing dress, surrounded by other people’s possessions. He’d never seen anyone so woebegone. Today she was red-eyed, covered in bruises. Nicky must have put her through hell last night. Those pale-skinned English girls always translated badly to the South of France for the first few days. Her clothes were frightful, her hair a disaster. Once she turned brown, however, she might have possibilities. I could teach her a thing or three, he thought. He lay down beside her and put his arm round her shoulders.
‘I declare National Necking Week officially open,’ he said.
She turned a woeful face to him and held up an arm covered in bites.
‘I don’t seem to attract anything but mosquitoes,’ she said, her lips trembling.
‘Has Yvonne been bullying you? Listen baby, don’t let her get you down. I know how she comes on, like she owns this beach personally and everyone has to act like a vicarage tea party, but you’ve just got to ignore her.’
Poor little thing, he thought, she really is miserable. Something will definitely have to be done about it.
Chapter Ten
‘I feel lucky tonight,’ said Matt after dinner. ‘I’m off to the Casino.’
‘To blow all our French bread, I suppose,’ said Cable sourly.
As they went into the Roulette Room, Imogen was overwhelmed by the smoke, the glaring lights, and the fever the place itself generated. Gambling was obviously taken very seriously here. Round the table sat women with scarlet nails and obsessive faces. None of the pale, hard-eyed men behind them betrayed a flicker of interest in Cable. Huge sums of money were changing hands.
Matt went off to the Cashier and returned with his big hands full of counters.
‘Fifteen for Cable, fifteen for Imogen, and the rest for me because I’m good at it. The others are fending for themselves.’
To Imogen, her fifteen counters suddenly became of crucial importance, and the green baize table a fearsome battleground. If she won, she would get Nicky back; if she lost, then all was lost. She would play number twenty-six, Nicky’s age. But twenty-six obstinately refused to come up, and gradually her pile dwindled away, until she had only one counter left. She put it on number nine. It came up. Relief flooded her. She backed it again, and again it came up.
‘Good girl,’ said Matt, who was steadily amassing chips beside her.
But something compelled her to chance her luck and go on playing, and this time she lost and lost until she only had two counters. In desperation, she put them both on Noir. Rouge came up.
Tears stinging her eyes, she escaped to the ladies.
‘Oh God, I look hateful,’ she moaned. Her face was still bright scarlet. The mistral had played even worse havoc with her hair, whipping it into a wild mop like a Zulu warrior. She couldn’t even get a comb through it.
She didn’t recognise the couple locked together in the passage when she came out a few minutes later. But she stiffened as she heard the familiar purr of Nicky’s voice.
‘Darling, you’re so lovely,’ he was saying. ‘And I can feel your heart going like the Charge of the Light Brigade.’
Cable gave a husky laugh, and wound her arms round his neck.
‘Do you believe in love at first s
ight?’ he went on. ‘I didn’t until I met you. Then – pow! Suddenly it happened, as though I’d been struck by a thunderbolt. I don’t know what it is about you – something indefinable, apart from being so beautiful.’
Imogen couldn’t believe her ears. He was using exactly the same words he’d used when he’d tried to seduce her that first time on the moor. Words that were irrevocably signed on her heart.
‘What about old purple sprouting Brocklehurst?’ said Cable softly.
Nicky laughed. ‘I knew it was a mistake the moment I met you, but I couldn’t let her down. She’s not much trouble and anyway it gave me a chance of being near you.’
‘I feel a bit mean. Can’t we find some arresting Provençal fisherman to bed her down?’
‘Never get near her,’ said Nicky and started to kiss Cable again.
They were so preoccupied they didn’t notice her stumbling past.
She met Matt coming out of the Roulette Room. He was looking pleased with himself.
‘I’ve just won nearly three thousand francs,’ he said.
‘How much is that?’ said Imogen, desperately trying to sound normal.
‘About £300. I’ve been good and cashed it in.’ He looked at her closely.
‘Hey, what’s the matter?’
‘Nothing, I’m fine,’ she said.
‘Cable and Nicky, is it?’
She nodded – impossible to keep anything from him.
He took her arm. ‘I think you and I had better have a little talk.’
He led her to a deserted corner of the beach. They sat down on the warm sand. A huge white moon had turned the sea to gunmetal; the waves were idly flapping on the shore.
Matt lit a cigarette. ‘All right lovie, what happened?’
Stammering, she told him.
‘I don’t mind him kissing her so much,’ she said finally. ‘I mean she’s so lovely anyone would want to. But it’s just his using the same words.’
‘Cliché, cliché, cliché,’ said Matt scornfully. ‘But then you can’t expect someone who hits a white ball across a net year in year out to have a very extensive vocabulary, can you?’
Imogen had a feeling he was laughing at her. ‘But Nicky’s clever. He speaks five languages,’ she said defensively.
‘A sign of great stupidity, I always think,’ said Matt. ‘Hell, I’m not trying to put Nicky down. I’ve nothing against people with IQs in single figures. I just think you should know some home and away truths about him. I bet I know how he picked you up.’
‘We were introduced,’ said Imogen stiffly.
‘No, before that. Wasn’t he playing in a match, and he suddenly picked you out in the crowd, and acted as though he’d been turned to stone? Then, I suppose, he missed a few easy shots, as though he was completely overwhelmed by your beauty, and flashed his pretty teeth at you every time he changed ends.’
‘He must have told you,’ said Imogen in a stifled voice.
‘No such luck, sweetheart. It’s standard Beresford pick-up practice in tournaments, all round the country. Quite irresistible, too, when combined with those devastating good looks. He never does it if there’s any chance he might lose the match.’
‘Then why did he bother to bring me on holiday?’
‘For a number of reasons, I should think. Because you’re very pretty, because he’s got a jaded palate, and you’re different from his usual run of scrubbers. Because he couldn’t make you in Yorkshire, and he always likes to get his own way and, finally, because he hadn’t met Cable then.’
‘And what chance have I got against her?’ sighed Imogen.
‘You still want him, after hearing all that?’
Imogen nodded miserably. ‘I’m a constant nymph,’ she said.
Matt sighed. ‘I was afraid you were. Well, we’ll have to get him back for you, won’t we?’
Outside her bedroom he took her key and unlocked the door.
‘Now baby, lesson one. Don’t cry all night. It’ll only make you look ugly in the morning. And if you’re still smarting about the purple sprouting Brocklehurst bit, remember that Cable’s real name is Enid Sugden.’
He smiled, touched her cheek with his hand, and went. Imogen undressed and lay on her bed for a few minutes in the moonlight. Fancy Cable being called Enid. She giggled, then her thoughts turned to Matt.
Was it Jane Austen who said friendship was the finest balm for the pangs of despised love? She got up, locked her door and fell into a deep sleep.
It was after ten o’clock when she woke next morning. She found Matt drinking Pernod on the front, surrounded by newspapers, his long legs up on the table.
‘You’re going brown. Isn’t it a pity one can’t have the first drink of the day twice?’ he said, ordering her a cup of coffee.
‘How is everyone?’ she said.
‘Grimly determined to enjoy their fortnight’s holiday. Yvonne running herself up as usual, Cable in one of her moods – I’m not sure which one. They’ve all gone water skiing.’
‘Didn’t you want to go?’ said Imogen anxiously. It was bad enough that Nicky should annexe Cable without Matt being left with Nicky’s boring girlfriend.
‘After my performance on the boat coming over – you must be joking. You and I are going to take a trip along the coast.’
It was a perfect day. The mistral had retired into its cave. The air was soft. And as they drove along the coast road, the smell of petrol mingled with the scent of the pines. She still felt upset about Nicky, but for today she was determined not to brood.
‘Where are we going?’ asked Imogen.
‘St Tropez,’ said Matt.
Oh, God, thought Imogen as the wind fretted her hair into an even worse tangle. Everyone will look like Bardot there.
Matt parked the car on the front. In the yachts round the Port, the rich in their Pucci silks were surfacing for the first champagne of the day. Matt steered Imogen through a doorway, up some stairs, into a hairdressing salon.
‘To kick off, we’re going to do something about your hair,’ he said.
Imogen backed away in terror. ‘Oh, no!’ she said. ‘They’ll chop it all off.’
‘No they won’t,’ said Matt, explaining to the pretty receptionist exactly what he wanted them to do.
‘It’ll look great,’ he said, smiling at Imogen reassuringly. ‘I’ll pick you up later.’
‘Il a beaucoup d’allure,’ sighed the pretty receptionist to one of the assistants, who nodded in agreement as she helped Imogen into a pink overall.
When Matt came back, he didn’t recognise her. He gave her one of those hard, appraising sexy looks that men only give to very pretty girls. Then he said, ‘My God!’ and a great smile spread across his face.
Her hair hung in a sleek bronze curtain to her shoulders, parted on one side and falling seductively over one eye.
‘Very pretty, little one,’ he said, walking round her. ‘You don’t look like Judge Jeffreys after too much port any more.’ But the expression in his heavy-lidded eyes belied the teasing note in his voice.
‘Let’s go and have some lunch,’ he said, tucking his hand underneath her arm.
He led her down a labyrinth of alleys smelling of garlic, abounding in cats and washing, to a tiny dark restaurant, which was full of fishermen. The food was superb.
Imogen watched Matt slowly pulling leaves off his artichoke.
‘What does beaucoup d’allure mean?’ she asked.
Matt looked up. ‘Lots of sex appeal. Why?’
Imogen blushed. ‘I just heard someone saying it about someone.’
As always he drew confidences out of her, as the sun brings out the flowers. Under that exceptionally friendly gaze, she was soon telling him about the vicarage, and her brothers and sister, and what hell it had been to be fat at school, and how difficult it was to get on with her father. He’s a journalist, she kept telling herself, he’s trained to ask questions and be a good listener. He’d do the same to anyone. But she found herself noti
cing that his eyes were more dark green than black, and there was a small scar over his right eyebrow.
‘You’re not eating up,’ he said, stripping one of her langoustine, dipping it into the mayonnaise and popping it into her mouth.
‘I was wondering what the others were doing,’ she lied.
‘Bitching I should think. Yvonne told me this morning that it takes all sorts to make a world. Really someone should write all her sayings down in a book so they’re not forgotten.’
He ordered another bottle of wine. Two of the fishermen were staring fixedly at Imogen now. She wondered if she’d got lipstick on her teeth, and surreptitiously got out her mirror.
Matt grinned at her. ‘They’re staring at you because you look beautiful,’ he said.
The musky treacherous fires of the wine were stealing down inside her. She was beginning to feel wonderful. Matt asked for the bill. Imogen got out her purse.
‘Let me pay, please let me.’
Matt shook his head. ‘This is on me.’
As they went out into the fiery sunshine, she swayed slightly, and Matt took her arm.
‘Come on, baby, we’ve got things to do.’
Imogen kept catching reassuring glimpses of her sleek reflection in shop windows. The rich in their yachts and their Pucci silks held no terrors for her now. She was walking on air.
‘I think I’m a bit tight,’ she said.
‘Good,’ said Matt, turning briskly into a boutique.
In a daze, she watched him rifling through a tray of bikinis.
‘If it’s for Cable,’ she said, ‘that red one would look lovely.’
‘Not for Cable,’ he said, piloting her into one of the changing rooms, ‘for you.’
‘Oh I couldn’t! I’m too fat.’
‘I’m the best judge of that,’ said Matt handing her a pale blue bikini and drawing the curtain on her.
‘Oh, what the hell,’ thought Imogen, hiccupping gently.
She put on the bikini, and then stood gaping at herself. Except for her midriff which was still pale, there, smiling back at her in the mirror, was one of those beautiful shapely blondes who paraded up and down the beach at Port-les-Pins. Could it really be her? She gave a squeal of delight.
