Imogen

by Jilly Cooper

  He jumped down, spilling some of the champagne, and said, ‘I’ve just seen Yvonne Edgworth asking Omar Sharif if he’d ever bought a whole flower stall for anyone.’

  The path down to the sea was quite steep and they were both very drunk, but somehow they managed to support each other.

  ‘I want to get my organ into Morgan,’ chanted Larry, and they both roared with laughter.

  ‘I seem to be going from one bad end to another,’ said Imogen. ‘I do love you, Larry. Is it possible to love two people at once?’

  ‘I think so,’ said Larry, ‘but it’s rather expensive.’

  His drawl was more exaggerated than ever. His hair was all over the place.

  They reached the beach. Imogen could feel the sand cool and separating beneath her feet. Somewhere on the way down she’d lost her shoes.

  ‘When love comes in and takes you for a spin,’ sang Larry. ‘I want to get my organ into Morgan. So do a lot of other guys at the party. I found several men in white dinner jackets looking for you when I went back to the house.’

  ‘There was only one,’ said Imogen. ‘You must have been seeing quadruple.’

  And they both shrieked with laughter again. Pot on a lot of drink makes the stupidest things funny.

  The whole beach and the distant lights of Port-les-Pins and the lighthouse seemed to hang in a rosy glow. The waves were hissing like little white snakes on the sand. A half grapefruit moon lay on its back in the dark sky – waiting to submit like me, thought Imogen. She felt weightless like an astronaut.

  Larry picked up a stick and tried to write with it, but the sand was too dry.

  ‘Tell the sea to come nearer,’ he said.

  They ran whooping hand in hand down to the water’s edge where he wrote Larry Loves Imogen in huge letters in the wet sand. Then he kissed her, and she could feel the warm sea washing over her feet.

  ‘I’ll give you a crash course in experience,’ he muttered into her hair, ‘you lovely warm thing.’

  ‘You do realise I haven’t been to bed with anyone before?’

  ‘I said I was a great believer in first times,’ said Larry, gently pulling her sweater over her head. ‘Shall we swim first? One should always have a bath before sex.’

  Perhaps I’m not too fat to bathe in the nude after all, thought Imogen hazily, as she ripped off the trousers and pants and threw them down on the sand. There was no shock as, shrieking with joy, she paddled ecstatically into the waves. It was almost as warm in the water as out.

  ‘It’s heavenly,’ she shouted to Larry.

  Next minute he was chasing after her, and she felt his hands round her waist.

  ‘You’re beautiful,’ he said looking down at her. ‘You look like Venus coming out of the waves.’

  ‘Bottichilly,’ giggled Imogen. ‘Though actually it’s not chilly at all, quite the reverse.’

  ‘That’s enough overture,’ said Larry. ‘Let’s get down to Act One.’ As he kissed her his lips tasted of salt, and Imogen was glad he was holding her; she doubted she could have stood up alone. She really felt very hazy. She asked Larry if he thought there was any point in having a crash course if she wasn’t going to remember the finer points afterwards.

  Larry laughed and said two of her finest points were sticking into his chest at the moment and he certainly wasn’t going to forget them, and began to kiss her in the hollow of her throat.

  In the distance she could still hear the sound of revellers, and shrieks from the swimming pool. Then she heard voices much nearer, angry voices, and she was gradually aware that Larry had stopped kissing her and was gazing over her shoulder.

  There was a long pause, then Larry muttered, ‘My God, it can’t be.’

  Then she heard an all too familiar voice saying, ‘For Christ’s sake, Gilmore.’

  Imogen buried her face in Larry’s neck, then slowly swivelled round. A man and a woman were standing on the sands only a few yards away from them. Both their faces were in shadow, but she could see the girl had short streaked blonde hair and was very slim, and no one could miss that height and the width of the man’s shoulders.

  Larry swallowed nervously. ‘Hi, Matt,’ he said brightly.

  ‘Oh dear,’ said Imogen, ‘I’d better do a Venus in reverse,’ and, giggling frantically, she slid back into the water.

  ‘What the bloody hell have you been up to, Gilmore?’ said Matt icily.

  ‘You told me to keep an eye on her,’ protested Larry.

  ‘And so he has,’ said Imogen’s head, just above the water. ‘Two eyes most of the time, and a lot of hands. He’s been lovely. We’ve had such a nice time. When love comes in and takes you for a spin, Oh la la la.’

  ‘Jesus,’ said Matt. ‘What have you done to her?’

  Larry now seemed to be on shore, futilely trying to tug on Imogen’s pink trousers which came no higher than his knee caps.

  ‘Imogen dear,’ he said, ‘you haven’t met Bambi.’

  ‘Bambi,’ squeaked Imogen, looking at Matt’s companion. ‘Oh my goodness, how do you do? I’ve heard so much about you.’

  ‘Funny,’ said Bambi acidly. ‘I’ve heard absolutely nothing about you.’

  Matt picked up Gilmore’s trousers and threw them at him.

  ‘I know you’ve been trying to get into Imogen’s pants all evening,’ he snapped. ‘Now try and get into your own for a change.’

  ‘Awfully good party,’ said Imogen, flipping water at them.

  ‘Come out of there at once and get dressed. I’m taking you home,’ said Matt.

  In no time at all, it seemed, she was sitting beside Matt in her dripping clothes, as he belted the Mercedes down Claudine’s drive. Somewhere in the distance behind them she could hear Yvonne’s voice rising and falling in fury like a fire siren.

  ‘I don’t want to go home. I’d like some more champagne,’ said Imogen petulantly.

  ‘You’ve had quite enough.’

  Imogen let her head loll back on the seat.

  ‘You’re a rotten spoilsport,’ she said in a slurred voice. ‘I’ve been having the time of my life. Everyone’s been trying to get off with me – Morgan the hero, the intrepid rescuer. Stars of stage and screen have been battling for my favours. I’ve been smoking pot, and drinking quite a lot, and having a whole load of new experiences. In fact I was just about to embark on my first affair with a married man when you and Bambi came along so inconsiderately and put a spoke in the wheel.’

  Matt gazed stonily at the road in front, and jammed his foot down on the accelerator.

  ‘Darling Larry was giving me a crash course in experience.’

  ‘A crash course! Larry ought to be shot.’

  ‘I don’t know why you’re so cross,’ grumbled Imogen. ‘You don’t want me. You’re just being a dog in the manger. Larry was just being kind. I asked him to seduce me. I thought if I became a woman of the world like Cable, a few more people might fancy me.’

  ‘Well, you’re going about it the wrong way.’ Matt ground the gears viciously.

  ‘When love comes in and takes you for a spin,’ sang Imogen tunelessly. ‘Oh, la la la, it’s bloody awful. Do you think Bambi’ll excite me as corespondent?’

  ‘Probably.’

  ‘Well, what a stupid time for her to stage a comeback, in the middle of an orgy. She must have known Larry’d be up to someone, if not me.’

  Matt ignored her and lit a cigarette.

  She was beginning to feel very odd. Everything like Vesuvius seemed to be erupting inside her.

  ‘Oh well, this time next week, I’ll be back in my little grey home in the West Riding,’ she said fretfully, ‘and you can forget all about me.’

  Then suddenly out of the corner of her eye she saw he was laughing.

  ‘You’re not cross anymore?’

  ‘Absolutely blind with rage.’

  ‘I’m awfully sorry,’ she said, her head flopping on to his shoulder, ‘but I do love you,’ and she passed out cold.

  Chapter Si
xteen

  When she woke next afternoon she thought she was going to die. She’d never known pain like it, as though a nutcracker was slowly crushing her skull in, and a lot of gnomes were hammering from the inside. For a few minutes she lay groaning pitifully, then opened her eyes, whereupon an agonising blaze of sunlight stabbed her like a knife and she hastily shut them again. Wincing, she started to piece together the events of the evening, the crazy lionising, the drinking and pot smoking, and finally the nude bathing. Someone had hung her wet trousers and jersey from the window. She wondered what had happened to her knickers and her shoes. She also had hazy memories of meeting Bambi, and Matt being very cross and bringing her home. But who the hell had undressed her? Sweat broke out, drenching her entire body. She only just made the lavatory in time and was violently sick.

  On the way back to her room she passed Madame and a squeegee mop, wanting to hear all about her encounter with Braganzi and the Duchess. Muttering about shellfish poisoning, Imogen apologised and bolted back into her room, where she cleaned her teeth and then crawled miserably into bed. She tried to remember what she’d said to Matt on the way home. Oh, why had she made such an idiot of herself?

  There was a knock on the door. It sounded like a clap of thunder. It was Matt wearing jeans and no shirt. He had just washed his hair and was rubbing it dry with a large pink mascara-stained towel. Imogen disappeared hastily under the bedclothes. She felt him sit down on the bed and slowly emerged.

  ‘You’re an absolute disgrace,’ he said.

  ‘Oh, go away,’ she moaned. ‘I know I behaved horribly. I’m quite prepared for what’s coming to me, and I don’t want any flowers or letters please.’

  A smile so faint it was almost imperceptible touched his mouth at one corner.

  ‘Rotten France,’ she said, burying her face in the pillow. ‘One spends one’s time being sick for love or just sick. I feel terrible.’

  ‘Serve you right trying to pack ten years’ experience into one night, and as for scribbling obscenities in lipstick all over Mrs Edgworth’s clean car.’

  ‘Holy smoke!’ She sat bolt upright, clutching her head with one hand and the sheet to her breasts with the other. ‘Did I really? Does she know it was me?’

  ‘No, thanks to me. I managed to blur the Yvonne Bismarck bits, so she assumes it’s some random scribbler who got lit-up at the party.’

  ‘Oh, thank goodness!’

  ‘“Goodness,” as Mae West said, “had nothing to do with it.”’ He shook his head. ‘I must say the most outrageous alter ego emerges when you get stoned. I’m not sure your father would be very pleased by your performance last night. Not that anyone else appears to have behaved particularly well. Nicky hasn’t surfaced yet and Jumbo’s looking very poorly.’

  ‘W-where’s Larry?’ she stammered, pleating the sheet with her fingers, unable to meet Matt’s eyes.

  ‘Gone. He sent fondest love and a letter. Bambi’s taken him off to Antibes.’

  ‘Will they be OK?’

  ‘Probably, after a bit of straight talking. They’re both equally to blame.’

  ‘And Tracey?’

  ‘Gone to a thrash in Marbella with some movie star. He wanted you to go too, but I thought you’d had enough excitement to be going on with. By the way I’ve got a present for you,’ and out of his pocket he produced a leather jewel box. For a glorious, lunatic moment Imogen wondered if he was giving her a ring. Then he said, ‘It’s from the Duchess and Braganzi to say thank you. There’s a letter from her, too.’

  Imogen opened the box. It was a gold necklace, set with seed pearls and rubies. She gave a gasp of delight.

  ‘Pretty, isn’t it? Try it on.’

  She bowed her head forward. He put his arms around her to do up the clasp, his broad brown chest was only inches away from her. She ached to reach out and touch it. She trembled as she felt his fingers on her neck. She prayed it was clean enough.

  ‘There.’ Matt leaned back. ‘It looks terrific. Have a look.’ He reached for a hand mirror beside the bed and held it up for her. The necklace was beautiful but the effect was slightly spoiled by a mascara smudge under one eye and a large bit of sleep in the corner of the other. Hastily she rubbed them away.

  ‘It’s so kind of them both. It was so little that I did,’ she muttered. Then she gave a gasp of horror. ‘But I never asked you, I quite forgot. What happened about the piece?’

  ‘They liked it. They hardly changed a thing.’

  ‘Oh, that’s wonderful. And your paper?’

  ‘They’re pretty pleased too.’

  ‘I’m so glad. So it was worth it after all that struggle.’

  ‘Yes, it nearly always is. I feel sort of Christlike today. It’s the best feeling in the world, or almost the best feeling . . .’ he smiled . . . ‘the day after you’ve finished something you’ve really sweated your guts out over.’ He squeezed her thigh gently through the blanket. ‘And it’s all due to you, darling.’

  Imogen wriggled with embarrassment. ‘It was nothing,’ she cast desperately around for a change of subject. ‘Look, does Yvonne really not realise it was me?’

  ‘Well, her mind’s on other things today. Evidently Jumbo disgraced himself last night, and being Saturday, the beach is like Oxford Street in the rush hour, but she’s forgotten all that. She got a telegram midday confirming her film part.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ said Imogen.

  ‘Quite. She’s being utterly insufferable, upstaging Cable in particular; so you can imagine Cable is not in the sunniest of tempers.’

  His hair was nearly dry now. Blond and silky, it flopped over his tanned forehead. Imogen longed to run her fingers through it. She was driven distracted by his nearness, but it was such heaven having him sitting gossiping on her bed, she’d almost forgotten her hangover.

  He got to his feet.

  ‘To celebrate her new starring role, Mrs Edgworth has actually offered to take us all out to dinner. I hope you’ll be able to make it. I need a few allies.’

  When he had gone she opened her letters. There were several invitations, addressed to Morgan Brocklehurst, asking her to parties in various parts of Europe. Someone even wanted her to open a fête in Marseilles next week.

  Larry’s letter was scrawled on a piece of flimsy:

  ‘Darling little Imogen, you were very sweet to me last night, when I needed it very badly, and you succeeded in making Bambi wildly jealous, which is all to the good, although I had great difficulty on the evidence of last night in persuading her how miserable I’d been without her. I’ll send you those pictures when I get them developed. If you ever want a bed in London, come and stay with us. Je t’embrasse, Larry. PS I thought your piece on Mrs Edgworth’s car was inspired.’

  The last letter was from the Duchess.

  ‘My dear Imogen, Thank you again a million times for what you did for Ricky. This little necklace is only a small way of expressing our gratitude. Do come and stay with us next time you have some time off and write and let me know how your holiday works out. I liked your Mr O’Connor and he writes very well too. I wouldn’t give up hope if I were you. Love, Camilla.’

  But hope would be hope of the wrong thing, sighed Imogen, but allowed herself a daydream of having a flat in London, and giving dinner parties, asking the Duchess and Braganzi to meet Larry and Bambi, with Matt coming early to help with the drinks, and her letting him in in a black satin petticoat, and him starting to kiss her so neither of them were remotely ready when the guests arrived.

  Stop it, she told herself firmly, but with the thought that she really would ask him to help her get a job in London, she drifted off to sleep.

  When she woke up around eight, she felt a bit shaky, but normal. The rest of the party, gathered in the bar, greeted her like a long lost sister. Within a few minutes she realised that they were in for a decidedly stormy evening. Yvonne, dressed in a cowl-necked sky-blue dress which could easily have been worn by the Virgin Mary, was at her most poisonous, smiling smugly, a
nd queening it over everyone, particularly Cable, whom Imogen would have felt extremely sorry for if she hadn’t been in such a filthy temper, biting people’s heads off, and casting dark spiteful looks in Imogen’s direction. Now Tracey had gone, she had apparently made it up with Nicky, and insisted on sitting next to him at dinner.

  They had just finished eating. Cable had only toyed with a few asparagus tips, when the waiter put a shampoo sachet on the side of her plate.

  ‘What’s that for?’ said Cable. ‘Do they want me to wash my hair?’

  ‘Cleaning your fingers,’ said Nicky.

  ‘I prefer finger bowls.’

  ‘They’d be quite useful for après-sex,’ said Nicky, examining the sachet. ‘They should put them in bedrooms.’

  ‘I prefer finger bowls for that too,’ said Cable.

  ‘Tinker, tailor, soldier, sailor,’ said Imogen idly counting her olive stones.

  Cable shot her an uncontrollable look of hatred. ‘Pity there isn’t a rhyme that includes dissolute Irish journalists. That’s what you’re really after, isn’t it Imogen?’

  ‘Pack it in,’ said Matt, icily.

  ‘Well it’s true,’ said Cable, opening her bag and getting out her lipstick. At the same time a bill fluttered out on to the table. Cable quickly reached out to retrieve it, but Matt’s hand closed over it first.

  ‘Give it to me,’ hissed Cable.

  Matt smoothed out the bill and looked at it for a minute. A muscle started to flicker in his cheek.

  ‘What’s this for?’ he said quietly.

  ‘A few things I bought in Marseilles.’

  ‘But this is for 4,500 francs!’

  That’s well over £500, thought Imogen incredulously.

  ‘It must have been your peacock feather dress,’ said Yvonne, brightening at the prospect of a showdown. ‘I told you it was a rip-off at the time.’

  ‘Particularly as someone ripped it right off you at that party,’ said James and roared with laughter, stopping suddenly when he realised no one else was.

  ‘D’you mean to tell me you spent 4,500 francs on one dress?’ said Matt slowly.