Crazy Pavements

by Beverley Nichols

‘Well – like, like, ll-l-like –’ (God! thought Brian, she’s going to stutter. That’s the worst sign of all.)

  ‘Like what?’ he repeated.

  ‘It was the way you said it,’ she murmured, oh, so virginally!

  ‘I didn’t think I said it any particular way.’

  She turned her head, arching her neck like an acro­batic swan.

  ‘You’re such a tease.’

  ‘Honestly, I’m not, Mrs. Gossett.’

  ‘Never mind.’ Her mood changed as suddenly as it had begun. ‘I forgive you.’ She sprang to her feet almost knocking over the wicker chair in which she had been sitting. ‘And to show you I forgive you, we’ll have another dance.’

  And gaily, with hand on hip, and fan fluttering by her side, she was already walking away down the long corridor, in the direction of the ballroom.

  Brian followed miserably. There was no escape.

  On all sides of him were delectable maidens, slim and chic – maidens with whom he might have been happy, maidens with whom he might have danced deliriously. And somewhere, perhaps, was the one particular maiden of his desire. . . .

  Mrs. Gossett suddenly drew up short. ‘My dear!’

  ‘Yes?’

  She raised her arm to point, and then remembering her gentility, quickly let it fall again.

  ‘Surely that’s your friend?’

  Brian’s heart leapt. ‘Who?’

  A sly smile spread over her face, and she coyly glanced at her somewhat tarnished slipper. But as Brian looked in the direction where she had pointed, he saw at the other end of the corridor, Julia.

  He stared at her, his lips parted, a quick flush dyeing his cheeks and fading away again. She was in white, with diamond shoes that glittered, even though she was standing still. By her side was a young man of no par­ticular interest or attraction.

  She had seen him. Here was the man walking quickly towards them while she waited. Brian was rooted to the floor. He wanted to fly, he wanted to stay, he wanted . . . oh, Lord!

  ‘Lady Julia wondered if it was you.’

  ‘Oh yes – of course.’

  ‘Will you come over?’

  Brian glanced plaintively at Mrs. Gossett who had assumed a pose of powerful nonchalance a few yards away.

  ‘I’m awfully sorry, but . . .’

  The man grinned. ‘Well, I’ll deal with that for a bit.’

  ‘I say . . .’ Thank God. . . . He could have hugged this chap. ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Molyneux.’

  Together they went to Mrs. Gossett.

  ‘May I introduce a great friend of mine? Mr. Moly­neux. He’s longing to meet you.’

  Mrs. Gossett was almost inarticulate. The air was so full of romance. At one moment she felt she should be haughty at Brian’s desertion. At another she felt that it was a sublime opportunity for saying things which could be ‘misunderstood.’ And again, she had to rally all her battery of woman’s wiles for the subjugation of Mr. Molyneux. Fortunately, the latter motive was uppermost. So she bit her lips, fluttered her fan, and gave to this new conquest a look of undiluted enticement.

  Languidly she lifted her blood-red fingers on to his arm, and darting a glance at Brian, uttered the one word ‘Later?’ Then she dragged Mr. Molyneux away.

  Why can one never plunge straight into Romance? Why are there always so many antechambers in which one must kick one’s heels, growing tired and cold and dull? Why, in fact, could he not lift Julia in his arms, and carry her out into the night, sealing her lips with kisses until she should say the one thing he longed to hear her say?

  Instead, there was a most prosaic beginning.

  ‘Darling – who is your girl friend?’

  Unaccountably, Brian suddenly felt inclined to defend Mrs. Gossett.

  ‘She’s the Duchess of Pentecost,’ he said. ‘In other words, Mrs. Gossett.’

  ‘Why didn’t you introduce me?’

  ‘Listen, Julia. I know she looks peculiar. But she’s my editress. It’s agony, but it can’t be helped.’

  ‘How terribly chivalrous you are.’

  Brian swallowed a lump in his throat, but did not reply.

  Julia watched him. She was more happy than she dared to confess, even to herself, that she had found him here. But she would not show it – yet.

  ‘I’m being horrible,’ she said quickly. ‘We’ll go and sit down somewhere.’

  It was nearly ten minutes before they found a place – a shadowed corner near the ballroom, where the sound of the bands came only fitfully, as though blown on the wind. Nor could they yet talk as they desired, for no sooner had they sat down than the screen trembled, and a head appeared from behind. It was Molyneux.

  ‘Sorry to interrupt,’ he said. ‘But I’ve called for my halo.’

  Brian’s face fell. ‘You haven’t brought her back yet?’

  ‘No. Guess who she’s dancing with now.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Maurice!’

  He could have shouted with joy. Julia peered beyond the screen.

  ‘It’s true,’ she said. ‘Look!’

  He looked. From where they were sitting they could see the open doorway of the ballroom. And at that very moment, the linked figures of Maurice and Mrs. Gos­sett slid into view. The dance was a tango, and Mrs. Gossett was extracting from it every possible curve, pirouette and posture. She clung to Maurice like an excited leech. As for Maurice himself, it was only too evident that he was exceedingly alarmed. He held his head as far from hers as decency admitted, and glanced wildly round the room with staring, horror-struck eyes. She was a far greater problem in life than any he had hitherto encountered.

  Brian felt at peace with all the world.

  ‘She’s good for another hour with him,’ he said.

  ‘Angel,’ whispered Julia to Molyneux. ‘You can take your halo.’

  And they were again alone.

  Julia sank on to the sofa, over which a tangled spray of yellow orchids had fallen.

  ‘Do you like all this sort of thing?’

  ‘Now you’re here.’

  ‘Yes – but forget me. Do you like being fearfully smart and gilt-edged and – you know?’

  ‘It’s rather new for me.’

  ‘Would you like to do it always?’

  He looked at her boldly. ‘Is that an offer?’

  She was silent for a moment. Then: ‘How you’ve changed.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘You wouldn’t have known what a remark like that even meant a few months ago.’ She leant forward. ‘Don’t change, darling.’

  He studied his finger-nails. ‘I’ve got to grow up some time.’

  ‘Physically, yes. But not in other ways.’

  ‘You mean you still want me to go on dropping bricks, and being awkward, and not knowing whether you eat caviare with a spoon or a fork?’

  ‘You eat it with a knife, my dear, but that’s beside the point.’ She was amazed at herself to find how diffi­cult it was for her to keep this conversation flippant.

  ‘Simplicity’s a rather futile rôle,’ he said. There was the suspicion of a sulk in his voice.

  ‘No, it isn’t. It’s a wonderful rôle. You used to play it perfectly.’

  ‘Did I?’ he asked eagerly. How wonderful it is to be analysed by somebody one loves!

  She nodded. ‘When you first called on me – what ages ago it seems – you were an absolute child. I felt it was almost wrong of you to be allowed to smoke cigar­ettes. And as for a cocktail . . .’

  He laughed happily. ‘You gave me the first I ever had.’

  ‘I know. I was a brute.’

  ‘Julia – really – that’s overdoing it a bit.’

  She pursed her lips. ‘Perhaps. But even if a thing’s got to be destroyed one doesn’t take any particular plea­sure in being the one to destroy it.’

  He was too puzzled to reply. And she, too, was puzzled by herself. She had imagined that the maternal feeling, the desire to shelter, which sooner or
later is bound to make its appearance in the romances of any popular novelist, was reserved for the pages of fiction alone. It was more than tiresome to feel like this, but she could not help it. And having said so much, one could hardly draw back. She went on:

  ‘Somehow, I hate to see you here at all. I hate to know that you’re learning to talk in the same silly way as all the rest. Sometimes I hear you say a thing’s “divine,” or “too adorable,” and each time you do that a cold shudder goes down my back. It isn’t you. You’ve learnt it from Don or Maurice or somebody and it means nothing.’

  ‘But they’re your friends.’

  ‘Yes. And look at them.’ She laughed quickly to cover the bitterness in her voice. ‘You used to say things were “jolly,” and I even believe I heard you use the word “topping” once. Why don’t you do that any more?’

  ‘Because I’ve stopped being a sweet little schoolboy, I suppose.’

  ‘That’s the trouble.’

  He looked at her moodily. ‘I believe you’re making fun of me.’

  She half closed her eyes. ‘That’s the last thing – the very last thing.’

  ‘I’ll put on my old dress-suit again, if you like. With the patched trousers.’

  ‘No. For God’s sake don’t go as far as that!’ She laughed in spite of herself.

  ‘Thank you for laughing at last.’

  There was a mist across her eyes. ‘Oh, my dear, you are a kid.’

  ‘I’m not.’ He squared his shoulders heroically. ‘I’m a terribly smart young man-about-town. I breakfast on dry martinis and sweet corn. I’m going to write a brilliant novel and make thousands and thousands of pounds and give you bracelets which are so utterly modern that they’ll be dated before you have time to wear them twice.’

  ‘Are you?’

  ‘Yes. And I’m going to dance with you now. Like a good old lounge-lizard. For hours and hours and hours. Oh, Julia, isn’t this priceless?’

  She gave him her arm. ‘You’ve said it at last.’

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Brian’s education proceeded apace. A fortnight later he went to a party given by the famous Tanagra Guest. People still talk of that party.

  Tanagra was as much a product of the war as Mon­sieur Poincaré, and some people were inclined to think she was equally regrettable. Her profession was, osten­sibly, that of a miniature-painter. She had painted miniatures of almost everybody in London, and she had the reputation of being able to compress the largest possible woman into the smallest possible space, rather in the manner of an animal-tamer persuading elephants to squeeze through paper hoops.

  Her appearance – six feet tall, thin, with a red Eton crop and large horn-rimmed glasses, was mysterious enough. But not so mysterious as her past. Speculation as to her origin was rife. Some said that she had begun as an attendant in a Ladies’ Cloak-room in Boston, others that she had been employed in a chewing-gum factory. As a matter of fact, she had been a mistress of drawing in a small school in New Jersey, from which she departed owing to a slight disagreement on the subject of the nude. What happened to her during the war, nobody knows.

  She had a mother somewhere, but she had not seen her for many years. But that did not matter much, because mothers were not among her friends’ more popular hobbies. All they cared about was ‘parties’ and they looked upon Tanagra to provide them.

  Provide them she did. Of party-giving she made a trade. Who paid for her parties one never quite knew. Somebody paid, of course, because one could not fill that huge studio in Chelsea with Easter lilies, and pro­vide cases of champagne and buckets of caviare out of the mere practice of miniature-painting.

  Still, what did it matter? Tanagra’s parties were always such fun. Everybody did their stunts so much better than in other people’s houses. Evan Spade, for instance, swore that the only place where he could imitate Beatrice Lillie was on Tanagra’s sofa, and that, surely, was enough to make any party a success nowa­days? And nobody minded, at Tanagra’s, if Mrs. Grindhaven danced a polka to a palpable valse, or if couples disappeared, a little oddly, into the backyard, or if Lady Jane put her cigar ash down one’s back. For Tanagra had the only two essential qualities of the suc­cessful party-maker. She knew the meaning of shaded lights. And she did not know the meaning of the word ‘hock-cup.’

  The present party was a new idea, and Brian, in his new capacity, as a bright young person, had been invited. Everybody was to be dressed as a child. And not only to be dressed, but to act as a child as well. The idea of Lord William, garbed in crawlers, lisping childish words, seemed too good to miss. Besides, Julia was going. She had said, ‘You must go. You’ll look so adorable in shorts.’ At which he had held his head very high.

  His invitation was written on children’s note-paper with pink woolly lambs at the top, and said:

  ‘Dear Brian, will you please come to my party on the fourteenth? Yours affectionately, Tanagra.’ And in the bottom right-hand corner was written, ‘Please tell your nurse to call for you at 4 a.m.’

  Had Society always done this sort of thing? He asked himself this question, as he stood, clad in shorts, socks, a tight-fitting jersey and sailor hat, prior to set­ting out. Did Mr. Gladstone and the Earl of Beaconsfield and the late Duchess of Argyll so attire themselves, and make merry in such scanty garments? Or had he got into rather a peculiar set of people? The question answered itself as soon as it fluttered through his mind. Shame on him to doubt these new friends! Julia, Lord William, Maurice? How could they possibly be ‘pecu­liar’? Shame indeed!

  He was to call for Maurice, who had insisted that they should go to the party together. He was a little nervous about this arrangement because it was becom­ing only too evident that Maurice was beginning to dis­like him. However, he had to go to the party with somebody.

  When he arrived at the studio at a quarter to eleven, fifteen minutes before his time, a weary-looking house­keeper informed him that Mr. Cheyne had been forced to go out for a few minutes but would be back at eleven. Brian was rather glad, because he had never been in the studio before, and he thought it might tell him some­thing about its owner. It did, but in a way which he had hardly expected.

  The first revelation came at once. He wanted to have a cigarette. On a painted table near the fireplace lay a small papier-mâché box. He opened it, then started back in astonishment.

  Inside the box was a slip of paper, laid across the cigar­ettes – and written in large block capitals was the word

  THIEF!

  This was very odd. It made him feel quite uncom­fortable. He found himself blushing as though the accusation were intended to apply to him alone. There was no doubt that Maurice had written it. The ‘THIEF!’ was in his handwriting. He closed the box guiltily and went away to sit on the extreme edge of the sofa.

  Then he thought – ‘this is ridiculous. It must be some absurd joke.’ A little self-consciously he got up from the sofa, whistling, his hands in his pockets. He approached the box again, and stretched a tentative finger towards it. THIEF! No. Better leave it alone. Perhaps these were very special cigarettes. Perhaps they were filled with some exotic drug. Anyway, there must be some reason.

  He decided he would have a drink. He spied a tan­talus and a soda-water bottle on a sideboard near the door. Maurice surely wouldn’t mind. He approached the sideboard, and lifted up the decanter.

  Another slip of paper fluttered on to the floor. He put down the decanter as though it had bitten him, then stooped down, wondering what he would find this time. There was another message.

  ‘YOU THINK I DON’T KNOW, DO YOU?’

  Brian stared at the paper with wide-eyed amazement. Who thought that who did not know? And what was it that they didn’t know? Did it mean that Maurice had a sixth sense that enabled him to discover automatically who had been at his whisky? Did it mean . . . He began to feel slightly indignant. If wherever he turned he were to be silently accused of incipient kleptomania, he would prefer to go outside.

  Then cu
riosity seized him. There might be more slips of paper. It really would be rather fun just to see. Would the sponge in the bathroom squeak out the word ‘robber’ if one squeezed it? Would the bath-mat be inscribed with the legend, ‘Thou God seeth me’? He tiptoed across to the door of the bedroom, opened it, and peeped in.

  A truly remarkable sight met his eyes. For, all round the walls were pinned sheets of note-paper, large and small, bearing a series of singular messages. Forgetting the fact that he might be regarded as guilty of indecent curiosity, he stepped inside.

  On the first piece of paper he read:

  ‘WHAT IS TEN SHILLINGS?’

  He felt slightly dizzy. If Maurice did not know what ten shillings was, nobody did. Underneath this question was drawn the face of a man, contorted into a sneer, pulling a long nose at ten silver disks.

  More and more singular. For the next slip of paper bore the single word:

  ‘YET!’

  By the side of this word Maurice had drawn an emaciated woman, lifting a long green-tipped finger to her lips.

  He turned to the adjoining slip.

  ‘TEN SHILLINGS EVERY WEEK FOR A YEAR EQUALS . . .’

  What did it equal? The next slip told him.

  ‘TWENTY-SIX POUNDS.’

  Underneath the ‘twenty-six pounds’ were depicted several touching scenes illustrating the powers of this sum for the purchase of happiness. The first repre­sented a pink youth with large hips lying on the sands of the Lido. The second showed three cases of cham­pagne. The third showed two suits, one blue and one black. The fourth was a somewhat attenuated drawing of the Eiffel Tower, standing stark against a roseate sky.

  Brian began to see light. These legends represented Maurice’s method of curbing his expenditure. It had never been exactly reckless, and in the circumstances he did not feel inclined to wonder at it. To wake up every morning, in the shadow of this artistic deification of parsimony, would be enough to put anybody off buying anything. There were many other legends, at which he took a cursory glance:

  ‘BISMARCK USED TO WORK TILL DAWN.’

  ‘WHY NOT A BUS?’

  ‘GIVE YOUR STOMACH A REST. WE ALL EAT TOO MUCH.’

  ‘DO YOU NEED IT?’