The Beach Hut Next Door

by Veronica Henry

  Jolyon Jukes, however, was different. Golden hair, dark eyes, tanned skin, but best of all a ready smile, he was confident without being cocky. The hairs on her arms had rippled as his gaze swept over her. His voice was light and dry and teasing; and there was a challenge in his eyes that Elodie couldn’t resist. She wasn’t entirely sure what that challenge was yet, but it had sparked something in her. Adrenaline fuelled her onwards, up the steps of the terrace, through the French windows, in through the drawing room, into the hall and up the stairs to her bedroom. Her heart carried on pounding even when she had regained her breath. She flew into the bathroom, splashed cold water on her face to tone down the redness, dampened a flannel and rubbed it under her arms and onto the back of her neck to wipe off the worst of the perspiration. She dragged a comb through her hair, still salty from this morning’s dip in the sea, and tried to pat it into some sort of style.

  It was a most peculiar and particular kind of panic.

  Elodie ran into her mother’s bedroom and sat at the kidney-shaped dressing table. Her fingers fumbled amidst the make-up in the right-hand drawer. She pulled out lipstick and powder and a wand of mascara. Moments later, an alien with frosted-pink lips stared back at her. There was no time to take it off and start again. She snatched up a bottle of Ma Griffe and dabbed it on her wrists, rubbing them together.

  ‘Elodie? Darling?’ Her mother was behind her, her perfect eyebrows raised in question.

  Elodie didn’t flinch at being caught. Lillie wouldn’t mind her ransacking her things.

  ‘I’ve just met Jolyon Jukes,’ Elodie told her. Lillie looked blank. ‘The Jukes’ son? They’re coming to stay this weekend.’

  ‘Oh.’ Lillie widened her eyes with interest. ‘And is he something else?’

  ‘He’s … something. Certainly.’ Elodie looked at her mother behind her in the mirror. She shrugged but her eyes were sparkling.

  Lillie gave a laugh of delight. ‘You see!’ she said.

  ‘But look at me. I look ridiculous.’

  Lillie came forward. ‘Not pink, my darling. Never pink with your complexion.’ She fished in the drawer for a different colour. ‘Rouge.’

  She demonstrated that Elodie should purse her lips. Her daughter did, and moments later the pink was removed and a carmine slash replaced it.

  ‘Hold still and shut your eyes.’ Lillie traced a sweep of black eyeliner over each of Elodie’s eyelids. She picked up a comb and teased a few curls, backcombing them into place.

  Elodie gazed at her reflection, intrigued. She was still in there, somewhere, but she wasn’t quite sure how to make this new incarnation behave. She stood up.

  ‘What should I wear?’

  Lillie flicked her eyes over her daughter. ‘White linen. Cool. Crisp. Chic.’

  Virginal, thought Elodie, and her stomach tumbled.

  Lillie reached out and picked up a pearl necklace hooked over the side of her dressing table mirror. She slipped them over her daughter’s head. Elodie felt their coolness settle on her collarbone.

  ‘White linen,’ she repeated obediently. Her mother kissed her forehead. Outside, they heard the deep rumble of a motorbike coming up the drive. They looked at each other for a moment.

  ‘That’s him.’ Elodie felt her heart thump.

  ‘I’ll let him in,’ said Lillie. ‘Go.’

  Five minutes later, Elodie examined herself in the bedroom mirror she usually never gave a second glance. Her dress was round-necked and short-sleeved and because she had grown taller since they had bought it, on a trip to London two years ago, it was only just to the knee, but it had a simple elegance. She fluffed up her hair and curled the ends up with her fingertips. She looked at herself in profile, put her hand to her chest and breathed in to calm herself.

  She wasn’t scared, she realized with surprise. She had waited long enough for someone to make her feel like this, so she wasn’t going to waste time being afraid. Anyway, what was there to be scared of? At worst she would look a fool, and that didn’t bother Elodie much. She covered her face with her hands as she gave herself a last glance in the mirror. Her eyes twinkled at her, and she laughed, both at herself and with the exhilaration.

  She dropped her hands to her waist, made her expression sober and locked gazes with herself. ‘Good evening,’ she said, in a cool, languid tone, then burst into peals of laughter, throwing back her head as she left the room.

  Jeanie and Roger Jukes were not what Lillie had expected from Desmond’s description. They roared up to the front of the house in a dark-green frog-eyed Sprite with the roof down. Roger was lean and louche, in a sports jacket and white trousers, and looked as if he would rather be anywhere else; Jeanie was an English rose with a cloud of white-blonde hair and a primness that was almost certainly a smokescreen. Prim girls didn’t marry men like Roger, whose coal-dark eyes were all over everything.

  They drifted into the house, a beguiling double act impossible to decipher. Lillie observed them through narrowed eyes as Desmond ushered them out onto the terrace. The Kavanaghs, she decided, would pale into insignificance next to the Jukes, which in some sense relieved her. Yet she felt wrong-footed. Desmond hadn’t been straight with her. He’d dismissed the Jukes; played them down. Or perhaps he genuinely couldn’t see it? Even she, perspicacious and never missing a detail, could never be sure with Desmond.

  ‘Superb,’ drawled Roger, standing by the stone balustrade and taking in the view as Elodie, armed with a silver tray, handed him a coupe of champagne.

  ‘I love the English seaside,’ sighed Jeanie, her little-girl voice only just above a whisper. ‘But Roger insists on the Med. He’s a sun worshipper.’

  ‘England would be fine if it was like this all the time.’ Roger waved his glass at the early evening sun, shining with such bright confidence that you could hardly imagine it wasn’t there every day through the summer months.

  ‘We are very lucky,’ Lillie told them. ‘Me, I love the South of France, of course, but I have grown to love it here. You never know what you are going to wake up to.’

  She fixed her gaze on Roger. He didn’t flicker.

  ‘So,’ continued Lillie, undaunted. ‘You and Desmond are in discussion about Jukes’s?’

  Roger looked amused. ‘Oh no,’ he said. ‘Not me. There would be no point in him talking to me. Jeanie wears the trousers where the business is concerned. Jukes is her family name, not mine. I took it when we married.’

  Jeanie’s eyes were wide over her champagne. ‘Such a bore. Such a responsibility. But Grandpa left me the shops. I used to go round them with him all the time when I was small, telling him what he should sell. So as recompense for my utter bossiness, I was left the lot.’ She rolled her eyes. ‘But they’ve turned out to be rather a millstone.’

  ‘What a shame,’ said Lillie, and her gaze settled on Desmond, who looked implacable.

  ‘Well,’ he said soothingly. ‘I don’t think you need to panic just yet. There’s huge potential. You just have to come at it from a different angle.’

  Lillie raised an eyebrow. Jeanie smiled. Roger drew on a cigarette, eyes narrowed.

  Elodie cleared her throat.

  ‘Peanut, anyone?’ she asked, thrusting a silver bowl amidst the grown-ups. She felt something shifting amongst them: a shift in the balance of power, and it made her feel uncomfortable.

  Roger scooped up a handful of nuts and dropped them into his mouth, one by one. No one said a word. At that moment, Jolyon came out onto the terrace. Now they were together, Elodie could see his dark roving eyes belonged to his father, and his fair hair was Jeanie’s. He was one of those people for whom genetics had played an excellent game.

  ‘Hello, everyone,’ said Jolyon. ‘Goodness, what a view.’

  ‘Champagne?’ said Elodie, proffering a glass, and his eyes settled on her and she felt relieved that there was a diversion from the awkwardness.r />
  ‘I met your younger sister on the beach earlier,’ said Jolyon. He was teasing her. He was definitely teasing her.

  ‘Really?’ said Elodie. ‘I hope she wasn’t rude. Only she can be.’

  ‘She was perfectly charming.’

  Their eyes met and Elodie felt her cheeks pinken slightly. Suddenly she wasn’t sure if he was joking or not. Did he really think she was someone different? Then he smiled, showing white teeth, and the way his eyes crinkled showed her he was joking, and for the first time ever in her life, she felt rather beautiful.

  As the rest of the guests arrived – the Kavanaghs, and two other sets of friends Lillie had made at the tennis club – Elodie and Jolyon gravitated onto the lawn.

  ‘So – you work for your father?’

  Elodie made a face. ‘Yes. Very unimaginative. But it seemed like the logical thing to do.’

  He gave a sympathetic smile. ‘Same here. Well, I work for my mother. What do you do? Secretary, I suppose?’

  She shot him a fierce glance. She didn’t like being pigeon-holed.

  ‘No, actually.’

  He widened his eyes at her and drew back. ‘Sorry.’

  ‘I’m in charge of marketing. And advertising.’

  ‘Impressive.’

  She relented with a grin. It wouldn’t do to be on her high horse. ‘Well, not really. Basically it means making up slogans. And drawing pretty pictures to put on labels.’ She swirled her champagne in its glass. ‘At the moment, I’m working on Sally and Sammy Strawberry. To try and get children to eat as much jam as possible. Each jar has a Sally or a Sammy sticker behind the label. If you collect ten you can send off for an enamel badge.’

  ‘Very clever.’

  ‘Actually, it is,’ she told him. ‘Sales have soared.’ She leaned in to him. She felt very daring. ‘If you’re very good,’ she said, ‘I’ll get you a badge of your own.’

  He put his head to one side as he considered this, and she was amazed how his eyes laughed even though his face was perfectly straight.

  ‘I wouldn’t want you abusing your power.’

  Elodie felt something rise up inside her; a joyful bubble that was like the beginning of a laugh, but had a keener edge, something syrupy and sharp. From the terrace, she saw her mother watching the two of them, an expression of approval on her face. Lillie gave her a nod. Of encouragement, she thought.

  Then she realized Jolyon was watching them watch each other.

  ‘You’re not much like your mother,’ he said.

  ‘It has been said.’ She rolled her eyes. ‘I haven’t inherited much from her at all. It’s a wretched curse, having a beautiful mother. People can’t help but compare.’

  His eyes didn’t leave her face. She found it disconcerting. ‘What?’ she said.

  ‘But you’re beautiful,’ he said. ‘Much more beautiful, to my mind.’

  Elodie just laughed. Jolyon looked perturbed, as if he wanted to press the point further, but Lillie was waving at them to come in. It was time for dinner.

  Lillie had done the placement with care, Elodie noticed. You could always tell her motives by where she chose to seat people. Lillie was next to Roger Jukes. Jeanie was in placement Siberia, at the bottom end of the table, in between the two tennis club husbands. Elodie could tell she knew that she’d been outcast by the way she didn’t flicker as she took her seat.

  She wondered who was better at the game, Jeanie or her mother. She saw her father frown as he took in the table arrangements. He was next to Mrs Kavanagh; another tennis club wife on the other side. If he thought he should be next to Jeanie, it was too late for him to say, or for the placement to change.

  Jolyon was on Elodie’s left. She was pleased, but she thought she probably couldn’t face food. There was too much excitement in her stomach for so much as a morsel. But she could copy her mother. Not help herself to anything. Push her food around her plate. Talk so much that no one noticed she wasn’t actually eating. So many of her mother’s tricks, hitherto ignored, were coming into play today. She could already imagine Lillie’s triumph.

  ‘So you spend all the summer here?’

  Elodie nodded. ‘Always. We shut up our Worcestershire house. Well, my father rattles around in it during the week, but basically we all move down here for July and August.’

  ‘It’s wonderful.’

  ‘It’s heaven. I love it.’

  Jolyon looked gloomy. ‘It’s the nearest we’re going to get to a holiday. We used to go to Capri. But we’re a bit strapped.’

  Elodie let him fill up her glass with wine. ‘Well, that’s why you’re here, isn’t it?’

  ‘Is it?’ Jolyon shrugged. ‘I’ve stopped listening.’

  He looked weary.

  ‘I think the idea is we join forces,’ said Elodie. ‘I think my father’s going to invest. Or something. But I probably shouldn’t say too much.’

  ‘Well, there’s clearly more money in jam than shops.’ Jolyon looked impressed as several platters of oysters resting on ice were set on the table.

  ‘Who cares about money?’ asked Elodie. ‘No, please, you help yourself first. I’m not an oyster person.’

  ‘It’s easy to say who cares about money when you’ve got it,’ Jolyon told her. ‘We nearly couldn’t afford the petrol to get down here.’

  Elodie looked at him. ‘Well, you should all have come in one car then,’ she said. ‘And a more sensible one at that.’

  Jolyon was speechless for a moment, then laughed. ‘You speak your mind, don’t you?’

  ‘Whose mind am I supposed to speak?’ Elodie retorted, but she was laughing too.

  At the other end of the table she could see Lillie effervescing, as only Lillie could when she had someone who interested her in her sights. Jolyon’s father was leaning back in his chair, bemused, his eyes glittering, a glass of wine in his hand. It was clear Lillie was nothing he couldn’t handle. He was the kind of man who attracted female attention and thrived on it. It was all in an evening’s work to him.

  At the other end of the table, Jeanie was composed, as cool as the ice the oysters were resting on, as charming to the man to the right as to the left of her. It was still early on in the evening. The chatter was animated but controlled; the champagne had relaxed everyone but it was not yet time for fierce debate or ribaldry. There were several courses to get through yet.

  At the head of the table sat Desmond. There was something kingly in his presence tonight, thought Elodie. She felt he was surveying his courtiers, as if each one had a role. What was hers, she wondered? She put down her glass. She’d had more to drink than usual. Reality was slipping away from her. For a moment, she felt unsettled. For the first time, she felt like a grown-up at her parents’ table, rather than a child.

  ‘Are you all right?’

  She turned to find Jolyon staring at her, concerned.

  ‘Fine. Sorry. It’s just a bit hot in here, that’s all.’

  Elodie picked up her water glass and drank.

  When dinner ended, everyone left the table together. Lillie had never subscribed to the tradition of the ladies withdrawing next door while the men were left to smoke cigars and drink port. She was nothing without the company of men, and she presumed all women were the same, so she served coffee and digestifs for everyone in the drawing room. Lit by lamps, with the doors open out onto the sea, the atmosphere was languid and relaxed. Everyone, it seemed, was comfortable in each other’s company. Any fears of a pecking order, the tyranny that rules so many dinner parties, had been rubbed out by the excellent food and wine, and they all slumped into the comfort of the sofas and armchairs while Oscar Petersen played in the background. The stresses of the working week receded into the background, and the pleasures of the weekend ahead stretched out in front of them.

  Only Elodie felt restless, but she hadn’t drunk as much as the
rest. She had spent the whole of dinner enraptured by Jolyon, although she had remembered not to forget her good manners, and had spoken to everyone else at the table. Now she couldn’t remember a word anyone else had said, only what he had. She prowled the room, turning over the record when it came to an end, refilling the silver cigarette box, not sure where to put herself.

  Where she wanted to put herself was next to Jolyon, but he was engrossed in conversation with her father. Every now and then he would look over at her, and twice he held her gaze and smiled. She had no way of telling if he felt the same way she did. Had he just been polite throughout dinner? He too had perfect manners, after all, and would have been trained in feigning undivided interest. Yet the way they had laughed at the same things, and the way he was happy to contradict and argue with her – in a teasing way, not a high-handed way – implied to her there was a mutual attraction. But Elodie was an ingénue. She really had no knowledge of the games men and women played between them.

  Her mother, of course, would be able to guide her. Her mother would know the signs. But Lillie was perched on the edge of a golden velvet armchair, describing something to Roger, her hands drawing pictures in the air, her hair slipping from its chignon, her eyes alive. She was oblivious to her daughter’s need for advice.

  ‘Be bold,’ Elodie told herself. ‘You have to make it happen.’

  Where she had got this courage from, she had no idea, but she had a staunch heart, and she still wasn’t afraid. What was the point in running away from the momentous? Surely you had to do everything in your power to draw it to you?

  She picked up the glass of wine she hadn’t finished from dinner. She looked across to Jolyon and caught his eye. Then she turned and walked out of the French doors and onto the terrace. The night was still and warm and smelt brackish: the tide was out and the trace of drying seaweed tinged the air. The moon hung in the sky, as pale and lustrous as the largest pearl on the necklace her mother had lent her. She could feel it on her skin. She could feel everything on her skin.