First Friends

by Marcia Willett

  ‘I’m sure that she meant that to be comforting,’ murmured Alex as Tom approached with their drinks. ‘Why can’t I sit next to you?’

  ‘Cass never lets her guests sit by their partners,’ said Kate, who had only just remembered this mildly disturbing fact. ‘She thinks that it’s more fun to split them up.’

  She took her drink from Tom and, while he talked to Alex about the antique print of Devonport that Alex had found for Kate to give him for his birthday, Kate let her gaze roam around the room over the other guests. Her heart gave a little jump as she saw George’s handsome sleek head bent towards a red-headed girl and she instinctively looked for Felicity before she pulled herself together. As if Cass would have Felicity in her house! There was Tony, cigarette in hand, talking to a short brown-haired girl and a tall dark striking-looking girl who was faintly familiar. She had an inward look as though only part of her mind was on Tony’s story. No good! Kate shook her head. Maybe it would come later. Abby, dressed in slinky black, was talking animatedly to a tall, fair man with his back to Kate while William stood by listening with an amused look on his face.

  ‘You know Ralph, don’t you, Kate?’ Tom was saying and the man on the edge of the group was turning to smile at her.

  ‘Of course.’ Kate remembered Mark’s First Lieutenant who had been so kind to her at that ghastly party and smiled with real warmth. ‘How nice to see you, Ralph. And now, of course, I remember! It’s Harriet over there. I knew I recognised her. Wasn’t she studying to be a Chartered Surveyor or something?’

  ‘Yes, she passed her finals just before we moved down,’ said Ralph. ‘We’ve got a quarter at Shit-a-Brick.’ He smiled and Alex looked puzzled. Kate laughed.

  ‘This is Alex Gillespie,’ she said. ‘He’s an expert on antiquarian books and prints but he doesn’t understand crude naval language. Shit-a-Brick, roughly translated,’ she explained to Alex, ‘is Crapstone. And this is Ralph Masters.’ She noticed Ralph’s enquiring look and knew at once what he was thinking. ‘Alex is my boss,’ she said, lightly. ‘I’m a working woman now, you know.’

  She hardened herself to go through the same procedure with George and Tony and was relieved when Cass announced that dinner was ready and they all moved into the dining room.

  Mrs Hampton and her niece Jinny, who had come down from Exeter for the weekend, had been helping to prepare the house and cook the dinner and they stayed on to wait at table. It was all beautifully done and everybody was suitably impressed. They sat down fourteen to dinner and Kate looked with interest at Cass’s seating plan. Two wives—Belinda and Pat—whose husbands were at sea, pairing off, as it were, with George and another submariner called Stephen, whose wife lived in Alverstoke. Tom, flanked by Harriet and Belinda, sat at one end of the great oval table and Cass sat at the other with Alex on one side and Stephen on the other. Kate had been placed between Tony and Ralph, looking directly across to Pat who had William and George on either side. She was interested to see that George and Pat seemed to be old, if slightly embarrassed, friends and she wondered what Cass was up to. She looked at Alex who was unfolding his napkin, his head inclined towards Cass, and then at Stephen who was talking to Abby on his left. At that moment, Jinny stepped between them to fill Abby’s glass and a quick look flashed between Cass and Stephen which made Kate sit up and take notice. She glanced involuntarily at Tom whose attention was taken up by Harriet who was fiddling with knives and forks and looking very odd. Kate tried to analyse her look: it was conscious, excited and controlled. She turned to Tony, who was staring at Cass with an intense but unreadable expression, and as she did so caught a look of despair on the face of the girl called Liz. She was puzzled and a feeling of dread began to weigh on her; a sensation of something being created that would have some future drastic effect on all their lives, as a stone tossed into a pond causes waves and ripples long after it has sunk to the bottom. There was an electric quality of overcharged emotions as if thought waves were beating the air like wings: people saying one thing and thinking another.

  ‘Yes, it’s a lovely house. Absolutely lends itself to parties . . . ’ (What fun this is! Mustn’t let anyone guess, though. His wife would be down on us like a ton of bricks.) Cass: talking to Alex and thinking of Stephen.

  ‘I hear that you’re a terribly important person now with letters after your name. Now that you’re down we must see lots of you . . . ’ (She’s a real sweetie. Terribly shy, though. Lovely legs.) Tom: talking to Harriet and thinking about her in a different light.

  ‘Still a hoary old bachelor, I’m afraid. Still waiting for some kind lady to take me on. Living in the Mess at the moment . . . ’ (I wonder if Cass heard that rumour about me and Pat. I wouldn’t put it past her. Still, it’s rather fun to see her again. Wonder how long her husband’s away.) George: talking to Belinda and thinking about Pat.

  ‘Oh, of course. I know who you are. I bought a wonderful book from you for my mother . . . ’ (I wonder which one of them it is that he fancies. Oh, God. Why can’t it ever be me?) Liz: talking to Alex and yearning after Tony.

  ‘How refreshing to meet someone who isn’t Navy. Do you live in the village?’ (It’s madness! What risks she takes! And so do I. I’m like a lovesick teenager. I can feel her leg under the table. Christ! Her old man’s looking straight at me!) Stephen: talking to Abby and thinking about Cass.

  ‘So when’s John back? Haven’t seen him around for a bit . . . ’ (She’s bored with me. I knew it. I wonder which of the bastards it is!) Tony: talking to Pat and thinking about Cass.

  ‘I hadn’t realised you weren’t Navy. Do you live locally?’ (Oh, what shall I do: I love him. I love him.) Harriet: talking to William and thinking about Tom.

  ‘Delicious pâté. My compliments to the chef.’ (At least I can sit and look at her. She’s not with us—in another world.) Alex: talking to Cass and thinking about Kate.

  As Jinny came round collecting empty plates, Kate shook her head as if to rid it of some fantastic thoughts and looked at Alex. He was leaning back in his chair, one hand in his pocket, the other idly turning his wine glass round by its stem. He was watching her and, as their eyes met, he raised his glass to her.

  ‘WELL, THEY CERTAINLY KNOW how to give a party!’ Alex negotiated the turn in the lane and headed for Walkhampton.

  ‘They’re experts.’ Kate was huddled into her shawl, pleasantly relaxed now having had rather more than usual to drink. Her emotions were heightened and disturbed by the atmosphere of the party. ‘They really love it, of course. I’m glad you enjoyed it.’

  ‘Yes, I did. It was nice to be with you in a non-work situation. May we do it again?’

  ‘Well, I don’t know when Cass will be having another party . . . ’ began Kate innocently and Alex laughed.

  ‘I asked for that,’ he said as he drove down the hill and over the little hump back bridge that spans the River Meavy. ‘But you know perfectly well what I meant.’

  ‘It was fun,’ admitted Kate and, for a blissful moment, forgot about being married, her reputation locally and how gossip or a divorce would affect the twins. She put out her hand and touched his knee. ‘Thank you for coming.’

  He covered her hand at once with his own and held it. ‘It’s a wonderful night,’ he said. ‘The moon’s up. Do you want to go straight home? We could take the Princetown road and go up to the top. The moor looks so unearthly by moonlight.’

  Kate stared at him in amazement. They had reached the Burrator Hotel and he waited at the crossroads, eyebrows raised.

  ‘I . . . I should love it,’ she stammered. ‘It’s a wonderful idea.’

  ‘Good.’ Alex turned right and they drove in silence until they reached Walkhampton Common.

  Kate drew in her breath as Alex swung the car into one of the parking areas and switched off the engine. The flat white disc that was the moon bleached everything of colour: the granite boulders and the grass, sparkling in the grip of frost, created a silver-white background against which the gorse bushes and
thorn trees were etched black.

  ‘Shall we get out?’ suggested Alex after a moment. ‘I’ve got a rug here somewhere. You could wrap yourself in that. The air will be unbelievable.’

  Kate got out and Alex came round to wrap the rug around her. He left an arm there afterwards and held her close against his side. Their breath smoked in the sharp singing air and the stars glittered with such brilliance that it seemed that they too must be touched by the frost. Kate’s teeth chattered, partly from the cold and partly with excitement. She realised that she was trembling from head to foot and he held her closer and turned her chin up with his free hand.

  ‘I can’t imagine a better time or place to tell you that I think I love you,’ he said. ‘I know you’re not free. I know there are all sorts of problems. But do you want to try to resolve them so that we can have a chance? Or is it still too soon for you?’

  She looked up at him at last. ‘I’m afraid,’ she said, almost inaudibly. ‘If I start, I’m afraid that I shan’t know how to stop.’

  ‘That’s what I thought,’ he said, with a sigh of relief, and he bent to kiss her.

  The rug and shawl fell unheeded to the ground as they held each other. They were disturbed by a heavy lorry that lumbered by, the driver banging derisively on his hooter and they drew apart. Kate stared up at Alex, her eyes blind with moonlight, and began to laugh. She was shivering violently in her thin silk shirt and he gave an exclamation and, bending down, picked up the rug and her shawl and wound her up in them.

  ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘I’m going to take you home.’

  OTHER TINY RIPPLES WERE beginning to spread.

  On their way home, Ralph and Harriet had a row: a silly affair that blew up out of nothing. Ralph had enjoyed his evening and said so. He enthused about the Wivenhoes, their home, the food, and went on at some length about what a great chap old Tom was, remarking more than once about how glad he was to see Harriet getting on with him so well.

  At last Harriet, more infatuated by Tom than ever and torn by feelings of irritation and guilt, snapped at him, saying that it was a pity that he couldn’t have sat by Tom himself if he liked him so much and that he seemed to be doing very well with Abby.

  Ralph was shocked into a surprised silence and after a moment or two decided to be hurt rather than finding out what, if anything, lay behind this rather uncharacteristic outburst. He had had just enough to drink to feel pleasantly martyred and when one or two other things of a cutting nature had been said on either side, they both subsided into silence. Ralph’s was a surly resentful silence: Harriet’s a guilty desperate one. They went to bed—each pointedly on his and her own side—still in silence, Ralph to fall at once into a heavy sleep whilst Harriet lay beside him across the icy sheet, staring into the darkness and wishing she were dead.

  LIZ TRIED TO IGNORE her heavy heart and chattered to a silent Tony on the way back to Plymouth. When he stopped outside her flat, he looked at her properly for the first time that evening and felt the prickings of guilt. He was surprised at how upset he’d been to realise that his affair with Cass was over. They’d been friends for years and he knew the score and had been as happy with the arrangement as she had. Why then did he feel jealous and miserable?

  He looked at Liz—a little brown girl: brown skin, brown eyes, brown hair—who was always prepared, even at disgracefully short notice, to be used as a stop gap and smiled at her.

  ‘Sorry, Liz,’ he said. ‘What a lout I’m being and what an angel you are to put up with me. I suppose there wouldn’t be a cup of coffee if I came in?

  Liz’s spirits soared and she smiled at him with such radiance that her plain little face was quite transformed. Taken aback and seized with an even greater sense of remorse and also with a confused feeling of paying Cass out, he pulled her into his arms and kissed her thoroughly and with great expertise. Her arms went round him and he began to feel more than the prickings of guilt.

  ‘Come on,’ he said, his lips against her hair. ‘Let’s go inside.’

  Fifteen

  As Cass embarked upon her affair with Stephen Mortlake, so Kate plunged into hers with Alex. She had been right in saying that once she started she would be unable to stop. Constitutionally unable to do anything by halves, she started the relationship with a whole-heartedness with which she had begun her marriage with Mark. It was as if she had been living in another world for the last twelve years, a sort of limbo existence, which had suddenly shattered leaving her free. She spent every available moment with Alex, revelling in the new freedom which had the effect of a powerful drug. Physically she was indeed drugged by his power over her body. If it had begun as a friendship, a meeting of minds, it was now balancing out with a vengeance. Having known only unsatisfying sex with an insensitive man, she now learned what making love was all about. And she simply couldn’t get enough of it. Night and day she burned for the physical contact of a man whom she loved and desired, knowing that her passion was fully reciprocated. Love-making was a leisured, happy, earth-moving experience and Kate was totally disorientated.

  Alex was moved, amused and delighted in turns. However, he was still cautious about pushing her into anything and recognised that she needed a period of freedom to enjoy what they shared as herself, Kate, rather than to have to think of herself in connection with the twins or Mark.

  For a few blissful weeks this was the case and then the twins came home for Christmas and Kate returned to earth with a bump. The real difficulties of the situation now presented themselves forcibly to her and Alex waited to see how she would react. To begin with, they could spend far less time together and certainly not at night. The dogs had often proved a bit of a problem here and since Kate had preferred, during week nights, to be in Alex’s flat rather than at the cottage, Megs and Honey had got used to sleeping at the flat and being taken for early-morning runs on the moor on Kate’s way home. They were obliging, good-natured dogs and had settled quite happily to this new routine. At weekends Alex came to the cottage. Up to this point, Kate had been fairly relaxed about being seen in public with him. In Tavistock it was accepted as a working relationship and with the dark winter evenings hurrying everyone indoors, it was unlikely that anyone would be around at the crucial moments to see Kate’s car still parked in a back road or to see her emerging very early to take the dogs for a run before she hurried home. She would reappear at the usual time to start work and no one was the wiser. They were never disturbed at the cottage and it had been one of the happiest times of Kate’s life.

  Now, driving the twins home across a sullen sodden moor, brooding under heavy rain clouds, Kate realised that her brief visit to paradise was over. She listened to their chatter and answered their questions whilst trying to imagine herself explaining the situation to them. She had been fairly certain that the separation from Mark would not be distressing for them. The visit to Cheltenham had not been a happy one and Mark had felt it necessary to try to belittle Kate in their eyes and had been short-tempered; Kate was glad that she had never criticised him to them or justified her own actions. She knew that she had no need to, Mark was more than capable of doing all that was needed himself. An affair with Alex or a divorce were quite different issues. She had heard that the twins’ headmaster had decided views on the subject of divorce and she knew that the boys would hate being both the objects of discussion and in the minority. So far as she knew, there was only one divorced couple with a boy at the school. No, divorce was quite out of the question, even if Mark agreed to it. And on what grounds would it be? Her infidelity with Alex, thereby proving that Mark and the gossips had been right after all? Would she be allowed to keep the boys if she had been committing adultery? Maybe they would be put in Mark’s care, living with the Websters while he was at sea. Her hands, gripping the wheel, turned icy at the thought. She saw herself in court under Mark’s cold disgusted gaze and shivered: out of the question until the boys had finished school or at least left Mount House.

  So then, did she explain to
the boys that she loved Alex and that she was having an affair with him? How would they react? Somehow it seemed quite impossible. She tried to imagine herself with Alex, laughing, talking, hugging, kissing—with the boys looking on. It simply didn’t work. They would still see each other, of course. Cass would continue to look after the twins some days whilst Kate went to the shop and maybe Alex could come round from time to time. The twins liked him and were used to seeing him. They’d just have to be very careful. The boys simply must not suspect. And nor must anyone else. It struck her for the first time that Mark could all but destroy her if everything came out and she felt her old fears returning. Thank goodness she worked for Alex and that he lived above the shop. At least, during the working day, they could continue to live and love.

  Kate caught herself thinking that, for the first time ever, the school holidays were going to seem very long indeed!

  CASS WAS HAVING HER own problems. Stephen was proving to be a rather demanding lover, prone to turning up unexpectedly on weekdays and telephoning at unsuitable moments. He had fallen very heavily for Cass, finding her light-hearted attitude, her great beauty and amazing generosity a complete contrast to what he was used to from his own wife. He fell for her hook, line and sinker and simply had no idea how an affair of this sort should be conducted. Cass was flattered, amused and then concerned. She had made the fatal mistake of assuming that his anxiety lest his old bat of a wife should discover his infidelity would encourage him to exercise restraint. But this was not the case. After a few visits he was pleading that they should throw caution to the winds and set up home together. Cass, torn between a desire to shriek with laughter and very real terror that he might drop her right in it, pointed out that she had no intention of abandoning her four children or Tom and that if he didn’t calm down, she wouldn’t see him again. This brought him to his senses but he was still unreliable and Cass, feeling that for once she had seriously misjudged the situation, was deeply relieved when Christmas approached and Stephen was obliged to return to Alverstoke to the bosom of his family.