Tell the Girl

by Sandra Howard

  He’d turned his back to Ludo and was studying me. I felt nervous, unable to withstand the scrutiny. ‘I want to talk about infidelity, Susannah,’ he said, taking a sip of his drink and keeping his shaded eyes trained.

  ‘I’m not very up in that,’ I laughed, while thinking inevitably of someone close to me who was. ‘Couldn’t contribute anything useful, I’m afraid.’

  ‘You need to be up in it,’ he said. ‘It goes on, it’s universal and I want to give you some advice. There are things you should know.’ I was kneading my hands in my lap and he covered them with one of his own. ‘Within a year your husband will have been unfaithful to you. That’s the way it is, a fact that you have to accept and understand.’ His hand moved to rest in an unthreatening way on my thigh. ‘You should rise above it; maintain your dignity. Carve out a life for yourself, do things that interest you; have some adventures and experiences of your own. A little variety is no bad thing.’

  He’d left me feeling stranded, floundering like a gaping fish. I wanted to say with cool control that in my view, fidelity and trust were the essence of marriage and such sophisticated cynicism was beyond me. But Joe had been unfaithful to me and it had been within a year, since I felt sure the affair had begun some months before. As Tony probably knew – as had the people staying at the Capri villa. But I wasn’t capable of high-minded comebacks and could only manage a lightly raised eyebrow.

  ‘You’ve left me speechless,’ I said. ‘I think we’d better change the subject, don’t you?’

  Just then, our host, Rory, came to sit on the sofa arm, to my huge relief. ‘I’m sure you’re being an insidious corrupting influence, Tony,’ he said. ‘And anyway, my aunt wants to talk to you – probably has a bone to pick, she always does. You haven’t got a drink, Susannah. Don’t go away, I’ll be right back. White wine okay?’

  Ludo had moved on. Dominic Elwes, at the other end of the sofa, was being morosely uncommunicative. I re-crossed my legs, smoothed the skirt of my short white dress with its silver-banded middle and tried to contain a fiercely beating heart. Alicia was always at the front of my mind, but Tony Lambton had just lit her up like a thousand light bulbs. And now she was approaching, coming to sit down. It was too much.

  ‘Hello, Susannah, how are you? How’s the work – hard at it as ever?’ Alicia perched on the sofa beside me. ‘I was just talking to Joe. He’s completely one-track about this fabulous-sounding trip, couldn’t get him off the subject. But I’m dying to hear, is Sinatra as sexy and drop-dead gorgeous as you’d expect? Did you absolutely melt?’

  ‘I did a bit, especially when the eyes were full on! But I’m sure this trip’s a pipe-dream. It was a spur-of-the-moment, friendly remark that he’ll forget in a flash.’

  ‘No, it really seems to be on. Joe said, when he phoned Henrietta afterwards she told him her friend Gloria had confirmed it, saying she was invited, too. And you’ve got dinner with Frank and Dean Martin at the Mirabelle tomorrow. I mean, wow!’

  ‘Well, let’s wait and see, shall we?’ I said tightly, seething. Joe hadn’t told me any of that, only that he’d phoned Henrietta to thank her. No word about dinner at the Mirabelle . . . What shitty right had Alicia to know first? ‘And anyway,’ I continued, deciding to bluff it out, ‘I don’t see much hope of tying up plans in a restaurant with Frank and Dino hamming it up. Frank calls him Dag.’ I slipped out this newfound knowledge defiantly. ‘They’ll be planning their nightlife and how to dodge the fans. It’s all so academic. We couldn’t afford the fares, and I’m sure they dress like it’s the Oscars every night out in Beverly Hills, sequins and slinky fishtail ballgowns. No way have I got the clothes.’

  ‘I’ve got cupboards-full,’ Alicia said, ‘which I certainly won’t be wearing. I’m pregnant actually, nearly five months. You can borrow anything you like. You must!’

  I stared, desperate not to let slip any emotion. Whose baby? Joe’s? Toby’s? ‘That’s wonderful!’ I exclaimed, struggling to force out a semblance of a smile. ‘Terrific news.’ My mind was feverishly trying to imagine what it might mean. Alicia taken up with the baby – even possibly showing more interest in her husband? Some hope. ‘Toby must be over the moon,’ I said, fishing.

  ‘He’d better be. He hasn’t totally tuned into it yet, though, all the ramifications . . .’

  And what were those? I gazed tensely at the smiling, blooming, two-faced woman beside me on the sofa; full-lipped, rich chestnut hair tumbling onto her smooth, bare shoulders. The band at the top of her silky strapless dress was tight, but her thrusting melon-shaped tits were still on show; no one could miss them under the pink-silk folds.

  ‘I’m serious about the clothes,’ Alicia said. ‘I’d love to think they were being used.’

  ‘Thanks, that’s amazing of you, but let’s see if this trip’s really on.’ I shut up after that, unable to take any more. How could she come and plonk herself down next to me so brazenly? How did she have the gall? Even Alicia couldn’t keep up the phony smiles and chumminess for long; she soon drifted off, back into the smoky body of the room, leaving me shaking like a reed.

  I stayed on the sofa listening to Cy and his Calypso rhythms. My stomach ached with period pains; my eyes smarted from the fug and the effort not to cry. It was after midnight. I had an early booking, a full day’s modelling ahead of me and Joe would want to stay for hours. Did I have to take off home alone and leave him to Alicia’s charms? But staying or going made little difference, I had scant hope of sleep either way.

  Tony Lambton’s advice was in my mind, which brought a bitter smile to my lips. It wasn’t much use to me – I was hardly going to put it into practice. I was Joe’s little bourgeois wifey, after all, far too middle-class to rise above his unfaithfulness and shape up to the ways of the world.

  Chapter 5

  Simon’s expression was unreadable. They were standing close in the bedroom and Daisy held her breath. It felt like being stranded on a precipice and praying he’d throw a rope; her heart was beating fiercely enough to fracture her ribcage.

  He’d appeared unexpectedly an hour ago, at lunchtime. Daisy had been baking bread; the house smelled and looked like a French boulangerie, stacked with still-warm baguettes and loaves. She was late with her cookery column and had planned to write up the recipe then pop over to Chelsea with some loaves for Susannah and Stephanie.

  Simon hadn’t wasted any time. He’d had her quickly and selfishly as soon as he was in the door, right there in the hall, overwhelming and thrilling her for the short-lived moment. He’d immediately immersed himself in his iPad afterwards, preoccupied, sending emails. Daisy made him his favourite ham and pickle sandwich, poured wine, brewed coffee. When he’d eventually come behind her at the sink, nuzzling her neck and feeling her up again, she’d led him upstairs, knowing she had to tackle him over America and lay it on the line. She couldn’t keep putting it off.

  She ached for him to understand, to be ungrudging and a little less selfish for once.

  ‘You must see what an incredible chance this is, darling,’ she urged, trying as well to please with her eyes, ‘I’m otherwise going to have to sell the house, which I really love, and move to a grotty flat somewhere miles out, which would be much harder for you to get to. It’s my one chance to avoid that, and it’s the boys’ home, after all – they’ve only just started at university. And I can’t let Susannah Forbes down, not now.’

  ‘Don’t make so effing heavy of it,’ Simon said. ‘It sounds a very flaky, one-off job to me. Go for a couple of weeks, even a month, get your first pay-cheque, show willing then have some unavoidable crisis or other, and beat it. I need you here, Daisy; you’re everything to me, lover girl. And I had thought I meant something to you, too – more than soft furnishings at least.’ They were standing facing each other and his eyes didn’t stray. ‘Does all that really come before me – before us? She’s using you, babe, can’t you see?’

  He brought her face close, holding her jaw, and Daisy parted her lips quivering with h
urt and desire. The cruelty in Simon was a sexual force. She couldn’t escape.

  She’d once heard a heroin addict describe the power of dependent need. It could put you beyond sanity, beyond humanity, unhinge you to the point of raising a hammer to a child or slashing out with a blade; you’d do whatever it took to feed your need.

  Simon was still staring, wanting an answer. ‘You could come over,’ Daisy said helplessly. ‘We could meet in New York . . .’

  ‘No, too risky and I have things on here. I’m on the edge of one or two useful deals. Listen, darling, Sarah takes the kids up to her mother in Northumberland at the start of the holidays; she’ll be away at least two nights at the end of June. We can have that time together. Don’t let me down, Green Eyes. I’ve got one cold hard woman in my life, don’t be another. But if you bugger off for months on end . . . where’s the caring in that?’

  He kissed her gently and took her to bed. His lovemaking was slow and sultry; Daisy felt enveloped, as if she really meant something to him, after all. And she still felt it later, sitting in her leafy back patch in the evening sun, sharing a chilled bottle of Sancerre and a sweet hour together. Her tiny garden felt like a hidden bower. She went back after he’d left. The wisteria was in scented flower, saxifrage plants filling every crack in the paving; her solanum was in bud, the tree peony had its first shaggy shell-pink bloom . . .

  Taking the glasses and bottle indoors, she stood still for a moment, looking round, staring at the mess and clutter from their sandwich lunch. The kitchen was full of rich aromas, piquant basil and geranium plants, the newly baked bread. She had her writing to do, planning, packing. Where was the joy in any of it? Daisy sank down onto a kitchen chair. The plane tickets were bought and she was going – at least for three or four weeks.

  Stephanie was on the phone, dealing with a small flurry of late calls from America, suppliers and contacts mainly, but she was never in a hurry to go home. She looked over enquiringly with the phone pressed to her chest. ‘It’s Daisy, Susannah. She’s been baking bread and wants to pop over with some loaves for us, if that’s okay.’

  I took the phone. ‘Of course, Daisy, thanks – a treat – only can you come right away? My friend Charles is here and we can all have a quick drink before we must be off to the theatre.’

  Charles was taking me to a Pinter revival and staying the night. He was occupying himself upstairs while Stephanie and I finished off in the office, mussing up the flat with his newspapers and earthy home-grown vegetables. He’d left them on a kitchen worktop looking like a still-life painting; white-based asparagus spears, baby carrots, plump peapods and a bunch of rhubarb with vast dark-veined leaves.

  He hadn’t chosen an ideal night. I had an appointment early the next morning with Cosmetic Solutions in the slim hope that they had some miracle solution for my faded old face.

  I turned, hearing Charles descend the spiral staircase. ‘Can I get you two a drink?’ he said, coming over, ‘Steph, what’ll it be?’

  ‘A wee gin and tonic,’ she said, her eyes lighting up. ‘Then I must be off.’

  ‘And you, Susannah?’ He touched my bare arm with his chunky ice-filmed glass. His face could crease and collapse as much as it liked, I thought with frustration, and lose none of its aged appeal. He had a high forehead, eyebrows that were thick and bushy enough to comb – unlike what was left of his hair – deep-set eyes, walnut brown. Eyes that often gleamed with private amusement as if he had some witty diversionary plan up his sleeve that was keeping him entertained. He was rangy without being particularly tall, yet having caught the last year of National Service, good at standing up straight.

  ‘That’s a very large whisky,’ I said primly, eyeing his glass. ‘You’ll go to sleep in the play. I’ll have the other half of Stephie’s tonic, thanks.’

  ‘How boring. They drink like cowboys out on Long Island, you’ll have to keep up,’

  ‘Isn’t it sailors? Will you come and see me? You know your way round those parts – you even like ice in your whisky.’

  Charles shook his head. ‘No, I’d queer your pitch. You’ve set your sights on this maturely perfect American,’ he kissed my cheek, ‘that’s clear to see. And I have to get on with the book; my deadline was last month. Cowboys drink buckets, think of the saloon bars in Westerns.’ He gave me a cryptic look. ‘You could come to Norfolk instead, bring your Mr Warren over for a long weekend. He might enjoy a spot of squelchy rurality for a change.’ I knew Charles too well to bother to correct his nonsense mixing up of the name. At least it meant he cared a bit about me going, which was a comfort.

  It would be easy to see Charles in the context of his ancestors, a great-great-grandfather who’d fought for the repeal of the Corn Laws; a family that stretched back to George Villiers, after whom half of Covent Garden was named. And he was, after all, an estate-owning, Labrador-loving countryman. But to pigeonhole him would be to miss his flip side. Charles was a thinker, a dreamer, given to travelling to remote uncomfortable corners of the globe simply to reflect on life. He’d spent a year breaking in horses on a Colorado ranch, another year learning Chinese when he’d taken risks to help dissidents. Even with his biographies, he chose offbeat characters for his subjects, loners and individualists; he liked to explore their lives minutely, yet always allow them their own voice.

  He’d reappeared with our drinks and was perched on the edge of Stephanie’s desk, smiling and looking expectant. ‘Now tell me,’ he said, ‘do either of you know what I mean by Dinkies?’

  ‘Weren’t they those little cars?’ Stephanie said. ‘Like matchboxes?’

  ‘Quite right, but when I asked the salesgirl in a toyshop if I could see her Dinkies I was nearly arrested! She went all set-mouthed and called over the supervisor. “Watch it, mate,” he said. “Any more of that lip and you’re outta here”.’

  The buzzer sounded and I let in Daisy, who looked bemused at the sight of the three of us, grinning like fools. I introduced Charles. ‘We were talking about Dinkies,’ he said, beaming. ‘Ever heard of them?’

  ‘Not again, Charles! It’s not that funny and I’m sure Daisy would have you arrested too.’ Daisy shook her head in smiling confusion and took her carrier of crusty loaves into the office kitchenette. She looked almost as if she’d been crying, which was worrying, and was much less exuberant than usual.

  ‘The boys okay?’ I asked, as she returned. ‘All set for the holidays in your absence?’

  ‘They’re trying not to show too great a thrill at the prospect of having the house to themselves. They’re at university,’ she said to Charles, brightening up and meeting his eyes, as though warming to him and feeling more able to contribute. ‘One of them, Sam, has a serious girlfriend already and he even asked, last holidays, if she could move in with us.’

  ‘And did you let her?’ Charles gave a teasing smile, ready to be amused.

  ‘No. I told him it wasn’t on, that we’d be just too much on top of each other, only Sam was a bit quick for me. “But that’s what it’s all about, Mum,” he said. “That’s the whole idea!”’ Stephanie took a moment to get there, then, given a rather strong gin, went into gales of laughter.

  ‘I must be going,’ she said, a little pink in the face and steadying herself. ‘Thanks for the bread, Daisy. With the smell of it, I’ll get envious looks on the tube.’

  ‘Time we were off too,’ I said. ‘Call you tomorrow, Daisy. Oh, and Warren phoned. He’s sending a car to the airport and talked of arranging soirées, visits to the Beach Club. I had to remind him we were there to work.’

  My beauty appointment was probably a lost cause since we were flying out in days, which left too little time to have anything very worthwhile done. I told Charles I was having a medical MOT and kissed him goodbye, feeling guilty about it. He’d be gone before I was home. He had a local lunchtime commitment, his grandchildren for the weekend, a cataract operation next week, yet he’d made the time to see me and even shown a little jealous pique.

  We got on,
got it together in bed in a comfortably familiar way, but there was always the same old impasse. Moving to Norfolk would, I knew, bring a sense of dread. It would make me feel like an old nag being put out to grass, marking out my days.

  At Cosmetic Solutions I was given a form to fill in by a pretty young assistant with a black bob, and shown into an elegant first-floor Harley Street consulting room. My appointment was with Angelica Kavouni and I was admiring the décor as she came in. ‘It’s very soothing,’ I said, appreciating her positive handshake and eye-contact. ‘I love the willow-tree silk panel on the wall, calm and delicate, just right.’

  ‘That’s one expert praising another! A client of mine is an interior designer and she helped me with the room. Now, what can I do for you? I see you’re a friend of Mrs Beamish.’ Angelica was attractive, slim and dark, and she had an intelligent look, intellect and competence. Nothing about her suggested she went in for flannelling.

  I explained the shortage of time and that I didn’t want any Botox or pouting lips. ‘Just something to make me look a bit fresher, brightened up, a little less faded and slumped.’

  ‘You’ve narrowed the field right away. I would normally offer a range of non-invasive options, fillers and low-dose Botox, which does keep the main expression lines, just reduces their intensity. However, I think Fractora would be ideal for your face. You might consider the other suggestions later on, combination treatments are very much in vogue, but this is a light radio-frequency treatment that will refresh your skin beautifully.’

  ‘What are the after-effects? What’s the downside?’

  ‘Have you anything much on this weekend? You will be quite red in the face for a couple of days, but you can cover it with make-up.’