The woman came back and handed Annie a glass of water. ‘He said he’d be back at five,’ she said abruptly. It was nearly six.
‘I’m sorry if I’ve interrupted anything,’ said Annie.
The woman gave a twitching shrug and began pacing the room and glancing out of the window. Annie sipped the water and watched her. She was wearing faded jeans and a paint-stained black T-shirt. Was that a tattoo on her upper arm? Her feet were bare. A strand of silver hair began at her forehead and Annie could follow it weaving in and out down the length of the plait. She began to feel sure she knew her from somewhere. Hair like ebony, skin like snow. Someone in a fairy tale. She was not exactly beautiful, but Annie couldn’t take her eyes off her as she moved edgily round the room. The silence was starting to get awkward.
‘I’m Annie, by the way,’ she tried.
‘I know.’
Silence again. I must introduce her to Will, thought Annie. They’d get on like a house on fire.
In the end a grumpy admission was forthcoming: ‘I’m Mara Johns.’
‘Oh! You were at Cambridge.’
So what? said Mara’s expression.
‘I think we were in the same college. In a different year, though.’
‘I don’t remember.’
This promising avenue of small talk was cut off abruptly. Annie sipped her water again. Oh, well. So this wasn’t the bosom friend she’d been hoping for. It was a warm close afternoon and she was feeling drowsy. She battled with a yawn.
‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘I’m always sleepy at the moment. I’m pregnant.’
‘I know,’ said Mara again.
‘Do you have any children?’ asked Annie, beating the silence back valiantly.
‘No.’ This was clearly a blunder. Mara was biting her lip and tugging at a strand of her hair.
Annie coloured. ‘Um, so what do you do? I mean –’
‘Paint.’ Mara jerked her head at the dour pictures.
‘Um,’ said Annie. She tried to summon an intelligent response. ‘I’m afraid I’m pretty hopeless at abstracts.’
‘I do other stuff, too.’ She pointed to another bit of wall.
Annie turned. It was a pencil drawing of two young men. She crossed to take a better look.
‘Oh!’ exclaimed Annie. ‘Wonderful. Are they brothers?’
‘Yes.’
Annie studied them. They were undeniably beautiful. The older stared out in arrogant contempt, the younger in smug, cat-like self-satisfaction.
‘Do they like it?’ she asked.
‘No,’ said Mara. Annie glanced and caught a broad toothy smile. It was instantly suppressed.
‘Does it have a title?’ asked Annie.
The smile flashed again. ‘“Big Shit and Little Shit.”’
Annie giggled.
‘They’re William’s cousins,’ added Mara.
‘Really?’ Annie studied the picture in surprise. There was a likeness. The older brother, particularly.
‘I knew them in Oxford,’ said Mara.
‘Do you know Will’s family, then?’
‘A bit.’ Then she scowled as though she’d been betrayed into silly chattering.
‘Have you done any others I could see?’ asked Annie.
Mara muttered something. At that point they both heard the front door.
‘Sorry sorry sorry!’ said Johnny as he came in. He shot himself in the head with an imaginary pistol. ‘The late Johnny Whitaker.’ He grinned at Annie. ‘Hello, flower. Has she been looking after you?’
Mara was wearing a no-sex-for-two-hundred-years expression.
‘You’ll not believe this,’ said Johnny, slipping out his dog-collar and undoing a few buttons. ‘I’d’ve been on time, only –’
‘Don’t even bother,’ Mara said as she left the room.
‘Fetch us a beer, pet,’ called Johnny after her. A door banged. ‘Lovely girl, my wife. So how’s Annie?’ He laughed at her anxious face. ‘Don’t worry. That’s mild. She must like you.’
‘How can you tell?’
But he only laughed again, and began asking her how she was settling in. She decided to take her cue from him and regard Mara’s behaviour as ordinary. They talked for a few minutes, then to Annie’s astonishment Mara came back in and handed him his beer. ‘Aw, thanks, sweetie.’ He caught her fingers and smiled up at her.
Annie looked away embarrassed. There was a short pause.
‘Listen, I’ll show you the pictures another day,’ said Mara.
‘Lovely,’ replied Annie.
Mara muttered again and left.
‘There you are, pet,’ said Johnny. ‘She likes you.’ He opened his can and drank and asked how she was keeping. They chatted for a while about babies, and she thought she could detect a wistfulness in his tone. ‘Now then,’ he said, getting down to business. ‘Why are you excommunicating yourself?’
‘Oh! Goodness. Because I’m living in sin, I suppose. I thought you wouldn’t want to give me communion.’
‘I operate an open policy. If they’re willing to come, I’m willing to accept them.’
‘Whatever?’
‘That seems to be the line God takes.’
‘Mmm,’ said Annie doubtfully.
‘Well, he accepts me. He can’t be that picky.’ He lit a cigarette.
‘Rubbish. I’m sure God –’
‘Guess what I do on Saturday nights,’ he interrupted.
‘Um . . .’ Annie banished her first thought. ‘Write your sermon?’
‘Exactly. Now, fifteen years ago my idea of a good Saturday night was to get drunk, get my leg over – unless I passed out first. Maybe smash a couple of faces in. Nick a car. And if I didn’t get locked up, well, that was a really good Saturday night.’
‘Which do you prefer?’ asked Annie.
He leant his head back and blew a thoughtful smoke ring. ‘Hmm. Tricky one. Sermons, I guess. No hangover.’ The ring floated across the room. ‘You know what I’m saying, though.’
‘Yes. But maybe great sinners make great saints,’ said Annie. ‘I was only ever a rather feeble sinner.’
He grinned.
She remembered her circumstances and blushed. ‘I meant . . .’
‘I know.’ He patted her arm. ‘Don’t be a stranger, flower. Come up for communion.’
‘It’s just . . . Will –’ Annie broke off. Johnny took her hands. ‘I think he loves me, but he won’t hear of marriage. I keep trying to tell myself it doesn’t matter, that it’s the quality of the relationship that counts, but . . . It sounds so old-fashioned. I can’t tell if he’s really opposed to marriage, or if it’s just because of bad experiences in the past. He’s been involved with some really horrible women. Maybe he can’t cope with commitment.’
‘You’ll be all right,’ he said. ‘He’s a good man. You’ll be fine.’ Somehow his optimism began to infect her. ‘God’s good, Annie.’ She looked up into his brown eyes. ‘Trust me,’ he said gravely. ‘I’m a priest.’
She giggled.
‘So what’s going to happen to your vocation?’ he asked.
‘I’ve abandoned it.’
‘How do you feel about that? Ee, I sound like a bloody therapist.’
‘Most of the time I feel relieved,’ she admitted. ‘Perhaps I never had a vocation at all. But the sense of calling seemed so strong at the time. I don’t know. I just can’t seem to hear God any more.’
‘Vocations don’t just go away, pet. They lie low, maybe. He’ll be in touch. What are you doing with your time at the moment?’
‘Um, writing, I suppose.’ She found herself telling him about her novel.
‘Does Will know about it?’ asked Johnny.
‘No.’ Annie was overcome by guilt that she hadn’t told him. This was followed by a cold fear that she had been disloyal by confiding in Johnny. ‘Um, what I said earlier . . .’
‘All in confidence,’ Johnny assured her. ‘I know, why don’t we form a self-help group? For people with bloody impos
sible demanding partners.’
Annie glanced fearfully at the door.
‘Listen,’ said Johnny, ‘if you ever want a job in the church, just say the word. I could do with a pastoral assistant.’
‘But the Bishop . . .’
‘He belongs to the if-it-moves-bless-it school of thought.’
‘But wouldn’t your congregation object?’
‘You’ll give a whole new meaning to the term “lay worker”.’ He grinned at her outraged expression. ‘Bear it in mind, pet.’
She thought about him as she walked home, remembering his voice singing ‘Amazing Grace’ from the church top. She’d never met anyone so full of himself and yet so full of God at the same time. The two were supposed to be mutually exclusive in Annie’s theology. Self must be banished and Christ must reign as Lord in every last nook and cranny of your life. If he’s not Lord of all then he’s not Lord at all, ran the slogan. And yet if Annie were God she’d have a soft spot for people like Johnny, be secretly proud of them in fact, and not want them to stop being themselves. Johnny was so brimful of belief. God is good. You’ll be fine. It was impossible not to be swayed.
Libby, heel! Annie hurried home and channelled her energies swiftly into her novel before Libby could lollop off and mate with the vicar’s trouser leg. After all, it was high time to rescue Isabella and Barney from the hotel car park. This was done easily enough. At last they reached the cottage . . . It was Will’s cottage in Northumberland, but on a wicked impulse Annie filled it with flowery settees, festoon blinds and little china bowls of peach-scented pot-pourri. She gave the double bed a plush headboard and, as an afterthought, tossed a few heart-shaped satin cushions on the cover. There.
Isabella began to realize that she was on a steep learning curve. She wondered if Barney had got hold of the wrong end of the stick somewhere along the line and was under the impression that the national nookie average was two or three times a night, rather than a week. She could hardly sit down.
‘Barney, I can’t. You’re a wonderful lover, but I’m really, really sore.’
‘But I’ll be really, really gentle . . .’
Bastard, she thought afterwards. What am I going to do? I’ve married a bloody sexoholic! She was not a girl to take it lying down, however. She caught him the next afternoon and tied him naked to the bedroom chair. He submitted to this whim tamely enough, confident he could escape at any point if he really wanted to. But Isabella had not been a Girl Guide for nothing.
She painted her lips slut red and knelt in front of him. Hardstaff nodded approvingly. After a long drooling moment Barney surreptitiously tested the knots. Isabella laughed. He made a more determined attempt. Finally the truth dawned.
She kept him teetering on the brink for nearly an hour. He raged and swore and struggled, but it was all in vain. She went to work with her lipstick, painting his face and chest like a Cherokee brave and putting rings round his totem pole. Sweat trickled down his body as he strained against those badge-earning knots.
‘Darling, you’re all hot and bothered! Are you thirsty? Let’s open some bubbly.’
‘I don’t want any, damn it,’ he said, through gritted teeth.
But she made him drink from the bottle till the champagne surged from his lips and ran in icy rivers from throat to groin.
‘Oops!’ cried Isabella. ‘We don’t want to waste any, do we?’ She followed the path with her tongue down his sweating belly. By now his curses had turned to whimpering.
‘Please, please, oh, please, Bella.’
In the end she was merciful.
He lapsed like a good cleric into the language of prayer: ‘Oh, God. Oh, God-oh-god-oh-god, Isabella! Aaah!’
Hmm, thought Isabella dispassionately, taking a swig of champagne. So that’s what all the fuss is about. She untied him. He collapsed on the bed a broken man.
The phone rang. Annie jumped with a guilty giggle to answer it. ‘Hello?’ she said.
There was a silence, then a man said, ‘Have I got the wrong number, I wonder?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Annie. The voice was very familiar, but she couldn’t place it.
‘I was wanting Dr Finlay. Is he no’ there, Janet?’
‘Oh! Um, he’s out, I’m afraid. Can I take a message?’
‘It’s his brother Seb. But that’s enough about me, he says implausibly. Who are you, darling?’
‘I’m Annie.’
‘Hello, Annie. And you’re what? A colleague? The Avon lady? A live-in lover?’
‘Um, well, the latter, I suppose.’
‘Good God! The dead walk, rivers run up hill, Orlando has a love life! This is wonderful. When am I going to meet you? Are you coming to the family festivities?’
‘Yes,’ she said, assuming he meant his parents’ fortieth wedding anniversary.
‘Please don’t worry. We’re all painfully nice. You mustn’t be offended, though, if I tell you you’ve picked the runt of the litter. We’re all bigger and better-looking than he is. Even Babe. You’re not cross, are you?’
‘No. Do you have his sunny disposition, though?’
He laughed. I’m sure I know him from somewhere, thought Annie. ‘I love you already. Listen, would you do me a huge favour and ask him to ring me when he’s back?’
‘Yes. Um, I’m afraid I’ve forgotten your name.’
There was a surprised pause. ‘Sebastian. The luvvie one.’
‘I’ll tell him.’
‘Angel.’ He hung up.
Annie picked up her biro to scribble Will a note. She’d got as far as ‘Your brother’ when the penny dropped. I’ve been talking to Sebastian Penn! She let out a short scream. That wonderful voice! Of course. Familiar from countless films and coffee commercials. And Will had said nothing. His younger brother was one of the most outrageously successful actors around and Will had not seen fit to mention it to her.
CHAPTER 25
She waited for Will to come home, unable to remember where he’d gone and when he’d promised to be back. Ten o’clock came and went and she became anxious. She got ready for bed. The sound of distant ambulance sirens chilled her. What if he’d met with some kind of accident? By eleven o’clock she was unable to shake off her morbid fantasies. If he’s not in by midnight I’ll call the police. But what if the police were already on their way? Footsteps on the path, a ring on the bell, two officers on the doorstep. ‘Miss Anne Brown? Can we come in?’
‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ she scolded herself as her tears brimmed over. Then came the blessed sound of his key in the lock. She flew downstairs.
‘What’s wrong?’ he asked. ‘Have you been choosing my funeral hymns?’
‘It’s not funny! Where have you been?’
‘Got held up at the drug abuse centre. I do a stint there on –’ He broke off, seeing her tears. ‘Annie! I’m sorry.’ She sobbed in his arms. ‘Listen, another time you can always get me on the mobile phone. I should’ve thought.’
They went up to bed.
‘Your brother phoned,’ she said, remembering. ‘He wants you to ring back.’
‘Which one?’
‘Sebastian. You might have told me, Will.’
‘Why? You’ve never been remotely interested in my family.’
‘I have! I just thought you wouldn’t welcome questions.’
‘All right,’ he conceded grumpily. ‘I can see that.’
‘So,’ she said, only a few months behindhand, ‘tell me about your family.’
‘Well, my father’s a vicar in North Oxford,’ he began. ‘My mother does endless committee work and so on. She’s also training to be a therapist – typical North Oxford matriarch. They’ve been there about thirty years. I’m the oldest. Ben’s next. He’s a book dealer, married to a barrister. They have two vile daughters aged six. Twins. Then there’s Seb, who you know about. Then Jake, who’s a priest. Then Babe – Robin – who’s in his last year at school. He was a happy accident.’
‘And they’re all bigger
and better-looking than you are.’
He chuckled. ‘But I can beat any of them in a straight fight.’
‘What if all four jumped you at once?’
‘It’s been known. Still, my self-defence is pretty good.’ He stroked her cheek and smiled. ‘You needn’t worry about me out there on the mean streets.’
‘I do, though.’
‘I know. Tell about your family, then.’
She did so, conscious that she was embarrassed by her background.
‘I look forward to meeting them,’ said Will.
‘Um, I’m afraid we’re not welcome. Until . . . unless . . .’ She told him about her mother’s hateful letter.
‘I see.’ He lay frowning at the ceiling.
‘I’m really sorry, Will. It’s not personal. They just disapprove.’ Why do I have to have such a dreadful family? She blushed with shame.
‘Are they disowning you?’ he asked eventually.
‘No, no. I expect they’ll come round,’ said Annie bravely.
‘Yeah. A grandchild is a great bargaining tool.’ He fell silent. ‘How was the vicar?’ he asked, after a while.
‘Fine.’ She told him about Johnny offering her a job.
‘Good. Take it. Then I won’t feel such a shit. Did you meet his wife?’
‘Yes. She chattered unselfconsciously for about half a second.’ He laughed. ‘I think I blundered,’ she went on. ‘I asked her if they had children. Do you know if . . .’
‘Can’t comment. She’s a patient of mine.’
This confirmed her suspicions. ‘She’s got a picture of your cousins on the wall. “Big Shit and Little Shit”, she calls them.’
He laughed again and turned the light out. She could tell he was lying awake, thinking. She couldn’t sleep, either, and decided to redeem the shining hour by planning her next chapter.
For the first month or so Isabella enjoyed being a curate’s wife. There wasn’t much to do other than read novels and tackle the hideous house and make love to her gorgeous husband. The wonderful thing about parish ministry was that Barney was in and out of the house several times a day. Isabella suspected he carried a furniture inventory in his mind and was ticking items off one by one as he rogered her on them.
The Benefits of Passion Page 27
