‘Congratulations,’ I said rather absently, my mind racing. Did I want to spend a night alone with Mace in London? (Yes! Yes!) Did I want to be seen at the theatre with a well-known actor and playwright, wearing a chiffon nightie from a jumble sale? (No!)
And if he took me to the theatre he was bound to see at last just how much of a fish out of water I was among his sophisticated friends … so perhaps I’d better do it, and sooner rather than later? Gird my loins in floaty sea-green and prepare to disillusion him?
I wavered. ‘You just want me to see you crowing on your own dunghill, don’t you?’
‘I’d rather be Cock of the North,’ he said cheekily, but I think he’s shaping up to that quite nicely already.
In the end I gave in and agreed to stay one night, but more because he was showing signs of being about to drive all the way back up here just so he could drag me out and carry me off personally. (Not that this idea didn’t have a certain attraction too.)
I will tell him when I arrive about my not being a real Rhymer after all, though unlike Matt, who set such store by it, Mace has enough fame for both of us.
It is odd to realise I do not have a right to any name except, I suppose, Matt’s, should I get the mad urge to start calling myself Charlie Fry at this late hour. And even that is not really my own, and forever now connected with Dead Greg.
Looking down, I discovered I’d covered the notepad in front of me with ‘Charlotte North’ in big loopy writing.
‘You big, loopy pillock,’ I told myself severely.
* * *
Chris’s temporary replacement had arrived (so amazingly quickly they must be convinced he’s thrown his lot in with the Devil and is about to hold satanic rites in the parish church) so he is now devoting himself to the running of Skint Old Northern Woman, at which he is very good.
If it becomes a regular thing – and it just might – perhaps he could become the editor?
They certainly don’t need me at the moment, and Anne and Em positively urged me to go to London to see Mace on his own ground. I don’t know what’s got into them.
‘After all,’ Em pointed out persuasively, as she sewed a button onto her dungarees while still wearing them, ‘he’s shown he’s serious about you, doing all that work to turn his house into a home from home. You could give the man a chance.’
And even Gloria said I might as well go – it would make no difference now.
Well, in the end I thought: what the hell? Feel the fear and do it anyway, if only to stop the arrival of ever more banana trees! I will need a verandah annex at this rate, and will be entitled to call myself Charlie Del Monte.
I was waved off in a large car, the back of which was bigger than the Parsonage pantry, though I was divided from the driver by an impenetrable wall of glass. (Not that this wouldn’t be a good idea for the pantry, too, when Gloria or Em are in it brewing potions.)
Anne loaned me a large rucksack, into which I packed my green Hake-Hackett outfit, turquoise cashmere sweater and the pink and silver nightie and dressing gown purchased in York and so far unworn: my encounters with Mace have so far been of the spontaneous kind. (He is clearly the kind of man who starts first time without the choke out.)
Jessica loaned me a pashmina to go over my green dress, but otherwise I do not have many clothes, so jeans will have to do. Let’s hope they are acceptable nanny garb, but I can’t help thinking they are going to look very odd with a nanny hat and shades.
I took a bottle of Father’s best whisky as a present, undoctored this time. Em gave me a picnic hamper, and a huge cold box full of food for Mace, in case no one was feeding him properly down there. She said he needed his strength keeping up, but she didn’t say for what.
She also affixed a little silver Chinese good luck charm to the zipper of my handbag and made sure I was wearing my power bracelets, including the new, much chunkier rose quartz replacement one she’d bought me.
Jessica insisted on spraying me liberally at the last minute with her Happy perfume, so I left in such a fug I had to have the windows right down for the first hour, and it must have seeped through the partition too somehow, because the driver kept coughing.
Still, it is reassuring to know that whatever happens to the rest of me, my wrists and handbag will be enjoying a really good time.
* * *
Skint Old Bookworm, no. 2
It is a little-known fact (because no one ever mentions it) that the Brontë sisters were all midgets. A visit to the Parsonage museum at Haworth, where some of their clothes are on display, reveals that they were not much bigger than the Tooth Fairy.
Chapter 24
Strange New Powers
Skint Old Fashion Victim, no. 5
Those in the know get their footwear from the sort of discount shoe warehouses where they string them together in pairs like kippers and toss them over racks.
For the persistent, there are good makes at market-stall prices, and you can build up an Imelda Marcos-sized collection for the cost of one pair of Jimmy Choo’s.
There is though, as always, one snag: discount devotees can always be recognised by the two tiny punched holes in the heels of their shoes where the string was threaded.
The driver, Trevor, was quite friendly once I’d persuaded him that opening his little glass partition and all the windows for a short while would be the quickest way to get rid of the eye-watering perfumed fug.
When we stopped for lunch he declined to share my picnic, preferring a burger meal in the motorway café, but afterwards he showed me photos of his four children and serenely smiling wife. (Though don’t ask me how you can look serene with that many offspring.)
After this I fell asleep in the back of the car, due to a potent combination of perfume fumes, exhaustion from not having slept much the previous night, and over-indulgence in food from Em’s picnic hamper. Oh, and the half bottle of red wine she’d thoughtfully included might have had something to do with it, too.
By the time I woke up it was dusk.
‘Primrose Hill,’ Trevor said, jerking a thumb at what I’d taken to be a stretch of countryside, then turned down a street of little shops and into a square of big, terraced houses set round a garden, and we were there.
‘What was that perfume called again?’ he asked as we pulled up. ‘Only I quite like it now it’s faded a bit, and I thought I’d get some for the wife.’
* * *
‘At last I have you in my power!’ hissed Mace melodramatically, curling the ends of an imaginary moustache and leaning against the closed front door.
I smiled nervously – but the house was very quiet. I stood in the hall among my varied luggage, feeling like the new governess in one of those Gothic romances.
‘We’re not alone here, are we?’
He straightened and smiled, looking more like himself, which was just as alarming in its way. ‘Yes. Did you think I’d have a retinue of servants lined up to greet you on the steps, with Mrs Danvers at their head? A cleaning service comes in on Mondays, and that’s it. I can cook, too,’ he added, ‘even if I’m not in the same league as your sister Em.’
‘She’s sent you some food – it’s in the large hamper and the cold box, and there’s quite a lot of my picnic lunch left in the small basket. Oh, and there’s a bottle of father’s whisky as well. Not doctored this time,’ I added hastily.
‘Just as well – what I’ve got’s incurable, and I’d hate to waste another bottle of good whisky. I thought you had rather a lot of luggage for one night, though,’ he added. ‘If you tell me which ones you want, I’ll show you your room first, so you can tidy up and come down when you’re ready.’
Ready for what? I wondered. After all, I’d agonised about spending the night with him and now here I was, alone and in his power, and so far he hadn’t even kissed me! Didn’t I deserve some compensation for being about to make a fool of myself in front of his friends?
I followed him upstairs, and he paused in front of an open door and sai
d: ‘This is mine – if you want me for anything in the night.’
‘Unlikely,’ I said coldly, but I peeped in as we passed.
Mace’s room had a sort of Moroccan palace look to it, something to do with the rich colours and canopied bed. It suited him anyway; as I suppose my little replica Parsonage room suited me, like a shell round a snail.
Looking round it was odd. It was like – and yet not like. Everything was softer and thicker and more luxurious, and the bathroom off had a shower over the little bath, and a heated towel rail, and radiators.
‘It’s amazing,’ I said, wandering around touching everything as though it might suddenly vanish like fairy gold.
‘I just wanted you to feel at home, Charlie. I thought it might tempt you to come here with me sometimes.’
‘But Father said you’d borrowed that book about the Parsonage interior ages ago before you met me.’
‘Yes, he mentioned the book and I realised it was just what I needed for the stage sets for my first play – sort of austere but functional, old-fashioned but with the odd modern convenience standing out like a sore thumb, you know?’
‘I certainly do,’ I said, back in the bedroom fingering a satin eiderdown like a lilac cloud while my feet sank into the carpet.
The colour was all it shared with the rough cord matting in my old bedroom.
There was soft lighting, and a little desk as well as the rather Shaker-style white painted furniture. I opened the wardrobe and discovered a long, navy gabardine mac with a belt and back pleat, and a polystyrene head sporting a mouse-brown bobbed wig, a navy felt hat like something out of a wartime film, and a pair of round-lensed tinted spectacles.
‘I think I’ve found your dressing-up clothes, but your secret’s safe with me,’ I said politely.
‘Your dressing-up clothes – it’s your nanny outfit. I borrowed the coat and hat from the props department, but the glasses and wig I bought. I thought they’d give you just that air of drab efficiency you might otherwise have lacked.’
‘Thanks.’
I closed the door, and turned to look at him, feeling puzzled and rather touched. ‘Mace, you’ve gone to a lot of trouble – and it might have been for nothing.’
‘But I liked imagining you here, and I was vain enough to think I could persuade you. And I want you to feel happy when you are here,’ he said.
‘Actually, it’s more like home than home is now that I’ve lost my room to Jessica. Aren’t you afraid I might take up residence?’
‘No,’ he said seriously. ‘No, I’m not afraid of that.’
Our eyes met, and he gave me one of his more ravishing smiles; but he still made no move to touch me and I was feeling … well, piqued, I think you might say.
‘I thought you might like to see my play tonight. An old friend’s invited himself along, too, with his wife, but we can shake them off afterwards, and come back here for a late supper from Em’s hamper.’
‘That sounds lovely,’ I lied. I expect I might have enjoyed it, too, but not dressed in my jumble-sale finds, and with his London friends. But still, wasn’t that part of the point of my coming, to show him how incongruous I am in his usual setting? That it wouldn’t work? ‘I’m looking forward to seeing your play.’
Well, at least that was true.
He looked pleased. ‘Are you really? Then I’ll leave you to get ready while I stow away that mountain of food and drink Em’s sent. There’s lots of time before we have to leave. And by the way,’ he added as he turned to leave. ‘Note the door does lock, and the key is in it!’
* * *
I looked out of the window at the dark, quiet square, where the big trees filtered out the street lights into filigree patterns on the damp pavement, and puzzled over what Mace had said and done – or not done – since I got there.
By the time I’d unpacked and had a leisurely shower I’d come to the conclusion that for some strange male reason, because I was alone in his house with him, he’d decided to behave like a perfect gentleman.
I admit, that’s not quite what I expected.
Alternatively, he’s playing hard to get.
Adjusting the neck of the green dress to a point where it strained modesty, I picked up Jessica’s pashmina and went down to see what the lion was doing in his den.
* * *
Walking into the theatre on Mace’s arm, wearing my jumble-sale wisp of chiffon, I wondered if I was in a dream or a nightmare.
Mace, six-four of immaculate dark suiting, was a dream, but his friend Gavin’s wife, Krystal – a tall, beige tapeworm of an ex-model – had given me to understand that I was hopelessly out of fashion to the point of being bizarre, without actually putting it into words.
However, when we got inside I could see that my dress wasn’t any weirder than a lot of the other outfits, and then Mace introduced me to several of his friends who didn’t seem to see anything amiss either. Most of them were really nice, and quite ordinary. This may have been because they were ordinary, but since I didn’t know who was famous and who wasn’t I just treated everyone the same, which seemed to work perfectly well.
The only dodgy moment came when I was left briefly alone with Krystal and another woman came up to talk to her, trailing a man with her like a fashion accessory.
‘Sonya – and Alistair! how lovely!’
‘Krystal, darling – all alone?’
‘Yes, but only for a minute – Gavin and I came with Mace North.’
Not only did she not introduce me to them, the two women talked to each other like I wasn’t even there.
I’ve never been snubbed before.
After a minute I looked across at Alistair, a tallish, slightly vacuous-looking man with a rather nice, pudgy face, and smiled.
I got off with him, and it was amazingly easy: I smiled, he moved nearer and said he hadn’t seen me around, had he? He was sure he wouldn’t have forgotten me. I said no, I was Charlotte Rhymer and usually lived in Yorkshire, but I was there for the evening with Mace North, and we were just getting on like a house on fire when Mace, with no more than a brusque ‘Excuse me!’ reappeared and dragged me away.
‘What do you think you were doing?’ he demanded, crossing his arms and glaring down at me. ‘He’s a married man – where’s your sense of ethics? Or were you just trying to make me jealous?’
‘I was only flirting!’ I protested hotly. ‘And I wouldn’t have done it if his wife and Krystal hadn’t snubbed me – though he has got a rather nice, teddy-bear sort of face,’ I added provocatively.
‘Unlike me?’
‘You’re more Conan the Barbarian than cuddly toy.’
‘I don’t know if that’s good or not,’ he said, frowning, ‘but I do know that if you flirt with anyone else, it’s over the shoulder and back home.’
I bet he would, too.
‘We Rhymer girls know how to deal with caveman tactics like that,’ I said with dignity.
‘Charlie…’
The bell went, and people suddenly started to move. ‘Come on,’ he said, slipping his hand around my waist and almost sweeping me off my feet. ‘The curtain’s about to go up.’
We were in a box, which made me feel as if I was on show, although I don’t suppose anyone was interested in the rest of us with Mace there; he was definitely worth looking at.
My God, he’s beautiful when he’s angry.
Once the play started I forgot anything else for, as well as his more obvious attributes, he can certainly write: it was sharp, witty and completely engrossing.
I was still bound up in it when we left the theatre, so I didn’t notice the photographer until a series of bright lights went off right in my face. I stopped dead, blinded, but Mace kept right on walking, taking me with him.
I only hope the green dress doesn’t come out in a revealing Lady Di manner, though perhaps they will airbrush me out, or something, because I’m not anyone.
When we stopped to let Gavin and Krystal catch us up, Krystal was looking furi
ous, but I don’t know if that was pique because she missed being in the picture, or because I flirted a little bit with Gavin in the interval, just to see if it worked on him, too.
We parted outside. Mace excused us from going on, saying I’d had a long day (although Krystal didn’t seem that enthusiastic about Gavin’s suggestion that we all go on somewhere together, anyway), and whipped me off in a taxi, which he seemed to conjure out of thin air.
‘So,’ he said, sitting back with a good foot of space between us. ‘Is flirting something you make a habit of? Charlie?’
‘I wasn’t asleep,’ I said, snapping my eyes wide open again. ‘And no, I didn’t even realise I could flirt until tonight.’
‘Of course you can do it. You had them eating out of your hand, and Krystal and Sonya are probably giving their husbands hell at this very moment.’
I yawned. ‘It was their own fault, they should have been nicer to me.’
‘Just how nice did you want them to be?’ he snapped.
‘I meant Krystal and Sonya should have been nicer, not the men,’ I explained, ‘but I’m sorry if they have got into arguments because of it … they were nice. Most of the people I met tonight were nice.’
‘Well, I don’t know why you should sound surprised about it!’
‘Mmm … but some of them were quite well known, weren’t they? And I’m not anyone, really. I don’t fit in your world.’
‘Why not? The theatre world’s full of oddballs.’
‘Thanks.’
‘And if you don’t fit into my world, I’ll make it fit around you.’
‘But Mace, everyone will think you are mad! I think you are mad! I’m not anybody. There’s no reason…’
‘Of course you are somebody – the artist daughter of famous biographer Ranulf Rhymer, editor of a new alternative magazine – the article’s coming out in the paper on Sunday, by the way – beautiful, unusual, maddening…’
‘I still don’t think people will know what you see in me; and neither do I. I must have the charm of novelty, but it’ll wear off.’
‘No it won’t. It’s not love philtres or infatuation or senile dementia or anything else: it’s love. And it doesn’t matter what other people think, does it?’
Every Woman for Herself Page 21
