Harry was not wholly happy when Doreen told him about her confrontation with Sylvia, because he feared that it would bode him no good.
‘Why don’t you let me give her clothes back to her?’ He looked at Doreen hopefully. They were both eating panfried monkfish tails at Fish!, within walking distance of Harry’s flat, at a table with an impressive view over the Thames towards Nelson Dock.
Doreen shook her head. She liked the clothes, counting them a battle honour, like the flags hanging in the Tithing St. Mary parish church, except that the flags had been all tattered and torn whilst the dresses and underwear and negligees were all expensive and brand new. Mr. Harriman, the vicar, had explained the flags to her class during a school visit, and told them that the village’s soldiers had brought them back as trophies from assorted wars. The concept of trophies pleased her greatly, for she had certainly won a victory.
‘She could cut up rough.’ Harry put down his knife and fork. Doreen might be his new mistress, and he might have paid for the clothes, and Sylvia might now be very much past history. But he had an unpleasant feeling that she would not let her wardrobe slip away quite so easily, and he feared aggravation. Sylvia was a woman capable of turning really quite vicious at times: he had seen it happen at a nightclub once, when a man thought fit to stroke her thigh. She had slapped the man hard, and made one hell of a fuss, and a real melee had ensued. It had all been most embarrassing.
‘I was the one with the knife.’ Doreen grinned at the memory. She had never thought of herself as a fearsome girl, but the idea was quite entertaining.
‘She’s a clever woman.’ Harry spoke half to himself. ‘I think she’ll do something nasty.’
Doreen glanced at him from under her eyelashes. She could see he was concerned, though she was not quite sure why, for she had seen the woman off in the blink of an eye. But perhaps he feared she would call his wife. The thought pulled her up short. She was still new in Harry’s life, and wanted to stay around for a while. She knew he would not risk a divorce, and losing half his possessions. Her instincts told her to back off a little. Yet the woman had plainly used his purse freely, and bought well, and she had taken her place. Perhaps it was time to stake a claim to a wardrobe all of her own.
‘All right, she can have her things back.’ It was a graceful surrender. ‘But then I won’t be able to wear them.’ She put out her hand to rest it on Harry’s as she spoke, pressing his fingers gently.
Harry eyed her quickly. He understood Doreen very clearly, but it was not the right time to edge into an auction. ‘We can talk about it later.’
He smiled as he spoke, but his voice hardened a little. He was tired, because he has been through a tough day, what with working on Dreamstone’s bid plans, and talking Anne out of her proposed trip to London. Doreen needed a wardrobe, he did not doubt it. But he felt that it was something she must work for, ideally by crumpling his sheets. He mused on the idea, and felt himself stiffen a little, because in his mind he envisaged a nice evening with Doreen doing pretty much all of the crumpling. It would certainly beat chasing bright lights again, for he was not really a man built for dancing from dusk into dawn. The previous night had severely drained him. He would enjoy himself to satiety, and then reward her with a shopping trip. He believed in prizes coming after events, not before them.
Doreen stroked his fingers, because she had a pretty good idea of what he was thinking. ‘Aren’t I worth it?’
Harry looked her full in the face, because he was not about to be pressured. ‘I’ll have to find out, won’t I?’
They stared at each other, hand on hand, and each knew who would be paying the bill.
Doreen lowered her eyes, and it was again a gesture of submission. She knew that she was still on a learning curve, and that she had pushed her luck a little too far. Harry had outflanked her. She also knew that she must now grant him victory honours, a flag of his own to hang high above his bed, to keep him onside. But she imagined that if she wove her flag carefully she might bind him even more tightly.
They followed the monkfish with crčme brulees and then walked back to Harry’s flat hand-in-hand. Harry pointed out various imposing buildings, and Doreen listened attentively, squeezing his fingers from time to time, and walking close to him. Now she would be a teenager for him, and admire him completely. She knew that she had ground to regain.
She followed Harry into his flat, waiting for him to close his door, and then she began to strip. She was dressed in a white silk shirt and black satin combat trousers, straight from the other girl’s wardrobe, and she swayed as she began to unbutton her shirt front. She had seen a woman do it in a television play, and been impressed. Harry moved closer to her, seeking to fold his arms around her, but she pushed him gently away, unzipping her trousers. She could see that he was watching her with a kind of fixed intensity, like a rabbit blinded by a headlight, and that she was well on her way to recapturing him. She continued to strip until she stood wholly naked in front of him, and then she knelt, deftly unzipping his trousers and unfastening his belt, to push them down around his ankles, and now he was swollen, pointing out at her in a stiffness of pink and grey flesh, and she touched the end with her lips, opening her mouth to enclose him for a moment.
Then she stood up. ‘You like that, don’t you?’ She whispered her words, and it was a secret between them. She reached to lift Harry’s shirt, raising it up over his head, and folded her arms around his neck, kissing him with small repeated kisses. Men, all in all, were quite simple beings. It was merely a question of probing their vulnerabilities.
She took his hand, leading him towards his bed, and positioned herself above him, squatting herself down on his loins. It was something her photographer had wanted to try, and she had stored the memory. Harry began to stroke her nipples, and she smiled at him, moving herself on him in a dreamy gyration that only included her haunches and the warmth where she could feel him inside her. She was rewarding him, and granting him victory, and spinning out his pleasure, and she could feel his heat mounting within her. He began to jerk spasmodically, and she lifted herself away, looking down at him a little mockingly.
‘Did you like that?’
Then she was with him again, but now under him, as he drove himself into her, and she felt his heat igniting her own fire again, and they both moved in the desperation that drives men and women together, and then he checked, and lay silent on her, and she knew that he was spent. She clasped her arms around his neck, and held him close, because the closeness that comes after coition can be an ultimate moment of sharing.
After a moment she looked up at him, their faces touching. ‘Did you like that?’
Harry kissed her, and knew in his kiss that Doreen’s wardrobe woud not come cheap.
Anne ate a small schnitzel as Harry gambolled, washing it down with a nice Mosel – she often found Hock a little on the chemical side, though the villagers liked it for cheese and wine parties. Then she slept the sleep of the just, to wake early, lying lazily in bed, passing the day to come in review. She wondered what kind of peculiar young woman Hilary might bring, and whether she was being wise, promising to do so much for somebody she had never met, and a person who also sounded so very daunting into the bargain.
She felt tempted for a moment to keep to her bed with a diplomatic cold, or a touch of summer flu. But then she made up her mind to do the best she could, because she knew her responsibilities as a Lady of the Manor, and she had never been a woman to shirk her duties.
She dressed soberly, after drying her hair, choosing a smart grey silk shirtwaister to reflect her mood. But she remained a little nervous, and found herself having to read the front page of her Daily Mail twice over to make sense of the headline. She thought of taking a walk through the Manor House garden to restore her composure, and perhaps having a word with Anthony about planning ahead for autumn vegetables. She thought he might try planting salsify, and Swiss Chard, and perhaps even black radishes, if they would grow in England. But Anthony did not seem very keen, so she spent the next hour arranging flowers and tidying the conservatory. She always found arranging flowers a very calming pastime, and sometimes, when nobody was near, she whispered to them of her concerns, for she had twice been to royal garden parties, and curtsied to Prince Charles.
She also decided to have coffee on the terrace, in the shade of her Cinzano umbrella, bought in a French market. Harry had disappointed her by blocking her plan to spend a night in London, but she liked the idea of going to France for a couple of weeks with Delia and the boys. Both had begun to learn French from Monsieur and Madame Cauchois, the village couple who kept an eye on the Chapmans’ French home, and she knew she could count on good weather. She was a little more doubtful about having a houseparty, but she prided herself on her ability to entertain. James and Levon were both keen on golf, and the best club in the area was less than an hour’s drive distant, so she could count on keeping both men out of her hair for most of their stay. She had met Shosanah just once, and it had not been a very uplifting experience, but she was sure she and Delia would cope, and of course they could have a dinner party every evening, which would mean everyone being on their best behaviour.
Suddenly she realised that Anthony was standing in the French windows leading from the conservatory onto the terrace. ‘Mrs. Harriman is here with a young woman, ma’am.’
Anne looked at him curiously, because something about the tone of his voice implied disapproval. But she knew better than to ask. Anthony liked to think of himself as a wholly impeturbable manservant, and eschewed opinions on those who considered themselves his betters. Anne had a feeling that any question might demean her in his eyes.
She rehearsed a social smile, making it welcoming, but with an element of coolness. She had not met many mad people, and was not sure what to expect. Anthony certainly seemed to have been doubtful.
Hilary Harriman looked much the same as the previous day, washed out and watery. But Anne stared past her at the young woman standing a little way behind her. She did not look very mad, with nothing about her to class her as a sex bomb. In fact she really seemed quite ordinary. She was slight, and quietly dressed, in a dark shirt and slacks, with an oval face, and regular features, and her hair cut in a bob level with her chin. She even seemed quite nice, in a strange sort of way.
She smiled. ‘You must be Julia.’
The young woman held out her hand, her face very serious, and Anne looked into her eyes. Or rather, she tried looking into her eyes, but found herself looking at nothing. It was as though she were staring into a blank space, a void wholly without expression, and she remembered the eyes of a snake she had seen in a zoo as a child.
She looked away, feeling more than a little uncomfortable. Now she understood why Hilary had been so jittery. She turned to wave towards the garden table Anthony had laid under her Cinzano umbrella. ‘Let’s sit down and have coffee.’
She took her time pouring coffee into the three cups, because now she was not sure how to proceed. She certainly did not want either of them talking about Geoffrey. Then she looked up with what she hoped was a sympathetic expression.
‘I hear you would like to get back into the stream of things.’
The young woman nodded, her face calm and composed. ‘I have been through a valley of tears.’
Anne frowned slightly. She thought it was Hilary who had been through a valley of tears.
‘I was torn in a battle between light and darkness. For a while I feared that darkness might prevail, but I found a protector.’
Anne saw Hilary wince, and moved quickly to head their conversation back onto safer ground.
‘I believe you were an accountant.’
‘Yes.’ For a moment a light seemed to flicker in Julia’s eyes. ‘People said I was a very good accountant, before the battle.’
‘Would you be able to go back, to accounting?’ Anne added the words to forestall any more revelations. ‘I mean, are you better now?’
‘Oh, yes, I’m not mad any more.’ Suddenly Julia’s eyes came to life. It was as though she had drawn back an impenetrable curtain, and returned from some hidden place to the world around her. ‘I’d like to work again. I didn’t much like being locked up and filled full of drugs.’
‘I’m sure.’ Anne nodded her agreement. But she was still uncertain. ‘But will you be able to cope?’
‘I’ll cope.’ Julia smiled, and Anne was struck by a kind of sweetness that suddenly seemed to suffuse her. ‘I just have moments when I need someone to safeguard me, that’s all.’
Suddenly Anne understood perfectly why Geoffrey had succumbed, or come close to succumbing. She judged that she was looking at a woman who might appear closed up and introspective, but who also possessed a power suddenly to open up and focus herself most directly on any target she might choose. Her mind cast back again to her childhood zoo visit and conjured a picture of a snake mesmerising a small animal, possibly a rabbit. Geoffrey possessed some very rabitty characteristics.
‘I will see what I can do to help you.’ She spoke, and it was a closure, because she had a suspicion that Julia might also possess a power to mesmerise other men as well. She certainly did not want Harry taking an interest. ‘Wait here, and finish your coffee, and I’ll call a friend of mine.’
Anne prided herself on her ability both to make friends and influence them. She had only met Barbara Hanson, the new broom at Wide Horizons’ Elegance chain, maybe half a dozen times. But Barbara remembered her perfectly.
‘Anne, how nice to hear from you.’
‘Barbara, I’m after a favour.’ Anne made her voice syrupy.
‘I’d love to help if I can.’ Barbara was equally charming, for Wide Horizon’s grapevine had begun to sizzle with news of Dreamstone’s bid. Elegance was mending fast, and she knew she could claim much of the credit. But Dreamstone probably planned to sell the chain on as a unit, and she needed insurance, in a world where a friend in need must ever be a friend indeed.
‘I’ve got a girl here, an accountant. The vicar’s wife brought her over. She’s looking for a job.’
‘Is she any good?’
‘I’m told she’s very good indeed. She’s well turned out, and nice looking as well.’ Anne felt she had no need to mention Julia’s valley of tears. Some things were better left unspoken.
‘Tell her to come and see me tomorrow.’ Barbara poured goodwill down her phone. Friendship is what friends are for.
Anne beamed as she replaced her telephone. She had done a good deed, and done it at speed, and passed Julia on. She wished life could always be so simple.