Ellie thought Ray underestimated his talent. He was far more professional and creative than any other producers she’d worked with. He got the best out of his cast, he appreciated their talent, he knew when to sit back and let them ad-lib, when to crack down and stick to the script, and he had a knack of drawing out excellent performances.
‘Are you enjoying yourself?’ Ray asked now, sitting down on the piano stool.
‘Very much,’ Ellie grinned. She couldn’t remember any other producer asking such a thing. If anything most of them seemed to prefer their cast cowed and miserable. She wondered what he actually wanted her for; the relaxed way he was just sitting there implied he’d just called her for a chat.
He was such a nice man. She liked his scruffy clothes, that broken tooth and his wide, warm smile. But most of all she liked his joyful nature. After being used to grouchy performers who thought the whole world was pitted against them it was a tonic to meet someone who could laugh off disappointments and look forward to each day with enthusiasm.
‘I love pantomime,’ he said, looking faintly sheepish. ‘My ambition was to become one of the “great” film producers, but I seem to be getting side-tracked by comedy plays, musicals and pantomimes.’
‘My ambition is still to be a “great” musical comedy star,’ she laughed. ‘But I don’t mind being side-tracked too much if it’s like this.’
‘You’ll get there,’ he said, suddenly serious. ‘Now you’ve got people watching over you.’
Ellie smirked. She thought he meant him. ‘You’re going to produce a musical comedy, then? With me as the star?’
‘I wish I could get the chance,’ he said with a shrug of his shoulders. ‘No, I meant the bigwig behind Bloomfield’s.’
‘What! Harry Bloomfield?’ Ellie was puzzled. ‘He isn’t the least bit interested in me.’
‘Not him, he’s just the front man.’ Ray frowned, looking at her as if she were slow. ‘I’m talking about Sir Miles Hamilton. You must know it was him who suggested you for this part?’
Ellie could only stare blankly. She felt as if she were surrounded by thick fog, Ray’s voice coming from somewhere distant.
‘You do know who I’m talking about, don’t you?’ Ray’s voice continued. ‘Ellie! What’s up? You’ve gone as white as a sheet!’
Ellie groped for a seat, pulled it down and flopped on to it. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I felt a bit funny for a moment. I met Sir Miles Hamilton once at a party. He put me on to Bloomfield’s, but I didn’t know he had anything to do with it.’
‘He’s one of Bloomfield’s directors.’ Ray looked hard at Ellie wondering why she should be so shocked by this news. ‘He’s got fingers in all sorts of pies in the entertainment business. Anyway, he’s seen you perform on several occasions. Harry Bloomfield told me this when he made the suggestion I saw you for this part. I wouldn’t mind betting Sir Miles will be coming on opening night to see how you’re shaping up.’
Ellie couldn’t think of anything to say to this.
‘Well, you might look a bit happier about it,’ Ray said, laughter in his voice. ‘I’d be grinning like a cheshire cat if I was in your shoes. I hope you can raise a bit more enthusiasm for my next shot.’
‘What’s that?’ Ellie said suspiciously.
‘I hoped you might have supper with me tonight.’
Ellie hesitated; she was still floored by the piece of news about Sir Miles.
Ray sighed. ‘I suppose you’ve got a boyfriend?’
‘No, it’s not that.’ She looked down at her feet, suddenly acutely embarrassed.
Ray reached out and tilted her chin up with one finger. He was smiling. ‘I’ll be honest,’ he said, teeth glinting in the gloom of the darkened theatre. ‘I’ve had this terrible, overwhelming desire to kiss you since the first day you came here. And I’ve had the oddest feeling it might be the same for you too. We aren’t in the line of work where people are going to be around for ever, Ellie. So couldn’t we have a stab at a bit of romancing, while we’ve got the chance?’
Ellie had heard many opening lines from men over the years, but this one made her tingle. She did want him to kiss her.
She gave it only the briefest second’s thought. So what if he was the producer, or that people would talk. She liked him and life was too hard and short not to take chances. ‘That’s the most honest approach I’ve ever heard,’ she laughed. ‘Okay, supper tonight.’
‘You’re the most fascinating woman I’ve met in a long time,’ he said, grinning impishly. ‘Very direct, funny and warm, yet I get this feeling there’s an awful lot of different activity going on beneath the surface.’
‘Like a duck’s feet?’ she laughed.
‘I wouldn’t like to liken anything about you to duck’s feet,’ he said. ‘But you’d better toddle home to change. I’ll pick you up at your digs at seven.’
*
‘Happy birthday, Ellie.’ Ray pulled the cork out of the bottle and filled up her glass. ‘It ought to be real champagne for your twenty-first, but funds wouldn’t run to that. At least this is a reasonable imitation.’
It was January 22nd, her twenty-first birthday, and they were in Ray’s small, cluttered bachelor flat in Fitzjohn’s Avenue, the wide road which led down from Hampstead Village towards Swiss Cottage. All the houses in the road were huge, many of them very dilapidated as it was many years since they’d been purely family homes. Number 25, where Ray lived, was a rabbit warren of small flats and bedsitters. Practically all the tenants were ‘arty’ types, even the two old ladies who lived on the ground floor.
Ellie had been here only twice before, both times during the afternoon, when she’d been appalled by its squalor. It was just one large room on the first floor with a small kitchen adjoining, and the bathroom was shared by all the other tenants in the house, up another flight of stairs. It was warm and cosy tonight, though: the shutters were closed over the windows, Ray had lit the fire earlier in the evening and now, in candle-light, with the bed made and covered by a thick quilt and all the unwashed dishes and dirty washing cleared away, it looked inviting enough to make her want to stay.
It had been the best month of her life. All the good feelings she’d had right from the day of the audition had been justified. So it was only a pantomime, but all the seats had been sold every night so far, and the local press had praised it to the skies. Her digs in Savernake Road overlooking the heath were among the best she’d ever had, with quite good food, constant hot water and even an electric fire in the room she shared with Sylvia. Quite often they giggled the night away as if they’d known each other from childhood, making toast on the fire and drinking cocoa. All the cast were fun, especially Norman Bounds, who played Dandini. He made no secret of being homosexual, but minced about claiming he was an ‘old tart’, and he often came into Ellie’s, and Sylvia’s room late at night for a bit of girlie chatter. At Christmas he’d bought them each a lovely pair of satin knickers, saying he wished he dared wear them himself!
But of all the good things that were happening, Ellie felt most thrilled by Sir Miles’s interest in her. He had come with his wife on opening night and called briefly at the dressing-room afterwards to compliment her on her performance. He had asked politely about Bonny, but Ellie felt his curiosity was all centred on her. She still didn’t know whether to believe he really was her father. She could see no similarity between them, and sometimes she wished Marleen had never told her about her mother’s affair with him. It made her want too much.
Bonny had turned up to see the pantomime with her Aunt Lydia at the start of the new year. Because Lydia was by her side there was no opportunity to really talk, but Ellie felt she was still very distressed by Magnus giving her up. A week later she wrote from her parents’ home to say she was joining a dance troupe called The Toppers because otherwise she might strangle her mother. Then she went on to say John Norton was in America but had written to her and that she hoped to see him again when he got back. As Ellie had heard
nothing further since then, she had to assume Bonny was recovering.
Then there was Ray.
From that first supper date with him back before Christmas, Ellie had known it was inevitable they’d become lovers eventually. Ray charmed her on every level: he was funny, intelligent and warm, he could chat easily about anything, he was as fascinated by the theatre as she was, in tune with her in every way. The only reason she had held out this long was because she hoped for something more. She wanted him physically, she had from the very start, yet she knew she wasn’t in love with him.
‘That wonderful meal was enough without champagne,’ Ellie smiled, taking the glass of sparkling wine from him and clinking it against his. ‘Here’s to the abolition of food rationing!’
‘I think it’s going to be around for a few more years yet,’ Ray said, his blue-grey eyes looking seductively sleepy; they’d already drunk two bottles of wine with their steaks in Maria’s in Flask Walk. ‘I dream of one day going into a shop and being allowed to have everything I want, to load up a shopping bag with pork chops, bacon, ham and twenty different kinds of cheeses.’
‘Is there more than one kind?’ Since Ellie had been in Hampstead and met many of Ray’s rather Bohemian friends she’d become highly aware of her lack of sophistication, and she chose to cope with this by pretending to be even less knowledgeable than she really was.
‘My little innocent,’ Ray said tenderly, moving closer on the couch. ‘There’s so many things I’d like to teach you.’
Ray was glad he’d had the foresight to spend this afternoon cleaning and tidying. The fire he’d lit then was roaring away now; he’d even changed the sheets. Ray didn’t normally go to so much trouble for his girlfriends – usually a smelly paraffin stove and an unmade bed was all that greeted them – but he was determined to seduce Ellie tonight. He’d even visited the barber’s this morning with the sole purpose of buying some sheaths. It was so rare to find a beautiful actress of her age who was still a virgin. Even her kisses were chaste.
‘What would you like to teach me?’ Ellie put her glass down on the floor and snuggled closer to him leaning into his shoulder. She was just tipsy enough to lose her inhibitions. Ray had put a record on, of lovely dreamy music. She hadn’t liked to show her ignorance by asking what it was, but she thought it was Mozart.
‘To trust me, for a start,’ Ray whispered, nuzzling at her ear. ‘To let yourself go and stop thinking about tomorrow, or next week, just the moment.’
He held her face in both his hands, kissing her so lovingly it sent delicious tingles down her spine. Ellie responded to his probing tongue by opening her lips just wide enough to receive it, and the tingles became tremors.
‘Mm,’ she sighed contentedly. His fingers were already unbuttoning her cardigan. The thought flashed through her mind that maybe she ought to have foreseen something like this tonight and bought some new underwear. Was it dark enough in here by candle-light that he wouldn’t notice how shabby they were? How was she going to get her dress off? It had hooks and eyes on the side! And what if she got pregnant?
An hour or so later, most of her anxiety had gone, lulled into a blissful world where nothing mattered more than his kisses. They were lying on the rug in front of the fire. Ray had pulled her dress over her head, all but one candle had burned itself out, her underwear had been slowly removed and surreptitiously shoved by herself under one of the cushions. She’d seen Ray take a packet from his jacket pocket and place it beside him on the floor. The only worry she had now was whether she should instigate him taking his trousers off, or wait for him to do it.
His chest was bare and as endearingly thin and narrow as a young boy’s, winter white and entirely free from hair. She ran her fingers through his curls as he sucked at her breasts, wanting to tell him how much he was pleasing her, but yet not knowing how. It was like a delicious dream she never wanted to wake from, wave after wave of sensual delight which she was taking selfishly, offering nothing in return. His fingers were probing into her, finding sensitive spots she hadn’t known were there. She wanted it to go on and on for ever.
The music had stopped long ago, the needle scratching in the middle. The fire crackled and groaned as the coals grew smaller, the last candle spluttered and went out and Ellie slid her hands down Ray’s back towards his trousers, desire greater now than her anxiety about the proprieties in love-making.
He moaned in delight as her fingers reached for his buttons, his belly arching away from hers to admit her hand. ‘I want you so badly,’ he whispered huskily. ‘You’re so beautiful, Ellie, I never want tonight to end.’
‘Show me what to do,’ she whispered, remembering suddenly that it had been at this point when everything went wrong with her and Charley.
‘Just hold me, angel,’ he whispered back, pushing his fingers hard inside her making her moan with more pleasure.
Passion welled up more intensely as she felt his hardness. He was wriggling out of his trousers, mouth back at her breasts sucking and biting. He had to be much more experienced than Charley was to have such control, because she was losing all hers.
But even when Ray was naked, he still made no attempt to enter her. He caressed her sex with such delicacy, she felt herself being drawn into a fiery tunnel that made her buck beneath him and clutch him tighter to her. She could hear herself making noises exactly like those she’d overheard from Bonny when she was with Magnus in the flat in Pimlico, but she didn’t care any longer, she just wanted to reach the end of that tunnel, wherever it was leading.
‘Come, baby, come,’ he whispered against her breast. ‘Then I’ll fuck you and make it happen again.’
Something extraordinary was happening. She was on fire, a burning sensation spreading all over her that made her tremble and gasp in pure delight. Ray’s fingers were doing it, it was birthdays, Christmas, first nights and brass bands all at once, then she found herself crying, clinging on to him, shaking from head to toe.
‘Nice?’ Ray murmured sleepily much later. They had moved into his bed some time ago and made love twice more, and she thought it must be nearly morning now. All the mysteries had been revealed to her – why Bonny couldn’t get enough of it, why songs and poems were written about it – and it had exceeded even her wildest expectations.
‘It was wonderful,’ she whispered, snuggling tighter into his shoulder. Tomorrow she would probably blush when she thought of some of the things Ray had done to her, or recalled the things she’d said. But right now she felt utter peace, her body satiated and complete. ‘That was the best birthday present ever.’
Chapter Twenty-Six
September 1948
Wet coats, umbrellas and condensation created a steamy fug in the crowded Hampstead teashop. Rain splattered hard on the bow-windows, the lace curtains fluttering each time yet another drenched person burst in to find refuge from the wet street.
Edward and Ellie were tucked into the furthest corner table. The teapot had long since been drained and the two-tier cake stand was empty aside from one unappetising slice of gingerbread. They studiously ignored the elderly waitress who was clearly hoping they would leave to make room for someone else.
It was mid-September and Ellie had been in Hampstead just over nine months since taking over the role of Prince Charming. The pantomime had run until the last week in February, but Ray Kennedy had kept her on since then in repertory, giving her parts in each new production. She had gained an enormous amount of acting experience during this time, from plays by Ibsen, Shaw and Noël Coward, to the present farce in which Edward had a role as the butler.
Edward had come back to London in March as the resident pianist in Churchill’s, a smart West End night-club. Ellie had introduced him to Ray and persuaded him to try Edward out in this part. In all these months Bonny had remained in The Toppers, touring the provinces, and Edward had all but forgotten the influence she once had on Ellie. Now, though, it seemed Bonny was asserting it again: Ellie was about to join up with her for a do
uble-act in a touring show.
‘But why, Ellie? Dancing with Bonny is a step backwards,’ Edward argued. ‘I don’t understand you. You’ve been making quite a name for yourself in comedy. What on earth made you agree to this?’
‘Because I want to keep up dancing,’ Ellie said in a low voice, aware that a couple of middle-aged ladies at the next table were listening. ‘It won’t be any good turning up for an audition in a musical comedy if I’m out of condition. I’ve been trying to keep up dance practice, but it’s impossible when I’m living in digs. My voice is suffering too. A six-month tour will set me up again.’
‘Touring’s exhausting,’ Edward said, leaning back in his seat and lighting up yet another cigarette. He was jealous. He and Ellie had been having such a happy time here in London without Bonny to spoil it. He thought she was being very stupid. ‘A week here, a week there, seedy digs, living out of suitcases and all that travelling, what kind of life is that?’
Edward’s appearance had gradually changed from that of a very correct English gentleman into a more artistic image in the last couple of years. His blond hair was longer, corduroy trousers and casual jackets replacing his old dark suits and stiff collars. His lifestyle of late nights, lack of fresh air and exercise had given him a slightly haunted pallor, and even his once very correct speech was peppered now with slang picked up in West End clubs and bars.
‘It’s a good experience,’ Ellie said firmly. ‘And I like seeing new places. You’re just cross because I’ll be with Bonny.’
Edward blushed. He hadn’t thought he was so transparent. ‘I thought she had a new man? Or has that fallen through?’
Ellie bristled a little. She didn’t like it when Edward was sarcastic about Bonny. She had no intention of passing on what Bonny had revealed in her letters regarding John Norton. ‘No, it hasn’t fallen through, in fact he sounds like a permanent fixture in her life,’ Ellie said tartly. ‘But he’s abroad a good deal of the time and anyway, Bonny does make her own living, you know!’
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