by Alec Waugh
‘As a matter of fact I did.’
‘I hope it’s true; I’ve always felt kindly towards Sir Thomas More because of it. I thought of it yesterday when you climbed out of the pool and I’ll tell you what else I thought. I thought what bad luck it was on women that they can never see their most compulsive feature. They could only see it with an elaborate arrangement of suspended mirrors; then they’d have to crick their necks out of joint. Think of all the hours they spend in front of their mirrors; how differently they’d feel about themselves if they could see themselves as the rest of the world sees them. Had you ever thought of that?’
‘I hadn’t, no.’
‘I suggest you do sometimes. It might cheer you up. It was wonderful seeing you climbing up the steps, but I’m not sure that it wasn’t even more wonderful when you stood at the steps and shook out your hair. I hadn’t realised then that you were blonde, or that your hair would have such a pretty wave in it. Then you turned around and I saw how young you were. I couldn’t tell seeing you from the back.’
His stream of talk was constantly interrupted by the rhetoric of the guide, by descents from the bus, by the examination of this and the other relic; but in retrospect when she thought over what he had said, she had the sense of having been exposed to a ceaseless flow of adulation.
She had been expecting that its flow would be continued later in the afternoon when they lay side by side on beach mattresses at the edge of the swimming pool. But to her surprise and on the whole to her relief it was not. Instead he talked about himself and about South Africa. He loved his country; he spoke of it not boastfully, but confidently, and without resentment that her domestic policies had led to so much antagonism from other nations. ‘We have problems, special problems of our own that other countries don’t understand. What’s right for us in our country might not be right for them in theirs. It’s a pity,’ he said. ‘But there it is.’
He was proud of being a South African. He had a farm, he said, near Cape Town. He had cattle and vineyards and an export business.
‘You’re married, I suppose?’ she asked.
‘There’s something wrong, isn’t there, about a man of thirty-five who’s not?’
‘I suppose so.’
Yes, he was married. And he had three children, seven, three, and a small baby. ‘Carefully spaced,’ he said.
There was a boyishness about him that she had noticed in other South Africans and had found attractive. They were wholesome, with an air of the open countryside and an exuberance that contrasted refreshingly with the bored superciliousness affected by so many Londoners. He was clearly having the time of his life and he was not putting out any alibi about being misunderstood at home, of being a frustrated man, a prisoner on parole, craving the indulgence of an hour. He stood firm on his feet. He was honest and straightforward—he happened to be spending a week in Malta; he had met a woman who attracted him, and he wanted to go to bed with her: a point of view that Myra could respect.
‘There’s nothing phoney about him,’ she said afterwards to Naomi.
‘So I may suppose that you’re looking forward to dancing with him later on.’
‘He dances very well.’
But to her surprise he was neither in the bar at cocktail time nor was he at his table in the dining room.
‘I guess that he’s sampling one of the local bistros,’ Naomi suggested. ‘He’s probably on demi pension.’
‘That’s it, I expect.’
‘He’ll be joining us in the bar after dinner.’
‘I shouldn’t be surprised.’
But he was not in the bar when they went up. ‘Let’s take a stroll,’ she said.
They strolled slowly up the hill to the casino. ‘Shall we go in?’
‘Why not. The hotel’s signed us in.’
They had been to the casino several times. They enjoyed gambling and the rooms had elegance. They sat at the roulette board and the ball ran luckily for Myra. Within half an hour she had accumulated over twenty pounds. Usually at that point she would split her winnings, put half in her purse and gamble with the remainder till she had either lost or doubled it. But tonight she felt restless and on edge.
‘Do you mind, I think I’m going while the going’s good.’
‘It’s as you wish.’
She quickened her pace down the hill. ‘Just one last drink,’ she said.
The bar was dimly lit; she looked from one corner to another, but no, he was not there.
She ordered a cognac and drank it quickly. A fellow guest invited her to dance. She hesitated before she rose. He did not dance badly, but her feet felt heavy. When the music stopped, she shook her head. ‘I’m packing up; I’ve had a long day,’ she said.
She excused herself to Naomi. ‘I don’t think I’ll have a final drink upstairs. I feel all in.’
But though she was indeed all in, she could neither sleep nor concentrate upon her book. ‘I’d better have a nightcap after all.’
She sat back among her pillows, sipping it. Outside the moon spread its long sash of silver on the water. She looked at her bedside clock—only ten past twelve. They were still dancing in the bar.
The telephone beside her rang. ‘Hi, what are you doing there at this hour?’
‘At this hour. It’s after midnight.’
‘The evening’s only started.’
‘For you maybe. I left an hour ago.’
‘Then unleave. Come down here right away. I’ve had a funny evening. I’ve a lot to tell you.’
She hesitated. She felt she should be annoyed with him, but she could not be. There was such vitality in his voice. ‘All right, give me ten minutes.’
‘Seven.’
‘Eight.’
‘O.K., settling for seven and a half.’
It was three o’clock before she was back in her own room.
‘Even so I’m puzzled.’
It was next morning; she had gone to Naomi’s room to share her breakfast. ‘Why should he have gone out last evening?’
‘What explanation did he give?’
‘That he had met an old friend in the bar, someone he’d played football with; they toured the hot spots.’
‘And that’s exactly what he did do, probably.’
‘But why, when he’d made all that fuss over me all day? It’s not as though he had all that much time to see me.’
‘He seems to have had several hours of your company.’
‘Only through a stroke of luck. Nine times in ten, I wouldn’t have gone down.’
‘Perhaps he was running a calculated risk, to see what kind of impression he had made on you.’
‘Do you think that’s likely?’
‘As a matter of fact I don’t. Some men enjoy what they call “an occasional evening with the boys,” particularly Englishmen.’
‘But he’s not English; he’s South African.’
‘It’s not so very different. What isn’t English in him is Dutch. And the Dutch in that way are like the Germans. My people and yours. Rowdy evenings with a beer mug. French and Italians aren’t that way.’
‘Even so I’m puzzled.’
Naomi shook her head. ‘You shouldn’t be. Men are incalculable. They call women the mysterious sex; compared with them we’re a simplified equation. In the meantime has he made any plans for us today?’
‘There isn’t any tour. So he’s hired a car to drive around the island.’
‘Am I invited?’
‘I’m sure he’d be delighted.’
‘I bet he would. You tell me at lunch the way it went. I’ll be at the table, not in the bar; I’ll leave that to him and you.’
‘Well, how did it go? Just the headlines.’
Myra laughed. ‘There were no headlines.’
‘No?’
‘No. We drove around. I’d seen most of it before. You know how it is—those villages that look all the same, the dun-coloured streets, the succession of drab exteriors, with their first-floor balconies and
their heavy doors, the dust-covered oleanders.’
‘Yes, yes, I can guess all that. And you went to Mdina and saw the old Arab gate; and you saw the weavers and he bought you a bag.’
‘He didn’t. He bought me a bolt of cloth.’
‘Which you’ll never have made up and that’ll cost you a packet at the Customs. Well, go on.’
‘There’s nothing to go on to.’
‘You mean nothing happened?’
‘I mean nothing happened.’
‘Didn’t he say anything?’
‘Nothing pertinent.’
‘After all those speeches he made yesterday.’
‘Exactly.’
There was a pause. ‘There are two things I’m wondering,’ Myra said.
‘Yes?’
‘I’m wondering if he’s one of those men who are all talk, who make speeches when people are around, but suddenly feel shy when they’re alone with you. Mightn’t he be that kind of man? Particularly as he’s married and may not want to get involved.’
‘It’s possible. What’s the alternative?’
‘That he’s hatching a deep-laid plot. He knows that he made an impression yesterday; now he’s letting the situation simmer. He’s working up to an assault on the last night.’
Naomi shook her head. ‘Not the last night, the last night but two.’
‘Why do you say that?’
‘First nights are rarely a success. You must know that.’
‘How should I know that?’
‘From your own experience.’
‘The first night of a honeymoon doesn’t teach you much—in that way.’
‘No, of course it doesn’t.’
Naomi smiled, a soft, fond smile. ‘Liebling, I forget how innocent you are. It’s one of the things that make you so attractive.’
During their morning’s drive Francis had kept the conversation casual, but that afternoon by the pool he returned to the mood of the previous morning.
‘I can’t believe,’ he said, ‘that fifty hours ago I didn’t know that you existed. I was ending a two months’ trip. Things had gone better and quicker than I had expected. I had a week to spare. Why not spend it in Malta, relax there, swim, see what there is to see. Go home refreshed. I came here for a rest, for nothing else. And then I found you.’
She made no answer. Was that true, she wondered, or had he thought, ‘I’ve go a week to spare. Where’d I be likeliest to find a quick romance? Malta? I’ll try that.’ A bit of both, she guessed.
‘Fifty hours ago,’ he was repeating, ‘I had no idea that you existed. Now I feel that I know you better than friends I’ve known all my life.’
That now is true, she thought. One meets a person at a party. One talks; one’s at one completely, and one’s lifetime friends seem shadowy.
‘This is a funny thing too,’ he said. ‘We live in different countries. I don’t come to England often. When I do, it’s for a specific purpose, to put over a business deal. I’d have no contacts with your people. We move in different worlds, and nothing’s more pointless than trying to keep up with someone whom you’ve met on a ship or in a beach hotel. In all human probability we shall never see each other again. Yet these four days here will remain alight in my memory till the day I die. I’ll be thinking of them every day. I’ll relive them every day.’
That touched her. What he said next rather more than touched her. ‘There’s something else,’ he said. ‘You’ll change over the years. Little by little, imperceptibly, you’ll note the changes in your mirror; that will sag, and this will wrinkle, your hair will lose its gloss. But to me you will look exactly the same as you do now. The years will not affect the picture that I have of you. I shall be seeing you exactly as you are on this patio here this afternoon.’
She sighed. Yes, that should mean something. Thirty years from now and a grandmother, she would be able to say to herself, ‘Six thousand miles away, on the other side of the equator, there’s someone for whom I still exist as a young woman in her middle twenties, who sees me as no one else in the world can see me now.’
She had a wish to make that memory as rich for him as possible, to make herself unforgettable. Why not, after all, why not?
Yet afterwards when they danced, he returned to the neutrality of friendly chatter. Was he, after all, one of those men who only talked, who were garrulous in public and tongue-tied in private?
Next day there was a whole-day tour of Gozo, the sister island, on which Naomi joined them. In the course of it, he said, ‘Listen. I don’t want to force myself upon you, but I’ve only three days left. Why don’t you both have dinner with me tonight? I’ll order à la carte. And as Myra’s husband’s in the Treasury, I’ll see if I can’t charge it against expenses.’
Only three days left. Three days was the radius within which a practised wolf, so Naomi had assured her, would organise his campaign. But there was no sign that Francis Everett had any such scheme under way. He was acting as though he were exactly what he had said he was—a contented family man enjoying a relaxed vacation at the end of a strenuous business trip. Why in heaven’s name should he be anything else but that? Why should she be indulging in these fantasies? From the moment that she had learned that Victor was frequenting the Brompton Road at three o’clock on a weekday afternoon she had been picturing the whole world in a mad amatory spin. Pull yourself together, she adjured herself. Because an attractive South African appears to enjoy your company, don’t cast yourself as Cleopatra. Relax, have fun. Let him give you a good dinner, and if, because of Victor, he can charge it against expenses, the best of British luck to him. Fortified with good intentions, she went down to the bar, resolved to enjoy her dinner.
She had set herself an easy task. A bottle of champagne was cooling in a steaming bucket. He had not ordered extravagantly; no caviar, no pâté de foie gras; straightforward dishes—smoked salmon, a steak with béarnaise sauce, a chocolate soufflé. She was grateful to him for that, for not making too much of an occasion of it. She was grateful to him too for the way in which he included Naomi in his talk, addressing himself to her as much as to herself, making Naomi feel that she was really wanted. He was a nice man.
And afterwards as they danced, in a continuing mood of warmth and gratitude, she let herself relax in a way that she had not before, drawing herself close, closer into his arms; subjected to the music, subjected to the sway and rhythm of his movements, letting him impose them on her. She half closed her eyes. ‘I could have danced all night. I could have danced all night.’ She was conscious of an abandon that she had rarely felt upon a dance floor. She had not danced much since her one season as a débutante. Victor did not particularly care for dancing. It was five years since she had danced like this. ‘I could have danced all night. I could have danced all night.’ Her eyes were fully closed now. Ah, this was wonderful. He led her with unfamiliar steps that she followed easily. As she swung and swirled and swayed, she became conscious slowly of the pressure of a protuberance against her inner thigh. She was instantly alert, startled out of her dream. This was a brand-new experience. It couldn’t be. Surely it couldn’t be. Her instinct was to draw away, but she could not; she had to know. Was it or wasn’t it? Instead she drew closer, moving her right leg between his; pressing it sideways. No, there was no doubt at all, the protuberance lengthened, broadened, hardened.
Her nerves were tingling. He wasn’t after all one of those timid men who only talked. Or if he was, her nearness had subdued him. However cautionary his mind, his body had controlled it, had taken over, issuing its own imperious commands. An exultant pride suffused her. She had not suspected that her mere dancing could have this effect. She wanted to look up at him, but her cheek was tight against his shoulder. Was he feeling awkward, ashamed of being trapped into this avowal? When they got back to the table, would he pretend that it had never happened? Would he manage to convince himself that she had not noticed? She was not going to let him have that alibi. That thing was certain. In a sudden
flash of mischief, of resolution, she tightened her hand’s hold on his shoulder, glided her leg between his to its extremity, and forced herself grindingly against him.
He gasped. He ceased to dance. He stood, close clasped to her, his hips moving against hers.
‘It would be wonderful to make love to you,’ he said.
‘You should try sometime and see.’
She forced into her voice an amused, teasing lilt.
‘What’s the number of your room?’ he asked.
‘It’s 207.’
He shaved and showered. He rubbed himself with Old Spice toilet water. He looked at the clock. Quarter of an hour since they had said goodnight. That should be long enough. Should he dress again? Was it presumptive to go in pyjamas and a dressing gown? Suppose he met someone on the way. Lucky that she was in the same wing, on the same floor as he was. It seemed very formal to walk into her room fully clothed; and then all the palaver of undressing. If he did meet anyone in the passage he would walk down to the front desk with some inquiry about transportation. Yes, much better to present himself in a dressing gown. Another glance at the clock. Nearly twenty minutes now. Time to be on his way. Had he ever known such acute excitement? Had his earlier years any equivalent for the experience that awaited him? It was the kind of thing that only happened to characters in books.
He walked down the passage with an unhurried stride. 201, 203, 205. Here it was. He turned the handle, pressed, but the door did not give. He looked up at the number to make sure. 207. That was it, all right. Could she have forgotten to press the opening stud? He tapped; there was no answer. He tapped again, more loudly. Still no reply. He could not very well tap any louder. Could she have fallen asleep? Had he misheard the number? He tapped again. He rattled the door. Still no result. He’d have to go back to his room and telephone.