by Robert Ward
“No, I was an insurance salesman,” he said sombrely.
She laughed again and sat back down on the swivel-chair behind the counter while he stood beyond it and sipped his tea.
“How do you know I haven’t got a brute of a boyfriend upstairs who’ll beat you to a bloody pulp for just looking in my direction?”
“Well, I don’t, but now I do. It’s just a chance one has to take.”
“What is it that you want?”
“I want to take you out somewhere.”
“This is a wind up, right? Someone’s got you to do this as a joke or for a bet or something, haven’t they? But aren’t you a bit old for this sort of thing?”
He looked sad.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “But I mean, you’re not exactly the type one expects…”
“I’d better be going then,” he said, placing his cup on the counter. “I’m sorry to have kept you from closing.”
He turned to go.
“No, wait,” she said. “I’m sorry. I’m not doing anything now. My boyfriend will be back later. I’ll leave him a note. Where do you want to go?”
“You’re sure?” he asked.
“Yes. I’m probably insane, but yes. You’re not going to rape and kill me, are you?”
“No.”
“Promise?”
“I promise.”
He was, after all, quite handsome and she had never been with a man of his age before, and she was simply curious.
Stephen had a dark green Mercedes and they drove out of the town to a country hotel called the King George, though which King George was not specified. It was an ivy clad coaching inn affair and Elizabeth had never been there before. Their speciality was good olde English fare such as roast beef and Yorkshire pudding, pork in cider, poached salmon and plum duff with custard. Elizabeth had a crab salad and Stephen, steak and kidney pie.
“So what’s all this about?” she asked.
“What’s all what about?”
“This.”
“I wanted to meet you, that’s all.”
“How did you know you wanted to meet me?”
“I’ve seen you. In the town. You attracted me. There’s nothing wrong with that is there?”
“It depends on what your motives are. And what do you mean, you’ve seen me in the town?”
“My office is there. I’ve just seen you around, that’s all.”
“Your office? My God, you’re not really an insurance salesman, are you?”
“No,” he said, smiling, “I’m a solicitor. But I suppose that’s equally boring.”
“Oh, I don’t know. Do you defend serial killers, or prosecute council tax defaulters?”
“Not much of either, really.”
“How do you mean?”
“I mean, I have minions.”
“You mean they do the work and you get the money?”
“Yes, that’s about it. Though it’s a bit more complicated than that. I still do, work. Special cases and that. But I don’t have much interest in law.”
“So why do you do it?”
“Because I can.”
“Good answer.”
A waitress in a white blouse and a black skirt with her hair tied back with a red ribbon brought them another bottle of Chateau Neuf du Pape and Elizabeth went to light one of her Sobranie cocktail cigarettes but then put it back into the packet.
“What do you expect to come of this?” she asked.
“Come of what?”
“Don’t pretend to be dense. It makes conversation so tiresome. What do you expect now that you’ve brought me here?”
“Honestly?”
“Yes, honestly.”
“I want to take you back to my house and make love to you.”
“I don’t believe this.”
“Why not? Because I’m a boring old solicitor?”
“Well, that’s it, partly. You’re good looking… I mean…”
“But old?”
“How old are you?” she asked, looking at him as she drank.
“Sixty one.”
She didn’t say anything, and he smiled. It was dark outside now and they had lit the open fire in the dining room of the hotel and the bar was filling up with the evening trade. They moved to a table in the Queen Caroline room and ordered Glen Morangies.
“Why back to your house? Why not here in the hotel?” she asked.
“Wherever,” he said.
“Do you do this often?”
“As often as I can.”
“Are you married?”
“No.”
“Ever been?”
“No.”
“Any children?”
“No,” he said. “I suppose you asked that because I’m old enough to be your father, or even grandfather?”
“No, I didn’t actually. It hadn’t occurred to me. I’m twenty two by the way.”
“Yes, I thought you were about that.”
“My boyfriend, Drew owns the bookshop. We live there.”
“Where is he?”
“Buying books.”
“Will he be away for long?”
“No. He might be back now in fact.”
“What are you going to do?” he asked.
“I’ll phone him and tell him what’s happened.”
“And what has happened?”
“I’ll tell him I’ve been seduced by a sixty one year old solicitor and that we’re going to spend the night together at the King George Hotel.”
“Not at my house?”
“No, I prefer not. I’m not sure why. Why are you so keen to go to your house?”
“It reflects my personality. Maybe I think you might like me more if you saw it. But it really doesn’t matter. How will he react? Your boyfriend I mean?”
She drank her large whisky, enjoying the fiery sensation on her tongue and asked for another.
“He’ll be pissed off a bit, I suppose. But it’s not something he would never have thought possible. We do have other friends, at least I do, if you take my meaning?”
“Sounds good.”
Stephen booked a room for the night at reception and while he was gone Elizabeth thought about what she was doing. She liked him, she thought. He seemed quite nice and witty and she didn’t think he’d harm her. Besides, again, she was curious. She did find him attractive, and she wondered what it would be like to sleep with him. She wondered why men liked to sleep with young girls, and women with older men. Something obvious, she concluded. She wondered if he had wiry grey chest hair and what it would feel like. She wanted to be adored of course and be cuddled in a protective embrace by someone who was besotted with her, someone who would care for her, die for her. She wanted him to feel her loveliness and be addicted to her. His little baby, if only for the night.
“I’m not really a solicitor,” he said when he returned. “I’m a magician and I want you for a sacrifice to my demon-god.”
“I thought as much,” she said. “But don’t you think I’m a bit old for that? What you want is a nice little virgin isn’t it?”
“You’ll have to do.”
“Oh, I see. I’m just the best you could get at the time.”
“Quite right.”
“You don’t sound like…”
“Sound like what?”
“Like…”
“A boring old solicitor of sixty one? You think I should have a nice glam wife of about forty five whose bored but devoted to her lifestyle, and a couple of kids at university by now who we’ve had a bit of trouble with about drugs and pregnancy and such but who’ll be all right because Daddy is always there to bail them out and they’ll turn out okay in the end anyway? Is that what you mean?”
She laughed and reached across the table and took his hands in hers and pulled him a little towards her.
“Yes, that’s exactly what I mean. God you’re funny.”
“Funny peculiar, or funny ha ha?”
“Ha, that’s what my Dad used to say. Oh
, God, no. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. Honestly, I didn’t.”
It was his turn to laugh.
“Look, we don’t have to tread carefully when we talk, okay? There’s nothing you can say that I haven’t thought of already. Stop worrying about it.”
“You’re so nice,” she said, looking into his eyes. “Why aren’t you though? I mean, all of those things you’ve just said? That’s what you should be.”
“Because, as I told you, I’m really a magician. I’m a strange and fascinating person. I’m not really sixty one. I’m five hundred and fifty, and through the centuries I’ve met you a hundred times. This is merely one in an endless series of encounters. I love you and will always love you whether it is you personally or what you are. It is destiny and cannot be denied. It is written that I must meet you and meet you. We are not responsible. Understand that, now and forever. We are not responsible.”
Elizabeth had continued to look into his dark brown eyes as he spoke and she felt herself liking him more.
“Yes, I have met you before,” she said. “But it was only in the bookshop. But that was enough. It’s amazing what judgements we make, isn’t it?”
“Your judgements you mean?”
“Yes, all right, mine. But I don’t think I was wrong.”
The hotel was by now full, seemingly to capacity, and all of the bars and the dining room were filled with the unintelligible sound of dozens of people talking, and Elizabeth and Stephen were pleasantly drunk with whisky and comfortable with each other.
People had come dressed to drink and impress each other and to have or pretend to have a good time in couples or in groups and to make out that life was forever and interesting. No doubt for most of them it was or seemed to be. Disco music boomed from one of the rooms where according to a chalked board at its entrance an eighteenth birthday party was taking place.
“Stephen,” Elizabeth said, a little drunk.
“Yes, that’s my name.”
“You know that this is it, don’t you? And why did you say, yes, that’s my name? I hate that. Don’t be glib like that, like you’re laughing.”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I can’t be held to account for everything I say. I’m just as nervous as you, you know?”
“I’m not nervous.”
“Well I am,” he said.
“Why?”
“It doesn’t matter. Anyway, what were you going to say?”
“That there can’t be anything more than this.”
“Than what?”
“You’re doing it again. Being dense. I mean tonight. I mean we can’t have a long term affair or anything.”
“Why not?”
“Because I don’t want it.”
“Why not?” he asked.
“Because I can’t have a long term anything. Even Drew knows I might just leave at any time. It’s just the way I am.”
“What about you and Drew? Do you love him?”
“Yes I do. But love doesn’t mean forever. It might end tomorrow. It doesn’t mean I don’t love him, he knows that.”
“Tell me about Drew,” he said and asked one of the passing black and white waitresses to bring them some more whiskies.
She thought for a moment and then looked him in the eye again.
“Drew is tall, like you, and he has pale blue eyes and blonde hair, slightly thinning at the sides of his forehead like a lot of men do. He’s lovely and he’s my friend and he gets quite upset when Cambridge lose the boat race. He’s kind and loving and he puts up with me. I would never avoidably hurt him and I’ll probably love him till the day I die. Is that enough?”
She took a drink, surprised by what she had said and waited for him to say something.
“I wish someone could say what you’ve just said about him about me.”
“Well, if they can’t, maybe that’s your fault for not being like him.”
“Yes, maybe so.”
They drank more malt whisky and then it seemed like a good time to go to their room. For some moments they hadn’t spoken.
The King George Hotel was just over four miles outside the town where Elizabeth lived and worked in the bookshop and Stephen had his office. It was a nice, friendly place, a piece of middle England. No doubt it had accommodated many solicitors and bookshop assistants in its time and no doubt would again. This night the solicitor and the bookshop assistant were given room fourteen, which of course should have been room thirteen.
Room service could only provide a bottle of Glenfiddich but that was certainly good enough and Elizabeth and Stephen lay back on their separate comfortable beds, having switched on the TV. A dreadful early seventies film was showing complete with garish grainy colour and a wah-wah pedal guitar music score. Stephen switched to another channel showing a forties film noir.
“Do you want this on at all?” he asked.
“Yes. I like background,” she said. “It distracts me from reality.”
“Why, is the reality so awful?” he asked.
“God, you’re so paranoid,” she said. “Let me see you then.”
“What? you mean you want me to strip for you?”
“Yes, of course. I presume you did intend us to take our clothes off at some stage of the evening? And why shouldn’t it be you first?”
Stephen stripped down to his underpants and stood there, feeling each of his years and feeling ridiculous, as people without beautiful bodies do.
“Well, this is what you get,” he said.
He did have wiry chest hair and Elizabeth got up from her bed and went over to him and ran her hands over him.
“It’s strange about bodies,” she said. “It’s only the face that really ages. The body stays the same, unless you really let yourself go of course. You, you really are still male and lovely. I like feeling you.”
She felt him, taking down his underpants and running her hands over him, and she watched as he got excited.
“My goodness, there’s life in the old boy yet,” she said. “Oh, no, I’m doing it again, aren’t I? I didn’t mean that.”
“I’ve told you not to worry about what you say,” he said.
She lay back on his bed and pulled him back on top of her.
“I love this,” she said.
“Why?” he asked.
“Because I didn’t expect it. Just let me feel you.”
They made love, and Stephen felt it perhaps more than she did. She felt him, and he her, but for both of them it was different. Afterwards they lay back on the bed and drank more whisky.
“Is there anyone you love more than you love anyone else, Stephen?” she asked.
“No, I don’t think so,” he said. “You see, I don’t think I’ve ever really loved anybody. I’ve always been too much in love with myself. That’s why I’ve always been single.”
“What a waste,” she said. “You’re a nice person. I could love you.”
“Yes, but you belong to a different time. What you said was true. This is it.”
“What does something like age matter?”
“Nothing if you’re not a product of your age. But I am, you see, and so are you, of yours.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“No, nor do I, but there’s someone you love, isn’t there? I don’t mean Drew. There’s someone else who you’ll love forever. Someone you maybe think of with fond memory? Someone who can never be replaced?”
She drew the bed-covers over her and nestled into him, pulling his arms around her and resting her head in the nape of his neck.
“What you say should be true,” she said. “But I can’t think of anyone who fits the description.”
In the morning they drove back to town. They knew that they would never see each other again except perhaps in passing. Elizabeth kissed him and he said that he loved her because of the light she emitted. She in turn said that he wasn’t sixty one but six hundred and ten and that she would like to meet him again in a future life.
Elizabeth
explained to Drew what had happened and he accepted it as he always did and within a day or so she had chosen to forget more or less everything that had taken place. It was only an article in the local paper that made her remember. It described the suicide of a local solicitor.
Rich,
Something terrible has happened. There was this guy… man I went out with. It was really bizarre because he was old you see. I mean really old, and anyway he picked me up one afternoon in the bookshop right out of the blue and Drew was away and I had nothing better to do and so I thought what the hell and so we went to a hotel for dinner and we stayed the night and he was interesting and nice and everything and then that was that.
Then, a few days later, I can’t remember exactly how long after, it was in the local rag that he’d killed himself! You know, exhaust fumes in his car in his garage. I mean, freaky, or what? Am I cursed? Does everything I touch turn to dust? Yours, totally unnerved.
Liz.
CHAPTER FIVE
Liz,
Wow! A femme-fatale or what? The poor bloke. It’s very unlikely to be you, you know? I imagine someone who kills themselves has been thinking about it for a long time anyway and as you only met him a few days before you can’t really have influenced him in any way. Maybe you were the last happy time in his life? Maybe he died happy because of you? Who knows? Try not to worry about it.
I’ve met this girl! Her name is Irma and for some unknown reason she keeps telling me she was only obeying orders. She likes to wear a uniform with jack-boots and she carries a whip around with her. She’s self conscious about her moustache. No, seriously though I have met a girl and I like her. Her name is Sally and she’s an art student. I had sex easily and comfortably with her which as you know is difficult for me and she seems to understand my weirdness and guilt. She now shares my hovel. You must meet her. We’ll arrange a foursome or something somewhere. God, doesn’t that sound awful?
They are quite beastly to a fellow at the travel agents. They make me work and get things right like booking people onto the right plane going to the right place for the right fare and at the right time and I’m proving to be completely incompetent at it. I think they keep me on out of pity. Isn’t working for a living an obscenity? I don’t know how much longer I can do it for. The pay is ludicrous anyway. How is one expected to live a life of depravity and degradation on it?