‘Ah! Mademoiselle!’ All smiles suddenly. Hand kissing. She was looking very lovely this evening. No idea that the gentlemen were friends of mademoiselle. Coats were whisked away and they were led through the maze of tables to a semi-circular booth near the band. There was a delicious smell in the room. Like someone sneaking a quick fag while frying a steak in the perfumery department. A ‘Reserved’ sign magically disappeared.
Again the thrill of heads turning. Jane was almost giddy with it. It was fabulous. Like Miss United Kingdom walking past the judges’ table in evening wear. Every eye on her: admiring her face, her figure, her legs. Marking her out of ten. All they needed was clipboards.
Ollie slumped ungratefully into a seat and ordered champagne. The waiter brought sweet instead of dry but Ollie was too depressed to send it back and besides, the girls seemed to prefer it. Suzy took a happy sip from her saucer then decided that it was time for a bit more nose-powdering and the two of them filed out to the Ladies’.
The mirrored room was packed with what looked like hundreds of women straightening seams, fixing straps, re-gluing eyelashes – like the emergency ward in a dolls’ hospital. A girl in embroidered organdie sat with a broken zip, grubby pink deceivers spilling out of the front of her bodice, black tears snaking down her face while Elsie, the attendant, who had already clocked up over ten quid in half crowns, stitched up the back of her dress. All of them had had far too much to drink. One little gang of tarts were out for a good time with a bunch of loud-mouthed old northerners in town ‘on business’ (they were actually down South for the weekend to service the weighing machines at a sweet factory in Lewisham). Jerome wouldn’t have let them in as a rule but a nice crisp fiver bought them a table by the kitchen door.
‘What’s yours like?’
‘Hands all over the place – talk about Bolton bloody Wanderers.’
Two shrunken-looking women of thirty-odd made a beeline for a pair of vacant stools. Both were wearing greasy old gowns in tired duchesse satin. They’d managed to get the zips done up but only just and there were great fat folds of back bulging out over the top. They sat dabbing listlessly at their strawberry blonde perms – hard to know why, as every strand had been lacquered to a standstill. You could see nasty poultrified bits of razored armpit every time they moved. It always offends the eye to see a thicket of hair under an upraised arm.
One of them slyly eyed Jane and Suzy but then forgot to put her mirror face back on before looking away and got a sudden, terrifying glimpse of her own vinegary expression. Not just older. Older was bad enough. She looked suddenly panic-stricken. Was that what she looked like when she wasn’t looking? Did all that envy and bitterness show through on the outside? You could see the trouble she had getting her face in order: chin up; eyebrows slightly raised to take up some of the slack. The possibility of a smile. Anything to lose the ghost of the sour old bag she had just seen.
‘What a lovely dress!’ She very nearly said ‘dear’ but swallowed it in time. ‘Dear’ would have widened the age gap still further.
‘Thank you.’
Jane found a smile and turned back to the face that Suzy had made: the neat lick of eyeliner; the smart eyebrows; the bewitching sweep of long black eyelashes. Wasted on Ollie, mind you.
‘Was that a man?’ a posh, bored voice was wondering.
‘Was what a man?’ Her friend had peeled off her stocking and was putting a fresh corn plaster on her little toe. You could smell her feet.
‘That tall one with all the feathers.’
‘Don’t be silly, Vanessa. She had a huge bosom. Jerry couldn’t take his eyes off her.’
‘So? Jerry never looks at their faces, darling. Looked like a bloody man to me.’
‘God I hate the West End on Saturdays. Talk about Nescafé society.’
‘No choice, unfortunately. Jerry’s Swedish clients always make this sort of trip at the weekend so they don’t lose a minute in the office. Bloody Lutheran work ethic. Are you going to that charity canasta party Monty Manafu’s doing?’
‘Never even met the man, darling.’
‘Yes you have. You must have. At Audrey’s. That wine-tasting evening she had for the spastics. Little fat chap. At Christ Church with Roger.’
‘No, honestly I haven’t.’
Vanessa wasn’t letting go.
‘You do know him. Little fat poof. Lot of gold teeth.’
‘Vanessa. I’d remember.’
‘You do remember. Little fat poof, darling,’ she lowered her voice, ‘little fat black poof.’
‘Oh him! God no!’
Jane sat on her dainty golden chair and checked her teeth for lipstick while Suzy dabbed needlessly at her forehead with a miniature pink puff.
‘The maître d’ seemed very friendly,’ said Jane.
‘Used to know my father years ago but he was only lapping me up like that to annoy poor Ollie. What a twerp, though, honestly. And so rude! We shall have to do a bit better than that.’
Suzy filled the fading centre of her Butterfly Pink lips, tweaked a tissue from the lace box on the shelf and gave it a hard, passionless kiss.
‘Ah well. Back to work.’
Work? Was it?
Ollie was suffering.
‘So, Suzy. Mam-zelle. You seem very, very friendly with the head man here. This your usual table then? Are you on commission? They’re all raking it in, Henry. That’s how the system works, old boy. Isn’t it, Suzy darling?’
‘That’s quite enough of that, Ollie old boy.’
‘Well. Is she? Are you on commission, Suzy old girl?’
Suzy smiled as wide and as pretty as if Ollie were paying her a string of compliments. Henry looked on approvingly as she turned to face Ollie and said in her smartest, doggiest voice: ‘Jerome used to work for Daddy.’ Deddy. ‘I’ve known him since I was a little girl.’ Gel. She turned her head abruptly as if about to cry. Nice work. Margaret Leighton couldn’t have done it better.
‘Dance with me, Henry.’
Ollie hadn’t realised. And kept on muttering about not having realised. Poor girl. Didn’t realise. While Henry propelled Suzy round the dance floor in a sort of syncopated smooch. He could have Boston two-stepped very happily but the cha-cha was slightly beyond him.
Ollie knew he had to pounce. ‘You’re a very, very pretty girl, you know,’ he cooed (just for a bloody change) and tried to grab Jane’s hand. Jane kept a smile in place and looked around the room as if she were having the time of her life but she wasn’t and there wasn’t even a mirror to cheer her up.
A pint-sized redhead at the next table was being given the treatment by a slightly foreign-looking man in a tonic suit.
‘You have beautiful hands, Monica.’
Which was a black lie. Monica was quite nice-looking in a Locarno sort of way but her hands were horrible little pink sausagey things. Nice curvy little figure, though – if it hadn’t been squished into a tight Vilene puffball the colour of hospital teacups. Monica had obviously read somewhere that matching accessories were very smart so her beehive had a green bow on it plus green button earrings, green satin evening slippers and chipped nail varnish all in the same snotty rotten colour. She had pencilled her eyebrows all crooked which gave her a slightly roguish look. The spiv obviously thought so. He was holding one of those big, pink paws.
‘They’re lovely hands. You don’t mind my saying that, do you, Monica?’
Of course she didn’t but then poor, dozy little Monica didn’t know what came next. He lowered his voice. Definitely foreign.
‘And you’ve got a lovely figure.’
She wriggled and looked a bit coy.
‘You shouldn’t be shy about it, Monica. Having a beautiful body is nothing to be ashamed of. You don’t mind me saying you’ve got a Lovely Figure, do you?’
Monica squirmed some more, loving it. All the hours in the mirror, all the busty gymslip years melting away in the heat of his compliments, but she was scared, too. Nobody had ever said things about
her body before. ‘Pretty dress’ yes. ‘Nice eyes’ maybe, if she was lucky. But not her body.
‘Because you have got a Lovely Figure, Monica.’ He lowered his voice but Jane could still hear.
‘You’ve got the Most Beautiful Breasts I’ve ever seen.’
Worked like a bloody charm. Even Jane was a bit excited but Monica went a very funny, dark pink colour that clashed horribly with the orange of her hair. Not just her face but her neck, throat and what could be seen of that beautiful cushiony cleavage. Monica was obviously horrified but you could see it was turning her on. It was all going according to plan. She might not come across that night but she’d get home, take off her green Vilene frock and suddenly everything would have changed. She’d look in the mirror and her body wouldn’t be her own any more. She wouldn’t be able to look at that fat, white bosom without thinking of him. He had already taken possession: moving in was just a matter of time.
Ollie was now asleep so Jane had to make do with the admiring eyes at nearby tables that kept straying from their own dates to check out the brunettes in the next booth. Which was all very nice but their admiration – no, desire was probably a better word – was all but cancelled out by the glum glances of the wives, girlfriends or paid help sat with them. It was one thing to make the effort – everyone made the effort but you were never really supposed to look like the picture on the packet. Are you quite sure you want to be the best-dressed girl in the room? The men won’t dare approach you and the other women will hate you.
But there was one man staring more fixedly with a strange half smile on his face. He was stood at the bar and he was wearing a dark blue suit.
She could sit and be watched and hope he’d come over. Only he wouldn’t. Not with bloody Ollie sat there snoring.
She got up and walked – the best, most beautiful catwalk – through the tables and up to the bar. Heavy velvet skirts tick-tocking over her slim little ankles, pretty French-pleated head held high. The barman (who was only twenty-one) practically fell over the counter leaning forward to catch her order. What could he get her? She smiled her sweetest smile.
‘Do you know what I’d really like?’
It went all quiet. They knew what they’d like. And what they’d like her to like. Dirty buggers. Later that night in the bathroom mirror the barman – debonair, roguish, utterly confident – leaned further forward, raised one eyebrow (hours of practice) and replied, ‘I think I know exactly what you’d like.’
But not now. Now he was too shy.
‘Could. I. Have,’ and she looked her man right in the eye as she said it, ‘a Nice Cold Glass of Orange Squash?’
She climbed neatly on to one of the bar stools, crossed her legs (just so) and smiled shy and sidelong at the blue suit.
And he looked the same look. The same slow, sexy eyes mapping the length of her calves but everything was bigger, louder and better dressed, as if Streatham had just been a rehearsal for their big scene.
‘Very pretty shoes. But can you dance in them?’
‘You bet.’
It wasn’t a jive this time; it was a rumba. And he could rumba. They didn’t speak again until he had piloted her back to the bar, one hand on her waist.
‘And?’
‘And what?’
‘What is a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?’
He looked around the room: the tarty girls and their ‘businessmen’ staggering off the dance floor in a cock-eyed conga; Ollie fast asleep; Henry warming his hand up Suzy’s skirt.
Was he with anybody? She scanned the tables vaguely and spotted a large group of rather drunk but rather smart-looking people over in the corner. An unnaturally tall, long-legged showgirl in a lot of feathers was with them.
‘I just came over to make a telephone call. I ought to introduce myself. My name’s John Hullavington.’
‘Great name. Your own?’ What a good line that was.
‘My very own. And you are?’
‘Jane James. Really.’ She nearly gave him the ‘Do call me Janey, everybody does’ routine but she stopped herself in time. He wasn’t everybody.
A blonde woman had broken away from the laughing group in the corner and was heading in their direction.
‘Time for another dance, Miss James.’
Not a rumba this time. Much slower. The lights were lowered but Jane could see the woman hastily changing tack and making for the Ladies’ instead, as if that was what she’d meant to do all the time. It is not best behaviour to dash away and dance with some fascinating stranger who has caught your fancy. Suzy was back on the dance floor with Henry and smiled approvingly, pointing to the table where Ollie was snoring in front of an empty champagne bottle. His fake teeth had slipped their moorings, making his face go a funny shape.
John’s voice was warm and soft in her ear.
‘I’m afraid your dancing partner isn’t much use.’
‘Oh. I wouldn’t say that.’
Wide surprised eyes ringed with shiny pale blue. Like a dolly. As if they’d click shut if you pushed her over. She breathed in, pressing herself a shade closer and felt his arm snake tighter around her waist, his lips brushing against her neck. He smelled nice: expensive shaving soap and tobacco.
‘Is this a slow foxtrot?’
‘Certainly seems that way. Why?’
‘Oh nothing.’ She gave a careful little giggle. ‘It’s just that I can’t do the slow foxtrot.’
‘Could have fooled me.’
He held her still tighter and smoothly reversed them in the direction of the table where Henry and Suzy were back whispering sweet nothings to each other. Nuzzling and stuff like bunny rabbits. Public intimacies between the sexes only render them absurd to other people. Henry was much too old for that lark. He pulled away as they approached the table.
‘There you are, Janey! I’m afraid old Ollie’s a bit of a spent force this evening.’
Henry looked up at John, checking his barber and his tailor while he waited for an introduction.
‘Henry, this is John Hullavington. John Hullavington: Henry Swan.’
‘I’m afraid I should go back and join my party. I’ll see you again, I hope? May I telephone you?’
Suzy gave him the number, the smart Langham exchange giving no inkling of the cracked old phone hanging on the wall in that cold, dirty corridor. John took a gold fountain pen from his inside pocket and wrote it down in a neat leather diary.
‘Johnny, where have you been?’
The blonde had finally tracked him down. Citron yellow was definitely not her colour. She was furious and she was making a right mess of it. Does he seem enraptured by another woman’s company? Say nothing. Don’t interrupt their tête-à-tête. She should have stayed at the table and flirted like mad with one of the other men. Instead she was chasing him all over the club like she was his mother or something. There was only one more mistake to make and she went right ahead and made it.
‘And who’s your little friend? I didn’t know they still did dancing partners here.’
Jane took yet another leaf from Suzy’s book and decided to look hurt rather than put out. John smoothly introduced everybody.
‘And I don’t think you know Oliver Weaver? Ollie was at school with Charlie. How’s Angela, Ollie?’
Ollie looked miserable and bewildered to be woken up by someone who knew the wife. The blonde dragged John away. Ollie began demanding the bill – asking nicely seemed beyond him. Jane and Suzy made a last visit to the powder room.
‘That was fast work.’ Suzy looked surprised, like Jane couldn’t pull a fella without her help.
‘I’ve met him before.’
‘Rather a dish. I wonder if he’ll ring? Not if the girlfriend has anything to do with it.’
At which point the blonde swung through the powder-room door with a friend. They could see her reflection in the mirror but she hadn’t yet spotted them.
‘Swine! Leaving me stranded with some feathered pervert while he was off danci
ng with that skinny little tart.’
‘Oh don’t be silly, Amanda. It was only a dance. You’d already said you didn’t want to. And you are as good as engaged, aren’t you?’
Maybe not. Not from the look on Amanda’s face, anyway.
The skinny little tart and her friend got up and twirled critically in the mirror, checking for laddered stockings, stray curls. It was past midnight and the blonde – who was the wrong side of twenty-five – was looking a bit lived-in. It would have been fine if the evening had been going well but misery can do terrible things to the face: pouches of disappointment round the mouth, tramlines between the eyes. You might wake up one morning married to a face like that but not if you’d seen it coming.
Gushing goodbyes from Jerome at the door and then back into the car. Ollie got in the back with Jane this time. They were dropping him off in St James’s first but he was determined to get full value for the five-minute drive down Regent Street. He had an arm round Jane’s waist and a hand on her knee and his tongue in her ear, telling her what a very, very, very pretty girl she was. His hair had a stuffy, old-man smell, bay rum or something. His hand was fumbling its way up her nylons just as Henry stopped smoothly in front of Ollie’s flat. Tell him you had a lovely evening (don’t thank him; he thanks you). A dirty, wet goodbye kiss and it was over but she could still taste his spit on her lips.
When they got back to the flat Henry turned the corner into the mews beside the block and parked under the lamp post. Suzy took the bunch of keys from her evening bag while Henry nipped round to let Jane out.
A Vision of Loveliness Page 10