Marcus.
I stared at the paper in my hands. Sat down slowly on a stool. An exeat in London? With Daddy meeting us for lunch? In some hushed restaurant where I could be relied on not to make a scene, while he gently explained that Mummy and Daddy were no longer going to live together? And yes, of course it was sad, but actually, it wouldn’t make much difference to their lives now they were at boarding-school, would it? What, Lily? Yes, of course you can see Mummy as much as you like. Well, alternate weekends, naturally. Oh, and by the way, Angus, that diver’s watch you wanted? I found it in Harrods this morning. And that new rug for your pony, Lily? Broad wink. Take a look in the tackroom next time you’re home. That’s, home at the farm, obviously. Not home in London. Although of course you will have your own rooms in London. Yes, perhaps the flat is a bit small. Maybe we should buy Mummy a new one, hm? Throw money at it.
My heart began to thump high up in my chest. He was trying to scare me. That’s what Mum had said. He was trying to scare me, and he was bloody well succeeding. I was terrified. This wasn’t the Marcus I knew, the kind, loving family man I’d been married to for fifteen years. This wasn’t my husband at all!
I put the letter down. Stared abstractedly at a grease spot on the wall for a moment – then came to. I slid off the stool and tore up the stairs, my mind racing. I had to look for clues. Not clues as to his whereabouts, clues to his mental state. Something that might tell me what was going on in his head, why he’d changed so dramatically, so abruptly, and actually, I knew just where to look. I swept along the corridor, still with hoover marks where Linda had been, and across the landing, but as I passed the children’s empty bedrooms, I stopped. Their doors were wide open, and as I gazed into Angus’s room, a lump came to my throat.
It was a sparsely decorated and rather formal room, as if any adornment had been put there with a degree of embarrassment. A couple of Chelsea posters hung on the walls, one or two cups he’d won at prep school were on his desk, and a token Bond girl hung above his bed. There was a bookcase, his music system, and a rack full of CDs, but that was it on the entertainment front. All Scalextric, soldiers, forts and trains that had once run riot in this room had been packed away, ready for me to pass on to godchildren. Only a token teddy remained on a chair. For this occupant had put away childish things.
I moved on to clutch the next doorframe, the one to his sister’s room. Conversely, this oozed its occupant’s personality. Puppy pictures, pony posters and rosettes abounded, so that you could hardly see the Cath Kidston roses. A pink mosquito net hung from the ceiling, shrouding the bed like a Bedouin princess’s. Soft toys were everywhere, squashed onto shelves, on top of the wardrobe, on her pillows; and in a basket at the end of her bed, an orgy of naked Barbies and one solitary naked Ken – woefully under-equipped for the job – lay in a tangled heap. Lily’s house mistress had said that Lily might sleep better at school if she could at least get into her bed, but Lily couldn’t bear not to have her things around her. She counted them religiously every night, wouldn’t let them out of her sight. How was she going to feel then, about letting her mummy out of her sight? About me not being here when she got home?
A lump the size of an Elgin marble rose in my throat, and with tears threatening, I moved smartly on down the corridor. I passed the two spare rooms complete with en suite bathrooms – very grand and lovely to have but hardly used – and on to our room. It was light, creamy and sumptuous, and I gave it a cursory glance but I wasn’t really interested. There’d be nothing of note in here. In here, however …I opened the door to Marcus’s dressing room where an altogether different feel prevailed.
It was a small dark room with green walls: cosy and masculine, with heavy russet curtains and a single bed for those nights when his insomnia became too much. All his clothes were in here: his suits in a huge Victorian wardrobe which I found depressing and had been dying to get rid of, and his shirts in a bow-fronted chest of drawers. His studbox and loose change were on top of the chest, together with a framed photograph of the four of us the day we’d moved into White Cross Farm. The whole family grinned at me over a five-bar gate. Although nominally his dressing room, Marcus never used it as such, preferring instead to collect his clothes from here and get dressed in our bedroom, chatting to me as I woke up. One of the more curious rituals of our marriage was that he offered me his wrists every morning so I could fix his cufflinks, waking me if necessary. Penny found this hilarious.
‘He wakes you up to get you to do his cufflinks?’
‘Yes, why?’
‘I think that’s outrageous. If Tommy woke me up to offer me his wrists I’d bloody well cuff them together!’
I tried that one morning. It didn’t go down particularly well.
I stood, glancing uncertainly around the room for a moment, then got to work. First I rummaged through the pockets of his suit hanging on the trouser press …nothing. Well, nothing unusual anyway – chequebook, pens, driving licence and loose change in the trousers. Then I looked in his sock drawer. The keys to the safe were there where naturally every burglar would look first, and some pills for heartburn. There was nothing tucked amongst his boxer shorts, or in the shirt drawer, or the jumper drawer further down. I straightened up and frowned. I wasn’t even sure what I was looking for, but nonetheless I kept going. Opening the wardrobe, I riffled through the other suit he currently used to go to the office. Nothing. I went through his overcoat, not used yet because we were having such a glorious Indian summer – but again, the pockets were empty. Then I spotted his briefcase, sticking out from under the bed. I crouched down and snapped it open. Everything you’d expect to find in a busy producer’s case was there – scripts, budgets, documents – and his desk diary too, kept purely for business. I opened it. Most weekends were blank, as he deferred to my calendar in the kitchen, but on this particular Sunday, today, he’d put a red line through it and written P.
I frowned. P? What was P? Or who was P? I flicked on, looking for more P s, but no. Suddenly I had a thought. Inside the lid of the case was a leather pouch, where he often stuffed letters and bills to pay at work. Marcus did all the paperwork. Another thing that astonished Penny was the fact that I’d never paid a bill in my married life.
‘Not even a milk bill?’
‘Not even a milk bill.’
Sure enough, the pouch was stuffed with bills and receipts. The children’s school fees were there, water rates, oil bills, and a few printed out emails. They were mostly in a sheaf, and to do with work, but one was separate, and folded into four. I unfolded it, and spread it out on my knee.
Dear Marcus,
I loved your last missive, just loved it. And I agree, why shouldn’t I be the mistress? What’s sauce for the goose, etc …
We meet again on Thursday and I can’t wait. I anticipate lots of action! Incidentally, why shouldn’t we meet at your place now? Surely the coast is clear? Think on it.
LOL, Perdita
I sat down hard on the edge of the bed. The house seemed very quiet, very still. It was one of those peculiar moments when the world tilts on its axis. Changes colour. Darkens. And you realize nothing’s ever going to be quite the same again.
I’m not sure how long I sat there. I wasn’t really thinking coherently, just listening to my heart pumping the blood around my body, like listening to a completely separate machine. After a while, I stared down at the paper in my hands. I knew I’d been looking for something, anything. But nothing as blatant as this. I didn’t have to rack my brains too hard either. I knew who Perdita was. My breathing became shallow. Laboured. I got up from the bed, one hand at my throat. She was the riding instructor at the local stables. Perdita had taught Marcus to ride. She was tall, blonde, and in her early thirties. A divorcée. Not gorgeous, necessarily, but attractive, fit. And very, very sexy.
I fumbled for the bed behind me, realizing my legs were shaky, and lowered myself to a sitting position again. Right. So. The story so far. Perdita was the mistress. My husband
’s mistress. My husband was having an affair. I pressed both hands to my cheeks and stared straight ahead. How long had it been going on, I wondered? I felt numb. Sick. But whilst my stomach was nauseous, my mind was feverishly putting the pieces together. What’s sauce for the …yes, of course. Finding me with Laurie had actually been very convenient, hadn’t it? I remembered how swiftly Marcus had moved, how quickly he’d got me out of the farm and into London. How pious and wronged and high-minded he’d been in that hotel room; how scornful, how disgusted, when all the time …the gander was getting the sauce, too.
I tried to control my breathing. Tried to slow it down. Where, I wondered? Not here, obviously, although that was clearly what she was suggesting, now that I’d conveniently cleared out – so, where? At the riding stables? My mind flew over there. No. No, not at the stables, in her cottage, which was behind the yard. It went with the job, and I’d commented on how pretty it was one day as I’d dropped Marcus off for his lesson; a sweet little bow-fronted affair, with roses round the door, gables in the roof …Which was where they lay, presumably. Under the eaves in that bedroom, overlooking the fields, lying in a post-coital glow, what – every Saturday? After his lesson? That was how often he saw her, every Saturday morning for the last …well, it must be over a year now.
I bent my head forward and clasped the back of my neck with both hands. A year! How stupid of me, so stupid! God, it was a classic scenario. Women fell for their tennis coaches and their personal trainers, didn’t they, so why should it be any different for men? And here was Marcus, being taught to ride by a willowy, sensuous blonde, every bleeding week!
And of course this woman was very much his type, I thought feverishly, jerking my head up. For Perdita was definitely a woman, not a girl; experienced, worldly, not a silly little Sloane sticking a Danish pastry under his nose every morning but a sophisticated thirty-something who knew her way round a bedroom. And what’s more, who knew more than he did – for once – about another passion of his. Riding. It came to me in a flash. Oh, that would be very attractive to Marcus, very. Someone who could crack the whip – literally – and stand, legs astride, in the middle of an indoor school, tight-jodhpured and leather-booted, as he trotted around her (a private lesson, of course, no pony clubbing for Marcus), yelling all manner of sexy instructions at him.
‘Grip with your knees, Marcus!’
‘OK, Perdita.’
‘Tighten those buttocks!’
‘Will do!’ (Pant.)
‘I want to see you really thrusting forward now … thrust!’
(Marcus, speechless with desire.)
‘Go deep, Marcus, deep!’
(Marcus, nearly falling off his horse with excitement.)
‘Rise, Marcus, don’t bounce. Up down, up down – buttocks clenched – CLENCHED!’
Oh, he’d be in a positive lather. He’d love all that. Particularly having recently vacated a bed in which a cross-looking woman with vertical hair and a Gap T-shirt had swatted away his Saturday-morning advances like a dirty fly. And now, here was a woman, clad in leather, encouraging him to thrust!
I remembered him saying, one Saturday morning after his lesson as he watched me cook lunch at the Aga, ‘Perdita says the muscles we use for the rising trot are the same ones that we use to make love.’
‘Does she? ’ I’d replied tartly. ‘Well, do you think the same ones could be employed to strain the sprouts? Make yourself useful, Marcus, and take that pan to the sink.’ And he’d disappeared obediently, in a cloud of steam.
I hadn’t batted an eyelid. My heart hadn’t even missed a beat. God, I’d practically thrown him at her. Practically said, ‘Here, take him. He’s in the way on a Saturday and I haven’t the energy for sex, so if you could service him, that would be great.’
And even if he’d said right then, ‘Look, Henny, I’m shagging my riding instructor, is that all right?’ I’d probably have snapped, ‘I don’t care what you’re doing, just get those children out from in front of the television and lay the table. Now, please!’
That’s how distracted I’d been. How comprehensively I’d taken my eye off the ball. Because I was so sure of him, you see. So sure.
A tear rolled down my cheek and onto the letter in my hands. Then another, and another. They plopped splashily down, wetting the paper. I remembered bumping into her in Waitrose once, stopping to say hello. We’d laughed at my groaning trolley and her jaunty basket. A bottle of Chardonnay and a couple of fillet steaks. For him, I wondered now. A little candlelit supper? And then, after supper … Oh God, I tried not to think. Tried not to picture Marcus, his eyes shining with excitement as she writhed on top of him …ohmygod ohmygod.
I stood up sharply, trembling all over. Now what, I wondered, smoothing down my shirt with fluttery hands. What should I do? Should I go back to London, or should I stay here and confront him? Be downstairs waiting for him, waving the letter in his face when he came home? ‘Well Marcus? Well?’
A friend of Penny’s had done just that. Confronted her husband with his infidelity, waved the shirt with the lipstick on the collar, or the equivalent.
‘Can you deny it?’ she’d cried.
‘No, I can’t,’ he’d admitted sheepishly.
‘And do you love her?’ she’d screamed.
‘Yes, I do actually.’
‘Well, then you’d better get out, hadn’t you?’
‘Right. Will do. Thanks very much.’
And he had. He’d gone, and never come back. Probably couldn’t believe his luck. Couldn’t believe he’d been handed his mistress and his brand-new life on a plate like that. He’d been shacked up in a cosy Maida Vale love-nest ever since, whilst Lucinda, the wife, struggled on in the country – tiles falling off the roof, garden up to her armpits – trying to cope. I dried my wet face on my sleeve and took a deep breath. No, I would not do that. I would not confront him. Would not corner him. I would not wait by the back door with a rolling-pin. This called for cunning. For boxing clever. I would not drive Marcus away. Nor would I make Marcus come back to me, simply because I told him to. I would certainly, however, I thought, putting one foot in front of the other and going unsteadily out of the dressing room, I would certainly make him wish it had never happened.
In the bedroom I opened a drawer and pulled out some clothes, throwing them in a suitcase. I filled it quickly, snapping it shut. But I left the drawer hanging open, because …yes. My mind was buzzing now. Let him see I’d been. Let him see I’d taken more clothes. Let him know I meant business. Oh Marcus, I picked up my case, staring wide-eyed and unseeing out of the window, you will regret this. You will surely live to regret this.
I went downstairs, put Dilly away in the bootroom, then went out of the back door, a suitcase in each hand. It was a half-mile walk back to the station, something I’d never normally contemplate, particularly with luggage, but I didn’t care. In fact, I almost welcomed it. My hand was still trembling, I noticed, as I locked the back door, but strangely …I felt energized, too. I stood a moment on the step, assessing this. Yes, I felt oddly elated. I lifted my chin and narrowed my eyes into the sun. Could it be that for all that I was shattered, for all that it felt as if someone had reached inside and squeezed my heart tight, for once I was not the guilty party here. For once, I thought, as I set off down the pot-holed drive, the moral boot was on the other foot.
Chapter Fifteen
The following day, I rang Penny from work.
‘Meet me for lunch,’ I ordered. ‘It’s important.’
‘Tricky, Henny. I’ve got a client coming in at two. Tomorrow would be better.’
‘Please, Pen,’ I implored her. ‘I need to speak to you.’
Hearing the tremor in my voice and sensing the urgency, she was there, in the Pitcher and Piano, the Covent Garden wine-bar I’d selected, on the dot of one.
She came in on a rush of cold air, clutching her face. ‘Bloody juggler in the Piazza lost one of his balls. Hit me in the eye!’
‘Poor yo
u,’ I managed, thinking a ball in the eye would be the least of my worries.
She touched her cheekbone tenderly with her finger-tips. ‘Ouch! Anyway, what is it? What’s happened?’
I handed her the piece of paper and she read it as she shrugged out of her coat, passing it from one hand to the other as she wriggled free of the arms. Her face darkened.
‘Oh shit.’ She sat down heavily.
‘Fairly damning, don’t you think?’ I said tremulously, pouring her a glass of wine and noticing that my hand was shaking too.
‘Who the hell’s Perdita?’ she said, still staring at it incredulously.
‘His riding instructor. A lithe, over-sexed divorcée who lives and works in the next village.’
‘How d’you know she’s over-sexed?’
‘If she’s servicing Marcus,’ I said darkly, ‘take it from me, she’s over-sexed.’
‘Right. So … have you not been servicing him, recently?’
‘Penny!’
‘I’m just wondering,’ she said hurriedly. ‘I’m not making excuses for him or anything, but you know, we all go off the boil sometimes what with children and tiredness and plain lack of interest, and I’m just wondering if he isn’t feeling a bit – you know. Deprived. Whether it isn’t just a quick roll in the sack and nothing serious.’
‘Oh, so that’s all right then, is it?’ I said angrily.
‘No, of course it’s not. And if it were Tommy I’d go insane, even if I had been off-games. God, I’d be bloody furious. It’s just …well, it just seems so unlike Marcus. Infidelity. It’s so tacky. So not him.’
‘I know,’ I said in a cracked little voice, taking the note back and gazing at it. ‘So not him.’ Tears filled my eyes. I’d had a bad night, and despite my brief flash of bravado yesterday as I’d marched off down the drive, I was feeling much less gung-ho this morning. My Dunkirk spirit seemed to have deserted me.
Not That Kind of Girl Page 21