Objects of Desire

by Roberta Latow

  After Anoushka’s problems had been ironed out, the conversation had turned to the women who had answered Page’s ad.

  ‘They sound to be what my attorney calls “the new underclass”. That’s what he called me.’

  ‘Am I a new underclass?’

  ‘Hardly. You’re different. You’ve done something with your life and now you’re doing something else with it. The new underclass are women like me who have been abandoned by their husbands, and dumped out into the world after they have had their families broken apart and their lifestyle ended. Women who want only to get back what they’ve had stolen from them, and can’t. That’s the new underclass and there are millions of us, so David says, and few who ever succeed on their own.’

  ‘I find that abhorrent.’

  ‘It is.’

  ‘I somehow don’t see you as one of those women, Anoushka.’

  ‘I’m not so sure. I loved my life, my home with Robert and my children. I can’t envisage anything better. What might save me is that I hate the idea of being labelled an underclass almost more than being one.’ Here Anoushka hesitated.

  ‘And?’ asked Page, who found Anoushka increasingly more interesting.

  She drained her glass in one swallow and then, gazing intently into Page’s eyes, said, ‘And, my life is as valid as Robert’s. Who and what I was before I met him and turned myself inside out to make him happy, to be the love of his life, his wife, the perfect mother of his children, and to reap the rewards His Eminence provided for me, must still be there. My happiness was built on a foundation of deceit. He spoiled me and destroyed me, undermined my self-esteem so cleverly I never knew it, thought it was love. He stole my life from me and I intend to have my revenge. They say it’s sweet. I want to taste it.

  Anoushka fell silent. Flushed with embarrassment she finally said, ‘I’ve given away too much. I don’t know what’s the matter with me. When I was married I never spoke of my personal life to anyone. But then I was so self-satisfied and felt so superior to other women who complained about their lives. I had nothing to complain about. I had it all. Now I seem to be spilling out my intimate life to anyone who will listen. You should have heard me at the British Museum!’ Anoushka found herself so ridiculous she shook her head from side to side and a smile crossed her face. She began to laugh at herself. ‘The British Museum no less – how ridiculous. But a classy place, if you have to do it.’

  That brought a smile to Page’s lips as well. ‘Will you stay here in London, Anoushka?’

  ‘No. I won’t find the sort of life I want here.’

  ‘Then come with me on my adventure. I think you’d make a good travelling companion. We like each other, are two civilised human beings. Joining forces might not be a bad idea for either one of us. Maybe it could turn out to be a great idea. Anyway it’s not a marriage, just travelling. You have your work which you say can be done anywhere, we won’t be on the road all the time. A sail boat or a motor yacht for a home, maybe a house on a Greek island where it’s peaceful and quiet when you want to work.’

  ‘See Lake Victoria, learn to sail, return to Alexandria, maybe even St Petersburg?’ added Anoushka.

  ‘A house in Bali on the beach, or a beach house in the West Indies.’

  ‘Oh, I’ve got one of those, we could certainly stay there. It’s wonderful. I couldn’t bear to think about returning there alone, but with a friend or friends as the case may be, that puts a different picture on things.’

  ‘Then you’ll come?’

  ‘Do you think I can afford it?’

  ‘You’ll have the money, Anoushka. You have assets, remember, assets that can be converted into money, and it will cost money to take a year off and travel the way I want to make this journey. Let me put it this way. Frankly, I don’t think you can afford not to afford it. Where else have you got to go?’

  The two women remained quiet for some time, contemplating their future, what they might be committing themselves to. It was Anoushka who called for yet more champagne cocktails. This time potato crisps came with them.

  Piers Hazlit walked into the bar and looked round the tables for the woman he was to meet. A dozen or more people were drinking in the bar but not one of them resembled the tweedy, plain-faced lady libber he thought he was looking for. He glanced at his watch. She was late. No matter, time was irrelevant to Piers. He went to the bar and shook hands with the bartender. ‘Hello, George.’

  ‘Haven’t seen you for a long time, Mr Hazlit. Been somewhere interesting, I expect?’

  ‘Yes, very. How’ve you been, George?’

  That was Mr Hazlit, polite but aloof, interesting without bragging about it, a real gentleman. George was sure to read about his latest adventure in the papers. Mr Hazlit was often in The Times, they favoured him with profiles every time he returned from some remarkable expedition. He was one of the last in the tradition of the great English traveller, explorer, writer – when he wasn’t exercising one of his many other passions. A Cambridge scholar who could recede into his books and be as happy and content there as he was on the move: a mountain to climb, an ocean to sail. The world knew him to be a superior travel writer and lover of nature. His friends a cricket enthusiast, a lover of young, beautiful and frivolous women. The gentleman aristocrat playboy, one of the best of the increasingly dying breed who still lived for the big adventure.

  ‘A malt whisky, no ice,’ he told the bartender.

  ‘Certainly, sir.’

  Piers looked around the room again. No, for certain she wasn’t there. ‘George, when a Ms Cooper comes in, would you send her to my table?’

  ‘She’s here. Over there. She’s the lady with the red hair.’

  Piers walked across the room, mesmerised by the two attractive women having drinks together. He recovered himself when he was standing in front of them enough to ask, ‘Ms Cooper?’

  The puzzled look on the face of the tall, slender young man with the aristocratic good looks was obvious. Page answered him. ‘Yes, I’m Miss Cooper,’ she answered, emphasising ‘Miss’.

  ‘Oh, I stand corrected.’

  ‘Sorry, an idiosyncrasy of mine. I hate that American tag the liberated woman has forced on the world in the name of something I have never understood.’

  Anoushka watched Page and the young man who were sparking off each other. She listened with some interest to Page ask, ‘And you? Who are you?’

  ‘Oh.’ The question seemed to snap the young man back from a mini-flirtation with Page. ‘I’m Sally Brown.’

  Page and Anoushka looked at each other, ‘Well, you’re a surprise,’ said Page.

  ‘And you’re not exactly what I expected. May I sit down?’ He drew up a chair before Page could answer and made himself comfortable. The waiter arrived at the table and placed his drink on it.

  ‘Do I call you Sally or Miss Brown?’ asked Page.

  ‘Sally! Oh, how stupid of me. I meant, I’m here for Sally Brown.’

  ‘Well, that’s quite different then,’ said Page, and the three of them began to laugh.

  ‘I’m Piers Hamilton Hazlit.’

  ‘Well, you already know I’m Page Cooper, and this is Anoushka Rivers.’

  ‘Hello. Can I offer you fresh drinks?’

  ‘No, these will do,’ answered Page, and the conversation suddenly stopped. Piers kept staring at her.

  ‘Is something wrong.’

  ‘Wrong?’

  ‘Yes, wrong. You keep looking at me as if I were a ghost.’

  ‘Oh, no, not an apparition. A surprise. You’re not at all what I expected.’

  He broke into a smile that completely changed his quiet, almost serious, good looks. The sexiness in his face excited and charmed: his relaxed manner, with his sureness of self, sent a message to the two women: dangerously attractive man, too easy to fall in love with, caution. At all costs, caution.

  ‘Well, what did you expect? Why did you expect anything?’

  ‘The ad in the International Herald Tribune. That�
��s what I’m here about. I mean, that’s what Sally’s here about.’

  Page and Anoushka looked at each other, then Page asked him, ‘And you expected what from that ad?’

  ‘Well, certainly not a vivacious, beautiful woman.’ He turned to Anoushka and really looked at her for the first time. ‘Sorry, have to correct that. Two attractive ladies. I suddenly feel very stupid, and find it rather awkward being here at all.’ And he smiled at them once more. He seemed to enjoy laughing at himself.

  He was the sort of man who smiled with his eyes. Anoushka found herself immensely attracted to him. It was more than physical, but it was that of course too. His manner was cool, with an outward reserve about him that hid a fiery soul, a passionate nature. It was all there in his face, the way he carried himself, and in the eyes – they told everything. The joys of waking up in the arms of a man such as Piers Hazlit, the warmth, intimacy and security, that’s what she missed the most.

  Looking at Piers she yearned once more for the security that comes from intimacy and commitment. She tried to shrug off the desire she had to fill the hole in her life that came from not going to sleep every night and waking every morning next to a warm body. One that is as much a part of you and your life as your very own skin. She quickly started to block out the pain of loss, only to realise that somehow Piers Hazlit had read her thoughts and her heart. She could see it in his eyes.

  She lowered her own and it broke the spell of whatever had been going on for them for a few seconds. She felt uncomfortable with her longing to get close to this man, enough to tell Page, ‘I think I’ll go make a phone call to Paris.’

  Well, thought Page, ‘Maybe Anoushka is a mover and a shaker after all.’ She smiled and said, ‘I think the British Museum first for a name, remember? Then Switzerland for an appointment, then Paris.’

  Anoushka thought, A caring friend, smiled and said, ‘Yes, I remember.’

  Piers rose from his chair as Anoushka prepared to leave the table. Their eyes met again almost accidentally but she pretended to herself that they hadn’t. She took only a step or two before she felt compelled to turn round and look at him again. To Page she said, ‘I won’t be long.’ But to Piers she said nothing, only gave him a dazzling smile.

  He watched her as she walked from the room. It registered with him at once that she was a sexy lady, one he would like to know in the biblical sense. But wrong time, wrong place. He returned to his seat and looked across the small table at Page. ‘I can almost wish that I was Sally Brown, except that I enjoy being myself too much,’ once more giving her a smile so sexy this time she understood that he had been turned on by Anoushka.

  Page watched her disappear through the door. ‘I find that very interesting, Mr Hazlit.’

  Piers realised that Page Cooper was a woman men didn’t put things over on. He liked her. She was not his kind of woman, Sally Brown was his kind of woman. But he liked Page, enough to give her another flirtatious smile and tell her, ‘Sorry to repeat myself, but you are a surprise.’

  ‘We’ve been through that, Mr Hazlit. Why don’t you tell me what you’re doing here?’

  ‘Actually, I’m the one who saw your ad. I’m the one who was intrigued by it and brought it to Sally’s attention. She doesn’t read the International Herald Tribune.

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Please let me explain. I saw it as an opportunity for her and suggested that an adventure, striking out into the unknown, was an opportunity she would be a fool to miss.’

  ‘I take it she is your special friend?’ Page was fishing, trying to catch what was going on here.

  ‘We have been close friends.’

  ‘A close friend who wants her to take a long voyage to far away places? And you’ve come to check me out.’

  ‘No, nothing like that. Well, maybe it’s a little like that. You see, I would never want her to be unhappy.’

  ‘You’re assuming that I’ll accept her as a travelling companion, and even before I meet her.’

  ‘I care about her and so will you, and I can assure you she is amusing and charming company.’

  ‘I hate women who are late.’

  ‘Well, that is a fault, I agree. She is habitually late. You will have to make excuses for that.’

  ‘I don’t have to make excuses for anything.’

  ‘I’m not doing this very well.’

  ‘No, you’re not.’

  ‘This time she’s late on my account. Something personal between us.’

  ‘I don’t get this. I don’t think I want to get this. Are you here to vet me?’

  ‘Yes, actually. Sally needs a new horizon, the sun has set on her old one, only she doesn’t want to believe it. She needs a new perspective, if she wants to be happy.’

  ‘And you know what will make her happy?’

  ‘Yes, I do, as a matter of fact.’

  ‘Are you so sure?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then what are you doing here, instead of her?’

  ‘I felt it was my responsibility to check you out.’

  ‘Because you talked her into the idea?’

  ‘That might be part of it. I wanted to make sure you were the sort of person she might like. And she will like you. You’re beautiful and glamorous, and Sally likes the pretty people of this world.’

  ‘Oh, I’m beginning to see. You thought …’ And Page was amused at what she thought he thought.

  ‘Yes, I expected middle age or more, jolly hockey sticks and rough tweeds.’

  ‘You forgot a little moustache and tightly permed hair, thick cotton stockings and sensible shoes.’ At that point Page crossed her sheer-stockinged, long, shapely legs shod in high-heeled black snakeskin shoes. She liked teasing him. They both began to laugh.

  ‘I think we understand each other,’ he said as he stood up. Page extended her hand in friendship. He took it in his and lowered his head to place a gallant kiss upon it. ‘Sally will be with you in just a few minutes.’

  Page was by now intrigued to meet her. A few minutes ran into fifteen and the return of Anoushka. ‘How did you do?’ she asked.

  ‘You are clever, Page.’

  ‘Well, unfortunately I have had to be.’

  ‘Everything went surprisingly well. To be honest, I think I’m a little overwhelmed by it all.’

  ‘I thought for a moment there that Piers Hamilton Hazlit might have done a little overwhelming himself,’ Page teased.

  Piers stepped from the hotel into Carlos Place and discreetly slipped the doorman a five-pound note for watching Sally’s black BMW cabriolet. He took several long strides towards Sally who was not as he had left her, sitting in the car, but standing by it talking to a friend he vaguely recognised. Sally had so many friends: shopping girlfriends, and lunching girlfriends, health-club girlfriends, old girlfriends and new girlfriends – too many friends for his liking.

  Looking at her, he felt a moment’s sadness, something poignant, for all the things they had not been to each other. He could still look at Sally and like her, want her, in the same selfish way he had always wanted her and had kept her. Sally was a perfect little package of feminine delight. That was the problem: she was nothing more and nothing less. He made no excuses to himself or to anyone else for liking her Barbie-doll looks, nor for tolerating her frivolous lifestyle. The superficial values that governed her life, her lack of ambition, her exquisite passivity, her adoration of him, had all suited his needs. She had taken little thinking about.

  Piers Hamilton Steven George Hazlit was a man mindful of his background and his obligations who was smart enough to manage his affairs through delegation to estate managers and agents so that he was free to play as he wished. His relationship with Sally had always stopped short of love; it was more easygoing fun, convenient sex. She was, if nothing else, a fun girl, an uncomplicated personality. That was good for a man who wanted an affair that takes little, if any, effort at all.

  Piers had liked the way Sally was there, always waiting for his return. Bu
t he had always been aware that they were two people adding nothing to each other’s lives. Because they shared nothing together but great sex, it had always been in his mind to end their relationship. Doing so had become an imperative because she had made the fatal mistake of pressing him for marriage and children.

  There was little if any guile in Sally. She had undermined her case for a wedding band and a white dress when she was honest enough to admit to Piers that she saw marriage and children as a hedge against old age and loneliness, and that she did not expect that they would change either Piers’s or her lifestyle, which she was perfectly content with. She had played the wrong hand, gambled and lost.

  As he looked at her, he realised he would miss her. Her tininess. Everything about Sally was petite: hands, feet, the perfect little breasts, the slim beautifully formed figure. She had often teased him. ‘How clever I am to have been born the right size and shape for Piers Hamilton Steven George Hazlit to play with.’ And she was clever enough to know she was a toy. How many times had she told him she didn’t mind being his play thing, she liked being a full-sized Barbie doll? That was the problem: he could never understand that that was all she wanted to be.

  He had told her from the beginning that he wanted more, but underneath her up-market doll’s looks there was a feisty, amusing and sexy lady who hung on to him tenaciously. What Piers could give her was what Sally wanted, and because he gave it to her, she loved him. She’d waited him out, year after year, and now the years were up as far as he was concerned. She had become boring, the life they lived together too stale and predictable.

  Her long dark blonde hair highlighted with streaks of ash and frosted white reflected different shades of gold in the afternoon sunlight. The perfect small pointed face with its turned-up nose and beestung sexy lips, rouged in pale coral lipstick, the huge brown eyes and long thick lashes … She was like the whipped cream on a Viennese hot chocolate. Delicious. He heard her laughter and watched her stand back from her friend, one hand on her hip as she twirled round, as if modelling her Jean Muir wide trousers and long, perfectly cut, soft jacket of the palest pink cashmere, so soft and feminine, so delectable.