Fruiting Bodies

by Natasha Cooper

  ‘Would you like some juice or coffee or something?’ said Mrs Rusham, pausing on her way to give Willow’s writing room a thorough clean so that it would be ready whenever she felt like working again.

  ‘I don’t think I need anything at the moment,’ said Willow, looking up from the paper. ‘What do you think of this woman?’

  Mrs Rusham took the Daily Mercury from her, put on her spectacles and looked at the photograph.

  ‘It’s hard to tell,’ she said at last. ‘She looks well dressed, pleasant, intelligent. Quite stylish, too. And that short upper lip somehow suggests a sense of humour.’

  Mrs Rusham did not ask why Willow wanted her reactions, but she looked curiously at her as she handed back the newspaper.

  ‘It’s been suggested that she was involved somehow with the dead obstetrician.’

  ‘Oh, I see.’ Mrs Rusham looked over her shoulder at the photograph again, but she could not see anything else at all useful in it.

  Willow flicked through the rest of the Daily Mercury until Lucinda began to whimper and then cry loudly. Willow dropped the newspaper, trying hard not to feel that she had been unfairly interrupted, picked Lucinda up and started to feed her. The telephone rang twice in quick succession but Willow ignored it.

  Half an hour later Mrs Rusham returned, carrying a tray with a glass and a jug of fruit juice.

  ‘I know you said you didn’t want any, but I thought you might get thirsty later,’ she said quietly, putting the tray down on Willow’s bedside table.

  ‘That was kind. It looks delectable. Who was it ringing up?’

  ‘Your agent, wanting to know how you and Lucinda are and whether she could come and visit you, and Mr Crescent asking the same.’

  ‘How nice of them! What did you say?’

  ‘That I would ring them back when I had spoken to you. I didn’t want to disturb you while you were feeding Lucinda.’

  ‘Mrs Rusham, you are a jewel. I’d like to see them whenever they can come. Well, perhaps not just after lunch; I’m getting very attached to the siesta habit. And the health visitor’s due at three-thirty. But any other time. Can you fix with them so that they don’t clash?’

  ‘Certainly.’

  ‘Oh, and would you ring Jane Cleverholme for me? She sent flowers to the hospital and I’ll write in due course, but could you say I’m back and would love to see her if she’s going to be anywhere near here in the next few days. I know she sometimes is.’

  Mrs Rusham glanced at the newspaper and then she smiled at Willow, nodding.

  ‘I’m not sure I’d ever have believed it,’ said Richard Crescent when Mrs Rusham had ushered him into Willow’s room at five o’clock, laid a lavish tea tray tenderly on the table near his chair, gazed at him with a severity that did not at all disguise her yearning, and left them alone. ‘What’s Tom Worth got that I didn’t have?’

  Willow looked at her erstwhile lover with more affection than she had ever been able to show in the old days.

  ‘God knows,’ she said with less than perfect frankness. ‘But I somehow can’t see you embroiled in nappies and sick.’

  ‘Sick? How revolting! She’s not going to throw up now is she?’ Richard glanced at Lucinda out of the corner of his eyes, letting his mouth twist into a grimace of prim distaste.

  ‘Possibly. Babies often do,’ said Willow, feeling a quite unexpected superiority over the elegantly detached merchant banker. She had known him best in the days before she had properly come to terms with the idea of herself as a best-selling novelist, when his smoothness had sometimes made her feel as prickly as a teasel.

  ‘But never mind that now, Richard. How are you? You look … worn out.’

  ‘Knackered is probably the word you were looking for,’ he said with a short laugh. ‘I’m all right. We’ve had a vile takeover battle, which we lost and so I’m marginally concerned about whether we’re ever going to get our fees paid. It’s bad enough working all night and killing oneself for loathsome clients when one wins and makes a decent profit, but this … Hateful. Luckily it doesn’t happen very often.’

  ‘Don’t you ever get tired of it? The same struggle over and over again, always having to find new targets and new clients and then go through the same beastly rigmarole that always used to scare you witless?’

  ‘Not exactly witless, dear girl, or I’d never have survived the various bloody culls that have decimated the bankers of this great city.’

  ‘Only decimated? You’ve been lucky then. But don’t you get sick of it, truly?’

  ‘God, yes. I’m longing to retire. I reckon if I can stagger on for another five years, I can reasonably go then. I’ll be fifty after all.’

  ‘And you should have stashed away enough to live on one way and another,’ said Willow much more lightly.

  ‘I’m not sure one ever does that, but I can probably scale down my standard of living.’

  Knowing that Richard had been earning an enormous salary and even more enormous bonuses for something over twenty years, Willow did not feel too worried about how he would keep himself from starvation.

  ‘Won’t you be bored if you retire completely?’

  To her astonishment, he looked self-conscious, almost shifty, but he did not say anything. After a moment, she understood and laughed.

  ‘A decade or so ago,’ she said, ‘I’d have asked whether you were planning to stand as an SDP parliamentary candidate, but those days are long gone. It’s novels now, isn’t it? What’s it to be? A financial thriller or something in the more sensitive rite-of-passage line?’

  ‘You always did know how to boost a chap’s confidence in himself,’ said Richard bitterly. ‘How did you guess?’

  ‘You just had that look about you, as though you’ve been thinking to yourself: well, if bloody Willow can do it, then I can’t see why I shouldn’t.’

  At that Richard laughed too.

  ‘Not so much bloody Willow as bloody Some-Other-People. I thought I’d give it a go. In fact I have had a word with Eve Greville about it. She thought I ought to try. Shall you mind?’

  ‘Only if your first advance is bigger than mine.’ Catching a glimpse of his expression, she added: ‘Selfish, I know, but it always is galling when all one’s years of experience count for nothing and some new hotshot with a clever idea and a good agent gets a fortune for a book that turns out to be pretty ordinary.’

  ‘And even more irritating,’ said Richard, who still felt he knew her well, ‘when it sells brilliantly, too.’

  ‘Oh, absolutely. Makes one want to throw up. Or resort to murder,’ she said, enjoying a renewed sense of herself as she had been before Lucinda’s birth.

  ‘Still you can hardly complain. There can’t be all that many novelists who’ve consistently made as much as you have over the years.’

  Richard looked round the beautifully furnished bedroom, with its glorious paintings and eighteenth-century furniture set against ivy-green walls that were lightened by the luxuriously pale carpets and curtains.

  ‘Honestly, Willow, I’m not sure you should have the gall to object to anyone’s luck. Here you are: an outrageously successful novelist, stunning house, perfect and loyal housekeeper, health, brains, love, Superintendent Worth to attend to your every whim and now a baby as well.’

  ‘Put like that,’ she said drily, ‘it does sound like a pretty good score, doesn’t it? Who’d have thought it in the old days?’

  She had a sudden vivid memory of her life in the days before she had even tried to write, when she had been living in a sad, damp first-floor flat in the unfashionable part of Clapham and working as a successful but isolated civil servant, so repressed that she did not even realise she was unhappy.

  ‘Yes, I suppose you could have been said to have paid in advance with a fairly hellish start.’

  ‘It wasn’t that bad,’ she said, suddenly ashamed of herself. ‘I moaned and groaned when I was changing myself and my life, but …’

  Richard brushed aside her protes
ts, thinking much further back to the bleak unhappiness of the childhood Willow had once described in the most matter-of-fact way imaginable and the vulnerability that she still attempted to hide from everyone behind an angrily confident exterior.

  ‘Now,’ he said, deciding that it was time to change the subject, ‘you’d better show me this infant of yours – so long as you can stop it being sick over me.’

  ‘Her,’ said Willow crossly and then felt even more cross with herself when she saw that he had been teasing her.

  Richard held Lucinda confidently and admired all the right things about her before eventually giving her back to her mother and taking from his pocket a flat, dark-blue leather box.

  ‘It won’t be suitable for ages, but she may like it later,’ he said casually, offering it to Willow.

  Surprised, she took the box and opened it to find inside an enchanting Edwardian pearl pendant set in gold.

  ‘Goodness, Richard, how absolutely lovely! And how incredibly generous! Thank you.’

  ‘It was my mama’s,’ he said in the same deliberately offhand way, ‘and since it’s pretty clear that I won’t be having any daughters to give it to, I rather thought I’d like yours to have it.’

  ‘Oh, Richard,’ said Willow, gazing at him and wondering if she had actually ever known him at all. ‘I really don’t know quite what to say. It’s beautiful, and you’re …’

  ‘No need to say anything, old girl. God forbid! You and I managed awfully well without talking about filthy things like feelings. Don’t let’s start now.’

  ‘No,’ she said, not sure whether she was more moved or amused. ‘It’s terribly kind of you, and, as soon as she’s old enough, I’ll give it to her and tell her all about you.’

  ‘Good, and don’t you go wearing it in the meantime. It’s Lucinda’s.’

  ‘Yes, Richard. Very well. I promise. I won’t take anything that belongs to my daughter.’ Something inside Willow lurched with a kind of terror, which she tried to ignore.

  ‘I should hope not. Now, enough of all that. What have you been up to recently. Did you finish the book before she was born?’

  ‘Yes, I did, although I didn’t quite crack the synopsis for the next one, which I had meant to get off to Eve before I went into labour. But now I come to think of it, you might be able to help me.’

  ‘Oh, yes?’ said Richard warily. ‘What now?’

  ‘Do you know a man called Roguely?’

  ‘Sir George? No. Never had anything to do with him. Thoms and Timpson are clients of our biggest rival and they guard him like the proverbial goose. But what on earth has he got to do with your unwritten synopsis?’

  ‘Nothing at all. I just wondered about him. I’ve been reading about his wife in the gossip column of Jane’s paper, and I was curious. That’s all.’

  ‘I mistrust you when you sound artless like that, Willow. Are you getting yourself involved with another bunch of dangerous criminals?’

  ‘Not exactly.’

  ‘Oh, dear. What would the gallant superintendent say? He hated the last investigation you did even though you didn’t come to any harm – or not very much.’

  ‘He’s hated them all, but I can’t stop being myself and be bullied into being the little-woman-at-home just because he …’ Hearing a note of panic in her voice, Willow stopped, swallowed, smiled and finished: ‘… just because Tom doesn’t like the idea of my getting involved in iffy detective work.’

  ‘Willow, my darling, I don’t think you need ever fear being anyone but yourself – or being bullied for that matter. You’re about the toughest nut I ever tried to crack.’

  ‘And have many of your nuts been tough, Richard? Funny thought, that. Your having tough nuts.’

  ‘Oh, shut up!’ he said, laughing in spite of himself. ‘You always used to be a bit of a monster, but I thought you’d got over it. Poor Tom.’

  She stuck out her tongue, thinking how much more she liked Richard as a friend than she ever had as a lover. He had been very convenient then – particularly in his refusal to let any connection but the most basic physical one come between them – and his attentions had given her a good deal of pleasure. But there had been no real honesty or freedom between them.

  She was about to ask him if he would like to be Lucinda’s second godfather when it struck her that Tom ought to be involved in the choice. To pre-empt any discussion about more godparents might make him think that she was taking some kind of revenge for his much smaller unilateral action in sending his own version of the announcement to The Times.

  ‘He’s said to be pretty ruthless under the charm.’

  ‘Who?’ she said, completely at a loss.

  ‘George Roguely. Although he’s not quite such a psychopath as some of his rivals; I mean, he does have a sort of life beyond his work.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Willow, ‘and a gorgeous wife, too, according to Jane’s paper.’

  Richard nodded. ‘He’s said to be utterly devoted to her, and his staff are believed to be equally devoted to him. They hardly ever leave, which speaks well of him. But he’s ruined rivals without compunction and trampled over anyone who gets in his way. Does that help?’

  ‘I’m not sure.’

  As the front doorbell sounded, Richard got to his feet.

  ‘Another of your admirers, I expect, Willow. I’d probably better be going in any case. I was teasing you, but it is actually rather good to see you looking so … satisfied.’

  ‘Like a cat with its head in the cream jug?’

  His grey eyes crinkled up as he smiled. ‘Just like that. Goodbye, my dear. Don’t lose touch.’

  ‘Would I? I’m fearfully fond of you.’

  ‘Ugh. Soppy. But I’m glad all the same. And I think the infant is s’blime.’

  ‘Thanks, Richard. And thank you so much for the pendant. It’s magnificent and Lucinda will treasure it. Goodbye.’

  Surprisingly stirred up by Richard’s visit, Willow rather wanted some time on her own so that she could sort herself out and even pretend that she was the old, secure, single, childless writer for a while. But she heard Mrs Rusham’s voice downstairs, saying: ‘Please go on up, and I’ll follow you with the drinks. I know Mrs Worth has been hoping you would come.’

  Then another voice, which Willow easily recognised as Jane Cleverholme’s, said clearly: ‘Great, terrific. Thanks, Mrs Rusham.’

  Quickly looking down at her chest to make sure there were still no milk dribbles or unsightly glimpses of the armoured nursing-bra peeking out over the top of her embroidered nightdress, Willow got out of bed to welcome her friend.

  ‘God, you look well!’

  ‘And so do you,’ said Willow sincerely.

  Jane had always dressed flamboyantly, but that evening she had outdone herself. She was wearing a magnificent, multicoloured Georgina von Etzdorf jacket over a pair of pencil-slim trousers.

  ‘You look frightfully glamorous. What are you up to?’

  ‘D’you think it’s a bit over the top?’ Jane examined herself in the cheval glass that stood in one corner of Willow’s room. ‘I love it and I’d been lusting after it for weeks, but I didn’t think I could justify it until I was invited to a bash to be given by our esteemed proprietor tonight in his Eaton Square house. I went and bought it today. I want to be noticed.’

  ‘You will be. But why?’

  ‘Keep this under your hat, won’t you? The editor’s rumoured to be about to get the boot.’

  ‘And you’ve got your eye on the job? Jane, that would be terrific. What a step!’

  ‘I know. I don’t suppose I’m even in the running, but I’ve never been asked to one of these dos before, and there must be a reason. Here’s hoping.’

  Willow laughed.

  ‘A drink? Or would you rather keep your brain sharp for the big chief?’

  ‘A drink would be great. Just a little one to get me going. You might not believe this, but I’m sweating with terror in my glamorous jacket.’

  ‘Oh, I
believe you, Jane.’ Willow thought of some of her own odder mood swings. ‘Mrs Rusham will bring up a bottle. Now, tell me everything that’s been going on.’

  ‘Me? You must be joking. You’ve been on the scene of the most dramatic thing that’s happened in London all month. I want to know all about it.’

  Jane had often been generously interested in the things her friends did, but Willow was surprised that she should be quite so excited by Lucinda’s birth. Then she understood.

  ‘You mean Alex Ringstead, don’t you? Oh, Jane, for a minute I thought you were talking about Lucinda.’

  Jane laughed.

  ‘I should have been. How was it? How are you? Are you pleased you did it?’

  ‘It was fairly awful. I’m absolutely fine except when I go a bit batty, which I do several times every day. And yes, I am, very pleased.’

  ‘Completely?’

  ‘Yes, of course. I do occasionally have my moments of doubt, but it’s a bit like swapping jobs. I don’t think it’s reasonable even to think about whether it was a good decision for at least three months.’

  ‘You always were a bit too revoltingly sensible,’ said Jane, watching Willow with her head on one side. ‘Oh, Mrs Rusham, that looks good.’

  Mrs Rusham eased the cork out of a bottle of cold champagne, neatly collected the froth and poured out two glasses.

  ‘Aren’t you going to have one, Mrs R?’ said Willow. ‘Go on. Just for once. What is it they say? Wet the baby’s head.’

  Mrs Rusham decorously drank about two mouthfuls of the wine and then left the room, murmuring something about preparing dinner.

  Jane forgot her splendid clothes and leaned comfortably back in the deep armchair in the window.

  ‘So. What really happened to the gorgeous Alex Ringstead?’ she said.

  ‘You sound as though you knew him.’

  ‘Not personally. But he’s one of those chaps people talk about. I know lots of women who’ve had him for their babies. Everyone liked him.’