“It's okay. You were wonderful all the same.”
“Me? You did all the good stuff. I just enjoyed the ride.”
“If you think that was good, wait until you try it on the Orient Express.”
“Really romantic, huh?”
“It is, but that's not it. All those cars were built in the twenties. They still have their original springs.”
A grin spread across her face. “Up-and-down bouncy, you mean?”
“You're beginning to get the picture.*’
“Oh, rats.” The grin turned to a frown.
“What's the matter?”
“We just blew your perfect moment.”
“Nope. Rehearsals don't count. Does that mean you'll go with me?”
“The paper owes me two weeks' vacation. I'd have to see about a third week.”
“Except for football games and white sales, nothing much ever happens in January, anyway.”
“I'll tell my boss you said so.”
They made love again. Just as slowly as before, but not as wildly. This time they talked and joked all the while. And afterward, Susan bathed him with warm, moistened washcloths, intending to make love to him in another way. She decided against it. Better to leave something special for the train.
The second time, and then the third, hours later when they woke in each other's arms, were once again all she could have hoped for. Almost all. There was a thing she’d noticed about him in the week since they’d met and she noticed it now in the way he made love. Paul Bannerman always seemed to know exactly what he was doing. No wasted moves. No real spontaneous emotion, at least so far. No wackiness, never early, never late. It was hard to imagine Paul ever losing himself in lovemaking the way she sometimes did. Hard to imagine him ever really giggling, or shouting, or showing any extreme of joy or sorrow. It was hard to imagine him angry.
They spent Thanksgiving at Tom and Allie Gregory's. Susan had invited her father as well, but he begged off, saying he'd promised to spend the day with some of the Gallagher's crowd who had no such place to go. She told him over the phone that she was thinking about a January ski trip to Europe. He seemed genuinely impressed. Even proud.
At first, Paul begged off as well. He spoke vaguely of other commitments that he said he'd try to reshuffle. It was only when he realized that her father would not be there that his other commitments were resolved. Not that she blamed him. It was still a bit soon to be meeting family. And she'd known more than one young man whose interest in her diminished considerably after spending an hour or two in friendly conversation with Raymond Lesko. Oh, he was always pleasant enough. But without actually threatening them in any way he would manage to communicate that flossing with a chain saw would be considerably less dangerous than any libidinous lapse involving his daughter. Raymond Lesko did more for male impotence than German measles.
Still, it would have been interesting to see how Paul handled her father. The matador and the bull. Allie said she could have sold tickets.
Allie, by this time, had come to adore Paul Bannerman. What more could Susan want, she asked. He was bright, charming, successful, and one of those men who seemed to genuinely like women. Susan in particular. He was perfect for her. On Thanksgiving Day, she said as much every time Susan passed through her kitchen.
Perfect, thought Susan. If not, he was awfully close. What more could a woman want? A flaw, maybe. An ordinary human failing. Heck, Paul didn't even snore. He didn't have any family skeletons because he apparently didn't have any family. His father had died when he was quite young, his mother some years later. Each was an only child. So was he. He grew up in California. She saw a UCLA mug on his desk, filled with pencils. No yearbook, though. She'd looked for one among his books, hoping to see what it said about him, who his friends were, what his interests were. Anything.
After college, three years in the Army. Made captain. Stationed in Europe. No Vietnam. Got a master's in international marketing while in the Service. Joined a tour operator afterward, did that for about ten years before opening up his own tour operation and finally a travel agency. Why Westport? A good travel market. And a good local agency was for sale. Not much more to tell, he said. Not especially interesting, he said.
“Ever done drugs?”
“Uh-uh.”
“Even gotten drunk?”
“In school a few times. Sure.”
“Probably never been arrested, right?”
“Right.”
“Ever been in a fistfight?”
“No, but I've written a few strong letters in my time.”
“I'm serious.”
“Okay. Once, Mary Lou Brickman took my skate key, and when she wouldn't give it back, I punched her in the stomach.”
“No, Paul, I'm serious.”
“Susan . . .“ he asked gently, patiently, “what is it you want to hear?”
“I'm not sure. What would you do if someone insulted you . . . some guy in a bar, for example.”
“I'd walk away.”
“What if he insulted me?”
“We'd both walk away.”
They'd had two or three exchanges like that. And they all went about that way. Paul would start by being flip, trying to keep it light, she'd press him, and he'd either change the subject or his voice would take on a sort of soft, low chill and she'd get mad at herself for being a nag. And for what? What did she really want to know? That he was a real man? Susan never doubted that. She was sure in her own mind that if Paul was ever forced to protect himself, or her, he'd do just fine. But she was also sure that he'd go to almost any length to avoid a confrontation. Which might explain why he'd never been married.
Wait a minute. What is this? Something good had happened to you so there has to be something bad about it? The guy's terrific. And this is Thanksgiving, right? Count your blessings.
As Christmas approached, Susan took it for granted that Paul would share it with her in the city. Her father, no excuses this time, would come in from Queens on Christmas Eve. It was time he met Paul, she decided, and time for him to know that Paul was someone special in her life. And the prospect of seeing how they'd size each other up was getting more interesting than ever.
The three of them could take a long walk along Fifth Avenue, looking at the decorations and the department store windows. Afterward, she'd fix a champagne supper and drag them both to midnight Mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral. On Christmas morning they'd exchange gifts, then Paul and her father could spend the rest of the day watching football and getting acquainted. Her father would leave at about five o'clock because her mother would be coming in from New Jersey for Christmas dinner and there was still too much polite tension between her parents.
But this time it was Paul who couldn't make it. He was sick about it, he told her, but he had business in Florida that would keep him away for the holidays. He had booked a large group onto a Christmas cruise and he was expected to go with them as tour guide and host. Speaking of Christmas, however, he might have an early present for her. If he were to give her a first-class ticket to the Bahamas, how would she feel about joining him there for New Year's? There was a place just off Eleuthera called the Windermere Island Club. Very exclusive, very quiet, very British. Not to try to turn her head, but various members of the royal family owned villas on the club grounds. No telephones or TV, five miles of perfect beach, lots of romantic little coves. The offer, however, would be withdrawn at once if she said Oh, wow.
Her disappointment at not sharing Christmas with him faded quickly amid visions of moonlit strolls along a tropical beach. Susan, after a five-second stammer, managed a simple, explosive yes.
The Windermere Island Club turned out to be one of those insular anachronisms the British had been establishing since their early years as a colonial power. Once the earliest visitors were satisfied that the trade or plunder potential of a given place could not be exhausted in less than a year, the British would set about choosing a likely spot for a club and shooing away any local
who happened to live there.
Since a British club was by definition a retreat, it contained very little that was indigenous to the surrounding area. Native color, to say nothing of colored natives, was specifically excluded. Where possible, a club's ambience and architecture would be distinctly British. If that were not possible due to a lack of suitable building materials, the design of the club would be borrowed from some other colonial post of fond memory. The Windermere Island Club, from the look of it, seemed to have gotten its inspiration in the British occupation of the Massachusetts seacoast. The clubhouse and its outbuildings had a weathered barn look more reminiscent of Cape Cod than of the tropics.
Paul met her at Nassau's International Airport. He waited, already tanned and grinning happily, as she cleared Customs. Taking her bag, hugging her, excited as a schoolboy, he led her through another gate where a Cessna air taxi waited to fly them to Rock Sound Airport on Eleuthera, less than thirty minutes away. He insisted that she sit with the pilot while he sat behind her providing a running commentary on all she saw. They flew over waters of such startling clarity that it seemed they were passing over desert dunes. The only undersea vegetation came in curious round clusters that looked like scattered green oases. Deeper waters ranged in color from aquamarine to turquoise, and as the plane descended, she could make out schools of parrot fish winding through the coral. This was a new Paul. Excited, nervous, at least ten years younger. The old Paul, Mr. Cool, seemed to have been washed away by the gentle surf beneath them.
Landing at Rock Sound Airport, they were met by a smiling Bahamian who led them to a fleet of Ford and Chevrolet station wagons from the early seventies, all in near-vintage condition. After a drive of another forty minutes, they crossed the single narrow bridge that connects Windermere Island to Eleuthera. It seemed to Susan that they'd reached the end of the earth.
“My gosh,” she thought aloud. “Is this place ever hard to reach.”
“It's deliberate,” he told her. “You'll see why.”
Crossing the bridge was like going back in time, to the way the islands used to be before the tourists came. The beaches, Paul told her, except for an occasional combing of storm debris, were kept just as they were when Columbus first saw them. A stout wooden barrier swung down behind their car.
The club's manager, an Englishman about Paul's age with an interesting scar beside one eye, was waiting to greet them. His eyes met hers. Appraisingly, she thought. Then they met Paul's. She saw approval in them. Susan wasn't sure whether she was pleased or annoyed. How many other women had been here with Paul? .
The manager, chatting amiably, led them through a small forest of hibiscus to the place where they'd be staying. She'd somehow expected a room in the clubhouse proper. But the place was a small villa, lustily furnished, with a well-stocked bar and a terrace that could have accommodated a dinner party. In the living room, a freshly iced bucket of champagne sat on a marble coffee table flanked by a basket of fruit on one side and tray of canapés on the other. The manager, whose name was Colin, said he would be pleased if they would join him for cocktails before dinner. Once again, there was an odd unspoken communication between the two men. Colin excused himself.
“He seems to know you pretty well,” she said, then wished she hadn't.
“I knew Colin in Europe,” he said. “We go back a long way.” His lips moved again but he said nothing more. She had a sense that he knew what she was. asking but did not know how to answer. She turned from him and stepped out onto the terrace overlooking the sea and horizon and miles of pink-hued beach. Not a soul in sight. Not even footprints in the sand.
“You do know how to show a girl a good time, don't you,” she said.
He didn't answer. He stepped close behind her, put his arms lightly around her waist and smelled her hair. She shuddered.
“Paul . . ,” She bit her lip. “I feel a little sticky from the trip. How about if I take a shower ... or we can take a swim?” It was true enough. The clothes she'd traveled in were too warm for this climate. But mostly , . . she could live with not being the first woman he’d ever brought here, but she was damned if she was going to follow the same script.
“Susan. . . .“He brought his lips to her ear. “You are as fresh and as clean as anyone I've met in my whole life.”
He trembled as he said that. She felt it against her back. She'd expected him to say something romantic. While opening the champagne. Something that would lead as quickly as possible to a nice, long, welcome-to-Windermere screw. But she now had a sense, standing there, that that wasn't what Paul had in mind at all. Not just then. And his words. The way he said them. With such longing.
He was making no move to turn her, to run his hands over her body, to loosen her clothing, or even to kiss her. She turned within his arms and held him tightly. He trembled again. She said nothing more.
“Paul?” It was the morning of their second day. They were barefoot, walking slowly along the beach, holding hands. “Do you send a lot of your customers here?” It wasn't precisely what she wanted to know but it was as close as she cared to come to asking about his other women.
“I don't send any,” he told her. “There are places I keep for myself. This is one of them.”
“It's so lovely here. That seems almost selfish.”
“You'll feel the same way by the time you leave. You won't want even your best friends coming here because you won't want anything to change.”
“Weren't you afraid that I'd change it for you?”
“You completed it.”
They walked along in silence for a while, Susan savoring the compliment. Beyond them, two ladies were approaching from the opposite direction. They were dressed in simple smocks with batik prints and wide-brimmed straw hats. One carried a walking stick. They might have been two elderly members of a British garden club. The ladies smiled a greeting as they passed. Once again, she thought, their eyes lingered appraisingly on her. And once again, they moved on to Paul with that same look of approval. One of them, Susan would swear, even poked him in the ribs as she walked by. Paul spoke before she could ask about them.
“Want to know who you just met?”
“Queen Elizabeth, right?”
“You're close.”
“Come on.”
“The one on the left is the Duchess of Abercorn. The other lady, carrying the stick, is the Countess Mountbatten of Burma. I told you. Quite a few of the British aristocracy keep homes here.”
“But they were . . .” Susan's eyes went wide, ”. . . so sweet.” She could not resist a glance back over her shoulder. She straightened quickly. The two ladies were also looking back.
“They're watching us,” she whispered.
Paul kept walking. “They've never seen me here with a woman. They're probably saying ‘Perhaps that American chap isn't bugger-all queer, after all.”
Susan's grin stretched to its limit. He'd answered the question she wouldn't have asked.
Her thoughts drifted back to the afternoon before. When he'd held her. For a man who prefers his own company much of the time, a man who doesn't even seem to have any close friends as far as she'd been able to tell, he'd seemed almost desperately glad that she was with him. She was, he had said, as fresh and clean as anyone he'd ever known. Fresh and clean compared to what? She wasn't exactly Linda Lovelace but she wasn't the Flying Nun either. What was he used to? Hell's Angels mommas with tattooed boobs?
But that curious moment had passed. And of course they made love. And Paul was back to his old self again by the time they joined Colin for drinks. Maybe, before they left, she'd take Colin aside and pump him about Paul. What he was like, back whenever way back was. Maybe she'd ask. ...
“Paul?”
”Uh-huh?”
“How do you happen to know a duchess and a countess?”
“I don't. I'm a guest here. So are they. That's all there is to it.”
Rats. She wished she hadn't asked. It's more fun to wonder. Now Colin will probabl
y say they met selling vacuum cleaners door-to-door. Better to stay in fantasy-land. Like this morning, when she sat by the pool in the same lounge chair used by the Prince of Wales. It wasn't the most sophisticated thing she'd ever done but so what? Enjoy. What's so great about reality?
The Bannerman Solution (The Bannerman Series) Page 7