Au Reservoir (3 page)

‘And Georgie,’ said Olga, ‘I’m sure I don’t need to introduce Noël Coward and John Gielgud.’

They all sat down and Noël Coward extended one languid hand for a menu and a second languid hand for a dry martini, which seemed to have arrived unbidden.

‘Tilling,’ he mused, rolling the word around his mouth to see if he liked the taste. ‘Oh God, isn’t that where that dreadful woman lives, the one who keeps writing to invite me to her amateur dramatics or something?’

‘Oh, my dears,’ gasped Gielgud in horror, ‘yes, it is. She writes to me too. Ghastly! I remember when she did the season in London a few years back and went around collecting duchesses as if they were postage stamps. Now, what was her name? Really, my memory is so shocking.’

‘I, on the other hand,’ said Coward firmly, ‘have a memory like an elephant. In fact, elephants frequently consult me when they have forgotten something.’

‘Her name is Lucia,’ Olga replied firmly before Georgie might feel forced to say something. ‘I know her. I can assure you that her heart is in the right place. It’s just that she’s a little …’

‘Over-enthusiastic, perhaps?’ ventured Georgie.

‘Why, how clever of you to find absolutely the right word, Georgie,’ said Olga admiringly. ‘That’s it exactly’.

‘And she does do a great deal for charity,’ continued Georgie rather awkwardly.

‘Oh, my dear boy,’ said Coward, ‘so do I. In fact, I am never happier than when in the company of those less fortunate than myself.’

Olga screamed with laughter and clapped her hands.

‘Noël, you are wonderful the way you come out with these things. Give us something else, do.’

‘He may not be able to,’ said Gielgud. ‘After all, there is a limit to the number of ad libs one can prepare carefully in advance – even for Noël, whose powers are prodigious in that respect.’

Coward sighed deeply.

‘Professional jealousy is a dreadful thing. Always remember, being an actor is easy; you simply have to learn your lines and not fall over the furniture. I, on the other hand, am something much greater. I am a writer; I am creative.’

Gielgud appeared unimpressed, but Olga urged them to order as it was growing late (though she might equally as truthfully have said because she was hungry).

Georgie felt the dinner pass as if in a dream. He could hardly believe that he was dining not only with Olga, his idol, but also with two internationally acclaimed celebrities. He knew that Gielgud was currently appearing as Richard III, yet both he and Coward seemed much more interested in swapping show business gossip of a particularly salacious kind. Gielgud also seemed to be taking an unusual interest in the young waiter who was serving them so attentively.

‘Nice boy,’ he commented, as the waiter set off once again to fetch something. ‘I wonder if I should give him something?’

‘Really, Johnnie,’ said Coward, ‘what a very naughty matinee idol you are.’

Olga screamed with laughter again, and Georgie found himself laughing with her. There were many times when she laughed and he wasn’t sure that he should, or even why he should, but there was something infinitely infectious about her laugh that made it impossible not to join in. Coming from the lungs of one of the world’s greatest singers, it was loud and doubtless had she been there Lucia would have described it as vulgar, but it came from the heart, and was part of that particular, indefinable magic that was just, well, Olga.

Three bottles of champagne later, the four walked rather unsteadily into St Martin’s Lane to where the doorman had procured them some taxis. As they made their way along the passageway past Wyndham’s Theatre, Noël said, ‘I expect Herbert Marshall is appearing here in something or other.’

‘How do you know?’ asked Gielgud, peering into the darkness in a vain attempt to see the billboards.

‘He’s
always
appearing in something at the Wyndham’s,’ replied Coward wearily. At that moment a volley of flashbulbs went off from a group of photographers who had been waiting in ambush at the end of the passage, leaving them completely blinded, though as Georgie followed Olga into the taxi he did hear them calling out, ‘Good night, Miss Bracely.’

It was scandalously late by the time they got to Olga’s flat, nearly two in the morning in fact, and Georgie went to sleep as soon as he climbed into bed. He fell to dreaming that Noël Coward had come to perform in the church hall at Tilling as a conjurer and had locked Lucia in a cabinet, from which he had made her disappear. But Lucia, though out of sight, obviously had no intention of being also out of mind, and from wherever she was concealed had started knocking vigorously to be released.

‘Oh dash it all, Georgie, do wake up!’ wailed Olga, who had given up knocking on the door and simply entered his room, throwing back the curtains as she spoke.

Georgie blinked helplessly in the sudden sunlight and then, remembering his toupee, started to grope for it on the chair next to him but succeeded only in knocking it on to the floor.

‘Never mind that, you darling,’ said Olga with a smile that he could not quite make out but which melted his heart nonetheless. ‘Look at this.’

He took the proffered
Daily Telegraph
, folded open at the society page. Above a large photograph of the four of them walking arm in arm past Wyndham’s Theatre was the caption ‘Miss Olga Bracely, fresh from her triumph at the Royal Opera House, relaxes with Mr Noël Coward, Mr John Gielgud and Mr George Pillson.’

‘Well,’ gasped Georgie, rather gratified since he had to admit it was a very good likeness of himself, ‘I can’t see that there’s anything to be upset about.’

‘Not even when both Noël and Johnnie have refused Lucia’s invitations several times?’

‘Not so much invitations,’ mused Georgie, beginning to see that all might after all not be well, ‘more like royal commands.’

‘Exactly,’ said Olga firmly, ‘the fact that they have snubbed her but dined with you was not one I was intending to have brought to her attention. Stupid of me! I should have guessed the photographers would be waiting for us outside.’

‘Well,’ ventured Georgie, ‘I suppose they were only doing their jobs.’

‘I’m glad that’s the way you feel,’ replied Olga in a rather strange tone of voice, ‘because I haven’t shown you the wretched
Daily Mirror
.’

He took the wretched
Daily Mirror
and stared at it in horror and disbelief. There was no need to open it. Covering half the front page was a photograph of Olga and Georgie locked in what appeared to be a passionate embrace in the bar at Sheekey’s. As he over-balanced on his stool, Georgie must have put out a hand for support and he now saw that it had come to rest, quite inadvertently, on what could only be described as Olga’s thigh. This time the caption read ‘Miss Olga Bracely, enjoying an intimate night out with her long-time friend and companion Mr George Pillson, the Mayor of Tilling.’

Georgie’s piteous gaze moved backwards and forwards from the newspaper to Olga’s face for several seconds, while his mouth opened and closed in a passable imitation of a goldfish. What felt like a severe attack of butterflies erupted in his midriff. Without a doubt this was the worst moment of his life.

‘Oh, my hat!’ finally came the faint bleat. On reflection he felt this did not fully reflect the enormity of the situation, so he repeated it for good measure. ‘Oh, my hat!’

‘Never mind your damned hat,’ came the brisk response, ‘we need to think what to do, Georgie. Think like we’ve never thought before. Oh, yes, come in, Céline.’

She broke off and sat absent-mindedly on the bed while her maid poured out two cups of extremely strong coffee. Georgie did not normally drink coffee in the morning for fear of heartburn but today he drained the cup eagerly and happily accepted another. Even under the extreme stimulus of this unaccustomed barrage of caffeine, however, his brain obstinately refused to work. Fortunately Olga’s mind was not similarly hampered.

‘Céline,’ she ordered, ‘take the telephone off the hook and leave it off. If anybody asks, it has been out of order since yesterday and we are waiting for a man to come and fix it.’

‘Oui, madame,’ acknowledged the maid with a bob, and left the room to do her mistress’s bidding.

‘What time is it?’ Olga demanded. Georgie lifted his half-hunter off the chair beside him and gazed at it rather short-sightedly.

‘Just after nine,’ he said.

‘When will Lucia see this?’

Georgie turned things over in his mind, which was finally showing faint signs of activity. Perhaps not springing into action, but definitely limping towards it.

‘She takes the
Telegraph
but usually reads the
Financial Times
first, followed by
The Times
,’ he said slowly. ‘She usually just flicks through the
Telegraph
after breakfast to see if there is anything nasty about anyone she knows. If there is, she cuts it out and puts it in one of her scrapbooks.’

‘The society page, then?’

‘Yes,’ acknowledged Georgie ruefully, ‘she goes straight to it.’

He glanced again at his watch and added, ‘About now, in fact.’

‘What about the
Mirror
?’

‘Well, I don’t know,’ said Georgie, thinking aloud. ‘I’m not sure if any of the servants take a newspaper; they probably make do with ours once we’ve finished them. I’ve certainly caught Foljambe reading the
Telegraph
.

‘I say,’ he said, with a sudden flush of optimism, ‘perhaps she won’t see it at all.’

‘Not a chance, I’m afraid,’ replied Olga. ‘Cadman probably takes a paper and the
Mirror
’s a dead ringer for a chauffeur. Anyway, someone somehow will see it and then it will be all round Tilling within minutes.’

Georgie knew in his heart that she was right. Come to think of it, he was pretty sure that Quaint Irene read the
Mirror
.

‘What will she do?’ Olga asked, as much to focus her mind as to quiz Georgie.

‘She’ll phone of course, so jolly well done you for thinking of that and taking it off the hook.’

‘And what about when she can’t get an answer?’

‘That rather depends,’ he pondered. ‘If she’s only seen the
Telegraph
then she’ll go shopping as if nothing has happened and try to turn it all to her advantage by saying she knew all about it.’

‘And when some kind unselfish soul shows her the
Mirror
?’

They looked at each other and both came to the same conclusion at the same moment.

‘Get up,’ hissed Olga. ‘Get up quickly and let’s go. Don’t even worry about shaving – you can go to the barber at Waterloo. Céline!’ she shouted as she ran from the room. ‘Bring me the
Bradshaw
.’

As Sherlock Holmes once observed, the vocabulary of
Bradshaw
is terse and nervous, but limited. As a tool for avoiding former mayors of Tilling bent on vengeful visits, it may however be found most efficacious, as was to prove the case on this occasion. As Georgie came into the living room, Olga was pouring over it.

‘I think I’ve got it,’ she muttered, jotting things down in a small notebook. ‘Yes, I’m sure I’ve got it.’

‘Got what?’ Georgie enquired.

‘No time to explain,’ she said briskly, ‘I’ll tell you as we go along. Céline!’

‘Oui, madame?’

Olga rattled off a string of very precise instructions, and then she and Georgie left the building in search of a taxi to take them to Waterloo Station.

At about the same time, Lucia put down the
Daily Telegraph
with a very disagreeable expression on her face. What could Georgie have been thinking of, to hob-nob openly with those two men – she would not dignify them with the epithet ‘gentlemen’ – who had snubbed her so caddishly? ‘Oh, really, Georgie,’ she thought, ‘how could you?’

Georgie could be so thoughtless, especially when in Olga’s company. It was almost as though the moment he saw her all decent sentiments, such as altruism and solicitude, vanished from his otherwise unimpeachable character. Why, she wouldn’t mind betting that it had been Olga who had set the whole thing up just to spite her.

She gazed unhappily at the photograph once again, and as she did so the glimmerings of an idea began to form in her mind. She narrowed her eyes intently, as though to make out more clearly this half-formed shape which was lurking tantalisingly in the mists of her sub-conscious, and suddenly she saw at once what was to be done. She got up from the drawing room table with a silvery laugh and rang for Foljambe to fetch her hat, gloves and shopping basket.

A few minutes later she was in the High Street. A small knot of Tillingites was already formed and loitering casually in front of Twistevant’s. So, she thought grimly, the story had already been spread. Well, she was equal to the challenge.

‘Good morning, good morning,’ she called merrily as she approached. Major Flint, Mr Wyse and the Reverend Kenneth Bartlett (known universally as the Padre) raised their hats respectfully.

‘Any news?’ asked Diva Plaistow, with what in a less transparent person might almost have passed for guile.

‘Oh, nothing really, just a call from Georgie, who’s enjoying himself up in town. He rang me yesterday evening to tell me he was going out to dinner with Noël Coward and John Gielgud. I had suggested it to Noël too, of course, once I knew my Georgino was going to be up in town, but I was so glad they managed it. Nice of them to include Olga, as well. I’m sure that’s the main reason Georgie arranged it, poor lamb. He is so fond of her, you know.’

The group gazed at her blankly, and none more so than Diva.

‘So it was all Georgie’s idea?’ she asked lamely.

‘Mine actually, dear,’ Lucia said with another of those silvery little laughs for which she was justly famous. ‘I would have gone too myself, of course, but as you know I decided to go to darling Riseholme instead, and now I’m so frightfully busy here in Tilling with all my committees. How you all work me so!’

Elizabeth Mapp-Flint was, however, made of sterner stuff than Diva Plaistow.

‘So,’ she said with her usual heavy irony, ‘Georgie, who lives in Tilling and has never met these two actors before, arranges to introduce them to a fellow performer who lives in London and attends show business parties every night of the week?’