For Love or Money (10 page)

‘Shut your eyes,’ he murmured; she obeyed. Deftly he slipped the rose into the soft hollow between her small breasts. She opened her eyes and looked down modestly.

‘You are in a funny mood tonight.’

‘Staid old George can get up to some pretty good tricks, eh? … You wouldn’t think it, but I once got a bit tight and pretended to commit suicide to scare them all.’ He sat back and nodded as though with satisfaction.

‘You never … I mean, they must have gone off their heads … Weren’t they hopping mad when they discovered?’

‘No, they took it pretty well. You should have seen Ruthie … cried like a baby … I can tell you, there’s been no trouble since then.’

If only fiction could become fact. Still at least Sally would never know. There she was only a couple of feet away … Her skin above the black dress looked brilliantly white,
emphasised
by the deep colour of the rose. Just like an
old-fashioned
Valentine with the lace and the rose. Her arms looked like the slender limbs of a young girl … Must have had too much wine, getting maudlin … George jerked
himself
back to reality with the sudden awareness of a young and naked body beneath her dress. Not even that could entirely blot out Ruth and Trelawn, but they certainly seemed further away.

In the sitting-room with Sally on his knee they had drifted still further. As his lips touched her grape-smooth cheek and the circle of her surrounding fragrance overwhelmed him, he
forgot. The soft pastel shades of the room seemed infinitely restful and delicate. The warmth of the fire kissed the
dove-grey
carpet; the lilac curtains blotted out the street.

 *

Ten minutes must have passed … George heard the
incongruous
jangling of the door bell from another world. Would he answer it? There might have been an accident in the street … a fire in another flat … no alternative. Sally got up from his knee …

‘Won’t be a moment.’

The Angel of Death would have been more welcome to George than the sight before him. He started back as though from the deadliest of vipers. Where was Moses now …?

The street lamps gave off a dim light but this spectre was all too apparently human. David’s breath came in small steamy clouds clearly visible in the cold night air. David smiled.

‘I didn’t like to telephone because …’

In a flash of apocalyptic light George saw what had to be done … the only thing … his breath came more easily … the stone in his stomach weighed less. His legs were no longer wax under a tropical sun. He was aware of the
existence
of his tongue again.

‘You must be famished … long journey … nice little pub round the corner … ham sandwiches … back in a minute … wait here.’

‘But I’ve just eaten and anyway I’m under age for pubs. I can’t drag you out at this hour of night having just turned up on you without a word. If I can just come in for a
moment
I’ll explain …’

David looked at George with alarm … he had obviously been drinking. It really was just his luck to have come on one of his nights. He went on anxiously:

‘It’s all quite simple, you see …’

‘Of course it’s simple … now look, no nonsense … I know you haven’t eaten … just being polite … no need for that … I’ll be back …’

George floundered back into the flat through a wall of water … at last he saw the sitting-room door.

‘Behind the sofa … disaster … no time … I’ll … later .. you can come out when you hear the door,’ he whispered incoherently.

He’d left open the flat door. He saw the sitting-room door was open too. She was about to speak … how loud? … must stop her. She was standing a good six feet away … nothing for it. He dived towards her and caught his foot on the edge of one of the white Chippendale chairs. The thick dove-grey carpet absorbed a good deal of the noise, but not all.

She was struggling fiercely as they both hit the ground … George got a hand over her mouth. He started to drag her behind the sofa. She was kicking out viciously with her
high-heeled
shoes. One of them flew off, narrowly missing his head. He pinned her down safely out of sight. Her eyes were wide with horror. He must have gone mad. Oh God … George was hissing at her with a finger over his mouth, then he was whispering again.

‘He’s here … outside … here … stay … I’ll explain … later.’

Sally obeyed with the blind terror of an animal
hypnotised
with fear. George emerged from behind the sofa still on his hands and knees. He felt desperately weak. Suddenly he saw the shoe in the middle of the floor. With the last supreme effort he hurled himself on top of it. He looked up just as David appeared in the doorway.

‘I heard a noise so I thought you must have fallen down … and when you didn’t come back I felt I’d better …’

David’s alarm redoubled as he saw George writhing across the floor evidently trying to reach an arm-chair.

There was one thought in George’s mind: he had to get rid of the shoes under a chair. With his back to David he managed to do so undiscovered.

He might be having a fit … what did one do when people had fits? But George made a miraculous recovery. He was on his feet again. David saw a nasty-looking cut on his
forehead
; he must have done it when he fell. He’d never seen him so bad before.

‘Are there any bandages in the house?’

‘About that little pub … really very close … a bit of elastoplast and I’ll be fine.’

‘No,’ said David with authority. ‘You’ve had a great deal too much already.’

George sank into an arm-chair and fired his last shot: ‘Well, if you won’t let me have a little brandy at the pub you’ll have to go to the all-night chemists at Piccadilly Circus and get me a sedative. I’ll never sleep otherwise.’

David was shaking his head. Quite suddenly George was crying; the effort, the shock, the pain, the indignity had all overcome him. What was there left? He felt himself the prisoner in the dock just before the black cap is put on. Nothing could save him now. If only it could all be over. The tears had stopped.

‘You must understand, I can’t leave you here in this state. You’ve already hurt yourself badly enough … I should never forgive myself if something worse happened to you.’

‘David, I beg you to leave me.’

David looked at him dubiously. These flashes of sobriety were almost more worrying than his drunken writhing.

George saw what he was thinking as clearly as if he had spoken it. In despair he said:

‘Will you help me to bed?’

With luck Sally might be able to escape while they were upstairs. He would throw the bedclothes about and make as much noise as he could. It would be expected of him.

‘I think you’d better stay here and rest a bit before we do anything else. I’ll tidy up a little while you sober up.’

He could make a dash for the door. David saw the
direction
of George’s gaze. He saw there was no key in the lock. Instead he moved a chair in front of the door and sat on it. He had seen what George did when his mother got drunk, so the situation, short of violence, presented few problems.

George sank back deeper into his chair, his heart-beats seemed to be coming slower. At last there really was nothing he could do. David picked up an empty glass; suddenly his eye lighted on another. Not surprising; when he was this bad he might keep glasses at opposite sides of the room to save
him the effort of moving. He righted the upturned chair and straightened the rucked-up carpet. A cushion lay on the floor just in front of the sofa. He went across and replaced it. He looked round the room to see if there was anything else … wait a second wasn’t that a black cushion with lace
trimmings
just behind the sofa … without bothering to move he leant forward and plucked at it … funny… must be caught under one of the legs. He took a couple of steps and bent down … Sally’s face was about six inches from his.

For a moment neither of them moved, but remained
staring
at each other crouched on their hands and knees. George buried his face in the side of his arm-chair. If only he could be struck blind and deaf. In the following seconds he would rather Sally had been struck dumb. Slowly she got up,
awkwardly
balancing on one high-heeled shoe. Her hair had fallen down over one eye, on her left cheek there was an ugly purple swelling, and the lace had come adrift from the bottom of her skirt where David had pulled it. George’s hands were over his face now, through a gap in his fingers he could see that she was trembling. Her high-pitched laughter was far worse than the abuse that George was expecting. Her whole body was shaking as each new wave overcame her. From the floor David looked up at her flung-back shoulders and the overhang of her quaking breasts. He remained immobile as in a nightmare. The first view of those
green-shaded
eyes still lingered before him. The shattered silence might have been his mind. Suddenly his strength returned, his legs jerked straight under him, his back unbent. As the tears started to blind him, he leapt towards the door. He half saw George’s hunched form in the arm-chair as the room raced by. In his nostrils the smell of cheap scent almost stifled him. In the corridor the laughter was fainter; in front of him was an open door, he ran through it and fell in the darkness on to a large double bed. The sheets were already pulled back.

 *

In the sitting-room, Sally had stopped laughing. She
wiped the tears from the corners of her eyes with her sleeve. At last George spoke.

‘I think you’d better go.’

‘I don’t think it will make much difference.’

‘I’d still rather you did.’

‘So you’re going to try and stop him running back to Mummy, is that it?’

‘I just think it’s only fair on the boy for you to leave us alone tonight.’

‘Anybody might think it was your son the way you’re going on. If he’s old enough to wear long trousers, he’s old enough to know about the birds and bees. Or does he think his mother and you talk about the state of the nation when you’re in bed?’

‘I don’t know what he thinks. I just want you to go.’

All traces of Sally’s laughter had disappeared.

‘I suppose you’re going to tell me that it was all my fault in a minute, that I’ve ruined fifteen years of adulterous bliss. Did you think I was going to pretend to be your
washer-woman
playing a quiet game of hide-and-seek with little Georgy Porgy before beddy bies? I really think you want to go back to that old bag.’

‘I don’t know what I want to do, except that I want to be left alone.’

‘You may not realise it, but this evening’s little romp has set you free. You didn’t even have to lift a finger.’

She was smiling at him now. George wondered what she was thinking. Better not disillusion her now.

‘I’ll have to see how things work out.’

‘You astound me, you really do. Little Lord Fauntleroy has met the wicked fairy so Prince Charming misses his cue.’ She moved across the room towards his chair and knelt down on the floor next to him. ‘Think of what we’ll be able to do now. It won’t be once a month but every day. It isn’t too late.’ She leant over intimately and slipped a hand into his shirt. Playfully she started to stroke the hairs on his chest.

George smiled back. There was no alternative he would have to play along if he was ever to get her out.

‘We’ll be able to go to the Riviera and Italy. I’ve never been abroad.’ Her eyes were shining. Streaks of eye shadow lined her cheeks where she had wiped her eyes with her sleeve.

George saw visions of a fat man in Bermuda shorts
walking
across crowded beaches, following his typist love. They wouldn’t even be able to afford Margate. Thoughtfully Sally picked the rose out of her bosom and put it in her hair. Or was it to be sunny Spain with the gay clicking of castanets? Was she thinking of the ideal bikini or dry martinis under large multi-coloured umbrellas? There’d be snapshots to show her friends, or perhaps a ciné camera. Pictures of George swimming, lounging, drinking, driving, George draped over a crumbling pillar by the Parthenon. Of course he’d take pictures too, of her. Sally bronzed, Sally
half-naked
, Sally eating caviare.

‘Darling, why don’t you come round tomorrow and then we’ll plan something definite?’

She nodded assent. George hurried into the hall to find her coat. He scrabbled under the other arm-chair for her missing shoe.

The taxi only took three minutes. She kissed him before she got in,

‘George darling, I can’t remember ever feeling happier.’

 *

Hastily George shut the front door and hurried back into the flat. He was relieved to see that David had shut the bedroom door. At least he would be saved convincing him that he had merely been trying to get rid of Sally.

David was sitting on the edge of the bed. He seemed to have partially recovered. But his face was tight as a
skin-stretche
d
mask. Neither of them spoke for several minutes, then like a triggered machine David stuttered:

‘How could you, how could you, how could you?’

George didn’t reply.

‘She was so common, so awful. How could you do it when you knew that?’

How to explain to somebody barely fifteen that
proletarian
flesh felt the same and young proletarian flesh
sometimes
better. How could he ever be judged by his peers? Who but over-sexed and fattening men dependent on elder women had a right to condemn? Hadn’t he paid the price with his freedom? Shouldn’t there be some reward?

‘Did you love her? Could you ever have loved somebody like that?’

What to say? I lusted hopelessly?

‘Once.’

‘But mummy, you didn’t tell mummy. Then back at home she still thought that you loved her, while all the time you hated her.’

‘How could I tell her?’

‘I don’t know, I don’t know. I only wish that I’d never come, that I’d never seen this.’

Why couldn’t it have been Steven? Then it would have been straightforward damnation. There would have been no attempts to understand.