Lovers and Liars Trilogy (185 page)

Now, watching Pixie sashay back and forth between closets and drawers, selecting a costume for a meeting that, alas, was not the hot date Pixie supposed, it occurred to her that Pixie’s revelations were doubly useful. Not only had they induced a saintly state of forbearance and wisdom, they had also ensured that there was now no going back. The luxury of changing her mind, a luxury Lindsay was aware she indulged in too often, was ruled out. This was good—now the bridges were burned, the Rubicon was crossed. She at once felt a surge of energy and bounced off the bed.

‘That red dress,’ she said, ‘that’s what I want to wear—the red dress.’

Pixie rolled her eyes. ‘Per—leaze,’ she said.

‘What’s wrong with it? It’s great. People like it. Rowland McGuire likes it.’

Pixie thrust the red dress to the back of the closet. She pulled out a black suit, a white silk T-shirt, a pair of stockings, black shoes with kitten heels, and some fake pearls that looked like Chanel fake pearls in a kind light.

‘Take the bra
off
,’ she said. ‘I want
subtle
. Just the occasional hint of nipple, for Colin’s sake. Don’t argue—
trust
. And never quote Rowland McGuire on clothes to me. I may lust after Rowland, but he knows
nothing
about what makes a woman look good. Rowland should concentrate on women’s underwear…’ She paused, smiling. ‘As, of course, one gathers he does…’

‘Yes, yes, yes,’ Lindsay said very fast, removing the bra and diving into the T-shirt. She knew Pixie was about to launch herself on the subject of Rowland’s physical charms, alleged sexual prowess and past amatory exploits. This recitative, of which Pixie was fond, and which might or might not be accurate, could continue at Homeric length. Lindsay did not want to hear about Rowland’s putative past amours, and she certainly did not want to hear the details of any present ones. Pixie’s reading, in any case, was useless; she came at the subject of Rowland from the wrong philosophic and moral viewpoint. As far as Pixie was concerned, Lindsay thought crossly, it was a truth universally acknowledged that any man in possession of a woman’s company must be in want of a fuck.

She closed her ears to Pixie’s lewd commentary and emerged from the T-shirt red-faced.

‘So tell me truthfully now,’ Pixie was saying. ‘Am I right? Did you and Rowland ever…’

‘What?
What
?’ Lindsay said. ‘Certainly
not
. For heaven’s
sake
…’

‘Pity, because it
is
heaven, by all accounts. I’d have liked to know if it was true…’ She gave a dreamy sigh. ‘Just, like, the best sex
ever
. Eight times a night.’

‘Don’t be so goddamn ridiculous.’ Lindsay began to yank on the stockings. ‘
No-one
does it eight times a night. Less is more, Pixie. Remember that.’

‘If you say so, Lindsay,’ Pixie replied, in the most irritating manner possible. ‘If you say so…’ Her eyes narrowed. ‘Are you telling me the truth? You’re sure you never—not even once?’

‘No, I damn well didn’t. Rowland is a colleague. Can we change the subject and change it now, please?’

‘OK. OK.’ Pixie looked thoughtful. ‘It’s just—I’ve noticed him
looking
at you, once or twice, and I could have sworn that…’

Lindsay put on the skirt, the jacket and the shoes. This took her at least thirty seconds and demonstrated consummate self-control, she felt.

‘What could you have sworn?’ she said.

‘Nothing, nothing. Put it this way,
maybe
he was admiring your work, but I got a rather different impression

‘Twaddle,’ Lindsay said, with firmness. ‘Tosh. Romantic drivel. When was this?’

‘Oh, back in the summer some time…’ Pixie made an airy gesture. ‘You were wearing that cream dress.’

‘Really? I’ve always liked that dress.’

‘And another occasion—when you were going straight to the theatre with him from work, September some time?’

‘I remember vaguely. September the eighth.’

‘He helped you on with your coat, and I caught that
look
on his face…’ Pixie shrugged. ‘I was probably imagining it. You were putting him down as usual, telling him how arrogant he is—that’s why you didn’t notice, I expect.’

‘Putting him down?’ Lindsay began, frowning. ‘No, Pixie—I don’t do that…’

‘You never
stop
doing it, Lindsay.’ Pixie gave her a kind look. ‘
I
know you don’t mean it, and so does he most of the time, but you’ve got a wicked tongue and you hurt him sometimes. Pity about that—you might have been in there with a chance…’

Lindsay turned to look at her own reflection. She would
silence
that tongue of hers, she thought; she would cut that tongue out if necessary. Never ever again, no matter how provoked, would she give Rowland McGuire a sharp answer. From now on, in her capacity as his friend, of course, she would speak with a becoming, a womanly sweetness; she would anoint Rowland with the balm of her female discourse…I shall be
dulcet
, she resolved, and not just to Rowland, but to all the male sex. Perhaps a certain tartness, even a shrewishness, had been her problem all along, she thought. And how astonishing that Pixie, whose instincts were usually acute for such nuances, should think she might have been in there with a chance.

Resolving to reform, and to start practising this new mildness of tongue immediately—she could practise on Colin over dinner, she realized; how fortunate—she executed a little pirouette. Pixie examined her, critically, from head to foot. The two women’s eyes met in the mirror; both smiled.

‘Well, I have to say it—you look great. I’ve improved you no end. Your skin’s radiant, your eyes are shining…Quite a transformation.’ Pixie gave her a sidelong sly glance. ‘I can’t take all the credit, there must be another reason…Anticipation, perhaps?’

‘What?’ Lindsay looked at her blankly. ‘Oh, of Colin, you mean? Well, it will be nice to have a quiet dinner somewhere…’

‘Quiet, huh?’ Pixie smiled. ‘You like him, maybe? I wouldn’t blame you. Thin but Byronic. Nice butt.
Wild
hair. Great line in Levis. Well hung. Dresses to the left—that’s always a good sign…’

‘How observant you are, Pixie. I must remember that.’

‘And quite an operator too, I’d say…’

‘An
operator
?’ Lindsay shook her head vehemently. ‘No, Pixie, you’ve got hold of the wrong end of the stick. He’s sweet. Volatile. A bit naïve. Not very sure of himself…’

‘Oh yeah? Like, he finds out what flight you’re on, and switches to it himself. Then he chats up that stewardess at Heathrow—I watched him do it, Lindsay—and gets you both bumped up to First Class? I’ve seen him with you, in the bar, gazing at you with those innocent blue eyes, looking like butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth…I
read
this man, Lindsay, and I know
exactly
what he’s after.’ She giggled. ‘And if I were you, I’d give it to him. After dinner tonight.’

Lindsay listened to this speech in thoughtful silence. From the vantage point of her new-won maturity and saintliness of character, she gave poor one-track-mind Pixie a pitying look.

‘Pixie,’ she said, ‘you’re getting cynical, you know that? When you’re older, you’ll understand. Sometimes men and women like to meet and simply
talk
. There is no hidden agenda…’

Pixie gave a snort. Some of Lindsay’s new saintliness deserted her.

‘Look, Pixie,’ she continued, the sweetness of tongue also momentarily failing her, ‘you know where we’re going after dinner? We are going up town to this apartment he’s staying in. There, Pixie, I’m going to meet his aunt—his great-aunt to be precise—because, God alone knows why, she’s expressed an interest in being introduced. Now I hate to disabuse you, but she’s around eighty-five years old, so I scarcely think…’

‘Wow! You’re meeting his
aunt
?’ Pixie appeared to be thinking fast. Her face lit. ‘Well, what d’you know, this must be
serious
. That’s good. That’s great. I’m really pleased for you, Lindsay. I’m getting the picture now—like, this could be
long-term
, I mean, several months, right? Lucky we did the make-over; this is obviously the big night. I see it all…You charm the old lady, get her
approval
, so to speak, then it’s good night to grandma…He brings you back here to the Pierre, like the gentleman he is, then it’s soft lights, sweet nothings…’ Pixie took her hand in a confiding way. ‘You’d like me to lend you some grass, maybe? I have a stash downstairs. It can help with a first fuck sometimes, I find; kind of eases all the tensions, revs you up for the
second
fuck, makes sure it goes all right…’

At this, saintliness deserted Lindsay completely. She snatched her hand back.

‘Are you totally mad, Pixie? Stone-deaf? How many times do I have to say this? It’s dinner, it’s the great-aunt’s, it’s back to the Pierre
on my own
. Read my lips, Pixie:
no fucking
. Have you got that?’

Pixie was mortally and morally offended. She gave Lindsay a look of shocked disbelief, made a few pungent remarks about women who hoarded their supposed virtue, then stalked to the door.

‘Poor Colin,’ she said. ‘That is so mean and miserly, Lindsay. I’m disappointed in you.’ She opened the door. ‘You know what I call behaviour like that?’

‘Don’t bother telling me,’ Lindsay began.

‘I call it fucking
immoral
,’ Pixie yelled, nipping out through the door and slamming it.

Colin’s idea of a quiet restaurant surprised Lindsay. It proved to be on East 55th Street; it was called Temps Perdu, had long been famous, and was very grand indeed. Realizing that it was their destination, Lindsay came to a halt on the sidewalk, a few yards short of its pinkish entrance canopy. She was about to suggest that this choice was an extravagant one, since Temps Perdu was celebrated for being very expensive, as in Third World debt, when she remembered she was practising sweetness of tongue.

She rephrased. ‘Won’t this be—well, a little
grand
, Colin?’ she said.

Colin looked at her non-plussed. Such a concept did not appear to be familiar to him.

‘Oh, I don’t think so,’ he said. ‘It’s terribly nice; you’ll like it. The food’s wonderful. There’s a great wine list, and there’s a very jolly head waiter; his name’s Fabian. He’ll look after us.’

It was on the tip of Lindsay’s tongue to say that, in her experience, head waiters in such New York restaurants were many things: haughty, intimidating, insultingly rude, for instance, but rarely jolly. The old Lindsay would have said this; the new Lindsay made some simpering vacuous disclaimer, and both Lindsays started praying as a flunkey in uniform held the doors back.

Please God, the Lindsays said silently, to a deity in which neither quite believed. Please God, let them honour Colin’s reservation; please God, don’t let them relegate us to a Siberian table so conspicuously ill-placed that even Colin will notice; please God, don’t let them treat Colin like a worm, and please let them see that he means well and he’s really very sweet…

Lindsay was so busy with these prayers and with squinting around trying to work out which table was nearest the rest-room exit, and whether they were being inexorably led to it, that she was seated at a banquette opposite Colin before the details of their reception began to penetrate.

Then she began to realize: the table at which they had been placed was a delightful one, and someone—she was not sure who it was, but someone pleasant with a deep, French-accented voice—had used the phrase, ‘Your usual table’. This usual table, moreover, was in a quiet, even an intimate corner; it had a snowy linen cloth, candles, charming flowers; beyond it, a wine waiter, supervised by a smiling benignant grey-haired man, was opening a bottle of champagne. It occurred to her that the benignant man must be Fabian—this
aperçu
being assisted by the fact that Colin addressed him as such.

‘With my compliments, Mr Lascelles,’ benignant Fabian appeared to be saying. ‘The ’seventy-six. I remember you liked that.’ A large leather-bound folder was placed in front of her. Opening it, Lindsay saw that although it listed three types of caviar and five ways of serving lobster, the menu she had been given did not list prices.

‘
Bon appétit
,’ said Fabian, a man Lindsay realized she now liked very much. He withdrew. Colin gave some Gaelic toast, which he said he had once learned in Scotland, and which ensured long life, love and happiness.

Lindsay took a sip of the champagne; it was nectar; it was a revelation; it was—no contest—the most delicious champagne she had ever drunk in her life. A tiny silence fell; remembering her new womanliness, Lindsay sweetly and sympathetically asked Colin what sort of a day he had had.

‘Ghastly. Unspeakable. Agonizing,’ he replied. ‘Here, feel. My hands are trembling.’

Lindsay took the hand he held out.

‘It’s fine. Not a tremor,’ she said, after a while.

‘Really?’ A glint of amusement appeared in Colin’s innocent blue eyes. ‘I
am
surprised. Try the pulse.’

Lindsay tried the pulse. She frowned, concentrating.

‘It’s fast,’ she pronounced eventually. ‘Definitely feverish.’

‘I thought it might be. Entirely the fault of the evil genius, of course.’

In his easy way, Colin then began to discourse on the subject of the evil genius—or Prospero, as he had apparently now decided to call him. He moved on to shred the character of the famous actor, Nic Hicks. He did this with some wit, but Lindsay was distracted and listened with only half her attention. Various suspicions were inching their way forwards from the back of her mind, and she wanted to examine them in detail. This was not easy; they kept entangling themselves in Colin’s sentences and the choice she was trying to make from the menu. Concentrate, she said to herself.

In the first place, there was, possibly, an alteration in Colin’s demeanour tonight; she could have sworn that there was a flirtatiousness in his manner when he took her hand, and an accomplished flirtatiousness at that. Perhaps, though, this thought was unworthy and had been planted by Pixie. In the second place, there was the question of Colin’s suit. She had never seen him in a suit before, and this three-piece masterly garment, dark grey in colour with the narrowest, most discreet of pinstripes, was of a kind Lindsay had believed almost extinct. It could only have come from Savile Row, and it made her understand what Englishmen meant when they spoke of having a suit
built
. The suit; the choice of restaurant; Colin’s reception there…the suspicions swelled and took on a monstrous shape. It occurred to Lindsay that, judging from this evidence, Colin Lascelles might be rich.