42
“Lilacs Out Of The Dead Land”
“I’ll get it,” said Ralph smoothly as his brother’s doorbell boomed and the other guests jumped.
Since Tom was again immured in the kitchen and their hostess was looking dismayed, Hugh murmured kindly: “Don’t you think you ought to let Jemima get it? It is her house.”
“I assure you Jemima would rather I got it,” replied Ralph, rising smoothly.
“Are you sure you want to?” said Jemima in a tiny voice.
“No,” he replied smoothly, going out into the passage and shutting the door behind him. Which didn’t prevent his hearing Derry Dawlish saying loudly: “What the fuck was that all about?” and bloody Hugh replying loudly with a laugh: “Young lerve!”
In the passage he found he’d risen smoothly, all right. At the same time his heart was hammering nineteen to the dozen and he felt extremely sick. He gritted his teeth and opened the door.
“Hullo,” said Phoebe limply. The colour rose up her strong neck.
Ralph actually managed to reply: “Hullo, Phoebe; come on in.” The sight of the colour rising up her neck possibly had something to do with the fact that he managed to get out any words at all.
“Is this an Overdale plot?” said Phoebe, still limp, as she came in.
Ralph didn’t manage to sound precisely insouciant as he replied: “No: the dinner was all his idea, and opening the door was all my idea.”
“That seems to cover it,” said Phoebe limply.
“Mm. That’s a nice jacket: may I take it for you?”
“Uh—no, it’s all right, thanks; I’ll hang onto it.”
“The house is quite warm, really. Given that they’ve got no central heating and that it’s the size and shape of a barn. A wooden barn,” he clarified.
“Yes,” said Phoebe weakly.
There was a short pause.
“Um—well, I suppose I might as well take it off, then.”
Ralph came up behind her and helped her off with the brown fur jacket without saying anything, largely because he was incapable of saying anything. His knees were actually trembling, he discovered.
“I’ve had it for ages,” said Phoebe with an effort.
“Mm? Oh—the lapin! Yes, I think I might have seen it before.”
“You’ve seen the dress before, too,” she said weakly, since he was looking at it.
It was the green-gold lamé she’d worn to... What the Hell had it been? There was a brush-off in there somewhere, he did remember that. Oh, yes: some bloody do at the Cohens’, was it? Or had it been at the Hardings’? He couldn’t remember for the life of him, but both Cohens and Hardings were in there somewhere. He could, however, now recall the brush-off very clearly: he’d driven her home, having more or less blackmailed her into it in front of their gracious hostess, and— Ugh.
“I’m pulling in my horns a bit. Not spending anything on frivolities like dress: I want to take some leave without pay in the fairly near future,” explained Phoebe, wondering why the Hell she was explaining.
“Mm. I think Jemima mentioned you’d taken up your Ph.D. again,” he murmured.
“Yes.”
Another pause.
“Shall we go in?” said Ralph weakly.
“Y— Um, no. Hang on a bit, Ralph.”
Ralph hung on. He wasn’t capable of actually saying anything, but he managed to look her in the eye.
Phoebe went very red, swallowed, and said: “I’m sorry about the roses.”
“Oh,” he said weakly. “Er—that’s all right. Understandable, in the circs.”
She swallowed again. “No; I—I let my prejudices run away with me without—without verifying the facts. I am sorry, Ralph.”
Ralph raised his eyebrows. “Without verifying the facts? Possibly you do have the makings of a scholar, after all.”
Phoebe’s jaw sagged.
“They were beautiful roses,” he said sadly. “Velvety.”
“Yes,” she admitted, chewing her lip.
Then there was a short silence.
“You—you didn’t—” Phoebe cleared her throat. “You don’t mean you actually chose them in person?”
“Of course I—” Ralph broke off. He took a deep breath. “Yes. You don’t come into the category of the casual phone call to Interflora, Phoebe. Didn’t you realize that?”
“No,” she said hoarsely, looking at him—he was sure, unaware she was doing so—pleadingly.
Ralph went very red indeed. “I think we’d better discuss that sort of thing later, then, don’t you?”
Phoebe merely swallowed.
“In the meantime, come on into the sitting-room, we’ve got several hours of. Purgatory to get through.”
“What? Oh,” she said limply. “Lead on, then.”
He opened the sitting room door and bowed her in. As well as he could, he still wasn’t precisely limp.
Over the sherry—once bloody Tom had been dragged out of his kitchen—Hugh revealed, rather flushed but very evidently terrifically pleased with himself, that he and Roberta were engaged. Congratulations, if not astonishment, all round. The little Jap kid demanded to see the ring so everybody followed suit. Very old-fashioned: three small rubies interspersed with minute diamond chips, set in a gold band.
“This is your mother’s ring, isn’t it, Hugh?” said Ralph with a smile. “I thought your bloody sister had her mitts on it?”
Hugh’s sister lived down in Christchurch, which was just as well.
“Yeah, she did,” he said, grinning. “I managed to persuade her to give it up. Well, she can’t wear it: she’s got hands like a gorilla’s and her daughter’s inherited ’em. Added to which the girl informed us that it was old-fashioned and ugly.”
“Whereupon the two of ’em had a flaming row and flung the ring at you in a fit of pique.”
“Something like that!” he said, laughing.
“That isn’t true, Hugh!” cried Roberta.
Everyone looked at her enquiringly and she blushed and said: “Well, they did have a row. And Hugh did provoke it on purpose. But he swapped the ring for the sapphire brooch.”
Ralph goggled at him. “For— Not that delicious thing you gave your mum when you got your F.R.—” Hugh was nodding. “Hugh, dear fellow—”
“Well, look at her!” he said with a laugh.
Everyone looked blankly at Roberta. She went redder than ever.
“No, of course not!” recognized Ralph with a laugh. “Not blue!”
“No; and I’m dark, too. Highly unlikely we’ll have a blonde, blue-eyed offspring,” said Hugh on a complacent note.
“Highly unlikely?” returned Ralph. “When I went to school it was genetically impossible, dear lad!”
“Recessive genes,” said Jemima thoughtfully, nodding.
“It isn’t impossible,” said Phoebe abruptly. “Two brown-eyed people, both of whom possess a recessive gene, can have a blue-eyed offspring. But two blue-eyed people can’t produce a brown-eyed offspring: they’ve both got paired recessive genes.”
“She’s right, you know,” murmured Tom.
“Ralph can’t have gone to school with Mendel, then,” noted Hugh.
“Oh; I thought he did,” said Derry Dawlish sadly.
The company duly went into sniggering fits. Apart from Akiko, who said confidentially to Roberta: “I cannot-ah wear bu-rue, either, Robert-ah.”
Ralph just let it pass. All of it. He didn’t even care, to tell the truth.
As they went into the dining-room Tom was overcome at the discovery that it was full of balloon-backed mahogany. Evidently Jemima Puddle-Duck hadn’t thought to mention it to him. Ralph could feel Phoebe’s eyes on him as Jemima hurriedly explained and Hugh—thank you, dear old friend—ascertained that they were mahogany, and English, and must be worth a small fortune. Dawlish had a good look at them and agreed they were Victorian, rather nice. He’d hang onto ’em if he was Tom.
“Look,” said Ralph, rather more loudly than he’d intended: “if I should ever happen to find myself with a dining-room the size of small barn on my hands and the dining table to match, I’ll reclaim them! Okay?
Sheepishly Tom agreed that was okay.
Over Tom’s blessed hors-d’oeuvre—he could make a decent pâté: why the fuck hadn’t he just done that and been content with it?—Dawlish asked Hugh politely about his plans for the future and Hugh embarked on a happy examination of, apparently, every bloody property for sale in the greater metropolitan area. Him what had barely managed to buy himself a townhouse up Willow Grove less than eighteen months since!
Over Tom’s delightful home-made, home-grown cream of celery soup, scattered with salad burnet leaves and a swirl of fresh cream, Dawlish introduced the subject of pottery: Akiko-san (the Jap kid giggled obligingly: subservient, weren’t they?) had taken him to see Michaela Daniels’s studio: didn’t she turn out some marvellous things? Tom, Jemima and, indeed, Ralph himself emanated a tingling silence at this one, but fortunately Hugh and Roberta couldn’t have heard the local gossip about Akiko and Sol yet. She agreed eagerly she did. He agreed cheerfully she did. Boy, was he ever over Master Potter! thought Ralph on a sour note, avoiding his relatives’ eyes. Phoebe apparently hadn’t heard about the Akiko-Winkelmann-Michaela triangle, either: she also agreed happily, and described her own Old Brown Blobby. Apparently unselfconsciously, and while Ralph didn’t think she was in fact unselfconscious about it, he did think—well, hope—that maybe she was well and truly over the egregious Yank. Dawlish then talked modern pottery. After quite some time it dawned on Ralph that he was the only one not joining in. Hurriedly he joined in.
As they embarked on the ducks Phoebe made a polite enquiry about Derry’s next film. Dawlish was pretty bright already, what with the Dry Sack which Ralph on an early occasion had donated to his poor relations, the fairly decent local Riesling with the first couple of courses and the really quite drinkable Coonawarra red that Tom had just set before them—not to say the fact that Akiko had by this point in time giggled obligingly approximately five hundred times, and asked him subserviently what the vegetabur’ with the mush-ahroom-ah was, what the little ur-leave’ with the soup-ah were, whether they had this-ah soup in Eng-gur-rand, Ur-Bear-san (giggle), and whether they had this-ah bird in Eng-gur-rand and what-ah it was called, Derry-san?—but at this he brightened further and proceeded to tell them all about it. This was probably just as well: eight into two wild ducks went reasonably well when one of ’em was a Jap kid that didn’t know enough to know she was entitled to a leg as well as a breast when the things were this size, and one of ’em was a besotted medical lady half her fiancé’s age and another a besotted medical gent twice his fiancée’s age, both of them in the state where they would have eaten sawdust and not noticed it, and, finally, another of ’em was a Jemima Puddle-Duck who had once said to Ralph’s affronted self as he served her with an exquisite piece of pheasant: “That’s far too much for me, Ralph.” “Reasonably”, however, was as far as it went. Ralph himself, for one reason or another, wasn’t particularly hungry tonight, but he glanced at the leg on Dawlish’s plate and looked sideways at the breast on Miss Fothergill’s plate and forbore to pass any remark at all.
Phoebe must have noticed his glancing: she murmured: “Feminine,” nodding at her plate.
“Mm,” agreed Ralph, looking drily at Akiko. –She had just asked, subserviently of course, where was Si-en-nah, Derry-san? –Ah.
Phoebe gave a smothered snort of laughter.
Ralph ate up his duck leg in Australian-Shiraz-based sauce, his mashed potato, and his sautéed eggplant with tomato, without even a passing glance of criticism at the combination.
As Hugh helped Tom clear the dinner plates there was a slight contretemps at the dining-room door which resolved itself into that hairy brute’s, having dragged itself away from the sitting-room fire, demanding either to be let out or duck bones, or possibly both, but which was settled by Tom’s forcibly putting it out.
Phoebe said in a vaguely puzzled voice to her hostess: “I must have got it wrong, Jemima: I had a sort of idea that that brute wasn’t actually yours?”
Ralph experienced a huge surge of relief at the choice of phrase. Because even the most admirable-seeming, not to say compatible-seeming women could turn out to have secret penchants for the most Goddawful pets. And a thing like that anywhere near his stuff—!
Jemima got very flustered explaining that it belonged to their boarder, who was on holiday—blah-blah.
“He is ver-ree big-ah dog,” stated Akiko.
“Yes,” said Jemima, going almost as red as her dress. “I’ll ask Tom not to let him back in the sitting-room, Akiko, if you like. But he won’t hurt you, he’s a very friendly dog.”
“Don’t worry, Geisha-san, I’ll protect you!” said Dawlish with a laugh, patting her hand. Sort of a combination of the patronising and the paternal.
Ralph studiously avoided Phoebe’s eye. The more so since Akiko was giggling both subserviently and sycophantically and thanking Derry-san humbly. He had a notion that Phoebe, at the same time, was studiously avoiding his eye. Which in the circs wasn’t all bad, souls!
Over the salad course Jemima said in a very weak voice to the great director: “I know not everybody likes beetroot, Derry, so, um, don’t feel you have to eat it.”
“Salade d’endives belges et de betteraves is one of my favourite dishes in all the world, Jemima, daring!” replied Dawlish on a fervent note.
“Oh,” said Jemima weakly. “Good.”
Ralph gave in entirely and said to his brother: “Where the Hell did you manage to find witloof?”
“Went to that place in Newmarket that you recommended. Where the Gov shops, isn’t it?”
“And Lady Cohen!” said Jemima with a loud giggle.
Studiously Ralph avoided Phoebe’s eye. Because he rather thought he recalled a certain other occasion where that greengrocer’s had got mentioned.
“Wha’ short ha hoy’ you uszhe in dresshing, Tom?” asked Dawlish thickly.
Tom replied blandly: “Olive oil.”
The famous director swallowed hurriedly and embarked on a long dissertation on the rival merits of various up-market brands of olive oil. Italian, Spanish, and apparently anywhere in between. Virgin, extra-virgin, cold pressed, et al. Ralph forbore to point out you couldn’t get most of them in this neck of the Antipodes.
Dawlish had more or less run down and was shovelling in a third helping of salad when Ralph noticed Phoebe, who hadn’t eaten all of her helping, reach for her glass, which still held a considerable amount of red wine.
Hurriedly he put his left hand over her right one. “I wouldn’t,” he murmured. Trying to ignore the fact that her hand had twitched sharply and that his heart was galloping frantically. Not to say the further fact that he was just about lifting Tom’s huge dining table off the bloody floor, no hands.
Phoebe swallowed loudly and licked her lips. “I quite like it,” she murmured uncertainly.
“Not with this salad and Tom’s salad dressing.”
She licked her lips again. Ralph’s blood thundered in his ears. “I never know about that sort of thing,” she admitted.
“No. Well, as a rule of thumb, don’t drink wine with salad. Especially not red wine, but preferably not any wine.”
Dawlish leaned forward from the foot of the table beaming approval, and offered a long dissertation on the demerits of English foodie mags, coupled with a dissection of the merits and demerits of various French red wines in combination with various cheeses. French, of course. Most of ’em round the table had at least heard of Camembert. Fortunately Hugh and Tom both asked him quite a lot about the more obscure cheeses, so Ralph didn’t have to.
Phoebe just sat back limply in her chair during all of this. She’d nearly passed out when Ralph had touched her hand. Why the Christ had she accepted the invitation, she was a bloody idiot, she might have known he’d have this effect on her! Well, he always had had, so why the Hell she’d imagined... And now she couldn’t think at all—or all she could think was that she wanted him. And she hadn’t meant it to be like this at all! She’d meant to be... coolly friendly, very calm and slightly sophisticated, and terrifically adult and—and coolly friendly! Oh, curse the man!
Over the cheese—Tom had got hold of some nice Brie, must have scoured the town for weeks, and fresh goat’s—Dawlish completed his dissertation and embarked on a further dissertation on “French” bread and different types of flour but it had to be admitted that neither Phoebe nor Ralph registered much of this.
As they ate Pudding Nesselrode which, give old Tom his due, was bloody nearly as good as Ralph had ever got at L’Oie Qui Rit, Dawlish left the topic of food and began to discuss theatre. This left most of them gasping, of course. After a while this dawned on the great director so he allowed himself to include telly plays in his dissertation and some of them had seen some of those. Ralph swallowed a sigh.
“Delicious, isn’t it?” said Phoebe.
Ralph jumped. “Uh—oh. Yes.”
“Sort of like—um—that Italian thing, I can never remember its name... Oh, yes: cassata. Don’t tell me I’m talking through the little hole in the back of my neck, thanks.”
“Er—no. Very well; I won’t, then.”
Phoebe glanced at him uncertainly. “Oh, go on, then.”
“It’s based on a crème anglaise, with purée de marrons and whipped cr— Never mind,” said Ralph dully.
“How on earth do you find the time to—to bother to know all this detailed foodie stuff, Ralph?” she asked with a smile in her voice.
“Um... it’s partly experience, I suppose. And I often read genuine recipe books, as opposed to trendy foodie crap, with me feet up of an evening.”
“Oh,” said Phoebe in a shaken voice.
Ralph was also shaken: he’d just remembered he’d given his Répertoire de la cuisine to Ginny Austin. Oh, Hell and damnation! Well, he’d get downtown tomorrow morning, first thing, and bend the ear of the little man in the halfway decent second-hand bookshop that sometimes found him old New Zealand first editions, but more often found him tripe that they tried to pass off as... Better ring Smith’s in Wellington, too.
“What’s up?” ventured Phoebe.
“Nothing,” he said, frowning.
Phoebe looked down at her dessert and poked it a bit with her spoon and decided she was full, really.
Over coffee and liqueurs, back in the sitting-room, Dawlish and Tom talked music. Ralph could have joined in but somehow he didn’t bother.
After quite some time it appeared to dawn on the two experts that Akiko and Jemima were quietly talking about clothes, or rather Akiko was talking and asking questions and Jemima was listening and answering, Phoebe and Roberta were talking about Roberta’s medical studies and Phoebe’s Ph.D., and Hugh and Ralph were merely sitting back sipping their liqueurs.
“Uh—well, come on, then, demonstrate!” said Dawlish with his loud, cheerful laugh. –Not for the first time Ralph wondered how the Hell it was that the fellow came over as so... offensively macho, was one way of putting it, while his films came over as so... bloody effete, was one way of putting it.
Tom refused firmly to demonstrate but he did put a record on and conversation became rather more general.
In the course of the evening Tom stolidly resisted Dawlish’s further urgings to sing, resisted Dawlish’s urgings to read some of his own poems, then, and, again, resisted Derry’s urgings to sing. Eventually Ralph gave up the attempt to maintain a conversation with Hugh, Roberta and Akiko—Phoebe was merely watching them, which didn’t help, and Jemima had apparently given up and was sitting on the rug dreamily stroking the brute’s head, since some misguided cretin, probably Ralph’s brother, had let it in again—and said: “For God’s sake stop being a blushing violet, Tom! I’ll tickle the ivories, if that old thing’s anything like in tune.”
Tom had the old upright piano that had once been Aunty Ethel’s. Its tone was akin to that produced by a tin plate being lightly bashed with a fork, but apart from giving himself the odd key for his E.M.S. practice, he usually only played ragtime on it, so it scarcely mattered.
“Yes, please do, Tom!” said Hugh eagerly, smiling at him.
“I thought it might bore people stiff,” said Tom apologetically. “Sing-songs round the pianner, and so forth.” He pulled a face.
Ralph got up and went over to the piano. “Come on,” he said heavily.
“Tom has beau-ti-fur-uh voice,” said Akiko carefully to Phoebe.
“Has he?” replied Phoebe weakly.
“Some people like it. Others loathe it, I’m afraid,” said Tom apologetically.
“Will you come ON?” cried Ralph. “—Where the Hell’s your music?”
“Get up, you idiot,” replied Tom unemotionally.
Ralph removed his bum from Aunty Ethel’s piano bench and Tom retrieved his music.
“Sing that new one that I like, Tom,” suggested Jemima placidly.
Without remark Tom placed the music in front of his brother.
“Eh?” croaked Ralph, eyes bolting from his head.
“New,” said Tom unemotionally. “Play.”
Obediently Ralph played one of Aunty Ethel’s old favourites. Off the genuine sheet music that had belonged to Aunty Ethel. Come Into The Garden, Maude. He was not unaware that as his brother began to sing Phoebe gave a gasp and dropped her liqueur glass—fortunately empty—on the rug.
“I never realized you were a counter-tenor, Tom,” she said weakly, when everybody had finished clapping.
Dawlish got up. “Of course he is. Star turn in the early music I’ve used in my Dream.” He came over to the piano and grabbed up Tom’s sheet music. “Not that, not that…” he grunted to himself, sorting through it. “Ah! –Go on,” he ordered.
Tom sang a selection of Dowland. After that Dawlish got so keen that he pushed Ralph off the piano bench and sat down himself.
Ralph came back to Phoebe’s side as the two experts argued the rival merits of Schütz and Monteverdi.
“What a musical family you are,” said Phoebe in a very limp voice.
Ralph bit his lip. “You can cut that out.”
She smiled a little but said: “No, really, I’m very impressed. I think I might have heard Tom sing, actually, only I—uh—didn’t realize it was him.”
“Mm, well, you’d have heard him if you went to that student production of the Dream last year.”
There was a short silence, while Phoebe remembered the precise circumstances which had prevented her brain’s being at its sharpest at that period last year. “Oh, good Heavens, was that—”
“Mm. He sings with the local early music society. Travels round the country a bit, too. Well, he used to; hasn’t in the last year or so,” he murmured, his eyes on Jemima.
Phoebe followed his gaze. “No,” she agreed.
Ralph looked at her mockingly. “They have got a new infant.”
“I know that!” she hissed angrily.
He smiled a little and didn’t say any more. The more so since Dawlish was telling them loudly to shut up.
Apparently the great man had ordered his limo to return at twelve-thirty. After Tom had rescued the unfortunate driver and given him pudding and coffee in the kitchen, Dawlish and Akiko finally got going around one-fifteen.
“Whew!” said Hugh with a laugh, sinking back into his chair.
“Yeah—sorry about that,” admitted Tom, grinning. “Now the party can really begin!”
“No, it can’t,” said Roberta firmly. “Hugh’s got appointments all day.” She stood up. “Come on, Hugh.”
When they’d gone there was a brief silence. Some of those present were sharply aware that that left only a cosy family party of Overdales and their female belongings.
“I wonder how long it will be before it dawns on Hugh that, young though she is, and relatively diffident though she is—which I don’t deny,” murmured Ralph, “the delightful Roberta is really not unlike her terrifying ma.”
“We almost invited them,” said Jemima tranquilly.
He gulped, and was reduced to silence.
Phoebe wanted to say something like “Sucks” but found she couldn’t. She cleared her throat and said: “I’d better be going, too, Jemima.”
“Not all the way back to town in that Jap tin can of yours with all that booze inside you,” said Ralph instantly.
“But I—”
“I’ll drive.”
“Ralph didn’t have much to drink,” said Jemima helpfully.
“No,” he said, with a mocking look at Phoebe. “One small sherry, half a glass of that white thing, half a glass of that red thing. Some time since.”
Phoebe hadn’t really had all that much to drink. She was aware that she could refuse—and quite possibly create a scene. Or at any rate embarrass her hosts. Depending on whether Ralph insisted or not. She was also aware that he did possess the vestiges of nice company manners, so it was possible he might not insist, in which case she could possibly get a taxi. Though remembering her abortive efforts to get one at the Carranos’— God, only about six weeks back: why did it feel like a lifetime? On second thoughts, Tom undoubtedly was aware of the sort of taxi service they had up here: he’d then insist on driving her himself…
“You did have two liqueurs, Phoebe,” said Tom helpfully.
She took a deep breath. “Very well, then. Thanks, Ralph. Uh—where’s my jacket?”
Ralph picked it up. “Here. But hadn’t you better pop off to the little girls’ room, first?”
She took another deep breath, but went.
In the Overdales’ downstairs loo she went automatically through the motions of renewing her lipstick, removing the shine from her face, and tidying her hair. The familiar reflection in the mirror seemed at an immense distance from anything to do with reality... Hell, why had she had that last glass of Benedictine? Phoebe tried to tell herself that if she hadn’t had quite so much to drink she would never have agreed to let Ralph drive her home. But she didn’t manage to get anywhere near convincing herself. Her blood felt as if it was fizzing crazily throughout her entire body.
“Well, fingers crossed, eh?” said Tom with a laugh as he stood on his front porch with his arm round his wife, waving at the tail lights of the BMW.
“I hope it all works out,” said Jemima in a small voice.
Tom laughed. “Works out? She could hardly keep her hands off him!”
“Not that, you fool,” replied Mima Puddle-Duck sourly, pulling away from him and going inside.
Tom followed anxiously. “What’s up?” he said in the sitting-room to her bent head.
“I just want Ralph to be happy,” said Jemima in a stifled voice.
“Um—yeah,” he agreed blankly.
“Don’t be so dense, Tom!” cried Jemima, angry tears starting to her eyes. “I want him to be happy on a—a long-term basis, not just a—a—one of those stands!”
“One of those stands, eh?” he murmured, putting his arm round her. “Don’t cry, sweetheart.” He kissed the top of her black head. “I want him to be happy long-term, too, silly old bastard.”
Jemima gulped and sniffled.
Tom sighed. “I’ve done me best,” he pointed out meekly.
“Yes. Thank you, Tom,” she said earnestly.
“Uh—that’s all right,” he said feebly, giving her his hanky.
Jemima blew her nose. “Bill was really surprized, he said he’d never known you perform a truly altruistic act for another adult human being in your entire existence.”
Tom’s jaw dropped. He didn’t even point out that Bill hadn’t known him for his entire existence.
She smiled at him mistily. “I know there’s words of more than one syllable in there, but he really did!”
“Uh—yeah,” he croaked. “Did ’e? Mm.”
“Perhaps we’d better not tell him about the chairs!” said Jemima Puddleduck with a giggle.
“Look, I never knew Ralph was gonna— Oh,” he said limply.
Jemima giggled.
Tom passed his hand through his rapidly-thinning hair. “Do I gather that I’m out of the doghouse?”
“What?”
“That doghouse full of male wankers,” said Tom very clearly.
“What?”
“Where you’ve had me for the last several days!” he said loudly.
“What? Oh! I wasn’t cross with you, Tom.”
“What was it, then: Mother Nature?” he said nastily.
“Well, yes, partly,” replied Jemima serenely. “But mostly I was awfully nervous about tonight.”
“Awfully nervous? I told you those ducks would be a breeze, I’ve done that recipe umpteen times, and the pudding sounds complicated but you can prepare it beforehand, that’s the beauty—”
“No! Honestly, Tom! Talk about a one-track mind! Not the food!” gasped Jemima, laughing. “About Ralph and Phoebe, of course!”
“Oh,” he said limply. “Of course.”
“I do hope it’ll be all right.”
Tom sighed. “Yeah, me, too,” he admitted.
Ralph drove down to the bottom of Blossom Avenue and turned right, towards Willow Grove, rather than left, the direction of the city. After a moment Phoebe said: “Where are we going?”
“Somewhere where we can discuss that.”
“Discuss it on your terms, on your home ground, Ralph?” she said affably.
“No, I—” He swallowed. “Look, I can’t face your place, if you must have it. It raises too many bloody memories.”
“Oh,” said Phoebe weakly. After a moment she managed to add: “And yours doesn’t, I suppose?”
“You’ve never even seen—” He broke off. There was an appreciable pause before he said: “I think I see what you mean.”
Phoebe chewed her lip for a bit. “Mm.”
“Well,” he said with a sigh: “nice walk across the golf course?”
Phoebe immediately got a vivid vision, she couldn’t quite see why, of the two of them arguing their heads off on the bloody golf course. “No, I don’t feel like going for a walk,” she said in a low voice.
Ralph slowed down. “Is it stalemate, then?”
“No, um— Well, what about the boat?”
“This is a joke, right?” he said cautiously.
“No!” said Phoebe angrily.
A dazed feeling came over Ralph. They’d had a couple of damned good dirty weekends on the boat, they’d had that bloody row on the boat when he’d been stupid enough to float her out to the middle of the bay, and the boat was right smack, bang in the middle of the view from Sol Winkelmann’s bloody shop window! He had always been a man who believed he understood women, but at this precise moment he felt fervently he was one with the great majority of muddled males.
“Well, fine, the boat it is,” he said weakly.
Phoebe was about to say it had fresh air: she always felt as if she could breathe when she was on the boat. But thought better of it. It didn’t seem appropriate, or logical or... She was, besides, guiltily aware that in her innermost being she identified the boat very strongly with Ralph. More than his car, or— Well, to her, it simply was Ralph. But God knew what that would say to him about her brainwashed little female mind! She was silent, gripping her hands together tightly in her lap.
Ralph drove north in silence. The roads were empty: once they were on the highway he put his foot down.
Eventually Phoebe said in a very small voice: “Be careful.”
“Am I going too fast?” he said, slowing down.
“No—um— It’s not that I don’t like speed. But it is Saturday night: there may be drunk drivers about.”
“Mm. What would you say,” he said slowly: “to driving across the Nullarbor?”
“The Nuh— I’d say you’d be mad even to think of it!” she gasped.
“Mm. Take the Indian Pacific, then?”
“Um—well,” said Phoebe, wondering madly why he was pressing the point, “it’s one of those things I’ve always sort of wanted to do. Even though innumerable people have warned me that miles of nothing gets incredibly boring very quickly and one inevitably ends up getting pissed in the club car.”
“Mm. I’d rather like to see Western Australia.”
“Haven’t you ever been there?”
“Well, I’ve seen Perth and Fremantle. Went over for the Americas Cup. What about you?”
“I’ve been to a couple of conferences in Perth, and I went on a trip to see the wildflowers one year with Sheila. You don’t know h—”
“Divorced, yes. Oh, and had a hip replacement a few years back, right?”
“Yes,” said Phoebe dazedly. “I didn’t realize I’d told you about her.”
“Always wondered whether her jaunting round the world with you was a factor in the divorce.”
“Don’t be an idiot! I was at school with her, we went on several trips before she got married, and—um, well, after the divorce,” said Phoebe on a limp note.
Ralph’s lips twitched. “And during the marriage?”
“Only a couple of times. –Well, for God’s sake, Ralph, her husband was a total no-hoper! One of those lumpish males that get married in their twenties and proceed to look forward to superannuation, retirement, and death! She could never even get him to go out to dinner, let alone—”
“Yes! Stop!” he gasped.
Phoebe stopped, glaring at him.
“It’s a very common syndrome, darling!” he gasped.
“I know that; there’s no need to be so bloody patronising.”
“I’m not,” said Ralph weakly, fumbling in his pocket. “But that neighbour of Tom and Jemima’s—June Something, lives up the road from them—”
“June Butler. She’s an old friend of Michaela’s. What about her?”
“She was making that precise same complaint about her husband, at Polly’s bloody Latino barbie,” he said weakly, pulling into the side of the road. “Oh, dear!” He blew his nose hard.
“He wouldn’t be forty yet,” said Phoebe limply.
“No! There you are!” he gasped.
“Yes,” she said weakly.
Ralph looked sideways at her. “Mm. –You wouldn’t like to drive, would you?”
“I thought I’d had too much to drink? And anyway, I wouldn’t, thanks: not your bloody BMW. I’d be shit-scared of scratching its pristine paintwork or grinding its gears, or something.”
“Very well.” He started up again.
After a few moments Phoebe said uncertainly: “Are you feeling all right?”
“Not as if I’m about to drop down dead of a heart attack, if that’s what you’re thinking. But I wouldn’t define it as ‘all right.’”
She swallowed and looked at him uncertainly. “Oh.”
Ralph managed to get through Carter’s Bay and almost as far as the roundabout. Then he pulled into the side.
“You are feeling sick, aren’t you?” said Phoebe in a voice that shook.
“No. –NO!” he shouted.
“Well, what?” she croaked.
“For God’s sake, shut up and drive, I’m shaking like a leaf, if you must have it.”
“What?”
“Just DRIVE!” shouted Ralph. He got out and leaned heavily on the car, shaking.
Uncertainly Phoebe moved over into the driver’s seat. It wasn’t too easy, what with the tight skirt.
Ralph gnawed his lip for a bit. Then he came round and got in beside her, not saying anything.
She started up and drove through the roundabout and onto the road to Kingfisher Bay.
“Handles like a dream,” she said, looking at him out of the corner of her eye.
“Yes. And watch out for flaming drunks coming from the Royal K.”
Phoebe drove on in silence. They’d almost reached the turn-off when she said: “If you didn’t feel like driving all this way, why in God’s name didn’t you say so?”
“Male pride,” said Ralph through his teeth.
“It must have been,” she admitted weakly.
Ralph scowled into the dark. “A woman, of course, would have had far more sense than to indulge in that sort of pathetic charade.”
“Don’t be a birk. Some of them with a modicum of brainpower may justify it to themselves as sense, but in fact women are educated to believe that there’s no shame in betraying weakness in those sort of circumstances.”
“Yeah,” he said limply. Not correcting her grammar.
“In fact, that it’s a merit, if anything,” said Phoebe grimly.
“Mm? Oh—mm. Frail little woman thing, mm.”
Phoebe drove on in silence but after a while Ralph could see she was smiling.
“What’s the joke?” he said grumpily as she swung across the road and into Kingfisher Parade.
“All that Japanese submissiveness tonight!” she choked.
“Fascinating, wasn’t it? Bloody Dawlish was almost purring, did you notice?”
“Hard to miss it. –I’d never have thought he was that thick: that Scotch film of his was really quite—well, sensitive.”
“Mm. Well, shows the dangers of categorizing anyone too simplistically, doesn’t it?”
“What?” said Phoebe weakly. “Uh—yes, I suppose it does.”
Ralph was silent. She glanced at him uncertainly but didn’t speak.
They drew up in his parking spot, still silent. Finally Phoebe said limply: “I hope you’ve got your keys.”
“Mm.”
“Look, if you’re dead beat, Ralph, I could always go on up to the Royal Ki—”
“No. Come on,” he said, hauling himself out with an effort.
He fumbled with the keys but it was pretty dark, so Phoebe gave him the benefit of the doubt. Once they were in the cabin, however, she could see he was shaking.
“Sit down. I’ll get us a brandy,” she said abruptly.
Ralph sat down weakly on the couch.
Naturally he didn’t merely have brandy: he had Cognac and balloon glasses. Phoebe sighed a little, but dutifully put the Cognac into the balloon glasses. “Here.”
She sat down at the other end of the sofa and sipped her brandy without looking at him.
Ralph was shaking so much he couldn’t drink the bloody stuff. He set the glass down on the coffee table. After quite some time he admitted: “I seem to have run out of steam.”
Phoebe gulped. “Yes.”
He picked up the glass. It chattered against his teeth but he managed to get some of the spirit down.
She looked at him anxiously.
“It’s bloody nerves!” he said angrily. “I haven’t been like this since I sat Finals— For Christ’s sake, woman, you will not have to ring for an ambulance!”
“No.” After a moment she said: “I’ve always seen that Tom’s a Hellishly nervy type. I didn’t recognize it in you: the man-of-the-world thing took me in just as it was intended to, I suppose. But you’re more alike than I thought.”
Ralph didn’t reply. He drank some more brandy and stared at the coffee table and finally said: “If you feel that there are a few things we ought to get straight, Phoebe, would you mind starting?”
Phoebe was extremely taken aback. The more so as it gradually dawned that she’d unconsciously expected him to take charge of the whole thing.—Talking about female submissiveness.—For a fleeting moment she wondered if he was doing it on purpose—out of whatever obscure impulse. But no-one could fake the shakes like that. She swallowed hard, and tried to think of something to say that would sound sensible and adult, and that wouldn’t put him off by being too cold, but on the other hand wouldn’t scare him off by sounding over-eager...
Finally she said in a very low voice, though she could not have honestly said whether it was a conscious decision or not: “I know you’ve more or less asked for it, Ralph, but I realize I’ve behaved like a shit to you over the past couple of years, and—and I’m sorry.”
“You couldn’t help the Winkelmann thing,” he said tiredly.
“That’s not what I mean,” she said slowly. “I—I think I got worse, rather than better—I mean, nastier to you—because, um, because the thing with Sol wasn’t working out and—and I wasn’t admitting it to myself, and I resented the fact that you were right about it.”
“Yes,” he said tiredly.
Phoebe went very red as she realized that he’d been able to see this all along, whereas she—
“Why in God’s name did you tell Nat about us?” she cried, forgetting her good resolutions.
“Oh, Christ,” said Ralph with a sigh. He passed a hand over his face. “Because I was jealous as Hell, is that what you want to hear? Because I thought the bloody man would drop you in righteous indignation. And believe you me, if I could have found any way to drop you in it with the Yank, I would have!” he ended viciously.
After a moment Phoebe said: “That’s nonsense. You could have told Sol about us, and you didn’t.”
He shrugged. “Didn’t know at that stage you hadn’t told him yourself, did I?”
“Ralph,” said Phoebe earnestly, leaning forward: “why are you doing your best to put yourself in a bad light? The point is not what you knew he knew or didn’t know, the point is, if you wanted to drop me in it with him you’d have told him in the hopes he didn’t know about it!”
“Mm. Well, I suppose the fact that I refrained could be interpreted in more than one way.”
After a moment she said weakly: “Well, why did you refrain?”
“I don’t know.”
She glared at him and he said: “That’s the truth. I honestly don’t know. It might have been because I genuinely wanted you to be happy.”—Phoebe went very red.—“It might have been because I assumed you must have told him.”—She looked at him speechlessly.—“Or it might have been because I didn’t care enough to make the effort.” He shrugged.
“You must have known whether you cared enough!”
“No.” Ralph leaned his head back against the back of the sofa, looked up at the ceiling, and sighed. “No. That’s rather the point I think I ought to be making. I didn’t know. Well, I knew I wanted you physically and I knew I didn’t want the Yank to have you. And the feeling that I’d like to see him drop dead, preferably of something painful, has been getting gradually stronger these past two years.”
Phoebe waited but he appeared to have stopped. Finally she said: “What about this thing with the little red-head?”
Ralph sighed. He went on looking up at the ceiling.
“I mean,” she said, in rather a high voice, “how serious was it?”
“I— Well, I suppose it was part fantasy, part self-delusion, and part just plain lust.”
“I see,” she said, biting her lip.
“I wanted her… I can’t begin to describe how much I wanted her. To the exclusion of all other considerations.”
Phoebe felt a red wave of jealousy rush right through her. She clenched her hands into fists and didn’t dare to say anything.
“It wasn’t just physical—though God knows that was bad enough, I was horny about twenty hours out of the twenty-four.” He paused. “If we’re being strictly honest, here,” he said on a dry note.
Phoebe noted mutely.
“Mm. I suppose it was an extreme version of mid-life crisis. I wanted her to fall for me to the extent that she virtually begged for it.”
She swallowed, and looked at him limply.
“Yes, well, self-delusion. I suppose I wanted it for my self-esteem. As well as to assure myself that the cruel message in my mirror every morning wasn’t actually true and I was still as irresistible as I’d been when I was twenty-one.” He sighed. “More so. Sophisticated, worldly, and irresistible. Get it?”
“Um—yes,” she croaked.
“Cretin that I was. She couldn’t see past the age thing. I’m not flattering myself when I tell you that she wanted me, all right, but not enough to ignore all her social conditioning.”
“I see,” said Phoebe slowly. “And you wanted that.”
“I suppose I did, mm. Hubris, eh? I wanted to see myself as invincible.”
“For Christ’s sake, Ralph!” said Phoebe with a shaken laugh.
Ralph looked at her wryly. “Him an’ all.”
Phoebe bit her lip. “Mm,” she said in a muffled voice.
Ralph hesitated. Then he said: “How do you feel about it now?”
“Um...” Phoebe went very red. “I’m still as jealous as Hell.”—Ralph also went very red and she looked at him doubtfully.—“But I think I feel sorry for you, as much as—as jealous.”
“Sorry for me for being such a cretin?”
“Um—no. God knows I’ve made an utter fool of myself, these past two years. Um, no: for not—not succeeding,” said Phoebe, her voice wobbling uncertainly.
Ralph gulped, tried to stop himself, and went into a paroxysm of laughter. “Oh, dear; I needed that!” he gasped, blowing his nose.
Phoebe smiled shakily. “Mm.”
There was a short silence. Then Ralph, flushing darkly, said: “But you are jealous, as well?”
“Yes.”
“Thank Christ for that,” he croaked.
She swallowed. “Why else do you think I minced those roses up? I mean, if it had just been because of the Nat thing, I’d just have sent them back to you. Only—well, you know,” she ended lamely, avoiding his eye.
“No,” he said huskily. He cleared his throat. “No, not really. Were you furious because you thought I was—was treating you like something that could be tossed aside and picked up whenever I felt like it, or because—because you wanted to be in what you fancied was the twin’s place?”
Phoebe hesitated. “Both,” she admitted painfully.
He sagged against the sofa back. “That’s good,” he said limply.
Phoebe looked at him doubtfully: he tried to smile but failed. “Ralph—” She could see he was shaking again.
“Phoebe,” he said rapidly in a very high voice: “can we just—just give the analysis and the recriminations or—or whatever they are, a rest for tonight? I suppose it’s important that we should talk about these things, but...” He broke off, clenching his fists.
“What?”
“Christ,” he cried, his eyes filling with tears: “can’t you see that we could talk till doomsday but whatever you might say or I might say, and however correct it may be, it doesn’t make any difference to the way I feel about you?”
Phoebe swallowed. “Um—well... Well, yes, I suppose I sort of see. But isn’t a bit adolescent to just give into our emotions at our ages?”
“What the Hell else is there?” he cried angrily.
There were a lot of things Phoebe could have said in answer to this. She hesitated. Finally she said: “I think I let my emotions carry me away, with Sol, and—well, I only ended up in the shit.”
“All right,” said Ralph, passing his hand over his face. “You don’t want to. All right. I get it.”
“I do want to!” she cried angrily.
“It doesn’t feel like it from my end,” he muttered.
She looked at him uneasily. He still had his hand over his face. “Ralph, I—I’ve been doing my best to resist you for two years... Well, more, I suppose,” she discovered in a low voice. “I suppose that’s why I didn’t give Nat the push, really. Well, I wasn’t sure how serious you were...” Her voice died away.
Ralph didn’t respond.
She twisted her hands together nervously. “Um—I’ve sort of wondered… I know this sounds awfully silly, but— Um, I’ve sort of wondered whether I was so awful to you this last year—well, since Tom and Jemima’s wedding, I mean—because I resented the fact that—that you were the one that seemed to be—well, that still seemed to want me. While Sol didn’t, I mean,” she finished in a small voice.
Ralph looked up. “I’ve sort of wondered if that would ever dawn on you,” he said on a bitter note.
Phoebe’s jaw dropped.
“You silly cow: of course you were kicking me in the face in order to punish me for still loving you! And if you’d only bloody well admit it to yourself, to punish yourself for still loving me!” he shouted.
They stared at each other. Ralph was panting and furious. Phoebe looked rather blue around the mouth.
“God, Phoebe, why can’t you break down and admit it?” he cried.
Suddenly her wide mouth quivered. “I—I don’t— I cuh-can’t—” She broke into snorting sobs.
Ralph bit his lip. He edged up and put a cautious arm round her shoulders. “Don’t.”
Phoebe continued to make snorting noises. He could hear she was trying to hold it in.
“Oy, it’s me that’s been bloody near tears all night, you know,” he said softly, putting his cheek on her hair.
“I ruh-really thought—!” she sobbed.
“Shh. Mm.”
“I really thought I was in luh-love with Sol!”
“I know. I dare say you were. Who can define emotional reality?”
She went on sobbing. Eventually she gasped: “I feel such a buh-birk!”
Ralph made a face above her head. “Mm.”
Phoebe gulped, and snorted a bit, and grabbed his dinner-jacket. Above her head Ralph made another face. Finally she sniffed juicily and admitted: “I’m terrified of making another mistake.”
“Mm.”
“I—I’m terrified of giving in to it,” she said huskily.
“Yes. Well, neither of us is particularly young any more: that’s understandable.”
There was a short silence. The sobs had stopped and she wasn’t sniffing any more. Ralph just waited.
Phoebe said incredulously: “How can you be so—so clinical?”
“I didn’t think I was being, really. Didn’t I say at some stage that I didn’t want to talk it over any more?”
“Mm,” she admitted in a strangled tone, glaring into his shirt.
“Actually,” said Ralph, making another ferocious face above her head: “I think I might lose my temper quite drastically if we have any more analysis tonight.”
“Oh,” she said numbly.
“Look,” he said through his teeth: “can we go to bed, or not?”
“I—I was trying to explain,” she said haltingly: “I’m afraid I might give way all at once—the falling-down-a-well thing—if we do.”
“I know that, Phoebe,” said Ralph through his teeth, “and that’s why I’m asking you!”
Phoebe looked up with a very shaky smile. “I might have known you’d know. You’re so damned intelligent, Ralph!”
“Shut the fuck UP!” he shouted, going very red and crushing her mouth with his.
After a moment she struggled to free an arm. She flung it round his neck and strained him to her.
Eventually Ralph raised his head, panting.
Phoebe was also panting. She smiled into his eyes and said dopily: “You always smell so nice; I’d forgotten.”
“Talking garbage,” said Ralph, kissing her again.
“And you’re so clean!” said Phoebe with a dizzy laugh, when he’d paused for breath. “Clean and well-pressed. Oh, dear!”
“Clean and well-pr—?” He goggled at her.
“I’m sorry; I’ve—I’ve missed it so much!” said Phoebe with a crazy laugh.
“What: having a clean and well-pressed gent—oh, one that smells nice, of course—in your bed?”
“Not exactly: in my arms, I think,” she said, hugging him fiercely and burying her face in his neck.
Ralph’s heart hammered furiously. “I see,” he said weakly.
There was a short pause. She continued to hug him fiercely. “Er—is it generic, Phoebe, or dare I hope it’s just me?”
She looked up with a laugh. “It’s you, you idiotic aesthete! You and your damned clean linen!’
“Well, good. Could you take me to bed now, with or without me clean linen?”
Phoebe was going to make a laughing rejoinder but she felt him tremble again. “Yes. Um—well, hop up and get undressed,” she said hoarsely.
He got up and began to undress. She could see he was now shaking violently.
“Ralph—”
“Take your flaming clothes off,” he said through his teeth.
Phoebe struggled out of the tight lamé dress and laid it on the sofa. She got out of her underclothes without looking at him and peeled back the bedclothes on the king-size bed. Navy cotton sheets. Help, how nautical! She climbed into bed and, since Ralph had only reached the stage of fighting with his shoes, and it wasn’t a particularly warm night, pulled the bedding up to her chin. After a few moments she said: “Look, can I help?”
“Shut up.”
She sagged limply against his nautical cotton pillows. How in God’s name did he manage the boat’s laundry? Cart it back and forth to—uh—to... How did he manage his laundry at all, come to think of it? She couldn’t imagine Ralph sitting patiently in front of the row of machines in a laundrette waiting for his up-market sheets to dry. He was now fighting with his trousers. Well, first the braces, but now the trousers. “Look, I wish you’d let me h—”
“Shut up,” he said through his teeth.
Got it, got it. Very un-macho to let the little woman help us get out of our complicated gent’s evening clobber even when we’re manifestly shaking like a leaf. Phoebe continued to watch him. Although her heart was shuddering in her chest and she felt more than slightly dizzy, a little smile began to hover on her wide mouth.
At last all Ralph’s clean linen was strewn in crumpled little heaps round the cabin floor. He came over to the bed, still trembling.
“Hop in,” said Phoebe kindly, lifting the clothes up.
He got in and hid his face in her neck with a sigh.
“It’s all right,” she said cautiously, putting an arm round him in a gingerly fashion.
“No,” said Ralph in a muffled voice into her neck. “It isn’t.”
Apart from the shakes, it manifestly had been, so Phoebe wasn’t particularly worried. She wasn’t too sure what her next move should be, however.
Suddenly he said: “Turn the fucking lights out!”
“Wha— Oh, um…”
“Controls. Your side,” he said into her neck.
Oh, yes, of course. Combination of your floating casting-coach and your floating Starship Enterprise. She fumbled with switches and eventually, after turning the ruddy fan on, managed to turn the lights off.
It was now pitch dark. Pitch dark. You couldn’t see your hand in front of your face. In fact Phoebe held her hand up in front of her face and verified that you couldn’t.
Ralph still hadn’t moved so she said: “Is that better?”
“Yes. Why the fuck aren’t you nervous?” he said into her neck.
“I am nervous. I don’t get the shakes, though. And of course I’m not genetically encoded to be performance-oriented: the whole thing’s a bit easier for me.”
There was a pause. “I thought it was cultural brainwashing?” he murmured.
“No. I’m coming to the conclusion that it’s genetic!” said Phoebe with a laugh in her voice.
“It’s about time,” said Ralph faintly. He kissed her neck softly.
Phoebe experienced a huge rush of mixed relief and lust. She put her arms round him and hugged him gently.
“Yes: hug me,” he said on a groan into her neck.
Phoebe hugged him tightly.
“I won’t be able to perform, you know,” he said into her neck.
“No—uh—”
“Genetic or not,” said Ralph faintly.
“No: ssh.” Phoebe hugged him strongly.
Finally he raised his head and said on a groan: “Kiss me.”
She kissed him gently, and then more strongly, and he rolled on top of her and said hoarsely: “This is gonna be the fiasco to end all fiascos. You can put it up there beside Whatsisname’s—bloody Bligh’s. I’ll go bang the minute I get in th—”
“Yes,” said Phoebe with a mixture of laughter and tears in her voice: “get in there and go bang, you fool: I’m going to scream if you don’t hurry up and— RA-ALPH!” she screamed.
You might have defined it as getting in there and going bang. However, Ralph had another word for it. Though he didn’t manage to dredge it up for quite a while.
“Cataclysmic,” he murmured, sprawled on top of her.
“Mm,” agreed Phoebe faintly.
“Take weigh’ r’off. Be a gen’ he muttered, shifting to take his weight off her.
“No,” said Phoebe on a groan, hugging him to her. “Stay.”
Ralph allowed himself the luxury of being hugged fiercely to all of Phoebe’s curves with all of Phoebe’s strength. In fact he shut his eyes and wallowed in it for some time, before managing to say: “Are you all right?”
“Mm? Oh—yes!” she said with a faint laugh. “Couldn’t you feel it?”
“Mm. Thought it was gonna take me poor little pecker right off,” he murmured, easing his weight off her a little.
She drew a deep breath and he smiled a little, rolled off her, and drew her over to lie against his shoulder.
“Cliché,” she said groggily.
“Mm. Gorrit off dir’y ole French films in me early youth,” he said, yawning.
“’S nice, though.”
Ralph picked up her hand and kissed it. “Mm.”
Phoebe lay back on his shoulder and breathed in his smell and felt his spunk slowly trickling out of her and smiled into the night.
“Might do better tomorrow,” he said at last.
“You couldn’t.”
“Uh—that’s very flattering!” he said with a startled laugh.
“No.” She frowned in an effort to explain it. “It’s not a matter of sexual athletics.”
“Uh—no.”
“Though you’re very good at those and I don’t say I don’t enjoy them. Well: the nicest type of indoor game.”
“Uh—yes,” he said weakly.
“This was different.”
“Mm.”
“Don’t you think?” she said on an anxious note, raising herself on her elbow to peer at him in the gloom.
“Yes,” he replied with a smile in his voice “Of course.”
“More intimate?” said Phoebe dubiously. “No, that’s not exactly it...”
“Don’t analyse it,” said Ralph with a little sigh.
“Sorry. But didn’t you feel it was...” She swallowed.
Ralph just waited. But he didn’t deny to himself that his heart was thudding in a painful mixture of hope and anxiety.
“I felt... completed,” said Phoebe in a very low voice.
“So did I,” he said, hugging her tightly.
She hugged him back but he could feel her body had tensed.
“What is it?”
“Well,” she said in a very high voice, “what do you want, Ralph? I mean, is this a—another fling, or—”
“No, you fool,” he said against her cheek. “Couldn’t you feel that?”
“Ye-es... Only I was afraid it wuh-was suh-sub—”
“Ssh. Don’t bawl again,” he said, stroking her flank.
“Subjective!” howled Phoebe, grabbing him fiercely and weeping all over him.
Ralph let her bawl all over him. He just hugged her and stroked her and said: “Ssh,” into her hair and neck from time to time. When she was quiet he murmured: “That was very silly.”
She moved agitatedly. “I know; I—”
“Stop it,” he said, hugging her to him. “I’m not in the habit of sending five dozen extremely expensive roses to ladies I only want casual flings with.”
“Um—no,” she said uncertainly.
“Nor am I in the habit,” admitted Ralph, wrinkling his nose, “of getting the shakes and, um, then getting in there and going bang without a beg-your-pardon with ladies I only want a casual fling with.”
Phoebe merely swallowed.
“Does that clarify it?” he said on a dry note.
“Not much.” After a moment she added: “I don’t want a casual fling, either.”
“No.”
She gulped. “Only are you capable of anything like a—a long-term relationship?”
“Dunno. Are you?” he said flippantly.
Phoebe was extremely taken aback. “I suppose I asked for that,” she admitted shakily. “Um... I carried a torch for bloody Dougal for something like twenty years. But I suppose that doesn’t count.”
“Don’t ask me, I’m no expert. Anyway, I wasn’t thinking of a long-term relationship.”
He felt her gasp, and stiffen.
“No— Hell, I’m sorry, darling, that was bloody cruel!”
“What, then?” she said faintly.
Ralph swallowed. “I—I have given this some thought, Phoebe.”
“Um—yes?” she said uncertainly.
“Well—um... Look, you may find the suggestion totally offensive, and if so, could you try to put it down to my genetic programming?” he said hoarsely.
“What are you TALKING about, Ralph?” she shouted.
Ralph cleared his throat. “Marry me,” he said hoarsely.
The blood thundered in Phoebe’s ears. “What?” she said faintly.
“For Christ’s sake, woman, I’m telling you I can’t flaming well live without you! Will you marry me?” he shouted furiously.
There were many replies a liberated, free-thinking woman like Phoebe Fothergill could have given to this one, of course. Indeed, something like fifteen full-blown objections immediately sprang to her mind. What she actually said, however, was: “If you want me to: yes.”
“Shit,” said Ralph weakly, beginning to cry into her neck.
“Don’t!” said Phoebe on a gasp, hugging him.
“Sorry—Hell—sorry!” he gasped.
“That’s all right. Ssh.” She went on hugging him. Ralph went on crying into her neck.
After quite some time Phoebe said huskily: “Ssh, darling. Don’t cry.” Ralph made a muffled noise; she swallowed and said with immense difficulty: “I love you. Don’t cry.”
“I love you, too,” said Ralph, gulping. “I’ve been going out of my mind: I thought you’d never— The thing with Winkelmann seemed to be dragging on forever, and I thought I’d been wrong about it and it wasn’t just something you needed to get out of your system.”
“Yes: ssh.”
“And then I went and made a fool of myself over the twin: I could feel myself doing it, and I knew you’d never forgive me if you found out about it, but I couldn’t stop!”
“No, I know: it’s all right: ssh.”
“Jesus, Phoebe: help me!” he said on a sob.
Phoebe hugged him tight and murmured: “It’s all right, now: I’m here now, darling. Don’t cry.”
And though all those fifteen objections still obtained and a small part of her mind was telling her this thing wasn’t going to be particularly easy, and the practical side alone, without even mentioning the mental and emotional adjustments that would have to be made, would be bloody tricky, somehow it did not cross her mind, at this precise moment, to analyse this scene in terms of male and female rôles, or genetic encoding or cultural brainwashing, at all.
Next chapter:
https://theamericanrefugeeanovel.blogspot.com/2022/10/raindrops-keep-falling.html
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