Old Sins (41 page)

‘I fancy that lady rotten. She’s gorgeous, she’s sexy, she’s been around, and yet right now she needs a jolly good old-fashioned fuck. And I’d like to give it to her. But she’s been the boss’s wife and I’m not going to get into that. Or her,’ he added with a grin.

But he had not reckoned on Eliza’s skill at getting what she wanted.

Coming back from a difficult two days in Paris trying to impose his will on the cosmetic buyer for Galleries Lafayette, David found a message on his desk. ‘Mrs Thetford phoned.’ He ignored it.

She rang again, two days later. ‘This is Eliza Thetford. Do you remember me? Sorry to hound you. I wondered if we could have lunch.’

David took a deep breath. ‘Mrs Thetford, of course I remember you. I’m charmed and flattered, but I think I should say no.’

‘Why?’

‘Your husband might not like it,’ he said and then, furious with himself, realized what he had said and how unutterably crass it must have sounded.

Her voice was amused down the line. ‘I don’t have a husband, Mr Sassoon. I’ve long since divorced him. And he’s much too busy getting into the Cabinet to worry about my having lunch with you.’

‘I’m sorry. You must think I’m quite mad.’

‘No. A little neurotic perhaps, but not mad. And I can see what you’re really worried about. But my first husband also doesn’t mind in the least what I do, or with whom I do it. And even if he did I have nothing more incriminating in mind for us than a business discussion. So when shall we meet?’

David knew when he was beaten. ‘Thursday?’

‘Thursday would be lovely. The Walton Street Restaurant at one?’

‘Fine.’

She was waiting for him when he got there, sitting at a table in the window; the moment he saw her, looking at him with the extraordinary combination of innocence and blatant sexuality that she so uniquely conveyed, he knew he was lost, that whatever he might resolve or think to the contrary, if she wanted him then she could and would have him.

Eliza wanted him; and she had him.

The business discussion she had managed to create (whisper thin, a request that he should advise her on her new prospective career as an interior designer) was over in half an hour; for two more they danced an elaborate sexual quadrille around each other, and finally fell into each other’s arms, bodies and Eliza’s bed in the Holland Park house as the October dusk gathered and the clock was striking five o’clock.

David stayed there for several days; he did not go to work at all on the Friday, and right through the weekend they talked, and made love with ever increasing delight, and drank quite a few bottles of wine, and even ventured out once to walk in
Holland Park and to top up the contents of Eliza’s fridge, which were extraordinarily meagre (‘I have to keep thin somehow,’ she said), and told jokes and played the music of Stevie Wonder, whose raw, sexy voice seemed totally in accord with the delightful discoveries they were making about each other, and spent quite a lot of time simply looking at each other in silence, happy and almost awed by the perfect pleasure they had found in one another’s company.

‘I have to tell you,’ David said quite late on the Sunday night, as they lay in bed and he was smiling at her, and dipping his fingers in his glass of wine, wetting her nipples and kissing them, ‘I have to tell you you seem to be threatening to become important to me.’

‘I should think so,’ said Eliza half indignantly, pushing him away and sitting up, ‘I don’t do this with just anyone, you know.’

‘No, I can see that. Just the best. But anyway, there’s no need to get upset. I think we have to spend some time together. Do you see any problems there?’

‘Not for me. Are there any for you?’

‘A few. The main one as I see it is your husband – your ex ex-husband, that is. Are you quite sure he isn’t going to object to any of this?’

‘Of course not,’ said Eliza, lying down again, ‘why should he?’

‘I don’t know. He’s a funny guy. Very possessive. Within the company. He doesn’t like interdepartmental liaisons for a start.’

‘He’s got a nerve,’ said Eliza. ‘Carrying on with Camilla the way he does.’

‘I know. But he is the boss. I suppose that gives him the right to have a nerve or two. And he has come down very hard on a couple of people having affairs on office territory. He dresses it up, of course, said they were wasting company time. But the real reason is he doesn’t like it. He gets kind of jealous, as far as everyone can make out.’

‘Well, that’s all right,’ said Eliza. ‘I don’t work for the company.’

‘I know. But you used to be his wife. It just worries me a bit.’

‘You’re really jumpy about him, aren’t you?’ she said, looking at him interestedly.

‘Yes, I am. He’s put me where I am today, as they say in the movies. I told you, I’ve had quite a few chances mucked up by my sexual indiscretions. I can’t help it.’

‘Well,’ she said, ‘I don’t know if I like coming such a very bad second to your career.’

‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it to sound like that. Let’s put it this way. There’s quite a strong body of opinion in the company that your husband still cares very much about you and what you do. If I was your ex-husband I would too.’ He bent and kissed her breasts again. ‘I just think we should be careful, that’s all. He’s a powerful and quixotic fellow. He could hurt both of us.’

‘I honestly think the body of opinion is quite wrong,’ said Eliza, ‘but anyway, all right, if you think we should, we’ll be discreet for a bit. Just for a day or two. Now put that glass down, and concentrate on me for a bit. It’s dark outside now, and the shutters are closed. Or would you like me to check there’s not a private detective hanging about underneath the lamp post?’

They were very discreet for a while. David kept his flat, and only stayed with her one or two nights a week (‘It’s more exciting and romantic that way anyway,’ he said) and Eliza, deeply in love by now for the first time since Peter Thetford, managed to restrain her strong inclination to ring every single one of her girlfriends and tell them, and even invented a completely fictitious new boyfriend for them who she said they couldn’t meet because his wife was madly jealous and had threatened all kinds of dreadful revenge. She rather enjoyed this and elaborated on it so much that in the end she had both herself and the lover threatened by the wife at gunpoint before finally the real story and the gossip broke and William Hickey informed the waiting world, or at least such part of it as read his gossip column in the
Daily Express
, that the beautiful Eliza Thetford had become very friendly with one of her ex husband’s senior executives and was engaging his help in setting herself up as an interior designer.

But Julian showed no signs of jealousy when he phoned her to discuss who should pick Roz up for the Christmas holidays.

‘I hear you have enlisted Mr Sassoon’s services as an agent,’ he said. ‘Charming fellow. I’m sure he’ll be very helpful.’

Roz looked at her mother as she climbed out of the red E-Type Julian had given her as a Christmas present (he said it was bad for his image to have his wife going round London like a pauper) and thought she had never seen her looking so happy or so beautiful.

‘Hallo, Mummy.’

‘Hallo, darling. You look – well.’

Only Roz, in her acute paranoia about her looks, would have noticed the pause; but she did and she knew what it meant. It meant that her mother couldn’t find anything else to say about her appearance (taller: only slightly thinner: shaggy-haired). She looked at her blankly.

‘I don’t feel very well, actually. I feel sick.’

‘Oh darling, I’m sorry. Will you be all right in the car?’

‘I expect so, yes, if we can have the windows open.’

She knew her mother hated that; it blew her hair about.

Eliza sighed. ‘All right, darling. Where are your things?’

They drove back to London in comparative silence, having exhausted the topic of Roz’s term, report, exam results; Eliza was wondering how to broach the news of David, and that she was hoping Julian would have Roz for Christmas.

‘Looking forward to Christmas, darling? I’ve got you a nice present.’

‘Depends what’s happening. Is it Wiltshire, or have you persuaded Daddy to take me to the Bahamas?’

‘Darling, I haven’t persuaded Daddy to do anything. I want you with me, of course. It’s what would be more fun for you.’

‘God, I don’t care,’ said Roz. ‘Wiltshire, I suppose. I can ride there.’

‘We must get your hair cut tomorrow,’ said Eliza absently. ‘I’ll book you into Leonard. And then get you some clothes. Would you like that?’

‘Not really. You know I hate shopping.’

‘Yes, but darling, you do need some new things. You’ve grown a lot.’

‘No I haven’t.’

‘Well anyway, I’m sure you need a couple of things. Now, Roz, I have something to tell you.’

‘Yes?’

‘I have a new – friend.’

‘Really?’

‘Yes. He’s called David Sassoon. He works for your father. He’s very nice, and I think you’ll like him.’

‘Is he living with you or just sleeping with you?’

‘Roz, I wish you wouldn’t talk like that. It isn’t very attractive.’

‘Sorry.’

‘No, he isn’t living with me. But we are very – fond of each other. And he wants to meet you.’

‘Oh.’

‘So he’s coming round this evening. Just for a meal with us both. I hope you like him.’

‘I don’t really feel well enough to have a meal with anyone, Mummy. I seem to have some kind of a tummy bug. I might just go straight to bed when we get home.’

‘Now Roz, that’s a pity. David is coming specially to meet you. Don’t you think you could make an effort?’

‘Well, I’ll try. But I certainly don’t feel up to getting all dressed up if that’s what you’re hoping.’

‘No,’ said Eliza, ‘I wouldn’t ever hope for very much from you, Roz. Now I’m sorry but we really will have to have that window shut.’

‘All right. I just might be sick, that’s all.’

She was sitting by the fire in the drawing room, still in her school uniform, when David arrived; she heard her mother open the front door, and settled herself deeper into her chair, picking up the latest
Vogue
which was lying on the coffee table; she didn’t even look up as they came into the room.

‘Roz,’ said her mother, and she could hear the familiar over-conciliatory note in her voice, ‘Roz, darling, this is David. David Sassoon. David, this is my daughter Roz.’

And she had looked up and met his eyes, his dark, amused, oddly intimate eyes, and her heart had felt as if it was rocketing up and down inside her, and she felt slightly dizzy at the same time, and she would have given anything, anything at all, to have been wearing her new long grey crushed velvet skirt from Biba, and the pink suede boots, and to have brushed her hair properly and to have put some Top-ex on the spot on her chin; and he said, ‘Hallo, Roz, it’s so nice to have a face to the name. I
see you’re reading
Vogue
, what do you think of those pictures, do you like them, they were taken by a great friend of mine?’ and overwhelmed by his smile and his jokey voice that sounded as if he was going to laugh any minute, its touch of carefully cultivated cockney, and the fact that anyone at all should ask her opinion about anything other than whether this term had been better than the last, she fell hopelessly and irremediably in love.

Later they all went out to supper to Nick’s Diner; she felt better, she told her mother, she had probably just been hungry, and she put on her velvet skirt and the boots, and did the best she could with her hair, and asked her mother if she had arranged her appointment for the next day at Leonard’s, and sat between them listening politely, offering her opinion if it was asked, which it was quite frequently by David, and even from time to time making them both laugh, and had the best time she could ever remember. She studied David intently all evening: drinking him in, feeling she could never have enough just of looking at him; the riotously curling hair, just short of his collar, his dark almost swarthy skin, the freckles everywhere on his nose, his eyelids, his forehead; his perfect teeth, and his great grin of a smile, that was always accompanied by that look of his, his eyes sweeping over your face and settling on your lips, as if he might be thinking about kissing you; and his clothes, oh, she loved his clothes, the printed cream and black silk shirt, and the black flaring trousers that fitted so extremely well over his hips (Roz tried not to look at his hips, or to contemplate what else those trousers were concealing) and his black velvet jacket, with the lining that matched his shirt. Roz could hardly swallow that evening, for emotion and excitement, but that was all right, she said she was still feeling a bit funny, but she did at David’s instigation have a glass of wine, and that on top of her empty stomach and her excitement conspired to make her a bit giggly and more talkative than usual, and then when they were going home in David’s car, to fall into a half sleep. But not so that she could not hear what was said.

‘She’s had a lovely evening,’ said Eliza, looking over her shoulder, ‘she’s absolutely out cold. I’ve never known her so talkative. You’ve obviously made a big hit. Thank you for letting her come.’

‘I enjoyed it,’ he said. ‘Don’t thank me. I like her, she’s an amusing kid, and I don’t know why you keep saying she’s plain, she has a great face, I’d like to get her photographed, Terry would love her look.’

‘Well, he’s not going to get a chance to love it,’ said Eliza briskly. ‘I know all about your friend Mr Donovan. And I must say you’re getting a bit carried away, David, she might look a bit better than she did, but I wouldn’t say she was model material.’

‘Not model, darling, but very interesting-looking, very striking. Anyway, what are we going to do now?’

‘I think maybe,’ said Eliza with another look at the inert form of her daughter, ‘you should go home tonight. I want her to get used to the idea slowly. Would you mind terribly?’

‘Of course not. I’m an easy-going guy. You should know that by now.’

‘You’re wonderful,’ said Eliza. ‘Come on, give me a kiss before our chaperone wakes up.’

Roz floated through the next day in a dream. David Sassoon, the most attractive, the most sophisticated man she had ever met, had said she was not plain, that she had a great face and that she was amusing into the bargain. She thought she had never been so happy. She smiled at her mother over breakfast, asked her if they could go shopping after the hairdresser, and then phoned her father and asked him if he would take her out to supper that night. She had never done such a thing before; she had never, convinced of her own nuisance value, and her own unattractiveness as a companion, had the confidence. She could hear him smiling down the phone.