A Quiet Life(50)

Edward made room for her in the space, stepping to one side so that she could join the ring, although nobody spoke to her. She tried to join in the conversations, greeting Quentin and Nina, asking Quentin how things were going in the forces, and complimenting him on his newly slender physique. She was struck by the joking tone with which Quentin replied, telling some absurd story about his deluded major whose false memories of the Great War were a source of great mirth in the regiment. But before he had finished his story, Nina broke in, asking where on earth the drinks were. Alistair called to a young man in a loud voice, and soon wine was being sloshed into glasses, and Quentin was free to resume. The burble of men’s voices continued and Laura was content to sip her drink. But Nina remained sullen, watching Quentin with her cold blue stare.

‘Come on,’ she said suddenly in an aside to him that everyone could hear, ‘the others are at the Café Royal.’

Quentin seemed embarrassed as he turned to her, and she laid a hand on his arm. Laura expected them to leave, but instead he went with her to the side of the room, where they seemed to be having an argument. Laura caught a little of it, when Quentin’s placatory tone seemed to break and he said loudly that he only had two days in London. Nina left alone, and Quentin rejoined the group.

‘Here you are, my duck,’ Nick was saying, putting his arm around Quentin. ‘I must tell you I heard something about that major of yours – but this definitely is not for the ladies …’ He looked at Laura and Winifred, who had now joined them, and Laura stepped backwards, feeling dismissed, but Winifred looked at him and lifted her chin.

‘You don’t think we’d be shocked, do you?’ There was something quick and confident about the way she spoke. Laura was impressed. Nick said something about how she was probably less shockable than Edward, and Laura caught a nasty undertone in his voice. Although Winifred came back with another retort, Laura drifted away again to the window seat where the German man was still sitting. He offered her a cigarette.

‘You’re a doctor?’ she said to him idly, remembering what he had said about a patient. He explained to her that he was a psychoanalyst, and she started talking to him about what that involved, but without really listening to his answers. She had learned from Florence that psychoanalysis was an incorrect interpretation of the world which personalised problems that could only be cured by class revolution. Her sense that there was something decadent about his work was not dispelled as he started to tell her a story about a man he knew who had only come to accept his homosexuality after a dream involving a cricket match which turned into an orgy. Laura thought the story rather shocking, but realised after a while that he seemed to be telling it simply to put her at her ease. The end of the story involved a stupid pun and Laura found herself giggling at it.

Just then, Winifred rejoined them. She was bitter about the way that Alistair and Nick were apparently now talking about going on to a club where women were not allowed. ‘I don’t know why we bothered to come,’ she said. ‘Much easier if they just put “women not wanted” on the invitations.’

Laura shook her head and told Winifred that it wasn’t really important; that of course the men would want to spend an evening together while Quentin and Nick were in town. That didn’t mean that Alistair and Edward didn’t really put Winifred and Laura first.

Winifred looked at her sceptically. ‘You are in the first fine flush,’ she said.

Laura could not say what she thought, which was that this kind of social activity didn’t really have much to do with their real selves, with their intimate selves, with the Edward she loved. Laura looked over at him, to where the men were roaring with laughter at some story that Quentin had just told. But Winifred was right to some extent – there wasn’t much point in staying. The psychoanalyst was inviting Winifred to go on with him to another party, but when they asked Laura to join them, she shook her head.

She went over to Edward and touched his arm. He turned immediately. When she said she would be leaving, he went out with her into the corridor and said he would take her back to Cissie’s flat. She demurred. She didn’t want to be a Nina, trying to break up the group, but he insisted, and as he walked her down the stairs to the street he suddenly ran his hand up her back and into her hair, pulling her hair a little so that her head lifted. Unusually for those evenings, they found a taxi quickly.

‘It’ll be empty?’ he asked about the flat, and when she nodded, he came in with her. She unlocked the door and led him into her small bedroom, suddenly shy when she realised that she had left a tangle of stockings, underwear and a dress she had tried on and discarded that morning on the floor. She kicked them under the bed. He did not kiss her face or mouth, the way he usually did, but immediately pushed her onto the bed, restraining her arms above her head with one hand and putting the other hand over her mouth. She found the restraint overwhelmingly sensual, and the explosion of her orgasm arrived almost as soon as he entered her.

They lay for a while afterwards, holding one another. Laura told him about the psychoanalyst she had met, and what he had said about boarding schools. Edward seemed to be considering, and then said something about the friendships you make when you are young and how they form you. Laura had never made a close friend at school, but she said she understood, because she could see it, in the moment, through his eyes. ‘It’s not as though family life is always so benign,’ said Edward, and Laura agreed. She loved it when they talked like this: they said so little, but they communicated so easily; there seemed to be no distance between them. Still, she was not surprised when he soon rose from the bed.