The Paying Guests(65)
‘I think she’s pulling your leg about something. She’s a married girl, isn’t she?’
‘Yes.’
‘I thought she was. You’d never know it. If I was her husband, I’d smack her behind… How about you?’
‘Yes, I’d smack it too.’
He drew in his lower lip in a silent guffaw. ‘No, I mean, have you got a chap? Is that what she’s smiling at? He’s not going to come and black my eye for me, is he?’
His face was such a nice one; she couldn’t think what to say. She turned away from him, perhaps rather primly. But she did not feel prim, she realised. What she felt, when she thought about it, was an odd temptation to settle back against his shoulder, to give herself over to the squash of his thigh against hers. And he must have sensed a yielding in her, or at least the possibility of one, because as the frying-pan hiss of the next record gave way to a burst of music she heard him chuckle.
Lilian, she saw, had finally changed her partner. The new boy was slim, fair-haired, one of a knot of youngsters on the other side of the room. He had danced Lilian over to them and was larking about with her there. Other couples had surrounded them, and Frances’s view was obscured; she caught broken glimpses, that was all, of Lilian’s white dress and stockings, her glossy dark head, her blurred red mouth. Taking another sip of claret-cup, she felt Ewart shift about until the side of his knee was pressing against the side of hers. There was a flutter of breath at her ear, and she understood that he had turned, had lifted his arm and laid it along the back of the sofa. When he spoke, his voice tickled her ear like the buzz of a wasp. He said, ‘How about this trip to Henley, then?’
She kept the glass at her mouth. ‘Henley?’
‘Yes, how about it? I told you, I can get my pal’s motor-car any time I want. It’s a lovely little motor – a red one. What do you say?’
Lilian and her fair-haired partner had moved away from the boy’s friends at last. They were dancing a tipsy Argentine tango, their cheeks pressed together, Lilian every now and then breaking off to complain that the boy’s chin was too rough against hers, or his steps too clumsy; but always letting herself be pulled back into the clinch.
‘What do you say?’ Ewart asked again.
‘Oh, I don’t know.’ Frances spoke without looking at him, still with the glass at her lips. ‘I’m so busy.’ And then, ludicrously, groping for an excuse and catching at a well-tried one from her youth: ‘My mother’s awfully old-fashioned about that sort of thing.’
He laughed, and nudged her. ‘You don’t need your mum’s permission, do you?’
She began to laugh too. ‘No, not really.’
‘Anyhow, I could call for you, do it properly, let your mum see what a steady chap I am. I bet she’d like me.’
Frances nodded, still smiling, still not quite looking at him. ‘Well, she would and she wouldn’t.’
‘Go on! She’ll like me all right.’
He spoke as if everything were settled. His jacket had opened with the lifting of his arm and she was conscious of his blazing torso, of the hot hard buttons of his waistcoat. As before, something about the scorching length and bulk of him was oddly persuasive: she knew that if she turned her face to his he would kiss her. Watching Lilian moving in her supple, muscular way in the grip of her fair-haired partner, she was almost ready to do it. She could simply think of no reason in the world why she should not. She took another warm sip from her glass, and closed her eyes. Ewart’s breath came against her ear again, beery, but beyond the beer sweet as a boy’s.
She felt a foot knocking at hers. Opening her eyes, she saw Lilian. The music was changing and she had left her partner: she wanted Frances to dance with her instead. Frances lifted a hand to say, Oh, no. Lilian caught hold of it and tried to pull her to her feet.
‘No,’ said Frances aloud, her drink spilling. She hastily put the glass down.
‘Yes,’ said Lilian, still tugging. ‘Come on.’
She set her jaw in that stubborn way she had, only pulling the harder the more Frances resisted – using two hands now, and hauling almost painfully at the flesh of Frances’s wrist. So Frances rose and, reluctantly, let herself be drawn into a dancer’s embrace, while Ewart, shifting into her empty seat, and grinning like a good sport, looked on.
The music started up: another tango. Their arms collided.
‘Who’s leading?’
‘I don’t know!’
They tried a few steps and nearly stumbled, tried a few more and stumbled again, and finally hit on something like a slow two-step, going sedately back and forth while the other couples lunged and dipped around them. But even then they danced badly, their feet tangling, their hands sweaty. Sometimes, in avoiding a more boisterous couple, they were pushed more closely together: their thighs or bosoms would meet, and, instantly, with a grimace, they’d attempt to move apart. Frances’s smile grew fixed and painful. Lilian laughed as if she couldn’t stop, saying, ‘Oops!’ ‘Oh, dear!’ ‘My fault.’
‘No, mine.’
The record was endless. They danced on, without rhythm, without a trace of delight. And yet, when the music died they stood among the other couples in their dancers’ pose, with their hands still joined. And when they finally separated, it seemed to Frances that the space between them was alive and elastic, as if wanting to draw itself closed.