The Designer(60)

‘That Russian of yours. They tell me he has left you.’

‘He’s away from Paris on business, that’s all.’

‘Business with some other fool of a woman.’

‘I don’t believe that. He loves me.’

‘And you? Do you love him?’

‘Of course.’

Suzy splashed foam at Copper. ‘You traitor!’

‘I love you, too. Don’t splash me.’

‘What do you love about him? That thing which he sticks in you?’

‘He hasn’t done that yet,’ Copper said with a smile. ‘But he has a rather nice thing.’

‘You’ve seen it?’

‘Just a glimpse.’

Suzy frowned. ‘I have a number of things in my drawer that are even better. If you like it so much, I will use them on you.’

‘I don’t want anything like that.’ Copper shuddered. ‘In any case, it isn’t just sex. I like his companionship. I miss being with a man. I like men. Don’t you? You’ve had male lovers.’

‘I will tell you something strange. I’ve been with many men, but never with one who was only a man. You understand? Cocteau, for example. He has shared my bed, but the love of his life is his handsome boyfriend, Jean Marais. There have been others, the same. You see how I live? In a twilight world where people shift from one sex to the other. You cannot tell the men from the women, or the women from the men. One gets so tired of it.’

‘I thought—’

‘What did you think?’

‘I thought that was how you liked things.’

‘Perhaps it is,’ Suzy said. Her long face was melancholy for a moment. ‘Perhaps I am corrupt. But you are a juicy, fresh pear.’ She lifted her soapy face to Copper for a kiss. ‘And I cannot get my fill of you.’

Copper wiped soap bubbles off her cheek. ‘Henry says you are cruel.’

‘Oh, so you have been gossiping about me?’

‘He told me that you had a mentor. She gave you everything and you threw her aside like an old glove.’

Suzy’s eyes widened for a moment. In the cool light, they were almost golden. Then she threw her head back and laughed. Copper watched the smooth column of her throat pulsing. ‘Like an old glove! Chérie, where do you get such phrases? I thought they had gone out with Sarah Bernhardt.’

‘But it’s true, isn’t it?’

Suzy was still smiling. ‘What if it is?’

‘Henry said it was almost as though you hated her. Did you?’

‘If you had been a little brown beetle and then you became a golden butterfly – wouldn’t you hate those who’d known you as a little brown beetle?’

‘I think I’d be grateful to the person who guided me,’ Copper said. She’d learned that Suzy’s intense gaze was due in part to her short-sightedness. She hated to be seen wearing glasses and her struggle to focus gave her a disconcertingly direct stare.

‘Like pity, gratitude is an emotion I do not know,’ Suzy replied. ‘Besides, she had come to believe she owned me. And nobody can own me. What else did your Henry say about me?’

‘That you broke her heart.’

‘He had quite a lot to say, it seems. Do you believe him?’

‘I don’t want my heart broken.’

‘Don’t you trust me?’

‘I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t trust you.’

‘Yet you listen to Henry? Why? Because he’s a man?’

‘Because he’s kind and sincere.’

‘Chérie, people will tell you all sorts of things about me. The little that they know, and the much that they don’t. If you listen to any of it, you are a fool.’

‘I hear everything and listen to nothing.’

‘Good.’

Suzy emerged from her bath like Aphrodite rising from the foam and dried herself. Copper felt no shame in watching her; Suzy was like a supple animal, unaware of its own nudity and therefore evoking no shame in the observer. The curls of tawny hair in the hollow of her armpits and between her legs caught the wintry light and glowed warmly. Catching Copper’s eyes on her, Suzy paused, and spread her arms wide. ‘Do you like me?’

‘You’re beautiful. You know you are.’

Pleased, Suzy turned slowly, showing off her lithe waist, the swelling fullness of her buttocks. ‘I’m not so young anymore, you know. Yet I have kept my figure. I can still show it in public. Not bad, eh?’

‘Not bad,’ Copper agreed. ‘Why don’t you shave your armpits?’

‘Shaving one’s armpits is so bourgeois.’ She lifted her arms to show the tufts on either side. ‘Isn’t it pretty?’

‘To you French, yes. To us Americans, it’s anathema to have even a shadow. But if you insist . . .’

Suzy touched the triangle between her thighs. ‘And here?’ she asked mischievously. ‘Would you like me to shave here, too – so you can see everything?’

‘No.’

‘Why not, if you are so keen to shave my armpits?’

‘Because that part doesn’t appear in public. The armpits do.’

‘How earnest you are.’ Suzy laughed. ‘You are blushing like a rose, my dear.’