Dangerous Pleasures Read online

  ‘In there. Quickly.’

  He obeyed. She glanced into the hall to see that she was unobserved, then darted in behind him, closing the door. She shot the bolt and turned on the steps.

  His thick arms grabbed her in the dark and pushed her back against the floor polisher and some pampas grass she was drying for the harvest festival. She sought his mouth and pulled his rugger thighs against her. He smelled faintly of Old Spice. She ran her fingers into his tough hair and pulled his head back so that she could take a series of rapid bites around his Adam’s apple. With a moan he broke free and thrust himself hard against her, making the shoe-cleaning things rattle in their box.

  ‘Now,’ he said.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I say no.’

  ‘Mrs Martin? Mrs Martin, are you there?’

  ‘Blast. Her Nibs. Get down there and count to a hundred and fifty before you come out.’

  He lurched down the stairs, kicking over a fertilizer bag as he went. Bee flicked on the light, smoothed out her skirt and twinset, then slid back the bolt without a sound.

  The Dean’s wife was standing on the kitchen doormat. She was a tall, ugly woman and strained her goldfish eyes to see over Bee’s emerging shoulder. Bee shut the door behind her.

  ‘Mrs Crewe. I’m so glad you could make it.’

  ‘Well I’m not really making it, you know,’ she snapped. ‘I’m looking for Mr Gardiner. I gather he’s here.’

  ‘Yes. He is. Why do you need him?’

  Bee set out firmly for the hall again, forcing Mrs Crewe to follow her. She glanced out of the window as they went, noting that the summer house door was still shut.

  ‘I gave a coffee morning today as well, as you probably heard, and he promised he’d come and help move my trestle tables when it was all over, but it finished a little earlier than planned and the Dean wants the room free for his heraldry class tonight. Mrs Friston said Mr Gardiner was here, so I wonder…”

  ‘Yes he is, as I say. I’m not sure where. He followed me out to the kitchen then said something about going around the garden to take a look at my leaning wall for me.’

  ‘Oh really? Well, perhaps I can find him there.’

  ‘Mrs Crewe?’

  Teddy walked in through the open front door, his hands thrust deep in his pockets. Bee flashed her praise.

  ‘Ah, Teddy, there you are.’ Her Nibs threw a glance at her hostess. ‘I’m afraid I’m going to kidnap you a little early.’ Without a word of thanks she stalked him from the house. Once again Bee faced a ring of enquiring faces.

  ‘Has anyone seen the Precentor?’

  ‘I thought I saw him earlier on.’

  ‘I wanted to ask him about that dreadful Series Three.’

  ‘Oh yes. King James is so much more…well…it feels more right somehow, doesn’t it?’

  ‘Of course, poor Mrs Crewe does have an awful lot on her plate.’

  ‘Sixty-two, isn’t she now? I must say, it’s lasting rather a long time.’

  ‘Bee, quick.’ Dinah’s face was colourless. ‘In the dining room. It’s Mrs de Vere!’

  ‘Mrs de Vere? Is she here?’

  ‘Well, perhaps she’s just joined. There was something about new members.’

  ‘I thought perhaps the committee…’

  Ignoring the chatter around her, Bee ran into the dining room. The grey-haired sea parted before her. In her chair by the fire, Mrs de Vere was writhing. One hand flailed before her, where it had dropped a coffee cup, the other plucked at her throat. Her vein-strung legs, bandaged at the ankles, twisted and kicked in their sensible, brown walking shoes, and her old wool skirt was riding up over a greyish petticoat.

  ‘God, she’s choking!’ Bee exclaimed, rushing forward. ‘Dinah, could you ring for an ambulance?’

  With little or no idea what to do, Bee reached the old woman and unbuttoned the top of her blouse. The lapels of her cardigan were studded with crude costume jewellery. A gold chain hung around her neck, tinkling with good luck charms.

  ‘Mrs de Vere! Mrs de Vere!’ she shouted, and banged her furiously on the back.

  ‘Yes, ambulance, and quickly please. We have an old woman choking on a biscuit here.’ Dinah’s voice rang out in the stunned near-silence of the hall. ‘What? Oh yes. Number eight, Chaplain’s Walk. But it’s one-way, so you’ll have to approach it from Bridge Street, at the other end.’

  Halfway onto the floor now, Mrs de Vere was turning grey-blue. Her glasses had fallen off and her milky eyes were wide with pain and terror. Her breath came in deep agonized sucks that made her teeth whistle. The other guests kept outside a neat four foot radius. Some stared blankly, others touched their mouths with listless fingers or picked unthinkingly at their clothes. Reverend Pyke was among them. His wife turned on him.

  ‘Jack, darling. What did you do to Kathy Roach that time? Quickly. Try to remember.’

  ‘Well I…I punched her. You always have to punch them hard on the solar plexus.’

  ‘Well do it.’

  Breathless from belabouring the gasping woman’s back, Bee looked up in despair.

  ‘Oh yes. Please. Try anything you know. She’s going to pass out any second.’ He dithered, finding a place to set down his cup and saucer and she felt her anger rise. ‘Well come on, then! She’s dying!’

  He darted forward, rolling up a shirt sleeve.

  ‘Hold her back so I can get at her,’ he said. Getting behind the armchair, Bee took Mrs de Vere under the arms and hauled her upright. ‘Steady. Steady.’ His voice was quavering. Bee noticed how black the hair was on his fist. ‘Now!’

  With a grunt of effort, he punched hard at the top of her ribs. Mrs de Vere’s hooting cry was hidden by the gasp from the onlookers. Her sucking whistles continued, only fainter.

  ‘Upside down,’ called Dinah. ‘We’ll have to get her upside down, as if it was a fish bone or something.’

  ‘Yes. That’s right.’

  ‘Upside down.’ There was a suggestion of hilarity in the rejoinders. Swing the old trout upside down.

  ‘I’ll take her legs,’ announced Reverend Pyke.

  He took her by the ankles and walked round, almost ponderously it seemed to Bee. With her feet over the back of the chair, the choking woman’s skirt flopped down onto her waist.

  ‘No. Jiggle her up and down a bit,’ called Miss Coley, who, chronic disabilities notwithstanding, had found her way onto a dining chair at the back of the crowd.

  ‘You’ll have to be quite fierce, though, Jack, if we’re to shake it loose.’

  Urged on by the well-wishers, Jack Pyke jiggled her up and down quite fiercely. Her tongue lolled outside her bloodless lips and her straggly hair began to swing against the carpet. Somebody laughed.

  Bee could stand it no longer. She bent down and cradled the woman’s jerking shoulders in her arm.

  ‘Stop. Stop. For God’s sake, stop! I think she’s dead.’

  But Reverend Pyke appeared not to have heard. Sweat streaming down his scarlet face, indignant from the fire, he continued to jolt his patient.

  ‘Just a few more. I think we’re nearly there,’ he gasped.

  ‘No, Jack,’ his wife called. ‘Stop. Stop.’

  She ran forward and laid a hand on his arm. He looked at her, then down to where Bee, near tears, was trying to lift Mrs de Vere back to dignity. He let go of the ankles and followed his wife from the room. With Dinah’s help, Bee turned the old woman round so that her feet were on the ground once more. The crinkled head dangled to one side. Dinah listened to her heart.

  ‘She’s dead,’ she said.

  A sigh — half apology, half disgust — ran through the crowd. Behind Bee’s back, they began to find their coats, telling each other that perhaps the most useful thing they could do was to get out of the way and let the ambulance men deal with it.

  ‘Where’s the Precentor?’ asked Mrs Brill. ‘I did so want to ask him…’

  ‘Perhaps tomorrow,’ hushed her daug
hter.

  The ambulance men duly arrived. As the two of them rolled Mrs de Vere onto a stretcher and covered her in a royal blue blanket, a nurse who was with them assured Bee that there was nothing more she could have done.

  ‘Looks as though she had a good run for her money, though, doesn’t it? At least she went out enjoying herself,’ she said. ‘Better than for it to happen alone.’

  ‘Yes,’ agreed Dinah. ‘There’s always something worse. Look, Bee, I’ll ride up to the hospital in the ambulance to see if they need any details or anything like that. She won’t have any next of kin that we know of. I’ll get back as soon as I can.’

  ‘Bless you,’ said Bee. ‘I’ll cope.’

  She stood in the porch and watched the forlorn little procession wend its way down the drive. Dinah was chatting to the nurse in the stretcher’s wake. The coats had all gone except for Mrs de Vere’s. Bee walked with a tray around the drawing room gathering cups and saucers, then did the same in the dining room. She plumped out a few cushions, rearranged the armchairs and walked over to the Bring and Buy stall. The lavender bags were still there. She slipped them into her pocket, then took a halfeaten biscuit out of the shortbread tin and counted the money. They had taken twenty-five pounds. Without the float that was nineteen. The remaining issues of the quarterly magazine had been knocked onto the carpet in the excitement. She gathered them up, threw them on top of the glowing logs, watched them flare up, then carried the dirty cups and saucers through to the kitchen.

  There was still no trace of Reuben or the Precentor. She assumed that they had discovered a shared interest in Kashmir or something, and had gone for a walk. She stood at the sink, squirted some washing-up liquid into the bowl and turned on the hot tap. As the foam rose, she picked up the rubber gloves and blew into them to turn the fingers the right way out. As she pulled them on, someone pressed up behind her. She jumped, then realized who it was.

  ‘She let you go early,’ she said, leaning her head back onto his shoulder as his hands ensnared her waist.

  ‘I heard what had happened and thought you might need a hand.’

  ‘Oh Teddy, Teddy,’ she murmured as he licked one of her ears, somewhat clumsily. ‘I want you to put me in your little red car and drive me fast, anywhere else, for several hours.’

  ‘Actually the big end’s gone,’ he apologized. ‘I’ve only got the bicycle at the moment.’

  Over the browning leaves of the geranium on the windowsill, she watched the summer house door open. Reuben emerged with a delicate yawn.

  ‘There’s a drying-up cloth on the back of the door,’ she said.

  PAINT

  for Paul Luke

  ANDREW WAS MOVING an overgrown shrub when he heard the telephone. It was a lavatera which had outstayed its welcome in what had only ever been intended as a temporary resting place. The roots were huge now, and deep. He had abandoned the fork and was having to scrabble in the earth with sore fingers, heaving at the obscene growths with all his weight to free them from the moist, unyielding clay. He was not altogether sure this was the time of year to be moving plants. The thing would probably die, traumatized by such rough handling. He ignored the ringing at first, then realized the answering machine was off and hurried, swearing, back to the house, rubbing earth off his hands and onto his jeans. The telephone fell silent just as he reached it, causing his head to spin briefly with sad possibilities of who he might have disappointed. Just as he was turning back to the door, it rang again, causing him to jump.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Don’t sound so uncertain,’ his mother was always teasing him. ‘You answer it as if it wasn’t your phone and you were taking some awful liberty.’

  ‘Hello?’ he said again, more forcefully.

  There was a clatter at the other end, as if the caller were doing several things at once.

  ‘Hello, Andy. It’s Dad.’

  ‘Dad. Hi. Is there some problem with tomorrow?’

  ‘No. No. Unless you want to cancel or something.’

  ‘Of course not. No.’

  The brief exchange was so typical of their relations; hesitant, uncommunicative, fraught with embarrassment at the very possibility of complications.

  ‘You see,’ his father went on, ‘it’s just that I wondered if you’d made any plans for our evening together.’

  ‘Er…No. Not really.’ Andrew wondered again whether he should have invited people, thrown his father a supper party. But he knew no people. Or no one he could comfortably seat at the same table as his father.

  ‘Because I thought we might drop in on some friends. For tea or something. I don’t think you know them. They’re doing a job on a house down there. Somewhere called Saint Vaisey.’

  ‘That’s not far from here.’

  ‘I know. We…er…I looked it up. They’re nice people. You’d like them. But I don’t want to mess up your plans.’

  ‘I don’t have any plans, Dad. I already said.’

  ‘Fine then. You can pick me up at Truro okay? I could always cab it.’

  ‘Course I can. Two-ten.’

  ‘Want a word with your mother? She’s hitting something on the kitchen table but I can get her.’

  ‘Better not,’ Andrew said, thinking of the lavatera roots drying above ground. ‘It’s an expensive time to be calling. Give her my love.’

  ‘Will do.’

  As he hung up he felt a stab of irritation that his father, who was coming West to visit Andrew’s home for the first time in the ten years he had lived there, should already be diluting the bare twenty-four hours they would have together with an addition of strangers. Then, as he returned to do battle with the lavatera, irritation was joined by the apprehension he always felt at having to meet new people. There was a shaft of relief too. After thirty years of having nothing to say to his father, the sudden prospect of having the man to stay on his own had been daunting. Andrew had bravely determined that this was a heaven-sent opportunity, a chance to meet as independent adults, to view one another without the deflecting mist of his mother’s nervous chatter. It was only twenty-four hours, after all. An afternoon, a night and a morning. As the days passed, however, those twenty-four hours had begun to loom over his pleasingly unsociable routine like an inescapable thundercloud. Having extra people to involve would relieve the tension. They might even have the makings of friends. Andrew lived alone and would not have had it any other way but he liked the idea, at least, of friendship.

  Looked at with apprehensive eyes, the little house seemed too basic, under furnished, poorly decorated. The few antiques he had inherited from his grandmother — a longcase clock, a rocking chair, a uselessly delicate chaise longue and a dingy oil painting of a woodland cottage — clustered in a corner of the sitting room. There they seemed to form an unintentional shrine to his parents’ effortless good taste, and sat awkwardly alongside the shabby but serviceable armchairs and once-amusing junk he had found in village jumble sales. His father had not noticed Andrew’s small attacks of chronic depression, attacks which Andrew always felt never quite amounted to a respectably full-blown nervous breakdown, but he had disapproved strongly of their immediate effect — a decision to abandon a legal training to run away to Cornwall.

  ‘It’s not the sixties any more, you know,’ his father jeered. ‘Only idiots drop out now. Idiots and ignorant, ungrateful fools.’

  Ironically, however, the spirit of the sixties, or at least selected highlights of the era, seemed to be creeping back into the nation’s consciousness. After six years Andrew found that his untroubled existence, living in a small village, working as a National Trust warden on the county’s beaches and coastal paths, was more in vogue than any city solicitor’s could ever be. In her occasional, faintly surreptitious letters, his mother claimed that his father had discovered he could now speak of Andrew’s mad decision with a note of pride and was describing him, absurdly, as living on the land.

  ‘He couldn’t help being a bit disappointed, darling,’ she explai
ned. ‘You must see that. I suppose it’s my fault really, for not having had more children. Big families leave more room for lovely eccentricity but only children like you have to play the be-all and end-all. I could have had more and I should have. But I didn’t. So there it is. Now, about those bulbs you said you’d find me…

  The following morning he rose early as always and drove over to a large local supermarket he rarely visited. He laid in stocks of the sort of things he remembered his father liked to eat and drink — whisky, steak, potatoes, chocolate-ripple ice cream, Stilton, claret. It was an expensive basketful — on his own he tended to live off vegetables, brown bread and tea — but the expenditure calmed him, lending him a kind of irreproachability in the face of anticipated criticism. On the way home he stopped at a garage to give the Land Rover a rare wash and take an industrial-power hoover to its filthy interior. Then he cleaned the house from top to bottom — an habitual Saturday chore performed with fresh vigour in his father’s honour. He made up the spare room bed and even arranged a jam jar of spring flowers on the bedside table before he decided this was somehow too soft and diligent a welcome and relegated the posy to the kitchen windowsill.

  He arrived at the station far too early and was forced to sit in the car park, poring over the road atlas, needlessly checking on the route to Saint Vaisey. When the train, which was late, of course, pulled in, a bewildering crowd of passengers disembarked from doors all along its length. For a few minutes Andrew had to stand on tiptoe and crane his head this way and that for fear of missing him. And then there he was, jauntily swinging a small overnight bag and clutching, in his other hand, an herbaceous geranium from Andrew’s mother. Andrew tried to relieve his father of both or either and, after the fuss, it was suddenly too late to shake hands naturally, so they did not touch at all. Claiming to be ravenous despite his sandwiches, his father insisted on stopping to buy some chocolate from a machine. He munched his way swiftly through two bars as they drove away, eyes bright with satisfied greed, snapping off pieces between his teeth rather than using his fingers.