Harriet Read online

  He sighed. Harriet wondered if she ought to rush out and blow the last of her month’s allowance on a new sweater. It would do her good not to eat for a fortnight.

  ‘This week,’ said Theo Dutton, ‘we’ll look at the sonnets. “With this Key,” said Wordsworth, “Shakespeare unlocked his heart.” When my mistress walks, she treads on the ground, and don’t forget it.’

  At a quarter to twelve he got out the sherry bottle.

  ‘There are two kinds of sherry in Oxford: one you cook with, the other you use for drinking. Usually the two get muddled, but not in my house. I think after this, you’d better go back to bed — alone.’

  He poured the sherry into smeared glasses.

  ‘I promised to take your children tobogganing,’ said Harriet.

  She came out of Theo’s house to find a long, dark green car waiting for her. A man got out; he was smoking a cigarette and had auburn hair and the wild careering good looks of a red setter. Harriet recognized him immediately as one of Simon’s cronies, Mark Macaulay.

  ‘Simon sent me to fetch you,’ he said. ‘He thought you might get cold feet; as if anyone could get anything else in this bloody weather. Are you all right?’ he added, as she got into the car. ‘Simon said he sent you for six.’

  Physically and mentally, thought Harriet.

  ‘I’m a bit sore at the bottom of my spine,’ she said.

  ‘Your coccyx,’ said Mark and laughed rather wildly. He already seemed a bit high.

  ‘Are there lots of people there?’ she said.

  ‘About a couple of dozen, including one or two predatory ladies who won’t be at all pleased that you’ve appeared on the scene.’

  He shot her a sideways glance and laughed again.

  Harriet felt nervous and excited at the same time.

  ‘Do you think I ought to go?’

  ‘It’s more than my life’s worth if you don’t. Not that it’s worth a lot anyway,’ he said, taking a bottle of brandy out of the dashboard and taking a swig. ‘I’m going down hill faster than a greased pig as it is.’

  ‘I wish I could go home and change,’ said Harriet.

  ‘Don’t change a thing. What Simon likes is novelty and you’re certainly different.’

  ‘He’s only being kind because he knocked me off my bike.’

  ‘Simon,’ said Mark, ‘never does anything to please anyone except himself.’

  Chapter Three

  Harriet had never seen anything like Simon’s drawing room — with its shaggy fur rugs, huge tropical plants, emerald green silk curtains and roaring fire which flickered on the French paperbacks — mostly plays and pornography — in the bookshelves. Invitations were stacked like a pack of cards on the mantelpiece. Signed photographs of famous actors and actresses looked down from the black walls. Glamorous people prowled about the room like beasts in a jungle. Then, most glamorous of all Simon, his blue-green eyes glittering, came over to welcome them.

  He removed Harriet’s coat, then her scarf, then her spectacles.

  ‘I don’t want you to see my imperfections too clearly,’ he said, kissing her on the cheek. ‘Isn’t she sweet?’ he added to Mark.

  ‘Yes,’ said Mark. ‘Much too sweet for you. That’s worrying me.’

  A handsome Indian strolled up to them.

  ‘I wish you hadn’t painted this room black,’ he said petulantly. ‘I don’t show up against it.’

  ‘Go and stand in the snow,’ said Simon.

  He gave Harriet a glass of ice-cold white wine, running his finger caressingly along her fingers as he did so.

  ‘That should cool you up,’ he said. ‘How was Theo? Did he like your essay?’

  ‘He seemed to — for once.’

  ‘What was it about?’

  ‘Which of Shakespeare’s heroes was — well — the b-best in bed.’

  ‘Bloody old letch excites himself that way. I suppose you’re an authority on bed now?’

  Harriet looked at her feet. There was a pause, then she glanced up at Simon and encountered a look that nearly took her skin off. Crimson, she turned to look out of the window.

  ‘The snow’s so beautiful, isn’t it?’ she said in a choked voice.

  ‘We aim to please,’ he said smiling at her. ‘Sit down and enjoy the view. You don’t need to meet any of these boring people.’

  Harriet parked herself on a black velvet window seat, trying to merge into the green silk curtains. She had never seen so many exotic people, and the room smelt so exotic too. Not only must every pulse spot of each ravishing creature be throbbing with expensive scent, there was also the smell of the apple logs burning in the grate, a faint whiff of incense, and the heavy fragrance of a huge bunch of rainbow-coloured freesias massed in a blue bowl on the table. There was another, sweet, clinging smell she couldn’t identify.

  Suddenly there was a terrific pounding on the door, and a handsome man with grey hair walked in. Harriet immediately recognized him as the leading actor at the playhouse this week.

  ‘Simon darling, just knew this was your room. You can smell the stuff all the way down the street. You’ll get busted if you’re not careful. Hullo baby,’ he added to a stunning blonde in a white silk shirt, and, taking a cigarette from her lips, inhaled deeply. When he breathed out about two years later, he turned to two elegant young men who were following him.

  ‘They’re both called Jeremy,’ he said to Simon. ‘And they’re madly in love with each other, which makes things a bit complicated.’

  The two young men giggled.

  ‘Jeremy and Jeremy,’ said the handsome actor. ‘You haven’t met Simon.’

  ‘We’ve heard so much about you,’ said the young men in chorus. ‘Quite the rising star, aren’t you?’

  ‘Simon,’ said a sulky-looking redhead with a mouth like a rubber tyre, ‘can’t we draw the curtains? All the plebs are looking in.’

  ‘My friend here,’ said Simon, giving Harriet a smile, ‘enjoys the view, so we’ll leave the curtains open.’

  The redhead exchanged glances with the blonde in the white shirt.

  ‘How’s Borzoi, Simon?’ said the actor taking another drag at the blonde’s cigarette.

  ‘Gone to the States,’ said Simon.

  ‘For long?’

  ‘For good I hope,’ said Simon, filling Harriet’s glass.

  The actor raised his well-plucked eyebrows.

  ‘Like that, is it? Imagine she was a bit of a handful.’

  ‘At least if she tries to come back, she’s such a bitch she’ll have to spend six months in quarantine,’ said Simon.

  Everyone laughed. More people arrived. Harriet watched the undercarriage of the gulls dark against the sky. The railings in the street were losing their shape now.

  ‘I must do something about my hair,’ said a wild-looking brunette.

  ‘You could try brushing it,’ said her boyfriend.

  Simon, the actor and the two Jeremys started swapping such scurrilous stories of stars of stage and screen that everyone stopped their conversations to listen.

  ‘Not boys, my dear, two girls at a time. His wife doesn’t mind; she’s got her own girlfriend anyway,’ said the actor.

  ‘I bet she minded her notices last week; they were ghastly,’ said one of the Jeremys.

  ‘Evidently in her costume she looks just like the Emperor Vespasian in drag,’ said Simon. Harriet’s eyes were out on stalks.

  A rather ravaged beauty came through the door, wearing a fur coat and trousers. No-one took any notice, so she went out and came in again.

  ‘Deirdre,’ everyone shrieked.

  ‘I’m exhausted,’ she said. ‘I haven’t been to bed.’

  ‘Darling,’ said the actor, kissing her. ‘I didn’t recognize you with your clothes on.’

  Someone put on a record.

  ‘My very good friend the milkman says, that I am losing too much sleep,’ sang Fats Waller.

  Mark Macaulay came and sat down by Harriet, and filled up her glass.


  ‘How’s your coccyx?’ he asked. ‘I ought to work this afternoon, but I shan’t.’

  ‘What are you going to do after schools?’ said Harriet.

  ‘I thought of having a stab at a Dip.Ed.’

  ‘I didn’t know you wanted to teach, Markie,’ shrieked Deirdre. ‘You hate children.’

  ‘I know, but a Dip.Ed’ll give me another year to look around. They don’t work one very hard, and by the end of another year, one might have decided what one wants to do.’

  ‘I’ve got an interview with a military publisher next week,’ said a boy in jeans with flowing blond hair. ‘I expect they’re awfully straight. Have you got a suit you can lend me?’

  ‘Simon has,’ said Mark. ‘You’d better get a haircut too.’

  The snow had deadened the roar of the traffic in the Turl to a dull murmur. A little bunch of protest marchers were struggling down the street with placards.

  ‘The acne and anorak brigade,’ said Mark. ‘What are they banning this time, reds or fascists?’

  ‘More jobs for teachers, I think,’ said Harriet, trying to see without her glasses.

  ‘Aren’t they just like Good King Wenceslas and his page?’ said Deirdre. ‘Through the rude wind’s loud lament and all that.’

  ‘I’m sure Wenceslas had something going with his page boy,’ said Simon.

  ‘I wish I had principles,’ said Mark, looking at the marchers.

  ‘I like people better than principles,’ said Simon, ‘and I like people with no principles best of all.’

  ‘Oscar Wilde,’ muttered Harriet.

  ‘Clever girl,’ said Simon. ‘Dorian Gray’s my next part. OUDS are doing an adaptation.’

  He’ll be marvellous at it, thought Harriet, watching him move off to fill someone’s drink. Even amidst the glittering menagerie of tigers he surrounded himself with, his beauty made him separate.

  Two girls looked out of the window.

  ‘That car’s been parked there for ages,’ they said, ‘let’s go down and write something awful all over it.’

  They rushed out of the door, and a minute later their shrieks could be heard, as, lifting their slim legs up like Hackney ponies, they raced across the snow.

  On the wall opposite was pinned a poster of a beautiful girl with long streaky hair and cheekbones you could balance a tray on.

  ‘Who’s that?’ she said to Mark.

  ‘Borzoi, Simon’s ex,’ he said.

  ‘Why did they split up?’

  ‘Inevitable, darling. They both spent far too much time arguing with the mirror which was the fairest of them both. Borzoi’s doing better than Simon too, at the moment, and that doesn’t help. She’s also extremely spoilt.’

  He looked at Harriet in amusement. ‘That’s why he fancies you.’

  ‘He couldn’t.’

  ‘Sure he does, and that’s what’s making Chloe so uptight.’ He nodded his head in the direction of the sulky redhead who was flirting determinedly on the sofa with the handsome actor. ‘She was convinced she was next in succession.’

  Oh golly, thought Harriet, but the warm excited feeling inside her persisted.

  Back came the two girls from the snow.

  ‘I only got as far as “Bugg”,’ shrieked one, ‘when a policeman came along.’

  ‘Everything looks so white and virginal,’ said the other, huddling by the fire.

  ‘Don’t know any virgins,’ said the actor. ‘Bit of a collector’s item these days.’

  ‘Moppet Wilson is,’ said Deirdre. ‘Never bares anything but her soul.’

  ‘What’s she saving it for?’ said Mark.

  ‘The man she marries. She thinks it's something one gives him like a pair of cuff-links on one’s wedding day.’

  ‘I’d rather have cuff-links,’ said Mark draining his glass.

  ‘Virgins must be boring to go to bed with,’ said Chloe, looking directly at Simon. ‘They don’t know first base from second.’

  Harriet looked up. Simon was looking straight at her. He gave her his swift, wicked smile. He knows, she thought in panic, and felt herself going scarlet again. Oh why the hell had she worn red? She turned her burning face to cool it against the window pane.

  ‘When I was a child I liked popping balloons, and fuchsia buds,’ said Simon softly. ‘I always like putting my finger through the paper on the top of the Maxwell House jar. I like virgins. You can break them in how you like, before they have time to learn any bad habits.’

  There was a long pause. Harriet got up and stumbled to the lavatory. Her heart was thumping, but her thoughts had taken on a strange, sensual, dreamlike quality. In the bathroom was a bidet, which seemed the height of sophistication. She toned down her face with some of Simon’s talcum powder.

  As she came back into the room, the actor was leaving.

  ‘Must go, darling. I’ve got a matinée. If I drink any more I’ll fall off the stage. Come along Jeremy and Jeremy,’ he added to the boys, who were feeding each other grapes.

  ‘Do put in a good word for me to Boris,’ said Simon casually. ‘He was coming to see Cat, but he never made it. Tell him I’m doing Dorian Gray at the end of term.’

  ‘Sure will, baby,’ said the actor. ‘We’ll all have dinner one day next week.’

  ‘He doesn’t like the hours I keep. He suggests that you should marry me,’ sang Fats Waller.

  ‘Where shall we eat, Simon?’ said Chloe. ‘What about the Parisian.’

  ‘I’m not forking out a tenner for a lot of old bones cooked in cream,’ said Simon.

  Chloe glared at him.

  ‘I must go,’ said Harriet hastily.

  ‘We’re just going to eat,’ said Simon.

  She didn’t want to eat. She knew at last she had come face to face with someone so fascinating that, if she allowed him to do so, he would absorb her whole being. She felt on the verge of some terrible crisis. She wanted to be alone and think.

  ‘I promised to take Theo’s children tobogganing.’

  ‘Oh come on,’ said Simon. ‘They won’t mind.’

  ‘I promised.’

  ‘All right then, as long as you come back later.’

  ‘You’ll be fed up with people by then.’

  ‘Only of certain people. We haven’t begun yet.’

  He put her coat on, and as he flipped her hair over the collar he let his hand slide caressingly down its newly washed length.

  She jumped away nervously.

  ‘I’ll drive you back,’ he said.

  ‘No,’ she stammered. ‘I’d rather walk.’

  But as she moved away down the path, he caught the two ends of her red scarf and pulled her back till they were only a few inches apart.

  ‘Promise you’ll come back?’

  She nodded. She could see the scattering of freckles on the bridge of his nose. The bluey-green eyes were almost on a level with hers. He had hardly to bend his head to kiss her. He tasted of white wine and French cigarettes. She felt her stomach go liquid, her knees disappear, as all the books said they would and they never had with Geoffrey.

  Breaking away from him, she ran down the street, not even feeling the icy winds now. As she rounded the corner, she surprised two undergraduates with placards by bursting out laughing.

  Chapter Four

  Her manic high spirits infected the children. They drove up to Hinksey Hill yelling Knick Knack Paddy Wack at the top of their voices, and screamed with delight as the red and silver toboggan hissed down the silent hillside, throwing them into the drifts and folds in the snow. Then they got up and, panting, pulled the toboggan to the top of the hill, hurling snowballs at one another, the Duttons’ cairn snapping at the snow with ivory teeth, until they were all soaked through but warm inside.

  Simon Villiers kissed me, she wanted to shout to the white hilltops, and happiness kept bubbling up inside her as she hugged the children more tightly. They were reluctant to let her go.

  ‘Stay to tea,’ they pleaded. ‘There’ll be crumpets and choc
olate cake and Doctor Who.’

  ‘Harriet obviously has other plans,’ said Theo Dutton, who opened the front door to them. ‘Be careful, my sweet. Read your sonnets. Try to shun the heaven, if it’s only going to lead to hell.’

  Was it so obvious to everyone, wondered Harriet, as she galloped back to her digs through the snow. She passed the Robert Redford film without a twinge of regret. She’d got the real thing ahead of her.

  Back in her room, she examined the picture of Geoffrey, smiling self-consciously and clutching a tennis racket. And that photograph makes him better looking than he really is, she thought. She glanced too, at the photograph of her elder sister Susie, looking ravishing on her wedding day and hanging on Peter Neave’s arm. That was one of Harriet’s problems, always being compared with a slim, beautiful sister who never got spots, and who had the kind of self control that never took too many potatoes, or betrayed too much interest in a man until she knew that he was hooked. Harriet knew how Susie had churned inside over the rich and glamorous Peter Neave, how she had waited all day biting her nails for him to ring, and when he finally did, had had the nerve to say, ‘No I can’t tonight, or tomorrow, or the next night, and I’m away this weekend,’ playing hard to get for the next few weeks until she’d literally brought Peter Neave to his knees with a proposal of marriage. How could one ever believe one was attractive when one ate too many cream buns and lived in Susie’s shadow, and frightened men off by getting too keen too quickly? She must try and be sensible about Simon.

  What could she wear? Her grey shirt had a mark on the front; the maroon sweater had lost its elasticity in the wash so the polo neck looked like a surgical collar; she’d sweated lighter rings under the arms of her brown dress when she’d been nervous at a party. Her jeans were clean but they covered her legs, which were her best thing, and they were so tight they would leave marks all over her body when she took them off. But she was not going to take them off, she said to herself furiously. Soon there were clothes lying all over the floor. The water only ran to a tepid bath. She was in such a state she washed her face twice, cut herself three times shaving her legs, and then got back into the bath to wash between her toes in case Simon was the sort of man who kissed one all over. Then she rubbed her landlady’s handcream all over her body and smothered herself in French Fern talcum powder.