Octavia

Chapter Ten

After the thrill of my recent encounter with Jeremy I behaved atrociously for the rest of the day. As we were sailing towards evening through low fields of buttercups and overhanging trees, I made Jeremy teach me how to steer the boat. I insisted on driving it towards the bank all the time, so he had to keep putting his hands over mine in order to straighten up. Gussie seemed to see nothing wrong. She beamed at us both. Gareth was making Pimms.

After dinner Gussie dragged a very reluctant Jeremy across the fields to look at a Norman church, and Gareth and I were left on the boat together drinking brandy. The night was very hot and still. An owl hooted in a nearby spinney. The first star flickered like a white moth in a dark blue sky. Gareth smoked a cigar to keep off the midges. The wireless was playing Beethoven’s Third Piano Concerto. If only it was Jeremy sitting there, I thought. Nevertheless, I’d made such good progress that day. I felt nothing could dim my happiness.

Gareth got up, flicked his cigar into the water and strolled over to the other side of the boat to stand looking at the darkening horizon.

‘How’s your weekend of sun, sex and sleep going?’ I asked.

‘Not quite as eventfully as yours,’ he said.

He came and stood over me, looking down at me, huge against the sky. Suddenly my heart began to thump unpleasantly, perhaps at last he was going to try his luck with me after all.

‘I want another drink,’ I said, getting quickly to my feet and wandering into the saloon.

Gareth followed me. ‘Aren’t you beginning to wonder why I haven’t made a pass at you?’

I turned round. ‘Since you seem quite incapable of passing anyone up, it had crossed my mind.’

He looked at me for a minute and then grinned.

‘Because I don’t like bitches, and you’re the biggest bitch I’ve ever met.’

Wham! I let him have it, slap across the cheek. He didn’t flinch, he didn’t even put his hand up to his face.

‘And that seems to substantiate my theory,’ he said, pulling a packet of cigarettes out of his hip pocket and offering me one. I shook my head dumbly, appalled at what I had done. He selected a cigarette carefully and then lit it.

‘You’re not really my type,’ he went on. ‘I like my women gentle and loving, soft and tender. Women so vulnerable I want to protect them just as I’d look after a kitten or a little girl lost in the street. Women who don’t automatically expect me to love them more than they love me. Maybe once upon a time before everyone started spoiling you you were like that, but not any more. You’re so hard now, lovely, they could cut a diamond on you.’

‘How dare you speak to me like that!’ I said furiously.

‘Because I’m probably the first man you’ve ever met who’s been left completely cold by you. I’ve met your sort before; you’re just a prick teaser or what the French call an “allumeuse”, more anxious to inflame men than gratify them once they’re well and truly hooked. You give off so much promise with that marvellous body and that great bright mane of hair falling over your eyes. And you’ve got the most beautiful face I’ve ever seen. But it doesn’t add up to a thing, because you’re so much in love with yourself that there isn’t room for anyone else.’

‘Shut up,’ I said in a choked voice. ‘I don’t want to listen.’

‘And another thing,’ he went on, pouring a couple of fingers of brandy into his glass, ‘although you’ve probably seen more ceilings than Michaelangelo, I guess you’ve never got any pleasure out of all those men you’ve slept with, and that troubles you a bit, because you’ve read somewhere that sex is supposed to be rather enjoyable and you can’t understand why it doesn’t work for you.’

It was like a nightmare.

‘Stop it, stop it!’ I screamed. ‘You don’t understand anything. I was going to get married but he was killed in a car crash only a few months ago.’

‘I know all about that,’ he said softly. ‘Tod was never going to marry you.’

I clutched the table for support; my legs seemed to give way.

‘You knew him?’ I whispered. ‘I don’t understand. Then you knew. .’

‘. . All about you long before I met you?’ said Gareth. ‘Yes, of course I did. Tod was living with an old girl friend of mine, Cathie Summers. They were fantastic together until you came along and broke it up.’

‘I didn’t break it up,’ I whispered.

‘Oh yes you did, lovely. You waited until Cathie’d gone to the States for a week and then you moved in. But it wasn’t any good. Tod was fallible like most men, but he saw through you pretty quickly.’

‘You’re wrong. You’re wrong. He loved me far more than he did her! He was with me the night he was killed.’

Gareth turned to me, his eyes suddenly stony with contempt.

‘I know he was. But as usual Miss Brennen — Myth Brennen I ought to call you — you’re bending the facts. Tod and I had a drink in the Antelope that night. Cathie was due back the next day, and Tod was in a panic about what she’d say if she found out about you. He was steeling himself to come round and tell you it was all off. I told him not to bother, just to let you stew. But Tod, being an ethical sod, insisted on going through with it.’

‘That’s right,’ I stammered. ‘And the moment he saw me he realized it was me he loved, not Cathie, and he was going to give her up.’

‘You’re a bloody liar,’ said Gareth. ‘Tod left me in the pub at five to eleven. He must have been with you by eleven o’clock. He was killed at ten past eleven — driving like the devil to get away from you.’

For a second I couldn’t move or tear my eyes away from his. Then I gave a sob and fled out of the saloon down the passage to my cabin and, throwing myself down on my bunk, broke into a storm of weeping. I couldn’t stand it. Gareth knew Tod, he knew all about me. He’d looked into my mind and seen everything — the aridity, the desert, the emptiness — and he’d brought to light terrible things I’d never admitted, even to myself, disproving lies that even I had begun to believe were the truth. I cried and cried, great tearing sobs until I thought there were no more tears inside me, then I just lay there, my face buried in my sodden pillow, trembling with terror.

Much later I heard Jeremy and Gussie come back. Oh God, I thought in agony, I expect Gareth’s giving them a blow-by-blow account of the whole incident. They must have stayed up to watch the midnight movie, because it was half-past two before Gareth came to bed.

‘Octavia,’ he said softly.

I didn’t answer. I ached for Jeremy. I wanted him to take me in his arms, to caress and console me and reconcile me with myself.

I didn’t sleep all night. Great waves of anguish kept sweeping over me. I toyed with the idea of creeping off the boat before anyone was up and going back to London. But how would I get there? There wasn’t a railway station for miles. I suppose I could ring one of my boyfriends and ask them to drive down and collect me. But would they? I’d never doubted I could get a man back at the drop of a hat. Now, suddenly, I wasn’t sure.

I was feeling so paranoid I could hardly get myself out of bed. Thank God I’d brought the biggest pair of dark glasses in the world with me. In the kitchen Jeremy and Gussie were cooking breakfast.

‘If you’ve got a hangover like the rest of us,’ said Gussie, ‘there’s some Alka Seltzer in the cupboard.’

‘No, I haven’t actually.’ Gussie poured me out a cup of coffee.

‘Do you take sugar?’

‘Of course she doesn’t, she’s quite sweet enough as it is,’ said Jeremy, smiling at me. He was so used to getting the come-on sign from me, he seemed amazed I didn’t crack back, and when he handed me my cup, his fingers closed over mine for a second. Yesterday I would have been certain he was trying to make contact with me; now my self-confidence had taken such a bashing, I felt it must be accidental.

I took my coffee up on deck. Three vast pairs of pants and the biggest bra in the Western Hemisphere were dripping from the railing. Gussie had obviously been doing some washing. A silver haze lay over the countryside. Pale green trees rose tender as lovers from the opposite bank. I couldn’t stop shaking. Amidst all this beauty and sunshine, I felt like an empty shell.

A minute later Gussie came and joined me.

‘What a beautiful shirt that is,’ she said. ‘I do envy you, Tavy. It doesn’t matter if you’ve got a hangover or feel off colour, you’ve got such a lovely figure and such marvellous hair, people still think you’re a knockout. But with me, my face is the only thing I’ve got — and that isn’t all that great — and when that looks awful,’ — she squinted at herself in the cabin window — ‘like today, with this spot, I’ve got nothing to offer.’

She looked down at her left hand and flashed her engagement ring in the sun.

‘Jeremy’s wild about you,’ she said wistfully. ‘He was teasing me yesterday, saying that I was lucky I’d got his ring on my finger before he met you, or heaven knows what would have happened.’

I suddenly wondered what Jeremy was playing at.

‘He’s got no right to say that,’ I said crossly. ‘He adores you. You’ve only got to see the way he looks at you when you don’t know he’s looking.’

She looked at me, delighted.

‘Do you really think so? Oh that does make me feel so much better. You don’t think me silly?’

I shook my head and she went on. ‘I was convinced Jeremy’d fallen for you. I was really screwed up about it. That’s why I’ve been eating so much lately. Not that I thought for a moment you’d lead him on. I mean, you’re one of my best friends — at least you were at school, I hope you still are. But you’re so beautiful I didn’t see how he could help it. And somehow you look so good together.

‘That’s why when he suggested asking you down for the weekend, I persuaded him to ask Gareth as well. Gareth’s so attractive, I thought you were bound to fancy him and that would put Jeremy off.’

God, how naive she was! I concentrated on lighting a cigarette. Oh why were my hands shaking so much?

‘I like Jeremy enormously,’ I said slowly. ‘He’s extremely attractive too, but I also think he’s perfect for you.’

‘I’m not sure he’s perfect for me at all,’ said Gussie. ‘I think he’ll probably be wildly unfaithful to me, but that’s because underneath he’s not very sure of himself, and he’ll need to make passes at women from time to time, just to boost his ego. But I hope so long as I make him happy enough, he’ll always come back to me in the end.’

I looked at her round earnest face, appalled.

‘But you can’t marry him, Gus, not thinking that!’

‘Oh yes I can. I love him so much it hurts sometimes. And I know it’ll kill me when he is unfaithful, but at least I can try and make him more secure by loving him.’

I looked at her in awe. This was the sort of girl Gareth was talking about last night. Friday’s child, loving and giving, prepared to give far more than she took.

Jeremy came up on deck. His blond hair gleamed almost white from the sun. Instinctively I turned my head away.

‘I wish Gareth would step on it,’ he said.

‘Where’s he gone?’

‘To ring up some friends of his who live a few miles up the river,’ said Jeremy. ‘He thought we might take a drink off them. He must have run out of 2ps by now.’

‘Here he comes,’ said Gussie.

Gareth walked up the path, whistling. He grinned when he saw us, wicked gypsy eyes narrowed against the sun. He bounded up the bank and, scorning the gangplank, jumped across onto the boat. He looked up at Gussie’s underclothes on the line.

‘Is that a signal?’ he said. ‘England expects every man to do Octavia?’

‘Did you get through?’ snapped Jeremy.

Gareth nodded. ‘We’ve timed it very well. They’re giving a party tonight. They want us all to go. The land at the back of their house slopes straight down to the river. They suggested we tie up there about teatime. Then you two girls can have baths and tart up at your leisure.’

‘How super,’ said Gussie. ‘But I haven’t got anything to wear. Will it be very smart?’

‘I don’t expect so. Anyway they can lend you something if it is.’

I turned away. My palms were damp with sweat. The thought of a party terrified me. Drinks and noise and people I didn’t know. They would be Gareth’s friends too, probably as tough and flash and sarcastic as Gareth himself. He must have warned them about me already — the tart with the heart of ice.

‘We’d better get moving,’ said Jeremy. ‘I’ll start up the engine.’

‘I’ll wash up,’ I said, diving into the kitchen.

No one had washed up last night’s plates and, as we were running short of water, I had to wash everything in the same grey, greasy liquid.

‘Hi,’ said a voice. Gareth was standing in the doorway. I stiffened and concentrated hard on the bubbles of yellow fat floating on top of the washing-up water.

‘Hullo,’ I said with studied lightness. I was determined to show him that yesterday’s showdown hadn’t bothered me in the least.

He came and put his hand on my shoulder. I jumped away as though he’d burnt me.

‘Easy now,’ he said. ‘I only wanted to apologize for last night. Not for what I said, because it needed saying, but I should have put it more tactfully.’

‘If you think anything you said last night had any effect on me, you’re very much mistaken,’ I said in a stifled voice. ‘Damn! We’re out of Quix.’

With a swift movement he took off my dark glasses.

‘Don’t! Don’t you dare!’ I spat at him. I didn’t want him to see how red and puffed my eyes were with crying.

‘All in good time,’ he said. He had me cornered now. God, he was big. His very size in that kitchen was stifling, overpowering. I backed away against the draining board, looking down at my hands, trembling with humiliation.

‘Why do you keep bullying me?’ I whispered.

I’d done that trick before, letting my breasts rise and fall very fast in simulated emotion, but now I found I couldn’t stop myself.

Gareth put his hand under my chin and forced it upwards. For an insane, panicky moment, I wondered whether to bite him, anything to drive him away, to destroy this suffocating nearness. Then he let go of me, and handed me back my dark glasses.

‘You can actually look ugly,’ he said, in surprise. ‘I don’t know why, but I find that very encouraging.’

‘Gareth,’ shouted Jeremy, ‘can you come and open the lock gates?’

‘Just coming,’ Gareth shouted. He turned as he went up the steps. ‘Don’t forget it’s your turn to put on the chef’s hat and cook us lunch.’

That was all I needed. I opened the door of the fridge and the baleful eye of a huge chicken peered out at me. How the hell did one cook the beastly thing?

Gussie popped her head through the door.

‘Gareth says you’re going to cook lunch. How lovely. I’ll truss the chicken for you if you like, and then you can make that thing you made us the other night. There’s masses of cream and lemon juice in the fridge.’

She’d only just had breakfast and her mouth was watering already.

‘Thank you,’ I said weakly. Why, oh why, had I been so foolish as to pass Luigi’s haute cuisine off as my own last week?

I go hot and cold every time I remember that lunch. I got in such a muddle that we didn’t eat until three o’clock, by which time the others were absolutely starving. I shall never forget their hungry flushed faces turning gradually to dismay as they sat down to eat and realized the chicken was burnt to a frazzle, the sauce was curdled past redemption and the spinach boiled away to a few gritty stalks. But the potatoes were the worst disaster. Because I hadn’t realized you had to roast them longer than twenty minutes, they were hard as bullets.

‘It’s a pity we haven’t got a twelve bore on board,’ said Gareth. ‘Then we could have spent the afternoon shooting pigeons with them.’

‘It’s absolutely delicious,’ said Gussie, chewing valiantly away at a piece of impossibly dry chicken.

Jeremy said nothing. Gareth laughed himself sick. He didn’t even make any attempt to eat, just lit a cigar, blew smoke over everyone, and said at last he understood why Gussie was always going on about the importance of having a good breakfast.

I escaped on deck and sat there gazing at the pink rose petals drifting across the khaki water. The panic and terror of the morning were fast hardening into hatred against Gareth. Once and for all I was going to get even with him.

Jeremy came and sat down beside me.

‘What’s the matter?’ he asked gently.

‘Nothing,’ I said. ‘I get these blinding migraines sometimes, they make me completely stupid. I’m sorry I loused up lunch.’

‘Hell, that doesn’t matter. We should never have let you do all the cooking. Why didn’t you tell us you were feeling awful?’

I smiled up at him. ‘It’ll go soon. Do we have to go to this party tonight?’

‘Of course not, if you don’t want to. I rather fancy going, just for the sake of going into a room with you, and everyone thinking you belong to me.’

‘You win,’ I said.

He took my hand. ‘Do you still dislike Gareth that much?’

‘Is it that obvious?’

He nodded. ‘A bit.’

He caught at a leaf of an overhanging tree. ‘Gus gets some funny ideas. She thinks you’re very mixed up beneath the panache and the sophistication. She says you need someone like Gareth to sort you out.’

‘How kind of Gussie to be so concerned with my welfare,’ I said, trying to keep the tremble of anger out of my voice.

There was a burst of laughter from the other end of the boat. Such was my paranoia, I was convinced Gussie and Gareth were talking about me.

‘Would you make me any different?’ I asked, looking deep into Jeremy’s eyes.

‘I’d just like to make you,’ he said. ‘Let’s not bother about irrelevancies.’

It’s the same old story, I thought, as I did my face before we went ashore. Now he’s really pursuing me, I don’t want him so much. The intensity and lust in his eyes had me frightened. I had a feeling I might have got a tiger by the tail.

My thoughts turned to Gussie and Gareth.

‘Insecure, unhappy, mixed-up, frigid, hard enough to cut a diamond on.’ They were having a field-day passing judgements on me. How dare that fat slob Gussie patronize me, how dare Gareth take it upon himself to tell me so many home truths? The chips were down. If they thought I was a bitch, all right, I was going to behave like one.