All Change

10

All Change

    That December quite a lot of things happened, some of which were to have repercussions that couldn’t possibly have been foreseen by anyone.

    In early December Charlie Roddenberry packed his smart American light-weight bags, looked around his smart Los Angeles apartment without any regret whatsoever, and rang his ex-wife in New England.

    “Mary Ann? Hi.” After the usual exchange of seasonal greetings and news about the weather—it was snowing back East, but it was very smoggy in LA and Charlie’s eyes were stinging and his sinusitis felt as if it was coming on, so he couldn’t work up his usual superiority about the California weather—Charlie revealed that he was just about to call a cab to go out to L.A. International.

    “‘Where the big jet engines roar’,” quoted Mary Ann.

    “Yeah.”

    “Look, Charlie, are you sure about this? You’re not just doing it on the rebound from that goddawful Christabel, are you?”

    “Hell, no!” replied Charlie in genuine surprize.

    “That’s good, honey.” They were on very good terms: theirs had been one of those stupid “high-school sweethearts” marriages; having got him right through graduate school, meanwhile producing a son and a daughter for him, Mary Ann had discovered that, though she was very fond of him, poor Charlie, they didn’t have a thing in common. And Charlie, who’d realized this at least two years earlier but had gallantly hung on in there because he felt guiltily that Mary Ann, who was very, very sweet but not very bright, intellect-wise, deserved better than a husband who dumped her only because she bored him to screaming point, had agreed fervently that they should get a divorce, and that she’d be much better off with Sal DiNova (who was a good ten years older than her, did something scientific so abstruse that no-one else could understand it anyway, and wanted to be able to come home to a sweet, simple, loving wife who was a damn good cook, putting his scientific work right out of his head until he had to be in school again the next morning).

    Charlie’s only regret was that three years ago Sal had got a post at a very famous university back East, and Mary Ann had naturally taken the kids with her; so he didn’t see as much of them as he would have liked. Sal DiNova, however, was a bluff, kind-hearted man who made an excellent father for both of Charlie’s kids and the three of his own that he very quickly fathered on Mary Ann; so the kids were very happy, and Charlie didn’t grudge Sal a thing, really—or not often. Neither did Sal bear Charlie any sort of a grudge: he himself had been married before and his ex had custody of their two kids, so he knew what it was like, and was more than happy to have Charlie spend as many Christmases with them as he liked, as well as having little Chuck and Susie go out to California for the summer vacation. This would, in fact, be the first Christmas since the DiNovas moved East that Charlie had not spent with them. He had only a few living relations: his mother, now re-married, had moved back to Georgia after his father, who’d originally moved them all out to California in the early silicon valley days, had died unexpectedly when Charlie was only twenty. Charlie couldn’t stand his stepfather. There were some distant cousins, also in Georgia, whom he also couldn’t stand. In fact he couldn’t stand Georgia, either, so he rarely went there. As his mother was totally absorbed in her second husband’s grandchildren, she didn’t miss him at all.

    Charlie asked to speak to the kids, but Mary Ann explained that Sal had taken them out to get the Christmas tree. “You couldn’t call us back later in—say, half an hour?”

    Charlie looked at his watch and said gloomily that no, he couldn’t, but he’d try again from the airport.

    “Okay, Charlie, honey; and listen: you take care, huh?”

    “Yeah, sure: you too, Mary Ann,” said Charlie, a trifle huskily. And hung up.

    Mary Ann, who’d been going to tell him to be sure and call when he got to New Zealand, looked dazedly at her receiver for a while, and then hung up slowly, and slowly went into Chuck’s room. His school atlas was open at the map of the Pacific, Sal having seized on the occasion of his wife’s ex-husband’s emigration to get a bit of geography into the kids’ heads. Mary Ann looked sadly at a great big expanse of blue, and some tiny little specks of islands, and at little New Zealand down there at the bottom of the page. For some reason she suddenly felt real strange, and had to sit down on Chuck’s bunk.

    Charlie Roddenberry, ignoring a very strange feeling in his chest that kinda felt almost like the pneumonia contracted during his last skiing trip coming back, and the hollow feeling in the pit of his very flat stomach that accompanied it, got into his taxi and was driven to LAX, where a big Air New Zealand jet very soon roared him off to Hawaii and thence to New Zealand.

    At first he combated the two odd feelings by trying to read his way through an issue of the J.P.A.P.S. As it wasn’t the latest issue, which contained some of those articles that Peter Riabouchinsky had solicited from all around the Pacific Rim, but quite two years old, he decided that it was balls—which it was—and began to wonder what the Hell he’d got himself into by accepting a three-years’ appointment as Reader out there. He had, of course, very carefully investigated on the one hand, the credentials of both Hamish Macdonald and the University itself, and on the other, the exact status of Reader—which, being next in the pecking order to the Deputy Director, he’d thought was okay—and three lecturers and two or more tutors below him. It would do his career no good at all to chuck the job in before the three years were up—more especially since the first year would be a setting-up year, and he would be paid his full salary for doing no teaching at all, merely helping Hamish and Peter decide on course content, structure the courses, write course descriptions for next year’s Calendar, choose the prescribed texts, prepare supplementary reading lists, plan timetables, order more books and journals, hire lecturers and tutors qualified in the appropriate areas, allocate teaching duties, and, eventually, allocate lecture and tutorial rooms. Plus preparing his own teaching material, and keeping up with his subject, of course.

    An unusual feeling of gloom and mild panic—he was not a panicky person at all, by nature—began to add itself to the other peculiar feelings, so he pressed the bell for the stewardess and when she came asked her very politely if he could have a bourbon and branch, please, Miss—for he was one of those middle-class Americans who, contrary to the popular legend that prevails in the world outside the States, have beautiful manners. Since it was Air New Zealand and Kaylene, the hostess, came from Timaru, where the wilder element had heard of bourbon and considered it daring and macho enough to be drunk by themselves but nobody except perhaps the most rabid TV Western fan would have recognised the term “bourbon and branch”, she said: “Um—bourbon and what was that, sir?”

    Charlie pulled himself together and reminded himself silently that he wasn’t at home, now, and said politely: “I’m sorry, Miss. Uh—make that—uh—”

    “Soda water?” said Kaylene helpfully, thinking what a nice man he was, even if he did have those big round, black-framed specs that some Americans wore, and his hair was a bit short and a bit thin, really, and you couldn’t of called him handsome, with that long face and those big teeth—though they were real American teeth, very white and very straight.

    Charlie agreed politely that that would be just fine, thank you, Miss. She’d retreated to get her drinks trolley when he took off the big specs and polished them with his handkerchief, a habit of his when at all emotionally disturbed, so Kaylene missed seeing what nice brown eyes he had when Air New Zealand’s overhead lighting, not artfully concealed enough, wasn’t glinting off his specs.

    Bourbon and soda was actually rather horrible, but Charlie drank it anyway, and then ordered another, politely asking if he could have plain water with it this time—for he wasn’t at all a shrinking violet, just a bit disoriented at finding himself actually on his way, sitting motionless in a jumbo jet with no running round tidying up, packing, saying good-bye, getting his car shipped out, or anything at all busy and distracting to take his mind off his momentous career decision. After that he had another. After that he had a doze, woke up, and ate his meal hungrily without noticing that it was totally flavourless and resembled nothing so much as pre-digested, regurgitated cardboard, for he was now almost thirty-three, and had lived in California since the age of thirteen.

    Friendly May Belle Meakin in the seat next to him observed this sign of revival with pleasure, and told him eagerly all about her married daughter out in New Zealand, and her three grandchildren, the youngest of whom, little Sarah, she had not yet seen, and all about her daughter’s husband, and their house, and the husband’s job, and the place they lived in, which was called Dunedin, which was a funny name, wasn’t it, and no (doubtfully) she didn’t think it was a Maori name, and had he ever heard of it? To which Charlie politely but truthfully replied that no, he hadn’t; and Mrs Meakin then asked him where he was going, and expressed great interest, and oh, yes, she’d been there, but it didn’t have the real tourist attractions, and what was he going to do out there? And Charlie, although his father had been something quite high up in silicon valley and he’d had an excellent education himself and had a very good degree indeed from a very well respected university, did not find her very natural, kindly interest in the least prying or embarrassing, but on the contrary, comfortingly familiar, Anglo-Saxon reserve in such situations having been long since discarded by middle-class American society. So he didn’t go all prickly or huffy as his British or even New Zealand counterparts might well have done (even though quite probably telling themselves at the same time that there was no need to take offence at this simple, kindly woman), but told Mrs Meakin all about his new job, amending his style slightly so that she would understand what on earth he was talking about, and about his kids, and his ex-wife, and even about his sinusitis and his dog Bobo, who was so old and weak that he’d had to have him put to sleep last year, which was one of the reasons he was free to make such a big move. Mrs Meakin expressed great interest and sympathy in response to all of this information. Then they both had a nice sleep, hardly waking at all when the plane touched down at Honolulu, and dozing right into morning, as the jet raced the rising sun across the Pacific.

    In early December Veronica Riabouchinsky fainted in the last nice downtown department store left by the reckless and short-sighted developers, while looking at Persian rugs with her parents. –She was Veronica Riabouchinsky in private life: Peter had decided that the Russian feminine was a bit too much for the locals to cope with; in her professional sphere she was still, of course, Dr V.S. Cohen.

    It was fortunate that Lady Cohen was there, for Sir Jerry immediately panicked, and wanted the man in charge of the Rug Department to call an ambulance.

    “Nonsense, Jerry! It’s the heat, that’s all! Go and get Mr Thwaites,”—Lady Cohen was old-fashioned enough to remember the name of the Rug Department’s manager, and he in turn was old-fashioned enough to appreciate this and to remember her—“and ask him to help you open a window.”

    Veronica, with her mother kneeling beside her on the great pile of Persian carpets on which she had providentially collapsed, and fanning her energetically with her hat—Lady Cohen’s: Veronica rarely wore one in summer—had already started to come round by the time Mr Thwaites and Sir Jerry had wrestled with the big, old-fashioned window and got it open.

    “Did I pass out?” she mumbled incredulously.

    “Yes, dear; now don’t worry, you’ll be all right in a minute.”

    “Crikey,” said Veronica weakly; she’d never fainted in her life, not even in mid-summer in the Sydney humidity, when most of the tiny proportion of the population that had unwisely decided to go shopping shot into David Jones’s air conditioning and stayed there.

    “Yes, dear; now, don’t move.”

    Mr Thwaites came and fussed over Veronica, and said could he fetch one of the ladies from—cough—downstairs?

    Lady Cohen knew that the ladies from the large and not very attractive women’s lavatory downstairs, though conscientiously keeping the place clean, which was a genuine plus, were otherwise only experts in endless furtive cigarettes, changing roller towels, and gossip, so she refused this offer firmly, and asked him if he’d mind calling them a taxi.

    The open window had made Veronica feel much better, so when Mr Thwaites produced some purely medicinal brandy she refused it, and rose to her feet—a bit wobbly, and having to grab at her father’s solid arm, but nevertheless vertical.

    In the taxi she said weakly: “I’ve never fainted in my life!”

    “No, dear,” agreed her mother brightly, patting her knee. “Jerry: ask the driver not to smoke, please, dear. –No, dear; but there’s a first time for everything, isn’t there? Perhaps you’d better ring Sir John Westby when we get home, dear.”

    Instead of objecting that the eminent gynaecologist was a fussy old has-been and the world’s worst M.C.P., Veronica flushed darkly, and said: “Mum, do you think—?”

    “Well, don’t you, Veronica?”

    “I suppose it is possible...” said Veronica in a trembling voice. Though it certainly hadn’t been for want of trying, by the beginning of December she still hadn’t been pregnant. Peter hadn’t appeared at all perturbed by her apparent infertility, had subjected himself to endless embarrassing (and, as it turned out, totally unnecessary) tests, and told her to relax and not to worry. He had refused to get worked up about it himself, seen that she got plenty of fresh air, fresh fruit and vegetables and exercise, and made love rather often, with rather less tearing passion and rather more joking, tickling, and teasing than he had so far shown himself capable of.

    It had worked, as the ecstatic Veronica reported to him shortly after the visit to Sir John Westby’s up-market Remmers surgery. Fortunately they were at home and alone at the time of this report, for Peter promptly made love to her with tearing passion for the rest of the long, warm, December afternoon.

    In mid-December the bottom fell out of Heather Freeman’s quiet, dull, secure and, apart from Donald’s occasional meanness and cruelty, passionless little world.

    “I don’t believe it, Dad! You can’t! You’re making it up! It—it’s a joke!” She sat bolt upright on her expensive pale puce sectional and glared at her father, her normally pale little face suffused with colour.

    Len Warburton sighed, and said patiently: “It’s not a joke, Heather; don’t be silly: why would I joke about something like this?”

    Heather repeated sulkily: “I don’t believe it.”

    Her father replied with some bitterness: “Look, Heather, you don’t imagine I’ve exactly enjoyed life with your mother over the last twenty-five years, do you?”

    Heather had never given the matter a single moment`s thought; she merely gaped.

    “You’ve got your own home, now: there’s nothing to keep us together—and God knows she doesn’t want me! Christ, she doesn’t even notice if I’m there or not, half the ruddy time!”

    Mrs Warburton never allowed swearing; Heather goggled at him.

    “And you can think what you like of Mavis—but at least she’s not above giving me some decent human warmth and comfort, which is more than your mother ever did in her damned life!” finished Len energetically.

    This second mention of the loud, vivid and over-made-up Mavis O’Brian from down the road, the most notorious divorcée in the whole district, that was, in not quite the good side of Meadowbank, for whom Mr Warburton was deserting his wife, reduced Heather to tears.

    Len Warburton was a mild and gentle little man, with a very strong sense of duty and not very much will of his own—which was no doubt why he’d let his bully of a wife trample all over him for nigh on twenty-five years—and his usual reaction to Heather’s tears was to fuss round anxiously with cups of tea and large hankies (since she was too big now to be sat on his knee and told she was Daddy’s pretty little angel). But the worm had turned.

    “It’s nothing to cry about, Heather!” he said in a loud voice that verged on actual annoyance. He got up and strode—or it passed for striding in a little, thin grey man of fifty who’d spent all his working life in a Harbour Board office—over to the window. The window was artfully placed to reveal a corner of the Freemans’ tiny courtyard with a little silver birch in it, and to conceal the view of the nearby motorway and a block of hideous council flats. Len glared at the silver birch.

    Heather gave a hiccupping sob, and said: “How—could—you?”

    “For God’s sake, Heather! You’re a young woman—a young married woman! I thought you’d understand! I can’t go on living in that—that sterile Hell!”

    “It’s her!” sobbed Heather. “That awful woman! She’s guh-got her claws into you!”

    Len swung round and said very loudly and crossly: “That’ll do, Heather!”

    Heather made a sound halfway between a gasp and hiccup, and stared at him.

    “Mavis loves me!” said Len loudly, gong very red. ‘‘And what’s more I love her; and I’ll thank you not to refer to her in that way in front of me!”

    Heather gave another sob, and glared sulkily at him.

    “And in any case, whether or not I’d ever met Mavis, if you imagine I’d’ve gone on living in that house a moment longer, you’ve got another think coming!” added Len angrily—whether or not with perfect accuracy.

    “Huh-how can you do a thing like this to Mum?” wailed Heather, indulging in a fresh burst of tears.

    Nobly Len Warburton refrained from saying: “With the greatest pleasure on earth.”

    “What’ll she do, poor Mum—how’ll she live?”  wailed Heather. “You’re huh-horrible and dis-guh-husting!”

    “She can go out and bloody earn her living for a change!” snapped Len Warburton. “Like I’ve had to for the past thirty bloody years!”

    “She’s older than you!” wailed Heather. “How can you? You’re mean and horrible and cruel!”

    She was two years older than him, and therefore not entirely incapable of earning a living, Len Warburton felt. And in any case he was leaving her the house and moving in with Mavis. As he’d already pointed this fact out to Heather he didn’t bother to repeat it. He’d had no real expectation that she wouldn’t take her mother’s side; but he had once been terribly fond of his pretty, fairy-like little blonde daughter, and had cherished some faint hope that some of the bond that had once seemed to exist between them might still have remained.

    As Heather was now sobbing: “Go away! You’re horrible and disgusting and I hate you!” he sighed, walked sadly over to the door, and saying gently in a voice that Heather could hardly hear above her own sobs: “Just remember, Heather: you’ll always be my daughter; you’ll always be welcome in my home,” went.

    Heather gasped, cried loudly to the closed door: “Your home? Her home, you mean!” and burst into tears all over again.

    After which, still sniffing, and with the occasional sob, she went into the bedroom, packed a large bag with all her favourite clothes, rang for a taxi (since, school holidays having just started, Donald had the car) and went round to her mother’s.

    At eleven o’clock at night, after she and her mother had watched Dynasty cosily together in the lounge with the flowery body-carpet, Mrs Warburton in her turquoise summer dressing-gown with her curlers in (she’d had her bath, earlier) and Heather in her pale pink summer dressing-gown with her curlers in (she’d had her shower, earlier), and were finishing off the last couple of chocolate biscuits with the second cups of tea that they didn’t usually have, only tonight was a bit different, they were so upset, Heather finally remembered she had a husband. She went into the passage and picked up the phone.

    “I’m at Mum’s,” she said sulkily.

    “I thought you must be,” returned Donald indifferently.

    “Dad’s done something awful!”

    “Has he?” said Donald listlessly.

    Heather told him what it was. The phone was silent. “Well?” she said crossly. “Don’t you think it’s awful?”

    Suddenly Donald gave a mad crack of laughter. “Oh—Christ! Good on him! I only wish I had his guts!”

    Heather gave a gasp of outrage and slammed down the phone. She bolted back into the lounge and told her mother what Donald had said, and that he was a beast to her, and she might have known he’d say something like that!

    “Men!” said Mrs Warburton viciously. “They’re all the same! You’re better off without them!”

    Although they had spent most of the afternoon and early evening—until the good television programmes started—bemoaning the fact that Mrs Warburton had just been stranded, manless, Heather saw nothing contradictory in this statement. “Yes! He’s a pig! And I hate him!” She gave a vicious sniff.

    Mrs Warburton got up slowly and began to put the supper things neatly on a tray. “I always knew he wasn’t right for you, Heather; didn’t I say, that first time, when you brought him home?” She certainly had, because then he was just “a student”; only then Len Warburton had told her what qualified architects earned, and she’d done her best to push Heather into the marriage.

    Heather sniffed again, lachrymosely this time. “Yes.”

    Mrs Warburton didn’t say anything as definite as Heather had better move back home permanently, or wouldn’t it be a good idea to think about a trial separation. She picked up the tray and moved slowly towards the kitchen. “I’ll move those winter things of mine out of your wardrobe tomorrow, Heather.”

    “Thanks, Mum.”

    In mid-December John Aitken, on one of his long, lonely Sunday walks through Regency Bath, which he adored for its architecture and Jane Austen associations, but hated for its associations with his miserable, failed marriage, slipped on the icy pavements and sprained his ankle badly. As the infrequent buses which passed him were all going in the wrong direction and there were no taxis at all, he had a very slow, painful walk home. It started to sleet when he was halfway back to his dingy flat and by the time he got there he was soaked and shivering. Not surprisingly, he came down with a frightful cold; as he had the sprained ankle anyway he supposed gloomily that this was as good a time as any to have a cold.

    Immured in his dingy flat, he had time to brood on several subjects, not the least of which was his failed marriage: after five years of growing acrimony, during which John had gradually come to realise that his wife’s charming blonde head held little else than a craving for endless parties, expensive restaurants, holidays abroad, and expensive appliances—none of which John could afford on his meagre salary as a very junior lecturer with absolutely no capital behind him—Felicity had cleaned out their bank account, sold most of the domestic appliances in question, including those that hadn’t yet been paid off, and driven off in their car with their two daughters to her parents’ place in Devon. That had been three years ago. Although John nominally had extensive visiting privileges he had been allowed to see very little of his two daughters; now seven and six, they seemed to regard him with the same bitter scorn as Felicity did and, on the rare occasions when they did come to stay, gave him quite clearly to understand that they’d rather be anywhere else.

    He also brooded on the weather, which until recently he’d never really thought about at all. No doubt his really shocking cold and the draughts in the dingy flat had some influence, here; as, possibly, did the fact that he was now thirty-six and, since apart from his lonely Sunday walks he rarely thought about taking exercise and totally neglected his diet, starting to feel his age. Quite some years back he’d let his beard grow in the hope it might make him look more mature: these days the sight of the curly, dark, shortish growth in the bathroom mirror merely made him think glumly how long ago that had been, which certainly didn’t help to dispel the big black cloud he’d lived under for several years.

    But perhaps the main factor in the gloom was the total lack of promotion prospects in his job. His university had a very thriving Department of Political Science—too thriving: there were at least seven people, two of them younger than him, too, between him and any prospect of promotion. John was a conscientious person who worked extremely hard, and worried a lot about his teaching capabilities, and went to seminars on how to run seminars, and that sort of thing, whenever he possibly could; which meant, there being only twenty-four hours even in a lonely divorced man’s day, some of which had to be spent sleeping, that his research work had got rather neglected: as Hamish Macdonald had pointed out to Sir Maurice Black way back in February, John Aitken hadn’t published nearly as much as Veronica Cohen.

    So after the miseries of the cold had abated a little and his ankle no longer felt as if it was on fire, he got out of bed, huddled a heavy blanket round his shoulders over the thick grey woollen dressing gown he was wearing over a pullover and his pyjamas, and hobbled out to his desk in his dingy, cold sitting-room. He picked up Hamish Macdonald’s letter and retired with it to bed.

    He looked at the letter without actually needing to read it: he already knew it by heart; sneezed, blew his nose, and decided the Hell with it: the Director had actually taken the trouble to write suggesting he apply for a Lectureship at this new Institute, so he must be a pretty safe bet to get it. He got out of bed again, hobbled back to the sitting-room and sat down at his antiquated manual typewriter to write his letter of application.

    Mirry went down to her parents’ farm in Taranaki for a long weekend in mid-December, and incensed her mother by informing her parents that (a) she wouldn’t be home for Christmas, as Basil and Gary were crying out for someone to work in the restaurant over the Christmas-New Year period and (b) she was going to start on her M.A. next year and she was going flatting and here was the address (holding out a very crumpled piece of paper).

    Kay Field, who had spent most of her life taking charge of other people’s lives, immediately flew into a rage and told her not to expect a penny from them. She was about to embark on her usual speech about girls not needing to go to university anyway when she received a nasty shock.

    “That’ll do, Kay,” said meek Harry Field quietly.

    Kay gaped, but quickly recovered herself. “What did you say?”

    Harry flushed, but said firmly: “I said that’ll do. Mirry already knows that I’ll see her through university for as long as it takes.”

    The commanding Kay made a gobbling noise.

    “There’s no point in arguing about it, Kay; I’ve made up my mind. We can afford it: the money’s sitting in the bank, doing no good at all; and the other kids are all off our hands. Anyway, I’m not prepared to discuss it.”

    Kay drew a deep breath and burst into an impassioned diatribe, in which trips to Europe, the drop in wool prices, the drop in fat lamb prices, Doreen’s kiddies, Mirry’s intransigence, the dangers of young girls flatting in the big city, the pointlessness of women getting degrees when they were only going to go and get married anyway, those funny palpitations she’d been having lately and her husband’s pig-headedness all got rather mixed up.

    Harry Field’s nice, gentle mouth tightened. “Come on, Mirry,’’ he said abruptly. “We’ll go and milk old Daise, eh?” He held out his hand, forgetting that his youngest child was now a grown woman of twenty-one. Mirry, who adored her little grey father, forgot that she was an independent young woman of twenty-one, took his hand, and went out with him to the home paddock with the big macrocarpas to milk the old house cow.

    The week before Christmas the northern North Island suddenly got a lot of drenching rain—which wasn’t at all unusual for December. North of the Bombay Hills, however, it wasn’t usually cold with it, whatever it might have been like further south; and Marianne scuttled down to her far-flung carpark with her neat dark green umbrella sheltering her smart cotton frock—scarlet poppies and pale green buds scattered on a dark green background—without feeling in the least in need of a coat. Now she was driving very slowly past the main block of the university in the drenching rain, which was making the day awfully dark, although it was only half-past five.

    Outside the Registry she spotted a small, hunched, miserable figure, getting drenched without a brolly or a raincoat, and drew into the kerb.

    “Sir Maurice!” she said, a little shy but determined. “Can I give you a lift anywhere?”

    Sir Maurice Black smiled in a pleased but slightly bewildered way at the pretty dark girl who was offering him a lift in the little silver-grey Honda City.

    Marianne immediately said: “It’s Marianne—Marianne Davies—Dr Macdonald’s secretary.”

    He laughed, and returned with considerable aplomb: “Of course! I didn’t recognize you for a moment, out of your usual setting, my dear!”

    Marianne by this time could see just how wet he was, and she said in some dismay: “You’re soaked through! Do let me give you a lift.”

    Maurice had been waiting for his current lady friend to collect him—alternately at the kerb and in the porch of the Registry, from where you couldn’t see the road properly because of a tree on the pavement—for half an hour, and was by now pretty pissed off with her—the more so since although she was handsome-ish, fortyish and sophisticated, which was the way he usually liked ’em, she was also distinctly bossy and very demanding, in every possible way. So he looked at sweet, pretty young Marianne with a very kindly eye, and said: “If you wouldn’t mind giving me a lift to the nearest taxi rank, my dear,” and got into the little car without further ado.

    Instead of immediately starting off, Marianne looked at his jacket, which was indeed soaked through, and, going a very pretty pink, said: “Would you like to take that wet coat off? There’s a rug in the back seat you could put round you.”

    Promptly Maurice stripped off his soaking navy pin-striped suit jacket, and flung it into the back seat. The front of his shirt was soaked, too, for like most of his generation he rarely buttoned his jacket, and certainly not in summer—even if it was pouring. Since the wet shirt was a very fine, pale blue cotton, and he wasn’t wearing a singlet, Marianne could see very clearly the quantity of dark grey and silver hair and the small, very dark nipples on his wiry, tanned chest.—Maurice Black was blessed with the sort of slender, strong physique that doesn’t put on weight much, even when one is sixty-six, and in any case he took great care of his body, quite rightly regarding it as one of his greatest assets.—Marianne, who during her professionally busy but socially arid eight months at the Institute of course had only thought of him as eminent Sir Maurice, who was very nice but old, suddenly went scarlet, and experienced a very odd fluttering sensation in her innards.

    “The—the rug’s back there,” she said huskily. Sir Maurice registered the blush, and being neither a boy nor a fool, was pretty well aware that it wasn’t his position as an eminent historian that had caused it.

    “Thank you, my dear,” he said calmly, and reached for it, not neglecting to brush against the top of her left arm as he did so. He began to wonder whether Macdonald’s pretty little secretary was attached—no rings, he saw from a quick glance at the hand that was clutching the wheel rather tightly. The hand itself was small, tanned and very pretty, with short, pink, rounded nails. Maurice, who loathed long vulgar magenta claws, looked at it with approbation.

    Marianne had Veronica Cohen to thank for this; naturally Veronica would not have dreamed of criticizing the Institute’s Secretary’s taste; but after observing Dr Cohen’s beautiful clothes, stunning but plain hairdos and restrained use of cosmetics for a couple of months after Veronica had officially taken up her post as Senior Research Fellow in September, Marianne had said casually to her friend Caro: “Veronica Cohen wears her nails very short, doesn’t she? I’m thinking of cutting mine; what do you think?” Caro, who couldn’t afford to dress well yet, had also absorbed Veronica’s style with huge interest, and incidentally learned the lesson that one could be well dressed without sacrificing an ounce of one’s professional authority. She had agreed to this proposition enthusiastically. Marianne had registered with dismay that Caro must have thought for some time that the magenta claws, of which she’d always been very proud when she worked for the Carrano Group, were awful. Caro had added that that that peachy-coloured polish of Veronica’s was nice, too. So now Marianne had short, rounded nails that were either peach or pale pink, depending on the outfit of the day. Approximately three days after she’d sacrificed the claws, Peter Riabouchinsky had patted one of her hands in an avuncular fashion and said: “Ah! This is new, I think, Marianne? It is very pretty, may I say?” Marianne had blushed and, not daring to tell him that she’d copied his wife’s example, thanked him shyly.

    Sir Maurice huddled himself into the rug; Marianne experienced a totally absurd desire to rub him dry with it as if he’d been a little boy. She looked hastily away as he pulled off his wet tie with a grunt of repulsion, and flung it, too, into the back seat.

    “Talk about a tropical downpour!” he said with a laugh, rubbing the chest briskly with the rug. The laugh was not at all the boom that he used when in male company, rather a sort of bass chuckling purr, and it went right through Marianne.

    “Yes!” she said in a squeaky voice that cracked huskily. Furious with herself, she glared at the rain and said: “I think it’s getting worse, if anything!” –Trying to ignore the fact that her blood seemed to have gone all fizzy, and that she was inexplicably and shamingly very hot between the legs.

    Maurice emitted another bass purr—of agreement, this time—and did the seatbelt thing. “Oh—damn!” He looked ruefully at his pretty chauffeur, twinkled, and said: “The bloody things are different in every damned car you get into, aren’t they?”

    More trembly than ever at his casually male swearing, Marianne agreed hoarsely: “Yes; you—you have to—to pull that end. Gently, or it’ll lock.”

    “Like this?” He pulled hard, and it locked. “Oh, bugger!” He chuckled again.

    “You’ve locked it,” said Marianne faintly. “Just—just let it go. Here—I’ll show you.” She leaned right across him, and, not looking him in the face, took the end of the seat-belt. “Like this.” She pulled it out gently and drew it across his be-rugged form.

    Maurice drew in a long breath of Arpège, sat back, and wallowed in the delicious sensations of the body contact and of being mothered by a very pretty girl who was quite obviously considerably affected by his masculinity.

    “There!” She still wasn’t looking into his face.

    “Thank you!” he said, laughing again, and dropping the “my dear” bit: didn’t want the little thing to start thinking of him as an elderly daddy.

    “They are silly things, aren’t they?” said Marianne in a muffled voice, doing up her own and very much not looking at him.

    “Too right!” he agreed, grinning.

    She put the car in motion and said doubtfully as they crawled down the street in the rain: “There’ll be awful queues at the taxi ranks on a day like this; and with Christmas, too... Couldn’t I—couldn’t I take you wherever you’re going? It’d be no bother, really!”

    Sir Maurice lived on the North Shore, which was quite a drive, especially in the rain. He replied obliquely: “I don’t want to take you out of your way, or make you late for a date, or something.”

    “I haven’t got a date,” said Marianne innocently. “It’d be no bother—honestly!”

    “We-ell,” he said doubtfully.—She looked at him hopefully, and drew into the kerb again, so as not to got herself swept onto the motorway, which was just coming up.—“Where do you live, Marianne? I don’t want to take you miles out of your way.”

    The innocent Marianne told him the name of the inner suburb where she had quite a nice brick-and-tile flat, the back one in a block of three.

    “Tell you what,” said Maurice briskly, with all the weight of his thirty-odd years of experience as an administrator behind him: “what say we go back to your place, eh? And I’ll ring for a taxi from there. And perhaps I could have a bit of a rub-down and get this damned shirt dry while I’m waiting for it, eh?”

    “That’s a good idea,” said Marianne in what the experienced Sir Maurice recognized as blissful unconsciousness that he could have any ulterior motive.

    She set the little car in motion again, avoiding the motorway on-ramp, since she didn’t need to go that way to get to her place, and they began to trundle gently homewards in the rain, Marianne reflecting that thank goodness the flat was tidy and she could quickly gather up that bit of washing that she’d left airing on the rack in the sitting room before he noticed it was undies and things; and Sir Maurice reflecting that it was years since he’d come in contact with such a sweet, innocent little morsel, and thank God he’d got a packet of Durex in his pocket.

    As soon as they got inside the pretty little sitting-room with its flowery wallpaper, flowery cushions on its charming, light-weight cane furniture, and pale green curtains, Maurice Black discarded the heavy rug and before she could come out with any nonsense about changing in the bathroom, or some such, tore his shirt off.

    “Ugh! That’s better!” He walked over towards the heater before the startled Marianne could move, and competently gathered up the several pairs of lacy panties, three pairs of diaphanous tights, and two bras that were draped on the rack in front of it. “Here—your pretties are dry; mind if I turn the heater on?”

    “Uh—no; that’s all right,” she muttered, holding out a nerveless hand for her undies. Maurice gave them to her without appearing to notice her confusion, competently folded up the rack and propped it on an armchair, and turned the heater on. He straightened, turned, and smiled at her.

    “Brr!” His shiver naturally drew attention to his very nice, spare, hairy chest, what was visible of his flat belly (also hairy—Marianne had to drag her eyes away from the way a charming pattern of dark grey disappeared into his pants), and his slender but perfectly male shoulders. “Got a towel or something I could borrow?”

    “Oh—yes; I’ll just—” She shot into the bedroom.

    Maurice Black allowed a grin to spread across his thin, dark face, and bent to the heater—he was genuinely chilly.

    “Here.” She reappeared with a pale peach, fluffy towel.

    Maurice rubbed his chest and arms vigorously, quite aware that the pretty little thing was almost mesmerized by them, and said casually: “Lovely little place you’ve got here; share it, do you?”

    “No—there’s just me,” said Marianne in some surprize. She gave a little laugh, which wasn’t a very happy little laugh, and said: “I’m a bit too old for flat-sharing, anyway.”

    “How old are you?” he murmured in a vague voice, and towelled his silver curls vigorously.

    Marianne tried valiantly not to look at the darker hair under his arms, tried in vain to persuade herself that underarm hair was “not nice”, even on men, who weren’t supposed to shave it off, and said gloomily: “Twenty-six. Nearly twenty-seven.”

    “Got a boyfriend, I suppose?” he said from the depths of his towel.

    “No,” replied the incurably honest Marianne.

    Maurice lowered the towel and looked at her in genuine surprize.

    Very red, she said: “They’re—they’re all married. I mean—when you get to my age...”

    “I see,” he returned thoughtfully.

    Marianne experienced a burning desire to pour out the story of her ghastly engagement to Nick, and had to swallow very hard to stop herself.

    Maurice looked down at his damp trousers, made a face, and said: “Look here, d’you mind if I take m’pants off? They’re clinging to me!”

    “Oh; no...” said Marianne faintly, looking at the pants, which were very wet, and failing, in her inexperience, to interpret the bulge in them at crotch level.

    In spite of, or perhaps because of, his own considerable experience, Maurice misinterpreted the look, smiled into her eyes and slid his zip down.

    Marianne turned scarlet, gasped: “I’ll just—I’ll just—” and shot into the kitchen.

    Realizing his mistake, Maurice gave a tiny chuckle, removed his shoes, socks and pants, stepped out of his underpants, looked at his prick with considerable satisfaction, rubbed his damp legs briefly with the peach towel, and swathed his loins.

    He trotted gently into the kitchen after her, looked appreciatively at the way the soft, dark hair was cut into a peak on her nape, and said in his bass purr: “What about a cup of tea, or something?”

    “Yes,” said Marianne huskily. “I’m just putting the jug on: would—would you like tea or coffee?’

    “Actually, if you’ve got anything, I wouldn’t mind a cup of coffee with a slug of something in it—take the chill off, eh?”

    Marianne turned round and blushed again at the sight of his chest. This time Maurice didn’t assume she’d noticed his erection: he now quite understood that, nearly twenty-seven or not, she was very inexperienced. Dubiously she said: “I’ve got some brandy. I don’t know what it’s like. Would that be okay?”

    “Just the ticket!”

    She looked very shyly indeed into his eyes and said: “Aren’t you cold? I could lend you a jersey, if you like.”

    Unable to resist the idea of slipping himself inside something warm and soft of hers, Maurice thanked her, and followed her sedately to the bedroom. There he looked about him with great interest. Double bed—well, that was a step in the right direction! –It was the one she’d got when she was planning to get married: she’d been unable to face the embarrassment either of asking the shop if they’d take it back or of trying to sell it, obviously unused, as second-hand. The colour scheme was very feminine: peach, terracotta, cream and grey-green, but not—thank Christ!—all frills and furbelows. Maurice Black, who genuinely adored women, had a thorough distrust of the frills and furbelows type: in his experience they usually wanted you to put a towel under their bums before you did it, insisted on the missionary position, and the second after you’d done it, wiped themselves with a paper handkerchief as if they’d been to the bog. Not to mention behaving as if their extremely rare orgasms were a personal favour they were doing you.

    Marianne looked rather frantically through her chest of drawers for something that would be suitable for a slim, short, but very male person. Maurice came and peered unashamedly over her shoulder.

    “How about this?” she said faintly. Her knees felt wobbly and she had the stupidest picture of herself sort of—of letting herself kind of lean backwards against him—Sir Maurice Black! He was—he was famous! She must be mad!

    Maurice looked approvingly at a very soft, cuddly pale blue jumper and said: “Fine!”

    Mutely Marianne handed it to him. He dived into it, got it over his face, and said in a muffled voice: “Haul it down, wouldja? It’s a bit tight.”

    He was unable to repress a tiny shudder of reaction when the little hands brushed against his skin as she tugged at the jersey. “Not stretching it too much, am I?” he said huskily into its pale blue softness.

    “No,” said Marianne, tugging again. The jersey descended over his chest and his ruffled silver curls appeared. “It’s an old one, anyway.”

    Maurice wriggled his arms right into the sleeves, got his chin out of the neck, grinned at her and quite deliberately put his hands over hers to pull the thing the rest of the way down. He smiled into her eyes and released her gently.

    Filled with a trembling sensation that was both delicious and terrifying, Marianne said without knowing what she was saying: “It looks better on you. It’s your shoulders, I think.” And went scarlet.

    He ignored the blush, put a hand very gently round her elbow and turned her towards the door. “Come on—what about that hot drink, eh?”

    He made quite sure she had a decent slug in her coffee, too—“to keep out the cold”—politely waved her to a seat on her own pretty little sofa, and, instead of taking the armchair, as Marianne had expected, sat down next to her, a fraction too close. He wanted very much to put his arm round her but knew that it was far too soon; and in any case he was not a man to rush his pleasures.

    They sipped their brandied coffees for a while in silence. Then Marianne said timidly: “Are you—are you warm enough, now, Sir Maurice?”

    “Mm; nice and cosy, thanks, Marianne,” he returned tranquilly.

    “I hope you don’t get a cold; you got awfully wet.”

    He replied calmly that he hardly ever got colds: he was as fit as a buck rat.

    Marianne said: “Oh!” in a squeaky voice, and went red.

    Overcoming a strong desire to inform her that he also fucked like a buck rat, Maurice drank his laced coffee peacefully, reflecting that he must get her a decent bottle of Cognac.

    Marianne’s head was in such a tangle that she could hardly sort out one impression from another. She wanted to pinch herself to make quite sure she wasn’t dreaming and it was the famous Sir Maurice Black—heck, he was a knight, he’d written all those books, everybody had heard of him, he was on TV quite often, too—sitting on her own sofa! At the same time she was dazedly aware that he wasn’t in the least like what she’d always thought he was like. He was—he was, well, more of a man, really. No, that was silly, of course he was a man, what was she thinking of? Well, more ordinary? Only she didn’t feel he was ordinary at all, that couldn’t be right.

    In a trembling voice she said: “I’ve read your book: Pioneer Days.”

   “Aw, that old thing!” he returned, grinning. “Wrote that years ago! What didja think of it?”

    Pink as a peony, Marianne looked honestly into his eyes, and said: “I thought it was awfully difficult, at first; I’d never read a history book before, you see. Only then I really got into it, and I thought it was marvellous! I went straight out and bought myself the paperback!”

    Sir Maurice Black had been told by many women, in many different contexts, that he was marvellous and that his books were marvellous; most of them had been considerably more articulate than little Marianne. He looked into the pink face and the earnest brown eyes and was touched to the core. “Go and get it,” he said huskily. “I’ll sign it for ya.”

    It was in her little bookcase on the other side of the room; he thoroughly enjoyed the view as she bent to retrieve it. On the flyleaf of the paperback he wrote in the large, scrawling hand that had been the despair of the History Department’s typists for over thirty years: “Sweet Marianne; with grateful thanks for taking pity on a drowned rat—Maurice,” and the date.

    Marianne looked at what he’d written, deciphered it easily—Mr Carrano had had awful writing, too—and blushed all over again.

    “That all right?”

    “Yes. Thank you,” she whispered.

    Maurice gave his bass purring laugh. “Didja expect me to put something bloody daft, like—uh—‘Kindest regards, Sir Maurice Black’?”

    Of course she had: she was immediately thrown into confusion, which Maurice unashamedly enjoyed very much. “I— No, of course; I mean...”

    He chuckled again and said: “Can’t stand that bloody handle; keep looking over me shoulder for the big-wig when they call me ‘Sir Maurice’.”

    Marianne giggled.

    He beamed. “That’s better! Get sick of being treated as if I’m only half human just because of the damn title!”

    “Oh,” said Marianne, going a bit pink again.

    “I am human, y’know,” said Maurice in his bass purr.

    “Yes,” she agreed huskily.

    “Then let’s not have any more of the ‘Sir’ crap, eh?” He twinkled at her, and pointing his finger at himself and then at her, said: “Me Maurice; you Marianne; eh?”

    “Yes,” she agreed; then, getting the reference: “Oh—yes!” She laughed into his eyes.

    Maurice had much ado not to sweep her up into his arms there and then.

    She sat beside him clutching the book, not saying anything. He began to search for a suitable way to indicate that he wished to be invited for dinner.

    Huskily Marianne said: “I—I could drive you all the way home, you know: it wouldn’t be a bother; I’d like to—really!”

    Maurice produced a lugubrious sigh, and replied: “No, you mustn’t do that; I’d better ring for a taxi.” He gave a little, rueful laugh and added: “S’pose I’ve been putting it off: there’s nothing to go home for. My wife’s already gone down to our daughter’s place in Nelson for Christmas, and I’m not much of a cook.”

    She looked at him doubtfully; for a moment he wondered if he’d overdone it. But no; she said tentatively: “Would you—would you like to stay for tea? It won’t be very fancy.”

     Maurice beamed, and replied simply: “I’d love to! If you’re sure it isn’t a bother?”

    “Oh, no!” said Marianne earnestly, eyes shining.

    After adjusting his damp garments on the clothes rack in front of the heater, he came and supervised her operations in the kitchen, terribly tickled by her little domestic busyness, and revelling in the proximity—the kitchen wasn’t very big. Naturally he seldom went near his own kitchen, but as Lady Black never went near his bed, and hadn’t done so for the last twenty years, there was perhaps some excuse for him.

    She had several bottles of wine to choose from; Maurice, rapidly discarding the New Zealand sweet whites, looked dazedly at what was left, and said: “Where the Hell didja get these?”

    “What?” replied Marianne vaguely into the fridge-freezer. Oh, dear, there was hardly any ice cream left, what on earth could she give him for pudding?

    “This wine: this one’s a Mouton Rothschild and this is a Pouilly Fuissé—both bloody good years, too—where the Hell didja get ’em?”

    As he pronounced them the way they ought to be pronounced, Marianne didn’t have a clue what he was saying. She swung round and stared at the two bottles he was clutching, one in each fist.

    “Oh—those. I’ve got a whole lot of them. Mr Carrano gave them to me when I left; I used to work for him, you know.”

    Ignoring inessentials, Maurice said tensely: “Where do you keep ’em?”

    “Out in the carport: there’s a sort of cupboard thing—like a shed.”

    “Show me,” he said grimly.

    “But it’s still raining,” said Marianne weakly.

    “Lend me a coat, then.’

    She found him a raincoat, which he couldn’t get his shoulders into, slender though they were, and draped it over him.

    “You’ll get a chill, Maurice,” she said shyly.

    Registering the “Maurice” with immense satisfaction, he replied cheerfully: “Balls!” and strode out.

    Marianne grabbed her umbrella and hurried after him, reflecting that even though he was so short—Nick had been six-foot-four—he was very male, wasn’t he?

    He scowled ferociously round the cupboard-cum-shed, and said: “Doesn’t get the sun, does it?”

    As there wasn’t a window, she replied blankly: “No.”

    “What about that damned door?”—scowling at it. “Doesn’t face north, does it? Or west?”

    “No,” replied Marianne uncertainly. “I think it’s south.” She stepped into the doorway, and said: “Yes; look: it’s south: look, there’s One Tree Hill, down there.”

    Maurice came and looked, clutched his towel, which was feeling dangerously loose, and said: “Thank God for that!”

    “I don’t understand,” she said faintly.

    He squatted, and felt some of the bottles carefully—she had half a dozen cases of each, for God’s sake, and a dozen of what looked like champagne—he’d investigate that in a minute. Then he felt the ground.

    “What are you doing?” asked Marianne in amazement.

    Maurice looked up, grinning like a boy. “Making sure you’re not ruining this marvellous plonk!”

    “Ruining it? I—I haven’t done anything to it. Mr Carrano said not to drink the red one for a few weeks because it had to have a rest, or something.”

    Maurice grunted, and felt the ground again. “Has to be kept cool. Be ruined if it got too hot.”

    “It’s always cold in here,” said Marianne. She looked at him anxiously and added: “I really don’t think you should stay out here like that.”

    He waited for her to call him “Maurice” again, and was ridiculously disappointed when she didn’t. He grunted again: the shed affair did seem suitably cool; and, still squatting, shuffled over to investigate the— “Ah, ha! The Widow! Vintage, too.”

    To his huge delight she returned quite seriously: “I don’t think it’s vintage; look, you can see the date on the labels: it’s quite new, really.”

    Maurice stood up with a bottle, shaking with chuckles. “It’s not like cars, sweetie—vintage champagne means it’s got a date on it—date of the vintage: date it was made, ya see?”

    “Oh,” said Marianne; whether she was more confused by this information, which seemed to contradict everything she thought she knew about wine, or by being called “sweetie” so casually by Maurice Black, would have been hard to say. ‘What—what if it hasn’t got a date on it? What do you call it, then?”

    Maurice hitched his towel, grabbed at the raincoat, which was slipping off his shoulders, and replied tersely: “Muck.”

    She gave a little half-delighted, half-shocked giggle.

    Squinting at the label again, he murmured: “You tried it yet?” The raincoat slithered, and he made a grab for it with the other hand.

    “Ye-es.”

    “Well? What didja think of it?”

    Hesitantly she replied: “It’s quite fizzy, but it’s awfully sour.”

    Maurice gave a shout of laughter and—inevitably—the towel fell off.

    It wasn’t as bad—or as good—as it might have been, because he was sixty-six, after all, and he’d got so interested in the wines that his interest in their fair proprietor had temporarily waned. Nevertheless Marianne gasped. She went crimson, and put her hands to her face in a little gesture that Maurice Black found totally and endearingly feminine. –In the same situation Lady Black had, of course, been neither interested nor perturbed; but then she’d known for years what he had under the towel and had never managed to get particularly excited about it anyway.

    Maurice looked at Marianne’s very different reaction to his privates, chuckled richly, and took a step towards her.

    “Oh!” said Marianne, looking quickly away.

    “Sweetie,” said Maurice in his bass purr, “don’t be like that. Didn’tcha think I was a man, under that bloody pink towel?”

    Marianne swallowed convulsively.

    “Haven’tcha ever seen a man before?” The awful thought that perhaps she was a virgin flitted across his mind; not that he wouldn’t have been more than capable of a sweet and tender de-flowering; but if she was, what he’d just said was all wrong—not to mention what he’d just done, or rather what the towel had done.

    But Marianne replied in an agitated squeak: “Yes! Of course I—”

    “Nothing wrong with me, is there?” said naughty Maurice, knowing perfectly well that there wasn’t.

    Marianne involuntarily peeked, said in a gasp: “No!” and looked quickly away again.

    “Don’t need to get all het up about it, then, do ya?” He was perfectly well aware that he himself was starting to get rather het up again, so to speak: the little sweetie was making it so obvious that she wanted to look at his equipment!

    He took another step towards her; Marianne made a little gesture with her left hand, and said faintly: “Don’t!”

    “Here: take the bottle while I hide me perfect body from the gaze of the curious,” said Maurice calmly, handing her the champagne, and picking up the towel.

    She clutched the champagne and, totally off-balance and quite unaware of what she was doing, goggled at Sir Maurice Black, clad only in her old pale blue jumper (the raincoat having now fallen off his shoulders), as he slowly, grinning broadly and not turning away at all (as Nick had always done) wrapped his now quite evidently interested equipment in her good peach bath towel.

    It took her till about halfway through the first course to get over her confusion and be able to look him in the eye.

    He was quite unconcerned by this, and concentrated on getting a fair amount of the fizz down her while he ate his dinner. It consisted of grilled lamb chops, mashed potato and rather a lot of frozen peas to spin out the two small chops that were really only sufficient for one person, but Maurice Black, who had limited but very exact tastes in food, nevertheless ate it all hungrily, and tried not to wonder too often, looking at her across the little kauri dining table, just what those neat boobs ’ud be like without that damn stupid and unnecessary bra that was spoiling her feminine lines.

    Marianne, who was convinced that that was the right thing to do, had put a record on; as Maurice Black was totally unmusical he didn’t mind eating his dinner to the sound of Vangelis; and Marianne didn’t know enough to know how awful it was; so they were both happy.

    “Any pudding?” he asked hopefully, being naturally still hungry after one small chop, a small amount of potato, and a great pile of frozen peas.

    Marianne hesitated. “Um—there’s some tinned apricots, and a bit of ice cream,” she said dubiously. Her family all liked tinned apricots with ice cream—only perhaps he was different... And there wasn’t really enough ice cream for one decent helping.

    Maurice bounded up happily and took her empty plate. “Good! We’ll have flambéed apricots, then; go and find the brandy, there’s a good girl.”

    Marianne stood up uncertainly as Sir Maurice Black competently cleared her little kauri dining table with its green cloth placemats, hand-printed with a little pattern of silver ferns, and disappeared into her kitchen with the dirty dishes. She picked up the brandy bottle from the coffee table.

    “Marianne!” he called. “Bring the brandy in here, sweetie!”

    Filled with a strange, sweet, trembling sensation, she obeyed.

    “Got any butter? –Where’s your frying-pan?”

    “Yes;” and: “Under the sink,” said Marianne faintly.

    Maurice then introduced her to his special way with tinned apricots, which entailed cooking them briefly in the butter, adding a lot of brandy and setting alight to it—she gasped—dowsing the flames rather quickly with a bit of the apricot syrup, tasting it dubiously, grinning, and sloshing in a lot more brandy which didn’t get burned off.

    Then you ate it, warm, without ice cream or anything, and it was absolutely delicious—as several more sophisticated ladies had also told him; but he nonetheless beamed with genuine pleasure.

    “Come on; I’ll give you a hand with the dishes.”

    “No, you mustn’t,” said Marianne faintly, feeling confusedly that that was all wrong.

    Maurice came from a perfectly ordinary New Zealand family: although his parents had both been great readers who had encouraged their children to study, and one of his brothers was now an eminent professor of physics at Cambridge, his dad had been a clerk in the Public Service and his mother had been a shorthand-typist before she married. So he ignored this injunction, and marched out to the kitchen. As he hated drying, he announced firmly that he’d wash.

    Marianne watched numbly as he filled the sink with hot water and far too much detergent.

    “No—stop!” –and she clutched his left wrist.

    “Christ, me watch!” His right hand was covered in suds. True, if it hadn’t been he’d probably have plunged it into the suds immediately. “Take it off for me, there’s a love.” He got very, very close to her as she did so, and pressed his left upper arm firmly against her right arm, registering with tremendous interest and pleasure the way the neat bosom rose and fell ever so much faster under the pretty, flowered green frock; registering, too, with considerable satisfaction, the way he himself was rising to the occasion under the pale peach towel—his trousers would still be damp, and if they weren’t he wasn’t going to be the one to point it out.

    During the dishes he chatted cosily about the same sorts of things they’d talked about during dinner, with lots of harmless jokes, and, after she’d recovered herself, plenty of eye-contact: books, a little mild history, and travel—they’d both been to Greece and Italy, Marianne a few years ago, after the broken engagement, and Maurice most recently just over a year back, on his retirement, so that made a great bond. Maurice told her all about New York, because she’d never been there, and Marianne listened enviously, made all the appropriate noises, and sighed and exclaimed in quite the right places. She had, of course, had considerable practice at dealing with older men during her stint with the Carrano Group, Jake Carrano not being one to put senior management, not to mention his hard-earned cash, in the hands of young whizz-kids, but it was quite unconsciously that she now drew on this experience. Maurice was more captivated than ever.

    After the dishes Marianne, pinkening, excused herself to go to the bathroom, and Maurice had a quick recce in the sitting-room, switching out the main light and turning on a couple of lamps, plumping up the sofa cushions, pouring them each a small brandy, and finally sitting down complacently on the pretty sofa.

    He had, of course, drunk much more champagne than she, but he’d had a quick slash while she was doing the chops, and in any case had a remarkably strong bladder. He was well aware that women couldn’t hold their liquor, and observed this customary weakness in his new little friend with a pleasant feeling of tender superiority. When she came in again, hesitating in the doorway, the lipstick replaced and the hair freshly combed, and, if he wasn’t mistaken, which he rarely was in such matters, a new squirt of Arpège, he was quite ready for her.

    “Come and sit down, Marianne, sweetie.” He patted the sofa next to him.

    Marianne returned in a trembling voice: “Wouldn’t you like a coffee or something?”

    “Yes, I’m having a wee brandy,” he said calmly. “You come and sit down and have one, too.”

    She came and sat nervously next to him, very tense, on the very edge of the sofa, pressing her knees tightly together.

    Maurice was quite aware that she was so tense because she wanted him, not because she thought he was going to spring on her. He handed her a brandy; when she’d sipped it a bit he said, very casual but purry: “That’s a lovely scent you’re wearing: is that Arpège?”

    “Oh!” said Marianne. She beamed all over her face and said naïvely: “Yes, it is—how did you know?”

    His wide mouth twitched. He bit back quite a few possible replies, put down his brandy glass carefully on the little table, turned to face her, and said gently: “I’ve known quite a few women in my time, my dear; I know most of the good scents.”

    She crimsoned, looked into his face like a mesmerized rabbit, and said very faintly: “Oh.”

    He took her brandy glass gently from her, put it on the coffee table, and took both of her hands between his.

    “Sweet Marianne,” he said softly: “I’m not going to pretend that I’m not very much attracted to you.” She jumped sharply, and the hands jerked in his. Maurice tightened his grasp slightly. “I know,” he said, making a whimsical, rueful face (Maurice did the whimsical bit rather well), “that you probably think I’m as old as the hills;”—“No,” Marianne whispered;—“a dirty old man, in fact!” This time he let the whimsical face develop into a little, rueful chuckle, and she said: “Oh, no,” a little more loudly.

    If she’d been more experienced he’d have then said that he was a dirty old man, and given her a meaning look; instead he continued: “But I—well, my dear, I may be getting on, but I am still a man,”—he paused artfully, and sighed—“with all that that implies!” Another rueful chuckle.

    “Yes,” whispered Marianne.

    Maurice dropped his gaze suddenly, looked down at his hands on hers, and squeezed hers convulsively. “You must have noticed, back in that damned shed of yours—” He looked up suddenly, gave a tiny laugh, and added: “Cold as charity, wasn’t it?” She gave a shaky giggle; he met her eyes for a moment, dropped his again, and murmured: “You must have noticed that I, well, that I wasn’t undisturbed by your presence...” His voice broke huskily.

    “Yes; I mean no; I mean—”

     Maurice lifted her hands to his mouth and pressed his lips to their backs.

    “Oh!” said Marianne, not attempting to draw them away.

    “Dear, sweet little Marianne,” he said, very bass and husky, “please—let me love you?” On the last, pleading note he suddenly looked into her face.

    There is, as Maurice Black had long since discovered, one Hell of a difference between the expression “let me love you”, and the more crudely exact “let me make love to you”; the latter, in his experience, was very much to be avoided with shy young things.

    Marianne was not in the least aware that she was being played like a tender little trout; and as she wanted him quite dreadfully she simply looked into his eyes, which were a deep lapis lazuli and astoundingly beautiful, and said shakily: “Oh, Maurice!”

    Still holding her hands, Maurice bent forward and very gently put his lips on hers. Marianne, terribly shy, did not respond in any way; he was not at all perturbed, merely moved his hands very slowly to hold her face, and moved his lips very gently on hers, until hers parted at last.

    Marianne had been having some frightened and confused thoughts. He had such beautiful eyes; but she ought to be thinking— After all, he was so much older; and it wasn’t the sort of thing you did with—with someone you ought to have respect for, because he was so clever, and quite famous; but it didn’t feel wrong, it felt wonderful, no, better than that, it felt right; only, he couldn’t really want her, could he? And he was so experienced, and she didn’t know anything, really... But as his tongue touched hers she experienced an odd kind of gladness, that was almost a feeling of triumph; and that at the same time was a feeling almost of having come home.

    She slipped her hands onto the slender torso in her pale blue jersey and held him tightly.

    Maurice’s blood sang with triumph; he kissed her more and more passionately, leaned his weight on her a little, and very gradually pushed her against the sofa cushions, still kissing, but panting for breath, now.

    His hands were supporting her slim back; he drew a deep breath, and said, very low: “Darling little Marianne!”—this time with rather less calculation.

    Marianne replied: “Oh, Maurice!” and kissed him again, quite demandingly, tightening her hold on his torso. Maurice had to tell himself quite sternly not to lose control. He kissed her enthusiastically, however, and laid his right hand tenderly on a neat little breast. That was most pleasant for both of them; after squeezing and stroking for a while, and some mumbling in her neck, which she obviously enjoyed, he silently took her hand and put it over his prick (still chastely swathed in peach towelling). She jumped violently. Chuckling softly, Maurice murmured: “Didn’tcha expect me to want that, eh?”

    She swallowed, and replied on a gasp: “No! I mean yes!”

    “All men want that, sweetie: it’s marvellous for a man, to feel ya touch him like that.”

    “Oh,” she said shyly.

    Maurice picked up her hand again and replaced it, and gave a genuine sigh of pleasure when this time she stroked him without having to be prompted.

    “Marianne, sweetie?”

    “Yes?” said Marianne shyly.

    “I don’t much like fumbling round on sofas; couldn’t we pop into that nice big bed of yours?”

    “I—it’s not that I don’t want— Only, you see, I’m not on the Pill any more.”

    He gave a tiny chuckle. “That’s all right, my sweetie: I’m like the boy scouts!”

    “Scouts?” echoed Marianne blankly.

    Maurice chuckled again, sat up, and said cheerfully: “‘Be prepared’—isn’t that their motto?” He pinched her chin gently, and said into her blank face: “There’s some condoms in my pocket—okay?”

    She went very red. “Oh.”

    He got up and investigated his damp pants pockets. ‘”Yes: here we are!”

    “Oh, good,” said Marianne weakly.

    “Come on, my little pet,” he said gently, taking her hand.

    Marianne let herself be led into the bedroom.

    Thus began the sexual education of Marianne. Since it was perfectly true that Suzanne Black had gone down to their daughter’s place and that he wasn’t much of a cook—his repertoire being of high quality but limited—Maurice simply moved into the flat for a week, leaving reluctantly on the morning of the 23rd to catch his plane with assurances that he’d be back the first week in January—which he was: he knew a good thing when he’d found it. As his sexual repertoire was also of high quality and not in the least limited, and as he knew how to pace himself in this as in most things, Marianne gradually, gently, and pleasurably began to learn at first hand not a few of the things in those books of Caro’s. Maurice learned without surprize (the blushes, trembling, and tenseness had been a pretty reliable indicator) that his new little friend was as hot as Hell when he’d got her motor running, and enjoyed every minute of her initiation fully as much as she did.

    Since Marianne, unlike his forty-ish lady friend, was too humble to be demanding in any sphere whatsoever, Maurice also enjoyed himself very much by giving her little gifts—starting off with the decent bottle of Cognac, and lots of flowers; moving on to huge bottle of Arpège for Christmas; and proceeding in the New Year to such items as lacy panties and slips (his was a well-known face in a couple of the more exclusive lingerie boutiques in Remuera), French soap, some decent wine glasses, packets of real coffee and a German coffee grinder and Italian coffee-pot to go with them, books he thought she might be interested in, the odd brooch or two, a little string of pearls (“Bullshit! ’Course ya can take ’em; only cultured, for God’s sake!”), a lacy nightie bought for the express purpose of giving himself the pleasure of taking it off her (which of course he told her: it increased the pleasure of the whole thing for both of them); and lots more flowers. He enjoyed himself so hugely that he dumped the forty-ish friend without a second’s regret and without any finesse whatsoever.

    He was much too wise to pretend to be anything that he wasn’t: he told Marianne right from the word “go” (or practically) that he was an old joker, couldn’t get it up as often as these young blokes did, and would see her three nights a week—only he liked it all so much that it was sometimes four; pointed out his wrinkles; pinched his belly to indicate that the flesh didn’t spring back like a young joker’s did; and said frankly that he couldn’t offer her anything except some good sex for as long as he could bloody well manage it.

    Marianne thought his wrinkles only added to his charm, told him shyly that he had the most beautiful eyes she’d ever seen—and, a little later in their relationship, timidly, that did he know that they went all dark, almost navy-blue, when he—when he was just going to, you know—and frankly admired the flatness and hairiness of his belly, not caring in the least that the skin was a little flabby and creased. The silver hair on his chest was absolutely beautiful, of course; and after quite some time she found herself able to tell him shyly that she thought his underarm hair was awfully pretty. “Bit grey, isn’t it?” said Maurice, a little startled by this artless confidence. Marianne sighed with satisfaction and replied: “Yes; but it’s very pretty, though.”

    Without quite knowing that she was doing so, she also learned a lot of other, not directly sexual things from Maurice Black: quite a lot about literature, for he was a voracious reader of eclectic tastes; a fair amount of history, for he still adored and was intensely involved in his subject; a fair amount about good wine; quite a lot about good taste in matters of dress, perfume and personal hygiene (he threw her vaginal deodorant into the rubbish bin on the second day, explaining clearly and specifically—with a demonstration—just why real women didn’t use that damned muck); and an enormous amount about men, of which perhaps not the least important facts were (a) that they were often awfully grumpy before they’d had their dinner, and (b) that they didn’t think bras and make-up were either desirable or necessary. After a while she found a qualification to this last discovery: while they claimed that make-up wasn’t necessary, in fact if you got all dressed up for them with just the right amount of make-up on (and plenty of Arpège) they got frightfully turned on, and said into your neck, meanwhile squeezing your bra-less boobs (she learned to call them that almost without blushing), that we didn’t really haveta go to this damned whatever-it-was, did we? While there was no qualification to the bra dictum, she did sometimes wear one: for the pure pleasure of having him grunt: “For God’s sake, let’s take this damned thing off ya”—and having him do so.

    Uncharitable persons might have pointed out that Marianne was the mistress of a married man, and that Maurice, pleasuring himself with a little thing forty years his junior, was, indeed, a dirty old man. The second point never occurred to either of them: sex was a perfectly normal and accustomed activity to Maurice; and though Marianne did sometimes experience a certain dreamy wonder that the age gap mattered so very little between them, that was as far as she ever got in that direction. She did have one or two doubts on the first point: not about being a mistress, a word not in vogue in her circle anyway, and which never actually occurred to her; but on the score of his being married. Maurice pointed out tranquilly that he hadn’t slept with Suzanne for nearly twenty-five years; as this was about the whole length of Marianne’s life it certainly seemed sufficient reason to her for his looking elsewhere for his comforts; besides which, she still had that involuntary inner conviction of its being right and of having come home, that she had had when he first kissed her. Those persons who caught sight of them occasionally in restaurants or theatres observed, more or less charitably, that “Old Maurie” was picking ‘em younger and younger, these days, wasn’t he?—and often felt considerable envy, looking at Marianne, if they were normal males, and a certain sour jealousy (unconfessed even to themselves, because Old Maurie, of course, must be about a hundred by now) if they were normal females.

    On the 27th of December, a shaken John Mackay rang his daughter from Edinburgh at eight o’clock in the morning, New Zealand time, to say that Sylvie’s mother had had a stroke, and if she could possibly— Because the doctors thought—

    Sylvie panicked; quite quietly and sensibly, and if you hadn’t known the background to it, you wouldn’t have known she was panicking at all. She couldn’t possibly go home to Edinburgh: there was all that typing she’d promised to do for Margaret Prior’s Baptist Women’s magazine; and the accounts for the Golf Club (she had somehow become unpaid assistant to the Secretary: even she couldn’t have said exactly how—though Margaret Prior, Jill Davis and Gretchen Sachs had a pretty good idea); there was Elspeth—if Hamish proposed to work through most of the long vacation, who would take care of Elspeth? There was the house: who would do the housework? And her car had to go in for its Warrant of Fitness next month: who would see to that?

    Hamish ignored all this, called the doctor to give her a sedative, booked her a First Class ticket the quickest way, regardless of expense, packed her bag with all her Scottish woollies, drove her to the plane, saw her onto it, and rang John Mackay to tell him the flight had left on time, and to ask after his wife—no change.

    Sylvie at one stage had quietly and madly declared that Elspeth must come, too; Hamish ascertained, without surprize, that she didn’t want to go; being only ten, and having been away from Scotland and her Scottish grandparents for almost a whole year, Elspeth couldn’t really remember what her grandparents looked like; and couldn’t remember much about Edinburgh, either—not surprisingly, since Sylvie had never shown her much—except that it was very cold, and you had to wear gloves and hats, and do ballet. Polly had asked her anxiously, during her visit in the May Holidays, whether Mummy had managed to find her a good ballet teacher; Elspeth had replied in macho tones that ballet was sissy, and when she was in Form One (next year—she was a bright child) she was going to play netball! Looking at her remarkably large feet, Polly had silently thought that that was probably just as well: the feet were an indication that some day, in the not too distant future, the fairy-like Elspeth was going develop into a real bean-pole, like her father.

    Besides, Elspeth was going down to Grandma and Grandpa’s place for New Year’s (which was what you called Hogmanay, in New Zealand), and although she seemed now to be convinced, Hamish thought dubiously, that the “baby lambs” of the August holidays would be quite big, now (those that Grandpa hadn’t sent off to the Works), she burst into tears at the idea that she might miss the further enormous treats offered by the farm. There was the horse that she was allowed to ride, and the dogs, that weren’t allowed to come inside and weren’t allowed to be given titbits, but that you could go and stroke and tell all about Puppy when they weren’t actually working. And going mustering with Grandpa’s manager, too! –Ian Macdonald, having unexpectedly come into his crusty great-uncle’s property at the age of thirty-eight, when Hamish was fourteen, had been unable to resist the call of the land where he had grown up, and had chucked in his job teaching engineering at Edinburgh, and taken himself, his Scottish wife and their son home to Taranaki; but as he knew little about farming he had very wisely kept up his great-uncle’s practice of having a manager. At first, learning rapidly, he had done a lot of the actual farm work himself; now, in his mid-sixties, he was taking it a bit easier. The farm was modern and prosperous and the old horse was only kept for sentimental reasons: they did the mustering on motorbikes, or simply on foot with the dogs on the craggier parts of the property.

    So Hamish merely told Sylvie firmly that she wouldn’t want to be burdened with a child on the journey.

    Also on the 27th of December, Mirry, who had made the restaurant’s busyness on Christmas Eve and Boxing Day an excuse not to do so earlier, sat down in the little granny flat carved out of Basil and Gary’s big basement, and wrote Hamish a letter. In it she said that she was going to pay for the flat from now on, and please would he cancel the automatic payment from his bank. (Fortunately Sylvie took no notice of their financial affairs, however interested she might have become in those of the Puriri Golf Club). After that she said that she thought it might be better if they didn’t see each other for a while. Of course she didn’t think so at all, she thought it would be awful, but she felt she was at the end of her tether, he was never going to think of divorcing his horrible wife: eight months is a very long time when you’re twenty-one and have never had anything like a permanent relationship before. She needed time to think things out, she said. After all, their relationship didn’t have much of a future, really, did it? This was as close as Mirry, who was one of those rare females with principles—who, as D.L. Sayers points out somewhere, do themselves no good thereby—could come to actually telling him that she wanted him to break up his marriage for her. And she remained his ever loving Mirry, with a couple of big X’s that sort of wrote themselves.

    On the 29th of December, rather late, what with having to organize Rosemary, who’d decided she was too old for family holidays, and had refused to pack anything the day before, and having to get Carol round to her friend Penny Woollaston’s place by ten o’clock, because (to the sulky jealousy of Rosemary) Carol was going down to Stewart Island with the Woollastons for a fortnight, and having to drag Damian away from the computer Grandpa had given him for Christmas, and take out all the electronic equipment he’d put in his bag and put back the clothes he’d taken out of it—rather late, then, the Rosens finally set out on the drive down to the Cohens’ huge holiday home at Taupo, taking a rather circuitous route, as they wanted to stop on the way and see an old schoolfriend of Becky’s in Te Kuiti.

    What with the delayed start it was mid-afternoon by the time they got to Te Kuiti, so after a little persuasion they stayed for tea. But as Becky knew Jim didn’t like sleeping in strange beds she refused an invitation to stay the night, and they set off south again at about half-past nine: there wouldn’t be much on the roads tonight, and they’d take it easy, it was a beautiful night; and the kids could always have a doze in the back seat if they got sleepy.

    At about half-past nine, Steve Marten, aged seventeen, Wiremu Te Kea, aged seventeen, and Wiremu’s cousin Billy Hirinui, aged fifteen and a half, all of whom had been drinking steadily for most of the early evening—first just beer and then a bottle of rum that Steve had pinched from his dad’s drinks cupboard—set out from the deserted old farmhouse in which they’d been drinking on the short drive north to their homes in Te Kuiti. Steve was driving, and they were all far too drunk to notice that he’d omitted to switch his lights on.

    It was just before ten o’clock when Steve’s souped-up old Valiant, doing well over a hundred K on the wrong side of the road without lights, collided with Jim Rosen’s dark green Jag, doing a sedate sixty (Jim was a cautious driver) on the right side of the road.

    Steve and Wiremu, in the front of the Valiant, and Billy in the back with no seatbelt, were all killed instantly.

    Becky and Jim, in the front of the Jag, died on impact.

    Rosemary, who’d sulked all the way, and the minute her father’s back was turned had undone her seatbelt, was flung through the windscreen and died instantly—in just the way Polly Carrano had once warned little Elspeth Macdonald it could happen.

    Damian, who was reading a computer magazine with the aid of a torch, had forgotten his seatbelt was fastened, and left it like that. He was knocked unconscious and suffered a broken leg, several broken ribs, and severe lacerations to his face, arms and neck; but he survived.

    Baby Sharon, strapped into her carrycot, which was wedged down behind the front seats and at that strapped down (the safest place in the car), slept through the whole ghastly thing. The hardened fireman who cut open the back of the car and pulled her carrycot out burst into tears when she opened her big dark eyes and gurgled at him.

Next chapter:

https://themembersoftheinstitute.blogspot.com/2023/01/repercussions.html