Neighbourly Concern

21

Neighbourly Concern

    “What?” gasped Mrs Harris.

    Georgy went on stuffing clothes into the old blue suitcase. “You heard. It’s only till he goes to Australia, of course.”

    “Georgy, you can’t!” gasped her mother.

    “Yes, I can.” Georgy balled up her green floral housecoat and shoved it into a corner of the case. “I won’t keep this case, I know it belongs to you. Adam’ll buy me a new one if I want one,” she said in a careless voice, not looking up.

    “Georgina Harris!” gasped her mother.

    “Never did you think to hear such a phrase from my lips,” agreed Georgy. “All right, I’ve gone over to the other side, so what? You pushed Ngaio into getting married and now you do nothing but whinge about the man she’s perfectly happy with, and you kept me in the nest until my feathers went caggy, and now I’m going to go and be the live-in mistress of a wicked fillum star.” She paused. “Caggy feathers and all.”

    “What on earth does ‘caggy’ mean, may I ask?” said Mrs Harris in a nasty voice, sagging in the doorway though she was.

    Georgy replied tranquilly: “I’m not sure, but until last week it was what my feathers felt like, all right.”

    “Look, Georgy, at least think about this!” cried her mother.

    “I have thought, I’ve thought that I’m twenty-seven and I’ll never get another opportunity to live with a man as gorgeous as Adam McIntyre if I live to be five hundred, and I’m going to do it,” said Georgy grimly. “And you can say what you like when Tanya from Hair 2000 asks you if it’s true I’m living with gorge-ous Ad-dum Mac-In-ty-uh.”

    “What’s little Tanya got to do with it?” gasped Mrs Harris.

    “I don’t know: possibly nothing. Or possibly everything, now I come to think of it,” said Georgy. She inspected a pair of pants, made a face at their saggy elastic, and discarded them.

    There was a short silence.

    “Georgy, he’ll—he’ll just go off overseas and—and where will that leave you?” faltered her mother.

    “I don’t know, and I don’t know that I care,” said Georgy thoughtfully. She removed a tee-shirt from the case and threw it on the bed. “Adam hates that thing, you can give it to the next old clothes collection, if you like.”

    “Well, I must say I agree with him, there,” said Mrs Harris—without much conviction, though. She came in slowly and gathered up the awful blue tee-shirt. “Georgy, you’re the one that’ll end up suffering over this,” she warned.

    “I know, but at least I’ll be alive,” said Georgy grimly.

    “Look, for Heaven’s sake, Martin Ramsay’d be better than him!” cried Mrs Harris distressfully.

    “Mum, if you can say that,” said Georgy heavily, “either you’ve gone blinder than the beastly budgie or your hormones have all dried up.”

    “I thought you were fond of Billy!” cried Mrs Harris.

    “He’s a blind, gormless little inbred twit that’d last two seconds in his natural habitat, poor little moulting sod,” said her daughter, cramming a pair of sneakers into the case.

    “Don’t put your shoes on top of your clothes!” cried her mother. For reply Georgy slammed the lid down and put all her weight on it.

    “Georgy, you’ll break that case!” she cried.

    “Good, it’s older than I am—help, it’s older than Billy!” gasped Georgy, shoving with all her might. Suddenly she released it and sprang at the catches and slapped them shut. “Hah!” she said pleasedly.

    Mrs Harris sat down weakly on the bed. “Billy isn’t that old. Well, he’s old for a budgie, you ought to be proud of him, Georgy.”

    “Mum, there is nothing intrinsically meritorious in longevity,” said Georgy heavily.

    Mrs Harris winced and couldn’t help thinking that she sounded dreadfully like Christopher Black. She would have felt sorry for Melinda on account of Christopher, had it not been obvious (a) that Melinda was completely happy with him and (b) that she was more than capable of handling him at his worst.

    “Not even in a budgie,” said Georgy with a smile, going over to the door with her case. “I’m not sure whether this flat’s got the phone on yet, or not; anyway, I’ll let you know.”

    Mrs Harris swallowed. “You haven’t even got any decent underwear,” she protested faintly.

    “Adam isn’t interested in my underwear. Well, he’s interested in how fast he can get it off me, if you count that,” said Georgy detachedly, going out.

    Mrs Harris turned very red and threw the tee-shirt, now wadded up with the discarded pants, across the room.

    “What?” shouted Clem angrily. “Look, speak up, Joel, has something happened to Adam?”

    “No—NO!” he shouted.

    “This line sounds like there’s a thunderstorm going on—is there a THUNDERSTORM THERE, JOEL?” screeched Clem.

    “No—NO!” screamed Joel.

    “Well, what’s HAPPENED?” yelled Clem.

    Suddenly there was a terrific crackling noise and the line cleared.

    “I thought this wasn’t supposed to happen with all these mod-run co-waxial thingy-whatsits,” said Joel weakly.

    “Thring, if I could get my hands on your skinny neck—! What’s UP?” yelled Clem.

    “Nothing, really.”

    “I see, you woke me up to tell me nothing’s the matter,” said Clem grimly. “Why—are you—ringing, Joel?”

    “Adam’s gone off to live in a cosy wee nest with a wee Anglo-Saxon lecturer,” said Joel glumly. “I thought you might like to know.”

    “Good God, is that all!” There was a short pause. “This lecturer is female, I presume?” said Clem weakly.

    “Alas, yes, dear Adam is not yet one of Us,” sighed Joel.

    “One of you, you mean,” said Clem grimly.

    “Well, quite. Um—I think I’ll hang up, now, Clem.”

    “Just a minute. Who is she, how serious is it and is there anyone there apart from Broken-Reed Thring to pick up the pieces?” said Clem grimly.

    “Uh—ten years younger than him if a day, very sweet and innocent, dying oath a virgin till He got up her, dear—”

    “WHAT?” bellowed Clem.

    “Honest, Clem!” squeaked Joel anxiously.

    “My God,” he said in a shaken voice.

    “Well, yes,” said Joel, swallowing. “That’s why I thought I’d better ring you.”

    After a moment Clem said: “How serious is it? –No, look, let me phrase that another way. What else was on offer?”

    “Well, you do have a point, there, dear: apart from the over-lipsticked telly moos that flocked from all points in their minis and their six-inch heels there was very little, really. Um—and I’m damned if I can tell how serious it is,” he ended lamely.

    “Bugger,” muttered Clem.

    For once Joel refrained.

    “Did you say she teaches Anglo-Saxon?” ventured Clem.

    “Yes. Got a doctorate and all.”

    There was a puzzled silence.

    “She’s very pretty; very—um—sweet, really,” said Joel lamely.

    “Are you sure? Not a clever bitch on the make?”

    “No: one dismissed that thought in a split second. Absolutely not. She lives next-door to his parents and old Christopher’s her greatest fan. Well, after Adam, I suppose,” he amended dubiously.

    “Good God,” said Clem blankly.

    “Mm,” agreed Joel miserably.

    After a long and not inexpensive silence Clem said slowly: “Is it just a holiday romance?”

    “Uh— I’m merely telling you the facts as I see ’em,” returned Joel glumly.

    “Well—well— Shit, it must be! Adam?” said Clem.

    “Ye-es... Well, as I said, very sweet. And totally bowled over by him, that helped. Though on the other hand he was pretty well bowled, too. Came home and raved to his ma about how intelligent she is.”

    “Adam?” croaked Clem.

    “Thee same.”

    There was another of those expensive silences.

    “Must be a holiday romance,” said Clem lamely.

    “Mm. Well, at least she isn’t a bitch. She won’t do anything to hurt him.”

    “No, but you know him, it’ll be like that blasted female—I forget her name, Betsy or something, the one that was about twenty-five. He’ll dump her and spend the next six months agonizing over it.”

    “That thought had occurred, actually. Only Betsy was quite horrifically dumb, wasn’t she?”

     “Uh—was she the one that was in that radio tripe with you and him?”

    “No, the friend of that one, but the principle is the same, dear.”

    “Yes,” said Clem heavily.

    “Georgy isn’t dumb,” ventured Joel.

    “Eh? Oh, is that her name? No...”

    “Well, I thought I’d let you know.”

    “Yes. Thanks. If he does something really stupid such as marrying her, Anglo-Saxon and all, ring me even if you think it’s the middle of the night,” said Clem with a flicker of humour. “If I’m not home, try the office, it’ll be the middle of the afternoon and I’ll be there.”

    “Ho, ho,” said Joel glumly.

    “I suppose you’re enjoying tropical sunshine out there?” said Clem sourly.

    “Er—well, no, dear, beastly soggy humidity, one feels like a warm sponge.”

    “Eh? Like a warm sponge bath?”

    “NO!” shouted Joel. “Like the spong itself, dear man! Soggy and drippy and beastly!”

    “Ha, ha, ha. –Maybe it’s got to his brain.”

    “Brain? I wish I could tell you that was involved! Do you know he— No, I won’t.”

    “Yes, you will,” said Clem grimly.

    “Um... You won’t like it. Oh, well,” he said, as Clem’s sizzling indrawn breath sped across the co-axial cable under the Pacific. “The thing is, first he had a delirious week at a country cottage with dear little Georgy, and then he sort of went off the rails a bit and did Livia for a couple of days, or so one gathered without much diff., and then he went into a terrific sulk for another couple of days, and then all of a sudden there he was, setting up dinky flats with Georgy. Fulltime, as it were.”

    There was a short silence.

    “Can you run that time sequence past me again, Joel?” said Clem, very weakly.

    “Week one, dirty week with Georgy. Not studying Anglo-Saxon.”

    “I got that!”

    “Er, week one plus—” Joel muttered to himself. “Damn it. Look, two days after the week away with Georgy he spent the night with Livia. Then we had terrific sulks. Friday lunchtime disappeared with Livia and never came home that night. Saturday morning he turned up to rehearsals bright and early without La Livia, spirited Georgy away to lunch, rehearsal as usual Saturday afternoon, a bit April and May-ish but nothing to remark, and on Sunday morning he ups and signs the lease of the flat.”

    This time a stunned silence came down the co-axial cable.

    “Er—you can make what you like of that, Clem, dear, it’s as true as I stand here,” said Joel feebly. “One’s minimal brain hasn’t been able to make much, I do assure you.”

    “No-o... Listen, you know Derry Dawlish is coming out in a week or two?”

    “Mm-hm.”

    “Uh—well, we’ll see, won’t we?” said Clem on a grim note.

    “Oh, quite, dear. One’s minimal brain had worked that one out,” said Joel, as grim.

    “Yes. Well—thanks, Joel. And don’t feel you have to pick up the pieces if and when, that was a figure of speech or something. I suppose his mother’ll be able to cope.”

    “Actually, dear, do you know, when one weighs up the pros and cons,” said Joel, now sounding to the puzzled Clem half a world away distinctly angry, “I don’t think one is all that worried about Adam’s bits and pieces. In fact they can take care of themselves. One is rather worried, though, about what he may do to poor wee Georgy!”

    Before Clem could unsag his jaw and reply, he’d hung up on him.

    “Gor,” said Clem limply, sagging back into his pillows.

    From her pillow his wife said groggily: “I suppose that was more nonsense about Adam McIntyre.”

    “Mm.”

    She sniffed.

    Clem didn’t make any response so then she said crossly: “Well? Is he all right?”

    “Eh? Oh, Lor’, yes. New girlfriend, that’s all.”

    His wife sniffed again. “I told you he’s tougher than he looks.”

    “Mm—well, he doesn’t look all that tough, actually, not unless they’ve got him decked out in black leather with a snub-nosed automatic in his hand,” he said with a twitch of the lips.

    “Go to sleep,” she sighed.

    “Mm.” Clem switched the light off. His wife was soon snoring but Clem lay awake for some time, feeling—not exactly worried—well, slightly worried—but more flummoxed, really. An Anglo-Saxon lecturer? Sweet? And Joel Thring on the woman’s side? Strewth. Likewise, Cor. Lumme, in fact.

    Jill groaned deeply.

    “Have a gin,” said Polly kindly.

    “Considering it’s my gin, I might as well.” Jill allowed Polly to pour her a gin. “Just wave the tonic at it,” she said.

    Polly waved the tonic at it. “I think I’ll have a very dry martini,” she said. She poured herself a large gin and added a drop of dry vermouth.

    “That looks good,” said Gretchen. Polly made her a very dry martini.

    Then they all sat down in Jill and Gretchen’s living-room and looked at one another.

    After quite some time Gretchen said cautiously: “Jemima approves.”

    “Huh!” said Jill.

    “Matrimony. It’s addled her brain. Lasts until about the first lot of dirty naps. Then you start thinking twice,” explained the matron.

    “Tvice about vhat? You vent and had Katie Maureen on top off tvins!” gasped Gretchen.

    “Yeah, but only because Jake said we could have a nanny.”

    “That’s fair enough,” allowed Jill.

    “Vell—ja, perhaps only slight addling,” conceded Gretchen.

    Polly swallowed gin hurriedly and said to Jill: “That reminds me, did you refer to me as Queen Polly in front of Sir Jacob?”

    “Guilty, Your Majesty.”

    “I thought so.”

    “Vhy exactly does it remind you, Polly?” asked Gretchen.

    “Because he’s been calling me it ever since the dratted garden party.”

    “Oh, this iss very clear,” noted Gretchen.

    “Drink up your nice martini, Gretchen, that’ll make it much, much clearer,” said Polly kindly.

    Gretchen grinned, and drank deeply.

    After a certain period of thoughtful silence Jill pointed out: “We’d got as far as remarking that Jemima approves.”

    “And of discounting it,” agreed Polly.

    “Oh, vere ve doing that?” said Gretchen.

    “Look, just—” began Jill as the doorbell rang. “That’ll be It, go and let it in,” she finished grimly.

    Gretchen groaned but got up. As she left the living-room door open they clearly heard the exchange as she opened the front door. Joel said in a nervous squeak: “Hullo, Gretchen, dear, not late, am I?” And Gretchen replied: “No, ve are just vaiting for you, to begin the lynching party. Come in.”

    Joel came in, looking scared. “Peace offering,” he said quickly, thrusting a huge bunch of yellow roses at Jill.

    “Good grief,” she said, clutching them feebly.

    “Put them in vater and then ve lynch him, ja?” said Gretchen, going over to the gin.

    “Hard, that’s what they are, hard,” said Joel sadly, as his cousin exited in search of a vase. “Er—hullo, Polly, dear: I’m sure your sweet, forgiving nature will allow you to be terribly kind and comforting and recognize that this poor player is—NOT TO BLAME!” he shouted in the direction of the kitchen.

    “If you’re not to blame, isn’t it irrelevant whether I’ve got a forgiving nature or not?” she replied calmly, draining her gin.

    He groaned. “Don’t go all inter-lek-tu-al on us now, dear, the nerves are shattered as it is.”

    “Haff a gin,” said Gretchen, suddenly appearing in front of him with a large tumbler.

    Joel took it feebly. It looked like a whisky tumbler to him. “Er, gin and what, Gretchen, love?” he asked timidly, sinking into an armchair.

    “Gin and gin,” replied Gretchen simply.

    “Er—‘cheers’ would be misplaced, wouldn’t it, so I won’t say it,” he ventured.

    “Don’t say ‘bottoms up’, either,” said his cousin grimly, coming in from the kitchen and putting her vase of roses on the mantelpiece.

    Gulping a little, he replied gamely: “No, no, wouldn’t dream, dear. Um... Down the hatch.” He knocked back a mouthful and shuddered.

    “We’d just got to the stage,” said Polly amiably, “of remarking that Jemima approves. –Ta, Gretchen,” she said as Gretchen handed her her refilled glass.

   Jill refilled her own and sat down heavily with a sigh. “And of agreeing—I think the ayes had it—that her opinion should be discounted.”

    “Starry-eyed,” he sighed.

    “Starry-eyed and under thirty,” agreed Jill pointedly.

    “Well, what could I do?” he shouted.

    “None of us knows, Joel, but we all feel you should have done something. That’s why we’re all blaming you,” explained Polly.

    “And all on the gin,” agreed Jill.

    “Yes. Well, no. We’re on the gin because it’s happened but we’re more on the gin than we would be if we didn’t feel you could and should have stopped it,” said Polly. She paused. “Have I got that right?” she said confusedly.

    “Yes,” said Jill.

    Gretchen muttered a bit under her breath. “Ja,” she decided.

    “No!” said Joel, pouting.

    “Good, I thought I had,” agreed Polly.

    “Well, who lent them her stupid bach?” he said, pouting.

    “True,” she agreed, drinking gin. “I am not entirely blameless. That’s partly why I’m on the gin.”

    “There vass also someone who vass not going to let them out off her sight,” said Gretchen thoughtfully.

    “Christ, short of chaining myself to Georgy’s wrist, what more could I have done?” groaned Jill. “I think Mac thought I’d gone barmy as it was, turning up to rehearsals at odd moments. Either that or he thought I’d developed a crush on bloody Bottom, he always seemed to be on whenever I turned up.”

    “Ve don’t know vhat more you could haff done, but ve definitely feel you could and should haff done more,” explained Gretchen kindly. “Ja, Polly?”

    “Ja, too right. –My glass is awfully empty.”

    “Just vait, Jill iss about to produce nibbles,” she said firmly.

    “Forgot I’d started those, drat,” said Jill. She wandered out.

    At this point Joel looked warily over at the level in the gin bottle, registered there was another one, empty, next to it, and gulped slightly. He eyed his companions uneasily, unable to think of a safe topic of conversation, but they just drank gin silently, so he followed suit.

    Jill returned from the kitchen. “I’ve put those things under the grill,” she announced. “When there’s a loud pinging noise from the kitchen, it’ll mean the pinger’s gone off.” She sat down and picked up her glass. “Did I drink this?” she asked suspiciously. Nobody replied, and she sighed.

    After quite some time, Polly said cautiously to Joel: “Have they moved in yet?”

    He groaned deeply and covered his face with his hand. Jill groaned deeply and took her glass over to the gin. Gretchen just groaned deeply.

    “I see,” said Polly weakly.

    Joel finished his gin and held out his glass mutely to his cousin. “Yesterday—ta, dear,” he said as she took it—“um, was it only yesterday? God.”

    “Yesterday vas Monday,” said Gretchen helpfully.

    Joel took a deep breath. “Yesterday afternoon after rehearsal, well, actually when poor, deluded Big Mac thought we were still rehearsing, Tom Overdale turned up with a big, strong friend who owns a station-waggon, which is the same as an estate waggon, you see. Whereupon Adam said that that was it for today and walked off the set taking Georgy with him, telling oneself in the most off-hand, nay dismissive way that if one wanted a lift one had better stir the stumps.” He pouted.

    “This iss not the point off the story,” Gretchen explained kindly to Polly.

    “That’s a relief!” she choked.

    “So one panted in their wake,” said Joel, pouting worse, “immured in the station-waggon in question, a nasty vehicle cluttered with sticky teddy bears and old crisp bags and Mars Bars wrappers, and just managed to catch sight of Adam and Georgy in his shiny new hire car disappearing in the general direction of—”

    “Bed,” agreed Polly, nodding.

    “NO!” he bellowed. He stopped, with a surprized look an his face. “Er—yes. But not in the sense you mean, dear,” he added firmly.

    “Go ON,” groaned Jill.

    Quickly Joel explained: “The station-waggon was in order to collect the bed. The double one from Adam’s room. The big strong friend had borrowed a—er—trailer, would it be? For the porpoise.”

    “Yes,” agreed Polly, nodding. “Is that something pinging, or it is just Joel’s porpoise singing?” she asked.

    Jill gave a yelp and shot out to the kitchen.

    “We-ell—” said Joel, with huge significance. He stopped. “Where was I?” he asked plaintively.

    “Wasn’t that It?” said Polly unkindly.

    “Ja, vhat else iss there?” said Gretchen.

    Joel pouted. “I don’t know why I come here, I really don’t!”

    “To drink Jill’s gin, it’s cheaper than buying your own,” said Polly unkindly.

    “Why is she being so beastly to me?” he squeaked.

    “Because she iss blaming you, Joel,” said Gretchen very slowly.

    “Yes,” agreed Polly.

    Joel got up. “I’m going, I’m going!”

    “You’ll miss out on the nibbles,” warned Polly.

    He sat down again. “I’ll stay for them if you’ll let me tell you the rest.”

    “Go on,” they agreed.

    Joel told it. But it only entailed a long moan about how difficult it had been to get the bed up the Blacks’ drive followed by a long moan about how difficult it had been to get it up Mrs Mayhew’s flat’s front steps. So they both told him he needn’t have bothered.

    “What I’m wondering—” said Jill brightly, bringing in a tray of singed things. “These are either angels on horseback or devils on horseback, I can never remember which,” she interrupted herself to explain.

    “Theological thingies on horseback,” decided Polly.

    “Quite. What I’m wondering is, who’s going to do the cooking?”

    “I thought it was going to be you, only I see it isn’t,” said Polly unkindly.

    “Nyergh! She’s blaming you, too!” cried Joel, poking out his tongue at his cousin.

    “Me? It wasn’t me that raced round lending the pair of ’em baches at the drop of a hat!”

    “Nyergh, nyergh, nyergh!” he said rudely to Polly.

    “Well, since we’re all to blame, shall we all have another gin?” said Polly eagerly.

    They all had another gin. Gretchen didn’t feel she was all that much to blame, but she had another anyway, and nobody seemed to notice.

    “Who will cook, though?” said Jill thoughtfully as they all ate singed theological thingies and drank gin.

    “Georgy,” said Joel definitely. “Woman’s rôle. Our Adam is not liberated, dears.”

    “That’s blindingly obvious. On the other hand, Georgy can’t cook.”

    “Elspeth tells me she can make muesli,” reported Polly.

    “But in Elspeth’s terms does making muesli entail more than pouring muesli into a bowl from a packet and adding milk?” asked Gretchen.

    “Um... No. You’re right, it can’t do, because she said it was real muesli, and it was nice but Mirry’s home-made muesli was nicer,” said Polly.

    “Real eqvates with from a packet,” said Gretchen thoughtfully.

    “Naturally,” agreed Polly calmly.

    “So they vill liff on muesli,” she decided.

    “And coffee, Adam can make coffee,” said Joel.

    “There’s always fruit,” said Jill weakly. “And salads.”

    “And The Deli,” agreed Polly.

    “Yes, provided either of them’s ever up here when it’s open,” Jill pointed out.

    “Oh, yes... Well, there are delicatessens in town.”

    “Yes, he’s found one,” agreed Joel.

    There was a short silence.

    “Well, they won’t starve,” decided Polly.

    “True, but let’s hope one is never invited to the wee nest for dinner!” shuddered Joel.

    “EH?” screamed Polly and Jill.

    “VHAT?” bellowed Gretchen.

    Joel shrank into the embrace of his armchair.

    “Potty. Too much gin in too short a space of time,” decided Jill.

    “Lost all normal pervaceous instincts,” Polly summed up.

    “What?” he said weakly, gulping.

    “Pervaceous, isn’t it good? From the verb ‘to perve’,” explained Polly kindly.

    “Um—how would you define it?” he asked weakly.

    “To spy upon from a hidden point of vantage with prurient intentions,” said Jill immediately.

    Joel choked involuntarily.

    “Listen, Thring, if an invitation even looks like being offered,” said Jill heavily, “one will be in there like a shot—get it?”

    “Pervaceous antennae a-quiver,” added Polly.

    “But one’s nerves!” he squeaked.

    “See? Lost ’em, every last instinct,” said Jill, going out with the empty tray.

    By the time Polly’s driver turned up (apparently on his own initiative) and firmly took her car keys off her, what with the gin and the extempore dinner of microwaved chicken, instant mash, salad out of the garden and ice cream with delish tinned peaches, followed by several rounds of Snap, Polly’s choice, and Snakes and Ladders, Joel’s choice, with the later games played going up the snakes and down the ladders, washed down with something exoteek with rum in it that Polly had made  with something she’d found in their pantry, Joel had forgotten why he’d come, which was of course to moan about Adam and Georgy and to hide from Christopher.

    “The thing is,” he explained earnestly to Polly as Bob drove them round to the Blacks’ house in Jake’s Mercedes and it came back to him: “Christopher’s as cross about it as Mrs Harris is, only they’re sort of cross in different directions.”

    Polly and Bob both choked.

    “So they can’t get together about it,” he explained.

    “We got that!” she gasped.

    “Yeah!” gasped Bob.

    “Of course, fundamentally they both think Adam’ll dump her, but that doesn’t mean either of them can come out and say so. Well, she can’t say that to Adam’s father, and he can’t say that—”

    “—to Georgy’s mother!” they gasped.

    “It isn’t funny. I feel like the meat in the sandwich,” he said sulkily.

    “I suppose Melinda’s over the moon about it?” said Polly, as Bob stopped at the top of the Blacks’ drive.

    “Er—well, no, dear, not precisely.”

    “Why not? I thought she was all for it?”

    Joel swallowed. “Er—well, she’s keen, of course, thinks it’s the ideal match—at least she said so in so many words to Christopher. Only...”

    “Well?” they both said.

    “Well, of course she doesn’t want it to happen, and she hasn’t admitted she thinks so, but it’s written all over her that she thinks that he’ll dump Georgy, too!”

    Polly put her hand on his knee. “Joel, for God’s sake come and stay with us for a week or so.”

    “I’d love to, darling. Only do you think the Blacks might be insulted?”

    Bob replied cheerfully: “Nope, relieved, probably dying to get you out of the road so’s they can have a good row about it in peace.”

    “He’s right, you know,” said Polly with a smile in her voice. “Come tomorrow.”

    Joel swallowed. “Sure?”

    “Yes, positive. There’s loads of room, and I’ll tell Nanny and Akiko not to let the kids plague you. Anyway, the boys are at school all day.”

    “In that case, Polly, darling, I accept. Undying gratitude!” he said fervently.

    “I suppose it will all fall apart?” said Polly glumly to her chauffeur as they drove away.

    “Adam McIntyre and little Georgy? Bound to. Soon’s he finds out she won’t run round after ’im like ’is mum does, probably,” he said unkindly.

    “That’s a bit hard,” said Polly weakly.

    “Well, whadda you reckon?”

    “Um... After he finds out she won’t run round after him like his mother does and after blimmin’ Derry Dawlish has looked down his nose at her because she’s not slathered in make-up and can’t drop the flaming theatrical buzz-words of the moment,” admitted Polly.

    “Then you are, then,” he said placidly.

    “Yeah,” Lady Carrano agreed glumly.

    “Not little Georgy from Kowhai Bay?” croaked Dorothy. “Help, I remember when she used to come in and borrow our Enid Blytons.”

    “What a fib,” said Janet amiably.

    By now Ginny Austin was rather pink and anxious-looking, so Janet elaborated kindly: “We have got some Enid Blytons, she reckons getting them to read anything’s better than actively discouraging kids from coming to the library—mind you, we’re the only library in the country that does. –Where was I?”

    “Deep in the uncharted waters of Enid Blyton territory,” said Dorothy drily.

    The red-headed twin giggled, but looked at them nervously.

    “I think you were about to explain to our student assistant-cum-Midsummer Night’s Madness spy, here, that although we haven’t actually known Georgy Harris since her cradle, we do know the Georgy Harris she means,” prompted Dorothy.

    “Um—yes,” said Janet weakly.

    “And find the whole saga incredible, the more so since he appeared to be very chummy indeed with Livia Wentworth at that ghastly garden party of your cousin’s last week,” added Dorothy to Ginny. “Or was that all for the cameras?”

    “Um—yes, I think it probably would have been, she always sort of—um... goes all gooey and um—sort of puts her arm round him and—and things,” said Ginny weakly, “when the photographers are around.”

    “What things?” asked Dorothy simply.

    Blushing, the longer-haired fairy twin replied: “Um—well, she giggles and all that: you know.”

    “Ah. Forests of fluttering mascara-ed mink,” said Dorothy thoughtfully.

    “Yes!” agreed Ginny on a gasp. “Heck, is that what they’re made of?”

    “So me spies down Puriri Pharmacy inform me, yeah,” said Dorothy drily.

    “Only the expensive ones, of course. It’s the fine ends on the mink hairs: they make them appear more realistic,” said Janet complacently.

    They goggled at her.

    ‘I read it in a magazine,” she explained simply.

    Visibly giving her Deputy up as a bad job, Dorothy said keenly to their student helper-cum-spy: “Well, where is this cohabitation taking place?”

    “I thought I said,” said Ginny weakly. “Um, Willow Grove: he’s rented one of the flats.”

    “I thought that dump was barely habitable yet.”

    “Um—no. I mean, most of it’s done, now. Well, all the outsides are done, and the drive’s all concreted. Um, I think Jake offered all the men big bonuses to get it finished by New Year’s, or something. A lot of the insides aren’t done, though.”

    “Which unit is it, Ginny?” asked Janet.

    “I’m not sure. Vicki knows, she did tell me, but I’ve forgotten. Near the top, I think.”

    “Aw, gee,” said Dorothy in deep disappointment. “Now we won’t know which one to train the binoculars on.”

    “Is it serious?” demanded Janet abruptly.

    The twin had turned a glowing pink. “I don’t know!” she gasped.

    Janet’s face fell but she rallied to ask keenly: “Well, what does your twin think?”—it having now dawned on her superiors at the Puriri County Library that Ginny, though brighter, lacked her sister’s sturdy common sense.

    Poor Ginny went pinker. “Um—” She swallowed.

    “Too much sense to take glamorous film stars from Overseas seriously,” diagnosed Dorothy. “Unlike one, G. Harris, it would appear.”

    “Yes!” gulped Ginny. “Georgy’s awfully nice, too... Oh, well.”

    “Don’t you like him?” asked Janet curiously.

    Ginny’s flush didn’t abate but she said: “Um—I just think he’s the sort of person that—that doesn’t care very much about other people’s feelings, he’s only interested in—in what he wants. Um—the sort of person that’s kind to people he likes or that interest him, but doesn’t bother about everybody else.” She swallowed and looked timidly up at Dorothy.

    Dorothy looked down at her kindly from her bony height, not to mention about another thirty years’ experience of life, and said drily: “Got it in one, I’d say.”

    Janet was now looking rather stunned. After a moment she said: “Oh, dear: poor little Georgy.”

    “And so say all of us,” agreed Dorothy on a grim note. “Er—did someone say they’d help with the Overdues this morning?” she added timidly.

    “I’m just going,” said Janet with a sigh. “You can help, Ginny, you can put them in the envelopes after I’ve folded them.”

    Dorothy went off to her office and sat down heavily at her desk, sighing. There were actually two—no, three good points about this Midsummer Nightmare, she decided. Point One was that she herself wasn’t in her twenties and silly with it any more—well, that was a general good point but it applied specifically in this instance. And Two was, of course, that she wasn’t Georgy Harris’s mother—poor Mrs Harris, thought Dorothy grimly. And Three, take it for all in all, really was a silver lining: it was that at least their part-time junior shelver had not fallen for Adam McIntyre with mad pash. Because having one of Them gasping and groaning all over the library would have been The Last Straw. And that reminded her—

    Dorothy got up, went through the workroom and out to the library. Sure enough, down at the Overdues counter Ginny’s red-gold head was surrounded by a group of goggling, gasping—

    Dorothy went over to them. “Oy. W,O,R,K.”

    Her staff scarpered back to their appointed tasks, pronto.

    Georgy blew her nose. “It wasn’t supposed to happen this week,” she said soggily.

    “No-o...” Adam frowned dubiously and did arithmetic on his fingers. The week before their trip to the bach—had she said it had ended that Thursday?—something like that; then the week at the bach, then last week, then this week, and today was Friday... “Never mind, darling,” he said weakly. “I suppose it might have started a bit early because your poor little innards are all a bit upset. What with the change in your lifestyle, and—er—me making emotional demands on you—not to say physical demands!” He made one of his best rueful faces.

    This fell extremely flat, Georgy glanced at it but didn’t appear to register it. Instead she looked at the sheets again and blew her nose again and said soggily: “I’ve got blood on the sheets.”

    “Darling, sheets will wash,” said Adam weakly. “At least they’re not Mrs Mayhew’s sheets!” He twinkled at her.

    “No,” said Georgy soggily, blowing her nose again and not smiling.

    Adam was seized by a strong desire to scream. Or possibly laugh hysterically. No—both. He swallowed hard and said on a firmer note: “Couldn’t you use one of those enzyme washing powders? –Livia was in a commercial for one of those, once,” he added vaguely. “In a frilly apron with huge pink fingernails, I seem to remember. Very verisimilitudinous.”

    Georgy didn’t react to this. She sniffed juicily and said: “I’m allergic to them.”

    “Oh.”

    There was a short silence.

    “Well, surely the problem must have arisen when you lived at home?” he said weakly.

    “Yes,” said Georgy, going very red.

    “Well?” said Adam, trying not to say it through his teeth, as it appeared she wasn’t about to elaborate.

    “Mum always uses some bleach stuff. Only it ruins good sheets like these. I mean, ours are mostly white,” said Georgy glumly, looking at the smart dull-rose sheets which Adam had bought for their double bed at huge expense at Eve’s in Puriri. Georgy had once bought her mother a set of small blue towel, blue facecloth and blue bubble-bath, all packaged up together and ornamented with a blue bow and a blue silk rose, from Eve’s, so she was aware that it sold the most expensive household linens in Puriri County, and she would readily have believed they were also the most expensive in the country.

    True, Melinda had forced several pairs of her sheets on him, but Adam had said they swore at Mrs Mayhew’s pale green bedroom carpet and pale green and pale rose floral Sanderson linen bedroom curtains, and had refused to use them after the first couple of nights. He had also bought them a duvet cover in tones of pale green, dark green, and dull-rose at Eve’s. Ignoring Georgy’s protestations that there was nothing wrong with the navy, pale blue and lemon one that Melinda had forced on him.

    Adam sighed.

    Silence fell in Mrs Mayhew’s green and rose master bedroom, apart from the noise of another resident of Willow Grove departing early for work in his Porsche and some squawking from a few birds in some scraggy and unattractive trees that Carrano Development had considerately left standing just behind the bare clay enclosure that presumably would one day be Mrs Mayhew’s back garden.

    Georgy, still with her damp handkerchief clutched to her nose, went on staring glumly at the bloody sheets. Adam stared glumly from Georgy to Mrs Mayhew’s Sanderson linen drapes and back again. Was this sort of scene going to happen every four weeks? Because barring preggy, she was sure as Hell going to menstruate every four weeks for the next twenty-five years or so.

    Eventually he took a deep breath and said with what he himself considered supreme patience: “Perhaps if you soak them in the enzyme stuff first and then—er—wash it out. With—er—hot water or something.”

    “Ye-es... And ordinary soap powder. I suppose that might work,” said Georgy without enthusiasm. She blew her nose again.

    Abruptly Adam got out of bed. “I’ll ring Ma and ask—”

    “NO!” she screamed.

    Adam’s jaw dropped. He took another deep breath. “Look, darling, every woman gets it, you’re hardly unique, you know!”

    Georgy was already very red but at this she looked very angry and wrenched the top sheet up to her chin and hugged it to her, glaring at him.

    “For God’s sake!” he said.

    Georgy glared sulkily.

    “Well, unless you’ve got a better suggestion, I’m ringing her,” he said.

    “Enzymes are proteinases, they eat me!” she cried angrily. “I’ll be itching for weeks, if you think I’ll feel like making love when I’m all itchy and raw, well, I won’t, see!”

    Adam had got as far as the door. “Good grief, you mean this washing-powder stuff gives you an itchy cunt?” he said.

    “Yes,” said Georgy sulkily, glaring at the pale green carpet.

    “Well, why in God’s name didn’t you say so?” he said.

    Georgy glared sulkily at the carpet.

    “I’ll tell Ma, see what she thinks,” he decided.

    “NO!” screamed Georgy.

    Too late, Adam had gone out to the phone.

    “You’re a MEAN PIG!” screamed Georgy furiously.

    Too late, Adam was ringing Melinda.

    ... “Soak ’em in cold water now,” he said with a grin, coming back from the phone, “shoot into Puriri and buy either some enzyme powder or some baby’s nappy soaker, soak ’em in that according to the instructions, rinse it out, wash ’em in hot water, hang ’em out on the line in the sun and wind.”

    Georgy blew her nose. “There isn’t a line,” she said sulkily.

    Adam sighed. “Then use the drier,” he said wearily.

    “Mm.” She didn’t move.

    “Come on, Georgy, hop up and I’ll dump them in the washing-machine to soak,” he said.

    Georgy swallowed.

    “Now what’s the matter?” he sighed.

    “Um—well,” she said, suddenly very loud and defiant: “if you want to know, I haven’t got any tampons, because it wasn’t supposed to start till next week!” She glared at him.

    “Oh. Uh—use a little folded towel or something, darling, there must be something you could use.”

    The little towels—Georgy had been unable to see why he’d apparently needed so many—had all been acquired at Eve’s and, given that Mrs Mayhew’s bathroom was very pale pink, were either pale pink or dull-rose—Eve’s had had some lovely dull-rose towel sets and to Georgy’s tremendous embarrassment Adam had bought them all. There hadn’t been enough of the little towels in these sets so he had bought some pale pink ones. Georgy had since discovered that he used the little ones to wipe his chin on after shaving with his safety razor, and that he only used them once and then threw them in the Ali Baba basket which he’d bought at Forrest’s in Puriri. Since he shaved twice a day it was just as well that Mrs Mayhew’s townhouse contained a large automatic washing machine.

    “Ye-es... I don’t want to ruin one of your towels, Adam.”

    “They’re our towels, for us to use or ruin or chuck out, whatever takes your fancy, darling.”

    “Ye-es...” Georgy looked at him timidly.

    Adam racked his brains. Finally he said weakly: “I’ll pop in to Puriri to the chemist’s for you after breakfast, shall I?”

    She turned puce and said hoarsely: “Thanks.” She glared at the carpet. “Um—you don’t have to go to the chemist’s, the supermarket’s got them,” she added hoarsely.

    He swallowed a sigh. “I am pretty hopeless, I do admit, but I’m capable of walking into a chemist’s and asking for a packet of Tampax.” She was silent. “Do you mean you’re not?” he said weakly.

    “No,” admitted Georgy.

    Adam might have said something, only he noticed her knuckles had whitened where she was clutching the sheet and suddenly found there was a lump in his throat. He went and sat down beside her and put a hand over the knuckles and said gently: “It’s all right, I’ll take care of it.”

    “Thanks,” said Georgy hoarsely, swallowing. “I’m sorry.”

    Adam sighed a little and put his arm round her and leaned his cheek gently on the auburn head. “Do you use Tampax, or some other brand?” He hesitated. “You’ll have to tell me, I don’t know anything about New Zealand brands of tampons.”

    “Yes, Tampax,” said Georgy gruffly. She paused. “Not regular, super,” she said gruffly.

    “Mm. Safer,” said Adam simply, tightening his arm on her. “I’ll get a big box.”

    “They’re very expensive here,” said Georgy in a tiny voice. “Um, I don’t know how much they are in England, but I bet they’re more here.”

    “Almost everything is. Except everyday foodstuffs, I think.” Adam got up. “I’ll fetch you a little towel, sweetheart. And a pair of knickers.”

    “Thanks,” said Georgy gruffly.

    Having provided her with these necessaries, and watched—not exactly unbelievingly, more sort of dully—as she exited into the ensuite clutching them, Adam sat down on the bed, and sighed heavily. Then he looked dubiously at the bed. Then he stood up with a resigned look on his face, and swathed his form in his navy silk dressing-gown. He had several light-weight dressing-gowns but this was the most conservative one and he was using it—though he hadn’t quite admitted this to himself—in order not to shock Georgy’s sensibilities. Because one of the others was cerulean blue silk with a big gold dragon embroidered down its back, one was a shorty white silk thing that wasn’t quite polite when he bent over, and the other, which he’d bought in a moment of desperate boredom in an airport boutique somewhere in the middle of America—to the accompaniment of Joel’s screams of jealousy, as it was far too big for him, not to say beyond his budget—was white cotton with a black and red pattern of spurred cowboy boots and whips all over it. And an embroidered breast pocket that said proudly: “Stud” in flowing red script.

    Then he hauled the bloody sheets off the bed, and went downstairs into the huge concrete space that was designed to be divisible into a double garage and games room, and thence into the small laundry that opened off it. Fully lined in pale blue, with a floor of navy tiles: it was really a very attractive little laundry. He inspected the huge washing-machine’s controls carefully and finally, sighing heavily, set it to cold, dumped the sheets in and turned it on. Then, as there appeared to be no way to halt the thing in the middle of its cycle except by hand, he leaned on it while it filled, gazing out of the small window at the view of the concrete wall enclosing Mrs Mayhew’s rear clay yard.

    As he thus gazed, the tall white door in the concrete wall opened—Adam knew it wasn’t possible to open it unless you had a key to its padlock, so he goggled—and a tall, solid woman with a short, untidy shock of very deep auburn hair appeared. After a moment’s dazed staring Adam decided it was a natural auburn—a lovely colour, somewhat deeper than Georgy’s—as she didn’t look at all the sort of woman who would tint her hair. To substantiate this opinion she was wearing a washed-out once-black tee-shirt and filthy and very ancient jeans.

    Adam glanced at the machine, ascertained it hadn’t nearly filled yet, and went out uncertainly and opened the back door.

    “Hullo,” he said neutrally to the woman, who was just standing there in the clay enclosure—with the sun full on her head, it was magnificent hair, what a pity she just wore it hacked off like that at chin level—gazing about her at the clay.

    “Hullo,” she said.

    Then there was a pause.

    “Are you Mr Mayhew?” she said.

    Adam swallowed. “No,” he said faintly. “Er—I believe he’s dead,” he added, rallying very slightly.

    “Yes, I think that’s what Mr Pritchard said,” she agreed uncertainly.

    Another pause.

    “I gather you can’t be Mrs Mayhew, then?” said Adam politely.

    “No, I’m Michaela Daniels,” she said.

    “I see,” said Adam politely.

    There was another pause but during it Ms Daniels produced a folded khaki something from her back jeans pocket, unfolded it and—horror—covered the magnificent auburn mop with it.

    “Well, who are you?” she said finally.

    “Adam McIntyre,” replied Adam, now definitely trailing his coat.

    “I thought Mrs Mayhew was overseas?” she said.

    “Mm, so I gather.”

    There was another pause but during it a determined expression appeared on Ms Daniel’s squarish and not unattractive, if entirely unmade-up face. Then she put her hands firmly on her solid hips and, setting her legs apart as of one ready for combat—and Adam had no doubt she was, she was a well-muscled woman—said: “Well, what are you doing here, then?”

    “I’m renting the place while Mrs Mayhew’s overseas. Ask Mr Pritchard, if you don’t believe me.”

    Her eyes narrowed. “I mentioned Mr Pritchard,” she pointed out.

    Adam’s lips twitched. “Mm.” However, he gestured at his dressing-gown (wishing very much it was the “Stud” one) and said: “Does this look like burglar’s garb to you? Or does it,” he added, glancing over his shoulder as the rushing noise of water filling the machine suddenly ceased, there was a loud click and then a rumbling noise, “more nearly resemble the garb of a humble tenant who’s just put some sheets in the washing-machine?”

    She stared at him thoughtfully, eyes narrowed.

     Adam was just about to scream, or something equally desperate, he had a feeling that this could go on all day, when another woman appeared in the back gateway, rear end first, tugging something. She straightened, turned, and said: “Oh, hullo.” She pushed a wisp of black hair off her forehead with a grimy hand and smiled at him shyly.

    He goggled at her. She was a dead ringer for the young Irene Papas in Elektra, except that this girl’s hair was in a long, thick black plait, which at the moment hung over one shoulder of her faded pale blue tee-shirt.

    “Er—hullo,” he said faintly. “Do you think you could convince your friend, here, that I’m a harmless tenant? At the moment she apparently suspects me of evil intentions towards Mrs Mayhew’s fake Chippendale bidet.”

    Grinning, the Greek girl said to her friend: “You remember, Michaela, this is the flat that Mr Pritchard said he was going to let. Ginny and Vicki wanted to rent it only it was too expensive.”

    “Oh—yes,” she admitted.

    “You must be the Austin twins’ friend, then?” said Adam, smiling at the Greek girl. “Vicki mentioned you were helping with the landscaping.”

    “Yes. And the housework. Do you need anyone to do housework?” she asked hopefully.

    “Yes, we do, actually. I think you’d better come in,” decided Adam. “We’ll have to convince Georgy that you’re necessary and that I can afford you, you see,” he explained with his nicest smile.

    “I get it!” She came over to him, blushed a bit, wiped her hand down her jeans, held it out and said gruffly: “I’m Roberta Nicholls.”

    “Good God, of course! Ariadne’s daughter!” he said with a laugh. “You’re very like her,” he explained, shaking hands.

    “Ugh,” she said simply, grinning”

    Suddenly her auburn-haired, khaki-hatted friend objected: “No, she isn’t very. The general shape of their skulls is the same but the planes of their faces are different, especially round the eyes.”

    “Their mouths are identical, however,” said Adam politely. “I’m Adam McIntyre,” he added to Roberta Nicholls.

    “I know,” she said, turning scarlet.

    “Sorry. Your friend didn’t,” he explained meekly.

    “She’s a potter,” said Roberta simply.

    Adam swallowed. “Oh, Lor’, I didn’t make the connection. I think you must be the cousin Vicki mentioned, then?” he said to the auburn-haired, khaki-hatted potter, holding out his hand.

    “Yes.” She wiped her hand down her jeans and grasped his.

    “Gently!” cried Roberta as Adam winced.

    “Sorry,” said the potter, not looking sorry at all, and releasing him.

    “Her hands are terrifically strong,” explained Roberta.

    “I noticed!” he gasped. “Um—well, look, I was just going to make coffee: why don’t you both come in, and we’ll have a cup, and talk Georgy into agreeing to have you do some housework for us, Roberta. –And before you say anything,” he added to the potter with a smile, “it’ll take all three of us, believe you me.”

    “Yes, I know that syndrome,” agreed Roberta Nicholls. “Some people maintain it’s closely connected to the Protestant Work Ethic and actually, if I bothered to think about it, I’d probably be one of them.”

    Smiling very much, Adam led them inside. “Excuse me a moment, I just have to stop the washing-machine.”

    “Why?” asked Roberta.

    “The sheets have to soak, they’re all bloody.”

    “I get it,” she said calmly.

    Adam halted the washing-machine in its stride and led the way upstairs. At the top of the stairs the potter paused and politely removed her Wellingtons.

    He showed them into the kitchen and went in search of Georgy.

    “There were two ladies in our back garden,” she said.

    “Yes. A potter and a potter’s mate,” said Adam meanly.

    Georgy stared at him.

    Smiling, he explained: “They’re the people Vicki mentioned, darling: they’ve come to do the garden. Vicki’s cousin, she’s the potter, and the other one’s a friend. Greek,” he ended on a weak note.

    “Oh. Um—but there isn’t any garden.”

    “No. I think the potter intends to dump five hundredweight of topsoil and a mountain of decorative rocks on it with her own meaty paws,” he said, inspecting his mangled hand. “Not to mention the odd mature pine tree, she’d be more than capable of hauling a few of them up the drive.”

    “It’s awfully steep,” said Georgy uncertainly.

    “Quite. Did you have a shower, darling?” he added with a smile, looking at the horrible housecoat with the murky green cabbages on it in which Georgy’s slim form was now huddled. She nodded and he said: “Good. Well, come on out to the kitchen and talk to the gardening girls while I make us all some coffee. Roberta—that’s the Greek one—has offered to do housework for us, and I think we ought to let her, don’t you? Given that Vicki told us she’s a student.”

    “Um—ye-es...”

    “I’m sure she needs the money,” said Adam firmly.

    “Mm-m...”

    Adam put his arm round her and led her out firmly.

    The gardening girls had had their coffee, Roberta drinking it black with sugar and not commenting on its strength, which considering her heritage, was only to be expected, but Michaela, like Georgy, having to have it with milk, the heating of which in a little pot, again like Georgy, she apparently considered tremendously up-market. Then they’d gone outside to get on with it. Adam had taken another look at Georgy’s face, which in spite of the warm sugared coffee was about the shade of her horrible housecoat, and had made her go back to bed.

    He’d had a quick shower and driven into Puriri. Since on his return he found Georgy in her housecoat curled up under the duvet clutching her tummy, he made her a cup of the herb tea the sympathetic chemist had forced on him, gave her a couple of the Panadol tablets the sympathetic chemist had forced on him, and insisted she wear, instead of the tampons he’d bought, one of the pads the sympathetic chemist had also forced on him. Purveying as he insisted the sympathetic chemist’s comments on the unwisdom of tampons when one’s poor wee innards were all inflamed.

    Having forbidden Georgy on pain of death to get up until she felt better, he departed for rehearsals, forbidding her categorically to show her nose in at the university for the entire day, never mind if she felt better in the afternoon. Downstairs he told the sympathetic gardening girls all about it, reflecting that this would no doubt embarrass Georgy just as horribly as his telling the sympathetic chemist had. Roberta immediately offered to finish off the sheets, so Adam accepted the offer. Roberta then offered to keep Georgy in bed if she showed signs of getting up, and Adam accepted this offer, too. He then definitively departed for rehearsals in his hired Laser (whatever that was), humming.

    Roberta and Michaela shovelled topsoil and lugged rocks energetically for some time. Roberta inspected Georgy once or twice but found she was asleep. She then finished off the sheets while Michaela went and got started on someone else’s back clay enclosure.

    She looked in on Georgy again at approximately lunchtime, found her awake, and forced another cup of herb tea on her, remarking that it was a good thing Adam had chosen the Puriri Pharmacy and not Poltergeist’s. Georgy choked and agreed that Mr Potter, the other chemist, was a bit like that, wasn’t he, and Roberta said too right, only his brother was worse, he was her and Michaela’s landlord—well, actually his brother’s wife was even worse. They then agreed that old Mr and Mrs Potter were, however, okay—it was doubtful if the staff of Puriri County Library would have entirely agreed with this sentiment, old Mrs Potter having set off the alarm again last Monday morning as ever was—after which Roberta ascertained that Georgy didn’t really feel hungry, promised to return on the morrow to start her regular housework for them, and departed, whistling.

    Georgy collapsed against her pillows, feeling dazed, not realizing that she was not the only person in the world on whom Ariadne and Keith Nicholls’s robust offspring had that effect.

    After quite some time, during which she obediently drank up her herb tea, though it was horrible, she realized that she really felt quite a lot better: still a little bit sick and crampy, but the headache had gone. So she got up and, as it seemed ages since she’d washed her hair, and as she didn’t dare to disobey Adam’s direct orders, decided that instead of trying to get into town to rehearsal, she’d wash her hair.

    So she washed her hair and changed into jeans and a blouse and then, just as she would have at her mother’s, went out to the front steps, on which the noonday sun was now shining, and sat on them to dry it. Not realizing that this was probably not the done thing at up-market Willow Grove. Nor that the puce-suited lady who was stationed in the bottom flat on their side during daylight hours in order to show prospective clients round and generally nobble prospective clients, had caught sight of her and was only refraining from Mentioning it to her because she was Adam McIntyre’s girlfriend.

    The sun shone, the cicadas chirped on the hillside behind the flats, and even on the very walls of Willow Grove, they were no respecters of trendy yuppiedom either, and Georgy tipped her auburn mass of drying curls down over her knees and went into a warm and happy daze in its shelter, not thinking at all…

    “Lovely day!” called a pleasant tenor voice.

    Georgy flung back a great froth of curls, sat up and smiled innocently. “Yes, isn’t it?” she agreed.

    Encouraged, the medical gentleman from the top flats came closer. “Beautiful,” he said with a smile, looking at the curls.

    The innocent Georgy didn’t recognize, as more sophisticated ladies immediately did in Sir Ralph Overdale’s presence, that this was a wolf in wolf’s clothing. She merely registered that the man was quite old (Sir Ralph was in his early fifties), slightly bald (most of Sir Ralph’s ladies considered this added to his sexual appeal and told him so), slightly fat (the slight embonpoint of the best food over the best sort of regular exercise in pools, down snowy mountain slopes and on the golf course, but Georgy didn’t recognize that, of course), and that he had on a business suit.

    “Have you come home for lunch?” she said kindly.

    Sir Ralph refrained from immediately offering her a horizontal one, but it was a real effort. He conceded that he had and revealed that in fact he’d packed it in for the day, he’d been operating since six o’clock “Slight emergency,” he explained, grimacing.

    “Six o’clock? It must have been!” gasped Georgy.

    He shrugged and mentioned casually whose the slight emergency had been but this didn’t register with Georgy. Sir Ralph was not the sort of man to let this sort of hiccup put him off his stroke. He came closer and said: “I don’t suppose you’ve seen a couple of macho female gardeners about these parts this morning, have you?”

    “Ye-es... Michaela and Roberta?”—He nodded, looking rather surprized.—“Yes, they were here this morning, I mean, they did our garden—I mean, Mrs Mayhew’s! The back garden!” gasped Georgy.

    This speech pretty well gave Sir Ralph the measure of Adam McIntyre’s girlfriend. His narrow lips twitched and he came right up to her steps and said: “I see. Are they still around? The master potter said she’d give me an estimate for my garden.”

    “It’s quite big, isn’t it?” she replied politely.

    Sir Ralph agreed to this proposition, resisting the urge to ease his crotch as he did so. Lucky bloody McIntyre, he thought on a glum note—his own love life at the moment was somewhat in abeyance.

    “I’m afraid they’ve gone; when Roberta made me a cup of herb tea,” said Georgy, blushing, “she said they had another job in Puriri that they had to do before lunch.”

    “Damn. Look, I don’t suppose I could come and have a peep at what they’ve done out there, could I?” he said, smiling nicely.

    Georgy registered the gold filling and blinked a bit, but said: “Yes, if you like. Um—come through this way, I don’t know how to open that,” she said, glancing at the garage door.

    Sir Ralph didn’t object, in fact he came up the long flight of steps to Mrs Mayhew’s front door on the first storey with what other, more experienced females would have recognized was definite eagerness.

    “My God,” he said in shaken tones when they were inside. As did his own flat, Mrs Mayhew’s sported a rudimentary entrance lobby off which the sitting-room opened. There all resemblance to his own dwelling ended. As the sitting-room door was open he had an excellent view of the pastel floral Axminster. Not that he needed it: the cabbage roses all over the walls of the rudimentary lobby and tiny hall beyond it were more than enough warning. Not to mention the tiny semi-circular piecrust table that supported the phone.

    “Yes, it’s all like that. Fortunately most of Mrs Mayhew’s furniture’s in storage,” said Georgy.

    Sir Ralph leaned in the doorway of the sitting-room, goggling at the velvet suite. “That furnishing velvet costs the earth: why would anyone spend that sort of money on that sort of abortion?” he whispered.

    “That’s more or less what Adam said,” agreed Georgy, smiling.

    “Note how that shade of—er—mauvey-pink falls precisely midway between the pink and the lilac of the curtains,” he croaked.

    “Yes, doesn’t it?” agreed Georgy pleasedly. “What about the carpet?”

    Sir Ralph winced and shut his eyes.

    “Adam says that none of the shades in it exactly match anything in the curtains. Or the suite, of course.”

    “I noticed that,” he whispered.

    Giggling, Georgy said: “There’s a pie-crust coffee table, have you noticed?”

    Sir Ralph opened his eyes eagerly. “Ooh, where?” he squeaked. He sounded very like Joel and the innocent Georgy thought that perhaps he was gay. She pointed it out and Ralph went into the sitting-room—without being invited, he was sure this wouldn’t strike her, and indeed, it didn’t—and duly shuddered over it. Then he caught sight of the picture on the opposite wall, and gasped.

    “I said we ought to take it down, but Adam says it gives the place the finishing touch,” she said serenely.

    “Real oils, I suppose?” he whispered.

    “Yes.”

    “The blue in the bows round their necks,” said Sir Ralph faintly, “clashes with every single”—he paused—“yes, every single shade in this room!”

    “Yes.”

    Sir Ralph had a helpless choking fit. Georgy giggled pleasedly. He was not so far gone that he failed to notice this. Nor did he fail to notice that his first impression had been correct and that she wasn’t wearing a bra under that darling little peachy blouse.

    “Are they Sealyhams?” he then said faintly.

    “Yes, that’s it!” cried Georgy, “We couldn’t think what they were! I knew they weren’t white Scottie dogs, or Pomeranians, I know a lady that’s got a Pom, and Adam kept saying they made him think of dowager duchesses—yes, of course! Sealyhams!”

    Grinning, Sir Ralph then said: “I think that rates an introduction, don’t you? I’m Ralph Overdale.”

    “You’re Tom’s brother, aren’t you? You look a bit like him,” replied Georgy, shaking his hand and smiling into his eyes. “I’m Georgy Harris. Jemima and Tom said you had one of the top flats.”

    “Yes, the far one,” he agreed. “It has the best view of the valley.”

    “Mm-mm... I like it the other way, too,” murmured Georgy.

    Sir Ralph valiantly ignored the fact that you could take that two ways, too. “I’m not into Woollaston, myself,” he admitted with a twinkle.

    “Ooh!” cried Georgy. “That’s exactly what I think! –I like him, that’s why I was glad Adam chose this flat,” she explained shyly.

    “I see,” replied the experienced Sir Ralph, smiling, and seeing a lot more than she imagined. “Do you think you could lead me very gently out of this—er—sea of pas-tel”—he put the accent on the second syllable and Georgy reconfirmed her muddled impression that he was a bit like Joel—“and show me the garden, Georgy? Or is it already full of garden gnomes?”

    “Not yet!” she said with a giggle. “Mrs Mayhew’s commissioned a bird bath and a fish pond, though. And she’s got Michaela and Roberta looking for a statue of a Cupid.”

    Ralph Overdale choked.

    “Only they haven’t found one yet that’s putrid enough, at least that’s what Roberta said,” she said with a smile, leading him out. “You have to go down this horrid little spiral staircase to get to the back door, is your flat like this?”

     He agreed it was, and followed her sedately.

    ... “Ooh, this is lovely!” gasped Georgy, about ten minutes later.

    The artful Sir Ralph had offered her a sandwich and a cuppa at his place, with the added inducement of his Persian rugs and his rock collection—his sister-in-law, Jemima, liked his rock collection, so it was a pretty safe bet—as an antidote to what by now Georgy had confided Adam called Conservative Horrible. Sir Ralph had silently decided to adopt that: it was a good one.

    He looked round at his white walls—a mixture of roughcast and hessian, but all painted white; his golden parquet flooring—kauri and even though recycled kauri, immensely expensive; and his Persian rugs, both on the floor and on the walls, and, smirking a little, murmured he was glad Georgy thought so. And did Georgy approve of his rock collection’s cabinet, it was a corner thing, old office furniture, and possibly the mahogany was a mistake— Georgy thought it was lovely, she loved a mixture of antiques with plain, modern things, she explained.

    Smirking even more, Sir Ralph then gave her a complete tour of the flat, not realizing that Georgy’s silence at the sight of his enormous king-size bed with its custom-made recycled-kauri headboard was a dazed silence rather than an admiring silence, or that Georgy thought that having your bedroom floor completely covered in white flokati rugs was sybaritic to the point of yuck. Or, indeed, that Georgy’s untutored eye did not appreciate (a) that the eiderdown of a million tiny puffed squares in a myriad shades of deep crimson, faded orange and navy was handsewn, a unique design, and perfectly toned with the one glowing rug on the wall above the bedhead; (b) that this rug, though small, was very, very old and very, very, very valuable, or (c) that the small objet on the wall facing the bed was an ikon and worth more than the rest of the contents of the flat put together, except for the afore-mentioned rug. Nor did the large gilded animal with a baleful look in its eye that stood under the windows to the right of the bed as you faced it impress Georgy as antique, Oriental, and valuable: she would much rather have had a real member of the cat family—smaller, cuddlier and definitely without a crooked face.

    Finally Georgy said politely that the bedroom was beautiful and Sir Ralph smirked, and showed her the ensuite, apologising profusely for its pale green Aakronite and explaining it had been put in before he laid eyes on the place. Did she know Polly Carrano? Georgy blinked, and admitted she did. Ah, then if she knew that darling cream downstairs bathroom of Polly’s—? After a bit of brow-furrowing Georgy thought she did, it had had a big bunch of cream roses in a marble vase in it the time she had dinner there, was that the one? Sir Ralph agreed it must have been, murmured that the vases in there were alabaster, and suggested that, really, cream marble with a nice big old-fashioned basin like that one of Polly’s was much more to his taste. Georgy agreed rather limply to this.

    He then led her out to his kitchen, which was just like Mrs Mayhew’s, not Conservative Horrible or—or Terrifying Taste, which was what Georgy had now decided Sir Ralph’s décor was, but just knotty-pine cupboards and drawers, with dear little round wooden handles on everything. The only difference was that his had a white bench where Mrs Mayhew’s had a stainless steel one, and he had a black ceramic stove top, eye-level oven and microwave where Mrs Mayhew’s were white. She didn’t notice that Sir Ralph had dark slate tiles on his kitchen floor where Mrs Mayhew had “Spanish”-tile-patterned vinyl.

    He offered her either pâté or smoked salmon sandwiches and Georgy admitted she didn’t feel fishy. The experienced Sir Ralph then took a second look at the complexion, noted the small spot by the nose and suggested avocado sandwiches, very plain, just a sprinkling of pepper, instead? And a mineral water?

    Georgy having acceded to this menu with visible relief, he rapidly prepared the repast. He often sat by the front windows to eat, would she like that? Georgy agreed, so they went through to the parqueted living-room and Sir Ralph pulled up a brass and glass coffee table of Spartan design and they ate there, looking out at a view of the Maureen Mitchell Memorial Reserve and beyond it the blueish hills that bounded the valley and, much closer, a good deal of Willow Grove. –Ralph Overdale was an inveterate gossip and an inveterate busybody as well as a man of exquisite taste and the situation of his unit suited him to a T and was, indeed, one of the main reasons he’d chosen it.

    Georgy’s cheeks looked a lot pinker when she’d finished eating—not only because, as he himself was the first to acknowledge, Sir Ralph could be an amusing and witty companion. He could also tell some of the filthiest stories known since the dawn of history, but naturally he didn’t do so to Georgy. He offered her a brandy and when she blushed and refused murmured that it relaxed the abdominal muscles, excuse him for mentioning it, but medicine was his profession.

    “Oh! Yes, I know!” gasped Georgy, all adorable confusion. Or so Sir Ralph found it, being the right age, the right sex and of the right predisposition to do so.

    He went right on twinkling at her and said: “Just a wee one? Doctor’s orders, an’ all?”

    “It won’t make me feel sick, will it?”

    “On the contrary. I’d prescribe a small one, followed by a nice lie-down. Then you’ll feel much better by the time your boyfriend comes home,” he said, still twinkling and not bothering to point out that actually he was a surgeon.

    “Yes—all right, then,” said Georgy, pinker than ever. “Thank you.”

    Ralph provided the brandy and most reluctantly sent her on her way. He stood in his front doorway and watched her cross the top of the drive and go up Mrs Mayhew’s front steps. That bum was adorable in those jeans, and Sir Ralph was totally indifferent to the fact that the pad she was wearing showed quite clearly under the jeans, or, rather, felt it added interest—he was a man who thoroughly enjoyed all aspects of the female body. And thought cynically as he watched her (a) that if McIntyre left her flat, as his brother Tom was predicting, he’d be in there like a shot, and (b) that he’d bet every cent he owned, not excluding the rug and the ikon, that she hadn’t registered for a single, fleeting, split second the bulge in his own expensively tailored silk trou.

    “Where in God’s name were you this afternoon?” demanded Adam aggrievedly as Georgy opened the front door to him.

    “Um... Here. Well, part of the time I was over at Ralph Overdale’s flat: that’s his, that far one at the top.”

    “What?” gasped Adam.

    “Yes: I told him you called Mrs Mayhew’s flat’s décor ‘Conservative Horrible,’ and he loved it!” revealed Georgy, beaming. “And you should see his flat, Adam! It’s all sort of white and modern, only with lots of antiques and things, all incredibly expensive-looking, and in the bedroom he’s got this huge sort of brass tiger thing that stands under the windows and sort of leers at you, and Persian rugs on the walls and things, and you know what? I think the name for his style’s Terrifying Taste!”

    “Terri— Yes,” Said Adam numbly. He swallowed. “Did you say Overdale?”

    “Yes: Tom’s brother,” said Georgy, nodding. “He’s a bit of a pseud, really, I suppose. Only quite witty—you know. And quite kind, really,” she added, remembering the brandy—though not having registered the reason for the avocado sandwiches, not thinking of those.

    Adam swallowed. He put his hands heavily on her shoulders.

    “What?” she said, looking up at him trustingly.

    “Darling, Tom’s brother is a certified wolf,” he said heavily. “Tom warned me not to let him anywhere near you—God, if I’d realized he’d be that quick off the mark— Did you say he asked you into his flat?” Georgy nodded and he said: “What in God’s name was he doing home in the middle of the day?”

    “He’s a doctor: he said he was doing an operation all morning, well, since six o’clock, it was an emergency.”

    Adam sighed. “Look, sweetheart: steer clear of him, mm?”

    “I thought he was all right. Well, a pseud, like I said. But he’s very well read, he was interesting to talk to.”

    “Georgy, of course he was interesting to talk to, he’s a wolf!” shouted Adam. “Don’t you understand me? He eats little girls like you for breakfast, two at a time!”

    “Oh, pooh,” said Georgy, pulling away from him.

    “Pooh, NOTHING!” he shouted. “For God’s sake, why do you think Tom Overdale went to the trouble to specifically tell me not to let him within coo-ee of you?”

    Georgy pouted and looked mutinous. “I don’t know, but—”

    “No, you don’t know, and you wouldn’t recognize a wolf even if he wasn’t draped in gent’s natty suiting. –Was he?”

    “Um—ye-es... He took his coat off to make the lunch.”

    Adam choked, and for once didn’t tell her to say “jacket”. “Lunch— You mean the bastard gave you lunch?”

    “Yes. I said, he was really very kind.”

    “Georgy, Ralph Overdale is not a kind man!” shouted Adam. “He was softening you up, for God’s sake, you little idiot!”

    “I don’t see how you can know, you weren’t there.”

    He sighed, passed a hand over his face, and realized that he’d been standing there shouting in the doorway for the benefit of Willow Grove. He pushed the door shut, put his arm heavily round her shoulders and propelled her into Mrs Mayhew’s sitting-room, where he pushed her gently onto the couch and sat beside her. “Listen—”

    He told her about Sir Ralph’s exploits with Livia’s predecessor in the rôle of the ex-model turned vicar’s wife. Georgy objected that that was just malicious gossip and Adam explained at great length how Livia’s predecessor—he’d forgotten the woman’s bloody name and he felt irritably all the way through his narrative that this lent everything he said a certain spurious note—had advertised Sir Ralph’s services all over TVNZ.

    Finally Georgy, concluded that it must have been the lady’s fault as much as Sir Ralph’s.

    Adam groaned.

    “Anyway, he’s quite old,” she said.

    Adam groaned.

    “Um—well—I suppose I didn’t like him all that much... Only he is a neighbour, and we do know Tom and Jemima; I mean, I couldn’t just ignore him.”

    Adam just groaned. God, he couldn’t even leave by herself for five minutes! God, he was going to have to watch her like a hawk, he was never going to be able to let her out of his sight, at this rate!

    “Eh?” he said dully.

    Georgy bit her lip and gave him a naughty look. “Um—Jemima says that Polly says it’s a good idea to ask a man that when he comes home from work!” she said with a little giggle.

    “Uh—what, darling?” he said groggily.

    “‘Would you like a gin and tonic, dear?’” repeated Georgy with a naughty twinkle.

    “Actually, I’d love one,” said Adam in a hollow voice. God! What with marauding surgeons—! Wouldn’t you think that she’d have been safe enough in a dump like Willow— “What?”

    “Only I don’t know how to make one!” said Georgy with a giggle, over by Mrs Mayhew’s piecrust cocktail cabinet.

    He got up hurriedly. “You didn’t take the gin out of the fridge, did you?”

    “Um—no. Um, I didn’t take anything out of the fridge... Um, what does gin look like, Adam?”

    Suddenly Adam gave a shout of laughter, hugged her very hard, and kissed her soundly. “What are we going to do with you?” he said into her ear.

    “I don’t know,” said Georgy vaguely, hugging him.

    He pulled the pale peach blouse out of her jeans and got a hand up it. “Mmm... after I’ve had a gin and tonic I might be able to think of something.”

    “Now?” gasped Georgy, swallowing.

    “It’s what all the best couples do after the man comes home from work,” he said with a snigger, pressing it against her little belly. Oo-er.

    Georgy said faintly: “But—”

    “Mm? Oh!” said Adam on a choke of laughter. “I don’t practice the Jewish rites, sweetheart.” Georgy looked completely blank, but he’d expected that, so he said: “We’ll put a towel on the bed. And I won’t have to use a nasty condom, won’t that be nice?”

    “Ye-es...”

    “Not if you’ve got nasty cramps, of course, darling.”

    “No, they’ve gone, I think it was that herb tea,” she said, beaming.

    “Mmm... Good.”

    “Only what about the towel?” said Georgy timidly.

    Adam laughed, swept her up into his arms—Georgy gasped—and said: “Isn’t this where we came in? I refuse, absolutely refuse, to discuss towels or sheets or linen of any kind, any further today!”

    He carried her into the bedroom and proceeded to demonstrate in full how he didn’t practice the Jewish rites. Towel and all.

    Afterwards he lay back on the dull-rose pillows and brooded a bit on Georgy and their neighbour from the top unit. ...Yes, keep an eye on her every damned minute of the day. Well, could that be bad, after all?

    “Woman!” he yelled in the general direction of the ensuite.

    “What?” said Georgy’s voice, sounding strangled.

    Grinning a bit, Adam called: “What about that gin and tonic you promised me? Was that only a come-on?”

    After a moment Georgy appeared in the bathroom doorway in her cabbagey housecoat. “What proportions do I put in it?”

    He explained, though without any hope she’d get it right.

    Georgy trotted off to the kitchen.

    When she came back it was with two of Mrs Mayhew’s cut-crystal wine glasses: never mind, what better fate could they hope for?

    “Come here,” he said.

    She curled up beside him obediently.

    “I love you, Georgy Harris, cabbagey housecoat, menstrual blood, an’ all,” he said, putting his free arm round her.

    “Mm. Will you love me when I tell you there isn’t any dinner?” replied Georgy with a chuckle.

    “No, probably beat you to a pulp,” he said, squeezing her.

    “Then in that case, I won’t tell you.”

    Adam lay back against his pillows with his arm round her, sipping incredibly weak gin and tonic, smirking.