‘Come in, come in,’ she heard Gideon implore.
And then there he was, smart in a starched white shirt, white waistcoat and dove-grey double-breasted suit, his shoes polished to a dazzling gleam and a single yellow gerbera daisy in his hand.
‘Miss De La Mare,’ he said, greeting her with a slight incline of his head, his left hand flat upon his stomach. ‘
Enchanté
.’
He handed her the gerbera and Arlette blushed, as she’d known she would, and smiled. ‘Likewise, Mr Beach.’
‘And, please,’ he said, ‘now that we are outside the realms of my professional persona, call me Godfrey.’
‘Godfrey?’
‘Yes, miss, for that is my real name, the name my mother chose for me twenty-eight years ago. Godfrey Michael Pickle.’
Arlette attempted to stifle a smile.
Godfrey Pickle
. It was no less unlikely than his stage name.
‘What a wonderful name, Mr Beach,’ said Gideon, entirely missing the point. ‘Now, let me pour you some tea.’
‘So, Miss De La Mare, you too have an interesting name.
Lady of the sea
. What is the provenance of such a name?’
‘I’m from the Channel Islands, Mr Pickle. A small cluster of rocks between the south coast of England and the north coast of France. It is a melting point of both English and French cultures.’
‘Ah,’ his yellow-tinted eyes lit up, ‘so you understand the island life. Like myself. The limitations and the joys of being hemmed in on all sides by the sea.’
‘Oh, yes, I certainly do. Although I should imagine there are more joys involved being hemmed in by the Caribbean Sea, than there are by the cold dark waters of the English Channel.’
Godfrey smiled. ‘Indeed,’ he said, ‘indeed.’
‘Do you get back at all?’ she asked.
Godfrey Pickle shook his head and said, ‘I have not been back to my island for eighteen
looong looong
months. And neither do I have any plans to return. The orchestra is booked up for the next year ahead. It’s possible that I may never return.’ He shrugged. ‘And what about you, Miss De La Mare … will you be returning to your rock in the English sea?’
‘I honestly do not know, Mr Pickle. I’ve been here for only four months. I’m certainly not ready to return yet, but maybe one day. If my mother needs me.’
Godfrey’s eyes clouded over. ‘Ah, yes, the poor mothers. My
mother
sits in my heart like a piece of grit every day of my life. She feels I am punishing her by leaving her without me. All the money in the world doesn’t appear to be compensating for my absence …’ he sighed.
The three of them fell silent for a moment, until Gideon slapped his hands down upon his thighs and said, ‘Well, I suggest we crack on. The light will begin to fade away soon; better move fast.’
In his studio upstairs, Gideon had arranged a striking tableau: a daybed draped with red chiffon and ivy, three church candles on towering sticks behind, and parlour palms in copper pots to either side. He asked Godfrey to remove his jacket and unbutton his waistcoat, and then Arlette to take off her angora jacket, under which she was wearing a cream blouse with a ruffled collar.
‘Would you mind, Miss De La Mare, just to pull open the top two buttons? Just to give me more skin to … to make a feature of. And yourself, Mr Beach. Mr Pickle. I think we do need to see just a fraction more of your … complexion.’
Godfrey and Arlette glanced at each other and Godfrey laughed. ‘You have a certain way with words, Mr Worsley. But let me first check with Miss De La Mare before I put any more of my
complexion
on display. Miss De La Mare,’ he turned back to Arlette, ‘if you are comfortable with the opening of extra buttons, then so am I. But I will not undo a single fastening if it any way offends you.’
Arlette smiled. And then she put her fingers to her top buttons. ‘It is only buttons, Mr Pickle, and it is only skin – how could I find it offensive?’
Godfrey looked at her through his velvet lashes, and his full lips turned up into a sensual smile. ‘Indeed, Miss De La Mare,’ he said, his eyes still upon hers, his fingers now on the buttons of his own shirt. ‘It is only skin …’
Arlette felt herself redden under his gaze, felt the erotic
suggestion
of what they were both doing, the unbuttoning of clothes, the beginning of the process of getting undressed, an act normally carried out in the privacy of their own sleeping quarters. She smiled and looked away.
‘Now,’ said Gideon, ‘if it is agreeable with both of you, I would like you, Mr Beach – Mr Pickle – to sit upon the daybed, at this end,’ he patted the mattress at the left end. ‘And you, Miss De La Mare, to sit in the middle here, facing this wall,’ he indicated the right, ‘with your back leaning against Mr Pickle’s shoulder.’
Arlette looked from the bed to the wall and then back to Gideon. ‘So,’ she said, ‘where are my legs to be?’
‘I thought,’ he said, walking to the bed and demonstrating the pose himself, ‘that maybe you could hang them over the side, crossed, like so, and if we could have your hair untied, Miss De La Mare – would that be all right? So that it hangs down Mr Pickle’s shoulder, here, and Mr Pickle will be looking, like this, directly at me – if that is agreeable with you, Mr Pickle? And you, Miss De La Mare, will be staring at this point, just beyond my easel, see, at that damp patch just there.’ He clambered from the bed and let Arlette copy his pose. ‘Yes, like that, but possibly if you could just press yourself a little closer to Mr Beach. Mr Pickle. As if you were, well, I suppose as if you were a romantically entwined couple, possibly pondering the future of your relationship, possibly wondering if your love could ever be realised. Do you see?’
Godfrey laughed. ‘Yes, I see, Mr Worsley. The Love That Shall Not Speak Its Name.’
‘Well, yes, something like that. Something illicit, dangerous, yet also something beautiful, something …
grand
. A grand, grand love, one that has brought both joy and heartache. Yes?’
Godfrey looked at Arlette and Arlette looked at Godfrey. ‘Is there to be a suggestion that myself and Miss De La Mare have …?’
‘Hmm?’ Gideon looked up at him sharply, a finger held thoughtfully to his lips.
‘I mean, is an observer to draw the conclusion that there has been something … carnal between us, between this couple.’
‘Oh, oh, I see. Well, yes, I mean, I suppose,
possibly
. Although –’
Godfrey cut him off and turned to Arlette. ‘Does this make you feel uncomfortable in any way?’
Arlette considered the question. She was still a virgin. She had not yet experienced any of the emotions that Gideon was asking her to portray. Yet, sitting here in this room, with this man, her blouse unbuttoned to her collarbone, her hair falling down around her face, she could grasp the tips of those feelings, she could imagine it, and so she smiled at Godfrey and whispered, ‘No, it does not make me feel uncomfortable in any way.’
She saw Godfrey’s eyes widen in surprise at her acceptance of this scenario and she felt her heart swell with anticipation. In opening her buttons she had opened a door into a part of herself she had not known was there.
Gideon moved from behind his easel towards the pair of them and teased the long tendrils of Arlette’s hair into a more pleasing form, his eyes narrowed with concentration. Behind his easel again he peered at his tableau and then he smiled. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘yes. I think that’s just right. Maybe an inch further back, Mr Pickle. Yes. And your head, Miss De La Mare, a fraction to the right. Yes. Now. That is truly perfect. Truly something to behold …’
The three of them fell silent, while Gideon put down his first marks. Outside Arlette could hear, just as she’d imagined before, the bleating of a passing barge, the metallic rattle of a carriage on the street below. But not just that. She could also hear the sound of Godfrey Pickle, breathing in, breathing out, his heart pattering lightly beneath his ribs. She could feel the solid mass of his body underneath his crisp white shirt and feel the first flush
of
warm sweat against the cotton. And there, across the room, she saw Gideon, his soft handsome face aglow with excitement, clearly seeing something remarkable before him. Her eye caught his for a brief moment and she smiled, encouragingly.
‘Are you comfortable, Miss De La Mare?’ he enquired gently.
‘Yes,’ she said assuredly, ‘I am most comfortable. Most comfortable indeed.’
28
1995
BETTY WAS ASLEEP
on the sofa, pinned beneath Astrid, who was slumbering on her chest when Dom Jones finally came home at twelve forty-five.
She opened her eyes and stared at him blearily. Her neck sang out in pain when she straightened it. She clutched it with her hand and grimaced.
Dom smiled at her fondly, and then at Astrid.
‘Couldn’t settle her then?’ he asked.
‘Mmm,’ she said, through a yawn. ‘No. Miss Astrid did
not
want to go in her cot. So she watched TV with me instead.’
‘Sorry I’m so late,’ Dom said.
Betty shrugged. ‘No problem. You told me you probably would be.’
‘How was it?’ He leaned down to take the baby from her and the smell of tobacco on his breath reminded her that she had not had a cigarette in over eight hours and hadn’t even noticed.
‘Fine,’ she said, through another yawn. ‘Good. Well, once I’d worked out how to put that double buggy up.’ She gestured towards the hallway. ‘That took nearly an hour.’
‘You took the kids out?’ He looked surprised.
‘God, yes,’ she said, stretching out her arms. ‘Would have gone crazy stuck in here all day. We walked down to St James’s Park. Fed ducks. Went on swings. That kind of thing.’
‘Wow,’ said Dom, looking pleasantly surprised. ‘Cool.’
‘Yeah,’ she said, ‘it was fun. We had fun.’
He looked at her in awe. ‘Well,’ he said after a moment, ‘you’re either lying, or you are, genuinely, Mary Poppins. Either way is fine with me. As long as you promise you’ll come back.’
He smiled at her. His eyes creased at the corners and he looked tired and sad.
‘Of course I will,’ she said, getting to her feet. ‘When do you need me?’
‘They’re with Amy tomorrow, but she’s dropping them back early evening. Could you do a late one? Possibly, like, early hours?’
She would have to phone in sick again, break Rodrigo’s little heart, but it was worth it. Dom was paying her more than three times her Wendy’s hourly rate. ‘Sure,’ she said, ‘yes. What time?’
‘Come at five,’ he said, ‘if that’s OK?’
He saw her to the door, the baby sleeping across his shoulder, and as she left he said; ‘Oh, wait, hang on,’ and pulled a roll of notes from his back pocket. ‘For you,’ he said, ‘and well worth every penny. Will you be all right walking home?’
‘Er, yes,’ she said, rolling her eyes. She tucked the roll of notes into her shoulder bag without looking at them. It felt strangely unseemly to accept such a large sum of money from someone for a day’s work. But then she thought of supermodels and decided that it was fine. And supermodels did not, after all, have to clean anyone’s bum.
‘Thank you, Betty,’ Dom said. ‘I’m glad we met. I feel good about this. I really do.’
He closed the door quietly behind her, and she headed back towards Berwick Street.
It had not been an easy day. The logistics of getting three
small
, uncooperative people from place to place had been challenging and exhausting, and there had been a moment after the tenth time she’d come back into Astrid’s room to attempt to settle her, when she’d had to keep herself from crying with frustration. But really, she’d enjoyed it. They were nice children. And it was all worth it to see Dom’s face soften with gratitude, to hear him say he appreciated her. Because Betty liked being appreciated and she missed looking after someone.
She rolled a cigarette as she walked, quickly and clumsily, and was about to head straight up to the fire escape and smoke it when she noticed a card in the wire basket beneath the letterbox in the front door with her name scrawled on it. She picked it out and stared at it for a second. It was a flyer for a club night in Windmill Street. The club was called the Matrix and the night was called Lovecats. With DJ J.B. on the decks.
J.B.
John Brightly.
She turned the flyer over and read: ‘I’m here 10 p.m. to 1 a.m. Come and sit with me if you’re not too whacked, John.’
Betty looked up at her window. She looked down at her clothes. Her summer dress, creased and vaguely stained after her day with Dom’s children, battered Converse, pale legs. She imagined her face: make-up long crumbled away, mascara long picked off. She thought of her breath, stale from the hour’s sleep she’d had on Dom’s sofa, her hair unbrushed and flat at the back.
And then she thought of John Brightly, alone at his decks, his strong toned arms gleaming under the disco lights. DJJ.B. It was nearly one o’clock. She was just in time. She lit the cigarette and smoked it urgently as she turned back to the front door, opened it and headed back out into the night, towards Windmill Street.
The Matrix was in a basement, the only outward signifier of its existence being a piece of paper taped to the wall imploring patrons to respect the residents of the area by leaving the
building
quietly, and a dusty blue light above the door with the letter M painted on it in black.
Beyond the grubby entrance, however, the Matrix was a gloomily glamorous place clad with tatty red velvet, scuffed gilt and chandeliers. She followed the sound of 10,000 Maniacs into a small room at the back, where around fifty people danced beneath a disco ball and another thirty or so stood around the edges drinking beer from bottles, smoking and looking quite serious. She saw John at the back, squashed into a small corner behind his decks, pulling a vinyl album from its sleeve and examining the surface of it under the dull lights.
She queued for a minute at the bar and bought two beers, which she carried over to the DJ booth.
‘Hi!’ she said, holding a bottle aloft.
John looked up at her and she saw his face turn from steely concentration to something suggestive of pleasure. ‘You came,’ he said, pulling his headphones from his ears and accepting the beer. He looked at his watch. ‘You just finished work?’