The Penultimate Chance Saloon (15 page)

There were people, but he didn't think it tactful to mention either Sal or Carolyn to Ginnie. Instead, boldly he said, ‘I feel a bit of love for you.'

She grinned, reached across the table and put her hand on his. ‘And I feel a bit of love for you. A bit.' She removed her hand. ‘But rather less than I did at the beginning of the evening.'

... and, by way of contrast,

a Bengali woman accused of marketing

a fraudulent love potion was acquitted

by a judge, who subsequently married her.

Bill Stratton could not deny that he was shaken by what Ginnie Fairbrother had said. Her perspective on his recent life did make it appear slightly shabby. That, coupled with Sal's words about people ‘sniggering', diminished his self-image as a magnificent love-god. He was just another more-than-middle-aged man, trying to cram in as much action as possible before the final shutter fell.

He was also intrigued as to why Ginnie had taken him to task with such vigour. Fair enough that she should disapprove of his late- flowering promiscuity, but she seemed to be taking it personally, as if it was her he'd let down, rather than her entire gender. Bill didn't allow himself to think why she should have behaved like that. He just wanted to see her again as soon as possible, and find a way to reinstate himself in her good books. But that was not going to be easily achieved. The morning after their dinner she had flown back to Croatia, where she was scheduled for many more months of convent capers. Bill's bridge-building with Ginnie would have to wait. But he did think a lot about what she said. Particularly about the lack of love in his life. While he had been with Andrea – even though she subsequently denied its presence – he at least had had the illusion of love surrounding him. And it was true that love had not been a component in any of his sexual encounters since the divorce.

Men were, of course, proverbially bad at using the ‘L' word. The commitment implied in it was so total. Telling a woman that you loved her was tantamount to signing a binding contract never to stop loving her, undertaking to protect and look after her for as long as you both shall live. Or at least that was the way Bill had always seen the situation. And he reckoned that was the reason why most men avoided all mention of love in their dealings with women. It was safer that way. But what Ginnie had said made him wonder whether his definition of love was perhaps too narrow. Ideal married love to one person was a nice idea, but how many people achieve that? Bill Stratton thought he had, but he'd been wrong.

Ginnie had hurt him when she said there was no love in his life. Maybe there wasn't that one exclusive love, but perhaps by a more relaxed definition ...? Well, he certainly felt something for Ginnie. That was a kind of love – he'd told her so. Perhaps he felt something similar for Sal, come to that. Even Carolyn.

Maybe he should tell them that he loved them? Mind you, he wasn't quite sure what response he would get. Baffled incomprehension, most likely.

Interesting idea, though. It might, he thought, be quite easy to say ‘I love you', once he got used to the idea. Once he'd managed to break the habit of thinking in terms of exclusive love, just for one person. But when he'd done that, and when he'd actually said it to more than one person, well, maybe it'd be open season on ‘I love you.' He could say it to anyone. The important thing, though, Bill told himself, mindful of Ginnie's criticisms, is that it's true. You only say it to people you love. But the number of those – and the different ways in which you love them – well, the older you get, the bigger that number might become.

He wished he'd been more forceful when he'd told Ginnie that he loved her. But he'd been on the back foot all that evening; not really a time for being forceful.

He supposed he could write to her or phone her. She'd made a point of telling him how well her mobile worked in Croatia. But he didn't want to put the delicate balance of their relationship at risk. Even when she gave him an ear-bashing, being with Ginnie meant a lot to him. Saying the wrong thing or making a wrong assumption about her interest in him could spoil everything. Virginia Fairbrother was a wonderful and attractive woman, but she was way out of his league.

A couple of days after their Moroccan/Japanese fusion experience, Bill Stratton had an after-dinner speaking engagement in a hotel in Nottingham. There was an unattached woman there who was giving all the signals of availability. They chatted in the bar afterwards. She laughed at his ‘by way of contrast' lines and seemed in no urgency to leave. At about midnight Bill looked at his watch and said it had been a pleasure to meet her, but he must be off to bed.

Where he went. Alone. Feeling incredibly virtuous.

* * *

He found over the next few weeks that his mind kept coming back to things Ginnie had said to him. He wondered about the anger. Had he really been using promiscuity as a way of getting back at Andrea? Not directly, of course, because she knew nothing about what he'd been doing, but maybe there was something in the theory. Sal, after all, had said exactly the same thing. Bill also thought about Ginnie's description of him treating sixty as the new sixteen. He did feel as if he was going through a change in his life. Maybe, he wondered, second adolescence is a necessary stage before second childishness. And mere oblivion. His behaviour certainly couldn't be covered by the catch-all title of ‘a mid-life crisis'. If this was his
mid-
life, then by the time he died he was going to have an entry in the Guinness Book of Records. But he did need a little time to reassess his situation. He was glad he'd done his stint as a serial philanderer, but that wasn't how he wanted to spend the rest of his life. As an old goat, being sniggered at by event organisers.

Maybe in future he should be on the look-out for more than sex. Possibly even for love.

* * *

When he next had lunch with Sal, he told her that he loved her. Their meeting had started rather oddly, because Bill knew there was something different about his agent, but he couldn't quite identify what it was. A disproportionately long time elapsed before he realised it was her smile. Ever since he'd known her, she'd had the yellowed teeth of a continually re-offending smoker; now suddenly he was faced with two rows of gleaming whiteness.

He didn't quite know what to say. It was a bit like seeing a bald man the first day he wears his toupee. Presumably he knows that he had no hair the previous day, and he knows that his colleagues know. New acquaintances might possibly be impressed and fail to notice that nothing on his head moves, but what is the recommended behaviour for old friends? Is the correct form to say nothing and pretend you haven't noticed? Or is it more polite to extend your hearty congratulations to him on the fact that he has suddenly got a large Shredded Wheat on his head? Sal's sudden orthodontic makeover presented Bill with a similar social dilemma.

But he needn't have worried. She
wanted
to talk about her new teeth. In fact, there was no way she was going to be stopped from talking about them.

‘Porcelain veneers,' she said. Aren't they wonderful?'

‘Yes. You look splendid.'

‘Cost an absolute fortune.'

‘I bet. All those fifteen per cents of my earnings.'

‘Don't you believe it. Thank God I've got other clients.
You
only paid for that tiny little one at the back. Anyway, it's part of the new me.'

‘Another “new me”? You're some kind of new you every time I see you.'

‘Oh yes, in the past,' she conceded, ‘I have gone for all kinds of self-help books, you know, trying to change my personality. But

I've given up on that. Now I'm going to change the shell, and let the personality develop inside it.'

‘By “the shell”, you mean your exterior appearance?'

‘Yes.'

‘What, so you're going to wear more make-up?'

‘I don't think that'd be possible.'

‘Ah.' Light dawned. ‘You mean you're going to change your body?'

‘Exactly. The teeth are only the start. I'm having a consultation with a cosmetic surgeon tomorrow. Soon you won't recognise the new me.'

‘Don't make too many changes,' he said. ‘I really like the old you.'

‘Yes, but that's what's wrong with it. It's old. Soon I'll be totally transformed.'

‘Well, do be careful.' Then he added, boldly, ‘I love the old you.'

She didn't seem to notice this avowal. If that's what it was. Certainly Bill had never used the word ‘love' to Sal before. Without even registering the novelty, she started on at him about how he ought to get his teeth fixed too.

‘You are in the public eye, you know. You've always got to look your best. It's a cut-throat business you're in. A lot of younger, better- maintained men out there, snapping at your heels.'

‘Maybe, but I don't need cosmetic dentistry. My teeth are part of me. They've got a lot of character.'

‘You could say the same of Stonehenge.' She looked disparagingly across at his uneven bite. ‘And, actually, the similarities don't stop there.'

Bill didn't really like this talk about his teeth. They had always been sensitive, and he had always been sensitive about them. He had had a lot of trouble with them over the years, though now they were so full of fillings there wasn't much left that could go wrong with them. They probably could do with porcelain veneers, but he reckoned, having got this far into his life without them, the unadorned original teeth would probably see him out. And when he had been regularly reading the news, ‘his crooked smile' had been referred to frequently. He'd even once had the accolade of his facial expression being mimicked by an impressionist in a television sketch show. Still, thinking about his teeth always upset him. Maybe because of their similarity to tiny tombstones, they made him aware of his own mortality.

Fortunately the conversation did at last move away from matters orthodontic. Sal was in very good form, seemingly liberated by the decision to lay off her mind and concentrate on improving her body. She was funny and relaxed, and they went for a second bottle of the dusty red Yakut. As they parted outside the Turkish restaurant, they went into a more effusive clinch than usual. Bill could feel the outline of her body against his. Clumsily kissing her hair, he mumbled, ‘I do love you, you know.'

‘I love you too,' she murmured.

Then, with a tipsy giggle, she tottered off on unfeasibly high heels back towards her office.

* * *

Sitting on the tube back to Pimlico, Bill Stratton glowed. Maybe there was love in his life, after all. He'd never really thought about fancying Sal, until that moment when she pressed her body against his.

So there was something between him and Sal ... and definitely something between him and Ginnie. It was rather nice, the idea of being a little in love with more than one person. Suddenly he felt a huge surge of well-being, possibly buoyed up by having sunk a whole bottle of the Yakut. He felt the capacity to love every woman in the world. They were so gorgeous. The curves of their breasts and legs, the infinite variety of their skin tones, the way their hair sprang and curled and shimmered from their heads. At Green Park a woman of incredible beauty boarded the tube and stood opposite him. Probably under thirty, she had short blonde hair and honey-dappled skin. A short skirt and sleeveless top showed her perfect contours. Long, long legs, slender muscular arms, an immaculate cleavage.

The well-being within Bill Stratton surged again. She was so beautiful. He was instantly in love with her. And he wanted to tell her so, to let her know how much she was appreciated. Surely any woman would want to know that a man found her beautiful? Since they spend so much time and artifice trying to achieve that effect, they must want to be informed when they have succeeded. Bill decided he would tell the woman she was beautiful. He might even say that he loved her. The unsolicited opinion of a man of taste – that'd really give a lift to her day.

The tube was slowing down for Victoria and she started moving towards the door. That was why she hadn't bothered to sit down, she was only travelling the one stop. She was going to walk right past Bill, and when she did, he would stand up and tell her she was beautiful. And possibly that he loved her.

He timed it beautifully. He stood up when she was directly in front of him, and he opened his mouth to speak. But then he saw the expression which had taken over her beautiful face. The expression which only he could have inspired. Contempt and distaste, with an undercurrent of fear. Someone so beautiful got men coming on to her all the time. She loathed it.

Bill wanted to explain. That he wasn't a threat to her, he just appreciated her aesthetically. That he really wasn't coming on to her. That ...

It was over in a matter of seconds. No one else in the carriage saw the look of loathing that had passed from her to him. She was gone, the doors closed and the tube sighed on towards Pimlico. Bill Stratton slumped back in his seat and saw in the window opposite, in ghostly reflection – rather like an X-ray image – exactly what the young blonde woman had seen. A white-haired, wrinkled figure with irregular teeth. An old goat. A dirty old man.

...and, by way of contrast,

a new Christian society for teenagers has

been founded in Ohio. It is called the

Affirmative Response Group,

and its slogan is ‘Say No To Everything.

Leigh was different from the other women, though the circumstances in which Bill met her were pretty similar. An after-dinner gig in London for some charity. Not that his own involvement was in any way charitable. Sal had sorted out a contract for his usual fee and his usual hotel room. So far as she was concerned – and so far, after brief initial qualms, as Bill was concerned – a booking was a booking. A charity could always try approaching a speaker direct and ask if he'd give his services for nothing. But if they went through Sal Juster Associates, they were by definition entering into a commercial transaction. (Many charity events – and particularly Charity Balls – actually lose money, because the initial outlay has been so huge that no amount of ticket sales or donations on the night are going to cover it. Enthusiastic people on charity committees rarely have much understanding of event finances. Still, that wasn't Bill Stratton's problem.)