Instead they walked out across the patio area, and Marnie gestured toward the steps leading down to the small stretch of private beach that ended at the water. It was on this, scattered around on a variety of blankets, that the garden party guests sat, some sprawled barefoot, some seated, deep in conversation.
Adeline Armand was seated on a mint green wrap made from some fabric with a satin sheen. She was dressed in a shell pink summer frock of crepe de chine and wore a large, floppy white hat with a broad brim, the most conventional outfit Lottie had seen her wear so far. She was surrounded by three men, including George, who was peeling leaves from some peculiar plant (an artichoke, Adeline explained later) and handing them to her, one by one, from under the half shelter of a large parasol. Frances was wearing a swimsuit, revealing a surprisingly lean and toned body. She stood more comfortably in her skin than in her clothes, her shoulders thrown back as she laughed heartily at something a neighbor had just said. There were at least four bottles of red wine open. There was no one else Lottie recognized.
She stood still, feeling suddenly foolish and overdressed in her white gloves. Celia, beside her, was trying to remove hers behind her back.
George, suddenly looking up, spotted them. “Welcome to our little
déjeuner sur l’herbe
, girls,” he called. “Come and sit down.”
Celia had already kicked off her shoes. She was picking her way through the sand to where George was seated, her hips swinging in a manner Lottie had seen her practicing at home when she thought no one was looking.
“Are you hungry?” said Frances, who looked unusually cheerful. “We’ve got some trout and some delicious herb salad. Or there’s some cold duck. I think there’s some left.”
“We’ve eaten, thanks,” said Celia, sitting down. Lottie sat slightly behind her, wishing that more people were standing up so that she didn’t feel so conspicuous.
“What about some fruit? We’ve got some gorgeous strawberries. Has Marnie taken them in already?”
“They don’t want food. They want a drink,” said George, who had already busied himself pouring two large goblets of red wine. “Here,” he said, holding one up to the light. “One for Little Red Riding Hood here.”
Celia glanced down at her skirt and then up again, pleased by the attention.
“Here’s to the fragile bloom of youth.”
“Oh, George.” A blond woman in huge sunglasses leaned over and tapped his arm in a way that made Celia bristle.
“Well, they might as well enjoy it while they’ve got it.” George had the well-lubricated look and loosened vowels of someone who had been drinking all day. “God knows they won’t look like that for long.”
Lottie stared at him.
“Frances knows. Give it five years and they’ll be thickhipped matrons, a couple of young brats hanging on their skirts. Fine upholders of the moral majority of Merham.”
“I know nothing of the sort.” Frances, smiling, folded her long limbs onto a picnic blanket.
Something about George’s tone made Lottie uneasy. Celia, however, took a glass from him and gulped down half its contents as if accepting a challenge. “Not me,” she said, grinning. “You won’t find me here in five years’ time.”
“Non?
And where will you be?” It was impossible to see Adeline’s face under her hat. Only her neat little mouth was visible, curved up in its polite, inquisitive smile.
“Oh, I don’t know. London perhaps. Cambridge. Maybe even Paris.”
“Not if your mother has her way.” Something about Celia’s determined ease in this company irritated Lottie. “She wants you to stay here.”
“Oh, she’ll come around in the end.”
“That’s what you think.”
“What’s the matter?” said George, dipping his handsome head to Celia’s. “Is Mater concerned for your moral welfare?”
Something about the way that Celia and George looked at each other at this moment made Lottie’s chest tighten.
“Well . . .” said Celia slyly. Her eyes held a sudden flash of promise. “There are an awful lot of big, bad wolves about, after all.”
Lottie eventually settled down on the edge of Adeline’s wrap, fighting the urge, even as she sat, to sweep sand from its folds. She felt overdressed and suburban and had trouble keeping up with the conversations around her, which made her feel stupid. Adeline, who normally took pains to make her feel at ease, was engrossed in conversation with a man Lottie hadn’t seen before.
Lottie sipped at her wine, trying not to grimace, and picked at a bowl of cherries.
“Fabulous house, Adeline darling. More Moderne than Deco, don’t you think?”
“Of course Russell is an idiot. And if he thinks that Eden is going to pay the slightest attention to him and his bloody scientists, he’s a deluded idiot.”
“Did I tell you Archie has finally got one in the Summer Exhibition? Hung so that it looks like a postage stamp, but you can’t have everything. . . .”
It was a long afternoon. There were no coconut cakes. Lottie, her cardigan pulled around her shoulders to try to stop herself tanning, watched the tide gradually ease away, lengthening the shore and turning an intricate sand castle that must have been made early that morning into a swollen pimple of sand. She could hear Celia giggling manically behind her and knew that she must be drinking. The girls only ever had wine at Christmas, and even the thimbleful of sherry they had been allowed before lunch last year had made Celia pink and her voice lift two pitches. Lottie had drunk half her glass before surreptitiously spilling it into the sand behind her. Even that had made her head ache and her brain feel fuzzy and befugged.
When Marnie cleared away the last of the plates, Lottie moved around a little so that she could see Celia. Celia was telling George about “the last time she had been to Paris.” The fact that she had never actually been to Paris seemed to have little impact on her elaborate tale, but Lottie, noticing the somewhat combative body language between Celia and the blond woman, thought it would be unsporting to undermine her now. From under her sunglasses the blond woman’s smile had become more of a snarl, and, scenting victory, Celia had become exuberant.
“Of course, the next time I go I’m going to have dinner at La Coupole. Have you had dinner at La Coupole? I’m told the lobster is fabulous.”
She stretched her legs out in front of her, letting her skirt ride up over her knees.
“I’m awfully hot, George,” said the blond woman suddenly. “Shall we go in?”
Oh, Celia, thought Lottie. You’ve met your match here.
Celia glanced at George, who was smoking a cigar, his head tilted back toward the sun. A flicker of something thunderous passed across her face.
“I suppose it is rather warm,” George said. He sat up, brushing sand from his shirtsleeves.
Then Frances stood up. “I’m getting overheated here, too. I think it’s time for a swim,” she said. “Are you coming, Adeline? Anyone?”
Adeline shook her head. “Too, too sleepy, darling. I’ll watch.”
But George, shaking his dark hair like a big shaggy dog, had started to undo his shirt, as if suddenly reanimated.
“That’s what we need,” he said, tamping out his cigar. “A nice refreshing dip. Irene?”
The blond woman shook her head. “I haven’t my things.”
“You don’t need swimming things, woman. Just go in your slip.”
“No, George, really. I’ll watch from here.”
The other men were stripping off now, down to shorts or trousers. Lottie, who had wondered if she were about to fall asleep, had been jolted awake and was watching with quiet alarm the sudden shedding of everyone’s clothes.
“C’mon girls. Lottie? I bet you can swim.”
“Oh, she doesn’t go in the water.”
Lottie now knew that Celia had drunk too much. She would never have so carelessly referred to Lottie’s inability to swim (a deep embarrassment to a seaside dweller) if she had been sober. Lottie shot her a furious glance, but Celia wasn’t paying attention. She was busy wrestling with her zipper.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m swimming.” Celia grinned broadly. “Don’t look at me like that, Lots. I’ve got my slip on. It’s no different from a swimsuit, really.”
And then she was off, whooping and squealing as she followed George and a handful of others to the water’s edge. Frances plowed in, pushing forth until she was up to her waist in the waves, then diving under like a porpoise, her swimsuit wet and shiny, like the pelt of a seal.
Celia, having reached the water, had gone in up to her knees and hesitated, until George reached for her arm and, laughing, swung her around so that she fell into the water. Around them the other guests bobbed boisterously in the breakers, pushing and splashing one another, the men naked to the waist, the women in fine layers of lace undergarments. Not one of them, Lottie noted, was wearing a girdle.
When Celia first turned to wave at her, however, Lottie suddenly wished Mrs. Holden had been more successful in trying to persuade her daughter to wear one. For now that her slip and underwear were soaked with seawater, few parts of Celia’s anatomy were protected from view. Get down, under the water, she tried to gesture at her, waving her hands ineffectually. But Celia, her head thrown back as she laughed, didn’t seem to notice.
“Don’t worry, darling,” Adeline’s voice came low and intimate from beside her. “No one will pay any attention. When we are in France, the women are usually naked from the waist up.”
Lottie, trying not to think too hard about what such holidays in France might comprise, gave a weak smile in reply and reached for the wine bottle. Suddenly she felt a distinct need for fortification.
“It’s just Mrs. Holden,” she said quietly. “I don’t think she’d be terribly pleased.”
“Then here.” Adeline handed her a large, boldly patterned scarf. “Go and give her this. Tell her it’s a sarong and that I said all the finest people are wearing one.”
Lottie could have kissed her. She took the fabric and padded down to the beach, tying her cardigan around her waist as she did. It was late enough in the afternoon now; the risk of tanning was minimal.
“Here!” she shouted, bare feet lapped by the receding tide. “Celia! Try this.”
Celia didn’t hear her. Or at least didn’t want to hear her. She was squealing as George dived for her waist, lifting her into the air and dropping her back into the shallows.
“Celia!”
It was hopeless. She felt like someone’s aged, persnickety aunt.
George saw her eventually. He came wading through the waves, his hair plastered to his head, his rolled-up trousers sticking to his thighs. Lottie tried to keep her glance above his waist.
“Can you give this to Celia? Adeline said it was a sarong or something.”
“A sarong, eh?” George took the cloth from her and looked behind him at Celia, who was launching herself backward on the swell.
“Think she needs covering up, do you?”
Lottie looked directly back at him, her face straight. “I don’t think she realizes quite how uncovered she is.”
“Oh, Lottie, Lottie, serious little guardian of morals! Look at you, all hot and bothered about your friend.” He glanced back down at the cloth, a grin spreading across his face.
“I’ve got a better solution,” he said. Then, “I think it’s you who needs cooling off.” And without warning he swept his arms around her waist and threw her up and over his wet shoulder.
Lottie was aware of being bumped along as he began to jog, and she panicked, tried to get her arm behind her to ensure that her skirt was still covering her knickers. Then suddenly she was falling down, a huge wave of salt water sweeping over her face, so that, coughing and spluttering, she struggled to find the seafloor under her feet. She could hear muffled laughter above her and then, gasping, found her head above water again.
She managed to stand and paused for a second, her eyes stinging and salt burning in the back of her throat. She felt herself retch a couple of times and made blindly for the shore. When she got there, she bent over, gasping. Her dress was stuck to her legs, her layers of petticoat melded together. Her top, which was a pale cotton, had become almost see-through, clearly revealing the outline of her brassiere. Raising a hand to her hair, she realized it was loose and that the tortoiseshell slide that had held it back off her face was no longer there.
She looked up and saw George, hands on hips, grinning. Celia, behind him, was wearing a look of appalled amusement.
“You bloody pig.” The words fell out of Lottie’s mouth even before she knew she was going to say them. “You bloody, bloody pig. That was
not on.
”
George looked briefly stunned. Behind her the lull of conversation from the picnic blankets suddenly stalled.
“Oh, it’s bloody funny for you,” she yelled, aware that there was a large lump in the back of her throat, threatening tears. “You with handfuls of money and your linen bloody suits. Doesn’t matter to you if your clothes get ruined. Look at my summer dress! Look! It’s my best one! Mrs. Holden will kill me! And you’ve lost my bloody comb.” And, to her own horror, the tears came, hot tears of frustration and humiliation.
“Steady on, Lots.” Celia’s face had fallen. Lottie knew she was embarrassing her but didn’t care.
“Come on, Lottie. It was only a joke.” George moved toward her, looking both exasperated and apologetic.
“Well, it was a very stupid joke.” Lottie looked around to see Adeline beside her. She was holding up her wrap to place it around Lottie’s shoulders. Her expression was one of mild rebuke. Lottie caught her spicy, jasmine scent as Adeline covered her.
“George, you must apologize. Lottie was our guest, and you had no right. Lottie, I am very sorry. I’m sure we can get Marnie to launder your lovely dress and make sure it is all right for you.”
But how will I get home, Lottie thought desperately, confronted by an image of herself tottering along the road in Adeline’s feather boa and Chinese slippers. She was interrupted by a voice from up on the cliff path.
“Celia Jane Holden. What on
earth
do you think you’re doing?”
Lottie spun around to find above her the appalled faces of Mrs. Chilton and Mrs. Colquhoun, who had been taking the scenic route home from Woodbridge Avenue. It had apparently proven rather more scenic than they’d expected.