Memoirs of a Dance Hall Romeo (12 page)

I lit another cigarette as I waited for her, and sat there gazing down at the dancers, more than a little pleased at the way things had gone. This was exactly what I wanted. A warm, sensual woman who wanted me as much as I wanted her, needed a man, if you like, in a way that Imogene never had.

The truth is that by then, love, and I mean physical love and large amounts of it, had become the most exciting thing in the world for me. An experience which never palled, and came up fresh as roses on a summer morning every time. Strangely enough, sitting there thinking about it, I was suddenly aware of some weird irrational guilt feeling, probably to do with my Methodist upbringing, but Lucy’s reappearance soon swept that out of the way.

We had one more dance, a slow foxtrot which brought us closer together than ever. Although it was only ten o’clock when I suggested that we left, she agreed with alacrity and went off to get her coat.

She lived in a cul-de-sac off the main road just past The Tall Man, in a large semi-detached house. There was a light on in the hall, but the glass sun porch was in darkness and I slid my arms around her waist from behind, pulling her close. She gave a long, shuddering sigh, arching her back, then strained against me, turning up her face to be kissed. Her body trembled, emotion I suppose, and she sighed again.

‘You were so wonderful back there, Oliver. So incredible. I just couldn’t believe it was happening.’

‘You don’t think I could have stood by and left you to that oaf, do you? A girl like you?’

Which was perhaps a trifle melodramatic as remarks go, but it seemed to be the sort of thing she expected, and I slipped a hand inside her coat and started to stroke her left breast. And then the unexpected happened. She disengaged herself, fiddled around with her handbag, produced a key and unlocked the front door. I shriveled instantly, the disappointment biting deep, but in the same instant things assumed an even rosier hue for she turned in the doorway, light streaming out from the hall.

‘You’ll come in for a while, won’t you?’

‘Will it be all right?’

She nodded. ‘There’s only my father and he goes to bed early.’

More promising than ever. I followed her into the hall and she opened a door to the left and led the way into a pleasant lounge. It was comfortably furnished, with a fitted carpet and a three-piece suite. She switched on an electric fire and drew the curtains.

‘Take off your coat and make yourself at home,’ she said. ‘I’ll get you a drink. I think there’s some whisky in the cupboard. Would that be all right?’

I assured her it would be just fine, and she found a glass and a cut-glass decanter and poured a generous measure, two good doubles combined. She would have made it more if I hadn’t stopped her.

She was damned naive and so keen to please me. ‘Have I done wrong?’ she asked, the eyes swimming anxiously behind the thick lenses. ‘Is that all right?’

I reassured her with a light kiss on the cheek. She excused herself for a moment and went out. I sat down in one of the easy chairs to drink my whisky. It was really very comfortable, the cushions over-ripe and stuffed with feathers. I got up to test the couch, which looked as if it might prove a more than satisfactory battleground, and Lucy came back.

I turned to my chair and knocked over a small occasional table with rather a clatter. She moved in quickly to right it. ‘Don’t worry, my father’s almost stone-deaf. He takes his hearing aid out when he goes to bed.’

She had got rid of her coat and was certainly even more attractive than I’d realized. The whisky talking, I suppose, but as she stood up from righting the table I put an arm around her waist and pulled her close. In my imagination she seemed to rotate in my hands sensuously, closing her eyes, the lips parting slightly, and the breasts swelled beneath the thin blouse.

She was trembling as she stood there, waiting, and I was filled with a sudden fierce pleasure that I could move her in a way I had always signally failed to move Imogene. It had a very satisfactory feeling of rightness to it. I was the master here. Male above female as it was ordained to be.

Wishful thinking or, more likely, the whisky increasing its grip. I sat on the couch and pulled her down beside me, then I kissed her, tenderly, but with considerable finesse, ready for the slow, careful build-up.

To this day, I am not too certain what happened next. It was as if Lucy lost her balance, sliding off the edge of the couch, pulling me down on top of her. I got the distinct impression that she was trying to beat me off, although her mouth stayed fastened to mine, the tongue darting in and out like a mad thing. Her legs threshed about constantly, and at one point I thought she was trying to put a knee into my crotch.

Suddenly I realized that, by some mysterious alchemy, she had managed to remove her pants. Her thighs spread on either side of me, knees raised. ‘It’s all right,’ she murmured into my right ear in a surprisingly matter-of-fact tone. ‘I’ve put my diaphragm in.’

Which fact alone should have occasioned me some suspicion, but by then I was thoroughly aroused. Within seconds of my entering her she started to shake and didn’t stop for quite some time. I finally managed to break free, which took some doing for she was as strong as a horse, and rolled on my back for a moment, taking some very deep breaths.

She kissed my ear. ‘Gorgeous!’ she whispered. ‘Absolutely heavenly.’

She reached for me again and before I knew where I was, I was back on the job, working away manfully while Lucy continued to orgasm. I’d heard of such cases, but had never experienced one until now.

When I broke free she was still in full flight, but I had very definitely given my all. Like the man in the song, I was tired and I wanted to go home. But she wouldn’t leave me alone.

What with that enormous whisky, on top of everything else I’d drunk that night, I just wasn’t in any fit state to rise to the sort of occasion she seemed to demand. It didn’t matter a bit, for the next thing I knew she was on top of me, legs straddled, the skirt rising.

She trembled and shook, eyes closed, her face wreathed in ecstasy. I suddenly knew beyond any shadow of a doubt that I had stumbled across that creature, who in spite of the frequency with which she invades the sexual fantasies of the average male, is in reality a rare bird indeed: the insatiable woman who can’t get enough of it.

She leaned down, covering my face with moist, openmouthed kisses, and a door opened and closed again upstairs. She gave an extra shudder, then disengaged herself, stood up and pulled down her skirt.

She put a finger to her lips, moved to the door and opened it slightly. I buttoned myself up hurriedly and heard a toilet flush. A stair creaked as someone started to come down, and she turned, face expressionless, and threw me my trenchcoat. As I pulled it on she picked up her pants, which were lying on the floor, and stuffed them under a cushion.

The door opened a moment later and a tall, skinny old man with the face of a desiccated monkey, and yellow, watery eyes entered. He wore an old-fashioned quilted dressing gown in some sort of wine-coloured silk and there was a hearing aid in his right ear.

‘Hello, darling, I thought you’d be asleep.’ Lucy kissed him on the cheek. ‘This gentleman was kind enough to escort me home.’

He glared at me like some virulent adder, moved to the fireplace and tapped a finger on the clock.

‘Gentleman?’ he said in a dry old voice that suited his appearance admirably. ‘And what kind of gentleman, pray, keeps a young lady out after eleven o’clock at night?’

The end part of his little speech rose to a crescendo. It was all of ten past eleven. I was tired and one thing was certain. After Lucy I had nothing left over for scenes of this sort.

‘I think I’d better be going,’ I said and edged towards the door. Lucy spoke to him briefly in a low voice. It sounded as though she said, ‘I think you should apologise, George.’

‘Oh, very well,’ he muttered and raised his voice, to call as I reached the door, ‘Perhaps I was a little hasty. Thank you for seeing my wife home safely. It was most kind of you.’

‘My pleasure,’ I said and got out fast.

Lucy had me by the sleeve as I went through the porch. ‘Please, Oliver, give me a minute.’

She closed the door, we were alone in the warm darkness. ‘You are one for the book, aren’t you?’ I said.

‘Lucille?’ he shouted querulously from inside.

‘The master calls,’ I said unkindly and opened the outside porch door.

She held on tight. ‘Can I meet you somewhere tomorrow?’

‘Good God!’ I said. ‘You really take the biscuit, don’t you?’

‘Please, Oliver, it’s a lot more complicated than it looks.’

She moved close, very close, the tops of those good breasts nudging my chest, and then she put a hand on my arm again. It was all she had to offer, poor girl, I could see that. On the other hand I wanted to get away and there was only one means of accomplishing that.

‘All right,’ I said. ‘Where and when?’

‘Ladywood Park gates. One-thirty tomorrow afternoon. Is that all right?’

When I nodded she kissed me passionately again, and then the old man started creating inside and she opened the door and went in.

‘Nymphomaniac?’ Jake said. ‘Don’t make me laugh. It’s all sailors’ tales, like mermaids and the unicorn.’

‘And a sea of pitch on the other side of the Cape of Good Hope?’ I said.

‘Exactly.’

He turned from making the tea and yawned as he walked to the window. He looked tired, too tired really, but it was understandable. His final exams were in three or four weeks. It was make or break time.

‘You don’t think it exists, then?’ I persisted. ‘As a condition, I mean?’

‘Oh, there’s a hell of a difference in frequency pattern, I’ll grant you that.’ He poured the tea and spooned in condensed milk. ‘Sex is an appetite just like food and drink, and some people like to indulge more than others.’

‘Then what’s the norm?’ I demanded.

‘There’s no such animal. Anything from once a year to three times a day, if you can find someone to put up with you.’

He sat in the window seat and filled his pipe. I said, ‘And what about Lucy?’

‘God knows.’ He shrugged. ‘Young girl married to an old man. That’s an old story. She was probably making up for months of frustration in one grand slam tonight.’

Which was always possible. I sat there thinking about it. He said, ‘What about tomorrow? Are you going to go?’

‘I hadn’t intended to. What do you think?’

‘Oh, give her a chance,’ he said. ‘Everyone deserves that. On the other hand, I’m too tired to think straight, so don’t blame me if it goes sour on you.’

It started to rain again as I crossed the garden on my way home, but then it had been that kind of winter. No snow at all.

When I went into the bedroom, everything was exactly as I had left it, the typescript of my book stacked neatly beside the portable typewriter, the final sheet still in the machine. For the first time in weeks there was nothing to do, no personal demon to drive me on. I went to bed and slept, in spite of the night’s exertions, extremely badly.

I spent the morning working hard on the editing of the book, had an early lunch and was at the park gates in good time for our rendezvous. I worked my way through the
Sunday Dispatch
as I waited.

There was nothing of any great minute in the news. Milk rationing was to be suspended, hotels and restaurants freed of the five-shilling meal rule. They’d certainly taken their time over that considering the war had been over nearly five years. Not surprisingly, there was to be a general election. I stuffed the newspaper into a wastepaper basket and stepped back hastily as a pre-war Austin Seven pulled in at the kerb, Lucy at the wheel.

‘Sorry I’m late,’ she called and opened the door for me. ‘Hop in.’

I squeezed into the passenger seat. ‘This yours?’

She shook her head. ‘No, my husband’s. It stood in the garage on wood blocks most of the war.’

She had made up her face very carefully and wore a blue reefer jacket with naval buttons, a Black Watch tartan skirt, tan stockings and brown brogues. She really did look very presentable.

‘I thought we might go for a drink,’ she said. ‘If that’s all right?’

Which was fine by me. I sat back and left it to her, and she took me to a little country pub about five minutes’ drive away, in a village just outside the city boundary. The sort of place that was certain to be swallowed up by Greater Manningham once private building really got going again.

We had the snug to ourselves. I got her the gin and tonic she asked for and a pint of bitter for myself, and we sat in an old fashioned wooden booth by the window, knees touching.

‘This is nice,’ she said, looking around the room.

‘Haven’t you been here before?’

‘Oh, yes,’ she nodded. ‘I came here several times with my mother, but that was a long time ago. 1945.’

‘The year the war ended.’

That’s right. She was killed in a car crash three weeks after V.E. day, with an Australian squadron leader she’d been running around with.’

She didn’t seem particularly upset, so I said carefully, ‘What about your father?’

‘Oh, he died years ago. Before the war. Some kind of cancer, I think. Here, let me get you another drink.’ She took my glass before I could protest and was away. She came back with another gin and tonic for herself and a whisky and soda for me, a double from the taste of it.

‘I thought you might fancy a change.’

I made no comment. Instead, I said, What about your husband? When did you meet him?’

‘He lived next door to us for years.’ I was seventeen when my mother died and she left me nothing but debts. I was working in an insurance office as a junior clerk. Two pounds five shillings a week. Anything would have been better.’

She traced an idle finger along the top of my thigh to my knee-cap, still staring out of the window. I said, ‘Why did he marry you?’

‘God knows. Not to sleep with me if that’s what you’re thinking. He was sixty-seven when we married and had a bad heart to boot. A whim of the moment maybe. Who knows.’