Old Sins (21 page)

‘Don’t go,’ he said, ‘unless you really want to.’

‘I don’t,’ she said and sat down on the bed; he looked at her for a long time, very seriously, and then put out a hand and traced the outline of her face with his finger.

‘You’re so lovely,’ he said, ‘so very very lovely.’ And then he pushed his hand under her T-shirt and stroked very very gently her breasts, and then he leant forward and kissed her on the mouth, gently, repeatedly, as he had in the car.

Lee sat still and silent; she felt her nipples grow erect, a monstrous aching deep within her, but she did not move.

‘Lie down,’ he said, ‘lie down beside me,’ and her eyes never leaving his face, she slid her T-shirt over her head, unbuttoned her trousers and stood naked before him, smiling.

‘No underwear, Mrs Wilburn? Is this for my benefit, or would that be presumptuous of me?’

‘It would,’ she said untruthfully, ‘I never wear any. I don’t like it.’

‘I think you’re lying,’ he said, reaching out and stroking her stomach, ‘I don’t believe those wonderful breasts could survive without the help of a bra. Dear God, have you no pubic hair?’ he added, sitting up and peering at her with genuine interest.

‘I shave it,’ she said, ‘Dean doesn’t like it. I thought you wouldn’t either.’

‘You were wrong,’ he said, ‘but it doesn’t matter. Here.’ And he put his hand behind her buttocks, pressing her towards him, burying his face in her stomach, kissing her where the hair should have been, licking her, searching out her clitoris with his tongue.

‘It’s different,’ he said, smiling up at her. ‘I’m not sure if I like it but it’s different. Is that nice? You must tell me.’

‘Oh, God,’ said Lee, and it was almost a groan, ‘it’s nice. Don’t, don’t stop.’

‘Oh, I think I will,’ he said, ‘in a minute,’ and he went on and on, until she cried out with pleasure and an exquisite pain, and fell on to him, lying above him, kissing him, licking him, biting him, thrusting herself on to him, and feeling suddenly the immense strong delight of his penis going deep deep within her, answering her need, gratifying her awful, aching desire. She lay there, tearing at him, like some hungry animal, rising from him, arching away, and then lunging down again, over and over again, shuddering with pleasure and need; she came once, and then again, and still she was hungry, still wanted more; he turned her on to her back, driving into her fast and hard, almost hurting her, stirring places and pleasures she had never known; she felt the waves growing, then breaking, and as she clung to him, calling out in an agony of release, he shuddered into her, with a huge groan of delight and relief.

And afterwards, they lay together and he took great handfuls of her long blonde hair and wound it round his fingers and kissed it and kissed her everywhere, on her eyelids, her nose, her lips, her breasts, saying her name over and over again. And then she felt him growing hard again, and her own need growing too, then he took her with him, further, higher than she would ever have imagined possible; and finally they slept, completely peaceful, for a long, long time.

It was midday when they woke; Hugo looked at his watch, groaned and shook her.

‘Lee, it’s after twelve, for God’s sake wake up, when is Dean getting home?’

And she looked at him through a haze of love and sleepiness, her body sated and yet hungry again, and smiled and kissed him and said, ‘On Friday night.’

They stayed there all weekend, occasionally going downstairs for food and wine and once to swim; they made love until their bodies ached with exhaustion and even Lee could ask for no more.

On Sunday afternoon they finally got up and showered together and dressed and sat quietly in the kitchen, drinking coffee and looking at one another.

‘I have to go quite soon,’ he said.

‘When?’

‘My plane leaves Los Angeles for New York at nine. I’ve ordered a car for six.’

‘Let me come with you.’

‘No.’

‘What do you want me to do?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said and she knew it was a lie.

She knew what he wanted. He wanted her to stay with Dean, and to be there when he needed her. It was a hard bargain. But she knew she had to settle for it. She had no choice. It was that or absolutely nothing at all.

In time, she could see, she would grow angry, resentful, but now, so filled with him, filled with pleasure and love, she could accept it easily and gracefully.

‘I’ll come to the airport with you,’ she said quietly, and was rewarded by seeing the respect in his eyes.

New York and London, 1956–9

WHENEVER JULIAN MORELL
was asked by the press, or eager young men with visions of following in his footsteps, how he had conceived each stage of his empire, he gave the same answer: ‘It’s all there,’ he would say, tapping his head gently, smiling (most charmingly at the journalists, slightly more coldly at the eager young men), ‘in your mind, maturing, honing down. All you have to do is release it. And know when to do so, of course.’

He did sincerely believe this; he had never consciously sat down and thought anything through, worked anything out; he had immense respect for the power of experience, instinct and logic to merge into something original, desirable and commercially sound and in his own case at any rate, the respect was totally justified. Certainly the phase of his empire that occupied much of his attention for much of the late fifties was not something that sprang from any brainstorming session or carefully formulated marketing plan. Nevertheless it was absolutely right for its time, with that perfect blend of the original and the familiar that leads the onlooker to believe that it was precisely what he or she had been waiting for and wanting for quite some time.

He was wandering through Harrods when the idea actually surfaced, looking at the cosmetic counters, chatting to the Juliana consultants and reflecting on their very pleasing sales figures; he suddenly had a vision of a very different kind of establishment: rather more than a beauty salon, a little less than a store: something small, intimate and totally extravagant. It should be, he thought, about the size of a large house, on two or three floors, rather like that of an infinitely luxurious hotel in feel, supplying his perfume and cosmetics and all the allied beauty business paraphernalia – treatment rooms, masseurs, steam baths, saunas, beauty therapists, hair stylists – that had become a most necessary accessory to well-heeled life on both sides of the Atlantic. But it would offer other things too, things to buy, all compatible with a mood of self-indulgence, the atmosphere rich and rare, a place that enticed, beguiled, encouraged women into extravagance.

Each department should be small and exclusive, leading
from one mood and set of desires to the next: logically extending from cosmetics to lingerie, dresses to furs, hats to shoes. Shopping there would not be a chore, or even a business, it would be a beautiful experience and his establishment would provide a series of different settings for the experiences, a world apart, an excursion into a charmed life; and it would not consist of departments and counters and salesgirls and tills, it would be carefully designed into spaces and areas and moods.

Women would come in initially for the cosmetics and the beauty treatments, that would be the lure; but then they would stay; and it would be the beautiful things they could acquire that kept them there: it would all be glittering, and unashamed luxury, outrageously expensive, and totally unique, so that a customer, should she only have bought a silk scarf, a leather belt, would feel she had acquired just a tiny portion of that charmed and charming life.

All these things Julian thought almost without realizing he had thought them; later, talking to Philip Mainwaring (the marketing manager for Juliana he had decided with some misgivings to employ) he found himself describing them in the finest detail. Philip listened politely, as he was paid to do, found himself more impressed than he really wanted to be – he found Julian’s capacity for creativity made his job pattern more complex and difficult than he had ever envisaged when he took it on – and tried, like the good businessman he was, to talk him out of it.

‘I can’t see it working here,’ he said, ‘not yet. London has come a long way in the last three or four years, but I don’t know that it’s ready for that kind of concept.’

‘It’s not that new a concept,’ said Julian, ‘I mean it’s not that far removed from the Elizabeth Arden’s Red Door idea, but I see it as being much nearer a store. With a wider range of merchandise perhaps.’

‘Your other retail outlets wouldn’t like it,’ said Philip gloomily, ‘have you thought of that?’

‘Can’t see why not. I mean yes, we’ll be in competition with them in a way, but it doesn’t make Juliana less good a selling proposition. Arden still sells everywhere, after all. And the salon side of the business would provide a perfect cover, if you
like, so that we’re not actually trying to beat the stores at their own game. We’re just giving women what they want, and a lot more besides.’

Philip looked at him thoughtfully. ‘I still don’t feel it’s right for London. Not yet. Have you thought about doing it anywhere else?’

‘No, not really. You mean somewhere like Paris?’

‘No, New York. It’s so busy over there at the moment. There’s so much money about. And there’s nothing they like more than a new idea.’

‘Well,’ said Julian, ‘I don’t know New York at all. But I’m ready to have a look at it. You could be right.’

‘How would you stock it?’

‘Obviously we’d have to employ buyers. Who’d buy stuff from designers and so on in the normal way. And we could have our own designers as well. Exclusive to us. Sign them up.’

Philip shuddered. ‘It sounds horrendously expensive.’

‘That’s not an argument against it. We can raise the money easily. Morell is on an extremely sound footing. OK. I’ll have a look at New York. I’m going over next week anyway, to see how much headway we’re making with Juliana. Come with me. I need your opinion on some of those people over there anyway. There’s a new woman on the scene called Estee Lauder. She has some interesting products, and her marketing is just extraordinary.’

‘OK,’ said Philip. ‘I’d like to come. Thanks.’ He looked at Julian and grinned. ‘What does our financial director have to say about all this?’

‘Haven’t told her,’ said Julian shortly. ‘I think I’ll sort out the money first.’ He returned Philip’s look a little coldly. He found the attitude of his younger staff towards Letitia’s position in the company (that she must only be there out of some kind of misguided family feeling, that he must have a relationship with her that was odd to put it mildly) at best irritating and at worst insulting. It seemed to him patently obvious that a company as successful as Morell’s was clearly in excellent financial hands and there was no more to the matter than that. Letitia now had a department of five which she ran with crushing efficiency; she was an innovative and exacting force in the business, and Julian’s only anxiety about her was that she was nearly sixty now
and could surely not work on into the unforeseeable future. He said as much to Susan Johns one day over lunch at the Caprice; Susan laughed and said she was quite sure that Letitia would outlive them all.

‘Including you,’ said Julian, watching her happily devouring a double portion of profiteroles. ‘You’ll have a heart attack any day now. Do you want some more of those?’

‘Wouldn’t mind. Do you think they know about second helpings here?’

‘They should if they don’t. Have you ever put on any weight, Susan?’

‘Never.’

‘You’re very fortunate,’ said Julian with a sigh, looking at the dozen or so outrageously expensive grapes which he was eating for his own dessert. ‘I have to be extremely careful what I eat these days. Middle-age coming on, I suppose.’

‘Oh, don’t be ridiculous. Anyway if you’re middle-aged so am I.’

‘How old are you, Susan?’

‘Thirty-five.’

‘You really were a child bride, weren’t you?’

‘I was. Seventeen years old. Criminal really.’

‘Yes,’ said Julian, looking sombre. ‘It’s too young.’

Susan, reflecting on the fact that Eliza had only been eighteen when Julian had married her, decided they were on slightly dangerous ground and briskly changed the subject. She had gathered from the occasional remark of Letitia’s that the Morell marriage was not quite as idyllically perfect as it had promised to be and it was a subject she preferred to keep not only from talking, but also thinking, about.

‘I hear you’re going to New York.’

‘Yes. Do you know why?’

‘I imagine to sell Juliana into the stores there.’

‘Yes. And I have another project too.’

‘Am I allowed to hear about it?’

‘Well,’ said Julian, signalling to the waiter to bring some more profiteroles, ‘I suppose as a director of the company you have a right to hear about it. But there is a condition.’

‘What’s that?’

‘You don’t tell my mother.’

Susan looked at him and shook her head in mock disapproval. ‘My goodness. It must be bad.’

‘Not bad. A bit risky, perhaps.’

‘All right, I promise. You need one sensible opinion. Come on, tell me.’

He told her. Of his vision; of how he saw it adding breadth and quality to Juliana’s image; of the kind of feel it would have; the sort of women who would be attracted to it; the people he would hope to have working on it and designing for it; where it might be, how it might look. Eliza would have given all she owned to be entrusted with half, a quarter of such a confidence.

‘It’s a new phase altogether, a new venture. I feel I need one.’

‘Why?’

‘Oh, you know, boredom, restlessness. I always want to be on to the next thing. What do you think, anyway?’

‘I like it. I think it’s terrific.’

‘Good God.’ He was surprised.

‘Didn’t you think I would?’

‘No, not really.’

‘Why not? Not my style, I suppose. Too upmarket.’

‘Now don’t start getting touchy, Susan.’

‘I’m not. I’m just teasing you.’

‘Good. No, but seriously, I’d have thought it was a bit out of order, from your point of view. Expensive. For the company, I mean, new ground. All that sort of thing.’