Rescuing Rose (16 page)

'Courtauld… twentieth December, ' he muttered as he scribbled away, 'that's only three weeks off. I'll come as a modern portrait so I don't have to wear anything too barmy. How about you?'

'I'm not sure. I might go as Damien Hirst's bisected cow. It's called "Mother and Child, Divided" so it would be very appropriate in my case, ' I added with a bitter laugh. Theo gave me a puzzled look. 'Or maybe I'll play it safe and go as Tracey Emin's unmade bed. '

'I think you'd look good as the Botticelli Venus, ' he said suddenly. I felt blood suffuse my face. 'I mean, ' he stammered, 'with your long red hair—that's all I mean. ' Suddenly the phone rang. I picked it up.

'Hello?' I said. There was silence, then stertorous breathing. 'Hello?' Oh not
again
! I slammed the phone down then hit 1471. Number withheld. Of course.

'Problems! problems!' yelled Rudy.

'You're telling me, ' I replied.

'Are you all right, Rose?' said Theo.

'Oh I'm fine, it's just that I've got this nuisance caller. '

'What a drag. My wife had one of those once. She never said a thing, she just put the phone down. Drives them mad. '

'That's what I do. '

'Then with any luck they'll stop. '

Whoever it was went quiet on me for a few days, so I forgot about it and in any case I was very busy at work. Plus I had my phone-ins and I went on
Kilroy
to discuss 'Couples Reuniting' and I had to give a talk to the Bath W. I. So what with all that I hadn't had time to plan my outfit—and by now the ball was only ten days away. What on earth should I wear? Looking through my Pre-Raphaelites book I had a stroke of inspiration. I decided to go as
Flaming June
, by Lord Leighton, as I shall be Flaming Forty that month. Plus the girl in the painting's got hair rather like mine, though she's much more pneumatic than me. Beverley said she was also desperate about her costume so on Friday night I took my art history books next door. Trevor lay by her chair, contentedly sucking the head of his toy gorilla while Bev and I looked at the plates.

'Do you fancy Baroque or Rococo?' I asked her as I flicked through my Gombrich. 'You've got a lovely high forehead so maybe Renaissance would be more your style… ' I gazed at the Raphael Madonna clutching the infant Jesus tightly to her and felt the familiar stab in my heart. 'Maybe you should go for Gauging I went on, as she picked up another book. 'You'd make a lovely Tahitian maiden or perhaps Impressionism's more your thing. How about—yes!—a Renoir bathing beauty in frilly swimmers—no, on second thoughts you're too slim. Or a Joshua Reynolds—or a pretty Gainsborough—what do you think, Bev? Bev?' I looked up. She was crying. 'Bev! What's the matter?' I grabbed her hand.

'I should go like this, ' she wept, showing me a pitiless Breughel portrait of a beggar with mangled limbs. 'Or maybe I should go as that screaming Munch, or as a deformed creature from a Hieronymus Bosch. '

'Beverley—don't, ' I said. 'You're lovely. '

'That's not
true
! I'm a
cripple
! she wailed. 'I'm a fucking
cripple
, Rose: a Raspberry Ripple. '

'Bollocks! You're beautiful. '

'Not any
more
. Everyone thinks I'm so brave, ' she sobbed, her face red and twisted with grief. 'Brave Bev. Battling Bev. But I'm not like that inside. I'm not like that at
all
. Don't tell anyone this, ' she confided with a teary gasp, 'but I get so upset sometimes. '

'
Do
you?' I said.

'Yes, ' she murmured with a sniff. 'I do. But I can't help it because I know I'll never—uh-uh—walk, or run again: I've got to sit down for the rest of my life. And I tell people that I've— uh-uh—got over it—but the truth is I
haven't
and I never
will
!' I thought again of the suppressed sobbing I'd heard through the wall and of the hockey sticks she'd burned on the fire. 'And all these paintings of these lovely—uh-uh—women with their— uh-uh—lovely, perfect, strong legs… '

'I'm sorry, ' I said as Trevor passed her a hanky. 'It's my fault for bringing them round. Have a good cry, ' I said as she buried her face in his fur. 'Why shouldn't you cry? Something awful happened to you. But Bev I know you'll be… '—my throat ached: I find crying catching—'I know you'll be fine. ' Her sobs subsided, and she looked up and wiped her eyes.

'Yes, ' she croaked. 'Maybe I will. I'm sorry, ' she said, 'I know things could be worse. The way I hit the ground I'm lucky not to be a tetraplegic, or dead. Perhaps I should go to the ball as a still life, ' she added with a bleak smile. 'I mean, there is still life. '

'Oh
yes
!

Suddenly Trevor went into the hall, then reappeared with the walkabout phone in his mouth.

'Oh, ' she laughed, then hugged him again. 'It's okay, Trev, Rose is here. Whenever I'm depressed he goes and gets the phone, ' she explained, 'so that I can ring up a friend. '

'How lovely, ' I said as my heart turned to mush and I reached out to stroke his ear.

'Actually, Rose, ' she said swallowing her tears, 'the real reason why I'm crying is not so much my accident as the fact that I'm very… ' Her voice trailed away. 'I'm very… ' she shrugged then stared, red-eyed, into the distance; 'I'm very… '

'Lonely?' I murmured. She nodded slowly, then looked at me.

'
Yes
. Yes, I am. I could deal with what happened so much better if I had someone to share things with. But I haven't been out with anyone since Jeff left and it's getting me down. ' 'But you know people, ' I said. 'You get invited. ' 'That's not the problem. The problem is Trev. Every time I meet a nice bloke it turns out that he's only really interested in me because of him. You know, the novelty of it. The Bev 'n' Trev show. Something to gas about down the pub. But if I try and meet a man
without
Trevor, they seem disappointed. They don't fall for
me
, first, on my
own
! This conversation sounded oddly familiar—it reminded me of the twins. 'I've got a date with this chap on Friday, ' she went on. 'But I'm terrified that he'll just fall in love with Trev. ' 'Then don't take him with you. ' 'But he gets anxious. I don't like to leave him. ' 'Then he can come to me. Trevor do you want to have dinner with me on Friday night?' He thumped his tail. 'Okay, seven-thirty for eight. Let me know if you've got a veggie. Right—back to the task in hand. ' I picked up one of the books again, flicked through it, then suddenly stopped. I looked at the picture, then looked at Bev. Perfect.

'I've got it, ' I said. I showed her the Degas ballerina, in her gossamer tutu, waiting in the wings to go on. 'That's the one, isn't it?'

Beverley gazed at it for a few seconds, then suddenly smiled. 'Yes—I think that's the one, ' she said.

'So what's your problem then Sarah?' I said on my Thursday night phone-in.

'Well my problem's that I'm thirty-nine and I'm terrified of turning forty. What can I do?'

'Listen honey, '—I adopt this feisty tone on the phone-in: it's part of the entertainment—'listen honey, ' I said. 'Forty is the new thirty. Everyone knows that. This is boom time for Middle Youth. Look at Nigella. Look at Madonna… Hey! Got it! Problem solved! Why don't you just change your Christian name to something ending with "a"! And now on line four we have… ' I peered at the computer screen. 'Kathy… ' Kathy? Oh
God
!!

'I just want all your listeners to know what a
wicked
, WICKED woman you are Rose Costelloe! My husband left me because of you. You sit there in that comfy studio of yours dispensing advice like some high priestess but you ruined my life you interfering cow. And you are going to PAY for what you did to me, destroying my marriage, you baggage! You are going to
pay
for that—mark my words, you'll be
really
sorry that you ever crossed me and—' Crazy Kathy was quickly faded out and I looked daggers at Wesley through the studio glass.

'And I'm afraid that brings us to the end of
Sound Advice
for tonight, ' said Minty with professional calm. 'But I hope you'll join us again. And remember, if you've got a problem, don't worry about it—but
do
ask Rose. '

'Wesley, ' I said crossly as I pushed on the studio door. 'Please don't put that Rottweiller through to me ever again! If I want abuse and intimidation, I can get it from my editor any day of the week. '

'I'm sorry, ' he whined, his bald head gleaming in the studio lights. 'She just, you know, slipped through the net. '

'Did you get her number?'

'She withheld it. ' Ah
ha
.

'Well someone—and I think it's her—has been harassing me with nuisance calls at home, and it's beginning to get me down. '

Sitting in the cab on the way back to Camberwell I thought, what if the woman's not just mad and sad but actually dangerous? Daphne, the
Daily Herald's
agony aunt once had a stalker, and he turned up at her office with an axe. He's currently enjoying a maxi-break at Broadmoor. What if Crazy Kathy's like that?

In the meantime the twins are being very secretive about their costumes for the ball, while Theo's still trying to decide. He ought to go as a Giacommetti, I thought as I surreptitiously scrutinised his slender physique. Meanwhile Bev and I went to 'MadWorld' Costume hire in Gray's Inn Road to get ourselves kitted out. In the cab there she told me about her date the night before—she wasn't impressed.

'I had to go Dutch! What a creep!'

'I've always gone Dutch, ' I said. 'Does it really matter, Bev? Aren't we modern women now?'

'I don't want to be modern on a first date, ' she said indignantly. 'It's so unromantic'

'I always went Dutch with Ed. '

'What? Right from the start?'

I'd never really thought about it. 'Yes, ' I said. 'Right from the start. He'd just bought this big house so I felt it was only fair to go halves. '

I fetched the costumes from the rail while Trevor helped Bev get changed. He removed her shoes with his teeth, then pulled off her track suit bottoms with the command, 'Tug, Trev! Tug!' I handed her the tutu through the curtain, then tied the ribbons of her ballet shoes.

'You look… lovely!' I said. 'So dainty. '

'And you look like the setting sun!' I was wearing a blazing orange floor-length Grecian tunic, with pleating as fine as Fortuny silk. 'The Pre-Raphaelite look really suits you, ' said Bev. 'You know, this is going to be fun. '

On the night of the ball Beverley's mother came to look after Trevor as he doesn't like loud music or late nights. Then Bev, Theo and I got a cab together to the Courtauld. This was the first time that Theo and Bev had met and they seemed to have struck up an instant rapport; and although she's very independent, she allowed him to push her chair. As we walked through the arched entrance of Somerset House into the huge courtyard I caught my breath. Illuminated fountains threw up jets of water like ostrich plumes, while behind, on the open-air ice rink, skaters spun dreamily around to the strains of a Viennese waltz. And now, as we walked towards the large marquee on our left we spotted the guests arriving for the ball. The inventiveness of the costumes was amazing—everyone had gone to town. Checking in their coats with us were a Medici Pope, a Frida Kahlo self-portrait and the Holbein Henry VIII. Standing by the Christmas tree was Caravaggio's Young Bacchus, his hair festooned with vine leaves and grapes. Nearby a dignified Rembrandt chatted to a wanton-looking Salome who was gaily clutching John the Baptist's head. There were some amazing modern works too. A tall, bony woman with a long, angular face made an authentic Modigliani; a curvy girl in a cobalt-blue body-stocking was clearly a late Matisse. Chatting to the Van Gogh
Self-Portrait With Bandaged Ear
was a woman dressed as Marilyn Monroe. This was the Andy Warhol Marilyn complete with lemon-yellow hair, pink face and blue legs. She'd even put wire all around the hem of her
Seven Year Itch
plunging white dress. The surrealists were out in force too. One man had the Dali lobster telephone balanced on top of his head and, most spectacular, a man who'd come as
The Therapist
by Magritte. His top half was a birdcage, containing two white doves, half obscured by red velvet drapes: but from waist down he wore conventional pin-striped trousers and a pair of shiny black shoes.

'What amazing costumes, ' I breathed. 'And it looks like a sell-out. '

'It is, ' said Bev. 'I managed to sell the last two tables only yesterday, to a firm of city solicitors—they're always on for this kind of thing. '

'Which firm is that then?' asked Theo with studied casualness.

'Prenderville White. '

Prenderville White? That was where his wife worked. Shit! I glanced at Theo, he'd gone red.

'There you are, Rose!' It was the twins clutching flutes of champagne. 'Flaming June!' they both cried.

'And you're—what are you? Of course. You're tubes of oil paint!'

'Correct!'

They were wearing identical white boiler suits, with 'Windsor and Newton' printed on them, front and back, with coloured belts. On their heads were flat white, hexagonal hats— or rather tops—with a matching stripe.

'I'm Burnt Sienna, ' explained Bella.

'I'm Scarlet Lake, ' said Bea. 'We should have got you to come as Rose Madder, Rose! It would have been rather appropriate, what!'

'This is my neighbour Beverley, ' I said frostily, ignoring her.

'You look tutu gorgeous!' Bella cried—and it was true. Beverley's white silk chiffon dress was knee-length, cut fairly low and tied with a sky-blue satin sash. Her motionless legs looked thin but elegant in their pearlescent opaque tights; her feet, in beribboned pink satin ballet pumps were placed carefully on the wheelchair plate. She'd pulled her hair back into a chignon and had a velvet choker around her slim throat.

'And this is Theo, my flatmate. ' Theo smiled politely at the twins as they shook hands but I could see the tense, unhappy expression in his eyes.

'So how are you enjoying Rose's regime, Theo?' asked Bea with a snort. 'She's fanatically tidy and she doesn't so much clean the house as give it a chemical peel!'