Scandalous (4 page)

“What? What’s so funny?”

“Sorry, darling. They’re jolly nice teeth. It’s just that they make you look so…American. Were they awfully expensive?”

“Of course not,” lied Theo. They’d actually cost him the better part of fifteen grand, but he wasn’t about to tell Theresa that. In America, and particularly on the West Coast where Theo had spent most of his undergraduate years, no one criticized you for spending money on your appearance. If anything, good personal grooming was considered a sign of self-respect. This was one of the many things Theo preferred about the States. Here you were made to feel like a vain, shallow idiot. “Besides, I’m a fellow now. It’s part of my job to look professional.”

Unlike his wife, Theo’s young mistress Clara had been wildly impressed with his Hollywood smile when she saw it this morning.
Young people appreciate me
, thought Theo.
The sooner the undergraduates breathe some life into this place, the better.

“My goodness, Professor Dexter. You’re ready for your close-up.”

Margaret Haines was smiling. One of only two female fellows in the entire college, Margaret made Theo uncomfortable.
A Latin scholar, she was cleverer than he was and only a few years older. He could never quite tell if she was being sincere or putting him on. In this instance he rather suspected the latter.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a perfectly pressed gown in my life. It looks good with your tan, though. Have you and Theresa been away?”

“
I
was away,” Theo said cautiously. “California, for work. T had to stay here, unfortunately. She’s at a crucial stage with her book.”

“Oh.
How
unfortunate.” That smile again. “You must have been lonely.”

Definitely taking the piss. Stupid old dyke.

“I soldiered on, Margaret.”

“I’m sure you did, Theo. I’m sure you did.”

Margaret Haines had vociferously opposed Theo Dexter’s appointment last year, but she’d been shouted down. Anthony Greville, the master, in particular had been a big supporter. “Dexter’s glamorous. The undergraduates worship him. And he’s a natural teacher. We need a bit of vigor at St. Michael’s, Margaret my dear. A bit of
pizzazz
.”

“The man is ghastly. He’s vain and arrogant. Not to mention an inveterate womanizer.”

Greville ran his rheumy old eyes lasciviously over Margaret Haines’s body. In her early forties she was still trim and attractive, albeit in a motherly sort of way.

“I can think of worse crimes,” he oiled, smiling to reveal a set of crooked, yellowing teeth. “Let he who is without sin and all that…”

The fellowship had supported him. Margaret Haines wondered how many of them were regretting it now, forced to share high table with Theo’s insufferable vanity. The man’s self-satisfaction needed a seat all to itself.

“I saw Clara Hausmann leaving your rooms earlier.” Margaret Haines felt a guilty rush of satisfaction watching the smile die on Dexter’s lips. “Back early, is she?”

Theo hesitated for a moment before answering. “Yes. Clara’s been struggling with her dissertation. I’ve been doing what I can to help.”

“I must say, it’s very generous of your wife to share you so freely with your students. Not even term time and already you’re giving private tutorials.”

Bitch. If she says anything to make things difficult for me with Theresa…

“You forget, my wife teaches herself,” Theo said smoothly. “She understands the pressures of the job.”

“But not the perks of the job, I imagine.” The meal was over. Margaret Haines got to her feet. “Something tells me she would be rather less understanding of those. Enjoy the term, Theo.”

Theo Dexter watched her go, feeling something close to hatred. It was no good. St. Michael’s wasn’t big enough for the both of them. He would have to figure out a way to get rid of her.

S
ASHA
M
ILLER SAT
in the backseat of her parents’ old Volvo, gazing out the window in wonder.

“There’s Downing!”

“Oh my God. That’s King’s!”

“Look, Dad, that’s Trinity. J. J. Thomson was master there.”

“J. J. who?”

“
Thomson
, Dad.” Sasha shook her head in wonder. “J. J. Thomson? He discovered the electron in 1897?”

“Oh.” Her parents exchanged smiles. “
That
J. J. Thomson.”

Sasha had been so quiet on the M25, her parents started to worry that something was wrong. She’d mumbled a few words in the Dartford tunnel—something about Will, the lad she was seeing from Tidebrook—then reverted to mutedom all the way up the M11. It was only when they pulled off at exit 11 and made their way through the flat East Anglian landscape toward the ancient city itself that Sasha miraculously sprang back to life.

“It’s all so beautiful.”

And it was. Sue Miller wasn’t a fan of the featureless countryside they’d driven through on the way here. No hedges, no nice old dry-stone walls, just acres of industrially cultivated rapeseed fields cutting a garish yellow swath through the landscape. But Cambridge itself was adorable, a medieval, redbrick wonderland
with charming cobbled streets and alleyways all tumbling down toward the river and the vast, green expanse of the Backs beyond. Everyone seemed to be on bicycles, not surprisingly given that the roads were so tiny. Twice Don almost scraped the paint off his wing mirror trying to squeeze the Volvo down some wafer-thin alley or other in search of St. Michael’s. As for the ludicrously complicated one-way system, at one point they wondered whether they would have to give up on the whole enterprise and go back to Sussex, so impossible was it to get within a mile of Sash’s college. But at last they did get there. Sasha sprang out of the car like a shot.

“Wow.” It was like stepping to a scene from
Brideshead Revisited
. Young men in rugby shirts and college ties chatted to pretty girls with piles of library books under their arms. Bikes with wicker baskets leaned against every available wall. The spire of St. Michael’s College Chapel cast a long shadow over the Porters’ Lodge. Across the court, Sasha could just glimpse the tops of the punts as they made their sedate way upriver.

I’ve died and gone to heaven. Just think, on Monday I’m going to see the Cavendish Laboratory, the greatest physics lab on the planet. Twenty-nine Cavendish researchers have won Nobel prizes. Twenty-nine! Imagine if I were the thirtieth?

While Don unloaded the suitcases from the car, Sasha closed her eyes and indulged in her version of the Oscar-night fantasy. Instead of the Kodak Theatre, Hollywood, and an Herve Leger bandage dress, Sasha was in Oslo City Hall, dressed in…well, who cared what she was dressed in, the point was she was receiving her physics prize for her pioneering work in…something. There were her parents, teary-eyed with pride. And Mr. Cummings, her lovely physics teacher from St. Agnes’s. And of course Will, looking gorgeous in black tie, escorting her up to the dais…

Sasha had said a tearful good-bye to Will last night. For all their plans and promises to each other over the summer, they
both knew that her going away would be a giant test for their relationship.

“I’ve never felt like this about anyone,” Will said truthfully, squeezing Sasha’s hand. They were walking through the woods that adjoined Chittenden. Now that his parents were back, there was little privacy to be had at Will’s house, and none at all at Sasha’s shoebox of a cottage. A few weeks ago it was warm enough to make love in the woods at night, gazing up at the stars. (Sex, if she was honest, was still not all Sasha had hoped it might be. Although Will asked her each time if he was “taking her to heaven and back” and Sasha always loyally replied in the affirmative, the truth was that the celestial round trip was still distinctly short haul.) But now that the nights were closing in it was much too cold for outdoor shagging. Even Will seemed to have lost his enthusiasm.

“I’ll miss you so much, Will. But at least we’ll be busy.” She tried to look on the bright side. “You’ll be working with your dad. And I’ll be in the lab all day and studying all night.”

“Not
all
night, I hope.” Will laughed. “You have to have some fun, Sasha.”

She looked at him curiously. “Studying
is
fun. I mean, nobody goes to Cambridge to get drunk and party. It’s all about the work.”

“Oi, you lot!” A loud, angry voice from the Porters’ Lodge brought Sasha back to reality. “Bugger off before I send you to the dean. And stop harassing my freshers!” A group of drunk, semi-naked young men dressed (or half-dressed) as Roman soldiers staggered giggling out of the lodge, pursued by the irate head porter, a beadle-like figure in black suit and bowler hat. As they left, two of them dropped their togas, flashing a pair of unappealingly white and hairy bottoms in Sasha’s general direction.

“So sorry, miss,” the panting porter apologized. “Not what you need on your first day at St. Michael’s.”

“Local thugs from the town, I suppose?” asked Sue Miller disapprovingly.

“Them lot? No, ma’am. They’re classics scholars. Ours, unfortunately. What are you reading, miss?”

“Physics,” said Sasha.

“Lovely. We like the scientists. Nice and quiet, your lot. Apart from the medics of course. You don’t want to go out with any of them.”

“Oh, I won’t be going out with anybody,” said Sasha earnestly. “I have a boyfriend. I’m here to study, not socialize.”

The head porter looked at her pityingly.

Poor little thing. Like a lamb to the slaughter.

Theresa Dexter watched in exasperation as, one by one, the papers fluttered to the ground.

“Bugger!” Her soft Irish accent rang through the crisp Cambridge air. “Bollocks. Come here, you stupid…oh, no, please don’t…shit.” She was standing outside her front door, car keys in her mouth, mobile phone wedged between her ear and her shoulder, clutching the most enormous stack of essays escaping from an elastic band. Not only had the first stray papers made a break for freedom, but as the wind picked up, they began to dance around the front garden, taunting Theresa. Two sheets were heading dangerously close to the road. “I’m sorry, Ma. I’ll have to call you back. Somebody’s dissertation is about to get run over by the Maddingley bus.”

Dressed inappropriately for the chilly weather in a floaty summer skirt and one of Theo’s old shirts, with her tangled mane of pre-Raphaelite curls held precariously in place by a pencil, Theresa dropped everything on the doorstep and began running after the errant essay papers, like an overexcited puppy chasing a butterfly.

“You all right, T? Can I help?”

Jenny Aubrieau, Theresa’s next-door neighbor and closest friend in Cambridge, stuck her head over the gate. Jenny was an
English scholar, like Theresa, and was married to Jean Paul, a research fellow at Jesus. Jean Paul was always urging Jenny to tell Theresa the truth about her philandering husband—Theo Dexter’s extracurricular love life was the worst-kept secret in the university—but Jenny couldn’t bring herself to do it. For one thing they hung out as couples, which made the whole situation doubly awkward. But more importantly, Theresa was so madly, blindly in love with Theo, the truth would destroy her. Besides, maybe Theo would come to his senses and get over his midlife crisis soon. Jenny Aubrieau hoped so.

“No, I’m all right,” said a flustered Theresa. “Actually, yes. Grab that one. That one, that one, that one! Oh God.” A single, handwritten sheet flew over the garden gate and dived directly beneath the wheels of an oncoming car. Seconds later more muddy tires pounded it into oblivion.

“Not the next Shakespeare, I hope?” Jenny helped Theresa retie the remaining papers and carry them out to her car.

“I very much doubt it,” sighed Theresa. “Still, it’s not very professional, is it?
Sorry what’s-your-name, I threw your essay under a car. We’ll call it a C, shall we, and better luck next time?
God, I hate teaching.”

“No you don’t.” Jenny chucked the files on the backseat of Theresa’s Fiat and stood back to wave her off.

“I bloody do. All I want is to be left alone to write.”

“Drink after work? I have to put Amelie and Ben down at seven, but I’m free after that if you are.” Jenny still felt awkward talking about her children in front of Theresa. She knew how desperately her friend wanted kids. Each pregnancy felt like a betrayal. But there came a point when
not
talking about them felt even more awkward. Particularly as these days Jenny’s every waking hour seemed to revolve around the little sods.