A Bouquet of Barbed Wire

Novelist and screenwriter
Andrea Newman
changed the face of British culture in the seventies with her steamy television serial
A Bouquet of Barbed Wire
, based on her novel of the same name. Among her more recent credits are the hugely successful
A Sense of Guilt, Imogen’s Face, An Evil Streak
and
Pretending to be Judith
. She was born in Kent and now lives in London.

Novels by Andrea Newman

A Share of the World

Mirage

The Cage

Three Into Two Won’t Go

Alexa

A Bouquet of Barbed Wire

Another Bouquet

An Evil Streak

Mackenzie

A Sense of Guilt

Triangles

A Gift of Poison

Andrea Newman

A complete catalogue record for this book can be obtained from the British Library on request

The right of Andrea Newman to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

Copyright © 1969 Andrea Newman

Cover image © Mammoth Screen (Bouquet) Limited and Ingenious Broadcasting 2 LLP 2010. All rights reserved.

The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, dead or alive, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.

First published in 1969 by Triton Books

First published in this edition in 2010 by Serpent’s Tail,
an imprint of Profile Books Ltd
3A Exmouth House
Pine Street
London EC1R 0JH
website:
www.serpentstail.com

ISBN 978 1 84668 772 3

Printed and bound in Great Britain by Bookmarque Ltd,
Croydon, Surrey

10 9 8 7 6 5 4

To my parents with love

I
T BEGAN
to rain as he entered the park, but not hard enough to make him look round for a taxi. Emerging from the station, he had been tempted by a pale gleam of sunshine, sufficient to convince him of the physical benefits of walking. He needed exercise, he had decided, just as he needed fewer cigarettes and less alcohol: it was pathetic how the habits of sloth and self-indulgence crept up unnoticed, along with middle-age, that unbecoming state which you did not even recognise until events brought it sharply and unkindly home to you. And now the fine Spring rain, for her first day back. He pictured her with painful tenderness, sun-tanned and shivering, getting ready for college in the unfamiliar flat. Was he too late? Would she still be there by the time he was able to phone? He had left home an hour ahead, under Cassie’s indulgent eyes, to catch an earlier train, feeling he could only telephone properly from the office, yet not knowing what he could possibly find to say that would be sufficiently casual when he finally heard her voice.

In the office Monica was laying mail on his desk as he arrived. They greeted each other with the easy friendship of people who have worked together harmoniously for years. He was fond of Monica: he would miss her.

‘How was your weekend?’ he asked her, not really wanting to know but wanting to let her tell him. Her plain face lit up: it really did become glowing and pink as if illumined from inside by a rose-tinted bulb. He hoped life would always
seem as good to her as it did now. She was, in his view, a deserving case, but perhaps for that reason all the less likely to be rewarded. Once in a while he had instincts about people and Monica was one of them: he had never felt her to be endowed with luck. In the circumstances he was even surprised that the wedding was still on. He wished, with sudden fervour and the conviction of disaster ahead, that he could give her some luck as a present. That was all she needed, all anyone needed. All the rest was superfluous rubbish. That fairy-tale about all the various gifts—quite unnecessary. In fact even fatal: for the over-endowed, like Prue, the gods meted out special punishment.

‘Well, we went to see the house again,’ Monica said, blushing happily, ‘and d’you know, the decorators have nearly finished. Isn’t that amazing? I thought they’d be
weeks
overdue—everyone always says how slow they are.’

Of course. They were her first set of decorators. Her own personal decorators working on her own first house. No wonder the poor child was red-faced with pride, dazzled by novelty. ‘That’s marvellous,’ he said.

‘Isn’t it?’ She beamed at him. ‘And it really looks good. I mean they’ve done a good job, they haven’t been slapdash. Harry was so pleased. Well, we both were.’

How tenderly she said his name. Lingering over it, caressing it with her tongue, then rushing on, embarrassed, trying to be casual. It was all so familiar. Wasn’t that how Prue spoke of Gavin?

‘That’s splendid, Monica,’ he said heartily, but she stopped, hesitated, a little uncertain, looking at him like a dog trying to gauge its master’s mood. Had the shadow of his thoughts reached her already?

Something had to be done. He could not bear her to suffer for his state of mind, to go away thinking she had made a fool of herself, or bored him. He sat down at his desk, smiled
up at her and said with a deliberate and whole-hearted effort of charm, ‘Monica, d’you think you could do me a favour?’

She brightened instantly, her smile becoming at once more confident. ‘Yes, of course.’

‘Could you rustle up some coffee—now? And maybe a couple of aspirin. I’ve got the devil of a head—it started on the train.’

She was happy again. He had made her happy by needing her help. If only it were always so simple. He glanced at his watch: there must still be time. ‘Oh, and Monica—’

‘Yes?’ She paused at the door, on her way to the coffee.

‘Could you get Mrs. Sorenson on the line for me first?’ He pronounced the name reluctantly, with irony, forcing himself to use it because he ought not to resent it so much, and because Monica, he knew, would have methodically and automatically reclassified Prue with her new name and number. Prue would now occupy a different page in Monica’s office address book. And if Gavin should happen to answer, Monica would say with slight emphasis, ‘Is Mrs. Sorenson there? Mr. Manson would like to speak to her.’ But that should not happen, for Gavin had further to travel than Prue: Manson had seen to that when he helped them with the flat.

He went through his mail. Monica had pencilled in suggested answers for him to accept or amend. In the middle of it, the phone. Prue.

‘Hullo.’ How faint she sounded.

‘Hullo, darling. I’m so glad I’ve caught you. I was afraid you might have left for college.’

‘Well, I would’ve done, only I’m cutting the first lecture.’

‘Oh. No good?’

‘It’s not that, it’s me. I’m no good. I’ve been so terribly sick.’

Monica put coffee on his desk, smiled, and went out. Two aspirins lay in the saucer.

‘Are you all right now?’ How hard it was not to betray insane anxiety.

‘Oh yes.’ She sounded very tired. ‘Well, better, anyway. Just terribly limp. I went back to sleep actually.’

‘And I woke you up.’

‘Oh, no. Well, sort of, but it’s just as well. I’ve only got an hour to spare.’

He hesitated. ‘Why not take the whole morning off? May be what you need—do you good. After all your health’s more important …’ She should be laughing, going to parties, studying for fun; shopping and spending his money and ringing up to tell him about it. Not being sick in that flat.

‘Oh, I can’t. We’ve got Partridge at eleven and I mustn’t miss him. What were you phoning about before I started telling you my troubles?’

He couldn’t ask about the honeymoon. Not yet. He knew he ought to but the words just refused to come. ‘Well, it seems a little inappropriate in the circumstances.’ He drank some of the coffee and threw the aspirins in the waste bin. ‘I was going to invite you to lunch.’

There was a pause. Then: ‘Oh.’ The old familiar sound, a cross between ‘oh’ and ‘ooh’, full of childish excitement and adult mystery. It was a very feminine sound to him, his reward for offering her a treat. ‘Would you think me a terrible pig if I accept?’

‘Not at all, I’d be delighted. But will you feel up to it?’ He was obliged to ask and yet if she said no it would be another twenty-four hours at least before he could see her. He held his breath.

‘Well, that’s just it. Right now, no, the very thought makes me shudder, but by one o’clock I just
know
I’ll be ravenous. That’s the way it goes.’ She laughed apologetically. ‘I’m getting to know the new me.’

He brushed that aside: it was too much for him. “Then I’ll pick you up at one, outside the main entrance. Will that do?’

‘Lovely. You
are
sweet. Where are we going?’

He shook his head, forgetting she could not see him, drunk with the pleasure in her voice. ‘Surprise.’ When he put the phone down he buzzed Monica and asked her to book a table for two at the Mirabelle for one-fifteen. He added, as an afterthought, that the coffee was excellent and the aspirins had worked wonders already: his headache was nearly gone.