Tess Stimson - The Adultery Club (15 page)

laws’ Hillman Imp and innocently repotted in Esher.

‘But Daisy says she’s in such pain from her arthritis,’

Louise protests ingenuously, when Cleo and I corner her

in the kitchen, ‘and Mary-Jane is the best painkiller there

is—’

‘Mother, please,’ Cleo hisses. ‘If you must dabble in

drugs, at least refrain from this ridiculous hippy patois

and call them by their proper names.’

Cleo professes not to remember playing Knock Down

Ginger, or scrumping apples, or pinching lipstick from

Woolies for a dare. She claims her crush on Donny

Osmond is a figment of my imagination, and that she

I I

always thought Fame was rubbish. Cleo is now a very

respectable chartered accountant (‘Blood will out Louise

sighed when she heard Cleo’s decision, ‘so much for

rebirthing ceremonies’) and would probably have made

the poor sweet Lyons a much more suitable daughter-in

law than the flaky sometime-chef they’re stuck with; but

there it is.

At thirty-nine, Cleo is still defiantly single. ‘My choice,’

she says tersely, when Daisy Lyon tentatively asks her

over the sherry if she is stepping out with anyone. ‘If I

wanted, I could have any man I pleased.’

‘Yes Kit mutters, Tjut you never have pleased any

man, have you?’

I adore Edward and Daisy Lyon, of course, impossible

not to - she’s an absolute lamb, and he’s such a gentleman,

so courtly and correct, with that wonderful ramrod military

bearing even at eighty-two; but you can tell they’re a

bit bewildered by the speed of the world these days, feel

somewhat adrift, desperately clinging to the old and the

familiar for support. And Nicholas - well, Nicholas can sometimes be very much his parents’ son. Which just goes to show: it’s nurture, not just nature, that will out.

I drag Kit out of the sitting room just before the

Queen’s speech; if he sees Nicholas and Edward stand to

listen to Her Majesty - as they always do - restraining

him will be beyond my capabilities.

Christmas dinner for ten is always a little testing,

especially when one of the guests decides on the spur of

the moment to become a vegan - ‘Marvellous idea, Sophs

Kit enthuses, ‘let’s start tomorrow, I hate Boxing Day

leftovers’ - but the goose is thankfully well received and,

miraculously, not in the least bit spoiled by the panicked

forty-minute search for Metheny (finally discovered fast

asleep under the potting bench in the boiler room in her

new Pooh slippers) or Evie’s disturbingly skilled attempts

at alchemy. Really, Kit is an ass. As if the baking soda

and vinegar incident last month wasn’t bad enough, he

has to provide her with the means to cook up H2SO4 in

her bedroom.

I feel dreadfully mean about my earlier dressing-gown

briskness when I open Nicholas’s present after lunch - not

that sexual favours should be in any way linked to sumptuous,

nutmeg suede coats from Joseph (though there’s no denying that if they were, I’ve more than earned it this last month or so. I don’t know what’s got into my husband,

I might have to borrow Evie’s chemistry set to cook up

some bromide for his tea) - but he’s obviously spent a lot

of money, an appallingly large sum of money. I mean,

Joseph - whereas I-‘Perfect, darling, thank you Nicholas says as he opens

my suddenly-meagre gift - a cashmere sweater the same

moss-grey as his eyes, ‘absolutely the right thing.’

‘I know it’s not terribly exciting, but you did ask for—’

‘It’s exciting to me he says quietly, ‘and it will be

wonderfully warm for skiing next week. You are a very

good wife to me, Malinche, a man simply couldn’t ask for

better. And I wouldn’t ask, obviously. Obviously.’

‘Such a very odd thing to say I muse to Kit later. ‘In fact,

he’s been behaving rather oddly altogether these past few

weeks. I know it’s driving him potty having Fisher looking

over his shoulder all the time when he’s supposed to

have retired—’

‘Oddly?”’Well, yes. Budge up, Kit, I can hardly move my

elbows.’

‘I don’t know why you don’t just tell him you smoke

Kit sighs, gracefully exhaling a smoke ring. ‘He’s hardly

going to divorce you and cite Marlboro Lights as corespondent.

You’re as bad as Metheny, hiding out in the

boiler room for a quick fag like this.’

‘Don’t you mean with a quick fag?’

‘Nothing quick about me, darling. Ask Paul. Or James.

Or—’

I cut him off quickly before he recites his entire sexual

history (which could take us to Easter.) ‘I don’t smoke, Kit.

Christmas Day and birthdays don’t count.’

‘It wouldn’t if you just stuck to your birthday, poppet.

Now, tell me about sweet Nick. In what way oddly?’

I inhale deeply, and spend the next five minutes

coughing like a romantic heroine with advanced consumption.

Lack of practice; entirely my own fault for not

telling Nicholas I smoked when we first met. ‘Don’t call

him Nick, Kit, he hates it. I don’t know quite how to put

it - he just seems - well, odd.’

‘So you keep saying,’ Kit observes.

‘He’s absolutely rampant, for one thing. I mean, he’s

always been surprisingly keen in the bedroom, though

perhaps not terribly imaginative - mind you, there was

the time with the maple syrup. And of course the nurse’s

outfit, very boarding school, that, some sort of Matron

thing—’

‘Malinche,’ Kit says, ‘sweet of you to share, but not

entirely necessary.’

Sometimes I forget Kit isn’t actually a girl.

‘Sorry. And then he’s been terribly grumpy, says it’s

work, of course, but—’

‘He’s always grumpy to me,’ Kit sulks.

‘Yes, well, you don’t exactly go out of your way to play

nicely with him, Kit

‘I make every effort—’

‘Kit, you gave him purple anal beads for Christmas.’

‘Just trying to share the fun, darling.’

‘It’s lucky for you he assumed they were part of

Sophie’s jewellery kit; you must get them back before she

turns them into a necklace for her teacher or something.’

I stub out my cigarette. ‘I don’t mean Nicholas has been

grumpy, exactly; more moody, I suppose. A bit bearish,

at times. And then suddenly terribly, terribly nice and

attentive—’

Kit pointedly says nothing.

‘Don’t even think it,’ I warn. ‘Not after—’

‘Yes,’ says Kit, ‘point taken.’

‘Although I muse, ‘he did say this girl’s name the

other morning in bed, it was actually rather funny—’

‘Funny? Are you quite mad, Malinche?’

‘Don’t look at me like that, Kit. He’s just having a

naughty little fantasy about this girl at his office - Sara. I

met her once, rather shy as I recall - but you know as well

as I do he’d never do anything. He’s positively phobic

about adultery, hardly surprising, given what happened

to his parents. It was quite unconscious. I’m sure he had

no idea what he’d said; he’d probably die of embarrassment

if I ever told him.’

‘Sadly, Pollyanna, I fear for once your optimism is well

placed,’ Kit says regretfully. ‘I can’t quite see Nicholas

doing the old inny-outy on his desk with the office floozie,

much as the image delightfully boggles the mind. No, I

think it probably is just work, sweets, or quite possibly a

brain tumour—’

‘Not funny, Kit.’

‘Now, you, on the other hand, I can quite see getting

up to all sorts of mischief.’

He’s lost me. ‘Mischief? Me? What sort of mischief?’

Kit unfurls his elegant frame from the potting bench

and saunters towards the door. 1 meant to tell you he

says negligently. ‘Trace Pitt is opening his own restaurant

in Salisbury, that’s why he’s back. And I hear—’ He turns

to me with a dark, amused smile, ‘I hear he’s hoping you will be his new head chef.’

‘Oh, Nicholas, isn’t it breathtaking?’

I jam my ski poles into the snow, biting off my gloves

finger by finger and unwinding my scarf as I drink in

the spectacular view. Below us, the Brianc,on valley looks

absurdly like a Christmas cake dotted with little green

plastic pine trees. The vicious snowstorm of yesterday has

cleared, leaving behind a foot of glorious fresh powder

and acid blue skies.

‘Fine,’ Nicholas says shortly.

Oh dear. I thought the hard skiing this morning might

have cheered him up a bit. Taken his mind off it, so to

speak.

I do love him, and I do still fancy him - ‘Is it something

I’m doing? or not doing? Please, tell me he said this

morning, desperately earnest - but I just don’t want sex

as much as he does. Not these days. Not with three

children, for heaven’s sake. And I’m sorry, but I’ve always

hated it in the morning. I don’t feel quite fresh. There’s too much raw life going on, too much spinning in my head PE

kits and lunchboxes and feed the rabbit and fix stuck

window - and not enough sleep. Never enough sleep. It’s

hard enough to get in the mood at night, when you can’t

help but keep an eye on the clock: it’s midnight, six hours

till I have to be up, if this takes another twenty minutes,

then-But in the morning, when you’d kill for just another

five minutes’ sleep. And knowing the girls could come in

at any minute. You would have thought, after ten years of

marriage, you would have thought he’d know when I’m

in the mood-‘Better get going,’ Nicholas says now, ‘the others will

be waiting.’

He shoots off down the piste before I even have my

gloves back on. I’m still trying to tuck my scarf back into

my ski jacket and do up the zip with clumsy fingers as he

reaches a sharp left bend. I glance up, squinting slightly

at the brightness of sun on snow, to see where he is, and

watch it all unfold before me: the pack of snowboarders

appearing over the crest of an adjoining run as if from

nowhere, Nicholas stationary on the bend, adjusting his

boot, waiting for me to catch up, the snowboarders suddenly

bearing down on him, the edges of their boards

glinting like knife blades in the sunlight. And then Nicholas

glancing up, astonished, as two of the snowboarders cut

in front of him, giving him nowhere to go, and four more

head straight towards him, so that he has no option but

to throw himself bodily into the snowdrift at the side of

the run if he wants to avoid being mown down.

And just as suddenly, it’s all over, and Nicholas is

iiii

picking himself out of the snow, the boarders’ mocking

jeers - ‘Get out the way, Grandad!’ - echoing down the

mountain.

To my surprise, Nicholas tells the story against himself

when we join Liz and her husband, Giles, at the piste-side

mountain cafe twenty minutes later, his moodiness melting

with the snow on his jacket.

‘My own bloody fault he observes, ‘standing in the

middle of the piste like that. Should’ve known better.

Right on a bend, too. Bloody idiot.’

‘They should have jolly well watched where they were

going,’ Liz protests.

‘Ah. Not as easy to manoeuvre as skis, snowboards

Giles says.

Giles is the kind of man who sees the good in everyone,

even homicidal Antipodean snowboarders. He has been

heard to remark that Osama bin Laden, being one of

approximately ninety-five brothers, is clearly very much

a family man.

‘But are you all right?’ Liz presses anxiously. ‘I’ve

ordered you an extra plate oifrites, for the shock.’

Nicholas laughs ruefully.

‘I’m going to have the devil of a bruise on my backside

in the morning, and my sunglasses are wrapped around

a pine tree, but apart from that, the only casualty is my

pride. You ever tried snowboarding, Giles?’

‘Young man’s game Giles harrumphs.

‘Giles! You’re only thirty-five I say, laughing.

‘Not wearing the years as well as you, Malinche he

says gallantly. ‘And I’m certainly an old enough dog to

know when new tricks are beyond mi’.’

T rather think it’s trying new tricks that keeps you

young Nicholas says thoughtfully, blowing on his vin

chaud, and surprising me for the second time this morning.

In fact, Nicholas surprises me rather a lot during the

second half of our holiday; and I surprise both of us by

finding this unfamiliar Nicholas rather erotic. So erotic, in

fact, that Nicholas has to brave the ordeal of purchasing

condoms in French from the local pharmacy at ten past

eleven one night; it (shamefully) never having occurred to

me to pack any.

‘Edepol nunc nos tempus et malas peioris fieri,’ Nicholas says triumphantly as he throws the packet on the bedspread and his clothes on the floor. ‘Now’s the time for

bad girls to become worse still.’

‘Who said that?’ I ask, pulling his beautiful naked body

onto mine.

‘Plautus.’

‘I like Plautus I say firmly.

It all starts the morning after his near-miss with the

snowboarders. I come down to breakfast late after struggling