The Woman Who Knew What She Wanted (13 page)

‘Very good,' he said. ‘I am afraid that the French produce much better wine than the Germans.'

‘And much better women!' Roland said. ‘All that hair! Hairy armpits, hairy legs! Why don't they ever shave?'

‘They shave their moustaches,' Oliver said.

‘Too bad,' Roland said. ‘I'll bet those German
Fräuleins
would look really hot with a little Hitler 'tache.'

We cackled at the idea of these comely German girls sporting dainty little toothbrush moustaches. A germ of an idea was filtering through. As the others continued to chafe each other, I slipped on my coat and excused myself.

I went outside. It was a lovely night, cool but not cold. Cally's horse was still standing stolidly by the side of the pub. I waited for a minute, breathed the air deep into my lungs, and then hurried back inside. I went straight over to Cally's table. Darren was talking and Cally was drinking. She looked up as I came over.

‘Hi Cally,' I said. ‘Sorry to bother you, but I think there's something up with your horse.'

‘My horse?' she said. ‘Right. I better…' She downed her wine in one. ‘Excuse me,' she said to Darren. ‘Thank you for a lovely evening.'

It all happened very fast. Cally gave Darren's shoulder a squeeze and a moment later she was flying out of the pub.

Darren caught my eye. I tried to look bland, bored, indifferent, just a humble minion who had duly passed on a piece of information to an acquaintance. I gave him a shrug and dickered for a second at the door before following Cally outside.

She had already untethered Dapple-Down and was waiting for me by the side of the pub. ‘Quick thinking,' she said. ‘Thank you.'

‘Any time,' I said.

‘I should never have come.' She scratched at Dapple-Down's cheek. ‘At least, I should never have come with Darren.'

All words, words, meaningless words, and the tension crackled between us like so much static. I could smell the horse and the sea, and in the dull light of the porch I looked at Cally and she looked at me, and nothing was said. Yet what a welter of thoughts kaleidoscoped through my mind, this incredible longing to stretch out and touch her, kiss her, and aware that she was so much older than me, knew so much more about the ways of the world.

‘Would you like to give Dapple-Down a carrot?' she asked.

‘I'd love to.'

She pulled a carrot from her pocket and gave it to me. I offered it up to the horse on the flat of my palm, with my thumb tucked low.

Dapple-Down leaned forward and kissed my hand with his lips. I could feel his teeth smooth on my skin. We listened in silence to the sound of the horse contentedly champing. Our eyes were locked. I had a sense of our faces, our lips, moving closer to each other, but maybe that's just what happens when you look long enough into a woman's eyes.

There was a bang from the pub door. It was Roland.

‘There you are!' He bumbled over. The spell was broken. Cally stepped in towards the horse and stroked its nose.

‘Saved by the bell,' she said softly, and we looked and we stared, and she gave me this calm nod, as if to say that we must accept whatever it was that the fates decided to throw at us.

‘Hi, I'm Roland.' He stretched out his hand. ‘I work at the hotel with Kim.'

‘Hi Roland. Yes, I've seen you often at the hotel. I'm Cally.' They shook hands. ‘So how's your evening going so far?'

‘Not bad,' he said. ‘Though everyone round here seems to have got a girlfriend, except for me and of course Kim.'

‘Not for want of trying,' I said.

Cally looked from me and then to Roland and then back to me again. ‘I'm going now.' She put on her riding hat. ‘Would you like to ride with me?'

‘I…' I paused, for I had some history with horses. I have always been quite diabolically bad at riding. ‘I'd love to.'

‘Great,' she said. She was like an acrobat as she swung herself up onto Dapple-Down. It was a big horse, but Cally, as ever, made it look effortless. ‘Tomorrow after lunch? How's that suit?'

‘That would be lovely.'

Roland and I watched her as the horse clip-clopped sedately down the road.

‘She likes them young, doesn't she?' Roland said.

‘What do you mean?' I said

‘First Darren; now you.'

‘I'm sure you'll get your turn eventually.'

‘She'd do just fine,' he said. ‘I'm not picky.'

The next morning, as I shaved and showered and served full English breakfasts to the holidaymakers, there was only one thought running through my head. In six hours I would be seeing Cally and we would be riding together. It was the most breathless anticipation, but combined with it was this seasick queasiness that comes over me when I have to mix with horses. I did not have any idea what was going to happen that afternoon, though I did fear the worst.

My tortured brain managed to produce every conceivable scenario, most of which revolved around my horse somehow being startled and then bolting off at high speed. From there I could picture myself with my fingers entwined in the horse's mane as it galloped hard over the heath, flying over ditches and dry-stone walls, before finally catching its fetlock in a rabbit hole. I was almost positive that it was going to end badly for me. I didn't even know where the nearest hospital was, but hospital certainly seemed on the cards, and there I would rest up for a week or three as Cally brought me books and grapes and tenderly nursed me back to health.

In the morning after breakfast, I played golf with Anthony. The hotel had a pitch-and-putt course, which was small but lethal. There were no fairways, and if you did not land your ball plum on the green, then you were stuck thrashing for ever in the heather. Every drive was either a hit or a complete miss; there was absolutely no margin for error.

I was playing like a donkey. Anthony was four up after four holes.

‘Something on your mind, Kim?' he asked as he teed up.

‘Nothing,' I said. ‘Nothing at all. You're playing out of your skin.'

‘Don't think so.' His ball looped high into the air like a mortar, before trickling onto the front edge of the green. ‘How are you enjoying it at the Knoll House?'

‘Very much.' I teed up my ball.

‘You seeing anyone?' he asked.

‘Nope.' I swiped at the ball and shanked it into some bushes. ‘Nobody.'

‘Won't be long before you're snapped up.' He tossed another ball to my feet. ‘Have another go.'

I sent the next ball straight into the same bush.

‘And again.' Another ball dribbled to my feet.

I could not believe it. For the third time, I smacked the ball into the bush.

‘Remarkable,' said Anthony. ‘I've never seen that done before.' He tossed down a fourth ball. ‘So what's on your mind?'

My normal reaction would have been to hide anything that even remotely touched on an affair of the heart. I wouldn't have dreamed of mentioning my passing passion, even to a friend like Oliver. And yet there was something so utterly disarming about Anthony's blunt, cheery face that I opened up to him.

‘Cally,' I said. I twirled the club in my hand.

‘Cally,' he said meditatively. ‘Cally is lovely.'

‘I'm going riding with her after lunch.'

‘Ah,' he said. ‘That's what's wrong with your golf. I'm sure you'll have lots of fun. But…' He trailed off and gazed out to the grey sea and the grey horizon. For a long time I waited for him to finish speaking, but he said nothing more.

‘But what?' I asked.

I don't know if he was going to say anything more, but he just shrugged and laughed. ‘But I'm sure you don't need to be told that!' he said. ‘You young whippersnappers never do anything else but have fun!'

I teed the ball up, focused, drilled it to the back of the green.

I remember how the sun shone. Anthony was whistling Lilliburlero as he merrily went on his way; now there, truly, was a man who didn't have a care in the world.

I don't recall much of lunch that day, because I was so desperate to leave. After we were done, I flew back to my room. I had a lightning shave, and I nicked my cheek, and do what I might, the cut would not stop bleeding. I was furious with myself, and spent minutes trying to stem the blood before plugging the cut with some toilet paper. I pulled on jeans and boots and my coat and then stumped off to Cally's house.

It was the first time that I had seen her house in the day; it was beautiful, just exactly the sort of holiday home by the sea that you would dream of. Set off to the side was a garage that I hadn't noticed before, as well as two stables and a small barn for chickens and bantams and horse feed.

Cally was already outside with the horses. Dapple-Down was saddled up, and she was just working at the buckle of a second slightly smaller horse. It was a black mare, at least a couple of hands smaller than Dapple-Down; it seemed docile enough.

‘Hello Kim.' Cally was in her tight britches and cream shirt and a very trim grey jacket. She had a silk stock, held in place with a gold tiepin; the brown leather of her boots absolutely gleamed. In comparison, I was a ragamuffin.

‘Hi,' I said. Now that I was confronted with the reality of Cally, in person and in the flesh, I was of course rendered into clodding inarticulacy. It was like I had blundered into mental quicksand that had dulled my synapses and turned my gushing words into a rancid little trickle.

She looked at me quickly and smiled.

‘Come and meet Scampi,' she said.

‘Good name for a horse.' I went over and gave the horse a stroke.

‘You have ridden before, haven't you, Kim?' said Cally.

‘A long time ago,' I said. ‘I'm very rusty.'

‘You'll be great,' she said. ‘Need a hand up?'

‘I'll be fine.'

I put on some black leather gloves. She had found me a substantial helmet; in my mind's eye, I was already preparing myself for the inevitable fall that would occur some time that afternoon. I wondered if I'd even make it out of the yard before the horse managed to buck me.

I put a boot into the stirrup and hauled myself up. From years back, I vaguely remembered how to hold the reins. Cally inspected me. I knew enough to know that I should sit straight with my shoulders back, like a cavalry officer on parade.

‘You look good,' she said, swinging herself up onto Dapple-Down. ‘Shall we go?'

We ambled at a slow walk through green fields and down towards the sea. Cally was riding next to me. We were almost knee to knee. I was no longer quite so edgy now that I was concentrating on not falling off.

Cally was smoking. She had crop and reins in one hand and her cigarette in the other. She looked very stylish. ‘Can't be too long today,' she said. ‘I've got a boring appointment at four thirty.'

‘An hour will be perfect,' I said.

‘See how we get on,' she said. ‘Shall we trot?'

My heart sank. Despite a dozen riding lessons during a teenage summer, I have always been particularly inept at the rising trot. As the horse moves, you rise up out of the stirrups. But the movement is almost syncopated, like a Scott Joplin rag, so that you're rising not on the beat but just a fraction of a second afterwards.

Not that Cally noticed, or if she did, she didn't care a fig. She was always happy when she was out riding.

‘She's a very easy ride, isn't she?' Cally said. ‘That's why I chose her. She's my daughter's horse.'

‘Your daughter?' In all our encounters, I had never once heard mention of a daughter.

‘Fiona,' she said. ‘She's studying in America at the moment.'

‘Wow.' I was momentarily taken flat aback at the idea that this beautiful woman had a daughter who was practically my own age. ‘You must have been a child bride.'

‘I don't know about that,' she said. ‘Married and pregnant at twenty-two. It worked out – for a while. I was very happy when we split up.' She had started on another cigarette and puffed on it as she opened the next gate. ‘I won't marry again.'

‘Who knows,' I said, ‘you may yet get swept off your feet.'

She was smiling, almost laughing, as she closed the gate. ‘I'm certainly hoping to be swept off my feet again, thank you, Kim darling,' she said. ‘But marriage is not for me. You, on the other hand, I think marriage might suit you very well.'

‘We'll see.'

The bridleway was narrow and uneven, cracked with narrow gullies where the streams of rain had carved through the chalk. I thought about getting off my horse, but the mare seemed steady enough. On all sides, we were hemmed in by trees and hedgerows so thick that they all but arched over our heads. I could already hear the sea on the sand, and as the flies droned in the hazy afternoon, the horses' ears flickered and their tails switched from side to side. Just a few yards ahead of me was Cally, a horsewoman to her very bootstraps. Even from behind she was a picture of easy elegance, a little stream of cigarette smoke eddying above her helmet.

The hedgerow dwindled to scrub and the chalk bridleway turned to sand and suddenly the sea opened up ahead of us. We rode at a leisurely pace through dunes and marram grass, and then we were on the hard, compact sand of the beach, and the horses pricked up their ears and cantered towards the sea. Cantering is easy; anyone can canter. Just bend your knees, lift up out of the saddle and lean slightly forward and, of course, hold on tight to the horse's mane. I dug my fingers deep into the mare's thick hair.

The tide was out and the horses' hooves tore up a hail of wet sand. Cally pulled up in the shallows and we stood in the sea, exuding exhilaration and verve and life.

‘You ready for a gallop?' she asked.

‘I think so.'

‘Let's go.'

With a slight squeeze of her thighs, she turned Dapple-Down's head and we started cantering up the beach in the direction of the Knoll House. And then, imperceptibly, she gave her horse a tweak and it was like flooring the accelerator in a sports car, for suddenly we were thundering along the beach at an all-out gallop. I had forgotten the extraordinary thrill of being astride a horse at full throttle. You can sometimes get a bit of it when you're skiing a black run on the very edge or when you're surfing. But the sheer speed and power of being on a horse at full gallop is something else altogether.

I don't know how fast we were going, but perched eight, nine feet above the ground, it was terrifying. Ahead of us, way ahead of us, we could see a couple walking hand in hand towards us through the surf.

It seemed like only a matter of moments before we were upon them. In a flash, I recognised that it was Oliver and Annette. I raised a hand as we tore past. ‘Hola!' I called. A glimpse of Oliver's amazed face as he recognised me.

I'd never ridden on a beach before; I don't think I'd even galloped on a horse before. But it was a total revelation. I think beforehand I'd always associated riding with prissy girls and haughty women and fat men in hunting pink, drinking cherry brandy. Well, I'm sure there is a bit of that. In any activity, there will always be people who grate. But it was the first time that I ever truly experienced the joy of riding, that heady rush of elation as we galloped along the Studland beach, with the sand and the surf spattering beneath our hooves.

Eventually, Cally eased up. She pulled a silver hip flask from her pocket and offered it to me. I took a swig. It was Grand Marnier, very cold, and I could feel it pumping heat into my core. ‘Thank you.' I passed it to Cally. She didn't wipe the top, but just put it straight between her lips and drank. A tress of wet hair lay on her cheek and she smoothed it away. I couldn't take my eyes off her lips. There was still some liqueur on her mouth and her lips glistened in the sun.
I wanted to lean over and kiss her.

‘What about that then?' she said.

‘Brilliant.'

‘Brought a bit of colour to your face.'

We were facing each other, our horses side to side. She offered me the hip flask again and I took it and I drank.

‘I think I'd die if I couldn't ride,' Cally said.

I smiled and tried to think of something pleasant to say. My brain stalled. I busied myself with rubbing the horse's neck. What does one say to a woman when there is nothing left to say and all that you want to do is kiss her?

We looked at each other. If a picture can sometimes be worth a thousand words, then that one gaze contained a whole book.

Without using her hands, she turned Dapple-Down around, and as she did so, her knee brushed against mine. As the whole of this delicate manoeuvre was performed, her eyes never once left mine.

We cantered back, nice and easy. Cally eased up so that we were side by side, riding knee to knee; she carried herself like a jockey.

Annette and Oliver had already left the beach. In silence, we rode up the bridleway, out of the sunshine and into the shade, and each of us alone with our thoughts. I wondered if I'd blown it. Sometimes, with a kiss, you can miss the moment, and there may never be another one.

We rode into the yard, and then led the horses through to the stables. I was relieved that the ride had passed without mishap. The stables were wide and airy, thick with fresh straw and with two cast-iron mangers bracketed onto the wall. There was a deep water trough, and a small orange feed bucket by one of the stalls.

I watched as Cally unbuckled saddles and bits and reins. There was nothing I could do to help, but when she picked up some straw and rubbed down her horse's flanks, I quickly followed her lead. I started at Scampi's neck and moved down to her flanks and legs. She was wet with sea and sweat and her underbelly was dusted with sand.

Cally had finished and came over to admire my handiwork. I could not see her but I was aware that she was standing quite close to me.

I gave a last sweep across Scampi's back and tossed the straw onto the floor.

‘Very good,' said Cally.

I smiled at her and made to walk out of the stall. But there was not much space and I planted my foot into the bucket of feed. I lost my balance and staggered into Cally. She caught me, her arms full about me. Without even a moment's hesitation we were kissing each other, hard and urgent and with all the open-mouthed ardour of a passion that had been denied, defied, for so long.

For a second we broke off, looked at each other, smiled and, still staring into each other's eyes, we kissed each other again, very softly at first, until eyes closed and lips parted and our tongues tasted and dabbed. We were locked into each other's kisses. I opened my eyes briefly, and saw Cally's mouth open underneath my own. I couldn't believe it that this was Cally, straining up beneath me, and that my mouth was upon her lips.

We explored each other's mouths and cheeks and faces, and for a moment Cally drew back and kissed my eyelids. I felt like I had been blessed.

‘I love your kisses,' she said.

‘I've been wanting to kiss you for a long time.'

‘Not half as long as I have wanted to kiss you.'

‘Really?' We had not kissed for all of ten seconds, and we were already eager for more. I kissed her again, very gently.

Still holding onto me with one hand, she looked at her watch. ‘I'm so sorry,' she said. ‘I've got to go.'

‘Your four thirty appointment.'

‘But perhaps later we will be able to continue where we left off?' Her eyes twinkled as she stretched up to kiss me again.

‘I hope so,' I said.

‘I wondered if you might be around tomorrow?'

‘I am.' I kissed her. How could I not kiss those lips that were but six inches from my own, especially as, in that moment, I was free to kiss her lips just as and when I wanted? ‘It's my day off.'

‘Oh good,' she said. Another look and another kiss. When lovers first start kissing, they can never have too much of each other's mouths. ‘I'll cook you some lunch.'

‘Perfect. What time?'

‘Say…' She kissed me. ‘Say noon. On the beach.'

‘I'll bring my trunks,' I said. ‘Whereabouts on the beach?'

‘Where you see the smoke, that's where my fire will be.'

Back at the hotel, I ate my tea dreamily. I, Kim, was going to be seeing Cally the next day. I couldn't help wondering, speculating, if there might be more than kisses on offer. But I was in no hurry. Besides, Cally was much older than me; she knew her own mind and would know exactly how slowly – or how fast – she wanted to take things. Yes, Cally could call the shots, and I would happily, delightedly, go along with whatever she suggested. She was obviously experienced, sophisticated; she had been married, had a daughter. How long, I wondered, would it be before she wanted more than my kisses? Would it be a quick burn, heady, fast and furious, or would it be a languorous, slow courtship, delightfully paced over many months before we succumbed to the inevitable?

I couldn't tell. Slow or fast or perhaps it might even be a no-go altogether, a ‘terribly sorry, big mistake, alcohol and idle curiosity, and the huge age difference between us, and so do please forgive me, but I do not wish to kiss you ever again' sort of thing.

As we were having tea, Anthony came to talk to us. He stood there, slightly awkward, rubbing the back of his hand with his fingers. He was already dressed for dinner in dinner jacket and bow tie. Gradually the chatter dwindled and Anthony had our attention.

‘I'm afraid that somebody has been stealing some of the wages from my office,' he said. ‘I'm sure that it's none of you. But, in the unlikely event that it is, could you kindly desist, otherwise there will be some general unpleasantness which will almost certainly involve the police.' His face lapsed into a smile; that was his natural default. ‘Thank you. I know it won't be any of you, but seeing as I've discussed it with the rest of the staff, I could hardly avoid mentioning it to you lot.'