afternoon, lying in the long grass behind the cottage, my arm thrown lightly across her lissom body (the nearest to love-making that she would so far allow, on account of Colin, the Vanishing Wonder), and talking about Miss Fry.
Not a very romantic topic, you may object? Ah, dear reader, you don’t understand! When you are young, and carefree, and in love, there is something infinitely satisfying in the contemplation of all the people who are none of these things. People like Miss Fry, old and ugly and alone—and all through her own fault, because she had never had the courage to grasp at happiness when it was offered … had never lain in the long June grass with a man’s arms around her … never heard his whispered words of love …
I don’t know why we were so sure that she hadn’t. We’d “typed” her I suppose (in the jargon of Theresa’s colleagues): the stereotype of the village old maid was just what we needed on that golden afternoon, to enhance by contrast our own sense of triumphant and eternal youth. The mere contemplation of Miss Fry’s primness and old-maidishness made us feel deliciously andquite effortlessly abandoned, though in fact we were both limp with the heat.
“The poor old thing’s half-crazed with jealousy, you see,” Theresa explained, in her psychological-insight voice, playing smugly with the lobe of my ear as she spoke, to show how different she was from Miss Fry. “You see, having heard that I was a Ph.D. student, she must at once have pictured the sort of frumpish, lumpish creature that students were in her young days. But now that she’s actually seen me, and … well … noticed that I’ve found myself a rather nice young man who … What? … Oh, but yes, sweetie, you are nice, of course you are, I never said … No, look, darling, stop it. Remember we agreed …”
“We” was an overstatement, but I let it pass. As I say, it was very hot, and it was nice to hear Theresa’s earnest, husky voice going on and on so close to my ear.
“You see,” she was explaining, “she’s got you cast as the villain. A real, old-fashioned villain, like the ones in the novelettes of her youth. She thinks you’re plotting a fate worse than death for me …”
“I am,” I interrupted; but Theresa carried on as if I hadn’t spoken, psychoanalysing Miss Fry and her repressed urges, her fantasy sex-substitutes, until, to tell the honest truth, I was nearly asleep.
I got the gist of it, though. Miss Fry for all these complex reasons that I hadn’t really listened to, now had me cast as friendly neighbourhood rapist, whose life-style consisted of first persuading innocent girls that the cottage they’d rented for the summer was haunted, and then offering to come and protect them from the ghostly visitations of the night …
“That’s an idea!” I interposed, tightening my arms round her. “Grrrrrrrr … rrrr! Whoo-ee-oo! Come on! Be terrified! Don’t you recognise a ghost-noise when you hear it? And you an expert on Village Superstitions ..?”
“Silly!” She struggled free of my embraces; and a few minutes later, we went indoors to make tea. And even now, when I know all too well, and with exact and dreadful clarity, exactly what was tofollow, I still have to say that that pot of tea we took out into the garden was the most delicious I have ever tasted. Boiling hot, as tea should be, and yet refreshing as iced-water on this scorching afternoon. I remember, too, what fun we had while we drank it; laughing, throwing bits of grass at each other, and generally fooling around.
And that night, for the first time, Theresa did not send me away when dusk fell.
*
How can I describe what happened next? Where can I begin? Not with our love-making, because it still hurts to remember how marvellous it was, and how close it seemed to bring us, beyond anything I had ever experienced. Perhaps the place to begin is afterwards—just a few minutes afterwards; half an hour at
Not a very romantic topic, you may object? Ah, dear reader, you don’t understand! When you are young, and carefree, and in love, there is something infinitely satisfying in the contemplation of all the people who are none of these things. People like Miss Fry, old and ugly and alone—and all through her own fault, because she had never had the courage to grasp at happiness when it was offered … had never lain in the long June grass with a man’s arms around her … never heard his whispered words of love …
I don’t know why we were so sure that she hadn’t. We’d “typed” her I suppose (in the jargon of Theresa’s colleagues): the stereotype of the village old maid was just what we needed on that golden afternoon, to enhance by contrast our own sense of triumphant and eternal youth. The mere contemplation of Miss Fry’s primness and old-maidishness made us feel deliciously andquite effortlessly abandoned, though in fact we were both limp with the heat.
“The poor old thing’s half-crazed with jealousy, you see,” Theresa explained, in her psychological-insight voice, playing smugly with the lobe of my ear as she spoke, to show how different she was from Miss Fry. “You see, having heard that I was a Ph.D. student, she must at once have pictured the sort of frumpish, lumpish creature that students were in her young days. But now that she’s actually seen me, and … well … noticed that I’ve found myself a rather nice young man who … What? … Oh, but yes, sweetie, you are nice, of course you are, I never said … No, look, darling, stop it. Remember we agreed …”
“We” was an overstatement, but I let it pass. As I say, it was very hot, and it was nice to hear Theresa’s earnest, husky voice going on and on so close to my ear.
“You see,” she was explaining, “she’s got you cast as the villain. A real, old-fashioned villain, like the ones in the novelettes of her youth. She thinks you’re plotting a fate worse than death for me …”
“I am,” I interrupted; but Theresa carried on as if I hadn’t spoken, psychoanalysing Miss Fry and her repressed urges, her fantasy sex-substitutes, until, to tell the honest truth, I was nearly asleep.
I got the gist of it, though. Miss Fry for all these complex reasons that I hadn’t really listened to, now had me cast as friendly neighbourhood rapist, whose life-style consisted of first persuading innocent girls that the cottage they’d rented for the summer was haunted, and then offering to come and protect them from the ghostly visitations of the night …
“That’s an idea!” I interposed, tightening my arms round her. “Grrrrrrrr … rrrr! Whoo-ee-oo! Come on! Be terrified! Don’t you recognise a ghost-noise when you hear it? And you an expert on Village Superstitions ..?”
“Silly!” She struggled free of my embraces; and a few minutes later, we went indoors to make tea. And even now, when I know all too well, and with exact and dreadful clarity, exactly what was tofollow, I still have to say that that pot of tea we took out into the garden was the most delicious I have ever tasted. Boiling hot, as tea should be, and yet refreshing as iced-water on this scorching afternoon. I remember, too, what fun we had while we drank it; laughing, throwing bits of grass at each other, and generally fooling around.
And that night, for the first time, Theresa did not send me away when dusk fell.
*
How can I describe what happened next? Where can I begin? Not with our love-making, because it still hurts to remember how marvellous it was, and how close it seemed to bring us, beyond anything I had ever experienced. Perhaps the place to begin is afterwards—just a few minutes afterwards; half an hour at
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