Angels and Men by Catherine Fox Page B

lying open, but she had found Maddy and May at that awkward time of a student’s day when it was too late to get in a really good afternoon’s work, but not late enough to abandon all pretence of working altogether. Her arrival solved the dilemma.
    â€˜Time for tea!’ May went to fill the kettle. Maddy rolled over on the bed with a yawn among musical scores and sheets of manuscript paper. Mara sat down, craning her neck to read the title of the book which Maddy had just let slide on to the floor. Stormy Summer by Margaux Spreadeagle. She gazed at Maddy in disdain.
    â€˜Oh, get that bloody superior expression off your face,’ said Maddy, looking, Mara thought, like someone on a diet caught in the act of eating a whole pound of Belgian chocolates. ‘I suppose you’ve never read a single romance in your life.’ This was a clever move, Mara realized. Either she was the pot calling the kettle black, or she was a mass of prejudice and ignorance. She picked up the book.
    â€˜ His dark eyes blazed ,’ she read aloud. May came back into the room and stood with the kettle, staring at her. ‘“You damned little bitch,” he bit out. “You want me as much as I want you! Don’t think you can get away with this!” He strode from the room, leaving her white and trembling on the bed. As the door slammed, the realization swept over her. “My God! I don’t hate this man – I love him!” ’
    She looked from Maddy to May in disbelief, and they crowed with laughter. ‘What is this crap?’ and she flung it aside.
    â€˜She doesn’t understand,’ said Maddy in throbbing tones. ‘She has never been left white and trembling on the bed with the realization, “My God! I love this man!” ’ Maddy retrieved the book and began reading again with such feeling that Mara was torn between disgust and amusement.
    â€˜It’s a different Weltanschauung , you see,’ explained Maddy, reaching for the mug May was handing her, ‘but one entirely compatible with a feminist outlook. The men are masterful, overbearing and loose-limbed, yes, I know,’ she said as Mara was about to break in, ‘but they invariably end up marrying the heroine, which – let me finish – in terms of the genre, is a triumph of the female world view. He is tamed and subdued by the love of a good woman. Harmony and fruition prevail – like in All’s Well That Ends Well . And you have to admit’, concluded Maddy, ‘that that is the most compelling and tightly reasoned justification for reading crap that you have ever heard.’
    â€˜I intend to do my dissertation on that very subject,’ said May from where she was standing at the mirror experimenting with various lipsticks. ‘ “Beauty and the Beast: Fairy-Tale Motifs in Popular Romantic Fiction, with Special Reference to Margaux Spreadeagle’s Stormy Summer ”. What do you think of this?’ She turned to them with a vivid, coral-coloured mouth.
    â€˜Ghastly,’ said Maddy. May wiped it off and reached for another tube.
    â€˜ “Vermilion Flare,” ’ she read. ‘It sounds like the title of another romance.’ She tried it, and turned to them again.
    â€˜An improvement,’ said Maddy. ‘It’ll go better with your dress, too.’ Preparations for the approaching college ball, Mara realized.
    â€˜Are you going to the ball, Mara?’ asked May, blotting lipstick kisses on to a tissue.
    Mara shook her head.
    â€˜Oh, but you must, you must!’ they protested.
    â€˜Who with?’
    This was supposed to be unanswerable, but they both replied promptly, ‘The polecat?’
    Mara had a vision of herself and the polecat locked in an endless snarling waltz, and laughed.
    â€˜Did I hear a strange sound?’ asked Maddy.
    â€˜An unfamiliar sound!’ said May.
    Yes, ha ha, thought Mara, returning to her usual sour