James said. “Yes,” I said. A shadow passed over his face. To this day I do not know if it had been caused by a cloud swifting across the sun, or by his spirit momentarily winking out. “It seems,” he said, “as if we must go our very separate ways.”
“Yes.” “Clarissa, I do love you, you know. I shall miss you bitterly. Bitterly.” Anguish crossed his face. For a moment I thought he might lose control. But he did not. An infinitely weary grace held him up, I'm quite sure. He kissed me then, full on the mouth. I clasped him in a terrible desperation and put my loins to his-I wanted to feel the lift and the heft of him. But I felt nothing, nothing. We disengaged. James had won through. I had lost.
“Please tell Mother and Father,” I said, “that it's quite too late. They may disinherit me, which is perfectly all right-I'm earning my own way and shall continue to do so.” “All right, Clarissa,” he said, his hand on the door. “Victoria,” I said. “Victoria Collins.” I smiled wanly. “Yes, of course. Victoria. Goodbye, sister.” James had won again.
12
“I preferred coming to see you, Miss Collins, here at your rooms in Quarkney's Course, rather than troubling you in your dressing room in the theatre.” She smiled vividly, the mass of her chestnut curls enhancing the serene loveliness of her gray eyes. She had introduced herself as Daphne Oblov, and seemed to be in her early thirties. “Your beauty, I must say,” she continued, “is even more fantastic at close range.” “Thank you, Miss Oblov. You said you wished to see me on a business matter.” “Quite. It's rather a delicate business matter, Miss Collins-I do so much not wish you to be encumbered with embarrassment.” “Would you like a drink?” I asked. “Yes, that would help, darling,” she said with a tiny sigh. “Scotch is what I have at the moment.” “That will go nicely,” Daphne Oblov said. I poured her a generous amount and, to my astonishment, she leaned back on the sofa and put it away, the whole damned glassful. I had no recourse but to offer her another; this one she sipped at, her tongue occasionally, with a very swift movement, circling the rim of the glass. Watching the woman doing this caused a bit of a flutter in my lower regions. I was altogether intrigued by the woman-she was a petite beauty with obviously very small breasts for which the nipples might have compensated-I didn't know. But her ankles were neatly turned and I suspected the rest of her was something of a delicacy. It made one want to nibble-but, she was here on business, or so she said. “You know,” Daphne said, “I so much enjoyed watching you onstage. You have a solid talent, darling, if not a flashy one. It makes one respect you more. Which is why it is so terribly difficult for me to talk about my business here.” “Oh?” I crossed the room to sit at her side on the sofa. I casually patted her thigh; the dimensions were modest but exceptionally springy-perhaps I exaggerated, but I hadn't had a woman in some time. “Perhaps,” I said, “this will put you at your ease.” I stroked the length of her thigh through her dress. Daphne Oblov had been keeping her legs primly together; now she relaxed somewhat, and her legs were no longer intent on being contiguous. “Yes,” Daphne said. “Yes.” She took a fair swallow of the scotch. Her gray eyes seemed to rest on the distance. “Yes, Miss Collins.”
“Victoria…” “Ah, yes, Victoria, darling.” The mass of her chestnut curls was beginning to heat me up considerably-I pictured them elsewhere. And her tongue, circling the rim of the glass…
“Yes, Daphne?” “I will go brutally-brutally to the point.”
She had repeated the “brutally” and I knew instantly that that was how she wanted me to be with her after she finished talking about her business. “I am the independent madam and owner,” she said, “of a prosperous bordello here in London-we are located in St. John's Wood, perhaps ten minutes from the Tarton. The facilities at my pleasure-house are at once antiseptic and luxurious. Two physicians are yearly on retainer to inspect my girls frequently, and none of them have as yet caught any disease whatever, and I've been situated there some three years-I hope I haven't alarmed you, Victoria.”
My expression had become stony. For more than a moment, I thought, I could suspend interest in the Oblov woman's thighs and possible teats. It was obvious she was about to make a proposition, and our fates seemed to have crossed-I had been making contacts so that I myself could approach a house of prostitution. Daphne Oblov was, of course, far more convenient and in the position, I warranted, of being a petitioner. “Not in the least, Daphne. Please go on.”
She took another swallow, lit one of those long Russian cigarettes, and resumed. “To be candid, Victoria, after I saw you in the Wilde comedy, darling, I could not resist thinking of you as a star-if not in the theatre, then at my brothel, where, incidentally, your income would be three times that of what George Maytemper may give you… I do realize the idea you may have of numberless men-possible disease-loss of status in the so-called respectable community-giving up the theatre-all these, I realize, militate against-” “Please, Daphne-I am mulling the whole thing over. Of course, I can't give you my decision now…” “Suppose I come see you again in a fortnight-is that sufficient time?” “Quite, and you needn't leave for the moment-do have another scotch.” She had another scotch, which she sipped at very slowly indeed, as she watched me in my brown study. I was thinking about my brother, of course, and my becoming a whore in the hope that that might finally satisfy my carnal itch-that after I had enough men in sequence, say a dozen of them in one night, I might not want sex at all for another forty-eight hours, possibly not for a week, possibly longer. It was worth the try, I had come to the conclusion before, so that I should cease being tormented by my vaginal and clitoridal desires. But, as I've recorded, I talked with James in the meantime and heard his decision to become an instrument in the House of God. And here I was, considering entering a house of prostitution… Perhaps I could use Daphne as a sounding board… “Daphne…” “Yes, darling?” She flicked the long ash of her Russian cigarette into a receptacle. “Does the idea of God ever concern you?” “Since He stopped being one of our clients, I am terribly concerned-there isn't a bidet in all of Heaven, I'll warrant.” Her laughter trilled forth and she ran a beautifully shaped hand through her chestnut curls. She made a moue.
She was utterly charming. I could have gathered her up then and there.
“Darling,” she went on, “I'm sorry. It's very hard to be serious about God. The Origin of Species, no matter how often Darwin might dedicate that book to God, he knows damned well he's dedicating it to a corpse-” “You read Darwin?” I was lightly dumfounded. “Do you object to an educated whore, madam and procuress? I've also read the nonmathematical essays of Bertrand Russell. And when I'm in a blue funk, which is often enough, I pick up Garnett's translations from Dostoyevsky and laugh myself silly-” “All right, Daphne. Do be serious.” She opened her gray eyes wide. “If you wish me to, Victoria…” Gamin-smiling, she lifted one leg on to the sofa as she let the other dangle. Then she rested a hand in her lap. “Go on, darling.” I chuckled. “You're quite impossible but quite marvellous as well. You've been here only minutes, really, and I've the feeling I've known you for years…” She shrugged. “There's something in you, Victoria, that corresponds to me.” “Yes-and says to hell with my brother joining the church. I mean-” I was becoming tight myself from the scotch-“I mean, never to hell with my brother, whom I adore, but to hell with his decision to be a curate-yes?” “Yes, to hell with your brother entering a convent-I mean a monastery.” “Let's stay with your convent,” I said.