And there was the pale blue boot door of Yvonne’s car, just asking to be scribbled on. She unscrewed the lipstick and wrote ‘Yvonne Edgworth’ in a large maroon scrawl. Then she added ‘is a stroppy cow’, then crossed out ‘cow’ and put ‘bitch’ and ‘hen-pecker’. Then she wrote ‘bugger’ three times on the top of the car, and ‘fuck’ twice on the windscreen. Then she rushed round to the other side and wrote ‘Yvonne Bismarck — the Iron Duke’, but that wasn’t quite right, so she crossed out the D and changed Duke to Puke, and laughed immoderately at her own joke. She’d just started to write ‘Go Home Carrot Top’ when the lipstick broke in half, so she ran shrieking back to Larry, who had returned and was swaying dangerously as he tried to balance along the top of the stone seat with a bottle in one hand and a glass in the other.
He jumped down, spilling some of the champagne, and said, ‘I’ve just seen Yvonne Edgworth asking Omar Sharif if he’d ever bought a whole flower stall for anyone.’
The path down to the sea was quite steep and they were both very drunk, but somehow they managed to support each other.
‘I want to get my organ into Morgan,’ chanted Larry, and they both roared with laughter.
‘I seem to be going from one bad end to another,’ said Imogen. ‘I do love you, Larry. Is it possible to love two people at once?’
‘I think so,’ said Larry, ‘but it’s rather expensive.’
His drawl was more exaggerated than ever. His hair was all over the place.
They reached the beach. Imogen could feel the sand cool and separating beneath her feet. Somewhere on the way down she’d lost her shoes.
‘When love comes in and takes you for a spin,’ sang Larry. ‘I want to get my organ into Morgan. So do a lot of other guys at the party. I found several men in white dinner jackets looking for you when I went back to the house.’
‘There was only one,’ said Imogen. ‘You must have been seeing quadruple.’
And they both shrieked with laughter again. Pot on a lot of drink makes the stupidest things funny.
The whole beach and the distant lights of Port-les-Pins and the lighthouse seemed to hang in a rosy glow. The waves were hissing like little white snakes on the sand. A half grapefruit moon lay on its back in the dark sky — waiting to submit like me, thought Imogen. She felt weightless like an astronaut.
Larry picked up a stick and tried to write with it, but the sand was too dry.
‘Tell the sea to come nearer,’ he said.
They ran whooping hand in hand down to the water’s edge where he wrote Larry Loves Imogen in huge letters in the wet sand. Then he kissed her, and she could feel the warm sea washing over her feet.
‘I’ll give you a crash course in experience,’ he muttered into her hair, ‘you lovely warm thing.’
‘You do realise I haven’t been to bed with anyone before?’
‘I said I was a great believer in first times,’ said Larry, gently pulling her sweater over her head. ‘Shall we swim first? One should always have a bath before sex.’
Perhaps I’m not too fat to bathe in the nude after all, thought Imogen hazily, as she ripped off the trousers and pants and threw them down on the sand. There was no shock as, shrieking with joy, she paddled ecstatically into the waves. It was almost as warm in the water as out.
‘It’s heavenly,’ she shouted to Larry.
Next minute he was chasing after her, and she felt his hands round her waist.
‘You’re beautiful,’ he said looking down at her. ‘You look like Venus coming out of the waves.’
‘Bottichilly,’ giggled Imogen. ‘Though actually it’s not chilly at all, quite the reverse.’
‘That’s enough overture,’ said Larry. ‘Let’s get down to Act One.’ As he kissed her his lips tasted of salt, and Imogen was glad he was holding her; she doubted she could have stood up alone. She really felt very hazy. She asked Larry if he thought there was any point in having a crash course if she wasn’t going to remember the finer points afterwards.
Larry laughed and said two of her finest points were sticking into his chest at the moment and he certainly wasn’t going to forget them, and began to kiss her in the hollow of her throat.
In the distance she could still hear the sound of revellers, and shrieks from the swimming pool. Then she heard voices much nearer, angry voices, and she was gradually aware that Larry had stopped kissing her and was gazing over her shoulder.
There was a long pause, then Larry muttered, ‘My God, it can’t be.’
Then she heard an all too familiar voice saying, ‘For Christ’s sake, Gilmore.’
Imogen buried her face in Larry’s neck, then slowly swivelled round. A man and a woman were standing on the sands only a few yards away from them. Both their faces were in shadow, but she could see the girl had short streaked blonde hair and was very slim, and no one could miss that height and the width of the man’s shoulders.
Larry swallowed nervously. ‘Hi, Matt,’ he said brightly.
‘Oh dear,’ said Imogen, ‘I’d better do a Venus in reverse,’ and, giggling frantically, she slid back into the water.
‘What the bloody hell have you been up to, Gilmore?’ said Matt icily.
‘You told me to keep an eye on her,’ protested Larry.
‘And so he has,’ said Imogen’s head, just above the water. ‘Two eyes most of the time, and a lot of hands. He’s been lovely. We’ve had such a nice time. When love comes in and takes you for a spin, Oh la la la.’
‘Jesus,’ said Matt. ‘What have you done to her?’
Larry now seemed to be on shore, futilely trying to tug on Imogen’s pink trousers which came no higher than his knee caps.
‘Imogen dear,’ he said, ‘you haven’t met Bambi.’
‘Bambi,’ squeaked Imogen, looking at Matt’s companion. ‘Oh my goodness, how do you do? I’ve heard so much about you.’
‘Funny,’ said Bambi acidly. ‘I’ve heard absolutely nothing about you.’
Matt picked up Gilmore’s trousers and threw them at him.
‘I know you’ve been trying to get into Imogen’s pants all evening,’ he snapped. ‘Now try and get into your own for a change.’
‘Awfully good party,’ said Imogen, flipping water at them.
‘Come out of there at once and get dressed. I’m taking you home,’ said Matt.
In no time at all, it seemed, she was sitting beside Matt in her dripping clothes, as he belted the Mercedes down Claudine’s drive. Somewhere in the distance behind them she could hear Yvonne’s voice rising and falling in fury like a fire siren.
‘I don’t want to go home. I’d like some more champagne,’ said Imogen petulantly.
‘You’ve had quite enough.’
Imogen let her head loll back on the seat.
‘You’re a rotten spoilsport,’ she said in a slurred voice. ‘I’ve been having the time of my life. Everyone’s been trying to get off with me — Morgan the hero, the intrepid rescuer. Stars of stage and screen have been battling for my favours. I’ve been smoking pot, and drinking quite a lot, and having a whole load of new experiences. In fact I was just about to embark on my first affair with a married man when you and Bambi came along so inconsiderately and put a spoke in the wheel.’
Matt gazed stonily at the road in front, and jammed his foot down on the accelerator.
‘Darling Larry was giving me a crash course in experience.’
‘A crash course! Larry ought to be shot.’
‘I don’t know why you’re so cross,’ grumbled Imogen. ‘You don’t want me. You’re just being a dog in the manger. Larry was just being kind. I asked him to seduce me. I thought if I became a woman of the world like Cable, a few more people might fancy me.’