"That was Bill and Diana," she said.
Oh, yes?
The boys disappeared to the library to watch TV. I poured out coffee for us both.
"They're flying to Dublin from Exeter," she said. "They're in Exeter now." Then, before I could make some adequate reply, she said hurriedly, "They're just crazy to see the house, so I suggested they put off their flight for forty-eight hours or so, and came down to us for lunch tomorrow and to stay the night. They jumped at the idea." I put down my cup of coffee untasted, and slumped in the kitchen chair.
"Oh, my God!" I said.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
THERE ARE FEW strains more intolerable in life than waiting for the arrival of unwelcome guests. I had said no more in protest after my first groan of despair, but we had spent the hours until bedtime in separate rooms, Vita in the library watching television with the boys, myself in the music-room listening to Sibelius.
Now, the next morning, Vita was sitting on what she liked to call the terrace, outside the french windows of the music-room, listening for the blare of their horn, while I paced up and down inside, primed with my first gin and tonic, my eye on the clock, wondering which state was the worse — this of anticipating the dire moment of a car coming down the drive, or the full flush of their having settled in, cardigans strewn on chairs, cameras clicking, voices loud and long, the smell of Bill's inevitable cigar. The second, perhaps, was better, the heat of battle rather than the bugle's call.
"Here they come," yelled the boys, tearing down the steps, and I advanced through the french window like one facing up to mortar-shells. Vita, as a hostess, was magnificent: Kilmarth was transformed instantly into some American embassy overseas, lacking only a flagstaff bearing the Stars and Stripes. Food borne in by the willing and triumphant Mrs. Collins graced the dining-room table. Liquor flowed, cigarette smoke filled the air, we lunched at two and rose at half-past three. The boys, fobbed off with the promise of swimming later, vanished to play cricket in the orchard. The girls, disguised in uniform dark glasses, dragged lilos out of earshot to indulge in gossip. Bill and I installed ourselves on the patio intending, or so I hoped, to sleep, but sleep was intermittent; like all diplomats, he enjoyed hearing his own voice. He held forth on world policy and policy nearer home, and then, with elaborate unconcern and obviously briefed by Diana, touched on my future plans.
"I hear you're going into partnership with Joe," he said. "That's wonderful."
"It's not settled," I replied. "There's a lot still to be discussed."
"Oh, naturally," he said. "You can't just decide on a flick of a coin, but what an opportunity! His firm is on the crest of the wave right now, and you'd never regret it. Especially as I gather you've nothing really to lose this side. No special ties." I did not answer. I was determined not to be led into a lengthy discussion. "Of course, Vita would make a home anywhere," he went on. "She has the knack. And with an apartment in New York and a weekend place in the country, you'd lead a very full life together, with plenty of opportunities for travel thrown in."
I grunted, and tilted an old panama hat of Commander Lane's over my right eye, which was still bloodshot. Unremarked, so far, by Vita.
"Don't think I'm butting in," he said, lowering his voice, "but you know how the girls talk. You've got Vita worried. She told Diana you've blown cool over the idea of coming to the States, and she can't figure out why. Women always think the worst." He then launched into a long, and to my mind loaded, story about a girl he had met in Madrid when Diana was in the Bahamas with her parents. She was only nineteen, he said. "I was crazy about her. But of course we both knew it couldn't last. She had ajob in the Embassy there, and Diana was due back in London when her vacation was over. I was so wild about that kid I felt like cutting my throat when we said good-bye. However, I survived and so did she, and I haven't seen her since." I lit a cigarette to counteract the clouds of smoke from his blasted cigar. "If you think", I said, "that I've got a girl round the corner you couldn't be more wrong."
"Well, that's fine," he said, "just fine. I wouldn't blame you if you had, as long as you kept it quiet from Vita."
There was a long pause while he tried, I suppose, to think of another tactic, but he must have decided that discretion was the better part of valour, for he went on abruptly, "Didn't those boys say something about wanting to swim?"
We wandered off to find our wives. Their session was apparently still in full swing. Diana was one of those overripe blondes who are said to be grand fun at a party and a tigress in the home. I had no desire to try her out in either capacity. Vita told me she was the loyalest of friends, and I believed her. The session ceased immediately we appeared, and Diana changed down into second gear, her invariable custom at the approach of masculine company.
"You've got a tan, Dick," she said. "It suits you. Bill turns lobster red at the first touch of the sun."
"Sea air," I told her. Not synthetic like your own. She had a bottle of sun oil beside her with which she had been lubricating her lily-white legs.
"We're going down to the beach to swim," said Bill. "Rouse yourself pug-face, it will take off some of that surplus fat." The usual badinage ensued, the interplay of married couples before their kind. Lovers never did this, I thought; the game was played in silence, and was in consequence the more delightful.
Carrying towels and snorkels, we made the long trek to the beach. The tide was low, and to enter the water the intending swimmer had to pick his way over seaweed and uneven slabs of rock. It was an experience new to our guests, but they took it in good part, splashing about like dolphins in the shallows, proving my favourite maxim that it is always easier to entertain, albeit unwillingly, out-of-doors. The evening to come would be the real test of hospitality, and so it proved.
Bill had brought his own bottle of bourbon (a gift to the house), and I cleared the fridge of ice so that he could consume it on the rocks. The muscadet which we drank with supper, on top of the bourbon, made too rich a mixture, and with the dish-washer throbbing away in the kitchen we staggered into the music-room after dinner considerably the worse for wear. I did not have to worry about my bloodshot eye. Both Bill's looked as if he had been stung by bees, while our wives had the high flush of barmaids lounging in some disreputable sailors joint.
I went over to the gramophone and put on a stack of records — the choice did not matter, so long as the sound served the purpose of keeping the party quiet. Vita was a moderate drinker as a general rule, but when she had had one too many I found her embarrassing. Her voice took on a strident tone, or alternatively turned silky sweet. Tonight the sweetness was for Bill, who, nothing loath, lolled beside her on one sofa, while Diana, patting the empty place next to her on the second, pulled me to it with a meaning smile.
I realised, with distaste, that these manoeuvres had been worked out by the two women earlier on, and we were set for one of those frightful evenings of swapping partners, not for the ultimate act itself but as a preliminary try-out, like a curtain-raiser before a two-act play. I could not have been more bored. The only thing I wanted to do was to go to bed, and, by God, to go alone.
"Talk to me, Dick," said Diana, so close that I had to turn my head sideways like a ventriloquist's doll. "I want to know all about your brilliant friend Professor Lane."
"A detailed account of his work?" I asked. "There was a very informative article about certain aspects of it in the Biochemical Journal a few years ago. I've probably got a copy in the flat in London. You must read it some time."