Breathless from the stiff window as well as confused by the unorthodox remark, Mrs Golson replied, ‘Well, it depends — surely. I can enjoy the smell of tweed — and leather — and all that — but I can’t say I like a man’s smelly smells.’
At once she blushed. She had never felt so tactless, stupid, vulgar. She wondered anyone put up with her. No doubt they would not have, if it hadn’t been for her money, it was her own bitterest private opinion on sleepless nights and in the company of those she wished to impress.
But Madame Vatatzes did not seem to question her companion’s values. ‘Even what you call their smelly smells can have a perverse charm. The smell of an old man, for instance. So many layers of life lived — such a compost!’
It was too much for Mrs Golson. ‘Wouldn’t you like to take off your shoe? I’ll put a cushion under your foot. I could even bathe the ankle. A compress … Should it be hot or cold? I can never remember.’
‘Oh no, thank you—really!’ It brought Madame Vatatzes back to her senses.
Mrs Golson noticed that, although the ankles were shapely enough, the young woman’s feet were on the large side, hands too, for that matter. Madame Vatatzes must have been conscious of her feet. She made a move as though to hide them under a skirt which was not long enough. Mrs Golson was reminded of an injured bird made anxious by the presence of some additional and possibly graver threat.
‘I was only thinking of your comfort,’ she said.
It restored her own confidence, if only momentarily.
‘Are you English?’ she ventured to ask.
‘More or less,’ the young woman replied.
‘You speak the language so beautifully.’ Mrs Golson paused, and sighed. ‘We are Australians,’ she informed her recently acquired friend.
‘So I gathered.’
‘Ohhh?’ Mrs Golson mewed. ‘Most people tell me there isn’t a trace. With men, it’s different of course. Curly — that’s my husband — is unmistakable. But Curly you haven’t met — except … No, tell me, do—how can you tell?’
‘By those I’ve known.’ Here Madame Vatatzes smiled her most seductive smile, then veiled her extraordinary eyes. ‘By a certain tone,’ she murmured, and left it there.
It went on clanging in Joanie Golson’s ears, who, nevertheless, had been known for her game of tennis, and who now played a devious shot.
‘Your husband, I take it, is French?’
Madame Vatatzes returned the ball out of Joanie s reach. ‘No,’ she said, ‘he is not French’ and sat contemplating her ankle.
Only Curly’s arrival could have affected Joanie worse.
Still looking, it was not at her ankle, but into distance, Madame Vatatzes asked, ‘Couldn’t you, please, make good your offer? My husband’s an old man. And sick. He’s probably beside himself.’
Remembering the rorty old boy bashing the piano, Mrs Golson was not deceived by Madame Vatatzes’ pathos. She only accepted that the shimmer had faded from the present occasion. What she would have liked to know was how much she had been taken in — but ever. Would she remain the plump turkey, a knife eternally poised above its breast? (She was inclined to dismiss those she had fooled or threatened, because hers was surely only a dessert-knife, not to be taken seriously.)
But she hustled herself away from her doubts, disappointments, and any suspicion of hypocrisy. ‘Oh, my dear, of course — I must ask them to find Teakle — get him to bring the car round. We’ll have you home in no time.’
Mrs Golson smiled at Madame Vatatzes and Madame Vatatzes smiled back. They might have been forking up Mont Blanc together in the rotunda below, enjoying that state of perfect feminine collusion, in which advice is given on the falsification of dressmakers’ bills, and what He does to them, or doesn’t do, is discussed and deplored.
When Curly had to come in.
Mrs Golson decided on cheerful acceptance. ‘This is my husband,’ she said. ‘Madame Vatatzes, Curly, has sprained her ankle. We met in the street soon after the mishap. I promised that Teakle would run her home.’
If Curly recognised the ‘looker’ he and Teakle had almost run down while she was out walking with her husband, he made no mention of the incident, to Mrs Golson’s agreeable surprise. Surely he must recognise her? He was so obviously appreciative of the creature’s beauty.
‘You can be sure we’ll take the necessary steps, Mrs Vatats …’ E. Boyd Golson’s pores oozed visible enthusiasm.
Madame Vatatzes lowered her eyes. It was less likely that she should recognise a man who had whizzed past her in a motor-car. She was simply embarrassed by Curly’s native crudity. At the same time Mrs Golson’s mind could not help reverting to their conversation of earlier. Was it that Madame Vatatzes, behind her silence and her modest expression, sat testing, categorising, perhaps even enjoying, the smell of a man? Mrs Golson was at once shocked by her own disgusting thought, even though it had been forced on her by this new acquaintance.
‘… do something about it at the soonest …’ It seemed to Curly’s wife that his suit fitted him far too snugly, that he was straining at the seams, cracking, almost stuttering with enthusiasm and the formation of a plan to ease Madame Vatatzes’ distress.‘… only thing — Teakle’s gone into Toulon by train with some cove he’s palled up with at the old hotel.’
‘Then I must make other arrangements. I must hire a cab. I must go home,’ Madame Vatatzes, again in some distress, insisted.
‘And so you shall, dear lady,’ E. Boyd Golson assured her. ‘I’ll drive you there myself.’
‘That is so kind. Only three or four kilometres along the road to Les Sailles,’ Madame Vatatzes informed him. ‘Normally, I walk it. We both walk it — in cool weather.’
‘You can rely on me, madam, to drive you to the frontier if necessary.’
This was an event Joan Golson had not bargained for. Again she had the impression of straining tweed, bursting flesh, and worse still, her late father-in-law’s professional hands dealing with a bolt of calico. The thought of entrusting her precious jewel to Curly’s gallantry was almost more than she could bear.
‘Oh, do take care!’ she gasped. ‘Don’t talk too much! My husband’s inclined to be a reckless driver.’
She stood pleating the skin above her nose, inside their encrustation of rings her white hands plump and helpless at her waist.
‘Nobody else has ever complained about my driving. If you feel that way, Joanie, come along for the spin. Lay a restraining hand on my arm whenever you think it necessary.’
‘Oh dear, no! In such a wind — and when was my poor advice ever taken?’
She laughed, and so did Curly.
Then Madame Vatatzes advanced, and again thanked Mrs Golson for her kindness. ‘Without you, everything might have been so much more disagreeable.’ The young woman’s handshake was so frank in its expression of warmth that Mrs Golson’s rings were driven into her.
Their visitant was going. She was leaving on Curly’s tweedy arm. Joanie had not allowed herself the last delicious spasm of a glance into Madame Vatatzes’ eyes. She knew she was sulking, a silly schoolgirl standing in the doorway, no doubt looking white about the gills as she watched them down the corridor. That ratty little fur the girl was wearing! For a mad instant Joanie contemplated tearing her sables off the gilded chair-back where she had hung them, rushing down the grey expanse of corridor, to arrive before the lift door opened, and fling her furs round the girl’s shoulders, not so much to spite Curly as to offer a token of her own passion.