Читать книгу: «Sally»

TWO

Sunday in Hampstead, silver winter sun making everybody look beautiful. The Barbour Brigade are out walking retrievers who have never retrieved in the countryside because the Heath suffices. The Young Trendies are here in force, hanging out, hanging about, sipping cappuccino at the pavement café, queuing for crêpes, looking around all the while to catch sight of their reflection whilst spying out anyone good-looking to look good for.

There is a young woman who weaves in and around these two species. She is smiling; it is a smile of energy and ease and it is infectious. She seems simultaneously absorbed in her own world yet aware of, and enjoying, her surroundings. And the shopping, by the looks of the two bags she swings. She is of average height, of slight build and her hair is a nothing-special brown, mid-length with a kink that is natural and nice. Her skin glows and there is a sheen to her very good cheekbones, a becoming blush to her cheeks, an endearing rosiness to the edge of her chin and the end of her nose. Her hazel eyes glint and dance. Her lips, naturally full, are soft red – Sally always uses lip balm during the winter months. And, though her legs would not see her to a Levi jeans commercial, her walk is a sexy, assertive stride. As a package, she looks very pleasingly put together. She is not stunning but she is radiant and heads turn.

Sally jigs past a boutique, one selling excessively expensive accessories. Two strides later (and unknowingly witnessed by at least three envious Hampstead Darlings), our erstwhile ballerina performs a fluid halt, heel-spin, about-turn, and floats effortlessly into the shop. Inside, the opulent aroma of fine leather envelops her, the hand of a skilled interior decorator is much in evidence and her senses are solicited at once. The rag-rolled walls in Homes-and-Gardens hues of ecru and taupe, and the polished wood floor covered here and there by a jaded kelim, provide a splendid setting for pieces of old furniture over which cashmere throws and finely woven woollen shawls are nonchalantly draped. Belts hang from a fabulously gnarled piece of driftwood; from leather trunks, suitcases and holdalls, a carefully spewed selection of socks and silk camisoles accost the eye. But Sally, who thinks the current fashion and hefty prices for bashed, blemished, artistically distressed leather goods somewhat daft, has made a beeline for the old Welsh dresser where the hats are displayed.

She has never worn a hat but she is trying them on with the jaunty confidence of one who would not entertain going out without one. The black felt cloche suits her well but makes her look too cutesy, the trilby is too butch and the beret too ordinaire. She looks stunning in the claret bowler but feels best in the black velvet. It is soft, floppy but beautifully cut. It hugs her skull and the brim, up the front, falls gently around her face and drapes elegantly at the back. She looks at herself in the mirror and the shop assistant, usually pushy, looks on too. She makes no attempt to goad her customer; she watches, slightly jealous, from a discreet distance. Sally is intrigued to find that the shape of the hat accentuates her bone structure and appears to lengthen her neck; under the black velvet, her eyes turn from hazelnuts into freshly shelled conkers.

I look really rather good, sort of alluring, feminine and vampish all at the same time.

It takes Sally but an instant to decide the hat must be hers; costing, though it does, a day’s pay.

At the Tea Pot Shoppe, Carlos was clearing the mountain of froth-stained cups from one of the outside tables, pocketing a mound of gratuitously small change left as a gratuity. It was nearing the end of his first month in England, he was tired and slightly homesick. It was a thankless job for a nuclear physics graduate, and the tips were lower than he’d been led to believe. Then he saw her, caught in profile as she started to cross the road, a pretty face framed perfectly by a sumptuous black hat. Suddenly, life in this strange country of offish Barbours and oafish Trendies had a plus to it. This, Carlos realized with a great deal of excitement, was his first glimpse of an English Rose. He gawped transfixed; watching the cars slither and toot while she danced and laughed her way between them. There is a zebra crossing a hundred yards ahead but today Sally prefers to jay-walk. Bella, bella! The hat, the face, the rosiness – and here she is, ordering a cappuccino and a Danish pastry.

Sally graciously accepted the compliments of the waiter. Soon she was deftly scooping up the chocolate-dusted froth and thinking of nothing in particular as it fluffed into nothingness on her tongue. The pastry was absolutely heavenly and she even closed her eyes as the first mouthful revealed to her tastebuds apple, crème patissière and the lightest of pastry. By the second sip and third mouthful, Sally was happily recalling the details of her decadent afternoon. A coffee-brown lambswool blazer; two silk shirts, one olive, one cream; a pair of exorbitantly expensive designer jeans; and a short (was it too short?) black devoré velvet skirt.

When on earth am I going to wear that?

You will.

She had indulged in garments of the finest fabrics, and at the most exorbitant prices. The whole experience had been so pleasurable, the looking, the touching, the trying on; the decision-making so effortless. Finally, it had been a joy and well worth the money to watch her acquisitions being coddled in tissue paper and then handed to her so reverently.

As she pressed a determined fork against the last flakes of Danish, she pondered for a moment; common sense versus decadence. Sally, you must understand, had spent her rainy-day money. Frequently she put a little aside ‘for a rainy day’, not really knowing when that would be. But it was definitely today and common sense had a place neither in her scheme of things nor her purse.

Today, she told herself as the brisk November breeze reddened her nose and chin a little more, today it is pouring.

Despite the pavements being dry and no umbrella in sight, Sally decided that it was the rainiest day in ages and the spending of pounds amassed from hard-saved pennies was utterly justified. These purchases, after all, were an investment. She turned to look for her waiter, and in doing so felt a whisper of velvet against her cheek. Its caress felt wonderful and, as the waiter was nowhere to be seen, she kept her head still a moment longer.

Over her second cappuccino, Sally indulged in recalling, moment by moment, thrust by thrust, the athletics of the previous night, and if one can feel light-headed between the legs, then that was how Sally was feeling.

Never have I been worshipped like that, never have I been so aware of my body, what it can do, how it can feel, how it can make another feel.

Perhaps it was because she had consciously watched, analyzed even, a man totally absorbed in her, so hungry for her, that her own physical awareness had been heightened. The sex seemed so much more fulfilling, the orgasm so exquisite. New. Sitting there, in Hampstead, with the light growing thin, a November navy replacing the afternoon silver, Sally decided to recast herself as a fly on the wall of her replay and ran the whole sequence again, this time as a series of film stills. Vivid in her mind’s eye was the interlocking of two bodies, the various formations and patterns, firm flesh, the spaces in between; Rodin’s marble; Henry Moore’s bronze.

Carlos found himself unable to resist. The English Rose, smiling carefree out loud, was compelling, magnetic. He was helpless in the face of her. As his luck would have it, she turned to him with that very smile as he presented the bill to her. With his very best English, he let go:

‘Señorita, your smile, it makes my day. Is so very beautiful. In you I see the English Rosa. If I was Shake His Speare, I write a play for you. You are foods for my ’eart and a vision for my eyes. Is so very lovely. I am breaking open for your smile of pretty innocence.’

Hand pressed with conviction against his heart, he kissed up at the sky as if imploring the gods to grant his wish. Sally was flattered to the hilt. Cocking her head, she gave him the smile to make his day, a wink too, and a tip which far exceeded her previously uniform ten per cent.

Not quite, thought Sally as she strolled away home, but thank you anyway. She threw back her head and grinned hugely at the near-dark sky. Actually, the smile that has made your day is not that of an innocent English Rose, but is rather the glow of a well-laid woman.