The Man Who Made Husbands Jealous

Exhausted from the American launch, Georgie was now running on pure adrenalin. Like a long-lost lover, her American public had been flowing back in the last week of the tour. The fan letters, dried to a trickle, were beginning to pour in, workmen hailed her from scaffolding. For the first time in years, people nudged as she passed in the street.

The English launch was far more of an ordeal, because London had been the home of her last humiliating flop and because Guy was with her today, which made her far more nervous, because he was the person she most wanted to please in the world.

She was deathly pale as she entered the party room, her earthy sensual face almost puddingy, but when she saw the waiting army of reporters and frenziedly clicking cameramen, colour seeped back into her cheeks, her long, mournful heavy-lidded eyes started to sparkle, and the deep lines, which ran from her wide snub nose past the corners of her coral-pink mouth with its huge pouting snapdragon lower lip, seemed to disappear in a wonderful, wicked, face-splitting smile.

The rigours of the American tour had knocked off seven pounds and given her back her cheek-bones. The long slinky dress, the same blue as sunlit summer seas, emphasized her slim shoulders, pretty breasts and waist and bypassed her hips and legs. As she draped herself over the papier-mache rock for the photographers, her heavy russet hair broke away from its moorings and writhed over her shoulders — Georgie, the sex symbol, was reborn.

Soon she was wooing the Press.

‘What are you working on?’ asked the Express.

‘A musical about mid-life crisis called Ant and Cleo.’

‘Autobiographical?’ asked the Mirror.

‘Of course not,’ Georgie smiled across at Guy, who said firmly, ‘And Georgie’s about to sign a contract for a new album for Catchitune.’

‘Darling,’ reproached Georgie, ‘I want to get shot of Ant and Cleo first.’

‘You looking forward to living next to Rannaldini in the country?’ asked The Scorpion.

‘God, yes. I’m a colossal fan. I think he’s brilliant and stunning, too.’

‘Perhaps he could produce Ant and Cleo,’ suggested the Telegraph.

‘Paradise Productions. Wouldn’t that be wonderful?’ sighed Georgie.

‘Look this way, Georgie,’ shouted the photographers, ‘To me, Georgie.’ ‘Smile, Georgie.’ ‘Climb on the rock; show us your legs,’ which was the one thing Georgie was not prepared to do.

Shoved rudely aside, as so often happened, by people anxious to get to his wife, Guy Seymour moved round the room, slipping cards with the gallery’s address on to anyone rich and famous who might be interested in buying paintings.

‘Is Georgie Maguire here in person?’ asked a pale girl from the Independent.

‘Of course she is,’ answered Guy quite sharply.

‘I went to a launch at lunchtime,’ said the girl huffily, ‘where the pop star didn’t show. The record company didn’t feel it was relevant and they didn’t play any of her records,’ she shouted over the boom of Rock Star. ‘Of course hype and hard sell are very unfashionable at the moment.’

‘That’s why we’re in the middle of a recession,’ snapped Guy.

‘She’s not bad for forty-six,’ admitted the girl, consulting her hand-out. ‘Which is her famous husband?’

‘I am,’ said Guy.

‘Oh, right. D’you manage Georgie?’

‘No-one manages Georgie.’

The room was filling up with record distributors, disc jockeys, Catchitune employees, musicians produced by Catchitune and the general freeloaders of the music business.

Through a fog of cigarette smoke, people drifted up and down: men in overcoats, T-shirts, designer gymshoes and baseball caps., clutching beer bottles like grenades, or in leather jackets with their shirts hanging out like Larry. Girls with scarlet lips, tangled hair, wandering eyes and pale faces like Brides of Dracula, who never saw the daylight, crunched over the sea shells, restlessly searching for celebrities or at least familiar faces.

Everyone pretended not to stare at Georgie, but they all agreed that the album was great and that, in the down light, she looked terrific. But they ignored her because big stars don’t like to be pestered and it wouldn’t be cool to go up to her.

The Press were getting restless.

‘That’s great, thank you.’ One by one they closed their notebooks, switched off their tape recorders and looked around for Rannaldini.

Georgie, however, having been out of fashion a long time, desperately needed reassurance. Like a bride at her own wedding whom everyone thinks is too important to waylay, she was suddenly deserted and sought Guy out in panic.

‘It’s going to be a mega-flop. Everyone’s leaving.’

‘Don’t be so bloody wet, Panda.’

‘Judging by celebrity head-counts, this party is a complete wash-out,’ said the girl from the Independent.

Then in walked Dancer Maitland, thin as a rake with his long tousled mane and black-lined eyes, one of the biggest rock stars on both sides of the Atlantic.

‘Hi, darling.’ He came straight up to Georgie, hugging her cautiously so as not to disturb either of their hair or make-up.

‘Great album. Wish I’d written it. Bloody nice of me to be here, when you’ve just pushed me off Number One in the States and no doubt you’ll do the same in England. I hear you’re moving to Rutshire. I’ll be there in April when practice chukkas start. You must come and ’ave dinner.’

‘Oh, we’d love to,’ said Georgie ecstatically. ‘Oh, Dancer, thank you for coming, and making the party. Have you met Guy?’

Dancer looked at Guy’s strong stern face, whose classical good looks were only marred by a nose broken when he was boxing for Cambridge. The warmth of the reddy-brown complexion and the friendly smile showing excellent teeth were tempered by eyes which despite laughter lines were the cold pale azure of Basildon Bond writing-paper.

A battered, gold corduroy suit, a blue-and-gold paisley silk-tie and beautifully cut, straight, white-blond hair falling on the collar of his dark blue shirt, gave him an arty look. But the overwhelming impression was of some high churchman: a man of passion but strong-willed enough to resist the overtures of the most wantonly ravishing parishioner.

Sexy but tough as shit, thought Dancer, wincing at Guy’s firm handshake.

‘Georgie gives you a good press,’ he said. ‘But I thought I was the only rock star livin’ in Rutshire.’

And the photographers got their picture, because Dancer came to launching parties even less often than Rannaldini.

Dancer was followed by Andrew Lloyd Webber, Rod Stewart, Simon Bates, Steve Wright, Cilia Black, Simon Le Bon and a host of other celebs, so Rannaldini wasn’t missed nearly as much as he would have liked. Hermione, on the other hand, made a deliberately late entrance with her devoted, balding husband Bob who, as the orchestra manager of the London Met, had had a punishing day dealing with Rannaldini and the Press.

Hermione was looking radiant in a rich, red Chanel suit embroidered with roses and with a built-in bra to boost her splendid breasts. To boost her sales, she carried a large crocodile bag, rattling with tapes of Blow the wind southerly to thrust on unsuspecting journalists.

‘I thought you’d like to hear some real music,’ she murmured to the music critic of The Times.

Although she smiled graciously round, she was pained by the fog of cigarette smoke and the photographers still clustering round Georgie and Dancer.

‘Who’s that striking woman in the swansdown bolero and red leather shorts? Didn’t she play Susannah at the ENO?’ she asked Bob. ‘Her face is so familiar.’

‘She’s the Catchitune receptionist,’ said Bob not unkindly. ‘You see her each time you go into the