The Man Who Made Husbands Jealous

finally ended.

‘Wait till Rannaldini goes,’ said Hermione.

Georgie gritted her teeth.

To gain the ascendancy before he left, Larry bought three of Julia’s paintings, and actually wrote Guy a large cheque. Bob, egged on by the Most Beautiful Voice in the World, put down a deposit on one of the smaller ones. Rannaldini bought the most erotic and said he’d talk to Guy about money later. Proudly Guy went round putting red stickers on them. Julia was in heaven. She didn’t say much, but her skin flushed faintly like the crimsoning on the underside of a wood anemone.

Larry and Marigold left immediately afterwards. They were followed by Rannaldini, who was flying to Milan first thing to do The Barber of Seville at La Scala.

Just for a second, as he and Georgie were alone in the hall together, he took her hands.

‘I’d love to talk to you sometime about Flora’s career,’ she heard herself stammering.

‘Of course,’ said Rannaldini. ‘Let us have lunch, and then we will have a chance to talk about ourselves.’

She felt he was just about to kiss her when Kitty came out, saying what a lovely evening it had been, and that Georgie and Guy must come over to Valhalla next time Rannaldini was home.

Georgie had the feeling that, with the departure of his boss, Bob would have liked to stay on and unwind, but that, for the same reason, Hermione felt the evening had lost all point, and dragged him away.

‘Look after Julia,’ Guy called out briskly to Georgie. ‘I’m taking Ben and Meredith round the house.’

Georgie was a little alarmed about what grand redecorating schemes Meredith might lure him into, but it was bliss to kick off her shoes, throw another of their own logs on the fire, and relax with a bottle of Kummel and Julia.

‘How beautiful both Marigold and Hermione are,’ said Julia. ‘I’d so love to paint either of them.’

Feeling slightly deflated Julia didn’t want to paint her, Georgie suggested Julia approached them through Larry and Bob.

‘They both obviously love your work, and Larry’s on such a high with Marigold at the moment, he’d commission anything. I do hope it lasts.’ Georgie collapsed on the floor so she was level with Dinsdale on the sofa. ‘Larry’s been such a shit to her. I’m sorry I was so uptight this evening, but two couples cancelled at the last moment because their marriages had gone up the spout.’

Julia had chewed off her lipstick and her eyeliner had smudged beneath the fox-brown eyes, but her skin was unlined in the candle-light, and the scorpion glinted evilly between her breasts as though it might plunge its sting into the soft white flesh at any moment. She must be Scorpio, that most passionate and complicated of signs, thought Georgie.

‘I’m so lucky to be married to Guy,’ she went on hazily. ‘I used to be very wild when we were first married,’ and a bit now, she thought, luxuriating at the prospect of lunch with Rannaldini. ‘I think Guy feels so much safer now I’m tucked away in the country. Even when I used to go into the West End from Hampstead, he used to police my every move.’

Dinsdale, half-asleep, grunted with pleasure as Georgie scratched his back.

‘Guy’s been so wonderful about my career,’ she went on. ‘So happy to bask in any reflected glory, but he’s going to get glory himself soon — not just your exhibition which I’m sure will be terrific — but because of Rock Star. I know The Scorpion’s a rag, but they’ve nominated Guy Hubby of the Year, and if he wins, he gets ten thousand pounds. I expect Guy will insist on it going to charity, but it means he’ll be a star in his own right. It’s lovely that people have started recognizing him in the street and asking him for his autograph.’

Julia’s eyes seemed to get bigger and bigger.

‘It’s so sad when marriages break up. You hang on to your Ben,’ urged Georgie, then thought, I don’t think she should at all, he’s ghastly, I must be pissed. As she refilled their glasses, she noticed an adorable china puppy tangled in blue ribbon clambering out of a flowered bowl among the ornaments on a side table.

‘How lovely! Victorian,’ she examined it, ‘I wonder where that came from.’

‘Geraldine and the girls from the gallery gave it to me as a moving-in present,’ said a returning Guy smoothly. ‘I kept forgetting to bring it home.’

‘The puppy’s exactly like Dinsdale,’ said Georgie enchanted. ‘How clever of Geraldine.’

Saying they must go, Ben bore off Julia and Meredith whom they were going to drop off on the way.

‘Nice, aren’t they?’ said Guy, gathering up glasses.

‘Juliet’s lovely,’ said Georgie. ‘Not sure about him though.’

‘She’s called Julia,’ said Guy, ‘and Ben’s a genius.’

20

The next morning Guy and Georgie were woken ridiculously early by the telephone.

‘Leave it,’ mumbled Guy.

‘Someone might have died.’

‘Well, I wish they’d die later in the day.’

The sleepy smile was wiped off Georgie’s face when she found it was Hermione, too lazy to write, but priding herself on her good manners.

‘Thank you for a pleasant evening. We so enjoyed meeting Julia Armstrong.’

Hermione wanted recipes of everything Guy had cooked — anyone would think he’d had a baby or landed on Mars, thought Georgie irritably. Then, before ringing off, she announced, ‘Sabine Bottomley has asked me out to lunch.’

She doesn’t seem like a Sabine, thought Georgie as she put back the receiver. She’s the one who’d do the raping.

For a few moments she tried to burrow like a mole back into the dark furry tunnel of sleep, but Guy was stroking her breasts and putting increasing pressure on her clitoris, like a stiff button on the cordless telephone, until grumbling Georgie lumbered out of bed, muttering that she must clean her teeth and wash, but Guy pulled her back. ‘I want you now.’

Head turned and mouth clamped shut to divert garlic-and-wine fumes, she admired her bobbing body in a long dusty mirror, wondering if she should move more, and tried to remember to grip Guy with her inside muscles. She found it hard to come unless she was still and concentrating on her orgasm. Beneath her Guy looked tired, his face rumpled, and his white-blond fringe fallen back off his forehead.

‘Tell me about the last time you went to bed with Tancredi,’ he whispered.

So Georgie told him about the last time Guy thought she had been to bed with Tancredi.

Afterwards, he said, ‘I’m sorry. That was selfish of me,’ and he brought her breakfast in bed with grape hyacinths in a little vase. Only able to keep down the coffee, Georgie buttered the croissant for Dinsdale. When she staggered down, hungover to the hairline, everything had been cleared up, and once again she realized how lucky she was to be married to Guy, her rock star.

She felt less chipper when she opened their joint bank statement. The outgoings had been horrific and had almost mopped up the massive advance from Catchitune. The advance on Ant and Cleo had been spent months ago. Conciliatory before a screw, brisk afterwards, Guy was waving the bank manager’s letter and just getting into his must-tighten-our-belts routine when all worry temporarily evaporated because The Scorpion rang to say Guy had been voted Hubby of the Year.

‘To be quite honest there wasn’t a lot of choice,’ the reporter confided to Georgie. ‘Faithful husbands are an endangered species. Can we come and interview you and him tomorrow for Monday’s paper?’

At least the house had been bulled up for the dinner party, so Guy didn’t have to spend the rest of the day tidying. Sunday was a lovely day. After the reporter left, they sat watching an orange sun setting like a tiger down