‘Her outgoings and her overheads and her running costs.’
‘Exactly. The removal of a business suit is somehow transactional. When I was finally allowed to come, and we were lying there, I had a sudden sense of danger. I suddenly expected Phoebe to say, All right, that’ll be five hundred quid.’
‘Mm. Remember the paranoid headlines in Portnoy? Asst Lit Ed Found Headless In Go-Go Girl’s Apt.’ Christopher looked around for the waiter. He murmured, ‘It’s time, or so it seems to this reviewer, for an alerting digestif. Grappa?’
‘Oh go on then…And afterwards, when I walked her home, she cooled me! She wasn’t having it.’ I explained. ‘She calls it quality control.’
‘Well, control anyway. She’s obviously mad about control.’
‘Mm.’ Just then I had a presentiment that on this subject I might cease to confide in Christopher. Either that, or my confidences would become inauspiciously terse. ‘But the gimmick of the self-imposed purdah. I’m hoping she’ll relax about that.’
‘Probably. You’ll wear her down. A bold and tender lover like yourself, Little Keith. Sensitive but strangely masterful. Caring and empathetic, and yet, withal, excitingly bold. Adventurous? Yes. Disrespectful? No. At once athletic and –’
‘Yes yes, Hitch.’
He sat back. ‘Oh well. For the record she sounds like a – like an uneconomical use of your energy, Mart. But there’s no point in telling you that, now you’ve got the scent of her. So. When does she get back from Germany?’
The bill came. We would be the last to leave.
I said, ‘Whose turn is it?’
‘Oh yours without question.’ He passed me the tray. ‘This shouldn’t present any undue difficulties. Who paid last night?’
‘Me of course and happily. She said, You know, if I paid, or even if we went Dutch, I’d have to hate you for all eternity. Yup. Until the conversion of the very last Jew.’
‘…Is she religious by any chance?’
‘As she was sending me on my way she said, And on top of everything else I’m a believer. She’s Catholic. It’s very important to me, but utterly private. I don’t go on about it. But at dinner she went on about – or kept returning to – a certain Father Gabriel. My mentor, my second father. All this.’
‘Catholicism. The far right at prayer. And her politics?’
‘Her politics?’ And I thought (as usual), What’s that got to do with anything? ‘She doesn’t have any politics. What she has is current affairs.’ They were gathering their things. ‘Mao hasn’t got long, et cetera. And oh yeah. She loathes Mrs Thatcher.’
‘Does she now. Phoebe can’t be Labour. So it’s personal.’
‘Oh, from the gut. By no means everyone fancies Mrs Thatcher, Hitch. Like you do.’
‘Ah come on, she’s a minx.’
‘Miss Dairy Product 1950. No erotic content whatever.’
‘False, quite false! And I can prove it.’ He started leading the way to the door. ‘In this day and age I suppose it should really be Ms Dairy Product. And Ms Universe.’
‘Mm. Why’s Miss Universe always from Earth?’
‘Why not Miss Neptune.’
‘She sounds nice. You can almost visualise her. Long eyelashes. Miss Neptune…’
‘But how about Miss Pluto? D’you like the sound of her? No, you’re wrong, quite wrong, about Maggie. The Leader of Her Majesty’s Opposition? She stinks of sex.’*6
We swung ourselves out on to the street.
—————
Now how in fact did the first date end? On what terms?
Let me think, let me consult memory, let me consult – the truth…
And the truth was he kissed and praised her and stroked her hair and weighed its runnels in his hand for six or seven minutes. And made it clear how ready he was to learn more – to learn more, at the feet of Phoebe Phelps. He stood back as she entered the little conservatory of the vestibule. Behind glass once again. The way she was when he first saw her, safely encaged in glass.
He lingered under the arch for a valedictory cigarette. Meanwhile his male intuition was telling him that even if he won the privilege of a second date, and a third, it was unlikely to last long – this thing with Phoebe. ‘Time’, says Auden, ‘that is intolerant / Of the brave and innocent / And indifferent in a week / To a beautiful physique…’ Her physique, it seemed to him, was an embarrassing, even an accusatory godsend (put together, inch by inch, with all his susceptibilities in mind). That body, in combination with that face: an image of middle-class probity, till slit by her lawless smile.
But the trouble was, or the trouble would soon be…Time, long-term time, what does it hold dear? It ‘worships language and forgives / Everyone by whom it lives’. What this would come down to, in the here and now, was everyday discourse; and when they talked there were few shared registers and associations, and so the words seemed to hang in the middle air somehow, keeping themselves to themselves. Clearly, the thing with Phoebe was bound up with the life expectancy of his carnal awe. It was a trite question, of course, but how long does lust last – all on its own?
…Was she watching him now, from the shadows of her balcony, as he enjoyed his husky smoke under the lamplight? There were moments, during the kissing and praising, when it seemed possible she might relent. Would she now call down for him – in aching languor?…He waited. Then as he buttoned his overcoat he raised an arm to her in tribute and farewell. Farewell – until May Day.
Then I turned with a flourish and walked back to Bayswater. I was not yet twenty-seven. It was 1976.
Mind over matter
‘Oh, Phoebe, is it always going to be like this?’ he asked in the dark – in 1977.
‘Ew, Phoebe, eez eet ohlways going to be like theece?…You’ve been saying that, in your poncy accent, every night for eleven
