'Well, we'd better see what they can offer us for lunch,' said Peter. 'I'll get the menu.'
Gaye held out a large expensive-looking folder and presented it, already opened, like a neophyte offering the collect for the day to an awesome priest.
Peter looked through quickly, a gentle cynicism showing on his face. He looked up at Gaye and found her watching him. 'Do you recommend 'Don's Delight' or 'Proctor's Pleasure'?' He asked it in an undertone.
'I shouldn't have the steak if I were you,' her voice as quiet as his.
'Are you free this afternoon?'
She weighed up the situation for several seconds before nodding her head, almost imperceptibly.
'What time shall I pick you up?'
'Three o'clock?'
'Where?'
'I'll be just outside.'
At four o'clock the two lay side by side in the ample double-bed in Peter's rooms in Lonsdale College. His left arm was around her neck, his right hand gently caressing her breasts.
'Do you believe a young girl can get raped?' he asked.
Gaye considered the problem. Contented in mind and in body, she lay for a while contemplating the ornate veiling, 'It must be jolly difficult for the man.'
'Mm.'
'Have you ever raped a woman?'
'I could rape you, any day of the week.'
'But I wouldn't let you. I wouldn't put up any resistance.'
He kissed her full lips again, she turned eagerly towards him.
'Peter,' she whispered in his ear, 'rape me again!'
The phone blared suddenly, shrill and urgent in the quiet room. Blast!
'Oh, hullo Bernard. What? No. Sitting idling, you know. What? Oh, tonight. Yes. Well, about seven, I think. Why not call in for me? We can have a quick drink together. Yes. Felix? Oh, he's well tanked-up already. Yes. Yes. Well, look forward to it. Yes. Bye.'
'Who's Bernard?'
'Oh, he's an English don here. Good chap. Pretty bad sense of timing, though.'
'Does he have a set of rooms like this?'
'No, no. He's a family man is Bernard. Lives up in North Oxford. Quiet chap.'
'
'What, Bernard? Good lord no. Well, I don't think so. .'
'You're a quiet man, Peter.'
'Me?' She fondled him lovingly, and abruptly terminated all further discussion of Mr. Bernard Crowther, quiet family man of North Oxford.
PART TWO
Search for a man
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Wednesday, 6 October
BEGINNING ITS LIFE under a low (Head Room 12 ft) railway bridge, and proceeding its cramped and narrow way for several hundred yards past shabby rows of terraced houses that line the thoroughfare in tight and mean confinement, the Botley Road gradually broadens into a spacious stretch of dual carriageway that carries all west- bound traffic towards Faringdon, Swindon and the sundry hamlets in between. Here the houses no longer shoulder their neighbours in such grudging proximity, and hither several of the Oxford businessmen have brought their premises.
Chalkley and Sons is a sprawling, two-storied building, specializing in household fittings, tiling, wallpaper, paint and furniture. It is a well-established store, patronized by many of the carpenters (discount), the interior decorators (discount), and almost all the do-it-yourselfers from Oxford. At the furthest end of the ground floor show rooms there is a notice informing the few customers who have not yet discovered the fact that the Formica Shop is outside, over the yard, second on the left.
In this shop a young man is laying a large sheet of formica upon a wooden table, a table which has a deep, square groove cut longitudinally through its centre. He pulls towards him, along its smoothly running gliders, a small automatic saw, and carefully lines up its wickedly polished teeth against his pencilled mark. Deftly he flicks out a steel ruler and checks his measurement. He appears content with a rapid mental calculation, snaps a switch and, amid a grating whirr, slices through the tough fabric with a clean and deadly swiftness. He enjoys that swiftness! Several times he repeats the process: lengthways, side-ways, narrowly, broadly, and stacks the measured strips neatly against the wall. He looks at his watch; it is almost 12.45 p.m. An hour and a quarter. He locks the sliding doors behind him, repairs to the staff wash-room, soaps his hands, combs his hair and, with little regret, temporarily turns his back upon the premises of Mr. Chalkley and his sons. He pats a little package which bulges slightly in the right-hand pocket of his overcoat. Still there.
Although his immediate destination is no more than ten minutes' walk away, he decides to take a bus. He crosses the road and traverses in the process as many lines, continuous, broken, broad, narrow, yellow, white, as
