“Harry, I don’t want to go to the movies without you.”
I patted her arm.
“Oh rot! Of course you must go. I haven’t time to argue
about it. I’ve got to get into my overalls and get the truck out.
You go with Bill.”
“No. I’m sure Bill will understand. I’ll come with you,
Harry.” I hadn’t expected that. For a moment I was thrown off
balance.
“Don’t be silly, Ann. You’d be in my way. You go with
Bill.”
The moment I had spoken I knew I couldn’t have said
anything worse. I saw her stiffen, and her face flush.
“I’m sorry, Harry. You’re quite right, I am being silly.”
She turned to Bill. “Do you mind taking me, Bill? I would
like to go.”
“Of course well go,” Bill said.
“Is there anything I can do, Harry, so you can get off
quickly?” She didn’t look at me as she spoke. If she had
slapped my face I couldn’t have felt more sick with myself.
“It’s okay. Finish your supper. I’ll go and change.”
As I walked into the bedroom I caught Bill’s eye. I could
see he suspected something was up. He didn’t miss much. As
I took out a pair of clean white overalls from the wardrobe I saw my hands were shaking.
I went downstairs, opened the garage doors, started up
the truck and drove it into the street. Then I went upstairs
again.
They were sitting at the table. Ann wasn’t eating, but Bill
was making short work of the fruit salad as if nothing had
happened.
“Well, I’m off. Have a good time, you two.”
They looked up, but I was already backing out of the
room. So I shouldn’t have to meet their eyes, I lit a cigarette.
“I hope you’ll get on all right, Harry,” Ann said quietly.
“I’ll fix it. Have a good time.”
“So long, Harry,” Bill said.
“So long.”
I went downstairs and got into the truck, feeling as if I
had committed the meanest act of my life.
I parked the trade in a car park of the Strand and went
along to Charing Cross Station where I picked up the suitcase.
I had a wash in the station convenience and changed there,
packing my suit and overalls in the case. I returned the case tothe Left Luggage office.
It was a quarter to eight by the time I came out of the
station. I had plenty of time so I walked to Bond Street. I
reached Gloria’s flat a few minutes after eight o’clock.
The side entrance to the flat was down a mews. The
front door was painted a vivid scarlet, and there were
geraniums and lobelia in the window boxes, giving the flat a
gay, continental air. Near by three big cars were parked: a
Cadillac, a Humber and the 1939 Buick I’d seen already.
I stood hesitating, looking up at the windows, still not
sure if I should ring the bell or sneak away.
I rang the bell.
After a few minutes delay, the door opened.
“Hello, Harry.”
I took a step forward, then stopped. She was in a black
evening dress, cut so low I could see the tops of her bre@sts and the furrow between them. In the evening light her
shoulders were porcelain white, and the overhead lamp in the
hall lit up the brilliants around the top of her dress and sent flashes of fight from a big paste diamond clip she wore in her hair.
She looked the most exciting and sensual woman I had
ever seen, and just to look at her, sent a feeling through me so vi0lent it scared me.
“My! You do look handsome.” Her hand reached out and
took mine. “The other boys will be green with envy.”
“You look as if you’ve stepped straight out of a movie.”
“Do I? That’s the first compliment I’ve been paid this
evening. I put this dress on specially for your benefit. Like it?”
“Its’ terrific: a knock-out.”
“Well, come on up and meet the others.”
“Is he here?”
“Yes. His name’s Dix: Ed Dix. When the party’s warmed
up I’ll find the opportunity for you to talk to him.”
She led me up a flight of steep stairs and into a long,
low-ceiling room that was full of tobacco smoke. The curtains
had been drawn, shutting out the waning evening light and
small parchment-shaded lamps, set in the walls, were alight.
“People: meet Harry Collins, my new boy friend,” Gloria
said from the doorway.
That surprised me, but there was nothing I could do
about it. I let her lead me into the middle of the room.
“Reading from left to right,” she went on, speaking
rapidly, “Betty, Connie, Paula and Madge. Don’t let them get
their claws into you, and girls, remember, he’s my property.”
The girls were expensively dressed, all, over made-up:
two blondes, a red head and a platinum blonde: none of them
had any attractions for me. I gave each of them a stiff little bow while Gloria slid her arm through mine and watched me with a possessive air that embarrassed me.
They all smiled. Paula, the red head, winked, while
Madge, one of the blondes, rolled her eyes at me.
A slight tug at my arm half-turned me to meet the four
men.
Three of them were in evening dress; the fourth was in a
pearl-grey lounge suit, cut on the American style. He wore a
hand painted tie of horses’ heads on a yellow background. He was tall and massively built, about twenty-five or six, with small dark eyes that stared through me, a small over red mouth and a long, massive jaw.
“Eddie, I want you to meet Harry Collins.”
So this was Ed Dix. I disliked him on sight.
“Hullo; how’s yourself?” he asked, moving towards me
with a slow, lounging gait He spoke with a marked American
accent
“Pretty good. Glad to meet you.”
He gave me a jeering little smile.
“You are? That’s fine. Meet the boys: Joe, Berry and
Louis.”
The three men averaged about twenty-seven or eight
years of age; Berry was short and thick-set with a white, hard face and flaming red hair; Joe was big; nearly as powerful- looking as Dix. He had the battered, squashed face of a fighter. Louis was fair and effeminate looking. He had a pencil- lined moustache and a carnation in his button-hole.
I didn’t like the look of any of these three any mare than I
liked the look of Dix, but they were obviously determined to be
amiable and each shook hands with me, grinning.
“Well, now you’ve met everyone, have a drink,” Gloria
said, leading me across the room to an elaborate bar. She
slipped behind it. “What’ll you have? Whisky?”
“Thanks.”
My eyes went to her half-concealed bre@sts again.
While she busied herself with an ice shaker one of the
girls put on a record on the radiogram. Soon all four couples were dancing while Gloria leaned against the bar, watching them, and from time to time looking at me.
I had time now to examine the room I was in. It was
expensively furnished with modem, showy furniture. The floor was polished parquet, and big lounging setter arm-chairs
stood against the walls. In a corner was the largest television set I’d ever seen.
“Don’t you want to dance with me, Harry?”
“I’m not much of a hand at dancing now.”
She came out from behind the bar.
“Don’t you want to try?”
I pot my arm round her, and she pressed up against me,
I could feel the soft curves of her bre@sts against my shirt front and smell the perfume in her hair. I got that feeling again, ripping the insides out of me.
Dancing with her was like dancing by myself. At one
Www Ann and I used to dance quite a bit, but since I had
bought the garage, there had been no time for dancing. I soon found I wasn’t as rusty as I thought I was going to be, and after a couple of dances, Gloria smiled up at
“Who said you couldn’t dance? You’re as good as Ed.”
“Is that a compliment?”
“I’ll say. There’s nothing Ed does badly: nothing at all.”
Dix was dancing with Madge. He seemed to be content
to stand in a comer with her and sway his body to the rhythm
of the music and not move his feet.
It was only when the record stopped and everyone came
over to the bar for drinks that I suddenly thought of Ann.
I was glad and relieved that I hadn’t brought her. She
would have been hopelessly out of place among these
smooth, over-dressed girls.
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