A Little Bit on the Side (29 page)

‘The pilaf sounds fine, but not the aubergine: can’t stand them.’

‘Try the grilled koftes then: meat based, very spicy and tasty.’

They finished with Turkish coffee: new to Jack who was an instant convert. The bill he paid by card, the tip in cash. It was accepted with a discretion which left him uncertain whether it had been too much or too little. On the way back to the hotel he reflected on the implications of their light lunch with the whole of the afternoon ahead of them.

With her shopping safely put away Josie turned to Jack and gave him a little kiss.

‘Now Jack. We have the whole of the afternoon before us, and we are going to have a very leisurely time. Very leisurely Jack. To start with you will undress me, and then I will undress you. Are you happy with that?’

‘Blissfully,’ said Jack.

As Josie was wearing only a light dress and her underclothes, Jack could think of little he could do to comply with the order to proceed leisurely other than to kiss each newly exposed area of Josie as he proceeded. This he did lovingly and lingeringly to Josie’s smiling but unspoken approval.

Even so it was not long before he eased the final flimsy garment from Josie’s feet, when he was seized with a sudden and quite untypical flash of erotic imagination. Dropping to one knee he lifted a foot and kissed it, moved on to instep, next ankle, then calf and knee, and so upward and upward to conclude at the last with a light kiss on Josie’s lips.

‘Why Jack, you are full of surprises. I liked that, very exciting. Now give me a proper kiss before I do my bit.’

Things had moved so rapidly after their return from lunch, however, that Jack had removed only his Jacket, and hardly had Josie started than she was struggling with the knot on his tie.

‘For heaven’s sake Jack! Why do men wear these stupid things? Give me a hand to get it started…. And don’t laugh. Surprising as it might seem to you I haven’t done this before.’

Jack loosened the tie enough for Josie to pull it over his head, and then stood smiling as she unbuttoned his shirt and struggled to drag it free from his trousers.

‘I can’t say that I speak with the voice of experience Josie,’ he said. ‘But I really do feel that I made a better fist of this little exercise than you’re managing.’

She gave him a slap on the chest, and then mumbled sorry and kissed him. Anticipating the next problem he lifted his foot so that she would have an easier time with his shoes, and eventually her task was done. Jack felt rather relieved that she made no attempt to emulate his finishing touch.

‘Now we’ll just lie down together and enjoy a few minutes of kissing, touching and stroking.’

‘You lead, and I’ll follow,’ said Jack.

And then began a leisurely, lingering afternoon of kissing and caressing; of twisting and turning and broken murmurs of delight; of touching and stroking and sinuous intertwinings; and of frontal, flanking and rearward assaults in which Jack was constantly frustrated by Josie’s determined evasive action, until delighted and frustrated with the game in equal measure, he fell back onto his pillow alongside her.

‘Oh Jack surely you aren’t giving up yet? But perhaps you’re right: we’ll just lie quietly for a while, and then start again from the beginning. That would be nice.’

By now the afternoon sun was shining full across the bed where Josie lay, eyelids briefly closed, and Jack, close alongside was content to lie and admire the soft haze of illuminated body-hair and the gentle flexing of breasts and body to her soft breathing. Then the pattern of breathing changed and he saw her, eyes wide open, smiling at him.

‘No quotations for this afternoon Jack?’

He thought her question over for a few moments, and then easing across her body, insinuated himself between her thighs.

‘Once more into the breach, dear friend, once more?’

‘My God Jack you really can be impossibly crude… but I like it,’ saying which she embraced him with legs and arms.

‘No quarter given or taken,’ she added.

‘And no prisoners,’ said Jack. ‘Prenez garde.’

After that final vigorous and extended assault of the afternoon they dozed for an hour or so, and Josie offered no objected when Jack draped his arm around her.

‘You know Mr Manning,’ said Josie as they drowsily roused themselves to shower. ‘I think I know now that we are going to be very good friends.’

‘Just friends is it Josie?’

‘Oh yes Jack, just friends, but very special friends.’

‘Special friends like these two days you mean do you Josie?’

‘I do indeed Jack — just like these two days. We will pleasure one another, as the Duchess so delightfully put it, whenever we feel so inclined, but you’re excused the top-boots, and I don’t think we’ll need to leave Barlow again. Not unless we want to that is.’

‘And will there be other special friends too Josie?’

‘Of course not Jack; not while you’re my special friend.’ Jack didn’t feel inclined to pursue it any further than that.

Friday was late opening at the British Museum, so when they had showered and dressed, Jack took Josie for a preprandial stroll around his favourite gallery, that for Medieval Europe. He wasn’t sure that Josie found the exhibits as breathtaking as he did until he called her back to a display which included a small collection of reliquary busts.

‘Well I’m damned,’ he said. ‘I remember on my first visit to the Players I had this strange feeling that you and I had already met somewhere at some time in the past. I fell for that little lady on my first visit here,’ He pointed to one of the busts. ‘Look. There. The colourful one with the golden hair: unknown female saint.’

‘Nothing very saintly about me for the last couple of days Jack.’

‘No, thank God, but braid and plait your hair, and dress you for the period, and you could be her sister. Same high forehead, same fine cheekbones and classic nose, and the same come-to-bed eyes. Odd that in a saint’

‘But she’s beautiful Jack, and you think I look like her…. Well thank you for the compliment, and have a kiss.’

They slummed it that evening in a Pizza House nearby, with a bottle of wine and after-coffee liqueurs. Following the extended and energetic encounters of the afternoon that soon had them drowsy, and by a little after eleven they were in bed and settling down to sleep, each on their own side of the hotel’s enormous special import. Almost like an old married couple, thought Jack, were it not for the acres of bed between us, and the fact that Josie clearly isn’t thinking along those lines.

In Barlow they walked up from the station together and parted at Josie’s front door in the High Street.

‘Gorgeous couple of days Jack, but remember strictly business between us when we are back with the group. Next time we must get together here. Love you.’ She gave him a peck on the cheek, and had half-turned to enter when she turned again.

‘Oh to hell with the bloody neighbours: they can think what they like. Come here Mr Manning, and kiss me goodbye properly.’

It was a long and lingering goodbye that Jack was still relishing as he made his way through the lanes of the old town, into Withy Lane and past the door of the lonely Angela, completely forgetful now of his earlier, embarrassing assignation with that loving lady.

It was a quiet time with the Barlow Players after the success of
A Flea In Her Ear,
with no meetings scheduled for six weeks, when Brandy was planning to start rehearsals for a production of
Uncle Vanya.
During those six weeks Jack and Josie met and pleasured themselves several times, but they were brief evening or afternoon communions at one or the other of their houses, and they never quite re-captured the first, fine careless rapture of their London revels. They were discussing the prospect of a long spell together, perhaps a week’s holiday early the following summer, but neither seemed inclined to move into permanent residence with the other.

As Josie had requested, Jack kept their relationship very much at arm’s length and businesslike whenever they met at the group for rehearsals, but as he had always believed, it was an utterly pointless exercise.

‘Lucky chap Jack,’ said Brandy, when they came together for a few moments during a coffee break. ‘Much envied by all the chaps I’m sure, a few of the girls too perhaps, but I can’t understand why the dear lady insists on this charade within the group. The town’s far too small, and you were of course seen departing and returning.’

‘And I’m still wondering why me, Brandy. Wouldn’t have any views on that would you?’

‘When it comes to Josie I wouldn’t dare to speculate Jack, but enjoy it while it lasts.’

Jack might have thought that a strange remark, had he not remembered Brandy’s earlier reference to Josie having two or three men over the years, but nothing permanent.

‘But back to business,’ continued Brandy. ‘Dot and I have been talking over the casting for
Vanya,
and feel that despite her age, Josie still looks so young she’d be perfect for Yelena. Now that you know her a little better, if I can put it like that, do you think I could tempt her back?’

‘You mean you’d like me to use my good offices to persuade her, do you Brandy?’

‘Your good offices! Oh what a lovely euphemism Jack. Yes, use your good offices by all means, and anything else that comes to hand, if only you can persuade the lady to return.’

They were interrupted by a howl from Dot, who had been sitting nearby reading the latest edition of the Barlow Recorder.

‘Bloody hell Brandy, I do believe the buggers are at it again: just have a look at this.’

‘Her voice was ever soft, gentle and low Jack, an excellent thing in woman…. Oh speak again bright angel.’

Dodging the swipe she aimed at him, he took the paper and quietly looked over the offending article, a letter on the local arts scene signed by Neophilist (Name and address supplied).

‘Oh dear,’ he said. ‘I do believe our Dorothy is right. The buggers are indeed at it again. Gather round gentles all: perpend and give ear.’

‘Oh my God!’ said Dot to Jack. ‘I wish I hadn’t started this. He simply can’t resist the chance to wrap his tonsils round his vowels in public. He can be such a bloody bore at times…. Do you have to Brandy?’

He ignored her.

‘Timbuktu? Don’t know anything from Timbuktu do we Dot?’ said Brandy. ‘Some interesting stuff from Kenya and South Africa, but not for Barlow I think. Well let Mr Neophilist huff and puff all he likes, if the needs arises we’ll see them off as we did last time.’

‘So what’s it all about Brandy? What happened last time?’

‘Oh it’s all a part of the them-and-us syndrome Jack. Been going on for years now, ever since the property boom brought the first buyers up from the south with wallets fat enough to freeze those with old Barlow blood out of the market. Trouble was though that they froze out old Barlow influence too, getting seats on the council, and positions on local committees and clubs.

Since then it’s always been there, simmering away below the surface: local resentment against newcomers who all too often were better breached, better informed and had more strings to pull than the locals.

It gets a bit heated at times, but as far as I’m concerned I can’t think of a more thoroughly entertaining sight than that of the respectable, churchgoing burghers of a fine old English country town busily trying to cut each other’s throats through the columns of the local rag. Beats the
News of the World any
time.’

‘And although you’re not exactly old Barlow yourself, you fell foul of the newcomers too did you Brandy?’

‘Nothing we couldn’t handle Jack, nor do I always object to what they’re after. If it hadn’t been for them in the late sixties the Mayor and the business cronies who supported him, bloody vandals, would have moved the old market cross and torn up the cobble-stones for a car park extension. Got more than they bargained for though: ended up with a national campaign and a camera crew from the Tonight programme down here to report on the potential atrocity. Nothing more heard then about taking up the cobbles.

Now that I agreed with, but then the Bloody Philistines had a go at the Barlow Players. Same whinge as now: thought our programme was too elitist. Well of course we’re elitist I told them. If we weren’t, who would be: elitist and bloody proud of it.

Then they infiltrated the group over the course of a year or two and tried their hand at a take-over. Wanted a diet of
Quiet Weekend, Not Now Darling
social evenings and cocktails. We soon saw the buggers off though Dot, didn’t we? Leafleted and organised our regular supporters, called a general meeting, and overwhelmed them. Then I had a quiet word with our few dissidents. Explained what the group was all about, and in brief told them they could fit in or fuck off. Most did the latter, but a few stayed on to do some bloody good work. And now I suppose we’d better get down to some.’

Jack passed on Brandy’s thoughts to Josie the next time they were in bed together, which was where they seemed to do most of their talking.

‘I don’t think there’s any doubt the chaps will be as keen as ever to stick their heads round the door when you’re changing, but in the circumstances I think I could offer you my protection if you feel like having a run at Yelena.’

‘That’s very gallant of you Jack, and typically devious of Brandy. Did he actually suggest that you should make the offer while we were in flangrante delicto? I wouldn’t put it past him. He’s quite without shame when it comes to a production.’