Freya (29 page)

‘Proving what?' asked Nancy, frowning.

‘I don't know – that acting relies more on instinct than intelligence? Pandora's rather a blank in person, but up onstage I believed in her completely.'

‘And the critics backed that up,' said Stewart, seeming to take heart from Freya's endorsement. ‘They loved her, and they hated him.'

‘The critics aren't always right,' said Nancy, who seemed to be taking this depreciation of Nat quite personally.

‘No,' said Freya patiently, ‘only they were this time. Come on, Nance, you remember watching him in
Romeo
. Nat spoke his lines as though they were in quotation marks. He didn't want to serve the play, he wanted to project himself.'

Nancy gave an irked shrug that withheld agreement, and the discussion appeared to be closed. Stewart was perched, awkwardly, at the opposite end of the couch from Freya, who now dragged herself upright from where she'd been lolling and invited him to sit down properly. He directed an uncertain look at Nancy, who, returning no more than a glance, indicated that he should not make himself comfortable. There was a definite ‘atmosphere' between them now, and Freya, surprised by a pang of pity for Stewart, said, ‘I think we've got some beer in the kitchen, if you don't want gin.'

But Stewart didn't need to be warned twice. ‘Thanks, no,' he said, rising. ‘I should be pushing off – I just wanted to see Nancy home safe.'

They said goodnight to one another, and Nancy followed him downstairs. Freya couldn't help being curious to hear what was said between them as he left, but their voices at the door were muffled and indistinct. Some minutes later Nancy returned, her brow clouded and her mouth primmed up. Without saying a word she began tidying the room, picking up a discarded newspaper and a porcelain ashtray filled with crushed stubs. Freya let the silence linger for a minute or so.

‘Is everything all right, Nance?'

Nancy abandoned her sweeping and stood still. She was twisting the tiny gold cross at her throat, a giveaway sign of her inner agitation. She sat down in the easy chair and addressed a point in the middle distance.

‘Stewart and I shan't be seeing one another again.'

Freya stared back, trying to gauge her mood. ‘I see. How did you break it to him?'

Nancy gave an unhappy half-laugh. ‘I didn't.
He
broke it to
me
. Can you imagine? There I am, mouth full of lemon sole, and he jumps in with a line about “let's part as friends”. It was all I could do not to look shocked.'

‘But isn't that what you wanted? You said as much back at the gallery.'

‘Yes, I know. But it should have been me telling him. It's humiliating. I asked him how long he'd been thinking about it – he said
two months
!'

Freya was puzzled. ‘So why did he take you out to dinner?'

‘Because he wanted to be a “gentleman” about it. And then walks me home, as though I'd be too upset to make it back alone.'

‘But, Nance … it sounds like you
are
upset.'

She answered with a sad lift of her eyes, saying nothing. Freya got up from the couch and knelt, resting her hands like a supplicant on Nancy's knees. She raised her face to her, waiting it out, until Nancy, after some moments, returned her gaze. Something she had noticed had brought a gleam to her downcast expression.

‘Why are you wearing that posh jacket?' she asked.

Freya had forgotten about it. ‘Oh, I was just trying it on. I've got that interview at the
Envoy
tomorrow.'

Nancy was running her eye over it, admiringly. ‘It looks very good on you. But not with that skirt?'

Freya admitted she hadn't given any thought to the skirt. In a trance of preoccupation Nancy stood up and stepped purposefully out of the room. She returned a minute or so later carrying two skirts, one in each hand.

‘Green or black?'

Freya rose and took first one, then the other, to hold against her. Nancy watched with the appraising eye of a master couturier.

‘Perhaps the black is too much with your jacket – more for a funeral.'

Freya nodded. ‘And I prefer this green one anyway.' Quickly discarding her own skirt she stepped into it, then walked through to her bedroom to consult the mirror. Nancy followed behind.

‘Oh, Nance, it's so …
chic
! How clever of you.'

She smiled over her shoulder. ‘Remember the morning after VE Day?'

‘How could I forget? – you darting off like a frightened deer when Stephen walked in. You were such a modest girl.'

‘Well, I
had
just woken up half naked on his couch. I think I blushed the whole length of my body.'

Freya laughed at that. ‘I got together a few things for you to wear, d'you remember, and you really surprised me by choosing those slacks. I'll always have that image of you crossing Wardour Street, with the ice creams in your hands.'

Her voice had become fond and faraway as she talked on, angling her body this way and that in the mirror. By the time she turned round Nancy had gone quiet again, her expression lost in melancholy.

‘Nance?'

Jolted from her reverie, Nancy said, after a pause, ‘It just set me thinking – that was nearly ten years ago. And what have I got to show for it? A badly paid job in publishing, a handful of rejected novels, and – as of this evening – single.'

Freya realised that this unhappy reckoning would feel the more acute in contrast to her own progress. But she would not let her brood. ‘You forgot to mention two significant pluses. You have a first-class degree from Oxford, which is something most of us will never get near.' She stared at her until Nancy was compelled to acknowledge it, with a reluctant smile.

‘And the other?'

‘Why, you've got me for a housemate!'

And now there was nothing reluctant about her smile. Freya leaned in to give her a hug, and squeezed her until Nancy started to laugh.

A few weeks later Nancy was in the kitchen at Great James Street prodding a casserole. Freya was pouring gin fizzes for their guests in the living room. They were throwing a dinner in celebration of Freya's new job at the
Envoy
. As she went round with the cocktail jug she wondered at the slightly odd mix of people she had invited. One of them, her brother Rowan, had not been anticipated; he had arrived early that afternoon from Cambridge, unannounced, and she didn't have the heart to send him off to stay at Tite Street. Joss, of course, was there, so too Elspeth, her friend – and now former colleague – at
Frame
; Ginny Gordon, whom she had kept up with from Somerville days; Fosh – Arthur Fosh – a photographer she had got to know through work. And one more who hadn't yet arrived.

‘If he doesn't show up in the next five minutes we'll have to start without him,' Nancy said, ‘else it'll be ruined.' Her face was flushed from the heat of the pan.

‘Righto,' said Freya, sloshing the gin fizz into Nancy's glass.

The latecomer was the only guest about whom she felt a mild apprehension. She had last seen him on the day of her interview at the
Envoy
. Simon Standish, the editor, had been decent about not keeping her in suspense: the paper was eager to have her on board. Her remit on the ‘About Town' page, he said, would encompass everything from film premieres and Fabian Society meetings to ballroom-dancing contests and WI bunfights. ‘We'd be looking for a light touch,' said Standish. ‘Nothing to frighten the horses – or the housewives!'

‘I shall keep both readerships in mind,' replied Freya, deciding not to react to his old-fashioned condescension.

‘Splendid, splendid,' he cried. ‘Well, that should conclude business for now – unless you have any questions of your own?'

‘Just one,' she said. ‘On the day I received your letter inviting me here I also got a bouquet of flowers – from this office. I was wondering whether you had sent them.'

Standish was frowning his puzzlement. ‘I'm not sure I know anything about – are you certain they came from here?'

She nodded. ‘The note was unsigned, but the letterhead was unmistakable.'

‘None of my doing, I'm afraid,' he said, then added, grinning, ‘though it seems to have done the job as a recruiting tool!'

They briefly discussed the notice Freya would have to give to
Frame
– a month, maybe six weeks – and then shook hands. She was on her way to the office lifts when a voice called her name from across the room. Turning, she saw a face that took her a couple of seconds to identify: Robert Cosway, grinning from ear to ear.

‘Freya Wyley, as I live and breathe,' he said, laughing, coming from around his desk towards her. He registered the surprise in her face. ‘God, have I changed that much?'

‘It must be the beard,' she said, starting to smile, though he
had
changed, noticeably, in the five years since they had last seen one another. He was swarthier, and had put on some weight, though he carried it with a kind of swagger. The raw-boned youth she had known was gone. Robert was another who had got married straight after university and had moved – she had heard – to the South Coast. ‘I didn't know you worked here – I didn't even know you were in London.'

He held open his palms in an expressive way. ‘Started here a couple of months ago. Been working at the
Hove Courier
down in Brighton for a few years.' The homely Mancunian accent had also disappeared, she noted; he could have passed for a southerner.

‘So you've moved up with – sorry, I can't remember your wife's name …'

‘Elaine. And it's ex-wife. I'm back on my own.'

‘Oh,' said Freya, measuringly, waiting for him to explain further. Instead he turned the focus back on her.

‘So all's well with Standish,' he said, eyes glancing at the office from which she'd just emerged. ‘I know he's very pleased to have poached you.'

Freya heard something rather arch in his tone. Robert was smiling at her, and she began to wonder. ‘Would I be mistaken in thinking you sent me a bouquet of flowers a couple of weeks ago?'

His laughter indicated she had guessed right. ‘I wanted to be the first to offer my congratulations.'

‘But I don't understand,' she pursued, ‘why would you send them before I'd even got the job?'

‘Sorry, I couldn't help myself, it was naughty of me,' he conceded. ‘But I know Standish. He always gets his man. Or his woman.'

So they would be colleagues, she and Robert. She had heard news of him, now and then, in the years since Oxford, and it surprised her to learn he was a journalist; with his degree in PPE and his vociferous opinions on social class he had seemed to her more likely to enter politics. When she asked him what he did at the
Envoy
he said that he had ‘a roving commission' (not the only roving thing about him, was her unkind thought) though he had his sights fixed on the post of political correspondent; he knew a few MPs and liked the gossipy atmosphere at Westminster.

She had invited him to dinner to mark their fresh start, and also because she thought he might be lonely following his separation. Nancy had just served up the casserole when the doorbell went, and since she was on her feet she went down to answer it. She returned with the latecomer, who looked sheepish as he was introduced to the assembled; only Ginny, aside from the hosts, had met him before.

‘Sorry to have kept you,' said Robert, seeing that everyone had started. ‘The office was just
bedlam
tonight.'

‘Bedlam, eh? Must be looking forward to that, Freya?' said Joss, still a little piqued by her defection from the magazine.

‘I can't imagine it will be any madder than it was at the
Chronicle
,' she said, ‘and at least I won't have to make the tea.'

‘Golly, this gin fizz is strong,' said Elspeth, widening her eyes as she sipped her drink. ‘I can feel myself getting tipsy.'

‘There's wine instead, if you like,' said Freya, hurrying out to the kitchen and returning with the two bottles of claret that Joss had brought.

‘So, Robert,' said Joss, working the corkscrew into the bottle, ‘you've known Freya since Oxford?'

‘Yes – and Nancy,' he said, with a respectful glance to his left. ‘I dare say Freya has told you about the first time we met?'

‘I don't think she has. Do go on,' said Joss over Freya's protests. Robert, not requiring much prompting, began to relate the story of his first morning at Balliol and the surprising encounter outside his staircase bathroom.

‘So there I am, stark naked, I look up to find this girl just staring at me, quite unembarrassed.' Giggles had started up around the table.

‘You make me sound like a peeping Tom,' Freya protested. ‘I was only there because it was my dad's old staircase. The last thing I expected was some youth bursting through the door with his privates on parade.'

‘I made rather a fuss, didn't I?' said Robert, grinning.

‘Yes – and over
such
a little thing,' she replied with a sly look.

‘You didn't even blush!' Robert said, shaking his head.

‘I've never seen Freya blush,' said Rowan, ‘not even when we were little. But she was good at making other people do so.'

‘She's toned the language down a bit,' said Elspeth, continuing this third-person appraisal as though Freya herself were not there, ‘though I always laugh to recall the first time someone got on the wrong side of her. These production managers came in, and one of them saw Freya and said, “Coffee for the three of us, love.” Freya just said, “The kettle's over there. And I'm not your fucking love” – the whole room went into shock.'

Joss laughed and, having filled everyone's glass, said in a heightened formal way, ‘Well, now we're all here, let's have a toast and wish all the best to Freya in her new job.'