The Insulators (4 page)

“Philip,” Janey said, “why didn’t you let me know you could be such an idiot?”

“You must blame my natural shyness,” Philip retorted; and then he whispered so that she could only just hear the words. “We’re being followed. Don’t mind what I do.” On the instant he took her in his arms and their bodies were locked, and it was as if fire ran through her. He held her in such a way that her thighs were close to his, her bosom too, but her head was back, pale in that lovely light; and he bent forward and placed his open lips against hers in a kiss which seemed to draw the very breath out of her body.

She was not aware of it, but two men passed as they embraced; and soon afterwards, two women.

“So he went to her apartment,” Ashley said with satisfaction. “Good.”

“Why so good?” asked Parsons.

“Oh, don’t be absurd,” rasped Ashley. “If they are having a passionate love affair, they will be much more inclined to get through their work quickly, living for the evenings or for the weekends. I don’t think we need let them see Taylor’s body, after all.”

Janey felt a quickening sense of excitement as they walked from the grounds towards her apartment block. Hers consisted of two rooms with a little kitchen recess, maintained by the organisation’s staff; whenever she cooked herself a meal here instead of going to the restaurant for the senior employees, the Jamaican maid did the washing up next morning. In some ways it was a luxurious or at least self-indulgent life. Now and again she threw a cocktail party up here, with everyone from the laboratory as well as a few friends, or rather acquaintances. These might be from the offices, people she had met at the restaurant or at the weekly Project Party, open to everyone of a certain rank. It reminded her of the big Captain’s Party on board an ocean liner: everyone from the laboratories was welcome and most made friends.

But this was the first time she had brought a man up with her.

She had never felt anything but tentative liking for Philip, he had always been formal, so intent on his work, so aloof. He had been here when she had come and his first year must nearly be up. She wondered what made him so anxious to escape when he had only a few months to go. She had occasionally wondered whether he looked on her as a woman or simply as a physicist, a creature with two arms and two legs mostly covered by a shapeless white smock, and a head sticking out from the top. Now, his hand was at her waist, prompting rather than pushing.

She opened the door, and dropped her keys, she was so nervous. He picked them up, held the door open, and gave a faintly mocking bow. She went into the big living room which had a wide window fronting lawns and flowerbeds. She stood looking out, yet was acutely aware of his approach although after the click of the closing door he made hardly any sound. She knew the moment when he was behind her. She felt his arms pass between her body and her arms, and the gentle cupping of her breasts. She began to tremble. Again, he held her in such a position that she could lean her head back against his shoulder, and he held her gently and ran his lips over her cheeks, her lips, her eyes, her forehead. Then he drew back so that she was acutely aware of him.

He let her go.

“Janey,” he said. “You are a most exciting woman.”

“Philip,” she retorted, “the only woman on an island is always exciting.”

“I don’t agree with you,” replied Philip. “In the first place there are plenty of women on this island, some of them – as if you didn’t know – here just for the titillation and pleasure of men.”

She turned her head; he was very close. “I really didn’t know.”

“Then you’ve kept your eyes closed!”

“Perhaps,” she said. “In a way I always have.”

“And you want to keep them closed? To be aware of no one but yourself and your fellow workers. That’s how you’ve always seemed to me.”

“Aloof, you mean?” She was astonished.

“Yes.”

“Good gracious! It was you who was aloof!”

He laughed and moved so that he could sit on the window ledge and look at her. There was a light from the moon and from the lamps outside, enough to see her clearly, although his face was in shadow. But his head and shoulders and lean body were sharp and dark against the window. He hugged one knee.

“I regarded you as untouchable,” he told her. “Unapproachable, too. And I always knew you would be exciting if the barriers could be broken down.”

“Thank you, sir,” she managed to retort.

“I’ve never meant anything more – and I’ve never been more sure,” he said.

She simply stood there, her heart racing and her body aquiver, aware not only of him but of desire. She had not known what toll the months had taken of her, how much he had been in her mind; indeed, how often she had told herself it was absurd to think of him, he was so aloof.

“Janey,” he said, softly.

“Yes.”

“You are not really a virgin, are you?”

She said: “No. Until a year ago, I was married.” After a momentary hesitation, she went on: “I was married for five years, in all.”

“Ah,” he said, and asked softly: “Happily?”

“Very.”

“What happened?”

“He—he wasn’t so happy as I was.”

“Divorce?”

“Yes.”

“Oh, Janey,” he said, in a tone of dismay. “I’m so sorry. It must have hurt damnably.”

“It did hurt, very much. I was so lonely and—and so shattered. I hadn’t realised he had fallen out of love, and he didn’t want to hurt me.”

“The purgatory of married fools,” he remarked gently. “So you were lonely and this job attracted you.”

“Very much.”

“Do you still like this job, as a job?”

She hesitated, yet knew that she must not, for long. When they had been in the grounds he had told her, in whispers, that all the apartments and all the departments, the public rooms, the theatre and the cinema and the clubs, were bugged; nothing could be said without it being fed into a control room so that it could be replayed and studied and examined word by word, not only for the surface meaning but for nuance, too. Whatever they said in the apartment could be heard and taped, and they could not talk confidentially, except of themselves. His last words had been: “They won’t mind lovers clucking.”

Now she sensed a stiffening of his body, as if the long delay worried him, and she herself knew that she had hesitated too long, as if she was not certain whether she liked The Project. But at last she said: “In many ways.”

“Ah! Not every way?”

“No,” she said. “It’s very lonely.”

“With so many handsome men about? Nonsense!”

“It is lonely,” she insisted. “Oh, the working conditions are wonderful except for the noise and that doesn’t worry me like it does Paul. And the food’s very good and one can’t complain of The Project being a cultural desert! But—well, it’s still lonely.”

“Does it have to be?” he asked.

“I don’t quite understand you,” she said, but in fact she understood very well, and her heart began to gallop again.

“I mean, will you be so lonely if you and I—” he hesitated, slid off the window ledge, took her hands and drew her close as he went on: “If you and I became lovers.”

He wanted to make love to her, to become lovers, so that he could escape. That was the one thing she could not say because it would be overheard, and it was the one thing which made her hesitate. She was young and free and lonely, and there was something about him which stirred her as she had not been stirred for a long time. But he would simply be using her; as Bruce had used her even though he had been sleeping with the other woman, planning to leave her whenever it most suited him although he had sworn it was because he had been so worried about causing her hurt.

Bruce had used her, then, and cast her aside.

This man wanted to use her, and cast her aside.

The difference was that he did not deceive her. She realised with a sense of shock that he had not said that he loved her, had not pretended in any way. They would be lovers until such time as he thought he could escape, and then she would be alone again. Would the loneliness be better or worse?

“Janey,” he said. “I’ve tried to take you by storm, and I know I shouldn’t have. You won’t hold it against me, will you?”

“Of course not,” she replied, and added with a laugh: “You did take my breath away!”

“But you soon got it back! Would you like me to go?”

“Oh, please, not yet. Will you have some coffee?”

“I would even have a drink!”

“Oh, dear!” she exclaimed, with a helpless little shrug. “I don’t have any.”

“You don’t
drink?”

“Not on my own.”

“Good God! And truly, what a woman! Then coffee, by all means coffee!” He followed her as she put on one or two table lights, making it brighter but not too bright, and went through the hall to the kitchen recess. She switched on a percolator and then took biscuits from tins – shortbreads from one, chocolate biscuits from another, plain from the third. The coffee pot began to burble and burp, Philip continued to look at her while leaning against the back of a chair. She was discovering that he had a habit of leaning back and hugging his right knee. In this brighter light from a strip of ‘daylight’ fluorescence, and at this angle, he was much better looking than she had realised. He had done something to his hair, ruffled it a little, and it softened his well-cut, rather severe features. His well-shaped lips were much more expressive than she had ever noticed at the office. The expression at both eyes and lips implied a sense of merriment, as if the situation amused him; and perhaps her attitude did, too.

She had never really fitted the permissive, bed-hopping society, and to a man of the world she might seem far too shy; or coy; or timid. He did not come close to her again and she wished he would, how contrary could one be? When the coffee was ready she carried the tray and he brought a plate of biscuits, and placed them next to the tray. They talked lightly and pleasantly enough but something of the sparkle had gone; perhaps because he had taken ‘no’ so quickly. He seemed to relish the shortbreads more than the other kinds, and she went to get some more.

When she came back, he wasn’t there.

Her heart gave a wild lurch, and she opened her lips to cry out – and on the instant he was behind her but this time his hand was on her lips, pressing firmly, hurting a little. And his lips were close to her ear, whispering. “Don’t make a sound until I tell you.” He drew his hand away, but stood very close to her, then he took her wrist and led her to one side of the room and into the bedroom. There he made a loud kissing sound, and, leaving her, sat on the bed and slowly climbed over to the other side.

“Wonderful,” he said. And a moment later: “Oh, darling, why did we wait so long.” Then he was on the other side of the bed and tiptoeing to the window, beckoning her. Bewildered, even angry, she nevertheless went to him, and he took her hand and pointed towards the far end of the lawns.

There was a man, creeping from one set of bushes to another. Now and again he turned round and looked behind him, obviously in fear of being followed. Suddenly, he straightened up and ran towards this block of flats, and his face showed clearly in the lamplight.

It was Paul Taylor; and he looked terrified.

He was crouching as he ran, as if afraid of being seen, and was looking towards this window as if in despairing hope of succour. He was only forty or fifty yards away, his mouth wide open, the light making his eyes seem dark and bright. At thirty yards he straightened up as if emboldened, and slowed down to a walk.

As he did so, men appeared at the sides.

He saw them, and reared up; and then he spun round and began to run at full pelt back whence he had come. But other men appeared from there and from the sides and quite suddenly he was surrounded. He began to shout and fight, and then all the men began to strike him, with short, stubby sticks held in their right hands. Slowly, he sank down in the midst of them but the men still struck and struck, until he disappeared.

Janey felt Philip’s arm about her.

She was cold with horror at what she had seen; and quivering. His arm comforted her. She began to form the words: “It’s horrible,” but his hand closed over her lips again and he whispered: “Don’t make a sound.” She continued to shiver. She did not want to watch but there was a mesmeric fascination about the group of men who drew back now; six, in all. Two moved forward as if at a word of command, and picked up Paul’s inert body and carried it away.

Janey began to sob.

Philip did not whisper again but, arm firmly about her waist, led her towards the bed, soon now he bade her: “Lie down.” She felt him pulling off her shoes, and loosening the high neck of her dress, where it had suddenly become very tight. She felt his hands at her waist, but they did not linger. He eased her onto the bed and then, quite skilfully, pulled blankets and an eiderdown from under her and then rolled them over her, making her into a cocoon. Next he put a hand to her hair and drew the strands away from the gap between neck and pillow, to make her more comfortable. Finally, he hitched himself into a sitting position, and rested one hand on the soft eiderdown. All this time she had shivered with the emotional tension, but gradually she slackened, as she grew warmer. He put on a bedside light which was not too bright, and smiled down at her.

“Like some coffee or tea?”

“N-no, thank you.”

“Are you warm enough?”

“I will be s-s-soon.”

“Good,” he said, and there was a funny kind of tone in his voice when he went on: “It’s
very
romantic.”

“Oh, Philip,” she said. “Please don’t joke. That was—horrible.”

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I won’t pretend it wasn’t. I think it’s made one thing clear, though. Only very highly paid mercenaries would behave with that kind of brutality – or political fanatics. My bet is that they are political fanatics but we need not worry about that now.” He hitched himself into a more comfortable position, hand still resting lightly at her waist. It made a warm spot, there. Her shivering stopped and for a while they were silent, until suddenly Janey moved, and took his hand, and drew it inside the covering, warm upon her breast. She was still horrified and frightened, and her only comfort was from Philip; and she could see him looking down at her, smiling faintly. She wanted to shut out the horror she had seen; she wanted so much to be comforted.

She said in a whisper: “Lie close to me.”

He put his lips to her ear and said very, very softly: “If I do, I shall want you very much.”

She drew his head down; and kissed him . . .

And soon, they were lying close, aquiver with desire.

And soon, they were lying still, desire past but warmth and comfort with them and the memory of the hideous sight outside almost gone. His left arm was beneath her neck, cradling and his right hand gentled her soft skin. For a while she could think only of the warmth and comfort, but suddenly she thought: He’s going to leave me, and she drowsed off with that in her mind. Another thought stabbed; a fear-thought, and she stiffened. Her lips parted but before she could utter a word he closed them with his; and when at last he drew them away, he said: “Softly, darling; speak very softly.”