The Queen's Margarine (26 page)

Instead, she must simply follow him upstairs and go to bed – to sleep.

Derek rang again, louder. He had booked in advance, for heaven's sake, so the least they could do was let him in. Yet, not only was the front door locked, all the windows were dark; no light except the dim lamp in the porch. That seemed odd in itself. Surely there must be other guests; folk who hadn't yet gone to bed?

He turned up his collar against the bullying March wind; cursing his own folly in not opting for a better class of establishment. But, by staying at the cheapest dives, he could pocket the difference between the small amount such places charged and his official hotel allowance. And, if ever he got the chop (a prospect depressingly likely), he would need every damned penny he could save.

VACANCIES
, the notice on the door read, so they must be open for business. Admittedly he was late – much later than he'd said – but his first customer had kept him waiting hours, which had set him back all day.

‘Third time lucky,' he muttered to himself, as he pressed his thumb, hard, against the bell-push.

Ah – footsteps! His salesman's smile was now so automatic, it switched itself on without him even willing it. The woman who'd taken his booking had sounded old and crotchety, so he was expecting a bad-tempered crone to come limping to the door. But, there, standing in the doorway, was a small, slight girl, with
flame-red
hair, an elfin face and a profusion of freckles that masked her milk-white skin.

‘G … Gemma,' he stuttered, all but reeling in astonishment. Decades had passed since he'd seen her, yet here she was, restored, revived, regained.

She gave him a blank stare. ‘My name's Stacey,' she said, with undisguised hostility.

Flushing with embarrassment, he stammered his apologies. What in Christ's name was he thinking of? Gemma would be fifty now: grey and lined and, most like, menopausal, whereas this girl was barely out of her teens. ‘Sorry,' he mumbled again. ‘I … I was confusing you with someone else.'

She was still regarding him suspiciously. No wonder.

‘You're Mr Baines, I take it?'

‘That's right. Sorry I'm so late, but—'

‘Yeah, we'd given you up.'

‘Sorry,' he said, fourth time. ‘Always apologize' was one of his personal mantras, even when he wasn't in the wrong, although he was definitely overdoing it right now. But the uncanny resemblance between Gemma and this girl had completely knocked him off his guard. ‘I was held up on a call. I did try to ring, to warn you I was running late, but no one answered the phone.'

‘Mum must have switched it off. It's
her
who runs this place, but she's gone down with a stomach bug, so she's left me in charge – worse luck! Anyway, come in. Your room's all ready. Shall I take you up?'

‘Actually, I wouldn't mind a drink first,' he said, putting his case down in the hall, to signal his intention of not moving from her vicinity.

‘Sorry, the bar's closed.'

‘Any chance of some food?' OK, he was pushing his luck, but he just had to feast his eyes on her. It wasn't food and drink he craved, but her face, her voice, her presence. Now that she'd switched the lights on, he could see she was shorter than Gemma, and had a different shape of mouth and slightly smaller breasts. None the less, she was stirring deep emotion in him; wild, tempestuous memories.

‘We don't do meals – only breakfast.'

‘Well, could you make me breakfast?'

‘What,
now
? It's ten past midnight.'

He risked a jovial laugh. ‘Don't they call it “all-day breakfast”? I would be grateful, honestly. I haven't eaten anything since six o'clock this morning.'

The girl looked dubious. ‘I could make you scrambled eggs, I suppose. Or egg and beans and sausage. But I'm not doing the full works – not cereal and toast and stuff.'

‘Egg and beans and sausage would be great. And maybe some fried bread.'

She ignored his last request. ‘The dining-room's this way.' she muttered, leading him past the reception desk into a small, shabby room, over-stuffed with ugly fake-wood tables and an assortment of mismatched chairs.

‘Tea or coffee?' she asked, her tone suggesting that both were forms of poison.

‘A pot of tea would be perfect. If you're sure it's no bother.' Of course it was a bother – she was making that perfectly plain. Yet, however sullen she might be, he still yearned to take her in his arms, crush her close against his chest, beg her never to leave him again.

‘Why don't you wait in your room till the food's ready? I'll give you a shout, OK?'

‘No, I'd prefer to stay down here.' Quickly he took off his coat and sat at one of the tables. How could he miss this chance of watching her come in and out; that lithe and lively figure he'd assumed he would never see again? However, she shut the kitchen door with what sounded like a petulant slam, leaving him with no company save the cutesy kitten gazing at him beseechingly from a picture on the wall.

Slowly he took in his surroundings. Kitten apart, there was little in the room that wasn't past its prime: old-fashioned, faded wallpaper; scuffed, grey vinyl floor; limp, half-hearted curtains that didn't quite meet in the middle. Even the table-top was smeary, and the red plastic tomato standing guard by the salt-
and-pepper
-set was oozing drools of congealed and crusted ketchup.

‘Please wait to be seated' ordered a notice on the wall – a request that underlined his solitude. He tried to picture the room full of cheery diners, queuing for a table, but failed to make the imaginative leap required. This hotel was in a backwater and off the beaten track, and it was giving him the feeling that it was a ghost hotel, or hotel in a dream, and that no guest but him had ever ventured here. Maybe even Stacey had vanished into the
stratosphere and he would continue to sit, abandoned and alone, throughout the long night hours.

He reached out for the pepper-pot and gripped it in his hand, just to anchor himself to something real and solid. Perhaps the girl was avoiding him deliberately. It must have seemed peculiar, the way he'd called her Gemma, or she might even have regarded it as some sort of clumsy chat-up line. He fumbled in his pocket for his wallet. A tenner (maybe a couple) might work a minor miracle; change her mood from aggressive to amicable.

Just at that moment, the door burst open and she barged in with a tray. Once she'd unloaded the tea things, he slipped the notes surreptitiously into her hand; his fingers tingling from the shock of meeting hers. ‘I realize I'm keeping you up late, so here's a little something for your trouble.'

‘Gosh, thanks! Fantastic! And it
isn't
any trouble – honest.'

The cash had softened her up, but who was he to object? He knew all too well how money made the difference between battling on in life, or giving up.

‘Great cup of tea,' he enthused, although the brew was weak and pallid; a single teabag floating in the chipped brown earthenware pot.

‘Mum says I can't make tea to save my life. Normally, she never lets me near the kitchen.'

A definite advance. Information offered in a congenial tone of voice. ‘Are any other guests staying at the moment?' he asked, keen to take advantage of the truce.

She shook her head. ‘Mum's been ill – not just the stomach thing, but – you know – other problems …' The sentence petered out.

Poor kid, he thought. If business was so bad, the mother might be forced to sell up; even land in the bankruptcy court. The sense of insecurity, the constant dread of ending up with nothing – they were
his
, as well.

‘Must dash, or I'll burn your egg.'

He'd gladly risk a burnt egg – indeed, a completely charred and ruined breakfast – for the privilege of keeping her in view. But she had already disappeared, although her pale, slender legs continued jouncing in his mind. He knew those legs – the silky feel
of the skin; the two special, star-shaped freckles on the inside of the left (and luscious) thigh.

Within minutes, he heard steps approaching, and racked his brains for some wise or witty overture. Somehow, he must charm her, gain her interest, prove he could be trusted. But, as he opened his mouth to speak, he saw not Stacey, but a young gangling man slouch into the room.

‘Sorry,' the stranger muttered, wiping his hands on his dirty denim jeans. ‘Didn't know anyone was here.'

‘That's OK,' said Derek, speaking to empty air. The youth had gone as swiftly as he'd come.

He spooned more sugar into his tea, to add a bit of flavour, although aware that every spoonful increased the calorie-count. When he'd first met Gemma, he'd been as slim as a swordstick. Now, he was developing the male equivalent of love-handles – something of a misnomer, since he'd made love to no one else in all those barren years; years he called his exile, in the sense of lifelong banishment from the one woman in the world who had been his hope and haven.

He jumped as Stacey banged back in. ‘D'you want your egg soft or hard?'

Would
he
be hard, he wondered, if he were back in bed with Gemma? The very thought sent a flutter through his groin.

‘Did you hear what I said?'

‘Sorry – yes. Hard! By the way, a guy popped in just now. Was it your brother, by any chance?'

‘No!' She gave a nervous giggle. ‘I'm an only child, worse luck! That was Steve, our handyman.'

‘He's working late.'

‘Yeah, we had a … problem. But he's fixed it now, so he'll be leaving in a jiff. Listen, I've done you some fried bread.'

‘Wonderful! It's one of my little weaknesses – fried bread. D'you find you have certain things you just can't do without?'

‘Yeah,' she said. ‘A decent night's sleep.'

‘OK, don't rub it in. Look, the minute you bring me my breakfast, I'll gobble it down double-quick.'

‘Don't worry – only kidding! Anyway, the sausage isn't done yet. I had to get them out of the freezer, and they're in this huge great
catering pack. It took me ages to hack one off from the rest. In fact, I almost lost a finger!'

‘I'm sorry.' Sixth apology. They must somehow move from sausages and ‘sorrys' to something more profound. ‘Do call me Derek,' he urged, hoping to strike a more intimate note. ‘And do you mind if I call you Stacey?'

‘Not bothered.' She gave a dismissive shrug, although at least she made no move to go. ‘So what line of work are you in?'

I'm a ‘champion', he all but said, a ‘hero'. Those were the terms bandied about at sales conferences, in an attempt to flatter conference-members that they were venturing out to win new lands, like the pioneers who had conquered the Wild West. In point of fact, most salesmen were despised, and with some real cause, he felt. There
was
something rather creepy about employing all the social graces not for genuine friendship but just to make a profit.

‘Well,' he replied, ‘you'll laugh at this, in light of what you said about your sleep, but I work for a company that manufactures Sleep-Sound beds. They're a totally new concept in sleep-health. Each bed has a memory-foam mattress that reduces pressure on the joints, and our double-deluxe model is electrically adjustable and comes complete with a built-in massage function. Or, if you upgrade to our top-of-the-range bed, you'll get an integral stereo system that plays hypnotic “sleep-well” CDs and—'

God, he thought, he was lapsing into sales patter, purely from force of habit. And, far from seeming impressed, she looked a shade alarmed. Perhaps it wasn't very tactful to have broached the subject of beds so early in their acquaintance. And ‘massage' sounded worse, with its sleazy connotations.

‘I bet they're pricey,' was all she said.

‘Yes, I'm afraid even our standard single would set you back six hundred, and our most expensive king-size costs a cool three grand.'

‘So who buys them, then? Rock stars?'

Who indeed? He could spend hours with potential customers, demonstrating every last detail of the beds, only to be told, ‘We'll think about it', or even have the door slammed in his face. Or they might ask him to return tomorrow, when he'd driven miles for
today's
appointment. Or totally forget that he was coming, and go
out on a shopping trip, like Mrs Watts this morning, who had eventually returned, loaded down with packages, pretending
he
had got the time wrong, although he'd phoned her only yesterday, to confirm. But, whatever the provocation, he must never lose his cool, but be unfailingly polite, upbeat and positive. His time didn't matter, only theirs. Indeed, he hardly even existed as a person. He was just a smile, a spiel.

‘OK, I'll get your nosh now.' The girl had clearly lost all interest in the buyers, or non-buyers, of his beds.

‘Thanks,' he said. ‘And bring a second cup, so you can join me for a cup of tea.' He was probably being way too forward, but it was all he could do not to clamp his body on to hers and keep it there by force. He should have done that with Gemma, he realized now, with hindsight. The love of his life, lost to some phoney artist – and one called Tristram, for God's sake. What chance had a lowly Derek Baines against a Tristram Trelawny? The slimy ponce had not only stolen Gemma, but used her as a life-model, as if she were a slapper who stripped off for anyone? He should have killed his rival in cold blood, instead of slinking away to lick his wounds in private. Yet he was sick and tired of ‘might-have-beens' – his companions now for close on thirty years.

When Stacey returned with his food, he pulled out the chair beside him and patted it invitingly. But she ignored the gesture and remained standing where she was. If only he was skilled at conversation and could enthral her with some exotic traveller's tale, or launch into a discussion about the Meaning of Life or the Riddle of the Sphinx. But all he could manage was sales-talk, and he would hardly sweep her off her feet with an account of ‘Sleep-Sound's flame-retardant mattress-covers, or their ‘no-quibble' five-year guarantee.