C. D. was waiting for me at the foot of the stairs and we went into the drawing-room together. Introductions again. This time by the hostess but in the same off-hand embarrassed manner as C. D. and acknowledged, I noticed, with equal off-hand embarrassment. I began to wonder if the reason for this might not be just that: embarrassment at having to introduce anyone to anyone else in these particular charmed circles where of course Everyone was supposed to know Everyone already. Whatever the reason, I must confess they showed a remarkable lack of interest in meeting me and for my part I was able to stifle my own. There was a Mr. and Mrs. Something, a Colonel Something, a Miss Something, three growing children, an elderly Mrs. Something-Something and a couple of dogs who bounced all over me and were the friendliest souls there. [...]

C. D. appeared in the drawing-room even later than I so we had a chance for only one small exchange before going in to dinner. However, it did much to make a shambles of the meal for me.

“You’re late,” I said and then I looked at him more closely, for although brushed and combed and freshly shaved there was about him an indefinable air of chaos, a curious rumpledness about his features. “What have you been doing?” I asked.

“Using you for imagery,” he replied blandly. “Are you shocked?”

I wasn’t right away. I didn’t even get it right away. And if he hadn’t pointed up the first part of the remark by adding the second part I probably wouldn’t have. I probably would have regarded it as merely cryptic, what-the-hell. But finally I got it all right. And when I did, I felt myself go bright pink. I stared hard at my drink. “No ice,” I mumbled shakily. “How quaint. Just like they’re always telling you in those Come to Britain books.”

And so we drove, and so we arrived at his house. And there he led me unresisting up the stairs into his bedchamber where, upon his lily-white bed, in the fullness of time he did lay me.

There is a time for asterisks and a time for speaking out. I don’t know—will all this morbid introspection into my terrible itch for that randy old man reveal itself merely as an exercise in self-indulgence, a senseless waste of time? Or will it be that, having put down clearly and to my own satisfaction once and for all precisely what it was like sleeping with foxy grampa, I may finally come to understand what was going on in me? And what was making me go on like that? Maybe not. We must hope for the best. But it’s so hard. I write three words and at the fourth memory seizes me. I waste hours mooning over a situation that play it as I may could only have been resolved by disaster.

Waking Monday morning at Dody’s I sat straight up in bed, my heart pounding. He was old. He was my stepfather. I hated him. And I’d enjoyed myself. Promptly I slid back down again stuffing the pillow over my face. Any combination of two would have been enough to send me under—all four was too much. Besides, I hated him but I loved him too. Yes. I know all about that sort of thing. Christ, I should, I’d heard nothing else my last two years in New York. “They have this terrific love-hate thing going,” everybody said about everybody else. “You watch, it’s going to destroy them—.” But never about me. When I took to someone I took to them, and when I took against them ditto. Mostly I felt indifference. Hmm. If you don’t mind I believe I will take this opportunity to apologize for my former fatuousness.

Compared with the slim hard-bodied young men his figure was a joke—round, tubby, pillow-paunchy, it had the consistency of foam rubber; rolling around with him was like rolling around with some big beach toy. But he flung himself into it with a devotion that was disarming. A tyrant on his feet, he turned out to be a real woman-worshipper in the sack. And subtle too. And full of tricks. He knew a trick or two, that one. And then it turned out I knew a trick or two I didn’t even know I knew. He could play a whole jazz concert on me. When we were finished we were covered, absolutely covered with each other. And yet I was never surprised at finding myself, six or seven hours later and in my own bed, in real trouble, seized with a shuddery revulsion of shame and disgust. How could I have? All those things. And with that fat old monster? And on top of everything—who was using whom? The original idea had been to enslave him for ever with my womanly wiles but rather the opposite seemed to be happening. For in spite of those sixth- and seventh-hour shudderings at the ghastly unnaturalness of the liaison, in spite of the painfully sharp recollections of my slender, delicate, gloriously young body stretched out alongside his vast old bulk—I am still at a loss to explain it—but in spite of all this—not once was I able to resist him in the flesh.

“Hey—not so fast! I haven’t had a square meal all day. Remember?”

“My dear. Of course. How unfortunate. I told my couple they could have the weekend off so I don’t suppose there’s a thing in the house. Still, if you’d like to forage.”

“No I would not,” I said firmly. “I mean I know English Sundays are hell and all that but there must be some place open for dinner.”

He looked doubtful. “Let’s see ... Air terminals ... Railway stations.”

The English postal service is one of the glories of its nation. You cannot go into a drugstore for some popular brand of toothpaste without being told they’re sorry it’s on order and will only take ten days. You have to face the fact that certain telephone exchanges are ungettable from certain other ones without begging the operator to intercede for you (KNIghtsbridge and MAYfair weren’t on speaking terms when I was there). Laundry or cleaning might take anywhere from three weeks to three years. But mail is delivered regularly, sometimes four times a day. Londoners think nothing of posting their letters in the morning for their friends to read at tea-time. And their families in Manchester can contact them by the same method in the evening.

So there I was, sprinting back for every post. My morning sleep shot to hell. And all in the name of justice.

We went to three night-clubs in quick succession. They were sad and sleazy and awful in a way I’d never quite come across before. It was the sadness mainly. The what-went-wrong look on the waiters’ faces as they stood staring bewilderedly at an empty room most certainly on the brink of bankruptcy. One thing that went wrong was the night-club comic with his hair too long and combed all funny singing “There’s no business like Shoe Business” to “There’s no business like etc.,” and doing impersonations of King Kong falling for a butterfly. Another wrong thing was the young man with a guitar who sang dirty Scottish ballads about goats sleeping with women (Trad.). Another was the girl in tights with a stocking cap pulled down over her eyes and ears who did a totally inexplicable dance with the lights out, mostly writhing on the floor. And lastly, the audience—a sprinkling of debs and their escorts who jeered and hurled pennies on the stage as the acts progressed—they were awfully wrong. It was discouraging. How was I going to get C. D. hooked on this dissolute way of life—let alone how was I myself going to bear it? How was I going to keep him out till dawn every night, exhausted and spent and running downhill until the final—what?—how about a heart attack?—would carry him off? What I had in mind was some divine little boîte that had good jazz and a sensational entertainer; one that was dark, smoky, and unhealthy and served rot-gut strong enough to melt the mind, rip out the lining of the stomach, explode the liver, and curdle the kidneys. Or, if that was too much to ask, at least a place interesting enough to keep him up late. He went to bed much too early. They all did in London. I never saw such people for leaving each other’s houses at the stroke of midnight.

The fourth night-club was a strip-tease joint. I got us out of there even faster. I wasn’t going to have him going around with erotic images other than my own on his mind if I could help it. The fifth—an enormous one—had not only tumblers but ice-skaters and a ventriloquist. We left during the juggling act.

And out we went. They took us to a small jazz club with a very good quartet and I observed with pleasure that it was not only small and crowded but very hot which meant good pneumonia possibilities. I made a note of its name.

“So am I.” More heavy breathing. “When are you coming back?”

“Tomorrow afternoon.”

“Good. What airline?” His voice sounded strangled.

“It’s the B. E. A. seven-something-or-other. Wait a sec. Seven-one-five.”

“I’ll meet you at the airport.”

“That’s awfully sweet of you but why bother?”

“Because I’m in a hurry.”

“In a hurry? Why, where are you—”

“My God,” he exploded, “do you understand nothing of lechery? See that you’re on that plane.” And abruptly he hung up.

Well, I thought. Well, well.