Jilly Cooper - Octavia

‘The young gels of today are not the same as they were twenty years ago,’ she said loudly.

‘Of course they’re not,’ I shouted across at her. ‘Twenty years ago I was only six. You must expect some change in my appearance and behaviour.’

She turned puce with anger at the roar of laughter that greeted this. Gareth didn’t laugh. He took hold of my arm.

‘I think you’d better come and eat,’ he said in even tones.

‘I’ve told you once,’ I snapped, ‘I don’t want to eat. I want to dance. Why doesn’t someone put on the record player?’

The MFH looked down at the circles of silver sequins.

‘What happens to those when you dance?’

I giggled. ‘Now you see me, now you don’t. They’ve been known to shift off centre.’

There was another roar of laughter.

‘Well, what are we waiting for?’ said the MFH. ‘Let’s put a record on and dance.’

‘All right,’ I said, looking up at him under my lashes, ‘But I must go to the loo first.’

Upstairs in the bathroom, I hardly recognized myself. I looked like some Maenad, my hair tousled, my eyes glittering, my cheeks flushed. God, the dress was so beautiful.

‘And you’re so beautiful too,’ I added and, leaning forward, lightly kissed my reflection in the mirror.

Even in my alcoholic state, I was slightly abashed when I turned round and saw Gareth standing watching me from the doorway.

‘Don’t you know it’s rude to stare?’ I said.

He didn’t move.

‘I’d like to come past — if you don’t mind,’ I went on.

‘Oh no, you don’t,’ he said, grabbing my wrist.

‘Oh yes I do,’ I screamed, trying to tug myself away.

‘Will you stop behaving like a whore!’ he swore at me and, pulling me into the nearest bedroom, threw me on the bed and locked the door.

‘Now I suppose you’re going to treat me like a whore,’ I spat at him. ‘What will your precious Lorna say if she catches us here together?’

Suddenly I was frightened. There was murder in his eyes.

‘It’s about time someone taught you a lesson,’ he said, coming towards me. ‘And I’m afraid it’s going to be me.’

Before I realized it, Gareth had me across his knee. I’ve never known what living daylights were before, but he was certainly beating them out of me now. I started to scream and kick.

‘Shut up,’ he said viciously. ‘No one can hear you.’ The record player was still booming downstairs. I struggled and tried to bite him but he was far too strong for me. It was not the pain so much as the ghastly indignity. It seemed to go on for ever and ever. Finally he tipped me on to the floor. I lay there trembling with fear.

‘Get up,’ he said brusquely, ‘and get your things together. I’m taking you back to the boat.’

The moon hung over the river, whitening the mist that floated transparent above the sleeping fields. Stars were crowding the blue-black sky, the air was heavy with the scent of meadowsweet.

Aching in every bone, biting my lip to stop myself crying, I let Gareth lead me across the fields. Every few moments I stumbled, held up only by his vice-like grip on my arm. I think he felt at any moment I might bolt back to the party.

Once we were on deck I said, ‘Now you can go back to your darling teenager.’

‘Not until you’re safe in bed.’

I lay down on my bunk still in my dress. But when I shut my eyes the world was going round and round. I quickly opened them. Gareth stood watching me through cigar smoke.

I shut my eyes again. A great wave of nausea rolled over me.

‘Oh God,’ I said, trying to get out of bed.

‘Stay where you are,’ he snapped.

‘I ought to be allowed to get out of my own bed,’ I said petulantly. ‘I agree in your Mary Whitehouse role you’re quite entitled to stop me getting into other people’s beds but a person should be free to get out of her own bed if she wants to.’

‘Stop fooling around,’ said Gareth.

‘I can’t,’ I said in desperation, ‘I’m going to be sick.’

He only just got me to the edge of the boat in time, and I was sicker than I’ve ever been in my life. I couldn’t stop this terrible retching, and then, because Gareth was holding my head, I couldn’t stop crying from humiliation.

‘Leave me alone,’ I sobbed in misery. ‘Leave me alone to die. Gussie and Jeremy’ll be back in a minute. Please go and keep them away for a bit longer.’

‘They won’t be back for hours,’ said Gareth, looking at his watch.

‘Can I have a drink of water?’

‘Not yet, it’ll only make you throw up again. You’ll just have to grin and bear it.’

I looked up at the huge white moon and gave a hollow laugh. ‘It couldn’t be a more romantic night, could it?’

In the passage my knees gave way and Gareth picked me up, carried me into the cabin and put me to bed as deftly as if I’d been a child. He gave me a couple of pills.

‘They’ll put you to sleep.’

‘I wasn’t actually planning to meet Jeremy on deck tonight.’

I was shivering like a puppy.

‘I’m sorry,’ I said, rolling my head back and forth on the pillow. ‘I’m so terribly sorry.’

‘Lie still,’ he said. ‘The pills’ll work soon.’

‘Don’t go,’ I whispered, as he stood up and went to the door.

His face was expressionless as he looked at me, no scorn, no mockery, not even a trace of pity.

‘I’m going to get you some more blankets,’ he said. ‘I don’t want you catching cold.’

That sudden kindness, the first he’d ever shown me, brought tears to my eyes. I was beginning to feel drowsy by the time he came back with two rugs. They smelt musty and, as I watched his hands tucking them in — powerful hands with black hairs on the back — I suddenly wanted to feel his arms around me and to feel those hands soothing me and petting me as though I were a child again. In a flash I saw him as the father, strict, yet loving and caring, that all my life I’d missed; someone to say stop when I went too far, someone to mind if I behaved badly, to be proud if I behaved well.

‘Getting sleepy?’ he asked.

I nodded.

‘Good girl. You’ll be all right in the morning.’

‘I’m sorry I wrecked your party.’

‘Doesn’t matter. They’re nice though, the Hamiltons. You should mix with more people like them; they’ve got the right values.’

‘How did you meet them?’

He began to tell me, but I started getting confused and the soft Welsh voice became mingled with the water lapping against the boat; then I drifted into unconsciousness.

When I woke next morning I felt overwhelmed with shame. In the past when I’d got drunk, I’d just shrugged it off as part of the Octavia Brennen image. Now I curled up at the thought of last night’s performance — barging in on those people half naked, behaving atrociously, abusing their hospitality, and then the humiliation of Gareth putting me across his knee and, worst of all, throwing up in front of him and having to be put to bed.

Oh God, I groaned in misery, as I slowly pieced the evening together, I can’t face him. Yet, at the thought of slipping off the boat unnoticed, it suddenly hit me that if I did I might never see him again. It was like a skewer jabbed into my heart.

Oh no, I whispered in horror, it can’t have happened! I couldn’t hate someone so passionately, and then find overnight that hatred had turned into something quite different — something that looked suspiciously like love.

I couldn’t love him, I couldn’t. He despised me and thought I was the biggest bitch going, and the nightmare was that, if we had been starting from scratch, I could have pulled out the stops, knocked him over with my looks, even fooled him into thinking I was gentle and sweet. I’d done it often enough before. But now it was too late. He’d seen me, unashamedly pursuing Jeremy, knew so many adverse things about me that I hadn’t a hope where he was concerned. It was funny really, the biter bit at last.