The Primal Urge. Brian Aldiss

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      2

       A Towel in Common

      The innocence, simplicity and diffidence which formed a good proportion of Jimmy Solent’s character were often ousted by male cunning; now mixed drink had precipitated their expulsion. Anyone who drinks at all knows there are a hundred degrees of sweet and subtle gradation between sobriety and the doddering old age of intoxication; Jimmy was a mere thirty or forty notches down the slide, and still firing on most cylinders. Only his old aunt Indecision had been shut away.

      He conjured up a taxi directly Rose and he got outside and urged it to Charlton Square as fast as possible. Knowing something of the oddness of women, he had realised the cardinal fact that once they had bathing costumes and the question of nude bathing was thus disposed of, the whole stunt would seem, by comparison, respectable. He wanted to borrow Aubrey’s car: taxis to and from Walton-on-Thames would be expensive. He had yet to tell Rose exactly where the pool was, for fear that she would object that it was too far away.

      Jimmy found when he reached the flat that Aubrey had evidently come in and gone out again with Alyson. That was bad; perhaps he had taken the damned MG. Moving like a clumsy wind, while Rose sat downstairs in the ticking taxi, Jimmy seized his own swimsuit and Alyson’s from the airing cupboard – it would have to fit Rose, or else. Sweeping into the kitchen, he pulled two bottles of Chianti from the broom closet which served as wine cellar. Then he was downstairs again, shouting goodnight to a surprised Mrs Pidney, and back in the taxi with his arm round Rose.

      At the garage they were in luck. The MG was there. Aubrey and Alyson would be walking; it was a nice evening for walking, if you did not have to get to Walton. Jimmy paid off the taxi and bustled Rose into the coupé.

      ‘They’re looking at us as if you’re trying to kidnap me,’ Rose said, waving a hand in indication at a couple of mechanics.

      Jimmy laughed.

      ‘No, it’s because we’re both bright pink,’ he said.

      Laughing, they backed out of the garage. Jimmy drove with savage concentration, fighting to keep the whiskers of drink away from his vision. They could crash on the way back and welcome, but he was not going to spoil the evening now. He was full of exaltation. He had won a prize!

      ‘Had an old car when I was up at Oxford,’ he shouted to her. He should not have said it; he reminded himself of Penny, who had ridden in that car. Dear little, dull little, Penny! Penny had not the sheer presence of this great luscious lascivious lump …

      ‘What happened to it?’ she asked.

      … nor that look in her eye.

      ‘Sold it to Gabby Borrows of Corpus for £20.’

      You still owe me £4 on that deal, Gabby, you sod.

      ‘He got a bargain, didn’t he?’

      What, off me, Ikey Solent!?

      ‘You should have seen “Tin Lizzie”! She was about tenth hand when I got her. And what am I sitting here talking to you about automobiles for, Rangy, my sweet pet?’

      He drew into the side of the road without signalling, braked, and took a long, deep kiss from her. She shaped up round him immediately like a young wrestler. Together, they plunged. The next thing he recalled afterwards was cursing loudly because he could not unhook her brassière. It popped most satisfactorily, and he slid his hands over her breasts, cupping them, kissing them. They excited and bemused him; he hardly realised what he was doing.

      ‘Let’s have a swim first, sweet,’ she said, gasping.

      Jimmy struggled up and looked at her. They were bathing each other in pink light. It was like a warm liquid over them. The long face had undergone a change. Her brow was wide and tolerant; every line of her face had relaxed, so that she seemed plumper, less mature, even less sure of herself. Here, now, she was beautiful. He took a long look at her, trying to remember it all.

      ‘“And threw warm gules on Madeline’s fair breast,”’ he quoted, half-shyly. ‘Have some Chianti?’ Just how much had she drunk before the party, he wondered, that she should ever want him?

      They drank gravely, companionably, out of the one glass Aubrey kept stowed in his locker, then drove on. Jimmy covered the road more slowly now. For one thing, he had caught the savour of the evening; it was something peaceful, relaxedly relentless – a kind of homecoming. He was going to be a proper man and take the correct tempo; Rangy would appreciate that. She knew and seemed to tell him exactly how these things should go. For another thing, he was having misgivings about the Hurns and their pool.

      Rupert Hurn had been at Merton with Jimmy. Their friendship had not been close, but twice Rupert had taken Jimmy and another friend to his home. They had met Rupert’s younger sister (what was that plump child’s name?), and his docile mother, and his pugnacious little stockbroker father; and they had swum in his pool. But the last visit had been two years ago. Rupert might not be at home; the family probably would not remember him. They might even have moved. Jimmy’s idea began to look less bright with every mile they made.

      He mentioned no word of his misgivings to Rose. If the evening was going to spoil, it should do so without any help from him.

      The sun was setting as the MG passed Walton station. To Jimmy’s relief, he remembered the way clearly and picked up Ryden’s Road with confidence. He could recall the look of the house now; it crouched between two Lutyenesque chimneys; the porch rested on absurdly fat pillars and a laburnum grew too close to the windows. Jimmy had passed the place before he realised it; they had had the sense to chop the tree down.

      He backed into the drive and climbed out. Rose climbed out and smoothed herself down. She took his arm, looking at him quizzically; her irises were a perturbing medley of green and brown. Jimmy wondered how on first impression she had seemed unattractive.

      ‘Er … come on,’ he said. Their Norman Lights had ceased to burn. He stepped between the fat pillars and rang the bell; in СКАЧАТЬ