Carnforth's Creation by Tim Jeal Read Free Book Online Page A

in a deck-chair next to the swing-seat occupied by the other two, he listened glassily while Jonathan yarned about soldiering in Aden. Gemma nudged his lean brown torso.
    ‘Tell him about the baboons, Jonno.’
    Supposing ‘baboon’ to be an appalling synonym for ‘nationalist guerrilla’, Matthew was pleasantly surprised when Jonno gave a humorous account of how his company had opened fire on some real baboons, mistaking them for nationalists in the dark. The volleys had sent thirty or forty terrified apes storming through an unsuspected Arab position , causing enough confusion for Jonathan’s men to capture their machine-guns with ease.
    Though his own forays among the under-privileged were “B” Features to Jonno’s Major Motion Picture, Matthew suspected that Gemma thought the man a droll period piece. When Jonathan left to get dressed, Matthew rose too, but complied when Gemma patted the cushion next to her.
    ‘I’ve been an awful fool,’ she remarked, smiling with wry acceptance of life’s incalculable shifts. Matthew merely smiled back, wondering whether she would try to charm him into changing his mind. ‘I mean it, Matty,’ she murmured sadly. ‘I had no right to expect anything … Paul thinks so too.’ Matthew tried not to look too sceptical. ‘Perhaps you’ll believe me,’ she continued huskily, ‘if I tell you Paul’s given up any idea of a film about Roy.’
    The pool water had darkened Gemma’s ash-blonde hairand washed away the mascara from her eyes, making her look younger and more ingenuous.
    ‘I don’t deny I thought I could persuade you,’ she admitted , with a chastened laugh. ‘But after a while I started enjoying seeing you so much that it didn’t really matter what came of it in that sense.’ She looked down bashfully. ‘I probably shouldn’t say this … I want to go on seeing you.’ Surprised, Matthew abandoned his study of the way in which the stretched fabric of her bikini snugly defined the underlying contours. She looked at him directly; blue eyes unwavering . ‘That’s why the film’s a non-starter … Can’t be anything else if we’re to keep seeing each other.’ A lovely smile, half-elegiac, half-worldly-wise, seemed designed to implore him to brave his fears. And suddenly there it was, that ‘come-on’ look he remembered so well, with its unspoken challenge. Surely you’re grown-up enough to take your sex straight, without reassuring splashes of guilt con carne? You can’t be spineless enough to want to limit your options before you have to?
    He was tempted to say something encouraging, but was too aware of the many times she had fooled him in the past. Perhaps she had talked tactics with Paul since the night before. Her cornflower eyes were regarding his distressfully now. (How well he recalled those sudden darts from cynicism to injured innocence.)
    ‘I’m not going to press you for an answer,’ she whispered, kissing him lightly on the cheek. ‘You’ll be the one to decide how much time you can spare.’
    Not wanting to commit himself, Matthew remained silent. To his relief she began talking about Paul’s plans for the evening.
    *
    Without intending to tell him yet about Paul’s astounding offer, Bridget nonetheless set out in search of Matthew after leaving the Statue Walk. To have any chance of winning him over to the idea of acceptance, she would first have to mend a number of fences. So why not start at once? Back in the house, nobody seemed to have seen Matthew for some time.When Eleanor’s cousin came into the Great Chamber as she was leaving it, Bridget thought it just worthwhile to ask him.
    In fact her journey to the swimming pool ended in the rose garden, where she spotted Matthew and Gemma Lucas ambling in her direction through a galaxy of red and yellow blooms. They were doing nothing more incriminating than talking, yet something about the way they were moving (hardly seeming to take in their surroundings) made her skin prickle.