Mavis Belfrage by Alasdair Gray Read Free Book Online Page A

me.”
    â€œO no,” said Colin, staring at her. She looked dazzling in white silk pants and white velvet tunic patterned with seed pearls, silver beads and minute mirrors.
    â€œThat must have … cost … a lot,” he said hesitantly.
    â€œIf you mean did I buy them out of my earnings as a street-walker the answer is
no
. You’ve never seen all the treasures packed in the cases I drag from lodging to lodging, Colin Kerr!”
    â€œWhat’s a street-walker?” asked Bill looking up from a comic he was reading. He too was sprucely dressed with well-polished shoes and neatly combed hair.
    â€œI’ll tell you one day when Colin isn’t here – Colin’s easily embarrassed. But Colin, look around! Isn’t the room lovely? Doesn’t the dining-table look inviting? Won’t your colleagues envy you for having such an efficient, loving, beautifully dressed, beautiful mistress?” Colin nibbled a nut from a dish of them on the bookcase and said, “Yes there dawns on me, waveringly, the notion that I will enjoy this party.”
    â€œOf course you will, and Colin!” (she laid a hand on his shoulder and looked at him with a girlish little pout) “I’ve a favour to ask – why are you grinning?”
    â€œWhen you’re extra cheerful then ask me a favour it’s usually for something I hate to do.”
    â€œIs there anything you wouldn’t do for me?”
    â€œProbably not.”
    She put her hands behind her back and said slowly, “Well I thought you, me and Bill would have a nice little snack together just now, and after that you might drive over to Comely Park which is where Clive – Clive Evans – lives and bring him back. You see he hasn’t a car, this place is hard to find by bus and … well there would be time for the two of you to go to a pub and have a pint together – before the other guests arrive, I mean. But of course you needn’t have a drink with him if you don’t feel like one. But I think you’d enjoy his company.”
    â€œNo,” said Colin.
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œI won’t go.”
    â€œWhy not?”
    â€œBill,” said Colin, “Mavis is going to make us a snack. Wash your hands please.”
    â€œAre you two going to have a boring emotional storm?”
    â€œGet lost Bill,” said Mavis. Bill pulled a face and went out leaving Colin and Mavis facing each other.
    In a dangerously quiet voice she again asked Colin why he would not go. He replied in a voice which in his own ears sounded absurdly rational and laborious. “Mavis, I do not dislike Evans because he is your lover. In that he has my sympathy because I would like to be your lover. And it isn’t impossible for me to meet him at a party and say the meaningless things people say to each other at parties. But I refuse totreat him as a friend to satisfy either your vanity or convenience.”
    â€œWhat a small tiny shrivelled ungenerous …” (she paused and grinned mockingly) “…
mind
you have!” He stared back at her and then sat down. She walked forward and back saying, “What do you suggest I do? I’ve told him to expect you. What do you suggest I do?”
    â€œPhone him and tell him to come by taxi.”
    â€œYou do it. It’s your idea – not mine.”
    â€œNo.”
    He employed his agitation by picking up Bill’s comic and staring at it blindly. After a few more aimless steps Mavis folded her arms and said, “I’ll explain why I arranged for you to pick him up. He didn’t
want
to come to this bloody party. He thought you would hate him because of me. I told him you were above such petty feelings. I said you would prove it by giving him a lift.” In a very low voice Colin said this showed that Evans understood and respected his feelings more than Mavis did; she should phone Evans, tell him she had been wrong and