Infatuation

'Do I? Gracious, sorry,' said Judith, getting up. 'I'll go and join the others. Shall I send Luke to you?'

As she got up, Baba caught at her hand, her golden head flung back and her mouth quivering. It was, Judith thought, a rather hammy performance. 'Oh, Judith, I can't bear to tell him, he'll be so angry and hurt—I thought . . . couldn't you . . .'

'No, I damned well couldn't!' Judith snapped furiously, and walked out before she really lost her temper. She had been putting herself through hell because of a misguided sense of loyalty to Baba, and all the time Baba had been having a terrific time in Hollywood and had come back determined to jilt Luke anyway. Judith had a dark suspicion that she had met someone else over there; she had caught a secretive, complacent smile now and then which looked very much like the smile a woman gives, thinking about a man.

She found Luke on the drive, his back to her, his hands in his tweed jacket pockets as he watched a magpie flap across the clear summer sky.

'One for sorrow,' Judith thought aloud, and he half turned to look at her, his mouth wry.

'There's another one over there in the elm—I think they're nesting here.'

'Two for joy, then,' Judith said lightly. 'Baba wants you.' As she heard how she had phrased it she wished she could recall the sentence. Baba did not want him, but Judith did, but she would have died rather than let Baba see that.

Luke's mouth compressed, he nodded, turning towards the house. Judith walked towards the low box hedges surrounding neat flower beds; she saw her grandmother pushing Mrs Doulton's wheelchair towards one of the yew bushes trimmed into peacocks. At close quarters the tail looked a little ragged. Judith heard the two women laughing at it.

'More like a chicken,' Mrs Murry observed.

'I've never like peacocks, anyway—vain, hysterical birds and very bad-tempered,' Mrs Doulton agreed.

They looked round as Judith joined them. 'I'm afraid we ought to be going soon,' Judith said.

'Must you? I have enjoyed this afternoon,' said Mrs Doulton. 'It's the first time I've been out of the house for months—how lucky that the weather was so good.'

They walked back to the house slowly and Fanny helped to wheel Mrs Doulton inside, her expression gloomy. 'I hope you haven't caught a chill out there. You should have worn something warmer than that jacket. You ought to have had a blanket around you.'

'Don't fuss!' Mrs Doulton protested.

'We must go,' Judith insisted and her grandmother put on the jacket Fanny brought to her.

'Fetch Luke,' Mrs Doulton suggested, and Judith said quickly that he was talking to Baba and there was no need to disturb them, she would be seeing him in the office next day anyway.

‘Don't forget that root,' Mrs Doulton told Mrs Murry. ‘Judith must bring you down again soon.'

Judith couldn't wait to get away; she wondered how Luke was taking Baba's news. He had said he wanted to get out of the engagement, but he was a very masculine man, how would his ego react to discovering that Baba was jilting him, rather than the other way around? As she drove back to London her mind dwelt continually on Luke's reactions; it was stupid to speculate without knowing what Baba was actually telling him. Judith was afraid to be too happy, she couldn't quite believe that Luke was going to be free so easily, but she could not have borne to wait to see his face afterwards. She was afraid. Now that he had seen Baba again, been reminded of how beautiful she was, been able to see Judith next to her and be forcibly made aware that Judith was very far from beautiful—how would he feel on being immediately told that Baba did not want to marry him?

After all, he had chosen Baba in the first place because of her beauty. In spite of having told Judith that he loved her and didn't care whether she was attractive or not, she couldn't feel over-confident about Luke's feelings. While Baba was out of sight she had believed he loved her. Now that Baba was back she had painful doubts again; about herself, about Luke. Baba had always been able to make Judith feel very plain. She could remember as a teenager standing in Ruth's bedroom listening to Baba as she looked into the mirror with a happy smile. 'How do I look, Judith? Do you think this colour suits me? Is my hair okay?' Baba had always asked you questions to which she knew the answer, she only asked because she enjoyed hearing you tell her she looked fantastic. Judith had avoided the mirror; she did not want Baba to look at her and then say very kindly: 'That isn't quite your colour, that's all, Judith. What a pity you're so skinny, you've hardly got a bust at all, but never mind, nobody will notice. They will be looking at me!' Baba's face had added silently.

Baba hadn't been spiteful, her sweetness had been false, that was all. She had always been looking into mirrors, enjoying the image of herself they gave her back. No doubt she would be perfectly at home in the mirror world of the cinema.

Judith dropped her grandmother and then drove on to her flat. It was almost six-thirty and there was nothing on television but the news and the religious programmes following it. She tad a bath at seven, got herself a boiled egg and some toast and settled down to read a fat paperback which she had had around for weeks without opening. She was pampering herself tonight; for weeks she had been working flat out and she deserved some relaxation. By eight o'clock it was almost dark. She switched on the lights and drew the curtains, curling up on a couch with the book and a pillow behind her head. She would go to bed early; in an hour, probably.

The book was printed on yellowish paper which made it hard to read, the print was far too small, there were too many pages. Judith's mind kept straying back to Luke. Was the engagement over now? Was he free? Or had he talked Baba out of jilting him? Given the choice between herself and a girl like Baba, what man could prefer her? Perhaps he had realised as soon as he saw Baba again that what he had thought he felt for Judith had been merely infatuation. They had been flung together during the past month, Baba had been out of sight, Luke might have drifted into imagining that he was in love.

She looked at her watch; she couldn't go to bed yet. The book was boring her to tears but she went on reading it. it was better than sitting there thinking about Luke all the time. She lif

ted her head, listening to the silence. What are you waiting for? she asked herself irritably. He won't come.

That was what she was waiting for—for Luke. If Baba had set him free and he really loved her, he would come to her.

If he didn't come, he didn't love her after all. She forced herself back to her book. She wouldn't think about that yet. Time enough when she knew that Luke had chosen Baba. There would be plenty of time in the future for her to cry then; she wasn't running to meet the anguish which that realisation would bring. She was waiting. She looked at her watch again. Ten minutes had passed. It felt like ten years. She almost went to the mirror to look for grey hairs, she felt as though she must have acquired some

Her intelligence said: you could have fought for him. You could have given Baba the approval she wanted, told her you didn't blame her, advised her to go after a career and forget Luke. She closed her eyes. If she had agreed to tell Luke what Baba wanted her to tell him she could have got Luke on the rebound there and then. She had walked away and made Baba do her own dirty work, and maybe that had been a fatal mistake because you could never guess what will happen between two people, especially when sex is mixed up in it.

But she knew she couldn't have acted any other way, her own integrity wouldn't have permitted it. The very fact that she had been sick with happiness at the news that Baba didn't want to marry Luke after all had made it obvious that she must stay out of it. It had been between Luke and Baba and none of her business. They had made that engagement, they must unmake it.

She put down her book and went slowly into the kitchen to make herself some coffee. It was nearly ten o'clock. Luke hadn't come, he wasn't going to come, and she could feel the remorseless tread of pain coming nearer as she waited and realised that she had lost.

The doorbell rang and her whole body jerked in shock. She slowly put down the cup of coffee, slowly walked to the door. It could be a neighbour asking to borrow a cup of sugar, or a policeman telling her that she had parked without leaving on her lights. She coolly warned herself of disappointment before she opened the door.