But as she closed the laptop, she felt deflated and unsettled. The threat of some vague and future legal action obviously troubled her, but it was more than that. She had been let down, tricked and lied to by another man, and for that she felt an utter fool.
Chapter Twenty-One
Paris, May 1961
‘Why does French bread taste so good?’ said Ros. They were strolling down the rue du Bac, and the taste of their supper – a huge pot of mussels laced with garlic and white wine and served with an enormous chunk of soft baguette – was still dancing on her tongue.
‘I think it’s the flour,’ said Dominic, his answer typically decisive and culturally knowledgeable.
‘We should take some back with us,’ she decided, imagining herself reliving this moment from Sam’s kitchen in Primrose Hill.
‘But it will be stale by the time we get back to Calais.’
‘Then I’ll stand it in a vase. Put it on my mantelpiece as a reminder of simple yet exquisite pleasures.’
Dominic laughed, and she grinned into space.
She still couldn’t believe she was here in Paris. They had caught the early-morning ferry from Dover; Dom’s Stag clattering up the metal gangplank had been like something from a sci-fi movie, but by the time they reached the Arc de Triomphe at a little after four o’clock that afternoon, she had felt like Jean Seberg in À bout de souffle.
‘Ice cream,’ she shouted, running up to a shopfront, leaving Dominic in her wake.
‘I can’t believe you are still hungry,’ he called after her.
She looked over her shoulder and grinned playfully at him. ‘We can’t come to Paris and not have ice cream.’
‘I think you’re thinking of Rome,’ said Dom, catching up with her, by which time Ros had ordered two boules de glace and handed him one.
She took a lick, her giddiness subsiding, and turned to Dominic with a more sober expression.
‘What’s wrong?’ he asked.
‘It feels wrong to be so happy.’
‘We’re on holiday.’
‘No we’re not. We’re here to work,’ she said, reminding herself that Dominic had officially commissioned her to write a thousand words on the Algerian situation in France. ‘I should be interviewing members of the FLN, not eating ice cream.’
‘I told you you could write about the Monaco Grand Prix.’
Ros waved a hand. ‘That’s your story. You do frivolous so much better than I do.’
‘Oh, I’m sure I can squeeze some pro-Tory rhetoric in there somewhere,’ he teased as she slapped him on the shoulder.
Whatever conflict there was between herself and Dominic Blake – wildly differing political views, social circles and outlook on life – had settled down into affect
ionate banter.
They still rarely agreed on anything, but Ros doubted she would ever meet anyone who understood her like Dominic. He was the only person who knew how to handle her moods, the person who made her a better version of herself. She wasn’t sure if that was why he made her so happy, but right now she didn’t think she had ever been happier.
Paris was everything she had imagined. They had parked the Stag on a side road on the Left Bank and walked a long stretch of the Seine from the Pont Neuf towards the Gare d’Orsay before looping round and weaving back through the streets of the fifth arrondissement.
Dominic had given her a guided tour, pointing out the famous Parisian sights, but in truth she hadn’t really needed it. She knew all about Les Deux Magots, where writers such as Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir had sat in a corner booth and discussed the issues of the day, and the political history of the Café de Flore, a 1920s hangout for Zhou Enlai when his communist fervour had been ignited. Her information had only come from books – it was the first time she had ever been to Paris – but the spirit of her literary heroes felt alive on the streets of the Rive Gauche.
Butterflies collected in her stomach as they approached the hotel, tucked away on a side street near the Sorbonne. She had not had a chance to feel nervous when they had checked in three hours earlier, even when Dominic had announced them to the reception desk as Mr and Mrs Blake. They had gone to their room, thrown their suitcases on the bed and headed straight out, desperate to explore, their stomachs grumbling after the long drive down from Calais.
But now Ros realised that she was excited and terrified in equal measure. Although she and Dominic had been dating for almost two months, although they went out three or four times a week and spoke constantly on the phone, they had not yet made love, a situation that was surely set to change within the next few hours.
Ros did not see herself as particularly old-fashioned, but stepping up her relationship with Dominic to a sexual and intimate one was something she had subconsciously tried to avoid since their first kiss at his flat. She was not an experienced lover, and Dominic most certainly was. She did not want to suffer in comparision with the dozens of women who had no doubt fallen like dominoes into his bed, didn’t want to break the spell of their compatibility. And deep down there was the lingering thought that he saw her as another notch on his bedpost, a challenge he would quickly lose interest in once it had been conquered.