Cal flopped onto the bed, eased the top button of his pants. He wished he could sleep. Stilton had given him the best part of two and a half hours. Maybe he could sleep. He closed his eyes. It wasn’t going to work. He thought about calling room service. A shot of spirits. That could do the trick. Then the phone rang.
‘Calvin? It’s me. Kitty.’
‘Hello Kitty.’
‘Wossup? You sound flat as my Aunt Flo’s Yorkshire pudding.’
‘I’m lying down. Your old man kind of ran me ragged today.’
This was a lie. It was not the day or the man that had worn him out, but the night and the daughter.
‘I could soon fix that. I get off at nine. I could be over there in a flash.’
‘Kitty, I don’t know how to say this, so maybe I should just say it as it comes. I know there’s a war on, and I figure the war does strange things to the way people behave. Men and women. But before we leap into bed again, don’t you think we should talk?’
‘Woss to talk about?’
‘I don’t know. That’s just the point. I don’t know you and you don’t know me. We met yesterday and we went straight to bed!’
‘No we didn’t. We had dinner with me mum and dad first!’
‘That’s hardly getting to know one another. Kitty, I just think we should try to get to know one another. I think we should talk.’
‘Don’t you like it with me, then?’
‘It’s not a matter of like or not like. It’s a matter of what I’m used to. You’re rewriting the rules. That takes some grasping. Let’s meet and let’s talk, as soon as we both have the time.’
‘Like I said, I get off at nine.’
‘And I have to meet with your father at ten.’
‘Great. That’s bags o’ time. I’ll see you in the Salisbury at quarter past nine. We can have a drink and a natter.’
This wasn’t what he meant. He wished he could tell her so.
‘The Salisbury?’
‘A pub.’
‘Another one? I thought your father had already dragged me through every pub in London. Good God, how many are there?’
‘Thousands, but this particular one’s in St Martin’s Lane, on the right as you go down. See you there. Quarter past nine. OK?’
‘Kitty, I’m kind of pubbed out.’
‘Yeah – but just for me, eh?’
He felt he couldn’t win this one. His idea was to talk, to discuss, for want of a better word, the protocol of their relationship. Her idea was to prop up a bar and chat to him for half an hour.
‘I’ll be there.’
He listened to the dial tone as she rang off. Lay back on the pillow. He wanted to sleep. He wanted Kitty. He wanted Kitty and everything she had on offer. Why the guilt? What bendable but unbreakable moral imperative had his childhood seared into his character?