Jelly had gone to work with not just her legs but her crotch shaved, and invited Brian Moss to put his hand up her skirt, feel and admire. Brian Moss was reluctant so to do.
‘I don’t want this thing between us to get too personal,’ he said. ‘You know that. I love Oriole very much. If she won’t have sex with me it’s because she’s too tired, poor thing. Two children under five are a handful for anyone. We bring them up in the modern way, trying to develop their personalities, so they don’t sleep much. I’m in charge by night. Elsie has nightmares, Annie gets colic. I get back into bed with Oriole: I may be cold but I’m loving, yet even in her sleep my wife rolls away from me. I seem to disgust her. She says my feet smell, and she doesn’t like the texture of my skin. She claims it’s clammy. But I do love her. I expect she’s right about me. I’m just a hopeless sort of person.’
‘Feel my skin where I’ve shaved it,’ was all his secretary said. ‘You’ll find it interesting. Smooth, but with a kind of prickle just beneath the surface; a very white skin there because, when you come to think of it, between the legs very seldom meets the light of day.’
But Brian Moss was not to be tempted: not by words, descriptions, nor open invitation as she led his hand upward, rubbed his finger against the shaven skin, tried to guide it inward into the soft damp warmth of the split. ‘I don’t know what’s got into you,’ said Brian Moss. ‘You never used to be like this. Oh God, is it all my fault?’
And he lit a cigarette, finding a packet in an open drawer. ‘You see!’ he said. ‘You’ve started me smoking again. Oriole made me give it up when she was pregnant. Passive smoking can do untold damage to unborn babies.’
‘And to you, too,’ said Angel. ‘But I don’t suppose your wife mentions that.’
‘You don’t seem to think well of wives,’ said Brian Moss nervously. It seemed to him his secretary was behaving oddly. He would have to get rid of her; he had let himself get involved with a seriously disturbed young woman. He would miss her but that could not be helped.
‘I certainly don’t,’ said Angel. She was sitting on the edge of the desk, removing her little lace-up boots Jelly had bought at Marks & Spencer’s. She let them fall. First the right, then the left. She kept her eyes on Brian Moss. ‘And your sort is the worst. She’s a cat wife, from the sound of it.’
‘What’s a cat wife?’ he asked, though who knew where the conversation might lead.
‘A cat wife wants a home and a man to pay for it, and someone to father her children and when she’s got it, she snarls and drives him away. And if she can make him feel bad, she will.’
She was unbuttoning her sweater, undoing her bra, wriggling out of her skirt.
‘Don’t do this,’ he begged. ‘Someone might come in.’
She ran over to the door, neat bosom bouncing, locked it, took the key and threw it from the open window. He heard the faint dry sound of its landing two floors below. ‘I know your wife’s kind well,’ said Angel, undoing his belt, unfastening buttons, unzipping his zip. ‘And thank God for her. One man’s misfortune is any whore’s good fortune.’
‘Don’t do this,’ he begged. ‘You’re not well. You’ve been working too hard. Get dressed. Get Lois to go down and get the key and let us out of here.’
‘Not till I’ve had my fun,’ said Angel. ‘I deserve some too. It’s my lunch hour. You’ll have to do as I say, or I’ll tell Oriole about you and me.’
‘There is nothing to say about you and me,’ said Brian Moss, ‘that I won’t deny at once. I’m not afraid of blackmail.’
‘I’ll tell her about the mole on your thing,’ said Angel, giggling. ‘Sometimes it seems little and sometimes it seems big. It’s a matter of proportion.’
‘I’ll say you saw it by accident,’ said Brian Moss but, since he was by now naked to the waist and leaning against the wall, his statement lacked conviction. His belt fastened one hand to the handle of a drawer above his head; his tie fastened the other to its fellow; his penis was slowly and powerfully rising.
‘What have you done to me?’ he demanded. ‘I’m completely helpless.’
He saw the expression on his secretary’s face alter. The mild look disappeared: she was prim and herself again.
‘Good Lord,’ said Jelly, backing off aghast, ‘I’m so sorry, Mr Moss. I don’t know what came over me.’
The door handle was rattling. It was Lois.
‘I can’t open the door, Mr Moss,’ called Lois through the keyhole. ‘It seems to be locked. Lady Musgrave’s here to see you. What shall I say to her?’
Tears now started to Jelly’s eyes. When she spoke, it was with a clipped and rather painful gentility.
‘You’ll have to forgive me,’ said Lady Rice to Brian Moss. ‘I’m afraid I’m having a hard day. I’m not really a secretary at all, though I have excellent office skills, gained during my marriage. Sometimes I feel I’ve been sleepwalking for years. You know?’
The expression changed again: hardened; became determined. The voice was brisk and cold.
‘Personally, Mr Moss, I think this serves you right,’ said Angelica, and then she called to Lois. ‘Come on in. You’ll find a spare key in my right-hand drawer.’
‘Miss White,’ said Brian Moss, struggling with his bonds, ‘you’re fired.’
‘Thank God for that,’ said all of them at once, in the attractive timbred voice they had lately developed. Brian Moss had taken credit for that too.