‘Can I help?’ asked a voice behind her.
She turned and saw Dante.
‘I’m on the cadge for money,’ she groaned. ‘Again! I’m desperate for something to drink.’
‘Then let me buy you some champagne.’
‘No, thank you, just some mineral water.’
‘Champagne is better,’ he said in the persuasive voice of a man about to embark on a flirtation.
‘No, water is better when you’re thirsty,’ she said firmly.
‘Then I can’t persuade you?’
‘No,’ she said, getting cross. ‘You can’t persuade me. What you can do is step out of my way so that I can leave. Goodnight.’
‘I apologise,’ he said at once. ‘Don’t be angry with me, I’m just fooling.’ To the bartender he added, ‘Serve the lady whatever she wants, and I’ll have a whisky.’
He slipped an arm about her, touching her lightly but firmly enough to prevent her escape, and guided her to a seat by the window. The barman approached and she seized the bottle of water, threw back her head and drank deeply.
‘That’s better,’ she said at last, gasping slightly. ‘I should be the one apologising. I’m in a rotten temper, but I shouldn’t take it out on you.’
‘You don’t like being dependent on people?’ he guessed.
‘Begging,’ she said in disgust.
‘Not begging,’ he corrected her gently. ‘Letting your friends help you.’
‘I’ll pay every penny back,’ she vowed.
‘Hush! Now you’re getting boring.’
Fearing that he might be right, she swigged some more water. It felt good.
‘You seem to be having a very disorganised holiday,’ he observed. ‘Have you been planning it for long?’
‘I didn’t plan it at all, just hurled a few things into a bag and flounced off.’
‘That sounds promising. You said you’re a photographer…’ He waited hopefully.
‘I specialise in the theatre, and film stills. He’s an actor, starring in a West End play. Or, at least, he was in a West End play until-’
‘You can’t stop there!’ he protested. ‘Just when it’s getting interesting.’
‘I was taking the pics. We had a thing going-and, well, I didn’t expect eternal fidelity-but I did expect his full attention while we were together.’
‘A reasonable desire,’ her companion said solemnly.
‘So I thought, but an actress in the play started flashing her eyes at him. I think she saw him chiefly as a career step-up-Oh, I don’t know, though. To be fair, he’s very handsome.’
‘Well known?’ Dante asked.
‘Sandor Jayley.’
Dante’s eyes widened.
‘I saw one of his films on television the other day,’ he said. ‘He’s supposed to be headed for even greater things.’ He assumed a declamatory voice. ‘The man whose embrace all women dream of-whose merest look-’
‘Oh, shut up!’ she said through laughter. ‘I can’t keep a straight face at that twaddle, which used to really annoy him.’
‘He took it seriously?’
‘Yes. Mind you, he has plenty going for him.’
‘Looks, allure…?’
‘Dazzling smile, more charm than was good for him-or for me. Just the usual stuff. Nothing, really.’
‘Yes, it doesn’t amount to much,’ he agreed. ‘You have to wonder why people make such a fuss about it.’
They nodded in solemn accord.
He yawned suddenly, turning so that he was half-sideways and could raise one foot onto the seat beside him; he rested an arm on it and leaned his head back. Ferne studied him a moment, noticing the relaxed grace of his tall, lean body. His shirt was open at the throat, enough to reveal part of his smooth chest; his black hair was slightly on the long side.
She had to admit that he had ‘the usual stuff’, with plenty to spare. His face was not only handsome but intriguing, with well-defined, angular features, dark, wicked eyes and a look of fierce, humorous intelligence.
Quirky, she thought, considering him with a professional gaze. Always about to do or say something unexpected. That was what she’d try to bring out if she were taking his photograph.
Suddenly he looked at her, and the gleaming look was intense.
‘So, tell me about it,’ he said.
‘Where do I start?’ She sighed. ‘The beginning, when I was starry-eyed and stupid, or later, when he was shocked by my “unprincipled vulgarity”?’
Dante was immediately alert.
‘Unprincipled and vulgar, hmm? That sounds interesting. Don’t stop.’
‘I met Tommy when I was hired to take the photographs for the play-’
‘Tommy?’
‘Sandor. His real name is Tommy Wiggs.’
‘I can see why he changed it. But I want to know how you were unprincipled and vulgar.’
‘You’ll have to wait for that bit.’
‘Spoilsport!’
‘Where was I? Ah, yes, taking pictures for the play. Thinking back, I guess he set out to make me fall for him because he reckoned it would give an extra something to the photographs. So he took me to dinner and dazzled me.’
‘And you were taken in by actorly charm?’ Dante asked, frowning a little, as though he found it hard to believe.
‘No, he was cleverer than that. He made a great play of switching off the actor and just being himself, as he put it, saying he wanted to use his real name because Sandor was for the masses. The man inside was Tommy.’ Seeing his face, she said, ‘Yes, it makes me feel a bit queasy too, but that night it was charming.
‘The thing is, Tommy was made to be a film actor, not a stage actor. He’s more impressive in close-up, and the closer you get the better he seems.’
‘And he made sure you got very close?’
‘Not that night,’ she murmured, ‘but eventually.’
She fell silent, remembering moments that had been sweet at the time but in retrospect felt ridiculous. How easily she’d fallen, and how glad she was to be out of it now. Yet there had been other times that she still remembered with pleasure, however mistakenly.
Dante watched her face, reading it without difficulty, and his eyes darkened. He raised a hand to summon the attendant, and when Ferne looked up she found Dante filling a glass of champagne for her.
‘I felt you needed it after all,’ he said.
‘Yes,’ she murmured. ‘Maybe I do.’
‘So what was the film actor doing in a play?’ Dante asked.
‘He felt that people didn’t take him seriously.’
‘Heaven help us! One of them. They make a career out of being eye candy but it’s not enough. They want to be respected.’
‘You’ve got him to a T,’ Ferne chuckled. ‘Are you sure you don’t know him?’
‘No, but I’ve met plenty like him. Some of the houses I sell belong to that kind of person-“full of themselves”, I believe is the English expression.’
‘That’s it. Someone persuaded him that if he did a bit of Shakespeare everyone would be impressed, so he agreed to star in Antony and Cleopatra.’
‘Playing Antony, the great lover?’
‘Yes. But I think part of the attraction was the fact that Antony was an ancient Roman, so he had to wear little, short tunics that showed off his bare legs. He’s got very good legs. He even made the costume department take the tunics up a couple of inches to show off his thighs.’
Dante choked with laughter.
‘It was very much an edited version of the play because he couldn’t remember all the long speeches,’ Ferne recalled. ‘Mind you, he made them shorten Cleopatra’s speeches even more.’
‘In case she took too much of the spotlight?’ Dante hazarded a guess.
‘Right. He wasn’t going to have that. Not that it really mattered, because everyone was looking at his thighs.’
‘I don’t think you’re exactly heartbroken,’ Dante commanded, watching her intently.
‘Certainly not,’ she said quickly. ‘It was ridiculous, really. Just showbusiness. Or life.’