A liaison like this usually begins when a girl is moving flats and wants to leave her luggage somewhere so she dumps it with her boy friend. Before he really knows it, she’s moved in, had a key cut, changed the wallpaper in the drawing room, and is adding the usual little feminine touches—bras dripping over the bath, make-up on the carpet. For the first few months they enjoy the thrill of living in sin and playing at being married. The possibility that Daddy might roll up with a horse-whip adds an edge to the situation. Soon other couples are asking them to dinner and they start asking them back, until it becomes a habit.
Men who are living with women are at pains to tell you within five minutes that they are not actually married. On the whole they seem to be more overtly randy than married men just to prove they’re not tied down.
SCHOOLBOYS (see Students, Bachelors, Lovers, Married Men, Divorcés)
Class
CLASS AS A subject is as taboo today as sex was during Victorian times. Nevertheless there are still certain differences between the classes.
THE ARISTOCRACY
Sir Galahad everyone in sight
“Open yer legs, dam’ yer!”
Aristocrats spend their childhood being beaten by fierce nannies and their later years murdering wildlife, so it’s hardly surprising their sex lives are a bit cock-eyed. When they get ‘awf’ with a girl they automatically expect her to go to bed with them—a hangover, I suppose from the old droit de seigneur days. The girl will have to experience a good many gaucheries de seigneur first, including a lot of coarse fishing around to find where her bra unclasps. She should be careful if she makes love to him in his own house, or the bedroom door may be suddenly flung open and the general public pour in, having been charged 50p to see over her.
Aristocrats have their mouths permanently open so that the back of their throats is coated with flies like a windscreen after a long journey. They have double-barrelled fowling pieces, wives called Fiona, and never go on holiday.
THE MIDDLE CLASSES
The middle class man indulges in wife-swapping parties and swinging—it is all-important for him to keep it up in front of the Joneses. He buys a great many porny books and magazines which he carefully locks away every morning, in case the daily woman finds them. He inconsistently disapproves of what he calls P.D.A.—public displays of affection, or necking in the street. The words ‘privacy of one’s own home’ are often on his lips. He keeps a large box of Kleenex for Men by the bed.
THE LOWER CLASSES
Ever since Lady Chatterley’s Lover, the lower classes have retained a tremendous reputation for being sensation in the sack—more vigorous and muscular, less fastidious. It’s all part of the New Brutality.
Photographers of both the lower and the upper classes are very much in vogue. But the upper class ones have to say ‘yer know’ every five minutes, and ‘ubsolutely funtustic’, to show how democratic they are. Photographers have long arms like monkeys from carrying so much equipment about, and usually shack up with models so they can talk shop in bed instead of doing anything else. And they don’t have to pay any model fees.
SNOBS
“I came up the hard way. The lift wasn’t working.”
Snobs or parvenus are very much to be avoided as it’s chips on the shoulder with everything. To justify his own insecurity, the snob tries to pull any girl he meets, a case of local boy makes everyone.
His intentions are always honourable: unless you have a title, he will never marry you. What are a few nights of passion to him compared with a lifetime at the wrong end of the table.
I once went out with a Harrovian parvenu. He said: “I fancy you more than any woman I’ve ever met, but I can’t marry you because you’re not Upper Class Enough.” I was later irritated to see his smug little face in the Tatler on his wedding day, a horse-faced duchess’s daughter on his arm flanked by a battalion of large bridesmaids. Tiara Boom-de-ay. Many parvenus are:
RICH MEN
“His voice was full of money.” DOROTHY PARKER.
Rich men are much more attractive than poor men, beggar men or thieves, but not all that interested in sex. They’re too busy training camels to jump through the eye of a needle, and worrying about being down to their last villa in the South of France.
Rich men come complete with all mod cons, saunas, swimming baths, indoor and outdoor barbecues and flagellation rooms. They are marvellous between the balance sheets.
They are funny about money, suspicious of being used, and afraid they are not being loved for themselves alone and all that.
It would be very boring to marry a really rich man, for he’d either be at the office night and day, or else under your feet all the time. You’d spend your life playing tinker tailor with the caviare, and waiting for Jackie Onassis to ask you to coffee parties.
Sexual Types
NARCISSISTS
ONE OF THE great misconceptions is that women don’t like very good-looking men. They do—the best lovers are either men who cater for and play on your fantasies or who are so beautiful you don’t need to fantasise at all. The trouble is that beautiful men aren’t usually interested in women.
You also have to spend so much time jostling with them for the mirror, telling them how marvellous they look, and knowing they’re only gazing passionately into your eyes to admire their reflection in your dark glasses. And because they feel secure on the basis of their looks, they’re inclined to be apathetic in bed.
They are also a bit boring about keeping fit, not eating or drinking much and getting up early to do press-ups. The only press-ups a man ought to do should be on one.
They usually have portraits of themselves in the attic getting older and older, and marry plain women because they don’t like competition.
FAIRIES
Every girl should have one at the bottom of her.
One is inundated with so much improperganda these days that it’s easy to think everyone is queer. You can be quite sure, though, if a young man comes floating up to you with flowing locks, gaudy shirt, matching flowered tie, a mass of necklaces, rings on each finger like a knuckleduster, bells on his toes, clouds of scent, and says “Hullo Baby” in a soft gentle voice, that he’s not queer.
Everyone thinks all actors are queer. That’s why the straight ones rush round making it with women to prove they’re not. I always wonder what the gay ones think when they have to kiss girls on stage: “Shut your eyes, and think of Equity,” I suppose.
People automatically assume that hairdressers and antique dealers are queer, but this is no longer so. Since both professions became big business, the butch has moved in.
THE LOUSE BEAUTIFUL
The toast is absent fiends.
Lice Beautiful have accounts at the sex shop, seen-it-all-before eyes, and a million light years of sexual experience under their belts. They also smell of sulphur and brimstone rather than aftershave.