been very efficiently hushed for once. And that meant it was big—
"I'm just a simple soldier, Lady Alexandra." And, for that matter, how simple was she? For, while her style and vocabulary were debutante, since when did debutantes chatter knowledgeable asides on Suez and Algeria and de Gaulle? Or was all that simply what had rubbed off frorn Audley and Jilly and Cousin Roland?
He had to know. "What makes you think I've heard about it?"
I didn't, darling—Jilly did. Just before I came up here she said I ought to tell you about Tienne, anyway . . . because he might turn up at the orgy. He does sometimes." She shrugged. "And you move in those sort of circles."
"What sort of circles?" So it was a Jilly after-thought!
"Oh—hush-hush ones. You know!"
But that joke had gone far enough. "I told you—I'm just a simple soldier."
"Simple my eye! Simple soldiers don't make friends with our Jilly. . . and they don't make phone-calls either. They make passes at me, is what they do. I'm an expert on simple soldiers, darling—and you don't fit the pattern, believe me!"
Roche realised that he was on a hiding to nothing on Lady Alexandra's own ground so long as he tried to play the game his own way. Jilly had given him better advice than she could imagine, but so far he'd made too little use of it.
"Tell me more about this fellow d'Auberon then—if I'm not dummy5
simple," he challenged her directly.
"Why d'you want to know about him?" Now she couldn't help being suspicious.
"Because I'm not simple. I like to know all about the opposition before I make my pass, Lady Alexandra."
"Oh ..." She was vastly relieved by his frankness. "So that's the way the wind blows! And I've been stupid again, haven't I!"
"A bit. But tell me, anyway."
"There's nothing to tell. He's much too honourable—and high-powered—for me . . . He's just an acquaintance of David Audley's, that's all—high-powered, like David . . . and also weird . . . also like David—"
"Weird?"
"Funny."
"Funny?"
"I don't mean funny ha-ha . . . but sort of ... contradictory."
She nodded into the valley. "Like, he's mad about rugger—
he's gone all the way to Cahors today to talk about rugger with these Frenchmen who are also bonkers about the silly game." She looked at Roche suddenly, and he realised that she'd shifted from the Frenchman to Audley. "And that's pretty weird, isn't it—the way these Frenchmen in the south play rugger—I never knew that until I met David Audley."
"Indeed?" He shrugged. "But I don't quite see how that's . . .
dummy5
contradictory. Lots of people play rugger."
"Ah!" She pointed at him quickly. "But you don't play rugger, do you? Hockey's your game, you said?"
"Yes. But—"
"But you know about it. And you know about cricket and soccer and tennis—who's good, and who's playing who, and all that sort of thing ... I know, because I've got all these cousins—Roland's got a rowing blue, and Jimmie played for the Occasionals, and Jake had a county cricket trial last year
—"
The Perownes come up like mushrooms . . . positively hordes of cousins—
"—I hate sport, personally," continued Lexy vehemently. "It's boring, and they all get drunk and sing dirty songs. And all I get to do is cut sandwiches and serve tea. But I know what they're like—it's all balls—"
Roche fought to hold in position whatever expression was on his face.
"—balls, balls, balls—just so long as they can kick them, or hit them, or throw them—big ones, little ones, white ones, red ones, all shapes and sizes ... it doesn't matter which is their special sport—if they're mad about one sport, they know about the others, what's what, and who's who . . . the British do, anyway . . . Roland does, and Jimmie and Jake—
and you too, David—" she drew a quick breath "— but David Audley doesn't!"
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He couldn't maintain his look of polite interest any longer.
Incredulity and incomprehension had to take over.
She observed his discomfort. "You haven't the faintest idea what I'm getting at, have you, darling?"
"Not a lot—no," admitted Roche.
She nodded. "I'm not surprised. It takes one to spot one."
"One—what?"
She laughed. "You know, when Mike was up at Oxford he played everything. I mean, when he was at Harvard, before that, he played football—American football, where they all dress up in the most extraordinary way and do even more extraordinary things to each other . . . But when he came to England, he played English games—rugger and cricket, and suchlike, and if you give him the chance he'll talk about them non-stop. All about deep square legs, and kicking for touch . . . it's ghastly to hear the way he goes on—it's so boring. But they're all like that, I tell you—all except David Audley."
A surfeit of sporting cousins had clearly scarred Lady Alexandra for life. "I'm still not with you, Lexy."
"No? Well, you just watch David Audley's face when anyone else talks about sport. He gets that glazed look of his."
Lexy herself usually had a slightly glazed look, as though she didn't quite understand what was happening to her, or what had just happened. But also she had already put on record that 'it takes one to spot one', whatever that meant.
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"Darling—he hates sport, just like me—that's what I think.
Even rugger, which is the only game he plays—I honestly think he's bored with that too . . . and as for all the rest... he simply doesn't care to know anything about them. It's all a great big façade."
"Clubbable?"
" Yes and no ... And I rather think I mean 'no' —"
And then Stocker had gone off at a tangent, without trying to answer what he didn't understand, into the equally unsatisfactory labyrinth of Audley's finances.
" Anyway—" Lexy grabbed the word with special emphasis, as if she was using it to haul herself away from her own private experience "— anyway, that's David all over: he just never quite fits... like, he absolutely hates the army, but he's terribly proud of the Wesdragons—the regiment, Father's regiment . . . and he hates the jolly old Establishment even more—that's the only time he swears, when he talks about them—but when Davey— Davey Stein—when Davey pitches into the British Empire, because of Palestine, and all that, David gives him both barrels and waves the flag like my Great-Aunt Maggie, who was in Amritsar when they shot all those Indians, and still swears by General What's-his-name who gave the order to open fire—it's positively hilarious . . .
and yet, at the same time, he likes the Arabs—And then, to dummy5
top it off, he thinks the Israelis are really rather super, the way they give everyone the two-finger sign—including all Mother's State Department friends in Washington. Oh—and he likes the Egyptians—he's terribly unfashionable there—"
"And the Russians?" The sixty-four thousand dollar question.
"Oh . . . they're the New Barbarians, darling—just inside tanks instead of on innumerable little shaggy ponies. You'll hear all about them tonight, I shouldn't wonder," Lexy waved away the whole might of the Red Army with a slender and very dirty hand. She stopped abruptly as she focussed on her own hand. "My God! just look at me . . . I'm absolutely filthy again—I don't know where it comes from, but I seem to attract dirt!" She lifted her face towards him. "Is my face dirty, David?"
Roche pretended to examine her features critically. All that was needed was soap and water, for under the clumsily-applied make-up and the soot from the boiler was a complexion not far short of Steffy's.