LITMIR.BIZ

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about the night; she knew she’d see her in the morning, and so she turned over and tried to sleep.

      Tressa was disappointed to find her cousin in the land of nod. She’d wanted to relive the night again, confide in Lizzie that her virginity was gone and forever and how wonderful the experience was. She was tempted to wake her up, but Lizzie slept deeply when she did go off—and what if, in trying to waken her cousin, she also roused Pat and Betty. She reckoned they’d string her up if she did that again. They’d been very stiff with her after last time.

      So she lay on the bed and went through it in her mind and fell asleep with a smile on her face and dreamed of making love to Mike over and over again.

      Tressa felt very delicate when she woke somewhere around mid-morning, but Lizzie didn’t look too hot either, she noticed. In fact, she looked dreadful. Tressa gasped when she saw the score marks on the back of Lizzie’s neck as she pulled her nightdress over her head.

      ‘Who did that to your neck?’

      ‘Who do you think?’

      ‘It was never Steve?’

      ‘Oh yes it was,’ Lizzie said grimly, ‘after I told him it was over,’ and she went on to describe exactly what had happened. ‘He frightened the living daylights out of me,’ she said. ‘And yet nothing really happened and I didn’t wait around to see if it would. But now…oh, I don’t know, I think it was partly my fault.’

      ‘How in God’s name did you work that out?’

      ‘Maybe I told him clumsily,’ Lizzie said. ‘You know, maybe I should have led up to it more, not just told him like that, straight out.’

      ‘He still shouldn’t have done that to your neck.’

      ‘He didn’t do it on purpose,’ Lizzie said. ‘He was holding on to me, holding my coat at the neck, and when I pulled away quickly his nails sort of caught me.’

      ‘Even so…’

      ‘Tressa, he wasn’t himself and he was so dreadfully hurt. I felt a heel. I should never have let it go on so long.’

      Tressa could see the guilt settling around her cousin. She knew her well and was aware how that guilt would eat away at her. ‘Come on, Lizzie,’ she said. ‘Put this behind you now.’

      ‘I’m sorry, Tressa,’ Lizzie replied. ‘How did it go with you and Mike?’

      ‘Do you want to know, after your night ended so badly?’

      ‘Course I do,’ Lizzie said. ‘I’m not that smallminded.’

      ‘Well I’ll tell you in the bathroom.’

      ‘Bathroom?’

      ‘Aye,’ Tressa said. ‘I’m going to run you a hot bath. It will do you the world of good.’

      ‘Tressa, I’m feeling a bit groggy.’

      ‘Then a hot foamy bath is just the thing,’ Tressa declared, and went on with a smile, ‘come on, and while you are soaping yourself, I’ll tell you about my night of passion.’

      Lizzie forced a smile from her reluctant lips and began collecting her toiletries together.

      The girls were tired when they returned to their room that night. It was Valentine’s Day and there had been a special menu, so the place had been bursting at the seams and they’d been run off their feet, for they’d been on the go since three o’clock. Lizzie sat thankfully down on the bed with a sigh when they’d got back to their room. ‘What time is it?’

      Tressa consulted her watch. ‘Just turned eleven.’

      ‘Oh, Hell, and we’re on earlies tomorrow.’

      ‘You don’t have to tell me.’

      There was a lot of noise outside for a Sunday night and someone was yelling something out in the street. ‘Sounds as if someone’s celebrated a bit too well,’ Pat said from the other side of the room.

      ‘Aye,’ Tressa said, crossing to the window, and then she exclaimed, ‘God Almighty! Lizzie, it’s Steve.’

      ‘No!’ Lizzie crossed to the window and saw Steve, off his head with drink and leaning against Mike, who seemed to be trying to remonstrate with him.

      The other two girls crowded behind them to see. ‘Ain’t that your feller?’ Betty said to Lizzie.

      ‘He was,’ Lizzie said. ‘I finished with him yesterday.’

      ‘Doesn’t seem to have taken it too well then,’ Pat remarked.

      Lizzie watched him shake Mike’s hand away, totter a couple of steps and, looking straight at her framed in the window, he screamed, ‘Lizzie! Come out, you bitch. You hear me, Lizzie?’

      ‘Tressa,’ Lizzie said, ‘I must go down.’

      ‘There is no way you are going near that mad man in the state he’s in,’ Tressa said firmly.

      ‘Tressa, I’ll lose my job if the manager finds out.’

      ‘He won’t know it’s you,’ Tressa said. ‘How many staff do you think the boss can name?’

      ‘He’ll tumble to it eventually. He’s not stupid.’

      However, the manager was tired and longing for his bed and had no patience with any drunk that the waiter said was screaming abuse in St Phillip’s churchyard. The whole incident would probably disturb his guests, who’d come to him in the morning with a list of complaints. It was not to be borne. ‘Phone the police,’ he told the head waiter. ‘It’s their business, so let them deal with it.’

      Within minutes, the watching girls saw two policemen approach Mike and Steve. ‘Now, now,’ said the younger one. ‘What’s all this about?’

      Steve, staggering on his feet, said, ‘She’s a bitch, a bloody bitch.’

      ‘I’m sure she is, sir,’ said the older man, ‘but I think it would be best to discuss it in the morning.’

      ‘It’s all right,’ Mike said, stepping forward. ‘I’ll see to him.’ He’d seldom seen Steve as drunk as this. He could handle his drink, could Steve, but then he’d been drinking nearly all day.

      Mike had had no idea Lizzie was to finish with Steve the previous evening, and when Steve told him at The Bell that lunchtime he was shocked and felt sorry for him. Getting drunk had seemed a damned good idea. It was only when Steve started muttering about going into the town and what he’d do, both to Lizzie and the bloody hotel she worked in, that Mike had decided he’d better go with him.

      ‘Come on, mate,’ he said now, his arms around Steve.

      ‘Get off me.’

      Steve’s hefty swing nearly had Mike on his back and the young policeman said, ‘Steady, sir.’

      ‘Steady, sir. Steady, sir,’ Steve mocked. ‘Why don’t the pair of you fuck off.’

      ‘We can’t do that, sir,’ the older policeman said firmly. ‘You either go home now, or you cool your heels in a cell.’

      ‘Look, there’s no need for this,’ Mike remonstrated. ‘I’ve told you I’ll see to him,’ and he tried again to put his arm about his friend. ‘Come on, mate, let’s go home, eh?’

      Home. The word registered in Steve’s befuddled brain. He wasn’t going home. He wanted to speak with Lizzie; make her see she couldn’t just finish with him like that.

      Again, Mike was sent reeling. ‘I’ll go home when I’m bloody well ready to go. After I’ve talked to Lizzie. I’ve got to see her.’

      The policemen had decided enough was enough. ‘Come along, sir,’ the older one said. ‘You can’t see people at this time of night. Leave it to the morning, eh?’

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