The Great Husband Hunt by Laurie Graham

Author:Laurie Graham [GRAHAM, LAURIE]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: FIC000000
ISBN: 9780446554190
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Published: 2008-12-14T05:00:00+00:00

30

Reggie Merrick was a darling English boy from a top drawer family and he put me in mind of Gil, with his fair hair worn a little long, and his blue eyes. But he had none of Gil's changefulness or spleen. He was happy to play tennis for as long as he had someone to play with and then he was just as happy to swim, or play tug-of-war with Beluga.

At Flicky's there was always something going on. People arriving. People motoring over to Monte Carlo. Every afternoon the help brought out bicycling machines to the terrace and an exercise tea was held, for those who were keen to slenderize. And often there were parties ard masquerades. One evening we were instructed to attend dressed as paupers, and jellied eels were served. Reggie and Humpy wore enormous flat caps and sang a comic song called “Ilkley Moor,” which those who understood the language of English unfortunates found most amusing. That summer was full of laughter.

I wrote to Gil and expressed the hope that he was profiting from his solitude. I never alluded to our angry parting. I guessed that when the season ended and I returned to Paris, it would be as though nothing bad had ever passed between us. But in the meanwhile I was finding life most congenial. My skin had turned a deliciously nutty shade of brown which looked very well against my white-silk day pajamas. I loved the hot, flowery smell of the hills behind Flicky's house. I loved the way the English talked without moving their lips.

Humpy and Reggie were practically cousins, Reggie's ma being a Choate of some kind, and they knew each other from school, too. They were the greatest of friends, except for a few days after Humpy fell in love with a boy who delivered melons for the kitchen and gave him a quite lavish pearl stickpin as a token of his ardor. Reggie hated waste.

Most often the three of us would lark around all day, but once in a while Flicky would commandeer Humpy to go with her into Nice to meet new arrivals, and then Reggie and I would keep each other company. He trained Beluga to sit with a caramel balanced on his nose until given the command to eat it. He taught me a domino game called Muggins, and I taught him the Charleston.

Then, one August night, we tiptoed away from a very boisterous game of Up Jenkins and climbed down to the sea for a dip. He took my hand, to steady me for the final jump down onto the shore, and as I landed I kissed him, on the mouth.

“I say, old thing,” he whispered. And then we romped and I discovered a completely different, slippery, wriggly kind of thrill than I had ever known with Gil.

By the time Humpy and I returned to Paris, in September of 1925, I was deeply troubled. I was in love with Reggie Merrick, but he was going back to his English life, far too much the gentleman to steal another man's wife.

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