The Would-Begetter Read Online Free PDF Page B

said, giving her a quick peck on the cheek. ‘That’s a great relief to me. You see, I just suddenly thought… I mean, I’d hate to step on your toes.’

Chapter 3
    Hector felt vaguely uncomfortable about all the lies he had told Caroline in his attempts to draw her out and obtain some hard data. Well, some of it was true, he reminded himself. I
do
vote Conservative, and the private income and the divorce (well, the impending divorce), are real too. It was just the illnesses… He wondered if he’d made a complete prat of himself. Perhaps Caroline wouldn’t want to see him again? Did he, in fact, want to see her? She was a trifle sharp; a bit too ready to take the piss, but in truth, he had probably asked for it. The only really important question was her apparent dislike of full-time motherhood. Hector wondered how well-thought-out that idea of hers had been, and felt inclined to discount it. He decided that it was a common enough attitude in successful young career women, until time and the advent of the right man combined to transmute it into comfortable domesticity. It was not an insuperable obstacle. Hector poured himself a whisky and sat back, watching the pictures on his silent television. He always zapped the sound off during the advertisements. The telephone rang.
    ‘Hector!’ Caroline said. ‘I’ve had a bad conscience about you…’
    Excellent, Hector thought. That’s a good sign. ‘Oh?’ he said.
    ‘Yes. I hope you didn’t think I was laughing at you, last time we met? I’m afraid we tend to be a bit cutting in our family. My brother’s just the same…’
    ‘Oh, I’m all for sharp wits,’ Hector said, ‘especially when packaged so beautifully.’
    ‘Ah,’ Caroline said, ‘under the circumstances I suppose I’d better take that one on the chin, and thank you prettily.’
    ‘Come round to my house this Saturday evening,’ Hector said, ‘and do it in person. I’ll organise some food.’
    ‘Lovely idea. How do I get to you?’
    ‘It’s difficult to find,’ Hector said carefully. ‘Best thing would be for me to meet you in the pub in the village and drive you there,… here, myself.’
    ‘Well… all right then.’
    They arranged to meet at eight thirty. That should give me time, Hector thought, to do the necessary preliminaries, and also to get us a Chinese takeaway for supper. That cool-box thing of Megan’s keeps things hot as well, doesn’t it? Now, I must organise sheets…
    ‘Have you noticed,’ Barry asked Jess over a snatched snack lunch in the
Chronicle’s
coffee area, ‘Wendy’s not wearing her engagement ring any more?’
    ‘Can’t say I have.’
    ‘Perhaps it’s all off?’
    ‘Mmmm.’
    ‘Jess? You wouldn’t find out for me, would you?’
    ‘Why?’
    Barry choked on a bit of cheese and onion crisp, and Jess beat him on the back. ‘Stop! Enough!’
    ‘Are you keen on her yourself, then? Surely not?’ Jess broke into a broad grin. ‘She’s
years
older than you!’
    ‘Fourteen.’
    ‘But Barry…!’
    ‘Aren’t we being just a teensy bit ageist here, Jess? And, no, I’m not admitting to anything. I’d just like to know, OK? I wouldn’t ask anyone else, but I know you won’t tell on me.’
    ‘So how am I supposed to find out?’
    Several people came in and stood at the coffee machine, chatting. Barry frowned a warning and started flipping through a pile of photographs on the table in front of Jess. ‘Who are all these stuffed shirts?’
    ‘Don’t get greasy fingerprints all over them! They’re Caroline Moffat’s Board of Directors, and they’re works of art.’
    Barry sniffed. ‘I’ve got a gut feeling about that woman,’ he said. ‘Bet you ten pounds that H.M. gets into her knickers within the month. It’s a doddle; can’t fail!’
    ‘Now then,’ Hector said on Saturday evening as he ushered Caroline out of the pub and into his Jaguar. ‘Your car will be fine here in the car park. We could always go in convoy, of course, but