Darkness in the Afternoon - Part Two

"My husband, Giorgio, is half Spanish and half cocker spaniel – only joking!" she exclaimed.

I feigned a smile. I couldn't keep my eyes of her long graceful legs.

"You must learn to chill out." She moved to the back of my chair and started to massage my shoulders. Elina’s masterly display confirmed what was absent from my life—an animated female with poor eyesight.

"Giorgio is half Spanish and half Italian on his mother’s side. He’s a painter and an author. He was educated at Oxford and practiced as a physician in Portugal. He is handsome, rich and generous.”

I was starting to despise Giorgio but I needed the case and the money. Just then my left leg decided to go to sleep. I sat back and rubbed my leg to restore circulation. Elina turned my chair round. "Here, let me do that."

As I tried to control my knees she asked. "Where did this dentist live?"

"What dentist?"

"The halibut—"

"Oh, the dentist—Above a jewellery store."

"You don’t give much away."

"I don’t have much to give—"

"You’re too modest."

When my trousers involuntarily moved, Elina's soft, freckled face flushed. "You’re line of work must be hard?"

I tried to fake manliness—a trait my mother had down to perfection. Elina had met Giorgio in Paris where he was exhibiting his work. "He found me sexy. Do you?"

"I never mix work and sex—extreme passion blinds me. I simultaneously wear contact lenses and glasses due to poor eyesight. I once dated a shrub for two weeks. On the upside it was a great kisser."

Elina became thoughtful; her perfume engulfed me like a Churchill cigar smoking a cigarette. "Love is a mystery," she mused. "One day he asked, and I said—well, you know—"

She kept caressing my knee and didn’t notice I was hyperventilating.

"What excites you?" she asked.

"Tarzan—the novels, not the movies." I began biting my elbows. "And hairstyles—French plaits—ringlets. I’m reading a book called My Life as a Hair-Piece by Bob Bouffant. The author is French and the toupee is English."

I asked if she had a photograph of Giorgio. She took a snapshot from her handbag. He was undeniably handsome. I was sure he had a wandering eye. My instinct told me if I could find his eye I would find him.

I stood up and grabbed my second-hand overcoat. "We can continue this conversation over a cup of coffee across the street."

End of Part Two

Read Part Three