Reform Of The Playboy

Harriet could only glare at her, almost speechless with fury.

‘I simply don’t believe it!’ she eventually managed to grind out through clenched teeth. ‘Are you seriously telling me that, after twisting my arm—and virtually forcing me to let my newly done up flat to that foul man, Finn Maclean—you’ve already chucked him and got yourself a new boyfriend?’

‘Now, Harriet—calm down!’ Sophie muttered hurriedly. ‘I did fancy him, for a while. Which is not surprising, since you have to admit that he’s a real case of “sex on legs”—right? But I soon realised there was no point in having to compete with all those other women, who seem to surround him like a swarm of flies.’

‘Yes, but—’

‘Finn may be diabolically attractive,’ Sophie admitted. ‘But I like a man to run after me—not the other way round. And besides,’ she added with a giggle, ‘who wouldn’t prefer to spend two weeks sailing around the Mediterranean in a huge yacht—with a guy who’s crazy about you—rather than queuing up for a chance to go out on the town with Finn? What do you reckon, Trish?’

Trish, who’d been buried in the Sunday papers, gave a quick nod of her head. ‘I’d take the yacht, every time,’ she agreed, before becoming absorbed in reading her horoscope for the coming week.

‘Well, thanks a bunch!’ Harriet grated angrily, before quickly grabbing a cigarette from the packet on the table in front of Trish. ‘You’ve really messed up my life—big time!’

‘Hey!’ Sophie frowned. ‘I thought you gave up smoking last year?’

‘Yes, you’re right—I did. But I really need one now. All right?’

‘OK…OK,’ the other girl murmured soothingly as Harriet glared angrily at her. ‘Look—I’m sorry if it hasn’t worked out with Finn. But you must admit that it really did seem a good idea at the time,’ she added with a shrug. ‘Besides, you couldn’t expect me to stay home every evening, just waiting for him to call.’

Harriet gave a heavy sigh. Stubbing out the cigarette, which had tasted foul, she realised that she had no one to blame but herself.

Sophie might be her oldest and dearest friend—but she ought to have known that the other girl had all the attention span of a newt. Which had to mean that the chances of her remaining interested in one man for any length of time were just about zero.

‘So, what happened at Finn’s birthday party?’

‘Don’t ask!’ Harriet groaned, burying her face in her hands for a moment, before giving another deep, heavy sigh.

‘Come on—tell all!’ Trish grinned. ‘It can’t have been that bad, surely?’

‘Oh, yes, it was,’ Harriet told her friends gloomily, before explaining that she’d had no warning of the proposed bash. ‘Although I suppose I ought to have guessed something was in the air—especially when he had all that champagne delivered,’ she admitted glumly.

‘Well, it all sounds fairly harmless, so far.’ Sophie shrugged. ‘What went wrong?’

‘The brand-new door entry system. Although I didn’t know anything about it at the time, of course.’

Harriet sighed heavily, before relating how she’d been to the Gate Cinema, to see a French film with some friends. After a late supper at Kensington Place, she’d returned home at about half past eleven—to find all the lights in the house on and the front door wide open.

‘I nearly had hysterics! I mean…it was nothing more or less than an open invitation to any passing burglars. What’s more, it clearly wasn’t an accident, since the front door had been deliberately propped open by a heavy case of champagne.’

‘So, what did you do?’

‘Exactly what any other sensible person would have done,’ Harriet retorted. ‘I stormed upstairs and told Finn Maclean precisely what I thought of stupid men like him. Especially those who were not only aiding and abetting the local criminals but also, if we had been burgled, would have been responsible for invalidating my household insurance policy.’

‘That’s a good point, you know,’ Trish told Sophie. ‘Insurance companies are getting very tough nowadays. A friend of mine forgot to lock all her windows when she went out shopping one day. She returned to find her place had been vandalised by some teenage hoodlums, and the insurance people refused to pay for the damage.’

‘That’s really bad,’ Sophie agreed, before adding impatiently, ‘So—what happened next?’

‘Well, as you can imagine, we had an almighty row,’ Harriet muttered, her cheeks flushing as she realised there was no way she could possibly explain what had happened in Finn’s apartment that night. Especially when she didn’t even understand it, herself.

‘Anyway,’ she continued hurriedly, ‘the long and the short of it was that, completely unknown to me, the doorbell entry system had given up the ghost. And, although Finn swore blind that he’d stationed a guest downstairs, to let everyone in, all I can say is that they sure as hell weren’t there by the time I came home.’

‘So…?’

‘So, I was over a barrel, wasn’t I?’ Harriet sighed, explaining that, with guests coming and going well into the small hours of the night, someone had to open the door. Because, as that rotten man had so graphically pointed out, it hadn’t been his fault that his doorbell and the front door release system weren’t working properly.

‘Oh, dear!’ Sophie exclaimed with a grin, before she and Trish collapsed with laughter.

‘It wasn’t funny!’ Harriet moaned. ‘I had to sit down there in the hall—practically propping my eyelids open with matchsticks—until God knows what hour. You’d think people would arrive at a party at the stated hour, wouldn’t you?’ she added indignantly. ‘But not Finn Maclean’s guests. Oh, no! As far as I could see, at least half of them had already been at other parties, and were decidedly the worse for drink by the time they arrived at the house.’

‘Poor Harriet!’ Trish murmured, clearly trying to keep a straight face.

‘Well, “poor Harriet” is just about right,’ she agreed grimly. ‘You should try letting tipsy people into the house all night, and see how much you like it,’ she added grumpily. ‘Just about the last straw was when a strange man actually patted me on the head, called me a “good girl”—and tried to give me a tip. Honestly, it was a complete nightmare!’

‘Have you managed to get the door entry system mended?’ Sophie asked, thankful that she had her own private entrance down in the basement.

Harriet nodded. ‘I called the engineers out first thing yesterday morning. Apparently, it was something to do with the wiring. But I told them that I’d be suing the socks off them if it ever happened again.’

‘That’s interesting,’ Trish murmured. ‘Since his birthday is in June, it looks as if Finn Maclean must be a Gemini.’

‘Believe me, there’s nothing “interesting” about Finn Maclean,’ Harriet told her with feeling. ‘A few adjectives like “difficult,” “maddening” or even “bloody-minded” would be much nearer the mark.’

‘That’s a Gemini man for you,’ Trish agreed with a grin. ‘Still, you’re Aquarius, which means you shouldn’t have any problem in coping with him. In fact,’ she added with a slight laugh, ‘I wouldn’t be at all surprised if you two didn’t end up together!’

Harriet gave a shrill, incredulous laugh. ‘You must be joking! I wouldn’t fancy him—not if he were the last man on earth.’

‘Hmm…’ Trish murmured, smiling to herself as she noted the deep flush rising up over her friend’s face. ‘Maybe I ought to lend you a few of my crystals. They’re a great help in bringing harmony to a relationship.’

‘I don’t want to be rude, because I know you’re into all that New Age stuff, but it’s definitely not my scene,’ Harriet told her firmly. ‘What I really need is a lawyer who’s clever enough to break that damned contract we signed. Unfortunately, it seems forged in chains of iron—so I’m well and truly stuck with the awful man.’

Sophie gave a helpless shrug. ‘I really am sorry that it’s all turned out so badly. But as far as the contract is concerned, you did say that you wanted it to be unbreakable, and so…’

‘I know I did. It’s all my own fault,’ Harriet admitted with a heavy sigh. ‘So, it looks as if I’ll just have to find enough patience to survive the next five months without slaughtering the rotten man!’

The contract wasn’t Sophie’s fault—and Trish meant well, of course, Harriet told herself as she waved goodbye to her friends, who’d arranged to play a game of tennis in Ladbroke Square. But no amount of crystal beads, lighting joss sticks or chanting Buddhist mantras would be likely to do anything towards bringing ‘harmony,’ or any other calming influence, into the difficult relationship between herself and Finn Maclean.

Slowly making her own way home, and out into the blessed peace of Lansdowne Gardens, Harriet sank down on to a bench beneath a lilac tree, heavy with fragrant white blossom, as she tried to clear her mind of what Trish would undoubtedly call ‘negative thoughts.’

Unfortunately, try as she might, it was proving almost impossible not to recall, in hideous Technicolor, the disturbing scene which had taken place two nights ago.

After bursting into Finn’s apartment, accosting him in the hallway and telling him, in no uncertain terms, exactly what she thought of anyone stupid enough to leave the front door of a house open to all and sundry, she’d found herself being roughly dragged into the small kitchen.