Free The Pregnant Widow by Martin Amis

simultaneously communing with an image that was fated, for now, to remain in the loneliest wilderness of his peripheral vision. After thirty seconds or so, to ease the trapped nerves in his trapped neck, Keith stared up and out—at the gold slopes of the massif, echoing in the pale blue. Lily yawned, saying,
    “What’s the other boring thing?”
    “Well, I have just been informed—”
    “No, what was the
other
boring thing?”
    Lily was looking at Scheherazade. So Keith did too … And this was the thought, this was the question they awakened in him, Scheherazade’s breasts (the twinned circumferences, interproximate, interchangeable):
Where were the police?
Where on earth were the police? It was a question he was often asking himself, in these uncertain times. Where were they, the police? Scheherazade said,
    “Sorry, I’m not with you.”
    “I mean, what was the
first
boring thing?”
    “The bathroom,” said Keith. “You know. Sharing it. The bell.”
    “Ah. Now what’s the
second
boring thing?”
    “Let me just get wet.”
    Scheherazade stepped forward and kept going and dived … Yes, theinexpressible tedium of the shared bathroom, where, the previous afternoon, Scheherazade appeared with her bent knees pressed together, and her fists closed tight on the hem of a pink T-shirt, as with short shuffling steps she backed laughingly away … Now she surfaced and climbed out with tensed tendons, covered in bright beads of water. And it was all laid before you. Topless as nature intended. And yet to Keith the spectacle seemed anti-natural—seemed unsound, like a slippage of genre. The cicadas turned their volume up, and the sun glared. She said,
    “Just cold enough. I hate it when it’s soupy. You know. Blood-heat.”
    Lily said, “Is the second boring thing more boring than the first boring thing?”
    “About the same—no, more boring. We’re being
joined
. Oh well. These things are sent to try us. Gloria,” said Scheherazade, lying back with her hands behind her head. “Gloria. Jorquil’s great throb. She’s in disgrace and she’s being packed off to purdah—here. With us. Gloria Beautyman. Beautyman. Spelt like
beauty
, spelt like
man
. She’s older than us. Twenty-two. Or
twenty-three
. Oh well, what can we do? It’s Jorq’s castle.”
    Keith had encountered Jorquil, or been in his presence for a minute or two—Jorquil, Scheherazade’s thirty-year-old uncle (it was that kind of family). Now Keith said, “Good
name
. Gloria Beautyman.”
    “Yes it is,” said Lily cautiously. “But does she live up to it? Does she carry it off?”
    “Sort of. I don’t know. I think she’s an acquired taste. Rather peculiar figure. Jorq’s besotted. He says she’s the best thing out. He calls her Miss Universe. Why is Miss Universe always from Earth? He wants to marry her. I don’t quite get it. Jorq’s normal girls look like film stars.”
    “Jorq?”
    “Yes, I know. He’s no Adonis, Jorq, but he is very rich. And very keen. And Gloria … She must have hidden depths. Still. Poor Gloria. After two weeks at death’s door from a
single glass
of champagne, she can almost sit up in bed.”
    “What’s she in disgrace for? What kind of disgrace? Do we know?”
    “Sexual disgrace,” said Scheherazade with a greedy look as her teeth caught the light. “And I was
there.”
    “Oh do tell.”
    “Well I did vow not to. I really oughtn’t. No, I can’t.”
    “Scheherazade!” said Lily.
    “No. I really can’t.”
    “Sche
he
razade!”
    “Oh all right. But we mustn’t … God, I’ve never seen anything like it. And it was so out of character. She comes across as a bit prim. She’s from Edinburgh. Catholic. Ladylike. And she almost died of shame. Let’s wait for Whittaker. He loves this kind of thing.”
    In espadrilles, khaki shorts, and a frazzled straw hat, Whittaker advanced down the path, leaving behind him, among the saplings on the second level, the barely distinguishable but plainly