Free Slightly Foxed by Jane Lovering Page B

her?"
    "Helped him to miss her a little less?"
    "He's not really like that, Jace." I clasped a rather dog-
    eared Keats to my sweater. "He's shy and kind of hidden.
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    Keeps everything under cover. If I hadn't read his poetry I'd
    probably think he was a bit cold, but he's so much more than
    that underneath."
    "Then you must get underneath him." Jace started ticking
    books off the packing list.
    "If only it was that easy," I began, but she looked at me
    sternly.
    "Alys, I know a lot about men, and this I know, they do
    not tell you things that you need to know, they tell you that
    which they are wishing to say . And if you are being serious
    over this man, you are needing to be talking much with him
    over things which are not said. They are the important things,
    Alys, the things which are in the head."
    "But he hasn't rung me, so how can I talk to him? Maybe
    he wasn't really that keen on me." I remembered the kiss in
    the stable. "Or at least, maybe he didn't feel the same way
    after I'd left."
    "Are you thinking seriously about him?" Jace handed me
    the book list.
    "I'm not sure."
    "What he looks like?"
    "Oh, about six foot, dark hair, needs a good cut, green
    eyes. Nice face, he's got the whole cheekbones thing going
    on. Long legs, good body, I mean—whew, yes, good body. He
    looks a bit unkempt, a bit slept in. Oh, and he bites his nails."
    "Alys, if you want this man you must show him that you
    are wanting him! If you really want him then you will find a
    way."
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    All the way home on the bus, I thought about Jacinta's
    words and by the time I'd arrived I was determined. Okay, so
    I didn't have his number, but he ran a commercial business.
    He wasn't going to be Mr. Elusive, was he? It was obvious—
    he doesn't ring me, so I ring him. Would he think I was
    chasing him? But, did it matter? If you really want him ,
    Jacinta had said, and I did really want him, didn't I?
    As I went through the front door, I became aware that the
    flat smelled strange. But I ignored it, desperate to carry out
    my plan before Florence got home and started asking
    awkward questions. I found a directory service, got the
    number for Charlton Hawsell Stud, and was halfway through
    dialling when my foot found the source of the odd smell.
    "Grainger!" I bellowed, my toes squishing about in a
    puddle of semisolid coldness. "You complete bastard ."
    Grainger half raised a bleary eyelid as he lay in his current
    comatosery, a basket of clean but unironed washing. "What
    do you think your litter tray is for ?" I hopped off across the
    floor, berating the cat all the while, although he had long
    since furled his eyelid back down like a blind, proclaiming him
    to be a cat Seriously Asleep.
    While I was standing poised on one leg with the other foot
    in the sink like an inferior Degas painting, Florence came
    bustling through. She was laden with bags and carrying a
    bunch of flowers which had definitely gone past their best.
    She poked them individually into the tops of the glass jars
    and bottles awaiting their visit to the recycling bin.
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    "I'm not even going to ask," she said, watching me
    perched less-than-athletically, sponging off my offending foot
    under the tap.
    "Well, I am. What on earth are you doing with those
    flowers?"
    A superannuated lupin drooped pathetically from the neck
    of a milk bottle and Florence dreamily tried to re-erect it.
    "They'd been left next door with Mr. Roberts last week. But
    he had to go down to Sheffield because his mother had had
    another fall, and he completely forgot that he'd got them.
    When he saw me coming up the stairs he gave them to me.
    There's a card."
    I found it, sticking wetly to the stem of a white carnation.
    Looking forward to seeing you again. Regards, Leo. I grasped
    the damp square of cardboard as though it was a message
    from the gods. He'd sent me flowers! But—I regarded the
    senior