Nightwork

'I don't need any tributes to my beauty,' I said. At one point, when Eunice had fallen and I was climbing back to help her up and put her skis on again, the man appeared and began snapping pictures from all angles. As politely as possible, I said, 'Hey, friend, don't you have enough by now?'

'Never have enough,' the man said. He was a gaunt, easy-speaking young man in baggy old clothes and he continued to click away. 'Back at the paper they like to have a wide choice.'

Paper?' I said. 'What paper?'

'Women's Wear Daily. I'm doing a story on Gstaad. You're just what I need. Chic and photogenic, with your skis together. Happy people, in the height of fashion, not a care in the world.'

'You think,' I said sourly. 'There're lots of other people around who answer to that description. Why don't you work on them?' I didn't relish the idea of having my photograph all over a newspaper in New York with a circulation of maybe a hundred thousand. Who knew what paper the two men who had visited Drusack read every morning?

'If the ladies object,' the man said pleasantly, 'of course I'll stop.'

'We don't object,' Lily said. 'If you'll send us copies. I adore pictures of myself. If they're flattering.'

"They could only be flattering,' the young man said gallantly. I suppose he'd taken pictures of a thousand beautiful women in his career and I was sure he hadn't been shy to begin with. Meanly, I envied him.

But he did ski off, loose and careless over the bumps, and we didn't see him again until we were on the terrace of the club, having a Bloody Mary, waiting for Fabian to appear.

By that time another complication had arisen. Just at noon I noticed a small figure following us at a distance. It was Didi Wales. She never came within fifty yards of us, but wherever we went, there she was, skiing in our tracks, stopping when we stopped, moving when we moved. She skied well, lightly and surely, and even when I put on a real burst of speed, which made Lily and Eunice fly down the hill completely out of control, to keep me in sight, there was that small figure faithfully on our trail as though attached to us by a long, invisible cord.

On the last run down, just before lunch, I purposely waited at the bottom of the lift, allowing Lily and Eunice to go up together, in one of the two-seater chairs. Didi came into the lift building, her long blonde hair now caught in a bow of ribbon at the nape of her neck and falling down her back. She was still wearing the flowered blue jeans and a short, bulky orange parka.

'Let's take this one up together, Didi,' I said as the chair swung into place and she clumped up in her heavy boots.

'I don't mind,' she said. She sat quietly as we swung up out into the open sunlight. The chair mounted silently and we got a view of the whole town spread out in the sunlight. The jagged white peaks, stretching everywhere, were like white cathedrals in the distance.

'Do you mind if ] smoke?' she said, starting to get a package of cigarettes out of a pocket.

'Yes,' I said.

'Okay, Daddy,' she said. Then giggled. 'Having a nice day?' she asked.

'Wonderful.'

'You're not skiing as well as you used to,' she said. 'More effort.'

I knew this was true but wasn't pleased to hear it. 'I'm a little rusty,' I said with dignity. 'I've been busy.'

'It shows,' she said matter-of-factly. 'And those ladies with you.' She made a peculiar little noise. 'They'll kill themselves one day.'

'So I've told them.'

'I bet when there's no men with them, if they ever go anywhere without a man, they snowplow all the way down. They sure have fancy clothes though. I saw them in the stores the day they came, buying up everything in sight.'

'They're pretty women,' I said defensively, 'and they like to look their best.'

'If their pants were one inch tighter,' she said, 'they'd strangle to death.'

'Your pants aren't so loose either.'

That's my age group,' she said. 'That's all.'

'I thought you said you were going to lead me in Gstaad.'

'If you weren't occupied,' she said. 'Well, you sure look occupied.'

'Still, you could have joined us,' I said. "The ladies would have been pleased.'

I wouldn't,' she said flatly. 'I bet you're all going to have lunch at the Eagle Club.'

'How do you know?'

'You are, aren't you?'

'It happens, yes.'

'I knew.' There was a note of scornful triumph in her voice. 'Women who dress like that always have lunch there.'

'You don't even know them.'

This is my second winter in Gstaad. I keep categories.'

'Do you want to join us for lunch?'

Thank you, no. That's not for me. I don't like the conversation. Especially the women. Nibbling away at reputations. Stealing each other's husbands. I'm a little disappointed in you, Mr Grimes.'

'You are? Why?'

'Being in a place like this. With ladies like that.' 'They're perfectly nice ladies,' I said. 'Don't be censorious. They haven't nibbled a reputation yet.'