‘Didn’t he know about Scarlet?’ asked Pip, cutting across her thoughts.
Evelyn shook her head. ‘I suppose he might have worked it out. I left his film set pregnant and he’d had sex with me some months beforehand. It’s hardly rocket science.’
‘Was he your boyfriend? You weren’t married, were you?’ Pip asked.
The young could be so prudish, Evelyn thought.
‘No and no, definitely not,’ she replied.
Pip seemed to hesitate before delving further, as if she were fearful of crossing a line. She really did look dreadful, Evelyn thought, although there was a little more colour in her cheeks after their walk along the prom.
Then Pip gave Evelyn a smirk and raised her eyebrows suggestively. ‘Was it a one-night stand?’ she asked, dropping her voice to a whisper.
‘More of a one-afternoon stand,’ replied Evelyn coolly.
‘Blimey!’ said Pip, her bloodshot eyes suddenly wide. ‘I would never have had you pegged as a “one-afternoon stand” kind of woman.’
Evelyn felt a little gratified at this, although she wasn’t sure what she was proud of – not being thought of as that kind of woman, or the sex itself.
‘I wasn’t,’ she said. ‘This was the one and only occasion on which such a thing happened. And this one shouldn’t have, either. But if it hadn’t, I would never have had my darling Scarlet, and I wouldn’t have been without her, no matter what I had to put up with.’
Pip’s smirk slipped. ‘What do you mean?’ she asked. Her whole demeanour had altered. ‘Was it against your will?’ Her voice was so low that Evelyn could barely make out her words.
‘No, no,’ Evelyn replied. ‘It wasn’t rape. But I’m not sure I entirely agreed to it.’
‘Then that’s rape, surely?’
‘Oh, Pip,’ replied Evelyn with a sigh. ‘Things are rarely ever that straightforward.’
Pip sat up straighter in her chair. ‘Well, that is,’ she said sharply. ‘There is no doubt. You either consented or you didn’t. There are no half measures.’
Evelyn wasn’t at all sure she was right. ‘Well, I went into his room willingly. When he suggested we had sex, I was a little shocked. It wasn’t at all what I was expecting. I was more naive than anything, I suppose. I thought it was a business meeting, you see. I had no idea . . .’
Pip’s mouth fell open and creases appeared across her smooth brow. ‘What exactly happened, Evelyn?’ she asked, her tone suddenly very serious. She shifted forward in her chair, her spine straight and her eyes boring straight into Evelyn’s.
Evelyn felt a little as if she were being interviewed. Was this how Pip dealt with her clients? She shuffled a little and let her eyes fall to the Formica table between them. ‘It’s all such a long time ago,’ she said vaguely, but Pip was having none of it.
‘Come on, Evelyn. Are you seriously trying to tell me that you can’t remember?’
Evelyn could see she was on a hiding to nothing taking that line. So she took a deep breath and let it out in a sigh. ‘His name was Rory MacMillan and he was the producer of a television show that I’d been cast in. My agent thought I had the part in the bag, but he told me I had to go to a meeting at Mr MacMillan’s hotel to go over some final details.’
Evelyn surprised herself by using such a formal description of the man. People didn’t really do that these days. The use of titles had fallen by the wayside and yet, despite everything, Evelyn felt compelled to use his. Pip’s expression altered minutely, but she didn’t stop her.
‘When I got there, he asked me if I wanted a drink, and then one thing led to another and we ended up having sex.’
‘But you didn’t want to?’ asked Pip.
Evelyn twisted her mouth as she composed an answer. ‘Well, I hadn’t intended to. It wasn’t what I was expecting when I walked into that room.’
‘So he forced you?’
Evelyn shook her head. ‘No, he didn’t force me. But I didn’t really have a choice. If I wanted the part – and I did, I really did – then that was the price I needed to pay. I knew that and so did he. That’s how it was back then. It was just the way it worked.’
Pip sat back in her chair and shook her head slowly. ‘Evelyn. Have you ever talked to anyone about this, about what happened to you?’ she asked.
Her voice was quiet now, and Evelyn had the impression she had missed something that seemed obvious to Pip. She shook her head.