In the end, I decide to stay. It is getting late and, who knows? Maybe all Continental hotels are like this. So far, I have not come to grips with enough foreigners to know what the form is. I very nearly comes to grips with Fifi because she rips off one of her high-heeled shoes and waves it under my nose before racing out of the room and rushing down the stairs. She looks like Hopalong Cassidy dragging herself through the door on one grotesquely high heel. I imagine that she is going to retrieve her wig, and wait in the room until the screams and shouts have died away. I do hope it is not as noisy as this all the time. In my present condition a good night’s undisturbed sleep is absolutely vital to my well-being.
When silence has reigned for a couple of minutes, I decide that it is safe to go downstairs. The manager has the most terrible scratches down the side of his face and is sucking his knuckles thoughtfully. It is obvious that he is not pleased with life and I am worried that he may make difficulties about ringing up Penny. To my surprise, his attitude is quite the reverse of what I had anticipated. He looks at his watch and practically snatches the telephone off its rest. The only thing I cannot make him understand is that we want to share a room. I keep trying to tell him that it must be cheaper but he shakes his head.
‘Two girl cost more,’ is all he will say. I do hope that he does not suspect that Penny and I are engaged in some unhealthy relationship. You never know how these foreigners’ minds work, do you?
When I am certain that Penny will get the message, I go upstairs again. I am not sorry to leave the foyer because it is filling up with a gaggle of over-dressed women who are lounging about in a very noisy and provocative way. I cannot understand what they are saying but they are clearly making fun of me and my Climax uniform. Their outfits make Fifi’s clothes look like something the Queen Mother would wear to open an old people’s home so I don’t know what they have got to talk about. So much for Continental chic. It’s more like shriek than chic. I return to my room and unpack my robe. I do not even have a shower, only a basin and a funny sort of foot bath thing. The Belgians are obviously very fussy about their feet. There must be a bathroom somewhere on the floor. I will have to go and look for it. I strip off my clothes and look at myself in the full length mirror – it is funny that a room so short in the fixtures and fittings department should have such a big mirror. I have hardly eaten anything in the last twenty-four hours and this has clearly done my figure some good. The little pads of flesh above my hips have disappeared and my bottom looks nice and firm when I stand sideways. My breasts, too, seem to have a good, tight line. I wonder what my one-day Mr Right would say if he could see me now? The thought makes me blush. I wonder what he looks like – not in the nude, of course! The very idea makes me blush even redder. It is strange, but when I look into the mirror I almost feel that I can make out the outline of a man behind the glass. It must be some kind of thought projection. I read an article about it in Titbits. Perhaps I am sciatic? Best to go and find the bathroom and not meddle with the unknown. What the future holds for us will be revealed in good time. I slip on my robe and notice that the air conditioning switches itself off immediately. I could distinctly hear it whirring when I was in front of the mirror. How strange. There is certainly no change in the temperature of the room. It is just as stuffy as it was when I first came through the door – stuffier if anything. I wonder if it has something to do with the smoke coming through the ventilation grill?
I go out and pass Fifi in the corridor. She is wearing her wig and hurrying downstairs. She shakes her fist under my nose and says something unpleasant but I take no notice of her. I think there is something wrong with her, stupid old bag. There is no room with ‘salle de bain’ written on it so I try the door at the very end of the corridor. To my disappointment, there is only a rather smelly shower. What a nuisance! I was so looking forward to luxuriating in a hot sudsy bath. What is strange about the shower is that there is nowhere to hang your robe and, seemingly, nowhere for the water to come out. What I find really ridiculous are the two concrete footprints in the middle of the floor. Surely everybody knows where to stand in a shower! Maybe they are there to stop you putting your foot down the large drain hole. It really should have a grill over it. I look around for a hook and then drop my robe on the floor outside the shower. There is no point in getting in soaking wet, is there? Another puzzling feature of the shower is that there only seems to be one control. A knob set in the wall in front of me. I suppose this means that there is no hot water. What a let-down after all my hopes of sensuous soaking. Ah well, no sense in moaning. Remember you are British, Dixon. I take a deep breath, steel myself and extend an unenthusiastic thumb – WOWWWCH! There is a horrible hissing noise and a torrent of water ricochets round my ankles. I am so surprised and horrified that I tumble backwards and collapse in the corridor. The ghastly contraption must be another kind of Belgian foot bath. Do these people have no desire to wash any other part of their bodies?
As I try to pull myself together, I become conscious of laughter and excited male chatter behind me. I turn and – oh dear! Half a dozen sailors wearing a uniform I do not recognise have crowded into the corridor. Their eyes sparkle as they feast themselves upon my naked body and I scrabble desperately for my robe. How terribly embarrassing! If I had known this was going to happen I would have had a quick sponge down in the footbath. I rise to my feet and, immediately, one of the sailors snatches up my robe. He has Slavic cheek bones and I imagine that he is about to return the garment with a courteous bow. Not a bit of it! He flings it over his shoulder and gives me the most enormous squidge between the thighs. I am so taken aback that for a second I stare at his hand as if it is a visitor from another planet – of course, in that situation, it might just as well be.
‘Goodsky!’ he says approvingly. ‘Tightsky as guard on Kremlin.’
While I am trying to think what he means, his companions let out a triumphant cheer and one of them lowers the trap door of material at the front of his bell bottoms.
‘Step aside!’ I shout. ‘Have you taken leave of your senses?’ I brush past the clutching hands and, pausing to bend down and snatch up my robe – a big mistake, that – I race back to my room. And it is a race, too. The first sailor is trying to get through the door as I slam it in his face.
Hardly have I drawn breath and pressed my shoulders against the door than I receive another unpleasant shock. I am not alone in the room. A slim dark-skinned, black-haired young man is standing by the wash basin. Were I introduced to him at a Young Conservatives’ Cheese and Wine Party I would probably find his looks quite appealing but in my present ruffled state any stranger constitutes a threat.
‘What are you doing here?’ I say. ‘This is my room. If you don’t leave immediately I will call the manager!’ I move as if to fling open the door and then think better of it. I can hear the sailors talking outside and I don’t want to bump into them again in a hurry.
‘I pay man,’ says my guest in faltering English. ‘You are Inglese? Is first time with Inglese. Very nice. Hope.’ So saying, he unbuttons his flies and holds out a small bar of gift-wrapped soap that he has taken from the basin. I am struck absolutely speechless. No words will form in my mouth and I find it impossible to cry out. ‘You wash,’ he says.
It is absolutely amazing, isn’t it? Why should this perfectly normal looking young man want me to wash while he exposes himself before me? I do meet some funny people but this chap takes the biscuit. ‘You wash yourself!’ I say, unable to keep the anger out of my voice.
To my amazement, the man shrugs his shoulders and proceeds to remove the wrapping paper from the bar of soap and work up a rich lather. I have not thought it seemly to comment on the size of his ‘thing’ but it really is enormous. Quite out of proportion to the rest of him. He is slim and slight, while the piece of equipment dangling between his legs looks like a young elephant’s trunk gripping a Cox’s orange pippin. While I try and control the mixture of awe and disgust which sweeps through my affronted frame, the owner of the love bludgeon calmly proceeds to anoint it with the lather he has worked up. The sight is enough to send shivers of horror through the most corrupted heart and the effect on my delicate sensibilities can be imagined. It is only by clinging to the knob at the end of the bed post that I manage to exert some control over myself.