Sidney Chambers and The Dangers of Temptation by James Runcie Page B

his ability to fulfil Helena’s expectations. He was sure that she was more experienced than he was and he also wanted to ask about her relationship with Inspector Keating. Had there been any funny business? They were always so odd when they were together and the inspector had been hostile towards him from the start.
    ‘I shouldn’t worry about Geordie. He’s always trying to bat above his average. It was a flirtation, nothing more. I think Helena just used her feminine wiles to extract information for the newspaper.’
    ‘It’s the feminine wiles I’m worried about. I’m not entirely sure what I’m in for. What’s marriage like? Is there anything I should know?’
    ‘This is not something that’s easy to talk about, Malcolm, especially here. All I can say is that if your love is tender and considerate and sometimes forgiving then you won’t go far wrong. It’s a matter of mutual compassion. Do you think you understand Helena?’
    ‘She’s a complex creature.’
    ‘She’s about to be your wife. You should know her pretty well by now.’
    ‘But do you
understand
Hildegard, Sidney? How much should a man know the woman he is going to marry and how much should be left to discover? Sometimes I think it’s like half-opening a present, guessing what it’s going to be and finding that it’s something entirely different.’
    ‘Then I look forward to being unwrapped.’
    Helena had arrived in the pub, approached Malcolm from behind and put her arms around his neck. She was wearing awhite smock with Jackie O sunglasses perched on her head. Neither of the men had seen her but there was a raucous jeer from the cricketers to her left.
    After buying the couple drinks and talking about the arrangements for the wedding rehearsal, Sidney dared to switch the subject and ask about her sister.
    ‘You’ve heard already?’
    ‘Geordie told me.’
    ‘We have to stop my mother finding out about the necklace . . .’
    ‘She’s that formidable?’
    ‘Will you talk to Olivia, Sidney?’
    ‘If you think it will help.’
    ‘Fortunately her boyfriend is in Corpus. That gives you an excuse.’
    ‘Now I am no longer the Vicar of Grantchester I do not have so much access to the college.’
    ‘I am sure you can find a reason.’
    ‘What do you have so far?’
    ‘Olivia’s twenty-one and she’s what you might call a free spirit. She’s always threatening to drop out and go and live in some godforsaken ashram, so I think Mummy and Daddy just kept bribing her to finish her degree. They paid for a party, to which they weren’t even invited, and Mummy lent her the necklace for the May Balls.’
    ‘She’s going to more than one?’
    ‘She could go to them all. She’s very in demand, my sister, as you’ll see. She combines beauty with availability. If her degree was in flirting, she’d get a first.’
    ‘But it’s not.’
    ‘No, it’s in English. I think that’s almost as easy. You end up studying books that most educated people are supposed to read anyway. But that’s by the by. Mummy told Olivia that she was only supposed to wear the necklace to the May Balls but my sister couldn’t resist showing it off at some ludicrous drinks party where they all got completely smashed. Now she can’t remember a thing. Sometimes she says the drinks must have been spiked. At others she blames one of her many boyfriends. The one thing she isn’t prepared to do, it seems, is to accept any responsibility herself.’
    ‘She’s not upset?’
    ‘She’s attempting a casual bravado. At least the whole disaster has happened after finals. She’s got no excuse if she’s messed them up.’
    ‘I suppose I should applaud your sense of priority.’
    ‘Don’t be pompous, Sidney. I’m annoyed with her more than anything else. Olivia could have been killed. Instead, she’s lost one of Mummy’s most valuable pieces of jewellery. I could kill her myself, I’m so annoyed.’
    ‘You’re keeping it out of the papers?’
    ‘The