The Widow's Club (20 page)

No one answered.

Mrs. Hanover had come out from behind the bar, and other patrons were converging toward the windows. There were exclamations of “What in the world?” And from outside came shouts, feet pounding.

Bunty peered around and shrugged. “I’m a teacher. Aerobics. Every Thursday afternoon at the church hall, St. Anselm’s, which is superconvenient for you, Ellie. Didn’t you just lose a lot of weight?”

I hate that expression. I hadn’t misplaced part of me. I’d starved it to death an ounce at a time.

Now the patrons of The Dark Horse were piling toward the glass doors. All except the Raincoat Man; he was standing at the bar, his back to me … and he was so familiar in that stance that I couldn’t move, even when I heard someone ask whether Lloyd’s Bank had been burgled. I shut my eyes and saw myself looking into our drawing room in the middle of the night and seeing a man in front of the fireplace.

The pub door crashed open; a voice broke over the gabbling. “Terrible accident … building under reconstruction
 … half the bloody floor caved in … poor devil fell forty feet! Someone said his wife was here in town … anyone seen her?”

I forgot the Raincoat Man. My legs felt like they were dissolving. The carpenters had warned Ben that the attic floor of Abigail’s was unsafe.

From the Files of
The Widows Club

WRITTEN REPORT FROM MRS. M. SMITH RE:

MRS. SHIRLEY DAFFY, 15th December

I trust the Board and our venerable President will appreciate I imply no criticism when reporting that Mrs. Daffy is upset over the failure of The Widows Club to admit her to its ranks. As her contact, I have explained that some men cling to life after everything humanly possible has been done to remove it from their grasp.

I have attempted to boost her spirits with the old adage, third time lucky. But I feel that Mrs. Daffy is in need of special moral support. I, therefore, request that we make an exception and allow her to participate in club functions even though she has not been initiated or received her badge. Inclusion in the bus trip to Skegness might do her the world of good.

Respectfully submitted,

Mabel Smith

Notation by Millicent Parsnip, Recording Secretary:

Suggestion vetoed by the Board, but a basket of fruit sent to Mrs. Daffy.

… “The accident victim, was, of course, neither Ben nor cousin Fredrick,” supplied Hyacinth. “It was that cat-o’-nine-lives, Mr. Vernon Daffy. He had gone to look at a house scheduled to be condemned and suffered only a few fractured ribs in the fall, I understand.”

“According to his receptionist, as reported in
The Daily Spokesman
, someone had telephoned to say the town council might change its mind about demolition. Mr. Daffy could get lucky, if he put in a quick bid on the building.”

“His wife was where?” Hyacinth separated a couple of pages in the notebook which had stuck together.

“Having her hair done at Sidney’s, but apparently she quite frequently stopped at The Dark Horse. She and Mrs. Hanover are chummy.”

“The man in the raincoat interests me.” Primrose adjusted the shawl around her narrow shoulders and fingered her Mickey Mouse watch. “Foolish creature to be so conspicuous but men don’t have our flair for disguise.…”

We were in the drawing room sipping our predinner sherry. Freddy had joined us for dinner, yet again, that evening. After discussing Mr. Daffy’s close call, I mentioned Miss Thorn’s news concerning Vanessa’s recent trips to Chitterton Fells, notably St. Anselm’s. Freddy scratched at his chef’s hat (which he wore everywhere these days, even on the motorbike) and said, “Guess this means we’ll
have to invite dear old Vinegar for Christmas; can’t have the neighbors chinwagging about our neglect.” He licked the inside of his glass. “Ah, well, shouldn’t be too bad if we include the worthy Reverend Rowland and the gruesome church organist. It might even be fun watching Vin hone her wit on their deadly dull lives.”

Getting up from the Queen Anne chair, I set my glass on the mantel. “Nice of you to take on the burden of planning Christmas, Freddy.” I ignored Ben’s look. “Will Jill be joining us, too?”

“No.” Freddy punched down his hat. “We agreed when we parted on total noncommunication, except of a telepathic nature, until the eighteenth of May. My birthday.”

“Shrewd move.” Ben gathered the glasses onto the silver salver. “Ellie, perhaps you should get in touch with Vanessa. If she’s been coming down here, she must be very much at loose ends. And it does look bad, our not having her over even for tea.”

“All right … darling.” Anything else would have sounded insecure. I read his eyes; he was already orchestrating that tea, succulent shrimp toasts, gooseberry tarts. Vanessa would rave while I said the radishes tasted fresh. Damn. It would have been so much easier if Ben had been a banker or an undertaker.

“Freddy, want to give me a hand with dinner?” Ben picked up the salver. “Ellie, sweetheart, put your feet up and relax.”

Nothing is more tension-inducing than striving to relax. I stared at the closed door. Phoning Vanessa might be an improvement. First, I would ask Ben how many minutes we should invite her to stay.

The kitchen door was ajar and I heard him say, “Darn it, Freddy, of course I’m worried about my mother, but I don’t want Ellie to think—” The electric mixer blared on. “You know how she’s been lately.”

Tobias came meowing down the hall. He’d get me caught eavesdropping on my own husband. “You know how she’s been lately;” that had to mean since the wedding. I scooped up Tobias. Was it possible Ben, too, had noted the absence of violins? But supposing he had. Surely he wouldn’t discuss anything of so intimate a nature with Freddy, of all people. Wait—hadn’t I read that men did
that sort of thing? Engaging in male-bonding conversations such as, “I say, old chap, been having a spot of bother with the wife. Isn’t twanging as she should.”

Everything I had read in
Marriage Takes Two
stressed the importance of confronting issues head-on, before insecurities grew like weeds and took over the marital flower garden.

I scratched Tobias’s ears and told both of us that Ben had only meant I was depressed about Dorcas and Jonas leaving. A secure wife wouldn’t resent his talking to Freddy about me—or his mother.

I went to the phone and dialed. She answered at the exact moment I felt justification in hanging up.

“Hello, Vanessa.”

“Oh, it’s you. Imagine you’ve heard I’ve seen the light. It happened when I saw my first miracle, your wedding. Ellie, don’t screw up your face like that; it makes your cheeks bag.”

“I am not.” Now I would spend the rest of this bloody conversation kneading my cheeks.

“You will remember, Ellie, that Mummy was being particularly obnoxious that day, trying to seduce that suit of armour. I don’t know how I could have borne the anguish”—Vanessa yawned into the phone—“if Reverend Foxworth hadn’t been so divinely Kind. He made me finally see what I have been missing all my life—spiritually speaking.”

Naturally he had been kind to her. She was my cousin. I gritted my teeth. “Vanessa, you are welcome to stay at Merlin’s Court whenever you are in Chitterton Fells.”

“Have you left it to me in your will?”

“Of course not.”

“Then I don’t think so, thank you. As I said to someone—I think it was Reverend Foxworth—Ben and Ellie only have a couple of dozen bedrooms; I would feel I was intruding.”

Stuffing the telephone cord into my mouth, I clawed at the air. Calm again, I said, “So you couldn’t manage Christmas?”

“Let me check my calendar.” A pause. “No, darling, I have other plans.”

Good. I would invite Rowland and Miss Thorn.

*   *   *

Both declined with regret. Previous engagements. Ben’s father didn’t, of course, celebrate the twenty-fifth of December and explained over the phone to me that this was a very busy time for him, selling Christmas trees.

“On Christmas Day?”

“A lot of last-minute shoppers.”

“Any word from Mrs.… Mum?”

“Paris got another card a couple of days ago.”

She had been absent almost a month and still no word for Ben. It really was awful, but when I tried to console him he got snappish, saying it was clear his mother did not wish to put him in the middle. How could a postcard put him in the middle?

Speaking of the mail, I had heard from my Chicago correspondent, Dorcas.

Dear Ellie old sock
,

Best way to describe this place is tall and cold. Breath freezes to your face. But natives are charming. Get bombarded with such questions as, do we Brits have hot and cold running water? Inside loos? Can’t count the times I’ve been told I speak English frightfully well for a foreigner. Our monetary system also fascinates them. Want to know what’s a sixpence, a shilling and a farthing. Get frightfully disappointed when I say the old coinage has gone the way of the bustle. Now Ellie, no need to worry about Jonas, unless you are averse to baseball caps and TV dinners—only food the man eats anymore. You have my word—won’t let him out of the apartment until weather breaks. Enjoyed all news in your last letter. How is the household help situation?

Ah
, yes. During the latter days of December we had received several applications in response to our ‘Help Wanted’ advertisement in
The Daily Spokesman
. The first woman, a Mrs. Philips, was aged. How would I ever be able to leave her alone in the house, let alone see her wheezing into her bucket? For her interview I sat her in the rocking chair, fed her lunch, and heard how she was working to buy a knitting machine, something she had always craved.

The next day I had one sent to her anonymously and proceeded to interview Mrs. Hodgkins, who was young
and stalwart, but wanted to bring her boxer dog, Alfred. Personally, I didn’t object, but Tobias is rather given to these silly prejudices.

The upshot of these negative experiences was that when Mrs. Roxie Malloy presented herself on the back doorstep, on the twenty-seventh of January (Christmas had been pleasant but nothing to write about), I didn’t say the position had been filled.

“Well, what’s it to be, Mrs. H., am I to be left standing on the step like a milk bottle?”

Time is a great mellower. The memory of how she had taken an uppish attitude when Freddy threatened to jump from the tower on my wedding day had scabbed over.

Which doesn’t mean I clasped Mrs. M. to my bosom and begged her not to leave us till retirement. She entered the kitchen carrying an enormous bag containing “me supplies, Mum.” Off came her coat, revealing her tree trunk figure compressed into a bronze-and-black taffeta cocktail suit, its hem three inches lower at the rear. She wore stacked black suede shoes, and so many rings I doubted she could bend her fingers. While I put her coat on a chair, she toted the bag over to the table, stepped out of her shoes, and disparagingly assessed the navy Aga cooker, the wallpaper with its wheatsheaf pattern, and Ben’s beloved copper pans.

“Husband not home?”

“He’s at work.”

“Quite a superior establishment, this”—a hiccup punctuated this observation and confirmed my suspicion that she had diluted her morning orange juice with gin—“and in a fairly salubrious neighborhood, but we both know that anyone deciding to work here would have their work cut out for them.” Exhausted by the prospect, Mrs. Malloy sagged into a chair and lit up a fag.

“Work cut out for you?” The place gleamed. I had spent hours keeping everything shipshape for the stream of candidates.

“Got a lot of dust traps.” Mrs. Malloy waved a ring-encrusted hand past the greenery curtaining the window, to the shelf containing Ben’s collection of Victorian mixing bowls. “But should Roxie Malloy decide to take you on, you won’t have reason to complain.”

Picking up a wooden spoon, I struck out at an imaginary
insect. “Mrs. Malloy, I am happy to discuss the position with you, but I do anticipate other applicants.”

“Don’t see them knee-deep at the door, do we? But suit yourself, Mrs. H.” She heaved to her feet and stubbed out the cigarette in a plant pot. “You won’t find many with my credentials. Two mornings a week I do the executive toilets at
The Daily Spokesman
.”

“
The Daily Spokesman
? You wouldn’t happen to know
the
Felicity Friend?”

Mrs. Malloy smacked her raspberry lips. “We have met in the course of my work; to say more would be a violation of me code of ethics. Three evenings I do the offices of Bragg, Wiseman & Smith, which tells you I can keep me eyes and hands to meself, all those documents sitting around; though who could make top nor tail of them I don’t know. That poor Lady Peerless. But I suppose these modern typewriters do Latin and such. And an old maid like her, she’ll have the hot chills for him.”

“Who’s ‘him’?” I asked, feeling horribly low.

“Mr. Greek God, Lionel Wiseman, but I doubt she’s got lucky. Not with him being married to the blond chorus girl—if they
are
married, which some in these here parts doubt.” Mrs. Malloy heaved a sigh. “On the subject of men—your husband isn’t the sort who makes a nuisance of himself, I trust?”