“What, knitting patterns and that sort of thing?” My love spoke with mounting affection and hopefully took the pounding of my heart for wifely reciprocation. It was silly to feel guilty about what had occurred, but I felt like Judas when I planted a kiss on Ben’s lips. “Did your mother say anything about my abrupt departure?”
“She didn’t get the chance. I did all the talking, Ellie, and I think she got the message that this is your house and she is to stop taking over and sacking the help.”
“There’s only Jonas left and, if we are to make his efforts pay off, I suggest you see your father, sow the seeds of jealousy, and do your best to make them sprout.”
“Easy said as done, sweetheart! I’ll let slip that Jonas has taken up weight-lifting and is thinking of dyeing his hair.”
“Is he?” I was seized by unreasonable alarm.
“Of course not!” Ben switched position with breathless haste so that his eyes—blazing into mine—became a kaleidoscope of shifting blues and greens. The fictional Sir Edward had nothing on my husband when it came to grand passion, and I soon realized
without too much regret that we had taken the subject of his parents to its natural conclusion.
“Darling,” I heard myself say, “if you kept a harem, would I be your favourite wife?”
Afterwards took its own sweet time coming, but eventually the room came back from fade-out and we lay holding hands until Ben drifted back to sleep and I started thinking about Mum alone in her tower bedroom. Surprisingly I didn’t focus on whether she had been roused from her slumbers but on the possibility that the lofty chest of drawers would come crashing down if she did decide to scale its narrow ledge to check along the top for dust. A case of my conscience getting the better of my common sense; but as I thumped my pillow and turned over, I did wonder if Eudora, Frizzy, and Pamela were embarrassed by what we had talked about at the Dark Horse. Oh, for heaven’s sake! I burrowed deeper under the bedclothes. Our behaviour might have been immature, but so long as our mothers-in-law never got wind of it, where was the harm?
Daylight banished any lingering unease. By the time I had taken my bath, put on a maidenly print frock, and rescued my young from the imprisonment of their cots, I was eager to make a fresh start with Mum. Having completed his morning makeover, Ben met up with me on the landing to take Tam, sporting a sailor suit, from my arms. Off father and son sallied to conquer the kitchen, where Abbey and I soon joined them.
The chairs stood four-square around the table; the plates and bowls stood to attention on the Welsh dresser. From the window I could see Jonas working in the garden. Everything and everyone was in its rightful place … except Mum. I was surprised not to find her at the sink, dismantling the taps in order to give the washers a polish.
“Ben”—I turned from seating Abbey in her booster chair—“have you seen your mother?”
“No.” He poured a sample measure of freshly
brewed coffee into a cup and applied his nose to savour the bouquet before taking an experimental sip which, after much rolling around the tongue, was found to be of suitable vintage, and duly swallowed. “She’s probably still in bed.”
Rubbish! We both knew the only time Mum would agree to a lie-in was when the coffin lid closed. What could be wrong? A particular piece of bedroom furniture loomed large in my fears, even though it was lunacy to picture her being pressed to death like the Blessed (or was it Saint?) Margaret Clitherow. Ben and I couldn’t have failed to hear if that chest of drawers had come tumbling down, unless … my blood ran cold … it had happened when we were making love and the trombones and clarinets were at their zenith.
Leaving the twins in their booster chairs under the watchful eye of Daddy, who promised not to feed them eggs Benedict, I raced upstairs to tap on Mum’s door.
“Hello, it’s me, Ellie!”
No answer.
I knocked again. This time, to my relief, I was rewarded with a tiny invitation to “Come in.”
When I timidly complied, I found Mum stretched out in bed with the sheet up to her chin, looking as if she were only waiting for a well-wisher to close her eyes and drop a couple of pennies on her alabaster lids.
“Don’t worry about intruding.” She didn’t so much as turn her head my way. “As my poor boy made plain last night, this is your home, not mine.”
“Aren’t you feeling well?” I hovered by the bedside while the skyscraper dresser mocked me from the wall.
“I’m as right as can be expected.” The ghostly words were spoken without a flicker of expression or eyelash.
“Good!” I looked around for someone to come to my aid, but the Grecian nymphs on the mantelpiece had their hands full holding up their bronze skirts. “Ben just made coffee and I could bring some up, or if you would prefer to come down …”
“That’s very kind of you, Ellie.” I heard a sigh so weak, it wouldn’t have fogged a mirror held to her lips. “But if it’s all the same with you, I’ll stay here out from underfoot. That way I can’t be accused of causing trouble and you can get on with whatever it is you do all day. All I want is my son’s happiness.”
“He won’t be very chipper if you put yourself to bed for life.” I tried to soften the words, but my patience was wearing as thin as Mum’s hair, which stuck out from her face in forlorn wisps.
“There’s no need to be sarcastic, Ellie; but when all’s said and done, I don’t suppose you will have me cluttering up the place for long.” It was pure chance that her eyes fixed upon the dresser, which to my nervous gaze appeared to be on the point of keeling over, with or without outside help.
“Please, Mum.” Sitting gingerly down on the bed, I said with all the firmness I could muster, “You mustn’t talk about dying.”
After looking blank for a second, her face cleared. “I meant you wouldn’t have to put up with me if I went ahead and married Jonas; he was talking last night about buying a little cottage with a thatched roof and roses around the door.”
“And I suppose you’d have Miss Marple living next door?” I am ashamed to say I let my irritation get the better of me.
“Who?”
“The village busybody. But don’t get me wrong,” I added quickly, “it all sounds extremely romantic and I am sure Dad will be sick with jealousy. Not that you give a fig bar what he thinks.”
Mum’s sniff was somewhat ambiguous.
“Jonas is a dear, wonderful man”—I sat pleating the corner of her sheet—“and I’m sure you would quickly adjust to his sleeping in his gardening boots.”
This wicked fib did not fall on fertile ground. Squaring her birdlike shoulders, Mum managed a courageous
smile. “After nearly forty years with Eli, I can cope with pretty much anything.”
“I’m sure you can,” I soothed, “but I don’t know that you will be able to wean Jonas away from the Church of England. He’s a
pillar
of our little congregation.” This at least was not a complete fabrication. To my certain knowledge, Jonas had attended St. Anselm’s on two occasions—my wedding and the twins’ christening.
Finally! I had scored a bull’s-eye. Mum blinked uneasily and murmured, “I must have heard what I wanted to hear. The way I understood it, he was C. of E. in name only. Are you telling me”—she shrank down in the pillows—“that he
passes
the collection plate?”
“And changes the numbers on the hymn board,” I assured her without a blush. “You did know he’s an elder?” At seventy-odd, surely no one could deny Jonas that distinction. “Oh, well, diversity is the spice of life. I’m sure you will be able to work things out—perhaps one Sunday at his church, the next at yours. After all, you and Dad coped with your difference all these years.…”
“That’s not the same thing at all!” Mum bobbed up like a jack-in-the-box. “It wasn’t the Jewish people who destroyed our monasteries and pinched our holy relics!”
“To say nothing of a few nuns’ bottoms in the process,” I agreed, with a sorry shake of the head.
“What my parents refused to see when I told them I wanted to marry Eli”—Mum’s sparrow eyes filmed with tears—“is that Catholics and Jews have a
lot
in common.”
“Of course they do,” I concurred. “There’s the Old Testament and—”
“And more important”—
sniff
—“is that I grew up with the mass in Latin while Eli attended services in Hebrew, so neither one of us understood a
word
of what was going on.”
“That would make for a strong bond.”
Mum looked at me in amazement bordering on shock. “Are you telling me, Ellie, that you understand why I did what I did?”
“Absolutely. In respecting Dad’s religious convictions you couldn’t insist that he marry you in a church any more than he could have demanded that the wedding take place in a synagogue, and neither of you could have accepted a heathen registry office.”
“So you don’t lump me in the same category as other fallen women … like Tricks?”
“Of course not,” I said firmly. “You’re much prettier.”
“Am I?” A smile wavered on her lips, and I wondered with a pang of guilt if this was the first compliment of a personal nature I had ever paid her.
“You put Tricks completely in the shade.” I laid my hand on hers. “Which doesn’t mean you shouldn’t gild the lily. Have you ever thought”—I was getting really daring—“about putting a rinse in your hair and using a smudge of shadow to bring out the sparkle in your eyes?”
She lay so still against the pillows that for a moment I thought I had gone too far, but then she said softly, “That’s one thing I’ve missed in life—having a daughter to help keep me smart.”
“We could have a beauty session today.” I gave her hand a squeeze. “I was looking at my hair this morning and thinking I need two inches cut off the ends.”
“You want me to cut it for you?”
“If you wouldn’t mind.”
“Well, if you’re sure you have a decent pair of scissors …” Sitting up, Mum pushed back the bedclothes and reached for her dressing gown at the foot of the bed. “I must say, Ellie, I’m not usually in favour of women your age wearing their hair long, but on you it looks better than most.”
“Thank you.” Picking up her slippers and handing them to her, I thought, Is that where I’ve gone wrong? Had I been guilty of never asking for her help or advice
because my own insecurities necessitated I present myself as the model wife and mother when in the company of the woman whose son I had appropriated? While Mum was buttoning up her dressing gown I moved casually over to the dresser, which had figured in my idle little plot to murder her and, upon a hands-on inspection, realized that guilt had made an idiot of me. That piece of furniture was as unbudgeable as the Rock of Gibraltar.
“You go on down, Ellie”—Mum was plumping up the pillows and spreading up her sheets—“I need some time to sort things out in my head.”
“Take all the time you want.” I moved towards the door. “By the way, where’s Sweetie?”
“Under the bed.”
“And we haven’t heard a peep out of her.” Hope reared its naughty head that the doggie would dig her way to China and chew up
their
Oriental rugs.
“She had a bad night. Not, of course, that you should feel guilty about that, Ellie.”
Hand on the doorknob, I said, “Perhaps she would like a magazine.” On Sweetie’s last visit she had devoured several copies of
Woman’s Own
.
“That’s all right, she took one of my crocheting patterns under the bed with her.” To my delight, Mum smiled as if she really meant it, and I heard myself asking if she would mind doing some ironing for me sometime.
“I know Ben misses the way you do his shirts.”
“Since you mention it, Ellie, I did notice that you press the creases in instead of out, but we can’t be good at everything and I’m sure you could teach me a thing or two.” She was clearly racking her brain. “I’ve got it, you could show me how to defrost frozen dinners.”
“It’s a deal,” I said, and headed downstairs convinced beyond a shadow of doubt that everything was coming up sunshine and roses.
On reaching the kitchen I found Ben draining a cup of coffee, one eye on the clock.
“How was she?”
“Fine. We kissed and made up.” I bustled him towards the garden door. “It dawned on me that incredible as it sounds, I may have been to blame for part of the problem. But I don’t want to hold you up doing a rehash. What are you going to do about the cars—take mine and worry about getting yours later?”
“I’d better hurry,” he said, shrugging into his jacket, “if I’m to have my meaningful talk with Dad, before setting down to Abigail’s.”
While the twins fussed in their booster chairs, I retrieved his car keys from my raincoat pocket, placed them lovingly in his hand, and waited for both his well-shod feet to clear the step before closing the door firmly behind him.
“Daddy’s all gone bye-bye,” I carolled at my impatient twosome, but before we could get down to a serious game of patter-cake on this, the fifth day of the tournament, the door banged open and Jonas came stomping into the kitchen with a big bunch of dahlias in his hands.
He shoved them at me. “Here you go, Ellie girl. Thought you might like something to brighten your day.”
“You’re a dear!” I gave him a peck on his grizzled cheek and received a grunt in return. The window showed a square of rheumy-eyed morning which promised to turn into a day of fretful rain and whining wind. But Jonas, as I understood it, was talking about the atmospheric pressure inside the house. His eyes under the shaggy brows were worried and his moustache had more of a droop than usual when he said, “You done wandering off, lass?”
“I’m back in harness,” I promised. Avoiding Abbey’s grab for the dahlias, I went over to the Welsh dresser to get down a vase. And when Jonas next spoke, I sensed he was glad I had my back to him.
“Did you hear tell, girl, as how I asked Magdalene to marry me?”
“Word leaked out.” I was about to say I was wise to his little game and thought it might just do the trick where Mum and Dad were concerned, when a knock came at the garden door. Bunging the flowers in the vase, I opened up, fully expecting to see Freddy on the doorstep with an empty porridge bowl in his hands and a hopeful smile on his lips.
“Mr. Savage,” I cried. “So you’re back safe and sound!”