‘What absolute rot!’
‘You don’t want me working. You know I have a good chance of a headship, so you want me here, trapped and ordinary. Geoff, you really ought to have married someone like Pristine. She’s good with a feather duster and doesn’t know her Cartland from her Trollope. It would have suited you to have a wife who could scarcely read and write, because you have an inferiority complex. In order to prop yourself up, you need the reassurance of a so-called lesser being. Well, I’m not a lesser being and I’ve no intention of becoming one.’
He sighed loudly. ‘I suppose there’s no point in arguing, though I never heard so much rubbish in my life.’ He paused. ‘Are you . . . are you going to leave me?’
‘I don’t know,’ she lied. Because she had to lie now, just as she had to leave.
‘What about Melanie?’
‘Again, I don’t know. Unlike you, I don’t pretend to have the answers. There is nothing positive here for me, and there’s much that’s negative. Your mother in permanent residence will be the icing . . .’
‘Then I’ll keep her away!’
‘No point. Nothing can make matters worse, and you know damned well that she won’t stay away for two days together. No. Life’s bad. I had to make a terrible decision the other day, a decision that involved a poor little unborn soul. After that fiasco, your mother is easy meat. I can’t stand the woman, but she can’t hurt me. Not now. Nothing can hurt me now. Because, you see, I’ve already gone away in the truest sense. Now that you know everything about how I feel, well, it’s rather like being divorced already.’
He cleared his throat. ‘Is there nothing we can do?’
‘Nothing at all.’
His head was bowed now as he spoke. ‘I don’t know how I feel about you any more, Kate. You’ve changed so much . . .’ His voice tailed away as if he were lost in some private memory. ‘Can’t we keep it going?’ he asked then. ‘On the surface at least?’
‘Why? To save face, to stop you appearing a failure? Look, I know you have other women. Go off with one of them and make it look like your decision. It won’t bother me. As my mother always taught me, pride won’t pay the rent.’
‘Bloody hell,’ he cursed quietly. ‘Poor Melanie.’
Kate watched Jemima waddling across the road to the brook. Jemima looked after her ducklings, just as Kate had, whenever Dora had allowed it, seen to Melanie’s physical requirements. But Kate didn’t always like Melanie. Obliquely, she found herself wondering whether or no the duck always liked her offspring.
‘Are you listening to me, Kate?’
‘What? Sorry . . .’
‘I said you can’t take Melanie with you if you go.’
‘No.’
‘And even your daughter cannot hold you here?’
‘Stop trying to blackmail me! She’s thirteen now. It’s too late for me to put right the ruination performed by your mother. In fact, Melanie is so much like Dora at times that I almost dislike her too.’
‘I see.’ His voice held an icy tone. ‘So none of us is required by you, is that it? And we’re to sit here in the pending tray until you decide whether we’re incoming or outgoing?’
‘Shut up.’
‘You always were a selfish and arrogant bitch, Kate. Too good for Ladies’ Circle, too good to support me at Round Table. I was actually relieved to turn forty! And for the last eight years, you’ve shown no interest in my Rotary work. Even my job is a bloody joke to you, isn’t it? All those remarks about American companies and how you hoped they’re better run than the war was. These things are noticed. Your sense of so-called humour is twisted to the point of being dangerous, Kate. What makes you so different? What sets you apart from all the other wives?’
She gazed at him steadily. ‘I don’t know. I really don’t know. But I sure as hell am going to find out!’
She spent the rest of the evening with Maureen, Phil having taken his sister to meet some remote cousin up in Rochdale.
‘I can’t go on,’ wailed Kate. ‘I’m sick of men. My father was useless and made me feel useless, Geoff treats me almost as badly.’
‘Stop feeling so bloody sorry for yourself. You got yourself pregnant by him, didn’t you? How the hell can you get pregnant by a man you loathe? I couldn’t sleep with Phil if I didn’t love him.’
Kate half-smiled. ‘You’re so naive, Mo. I pretend he’s somebody else. Most women pretend their husbands are somebody else, don’t they?’
‘Eh?’ Maureen’s eyes were round with shock. ‘I don’t. I’ve only ever needed Phil. Who do you pretend about?’
‘Someone I used to know. Another spineless bastard, but at least he was gifted at something.’
‘Good God!’
They stared into the fire, each lost in her own private thoughts. Maureen was worried, Kate sensed that. And it was nothing to do with the abortion or with the topic of conversation tonight. Whatever it was, Maureen was not yet ready to open up. When she did become ready, Kate would be the first to hear about the trouble.
But what was she going to do about her own mess? Where could she go, who would take her in? Rachel? Oh, Rachel would never turn her back, not completely, not on her own daughter. But Kate had the need for a completely fresh start in a place of her own, yet she had not the money to buy a house. It would have to be rented. Where? Where would she go?
Maureen broke into this glum reverie. ‘What do you do when he’s unfaithful?’
‘Why? Is Phil at it now?’
‘No!’ The denial was rather swift and emphatic.
Kate raised her shoulders and arms in a hopeless gesture. ‘What can I do? What could I ever have done about it? Of course, I blamed myself at first. I wasn’t a good wife, wasn’t lively enough in bed, couldn’t keep him interested. It took a long time for me to realize that I didn’t count, except as an image of a wife. No matter who he’d married, Geoff would have been unfaithful. It’s in his nature, it’s his personal weakness. So I’ve tended to ignore it.’
‘How? How can you ignore such an enormous problem?’
‘By stopping caring. It was an act of will, Mo. Funnily enough, it had precious little to do with my emotions. I just decided not to worry when he was away. Now, I don’t even think about it except when I need to throw it in his face. Of course, I never speak of it in front of his mother, she simply wouldn’t believe me. It would be nutty old Kate all over again, imagining things, getting it all wrong.’
Maureen sighed. ‘You’ve had a hard life, love, what with your father and all.’
‘Yes, but I’m still here. I do have some faith in myself, you know. Somewhere, buried under piles of rubbish in my brain, there’s a lot of personal ambition and drive. It won’t be long now, Mo. The tide of my life is shifting. As Macmillan said just a few months ago, there’s a wind of change.’
‘What the hell are you up to now, Kate? Wasn’t the abortion enough?’
‘The abortion was just the beginning.’
Kate refused a lift from Maureen, choosing to walk the half mile or so that separated their two houses. Beside the brook, she stopped and searched the twilight for Jemima. ‘Where do you go at night,’ she whispered. ‘And is there room for me?’
7
Maureen Carter ran past the Golden Lion, her bright bleached hair streaming behind her like the wake of a boat. For once, she took no leisurely joy from her surroundings, didn’t care to study the Victorian village hall, the beautiful church spire, the rows of ancient gravestones. She paused for breath beside St Peter’s boundary wall, a hand straying along grey stones as she fought for breath and composure. Across the way, the top of a familiar reddish head was just visible in the doorway of the supermarket, the rest of her friend’s body being obscured by a gaggle of gossiping females in the shop’s broad entrance. It must be Kate, had to be Kate! And she had better be coming out, not going in to start on the week’s list. ‘Kate!’ she yelled, her tone wavering, ‘Kate, it’s me, over here!’
Kate crossed th
e narrow road carefully, shoulders dragged down by her newly acquired burdens. ‘Glad to see you, these bags must weigh about a ton. Have you brought the Mini?’
Maureen nodded, too winded for speech.
‘You’ll have to cut out the fags, flower. You sound like an old puffer steaming its way into Trinity Street. Hey, what’s up with you at all?’ She looked hard into the older woman’s haggard face. Maureen Carter was still pretty, fortyish, very dainty and always extremely well-groomed. But the hair was limp and tangled, the nails chipped and half-covered in flaking fuchsia-coloured polish, while the usual ornaments – bangles, beads and earrings – were remarkable by their absence. ‘Come on now, Mo. This’ll never do, will it? I’m not used to seeing you looking so down in the mouth.’ Kate dropped her shopping into a careless heap and placed an arm about trembling shoulders. ‘Is it the end of the world, or what?’
‘It’s near the end. We can’t talk here.’ Maureen snatched up one of the bags and marched ahead, leaving Kate to tag along behind with the rest of the parcels. At a half-run, they passed the wallpaper shop, the fruit and veg, the newsagent, finally coming to an abrupt halt outside the National Westminster where Maureen’s small red car was slewed at an angle that barred the entrance to the bank’s parking lot.
An angry motorist jumped out of his Jag and approached the two women. ‘What sort of parking do you call that?’ he barked, his lip curled into a sneer.
‘Imaginative,’ snapped Kate with a strength she didn’t feel. Maureen said nothing; she simply began to hurl parcels into the Mini’s back seat.
‘Bloody women drivers!’ shouted the Jag man. ‘Pathetic. No idea, no idea at all.’
Maureen straightened, a hand resting on the roof of her car. ‘I’ve got plenty of ideas,’ she said coldly. ‘For a start, you can take that thing . . .’ she pointed to the rampant cat that decorated his bonnet. ‘You can take it and shove it right up your . . .’
‘Maureen!’ yelled Kate. She knew her own eyes were wide with surprise, while her lower jaw seemed to have dropped by several inches. She had never seen this side of Maureen before. Such a sensible girl, such a sweet-natured person. What was going on? It was as if Mo had changed overnight. ‘Maureen,’ she repeated. ‘We’ve got to move. The bank manager’s trying to get out of the carpark.’
Maureen immediately leapt to the gate. ‘Just the man,’ she muttered almost inaudibly. She rolled up her sleeves, then placed her hands on the bank manager’s car as if to hold back its progress. Though there was no need, because her own car was very much in the way. ‘Listen you!’ she yelled. ‘That was my money. Mine!’ She beat her breast with a closed fist. ‘Fourteen years I’ve taught the unteachable for that money. Fourteen bloody years!’ She turned to the Jag driver. ‘Why don’t you go to the Midland, sonny-boy? It might save you a bob or two. I parked here for a reason, you understand. See him? The bloody bank bloody manager? He’s given all my money away . . .’
Kate began to chew her fingernails, something she had not done for thirty years, ever since her mother had dipped them in bitter aloes. She had to stop Mo making this awful scene, she must. But how?
The bank official wound down his window. ‘Mrs Carter, calm yourself, please. It was a joint account, either signature would do.’
‘You could have warned me!’
‘Warning you was not part of our agreement, Mrs Carter . . .’
Maureen’s hands shaped themselves into talons. ‘Putting a brick through your windscreen isn’t in our contract either, but I’m considering it. You could have warned me. You should have . . .’
Kate took a few deep breaths. This wasn’t Maureen, this wasn’t her dear friend. How could she cope with or talk to someone she didn’t even know? It would be like tackling a wild animal! And the ice-cream would be melting soon, she thought irrelevantly. It would probably drip all over the sausages.
An inquisitive crowd was gathering, and Kate thanked the stars that both she and Maureen worked on the other side of Bolton. The parents would have soaked this up like water in a sponge.
‘The agreement,’ the manager was saying now. ‘Both you and Mr Carter were cognisant of . . .’ He checked himself as the pavement filled with people. ‘This is neither the time nor the place,’ he muttered.
Maureen jumped on to the bonnet of his car, folding her arms as she claimed this very strange piece of seating. ‘I’m waiting here for my housekeeping,’ she pronounced clearly.
‘I’ll give you some,’ whispered Kate in desperation. She could feel those icy fingers creeping round her stomach. If this went on much longer, she would have a full-blown panic attack. ‘Come on, for goodness sake. Look, the bin men are trying to get through and there’s a coal lorry too. The police will be along soon . . .’
‘I don’t care!’ Maureen tossed her head and Kate was suddenly touched deeply, partly because she knew that Maureen did care, but mostly because she glimpsed a good half inch of dark roots near her friend’s scalp. Oh God, this was so sad. Here was Maureen’s vulnerability on show for all the world, well, for all of Edgeford to see. ‘I want my money, I want my money!’ This chant was turning the situation into an even bigger farce.
‘I’ll give you some,’ repeated Kate. ‘Anything you want, just clear the road.’ She glanced at the tailback which stretched now from the church to the bottom of Cross Pit Lane. ‘Move the Jag,’ she hissed imperiously at the increasingly angry motorist.
‘What?’ The man’s face was contorted with passion. ‘I’m trying to get into the bank.’
‘You’re stopping the traffic,’ said Kate with a degree of confidence that belied her terrible nervousness. ‘Move the Jag, I’ll move the Mini. Then you can get in and Mr Shaw . . .’ She jerked a thumb in the direction of the red-faced bank manager, ‘can get out.’
‘You can’t drive,’ announced Maureen to the world in general.
‘I know. I’ve never been allowed. But give me the keys anyway.’
‘Not till I get some money.’
Kate walked to the open window of the large blue Ford. ‘Give me some money,’ she ordered wearily. He pushed a five-pound note at her.
‘Not enough!’ screamed Maureen. After assimilating the steely stare that occupied the face of his bonnet squatter, the manager pushed two further notes into Kate’s hands. ‘I’ll pay you back tomorrow,’ mouthed the shamefaced recipient of this bounty.
‘That will have to do, I suppose.’ Maureen jumped down, leapt into the Mini, screaming off in reverse almost before Kate had time to close the passenger door behind herself. ‘Dear Lord, you’ll hit the Jag!’
‘Good.’
‘Maureen, behave yourself!’ Kate shouted as they sped forward past the newsagent, the fruit and veg, the wallpaper shop. ‘You’ll have us both dead.’
‘Sorry.’ The car screeched to a halt opposite the church, its weeping driver burying her face in her hands. ‘Oh God,’ she sobbed, ‘where did I go wrong? Where?’
‘I don’t know. It’s a mystery to me. Why are you so upset? I’ve never seen you like this before. Come on, calm down. Whatever it is, it’s not worth making yourself ill, is it?’
The tiny woman leaned back in the seat, her face wrinkled as she struggled with tears and thoughts that were obviously unsavoury. ‘When you said the other day – when you were talking about imagining other men – I was shocked, Kate. He’s always been enough for me. I’ve loved him ever since the first time I set eyes on him. But I felt a bit guilty when we were having that chat, because I have fancied other men. Just in passing, nothing serious.’
‘That’s all right. It’s perfectly normal.’
‘Like the young Reverend . . .’ she waved an arm towards the church. ‘And the dentist. Then last New Year at Beryl’s party, there was that young policeman. I dreamt about him for days. This is probably my punishment for being mentally unfaithful.’
‘What are you on about at all?’
‘Men. I’m on about men.’
‘I see. Lif
e’s great confusion, eh?’ Kate grabbed her companion’s arm. ‘Now that you’ve calmed down a bit, you can tell me what this is all about. If you don’t, I shall get out and walk. Because you are driving me nowhere except stark raving bonkers.’
‘Oh, am I? Sorry.’
‘It’s like a flaming detective novel. I don’t know whodunnit, or what they done, or who they dunnit to.’
Maureen shifted in her seat and gazed at Kate, her eyes hollow, empty and enormous in the small pale face. ‘No. You don’t know, do you? Though after what you went through with the abortion and all, you must have some idea of pain. Tell me, is shock bad for diabetes? Can it shove you over into a coma?’
Kate shrugged as lightly as she could. ‘Not sure. But I suppose we’ll soon find out, eh?’
Maureen shivered. ‘I can’t say it. Saying it will make it more real. I can show you, but I can’t talk about it. Perhaps I’ll be able to talk after you’ve seen it.’
‘Seen what? Bloody what?’
‘The kids were in a bit of a state, so I took them to my mother’s.’
‘Oh heck. You . . . you haven’t . . . killed anyone, have you?’
‘Not yet. But in view of my terrible behaviour just now, I wouldn’t put anything past me. Maybe I’m working up to that one. Slowly.’
Kate’s head dropped as she spoke. ‘Actually, it’s not a complete mystery. I gather that Phil has cleaned out the joint bank account and left you penniless?’
Nest of Sorrows Page 15