by Jill Mansell
‘I’m just trying to explain.’
‘You don’t have to,’ said Pru. ‘It doesn’t matter any more.’
He finished his tea and rose cautiously to his feet.
‘Time I made a move. Blanche’ll be waiting for me with a frying pan.’ His smile was crooked.
‘And it won’t be for making bacon and eggs.’
‘Well, good luck.’ Pru smiled back.
At the door Phil glanced around the room again, his estate agent’s eye taking in the rotting window frames and damp walls.
‘I really am sorry, Toby,’ he used his old nickname for her, ‘about this place.’
But not quite sorry enough, Pru couldn’t help noticing, to stick his hand in his pocket and maybe give her a couple of hundred pounds out of his winnings.
‘Take care of yourself,’ she said as Phil made his way downstairs.
He grinned, evidently at the prospect of having to avoid low-flying frying pans.
‘You too, sweetheart. And thanks for putting me up.’
‘My pleasure,’ said Pm. "Bye.’
Chapter 32
‘You’re doing what?’ squealed Dulcie later that afternoon when Pru turned up on her doorstep and explained the situation so far.
‘I saw the consultant at lunchtime. He’s booked me in for surgery tomorrow morning,’ Pru explained. ‘The only problem is, I thought I’d be flat out, but apparently they don’t do that any more, they only give you local anaesthetic.’
Dulcie’s stomach cartwheeled at the prospect.
‘Gross.’
‘I know.’ Pru pulled a face. ‘So I wondered if you’d come with me. Kind of hold my hand, give me a bit of moral support.’
Dulcie was moderately squeamish but she adored ER. Maybe if she pretended she was watching it on telly .. .
‘What’s the surgeon like?’
Pru half smiled.
‘Tall, dark, quite dishy actually.’
Dulcie briefly fantasised exchanging steamy looks over the operating masks with Dr Doug Ross.
‘Okay, of course I’ll come.’
‘I might ask Liza too.’
Liza, Dulcie decided, could exchange steamy looks with someone far less attractive, one of the hospital porters maybe. She wanted to keep Doug to herself.
‘We’ll both be there,’ she promised Pru. ‘We’ll have an ear each.’
‘And don’t tell anyone,’ Pru pleaded. ‘I’ve already spoken to Eddie. I told him a friend’s invited me to stay with her ather villa in Majorca. As far as he’s concerned I’m away on holiday for two weeks. That’s how long the bandages have to stay on,’ she added, looking embarrassed. ‘I know it’s stupid, but I just don’t want anyone to know.’
Dulcie mimed zipping up her mouth. Then a thought belatedly struck her and she unzipped it.
‘But how can you afford it? I thought you were strapped.’
Pru ran briefly through the events of last night. Dulcie listened agog. When Pru finished, she broke into applause.
‘But I had no idea you were so desperate to have it done! Why didn’t you say before? I could have lent you the cash.’
Pru said levelly, ‘I didn’t want to borrow the money.’
‘Oh, right.’ Dulcie’s expressive eyebrows said it all. ‘But you didn’t mind stealing it.’
Pru looked worried.
‘I only took as much as I needed, eleven hundred pounds—’
‘Pru, come on, I’m joking! What am I going to do, call the police?’
‘He still had eight hundred left,’ Pru rattled on, as if needing to reassure herself.
‘Well personally I think you’re mad,’ Dulcie declared. ‘If it had been me I’d have nicked the lot.’
Sadly for Dulcie the surgeon spent far too much time concentrating on Pru’s ears to have any left over for smouldering eye-meets with her. Performing the surgery appeared to be uppermost in his mind.
Since he was dishy, this was disappointing to say the least.
‘Why should you be bothered?’ said Liza, when they retired to the coffee room afterwards. ‘I thought Liam was the only man for you.’
Dulcie shrugged. The thing was, she was beginning to doubt if she was the only woman for Liam. Okay, so he’d gone out and bought her an exercise-your-way-through-pregnancy video, but that had been the most romantic gesture of the past fortnight. More and more often recently, he had been phoning up to tell her he had to work late at the club.
Dulcie’s fantasy – apart from the ER, Doug Ross-type one – that Liam would whisk her down to Mallory’s and tell her to choose a dazzling, money-no-object diamond ring had so far failed to materialise. Neither had he suggested living together.
Worst of all, when Dulcie had visited Brunton Manor last week, Imelda had been wearing a horribly self-satisfied smirk of the I-know-something-you-don’t-know variety.
It was hard to maintain the rosy glow of pregnancy when you suspected you were being laughed at -- or even worse, pitied – behind your back.
‘Here we are then,’ announced the surgeon, entering the coffee room with his arm around Pru’s shoulders. The pressure bandage holding her ears in place looked comical and her hair was sticking out like Ken Dodd’s but she was clearly relieved the ordeal was over.
‘All ready to go home,’ the surgeon purred. ‘Now I’ve explained to Pm, she has to take things easy for a few days. She needs cosseting.’
He beamed at Dulcie and Liza. He was using his jolly, be extra-nice-to-the-private-patient voice.
Dulcie decided he wasn’t so gorgeous after all without his sexy operating mask; he was just a smarmy, patronising git.
‘So, can I leave her in your safe hands, girls? Promise me you’ll take good care of her.’
Dulcie didn’t even care when she realised all his attention was on Liza. The man was practically drooling; he obviously fancied her rotten. And he was wearing a wedding ring. Unfaithful bastard.
‘We can’t cosset you in your bedsit,’ Dulcie told Pru, who was looking horribly pale and in need of rest already. ‘Come on,’ she reached for her thin arm, ‘you can come and stay with me.’
Telling Pru he had been banned for six months had been a panic reaction on Eddie’s part, simply the only excuse he’d been able to come up with to ensure he could carry on seeing her on a regular basis. If she were no longer driving him around, he would be reduced to catching the occasional brief glimpse of her at the club.
Eddie knew it was stupid, not to mention expensive, but he didn’t care. He looked forward to their time together. He could talk to Pru more easily than any other woman he knew. He could relax with her. She made him feel good.
He had felt horribly guilty when, on the phone yesterday, she had apologised over and over again for letting him down.
‘I know it’s short notice,’ she had falteringly explained, ‘but my friend begged me to go and see her ... I’m really sorry to let you down like this ...’
Pru was such a terrible liar, Eddie knew something was up. His stomach contracted with fear at the possibility that Pru might be heading off to the sun with another man ... though if this was the case, why would she feel the need to lie? She was effectively single, she could do whatever she liked, with whoever she liked.
Eddie hated the idea but he had no right to say so. Miserably he wished Pru a happy holiday; another big lie.
At least he had his licence back. Pru wasn’t inconveniencing him in the way she thought. Eddie just wished, as he drove Arthur and himself to Bristol that evening, he could stop torturing himself imagining what she might be getting up to on a sun-drenched beach in Majorca.
As he parked outside Elmlea nursing home he noticed one of the other residents, a bright-eyed old dear with a walking stick, sitting on one of the wooden benches watching him.
‘No dogs inside,’ she called across to Eddie when he let Arthur leap out of the car. ‘Matron won’t allow it; they might widdle on the lino. Then we’d have residents skidding in all direction
s.’ She cackled with laughter. ‘Fractured femurs galore.’
‘I know,’ said Eddie. ‘I’m just letting him out for a two-minute mn.’
‘Two-minute widdle, more like.’ Still smirking, the old dear held out a gnarled hand. ‘Here, you can leave him with me. I’ll look after him.’
‘His name’s Arthur.’ Eddie passed her the lead.
‘My late husband’s name.’ Up close, the woman’s eyes were astonishing, almost kingfisher blue.
‘He used to widdle everywhere too, come the end.’
Cautiously, Arthur sniffed her lisle-stockinged leg.
‘Not me,’ the woman told the dog briskly. ‘Still continent, thank you very much.’
By the time Eddie re-emerged from the nursing home he found Arthur draped across the rest of the bench with his head on the old woman’s tweed lap. He was fast asleep and snoring like a train.
‘Getting more like my husband by the minute.’ The woman fondly stroked Arthur’s ears.
‘Well, thanks for keeping an eye on him,’ said Eddie. ‘So where is she?’
‘Who?’
‘That pretty girl of yours. Dumped you, has she? All over now?’
‘You mean Pm?’ Eddie hesitated then said awkwardly, ‘She’s away on holiday. A fortnight in Majorca.’
‘Why didn’t you go with her?’
‘Well ... she’s gone to stay with a friend. A female friend.’ The old woman’s straggly eyebrows lifted in amusement. ‘What, you mean she’s a lesbian?’
‘No. Of course not.’
‘So. D’you miss her?’
‘No ... well . ..’ Eddie wasn’t often at a loss for words but it was pretty daunting being interrogated by an octogenarian. Flustered, he went on, ‘It’s only a holiday. She’ll be back in a couple of weeks. Anyway, we aren’t involved in that way.’
‘But you wish you were,’ said the old woman.
‘Not ... not necessarily—’
‘Bull. Get a grip, man! Life doesn’t last forever, you know. And you’re no spring chicken.’
‘Are you always this bossy?’ Eddie retaliated, relieved to see that Arthur had at last opened his eyes.
The old woman gave him a long, measured look.
‘I’m eighty-four years old, young man. I can say whatever I like.’
‘You don’t even know me.’
‘Ah, but that’s it, I do. You’re Edna Peverell’s son-in-law. What d’you think we do all day in this place, play table tennis?’ Mockingly, remorselessly, she went on, ‘We talk, young man. I know everything there is to know about you. And if you ask me, it’s high time you got yourself another wife.’
Chapter 33
Hearing from Liam after three days of nail-biting silence made Dulcie’s heart do an extra jubilant hop, skip and jump. Just the sound of his voice on the phone – those melting Irish syllables – was enough to remind her how hopelessly smitten she still was.
‘How about if I come round about eight-ish?’ said Liam beguilingly. ‘We could have a romantic evening together, just the two of us.’
Romantic evening? Did that, Dulcie wondered, suggest a big dazzling engagement ring to go with the rampant sex?
She glanced across the sitting room at Pru, who was lying on the sofa watching a wildlife documentary. Her hair, desperately in need of a wash, was sticking out at all angles around the bandages.
What with that, no make-up and a Julio Iglesias T-shirt, she looked a sight.
Furthermore, Dulcie remembered, she was here incognito. As far as the rest of the world was concerned, Pru was in Majorca.
‘Actually, my grandmother’s staying with me for a few days. It’s easier if I come to you.’
‘Okay.’ Liam realised he would have to go through the flat first, removing any evidence of Imelda’s recent stay. ‘Better make it nine then, the place is a mess. I’ll have a clear-up before you arrive.’
He must love me, Dulcie thought joyfully, to care about tidying up.
As the end credits of the wildlife documentary began to roll, Pru heard Dulcie wail, ‘Oh bum,’
from upstairs. ‘What?’ she said when Dulcie reappeared looking disconsolate.
‘So much for a romantic evening. My period’s started.’
‘What will you do?’
Dulcie said gloomily, ‘Have a headache, I suppose.’
‘A what?’ Liam grinned, clearly thinking it was a joke. He waited for the punchline.
‘A headache. Right here.’ Dulcie clutched her temple and winced. ‘It’s throbbing like mad.’
‘I know how it feels.’
‘Ouch, it really hurts. Maybe I’m getting migraine, like Liza.’
Playfully Liam pulled her on to his lap.
‘Lucky I know a cure for headaches.’
His hand was travelling to the nape of her neck. In one smooth movement her dress was unzipped. Dulcie tried not to squirm with pleasure.
‘I can’t ... I can’t.’ As the magic fingers slid lower she wriggled frantically away, gasping,
‘Please don’t! The doctor said I mustn’t—’
Liam’s hand shot out of her dress as if he’d been electro- cuted.
‘What?’
Phew, mission accomplished.
‘The doctor.’ Dulcie shook her head slightly, the reluctant bearer of bad news. Greta Garbo had done something similar in one of those films where she died at the end. ‘When I saw him yesterday he said we shouldn’t ... you know. To be on the safe side.’
‘Is everything all right?’ Liam stared at her stomach.
‘Oh yes, as long as I take it easy. Just for the next week or so.’
He was looking stunned. Touched by his concern, Dulcie gave him a reassuring kiss.
‘Don’t worry, everything’s going to be fine. All I need is a bit of ... of cosseting.’
Liam thought for a moment.
‘I’d have said move in with me for a couple of weeks, but I suppose that isn’t really on.’
Dulcie’s eyes widened with excitement. She couldn’t imagine why not.
‘Well—’
‘Not if you’ve got your grandmother staying with you.’ Oh. Bugger.
No.’ Disappointed, Dulcie dredged up a smile. ‘I suppose not. Well, she’ll just have to cosset me instead.’
It was blissful, anyway, being looked after by Liam that evening. While Dulcie lay on the sofa with her feet up, he cooked a rice, fish and vegetable casserole so healthy and bursting with vitamins it could have won a triathlon. After dinner, when Dulcie assured him her doctor had told her she must give in to her cravings, he even jogged down to the petrol station and bought her two packets of crisps and a Bounty ice cream bar.
While Liam washed up, Dulcie embarked on stage two of her plan.
‘Finlay?’ she suggested, holding up the book of babies’ names she had bought yesterday. ‘Look, it’s Gaelic for fair soldier. Is Finlay better than Xavier, do you think?’
Liam wasn’t wild about Xavier. As far as names were concerned, maggot was better than Xavier.
Honestly, pregnant women had some funny ideas, presumably because their hormones were up the creek.
‘Finlay’s not too bad.’ He rejoined Dulcie in the sitting room and leaned his elbows on the back of the sofa, wishing he could summon up more enthusiasm for the task. It was weird trying to choose a name for something currently the size of a centipede.
But Dulcie, it seemed, had enthusiasm to spare.
‘And now, raising the Wimbledon championship trophy proudly above his head, this year’s triumphant winner ...’ she fanfared ‘... Finlay Fackrell!’
‘Jesus Christ.’
‘What?’ Dulcie abruptly twisted round and gazed up at him in concern. The expression on his face was one of utter horror. ‘What’s wrong? Don’t you want him to win Wimbledon?’
‘It’s not that,’ spluttered Liam, ‘it’s ... it’s Fackrell!’
Dulcie looked wounded.
‘That’s my name.’
&nbs
p; ‘Yes, but—’
‘I’m sorry.’ Dulcie tried hard to ignore the triumphant little voice in her head yelling Bingo! ‘I just kind of assumed, under the circumstances, he’d have my name.’
Liam looked deeply uncomfortable.
‘Yes, but Fackrell. Couldn’t you stick with Ross? Finlay Ross sounds all right.’
‘But it’s my married name! It’s Patrick’s name,’ she protested, ‘and this isn’t anything to do with Patrick.’
Another long silence. Dulcie could feel Liam’s warm breath on her shoulder. She could smell his aftershave. Mentally she willed him on; this was his cue, his big chance to say something impossibly romantic, something along the lines of, ‘I want my son’s name to be McPherson, I want your name to be McPherson, oh, Dulcie, I can’t bear it another minute .. . please divorce Patrick and marry me ...’
She couldn’t understand why it wasn’t happening. Was this a dream opportunity or what?
Liam stood up and ruffled her short hair in an awkward let’s-change-the-subject gesture.
‘Okay, you win. But if it’s going to be Fackrell you can’t have Finlay. Sounds like some character out of Sesame Street. You’d be better off with something plain,’ he concluded offhandedly as he disappeared into the kitchen, ‘like Rob or Tom.’
When Dulcie woke up the next morning, Liam was already out of bed and in the shower. She lay back against the pillows and fantasised pleasurably about him soaping his perfect body. As soon as the week was over, she would make up for this enforced celibacy, big-time.
Reaching across for the phone, Dulcie dialled home. ‘Are you okay?’
‘I’m not an invalid,’ protested Pru. ‘Actually, I’ve just defrosted your fridge. Do you have any idea how many Bounty ice cream bars there are in your freezer compartment?’
‘I hate running out.’
‘It’s a miracle you can run anywhere, the amount you eat.’
At that moment Liam appeared in the doorway, an odd expression on his face.
‘Anyway,’ said Dulcie, ‘I’ll be home soon, Granny. And don’t worry about the washing-up, I’ll do it when I get back.’ Pru sounded amused. ‘Careful, I might hold you to that.’