Quartet in Autumn (22 page)

'You can't know what a woman is up to,' Marjorie said. 'It's something that can never be expected or explained.'

Letty agreed that this was very true and found herself thinking of Marcia leaving her house to Norman, a perfect example of the unpredictability of women. And now, with Marcia dead, her action could never be explained.

'Where will David Lydell go?' Letty asked.

'Go? That's almost the worst part of it — he won't be going anywhere. He'll be staying here.'

'He's decided to stay
here?'

'I don't know about decided — I don't think he's considered moving.'

'Well, I suppose he hasn't been in the village very long, but in the circumstances ...' Letty was uncertain of her ground here and felt unable to go any further. And yet, when one came to think of it, why should David Lydell leave the district? He had done nothing worse than change his mind and, as people were always saying, it was better to discover this kind
of
mistake sooner rather than later. 'Where will he live?' she went on. 'Surely not at the old peoples home — at Holmhurst?'

'I don't think so — I suppose they'll move into the vicarage.'

That uncomfortable vicarage, that needed so much doing to it, Letty remembered. Perhaps it was just what he deserved. 'But won't it distress him to think of you alone here?' she said.

'Oh, Letty...' Marjorie's smile was indulgent, as if making allowances for her friend's unworldliness. 'Anyway, I have a feeling that I may not be alone for long.'

'Really?' This coy admission made Letty wonder what Marjorie could possibly mean. Surely it was much too soon for another likely husband to have appeared in the village?

'Why, don't you see.. ,' Marjorie began to explain and then of course Letty did see. Now that there was to be no marriage the plans for Letty's retirement could be carried out as before, just as if nothing had happened to change them. She would (naturally) be moving into the country to join Marjorie as soon as arrangements could be made.

And then what? Letty wondered. Supposing after a few months or years Marjorie met somebody else to marry, what would happen to Letty then? In the past she had always trailed behind Marjorie, when the two of them were together, but there was no reason why this should always be the pattern. She decided that she would think the matter over, not make up her mind immediately.

'I suppose you've sent back his ring,' she said, deliberately returning to the matter of the broken engagement.

'Oh, goodness no — David wanted me to keep it. I suppose he could hardly have asked for it back, under the circumstances.'

'No, he couldn't have asked, but you might have felt you didn't want to keep it,' said Letty.

'But it's such a pretty ring, a moonstone in an antique setting. You know I've always wanted an antique ring,' Marjorie babbled on, saying how much more interesting such a ring was than the conventional small diamond of her first marriage. 'And when one's older, one's hands seem to thicken and the fingers get fatter, so a larger ring looks better.' She spread out her left hand, still wearing the moonstone, appraisingly for Letty to see.

Twenty-Four

W
ONDERS
WILL
NEVER
cease — that's all I have to say.' Norman took a corned-beef sandwich out of a plastic bag.

We've certainly had abundant proof of that,' said Edwin, busy with a tea bag. I had Mrs Pope on the telephone last night and she told me the whole story. Letty's friend rang up to say that the whole thing was off — she wasn't going to get married after all. Of course she was very upset — that's why Letty went down there.'

'What could
she
do? Listen to her friend going on about her loss, I suppose. Old Letty never strikes me as being much use in a crisis.'

'Perhaps she can't do all that much — but the presence of a woman friend.. ,' Edwin hesitated, not knowing how to classify the type of comfort Letty might be capable of providing.

'Oh, yes, I agree — women certainly have their uses.'

'Especially if they leave you houses in their wills,' Edwin said, in a jocular tone. 'You must be getting quite used to being a property owner.'

'I'm going to sell it,' Norman said. 'I wouldn't fancy living in it.'

'Yes, that's the best thing — it would be much too big for you,' Edwin pointed out, reasonably enough.

'Oh, I don't know so much about that,' said Norman huffily. 'It's only an ordinary semi, you know, just like yours, and you don't find yours too big. I don't necessarily want to end my days in a bedsitter.'

'No, of course not.' Edwin's tone was the soothing one he generally used to pacify the angry little man.

'I suppose I'm more likely to end my days in an old people's home,' said Norman, taking up the large economy size of instant coffee. It says "Family Size" here — funny, really, when it's mostly used by people in offices.' He spooned coffee powder into a mug. 'Of course you do save a bit — that's what Marcia and I thought.'

Edwin made no comment. In his silence he agitated his tea bag with a spoon; a stream of amber-coloured liquid was released into the boiling water. Then he added the usual slice of lemon, stirred it and prepared to drink. Norman's words, the way he had said 'Marcia and I', had made him wonder whether the two of them could ever have married. Yet it was impossible to imagine how such an event could have been brought about. If they had met many years ago, when they were both younger? Apart from the difficulty of picturing them being younger, they probably wouldn't have been attracted to each other at that time, and even now the idea of 'attraction' seemed ridiculous when you applied it to Norman and Marcia. And yet what was it that brought people together, even the most unlikely people? Edwin had only the haziest memories of his own courtship and marriage, in the days when he had been a server at the spikiest Anglo-Catholic church where Phyllis was a member of the congregation. In the thirties people did get married in a way that they seemed not to now, or at least not to the same extent, he qualified. Supposing Marcia had not died, could she and Norman have married and lived in her house? It was something he felt he could not ask Norman
.
..

But now Norman was breaking into Edwin's unspoken thoughts and asking his advice about a matter that seemed to be troubling him

'All those clothes and things, what am I to do about them?'

'How do you mean?'

'Marcia's clothes and the things in the house. Of course the nephew — the one in the kaftan and beads — was taking some odds and ends, but he said his mum didn't want to be bothered, said I was to do what I liked.
I
— I ask you!' Norman kicked the wastepaper basket with an angry gesture.

'What about that neighbour and the social worker — the ones who were at the funeral?'

'The sexy blonde and the bossy do-gooding bitch?' Irritation seemed to add violent colour to Norman's way of expressing himself. 'Catch me asking
them!
'

'Well, there must be somebody at the local church ... somebody who could make use of them.'

'You
would
suggest that. No doubt your friend Father G. would come to the rescue.'

'I'm sure he would,' said Edwin, on the defensive. 'Old clothes are always welcome for jumble sales.'

'Jumble sales! Thank you very much! So that's what you think Marcia's clothes would be.'

'Well, you must admit the last time we saw her she did look a bit odd,' Edwin began, but then he stopped himself. This pointless bickering was getting them nowhere. Perhaps Norman was remembering Marcia differently now — a gracious white-haired woman with a sweet expression, as Sister had described her at the end. 'Have you thought of asking Letty?' he asked. 'I'm sure she would help.'

'Yes, that's an idea.' Norman seemed grateful. 'It would be better than having a stranger.'

'What are we going to do with all these milk bottles?' Edwin asked.

'I don't know,' said Norman. 'What would you do — just leave them?'

'I suppose I'd get rid of them gradually — put out a few for the milkman every day.'

We could start by putting some out now,' Letty suggested.

'Yes, they're always telling us to rinse and return,' said Norman.

'And these are spotlessly clean,' Edwin pointed out.

'I wonder if Marcia would be angry to think of us doing this,' said Letty. 'She must have had some plan in mind, keeping them all in the shed, so beautifully washed and arranged.'

The three of them had spent an interesting afternoon in Marcia's house, going through her things. Letty had been most surprised at the clothes, stowed away in wardrobes and drawers, dresses of the thirties and earlier, now coming back into fashion, some of them obviously belonging to Marcia's mother. Things Marcia herself must have worn when she was young before any of them had known her. And there had also been clothes she must have bought comparatively recently, most of which seemed inexplicably unworn. Had she been keeping them for some special occasion which had never arisen? It was impossible to know now.

They had started their work upstairs, but when they came down to the kitchen it had been even more surprising to open the store cupboard and come upon such an array of tinned foods.

'Whatever can she have bought all this stuff for?' Edwin exclaimed.

'Well, you buy tinned stuff, don't you?' Norman was immediately on the defensive. 'What's so surprising about it?'

'But she never seemed to eat anything,' Letty said.

'Never a big eater, she used to say,' Norman reminded them.

'I suppose she was prudent, like Mrs Thatcher,' said Edwin. 'What with prices going up the way they have been.. .'

'And will continue to go up, whatever government is in power,' Norman snapped.

'So beautifully arranged and classified,' said Letty, with wonder in her tone. 'Meat and fish and fruit, and here soups and macaroni cheese and ravioli.. .'

'Light supper dishes,' said Norman. 'I'm very partial to macaroni cheese — it was a godsend when I had that time with my teeth.'

'Yes, it would be,' said Letty, her tone now warm with sympathy.

'I think Norman had better have this stuff,' said Edwin. 'After all, if the cousin and her son have given you the go-ahead.. .'

'Well, I suppose the son might have some — a young man living in a hippy pad would probably be glad of a few tins. Luckily he doesn't seem to know quite how many there are. Why don't we all take a few for ourselves now,' said Norman.

Hesitantly, for it seemed very wrong to be helping themselves to Marcia's store cupboard like this, the three of them began making their selection. In some subtle way this reflected their different characters. Edwin chose spam and stewing steak, Letty prawns and peach halves, Norman sardines, soup, butter beans and the macaroni cheese.

Then, in the bottom corner of the cupboard, they came upon a bottle of sherry, unopened. It was a Cyprus cream sherry, reputedly made from grapes growing in vineyards which had once belonged to the Queen of Sheba.

'Shall we open it?' Norman asked. 'Don't you think she must have meant it for us, perhaps for this very occasion?'

'She could hardly have imagined us all here like this,' Letty said. I mean, without her.'

'Perhaps we should do as Norman suggests,' said Edwin. 'After all, it may well have been what Marcia would have wished, given the exceptional circumstances.' That was perhaps the best way of putting it, for it wasn't quite like every day. And surely, he felt, if anyone could claim to know what Marcia might have meant or wished, could attempt to probe such a mystery, it might be Norman?

'Queen of Sheba,' said Norman, who had found glasses and was pouring out generous measures of the golden liquid, 'I like that! Here's to us, then.'

'I suppose you'll be moving down to the country, Letty, now that your friend's not getting married after all,' Edwin said, the glow of the drink adding to the pleasure he felt at the improvement in Letty's prospects. It seemed to round things off in a most satisfactory way.

'I haven't decided,' she said. 'I'm not at all sure that I want to live in the country now.'

'That's right,' said Norman, 'don't you do anything you don't want to do, or let anybody tell you what you ought to do. Make up your own mind. It's your life, after all.'

'But I thought you loved the country,' said Edwin, dismay in his tone, for surely all middle-aged or elderly women loved, or ought to love, the country?

'I don't think I
love
it exactly,' said Letty, thinking of the dead birds and mangled rabbits and the cruel-tongued village people. It was just that it seemed a suitable arrangement when we made it. Now I feel that I have a choice.' She took a long draught of the sweet sherry and experienced a most agreeable sensation, almost a feeling of power. She felt as Norman had felt when he discovered that he could influence the lives of other people by deciding whether to live in Marcia's house or not. Letty now realized that both Marjorie and Mrs Pope would be waiting to know what
she
had decided to do.

'But surely you don't want to stay in London?' Edwin persisted.

'I don't know. I shall have to think about it,' Letty said. 'Oh, and that reminds me,' she added, 'Marjorie wondered if you two would like a day in the country. We could all go down there for lunch.'

She could not help smiling, for from a practical point of view there was something slightly ludicrous in the picture of them all — Marjorie and Letty and the two men — squashed up together in the Morris.

'Those two friends of yours, the men you worked with in that office, Edwin and Norman,' Marjorie had said, lingering over the names, wouldn't it be rather nice to invite them down for a day?'

Any new interest that might take Marjorie's mind off her disappointment was to be encouraged, Letty felt, though it was difficult to think of Edwin and Norman as objects of romantic speculation, and two less country-loving people could hardly be imagined. But at least it made one realize that life still held infinite possibilities for change.