if
‘Roger.’
She didn’t talk about him much. Barely at all, so I never did either. Angie probed occasionally, but got nowhere. But she did once say that the fifteen years she’d been married to him had been the happiest of her life. He’d died of testicular cancer at forty-five; no children.
‘Yes, Roger. And because of him, because he was such a find –’ Her eyes shone suddenly. ‘Oh, Poppy, if only you’d met him. Such fun. So alive. And such a safe pair of hands too. Because of him, I won’t marry again. No one will ever match up. Oh, I know I play it for laughs and flirt with all the eligible old bachelors, but that’s all it is. A laugh. I haven’t been with another man since Roger died.’
I tried to hide my surprise. He’d been dead a long time.
‘But you’ll meet someone,’ she urged. ‘You’re young, you may even marry again, but Poppy, never, ever settle for anything less than perfect.’ She eyed me steadily over the rim of her glass. ‘A good marriage is the best thing in the world, but a bad one is the very worst. If a racing certainty doesn’t come along – and it might not – stick to your own company.’ She smiled. Touched my glass with hers. ‘We’ll be merry widows together. Deal?’
I smiled. ‘Deal.’ I felt my anger subside and something like relief flood through my veins. To be like Peggy. To end up like Peggy, who I’d always admired, would not be so bad. Would be pretty terrific, actually.
‘And there are some nice men out there,’ she mused. ‘Jennie’s Dan, for instance, albeit in short pants.’
‘Yes, Dan’s lovely,’ I agreed.
‘Angie’s Tom too.’
We regarded each other guiltily. We both liked Tom, even though he had behaved very badly. But then, Angie probably wasn’t the easiest woman to live with. There were two sides to that story, as there often are.
‘Did I tell you I saw him the other day?’ she said casually.
‘No, you didn’t. Where?’
‘I ran into him in town. Had a drink with him.’
‘Really?’ I was intrigued. ‘Does Angie know?’
‘No, she doesn’t, and don’t tell her.’ She sipped her wine. ‘Apparently she rang him.’
‘Yes, she did, and he didn’t return her call. She’s devastated.’
Peggy didn’t say anything for a moment, then: ‘Angie’s either devastated or thrilled to bits. Cast down or euphoric. Never anything in between. That can be quite exhausting. Tom knows he behaved like an arse but sometimes … ’ She hesitated. ‘Well, sometimes we all need some space. Just to get things into perspective.’
I snorted with derision. ‘Space. That sounds horribly like psychotwaddle to me, like some garbage some counsellor’s told him. And I wouldn’t call a middle-aged man running off with a twenty-six-year-old groom and leaving his wife and children perspective. Last drop?’
‘Why not,’ she said, looking at me with interest as I poured. Normally I agreed with most things she said. Was easily persuaded. But my nerve endings were still quite exposed from the last ten minutes, and much as I liked charming, good- looking Tom and had had some riotous evenings in his company, I wasn’t prepared to make too many excuses for him.
‘Are you going to that?’ Peggy asked, changing the subject. She nodded across at the dresser where, amongst the blue and white plates, I propped the occasional invitation. I followed her eyes to a stiff white card embossed with an elaborate italic script.
‘Oh. No, I doubt it.’
It was a ticket to the hunt ball, which had been dropped through my door. By Mark, I assumed. ‘Compliments of the hunt’ had been scrawled on a slip of paper inside the envelope. But then, I had made quite a large donation to the hunt. A handsome cheque, which I’d popped through his door earlier. And Mark had rung me, overwhelmed.
‘We can refurbish the kennels, Poppy, keep all the staff. I was going to have to let the kennel girl go. It’s so generous. I don’t know what to say.’
‘Don’t say anything.’
And then the ticket had arrived pronto, by hand through my door. And, actually, my plan had been to ask Luke, tonight. See if he’d come with me. Waltz in with my new boyfriend. But that would have sealed the deal, wouldn’t it? And my fate along with it. Knowing myself as I did, it would have been hard to stop that stone rolling into a relationship.
