“I wouldn’t, except I’m deaf,” Mrs. Gartree said.
“Goodbye,” Anna said.
“Toodle-oo,” said Mrs. Gartree.
Anna went into Ralph’s office and found his diary. He really is beginning to move in mysterious ways, she thought. In the afternoon, at two o’clock, he was due for another meeting in Norwich about the Home-from- Hospitals scheme. The Trust was funding a project to create networks of helpers for the old and chronically sick; discharged from hospital to isolated cottages, or to homes in villages with no shop or chemist, they needed failure- proof rotas of visitors if they were to be kept free from anxiety, hypothermia, and the risk of falls.
She flicked through Ralph’s address book; the Norwich number came to hand. “Pat? It’s Anna. Ralph’s wife.”
“Oh, yes. How are you, Mrs. Eldred?”
“Look, when Ralph arrives for your meeting, would you ask him to ring home? I’d like a quick word.”
There was a silence. “Just a minute.” A pause. Then “Mrs. Eldred? I think there must be a mix-up. We haven’t got a meeting today.”
“Are you sure?”
“No—yes, I mean—I’ve just checked my diary.”
“I’m sorry,” Anna said. “I must have got the dates confused.”
“That’s okay.” The woman sounded relieved. “For a minute I thought I’d made some awful mistake. I’d hate to make a mistake about a meeting with Mr. Eldred, he’s always got so much to do.”
“Yes, hasn’t he?” Anna said. She put the phone down. Well now, she thought. But she did not like what she thought. Mrs.
Gartree could be discounted, as a witness; but it was strange that Pat Appleyard wasn’t expecting him. It was agreed between them that he would always leave his diary for her, and update it each evening, in case there was an emergency at the hostel, in case she needed to contact him; and he had always stuck to that diary, he was known to be reliable and punctual and to save his severest strictures for people who were not.
I am not quite an innocent, Anna thought. I have read a novel or two, in my time. A disappearing husband— unless he’s a drunk or a criminal—means another woman; yet there’s something farcical about it, isn’t there, if a disappearing husband covers his tracks so badly, or doesn’t try to cover them at all? But no doubt, if Ralph took to lying, he wouldn’t be very proficient at it. Not at first. As far as she knew, he’d had no practice.
Anna sat down in the hard chair at Ralph’s desk. Her mind moved slowly, cautiously. Opportunity? He had plenty. He met hundreds of people in the course of his year, clients, social workers, journalists. Routine to fetter him? He had none; each week was different, and the diary was all that constrained him.
Anna tried to smile—as if there were someone in the room to see her effort. You are being ridiculous, she thought. Yes, he meets women, but so he has done for years; he meets women, but if he were interested in one of them, who in particular would it be? No answer suggested itself. I would have imagined, she thought, that though you cannot know people, not really, I would have imagined that I did know Ralph.
She felt very cold, and went upstairs to fetch a cardigan.
The day must continue, though the cardigan somehow failed to warm her. She said to Kit, “Are you doing anything this afternoon?” Silly question; when was Kit, this summer, ever doing anything? She sat around, she slept, she made herself intermittently useful. “Because if you’re not, would you come shopping for
clothes with Melanie and me? I thought, you see, as you’re nearer her age—”
“Sure,” Kit said. “We’ve got a lot in common.”
“Where do you think we would do best?”
“Depends what she wants. If she wants another leopard-skin-print T-shirt, we could try Woolworths in Dereham.”
“Such snobs, my children.”
“Okay,” Kit said grudgingly, “I’ll come. What does she need?”
“She needs a coat of some sort. And some shoes to wear in the house.”
“To spare us the clatter of the boots.”
“A sweater, as well, in case it turns cold.” She pulled her cardigan around her. “And another pair of jeans, perhaps, and a couple of shirts or T-shirts. And underwear, I feel sure—I’ve not inspected, I don’t feel up to it.”
“She doesn’t wear any,” Kit said.
“Who says so?”
“Robin.” Kit sighed satirically. “He’s of an age to notice. Well then … we could go to Norwich, and catch up with Dad after his meeting. We could make him take us out, for tea and iced buns, so Melanie can see us behaving like a family in a picture book. We could have anchovy toast, and dote on each other.”
“No,” Anna said. “Not Norwich. I tell you what we’ll do—it’s a nice day, let’s go to the seaside. Get some fresh air. We’ll go to Cromer. She might like it.”
“She’ll be crying for cotton candy, and to ride on the donkeys, I suppose,” Kit said. “Honestly, you do have a strange idea of what constitutes a treat for a person like Melanie.”
“You know what your father said. Try to be kind.”
Anna went upstairs. She stood outside the closed door for a moment, gathering herself. Then she tapped on it. No answer. Softly she turned the handle. “Melanie?”
