Prudence

He laughed. ‘You wouldn’t like to have lunch with me? Then afterwards we can choose Lucasta’s presents, and get the things for the party.’

‘Oh, I’d love to. What about Maggie? She looks rotten,’ I said. ‘Doesn’t she want to come with us?’

‘Not in the least. I’ll pick you up about one o’clock.’

Back in the drawing-room Berenice was starting her Ancient Mariner act on Maggie.

‘I exercise every morning,’ she was saying. ‘Exercises aimed at the stomach, the tarps of the legs and whole pelvic area that one uses for sex. Start using those internal muscles and everything improves, and I mean everything, Margaret.’ She smiled warmly at Maggie. ‘I’m sure you and Jack can work it through.’

Ace came back at lunchtime with Jack, who said he’d just flip through his mail and we’d be off. Maggie was still in her dressing-gown. Rose hadn’t surfaced. Berenice was flapping around about going on television in Manchester that evening.

‘The producer has said don’t bother to dress up.’

Would her French jeans and Hermes belt be too casual? What time did Ace think they ought to start? Would the roads be bad? I saw Ace stifle a yawn. He looked absolutely knackered. Too much of Berenice’s superior muscle tone, I thought sourly. Having been so crochety with him last night, I found it very difficult to act normally now. We were acidly polite to each other. I still couldn’t look him straight in the eye.

The telephone rang. Maggie shot out of the room to answer it. Normally Jack wouldn’t be home at this time of day. I wondered idly if it was Pendle ringing.

Berenice turned to Ace. ‘Shall I make an egg plant lasagne for this evening, sweetest? We could heat it up when we get back.’

Ace said that he’d much rather eat out.

Maggie poked her head round the door. ‘It’s for you, Ace,’ she said. ‘It’s Penelope Blake.’

‘You look a bit uptight, sweetest,’ said Berenice, when Ace came back five minutes later. ‘Shall I massage your neck?’

‘I am not uptight,’ snapped Ace. ‘That was Elizabeth’s mother confirming lunch tomorrow. I’m sorry,’ he added to Jack, ‘it was arranged before I knew about Lucasta’s party. I can’t really stand them up.’

‘Course you can’t,’ said Jack, throwing a pile of envelopes into the wastepaper basket.

‘You’ll miss my party,’ wailed Lucasta.

Ace pulled her on to his knee. ‘No I won’t lovie. It’s only forty miles away. I should get back by five if the snow doesn’t get any worse.’

‘I’m so much looking forward to meeting Elizabeth’s folks tomorrow,’ said Berenice. ‘I’m sure we can be very supportive.’

‘I’m afraid I’ve got to go on my own,’ said Ace bluntly. ‘I haven’t seen them since the funeral. It wouldn’t be very tactful to barge in with someone else.’

Berenice shook back her dark hair angrily. Suddenly there was a muscle going in her cheek.

‘And what am I supposed to do while you’re away?’

‘You can help Pru organize the party.’

Lunch with Jack was a blissful relief. We both drank too much and I told Jack about Berenice’s plans for revamping the drawing-room.

‘She’ll have my mother jogging in a track suit and Mrs Braddock in an old people’s home by Christmas. We’ll all be out at the rate she’s going.’

‘She believes in clearing the decks,’ I said gloomily, ‘and she isn’t too choosy who she sweeps into the sea.’

‘She’s certainly put the kibosh on Ace. He could hardly walk this morning. Never actually came near the mill at all. Just sloped off to see an osteopath about his bad back.’

I giggled. Jack always had the ability to make things seem less awful.

‘I expect you’ll be round at the osteopath tomorrow,’ I said. ‘Berenice has been giving Maggie a few tips on sexual technique.’

Jack took my hand, ‘When you said “I love you” in that tonic bottle last night, did you mean it?’

‘Yes,’ I said, ‘brother-sister.’

‘We’ll always be friends, won’t we? Christ, how maudlin can one get? What the hell am I going to do about Maggie?’

‘You could boost her morale a bit more,’ I said.

Afterwards, expansive from drink, we went shopping, buying party food and three cases of Entre Deux Mers — to cheer up the mothers, said Jack. Then we spent a fortune at the toyshop, buying loads of little presents for the party and a red and silver sleigh and a three-foot fluffy white rabbit as main presents for Lucasta. I bought her a black velvet cat suit I thought she might like to wear to the party.

‘It’s so much easier shopping with you than Maggie,’ sighed Jack. ‘She always gets green eyes when I spend money on Lucasta.’

When we got back, Ace and Berenice had gone. I found Maggie eating chocolate cake in the kitchen.

‘What are you doing in here?’ I said.

‘It’s the warmest room. The central heating’s given up the ghost. Berenice and I have been having a terrifically productive dialogue. Jack and I have got to work through our conflicts and stop laying bad trips on each other, and re-structure our marriage.’

‘That’s nice,’ said Jack, coming in with a tumbler half full of whisky and heading for the fridge. ‘You can start off by putting a couple of my shirts in the washing machine.’

‘That’s broken too,’ said Maggie. ‘It went bananas this afternoon. It was like Lake Windermere in here an hour ago.’

‘Well you can wash a shirt by hand,’ said Jack. ‘Tomorrow is my daughter’s birthday. I have important customers coming over. I need a clean shirt. Christ, isn’t anyone ever going to de-frost this fridge?’

‘I am not going to wash your shirt, Jack,’ said Maggie, her voice rising, ‘just because I am a female person. You are a microcosm of the whole male power base. Don’t you know the whole macho number is sick?’

‘Oh boy,’ said Jack, ‘that is profound. I think you’ve been talking to Berenice. I can’t even get the ice tray out, but I would have thought you and Ms de Courcy would have provided enough hot air to melt it.’

‘Can’t we even have a meaningful dialogue? You’ve been on a macho trip all your life, Jack.’

‘Oh, shut up.’

‘I’m entitled to my own opinions.’

‘Of course you are. I don’t want to hear them, that’s all.’

‘Oh, I hate you,’ sobbed Maggie, rushing out of the room and slamming the door behind her.

‘At least that might loosen the ice tray,’ said Jack.

Later we watched Berenice on television. She was wearing a man’s grey flannel suit, a white shirt and the inevitable Hermes belt.

‘She’s certainly easy on the eye,’ I said.

‘And absolute hell on the ears,’ said Jack.

I was safely in bed by the time they came home — but this time Ace didn’t bother to come and say good night.

Chapter Fourteen

The good thing about Lucasta’s birthday party was that I was so busy I didn’t have much time to brood. After a lousy night, I got up early. It was bitterly cold, the central heating was still kaput, and there were frost patterns like doilies all over the windows. I put on a thick grey sweater over two other sweaters, rust shorts, tights, leg warmers, and boots, and I was still cold. I went down to the kitchen to help Mrs Braddock make sausage rolls and