They’ve got some really smart shops in the Parade.”
¦
To Maggie, it was a delight to try on pretty dresses and find that they fitted. Before, she had always chosen skirts with elasticated waists and loose blouses or sweaters to hide her lumpy shape.
Fell bought a charcoal grey suit, shirts and new underwear until, after several trips back to the car park, Maggie’s little car was laden.
“Now, let’s get your hair done,” said Fell.
“I don’t think much can be done with it.”
“It’s shiny now. It didn’t use to be,” said Fell. “Let’s try.”
Maggie had her dreams and fantasies as well. When she emerged from the hairdresser with her hair cut in a becoming wispy feathery cut which framed her heart-shaped face, she felt it was only a matter of time now before she and Fell became lovers. He was so delighted with her appearance.
They decided to dress up in their new clothes that evening and go out to the French restaurant.
Maggie put on a fine cotton dress, white with a pattern of roses which clung to her now shapely hips and was long enough to hide her legs. She pictured the scene in the restaurant. There would be candlelight in the evening and Fell would lean across the table and look into her eyes and take her hand, and then…and then…
She thought Fell looked distinguished and handsome in his new suit and striped shirt. Well content with each other, they walked through the balmy summer evening to the restaurant. Swallows swooped around the walls of the old castle.
“Dandelion summer,” said Fell. “It’s a dandelion summer.”
Together they went into the restaurant. Bolder now, Maggie ordered her own food. The next step in her appearance was contact lenses.
Fell smiled into her eyes.
“What are you thinking?” asked Maggie huskily.
Fell laughed. “I was thinking that I can’t wait to start on the living room tomorrow. We’ve been using that packing case as a table for long enough.”
It’s too soon, Maggie chided herself, as the bubble of her dream burst. I mustn’t rush things.
“That woman over there, the one who keeps smiling over at me,” said Fell. “I know her from somewhere.”
Maggie followed his gaze. “That’s Mrs. Harley. Used to dine at the hotel with her husband. I heard he died last year.”
“What did her husband do?”
“He was manager of your bank.”
Mrs. Harley rose and walked over to their table. She was the sort of woman, Fell thought, that he often dreamed about. She was wearing a short black chiffon dress which clung to her excellent figure and showed off her long, long legs. Fell saw a cloud of dark hair, a full pouting mouth and large dark eyes fringed with long lashes.
“I know you, don’t I?” she said to Fell.
All at once, Fell wished he were on his own. He knew he would never have told her he had been a waiter at the Palace.
But there was Maggie, and Maggie was saying, “We both waited table at the Palace.”
“Of course!” She smiled. “You look so…debonair…I didn’t recognize you.”
“I’m Fellworth Dolphin, Fell, and this is Maggie Partlett. I was sorry to hear about your husband’s death,” said Fell.
“Yes, too sad. I’m in business now. Let me give you my card. I run a health shop in the High Street.” She handed Fell a card. “Drop in and see me and we can have a chat.”
She drifted off on a cloud of Chanel.
Maggie’s dreams lay in ruins. Fell was looking excited, happy, elated, and his eyes kept drifting over to Mrs. Harley’s table.
“I hope our Mrs. Harley is not a gold-digger,” said Maggie with a lightness she did not feel.
“Why should she be that?”
“This is a small town and gossip travels fast. It’s a good thing your relatives don’t live here. A lot of people probably know now that you’ve come into money.”
Fell frowned. “She seems very prosperous.”
Maggie dropped the subject and tried to chat about house improvements and ignore the heavy, indigestible misery that had settled somewhere in her gut.
To her relief, Mrs. Harley left. Immediately Fell decided they should get home. Usually he liked to linger over his coffee.
And once home, he didn’t want to sit up. He was tired, he said. And Maggie knew he wanted to be alone with dreams of Mrs. Harley.
In his room, Fell took out that precious card. Her full name was Melissa Harley. He had fallen in love before with such as Melissa, but his circumstances had kept his love to fantasies and dreams. He dreamt like a very young teenager, for his repressive life had frozen his emotional development like an insect in amber.
But he was blessed with a certain amount of stoic common sense, and in the clear light of another morning, all he looked forward to was more home improvements with Maggie.
It was only after another busy morning of shopping and planning, when Maggie suddenly said she had left her television set, but might as well go and get it and then they would have one each, that he felt the compulsion to go out and stroll along the High Street in the direction of the health shop.
The shop was called Whole Body and as he hesitated outside the window, Melissa Harley came out. “Why, if it isn’t Fellworth,” she said.
“Fell,” he corrected quickly. “I don’t like my name much.” He blinked a little in the sunlight. Melissa seemed smaller and plumper than he remembered, but Fell was a romantic and he wanted to see a glamorous woman again, and so his imagination quickly told him that he did.
“Why did your parents choose a name like that?”
“They never told me. I suffered a lot because of it at school.”
“Poor you. Got time for a coffee?”
Of course he had. All the time in the world.
They strolled into a tea shop of the olde English variety, beams and horse brasses, and cakes that most of the world had forgotten about – Eiffel towers, congress cake, fly cemeteries, empire biscuits.
She fixed those dark eyes on his and said in her husky voice, “Tell me about yourself.”
“There’s not much to tell,” said Fell. “I’ve had a rather dreary life.”
“You’re not still waiting table?”
“No, my parents have left me a bit of money, so I’ve packed it in.”
“So what do you plan to do?”
“I thought of starting up some sort of business, a restaurant or bookshop.”
She smiled at him, a languorous smile. “Or you could invest in an existing business – like mine.”
He stared at her. “Would you like to work with me, Fell? I run a prosperous little concern.”
“That would be wonderful. But I’d need to ask Maggie.”
“Ah, yes, your little friend. Well, let me know.” She was suddenly brisk. Fell longed to tell her that his engagement to Maggie was a sham, but an irritating loyalty to Maggie kept him quiet.
She talked about the shop, about how she had dreamt up the idea after her husband died. Fell looked through the distorting prism of his imagination at what he saw as the beauty of her face and listened to the sound of her voice, mesmerized.
When they parted, he braced himself to tell Maggie. Maggie would be disappointed because she was really keen on a bookshop, but it was
Maggie was home when he arrived. To his relief, she did not protest, simply listened to him quietly with her hands folded. “It’s your inheritance,” said Maggie when he had finished. “You haven’t had much fun in your life. You have to do exactly what you want.”
Fell hugged her in a sudden rush of gratitude. “I know you really wanted a bookshop, Maggie, but this is a
