The Widow Read Online Free PDF Page A

shapeless skirts. You got them into bed and instantly they began worrying about the Spanish Civil War. Harriet with children … Incidentally I’m too old for childbearing.’
    â€˜He neither considers himself, nor wishes to be considered, in that agricultural aspect.’
    â€˜I’ve had enough of children. And teaching paraplegics to swim … A lot are teenagers you know: motorbikes …’
    â€˜Heartbreaking.’
    â€˜A professional doesn’t see it that way. I was in a swimsuit and a boy gripped me insolently by the tit. Rather encouraging – both ways.’
    â€˜And what did you do?’ asked Arthur a little sourly.
    â€˜Oh, held him under water a while.’
    These two years were preposterous, Arthur was to say later. And hideous. Work had been difficult too; scrabbling about, lot of politics to have his grant renewed and Get Published. He’d tried to make things up with an estranged wife, who’d married again, divorced again. Fiendish woman.
    â€˜You must have been out of your mind. And that was my fault?’ asked Arlette.
    â€˜My doing entirely, where you’re concerned. Responsibility.’
    â€˜That’s what it all boils down to, doesn’t it? Taking one’s responsibilities.’
    â€˜Sociology is largely about people who fail to.’
    The woman killed herself in the end. Arthur told her at last, spitting blood and mumbling, looking as if he’d just had all four wisdom teeth pulled.
    â€˜
Not
your responsibility,’ said Arlette, very firmly.
    They were in the village of Illhausern, thirty kilometres outside Strasbourg, but the food has three stars.
    â€˜You must be filthily rich,’ said Arlette. ‘Or is there something special?’
    â€˜Strasbourg is quite a good town, isn’t it? You know it fairly well by now.’
    â€˜I’ve thought of moving, often enough. The food’s awful, and they’ve little sense of humour, poor dears. But where’s better?’
    â€˜I’ve been offered quite a well-paid job here. I’m in two minds.’
    â€˜What stops you taking it?’
    â€˜You do, imbecile.’
    â€˜If that’s all there is to it, I’ll accept. Or is it the well-paid job that’s an inducement?’
    â€˜Stop that. You’ll agree?’
    â€˜I’ll agree.’
    â€˜Waiter, bring me the wine list please.’
    â€˜Do by all means commit follies,’ said Arlette. ‘We have so few left.’
    â€˜How nice to see you looking so happy,’ said the owner courteously, bringing a fantastic bottle and a waiter to open it.
    â€˜Tell me all about it, then,’ she said, tasting.
    â€˜Oh, the Council moves in mysterious ways you know, and several are sociological. Great deal of nonsense about pecking order. Bureaucrats are horribly touchy about their standing. Mine,’ said Arthur happily, ‘will be rather high. Too high, no doubt, for the Krutenau.’
    â€˜My dear boy, there wouldn’t be room. And will there be room anywhere, for you and me together with all this standing?’
    â€˜I’ve thought about this problem,’ said Arthur. ‘You don’t want to go to cocktail parties.’
    â€˜Nor play bridge wearing a hat. Nor live in a Council-of-Europe flat. That rhymes. Must be the wine.’
    â€˜Stop your nonsense. Get our own flat. You choose it. Used to getting your own way, huh? A Bull, of course.’
    â€˜Indeed I am, alas. What are you?’
    â€˜A Fish.’
    â€˜Oh dear,’ said Arlette. ‘The combination is appalling. The very worst there is.’
    â€˜Stop being superstitious and French.’
    â€˜Stop your nonsense, stop being French, how much more of this is there going to be? Pull your pants down woman and put a pillow over your head.’
    â€˜I’m being serious. A couple should be a real couple.’
    â€˜Certainly. Axiom of the new sociology. None of this