Wish Her Safe at Home Read Online Free PDF Page B

which trickled down my cheeks.
    “And I didn’t know what to do with the rock. I carried all the dirty dishes to the sink and washed them and put away the cereal packet and the butter dish and the marmalade but in the end I just left that packet on the table. I couldn’t think what to say.”
    I shrugged.
    “Well, it simply disappeared and wasn’t spoken of again. I stayed with the Michaels for a further three days. It seemed a terribly long visit.”
    “How deeply unfortunate!” said the woman.
    “So, yes, my mother was a very silly person. Snobbish and small-minded and manipulative—and altogether altered from the time my father was alive. With him around, who knows, she might have gone on being the mother of my earliest recollections. With him around I can’t begin to tell you how different my own life would have been!”
    “No, I feel sure of it.”
    But I raised my hand with a commendably stoical gesture. “Oh, well.
C’est la vie
!”
    A duck—rude thing—displayed its bottom. Perhaps the lady from the teashop would have gained in interest if she had done the same. “Oh, there’s your bus!” I cried. “Be careful with your basket!” I watched her running to the park gates and dropping her library book, the
Woman’s Weekly
and a ball of lime-green wool. Her hat slipped down over her eyes. It suited her. It made her look more stylish.

6
    Sylvia was angry (
extra
angry) when I phoned to say I’d be spending the night in Bristol. “When the bloody hell did you decide that?”
    “Oh... about an hour ago.”
    So it was as well I’d had the forethought
not
to bring my toothbrush. My hand had hovered over it that morning (“Just in case,” I’d told myself, for it had then been nothing but the barest possibility) yet native cunning had prevailed. I had slipped a nightdress into my handbag, and a fresh pair of stockings and knickers, and left it at that.
    In the taxi though—since I was now a teenager again and on my way to Paris—the barest possibility had progressed from rank outsider to odds-on favourite. At Paddington I had asked for a weekend return.
    And, roughly eight-and-a-half hours later, I was hoping that Sylvia would soon be pacified by the cheerfulness of my manner. “Is it still drizzling up in town? Here, right from the word go, it’s been lovely! Quite lovely! Right from the moment I got off the train!”
    “Oh, my day is now complete,” she said. “Thank you so much.” She hung up.
    Well, I needn’t feel guilty, I told myself. She was only being Sylvia. I got my toothbrush and my tube of toothpaste at a local chemist’s. “Not too bad a winter so far,” said the grey-haired man behind the counter. We were now in the last days of March.
    “Oh, what a pessimist!” I exclaimed. “The winter’s over.”
    He laughed. “Yes, you’re right.”
    I questioned him about the town. “As a matter of fact I shall shortly be coming to live here.”
    “You won’t regret it. It’s a nice place.”
    I was glad to be discussing my plans. For one thing, it made them more official. Having just spoken to Sylvia—but naturally not having apprised her yet of my decision—I knew that back in London I might falter. I needed to have people to whom I had committed myself.
    “Then we’ll be seeing you perhaps?” remarked the chemist.
    “Certainly.”
    “Hope so, anyway.”
    As I walked along the street in the pale evening sunshine I pondered those last three words.
Hope so, anyway
. It seemed a strange thing to have said, a little unnecessary even, unless he’d truly meant it.
    I smiled. There was no doubt about it. This was a most delightful town.
    Then I quickened my pace and felt blissfully aware that spring
had
come. A charming red frock caught my eye in the window of a dress shop. I stood gazing at it for well over a minute, conscious both of my own reflection and that of the world behind me.
    Disappointingly, the shop was closed.
    Never mind. For dinner I chose some of