The Marrying Game (55 page)

‘It must have been a proper drawing room once,’ Polly said. ‘The proportions will be lovely. I’m aiming for lots of light, which is the great asset of a typically early Georgian house like this.’ She sighed. ‘I do wish I had a magic wand, and I could make it ready for tonight. I’ve done my best, but this is still a hostess’s nightmare. The state of the downstairs cloakroom cries out to heaven. That’s another thing I’m going to fix before winter sets in.’ She sat down opposite him, folding her hands expectantly on the table.

Ran glanced across at her. ‘Hmmm?’

‘I’m talking about the downstairs lav.’

‘Oh. Is it blocked again?’

Polly let out another sigh. ‘It needs a new sink, new lav, new door – and some of that gorgeous dark green paint John Oliver does. And I have to decide if eighteenth-century hunting prints are a classic, or a cliché.’

The fog of incomprehension was clearing from Ran’s dark eyes. ‘Hang on, Poll – this is all going to cost a bloody fortune.’

She smiled, pouring coffee, enjoying the picture of serenity she made. ‘I know it’s a huge project, but I don’t want to do it in stages. I might ask Bickerstaff’s to take it
on
. They’re expensive, but worth it – that’s what poor Rufa told me, only a matter of days before she vamoosed.’

Ran was not ready to move on to the topic of Rufa. ‘It’s going to cost a fortune, though,’ he repeated. There was that stubborn glint in his lustrous eyes.

Polly made her voice caressing. ‘Oh, darling, you don’t have to worry about that. I’m not Christina Onassis, but one is moderately well-heeled. I can certainly afford to make a few more improvements here – I think of it as an investment in the future.’

‘But that’s your money,’ Ran said. ‘I can’t let you spend your money on my house.’

Polly murmured, ‘
Our
money, surely. Our house.’

His perfect brows drew together ominously. ‘If you want the truth, I don’t fancy any more changes. I like it as it is.’

‘Now you’re being silly.’ This was seriously vexing. Keeping her voice light and reasonable was an effort. ‘You can’t possibly like all this chaos.’

‘I need the parlour for my meditation.’

‘You can meditate in the new drawing room.’

‘Why do you want to knock all my walls down?’ Ran was plaintive. ‘This is my home!’

Polly’s wedding dress was still hanging, in its protective blue body bag, on the back of the door. She did not think she needed to point out the obvious fact that it was her home, too. She smiled into his heavenly eyes. ‘Sweetheart, I’m not trying to destroy your home, honestly. I know I harp on about redecorating. I was only getting flurried about tonight.’

‘Tonight?’ Ran echoed innocently.

She let out a peal of indulgent laughter. ‘You’ve forgotten,
haven’t
you? It’s my dinner party for Hugo and Justine, and Hugo’s parents.’

‘Oh. Right.’

‘I will admit, I do get into a state when I’m entertaining. I haven’t cooked properly for such a long time – I’d love to have hired poor Rufa again, if only she hadn’t married money and then eloped with her lover, and given up cooking. I don’t know anyone else I could trust with those pheasants.’

Ran folded his newspaper. With the expression of a man facing a firing squad, he said, ‘The thing is – I’m really sorry – but I won’t be here.’

Silence settled around them. The blood slowly drained from Polly’s lips, leaving them white and compressed with unbelieving fury. This dinner party was meant to be her introduction to the local gentry. It was essential, when living in the country, to make oneself known to the right neighbours; something Ran’s late father had never bothered to do. Hugo’s parents were prominent among the squirearchy on this side of Gloucestershire. She had been fretting about the menu for weeks – how dared Ran act as if he did not know about it?

‘Of course you’ll be here,’ she said. ‘Where else would you be?’

He looked unhappy. ‘The thing is, it’s November the fifth.’

‘And –?’

‘Sorry I forgot to tell you, but Nancy’s invited a few people over for a firework party.’

Bloody Nancy, Polly thought wrathfully; why can’t she just go back to London? ‘Well, she’ll understand if you say you can’t come.’

‘I have to be there,’ Ran said. ‘I promised Linnet.’

‘But you were over there two days ago, for her birthday. I do think you might pay some attention to me, for a change.’ Polly paused; it was never a good idea to whine. ‘After all, I did go all the way to London for that pink bicycle.’

‘No, I can’t let them down,’ Ran said solemnly. ‘Nancy arranged the party specially, to cheer Linnet up.’

‘She seemed perfectly cheerful to me.’

‘She misses Rufa.’

‘For God’s sake,’ Polly snapped. ‘You’re always rushing over to Melismate. You practically live there. I wish you’d just accept that you don’t belong to the Hastys any more. Hanging around them just makes you look stupid.’

‘I’d rather hang around the Hastys than that berk Hugo,’ Ran said hotly.

‘Oh, I know what this is really about – it’s your obsession with Lydia again.’

‘I’m not obsessed!’ This was his tenderest place.

‘Just because she’s joined a choir and got herself a life –’

‘This is not about Liddy, all right?’

‘I suppose I’ll have to settle for a compromise,’ Polly said icily. ‘My mother always says that’s the essence of a good marriage. Since you’ve made the arrangement, you’d better show your face for the first bit of the party – presumably it’ll be early, because of Linnet. But you’ll have to leave at seven at the latest. And please don’t put on your new suit until you get back.’

‘I’m not coming back,’ Ran said, with an unfamiliar steeliness. ‘I’m staying for the whole party. I’ve bought sparklers.’

‘You’re coming back at seven!’ Polly was fierce. ‘I’ve invited the D’Alamberts to meet us as a couple. I’ve told them unofficially about the wedding. If you’re not here, it will look ghastly.’

‘What fucking wedding?’ Ran shouted. ‘I wish you’d told me about it, while you were spreading the news far and wide! When did I agree?’

She stood up, holding herself rigidly to control the shivers of rage. ‘Every time I do something you don’t like, you try to ruin it by pretending we’re not getting married. It’s pathetically childish. Why else would I be spending all this money?’

‘I’ve told you – I don’t want your fucking money!’

‘How very high-minded and noble of you. I’m expecting you here at seven. If you’re one minute late, you can sleep on the sofa.’ Polly had been working towards sweeping majestically from the room, underlining the final threat with a smart slam of the door.

Ran confounded her by suddenly erupting from his chair, scattering slices of toast. ‘I’ll come back when I feel like it! This evening belongs to Linnet – you’re always trying to come between us!’

He stormed from the room, slamming the door so hard that Polly’s wedding dress leapt in its blue plastic shroud.

Nancy carried the plate of sausage rolls out to the old stableyard, where Roger had built the bonfire. The fire was now a ten-foot wall of orange and scarlet flame, cracking out sparks like sniper’s bullets. A lavish buffet was laid out on the kitchen table. Drinks and snacks were circulating. Everything seemed to be going well, though
Nancy
still had her doubts. Quite apart from the awkwardness of everyone for miles around knowing about Rufa, she had never taken sole responsibility for a party before.

She halted for a moment, missing Rufa so intensely that tears rushed to her eyes. Since Edward had brought back the news from Oxford, Nancy had shed rivers of tears. Where on earth had the silly mare hidden herself? Rose had protested that she was bound to turn up in a few days, but Nancy knew her sister better. Rufa could be horribly stubborn. She felt shame far more acutely than anyone else in her family – she would never face them until she could face herself. She would die before she came home.

Nancy had spent a night in the wine bar sobbing into Roshan’s shoulder, picturing Rufa alone and in despair. She had fled back to Melismate, and insisted upon calling the police. Rufa was an adult, however, and there was nothing much the police could do. Their only hope was Edward. A week or so after the postcard from Durham, Edward had opened Rufa’s credit-card statement, and discovered she was in Edinburgh. He was searching for her now, and he would let them know the second he saw her. Nancy loved him for loving Rufa. She did not see how she could have endured the anxiety, if Edward had not been on the case.

This party was an attempt to cast out fear. They were all frightened by the chasm in the family. The Man had always responded to adversity by throwing a party, and it was his spirit they were trying to invoke. Nancy had been shocked by the amount of labour involved – the phoning, the endless shopping, the slicing, buttering and general setting-out. Rufa had been the one who
dealt
with all this, somehow managing to look as if she were enjoying herself at the same time. She was a worker of miracles, a maker of magic.

But this is my party, Nancy thought; I have to do things in my own style.

Rose was wandering around the groups of guests, refilling wine glasses. Lydia and Selena had risen to the occasion magnificently. Nancy was intrigued by the changes she had found in her sisters on this visit home, and could not stop wondering whether they would have happened anyway, if Ru had not vanished. Selena, last seen sloping moodily off to photoshoots, had amazed Nancy by meeting her at the station in a neat white Golf. Since her return to Melismate she had passed her driving test, and now drove herself and Linnet to school. For the supper this evening, she had made an impressive venison casserole. She was young enough to wipe out the nightmare year, and revert to being an ornament to St Hildy’s, almost as if the Man had not died.

Lydia had been another revelation. She was as pastel-shaded and as gentle as ever, but no longer so soft that she was running off the plate. Her excellent cooking had made the supper possible – she had produced gingerbread men, complicated salads, baked potatoes and vegetarian hot dogs.

‘Stop thanking me,’ she had said earlier. ‘Consider this as your reward for cheering up Linnet. She hasn’t let you speak in your own voice for days.’

‘Listen, I’d happily speak like Egbert Ressany for the rest of my life if I thought it would cheer Linnet up.’ It had cut Nancy to the heart to find Linnet sobbing every night for Rufa, and asking why she did not phone. She had dredged up all her storytelling powers to invent mad
adventures
for the Ressany Brothers, and fantastic narratives about Rufa’s mythical life in Scotland, full of ingenious reasons why she had not been in touch. Nancy did not like Rufa becoming a fictional character, but Lydia swore Linnet was happier.

Watching Linnet now, Nancy decided the party had been a brilliant distraction. She had asked Terry and Sandra Poulter, who worked for Edward, and had a child in Linnet’s class at the village school. Another child, from the same class, had been brought by two of Lydia’s friends from the choir. Nancy smiled at the three small girls, silhouetted against the flames, quivering with glee like hummingbirds.

How long is it, she wondered, since nice, normal people like this came to Melismate parties?

Selena had asked two friends from St Hildy’s Oxbridge class. Nancy and Rose had been amused by their tidiness and respectability. Their names were Laura and Clarissa, and they were about a million miles away from the studded Neanderthals Selena had hung out with last year. With sparklers in their hands, they were as childlike as the smaller children. They wore wholesome woolly gloves, and had glossy hair. Selena was trying to write her name on the air. Her warm, laughing breath made a wreath around her head in the freezing night.

If I half-close my eyes, Nancy thought, I can nearly see him. She suddenly knew how the Man would have approved of all this, as if he were standing at her elbow telling her so.

Lydia had made mulled wine, to the Man’s old recipe, in the battered tea urn he had rescued from a dustbin outside the church hall. She looked charming, in new
jeans
and an oversized scarlet sweater. She had invited a dozen people from the Cotswold Chorus, and was listening to the conductor, Phil Harding, with a rapt and radiant face.

‘Look at him,’ Ran’s voice said bitterly, next to Nancy’s ear. ‘Smarming all over her.’

‘Have a sausage roll,’ Nancy said, thrusting the plate at him.

‘Are they organic?’

‘Of course not.’ She pulled the plate back. ‘Do stop glowering, Ran.’

‘He fancies her – it’s disgustingly obvious.’

‘He’s allowed to fancy her.’

Almost to himself, Ran muttered, ‘No he’s
not
.’

‘And I can’t help thinking she rather fancies him.’

Ran scowled. ‘He’s just taking advantage of her.’

‘Go and light some fireworks for Linnet,’ Nancy said. ‘Isn’t that why you came?’

‘I’m not letting that mimsy singing bastard out of my sight!’

Nancy laughed, kindly but scornfully. ‘God, you’ve got a nerve. If you’re that jealous, you’d better start thinking how to win her back, before it occurs to the mimsy singer to marry her.’