Catherine Narracott
The Wife
My husband walks back to me, smoothing his hair into place. Just before he spoke to the three women, he ruffled his hair with one hand, making it stand up in small tufts, like the rumpled head of a much-loved schoolboy. I have seen him do it many times before.
‘Not quite what I had expected of our fellow guests,’ he says in an undertone, ‘three moth-eaten old dears. What can they be doing here? Not skiing, surely: one of them looks about a hundred and a day … that little puss with the white fluffy hair. Doesn’t look all there, does she?’
‘They’re not all old,’ I say, looking at them. ‘One of them is probably in her thirties.’ With the right clothes and better coiffure she might even be attractive: tall and slender with dark-gold hair.
He waves a hand; that makes no difference.
Perhaps to say thirties is old – for a woman.
My husband turned forty a few years ago, but is still described by the newspapers as ‘boyish’.
I am twenty-two, and yet I have only a few more years left of being a truly ‘young’ woman.
I can feel it … as though there is an hourglass trickling sand inside of me.
I’m lucky that I’m petite, with good skin; I can fake it for a little while longer than some.
‘What difference does it make,’ says Anthony now, ‘if they all dress like elderly spinsters?’
It’s true: the clothes are dreadful. So many women just don’t know or care how to make the best of themselves. They don’t realise how helpful clothes can be for giving a good impression.
‘But darling,’ I say. ‘Don’t you always say it’s the old dears that are the most reliably Blue?’
‘Yes,’ he smiles ruefully. ‘Tory heartland. Don’t want anything to change.
Can’t bear the thought of the new estates blemishing their beloved old villages.
Want everything to go back to how it was before the war, the Good Old Days.
All whilst living off their wealthy relatives and contributing nothing to society besides gossip.
Well,’ he chuckles, ‘as long as they keep putting the cross in the right box!’
I shiver. The large entrance doors have been thrown open again, letting in a rush of freezing air and several people with luggage, who must have been on the later train up.
One of them is coming in this direction – apparently making straight for us.
A hulking, stooped, ugly figure: a similar age to Anthony but that can be the only thing they have in common.
Where my husband is handsome and sleek, everything about this man seems misshapen.
There is something battered-looking about him, as though life has knocked him around.
There’s also something lopsided about his face.
It takes me a moment to realise this is partly because his right earlobe is missing.
‘Darling,’ I whisper. ‘Who is that man?’
‘Ah,’ Anthony says, ‘did I not mention Bruno to you?’
‘Who?’
‘Bruno Crane! My old brother-in-arms.’
I shake my head. He has not said anything to me about this man.
‘Ah! Sorry, it must have slipped my mind. Yes, Bruno has come along to do some ice-climbing with me, for old times’ sake!’
‘But—’ Before I can say anything, this Bruno Crane is looming over us.
His breath is sour. It makes me think of poor diet, of hidden illness.
All of my husband’s acquaintances dress and speak like him, went to the same schools, have the same voting records, attend the same clubs.
Bruno Crane I can tell, even before he opens his mouth, is not one of them.
The best society hostess learns to observe others, to learn to anticipate their needs from tiny unspoken cues.
It has made me rather good at reading people.
And this man does not make any sense beside my husband.
‘Anthony,’ Bruno Crane says. ‘How are you, old man?’ He sticks out a meaty hand and clasps Anthony’s arm – so tightly, in fact, that my husband is momentarily unbalanced and trips a half step forward before he rights himself.
I look at those thick fingers gripping the smart fabric of Anthony’s jacket and can’t help thinking of a drowning man seizing hold of a piece of driftwood in a stream.
Then Bruno Crane turns to me. ‘And … Catherine? I – I don’t believe we’ve met.’ He frowns. ‘Forgive me. I – I didn’t know you were coming.’
‘No,’ I say. ‘I think we are both surprised.’
I note that Bruno Crane’s eyes dart nervously towards Anthony, a little like an actor in a rehearsal who is still slightly unsure of his lines and relying on the prompt to fill in. ‘Well. It’s – it’s an unexpected pleasure to find you here.’
But he doesn’t sound very pleased. It’s clear he is lacking in the social grace, the polish, the charm that smooths my husband’s every interaction, that makes him such a good politician.
The look I catch him giving Anthony over my head is more than questioning. I see, I think, anger in it.
I turn to Anthony just in time to catch his look in return.
It’s a warning. He is giving Bruno Crane a warning.
I know this look because I’ve seen it before.
Don’t say the wrong thing. Don’t say too much.
He doesn’t have to send it my way very often, of course, because I am so good at keeping up appearances.
I wait for my husband to explain the confusion and I think Mr Crane might be waiting for the same thing.
But he doesn’t. Instead, he says: ‘If you need any nylons or perfume, darling, I’m sure Bruno can be of assistance.
Isn’t that right, Crane?’ But before the other man can reply: ‘Fancy a climb this afternoon, Crane? Shake off some cobwebs? There’s a short one up the rock face beyond the glacier that should only take us a couple of hours. ’
I open my mouth, about to say that I thought we were going to try and do a ski run before the end of the day, then close it again.
Bruno Crane isn’t as good as my husband at concealing his emotions. It is quite apparent that this idea of an ice climb does not appeal to him, that in fact he can probably think of nothing worse. And yet he nods. ‘You’re on, old man. I’d love to.’