Past Praying For (10 page)

‘
Oh – no one was meant to see that. But just look at these! I can never get the temperature right, never. I hate this bloody thing!’

‘
I don’t think you’re allowed to say you hate Agas. They’re an icon of our class. And those look perfectly all right to me, for anyone who isn’t a perfectionist like you.’

Elizabeth
gave the pastries a disparaging glance and set them down. ‘I’m sure it’s all my fault. Piers insisted we had to have it, and he says it’s every woman’s dream, but I still can’t get the hang of it.’

‘
Ask Laura. She talks to hers.’

‘
Oh Suzanne, I can’t ask Laura anything just now! I don’t know what to do about it.’

Their
eyes met significantly across the kitchen table. ‘It’s a pretty awkward situation, isn’t it? Did Piers tell you what happened?’

‘
Not a word. But then I suppose he couldn’t, really. If you’re a governor you’ve got a duty of confidentiality.’

‘
Of course,’ said Suzanne diplomatically. ‘But Laura isn’t taking it well, you know. She always looks so tremendously together and confident, but she’s really quite shaky about herself underneath. She was doing her best to put a good face on it last night, all bright and brittle, but you could see she was thinking about it all the time.’

‘
I know.’ Elizabeth’s grey eyes were troubled. ‘I wanted to say something, but I was afraid I’d make matters worse. And they wouldn’t come today. Something about a relative or an old friend coming, but I shouldn’t think she feels very festive. And I know she’s blaming Piers, even though he’s only one of fourteen governors and if all the rest wanted this other woman, there wouldn’t be anything he could do.’

‘
No, of course not.’ Suzanne admired Lizzie’s wifely loyalty, and she couldn’t exactly say that it would be just like Piers to ruin Laura’s chances purely for the fun of it.

‘
I honestly think you should just leave it, Lizzie. She’ll get over it. She’ll have to, won’t she? There isn’t an alternative, really. After all, we’ve all got our crosses to bear, haven’t we, and we don’t have time to sit about whimpering. There’s always the next meal to cook.’

Suzanne
’s eyes scanned the cluttered kitchen. Heaven only knew how Lizzie conjured her elegant cuisine out of this mess – the sink full of pans, vegetable peelings, bowls and spoons and kitchen knives on the work surface. However neat it was when she started, she always got into a fantastic mess when she was cooking, and it reminded Suzanne sharply of her own problems.

‘
Lizzie,’ she said slowly, ‘can I ask you something? Am I –’

As
she spoke the door opened and Camilla came in. She was pouting, and clutched protectively to the front of her navy Viyella sailor dress was a doll of horrible vulgarity.

‘
Mummy, Mike Cutler says he’s going to cut Samantha’s hair off.’

‘
Mike’s just teasing you.’ Elizabeth began decanting the despised canapes on to a plate.

‘
He isn’t, he isn’t!’ The protruding lip was beginning to tremble. ‘He says –’

Elizabeth
intervened hastily. ‘Milla, we won’t let him, I promise. Now, why don’t you show Suzanne what you got in your stocking? She’s dying to see, aren’t you, Suzanne? You put most of it over there on the dresser, I think.’

Diverted
from her grievance, the child skipped over.

‘
Look, Suzanne! This is a pound, and I got that down at the toe of my stocking, and this is an orange...’

Elizabeth
paused in her task to direct, across the small fair head, a look of fond maternal complicity at her friend.

Suzanne
managed to smile back. She showed no outward sign of the shaft of purest envy that pierced her heart.

***

Margaret Moon carefully put the last of the plates she had used back in place behind the glass of the corner cupboard. They were part of her grandmother’s wedding china, gloriously gilt and beflowered, and she made a practice of using them whenever there was an excuse.

Like
the Cutlers, she had enjoyed an excellently trouble-free Christmas dinner for one, also courtesy of St Michael. Would he, she wondered idly, as she covered the remains of a small plum pudding and popped it in the fridge, become by use and wont the patron saint of shoppers? ‘By St Michael, that is a fine piece of steak!’ Or working mothers, perhaps...

She
put the Christmas Oratorio on her elderly hi-fi, made herself a cup of Blue Mountain coffee luxuriously topped with whipped cream – it was Christmas, after all – and carried it through, with a small box of Belgian truffles, to put on the table beside her armchair.

‘
You do know how to show a girl a good time,’ she murmured appreciatively as she went to sit down.

Pyewacket
was in possession already, naturally, since this was the most comfortable chair, and asleep with that air of boneless relaxation specific to cats. It did seem harsh to wake him, when he was so sound asleep...Then she noticed one eye open, watching her, and recognized the power play.

‘
Scat, cat!’ she said, suiting the action to the words and sinking into her chair with a sigh. She kicked off her shoes and put her feet up on the little Victorian footstool her mother had covered with petit point, and chose a chocolate.

She
was very tired. Three services in the last twelve hours – she had not realized how much conducting them, on top of all the planning and preparation, would take out of her, though perhaps she should have.

It
had all gone smoothly; no hitches, nothing forgotten, and everyone cheerful, healthy, happy and prosperous, all these bright, middle-class families with their 2.4 children with shining hair and perfect teeth, clutching expensive playthings whose price would feed a family for a week, and which by the day after tomorrow would probably be broken or neglected. They looked as if the only problem they had in the world was how to pay off January’s Barclaycard.

Margaret
had always believed that the good things of life were there to be enjoyed, and she was far from being a Puritan – indeed, an ascetic friend had accused her, with asperity and some justice, of being a hedonist – but that sort of pointless, conspicuous waste was hard to stomach.

She
hadn’t felt exaltation, or even satisfaction, at her successful organization of the Christmas worship. She had felt – she groped for the word – irrelevant. That was it. They viewed the church as little more than a social club in refined surroundings where you could be sure of not having to encounter the undesirable element.

It
was personally depressing, too. She liked her own company; she had chosen to be alone on this her first parish Christmas instead of inviting guests. She even liked this plain little box of a sitting room, furnished with some cherished belongings from her family home, including a few good watercolours, and her books, of course, ranged in long bookcases on either side of the exuberantly tasteless electric fire. She was far happier here – she took another chocolate – than she would be making polite conversation at someone else’s lunch table.

But
she did wonder whether a bachelor vicar, new to the charge, would have received not one single invitation for Christmas Day? She thought not; John Anselm, the previous encumbent, had warned her of the pitfalls of accepting one invitation rather than another. She would have valued a chance to talk to him about it, but he had underlined his wisdom by retiring to the West Country to which he felt he still belonged.

Oh,
she wasn’t paranoid enough to feel that it was especially personal, at least mostly she wasn’t. Although – well, probably she wasn’t the sort of person the smart sort of person liked, and if she were honest the feeling was mutual. She hoped it didn’t show, but it could be that she hadn’t learned to fake sincerity as well as she thought she had.

On
the other hand, it could be simple unease with this oddity, a woman whose office made her a spiritual parent. It could even be hostility; Margaret, whose antennae were usually quite sensitive, had detected aggression in several humorous comments. By their jokes ye shall know them, she thought wearily, but to tackle hostility it must be openly expressed, which in this society was about as likely as turning up to a drinks party and finding they were all wearing shell suits. That was one of the reasons she had preached her sermon.

She
sighed again, and ate another chocolate. Three o’clock; her sister Ruth would be phoning later from Canada, where she was married with five children; driven to this excess, she claimed, by the unphiloprogenitive nature of her siblings.

But
it was probably a good time to phone Robert, the remaining member of her family. He would have lunched, as usual on Christmas Day, at his club with another bachelor, but should by now be back in his extremely comfortable flat in Bath.

She
dialled the number, and when he picked up the receiver heard the strains of the same piece of music sounding from the other end. It had always been traditional Christmas listening in the Moon family.

‘
Snap!’ she said by way of greeting, and held the receiver nearer her own recording.

He
was never disconcerted. ‘Ah, Margaret!’ he said. ‘I thought it would be you. Happy Christmas! And has Stretton Noble survived the shock of Christmas with the female touch?’

‘
Oh, yes,’ she said brightly. ‘It’s all gone very smoothly indeed. Not a response missed, lovely singing, lots of happy families. I’m just putting my feet up in the consciousness of a job well done.’

‘
I see.’ There was a pause, then, ‘Depressed, are we?’

She
sat upright and glared at the phone as if she could see him, wearing his red smoking jacket, no doubt, and the inevitable bow tie.

‘
Remind me,’ she said tartly, ‘in my next incarnation, not to choose a brother who’s a psychologist.’

‘
Well, I can readily imagine that you might be tired of the Church of England, but I can’t think that Buddhism would suit your temperament. What’s the problem?’

She
fought a rearguard action. ‘I don’t know what you mean. What have I said to indicate that everything isn’t absolutely fine? As it is, of course,’ she added hastily.

‘
My dear girl, I’ve known you since you were a singularly unrestful addition to the nursery I had happily considered my personal preserve. Unless you’re saying that you’re totally exhausted, haven’t got a moment to yourself and are just dashing off to something else which will probably finish you off completely, you’re miserable.’

Her
laugh was a little forced. ‘It’s just a question of adjusting, that’s all. I need to be needed, Robert, and I don’t think anyone needs me here at all. Everyone’s well-fed and well-housed and comfortable, and I even suspect that there are people I could help who don’t come to church because it’s a middle-class preserve.’

‘
Oh, I feel sure you can be relied on to take it down-market fast, if that’s what’s needed. A couple of tambourines, a bearded guitarist and some hip-hop for Jesus…’

Margaret
groaned.

‘
Hah! Got you there, haven’t I? You don’t like that any more than they do, do you? Look, when am I going to be allowed to come over and inspect this place for myself? You’ve got to let me come sometime, you know.’

Suddenly
it seemed a very attractive offer. ‘I did want to get things going myself. And you can’t stay for a service yet, I’m not ready for that. I’m not sure I totally trust you not to try to make me laugh. But if your friends in the police force are going to give you a breathing space over Christmas, why not come down tomorrow for a couple of days? I even have an invitation – the redoubtable Mrs Travers is having a drinks party to which I “and any house guests you may have, my dear” have been, amazingly enough, invited.’

‘
I’ll look up the section on paranoia before I come. I’ll be with you around tea time tomorrow, barring forensic emergencies.’

She
felt much more cheerful when she put down the phone. It rang again almost immediately, and she picked it up expecting Ruth’s exuberant mid-Atlantic tones.

But
it was a parishioner, elderly and distraught, whose husband had been taken into hospital with a heart attack after Christmas lunch.

It
was a timely reminder that a turkey on the table and a roof over your head were no guarantee of human happiness. With a sense of relief at the opportunity for service, she grabbed her coat and hurried out.

***

Their guests had gone. Suzanne, leaving Patrick and Ben watching the Christmas movie, had gone to tidy up the kitchen. She ached for her bed; Christmas was bad enough, without the additional stress of having to conceal from Patrick’s mother, who believed the sun rose only to shine on her eldest son, that she was barely speaking to him.

When
Patrick unexpectedly opened the kitchen door, her lips tightened and she turned away, busying herself at the sink.