Silver Wedding (27 page)

'You never told me why. Why all this hate?'

'It's not hate, it's determination. And why? I suppose because you have cold, cold eyes, Frank. I didn't see that until lately.'

Renata was coming back across the room. They stood up, it was time to go.

'You'll be back for the meetings .. . and everything?' Frank said.

'Not all of them, I think if this operation is to be a success, we mustn't let anyone involved think that we keep running to London all the time. Major decisions should be made in the place itself. Otherwise they'll just think they're a little outpost instead of important in their own terms.'

She was right of course, as she had been so often.

He held the door of the taxi open for her. She said she was too big to fit into her little sports car any more.

For a brief moment their eyes met.

'We both won,' she said softly. 'You could put it like that.'

'Or neither of us won,' he said sadly. 'That's another way of putting it.'

And he put his arm around his wife's shoulder as they went to where the Rover was parked.

Nothing would ever be the same between them after tonight. But the world had only cracked a little for them, it hadn't blown apart as it might have. And in a way that was winning. the phone and ask her. Straight out. And talk to her too about face shaping, and how to shadow the jawline. But she would never ask Maureen anything like that these days. Things had changed completely as the years went by.

There were no friends around here who could share the fun of all this self-improvement. No indeed, her neighbours would think it frivolous and silly. A lot of the women went out to work, they either knew such things anyway or else they hadn't time for it. Anyway Deirdre would never dream of letting them into her business, letting them know that this was a big thing in her life, that it was her one chance to prove that a quarter of a century had added up to something. Deirdre intended to impress her neighbours rather than let them share in the fun. They weren't really important, not like people back in Dublin, but still it was good to let them see that the Doyles were people of importance, of worth.

What would Desmond say if he saw her studying this article so intently? Would he say something flowery like that she was Truly Beautiful already? Or might he just say that's nice in the curious flat way he often said things were nice without engaging in them at all? Or might he sit down and say to her that there was really no need for all this fuss and preparation. Desmond often told her not to fuss. She hated that, she didn't fuss, she just saw to it that things were done right. If somebody hadn't lit a fire under Desmond all these years where would they be now she would like to know?

Deirdre would not share her beauty secrets with her husband.

Long long ago in that strange summer when it all began, Desmond would lie on a narrow bed and admire her as she brushed her long fair curls, he would say that he never knew that peaches and cream was anything except a line in a song until he saw Deirdre's lovely face. He would reach over for her and ask if he could help her rub more of that nice cold cream in, maybe down her throat a little, maybe around her neck and arms. Maybe . .. maybe. It was so hard to remember Desmond being like that. But the article in the magazine said that she could recapture all that fresh glow, it was only a matter of proper skin care.

Deirdre would follow every single step, all those upward and circular movements when massaging in the throat cream, all that avoiding the delicate tissue around the eyes. She was going to look right on this day if it killed her. She was going to show them that they had been wrong to pity her twenty-five years ago when she had married Desmond Doyle, a counter hand in a grocery shop, a boy from a poor family in the back of beyond in Mayo. A family that nobody had ever heard of.

This day would be her silvery revenge.

They had all said yes, every single person who had been expected to come. There were some of course who had been asked but knew that they were not meant to come. Like Desmond's odd brother Vincent, the man who never left his mountains and his sheep in that lonely place where Brendan had chosen to spend his life. There had been a message from her son that his uncle very much regretted but it was a bad time to get away. That was the way it should have been done. Deirdre had nodded, pleased at the correct response.

. And of course the Palazzos who ran the huge company where Desmond had worked for so long. Unfortunately they couldn't come, a sweet letter from Carlo and Maria, signed personally, wishing them all kinds of happiness and full of regrets that it would coincide with their annual visit to Italy. There would be a gift and flowers. But it was right that they didn't come. They were too high up, they would cramp everyone .else's style. And Deirdre's mother who felt able to talk to everyone might discuss with them too closely Desmond's career in the company. She might discover that Desmond had never risen high and had at one stage been let go. This would be at odds with the glowing picture Deirdre always painted.

Frank Quigley and his wife Renata Palazzo said they would love to come. Deirdre thought grimly that Frank, for all his vast success and his unfair advancement up the ladder even before he married the heiress to the Palazzo fortunes, was still a good man to have at a function. He always seemed to know the right thing to say, and said it. She remembered back to their wedding day, Frank had been the best man then, he had been well able to handle anything that had turned up. Including Deirdre's mother and father, with their faces like early Christian martyrs throughout the ceremony and the so-called festivities.

And Father Hurley was coming, he said it would be a marvellous chance to visit a couple whose marriage has worked out so well. Deirdre knew she could rely on kind Father Hurley to say the right thing all evening.

And of course the Irish contingent would arrive. The date had been long fixed in their minds. There had been a possibility that her brother Gerard might not be able to make it but Deirdre had telephoned with such surprise and hurt and bewilderment that somehow his plans had changed. She had told him straight out on the telephone that there was no point in having a silver wedding if the family couldn't be there.

'Will Desmond's family be there?' Gerard had asked.

'That's not the point,' Deirdre had said.

Mother was coming of course, and Barbara, they were going to make a long weekend out of it all, come on the Thursday, do a few shows, take in a lot of shopping. Barbara's husband Jack would combine it with a business trip of course. That's what he was always able to do.

And when they arrived they would have drinks on the lawn in Rosemary Drive in the late afternoon. Then they would all go to a special Mass where the priest would refer to blessings of the sacrament of matrimony in general and specific reference to Desmond and Deirdre in particular. Father Hurley would be called on as the priest who married them to say a few words . . . Then after photographs outside the church and everything they would gather back at Rosemary Drive, and champagne would be opened.

There had been no champagne back in 1960 but Deirdre would not let her brow furrow about that. If she were to be truly beautiful she must keep worry lines away from her face.

She told herself that there really was no need to have worry lines. Everything would go perfectly.

And even if... no, no, smooth out the temples, don't screw up the eyes.

The beauty plan had suggested you do a Countdown and a Chart. Nothing pleased Deirdre more, she loved making out plans and schedules like this. Anyway she already had her own Countdown to the silver wedding in terms of things to be organized.

Desmond had shaken his head sadly, but men didn't understand the way things were done. Or maybe, Deirdre thought crossly, some men did, and those were the ones who got on. Men like Desmond who had never risen in Palazzo, who were leaving and going into partnership in a corner shop. Those men didn't understand.

And because Deirdre was so plugged into her countdown, she knew she had exactly 110 days to go when the telephone rang and it was her mother at the other end of the line.

Mother rang only every second weekend, on Sunday evenings. Deirdre had instituted that practice years ago, they rang each other on alternate Sundays. Sometimes she felt that Mother had little to say, but that couldn't be possible. Mother wasn't good at writing letters so these conversations were Deirdre's lifeline. She remembered everything that was said, and even kept a little spiral notebook by the phone to jot down names of Mother's bridge friends, or of the party that Barbara and Jack had been to, or the concert that Gerard had taken Mother to. Sometimes Mrs O'Hagan would exclaim that Deirdre had the most extraordinary memory for little things. But Deirdre thought it was only natural that you should want to recall matters of moment in your family's life. She was always mildly put out that Mother hardly ever remembered any of her friends, and never inquired about Palazzo or about any of the outings that Deirdre had described.

It was unexpected to hear from Mother in the middle of the week , in the middle of the day.

'Is anything wrong?' Deirdre said at once.

'No, Deirdre, Lord above you sound just like your grandmother.' Kevin's mother always began every greeting by asking was anything wrong.

'I meant it's not your usual time to ring.'

Mother softened: 'No, I know, I know. But I'm in London and I thought I'd try and see could I catch you at home.'

'You're in London? Deirdre cried, her hand flying to her throat. She looked around the living room, untidy and covered with Desmond's papers, plans and projections, notes that he had been discussing with the Patels, the family who ran the shop that he insisted was far more his life's dream than the great Palazzo company. Deirdre herself was dressed in a faded pinny, the place was a mess. She looked out the window fearfully as if her mother were about to come straight in the door.

'Yes, I just got in from the airport. The Underground is marvellous isn't it? Just whizzes you in, door to door almost.'

'What are you doing in London?' Deirdre's voice was almost a whisper. Had Mother come three months too early for the silver wedding, was there a crisis?

'Oh, just passing through ... you see the tour leaves from London.'

'The tour? What tour?'

'Deirdre, I told you all about it... didn't I? I must have. I've told everyone else.'

'You mentioned no tour to me.' Deirdre was mutinous.

'Oh I must have, maybe I wasn't talking to you.'

'We talk every Sunday night of life, I was talking to you four days ago.'

'Deirdre, is anything wrong dear? You sound so strange. Like as if you're fighting with me or something.'

'I didn't know of any tour, where are you going?'

'Down to Italy first, and then by ship, we pick up the ship in Ancona and head off from there ..."

'Where do you head off to?'

'Oh a variety of places . .. Corfu, Athens, Rhodes, Cyprus, and some place in Turkey ...'

'A cruise Mother, you're going on a cruise!'

'I think that's a very grand name for it.'

'It sounds a very grand outing.'

'Yes, well let's hope it won't be too hot out in all those places, I think it's probably not the right time of year to head off...'

'Then why are you?'

'Because it came up, anyway enough of this, are we going to meet?'

'Meet? You're going to come here? Now?'

Mother laughed. 'Well thanks a lot, Deirdre, that sounds a great welcome, but actually I hadn't intended on going out to darkest Pinner... I thought you might come in and join me for a spot of lunch or coffee or whatever.'

Deirdre hated Anna calling it 'darkest Pinner', it was such an insult, as if the place was off the beaten track. And here was her own mother, who was from Dublin for heaven's sake, who didn't know where anywhere was, and whether it was on or off any track, saying the same thing.

'Where are you staying?' she asked, trying not to let the irritation show.

Mother was in a central hotel, very central she said, it had only taken her two minutes to leave the Piccadilly Line and be in her foyer. Simply remarkable. It would be easy for Deirdre to find too.

'I know how to get there.' Deirdre was white-faced.

'So will we say the bar here at one thirty, will that give you time ... ?'

Deirdre left a note to Desmond on the table. These days she never knew whether he was going to come back or not during the day. His arrangements with Palazzo seemed to be fluid. Frank Quigley had said there would be proper arrangements made, for a manager like Desmond, setting up on his own, it wasn't a question of severance pay, redundancy, compensation, golden handshakes ... It was all defined as Proper Arrangements. Deirdre hoped it would be finalized by the time of the silver wedding.

Grimly Deirdre went upstairs and put on her best suit. Her hair was limp and greasy-looking. She had planned 10 wash it later in the day, now there wasn't time. Her good handbag was being mended, the catch had worked loose. There was a grubby looking bandage on her wrist where she had burned herself on the oven. She didn't like to open it all up and apply a fresh one, they had told her that it should be done at the hospital.

In low spirits and filled with a vague apprehension Deirdre Doyle set out to meet her mother. She felt drab and unattractive. She looked what she was, she decided, catching a reflection of herself in the window of the train that took her into Baker Street. She looked the middle-aged housewife from the suburbs, married to a not very successful man, no job to exercise her mind, not enough money to dress herself properly. Suffering badly from the empty-nest syndrome. Perhaps more than most: one daughter trying to be accepted in a convent where they wouldn't let her take her vows, another daughter who sometimes didn't come to see her parents more than once in a fortnight, and her son, her beloved son gone, fled to live at the other side of another country.

She was sure that she and Mother would fight. There had been something in the tone of the phone call that she hadn't liked. Mother had been impatient with her, and patting her down as if she were the difficult one.