The Best of Times (53 page)

The one sadness hanging over Mary’s wedding day was that Christine refused even to consider sharing her mother’s happiness.

“I’m sorry Mum,” she said when Mary asked her. “I can’t. It feels wrong, disloyal to Dad. And please don’t ask me again, because I can’t change my mind. I’m not being difficult; I just feel very … uneasy about it.”

Gerry was coming, and her son, Douglas, had arrived from Canada with his wife, Maureen, and their two children. Timothy would take her down the aisle, and that would make up—almost—for Christine’s absence; they had always had a very special close relationship, she and Timothy. He had always adored her, asking her to all his birthday parties—except the teenage ones, of course—demanded she was outside the school gates after his first day, invited her to all the interminable football matches he played in and the school plays, and, after he had left home, visited her at least once a fortnight demanding the cottage pie she made, he said, so much better than anyone else.

So there they would all be, and Russell’s children had taken her to their hearts, especially his son, Morton; and the girls, Coral and Pearl, were very sweet and kind.

She would be surrounded tomorrow with friends, some old, some new; it would be a wonderful day. But still … it hurt that Christine would not come, and more, that Christine knew it hurt, and even so was not persuaded.

They had been to New York, and she had had the most wonderful time; she had met a lot of Russell’s friends and attended so many welcome dinners and cocktail parties she became exhausted and had to go to bed for two days; but she had also been shown the sights, had gone up the Empire State and looked down in awe on the dazzling fairyland that was the city far below, drunk cocktails in the Rainbow Room,
done the Circle Line tour, shopped in Saks and Bloomingdale’s, and taken a horse-and-carriage ride in Central Park.

But she had gone home at her insistence to her own dear house in Bristol until the wedding; she contemplated its sale with deep misery, but then Russell had had the idea of giving it to Timothy. “It’s so tough these days for kids, trying to get a foot on the property ladder, and when they can’t get a mortgage for love nor money. Try him out; see what he says.”

Timothy had said only one word when she told him, and that four-lettered; he had then gone bright red and said, “Sorry, Gran, sorry, sorry, but that is just so … so cool; you are just absolutely the best.”

Christine had been a bit funny about that too, said it wasn’t good for young people to have things made too easy for them, but Gerry said if anyone had made things a bit easier for him when he’d been young, he might have progressed a bit farther than he had.

Douglas and Maureen and their daughters were staying in the house with her; and Douglas would drive her over to Tadwick Church next day. Russell had moved into Tadwick House, and his three children were staying there; they had said they would go to hotels, but Mary had begged them to use the house. “I hate to think of it not lived in; it will be wonderful to have you there. And besides, it will be nice for Mrs. Salter to have something to do other than wait hand and foot on Russell. So bad for him anyway.”

“But, Mary, dear, he’s ruined already,” Pearl said, and Coral agreed.

“You have to blame Grandma Mackenzie; she thought he was the nearest thing to an angel on this earth.”

“Heaven help us all,” Mary said, “if we get up there and find it inhabited by people like your father!” And then added hastily that actually of course it would be very nice. You couldn’t be too careful with stepchildren: even if they were sixty …

• • •

It was a perfect December morning: bright and golden, with frost spangling the hedges and meadows and a sky that was brilliantly clear and blue.

The guests started to arrive at eleven thirty. Russell was deeply touched by how many people, some of them quite elderly, as he remarked to the girls—while clearly and blissfully unaware that this description could be equally applied to him—had accepted and made the really quite long journey to Somerset, England, as they all called it. Mary’s friends—also quite large in number; there was no doubt they were good, healthy stock, their generation—followed them in, and the organist began to play the lovely echoing, rounded sound soaring through the little church. Russell felt a dangerous lump in his throat, and gripped Morton’s hand suddenly.

• • •

Alex felt rather proud to be arriving with not one but two extremely pretty women; he had confessed to Emma that he and Linda had become “just friends, nothing more, seen each other for a meal once or twice.” Given that he flushed to the roots of his hair as he said it, and failed to meet Emma’s eyes, she guessed that the relationship might be just slightly more meaningful than that, but she nodded politely and said how nice that must be.

Linda had suggested she meet them at the hospital; they proceeded in her Mercedes … “I’m sorry, Alex, but I’m just not prepared to sit in that bone shaker of yours.” The Mercedes was very low-slung and swayed about a lot, and by the time they arrived in Tadwick, Emma, who had obviously been relegated to the back, was feeling extremely sick and had to stand in the lane breathing deeply for five minutes before she trusted herself to go into the church. She was wearing an off-the-shoulder red dress, with a white stole wrapped around her, and high-heeled red shoes, and her long legs were golden and bare. What was it about the young? Alex wondered. What extra, if short-lived gene did they possess that they didn’t feel the cold?

Linda was looking staggeringly beautiful in a pale grey silk suit
with an ankle-length skirt; she had extraordinarily good ankles, Alex thought, studying them as she walked ahead of him down the aisle, and then as he settled into the pew, found himself thinking rather unsuitably carnal thoughts about the rest of her legs, and tried to concentrate on the organ music instead.

Dear old chap, the bridegroom looked; he had not met him before. He was tall, as far as Alex could make out, and he sat ramrod straight in the pew, occasionally running a hand through his thick white hair and staring fixedly ahead of him; presumably the chap beside him—well into his sixties—was his son. And how wonderful it was, Alex thought, that love could flower so sweetly and so late, that two really very old people could be celebrating their marriage in a spirit of such determination.

And these people coming in now, walking to the front of the church, they must be Mary’s family, a grey-haired, rather portly man and a very pretty young girl. And another man, slimmer and fitter-looking, together with a woman in a rather chic yellow coat and brown fur hat, and two girls in trouser suits with very high heels and a lot of makeup.

There was a flurry at the back of the church, and three little boys appeared, all dressed identically in tuxedos; fine-looking little chaps, with dark, curly hair and brilliant blue eyes, flanking a wheelchair in which sat Patrick Connell—also with the dark hair and the blue eyes—dressed in a very smart suit, smiling broadly and pushed by Georgia. Patrick had made such progress, Alex thought; it really was a little less than a miracle: he could sit up properly now, no longer belted tightly into the chair, and his legs in their perfectly pressed trousers were beginning to look larger somehow, and as if they knew how to work and walk, and less at variance with his heavy shoulders and broad chest.

Georgia looked amazing in a brilliant green dress—also bare shouldered—with a green feather arrangement in her wild hair. Linda was sporting similar headwear; they were known as fascinators, she had informed Alex on the way down.

Georgia urged the three little boys into a pew at the back and, after a whispered conversation with Patrick, inserted herself between them, clearly with a view to minimising talking and giggling; Patrick was beside them in the aisle.

• • •

This was a great day, Patrick thought, for all of them, and thought how far he had travelled from that darkest of the dark days all those months ago, and how impossible it would have seemed then that he could have been attending a wedding, dressed up to the nines, his conscience clear and his physical outlook so good … He was interrupted in this reverie by a change of pace and tune from the organ and a rustle of excitement from the opening door, and saw that the bride was standing on the porch, on the arm of a handsome young chap positively beaming with pride, and behind them, dressed in the palest, softest pink chiffon dress, his beloved, beautiful Maeve.

• • •

She should be here, Gerry thought, Christine really, really should be here. What demon had possessed her that she had been able to resent her mother’s new happiness so deeply; and worse, to be unable to suppress it or at the least conceal it? He was ashamed of her, and he wasn’t sure how he was going to cope with those emotions in the days ahead. He—

“Stand up, Gerry,” hissed Lorraine, Tim’s girlfriend—very nice to have on his arm that day. What did they call girls like her? Oh, yes, arm candy. “They’re here.”

• • •

Russell was afraid for a moment that he was going to pass out, so strong was the wave of emotion that passed through him then. The sound of the organ, the opening of the door, the knowledge that she was walking towards him down the aisle at last, after a wait of more than sixty years … it was an experience of such intensity that the
light in the church seemed to fade a little, the sound of the organ to diminish, and all that existed for him was her, walking slowly towards him, then standing beside him, smiling up at him, his Mary, his adored and adorable Sparrow, her eyes as brilliant and blue as they had been then, her mouth as soft and sweetly smiling, and her hands shaking a little as she handed over her bouquet to Maeve.

• • •

And Mary, looking up at him, saw the young Russell again, whom she had loved so very much, whom she had never forgotten and never failed. She had feared she might cry, make a fool of herself at this moment, as she put it; but she felt steadfast and strong, purely and intensely happy.

• • •

This was how it should be
, Linda thought; this was love she was looking at, true love, not the counterfeit version she had known, and wondered if it was what she felt for the man beside her, who had suddenly and unaccountably gripped her hand.

• • •

This was how I thought it was
, Alex thought,
and do I dare even to think I’ve found it now?

• • •

This is what I thought we had
, Emma thought,
and what I’ve lost, and will I ever find it again?
, and first one large tear and then another fell onto her prayer book, and for a while she saw everything spangled with tears.

• • •

Mary reached up suddenly and kissed Russell, and the gesture was so sweet, so spontaneous, that a small fragment of applause started from somewhere near the back of the church and spread round it, and Mary
turned to acknowledge it, smiling, and thought as she did so that she saw the door begin to open; and then turned back to the vicar as he bade them all welcome and prepared to embark on the lovely, familiar words. (While omitting, as they had agreed, those that might appear somewhat ludicrous, about the procreation of children, and carnal lusts and appetites.)

But then something truly wonderful happened: as the vicar began to speak, the door at the back did indeed open—everyone heard it and turned to look—and through it, with no expression on her face whatsoever except one of absolute determination, came Christine, bareheaded, wearing the old mackintosh in which she walked the dogs and some really quite sturdy boots, and Mary, catching sight of her, provided one of the most beautiful moments of the day, for her small face fragmented into joy and she left Russell and walked back up the aisle and put her arms round her daughter, her beloved, brave, difficult daughter, and kissed her, and then led her by the hand to her place in the front pew, next to Gerry. Who, in turn, put his own arm round her and gave her a kiss.

The service proceeded without any further departure from convention; Tim gave her away with his eyes suspiciously bright; Russell beamed throughout, until it was his turn to make his vows, and then as he said, “Thereto I give thee my troth,” his strong voice cracked and two great tears rolled down his handsome old face; and as Mary promised to love, cherish, and obey, a giggle rose unbidden in her voice, and it was more than a moment before she could compose herself once more.

And then, having uttered his final solemn exhortation that no man must put them asunder, the vicar pronounced them man and wife and told Russell he might kiss the bride; and Mary was not only kissed but held so tightly and so fervently that it seemed Russell was afraid, even now that she had been pronounced his, of losing her again. The bells began to peal; Mary turned, took Russell’s arm, and walked slowly down the aisle, smiling into the dozens of flashing cameras that had most assuredly not been a feature at her first wedding,
waving at people, blowing kisses, and hugging the small boys who scrambled over their father and rushed from their pew to greet her.

“I’ve been to a great many weddings,” Maeve confided to Tim, who was walking her down the aisle, “but never in my entire life one more beautiful than this.”

CHAPTER 44