Who's Afraid of Mr Wolfe? (17 page)

‘Who are you meeting?’

‘Edith.’

Lesley flicked her eyes skyward and clicked her tongue. ‘Well, why didn’t you say that? You made it sound like a date. It really wiped the smile off Dave’s face.’

‘Dave?’ Ellie said, trying to sound as if she didn’t know what Lesley was getting at, even though the way the guy had been behaving all day had confirmed her earlier suspicions that he liked her. Every time she’d moved, he’d been right behind her.

‘Look,’ Lesley said, ‘I know you won’t have noticed this, not having dated since Magna Carta was signed, but Dave really fancies you. Play your cards right and I think he’s going to ask you out.’

‘Really?’ Ellie realised she’d overplayed the innocent bit when she saw Lesley’s eyes narrow.

‘Hang on … you wanted him to think you had a date.’

Ellie started walking again. ‘Yeah, well.’

‘What’s the problem? He’s really keen.’

‘I don’t know, Lesley. I—’

‘What are you afraid of? That you’ll have a bad time?’ Lesley gave her a playful pinch on the arm. ‘Or that you’ll have too good a time? Afraid he’ll dislodge Sam the Slug out of your brain for a few hours?’

Ellie stopped and faced Lesley. There was no shutting her up when she got her teeth into something. ‘I don’t feel ready for—’

‘For what? Look, we’re not talking about finding a replacement for Sam. All you need is someone to give you a quick re-bore.’

Ellie grimaced. ‘Oh, Lesley, lovely poetic thought.’

‘Never mind my poetic thoughts. Come on, put him right about your dinner date and get his phone number, eh?’

They had reached the pub, and as Lesley went to open the door, Penny and the keyboard player came back out. He had his hand on her backside and she had one of hers on his thigh.

‘That was quick,’ Ellie said. ‘Must be off for a bit of organ practice.’

Lesley sniggered and pushed her in through the pub doors.

Half an hour later Ellie was on the bus to meet Edith
with Dave’s phone number on a beermat in her handbag. He hadn’t seemed to mind when she’d told him that she had recently come out of a long-term relationship and wasn’t sure she was ready for anything else yet.

‘Well, when you are, make sure it’s me you ring first,’ was all he’d said.

His goodbye kiss had had a lot of heat in it and it was only Ellie extricating herself from it as tactfully as possible that had stopped it bursting into something much hotter.

When Ellie got to the restaurant, Edith was already sitting at the table, a large gin and tonic in front of her. She seemed preoccupied and Ellie suspected that she was up to something. The restaurant was all starched tablecloths and even starchier waiting staff; the waiter who greeted Ellie had done a little camp shudder at the sight of her jeans.

Somewhere there was a string quartet sawing its way through Lloyd Webber hits.

When Ellie saw the prices on the menu, her suspicions that Edith was buttering her up grew stronger.

‘Edith, it’s mind-blowingly expensive here. I’m only going to have a first course and a pudding.’

Edith waved her objections away and, as if to prove some kind of point, ordered an expensive bottle of wine.

Over on the other side of the restaurant, a couple of diners were smirking at Edith’s outfit and probably trying
to work out which short transvestite in London was currently missing a velvet catsuit with sequinned belt. Edith gave them one of her dowager stares and they looked away hurriedly and became engrossed in the wine list.

The first part of the meal passed without event. As the large white plates bearing tiny portions arrived, Ellie and Edith chatted about nothing in particular and whispered about the people at the next table, who had not said one word to each other since they had been seated. Even so, Ellie knew that Edith’s mind was elsewhere, and after the puddings had been placed in front of them, Edith put down her spoon and fork.

‘Ellie darling, I have not been entirely honest about why I invited you for dinner tonight.’ Edith’s tongue darted out and made a nervous pass over her lips.

‘Well, I was curious, Edith. I mean, you’re always generous, but this is way beyond that. Come on, spill the beans.’

Edith’s fingers were now playing with the buttons down the front of her catsuit. She gave a delicate cough. ‘Well, Ellie, I know, of course, that your flat is up for sale and I couldn’t help noticing when I was staying with you recently that you have lots of details of other flats. From estate agents. Lots.’ She gave Ellie a concerned look.

‘Too many, Edith. I’m getting bogged down trying to decide which ones to go and see. But with Sam …’ Ellie still couldn’t bring herself to say ‘gone’.

‘Yes, I understand, dear. On one salary you can’t afford the flat you’re in.’

‘Not just the flat, Edith. I can’t afford the area either. I’m looking much further out. It will cost me more to get to and from work, but … Anyway, there are a couple of flats in Harrow on the Hill that sound good.’

‘Harrow on the Hill!’ Edith made it sound like Hades.

‘They’re still slightly outside my budget, but what with the knickers thing, I was thinking of asking for a pay rise soon.’

Thinking about it, but not fully intending to do anything. That would mean going in to see Jack, whom she’d been avoiding since the Jubbitt Junior incident. It had been much easier to see Jack as a testosterone-driven power freak than a decent person who protected his staff. And she still couldn’t quite understand that deep look he had given her when she had first told him about Jubbitt Junior’s wandering hands. It had made her feel at the time as though she was at fault; now it made her feel unsettled, like … Well, she wasn’t sure. She couldn’t name that emotion, like she couldn’t name the word that would describe Jack perfectly. Just when she needed words, they seemed to be failing her. Jack was making her feel like a dictionary slowly being wiped of its contents.

Ellie realised she had been daydreaming when she heard the tail end of Edith saying, ‘And I did notice, Ellie, that many of those flats only have one bedroom …’

Ellie had a light-bulb moment. ‘Don’t worry, Edith – I’m going to get a sofa bed. When you want to stay, you can have my bed and I’ll sleep on that.’ She reached across and gave Edith’s arm a squeeze. ‘Nothing will change. It will just be a bit further for you to travel. I can always come and collect you, keep you company on the bus.’

Edith picked up her spoon and pushed her chocolate mousse
à la
Bavarois around the bowl. She had her lips pursed and Ellie noticed how she had managed to overrun the edges of them quite dramatically with her lipstick. Edith put down her spoon again.

‘This flat business, Ellie. There is an alternative you might like to consider. My house is very large, too large for one … I wondered … why not come and live with me?’

Ellie’s mouth formed itself into a little ‘no’ shape. There wasn’t any way she could live with Edith. The thought was a kind one, but completely mad. Every time she visited Edith’s house she came away depressed. With its swirly carpets and epileptic-fit-inducing wallpapers, it was a homage to all that was wrong with 1970s décor. The kitchen was a nightmare of old and unreliable appliances, and the garden was completely overgrown.

Surely if she moved in with Edith, it would only be a matter of time before she starting wearing support stockings and buying a ‘nice piece of fish’ for her tea.

That ‘no’ wasn’t coming out, though. She made another
effort to say it. Then she made the mistake of looking directly at Edith and saw the hope burning in her eyes. Ellie pictured Edith among all those empty, echoing rooms in her house and felt intensely sad. She thought about all those times Edith had pitched up at her flat, unannounced and looking for company. How was she going to manage that when she wasn’t living right round the corner?

Ellie heard herself saying, ‘You’ve been thinking about this a lot, Edith. How would it work?’

‘Well, you would have the top floor as your own. You’ve got a bathroom up there and two other good-sized rooms. You can have a sitting room or a study as well as your bedroom, arrange it as you like.’

‘I could get it redecorated, get some new carpet?’

‘Of course, and I’ve done a bit of research into having a shower installed.’ Edith reached down for her handbag and extracted a sheaf of leaflets from bathroom suppliers. ‘It would take a few weeks, of course, but you could use my bathroom while it was being done.’ She held out the leaflets.

‘Mrs Radjewzki at the day centre, her nephew Stanislaus is a plumber and he’s already given me a quote. Very reasonable, and he could fit us in almost at once.’ Edith’s eyes twinkled. ‘He’s very fond of his aunt, and luckily his aunt is very fond of me.’

Ellie put the leaflets on the table and couldn’t hide her amusement. First Lesley and now Edith: this was the second
time today that she had been mentally mugged by small, doughty people.

She looked at Edith again, at all that hope, and before she could change her mind, said, ‘Edith, that’s a brilliant idea.’

Edith stared resolutely at her pudding, and after a while Ellie handed her a napkin and Edith gave her eyes a good wipe and blew her nose.

The meal turned into a bit of a celebration after that; it was like a light had gone back on inside Edith.

Later, with Edith snoring happily away in the spare room, Ellie went back over her decision and convinced herself it was a good one. She was getting to stay in an area she liked and her rent would be more or less what she was paying for the flat before Sam went. Being able to keep an eye on Edith would take a whole lot of worry off her mind too. She could subtly make sure she was eating properly and actually getting some rest.

Edith hadn’t seemed to mind the few stipulations that Ellie had set. On Monday morning Ellie was going to ring some cleaners to come and blitz the whole house, and Ellie had already been on the internet and ordered a new cooker and fridge. All Edith had to do was find somebody to run a flamethrower over the garden.

Ellie had no idea why she was feeling so elated. Perhaps it was all about making a fresh start in a place where she had never lived with Sam.

She looked around the sitting room, at the empty spaces that marked where Sam’s possessions had been. It already felt half lived in; the entire flat did. There were too many reminders of the fact that a couple used to live here.

She stood up and started turning off the lamps.

She’d always thought that when she moved from this flat, it would be into a house with Sam, the next stage in their life together. That thought should have upset her, but she found herself having very few feelings about it at all.

She pulled the sitting room door closed behind her and walked towards her bedroom.

Time to move on.

Her brothers would tell her she was mad. Lesley would tell her she was mad. Everyone would tell her she was mad. But sometimes being mad was the most sensible thing you could be.

Two weeks later and Ellie was putting her books on her new shelves in her new home, the swirly carpet and hideous wallpaper a distant memory. Everything past the turn of the stairs was pale and calm, except for the bathroom, which was currently ripped out but would be back gleaming and white by the end of next week. Stanislaus had promised, and what Stanislaus promised, he delivered. Usually ahead of schedule.

Ellie wandered through her rooms and that feeling of
elation sprang up inside her again. It was all hers. Nobody to negotiate with over what went on the walls or what colour the bedding should be. Queen of all she surveyed.

Down in the garden, two lads were sitting reading newspapers and smoking, their backsides on a couple of boxes, their legs stretched out in front of them. A few square yards of lawn could now be seen among the brambles, but it looked like it was going to take a while. Shame Stanislaus didn’t do gardening; he’d have had it cleared and an ornamental pond in by now. With hot and cold running water.

Ellie heard the front door open and Edith’s voice waft up the stairs. She went out on to the landing and peered down. ‘Hello, Edith. I’m sorting out my books.’

Edith shouted something back that might or might not have involved putting the kettle on and Ellie went back to cosying D. H. Lawrence up with Jane Austen and had a good laugh over what that particular pairing would have been like. The next book she pulled out of the storage box was
Wuthering Heights
, and she held it away from her as though it was somehow dangerous. She wasn’t going to open it and look inside. She didn’t need to. There was already a large, unpredictable Yorkshireman rampaging around her head.

She put the book between Gertrude Stein and Virginia Woolf and gave a nod of satisfaction; that would keep the bugger in check.

Edith called up the stairs about biscuits and Ellie called back. It felt good to be living with another heartbeat again, and so far Edith had proved to be a surprisingly easy housemate, certainly easier than Sam. She had a better social life than Ellie’s, so she wasn’t in a lot, and she didn’t seem to expect Ellie to do anything at all for her. When Ellie did, though, she was delighted, but there was no ‘poor little old lady’ act. They had fallen into an easy routine and Ellie knew that she was getting as much out of the arrangement as Edith. Sam leaving had brought home to her how much she needed Edith to make her feel part of something that had slipped away with the death of her parents. Ellie had her brothers, of course, but they had families of their own now, other pressures on their time. Edith was her link with her past. She was happy to sit and listen to Edith’s stories about growing up in Canterbury and then India and delighted to discover things about her father’s childhood that she had never got around to finding out from him herself.

If Sam leaving had made her feel as if she was drifting, all familiar points of reference gone, Edith was anchoring her again.

Ellie straightened a few more books.

Yes, it had been a brainwave on Edith’s part, this living together.

Ellie had even got used to everybody and anybody calling them ‘the odd couple’.