An Independent Woman

‘Do sit down,’ she invited him, and, when he looked askance at Muffin the household cat, sitting in the old Windsor chair by the stove, added, ‘Take a chair at the table. It’s warm here. Anyway, I haven’t lighted the fire in the sitting room yet.’

She bent over her pastry, and presently he said stuffily, ‘You can at least leave that and listen to what I have to say, Julia.’

She put the dough on the floured board and held a rolling pin.

‘I’m so sorry, Oscar, but I really can’t leave it. I am listening, though.’

He settled himself into his chair. ‘I have given a good deal of thought to your regrettable behaviour at the dance, Julia. I can but suppose that the excitement of the occasion and the opulence of your surroundings had caused you to become so—so unlike yourself. After due consideration I have decided that I shall overlook that…’

Julia laid her pastry neatly over the meat and tidied the edges with a knife. ‘Don’t do that,’ she begged him. ‘I wasn’t in the least excited, only annoyed to be stuck on a chair in a corner—and left to find my own way in, too.’

‘I have a position to uphold in the firm,’said Oscar. And when she didn’t answer he asked, ‘Who was that man you were talking to? Really, Julia, it is most unsuitable. I trust you found your way home? There is a good bus service?’

Julia was cutting pastry leaves to decorate her pie. She said, ‘I had dinner at Wilton’s and was driven home afterwards.’

Oscar sought for words and, finding none, got to his feet. ‘There is nothing more to be said, Julia. I came here prepared to forgive you, but I see now that I have allowed my tolerance to be swept aside by your frivolity.’

Julia dusted her floury hands over the bowl and began to clear up the table. Listening to Oscar was like reading a book written a hundred years ago. He didn’t belong in this century and, being a kind-hearted girl, she felt sorry for him.

‘I’m not at all suitable for you, Oscar,’ she told him gently.

He said nastily, ‘Indeed you are not, Julia. You have misled me…’

She was cross again. ‘I didn’t know we had got to that stage. Anyway, what you need isn’t a wife, it’s a doormat. And do go, Oscar, before I hit you with this rolling pin.’

He got to his feet. ‘I must remind you that your future with the firm is in jeopardy, Julia. I have some influence…’

Which was just what she could have expected from him, she supposed. They went into the hall and he got into his coat. She opened the door and ushered him out, wished him goodbye, and closed the door before he had a chance to say more.

She told her sisters when they came home, and Monica said. ‘He might have made a good steady husband, but he sounds a bit out of date.’

‘I don’t think I want a steady husband,’ said Julia, and for a moment she thought about the Professor. She had no idea why she should have done that; she didn’t even like him…

So, during the next few days she waited expectantly for a letter from the greetings card firm, but when one did come it contained a cheque for her last batch of verses and a request for her to concentrate on wedding cards—June was the bridal month and they needed to get the cards to the printers in good time…

‘Reprieved,’said Julia, before she cashed the cheque and paid the gas bill.

It was difficult to write about June roses and wedded bliss in blustery March. But she wrote her little verses and thought how nice it would be to marry on a bright summer’s morning, wearing all the right clothes and with the right bridegroom.

A week later Thomas came one evening. He had got the job as senior registrar and, what was more, had now been offered one of the small houses the hospital rented out to their staff. There was no reason why he and Ruth shouldn’t marry as soon as possible. The place was furnished, and it was a bit poky, but once he had some money saved they could find something better.

‘And the best of it is I’m working for Professor van der Maes.’ His nice face was alight with the prospect. ‘You won’t mind a quiet wedding?’ he asked Ruth anxiously.

Ruth would have married him in a cellar wearing a sack. ‘We’ll get George to arrange everything. And it will be quiet anyway; there’s only us. Your mother and father will come?’

Julia went to the kitchen to make coffee and sandwiches and took Monica with her. ‘We’ll give them half an hour. Monica, have you any money? Ruth must have some clothes…’

They sat together at the table, doing sums. ‘There aren’t any big bills due,’said Julia. ‘If we’re very careful and we use the emergency money we could just manage.’

Thomas was to take up his new job in three weeks’ time: the best of reasons why he and Ruth should marry, move into their new home and have a few days together first. Which meant a special licence and no time at all to buy clothes and make preparations for a quiet wedding. Julia and Monica gave Ruth all the money they could lay hands on and then set about planning the wedding day. There would be only a handful of guests: Dr Goodman and his wife, George, and the vicar who would take the service, Thomas’s parents and the best man.

They got out the best china and polished the tea spoons, and Julia went into the kitchen and leafed through her cookery books.

It was a scramble, but by the time the wedding day dawned Ruth had a dress and jacket in a pale blue, with a fetching hat, handbag, gloves and shoes, and the nucleus of a new wardrobe suitable for a senior registrar’s wife. Julia had assembled an elegant buffet for after the ceremony, and Monica had gone to the market and bought daffodils, so that when they reached the church—a red-brick mid-Victorian building, sadly lacking in beauty—its rather bleak interior glowed with colour.

Monica had gone on ahead, leaving Julia to make the last finishing touches to the table, which took longer than she had expected. She had to hurry to the church just as Dr Goodman came for Ruth.

She arrived there a bit flushed, her russet hair glowing under her little green felt hat—Ruth’s hat, really, but it went well with her green jacket and skirt, which had been altered and cleaned and altered again and clung to, since they were suitable for serious occasions.

Julia sniffed appreciatively at the fresh scent of the daffodils and started down the aisle to the back views of Thomas and his best man and the sprinkling of people in the pews. It was a long aisle, and she was halfway up when she saw the Professor sitting beside Mrs Goodman. They appeared to be on the best of terms and she shot past their pew without looking at them. His appearance was unexpected, but she supposed that Thomas, now a senior member of the team, merited his presence.

When Ruth came, Julia concentrated on the ceremony, but the Professor’s image most annoyingly got between her and the beautiful words of the simple service. There was no need for him to be there. He and Thomas might be on the best of terms professionally, but they surely had different social lives? Did the medical profession enjoy a social life? she wondered, then brought her attention back sharply to Thomas and Ruth, exchanging their vows. They would be happy, she reflected, watching them walk back down the aisle. They were both so sure of their love. She wondered what it must feel like to be so certain.

After the first photos had been taken Julia slipped away, so as to get home before anyone else and make sure that everything was just so.

She was putting the tiny sausage rolls in the oven to warm when Ruth and Thomas arrived, closely followed by everyone else, and presently the best man came into the kitchen to get a corkscrew.

‘Not that I think we’ll need it,’ he told her cheerfully. ‘The Prof bought half a dozen bottles of champagne with him. Now that’s what I call a wedding gift of the right sort. Can I help?’

‘Get everyone drinking. I’ll be along with these sausage rolls in a minute or two.’

She had them nicely arranged on a dish when the Professor came into the kitchen. He had a bottle and a glass in one hand.

He said, ‘A most happy occasion. Your vicar has had two glasses already.’

He poured the champagne and handed her a glass. ‘Thirsty work, heating up sausage rolls.’

She had to laugh. Such light-hearted talk didn’t sound like him at all, and for a moment she liked him.

She took her glass and said, ‘We can’t toast them yet, can we? But it is a happy day.’And, since she was thirsty and excited, she drank deeply.

The Professor had an unexpected feeling of tenderness towards her; she might have a sharp tongue and not like him, but her naïve treatment of a glass of Moet et Chandon Brut Imperial he found touching.

She emptied the glass and said, ‘That was nice.’

He agreed gravely. ‘A splendid drink for such an occasion,’ and he refilled her glass, observing prudently, ‘I’ll take the tray in for you.’

The champagne was having an effect upon her empty insides. She gave him a wide smile. ‘The best man— what’s his name, Peter?—said he’d be back…’

‘He will be refilling glasses.’ The Professor picked up the tray, opened the door and ushered her out of the kitchen.

Julia swanned around, light-headed and lighthearted. It was marvellous what a couple of glasses of champagne did to one. She ate a sausage roll, drank another glass of champagne, handed round the sandwiches and would have had another glass of champagne if the Professor hadn’t taken the glass from her.

‘They’re going to cut the cake,’ he told her, ‘and then we’ll toast the happy couple.’Only then did he hand her back her glass.

After Ruth and Thomas had driven away, and everyone else was going home, she realised that the Professor had gone too, taking the best man with him.

‘He asked me to say goodbye,’ said Monica as the pair of them sat at the kitchen table, their shoes off, drinking strong tea. ‘He took the best man with him, said he was rather pressed for time.’