Saving Grace by Jane Green Read Free Book Online Page B

absolutely certain is that this too shall pass. It always does. The good, the bad, the ugly, the beautiful . . . it all passes.
    When she looks at him with disdain, finds fault with everything he does, she has learned to take deep breaths, to keep herself busy, to be more careful with how she spends her time – to do things that make her happy, bring her joy. She will ring Clemmie and take her out in the city or go to see a movie with her friend Sybil. Things she can do without him, things that remind her of the good in life.
    She will keep the focus on herself rather than look for someone to blame and wait for it to pass.
    It has passed. This morning, as they make love, slowly, mindfully, she looks into her husband’s eyes and feels a thread of connection so strong she can almost see it. She loves him. She loves him. She has only ever loved him. These are the times when that is easy to believe.
    Afterwards she gets up, goes into the bathroom as Ted watches her from the bed, manuscript in hand, peering over the top of his reading glasses, laying the manuscript down for a few moments to admire his wife.
    ‘You are still the most beautiful woman I have ever seen,’ he says, admiration and gratitude both apparent in his gaze.
    Grace pauses, smiling at the unexpected compliment, glad they have circled back to finding love and appreciation for each other. She blows him a kiss before going into the bathroom, a newfound lilt to her step.
    ‘How’s the manuscript?’ she calls, hearing Ted’s foosteps on the stairs. ‘Is it still the one you were reading? The writer being hailed as the next Ted Chapman?’ Ellen is the one who usually sifts through the manuscripts and advance reading copies that arrive, but these last few weeks it has been Grace, and she is interested in what he thought.
    ‘It’s good,’ Ted says. ‘But not great. A compelling story and moving characters, but overwritten. A little too much. Still. I’m blurbing it. It’s from my editor and I think it’s good blurb karma. Will you send it back to the publisher today?’
    ‘Which publisher? Did you keep the cover letter?’ Grace’s heart sinks, knowing how Ted always loses the letter of introduction, the letter that names the editor.
    ‘No. No idea where it went. You’ll track it down. It’s someone at Penguin.’
    Grace will track it down, by first going through the ever-growing piles of papers in Ted’s office, then, when that fails, by ringing Penguin and speaking to editorial assistant after editorial assistant until someone discovers the editor. It will take at least an hour, and it is an hour that needs to be spent testing new recipes for Harmont House and preparing the shopping lists for next week.
    ‘Of course,’ she says, staring past the mirror on the makeup table and looking out the window.
    The garden is starting to bloom and nothing was cut back last year. She could employ teams of landscapers, but nothing gives her more pleasure than getting out there herself. Even when the work is backbreaking, it grounds her, in the truest sense of the word. She isn’t a style icon, or a writer’s muse, or the wife of an important man when she’s on her knees in the garden, hair scraped back under an old hat, clippers in hand; she just
is.
    She doesn’t think, doesn’t worry, has no anxiety She feels no pressure when she is in her garden. She can weed for hours, losing all sense of time until her back starts to hurt and she remembers all the other things she has to do.
    Today was the day she planned to do the garden before a market run for ingredients for the week’s cooking at Harmont House.
    Perhaps, she thinks with a sigh, she will postpone the gardening. The only thing she won’t skip is Harmont House.
    TOAD IN THE HOLE
    (Serves 4 to 6)
    INGREDIENTS
    250g all-purpose flour
    1 teaspoon salt
    Black pepper for seasoning
    3 eggs, beaten
    350ml milk
    2 tablespoons melted butter
    1 tablespoon vegetable oil
    8 sausages, preferably