The Ex-Wives by Deborah Moggach Read Free Book Online

waiting, with her hoots of mirth.
Honestly, Buffy, how could you?
It was undeniably lonely, that she wasn’t there to listen to his exploits at the language school, which by now he would have worked up into one of his anecdotes. On the other hand it was a relief, that she wasn’t there to be all superior about it. He must remember that. She had been insufferably superior. Her greatest feat, her most awesomely mind-boggling one, was that she managed to be superior
even when it was revealed she had been double-crossing him. For months.
He, Russell Buffery, had been the totally innocent party. She had been lying and cheating, packing and unpacking, and all the time shagging herself senseless with some under-aged photographer in Soho.
And yet she had managed to still be hoity-toity about it.
The whole thing was breathtaking.
    Looking back over those final explosive weeks, he couldn’t remember how she did it, probably some sort of conjuring trick. But she had managed, in someappallingly female way, to make
him
feel to blame. It was all, obviously, his fault . . .’ Your infantile egocentricity . . . your drinking . . . your hypochondria . . . And another thing . . .’ All his ex-wives said that,
and another thing.
You never helped with the children, you never helped with the washing-up . . . you were never supportive with my career . . .
and another thing
. . . you dropped ash on the duvet . . . you laughed at your own jokes . . . at that dinner party at the Robinsons’, remember, you fell asleep in the soup,
the soup,
remember, we hadn’t even started the main course, I could’ve
died
. . . a blizzard of
another things,
a smokescreen of them . . .
    He remembered that mockingly sunny day, three months earlier. How he had unzipped her suitcase with feverish hands.
    â€˜I told you, I changed taxis!’ she had cried. ‘The cabbie from the airport, he was going on about darkies and what’s the country coming to and I simply couldn’t stand it. Racism is so repellent, especially when one’s paying for it. So I got into another one!’
    The self-righteousness of her voice, barely faltering even when she saw him taking out the bottle of Sudden Tan!
    â€˜That’s for my legs. They always take the longest to get brown, not that
you’d
notice.’
    See! She had managed to put him in the wrong, even then.
    â€˜Where’s your plane ticket?’ he had demanded. ‘Where’s your lira?’
    â€˜Don’t be so paranoid, darling. It’s bad for your blood pressure.’
    Just then she stopped. He had pulled out a newspaper –
La Stampa
. It still had its sticker on:
Pat’s
News and Smokes, Wardour St
. W.1.
    â€˜Oh shit’ she said.
    Buffy paused outside Blomfield Mansions and looked up at the porch. Two cupids, carved in stone, were entwined above the doorway. They were portly and sooty; the private parts of one of them had chipped off. He knew how they felt. With what hopes, years before, had he once carried Penny across the threshold – well, not carried, because of his bad back, but he had lifted her, with a little hop, over the rubber doormat. How those cupids mocked him now! My God he was feeling maudlin, and he hadn’t even had a drink.
    He let himself into the flat, stumbling first over the dog and then over a plastic bag of empties. There was a funny smell coming from somewhere. Once he had been in the place for a bit he got used to it, but it always hit him on entering. The answerphoneshowed ‘1’. Briefly, but unconvincingly, he had an image of Penny, sobbing on the other end of the line and begging to come home. Asking him to forgive her. Grovellingly telling him that for once it was her mistake and she would always love him.
    He replayed the message.
    â€˜Granada TV here, could you call back as soon as possible and ask for Gwenda.’
    Granada TV! His spirits rose. He dialled the number. Maybe it was a cameo role