The Wedding Group by Elizabeth Taylor Read Free Book Online

Cressy.
    ‘She
is
inclined to cry,’ Toby explained to David. ‘Don’t worry about it.’
    ‘One simply
can’t
worry over touchy people,’ Alexia said. ‘One would spend one’s life…’
    Midge was usually in her element when she was contentedly, quietly pouring out coffee after a good dinner, listening to the young people talking; but, this evening, something was different – nothing deeply wrong, only the surface pattern of such occasions a little changed. She could not lay a finger on it, and was trying to, feeling abstracted, as she filled the cups and handed them to David.
    ‘Now sit back, Ma; you’ve done enough,’ he said, taking his own cup.
    There were renewed praises for her cooking.
    Of course, she reflected, the young people themselves were getting older. Nell, for instance, was almost like one of her own generation. Midge thought her so ungainly, although she carried herself well – like a caryatid, though with nothing more to support than the weight of all her auburn hair. Once in a chair, she slumped and sprawled, her skirt caught up above her fat legs, showing stretched stocking-tops, suspenders, edges of tatty lace. She had kicked her shoes off, and kept feeling about for them with her toes. Her ringed fingers combed through, puffed up her fringe. Older men, on the newspaper, thought her a ‘fine woman’, David had told his mother, finding it rather amusing.
    Perhaps, Midge thought, it was Nell, with her careless, slovenly ways, who had ruffled the evening. She had decided last night, on her arrival, that she would easily be able to get onwith her. If David could find something in her, she would assiduously search for it herself.
    There had been footsteps in the night, across the landing, a door softly closing. It was not her business, she decided. She had tried to go to sleep, willing her mind to other lines of thought, yet waiting all the time to hear the noise of the lavatory being flushed, and the footsteps returning. Nothing had happened, but a long, long silence, and she had fallen asleep while it still continued. ‘Under my roof!’ she had thought, on first waking in the morning. Then she had smiled, realising that the phrase sounded more like Archie’s than her own. At the back of her mind, so
far
back that she hardly knew it was there, was the idea that extramarital relations might make the other sort unnecessary.
    They had finished talking about Cressy, and Nell was reading David’s palm, leaning forward over the dog on her lap, his hand in hers. She found all kinds of conflicting traits, the most broken heart-line she had ever set her eyes on, with a chain of islands; recklessness; fickleness: but in the end she could see, with perhaps a little stretch of imagination, calmer days ahead, and a child – certainly one child.
    He listened mockingly and, as soon as he could, withdrew his hand.
    Now it was Alexia’s turn. She held up her palm obligingly, but with her eyes fixed on Nell’s face, as if it were
her
character which was under scrutiny.
    ‘This couldn’t be more straightforward,’ Nell said. ‘There are just the four long, clear lines – life, head, heart and fortune. Great honesty and forthrightness.’ She turned Alexia’s hand about, folding the fingers, and uncurling them. ‘The girdle of Venus is the only unusual thing – very deeply marked with indentations.’ She ran a finger along it.
    ‘That’s where I cut my hand on some broken glass and had to have three stitches,’ Alexia said.
    Nell returned the hand and sat back in her chair, stroking the dog. ‘It’s all crap, anyhow,’ she said.
    ‘Oh, please do mine!’ Midge begged.
    ‘My dear, it’s only a joke. My mother once said to me when I was young, “Just learn to make good coffee and tell fortunes, and you’ll never be at a loss.” She tried to make me smoke, too. Just one of the little social graces, she explained. Something to do with one’s hands, you know.’
    As she was now using her