Mrs. Peacock ignored this. She got slowly to her feet, emptied the sherry glass, and wiped her lips with a small lace handkerchief. “Just one other thing before I go.” She pointed to Jordan who, by this time, was lying on his back, writhing and weeping. “There’s something seriously amiss with that child. He needs help without more ado. I knew a child like him twenty-five years ago, always crying and screaming. And what d’you think? Nothing was done and he grew up to be a psychopath. He’s in prison now, in a straitjacket, one of those places where they put violent people who are a threat to the community.”
But Zillah had gone to her bedroom to fetch the money. The amount was more than she had in the flat and she had to take a five-pound note out of Eugenie’s piggy bank. Eugenie, who was really a very strange child, perhaps a genius, started laughing as soon as Mrs. Peacock had gone. Zillah could hardly believe she’d understood what the woman had said but something had made her laugh and after a second or two Zillah joined in. She put her arms round her daughter, preparing to give her a hug, something she hadn’t done for a long time. Eugenie stiffened and pulled away.
Jims might have been trying to get through to her but it didn’t matter much. She knew he’d be here by lunchtime. He’d have canceled his engagement in Casterbridge and driven straight home. There was very little to eat in the flat and obviously she couldn’t go out shopping. If Mrs. Peacock hadn’t been so abominable and rude and defiant, she’d have asked her to get a few things in. The children could have scrambled eggs, though they’d had rather a lot of these lately, and Eugenie had already told her eggs were stuffed with cholesterol and did she know?
It was just after twelve when Jims came. Unlike her, he wasn’t so foolish as to run the gauntlet in Great College Street, he’d have seen what was going on when driving past in the car, but still there was no escape for him. Media people were round the back as well. Zillah, shaking with nerves, heard the lift come up and its doors open. Malina Daz was with him, wearing a sea green salwar kameez and with her hair done like a Japanese geisha’s.
Jims opened the living-room door, took a step inside, and surveyed his little family the way uncharitable people look at asylum seekers. To the children he said not a word. He addressed Zillah in an Arctic voice. “Malina and I are about to prepare a statement for the media. I will show it to you when we’ve finished.”
Malina brought the statement in to her. It was short, prepared on a word processor.
My wife, Zillah, and I fully understand the sensation that recent circumstances-the tragic death of Mr. Jeffrey Leach taken in tandem with our marriage-have occasioned in the media. While absolutely concurring in the opinion of national newspaper editors that this matter is in the public interest and should not be kicked into the long grass but openly aired, we would nevertheless like to assure those kind enough to take an interest in us, that we were totally innocent of any offense.
My wife sincerely believed that her marriage to Mr. Leach had been dissolved twelve months ago. She had implicit trust in Mr. Leach as did I. Not for a moment did either of us believe we were guilty of wrongdoing. If we had, in spite of our love for each other, we of course would have deferred our marriage until we had secured a formalization of the divorce and could start afresh with a level playing field.
Needless to say, we shall remarry as soon as this is feasible. We would both like to extend our best wishes to those good enough to be concerned for us and ask them for their understanding, indulgence, and, indeed, forgiveness.
“It’s a bit formal,” said Malina, “but we deemed that suited to the seriousness of the subject matter. Jims decided it might be best not to mention your husband’s passing setting you free. It looks bad. And we were minded not to use the word ‘bigamy.’ It sounds terribly twentieth-century, don’t you think?”
Because she dared not ask Jims, Zillah asked Malina, “What will they do to me?”
“What, for being married to two men at the same time? Not a lot, I should think. After all, your husband’s dead, isn’t he? It’d be different if he were still alive somewhere. They’ll be focusing on the murder.”
Malina went off to do whatever she did to disseminate the statement. Jordan cried himself to sleep. Eugenie said that if someone would take her there she’d like to go round to her friend Matilda’s for the afternoon but first she was starving.
“There is no food in the house,” said Jims.
“I know there isn’t. I couldn’t go out shopping, could I? Not with all that lot outside.” Zillah very much wanted to placate him. “I could now if I go through the basement. They aren’t in the back.”
“They are. They nearly flattened my car when Malina and I came in.”
“Miss McMurty says that if you don’t have enough to eat you’ll get a vitamin deficiency. Your eyes will go blind and your teeth drop out,” Eugenie said.
“I will get one of the porters to shop for us,” said Jims.
Zillah wondered when the showdown would come, when he’d ask her why she’d deceived him over the nonexistent divorce. She prepared lunch. The porter had bought inferior quality food from some corner shop, besides getting all the things the children didn’t like. The lettuce was wilted and the tomatoes soft. Jordan screamed when he was expected to eat corned beef.
“Can I phone Matilda and get her to come here?” Eugenie suggested.
“I’m surprised you condescend to ask.”
“Well, can I?”
“I suppose so. You’ll have to play in your bedroom. I’ve got a splitting headache.”
Too late Zillah remembered Matilda’s father would probably bring her. But when the child arrived half an hour later she was in the care of a very young and beautiful au pair. She supposed she ought to be thankful Eugenie’s friend was allowed to come at all, permitted to associate with the Melcombe-Smiths, after what had been in the papers.
“I’ll come back for you at six, Matilda.”
They had to have her for three whole hours? That meant Zillah must find something to feed them. She watched them go off toward Eugenie’s room, chatting happily, her daughter giggling like a normal child. The phone began to ring. Zillah lifted the receiver fearfully. It was her mother, saying nothing this time about newspapers but asking if she was so indifferent to her father’s fate that she had forgotten he’d had a heart bypass that morning. After making wild promises she knew she’d never carry out, once Nora Watling had slammed down the phone she was left alone with Jims.
He took from the bookcase an as yet unread biography of Clemenceau, returned with it to his armchair, and, in total silence, opened it at the preface. Zillah picked up a glossy magazine and tried to read a piece about collagen lip implants. Suppose he never spoke to her again? What would she do? She remembered, back in December, how she’d foreseen this marriage as the chaste and charming companionship of two best friends, two people who would have fun together, enjoy life, and at the last have a greater affection for each other than either had for any lover.
“What do you want me to say?” she asked him when she could bear the silence no longer.
He looked up, a shade of irritability crossing his face. “I beg your pardon-what?”
“I asked you what you wanted me to say.”
“Nothing,” he said. “There is nothing to say. The newspapers have already said it.”
“We can get through it together, can’t we, Jims? All the fuss will die down. You’ve done nothing wrong. The statement will stop it, won’t it? Oh, Jims, I’m so desperately sorry. I’d have died before I let something like this happen, I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. Abjectness doesn’t suit you.”
She’d have gone down on her knees to him but for the phone ringing at that moment. “Don’t answer it, let it ring.”