Isabel hesitated. It was, in a sense, woman’s business, but she wanted to talk to Peter too. She shook her head. “Both of you,” she said. “I wanted to talk to both of you. Do you mind?”
“Of course not.” She took Isabel’s arm, gently. “Come on.”
Peter was surprised to see her, but immediately realised from Susie’s manner that something was wrong. He had been sitting at the kitchen table filling in a form of some sort, and he rose to his feet as Susie and Isabel entered. “An unexpected pleasure,” he said, folding the form and slipping it into a plain manila file on the table. “Bureaucracy. Forms. There are forms for absolutely everything these days. Permission-to-breathe forms.”
“Don’t jest,” said Susie. “There’s probably some official drafting one right now.”
Isabel made an effort to smile. “I suppose that having so many bureaucrats, we need to find something for them to do.”
Peter agreed. “Work expands to fill the time of the people you employ to do it. It’s ever thus. Coffee, Isabel?”
Isabel sat down at the table. She was aware that both Peter and Susie were looking at her in a solicitous manner. For a few moments, nothing was said. Susie took the kettle and filled it under the tap; Peter moved the file on the table so that it lined up with a crack between two planks.
It was Peter who broke the silence, clearing his throat and then, hesitantly, asking whether there was anything wrong. He did not want to pry, but he wondered …
Isabel looked down at her hands. “Yes, I’m afraid there is.” She looked up and felt a sudden flood of gratitude to her two friends. In the lives of most of us there are a few people to whom one can go at any time, in any state of mind, and expect complete, unconditional sympathy. Peter and Susie were such for her.
She started to tell them. She explained how Eddie had made the comment in an offhand, incidental way. “He was absolutely certain that it was Jamie,” she said. “And I’m equally certain that Jamie said that he was rehearsing that night. I remember it very clearly because I asked him what they were playing and he said it was a dreadful programme that he couldn’t stand and he didn’t want to be there.”
Peter listened carefully. In the background, Susie measured coffee grounds into the pot, her head half turned from her task in order to catch what Isabel was saying.
“So you’re saying that he said that he would be at a rehearsal and wasn’t. Is that all?”
Isabel frowned. “All? He was at the cinema with somebody …”
Peter held up a hand. “Hold on. Hold on. All you know is that he was at Filmhouse, or wherever, and that he saw an Italian film. That’s all that Eddie said.”
Isabel replied that people did not go to the cinema by themselves—or not very often. “Why would he? And if he did—if for some reason he decided on impulse to go—then surely he’d tell me. And he didn’t.”
Susie, pouring boiling water into the pot, spoke over her shoulder. “Not necessarily. Married couples—and you’re virtually that—don’t give each other every detail of their day-to-day lives. Didn’t you tell me once—I’m sure you did—that you and Jamie both give each other room for a personal life? You did say something like that, didn’t you?”
Isabel had, and she admitted it. “But not something like this. I wouldn’t go off to a film with somebody and not tell Jamie.”
“With somebody?” interjected Peter. “You don’t know that, Isabel. You don’t know for sure that he was with somebody else.
“And what if it was just a friend—a male friend? Somebody from the orchestra.”
“Men don’t do that,” said Isabel flatly. “They don’t go off to the cinema with their male friends. Women do. Men don’t.”
Peter did not contradict her. She was right, he thought. But it seemed to him that this was a misunderstanding rather than a deception, and he put this to Isabel. She listened, but as he spoke she started to shake her head.
“I just have a feeling about this,” she said. “I just feel that there’s something wrong.”
“Then talk to him,” said Peter flatly. “Ask him.”
She shook her head. It would not be possible; she simply could not do it. What would it be, anyway? An accusation. Where were you last Wednesday? Somebody saw you, you know!
Peter listened. When Isabel stopped, they looked at one another across a gulf of disagreement. Peter glanced at Susie, exchanging a look that Isabel knew meant that they had discussed something before. They must have talked about me, she thought; about my problems.
Peter shifted in his seat. “Come on, Isabel. This could just be a simple misunderstanding. The rehearsal might have been cancelled, and Jamie might well have gone to the cinema on his own or with an orchestra friend, although it is a little odd he didn’t tell you afterwards.”
She listened, but as he went on she started to shake her head. “I just have a feeling about this,” she said. “I just feel that there’s something wrong.”
“Then talk to him,” Peter repeated quietly. “Say that you heard from Eddie that they had met at the cinema, and let the facts unfold gently. There may well be a simple and unexciting explanation.”
Again she shook her head. No. She could not talk to him about it.
Peter seemed to hesitate, and Isabel could see that he was considering carefully what to say next “Listen,” he said. “This isn’t perhaps about something completely different, is it?”
Isabel stared at him. “What do you mean?”
“Well, we like Jamie very much and we think it’s wonderful that you are so happy together … but we have asked ourselves occasionally …” He looked at her cautiously, gauging her reaction. “Occasionally we’ve asked ourselves if the real threat to your relationship might not be Jamie falling for a younger woman, but your finding out that aside from physical attraction, Jamie did not bring enough to the relationship to keep you interested.” He paused. “Is that what this is really about? Are you finding yourself drifting apart from Jamie?”
She felt herself blushing. He was wrong, and he should not have said it; there were boundaries in friendship and one of those, she felt, had just been crossed. “No, not at all,” she said. “And, frankly, that’s not what one expects even a close friend to say.”
“Close friends,” replied Peter, “are there to risk saying these things, if only to get them out of the way. So you’re quite clear you want your relationship with Jamie to continue? You definitely want to marry him?”
“Yes, of course I do. Jamie and Charlie are … well, everything, as far as I’m concerned.”
Peter nodded. “All right, but let’s get our feet firmly back on the ground. You firstly have to find a way of speaking to Jamie about the visit to the cinema. You can’t let it fester in your mind. If he is having an affair, which I think unlikely, you and Jamie need to discuss what it says about Jamie’s feelings for you, and what Jamie is going to do about it.”
She started to speak, but he continued. “Then, if you establish that it is the misunderstanding I suspect it is, you really are going to have to try to be more at ease with the relationship which you have with Jamie. How often have we talked about this?”
He answered his own question. “You’ve constantly spoken and agonised about the age gap, haven’t you? And what has everybody said to you—us included? Don’t make such a big thing of it. Relax and enjoy your good fortune.”
He glanced at Susie for confirmation, and she nodded. “But it’s continued to eat away at you. And you’ll remember that on many occasions I’ve told you to loosen up, and to stop thinking about it so much. But you’ve gone on seeing yourself as a foolish older woman who has taken up with a toy boy. You’re going to have to come to terms with fact that it’s an unusual relationship, but one which seems to work.”