Free The Londoners by Margaret Pemberton Page A

if she knew things about the wedding arrangements that she wasn’t revealing and then, deciding she might sleep easier if she
was left in ignorance, she said dryly, ‘Life isn’t dull in Magnolia Square, is it? I thought I’d heard everything when Miss Helliwell told me she’d asked Mr Nibbs to adapt a
child’s gas mask in order that it could be worn by her cat.’
    ‘Did he succeed?’ Kate asked, knowing that if he had done Mrs Singer would want a similarly adapted gas mask for Bonzo.
    ‘I haven’t the faintest idea,’ Miss Godfrey said as they reached her gate. ‘I certainly haven’t seen Faust rigged and accoutred, nor do I particularly want to. In
comparison, however, the Jennings’ family’s antics make Miss Helliwell’s flights of fancy seem quite rational.’
    Kate felt laughter again begin to bubble up in her throat. ‘Goodbye Miss Godfrey,’ she said, looking forward to seeing Miss Godfrey’s face when she saw Bonzo in his bow,
‘I’ll see you tomorrow, in church.’
    ‘Goodbye, Katherine,’ Miss Godfrey said, looking forward to a little peace and quiet and a nice cup of tea. ‘Sleep well.’
    Later, freshly bathed and with her heavy waist-length hair shampooed and hanging loose, Kate sat dressed in a white terry dressing gown near the open window of her bedroom. It was nearly nine
o’clock and the hot summer evening was pleasantly cool as dusk approached. She rested her chin in her hands, her elbows on the windowsill, looking out over Magnolia Square.
    Charlie Robson was walking Queenie across the grass surrounding the church. Miss Godfrey was watering her sweet peas, Mr Nibbs was sitting in a deck-chair, his head slumped a little to one side
as if he had fallen asleep and Miss Helliwell was anxiously calling Faust in for his supper. In nearly every garden that she could see, magnolia shrubs and trees were in flower. On the far side of
the Square, the Collins’s
magnolia grandiflora
was heavy with creamy-white blossom. Yards away from the church porch a
magnolia parviflora
was thick with pendants of white
petals starred by wine-coloured stamens.
    Smiling again at the thought of the gas mask Mr Nibbs had adapted for Faust, she wondered how Carrie would now be feeling. After tomorrow, the rest of her life would be irrevocably different.
She wondered how she herself would feel if she were about to be married. Would she be nervous? Would she have any last minute doubts? And where, at this precise moment in time, was the man she
would one day marry? Was he half a world away or only a few miles away? Would she fall in love with him the instant she set eyes on him or would it be a long, slow, gradual process?
    Her hair was dry now and she turned away from the window and began to brush it. Normally she would also have braided it but tomorrow she was going to wear it in an elegant Grecian knot and she
wanted it to be smooth and kink-free. Twisting its long length as if it were a skein of heavy wool, she secured the end with a piece of cotton and then took off her dressing gown and climbed into
bed.
    There was a tap on her door and without opening it her father said, ‘Goodnight,
Liebling
,’ as he did every night.
    She smiled lovingly. There were some advantages to not being in love and engaged. She wasn’t having to face the prospect of moving far away from Magnolia Square as Carrie might have to do
in order to remain near to Danny.
    ‘Goodnight, Dad,’ she said, nestling down against her pillows, unable to even imagine living anywhere else but the house in which she had been born. ‘God Bless.’

Chapter Four

    ‘And did everything go off without a hitch?’ Miss Pierce asked Kate on Monday lunchtime as they sat together in the small canteen that catered for the needs of
Harvey’s office staff.
    Kate thought of Carrie looking almost regal in her sumptuous satin wedding-gown, her face aglow with happiness as she walked down St Mark’s aisle on her father’s arm; of Miss