Free Marking Time by Elizabeth Jane Howard

I mean, you told me that you only had the baby because Villy wanted it so much. So it seems rather odd to give her a whole lot of jewellery for it as
well.’
    ‘I always gave her a piece after each of the children. I couldn’t very well change about that.’ After a silence, he said, ‘Could I?’
    ‘Obviously not.’
    Her sarcasm was either lost on him or he ignored it, as he said, ‘Well, I bet Angus gave you things after you had the boys.’ Then, with what seemed even to her incredible stupidity,
he added, ‘Let’s close the subject, shall we?’
    Pictures of Angus, drunk and maudlin after their firstborn, and the idiotic fur coat he had bought her occurred, and she said bitterly, ‘Oh, yes. After I had Ian, he bought me a fur coat
– a full-length skunk that I had to take back to the shop as soon as I could go out.’
    ‘Why on earth?’
    ‘Because he did not have the money to pay for it. The cheque had bounced by the time I got it back.’
    ‘How perfectly beastly for you. Poor sweet!’ But then he added, ‘I expect he meant well, though.’
    ‘He didn’t mean anything. Except that he wanted to be the kind of man who gave his wife a fur coat. He’d told masses of our friends, and when people asked to see it, he told
them that he had had to send it back because I had ridiculous principles about not wearing fur.’
    Edward did not reply. They were driving down Whitehall, and lorries loaded with sandbags were being directed by police into Downing Street and to the doors of the government offices. There was
not much other traffic.
    ‘And so,’ Diana continued – she felt both nettled and reckless – ‘of course he gave me nothing after Fergus. Or Jamie.’ This is idiotic, she thought. Why am I
saying such unattractive, unimportant,
stupid
things? She began to feel frightened. ‘Edward—’
    ‘Since you brought the subject up,’ he said, ‘it seems rather funny to me that you should make such a fuss about Villy having a child while we are going to bed together, when
you did exactly the same thing yourself.’
    ‘I never told you that I didn’t ever go to bed with Angus! I told you that I didn’t
want
to! And, anyway, it was different about Jamie.’
    He did not want to pursue the difference. ‘Well, come to that, I can’t remember ever telling you that I never went to bed with Villy. I didn’t talk about it
because—’
    ‘Because what?’
    ‘Because it simply isn’t the kind of thing one talks
about
.’
    ‘You mean, it might be embarrassing?’
    ‘Yes,’ he said doggedly, ‘it certainly might.’
    Outside Waterloo Station there was a queue of buses all full of children waiting to get into the station. As they drew alongside one of them they could hear the shrill voices in a kind of
singing shout: ‘Jeepers creepers! Where d’yer get those peepers? Jeepers creepers! Where d’yer get those eyes?’ over and over again.
    ‘Poor little beggars,’ Edward said. ‘Some of them must be going to the country for the first time in their lives.’
    This touched her; she put a hand on his knee. ‘Darling! I don’t know what came over me! I’ve been feeling so blue. And it’s the end of our lovely time. I suppose
I’m terrified that you’ll be sent away somewhere and I’ll never see you. It’s ridiculous to quarrel when everything’s so awful, anyway.’
    ‘Darling! Here – have my hank. You know I can’t bear you to cry. Of course we won’t quarrel. And I promise you one thing.’
    She took her nose out of the voluptuous handkerchief that smelled so deliciously of Lebanon cedar. ‘What?’
    ‘Whatever I do I’ll find a way of seeing you. Wild horses wouldn’t keep me away.’
    She blew and then powdered her nose.
    ‘Keep the handkerchief,’ he said.
    ‘Really, you encourage me to blub,’ she said; she felt lightheaded as people sometimes do after a near accident. ‘You always tell me to keep your splendid handkerchiefs. I have
quite a serious