Free How to Murder Your Mother-In-Law by Dorothy Cannell Page B

moustache—“as how I’ve lived a very sheltered life.”
    “Of course we’re married,” Dad blustered. “It doesn’t take a man of the cloth, or some judge, to make a marriage. What it takes is a man and a woman getting together and speaking their vows one to the other. Andif that’s not enough, there’s the ring. Do you think, Ben, I’d have forked out four pounds ten for that one your mother’s wearing if I didn’t view our union as binding before God and man?”
    “I’m illegitimate!” My husband raised one eyebrow after the other as if it were a juggling trick he had just mastered.
    “Oh, son! Don’t say that!” his mother sobbed.
    “I don’t blame you!” Ben gripped the arms of his chair as if on a roller coaster about to take off at breakneck speed. “You were a young, impressionable girl.”
    Dad thumped a fist. “She was close to forty.”
    “I have to try and make you understand, Ben dear.” Mum raised her waif’s face. “Times were different then. Elijah’s parents threatened to take their lives if we married in the Church and mine said they would do the same if the wedding took place in a synagogue.”
    “What was wrong with a registry office?” My husband sounded a bit more mellow.
    Mum let out a little screech. “I couldn’t have entered one of those ungodly places.”
    “I still say I’m cutting you both out of my will.” Ben allowed amusement to creep into his voice. Well done, my darling! He was rallying with amazing fortitude. The bar sinister loomed less large. He would not feel compelled to resign from his clubs. What surprised me was that Mum had not felt compelled to resign from the Roman Catholic Church, but she proceeded to explain how she had circumvented that calamity.
    “They say you can convince yourself of anything if you want to badly enough; sort of like pasting one photo over another. So whenever I thought about my wedding day I pictured it taking place at Holy Mother Mary’s Church with dear Father O’Dugal officiating … just the way I’d always imagined.”
    “But it’s not too late,” I cried, doing what I did best—sticking my nose in where it wasn’t wanted. “You can finally have your dream wedding. Ben could give you away, Mum, and—”
    “I could be the bridesmaid.” Tricks didn’t sound quite as enthusiastic as I would have expected.
    “And I do be thinking I could do the flowers.” Jonas touched his forelock.
    “It would be a relief to see you respectably settled, Mum. Bear in mind, Ellie and I are getting on in years and can’t expect to live forever.” Ben was back in top form. “Of course I’ll need to have a word with Dad to make sure he can support you and any little ones that may turn up.”
    Mum flushed a becoming pink, and the suspicion of a dimple appeared in her cheek. “I suppose it would be best to go to the church down here, where nobody knows us, Elijah.”
    “Church?” Dad sounded as though he did not believe his ears. “I’ll have you know, Magdalene, that if this ceremony is to take place, it will be at the
synagogue
.”
    “No squabbling, parents!” Ben told them, but his was a voice crying in the wilderness. His elders were on their feet, glowering across the table at each other.
    “What a fool I’ve been!” His mother’s face screwed up tighter than a fist. “You didn’t refuse to marry me at Holy Mother Mary’s because of your parents. You were putting your own feelings first. Just as you have done every day of every week we’ve been together!”
    “If that’s the way you believe”—Dad’s eyebrows almost shot off his forehead—“I’ll give you a wide berth from now on, Magdalene! In fact, if you would prefer it, I’ll spend the night at a hotel.”
    It was an idle threat. The idea of his forking out good money—when he had a bed here for free—was mind-boggling, but I felt compelled to utter a protest. “Be a dear, and you and Mum talk things over …”
    “There is no