Free Unknown by Unknown Page A

avidly. Jerome was aware of it too, for he caught her arm and let his fingers close around it painfully.
    ‘Pick up your packages, Kate.’ He smiled down at her lovingly for the saleswoman’s benefit and continued in a lower voice while maintaining the smile. ‘You will be properly dressed for this wedding, and if you won’t choose something adequate, then it will be chosen for you, and you will wear it if I have to dress you in it myself.’
    She smiled back at him, a smile of saccharine sweetness. ‘A hat next, I think, darling,’ she purred, and marched off to the millinery department. Part way through the business of choosing a hat, she became quite enthusiastic and found herself searching for something which would be just right—and then she remembered. She paused before the mirror with a Cream hat in either hand and closed her eyes. It wasn’t a matter of buying what she wanted or what she liked. It didn’t matter whether she loved or hated it, she would never wear any of it again, she wouldn’t even be able to look at it. It would all have to be either given away or burned. Personally, she was in favour of burning it all, in a public place and with as much smoke as possible, either that or cutting it all into very small pieces with a sharp pair of scissors.
    She had one very bad moment when she had tried to phone Gerald. Jerome was in the small room which he used as an office and he had shut the door firmly, leaving her to mooch around the flat on her own, so she had crept silently to the bedroom and picked up the handset of the extension by the bed. There had been a faint burring sound, and with shaking fingers she had dialled Gerald’s number and waited. She did not have to wait long. Jerome’s voice came over the wire, clear in her ear. ‘That number is unobtainable to you, Kate.’ Vexed beyond all reason, she had flung the phone on the floor, locked herself in the bathroom and shouted every swear word she could think of, like a litany.
    The struggle over the honeymoon continued. Kate refused to budge an inch. She didn’t want to go to Calabria, she didn’t want to go anywhere!
    ‘You talk about a honeymoon,’ she turned on him, distaste in every line of her body and thick on her tongue. ‘A honeymoon! Is that what you call it? Honeymoons are romantic things, for lovers. Find another name for it!’
    Nothing stirred in the immobility of his face. According to what I’ve read, it used to be a period during which a couple came to know each other better so that when they returned they could take up life again among their acquaintances without embarrassment. We will use the period in that way. You will come to know me better and I shall learn a little more about you. Whether it will be romantic or not, I couldn’t say, but we will be lovers, Kate. I’m looking forward to knowing more about you.’
    ‘There’s nothing more to know about me,’ she snapped. ‘I’m not a very complex person. When I’m happy, I laugh, when I’m miserable, I cry, and when I’m in a temper, I throw things about—and candidly, I don’t want to know you any better than I already do. I’d be much happier if I didn’t know you at all! Let me go, Mr Manfred. Let me and Philip go, I’ll go back to teaching and Philip will be well looked after, I promise you that. This marriage, it’s a farce and you know it, so why insist on it? In a couple of months, you’ll be bored to tears and wanting a divorce. I’m not your type, you should know that.’
    ‘You never stop trying, do you?’ His voice held a note of wonder and something almost like reluctant admiration. ‘No, we’ll be married as I’ve planned—and don’t build your hopes on the thought of a farcical marriage or a quick divorce. The marriage will not be a farce and I don’t believe in divorce. If a man can’t be happy with one woman....’
    ‘You won’t be happy with me,’ she broke in threateningly.
    ‘Threats, Kate?’
    On Wednesday evening,