Free A Mother's Spirit by Anne Bennett Page A

told him that her parents had both given their approval for the match. He wanted to whoop with sheer unadulterated joy, for it seemed to be filling his whole body, but he contented himself with catching hold of Gloria and holding her close.
    When their lips met it was as if a furnace had been lit inside each of them. The kiss the night before was one that Joe thought might have to last him a lifetime, but this kiss was like a promise of the joys to come, and when they eventually broke apart, they both groaned with desire.
    Joe released her before he forgot himself altogether, and holding out his hand he said, ‘Come. I must see your parents immediately.’ Hand in hand, they left the room and ran down the stairs.
    ‘Well, well, well,’ Brian said when he saw Joe at the door. ‘Fine turn-up for the book this is. The minute my back is turned you are making love to my daughter.’
    Joe smiled. ‘Not quite, sir. But I do love her very much and would like your permission to marry her.’ ‘And you have it, Joe,’ Brian said, going forward to shake him by the hand. ‘And I hope you know what you are taking on. She can be the very devil when she doesn’t get her own way.’
    ‘You really can’t tell me anything about Gloria that I don’t know, sir,’ Joe said. ‘And there is nothing about her that I do not love.’
    Gloria gazed at Joe and thought her heart would burst with happiness.
       
    Everyone in the house seemed stunned by the news, and not everyone was that pleased either.
    Kate said, ‘There is bettering oneself and taking advantage, and that’s what the young pup has done, setting himselfup to marry that pretty young thing and him near old enough to be her father. Mark my words, it never works trying to mix chalk and cheese.’
    Joe knew what they thought but there was nothing he could do about it, and anyway he was taken aback by the speed at which everything was decided. Gloria was now sporting a platinum engagement ring with a huge diamond in the centre of it, and Brian declared there was no need to delay the wedding.
    ‘The autumn I always think is a nice time of year,’ he said.
    ‘It is, sir,’ Joe agreed, ‘and though I am immensely grateful that you are taking over the entire cost of the wedding, I need a little time to save up enough for a deposit on some suitable place for the two of us to live in.’
    ‘What are you talking about, man?’ Brian said with a laugh. ‘You will live here, naturally.’
    That hadn’t been what Joe had anticipated at all. He imagined he and Gloria in their own little house or apartment somewhere, but when he said this, everyone seemed to think it was all rather amusing.
    ‘Darling, I wouldn’t have the least idea how to keep house,’ Gloria said. ‘I have never had to do it, and as for cooking anything, well, I have never done that either. I honestly don’t know how to boil an egg.’
    ‘But did you not have any sort of cookery lessons at school?’ Joe asked.
    ‘Well, no,’ Gloria said. ‘Why would we? And I have never washed dishes, or really cleaned anything, and wouldn’t know how to start dealing with the laundry. We have servants to do those types of things.’
    Joe realised then that after his marriage everything would go on as it always had done, and the only thing that would alter after he put the ring on Gloria’s finger was that she would share his bed.
    Three rooms were being amalgamated to make a suitefor Joe and Gloria, and when Joe was shown the plans for his approval he was staggered at the size of it. He knew he wouldn’t be sorry to leave the room that Brian had assigned to him when he had moved into the house. It had a carpeted floor, a blue fluffy rug by the large and comfortable bed that matched the drapes at the windows, a wardrobe, chest and dressing table in light wood, and a bathroom for his use off to the side. It bore no resemblance at all to his spartan cellar where he had felt so contented, and yet he had never felt at