Free The Wedding Group by Elizabeth Taylor Page A

the pond. She drove slowly. Even the sight of that had lifted her spirits. In the cottages were other lights – sometimes only the blue-white illumination of a television screen in a room whose curtains were undrawn. Against golden blinds were silhouettes – of a shrouded birdcage, or a geranium in a pot. A faint glimmer shone through the antique shop from the room behind. The Three Horseshoes was the most lit up of all – the sign flood-lighted, and brightness streaming through the chintzy windows. She drew up the car and went in, feeling a little apprehensive and self-conscious, for she had never been there without David.
    The bar was not very crowded. It had a murmurous glumness about it, in spite of the barmaid – whom Midge had never seen before – dazzling in a lurex-woven dress. The landlord introduced her to Midge as Gloria.
    ‘Oh, I know your son,’ she said. ‘There’s quite a likeness. I expect you’re often told that.’
    In fact, Midge was not told it nearly often enough, but always warmed up when she was.
    Gloria brought a look of London to the bar, and old Mr Pitcher glared crossly at her. When she bent down to reach for a light ale from the bottom shelf, she showed a sun-burnedcleavage. Her hair, of a uniformly butter-colour, was built up high with a false piece of nylon. Midge was ‘dear’ to her from the outset.
    ‘G. and T.,’ she repeated, when Midge gave her order. ‘Ice and lemon, dear?’
    Midge poured most of the tonic water into the glass. She had had nothing to eat, and was nervous about driving home. That was another thing, she thought. She liked to be taken out, not to have to fend for herself. She sat down by the bar, on one of the high stools, so that she could chat to the landlord and not seem solitary.
    After a while, when she had lit her cigarette and settled herself, she looked round her. In a corner, the girl, Cressy, was sitting with her father. She had been staring at Midge, and smiled quickly when she caught her eye. She looked flushed and shabby, and at once began to make random conversation with her father.
    Other conversations, from other parts of the bar, mixed and became a tangle in Midge’s head. There was a couple behind her, sitting at a table, drinking, very slowly, lager and lime. The young man’s hair was long; the girl’s short.
    ‘We ought to go and see my rich old aunt at Worthing,’ he said. ‘Considering I’m the only one she’s got to leave her money to. Not that you’ll see much evidence of it. She’s as mean as sin.’
    ‘All the better for you,’ the girl said.
    ‘I mean if you can put up with that awful house for half an hour. Show willing, you know.’
    The girl listened intently, her hand on the table. He put a finger against one of hers, and kept it there in a proprietary way. They stared at one another, as if hypnotised.
    ‘Well, Mother, you’re getting quite giddy in your old age,’ said a loud and sycophantic voice.
    Midge half-turned her head, as if hearing an echo.
    ‘I’ve got a rich aunt, too,’ the girl behind Midge said. Looking backwards, Midge saw the two fingers tapping about one another, lively and playful, as if with a life of their own, nothing to do with the conversation, or the long and penetrating looks.
    ‘Really rich?’
    ‘Well so-so.’
    ‘Anybody else but you?’
    ‘Nobody.’
    There was a contented pause. Then, ‘How old?’ he asked in a low voice.
    ‘Thirty-nine.’
    This information seemed to cause no stir of disappointment.
    ‘Married?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘Lesbian?’
    ‘I s’pose so.’
    ‘Don’t you, Mother?’ the other woman was shouting. ‘I said you like the Horseshoes, I said.’ Lowering her voice, she added, to the man beside her, ‘It makes a nice change for her. Poor old thing. And we’ve all got to get old one day.’
    As I was telling myself earlier, Midge thought grimly, glancing at Mother, who was buttoned up tightly in navy serge. Poor old thing indeed. Growing deaf, carted