Free The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes

mystery. And that this was the first thing a man sensed, and the first thing that attracted him, or not. Some men are drawn to one type, some to the other. Margaret – you won’t need me to tell you – was clear-edged, but at times she could be envious of those who carried, or manufactured, an air of mystery.
    ‘I like you just as you are,’ I once said to her.
    ‘But you know me so well by now,’ she replied. We had been married about six or seven years. ‘Wouldn’t you prefer it if I were a little more … unknowable?’
    ‘I don’t want you to be a woman of mystery. I think I’d hate it. Either it’s just a façade, a game, a technique for ensnaring men, or else the woman of mystery is a mystery even to herself, and that’s the worst of all.’
    ‘Tony, you sound like a real man of the world.’
    ‘Well, I’m not,’ I said – aware, of course, that she was teasing me. ‘I haven’t known that many women in my life.’
    ‘“I may not know much about women, but I know what I like”?’
    ‘I didn’t say that, and I don’t mean it either. But I think it’s because I’ve known comparatively few that I know what I think about them. And what I like about them. If I’d known more, I’d be more confused.’
    Margaret said, ‘Now I’m not sure whether to be flattered or not.’
    All this was before our marriage went wrong, of course. But it wouldn’t have lasted any longer if Margaret had been more mysterious, I can assure you – and her – of that.
*
    And something of her rubbed off on me over the years. For instance, if I hadn’t known her, I might have become involved in a patient exchange of letters with the solicitor. But I didn’t want to wait quietly for another envelope with a window. Instead, I rang up Mrs Eleanor Marriott and asked about the other document I’d been left.
    ‘The will describes it as a diary.’
    ‘A diary? Is it Mrs Ford’s?’
    ‘No. Let me check the name.’ A pause. ‘Adrian Finn.’
    Adrian! How had Mrs Ford ended up with his diary? Which was not a question for the solicitor. ‘He was a friend,’ was all I said. Then, ‘Presumably it was attached to the letter you sent.’
    ‘I can’t be sure of that.’
    ‘Have you actually seen it?’
    ‘No, I haven’t.’ Her manner was properly cautious, rather than unhelpful.
    ‘Did Veronica Ford give any reason for withholding it?’
    ‘She said she wasn’t ready to part with it yet.’
    Right. ‘But it is mine?’
    ‘It was certainly left to you in the will.’
    Hmm. I wondered if there was some legal nicety separating those two propositions. ‘Do you know how she … came by it?’
    ‘She was living not far from her mother in the last years, as I understand it. She said she took various items into her safekeeping. In case the house was burgled. Jewellery, money, documents.’
    ‘Is that legal?’
    ‘Well, it’s not illegal. It may well be prudent.’
    We didn’t seem to be getting very far. ‘Let me get this straight. She ought to have handed over this document, this diary, to you. You’ve asked for it, and she’s refusing to give it up.’
    ‘For the present, yes, that is the case.’
    ‘Can you give me her address?’
    ‘I would have to have her authority to do so.’
    ‘Then would you kindly seek that authority?’
    Have you noticed how, when you talk to someone like a solicitor, after a while you stop sounding like yourself and end up sounding like them?
    The less time there remains in your life, the less you want to waste it. That’s logical, isn’t it? Though how you use the saved-up hours … well, that’s another thing you probably wouldn’t have predicted in youth. For instance, I spend a lot of time clearing things up – and I’m not even a messy person. But it’s one of the modest satisfactions of age. I aim for tidiness; I recycle; I clean and decorate my flat to keep up its value. I’ve made my will; and my dealings with my daughter, son-in-law, grandchildren and ex-wife