Something in Disguise Read Free Page B

if the result was simply that she sent all the
housekeeping bills soaring with her fancy cooking? Money between husband and wife should be shared, in his opinion, and this meant that May had absolutely no right to squander that inheritance from
her relative in Canada – an estimable old lady who had died about a year before the colonel had married May. He had forced her to buy this house with some of the money, because any fool could
see that property was going to go up, but after that, he had got nowhere. She had insisted upon having her own bank account and cheque books, and could therefore scribble and fritter away any
amount of capital without reference to himself. The only times when the colonel could contemplate being French – or something equally outlandish – were when he thought about the
marriage laws: there was no nonsense about women being independent there . His rather protuberant and bright blue eyes blazed whenever he thought about the Married Woman’s Property Act.
Well at least he made her pay her share of the household accounts: she couldn’t have it both ways. But the wedding presented difficulties. He had managed, by playing on Leslie’s
father’s snobbery and patriotism, to wrest from him a certain share of the – in his view – totally unreasonable and iniquitous expenses of this jamboree. He was, after all, a
gentleman, a soldier and he had served his country, and he had made these three points delicately clear to Mr Mount who was clearly no gentleman, but had the grace to recognize this fact, and who
had been reduced to explaining and apologizing for his flat feet (a plebeian complaint if ever there was one, nobody at Sandhurst had ever had flat feet, by God!) which had precluded his serving
his country in any way but building ordnance factories. There was a world of difference between that sort of job and being in Whitehall.
    But the fact was that those factory-building fellows had made the money, and simple chaps like himself, fighting for their country, hadn’t. Mr Mount had offered to pay half the cost of the
reception, and the colonel had accepted this, because, after all, Alice had no relatives that they ever saw apart from himself, whereas the Mount contingent was positively pouring from
Bristol or wherever it was they came from, so Mr Mount paying half was really the least he could do. The border was looking very ragged. Alice hadn’t seemed to put her heart into it these
last months although he had pointed out again and again that if you wanted a decent herbaceous border you had to work hard on it in the spring. He sighed and his waistcoat creaked: he had had the
suit twenty-six years after all – bought it to get married to Alice’s mother, and although his tailor had adjusted it several times to accommodate the effects of time, no more
adjustments were possible. Few men, however, could rely upon their figures when they were in their sixties as well as he could. The upkeep of this place was a terrible strain to him: it was so damn
difficult to get anyone to do anything these days. He pulled a pleasant gold half-hunter out of his watch pocket – twenty to twelve – must be getting a move on. The watch had been left
to Alice by her godfather, but it was no earthly use to a girl . . . He turned towards the house and began shouting for his wife.
    The church was Victorian neo-gothic: varnished oak, brass plaques and candlesticks, atrocious windows the colours of patent medicines, soup, syrup and Sanatogen foisted upon
the building by families who had feared society considerably more than they can ever have feared God; hassocks like small dark-red ambushes lurked awkwardly on the cold stone floor; battered prayer
books slid about the pew desks, and tired little musty draughts met the guests as they were ushered in. The organ, whose range seemed to be between petulance and exhaustion, kept up the semblance
of holy joy about as much as a businessman wearing a paper