The Widow Read Free Page B

cheaper but it’s you know, that tender trap. Karen went to the Suma over in Cathérine. That big one’s too far anyhow. Have a beer or a cup of coffee and you’ve lost all you’d won. Nev’mind. Lemme get this pot warm. Spend most of me time here, t’tell th’truth.’ Norma made efforts sometimes to speak less broad,but you could see her heart wasn’t in it. What was the use of speaking posh? Arlette spoke posh, having had it explained that it meant port-out and starboard-home, an English conception of class structure she found typically subtle. Could one speak both posh and with a French accent?
    Ting-ting at the door. ‘That’s Karen.’ The little one, with a big basket pathetically freighted with fish-fingers and instant mashed potato. Small and dark like the mother, with a fringe and brilliant eyes. ‘Hallo,’ she said, friendly. ‘I’m Karen.’
    â€˜And I’m Arlette.’
    â€˜That’s a nice name,’ approvingly.
    Arlette knew she’d been right to come. It built confidence. There was very little she could do for Norma. Technically nothing at all. But the half-hour yesterday, and again today of moral support – that was enough. It broke the isolation. Norma didn’t even want help much. Her cry of anguish was borne of being all alone; but her toughness and her startling self-respect would see her a long way. She’d always be in trouble, spend her whole life falling down stairs, but would always pick herself up.
    â€˜Geta train ticket out of that Consulate,’ she was saying reflectively, picking a tealeaf off her lip. ‘’n even if I can’t, can always hitch-hike. Not the first time, is it duck?’
    â€˜No,’ agreed the little girl sturdily, not knowing quite what she was talking about, but backing Mum up instinctively. Rain clattered suddenly on the windows and they all looked out. The smaller boy, carrying the football, came racing across the open space. The bigger one came walking rather slowly, nonchalant, hands in pockets. What’s a bit of rain? They both came in with that tough delinquent shamble, more or less sideways, eyes downcast. Both said the same thing.
    â€˜C’n a have a biscuit then, Mum?’
    â€˜No way,’ said Norma. ‘And let’s have you smartened up a bit and say howdyedo to Mrs Davidson then.’ They held their hands out in the French way they had learned to copy: these two children’s hands, unexpectedly warm, dry and small,touched Arlette oddly. The small girl had switched on a transistor radio, and was listening raptly to a German announcer giving the waterlevels on the Rhine.
    â€˜Bingen. Zwei. Neun. Siebenundzwan –’
    â€˜Let’s have some fucking music then.’
    â€˜Hey,’ said Norma, not in the least pretending to be shocked; just restoring discipline. The boy grinned, winked at the fifty-year-old Arlette in so comic a way that she could hardly keep her face straight. Not exactly innocent, being indeed blatantly sexy, but the forthright childish openness was so attractive. She had never seen less self-conscious children. They moved in this hostile, suspicious French world with the ease and dignity of young wolves.
    â€˜I’II be buzzing then,’ when the rain slackened.
    â€˜All right love,’ said Norma. ‘I’ll remember you.’ She stood on tiptoe to give her a kiss. ‘Won’t give no trouble. Slip out quietish, while Robert’s at the pub.’
    â€˜If you manage to send one of the children – I’ll come and drive you.’
    â€˜Nice of you – but won’t have time. Got to choose the moment, like.’
    Arlette knew she would not take money.
    â€˜Come on,’ she said to Karen, ‘you come with me, show me the way through back to Cathérine.’ As she left she saw the door on the landing open again a crack.
    Pretending to scrabble in her bag