No Fond Return of Love by Barbara Pym

Author:Barbara Pym [Pym, Barbara]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9781559213066
Publisher: Virago
Published: 1974-01-02T06:00:00+00:00

His golden locks Time hath to silver turn’d –

and, when one came to think of it, he must be rather old – getting on for fifty, probably. She was rather sorry now that she and Marian had mocked him.

He bent down towards her, almost as if he were about to kiss her. A feeling of panic came over her and she cried out inside herself, Oh, Paul, Paul… but at that moment there was a knock at the door and a dark foreign-looking maid stood in the doorway.

‘Please sir, Mrs Williton is here. She will speak with you.’

Down in the hall Grace Williton stood in front of a mirror, ornately framed in gilt cupids, and straightened her pink felt hat. She had decided to wear her new hat with her grey costume for this visit to her son-in-law. He would have got her letter yesterday, warning him of her visit. She was glad that the maid had said he was in. That showed that he was not shirking his duty – for once, she added sarcastically. But sarcasm was not normally within her range. She liked to think of herself as a straightforward sort of per-son. ‘People always know where they are with me,’ she would say rather smugly; it never occurred to her that people might not always want to know such things.

She began to climb the stairs, wondering as she did so if the carpet was brushed every day and if moths lurked in the darkness of the treads. She had never felt at home in this house and she never would. Neither had Marjorie, if it came to that.

‘Dr Forbes is in the library,’ said the maid, backing away from the door so that Mrs Williton could go in. ‘I say you have come.’

‘Well, Aylwin,’ she began uncompromisingly, feeling as always what a ridiculous name he had.

‘Why, Grace, this is a surprise!’ he brought out, feeling that while ‘Grace’ was not quite right, ‘Mother’ was impossible.

Mrs Williton had not at first seen Laurel, who was over by the table, displaying an unnatural interest in the proofs of Aylwin’s book.

‘May I introduce Miss – er – Mainwaring,’ said Aylwin, who had temporarily forgotten Laurel’s surname.

Laurel looked up in surprise, not at first recognizing herself under her aunt’s name. She saw a little dumpy woman in a grey suit and pink felt hat, her gloved hands clasped tightly together.

‘Mrs Williton – my mother-in-law,’ Aylwin explained.

‘How-do-you-do,’ Laurel murmured, smiling because of the sherry and the unlikeliness of Dr Forbes having such a banal thing as a mother-in-law. ‘I was just going,’ she added.

‘Let me see you down, then,’ said Aylwin. ‘You will excuse us, Grace? I shan’t be a moment.’

‘I didn’t know you had a mother-in-law,’ said Laurel brightly, as they were going down the stairs.

‘Well, it isn’t the kind of thing one reveals – or conceals, for that matter,’ said Aylwin, unhappy that the evening should be ending in this slightly ridiculous way. ‘I’m sorry she should have chosen to call just no w.

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