The Philanderer's Wife by Katherine Trelawney

Author:Katherine Trelawney
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: #1
Publisher: m-y books Ltd
Published: 2014-10-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 14

For Hilary, the moment when she had finally told Paddy that she was resolved to keep her child was such a momentous one that she expected her whole life to change after it. But it did not. She spoke with her doctor, who had been kindly and professional and arranged for her to have the appropriate antenatal care. She told her manager at work, who again had been concerned and professional, and had told her that she might have a short period of maternity leave, and then finish her year’s contract.

After a few weeks, she spoke also to just one of her girl-friends, who was shocked and very obviously worried about her, and to such an extent that Hilary became cautious about imparting her news any further. She avoided quite a few normal social invitations, using work as an excuse. As a result her life became smaller and more contained. In fact, outside work it became confined virtually to the four walls of her own room. She continued writing to Peter in Milan, but made no mention of her pregnancy.

Three months after she had told Paddy, and six months into her pregnancy, she was feeling well, and a little stout; but she could still (if she chose her clothes carefully) pass for a simply more substantial version of her normal self.

Contact with Paddy had been problematic. The time they spent together veered disconcertingly between the almost blissfully happy and the downright unpleasant. On the former occasions Hilary’s heart would plan a happy ever after, and even her head would be persuaded to some arrangement where Paddy was an involved father and offered her “support” in ill-defined terms. On the others, she looked at the increasingly disturbing prospect of going it all alone.

The last occasion had been one of the bad times. They had been to the theatre, and Paddy had arrived late. Neither of them had enjoyed the play, and Hilary had been very irritated by the fact that Paddy had wanted to spend a good long part of supper afterwards dissecting the weaknesses of plot and performance. Hilary really would have appreciated a break from this kind of discussion, after a long day at work with a production that was not going well in rehearsal. She had less patience in her pregnant state, and became easily tetchy.

She also found that being a couple of hours late for a meal could make her feel quite weak with hunger. Although she had explained this to Paddy, he had refused to do what she would have liked, which was to dive into the first restaurant they saw which had space and the prospect of prompt service. Instead he insisted on walking to his favourite Chinese and then waiting what, to Hilary, seemed an endless fifteen minutes for a table. At the end of the meal, he had become serious and explained to her (for what seemed to be the hundredth time) that he had no intention of leaving Joscelyn, even if he offered her “support”.

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