Bread and Chocolate

‘Why ever not? You’ll only get them crumpled, and Elizabeth will have to iron them again.’

He forgot his tragic face and laughed. ‘I don’t think she’ll do that!’

‘How inconvenient for you. You’ll have to use the laundry service and I hear they’re dreadfully careless.’

He flung himself on to the little stool before her dressing table, and glanced at his handsome face in the mirror. ‘I can’t bear this,’ he said dramatically.

‘Poor Jeff,’ she said sympathetically, folding his shirts carefully and neatly. ‘I do hope you’re doing the right thing.’

There was a brief silence.

‘I thought you would be distraught,’ he said.

Only Stephanie could have heard the faint note of disappointment in his voice.

‘Of course I am,’ she said. ‘But it doesn’t seem real. What shall we do about dinner with the Mitchells on Friday night?’

He hesitated, and then found the right tone. ‘I have lost it all,’ he said. ‘All! I know it. Our marriage, our friends, everything!’

She nodded. ‘If that’s what you want, darling.’ She was distracted by the sock drawer. ‘D’you want enough socks for a week, or do you want to take them all?’

‘Just enough…all of them…’ His outflung gesture implied his despair. ‘I can’t think about socks at a time like this!’

‘No,’ she said. ‘Everything does seem terribly wrong, doesn’t it? It doesn’t feel like a good idea at all.’

‘Oh, but it is,’ Jeff said hastily. ‘I love her, I can’t help myself. I’ve never…’

‘And all your winter suits?’ she interrupted. ‘They’ve all been dry cleaned, of course.’

‘You’ll miss the house,’ he said, trying to invoke her distress.

‘Oh, of course. But it’s such hard work. The garden alone is two days every week. Does Elizabeth garden?’

‘No,’ he said moodily.

‘You’ll have to get a gardener then,’ she said. ‘I’ll find a good one and leave Elizabeth a note. They’re dreadfully expensive. It’ll be about £80 a week. And a housekeeper on top of that.’

‘A housekeeper? What will we want a housekeeper for?’

She turned her guileless face to him. ‘Elizabeth isn’t going to want to do dusting and cleaning at the end of a day’s work, is she? All that exhausting sacking of people that she must do? And shopping and cooking dinner, and your breakfast, surely?’

‘Well, no…but…’

‘I’ll leave you the number of an agency. They’re about ten pounds an hour, you’ll need someone to come in for at least three hours a day…’ She started folding his jackets and laying them carefully on top of the suitcase. ‘Say six days a week…gracious! That’s £180 a week. And the gardener as well. That’s £260 a week, um, more than £1000 a month. Darling, this is going to be fearfully expensive. Are you sure you can afford it?’

Jeff looked anxious. He hated spending money.

‘But Elizabeth will help, I’m sure.’ She took a gamble. ‘Is she very well paid?’

‘Not yet,’ he admitted reluctantly. ‘She’s a freelance.’

Stephanie looked despondent. ‘She won’t do the secretarial work and the book-keeping then?’