The Little House

‘And you will be absolutely free to come and go as you wish while you stay here,’ Elizabeth said. ‘So don’t be afraid that I will be fussing over you all the time. But a little later on you might be glad of the chance to rest.’

‘I do get tired now,’ Ruth admitted. ‘Especially in the afternoon.’

‘I think I slept every afternoon as soon as Patrick was conceived,’ Elizabeth remembered. ‘Didn’t I, Frederick? We were in South Africa then. Frederick was on attachment. All that wonderful sunshine and I used to creep into a darkened room and sleep and sleep.’

‘You were in Africa? I never knew.’

‘Training,’ Frederick said. ‘I used to go all over the world training chaps. Sometimes I could take Elizabeth, sometimes they were places where I was better off alone.’

‘You were working for the South African government?’ Ruth asked.

Frederick smiled at her. ‘It was a wonderful country in those days. The blacks had their place, the whites had theirs. Everyone was suited.’

‘Except the black homelands were half desert, and the white areas were the towns and the goldmines,’ Ruth said.

Frederick looked quite amazed: it was the first time Ruth had ever contradicted him. ‘I say,’ he said. ‘You’re becoming a bit of a Red in your condition.’

‘Oh, Ruth’s full of it,’ Patrick volunteered, taking the sting from the conversation. ‘She’s researching for a programme on early Bristol industry, and she’s gone back and back. I told her she’ll be at the Garden of Eden soon. She’s got her nose in these books from morning till night.’

‘Clever girl,’ Elizabeth said. ‘You’ll need a little study when you move in. I could convert the small bedroom for you to work.’

‘Thank you,’ Ruth said. ‘But I will have finished quite soon.’

‘And anyway, she should be putting her feet up,’ Patrick said. ‘She’s been reading far too much, and spending half the day in the library.’

‘And what about you, old boy?’ Frederick asked. ‘How’s the new post?’

Patrick smiled his charming smile. ‘Can’t complain,’ he said, and started to tell them about his secretary, and his office, his reserved car space and his management-training course. Ruth watched him. She felt as if she were a long way away from him. She watched him smiling and talking: a favourite child of applauding parents, and as she watched them their faces blurred and their voices seemed to come from far away. Even Patrick, beloved, attractive Patrick, seemed a little man with a little voice crowing over little triumphs.

Three (#ulink_cc6ac4c7-1d9c-573c-931c-0e5f6dafb5f6)

RUTH AND ELIZABETH were to go down to the cottage together, to measure for curtains and carpets, and discuss colour schemes. The builders had all but finished, the new kitchen had been built, the new bath plumbed in. Elizabeth had tirelessly supervised the workmen, ascertaining Ruth’s wishes and chivvying them to do the work right. Nothing would have been done without her, nothing could have been finished as quickly without her. Patrick, absorbed in setting up the documentary unit at work, had been no help to Ruth at all. Without her mother-in-law she would have been exhausted every day by a thousand trivial decisions.

Ruth had planned to walk down to the cottage in the morning, when she felt at her best. But Elizabeth had been busy all morning and the time had slipped away. It was not until after lunch that she said, ‘I’m so sorry to have kept you waiting. Shall we go down to the cottage now? Or do you want your nap?’

‘We’ll go,’ Ruth decided. In her fifth month of pregnancy she felt absurdly heavy and tired, and the mid-afternoon was always the worst time.

‘Shall I drive us down?’ Elizabeth offered.

‘I can walk.’ Ruth heaved herself out of the low armchair and went out into the hall. She bent uncomfortably to tie the laces of her walking boots. Elizabeth, waiting beside her, seemed as lithe and quick as a young girl.

Tammy, the dog, ran ahead of them, through Elizabeth’s rose garden to the garden gate and then down across the fields. Ruth walked slowly, feeling the warmth of the April sunlight on her face. She felt better.

‘I should walk every day,’ she said. ‘This is wonderful!’

‘As long as you don’t overdo it,’ Elizabeth warned. ‘What did the doctor say yesterday?’

‘He said everything was fine. Nothing to worry about.’

‘Did he check your weight?’

‘Yes – it’s OK.’

‘He didn’t think you were overweight?’

‘He said it didn’t matter.’

‘And did you tell him how tired you’re feeling?’

‘He said it was normal.’

Elizabeth pursed her lips and said nothing.

‘I’m fine,’ Ruth repeated.

Elizabeth smiled at her. ‘I know you are,’ she said. ‘And I’m just fussing over you. But I hate to see you so pale and so heavy. In my day they used to give us iron tablets. You look so anaemic.’

‘I’ll eat cabbage,’ Ruth offered. She climbed awkwardly over the stile into the next field.

‘Careful,’ Elizabeth warned.

The two women walked for a little while in silence. In the hedge the catkins bobbed. Ruth remembered the springs of her American childhood, more dramatic, more necessary, after longer and sharper winters.

‘I forgot to tell you,’ Elizabeth said. ‘Patrick rang this morning while you were in the bath. He said he has to go up to London this afternoon for a meeting and it’ll probably go on late. He said he’d stay up there.’

Ruth felt a pang of intense disappointment. ‘Overnight?’ She hated being in Patrick’s parents’ house without him. She felt always as if she were some unwanted refugee billeted on kindly but unwilling hosts.

‘Possibly Tuesday as well,’ Elizabeth said. ‘You can have a nice early night and a lie-in without him waking you in the morning.’

‘I’ll ring him when we get home,’ Ruth said.

‘He’s out of touch,’ she said. ‘In his meeting, and then on the train to London.’

‘I wish I’d spoken to him,’ Ruth said wistfully.

Elizabeth opened the gate to the garden of the cottage and patted Ruth on the shoulder as she went through. ‘Now then,’ she said briskly. ‘You can live without him for one night.’

‘Didn’t he ask to speak to me?’

‘I said you were in the bath.’

‘I would have got out of the bath, if you had called me.’

‘I wouldn’t dream of disturbing you,’ Elizabeth declared. ‘Not for a little message that I can take for you, darling. If you want a long chat with him you can save it all up until he comes home the day after tomorrow.’

Ruth nodded.

‘There’s nothing wrong, is there? Nothing that you need him for?’