A Most Suitable Wife

So, ‘Yes, dishonest,’ she had challenged, and it had gone on and on from there, with Taye for once in her life refusing to buckle under the tirade of venom her mother hurled at her.

And, seeing that for the first time she was not going to get the better of her daughter, Greta Trafford had resorted to telling her to follow in her father’s footsteps and to pack her bags and leave.

And Taye, like her father, had suddenly had enough. ‘I will,’ she had retorted, and did. Though it was true she did almost weaken when she went in to say goodbye to Hadleigh. ‘Will you be all right?’ she asked him.

‘You bet,’ he said, and gave her a brave grin, and, having witnessed most of the row before he’d disappeared, ‘You can’t stay. Not now,’ he had told her.

Taye had gone to London and had been fortunate to find a room to rent, and more fortunate to soon find a job. A job in finance that she became particularly good at. When her salary improved, she found a better, if still poky, bed-sit.

She had by then written to both Hadleigh and her mother, telling them where she was now living. She also wrote to her father, playing down the row that had seen her leave home. Her mother was the first to reply—the electricity bill was more than she had expected. Since Taye had used some of the electricity—even though she had been at home contributing when she had used it—her mother would be obliged to receive her cheque at her earliest convenience.

Her mother’s ‘requests’ for money continued over the next three years. Which was why—having many times shared a lunch table with Paula Neale in the firm’s canteen, and having commented that she would not mind moving from ‘bed-sit land’—when Paula one day said she had half a flat to let if she was interested, and mentioned the rent required, instead of leaping at the chance, Taye had to consider it very carefully.

Could she really afford it? Could she not? She was twenty-three, for goodness’ sake, Hadleigh coming up to eighteen. And their mother had this time promised he should go to university. Was she to wait until he was at university, Taye wondered, or dared she take the plunge now? It had been late February then, and Hadleigh would go to university in October. Taye—while keeping her fingers crossed that nothing calamitous in the way of unforeseen expenditure was heading her way—plunged.

And here she was now and it was calamitous—though this time that calamity did not stem from her mother but was because, unless she could find someone to share, Taye could see she was in a whole heap of financial trouble. But, so far, no one except for one Magnus Ashthorpe had shown an interest. And, as an interested party, he was the one party she did not want.

All that week Taye hurried home ready to greet the influx of potential flat-share candidates. Julian Coombs, the son of the owner of Julian Coombs Comestibles, where she worked, asked her out, but she declined. She had been out with Julian a few times. He was nice, pleasant and uncomplicated. But she did not want to be absent should anyone see her card in the newsagent’s window and call.

But she might just as well have gone out with Julian because each evening she retired to her bed having seen not one single solitary applicant.

She toyed with the idea of inviting Hadleigh to come and stay at the weekend. But he worked most weekends waiting at tables in a smart restaurant about five miles from Pemberton. It was, he said, within easy cycling distance of Pemberton, the village on the outskirts of Hertfordshire where he and their mother lived. And, besides Hadleigh not wishing to miss a chance to earn a little money for himself, Pemberton was not the easiest place to get back to by public transport on a Sunday.

So Taye stayed home and almost took root by the dining room window. Much good did it do. Plenty of people passed by but, apart from other residents in the building, no one came near the door.

And early on Monday evening Taye knew that it was decision time. By now the newsagent would have taken her card out of his window, and she could see no point in advertising again. Clearly the rent required was more than most people wanted to pay. In the nine days since she had placed that card in the newsagent’s she had received only one reply. So far as she could see, with the rent due on quarter day in a few weeks’ time she had to either give up the apartment—and heaven alone knew what she was going to do if they demanded a quarter’s rent in lieu of notice—or she had to consider sharing the flat with a male of the species; a male who, for that matter, she was not even sure she could like.

Oh, she didn’t want to leave, she didn’t! How could she give up the apartment? It was tranquil here, peaceful here. And with the advantage of the small enclosed garden—a wonderful place to sit out in on warm summer evenings, perhaps with a glass of wine, perhaps chatting to one of her fellow flat dwellers. Perhaps, at weekends, to sit under the old apple tree halfway down the garden. There was a glitzy tinsel Christmassy kind of star lodged in that tree—it had been there, Paula had told her, since January, when a gust of wind had blown it there from who knew where. And Taye loved that too. She was in London, but it felt just like being in the country.

On impulse she went into the kitchen and found the piece of paper with Magnus Ashthorpe’s phone number on it. She should have thrown it away, but with no other applicant in sight she rather supposed it must be meant that she had not scrapped it. Not that she intended to ring him. She would see what sort of a reference this Mrs Sturgess gave him.

‘Hello?’ answered what sounded like a mature and genteel voice when she had dialled.

‘Is that Mrs Sturgess?’ Taye enquired.

‘Claudia Sturgess speaking,’ that lady confirmed.

‘Oh, good evening. I’m sorry to bother you,’ Taye said in a rush, ‘but a man named Magnus Ashthorpe said I might contact you with regard to a reference.’

‘Oh, yes, Magnus—er—Ashthorpe,’ Claudia Sturgess answered, and suddenly seemed in the best of humours. ‘What would you like to know about him?’

‘Well, he has applied to rent some accommodation,’ Taye replied, it somehow sticking in her throat to confess it was shared accommodation—which she freely admitted was ridiculous. How was she to find out whether or not he was some potential mass murderer if she didn’t give the right information and ask the right questions? Giving herself a mental shake, Taye decided she had been reading too many thrillers just lately, and jumped in, ‘I wonder how long you have known him and if you consider him trustworthy?’

‘Oh, my dear, I’ve known him for years! Went to school with his mother,’ Mrs Sturgess informed her with what sounded like a cross between a giggle and a chuckle. ‘May I know your name?’ she in turn enquired.

‘Taye Trafford.’ Taye saw no reason to not tell her. But, hurrying on, ‘Do you think he would make a—um—good tenant?’

‘First class, Miss Trafford,’ Mrs Sturgess replied without the smallest hesitation. ‘Or is it Mrs?’

‘Miss,’ Taye replied. ‘You—can vouch for him, then?’

‘Absolutely. He’s one of the nicest men I know,’ she went on glowingly. ‘In fact, having had him living with me one time, I’d go as far as to say that if he doesn’t get the accommodation you have on offer, I would welcome him back here to live.’ Taye reckoned you could not have a better reference than that. ‘Where is this accommodation?’ Claudia Sturgess wanted to know. ‘London?’ she guessed.

‘Yes,’ Taye confirmed. ‘He, in your opinion, is trustworthy, then?’

‘Totally,’ Mrs Sturgess replied, all lightness gone from her tone, her voice at once most sincere. ‘He is one of the most trustworthy men I have ever come across. I would trust him with my life.’

‘Thank you very much,’ Taye said, and, realising that she could not have a better reference than that, she thanked her politely again and put down the phone.

Yet, having been sincerely assured by this woman who had been at school with his mother that Magnus Ashthorpe was totally trustworthy, still Taye hesitated. Even though she knew that mixed flat-shares went on all over the place, she somehow felt reluctant to have him so close. And, if she didn’t make that call to him, well, it was not as if he was desperate for somewhere to rent, was it? By the sound of it, Mrs Sturgess, his mother’s friend, would have him back living with her like a shot. Presumably, though, he did not want to return there.

Taye thought of her own mother’s friend, the hardbitten Larissa Gilbert. Would she want to go and live with the thin-lipped Larissa? No way.

The decision seemed to be made.

Taye picked up the phone and dialed, half hoping Magnus Ashthorpe had his mobile switched off. He hadn’t, but he was already taking a call. She waited a long five minutes and then, aware that she had no option unless she was to go on the apartment-hunting trail herself—the much smaller apartment hunt; she could not bear the thought of returning to a bed-sit—she had to make that call.

She redialled—it was picked up at the fourth ring. ‘Pen…’ he began, and then changed it to, ‘Hello.’

She guessed his previous caller was probably someone called Penny, and he thought it was she ringing back from his previous call. Sorry to disappoint. ‘Hello,’ Taye replied, and began to feel more comfortable to know he had got a woman-friend. ‘It’s Taye Trafford.’ He said nothing. Not one solitary word. And she swiftly recalled how he had barely spoken when he had come to view the apartment. Perhaps that was what Mrs Sturgess liked about him—that he was not forever chattering on. ‘About the flat-share,’ Taye resumed.

‘Yes?’

She found his monosyllabic reply annoying and started to have second thoughts. ‘There isn’t a garage,’ she drew out of nowhere, even at the eleventh hour, as it were, attempting, when she really needed him, to put him off. ‘Well, there is, but the owner is abroad and has a lot of his belongings stored in it.’

‘That won’t be a problem.’

‘You don’t have a car?’

‘I find public transport quite useful,’ he replied, and, assuming too much in her opinion, ‘I’ll move in tomorrow,’ he announced.

Her mouth fell open in shock. Of all the… ‘I’ll try to get off work early—’ she began, and was interrupted for her pains.

‘You work?’ he questioned shortly. ‘You have a job?’

She did not care for his tone. ‘Of course I have a job!’ she exclaimed. They were on the brink of a row—and he hadn’t even moved in yet! ‘It’s how I pay the rent!’ she added pithily.

‘Huh!’ he grunted. It sounded a derogatory grunt to her. But before she could ask him what the Dickens that ‘huh’ meant, something else struck her.

‘You can pay rent in advance?’ she queried, everything in her going against asking him for the money but realism having to be faced. ‘I shall need the whole quarter’s rent before quarter day, the twenty-fourth of June.’

‘I’ll give you the cash when I see you tomorrow,’ he replied crisply.

‘A cheque will do as well,’ she calmed down a little to inform him—she could bank his cheque on Wednesday, that would still give it plenty of time to clear before quarter day.

‘If that’s it—’ he began.

‘One other thing,’ she butted in quickly. Again he was silent, and she felt forced to continue. ‘Er—naturally I’d expect you to respect my privacy.’

‘You mean when you bring your men-friends home?’ he questioned tersely. What was it with this man? She had not meant that. Thank goodness there was a lock on the bathroom door. ‘Naturally,’ he went on when she seemed stumped for an answer, ‘you’ll afford me the same privacy?’

‘When you bring your women-friends back?’ she queried tautly.

‘Until tomorrow,’ he said, and cut the call.

Slowly Taye replaced her telephone. Somehow she just could not see the arrangement working. But, for better or worse, it seemed she had just got herself a tenant.

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