School for husbands, p.1
School for Husbands, page 1
Table of Contents
A PLUME BOOK THE SCHOOL FOR HUSBANDS
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
A PLUME BOOK THE SCHOOL FOR HUSBANDS
WENDY HOLDEN is the internationally bestselling author of The Wives of Bath, Azur Like It, Simply Divine, Bad Heir Day, Farm Fatale, and Gossip Hound. She is married with two children, and lives in the English countryside.
Praise for previous Wendy Holden books
“Absolutely fabulous…”—The New Yorker
“Hilarious.”—Entertainment Weekly
“Holden’s book soars above other volumes in the genre.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Wickedly funny, surprisingly sad.”—bookreviewers.com
“Biting wit and scathing satire.”—curledup.com
“Holden’s skill, wit, and aplomb make her a stand-out in the oft-sugary genre.”—Gotham magazine
Also by Wendy Holden
Simply Divine
Bad Heir Day
Gossip Hound
Farm Fatale
Azur Like It
The Wives of Bath
PLUME
Published by Penguin Group
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Published by Plume, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. Previously published in Great
Britain by Headline Publishing, Ltd.
First American Printing, January 2007
Copyright © Murgatroyd Ltd., 2006
All rights reserved
rEgisTErED TRADEMARK—MARCA REGISTRADA
CIP data is available.
ISBN : 978-1-4406-8480-7
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To JM, AAM and IM
CHAPTER ONE
Sophie twisted round. Relief flooded through her. People had turned up. More guests were coming into the church all the time. Everyone had dressed up too: the men fresh in pale summer suits; the women pretty in floaty florals. Some, even more gratifyingly, had gone as far as hats, which looked sharp and colourful against the soft mediaeval stone of the walls.
Her mother’s hat, as expected, was the biggest of all; a huge confection of gold gauze. It seemed to Mark, next to Sophie, that it filled the whole church. Any objection he had had to the ‘proper christening’ his wife had wanted for Arthur had stemmed less from doubts about delivering his son into the hands of the Almighty than delivering the party into the hands of his in-laws. But Shirley and James lived in a postcard-perfect village. The Dower House had a big garden and they were able to fix it with the vicar. So the venue had been unarguable.
Most of the rest of it, unfortunately, had been very arguable. That Shirley intended the occasion to be the big wedding reception they - and more significantly she - had never had was obvious from the start. His mother-in-law, Mark knew, had never forgiven him for depriving her of her big-hat moment as Mother of the Bride by insisting on a registry office followed by a small lunch.
But nothing was to be small now, apart from Arthur of course, though the vast christening robe Shirley had bought for her grandson went some way to addressing even that. Mark looked down at his son in his wife’s arms, swathed in acres of fake-ancestral frills. He wondered whether Arthur’s unusual calm was due less to a sense of occasion and more to a sense of being smothered.
Mark felt smothered himself. Shirley and James were paying for the celebrations, admittedly. They had absolutely insisted, and his and Sophie’s financial circumstances did not constitute a contrary argument. But even so, did Shirley’s arrangements have to be so relentlessly unheeding of anything he or Sophie had wanted? What he had mainly wanted was to keep it simple. Sophie had wanted to keep the peace. Shirley, however, had wanted fleur-de-lis cocktail napkins, a marquee festooned with ivy, and luxury portaloos with mahogany seats and carnations in the cubicles. She had converted their plans for sandwiches (plain beef or egg) into poached salmon on thyme ciabatta or roasted Mediterranean vegetables on tomato bread. Thankfully, he had got wind about the string quartet in time.
‘I was thinking more along the lines of a brass band,’ he had told Shirley. In actual fact he didn’t care what the music was, but he was damned if Shirley was getting her own way in everything, paying for it or not.
His mother-in-law had frowned as much as facial surgery would allow. ‘Rather common, don’t you think?’
Her gaze had lingered on him meaningfully. Mark was aware that his mother-in-law considered him a less-than-perfect husband for her daughter. Or a less-than-perfect son-in-law for herself, which was possibly a slightly different thing.
He had not particularly expected to win the brass band argument, but Sophie’s father James, a retired corporate accountant who generally gave way to his his wife in all things, had most unexpectedly lit up at the suggestion. Sophie, too, had lent her support. So a brass band had been duly engaged and briefed to play ‘Oh I Do Like to Be Beside the Seaside’, ‘Knees Up Mother Brown’ - which, as Mark pointed out, had particular relevance given Sophie’s married surname and Arthur’s recent birth - and other jaunty Edwardian ditties.
Shirley had hit back with the flowers. Examining them now as she sat in the church, Sophie tried to persuade herself that her mother’s ‘statement’ gladioli and gerbera weren’t garish in the least and worked just as well as the simple summer country flora she and Mark would have preferred.
But the weather was wonderful, which was infinitely more important. The saints, sinners and coats of arms glowed richly in the stained-glass windows as the sun outside gathered momentum. Watching various members of the congregation bow their heads as they sat down, Sophie realised guiltily that she had prayed for good weather far more fervently than anything else. She had consulted the BBC’s five-day weather forecast on a daily basis; latterly, almost hourly, much to Mark’s amusement.
Frankly, she could have done without him laughing. Much as she loved Mark, and she truly did, Sophie could not help feeling unsupported at times, now being one of them. Organising - or, more accurately, organising her mother organising - an event on the scale the christening had become had sent her stress levels soaring. New problems seemed to emerge every day, none of which Mark had been particularly helpful in solving. She accepted that he had been very busy with work - his job was new, he had to prove himself, and their financial circumstances were straitened. But even so, he could have been more diplomatic with Shirley and more constructive about the crucial question of godparents.
In the end it had been
Cecily was the reliable one. An old university friend of Sophie’s, she was single, childless and a primary school teacher. ‘Cess’ll have time for Arthur because she doesn’t have children of her own, and she’ll be able to tell me whether he’s reaching his milestones or not.’
‘And confirm he’s an undoubted genius at five months, too,’ joked Mark, effortlessly guessing his wife’s unspoken agenda. ‘But are you sure she does organised religion?’
‘Absolutely. She’s very interested in religion. Has to be. Her school is in one of the most deprived areas of London, ninety-nine per cent Muslim, I think she said.’
Mark nodded. ‘But isn’t she a bit - well - alternative? You didn’t speak for weeks, remember, when she found out you were putting Pampers on Arthur.’
‘Oh, she’s got over that now. And anyway, it will be good for Arthur to have a godparent who can raise his social consciousness. He needs to realise there are other people out there apart from middle-class kids like him.’
‘I suppose so.’ Mark decided not to point out that their street of gentrified terraces faced one of the largest council estates in South London.
‘Good. That’s decided then.’ Sophie smiled.
For the exciting and influential godparent Sophie chose a former work colleague whose father was a frozen-foods tycoon. His revelation that Arthur would be one of his ten godchildren and not, as she had thought, the special one and only, was a disappointment.
‘Of course,’ she had grumbled to Mark, ‘the others only asked Richard because he’s got no children, a rich father and good contacts.’
‘So why else did you ask him?’ Mark had teased.
‘Because,’ Sophie flashed back, ‘Richard’s the one who’ll take him out and buy him champagne cocktails and tell him about girls.’
Shortly after this exchange, Richard texted to say he had come out and was going to New York to live with his boyfriend. It was the text that hurt. Sophie withdrew the godparent invitation and announced they must find someone else to fulfil the fun and influential brief.
‘But who?’ Mark had asked.
It was a good, if difficult, question, and one, again, which seemed to fall to Sophie. The problem was that every other suitable male of their acquaintance was married with children of his own and no spare capacity, financial or spiritual, to take an interest in someone else’s offspring. As the date of the christening neared, Sophie was even considering asking the postman. He was pleasant, friendly, clean and childless, although, as he had a girlfriend, there was no guarantee this would continue. Still, he was better than nothing.
In the end, help had come from a most unexpected source.
Her mother had taken to ringing Sophie about the party on an almost daily basis. ‘Cambozola!’ Shirley declaimed dramatically as Sophie picked up the phone one morning.
‘Sorry?’ Sophie frowned. What language was being spoken? ‘Who is this?’
‘Cheese, darling. We need to decide.’
‘I don’t care, Mum,’ Sophie groaned. She was by now wondering whether the nice man in the newsagents had spare godparental capacity. After all, if it was contacts in the media she was wanting . . .
‘Still no luck with the replacement godfather, darling?’ Shirley enquired, divining the reason for her daughter’s lack of interest in dairy products.
‘Not as such.’
‘Well you’ll never guess who I bumped into in town today!’ Shirley exclaimed. ‘Margaret Sharp!’
Her mother was right; Sophie never would have guessed. While Shirley meeting this mother of an old boyfriend was not improbable - they lived in neighbouring villages, after all - the warmth with which she spoke of it was astonishing.
‘Margaret! But I thought you didn’t like her. You used to say she was common when I was going out with Simon.’
‘That was nearly twenty years ago.’ Shirley sniffed. ‘People change.’
Sophie considered. She remembered Margaret Sharp as a dumpy woman who worked in a factory and had a face like an anxious hamster. Short of her suddenly becoming the Duchess of Devonshire, it was hard to imagine how she could possibly have changed enough to interest her mother.
‘Simon’s doing awfully well now,’ Shirley added casually. ‘He’s a millionaire banker with a manor house in Hertfordshire.’
‘Simon is?’ Sophie exclaimed. ‘I mean, I knew he was a banker, but—’
‘Heated swimming pool as well!’ her mother interrupted. ‘You see what you missed!’
Sophie’s hackles rose. ‘Mum! Simon was twenty years ago. We hardly went out for more than a month. And you didn’t like him anyway. You used to say he was a spotty oik.’
‘As I say,’ Shirley said breezily, ‘people change. Do you ever hear from him, by the way?’
‘He still sends me a birthday card.’ Sophie had never been quite sure why. She suspected the date was on his secretary’s database.
‘Mmm.’ Her mother was silent for a few moments. ‘Well, seeing Margaret gave me an idea. It’s the obvious answer to your problem.’
‘What is?’
‘Simon’s perfect godfather material.’
‘Godfather material!’
‘Well, why not?’ her mother challenged. ‘He’s rich and successful and a wonderful role model. Arthur needs good role models.’
‘Are you saying,’ Sophie asked touchily, ‘that Mark isn’t a good role model?’ But why ask the question? Of course her mother was saying that. Mark was a book salesman and Simon a millionaire. ‘It’s not all about money you know,’ she grumbled.
‘Well, most of it is. And it’s Arthur you’re thinking about here, anyway. Simon’s rich and successful, he’s someone you’re still in touch with and someone who could help Arthur a lot in the future. And frankly, darling, isn’t time running out?’
The vicar had now arrived. A woman vicar, whom Mark had liked from the first meeting. She was laid-back, friendly and obviously hadn’t minded his uncertain approach to Believing. She had also turned out to be a Merseysider, with an interest in Liverpool Football Club as well informed as it was unexpected.
The organist, an old lady whose style Mark appreciated for its clear Les Dawson influences, struck up a tune that emerged, after a few confusing seconds, as ‘Jerusalem’. This being the cue, Mark, Sophie, Arthur and the godparents moved forward to the font.
They made an arresting group. Cess, who was no lightweight and whose clumsily bundled-up hair was dyed a brilliant red, was dressed for the occasion in a hot-pink sari. This not only made her pink face look puce by comparison, but also clashed, Sophie feared, with her own flowered wrap dress. Thank goodness Simon and Mark looked properly sober. Simon in particular looked perfect.
About this, Mark was less sure. Simon Sharp had apparently been Sophie’s boyfriend when they were both eighteen. Although, frankly, it was difficult to imagine the tall, grave Simon as a teenager.
He seemed focused and controlled to a rather scary degree; polite but uneffusive. His face was flat and masklike and his eyes were watchful. The feeling of standing in front of him was, Mark thought, that of standing before an open freezer door.
‘He’s not much fun, is he?’ Mark had objected. ‘You wanted someone fun and influential to be the other godparent.’
‘But Simon is influential,’ Sophie argued. ‘Just think how useful he’d be if Arthur ever wants to go into the City. Or law. I think Simon has lots of legal connections as well.’
Mark raised his eyebrows. Admittedly, Arthur was only a few months old, yet already possessed of the kind of volcanic temper that sat ill with a career at the Bar. Unless, that was, as a defendant.
‘And Simon’s single, and doesn’t have any other godchildren,’ Sophie added.
