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Tibbs can solicit away without you for one day, James. Especially when it means we’ve at last found the right cottage.’

      ‘What? You don’t mean this one do you, Tish?’ His bright blue eyes widened in astonishment. ‘I can’t imagine why you wanted to view it in the first place – it’s too small, and it isn’t even detached.’

      ‘It’s twice as big as the flat: all these chairs make it look smaller. There are thirty-two.’

      ‘Thirty-two what?’

      ‘Chairs.’

      ‘What’s that got to do with anything? Look at the garden – it’s a wilderness.’

      ‘A big wilderness. There’s some sort of shed out there, too, and plenty of room for a garage at the side of the house.’

      ‘But the house is old, dark and probably unsanitary,’ he suggested cunningly. ‘It belonged to an old man who didn’t do anything to it for years, and probably died in it.’

      ‘From an overdose of chairs, perhaps?’ I suggested. ‘People have died in most old houses. Of course I’d have to scrub it from top to bottom before we brought any of our things in, and all the walls and ceilings need painting, and perhaps the floors sanding down and sealing if they’re good enough. Roses round the door … pretty curtains … And just look at the situation! Only one neighbour – and the agent says that’s a sweet little old lady – and the back garden overlooks the parkland of the local big house, so it’ll be very peaceful …’

      I tailed off. James was looking stubborn and sulky, one of his limited repertoire of expressions. (And now I come to think of it, ‘indulgent affection’ hasn’t made many appearances lately, or ‘extreme solicitousness denoting a single-minded determination to have sex’.)

      ‘You know, Tish, I’ve been thinking lately that perhaps we should just look for a small weekend place near the sea instead. Jack’s promised to teach us to sail and—’

      ‘No. Absolutely not,’ I interrupted firmly. ‘My idea of a fun weekend does not entail sitting with my bottom in icy water, while being alternately hit over the head with a piece of wood and slapped by a bit of wet canvas. Besides,’ I added, hurt, ‘didn’t we always plan to move to the country once we could afford it?’

      ‘Well … yes, but—’

      ‘And then I can give up working in the library for

       peanuts – which really makes no sense when you think that I could earn just as much from writing, if I had more

       time – and we can start a family, and you could commute to work, and get lots of fresh air and exercise in the garden growing our own fruit and vegetables. Isn’t that what we’ve both dreamed of?’

      He closed his mouth and said hastily, ‘Yes, darling, of course it is. That is, it sounds wonderful, but perhaps we ought to wait for something detached to come up and—’

      ‘We’ve been married six years, James. I can see the big three-0 coming up, and you were forty last birthday.’

      He winced.

      ‘We can afford this house, it’s near enough to commute – only about eleven miles to Bedford station. I’ll come off the pill as soon as we move, and we’ll eat a healthy diet and take long walks to get fit.’

      James looked slightly punch-drunk. ‘I suppose it might be quite nice here,’ he conceded reluctantly. ‘And,’ he added brightening, ‘Gerry and Viola live only a few miles away, and I’m sure he drives into work. Must leave pretty early. I’ll ask him what it’s like.’ He put his arm around me. ‘I can see you like this place, darling, but don’t set your heart on it. I think we ought to look at a few more first, and once I’m a senior partner we could afford something detached.’

      ‘I want this one, a real country cottage, not a detached mock-Tudor somewhere. I want to be a country dweller, with muddy wellingtons and a cottage garden. And you used to like the idea of being self-sufficient – you had all those books about it. I think they’re in the back bedroom cupboard. I’ll look them out when we get home.’

      He didn’t look too enthusiastic, but he’s a man of short-lived crazes, as I’ve learned the hard way. While I would have expected someone to warn me had I been about to marry a serial killer, no one felt it necessary to inform me that I was about to marry a serial hobbyist. Perhaps it should be written into the marriage ceremony? Thou Shalt Not Become A Serial Hobbyist. Still, I don’t see why he can’t have the same one twice, like the measles, with a bit of exposure to the germ.

      He was rather dampening when I enumerated the cottage’s many advantages on the way back to Mother’s house in darkest suburbia for Granny’s birthday tea. I’ll have to work on him; but I’m in love with my cottage, and am beginning to have distinctly now- or-never feelings about making the move.

      I think it’s something to do with thirty looming ahead (my birthday is in February) and so few of my ambitions realised. And if I’m going to take the plunge and have a baby, then my sell-by date is just peeping up on the horizon.

      One definite plus point to living in the cottage at Nutthill would be that James wouldn’t be so tempted to call in at the pub on his way home from work in the evenings if he had such a long drive ahead of him. (Networking, this is called, apparently.) And with so much to do to the house and garden he won’t have either the time or the money for his Friday night sessions out with ‘the boys’, or our regular show or film and restaurant on Saturday nights.

      I never feel relaxed in big, pretentious, expensive restaurants anyway, and would always have preferred to save the money towards the cottage. I’m not much of a social animal, in fact. I like a quiet life and time to write after work, and I enjoy a trip to a museum or art gallery more than anything else.

      James’s friends are all about ten years older than I am, with self-assured, well-dressed, boring wives, against whom I stand out like a macaw among a lot of sparrows. They’re all so well-groomed and taupe. If they mix two colours together in a scarf they think they’re daring.

      Living so far out into the country would also distance us from James’s appalling old school chum Howard, ageing hippie extraordinaire, who has recently moved back to London after a brief spell crewing on a yacht, where I should think he was as much use as a twist of rotten rope.

      He managed to acquire a rich girlfriend in the interval between jumping ship in Capri and being deported. (I hadn’t realised that he knew Comrades came in two sexes, but there you are. She must be deranged.)

      James may not immediately see all the cottage’s

       advantages …

      He dropped me at Mother’s in mid-afternoon (and I can hardly wait to put some distance between myself and Mother – another plus) and drove off to the office to pick up some papers (allegedly) though I did tell him that if he wasn’t back within the hour I’d kill him.

      I stifled the ignoble thought that perhaps he just wanted to see his ex-girlfriend Vanessa, recently reinstalled as secretary. When she got divorced and had to find a job, she pleaded with James to put a word in for her, and he felt so sorry for her he persuaded his uncle Lionel to take her on again.

      He explained how it was, so I’m not in the least bit worried or jealous about her being there every day, even though she’s another bubbly blonde. From the sound of it, her bubbles may have gone a bit flat; James said her husband was a brute and she’s looking very worn and years older.

      Mother was a bit pensive and hurt when he drove off, and nearly as dismal as James when I described the cottage. She only really cheered up again when he returned and fell like a famished wolf on the rather nursery spread of food she associates with birthdays.

      Then the cake was brought out and we had to sing ‘Happy Birthday’ with James and Mother trying to harmonise, slightly hampered by Granny, who had already loudly announced that she didn’t want any fuss made about birthdays at her time of life,

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