Rags to Riches

by Nancy Carson

  When the concert ended, Maxine received the thanks and congratulations of her fellow musicians and the offer of a permanent position in the sinfonia from Leonard Beresford. She wiped the borrowed cello clean of her finger marks and patted it goodbye and Alan said he would put it away in its case for his absent friend. He was sorry when she declined his offer to see her back to her hotel. An old friend had spotted her, she explained, whom she just had to see. So the orchestra drifted away while the audience lingered in conversation, only slowly exiting the church via the South Porch. Maxine gathered her belongings together, retrieved her coat and walked with uncertainty toward Howard who was standing waiting in the aisle.

  Her smile as she approached him disguised the commotion inside her head. She was trembling, her stomach was churning uncontrollably with apprehension that perhaps after all, he merely wanted to say hello. But there was warmth in his eyes.

  ‘I can’t believe it’s you, Maxine,’ he said at last. ‘You’re the very last person I expected to see tonight.’

  ‘You know me, Howard,’ she replied flippantly. ‘Full of surprises.’

  ‘So when did you return from America?’

  ‘Oh, Tuesday.’ She said it as if it had been a decade ago. ‘I arrived in Foxham late this afternoon.’

  ‘And what an eventful first few hours you’ve had. Drafted in to the visiting orchestra straight away…’

  ‘I know. I could scarcely believe it when they asked me to play…So how are you Howard? How have you been?’

  ‘I believe I’ve settled in here,’ he replied pleasantly, deliberately skirting round her question. ‘The locals seem to have accepted me well enough.’

  ‘That’s good. But I didn’t mean that particularly. I meant…’

  Howard looked about him. People still lingered in the church, talking in lowered voices, some watching him curiously. ‘Let’s sit in this pew until the crowd has gone, shall we? You and I have got plenty to catch up on, I think.’

  ‘You don’t say.’ She allowed him to lead her into the pew and sat down on the hard wood. ‘How long has it been? Ten months?’

  ‘Nearer eleven, Maxine. Last time I saw you was on the second of November last year. We’re almost at the end of September now. I think I’ve counted every day.’

  ‘But you didn’t answer my question. How have you been?’ Maxine persisted.

  ‘Need you ask?’

  ‘I do ask, Howard,’ she whispered without looking at him. ‘I need to know.’

  ‘What do you think? I’ve missed you…in a way I never thought possible…I said so in my letters that you never replied to.’

  ‘Oh, Howard,’ she sighed. ‘I never got your letters. That’s why I never wrote. Somebody intercepted them and hid them from me…’

  ‘Brent Shackleton?’ he suggested.

  ‘Huh! How did you guess?’

  ‘I never liked him, Maxine. And I was always aware he had his eye on you. I suppose he was the only one capable of doing something as underhand as that.’

  ‘I found them, though, Howard. Not much more than a week ago. I thought you hadn’t written…Don’t you see? I thought you didn’t want me.’

  ‘Oh, Maxine…’ He took her hand and turned towards her devotedly. ‘I’ve never stopped wanting you.’

  She turned her face up to heaven and closed her eyes with blessed relief. This was exactly what she wanted to hear.

  ‘That’s what brought me back from America – the hope that you still wanted me. When I found your letters I just had to come…to see if you still felt the same. I couldn’t go on not knowing.’

  He sighed. A heavy, desolate sigh. ‘Oh, Maxine. If you only knew how many times I cried for you. If you only knew how many times I stood outside at night looking up at the moon with tears in my eyes, wondering if you were looking at it too, as if it were some common point of contact, some way of reaching out to you. I spoke to you through the moon. Did you never get those messages?’

  ‘I think I did. I think I must have done. I couldn’t forget you, Howard. I’m so sorry…that I mucked things up between us…’ She began to weep again and took her handkerchief out of her handbag to mop up her tears.

  ‘Please don’t cry, Maxine…You’ll start me off too.’

  ‘Can you ever forgive me for what I did? For what I’ve done?’

  ‘What is there to forgive?’

  ‘Oh, Howard, there’s a whole bunch of things. There’s too much…’

  ‘Look, I’m the one who should be seeking forgiveness. For the way I failed to tell you as soon as I knew I was to move here. That was the crux of it. I was wrong and I should have been horsewhipped.’

  ‘No, Howard, I was wrong in taking the self-righteous attitude I took. It was unforgivable. Like everything else I’ve done since…But I never stopped loving you, you know. Never. You have to understand that. Despite everything that’s happened I still love you…more than ever.’

  He put his arm around her shoulders and hugged her with his infinite fund of affection. ‘Oh, Maxine…Every day that’s dawned I’ve prayed to God to bring you back to me. I just never thought it would happen, least of all like this. I always imagined meeting you off a train at some smelly railway station…’

  She tried to imagine it herself, and laughed through her tears. She wiped her eyes and blew her nose.

  ‘Did you ever hear my records on the wireless, Howard?’

  ‘Hear them? I bought the records. I play them constantly.’

  ‘Do you listen to the words?’

  ‘I know them all by heart. Would you like me to sing them to you?’

  ‘Please, no,’ she said and laughed, snuggling up to him. ‘They were my love songs to you. I didn’t know where you were and it was the only way I could think of to let you know how I felt. Did that ever occur to you, Howard?’

  ‘Well, I was able to identify with the sentiments, but I…I didn’t dare begin to hope that they—’

  ‘Howard, can we try again?’ she pleaded, raising her head from his shoulder and seeking his eyes. ‘Do you think it’s worth risking our poor hearts again for each other?’

  ‘Oh, yes, yes, Maxine. A thousand times, yes.’

  She smiled more cheerfully and took his hand. ‘I’ll make you happy,’ she promised. ‘I’ll make you so happy…’

  ‘What do you intend to do about your singing career?’

  ‘All that’s behind me, my love. As long as you want me, I shan’t go back to it.’

  ‘I want you,’ he declared, ‘whether you go back to it or not.’

  She squeezed his hand, fondling it nervously between her fingers and peered into his eyes through her blur of tears. ‘I’ll never go back to it as long as I have you…Never. Anyway…before you commit yourself finally…’ She sighed deeply. ‘There are things I want you to know, Howard. Things you have to know. I don’t want any skeletons tumbling out of my cupboard later. You might see me in a different light when I’ve told you what they are…You might change your mind.’

  It was his get-out if he felt he needed it; and she felt she owed it him in case he could not come to terms with her recent past. If he did not need an exit, it would indicate the strength of his love. She was risking everything but she had to confess how, when she thought he hadn’t written and consequently believed he no longer loved her, she’d allowed herself to be wooed by Brent Shackleton, eventually become his lover and, in secret, been his bride. She told how, after they were married, their relationship had imploded but his interest in booze, narcotics and expensive prostitutes had exploded along with the money she was making; and she saw how Howard’s expression changed from elation to despair. She saw how agonised he was when he thought he was too late, how he laboured under the belief that she was married and could never be his. She saw his dejection when he thought his dream could never be realised. But, when she told him how Stephen had suddenly appeared with Brent’s existing wife and how it proved that Brent was a bigamist, his face lit up again.

&
nbsp; ‘So you’re not married after all?’ he said, seeking further reassurance.

  ‘No. Because his first marriage is extant, his marriage to me is invalid.’

  ‘Jesus!’ Howard gulped and his whole demeanour changed. ‘Well, I think we should keep all that to ourselves, Maxine. We’ll make no mention to anybody of a previous marriage, even if it is void.’ He regarded her steadily. ‘You’re sure you don’t still love him?’

  ‘Love him? I never loved him, Howard. If I loved him I wouldn’t be here now. I was vulnerable. He was kind to me when I needed kindness and affection. He wooed me through the grief of losing you. Oh, he knew what he was doing. He caught me on the rebound. It was a big, big mistake I made.’

  ‘I forgive you anyway.’

  She squeezed his hand tightly and felt tears burn inside her eyelids once more. ‘But can you really forgive me…knowing you’ve not been the only one I’ve…?’

  He knew what she meant. She did not need to spell it out.

  ‘I understand, Maxine.’ He looked into her eyes with infinite sympathy. ‘After all, you’re only flesh and blood…but aren’t we all? I can live with your past. I forgive everything, if there’s anything at all to forgive.’

  ‘I’ve been so worried…so worried that you wouldn’t be able to accept it,’ she said softly. ‘I would have understood if you felt you couldn’t. Thank you, Howard. Thank you. But…but what about you? There was a girl sitting next to you.’

  ‘Oh? Oh, that was Vera.’ He patted her hand reassuringly. ‘Vera is the church secretary. She’s engaged to the churchwarden’s son.’

  ‘So there’s nobody else?’

  ‘There’s never been anybody else, Maxine. I never wanted anybody else.’

  She sighed with relief. ‘So d’you still want to give it another try?’

  ‘Maxine, you’re still the same lovely girl I fell in love with. I love you still. Why should things you’ve experienced without me make any difference? I suspect, after everything you have experienced, that you’re a much better, infinitely wiser person. I reckon you’d make an ideal vicar’s wife – you’ve seen something of life. Ten times more than the average person. The question is, do you think you could stand it here after all the excitement you’ve had? Do you think you could put up with a sleepy little town like Foxham after the glamour and spectacle of New York?’

  ‘It’s not all glamour, Howard,’ she said, recalling her trek through the streets of Manhattan, accosted by down-and-outs. ‘Believe me, it’s not all glamour.’

  ‘Do you reckon you could put up with the constant procession of callers, the committee meetings you’d be dragged into, the personal problems folk would want to share with you, helping run the parish, the being nice to people all the time?’

  ‘I think I’d love it, Howard.’ She smiled resolutely, dried away her last tear and shook her dark hair. ‘You said in one of your letters that the vicarage was like a mausoleum.’

  ‘Oh, so it is. But I know that with you in residence we could make it a very comfortable home. It’s huge, you know. Ideal for raising a family.’

  ‘Raising a family?’ She chuckled. ‘Now there’s a thought.’

  ‘Does it appeal?’

  ‘Oh, you bet. So can I see the vicarage tomorrow?’

  ‘At such short notice?’ He laughed. ‘How about after Holy Communion in the morning? You’ll be my guest for lunch, of course…and dinner. So how long do you intend to stay in Foxham?’

  ‘How long do you want me to stay?’

  ‘How about forever?’

  ‘Then I’ll stay forever,’ she whispered.

  ‘Then we should get married soon. We won’t be able to hide your comings and goings at the vicarage before somebody catches on.’

  ‘Couldn’t you publish the banns of marriage tomorrow – for the first time of asking?’ she suggested.

  ‘Is that your official acceptance of my marriage proposal?’

  ‘If you like.’ She smiled joyfully.

  ‘You’re sure.’

  ‘Oh, I’m sure.’

  He turned round to look over his shoulder. The church had cleared. All the concert goers had disappeared.

  ‘May I kiss you Maxine? Just to set a seal on it. It’s been so long.’

  She smiled happily and they kissed, a heady, lingering kiss that drained away the ambiguities of eleven unpredictable months and the remaining dregs of doubt. Howard still loved her. Howard still wanted her. She could ask for no better outcome.

  ‘We’d better go,’ he said, looking into her eyes. ‘Mr Swanton, the churchwarden will be wanting to put out the lights. I’d hate to keep him up. Are you staying at the Dog and Gun?’

  She nodded. ‘Please don’t take me back yet though. Couldn’t you give me a moonlit tour of Foxham first?’

  ‘If you like. You’ll not see much in the dark though.’

  ‘I’ll be able to feel your lips on mine again.’

  He smiled contentedly, taking her hand as they rose from the pew. ‘I’ll get George at the Dog and Gun to take special care of you.’

  ‘Couldn’t you take care of me yourself?’

  She watched him ponder a moment but she knew he dare not allow her to sleep at the vicarage and she regretted suggesting it.

  ‘I could take a couple of weeks holiday,’ he said earnestly. ‘We could go away together. I could soon fix that. Nobody would know us miles from here…Shall we?’

  She smiled very happily. ‘As soon as ever you say the word.’

  The End

  Maxine’s Songs

  Destiny Jests With Me

  When I first met you I warmed to the touch of your hand.

  From that moment on I’ve wanted to know where I stand.

  I’m far, far away and I miss you, I can’t understand

  Why this is the moment that destiny jests with me.

  Because I miss you, I think of you all through the day,

  Dreaming about you, or crying the nights away.

  Held in your arms is the only place I want to stay,

  For this is the moment that destiny jests with me

  What fools are we to offer our love to chance.

  Just being hurt shouldn’t mean the end of romance.

  We turn, turn, turn away from our destiny,

  And this is when destiny jests with me.

  I wait for your letter, telling me that in your heart

  You want us together, and never to be apart.

  To have and to hold, rich or poor, till death us do part,

  For this is the moment that destiny jests with me.

  Does He Ever Think of Me

  Once in a while I wonder how he is,

  If he’s working hard and getting in a tizz,

  If he’s climbing mountains, scouting out the land,

  Whether all at sea or making castles in the sand.

  Sometimes I picture him sitting in his car,

  Sadly on his journey to a place that is too far.

  I imagine, nowadays, he’s doing very fine,

  And I wish with all my heart he was still mine.

  But what is in his mind?

  How does he feel?

  Does he still remember things

  That once to us were real?

  If he did, I’m sure he’d let me know,

  But I wonder,

  Does he ever think of me?

  I can see his smile, the warmth that’s in his eyes,

  I can feel his arms around me, hear his sighs,

  The smell of incense brings him close to me,

  If only he and I were meant to be.

  But what goes through his mind?

  How does he feel?

  Does he still dream of the things

  That once to us were real?

  If he did, I’m sure he’d want to let me know,

  But I ask this,

  Does he ever think of me?

  From Tears to a Kiss

  My life has drifted from smiling to sighing,
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  From sighing to crying,

  Please lead me from tears to a kiss.

  A kiss can make you quiver with joy

  A kiss can burn into your soul

  My only wish is to kiss you again

  Living without you has taken its toll.

  As I drift on an ocean that’s deep with doubt

  On waves that are heaving with woe

  I yearn to be with you to taste your soul

  With a kiss that is also a vow.

  I shall cross the vast distance from tears to a kiss

  And feel the beat of your heart

  I am coming back home, I’m returning to you

  And the thought of your kiss is a start.

  Gently Mend My Broken Heart

  Gently mend my broken heart

  If I come home to you.

  We have been too long apart

  I guess you know it’s true

  I still hear your words of love

  Ringing in my ears

  Are my warm thoughts strong enough

  To reach you through the tears?

  Is happiness within your gift?

  Though you never wrote a word,

  I need your love, I’ll cease to drift

  And fly to you like a bird

  So gently, mend my broken heart

  When I come home to you

  No longer shall we be apart

  When we build our home for two.

  It’s Not Your Fault

  The stars are shining in the dark night sky

  Cupid’s arrows have a tendency to fly

  You’d think he’d miss us with his poisoned arrow

  It’s not your fault his aim is straight and narrow

  Sorrow has no place in our two lives

  So why be blue when love at last arrives?

  Let’s be glad we might soon be together

  It’s not your fault we’ve had such stormy weather.

  It’s not your fault the sky above is grey

  It’s not your fault that flowers fade away

  It’s not your fault I love you like I do