Choral Society

by Prue Leith

  He put his glass down and grinned at her.

  ‘Joanna Carey, you and I have much more in common than I realised. I sing too.’

  He told her that he and his wife had been in the Wakefield Choral Society for years and had performed together at festivals and even at the Albert Hall. Joanna felt a twinge of jealousy. It must be good to have someone to share an interest with. And he sounded fond of Elaine and so balanced. It must have been a good marriage.

  ‘We’ve not really got singing in common,’ she said, almost crossly. ‘I go to my singing group because I cannot sing a note.’

  His eyebrows went up in surprise. ‘Tell me about it.’

  So she found herself talking about the terrifying school choir master, her ability to sing alone but not with others, and how she longed to do it properly. She told him of the slow progress she was making with Nelson and the group, and that Rebecca and Lucy had become her friends. Stewart listened with interest and sympathy.

  Then, to her own surprise, she said, ‘I think I was too scared to retire. I was sure all my friends were business colleagues and that I’d end up a lonely old woman reading gardening catalogues. But now with Lucy and Rebecca, maybe it won’t be like that.’

  ‘Of course it won’t,’ he said, ‘you’re interesting, talented, good-looking and (forgive me) rich. You’d never end up lonely.’

  Joanna was suddenly embarrassed at the turn the conversation was taking and asked him if business still interested him as much as it did.

  ‘No, it doesn’t. I’m too old for the City jungle. As I get older I find myself agreeing more and more with Caroline’s sentiments. I like the thought that business should be a force for good.’

  Joanna did not want to go there. She was enjoying the little cocoon of warm intimacy and she knew talk of Caroline would lead them into conflict. So she nodded but said nothing.

  Stewart wanted to know what had brought her into Innovest. ‘I’d have thought,’ he said, ‘with your record, you’d have started another business. You could do whatever you want! Veuve Clicquot Businesswoman of the Year, Queen’s Award for Industry, Order of the British Empire, London Entrepreneur of the Year, half a dozen honorary degrees …’

  ‘Stop, for God’s sake! Heavens, you’ve certainly done your homework!’

  ‘Not difficult these days. I Googled you. Do you think I’d have let Innovest put someone on the board that I didn’t approve of?’

  Canny old charmer, thought Joanna. She refrained from pointing out that he’d have had no choice: the piper calls the tune, and with seventy-five per cent of the Greenfarms equity, Innovest was definitely the piper.

  She told him she’d sold her head-hunting agency because she’d wanted to retire and spend at least some of the money she’d made doing the things a long career in business had left her no time for. But then she’d found retirement less exciting than work so was drawn back into business.

  ‘Technically, I work as a freelance consultant,’ she said, ‘but Innovest have so many fingers in so many pies, I do all sorts of jobs for them. And I sit on their board of course.’

  ‘And you enjoy it?’

  She was about to say what she always said, that she loved it, that business gave her a buzz, that it was great working with young imaginative entrepreneurs, etc. But instead she found herself saying, ‘Not all the time. I did not enjoy the board meeting last month.’

  He looked at her for a moment, an evaluating, measuring look.

  ‘No, that must have been hard. But you handled it well. Kept your cool. I was impressed.’ He smiled and added, ‘Can’t say I did as well. I do tend to lose it when I can’t get my way.’

  Joanna realised they could not put off a discussion about Greenfarms any longer.

  ‘I’m sorry, Stewart,’ she said, ‘it’s a horrible situation. But you must have thought about it. It cannot have been a surprise.’

  Before he could reply the waiter appeared with the bill, saying they were about to arrive at King’s Cross and he needed to cash up.

  Stewart paid, and then said, ‘We’ll have to go somewhere to talk. Can you bear the first class lounge on the station?’

  Joanna shook her head. ‘I’m due at a meeting, for which, thanks to your company and your champagne, I have not done my prep. Besides, don’t you have an appointment or anything?’

  ‘Jo, I came so I could talk to you.’

  ‘What! Don’t you have any business in London?’

  ‘Only you. How about after your meeting?’

  The train slid to a stop, and people started pulling down bags and bumping through the corridor. Joanna stood up.

  ‘We’d better collect our stuff before someone steals it or they call the bomb-squad.’ She started down the train back to her original seat.

  Stewart followed in silence. But when they were out on the platform, he said, ‘Jo, we’ve got to meet. When?’

  ‘I can’t do today. After the meeting I’m going to now, I’m due to see a client for a drink. ‘

  ‘Where are you meeting him?’

  ‘American Bar in the Saxon. But Stewart, I don’t know how long I’ll be with him. He’s flown in from the States to check his investments and decide on new ones and it may take hours.’

  This seemed to satisfy him and he said nothing more until they reached Joanna’s taxi, waiting with a yellow board reading INNOVEST in the window.

  Stewart opened the door and Joanna climbed in.

  ‘I’m sorry, Stewart. We should have talked on the train.’

  ‘I’m glad we didn’t,’ he replied. ‘Or rather I’m glad we talked of more important things.’ He smiled into her eyes, familiar and friendly. ‘I’ll be in the Saxon Grill from seven-thirty. You need only walk down the stairs, and you’ll be there.’

  He slapped the roof of the taxi as he might a horse, a sort of dismissal and a goodbye, and walked briskly away, not waiting for an answer.

  What makes him think that I’ll be there? thought Joanna. That I’ll have dinner with him? How dare he assume I have nothing to do after my meeting?

  But the truth was she was not at all indignant. She was, against all the rules of feminism, impressed, and she would love to have dinner with him.

  But as her taxi crawled through the traffic, she made a calculated, strategic decision. She needed to keep her relationship with Stewart on the right footing. She had to win on the Greenfarms issue and she must not let him get the better of her on a personal level. She took out her BlackBerry and texted him. Sorry Stewart. Can’t do tonight. Call me.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Through the grey thicket of sleep the high buzz of the front door bell threaded its way to Lucy. She realised it had been ringing for some time. She turned over, pulling the duvet over her head.

  She wanted more sleep, but some residual obligation to proper behaviour intruded. I should get up, she thought, but who’s to know? Grace has abandoned her campaign to reform me and has taken the children to Majorca.

  Grace had called ten days ago, and it had not been a good conversation.

  ‘But why won’t you come to London?’

  ‘Because there’s no singing class this week because it’s school half-term and I’m perfectly happy at home.’

  There was an exaggerated pause and Lucy could see her daughter shutting her eyes and taking a patient breath.

  ‘But Mother, we won’t see you at all if you won’t come up this week. You know we’re going to Majorca on Monday. The children should see their grandmother.’

  Lucy was tempted to retort that grandmotherly contact was not the children’s right, or her duty. Instead she said, ‘You could bring them to me. They love it here. We could go blackberrying. And it’s perfect autumn weather for once.’

  ‘Oh Mother! You know I haven’t the time. I’m much too busy. But you’re retired …’

  ‘Grace,’ Lucy retorted, ‘I am not retired. Six months ago I lost one important job. Not the same thing. I’m still writing, as you well know.’r />
  ‘But not full time, Mother. You’ve never been able to write more than four hours a day. So why can’t you write one morning, come up one afternoon, stay with us, and return next day in time to do another four hours?’

  Lucy was angry now, but she tried not to bark.

  ‘Darling, don’t you think that since you hold that being a full-time mother is the most important work in the world, giving the children some country air would be—’

  ‘Mother, don’t moralise. I can’t bring them down, and if you won’t come up, we’ll just have to see you when we get back.’

  Lucy had put the receiver down, furious, but feeling ticked off all the same.

  She’d heard nothing from Grace since then, and had felt increasingly guilty for being so unobliging. But not guilty enough, she told herself sourly, to text her daughter or ring her up.

  The ringing at the door stopped. Lucy was just drifting back to gentle oblivion when a new noise, the old-fashioned uneven clang of a real brass bell, sounded strangely through the house. Her caller had found the iron bell-pull set in the stone to the right of the door. It was attached by a chain to an ancient interior bell. It took Lucy a second to place the noise. No one used that bell any more. She was surprised it worked.

  Whoever it was did not give up easily. Lucy clambered out of bed and looked down from her bedroom window. A Parcel Force van stood there with its driver’s door open. She leant her forehead against the window pane and listened to the door bells, both electric and antique, ring at once. They stopped together, and Lucy closed her eyes in relief – but she did not move.

  When she opened them, the driver, a fat packet under his arm, was walking briskly back to his van. She knew what was in the packet – the book she’d ordered on Polish soups and stews. She needed the book to cross-check some recipes, and to steal (well, be inspired by) some others. She wanted a few more hefty Eastern European dishes, full of garlicky potatoes or chickpeas, with big chunks of cabbage, spicy sausage or veal that could be slow-cooked for hours at the weekend for freezing or reheating in the week.

  Lucy knew she should open the window and call out to him. She needed the book and he’d tried so hard to do his job and deliver it. Yet she could not. She could not face having to talk, to apologise, smile, go downstairs, open up, apologise again for her state of undress, sign things. Smile, smile, smile. She just didn’t feel like smiling.

  She watched him toss the parcel across to the passenger seat, pull himself into the cab, slam the door, drive away. And then she went back to bed. There was relief in curling up under the covers, her hands around her knees.

  At lunchtime she did get up, and made some toast and tea. She did not dress, however. What was the point? No one would see her.

  She resolved to spend the afternoon at her desk. She would work, she’d be cheerful, she’d pull herself together and just get on with it. It was a year since David died and surely, surely, she should be OK by now?

  But the hours were not productive. She had no energy, and little interest. After two cold calls (double-glazing and Sky television) she unplugged the telephone. When her mobile rang, she cancelled the call without answering it. She looked at the screen. Seven messages. She rang one-two-one and listened to the last of them. It was from Joanna.

  ‘Listen Lucy, I’m worried about you now. I’ve been calling all day. If you don’t ring back I’m coming down. Or maybe I’ll send in the cops. So pick up the phone, you idiot, and ring me.’

  Lucy frowned. She couldn’t have Joanna in the house. It was a mess and there was no food. And anyway, she was trying to work. She’d have to stop her, but she could not face a conversation and texted her instead.

  Darling Jo, sweet of you. Sorry about silence. Trying to finish book on bloody soup. See you next week for singing. Don’t worry. Luv

  Lucy sent the text and forced herself to listen to the rest of the messages. She deleted them as soon as she’d got their gist, sometimes as soon as she recognised the voice, without waiting for the message. Three of them were from Joanna, the first a friendly enquiry, but becoming more worried. (Why had she not come to the last singing class? How about going to a concert to make up for no singing over half-term? Was she OK?)

  Oh, God, thought Lucy, Joanna is marvellous, a truly good friend. But such a control freak. You’d think having all those companies to run would be enough for her. If only I could convince her – and Grace – that there is nothing wrong with me, except that I don’t feel sociable. I am just not up to shopping with Rebecca and listening to her banging on about Nelson. Or entertaining my grandchildren or going to a concert. And I can’t seem to get enough sleep.

  She managed to finish the chapter on cheese soups with a Danish Samsoe soup and a Derbyshire Stilton one, but she wasn’t pleased with it. She decided to leave it and go back to correcting and editing earlier chapters.

  When she’d corrected the whole tomato soup chapter, with hardly a typo or a word wrong, she realised she’d already edited it. She’d only done it yesterday, but she had no memory of it.

  Usually she liked correcting and editing. She always did the first read-through on screen and then printed off her pages to correct them again by hand. But today she could not concentrate. She abandoned the typescript and added it to the pile of unopened mail, then made a foray to the kitchen for a lump of cheese which she ate in her fingers at her desk, shaking the crumbly bits from her papers, disgusted with herself.

  She opened her laptop and returned to her chapter for a glossy book, Great Victorians. She had agreed to write an essay on the Reform Club chef, Alexis Soyer – partly because she needed the money, but mainly because the man fascinated her – but she deleted almost as many words as she wrote, and the chapter did not advance.

  Lucy read what she’d written. It was concise and well constructed. But lifeless. How could she have removed the fire from the captivating Soyer? He should be a gift to a writer. He’d founded soup kitchens in the Irish famine; he’d revolutionised hospital catering behind the front line in the Crimea; he’d masterminded a catering extravaganza to cream off the visitors to the Great Exhibition; he’d invented countless kitchen appliances and gadgets. All that before you even touched his day job, or his eccentric dress, or his young wife, soon to die.

  She closed the laptop and put her head down on top of it. The truth was, even Soyer failed to interest her. I have to pull myself together, she thought. Tomorrow.

  She wasn’t sure how long she stayed like that. Maybe she slept briefly, but when a stiff back roused her, she again wandered through to the kitchen to open the fridge and peer into it. She extracted a pot of yogurt and a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc. She put a teaspoon and a corkscrew into one dressing gown pocket and a glass into the other, and, clutching yogurt and wine to her with one arm, she managed to scoop up the cat with her free hand. She would watch the news with Magnificat on her lap and a glass in her hand. The thought lifted one thin layer of grey from her spirits and she said aloud to the cat, ‘Right Mags, time for rest and recreation. I am going to drag myself out of the wretched pit.’

  And indeed she quite enjoyed the catalogue of a government minister’s indiscretions and the good news story of villagers seeing off a supermarket development. But then, the ever-cheerful Orlando Black appeared in the middle of a row of well-known cooks, clearly the chairman of a celebrity cook’s quiz show.

  Lucy’s first thought was that she’d been going to chair this show, and that the irrepressible Black was filling yet another pair of her shoes. But then she remembered she’d refused the job because she’d thought the format vulgar – for every question the participants got wrong, they’d lose points which they could buy back by eating something disgusting: sheep’s eyes, live flying ants, etc.

  The show was quite as dire as she’d imagined it would be. The contestants displayed abysmal ignorance of ingredients, culinary history and culture, even of classical recipes, and then shrieked and gagged over deep-fried grasshopper or mopane worms.
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  She flicked off the TV and stared at the blank screen for a few seconds. Then she put her head back on the chair and started, once more, to cry. Her face wet with tears, she wailed, ‘Oh David, David, when will the misery start to lift?’ She held Magnificat tight and buried her face in his fur. But he struggled free, jumped down and, with an irritated twitch of his tail, took himself off.

  Even the bloody cat rejects me, she thought, and smiled despite herself.

  Chapter Fifteen

  A week after the train ride with Stewart, Joanna agreed to meet him for dinner.

  He’d booked at the Saxon. She was early and, since she’d come straight from a drink with her colleagues at Innovest, she headed for the Ladies and spent some time re-doing her make-up, with a touch more on her eyes than she wore during the day.

  Her charcoal jacket, fine for business, was now too formal, so she decided to carry it and wear her pink and purple pashmina (she always carried a pashmina in the back pocket of her briefcase against over-zealous air-conditioning). She draped it over her shoulder and was pleased that it went well with the soft mauve blouse.

  She turned her head this way and that, closely inspecting the skin round her eyes and jaw. Sometimes she looked positively wrinkled, but tonight she looked good, not bad for fifty-five. And then she admonished herself: what was she trying to do – seduce her chairman? It was ridiculous. She was a confirmed spinster and happy that way. But she did feel pretty upbeat. Maybe having that frozen daiquiri in the pub was unwise.

  The truth was she felt a fluttering in the gut she’d not felt in years – not since her disastrous affair with the glamorous Tom. That had come to grief when the prospect of marriage and children had him dodging for cover like a rabbit with a dog on his tail.

  She looked steadily into the mirror and asked herself if there had been, on Stewart’s part, any more than professional interest in her on the train last week. Yes, she concluded, there had been. It was probably nothing, but he was the kind of man who could not help but charm women. She had better be on her guard.