‘He’s gone to buy your…’ Martha caught Ben’s eye.
I pretended I hadn’t heard and turned my attention to the frying pan.
I put Richard’s plate in the oven and we started to eat – Melanie had crawled down in her dressing-gown – because Ben was getting agitated. He hardly touched the lunch I had made especially for him, looking anxiously, for Richard, towards the door.
‘I expect there’s a lot of traffic.’ I tried to calm him. ‘Why don’t you bring your stuff down?’
‘It’s down.’
‘Will you bring me back some chocolate,’ Martha said. ‘There’s this girl in my class and her mother went to Gstáad and brought her back the most enormous…’
‘Hang on!’ Ben said. He jumped up from the table and fiddled with the radio, raising the volume.
‘…police officers and pedestrians…’
‘What is it?’ I put Ben’s chips down the waste-disposal.
‘“Car bomb”, I think he said,’ Martha said.
Melanie picked up a chip in her fingers. ‘IRA.’
Ben had gone white.
He was changing the station.
‘A girl at school…’ Martha said.
‘Shut up a minute…’
‘…a bomb has exploded outside Harrods, Knightsbridge…the store was crowded with Christmas shoppers…’
Ben was looking at me oddly.
‘Are you all right?’
He swallowed. I could see his Adam’s apple moving.
‘A blue fox,’ he said.
I thought he had gone crazy.
‘…it was advertised in the newspaper.’
Melanie and Martha stared at him.
‘Fur,’ he said.
It took me a few minutes.
‘Ben!’
‘What on earth’s the matter?’ Melanie said.
‘…eye witness reports…’
‘He told me not to say anything,’ Ben said.
I could not have managed without them.
‘He’s probably on his way home,’ Melanie said.
‘…Hans Crescent, some of whom appear to be in a serious condition…’
‘He promised to take Ben to the airport,’ Martha said. ‘He’ll be here in a minute.’ Her voice was shaky.
Ben held up his hand.
‘…“breaking glass and people screaming. It hit the back of my head”…’
I was looking for my car keys.
‘…police have cordoned off the area…’
‘My car keys…!’
‘Cora had them,’ Martha said.
‘Why don’t you wait…?’
‘There’ll be a number to ring…’
‘He’ll be on his way home by now…’
‘Wait a few minutes…’
‘I’ll put my clothes on…’
‘Stay with Martha…’
‘Shsh…’
‘…injured civilians…the Salvation Army Band played carols a few yards away…’
Cora had hidden the car keys. Martha and Melanie turned everything upside down. Ben stood by the radio. I leaned against the sink. As if they were playing hunt the thimble. They charged round the kitchen falling over each other, turning over tea towels and saucepan lids.
Richard was never late.
‘You’ll miss your plane,’ I said to Ben.
The keys were in the drawer with the wooden spoons.
Martha dangled them before me.
‘Everything always happens in threes.’
I could hear my mother’s voice.
‘I think you’d better wait,’ Ben said.
‘…thrown to the pavement and died instantly…’
They followed me to the hall.
Melanie put my coat round my shoulders.
Ben said: ‘Jean.’
Martha held my hand.
I had never been so loved.
Epilogue
I opened the front door with its coloured lights.
My path was blocked by a Christmas tree.
Behind it was Richard.
Grinning.
Holding a Harrods’ parcel.
ROSEMARY FRIEDMAN
GOLDEN BOY
This is one of Rosemary Friedman’s best-loved novels. Freddie Lomax is a slick, work-driven city executive, popular and sociable, other eyes always drawn to the magnetic field of his charm. Utterly without warning he is given two hours to clear his desk at the bank and he finds himself joining the ranks of the middle-aged unemployed. His confidence that a new job will appear proves unfounded, and with all the time he now spends at home his marriage to Jane begins to suffer…until, when he thinks he can go no lower, he discovers that he is not the only one with problems and he applies his talents to a last attempt to save his relationship.
‘What a story! What a storyteller!’ – Daily Mail
THE LIFE SITUATION
Oscar John has it all: a successful author, he has been happily married for sixteen years. But then everything changes when he meets Marie-Céleste, an elegant French doctor. When his sexual curiosity turns into passion and an all-consuming love, he is completely unprepared…
PATIENTS OF A SAINT
The doctor’s practice, first introduced in No White Coat and again in Love on My List, is expanding. He finds himself buckling under the strain of an increased workload and the demands of his exuberant twins. His wife, Sylvia, persuades him to take a much-needed break and he realises that it is time to find an assistant.
This proves to be a difficult task, but once he has found the right man, the doctor has more time to devote to individual patients and to his family.
Into this busy environment arrives the doctor’s alluring cousin Caroline. On a study visit from the US, she invites herself to stay for six months – a situation which causes much chaos and hilarity.
PROOFS OF AFFECTION
One year in the life of a London Jewish family at a time of great change: Sydney Shelton’s business is not doing too well these days, but he has provided for his future and his worries are not about trade but about his own health and his children, now young adults. Sydney’s wife Kitty knows how ill he is – but they cannot talk about it. The children openly flout tradition and go against his wishes. What will happen to them if he dies?
With a light satirical touch and great sensitivity, Rosemary Friedman explores the tensions and deeper feelings of a traditional Jewish family facing the pressures of change.
ROSE OF JERICHO
Kitty’s husband Sydney is dead, and eighteen months later she is still struggling to come to terms with his death. She takes comfort in the lives of her children, and the full comedy and crises of Kitty’s circle of family and friends vividly unfold. On a package holiday to Israel, in between awe-inspiring visits to the Dead Sea and the dramatic desert, she gets to know Maurice Morgenthau, reserved New Yorker and survivor of the Nazi concentration camps. The friendship between them grows and Maurice helps Kitty gain a new sense of perspective on her life. In turn Kitty helps Maurice tell his harrowing story of survival for the first time.
TO LIVE IN PEACE
This novel pursues the story of widow Kitty Shelton from Rosemary Friedman’s delightful earlier novels Proofs of Affection and Rose of Jericho. Kitty has watched her beloved husband die, and her children grow to adulthood. She takes security from her role as family matriarch, but now her north London Jewish community is rife with dispute about the recent Israeli invasion of Lebanon. At the invitation of her gentlemanly suitor, Holocaust survivor Maurice Morgenthau, Kitty visits New York – where she learns to please herself and in so doing learns to discover herself too.
About the Author
Rosemary Friedman’s writing career was launched with great success by her first novel No White Coat, published in Best Doctor Stories alongside Somerset Maugham and A J Cronin. She has gone on to write eighteen further novels, including Proofs of Affection (‘a classic of its kind’ – Evening Standard), which was serialised by the
BBC. She has also written two popular children’s books, Aristide and Aristide in Paris, as well as The Writing Game, an inspirational memoir for writers and readers.
She has written commissioned screenplays for both film and television in the UK and US, and her play Home Truths toured successfully in 1997. In addition, Rosemary has been a judge of literary competitions and a member of a number of distinguished bodies such as the Executive Committee of PEN, BAFTA, the Writers’ Guild, the Executive Committee of the Society of Authors, and the Royal Society of Literature. She lives in London.
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
ALL PUBLISHED AS EBOOKS FROM ARCADIA BOOKS
THE COMMONPLACE DAY
AN ELIGIBLE MAN
THE FRATERNITY
THE GENERAL PRACTICE
GOLDEN BOY
INTENSIVE CARE
THE LIFE SITUATION
THE LONG HOT SUMMER
LOVE ON MY LIST
A LOVING MISTRESS
NO WHITE COAT
PATIENTS OF A SAINT
PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT
PROOFS OF AFFECTION
ROSE OF JERICHO
TO LIVE IN PEACE
VINTAGE
WE ALL FALL DOWN
Copyright
Arcadia Books Ltd
139 Highlever Road
London W10 6PH
www.arcadiabooks.co.uk
First published in 1985 by House of Stratus; reprinted 2001
This Ebook edition published by Arcadia Books 2013
Copyright © Rosemary Friedman 1985, 2001
Has asserted his moral right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the written permission of the publishers.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 978–1–909807–04–4
Arcadia Books supports English PEN www.englishpen.org and The Book Trade Charity http://booktradecharity.wordpress.com
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A Second Wife Page 13
