Mrs Pargeter 02; Mrs, Presumed Dead

∨ Mrs, Presumed Dead ∧

Five

Vivvi Sprake was an over-hearty presence in yellow dungarees, one of those people whose emotional range does not encompass subtlety.

“And what did your husband do, Mrs Pargeter?”

The object of her interrogation gave an equable smile. “He was in business on his own account.”

“Oh, what sort of line?”

“All kinds,” Mrs Pargeter replied, charmingly but uninformatively.

“Finance?”

“Yes.”

“Commodities?”

“At times.”

“Was he a broker?”

“That kind of thing, yes.”

Vivvi seemed tacitly to recognise that that was as far as she was going to get, so she shifted her approach. “Carole’s husband Gregory’s in Commodities.”

“Oh?”

“I assume you must have met Carole by now.” Vivvi Sprake spoke with great care, restraining her northern accent as one might a kitten capable of suddenly breaking free to do something disgraceful on the floor. “I mean, with her being right next door to you.”

“No, I haven’t yet.” So Mrs Huffy the Houseproud was called Carole. Slowly the names were coming together.

“Oh well, I must introduce you.” Vivvi darted away to collar a woman with rigidly coifed blonde hair, who wore a grey blouse and matching skirt.

The quarry was brought forward for presentation to the guest of honour. “This is Melita Pargeter – Carole Temple.”

“Hello.” Carole made no pretence of being interested in her new neighbour.

“Hello, I’ve seen you cleaning your windows,” said Mrs Pargeter comfortably.

“Oh?” The tone implied affront.

“Well, I could hardly miss you, love, could I? I’ve been going in and out so much the last few days. You know how it is with a new house – you keep remembering things you’ve forgotten. Didn’t you find that when you first moved in here?”

“No,” Carole Temple replied. “But then my husband and I had made lists of all the things we might possibly need.”

Yes, well, you would have done, wouldn’t you, thought Mrs Pargeter. She somehow couldn’t see a close relationship developing with this neighbour.

Still, she went through the motions. “We’re very conveniently situated here, though, aren’t we? You know, for the shops. You can get virtually everything you need on the Parade, can’t you?”

“Well, you can,” Carole Temple conceded, “but they’re all very over-priced. I go and do a weekly shop at Sainsbury’s. And then once a month I stock up with basics at the Cash and Carry.”

Once again, you would.

“I gather your husband’s in Commodities,” said Mrs Pargeter, hoping that a change of subject might stimulate the conversational flow.

“Yes, he is,” Carole Temple confirmed with a finality which confounded such hopes.

Mrs Pargeter took refuge in a sip of coffee before attempting another foray. “Do you have children?” Surely that was a safe, uncontroversial subject.

“Two. At boarding school.”

“Oh?”

Mrs Pargeter waited for fond parental amplification of these minimal details, but she wasn’t even granted the sex of the Temple offspring. All she got was: “Very expensive, boarding schools these days.”

“So I believe.”

“Do you have children?”

The suddenness of this enquiry took Mrs Pargeter by surprise. But when she looked at Carole Temple’s face she saw no flicker of interest; the question had been asked merely as a matter of convention.

“No. No, I don’t.” The fact was still a cause of mild regret to her. But then, given the unpredictable demands made on the late Mr Pargeter’s time and his occasional absences, she had long ago concluded that their childlessness had probably been for the best. When they were together, they had been able to devote all their energies to each other.

By now roadblocks seemed to have been set up in all conversational avenues, and it was with some relief that Mrs Pargeter saw Vivvi Sprake bearing towards her, bringing in her wake two women who, by a process of elimination, must be Mrs Busy the Businesswoman and Mrs Snoop the Spy.