‘You’re afraid I’ll take out my purse and lay it on the table and rattle it about, getting out the money. Don’t get that idea into your head. Just as we go out, before we ever get out of the house, I’ll give you something for my half. That way there can’t be any awkwardness. It’s called Dutch treat, you know. What’s that in Russian?’
There was no Russian word for it. ‘Students, perhaps,’ said Frank, ‘I’ve seen them empty out their pockets at the beginning of the evening and put all the money they’ve got in the middle of the table.’
‘That’s not Dutch treat,’ said Nellie.
Once he had his training certificates, he had reasonably good prospects to lay before her. He felt that he could assume that she wouldn’t be too distressed at leaving her family and friends, still less at getting out of Norbury. If he wanted to go ahead with it, he ought to speak to Charlie, explaining in more detail about the firm and his prospects. He did want to go ahead with it, and after fixing things up with Nellie, he did speak to Charlie. No worry about a ring, because he had brought with him a ring belonging to his mother which his father had bought for her at Ovchinikof’s in Moscow. It was a Russian triple knot, in three different colours of gold, made so that the three circlets were separate but could never be taken apart. They slid and shone together on Nellie’s capable finger. At the choral society it was thought pretty, but foreign-looking. ‘When your mother gave it you, she must have expected you to find someone,’ said Nellie. ‘Was she ill?’
‘I don’t think so, she certainly didn’t say so?’
‘What were the girls like in Nottingham?’
‘I can’t remember. Very moderate, I think.’
‘I daresay they fancied you because you were tall?’
‘They might have done.’
‘Did you fall in love with any of them when you were in Manchester, or when you were in Nottingham, and offer them this ring, and get turned down?’
‘No Nellie, I didn’t.’ They were walking in Norbury Park. The air and the trodden earth and grass breathed out moisture. Grace had warned them that they would find it very damp.
‘You might have had to take the ring back to Moscow, then, and tell your mother it was no go.’ They sat down on a bench, from which an elderly man tactfully got up as they approached.
‘Look here Frank, do you know a lot about women?’ He was undaunted.
‘I think you’ll find I know quite enough for the purpose, Nellie.’
There was no need to wait a long time for the wedding. Frank’s parents had to arrange to come from Moscow, and it was never easy for them to leave the business, but all his relatives from Salford were singlemindedly devoted to attendance at weddings and funerals, and would let nothing stand in their way. The preparations made Frank resolve never, until he came to be buried, to let himself become an object of attention at any kind of religious ceremony again. He knew, however, that he ought not to grumble. Both Charlie and Grace, who were going, after all, to considerable expense, told him that it would be Nellie’s day. He felt deeply tender towards her because of this and because of her practical good sense and the number of lists she was making and the letters which were answered and crossed off yet another list. He was startled when she said: ‘I’m doing all this as it should be done, because I owe it to both of us. But I’m not going to be got the better of by Norbury.’
‘They wouldn’t dare,’ Frank said. ‘Which of them would?’
‘You don’t think I’m marrying you, Frank Reid, just to get out of Norbury?’
‘I don’t put myself as low as that,’ he said, ‘or you either.’
‘I don’t just mean the people here,’ she went on earnestly, ‘I mean all the people we’ve invited, those cousins of yours from Salford, and those aunts.’
‘They’re not so bad.’
‘People always say that about their aunts,’ said Nellie. ‘The wedding will bring out the worst in them, you’ll see. I’m not a dreamer. I have to look at things quite squarely, as they really are. That’s one of the things you like about me. I know it is.’
She had no doubts. Even her curling hair seemed to spring up from her forehead with determination. Frank kissed her, but not in such a way as to interrupt her. She asked him whether he’d given any thought as to what the wedding would be like.
‘It’s best to take things as they come,’ he said.
‘Well, I’ll tell you what it’s going to be like. I’m not talking about the church service. I mean afterwards, when we’re back here. We’re going to have ham and tongue, cucumber sandwiches, vanilla shape and honeycomb mould, nuts, port wine and Madeira. The port wine will be a bit much for Charlie and after a bit it’ll be too much for the lot of them, and they’ll all take some, because teetotallers always say that port doesn’t count, and the older ones, they’ll draw together a bit and lower their voices and say to each other, she doesn’t know what she’s in for. She’s twenty-six and he’s the first boy she’s ever been out with seriously. He’s a decent sort, you can see that, so they won’t have been up to anything yet, and she hasn’t any idea what she’s in for.’
‘I was hoping they’d have confidence in me,’ said Frank, ‘they’ve no reason not to.’
‘Oh, they won’t have anything against you personally. But they have to make out that it’s a tremendous thing – the only thing that ever happens to a woman, really, bar having children, and change of life, and dying. That’s how they see things in Norbury. There’s a certain expression they have, I’ve noticed it so often. They’ll say that if they’d known what it was going to be like nothing would have dragged them to the altar.’
Frank felt rather at a loss. He kissed her again and said, ‘Don’t be discouraged.’ She remained rigid.
‘What does it matter what all these people think, Nellie? If you’re really right, we ought to pity them.’
Nellie shook her head like a terrier.
‘I’m not going to be got the better of. They may not know it, they won’t know it, but I’m not going to.’
It was a brilliant day, a moment when a Norbury’s dampness justified itself in bright green grass, clipped green hedges, alert sparrows, stained glass washed to the brilliance of jewels, barometers waiting to be tapped. They were alone in the house. Nellie said: ‘Would you like to see my things? I mean the things I’m going to wear for the wedding. Not the dress, they’ll bring that later. It’s not lucky to have it in the house for too long.’
‘Yes, of course I would, if you feel like showing them to me.’
‘Do you believe in luck?’
‘You’ve asked me that before, Nellie. I told you, I used to believe it was for other people.’
They went up past the half-landing and into a bedroom almost entirely filled by the wardrobe and various pieces of furniture which looked as though they’d come to rest there from other rooms in the house. The morning sunlight, streaming through the one window caught the wardrobe’s bright bevelled glass. On the white bed some white draper’s goods were laid out, turning out to be a petticoat, a chemise, drawers and corsets. These last Nellie picked up and threw on the ground.
‘I’m not wearing these. I’ve given up wearing them. From now on I’m going to go unbraced, like Arts and Crafts women.’
‘Well, it’s always beaten me how women can stand them,’ said Frank.
‘Don’t think I’m going to pay for them, though. They can go back to Gage’s.’
‘Why not?’
‘They make ridges on your flesh, you