Dorothy Cannell - The Widows Club

Make haste, Rowland dear. Other women may wish these moments extended, every word savoured for cherishing in later years, but I couldn’t wait to feel that ring on my finger, to know that I was finally Mrs. Bentley Haskell.

“Dearly Beloved, we are gathered here today…”

I was drowning in the brilliance of Ben’s eyes, their shifting colors… such an incredible blue-green, flecked with amber… and those black lashes, long enough to rake leaves. How could I, a fat girl masquerading in a thin body, be so blessed?

“And so I caution all here present that if any of you know of any just cause or impediment why Bentley Thomas Haskell and Giselle Simons may not lawfully be joined together in the holy estate of matrimony you shall declare it now or forever after hold your peace.”

Pause.

“Yoo-hoo, I do! I have something to declare!”

Gasps. A commotion erupted at the back of the church. A baby bellowed. Exclamations of horror. Footsteps. Rowland, an expression of consternation on his kind, handsome face, tucked a finger into the book and let it fall shut with a thud. Ben dropped my hand and turned to stare at whoever was pounding down the aisle. I took one look and became immobilized.

This was monstrous. Whoever the woman was, she was off her rocker. A disappointed spinster who went from wedding to wedding, causing a ruckus at each one? Perhaps I should try to pity her. Might I not have ended up the same way myself?

“There now, Mumma’s little pudding cheeks. Say hello to Da-Da.”

A baby! The Just Cause and Impediment she held aloft was a baby. Ben’s baby. Jane Eyre’s tribulation was nothing to this; she only got lumbered with a mad wife.

Closing my eyes, I took slow deep breaths. I tried to bear in mind that Ben had never claimed to have kept himself untouched by human hand until I had happened along. Yes, a baby did indicate a certain closeness in the relationship, but I would have to try very hard not to be jealous and petty.

The woman identified herself: Mrs. Bentley T. Haskell, the First. She was screeching that the louse had bunked off without even the courtesy of a divorce.

Loud bawling from the baby.

“Pack of lies, the whole lot of it!” rapped out Dorcas. From the corner of my eye I saw her lift my crushed bouquet as if to pitch it in my predecessor’s face.

A sparkling laugh, which I recognised at once as cousin Vanessa’s.

A menacing yowl from dear Jonas.

Ben’s arm came around me. Wed, or almost wed, to a bigamist! I searched his profile and found it explosive. Exerting every ounce of will, I forced my leaden body into a half turn.

The woman, all six foot of her, was planted level with the front pew. My one, benumbed thought was: how could Ben ever have desired her enough to produce the child now dangling untidily over the arm of her black coat? The destroyer of my happiness was wearing a week’s worth of greengroceries-apples, bananas, and oranges-on her hat. Beneath its olive-green brim, mangled yellowish curls bounced against hollowed cheeks caked in rouge. Her eyelids were coated with a luminous mauve, liberally sprinkled with tinsel dust, and the exaggerated bow of her mouth was outlined in glossy lavender pink.

The baby kicked out, and the black-clothed arm went into a spasm of junketing up and down. An appalling, expectant silence descended. Time went into slow motion. Among the sea of faces I saw Uncle Maurice, Aunt Lulu, my ex-neighbor Jill-a hand covering her mouth-and Ann Delacorte, who had helped me select my wedding dress from those for sale in her husband’s antique shop. Could she persuade him to take it back?

“Believe me, vicar ducky, I ain’t a vengeful woman. All I asks is me rights.” The woman drew her free hand across her eyes and spluttered piteously.

“Wicked shame,” came a cry from the rear. “He should be strung up, won’t say by what on account of being in church.” This theme was swiftly picked up by other voices. “Makes Dr. Simon Bordeaux look like a saint. He puts women out of their misery!” someone yelled.

Tucking the book under his arm, Rowland appeared lost in thought. “Ellie, Ben-and you, madam-I think it best that we adjourn to the vestry to discuss this unhappy turn of events.”

The shadows cast by the candles made the woman look as though she needed a shave. Ben, how could you? I thought mournfully.

“To the vestry, to the vestry! I feel a lynching coming on!” Ben’s arm tightened around me, and despising myself, I clung to him.

Rowland cast his eyes upward. I thought he was praying for help, then realised he was signalling to the organist. With “Rock of Ages” pouring its rousing tide of rejoicing and repentance down upon the up-in-arms congregation, Ben and I, the woman and the infant, followed Rowland into the vestry.

Drawing the door closed behind us, Rowland fumbled in the folds of his cassock, pulled out a pipe, jammed it into his mouth, removed it, and stood tapping the bowl with one finger.

“Ellie,” he said pensively, “why don’t you sit down in that chair by the writing desk. Perhaps you would like a glass of water?”

I shook my head dumbly and remained standing.

The woman was lounging against the wall; the baby tugged on her coat buttons.

Rowland looked from her to Ben, who still had his arm around me.

“Is what this woman claims true? Ben, are you now or were you ever married to her?”

I braced myself, but I was not prepared for what happened. For suddenly, clutching his arms around his middle, Ben backed against the wall, doubled over, and howled with laughter.

His mind had snapped under the strain. My gaze fixed on his wife.

I must have had a minibout of temporary insanity because my hand reached out, not to strike the woman, but to help myself to one of the apples on her hat. Thank heaven pride returned. I would not sully my hands or my lips with anything this woman had touched with those fingers poking through the holes in her gloves. I couldn’t look at Ben. It was ghastly enough to hear his emissions of mirth.

My eyes clung to Rowland and saw his lips moving. Was he praying for a speedy end to this abomination? And whose side would God be on? If what this woman claimed were true… but of course it wasn’t. She must be brought to see that she was indulging in a case of mistaken identity. If not, flogging no longer being an accepted practice, there had to be some equally compelling…

Another revolting gurgle of laughter burst from my bridegroom, and the rubber band holding my nerves together finally snapped. I was standing in a welter of butchered dreams and in the process had gone as mad as Mr. Rochester’s first wife. For I could swear that Ben’s first wife had winked at me.

Incredibly I beheld a countenance that, seen in better light, was uncannily familiar. My rival’s expression switched to weary martyrdom. Lifting a hand to her hat, she plucked off a banana, peeled it, and stuffed it into the child’s slobbering mouth.

“Perhaps we should fetch Dr. Melrose, Ellie. I believe Ben has gone into shock.” Rowland’s voice was deeply concerned.

So dear a man! His was a mind singularly unacquainted with evil. The baby-bonnet askew, collar jacked up because its coat was buttoned wrong-spat out a chunk of banana and, bleating miserably, banged sticky hands against its mother’s rouged cheeks. And then, as I stood in frozen horror, the poor little creature was shoved into my arms.

“Here Ellie, take the ruddy little blighter. Won’t hurt you to practice up on motherhood,” said the woman in the masculine voice of my cousin Freddy Flatts. “Come on, Ellie, old stodge! Be a sport like your intended! He was as surprised as you were, but he’s taking it on the chin.”

Freddy grinned down at my fiancé, who had slithered into an ignoble heap on the vestry floor. “Glad you enjoyed the joke, mate. Been toying with the idea of pulling this stunt for years. But I can tell you, I couldn’t come up with any couple that meant so much to me that I was prepared to shave off my beard, bleach my hair, and bribe old Alvin into lending me his soggy kid. Not until you two. Something to tell the grandchildren, eh? But I tell you, my girdle is killing me.”