Isabel Wolff - The Making of Minty Malone

‘Cold?’ interjected Amber acidly. ‘They were deep frozen.’

‘Thank you, Amber. As I say, I refuse to speculate about Dominic’s behaviour this morning,’ Charlie went on, ‘except to say that he has been working rather hard recently. Very hard, in fact. And he has seemed rather preoccupied lately, so, er, I suspect that er, professional pressure is largely to blame. And I think the best thing is if we just try to enjoy our lunch, and, er, try to, er, well …’ his voice trailed away ‘ …enjoy our lunch.’

And the waiters came round with the Laurent Perrier – in the circumstances we’d decided not to have a reception line – and people drank it, and chatted in low, respectful voices. They sat huddled round their tables like spies, as they swapped theories about Dom’s dramatic exit.

‘– another woman?’ I heard someone ask.

‘– dunno.’

‘– already married?’

‘– nervous breakdown?’

‘– always a bit flaky.’

‘– totally humiliating.’

‘– what about the presents?’

I was on the top table, of course, but instead of sitting there with my new husband, I was next to my bridesmaid and the best man, and my parents, brother and cousin. And Madge, unfortunately. She’d come along to the Waldorf, too.

‘Well, at least I got to wear my new Windsmoor,’ she said with a satisfied shrug. ‘It cost an absolute bomb.’

‘Windsmoor? I say ,’ said Amber incredulously. She seemed more outraged than me.

‘Do you have any notion as to why your son has done this?’ Dad enquired with stiff civility.

‘Well, I suppose he felt that it wasn’t right , and that he just couldn’t go through with it,’ she offered. ‘He’s got such integrity like that.’

‘Integrity!’ Amber spat.

‘Amber, Amber, please,’ said Charlie. ‘It doesn’t help.’

‘Nice tiara, by the way, Minty,’ said Madge.

‘Thanks.’

‘And you can keep the griddle pan.’ I was too shocked to take in this happy news.

‘Never mind, Minty, darling,’ said Mum, putting a solicitous arm round my shoulder. ‘I always thought the man was a first-class shyster and rotter, I can’t deny it, and – oooh, sorry, Madge!’ Mum blushed. ‘An appalling waste of twenty-eight grand, though,’ she added regretfully.

‘Is that all you can think of, Dympna?’ Dad asked wearily, as a waiter flicked a large napkin on to her lap.

‘Well, just think of all the homeless bats and battered wives you could save with that lot!’ she retorted. ‘What about the insurance policy?’ she asked.

‘Charlie phoned the helpline on his mobile,’ Dad replied. ‘I’m afraid it doesn’t appear to cover stage-fright.’

So we sat there eating our lunch, amid the curiously merry clatter of cutlery on china, and the pan-seared swordfish arrived and everyone said it was very good, though obviously I couldn’t eat a thing; and the string trio were playing ‘Solitaire’, which I thought was extremely insensitive, and I was just making a mental decision not to tip them when Charlie’s mobile phone went off. He flicked it on, and stood up.

‘Yes? Yes?’ I heard him say. Then he said, ‘Look, Dom, don’t tell me this, tell Minty. You’ve got to talk to her, old chap – I’m going to put her on to you right now.’

I grabbed the outstretched phone as though it were a lifeline and I a drowning man. ‘Dom, Dom it’s me. Listen …Yes …Yes, OK …Thanks …No, Dominic, don’t hang up. Don’t. Please, Dom, don’t! …Thanks, Dom. No, don’t go, Dominic! Don’t, Dominic …Dom –’

He’d gone. And then, at last, I burst into tears.

‘What did he say?’ asked Charlie, after a minute.

‘He said …he said, I can keep the engagement ring.’

‘Ah, that’s nice of him,’ said Madge with a benevolent smile. ‘He was always very generous like that.’

‘And the honeymoon.’

‘Heart of gold, really.’

Mum shot her a poisonous look.

‘But how can I go on my honeymoon on my own ?’ I wailed.

‘I’ll come with you, Minty,’ Helen said.

And so at ten to five Helen and I left the Waldorf in a cab – she’d already dashed home to get her passport and a weekend bag. And we were waved off by everyone, which felt rather strange; I decided, in the circumstances, not to throw my bouquet. I left it with all my wedding gear, which Dad said he’d take back to Primrose Hill. And as I crossed the Thames in the taxi with my bridesmaid instead of my bridegroom, I kept thinking, ‘Where’s Dominic? Where is he? Where ?’ Was he still on the bus? Unlikely. Was he back in Clapham? When had he decided on his course of action? Was it pure coup de théâtre , or a genuine éclaircissement – and why was I thinking in French?

‘I don’t think he’ll be back,’ Madge had announced, as she sipped her coffee.

‘What makes you so sure?’ Charlie enquired testily. Tempers were frayed by now.

‘Well, once he makes up his mind about something he never changes it,’ she said, patting her perm. ‘Like I say, he’s got such integrity like that.’

‘Oh, why don’t you shut up about Dominic’s blasted “integrity”?’ said Amber, with a ferocity which struck me as rude. ‘Look what he’s done to Minty!’

‘Well, it is unfortunate,’ agreed Madge, with an air of regret. ‘But much better to pull out now than later on.’

‘No!’ I said in a voice I barely recognised as my own. ‘I’d rather he’d gone through with it, just gone through with it, and divorced me tomorrow, if that’s how he felt.’

‘But he’s got such a lot to lose,’ she said.

‘Well, I’ve lost all my dignity!’ I replied. ‘It’s so humiliating,’ I wailed, as I tried to avoid the pitying looks of the catering staff. ‘And in front of every single person I know.’ And it was then that I suddenly regretted having let Dominic persuade me to invite half the staff of London FM. How could I work there again, after this? I looked at my napkin – it was smeared with mascara, which annoyed me because I’d paid £24 for it and had been assured by the woman in the shop that it was completely waterproof. I looked at my watch. It was ten to four, and the train to Paris was at five fifteen.

‘I think you should go,’ said Dad again.

‘Why don’t you go,’ I said, ‘with Mum?’

‘I can’t,’ she said. ‘It’s the Anorexia Association Ball on Tuesday. I’ve got to look after Lord Eatmore, he’s the sponsor.’

‘Go with Helen, Minty,’ said Dad. ‘That way, if Dominic wants to ring you, he’ll know where you are.’

Oh yes. Dominic would know that all right. The George V. The Honeymoon Suite. That’s what he’d asked me to book and, very obediently, I had. So that’s where he could ring me. He could ring me there and explain. Perhaps he’d even come over and talk to me in person. But deep down, I knew he wouldn’t – because I knew that Madge was right.

In The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne the heroine, Hester, is made to wear the letter ‘A’ on her dress. ‘A’ for Adultery. ‘A’ to indicate her public shame. As Helen and I swished through the Kent countryside on Eurostar, I thought, maybe I should wear ‘J’, for jilted. This would save people constantly coming up to me in the coming weeks and asking me why I looked so strained, and why I hardly ate, and why I had this mad, staring expression in my eyes. It would be the emotional equivalent of a black armband, easily read from afar, and leaving nothing to be said – except perhaps for the occasional, and entirely voluntary, sympathetic gesture.

And I thought too, as I gazed at the sunlit fields, of how incredibly unlucky I’d been. I’d had more chance of being blown up by a terrorist bomb, or hit by a flying cow, than being deserted, in church, mid marriage. And I thought of Sheryl von Strumpfhosen and of how she’d got my horoscope so horribly wrong: ‘Your love life takes an upward turn this weekend,’ she’d written. Upward turn ? And then I remembered my marriage manual, Nearly Wed , and a grim smile spread across my lips. I thought as well of all the kind things people had said as I left the hotel. ‘Chin up, Minty!’ ‘Probably all for the best …’ ‘Expect he’ll come running back!’ ‘Thought you looked lovely, by the way.’ They had crawled and cringed with embarrassment, brows corrugated with confusion and concern. I’d felt almost sorrier for them than for myself. I mean, what do you say? And then, I realised, with a heart like lead, that it wasn’t just the people who were in church. It was the hundreds of others who’d read that I was engaged.