he wasn’t having again, incidentally. I gather there was an element of ultimatum from him about it. When she asked him to take her back, he said, “On one condition. We get married now.” ’
‘Gosh, how thrilling.’ I shivered. ‘Frightfully masterful.’ I was intrigued. Simon was quite a catch. ‘So who had she been going out with all this time, then, while he waited?’
‘Oh, some married man, apparently.’
‘Right. And what happened to him?’ I asked, as the door at the far end of the church swung open with a flourish.
‘He died,’ Jennie told me, as at that moment the gothic arched doorway filled with ivory tulle. It shimmied for an instant in the shaft of sunlight behind it, then steadied and moved towards us. Accompanied by some tiny attendants in matching ivory silk, and with lilies of the valley in a charming circlet in her blonde hair, white roses cascading like a waterfall from her bouquet, Emma Harding came gliding down the aisle.
17
It was all I could do to stay upright and not give way to my knees, which were advising me, in the strongest possible terms, to sit down. I certainly couldn’t have done without the help of the pew in front, the back of which I clutched, knuckles white. I gazed in horror and disbelief as she got ever closer, a nightmarish veiled vision, smiling coyly and acknowledging friends along the way, presumably on the arm of her father, a small, ruddy-faced man with bulbous eyes. My own eyes were giving them some competition, unable to believe what they saw.
‘Pretty,’ commented Jennie charitably in my ear, because of course we had a bird’s-eye view from the raised choir stalls.
‘Pretty unbelievable!’ I spat, a trifle loudly perhaps, causing even Molly, tone – if not stone – deaf, to turn.
‘That’s Emma Harding!’ I hissed. ‘The one who was bonking Phil until he up and died a few weeks ago!’
The shock on Jennie’s face gave the outrage on mine a good run for its money. The blood drained from her cheeks and the breath was seemingly sucked from her as if a high-speed vacuum had been applied to various orifices. She stared at me, dumbstruck. Then, as one, we swung back to the bride.
‘I don’t believe it,’ she gasped, joining me in clutching the pew in front.
‘I swear to God,’ I sped on furiously. ‘She sat on my sofa in my sitting room piously explaining how she wouldn’t take a penny from me, before deciding better of it. I’d know her sanctimonious little face anywhere!’
Jennie digested this in horrified silence as Emma and her father proceeded in stately fashion towards us, up to the steps where Simon and the vicar waited by the altar.
‘And all the time she was busy re-bagging Simon!’ Jennie said. ‘Little tart,’ she spat venomously. Sylvia, in front, turned to give her a disapproving look.
‘Scheming little tart,’ I agreed, ignoring Sylvia’s furious frown.
Fortunately for Emma, Luke was still giving it whampo, and our remarks didn’t drift further than our immediate neighbours. We watched, tight-lipped and incredulous. Without much fear of recognition either, disguised as we were in unfamiliar cassock and ruff. Emma’s eyes, anyway, were only for her groom, waiting straight-backed and proudly for her; she wasn’t busy scanning the choir stalls for detractors. As she hove into view under our noses I realized she was much more of a highlighted blonde than a natural one these days, and she was sporting a deep San Tropez tan, her shimmying shoulders, smooth and gleaming, rising from her strapless gown. She glided into position, and as Luke’s final chord drifted away into the rafters she smiled up into her groom’s eyes. Simon’s face was suffused with unadulterated delight as he gazed down.
‘Hussy!’ hissed Jennie, and even Angie leaned around to give her a startled look.
Mike, our vicar, rocking back and forth on the soles of his shoes, said a few words of welcome – as usual mentioning the church roof – and then directed us to our first hymn. I managed to mutter a few words of it but Jennie, beside me, stood mute and pale throughout. Finally, under cover of the last verse, which was delivered at full volume by the congregation and to which we were supposed to provide the descant, she muttered in my ear, ‘I’ve a jolly good mind to say something.’
My eyes widened in horror. She had a determined look on her face that I knew of