English Correspondence by Janet Davey

decent.’
    Maude calmed down and then started up again. ‘Sylvie. There will have to be a message. You mustn’t leave it to the florist.’
    â€˜Of course I won’t leave it to her. I’ll tell her what to put.’
    Maude talked rapidly and quietly and seemed to end up saying something not quite clear. Her name.
    â€˜
Your
name? Sorry I don’t understand.’
    Added.
    â€˜Added to what?’
    Yvette took another sip of water.
    She was telling her what to write. Paul, Sylvie, Maude. She showed some restraint in the order.
    â€˜I see. I’d have thought something more general. But that’s all right. I’ll do that.’
    â€˜I did know Maurice,’ she said. ‘I’m not trying to be pushy.’
    â€˜No, it’s all right. I said so. I’ll do it. It’s fine.’
    â€˜Is it really all right?’
    â€˜Really.’
    â€˜You’ll tell Paul, won’t you?’
    â€˜Yes, I shall. Bye.’
    Sylvie put the telephone down and switched on the computer.
    â€˜That was Maude,’ she said.
    She need not have said anything. But the person she had been speaking to and the person in the room had met. She had no idea what they thought of each other, though she guessed that there was admiration there somewhere. It would have been unnatural to keep silent. Yvette left the magazine open as if she might continue with it. She looked at once blithe and sympathetic.
    â€˜Is everything all right, darling?’
    â€˜Maude told me that Maurice – that’s the man we were giving the retirement party for yesterday evening – he died.’
    â€˜That’s terrible. When did that happen?’
    â€˜Last night. He collapsed.’
    â€˜Here? You don’t mean here, darling?’
    â€˜Yes.’
    â€˜Where?’
    Sylvie said nothing.
    â€˜In the dining room? Not at the table?’
    Still nothing.
    â€˜Darling, why didn’t you tell me? Such a shock for you. A dreadful shock.’ She paused and thought. ‘You said it had been a difficult evening. I’d no idea it was anything like this. Why didn’t you tell me?’
    â€˜I don’t know really. I didn’t feel like talking about it.’
    Yvette looked at her, didn’t get up. She was about to say something and thought better of it. She heard Sylvie’s reply in advance from across the room, though neither of them spoke. Faint and cross it was going to be. Brought what all back? What’s
he
got to do with it? So Yvette never mentioned George after all.
    Sylvie knew that her mother-in-law was hurt that she had failed to confide in her about Maurice, but she ignored the grievance and got on with composing the note to accompany the flowers. She did it in her head. A formula was best, simpleand unsentimental with their names at the end, Maude’s by request. She would avoid naming the restaurant; macabre publicity at the graveside. If they didn’t know who they were from, that was just too bad. She had read the messages that people had sent with George’s funeral flowers. They were all different: some to him, some for or about him, some misspelled by the florist. Don had advised her against. He had told her to say Family Flowers Only. But this seemed hard on the friends and the flowers – and left the family, which was really just her, rather exposed.
    She took advantage of her efficiency with the note, made it carry over into writing the letter to the Englishman. So that ended up straightforward too. She wrote it as soon as Yvette left. She said he’d left his book behind. She’d quite like to read it, if that was all right, before sending it back, but if he wanted it sooner she’d post it. None of the strange, almost spellbound feelings she’d had about finding it got into her letter, which was a good thing or he never would have replied. She realised that and also realised that it was just luck that they