Frederick Troy was at home in Goodwin’s Court, London WC2 some three or four miles from his brother’s house in Hampstead. He too was in bed. He too was the grateful recipient of breakfast in bed, followed by hanky-panky and high jinks. He too stared at the ceiling, but less in need of something to say than utterly content with silence.
His mistress, Foxx, had just returned from topping up her mug of tea—that part of the Northern mind that desired to start the day with tea was impenetrable to Troy, but he had long since ceased to wonder at it—and she had tossed the morning mail to him. A single airmail letter floated onto the sheet. A pale blue multi-folded piece of origami, lighter than goose down, that defied being opened in any manner that prevented tearing, unfolded into something the size of a bath towel and was best read by rotating the single page … this way, that way … until something resembling meaning hove into view.
It was from his wife. Troy had married Tosca a little over two years ago, and a little less than two years ago they had parted. He had not seen her since. Foxx surely knew who’d sent him an airmail letter and question or comment could not be more than seconds away.
“It’s postmarked Chicago,” she said before he had taken in more than the date.
He twisted the outer face towards him.
“No return address, though,” he said.
“Then she doesn’t want you to know where she is. Anyone could have posted that for her.”
Troy read on. Foxx slurped tea for emphasis.
“What does she say?”
“No.”
“No?”
“No. She does not agree to a divorce.”
“Oh bum. Does she say why not?”
“More or less. The last year …”
“She’s been gone nearly two!”
“The last year has been difficult for her. It would be a decision made in haste and stress … and besides, what she’s not saying is that she knows damn well I can sooner or later divorce her in absentia on grounds of desertion.”
“Later?”
“Sooner.”
“All meaningless, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“So we stay as we are?”
“Yes.”
“And that suits you just fine, doesn’t it?”