‘What’s the matter, dear?’ Maurice Penze-Weedell said to his slack-jawed wife. She was staring at him as if he had just landed from another planet.
‘Were you just smoking a cigar?’
‘No.’ He opened his mouth and exhaled minty breath at her. ‘No cigar, I don’t like cigars, you know that.’
‘I – I –’
‘You are looking a little squiffy, my dear, if you don’t mind my saying so. Perhaps we should go up – you know – to bed?’ He tried to put his arms around her, but she brushed them off.
‘It’s Antiques Roadshow! Really!’
He nodded, glumly. She never missed an episode. There were dozens of shows on television where she never missed an episode. Claudette’s life was fitted around them.
She turned, walked back into the lounge and settled down on the sofa. Then she reached for the prosecco bottle and topped up her glass. ‘You just missed something,’ she said.
‘I did?’
She pointed at the porcelain donkey on the shelf in the glass cabinet. ‘An objet just like that was valued at twenty thousand pounds!’
‘Blimey O’Reilly!’
‘I bought that for ten pounds – and you said I’d been ripped off! Ha! Who’s laughing now?’ She downed her glass.
Maurice hastily refilled it, thinking, Keep her in the drinking mood! He had that feeling he might get lucky tonight. She sometimes turned rampant when she was squiffy – so long as she didn’t pass out first.
‘Perhaps after the show has finished we should have an early night, my dear?’ he ventured.
‘I’m not missing the new Poldark,’ she said. ‘It’s on at nine. I’m not missing that gorgeous hunk Aidan Turner.’
‘We could record it.’
‘Why would I want to do that when I could watch it tonight?’
‘Well, what if I gave you a better offer?’
She unwrapped the last but one of the Green Triangles. ‘There’s only one better offer you could give me this evening, dear.’
‘Yes?’ he said like an eager puppy. ‘What would that be?’
‘To go out and find me some more Quality Street. You’re OK to drive – you only had a couple of glasses at lunchtime.’
He looked dubious. ‘I could try – but I think all the supermarkets are closed on a Sunday night.’
‘What about petrol stations?’ she said. ‘Really, I thought you were a man of initiative. Remember what you said that night you proposed to me? You said that if I would marry you, you would always give me what I wanted, no matter what it took? Do you remember?’
‘I do, my dearest.’
Maurice hurried from the room, and moments later, above the television, she heard the sound of his car engine starting.
On the screen, an Antiques Roadshow expert was examining a collection of commemorative Coronation chocolate tins.
She became aware of the smell of cigar smoke again. Stronger than before. Much stronger.
‘Maurice!’ she called out.
She heard his car driving off.
A smoke ring drifted past her eyes.
She jumped up and went to the doorway. ‘Maurice?’
Behind her, the empty tub fell onto the carpeted floor.
‘Maurice!’ she yelled.
There was a sharp click and the television turned off.
An instant later the house was plunged into darkness.
Halfway up the stairs, she saw the red glow of a cigar.
‘Maurice?’
It moved towards her.
She fled, along the hall and out into the garden, slamming the front door behind her.
All the Christmas lights had gone off.
‘Maurice!’ she shouted.