The High Places: Stories

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The wife was driving on the night they hit Mr Ronald.

‘My first drive since getting married,’ she said.

‘First this, first that,’ said her husband. He looked at her, sitting high in the seat: her hair looked flimsy and blond. It was ten o’clock and only just dark. These were the days for marrying — the long days, and the summer. It hadn’t rained.

‘You’ve got to be thankful for the weather,’ the registrar had said to the husband. The husband was thankful for the weather and for everything else. He carried his shoulders inside a narrow suit and his wife wore a blue dress. They came out of the registry office into the pale summer and St Mary’s rang the hour.

‘Listen!’ said the wife. ‘Just like we’ve been married in a church.’

It was midday, and because they were in Cambridge the college bells also rang.

‘Like we’ve been married in every church,’ said the husband.

Their witnesses — two friends — took photographs. The four of them went to a pub on the river to celebrate among the tourists and the students who’d just finished exams. The tourists pressed around them, clumsy at the bar; the students slipped through and were served first. The bride and groom were rocked from side to side in the crush. They co-operated with the crowd and liquid spilled over their glasses.

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