“So do we dispose of the disciple of Husserl as well?”
“We do.”
The old lady’s maid entered the library with the tea tray and went around the room turning on the lamps, closing the heavy curtains, and stoking the fire. Her silent, methodical movements passed almost unnoticed by the other two women, who were absorbed in unpacking fragile Nativity figures and conjuring further ghosts of men from the past.
“I think I should cross out these three,” said Miss Prim pensively once the door had closed behind the maid.
“I think so too, Prudencia. The fact that you refer to them as ‘these three,’ lumping them together, should give you a clue. Trust me, no woman should marry a man she sees as part of a group; it doesn’t bode well.”
Miss Prim laughed wholeheartedly, admitting that none of the three men was at all likely to be a potential husband, and crossed off their names. When she reached the sixth name on the list she saw that it was one of those added by Hortensia and Emma.
“The vet?” Miss Prim burst out laughing once again. “The vet? What possessed them to include him?”
“As far as I know it was Herminia’s suggestion. She claimed to notice some interest on your part the day you met him.”
The librarian recalled her flirting at the tearoom and again blushed. Couldn’t you do anything here without all the neighbors knowing? Admittedly she had found the young vet attractive, but from that to its being the talk of the village was quite a leap. True, she had smiled at him, paid him attention, and tried, unsuccessfully, to charm him, but wasn’t that every woman’s prerogative without it becoming the subject of public discussion? And anyway, what none of the ladies of San Ireneo knew was that part of the vet’s allure that afternoon had sprung from her rage at the Man in the Wing Chair. Would she have noticed the vet if she hadn’t been absolutely furious over her employer’s discourteous behavior? Would she have smiled as much? Miss Prim knew the answer perfectly well.
“Don’t you want to give him a chance?” asked the old lady curiously. “I know Hortensia well enough to sense she’d be happy to arrange a date and even make the poor man think that it was his own idea.”
“I’m pretty sure the poor man, as you call him, won’t want to have anything to do with a woman who believes that a love of animals isn’t real love. I think I said the wrong thing the day Hortensia introduced us. I’m afraid I offended him.”
The Man in the Wing Chair’s mother peered at her in surprise over her glasses.
“Offended him? For the love of God, what is the matter with men nowadays? In my husband’s day, my father’s, my brothers’, the idea that a man might be offended by a bit of idle chat with a woman would have been thought ridiculous. A man who feels wounded by a conversation in a tearoom is simply a wimp. I can’t imagine what you saw in him.”
Miss Prim said nothing as she went on carefully unwrapping the figures that decorated the living room every December.
“These are wonderful,” she said with admiration.
“They’re over four centuries old. They were made by Irish monks. My husband, who had no sisters, inherited them from his mother, who inherited them from her mother, and so on for several generations. I was going to leave them to my daughter, but that wasn’t to be. They’ll go to Teseris, of course,” she said with sadness in her voice.
Miss Prim kept a respectful silence.
“So what about the wounded vet?” asked the old lady, making an effort to emerge from her introspection. “Would you go out with him?”
“Maybe. It would depend how he asked,” she replied, smiling. “Let’s see, there are two more names here and... a question mark. What does that mean?”
The Man in the Wing Chair’s mother cleared her throat and suddenly appeared intensely interested in the Christmas decorations.
“It must be a mistake. There’s no name, just a question mark,” murmured Miss Prim.
“I don’t think it’s a mistake. I’d say our dear Hortensia and Emma know exactly what they are doing,” said the old lady with a wry grin.
“What do you mean? Who does the question mark stand for? Is it an actual man?”
“You do have an outlandish turn of phrase sometimes, Prudencia. Is there such a thing as a man in the abstract? At least, one whom you can go out with?”
Miss Prim did not reply.
“Of course the question mark stands for a specific man. Our two ladies obviously know of a prospective husband whom you haven’t yet identified.”
“Do you mean I haven’t met him yet?”
“Why would they bother to conceal his identity with a question mark if you hadn’t met him? Of course you know him, my dear, that’s the point—to hide from you a man you haven’t yet considered as a candidate, or maybe are refusing to consider. Can you think of any man who fits that description?” asked the old lady, looking inquiringly into her eyes.
Miss Prim lowered her gaze and began nervously rummaging through the box of Nativity figures, eventually pulling out a little shepherd carrying a sheep.
“Would you mind handling those figures a little less energetically,” said the old lady coldly. “A husband may last a lifetime, but those figures have survived several lifetimes. And I’d be grateful if they could continue to do so.”
