‘And what with the curtains being drawn,’ added Jess.
‘Well, I feel blessed to have such wonderful neighbours looking out for me.’ Alice smiled, truly touched. She could lie dead for goodness knows how long in the big house, and it reinforced to her that it had been the right decision moving here.
Jess and Declan headed back upstairs then and Mark, struck by sudden inspiration after the relief of finding Alice was okay, asked if she had any plans for the day.
‘Not especially,’ she replied.
‘In that case, do you fancy a day out on the boat?’
‘Your boat at the marina?’
‘Yes. Maybe a spot of lunch later,’ suggested Mark.
‘That sounds simply perfect. When are you thinking of leaving?’
‘Say in an hour?’ Mark glanced at his watch.
‘Wonderful. I’ll be ready.’ She smiled.
NINETEEN
ALICE
Alice loved spontaneous invitations, when a day turned out completely differently from the way you might have imagined. She especially enjoyed this invitation from Mark, as it seemed to be inspired by her wish to bring everyone together here. Life was definitely returning to Wisteria House.
She opened the windows and curtains and let some fresh air into the lounge, before going to her bedroom to decide what to wear. As Alice headed off to shower and change, she thought, not for the first time, how fortunate she was that the residents of the block had taken her up on her offer of dinner that Friday evening. She had observed their comings and goings during that first week, not in an intrusive way, but at the end of the week she had deduced that the residents didn’t have partners. That was probably why they were open to the dinner invite in the first place.
She never saw her neighbours much at the house near the sea. A family occupied the house on one side, with two teenagers who nodded politely on the rare occasion she encountered them. They had gatherings that she was never invited to.
She would observe guests making their way up the path, laughing and clutching bottles of wine, and push down a tingeof envy. But then, why would they want a woman of her age at their parties? Or maybe they simply never thought to ask? That was the problem with putting people into pigeonholes according to their age, thought Alice. She would have loved to have chatted to the young people, hearing all about their hopes and ambitions for the future. Growing old seemed an almost impossible notion when you were young, she realised that, but it would arrive before they knew it.
The residents of the house on the other side were business owners and rarely at home. Alice and George had socialised with the previous neighbours when he had been alive, but when they both moved on to nursing homes, the new neighbours never engaged with them. Her and George’s offer of drinks and nibbles had been politely declined by the new, younger families and that was that.
Exactly an hour later, Mark knocked at Alice’s door. She was wearing white trousers and a navy and white striped T-shirt.
‘You look very nautical,’ Mark said with a wry smile.
‘I suppose I do, don’t I?’ she replied. ‘I have a headscarf too. I know how windy it can be out on the water.’
A memory came rushing back to Alice of when she and some friends had taken a boat trip along the River Thames in between shows at the Palladium and attracted the attention of some handsome men at a bachelor party. The men had bought them drinks, probably hoping for something in return, but the girls had giggled and ran off to their lodgings when the boat returned from its sail as the men headed off to a bar. Life had been so good then, the possibilities endless for all of the girls, and Alice had enjoyed every minute of her life, especially after she met George.
They took the short drive to the marina and, after parking up, walked along the waterfront, where sailing boats rubbed shoulders with small speedboats and single-engine vessels. As they walked along the wooden path, several people said hello.One guy, a friend of Mark’s, stopped for a chat and Mark introduced him to Alice.
‘Pleasure to meet you,’ said the grey-haired man, who was perhaps in his seventies.
‘Alice here used to be a Tiller Girl, you know,’ Mark told his friend proudly.
‘You never did!’ The man stood open-mouthed, and recounted a similar tale to Mark, of watchingSunday Night at the London Palladium.
‘It was a lifetime ago,’ she told him when he had finished speaking, amused how it always elicited an excited response, particularly from someone of the older generation, even though the Tiller Girls still performed today.
‘Well, it was a pleasure to meet you,’ said the guy when they had finished chatting. ‘A Tiller Girl, hey.’ He shook his head as he walked off, as if he had just met royalty.
‘Here she is,’ Mark announced presently. His sailboat was moored at the end of a row of a dozen or so vessels.
‘Oh, it’s perfectly lovely.’ Alice eyed the smart boat, white with a green stripe and the nameThe Oysterpainted on the side.
‘Unusual choice of name,’ she commented as he took her hand and guided her into the boat.
