Page 103 - What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours

doing, he knew! For her part she’d given up trying not to be quite so in love with

him at some point in their late teens when she’d clocked that, without
deliberately cultivating any particular scent, Jacob Wallace managed to smell
exactly like a just-blown-out candle. But if the feelings on his side weren’t there
anymore then it was better for him to just go. His contributions to their joint
bank account tripled hers but she wouldn’t have a problem doing without
handwoven rugs at home and boutique hotels abroad. Doing without Jacob
himself was going to make her a little bit crazy for a long time, so no she wasn’t

going to make it easy for him to say his piece and then leave.
—

WITH A WEEK to go before their summer holiday Jacob all but ambushed Jill at a
Tube station. She was adding another month’s worth of public transport to her

Oyster card when an arm slipped around her neck and her husband murmured:
“Jill, Jill . . . you can’t fight this any longer. I need to ask you something . . .”
She could’ve feigned alarm for just a couple more moments and elbowed him
in the groin, but instead she turned her head and hissed: “Whose idea was it to
get married in the first place, eh? Why don’t you ask around and get back to
me?”
She wasn’t going to let him off just like that but he’d better not be hoping

she’d cling to him either! If she didn’t feel like being on her own she could get
another husband if she wanted.
(Jill had run into Max outside their friend Mary’s bakery the other day, and
he’d held her at arm’s length, given her a long, admiring look, and said: “God,
you’re deteriorating fast. Lucky me, getting out while the going was good,
eh?”—his eyes directly contradicting his remarks. Not that she’d ever go back to

Max, with whom wedded bliss had been nowhere to be found. It had made her
nervous that almost all her new in-laws were Swiss bankers, but also there were
the terrific nightlong rows she and Max got into. If she protested Max’s
shameless revisionism by making reference to something he himself had said
just the day before, he’d become “concerned” about her negativity or would hit
her with some barbed comment somebody else had apparently made to him
about her demeanor—it wasn’t clear whether he made them up or merely saved

them. She never stopped liking Max, but did grow weary at the thought of him.)
Jill went over to the blue stand where issues of the Evening Standard were
stacked, but Jacob handed her his copy.