Read Online My Mrs. Brown by William Norwich - Free Book Online Page B

“and I was wondering if you might want to have a glass of my grandmother’s sherry with me. It will make me sleepy, but I wouldn’t drink alone.”
    That wasn’t entirely true. Alice was very happy to drink alone, a bottle of wine, a bath filled with bubbles, and maybe a joint? Add some great music, and it was a recipe for bliss.
    One of Mrs. Fox’s best customers at the bookshop had given Mrs. Fox a bottle of dry sherry every year for Christmas. She uncorked the bottle only on New Year’s Eve so she and Mrs. Brown could toast the new year, and pretty much the rest of the year it stayed on a kitchen shelf. There were six bottles left.
    â€œBut it is only Thursday night,” Mrs. Brown said. Saturday seemed the only acceptable night to have a drink. Drinking on weeknights was decadent or, worse, a sign there was a problem. Mr. Brown had drunk on weeknights. Not in the beginning, when they were first married, but later, toward middle age, every night drinks and eventually every night drunk.
    Still, getting out of her kitchen meant getting away from thinking about the past, at least for right now. Having something as relaxing as a bit of Mrs. Fox’s sherry did appeal to her. Mrs. Brown followed Alice to her living room across the way. Alice poured the sherry in short-stemmed crystal glasses that had originally belonged to her great-grandmother. She poured the sherry almost to the top of the glass. Again, Mrs. Brown thought, It’s the difference in our generations. We’d never pour that high.
    Two sips of sherry and Mrs. Brown told all. About what had happened when she saw Mrs. Groton’s suit dress, and about the novel Rachel Ames had given her, Mrs. ’Arris Goes to Paris, which could be a blueprint for how she might get her dress.
    â€œThat’s a lot of money you will need to save, Mrs. Brown,” Alice said. “In the novel, which I’d like to borrow if that’s okay with you, how does Mrs. Harris save for hers?”
    â€œI haven’t finished reading it. I am not the fast reader that you are or your grandmother is,” Mrs. Brown said. “But as far as I got last night she was doing without extras, like the bunch of flowers she’d buy herself on the weekend. Then she wins a football pool. She wins big, I guess.”
    â€œThat easy, really? Then what happens?”
    â€œThat’s as far as I read. In fact,” Mrs. Brown said, “that’s as far as I’m going to read.”
    â€œWhy?” Alice asked.
    â€œBecause, Alice, if it doesn’t have a happy ending, I do not want to know.”
    Lest Mrs. Brown feel anything less than enthusiasm and support, Alice resisted the urge to ask too many more questions. But she explained that if this was really and truly something she wanted to do, then once Mrs. Brown had saved up the money, she wouldn’t have to go to New York to buy the dress. She could shop online, like most people Alice’s age do. Even people Alice’s mother’s age, late forties, shop online. Everyone does.
    Mrs. Brown smiled but didn’t respond, nor would she tonight. That Alice didn’t understand was clear to her. Why the sudden urgency for the odyssey ahead? Mrs. Brown had only a slightly better understanding. She couldn’t articulate more, not yet.
    It was getting late. Mrs. Brown thanked her young friend for the tipple of sherry. It certainly had worked its soothing charms. Before she returned to her place, she reminded Alice that she’d mentioned something about a tweed jacket she’d gotten from the Ashville Thrift Shop that didn’t fit quite right? Mrs. Brown had an idea for fixing the problem that she’d like to try.
    â€œTomorrow night, we’ll have a look,” Mrs. Brown said. “I’m no Oscar de la Renta, but probably there’s a seam or two I can do something with.” She added, “No charge, I mean. Just so you know that, after all