Not all right. Not quite good. But perfect. There would have been reason enough for this assertion. She had a nice home – a substantial semi in a good street – which she always kept in the most immaculate condition. She had two wonderful children, who never earned less than the highest praise from their teachers. She was a force for good in the community, regularly contributing to charity drives and being one of the stalwarts of the Brighter Neighbourhood Committee which she had helped to found. She could have been complacent about all this – but she wasn’t. For though she knew that she had worked hard to achieve the life she wanted, she also knew that the foundation stone on which it was all built was her husband, Tom. Tom would not have been every woman’s choice. He was not particularly handsome or witty. In his work, he was steady, rather than innovative and inventive – but that had served him well in Brown Brothers’ Furnishings, a conservative company in which steadiness was one of the cardinal virtues, and where he had already risen to the position of assistant manager in the soft furnishings department.
