Page 42 of Old Girls on Deck

‘Then they leave, I suppose. It’s not easy when your partner stays on the ship. Well, Mrs Wedderburn will know this better than anyone.’

‘What does your wife think?’ I asked casually.

‘I no longer have a wife,’ he said, turning away to look through a filing cabinet, ‘the pressures of it all were too much for her. She preferred someone who always came home for dinner every evening.’

Aha!

‘That’s sad,’ I said. ‘Did you have any children?’

Diana dug me in the ribs with her elbow at that point, but I pulled a face at her.

‘I have a son who works for a cruise line in Australia, and a daughter who is married and lives in Paris,’ he said, turning round.

‘Oh that’s?—’

‘So, show us the pictures,’ Diana said, interrupting me before I could ask any more embarrassing questions.

He pulled out a folder and put it down on the desk.

‘These are the ones I have pulled out. I have many as you may imagine, but I think these are the best. Please feel free to disagree. And do sit down.’

He moved a pile of papers from the two chairs on the other side of his desk, and then couldn’t find anywhere to put them, so eventually he dropped them onto the floor.

I opened the folder and there we were. In all our glory.

The first one was as we arrived on the ship, standing looking over-excited under the balloon arch. No one would know that a few moments later Diana had gone flying and almost demolished the thing.

Then a picture I hadn’t known he had taken, the two of us sitting in the Ocean Spray theatre, our faces illuminated by the lights from the stage. We looked enthusiastic, laughing at something.

Then a wider view from behind us, showing more of the audience, Dick Dainty on the stage in front of us, but out of focus. It felt a bit strange to know Raphaël had been there, and we hadn’t known it. Taking pictures. Perhaps this was how celebrities felt when the paparazzi were out in force.

Then the fruit carving and the truffle making. Mercifully a picture could not tell a thousand words, because he had managed to take pictures of us smiling and having fun, and not splattering ourselves with food. Perhaps those had been edited out?

‘I love that one,’ Diana said, pointing to a picture of the two of us in the line dancing class.

I remembered that moment, when both of us forgot which foot to start off on, and we had trodden on each other several times. The picture showed us laughing at each other, Diana’s head thrown back, me slightly wild-eyed, my hair coming loose from the combs I had used to keep it out of the way.

‘We looked like we were having fun,’ I agreed.

‘And dare I say it, we look so young.’

‘Oh, come on, you’re hardly in your dotage,’ I muttered.

We did too, she was right. And Raphaël had captured Diana’s energy very successfully. She certainly didn’t look like a woman who would pass unnoticed any more. She looked bright and beautiful. Full of fun. Which she hadn’t been for a long time.

I’ve never been very good at having my photograph taken. I never knew what to do with my face and I usually ended up pulling an odd expression. Worrying about my smile and whether I had a double chin, or something stuck in my teeth.

‘Perhaps that’s what having fun does for us,’ I suggested.

Then the pictures taken at the captain’s cocktail party. A couple of formal ones with the captain, where I had assumed one of my shall I smile or not expressions. But then a couple where Diana and I had been sipping cocktails, looking at each other over the rim of our glasses, eyebrows raised. He really had done a great job.

‘They are awfully good,’ Diana said. ‘Did you use Photoshop?’

He shook his head. ‘There was no need. And anyway, what is so terrible about a natural picture? A happy expression?’

‘You haven’t seen some of the pictures my husband took over the years,’ I said.

‘I do have some where your face is covered in chocolate smudges,’ he said, his eyes twinkling.