Fast Fiction: Straying
Would you expect the wife of a brute of an ex-boxer to “stray’’? And if she did, what would be the consequences?
Richard Mallinson tells a wayward tale.
'It's hard to believe,' said Dettle, 'that she's been married to that brute of an ex-boxer for more than ten years and has never strayed.’
'Well,' I said, 'we can't be sure about that, can we?'
'Oh, yes, I think we can,' he said, as if he really knew.
'Do they have children?' I asked.
'No, no children .. . it's perhaps just as well.'
'Just as well?'
'Yes, given the life they lead . . . too hectic for comfort.'
'Perhaps having children would calm them down a bit,' I suggested.
'No . . . they'd just leave them with nannies.'
*
A few weeks later I happened to meet Dettle again.
'I've been proved wrong,' he chortled as we strolled.
'Wrong about what?'
'About you know who. She has strayed - indeed she is straying - but only with one person.'
He spoke confidently and, I thought, smugly.
'How do you know?' I asked.
'Ah, sorry . . . can't reveal my sources.'
*
'He's a violent bastard,' said Dettle when I visited him in hospital. 'Who is?'
'Can't you guess?'
The ex-boxer? Good lord . .. have you told the police?'
'No, I told them I was beaten up by muggers.'
*
When I got to know her, I mentioned Dettle.
'Oh,' she said, 'you mean that old pest who got mugged, do you?'
