The Time Remaining

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210 33 Gilchrist enters the inn and stands outside the door leading to the dining room. He can hear a woman who is just concluding her introduction. “And now,” says the woman, “it is a pleasure for me to welcome back to Annapolis one of our most cosmopolitan Annapolitans, Holly Mattimore.” There is a sustained wave of applause. “Thank you for those wonderful welcoming words,” says Holly. “I am truly happy to be back home before returning to Ireland so I can say a few words about one of Ireland’s greatest writers, my late husband, Julian Mattimore. In each of his twelve novels we are given a different picture of different Irish people in their different lives, but collectively they are as complete a portrait of Ireland as the one we find in Joyce or the plays of O’Casey. And I had the unique privilege of being the wife of the man who made that portrait . . .” It has the sound of a set speech as Gilchrist listens on. But it sounds even more like someone trading on someone else’s talent and reputation. The deference in Holly’s voice tells Gilchrist all he wants to know, and he is absolutely unable to explain why he had not suspected it from the beginning and why he had never even thought of it as a possibility in the years since. Holly is now the stereotypical memoirist on tour. When he learned of Mattimore’s death two years before and then read newspaper articles afterward, he noticed that there were often semisarcastic references to “the Widow Mattimore” and how she was intent on keeping her late husband’s legacy alive. It was also noted that she received fat fees for appearances. He steps slightly away from the wall and glances at Holly as she continues her opening remarks. She looks slightly heavier in the cheeks but otherwise the same. What surprises Gilchrist is that the sight of her has no effect on him whatsoever. He regards her as he might regard any woman speaking Time and the City | 211 at any midday women’s luncheon anywhere in America. He has heard the wives of a few recently deceased politicians speak in circumstances like this one—women whose only apparent role is to be a semi–public relations voice for their husbands. Gilchrist feels he had heard enough. He leaves the inn, wondering what Holly’s original attraction was for him and why he has wasted so many years of recrimination against other women because of that. ...