Stories of Laughter and Lament

Stories of Laughter and Lament, set among the filthy rich and the dirt poor, seven stories first selected and published by Penguin Books. Widows Charles Rand fell off his yacht, somewhere in the middle of the bay, on one of the first pale blue evenings of autumn. Later, the Coroner would be unable to fix that time more precisely than between six and ten o'clock. Newspapers, reporting that he had sailed off without crew, used terms which pictured Charles as a hardy loner. Anyone who knew him smiled at this. Children Aren't Supposed to be Here at All Troilus and Cassandra spend their days at a private school, are then alone until their parents come home from the office. The Routine An airplane journey, in reverie the narrator reprises scenes from the recent breaking up with his lover. His defence is hard-bitten cynicism. His neighbour in the next seat is spectacularly disabled. Pedigrees This is a world of croquet on the lawn, the breeding of horses for dressage, of dogs for the shows, and very little sanity. Inventory A son of English Old Money, whose talents so far have won him note as a failure, expects Christmas dinner in Kent to win him derision from his father in front of his entire family. Ticket for Charity When Charity Lord fell pregnant she told each of the six boys who were that month's quick loving, in turn, as they stumbled from the hotel. Melodrama for a Plastic Heroine A love story. He lives alone, penniless, in a city tenement. He scrapes together enough money to buy himself a wife. She is a life-size inflatable doll whom he pushes about in a wheelchair, shawled, as if she were merely lamed. On the busy sidewalk they do not draw a second's interest.