He shakes his head. ‘We went on a few dates back in October. We were both new at the same time and hit it off. She was a great girl. But it didn’t last long. A couple of weeks at the most. I don’t think her brother could have meant me.’
I’m disappointed but I try not to let it show. ‘Peter said she was seeing someone when he spoke to her, just before she died. Do you know who?’
He swigs his pint and replaces it on the table before answering. ‘Jemima was a lovely girl but very private. She didn’t open up easily. After we’d gone out a few times and it was clear it wasn’t going to work, she avoided me. I thought we could be friends but … I don’t know. I really liked her, but she could be very up and down.’
‘Do you think she might have been depressed?’
‘It wouldn’t surprise me. There was the fun Jemima, you know, the girl who was sweet and funny and liked to have a laugh, and then there was this other side to her. This darker side. She could be quite sulky. Uncommunicative. I never knew which Jemima would show up for our date.’
‘Is that why it didn’t work out?’
He sits back in his chair. ‘God, Una, you do like to ask questions.’
‘Sorry. I’m sorry. I just want to try to understand …’
He sits forward. ‘Why? You didn’t even know the girl.’
‘For Peter. Mainly.’
‘So you and this Peter. Are you together?’
‘What?’ I laugh. ‘No. No, of course not.’
‘So what, then? You’re just helping him out of the goodness of your own heart?’ His tone takes on a teasing quality, but it rankles.
‘No. Selfishly, I’d like to know if there was anything suspicious about her death when I’m literally, you know, living her life. Employed by the same people, living in her room … and then before her, Matilde, also dead …’ The fear is evident in my voice.
He surprises me by reaching across the table and taking my hand. ‘I’m sorry. Of course it must be horrible. But honestly, Una, I don’t think you need to worry. I heard about Matilde. It was a hit-and-run. Terrible, but it happens. And Jemima, well … Like I said, I think she had some problems. I know you said her brother can’t accept she took her own life, and I know I only dated her for a few weeks, but let’s just say I’m not surprised.’
Lewis’s hand feels warm and reassuring in mine and relief washes over me. It’s only just hit me how scared I’ve felt. But being here with Lewis, listening to him rationalizing it all, makes me see how paranoid I’ve been.
19
Kathryn
Kathryn pulls the duvet over her head and groans. She’s been tossing and turning for hours and she knows why. She’s been waiting for Una to get home. She pulls back the covers and gets out of bed. It’s no use. She won’t sleep until Una’s in the house and she’s gone down to check the front door. It doesn’t matter how many times she tells her mother’s latest companion to double-lock the fucking front door, she never does it. She stands in the middle of the room and takes a deep breath. In and out. Just like the therapist told her. It’s not Una’s fault. How can Una know that Kathryn lives with the crippling fear – especially when she’s ensconced in her 1930s house with Ed and the kids – that one day there will be that knock at the door?
She’s coming back from the loo when she hears the creak of the front gate and low voices. She checks her Fitbit, which she wears at night because she likes to track her sleep. It’s nearly 1 a.m. Where has Una been all this time? She watched her go out earlier. She’d left the house at seven twenty-five dressed in tight black jeans with so many rips that Kathryn wondered what was the point in wearing them at all. She must have been freezing.
Before she has time to think about it, Kathryn finds herself in the spare room – Viola’s old room – that looks out onto the front garden. The curtains are already open: nobody comes in here to close them. Every trace of Viola was wiped from the room many years ago. Now there’s just a double bed with a new, crisp duvet that is never used and different furniture, heavy mahogany instead of white. It’s like Kathryn and her mother have this unspoken rule. Despite the stripping of Viola’s personality, it will always be her room, and even though it’s been thirty years since her older ‘sister’ left, Kathryn can still sense Viola’s presence here. She can almost smell her White Musk perfume from the Body Shop.
The sound of Una giggling brings Kathryn back to the present and she rushes to the window. Una and Lewis are standing by the gate. He has his arms around her tiny waist and hers are slung around his neck. She’s looking up at him, and as he bends to kiss her, Kathryn feels a bolt of jealousy rip right through her that’s so intense it makes her feel sick. She can’t remember the last time she kissed Ed. Not properly. Not like the abandon she’s witnessing before her. It feels so long ago that she was Una’s age, when someone as handsome and sexy as Lewis was interested in her. She can’t bear it. She turns away. And in that moment she feels pure hatred for Una, for how easily she swans through life with her doe eyes and her long blonde hair and her pert tits, getting whatever she wants, whoever she wants. How unfair that life was never like that for Kathryn. She had to work so hard and put so much effort into achieving the life she’s got now. Years of being the perfect daughter, the perfect wife, the perfect mother. And for what? For girls like Una to snatch it all from her by charming their way into someone’s affections?
She goes back to bed and lies there, her whole body tense, feeling frumpy and unattractive in her flannel pyjamas. She wonders what Una wears to bed. Something sexy, no doubt. She strains her ears, listening for the front door, and eventually she hears the tell-tale creaks, bangs and muffled swearing of Una letting herself in.
Kathryn gets out of bed and drags her dressing-gown around herself as she pads out onto the landing. A slice of moonlight from the side window casts shadows on the walls and she clutches the banister to steady herself. As she descends the stairs, she sees Una sitting in the middle of the huge hallway trying to take off her boots. She’s giggling to herself.