Una
Elspeth is sitting in her favourite chair in the lounge, pretending to read a book. I’ve come to realize it’s her way of sending me to Coventry, as my mum used to say. When she’s in this mood I have no choice but to sit there with her. I have nothing to read as I left my book upstairs, and the one time I brought it down with me Elspeth had stared at me disapprovingly, as though I was slacking. As if I couldn’t do my job properly unless I sat, watchful and quiet, like a guard at Buckingham Palace. She even made a disparaging comment about how I should be ‘expanding’ my reading material to ‘open’ my mind. So I stare into space and try not to feel uncomfortable while, every now and again, puncturing the torturous silence with ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ which she always refuses, probably because she doesn’t want to give me the luxury of going down to the kitchen to talk to Aggie. I’ve come to understand that this is what Elspeth likes to do best: play mind games.
I’ve not heard from Lewis since our kiss the other night. And I have a feeling I won’t. There was something final, almost aggressive, about that kiss. I felt it was his way of saying goodbye to me. It would be hard to make it work, what with Elspeth detesting him. I called Peter a few times to tell him about my meeting with Lewis, but he didn’t answer his phone and I never left a message.
I make an excuse that I need the loo, anything to get away from Elspeth and her moods for a few minutes. I sit in the toilet just off the huge hallway for longer than I need to, staring at the china-blue patterned wall tiles and the ornate bone-white basin. I feel lonely and isolated. When I was working at the home and was having a bad day I had Cherry to gossip to. Here, there’s no one I can chat to who understands how I feel, who’s in the same position. The only other people who have been here before me are dead.
When I return to the lounge, she’s no longer there. I feel a flutter of panic. What if she’s wandered off somewhere and fallen down the stairs? Kathryn will accuse me of being negligent. I rush down to the kitchen, but it’s empty. Aggie is out shopping for ingredients for dinner tonight. Maybe Elspeth’s gone upstairs to lie down. I dart out of the kitchen and I’m just about to mount the stairs when I hear music coming from the direction of Elspeth’s study. It sounds old-fashioned, something classical I vaguely recognize. I’m as silent as I can be on the flagstone tiles in my socked feet. I’ve never been in Elspeth’s study before. It’s usually locked. Now the door is open an inch or so and I stand outside, watching through the crack. At first I can see a mahogany desk and floor-to-ceiling bookshelves that span the whole wall to my left. But then I glimpse Elspeth.
She’s dancing.
I take a step forward, unable to believe my eyes, but I’m not mistaken. Elspeth is dancing around the room, her arms framed as though in a waltz with an invisible partner. I’m so shocked that I can only stand there for a few minutes, frozen to the spot, watching her waltz around the room. Then the song comes to an end. She stops and I take a step back in case she sees me.
‘Una!’ she calls, her voice breaking the silence and I jump. I run to the stairs, trying to make out I’ve only just come down. ‘Is that you? I’m in the study. I need your help.’
I return to the study where she’s slumped into a chair, her hand on her heart. There is a film of sweat above her top lip. ‘Can you help me up? While you were off doing God knows what, I got so fed up waiting for you I had no choice but to come down here alone. Now I’m out of breath and can’t get out of this chair.’
I stare at her, puzzled. I long to tell her I saw her dancing around the room just a few minutes ago but I can’t. She shoots me a look as though daring me to challenge her. Does she know I saw her?
‘Well, don’t just stand there,’ she snaps. ‘Help me up!’
I go to her and she grabs my arm as I lever her out of the chair. She clutches me as though she can barely walk and we return to the lounge in silence, my mind whirling. I’ve always suspected Elspeth wasn’t as frail as she tried to make out, but still. The sight of her prancing around the room like a woman half her age and then her pretence at being unable to stand up has shocked me. She’s even more manipulative than I thought.
The day is unbearably long. We don’t go anywhere, and the only person I see is a postman delivering a canvas swathed in bubble-wrap that is nearly my height, which I have to lug across the hall and into the library, while Elspeth says, ‘Be careful, that’s an expensive painting,’ every five seconds. By the time we head to the kitchen for what Elspeth calls supper but I call tea I’m desperate for someone, anyone, to talk to. Aggie is bustling around us but we can’t have a proper conversation with Elspeth’s brooding presence sullying the atmosphere. She’s perfectly pleasant to Aggie, which just highlights exactly what she thinks of me at the moment.
When Aggie goes out of the room, grimacing at me in solidarity over her shoulder as she leaves, I can bear it no longer. If I want to keep this job, I have to play the game too.
‘You know,’ I say, as I pick at my meat pie and potatoes, the atmosphere between us diminishing my appetite, ‘I won’t be seeing Lewis again. It was a mistake.’
She’s sitting opposite me but she doesn’t glance up from her food. And at first I wonder if she’s even heard me as she pops a forkful of potato into her mouth elegantly and swallows. Then she looks up. ‘That’s good to know.’
‘Can I ask …’ I clear my throat, my palms sweating, hating myself for stooping to her level, but I need the money. I have to think of the future. ‘… why you dislike Lewis so much?’
She doesn’t answer straight away and the silence that ensues makes my scalp prickle.