“But I only do this job until I can save money to go to fashion clinic and become designer. You understand this? Adrian has told you, I think? I make clear to him in emails. Is not my ambitions to become housekeeper. Just to save money.”
Marion wondered what “fashion clinic” was. Did she perhaps mean fashion college, or something else altogether? Still, there didn’t seem any point in asking her to explain. Listening to the girl prattle on, Marion could not believe that this was the sort of person John was likely to get along with. She seemed too pushy and money-minded, interested only in shopping for designer clothes and luxuries; what could they even have found in common to talk about in their correspondence? Of course she was pretty, yet there was a glossy hardness about her, a sweetness you could break your teeth on, like a candied apple.
When they got back onto the motorway, iron-gray nails of rain began battering the car. John drove fast, swerving from lane to lane, while the wipers barely managed to clear the windscreen for more than a split second at a time. Violetta declared she wanted to go to the toilet.
“You should have gone in McDonald’s,” said John gruffly.
“I would be embarrassed,” the girl whined in a baby voice. “You shouldn’t go toilet in restaurant if you don’t eat something. They don’t like it. Maybe the manager shouts at me in front of many peoples.”
“Well, we can’t just stop on the motorway—you understand English, ‘motorway’? No stopping. Do you have motorways in your country?”
The girl made a high-pitched huff to show that she was offended. Did they even have proper toilets, wondered Marion, or just holes in the ground that you squatted over? But the girl had noticed the little man and woman shapes on the sign for a service station and even she knew that meant there were toilets.
“It is no good, you must stop, or do you want me to go toilet in your fucking car?” said Violetta, instantly switching from spoilt baby to angry vixen.
“Hey,” said John, the stern schoolmaster. “Mind your mouth, young lady.”
Red signs burning through the rain indicated a speed limit of twenty miles an hour. The traffic had slowed almost to a stop.
“John, we might not be home for a long time,” said Marion. “We could stop at that place just ahead, where we got coffee on the way up? I wouldn’t mind using the loo.”
John kept his eyes fixed on the Tesco lorry in front.
“No. I’m not stopping. You’ll both have to wait.”
“But why?” said the girl. “This is not human,” she cried. “You can’t treat even animal this way.” Then with her voice filled with fake tears: “Please, I am desperate.”
The traffic crawled forwards for another five minutes until they came to a dead stop. Signs advertising Burger King and Marks and Spencer were visible next to the flat buildings of the service station a few hundred yards ahead. The girl saw her opportunity and opened the door.
“You can’t bloody well just get out here,” shouted John. “Get back in the sodding car!”
But it was too late. Violetta, dragging her conspicuous pink suitcase behind her, was running along the steep grass embankment towards the service station. Then the Tesco van in front suddenly darted forwards, and the traffic in their lane began to move. They were holding everyone up, and the other cars started beeping their horns.
“Can you believe that?” He turned to his sister. “What does she think she is playing at?”
“John, just let her go, please. Just keep driving.”
“What if the police picked her up? She’s breaking the law running along the side of the motorway like that.”
“It doesn’t matter. Just let her go, please,” Marion replied.
John swerved into the lane for the service station. There was a look of terrible purpose in his eyes, and the veins in his neck were fat and twisted like earthworms.
“No, I won’t let her go. All that bloody planning would be wasted. And she took money. She’s not getting away now.”
The service station was very busy, and John got angrier and angrier while trying to find somewhere to park. When they finally found a space, it was as far from the entrance to the building as it was possible to be.
“You’ll have to go and find her, Marion.”
“But, John, that girl—I mean, perhaps it would be better to just let her go—don’t you think?”
“We can’t just let her wander off like that. The police could pick her up, they’ll want to know what she is doing here.”
“But why do I have to find her?”
“Because you’re a bloody woman, you can talk to her. And what would it look like, me chasing after some young girl?”
She knew John would not leave the car park until she went and got the girl. Frightened and weary, she forced herself out of the car. If only she had put on her raincoat. Her wool coat soaked up the rain as she made her way towards the main building. The car park was nearly full, and impatient drivers looking for spaces kept beeping their horns at her as she got in their way. I just want to be home again. She prayed silently, Please let it be over.
Marion went through the sliding glass doors of the service station and found a food court, a small supermarket, and gift shop, but no sign of Violetta. She went into the ladies’ toilets. The long queue consisted mostly of elderly women who all seemed to be traveling on the same coach trip around England. “I was very disappointed by Stonehenge,” said one of them. “Will you hold my handbag and coat, Margaret, I don’t like to put anything on the floor, you don’t know how often they clean these places,” said another. Catching sight of herself in the mirror, Marion realized she blended in seamlessly with the ladies on the tour. How lovely it would be to slip onto their coach with them and escape!
As she waited, Marion noticed the central cubicle in a row of five remained occupied, and a strip of pink plastic was visible in the gap between the floor and the bottom of the door. Marion took her time using the toilet, and when she came out again, the room was empty except for herself and the occupant of the middle cubicle.
Marion knocked on the door.
“Violetta?”
She heard a sound that might have come from a small trapped animal.
“I’m sorry John wouldn’t let you go to the loo, but he was worried that stopping would make us late getting home.”
“I don’t like you people,” said the voice from inside the cubicle. “You English are very mean and have no good manners. You are scaring me. The old man, he scares me the most. I don’t want to come work for you.”
“John doesn’t mean to shout,” said Marion. “He’s just tired from all the driving. He is a very kind man, really. When you get to know him better, I’m sure you’ll like him.” Then she sighed wearily. “Please come out and get back into the car with us.”
There was a pause, then a sharp: “No!”
A part of Marion wanted to tell the girl to take her chance and escape. Run away and keep running. Whatever you do, you must not get back in that car. Something dreadful will happen. You will never see your family or the light of day ever again. Please just go. Run. Anything that happens to you will be better than coming with us.