Authors: Aline Templeton
At
least she could spy on Dumbo, even if she couldn’t always fight her way out. Dumbo, poor fool, could see nothing when Missy was in control, though even that lame-brain was beginning to sense the musky taint of wickedness in the air about her, and be afraid. Very much afraid.
Smiling
drowsily, Missy made her way quietly back upstairs.
***
Laura Ferrars, yawning a yawn which almost dislocated her jaw, shuffled into the kitchen with her dressing gown unfastened and her feet shoved into an ancient pair of furry slippers. It was six o’clock; she would put the turkey in the oven and then go straight back to bed. She didn’t wake refreshed these days, after restless and dream-haunted nights.
Melissa
and Sara, thank heavens, were past the stage of 4 a.m. reveille on Christmas Day, and if Sara woke she would open her stocking quietly in her own room. The Wicked Witch of the North was a pussycat compared to Melissa untimely roused.
With
arms braced she lifted the prepared turkey from the kitchen table and slid it into the Aga. For a nasty moment she thought it hadn’t clearance, but no, it was all right.
She
was going to make a big effort today, she decided as she closed the door. After all, it was Christmas, and James and the girls couldn’t be expected to tiptoe round the corpse of her self-esteem speaking in hushed whispers indefinitely.
She
had not as a child been in the habit of expressing her feelings, and living with James certainly wouldn’t encourage anyone to parade them. ‘Thank goodness you’re level-headed, Laura,’ was his highest praise, usually after he had left her to cope with a teenage tear-tantrum from one of the girls.
She
was past mistress by now at suppressing her problems under a veneer of confidence when she felt shy, or calmness when panic threatened to engulf her. And it worked, in its way, though when articles in thoughtful magazines suggested that this was hardly wise, she could believe them. The injuries life inflicted on her never seemed to heal very well; they suppurated and left scars, but you can’t change your nature to order.
So
all she could do now was to cover this particular wound – deeper and wider and more crippling than any she had suffered before – with the flimsy fabric of cheerfulness and hope that gangrene didn’t set in.
At
least she should have another three or four hours before she had to get the show on the road. She had reached the kitchen door when her eye was caught by something on the floor.
One
of the girls must have left her school blazer lying there, though what on earth she had been doing with it in the holidays she could not imagine. Tutting mumsily, she went to pick it up and restore it to the pegs in the lobby by the back door.
The
Cranbourne Girls blazer was a pleasant shade of dark green, with its crest and motto (‘
Video
,
audio
,
disco’
: officially rendered as ‘I see, I hear, I learn’ but the source of much mirthful satisfaction to those of a less classical bent) embroidered on the pocket in gold thread.
This
pocket, when Laura picked it up, flapped loose. Uncomprehending for a moment, she stared at it, ripped savagely along its stitching from the body of the garment.
Her
first thought was of concealment. She had been shaken already by the flowers, but this was worse. If it were, indeed, something she had done herself, the others must never know. No one must discover if she was having blackouts, going mad.
She
had the needle threaded and was sitting in her rocking chair, the blazer in her hand, before her shock dissolved in tears. Surely she could not have done this, surely...
But
if not she, then who? She looked about her comfortable, homely kitchen as if, even now, some spirit of malevolence might lurk within its walls, and began to shake.
***
The Christmas Day Open House at the Lodge was proving less than entirely successful. Too many of the guests had seen each other too recently, and the children who had last night relished the novelty of all being together, were jaded and fretful after a late night and an early start to the day.
Half
a dozen other couples appeared, some fresh from the eleven o’clock carol service at St Mary’s, which inspired Piers to new heights of wit as he greeted them with glasses of champagne heavily adulterated with peach schnapps.
‘
Well, how was our lady padre this morning? Miss Margaret Moon – it’s just too good to be true, really, wouldn’t you say? Do you suppose it’s a
nom
de
plume
– or a
nom
de
guerre
, perhaps, fight the good fight, and all that.’
He
gave a roar of laughter which shook his fleshy jowls, and one or two of his audience laughed too.
‘
It does seem a bit strange, certainly, having a woman priest,’ said pretty Anthea Jones, who had given her husband Richard instructions that he was not to leave her side for ten seconds if Piers McEvoy were anywhere in the vicinity.
‘
I really don’t get this, you know. Tell me why it’s such a big deal? If she was setting up as a football jock, I could understand it.’ Hayley Cutler, resplendent in a holly-berry red silk shirt and dark green velvet trousers, was in a mellow mood already, thanks to the American breakfast-time Christmas tradition of egg nogg made with liberal proportions of brandy.
‘
I have to say it’s crossed my mind that she’d make quite a useful prop,’ Piers put in.
Hayley
persisted. ‘We’ve had women priests in the States for years, and it seems like a nice enough job for a lady to me. Sure, some of them are dreary enough, but the guys in that line of business aren’t usually any ball of fire either.’
‘
I don’t think I would actually describe Margaret Moon as dreary.’ Richard Jones, a cheerful, open-faced young Welsh doctor who in his spare time was a handy second-row forward for the county rugby football team, had already had some dealings with her over elderly and hospitalized parishioners, and was ready to admit that she had impressed him.
‘
To keep up the sporting metaphor, she’s ready to run with the ball, I would say. She might actually stir things up around here. She’s a good person to talk to, and she’s started taking a real interest in people’s lives already. Perhaps the fact that she’s a woman is an advantage.’
Suzanne
sniffed. ‘The whole thing gives me the creeps. There’s something unnatural about it, and she looks simply ridiculous, standing there in a white nightgown. It takes all the meaning out of it, as far as I’m concerned.’
‘
Never knew you were one of the God Squad, Suzie.’ Piers was splashing champagne into every glass he could find that was not brimming already.
‘
She isn’t. She’s just in a bad mood and looking for someone to kick who can’t kick back, aren’t you, sweetheart?’
Patrick
’s malice was embarrassingly apparent, and Suzanne, whose colour was already high, glared at him with more naked antagonism than was socially comfortable for the bystanders.
Anthea
shifted uneasily, and true to his rugby player’s instincts, Richard flung himself into the conversation with gallantry if not tact.
‘
It’s all a question of getting used to the idea, don’t you agree? Think how much prejudice there was initially against the idea of women being doctors instead of nurses, and yet no one thinks twice about that now.’
It
might have been described by one of his team-mates as gathering a hospital pass. Suzanne’s face darkened further.
‘
Oh no?’ she snapped. ‘Well, all I can say is that you do if you have to work with them in theatre. That’s one area where political correctness can’t be used to cover up deficiencies, and nothing would induce me to allow a woman doctor to lay hands on me. Take my advice; if there are mascaraed eyelashes above the theatre mask when they wheel you in, get up and get out.’
In
the awkward silence which followed, Anthea, who was taking five years out from medicine to enjoy her two small children, bit her lip, and Richard bridled, ready in her defence to make matters worse. But before he could say anything, Piers intervened with spiteful glee.
‘
Oooh! Do I detect just the teensiest weensiest whiff of sour grapes? Come on, Suzie darling, we all have to accept our limitations!’
Suzanne,
her cheeks crimson, stared at him with open loathing for a long moment.
‘
Oh, I do wish you would,’ she said at last, and turned away, leaving the group, with some relief, to drift apart in search of less contentious conversation.
Fumbling
for a handkerchief, Suzanne fled to lock herself in the cloakroom where she could have a good howl.
What
on earth had possessed her to vent her feelings like that? She had forgotten Anthea was a doctor, though she and Richard would never believe that now. And she liked Anthea: she was young and sweet and funny, and she had hoped that Anthea liked her too.
But
probably she didn’t. Suzanne found herself doing things that made people dislike her, but somehow she couldn’t stop herself. She didn’t much like herself, come to that.
And
she was upset today. She was so upset that talking to people at all was difficult, without bursting into tears.
She
’d been desperately hurt about Ben last night, of course, and angry because she felt so foolish about his deception of her over these last years. But oddly enough, it had been Patrick who had made her feel better.
‘
Oh, come on!’ he had said. ‘That’s a very loving deception. Think about it; he probably felt much the same when he found out he’d been kidded about Santa Claus.’
That
did set it in a happier light, and she was grateful to him, though she still felt bereft in a way that obviously he did not understand. Perhaps no man ever did, and that was forgivable. Perhaps if they both made an effort to accept the differences between them, things would be better.
After
he had gone up, she finished off her preparations then followed him to bed in a mood of comparative optimism, which made the next morning’s discovery all the more shocking.
The
meticulously prepared kitchen she had left last night was today a shambles. The little bowls of chopped vegetables, measured herbs and spices had been stripped of their cling-film and tipped into a heap in the middle of the table. The crumbs for the bread sauce had been sprinkled along the edge of the surfaces in loopy patterns, and the ingredients for the stuffing had been taken out of the fridge and mixed together in the bowl where she had some scraps for the dog. After a long search, she found her cooking knives in the dustbin.
Ben,
that was her first thought, in some sort of stupid reaction to last night, but when she went up to his room to ask him about it, the child’s bewilderment was transparent. He was awake already, his little face white and miserable, and even if she herself felt distracted, she could not have him looking like that on Christmas morning.
‘
Maybe you’re too big for a stocking,’ she said, ‘but it’s a long time till we open our presents in the afternoon. If you’d like to go and look in the cupboard under the stairs, you might find a few things to keep you busy.’
She
was rewarded by the transformation in his face, and a strangling hug, and a little of the pain about her heart eased.
But
as she came downstairs to tidy up and salvage what she could, her face darkened again. So it was Patrick, was it! What a spiteful, heartless thing to do, even if you did constantly sneer at your wife for her lack of spontaneity.
They
had had one of their most bitter and destructive rows about it. Patrick, presumably taken aback by the scale of her anger, foolishly denied it, and then became absurd, suggesting that someone might have broken in, or even, when confronted with the absence of any sign of breaking and entering, accused her of having done it herself.
Remembered
rage and indignation dried the tears on her cheeks, and she splashed her face with cold water and renewed her make-up. She would go and seek out Lizzie – always a soothing friend – and offer to help. That was what she was good at – the practical side of things. There weren’t many women who could run a house and family as she did, and hold a job like hers, to everyone’s satisfaction – or almost everyone’s, anyway. Or at least what ought to be to their satisfaction, even if, quite unjustly, it wasn’t. But this wasn’t the moment to be thinking about all her worries.
When
she opened the kitchen door, it was to find her hostess kicking the sleek green Aga at the far side of her expensively countrified kitchen.
‘
Lizzie?’ Half-laughing, Suzanne stopped in the doorway and stared at her. ‘Whatever are you doing?’
Elizabeth
jumped and looked abashed, then turned, holding out a tray of slightly overdone piroshkis.