Authors: Charlotte Oliver
Eventually, Mary Hazel ushered me into a white marble kitchen dominated by a fire-engine-red espresso machine. “T’ing makes useless tea,” she muttered good-naturedly. “I told him, get a kettle, but he won’t. So I got to use the stove.”
She bustled around the kitchen, glaringly out of place among the sleekly hidden fittings, hydraulic opening mechanisms, and lustrous countertops. Soon she’d found a small red saucepan, which she filled with hot water from the espresso machine and placed on the gleaming halogen hob.
“It’s got to be blowin’ bubbles before I make tea with it.”
How was I going to handle this? I’d prepared a whole set of intelligent questions to ask about the working environment, how we were all going to interact with one another, what sort of day-to-day tasks I could expect; but now it seemed I could chuck out all that preparation.
I had been prepared for a place of work. I had been ready to meet a set of colleagues—media staff, maybe a senior PA. I’d spent the whole weekend erecting a facade of professionalism. But I had absolutely not been prepared for feeling like a trespasser in a bachelor pad, however luxurious and expansive it might be.
I chewed savagely at my cuticle as I watched the mysterious Mary Hazel. Who was she? An assistant of some kind? And why wasn’t Jack here? Surely this must be
his
home. I wouldn’t have been sent to someone else’s. Surely?
“He’s usually ‘ere,” said Mary Hazel, reading my mind again. “He’s back in two days.” She seated herself at the central island, across from me. Her eyes were a compelling almond shape, faintly flecked with copper. “What you wan’ to know, Miss Parkwood? Now that you got some time to settle in?”
I laughed, wanting to seem charming, but it came out brittle. I tried to ignore my discomfort.
You’re going to have to make a go of this,
I thought urgently.
Whoever she is, she must be worth making a good impression on.
“What do you do?”
“I’m the maid,” she said simply.
“The
maid
?”
“The maid,” she confirmed. “Or the cleaner, or the housekeeper, if you prefer. Here’s your tea. You want milk an’ sugar?”
“Yes please,” I gulped. So she was a member of the domestic staff. Was
I
a member of the domestic staff? Had all this talk of personal-assistance-with-some-PR been euphemistic?
Surely not for the salary I’m on
, I thought. “I mean—milk, no sugar.”
She put the cup down in front of me. “If you’ve got no questions, well, I suppose I can jus’ tell you a thing or two myself.” She leaned back against the corner unit and sipped her tea thoughtfully. I gave her my full, rapt attention, eager for a signpost in this strange land. “Miss Parkwood, many have preceded you and I don’ doubt many will come after you. Your overseer moves in mysterious ways, make no mistake.”
I was staring at her so intensely I expected to start boring a hole in her forehead. She glanced over at me and laughed. “Don’ look so worried, darlin’. He’s just a man. Just a silly man like every man is silly.”
I laughed too, but only because I wanted her to think I was as in control and unafraid as she was. I felt overcome with dread—everything felt wrong: the house, the absence of the boss, and cold stillness of the air inside this palatial apartment. The interview had gone badly for a reason, I now decided; it was an omen. I should never have come here. I’d made a mistake. How to bow out gracefully?
Mary Hazel sipped her tea and told me little factoids about the man she called Mr. R-W. He didn’t eat breakfast (Mary Hazel maintained that this was a sign of moral instability); he had more money than he had any right to, and the Lord Jesus knew her orphan cousins back in Barbados needed it more than he did; he was a ladies’ man, she knew it, but he did hide it expertly, she had to give him that. “Take heed of every word he says, Miss Parkwood, and take care to know your own mind. He’s a strange child, R-W. Does strange things to the poor girls that dance attendance on him.” She laughed—a deep, beautiful laugh. Mary Hazel had the look of a goddess; serene and enigmatic, despite her apparent openness.
“What do you mean, ‘strange things’?” I asked haltingly, painfully aware of how afraid I sounded.
Her eyes flashed with amusement. “Oh, nothing so sinister as it sounds. Nothing a sensible girl can’t see through. He just gone and kissed that Blarney stone, and a girl is liable to be dazzled by him.”
So he’s a smooth talker?
I thought, not all that surprised. We hadn’t done much talking, but that was no indication of anything.
I decided to take a slightly more direct approach. “I had an interview with his brother—his half-brother. Do you know him?”
“I do,” she said, obliquely.
“He seemed to have some strange ideas about why I was hired. I think. It was hard to tell what he meant.”
She burst into peals of laughter. “That Tam!” she spluttered, wiping tears of mirth from her eyes. “So upstandin’ despite all the opposition a’ modern life!”
I waited while she finished her chuckling, more apprehensive than ever. Was Tam supposed to be the
upstanding
one out of the two brothers? Was I to expect
worse
behaviour from the mysterious Jack?
“Don’t let Tam worry you,” she said eventually, patting me maternally on the forearm. “He’s just of a different stripe to most.”
That confused me, of course, but there was no point in pressing too deeply. This was all too weird. I wasn’t coming back here.
I’ll go back to the dealership tomorrow
, I thought;
I’ll say I had a seizure and don’t remember resigning
.
When I finished my cup of tea, Mary Hazel took me on a tour of the apartment, the first stop being the office from which I’d be working. “That’s his,” she said, pointing out an expansive Louis Quatorze desk, flanked by a worn leather chair that swivelled out to face a wrap-around window overlooking expansive parkland.
There was a laptop on a small desk across the room, which I deduced was to be my place in this strange universe. The screen blinked reproachfully at me. I swallowed and looked away.
She showed me the guest cloakroom (white marble too), and the small sitting-room that led off the office. “He ‘as his meetings in there,” she explained.
There wasn’t much else; “He keeps ‘is bedroom door locked,” she chuckled.
I felt as if the day was wasted. Mary Hazel couldn’t tell me what I was supposed to be doing, so I felt I just had to squander the allotted time as quietly as possible. I worked out how to get the little laptop to switch on, then connect to the wireless network, and surfed aimlessly as I considered how I was going to get Victor to believe the seizure story. Could I get a doctor’s note? Were the symptoms fakeable? Perhaps a short, sharp bout of food poisoning, complete with fever and hallucinations, was more credible?
At intervals, a little voice reminded me of the salary I was promised. Maybe I’d stick it out if I had any sense.
To be truthful, it was tempting.
At 4 o’clock, just as I was gathering up my handbag and wondering whether it was too early for me to disappear, I jumped a mile at the sudden sound of a ringing phone.
“It’s for you,” called Mary Hazel from the kitchen. “It’s the Mister.” Her bell-like laugh echoed down the passage.
I felt that same surge of adrenalin that I’d had in the gallery on Friday night. What did he want? What was I going to say? Did he know I’d done nothing all day? Maybe he suspected I wasn’t going to come back. But that was ridiculous—how would he know that? Did I think he was psychic or something?
I tried to pull my thoughts under control; after all, who was this man to me? He’d hired me to do a non-job. He’d pretended he wanted a public relations person when all he wanted was a domestic secretary, by the looks of things. What did I care what he thought of me?
Despite my attempts at bravura, I could feel my insides trembling as I picked up the extension on my desk.
“Ava,” said a voice.
“Hi,” I said, feeling my face go hot.
“Are you settling in alright?” he said.
“Yeah,” I said, then kicked myself internally. Who says ‘yeah’? Was I still in primary school or something? “I mean, um, yes, thank you.”
“Wonderful,” he said, sincerely. “I’m so glad to hear that.” I was taken aback by the warmth of his voice. How could Jack and Tam share any genes at all? How was it possible? “Has Mary Hazel been regaling you with her tales?”
He laughed, and so did I, without really knowing why—except that I had a deep, pre-rational desire to please this man on the other end of the telephone.
“I just wanted to ring and say how sorry I am that I’m not there for your first day. I’ve been desperate for someone to help me and I really wanted to get you started on a few things right away.”
“Okay,” I said, beaming with happiness.
“Don’t run off and leave me just when I need you most.” I could hear the smile in his voice. “I promise once I’m back you’ll have plenty to do.”
After he rang off, I felt shaken and giddy and manic and confused. And I must have looked stunned when I said goodbye to Mary Hazel: she looked at me with thinly veiled suspicion. Later, it occurred to me that she’d thought I was one of the sensible girls at first. Then she saw that I wasn’t.
When I got home that evening, I went straight upstairs without saying hello to anyone and without getting any dinner, like a furtive teenager. While I lay in bed, mind and stomach churning in tandem, I could hear Mia and Mum murmuring in worried tones, but after a few hours they too came upstairs and the house fell silent.
In my dreams that night, every scenario made its appearance: begging my job back from Victor; signing on, like Mia did; taking my chances with Jack.
It was futile, of course; nothing but a restless mind entertaining fantasies. I already knew what I had to do.
The next morning, I was up before my alarm went off, sneaking out of the house in Mia’s shoes.
I could barely sit still on the bus. Despite having only a few hours of fitful sleep, I felt wide awake, on needles.
Mary Hazel’s words echoed in my head.
Take care to know your own mind.
I didn’t know my own mind—I had no idea why I did the things I did. I’d always floated through life with no real direction, and certainly no motivation. Now I felt the opposite; I found myself racing through a labyrinth of emotions, driven by an irresistible force, unable to stop for long enough to examine the reasons why; searching for something unnamed but essential.
I tramped the pavement towards his building blindly, contemplating it all. What was Sharon doing right now? Had they found a replacement for me yet?
I should ring her
, I thought, as I bit the side of my cuticle ragged.
Tell her how things are going.
I hadn’t dared to phone the night before; I didn’t want to talk to anyone.
I didn’t want to be talked out of anything.
I’m so glad he won’t be in today,
I thought, impossibly grateful. At least I had one more precious day to gird my loins.
But when the front door swung open, it wasn’t Mary Hazel standing there to greet me.
It was Him.
A rush of blood sprang into my face. I stood with my handbag clutched against my chest, open-mouthed, like a geriatric at a Chippendales show.
His eyes burned deep and blue-black as sapphires.
“Hello Ava,” he murmured. He was in dark trousers and a formal shirt. I tried to summon up a power word or two, but all I could think of was that my mouth had gone dry. I licked my lips, painfully self-conscious. “Hi.”
His hair hung in loose, slightly damp waves against his head, as if he were an Assyrian prince or a Roman general. There was a smell of expensive shampoo coming off him. Then I noticed he was barefoot.
Should I ask if I can come back later?
I thought, panicking.
Have I come at the wrong time? Is this the wrong day?
“Come in, come in,” he said, smiling. “Please excuse me; I got in from Frankfurt earlier than I thought and I just had to have a shower.” In one hand, he held a towel, with which he rubbed his damp hair as he walked down the passage toward the office.
I assumed I was supposed to go after him. Again, there was that momentary twinge as I stepped over the threshold, but this time I paid it no heed. I followed.
“Your paintings are nice,” I attempted, weakly, after racking my brain to find something to say.
He glanced backwards at me, his eyes flashing with an expression I couldn’t place. “Not pretentious?”
My heart sank. Was this how we were going to start out? “About that,” I began, “I was—so rude to you when we met, and I—”
But then he laughed, interrupting me. “Don’t be ridiculous,” he said. “Let’s go down to the office.”
Had he been
teasing
me? What had he meant by that? I felt a pout of exasperation form on my face as I followed him down the softly-lit corridor. I nodded to Mary Hazel as I passed the kitchen; she smiled, almost imperceptibly, and said nothing.