The Blind Assassin - Margaret Atwood [208]
“I don’t have a green thumb,” I said to Winifred. “Not like you.” My pretense of incompetence had now become second nature to me, I scarcely had to think about it. Winifred on her part had ceased to find my fecklessness altogether convenient.
“Well, of course you have to make some effort,” she would say. At which I would produce my dutiful lists of dead plants.
“The rocks are pretty,” I said. “Can’t we just call it a sculpture?”
I thought of setting off on my own to see Laura. I could leave Aimee with the new nursemaid, whom I thought of as Miss Murgatroyd – all our servants were Murgatroyds to my mind, they were all in cahoots. But no, the nursemaid would alert Winifred. I could defy them all; I could sneak off one morning, take Aimee with me; we could go on the train. But the train to where? I didn’t know where Laura was – where she had been stashed away. The BellaVista Clinic was said to be up north somewhere, but up north covered a lot of territory. I rummaged around in Richard’s desk, the one in his study at the house, but found no letters from this clinic. He must have been keeping them at the office.
One day Richard came home early. He seemed quite disturbed. Laura was no longer at BellaVista, he said.
How could that be? I asked.
A man had arrived, he said. This man claimed to be Laura’s lawyer, or acting on her behalf. He was a trustee, he said – a trustee of Miss Chase’s trust fund. He’d challenged the authority by which she had been placed in BellaVista. He had threatened legal action. Did I know anything about these proceedings?
No, I did not. (I kept my hands folded in my lap. I expressed surprise, and mild interest. I did not express glee.) And then what happened? I asked.
The director of BellaVista had been absent, the staff had been confused. They had let her go, in custody of this man. They had judged that the family would wish to avoid undue publicity. (The lawyer had threatened some of this.)
Well, I said, I guess they did the right thing.
Yes, said Richard, no doubt; but was Laura compos mentis? For her own good, for her own safety, we should at least determine that. Although on the surface of things she’d appeared calmer, the staff at BellaVista had their doubts. Who knew what danger to herself or others she might pose if allowed to run around at large?
I didn’t happen by any chance to know where she was?
I did not.
I hadn’t heard from her?
I had not.
I wouldn’t hesitate to inform him, in that eventuality?
I would not hesitate. Those were my very words. It was a sentence without an object, and therefore not technically a lie.
I let a judicious amount of time go past, and then I set off to Port Ticonderoga, on the train, to consult Reenie. I invented a telephone call: Reenie was not in good health, I explained to Richard, and she wanted to see me again before something happened. I gave the impression that she was at death’s door. She’d appreciate a photograph of Aimee, I said; she’d want to have a chat about old times. It was the least I could do. After all, she’d practically brought us up. Brought me up, I corrected, to divert Richard’s attention away from the thought of Laura.
I arranged to see Reenie at Betty’s Luncheonette. (She had a telephone by then, she was holding her own in the world.) That would be best, she said. She was still working there, part-time, but we could meet after her hours were up. Betty’s had new owners, she said; the old owners wouldn’t have liked her sitting out front like a paying customer, even if she was paying, but the new ones had figured out that they needed all the paying customers they could get.
Betty’s had gone severely downhill. The striped awning was gone, the dark booths looked scratched and tawdry. The smell was no longer of fresh vanilla, but of rancid grease. I was overdressed, I realized. I shouldn’t have worn my white fox neckpiece. What had been the point of showing off, under the circumstances?
I didn’t like the look