The Blind Assassin - Margaret Atwood [227]
“Laura, I hate to tell you this,” I said, “but whatever it was you did, it didn’t save Alex. Alex is dead. He was killed in the war, six months ago. In Holland.”
The light around her faded. She went very white. It was like watching wax cool.
“How do you know?”
“I got the telegram,” I said. “They sent it to me. He listed me as next of kin.” Even then I could have changed course; I could have said, There must have been a mistake, it must have been meant for you. But I didn’t say that. Instead I said, “It was very indiscreet of him. He shouldn’t have done that, considering Richard. But he didn’t have any family, and we’d been lovers, you see – in secret, for quite a long time – and who else did he have?”
Laura said nothing. She only looked at me. She looked right through me. Lord knows what she saw. A sinking ship, a city in flames, a knife in the back. I recognized the look, however: it was the look she’d had that day she’d almost drowned in the Louveteau River, just as she was going under – terrified, cold, rapturous. Gleaming like steel.
After a moment she stood up, reached across the table, and picked up my purse, quickly and almost delicately, as if it contained something fragile. Then she turned and walked out of the restaurant. I didn’t move to stop her. I was taken by surprise, and by the time I myself was out of my chair, Laura was gone.
There was some confusion about paying the bill – I had no money other than what had been in the purse, which my sister – I explained – had taken by mistake. I promised reimbursement the next day. After I’d got that settled, I almost ran to where I’d parked the car. It was gone. The car keys too had been in my purse. I hadn’t been aware that Laura had learned how to drive.
I walked for several blocks, concocting stories. I couldn’t tell Richard and Winifred what had really happened to my car: it would be used as one more piece of evidence against Laura. I’d say instead that I’d had a breakdown and the car had been towed to a garage, and they’d called a taxi for me, and I’d got into it and been driven all the way home before I’d realized I’d left my purse in the car by mistake. Nothing to worry about, I’d say. It would all be set straight in the morning.
Then I really did call a taxi. Mrs. Murgatroyd would be at the house to let me in, and to pay the taxi for me.
Richard wasn’t home for dinner. He was at some club or other, eating a foul dinner, making a speech. He was running hard by now, he had the goal in sight. This goal – I now know – was not just wealth or power. What he wanted was respect – respect, despite his new money. He longed for it, he thirsted for it; he wished to wield respect, not only like a hammer but like a sceptre. Such desires are not in themselves despicable.
This particular club was for men only; otherwise I would have been there, sitting in the background, smiling, applauding at the end. On such occasions I would give Aimee’s nanny the night off and undertake bedtime myself. I supervised Aimee’s bath, read to her, then tucked her in. On that particular night she was unusually slow in going to sleep: she must have known I was worried about something. I sat beside her, holding her hand and stroking her forehead and looking out the window, until she dozed off.
Where had Laura gone, where was she staying, what had she done with my car? How could I reach her, what could I say to put things right?
A June bug was blundering against the window, drawn by the light. It bumped over the glass like a blind thumb. It sounded angry, and thwarted, and also helpless.
Escarpment
Today my brain dealt me a sudden blank; a whiteout, as if by snow. It wasn’t someone’s name that disappeared – in any case that’s usual – but a word, which turned itself upside down and emptied itself of meaning like a cardboard cup blown over.
This word was escarpment. Why had it presented itself? Escarpment, escarpment, I repeated, possibly out loud, but no image appeared to me. Was it an object, an