The Devil's Feather - Minette Walters [23]
“Is he married?”
“Was.”
“Kids?”
“Two…a boy and girl…they live with their mother in Dorchester.”
“What’s she like?”
Jess had a way of looking at me that was unnerving, a little like having a scalpel slicing into my brain. “Weepy, clingy and wet,” she said, as if that were also her description of me. “He wouldn’t have strayed if she’d beaten him up a bit more, or found herself a job. She’s the fiancée he produced to get rid of Madeleine…and she took him to the cleaners when she discovered he was rogering a couple of nurses behind her back.”
“You mean two in a bed?” I asked in surprise.
It was the first time I saw Jess laugh. “God! That would have been funny! He’s a gent, for Christ’s sake. He took them one at a time and sent them flowers if he couldn’t make it…and now all three of them feel abused. I feel marginally sorry for the wife—except she brought it on herself—but the nurses haven’t got a leg to stand on. They knew they were sharing him with one woman so why make waves about another?”
I thought rather guiltily of the married men I’d bedded. Particularly Dan. What kind of relationship was that? “It’s easier to compete with a wife. You know what you’re dealing with. Another lover suggests you’re as boring as the woman you’re trying to depose.”
IT WAS A GOOD FEW MINUTES after we heard Peter’s car drive away before either Jess or I spoke. I couldn’t think of anything to say, other than “Go,” but she was staring at the floor as if looking for inspiration in the quarry tiles. When she finally opened her mouth, it was to express disapproval of Peter. “I don’t know why he did that. If you phone his private line you’ll have to pay for treatment. I’ll give you directions to the clinic so that you can get it for free.”
“Perhaps I’m not entitled.”
She frowned. “I thought you said you and your parents had been given asylum.”
I reached for my keys from the other side of the table so that I didn’t have to look at her. “Ja, well, I still hold a Zimbabwean passport so I don’t know what my status is. I think Dr. Coleman was just trying to be helpful.” Over the years I’ve developed a mid-Atlantic accent that doesn’t specify where I come from, but under stress my South African intonation takes over. I heard the “Zim” of “Zimbabwean” come out as “Zeem,” the “think” as “thunk,” and the “C” of Coleman as a hard “G.”
Jess picked up on it immediately. “Is it me that’s worrying you? Do you want me to go?”
“I’m sure I can manage on my own.”
She shrugged. “Are you planning on staying?”
I nodded.
“Then you’d better let me light the Aga first because you won’t be able to cook without it.” She jerked her chin towards the door to the corridor. “You might as well have a wander while I’m doing it…see if there’s anything else you need help with. It’ll be your last chance. I’m even less keen to be here than you are to have me.”
Looking back, it’s odd that neither of us took these remarks personally. They were simple statements of fact: we preferred our own company. It hadn’t always been so for me but for Jess it was natural. “I get it from my father. He could go days sometimes without speaking a word. He used to say we were born into the wrong century. If we’d been around before the industrial revolution our skills would have counted for something and our reticence would have been taken for wisdom.”
Her mother had tried to teach her to be more forthcoming. “While she was alive, she could always get me to smile—my brother and sister, too—but I reverted to type after they died…or forgot how to do it. I don’t know which. It’s a learnt skill. The more you do it, the easier it comes.”
“I thought smiling was an automatic response.”
“It can’t be,” said Jess bluntly, “otherwise Madeleine wouldn’t be able to do it. Her smile’s about as genuine as a crocodile’s…and she shows more teeth.”
ALL THIS TOOK TIME to make sense. That day, I was just an explorer. I remember standing in front of a poster-size photograph on the wall at the end of the upstairs landing with “Madeleine” printed underneath