The Secret Life of Evie Hamilton - Catherine Alliott [154]
‘Hm?’ I was thinking about Mario being her master and her lover.
‘Because I take photos.’
‘What photos?’
‘In village shop.’
She'd lost me. ‘The photocopier in the village shop?’ I hazarded.
‘Yes, ten pence each. Right rip-off.’
‘Oh. Of what, Maroulla?’
‘Of thees. Mario say keep it safe, but when I die, who knows? I can't keep it safe no more, can I? So I geev one to Tim, yesterday. And Felicity when she come.’
‘Tim's been here?’
She was sitting up now, or attempting to; pushing herself up her pillows, opening the drawer by her bed, rummaging with fluttering hands.
‘Of course. He come one time every week.’
‘Does he?’ I was appalled. ‘Oh, Maroulla, how awful. I knew Felicity came, but I didn't know… I don't know why…’
‘You busy. I know. I bring up family. I work. I know.’
Well, she knew about running two households, scrubbing two kitchen floors and making endless meals. She didn't know about paying a cleaner and putting a little business the local restaurant's way.
She was lighting upon a brown A4 envelope now, her eyes eager, opening it with a shaking hand. She pulled out a piece of paper and gave it to me. ‘There. You read.’
‘What is it?’
‘I no know, I no read.’ No, of course she couldn't. Not English, anyway. ‘But he make us watch, and sign it. And when I ask Mario, he say very important paper, but he no read either. So I clean office every day, and your father, he so very untidy, and many things get lost in there, and always he rage and shout he can't find things and I worry. So one day I open drawer and find paper, and I take to rip-off shop to copy.’
I gazed at her a long moment. Then down at the paper. An A4 sheet bearing a photograph of a piece of notepaper, clearly torn from a pad; the ring binding visible down one side. In my father's scrawling hand, I read:
This country is a complete and utter disgrace. More crap from Defra, more unwarranted restrictions on my land, more outrageous demands from Brussels and piss-poor market prices. Christ Almighty. Felicity, my darling I have no option but to leave the whole bloody shooting match to Tim. Farm, land, money – everything. Poor bugger. He'll have a hard enough time of it as it is with this government, and you always said you'd be happy going back to your flat in college. You have your work, and Evie has Ant to provide, so I don't feel bad about the division of spoils. I'm sorry, my love, but I can't in all conscience saddle him with the bricks and mortar and not the wherewithal to run the wretched place. It will break him, as it's surely breaking me.
Your loving husband, Victor Milligan, 27 February 1999
Mario Rodriguez, 27 February 1999
Maroulla Rodriguez, 27 February 1999
I read it again. Looked up slowly. ‘He asked you to witness this?’
‘Yes, see there.’ She tapped her signature impatiently. ‘In his office. I weed the garden. He call to me through the French windows. No, Meester Milligan, I say, muddy shoes. But he say bloody well come now, Maroulla, impatient. Mario, he there, by Meester Milligan's desk, making cross face at me to hurry.’
‘So where's the original?’ I breathed.
‘Qué?’
‘The first one he wrote, from the notepad.’
‘Back in his drawer, I tell you.’
‘You put it back in his desk?’
‘Yes, his desk. In special folder.’
But we'd gone through his desk when he died, Felicity and I. We'd done it together: taken that whole, chaotic room apart; stacked all the papers in cardboard boxes, all the bills, files, tax forms, receipts that had exploded from drawers, that had been piled up on the floor – a backbreaking task. There'd been nothing. He'd died intestate, nothing at all.
‘Ees good?’ She looked at me, anxious.
I exhaled. ‘Ees bad,’ under my breath.
‘Qué?’ She looked stricken.
‘No, no, it's good, Maroulla. Yes, I'm sure. And Tim's seen this?’
‘Yesterday, when he come.’
‘And what did he say?’
‘He lose blood.’
‘What?’
‘In his face. Whiteness.’
‘Oh. Right.’ I swallowed.
She frowned, worried. ‘I do wrong?’
‘No, no, you did right, Maroulla.’ I forced a smile. Took her hand. ‘As ever. You did right.