Jean had tried to banish the smell of damp in the room with the electric bar heater, which was only deployed in exceptional circumstances because it was both dangerous and costly. The cable was frayed, exposing bare wires, and the plug rattled in the socket. It gave off a powerful odor of scorched lint, burned onto the element, which then had to be masked with a squirt of Yardley’s Lily of the Valley. The combination was not particularly soothing and triggered a sneezing fit, which left her mother quite weak and begging for fresh air.

At last she was settled, with a cup of tea and some magazines and her prescription painkillers within reach, and only now did she seem to take notice of Jean as an individual with her own separate existence.

“What have you been doing with yourself all this time, anyway?” she inquired.

I have been spending the nights with my married lover, under the nose of his neighbors, leaving the house abandoned and the milk to curdle on the doorstep.

Tomorrow, perhaps, when her mother had settled back in properly, there was a difficult conversation to be had, but not today.

“I’ve taken down the runner beans and written to Dorrie. And bought some new towels for the bathroom. Nothing out of the ordinary.”

34

The call to Gretchen had to be made, but Jean kept procrastinating, finding ingenious reasons to defer it until some other, less onerous task was done. For as long as a meeting could be avoided, she had no trouble dodging her conscience over Howard, but face-to-face she would sooner or later have to resort to lies, or evasion, behavior she despised.

This was not the only reason for her discomfort. Since talking to Kitty Benteen, Jean had a dark sense that something less than holy had taken place at St. Cecilia’s. Until she had evidence, there was no question of disclosing her suspicion, but it would be there between them, a malevolent spirit, and another barrier to honesty.

In the event, it was Gretchen who rang her, asking if they could meet as soon as possible. She sounded agitated on the phone, the foreignness of her accent suddenly apparent.

“I can come tomorrow, if you like,” Jean offered.

Now that the nettle was grasped there was no point in further delay. It was a workday, but then this was work, and she still had not addressed the problem of leaving her mother alone outside these hours.

“No, it will have to be Wednesday or Friday, because that’s when Martha’s teaching. We’ll have the place to ourselves.”

Jean refrained from asking why Martha’s absence was a precondition of their meeting, noting only her own relief. Since hearing of her tepid efforts to welcome Margaret into her household, Jean had been incubating a certain hostility toward Martha and had no wish to have it tested by another prickly encounter.

“Could I ask a favor?” Gretchen added when the time and date were settled and the conversation had run its course. “You can say no if it’s inconvenient. I left behind a patchwork eiderdown on my bed at home. I wonder if you could fetch it and bring it with you. It’s pink and green.”