Beecham, too, was impressed and reassured by Cheryl’s stately bulk, the way she loomed, silent and impassive, at the door every weekday morning without fail at six forty-five. He was even a little fascinated by her appearance. She had the sturdiest, most powerful-looking legs he had ever seen on a woman. Her calf muscles were so large and firm they practically made a right angle above her ankles. Nancy, in her suit and pumps, looked like a twig next to her. On her bare feet, the girl wore a pair of floppy tan plastic sandals that made a sound like a soft broom sweeping sand across their polished oak floors. She radiated a kind of imperturbable peace. She hardly spoke. Very occasionally, when their paths crossed in the early mornings, Beecham Clay wondered what went on in her head, what she made of them. But for the most part, he didn’t give the girl a great deal of thought; she was Nancy’s to think about; she was there, in their house, for thirteen hours a day and Nancy seemed happy with the arrangement; her return to work, after all the anxiety over the European girl, had been easier than he’d expected.

How did she seem to you then, Beecham, this Cheryl?

Oh, heavy but reliable. That’s probably what Beecham Clay would say now about Cheryl Toussaint if you could ask him.

Maybe it was because Cheryl reminded Nancy so much of her mother’s maid, Iceline, that she took so strongly to her, right from the beginning. Even though Cheryl was nothing like Iceline to look at – Iceline had been much older, for a start, and very thin, almost dry-looking; and instead of the baggy over-washed T-shirts and wide gathered skirts Cheryl wore, Iceline had dressed every day in a pale grey uniform with a white apron; on her head, a small starched hat, like a paper boat. Iceline had been there in Nancy’s parents’ Chappaqua home, always. She’d been there before Nancy and her sister Barbara were born and had still been there when they’d left it; moving about the place, like a soft shadow, mopping and polishing and cooking and looking after Nancy and Barbara and keeping everything running smoothly with a stolid, wordless, uncomplaining proficiency. ‘That woman,’ Nancy’s father had been fond of saying (generally about once a week and always within earshot of his vague and dreamy wife), ‘is the only thing that stands between this family and Armageddon.’