The Apartment - K. L. Slater Page 0,48

a waste of time that could be spent working, not a luxury to share together.

Skye snuggles into me happily as we watch the film together. Except I am not watching the film at all. I’m bluffing. Laughing in all the right places because I know it off by heart.

It’s a different story inside. I feel like I’ve swallowed a hard knot of rope; a lump in my stomach that ever can’t be shifted.

We were close, Lewis and I. So close. We shared all our hopes and dreams. We shared our fears.

Once, we spent a long day hiking in the hills and when we got to the top, we sat and held hands to watch the sunset together.

‘No secrets ever,’ Lewis whispered in my ear before he gave me a long, lingering kiss. ‘Promise me?’

‘I promise,’ I said, and I meant it.

I thought I would always be with Lewis, that he would always be in my life. My rock.

Now he’s gone, not just out of our home but gone forever.

It brings up in me a feeling I want to hide from. A feeling I don’t know how to deal with.

The feeling is fear.

Moving here amongst people I thought might become friends felt so good. But there are no people like us here . . . everyone is so much older and from a different life altogether. And now we’re much further away from Brenna, and it feels like we’re out on a bit of a limb.

Adder House might be a strange little bubble of privilege screened off from the world, but it’s imperative that I feel sure my daughter is safe here.

28

You track the woman outside when you can, observe her and the child around the house and garden where possible.

Her mood is changing; her confidence is waning.

The fact the child will soon be starting at St Benjamin Monks is encouraging. This is where the fun really begins.

You reach for the cotton gloves and slip them on to your hot, moist hands.

I carry Douglas through the spartan, echoing corridors towards Professor Watson’s offices.

He will be one year old in just a month’s time and he is getting heavy. He is not walking yet, but he is crawling. Sometimes, I feel as if my heart might burst with pride.

I glance at the signs for the scientific laboratories ahead of me and shudder.

Yesterday, I had taken a baby who was suffering from feeding problems up to the medical examination area for an appointment and I had to pass this turning.

On the way back down, I couldn’t help myself. I peered in at those poor lab rats.

I had heard the scientists did not think of their small subjects as living creatures at all but viewed them merely as objects . . . things, to be experimented on. That is how the doctors and scientists are able to distance themselves from the sheer horror of it all.

I would never agree to Douglas having an operation of any kind if he did not need it.

No matter what was offered to me.

But, as Rosalie assures me, Professor Watson is not that kind of scientist at all. I feel confident of that.

I have had a bad week with my boy. His calm, sunny nature has seemed to dissipate as the days go on. He has grumbled and whimpered, even after being fed and changed.

It isn’t like him at all.

I spoke to Rosalie only yesterday and asked if the work Professor Watson is carrying out may be contributing to his distress.

Rosalie laughed. ‘You have a healthy imagination, my dear. Has the professor ever touched a hair on the child’s head? Has he struck him?’

‘Of course not.’

‘Then you must not worry, Beatrice. The professor operates within the highest ethical code and employs methods the likes of yourself, a mere wet nurse, cannot possibly contemplate. Only a few more sessions and dear Little Albert will simply forget everything that has happened.’

I nodded, feeling marginally better.

‘And your position at the hospital will be secure, perhaps even a promotion on the cards if the professor is pleased with your efforts.’

A promotion will make life so much easier, particularly when my sister gives up working.

I turn left and walk a short way across a carpeted area that features plants and a large window overlooking the hospital gardens that lets in lots of natural light.

I knock on Professor Watson’s office door and wait.

The door opens and the professor peers down at me through the wire-rimmed spectacles perched on the end of his narrow, bony nose.