The Mistress - Jill Childs Page 0,78

face in its fur. ‘Can I keep her?’

I hesitated, taken aback. ‘I suppose so.’

‘I’m going to call her Buddy.’ She looked up at me, expectantly. ‘Good idea?’

‘Great idea…’

I left her there, whispering to Buddy, and crossed the landing to find the master bedroom at the front of the house. Like the sitting room directly below, it was well-proportioned and sunny. The same broad picture windows, arched here, looked out across the valley. Another, more modest window was set in a side wall, giving onto a copse of trees.

A king-sized bed dominated the space, with narrow bedside tables on each side. Fitted wardrobes ran along the length of one wall. I opened a wardrobe door to find drawers hidden inside as well. Plenty of storage. An armchair, a little fussy for my taste, had been placed near the picture windows, looking out, as if it were inviting me to sit and admire the view. I thought of Miss Dixon, slumped in her armchair, day after day, looking out at the streets below, waiting for someone who never came.

I crossed the room to the low door at the far end. It creaked open to reveal a narrow en-suite bathroom with a slanting ceiling. It was fitted into the space under the eaves, white and freshly painted, the suite modern.

As I turned away, my eye caught my flushed face in the mirrored front of the bathroom cabinet, reflected back to me at an angle as the loosened door swung. I opened it to see how it fastened.

I’d expected it to be empty. It wasn’t. I stared, my breathing hard.

An upturned shot glass sat on the middle shelf and, beside it, a miniature bottle of red wine.

I didn’t need to peer more closely to see what it was. Shiraz. Left there for me to find.

I stood, trembling, thinking hard. About Miss Dixon and the bottle of bitter wine she’d said was waiting for her in the boathouse, a glass already poured for her to drink.

I thought about the bathroom cabinet and the way its front swung open, inviting me to look inside. Why, of all places, there?

Fifty

Anna agreed to go to bed early that evening. She looked worn out, her cheeks pale and hollowed.

I sat on the edge of the bed with her as she drifted into sleep, stroking her soft, spiky hair away from her forehead and studying her features. My stomach twisted as I looked at her, so vulnerable, so unaware. The fair skin, her long, dark eyelashes, fluttering now as she tipped backwards into oblivion, her bow-shaped upper lip, the deepening puff of her breath. Buddy the sheepdog was tucked in beside her, his head on the fleshy cushion of her upper arm, as if he could protect her from what lay ahead. I waited, keeping watch over her as she slept, frightened to leave her alone in this house. She stirred but didn’t wake when I kissed her on the forehead.

Downstairs, I heated a ready meal in the microwave and poured myself some orange juice.

I settled in the sitting room, glass in hand, gazing out over the valley. There was no TV, no WiFi, not even a telephone. I’d lost my mobile signal as soon as we’d come over the ridge and dipped down into the hollow. It was hard to imagine being more isolated.

I sat very still, listening to the silence. Ahead of me, the valley steadily darkened, the black tinged with pink as the sun set. I wondered what Bea was doing. If she and Clara missed us. I thought of our old terraced house and the neighbours on either side, audible every time they plugged an appliance into a socket or turned up the volume on a film.

I imagined this place in winter. The caravans and tents and bed and breakfast trade would pack up and leave. It would be desolate here. Barely a soul. I thought of Mike Ridge, quietly watching from his car as we packed up and drove away.

The darkness, thick now, pressed down. All I saw, as I looked at the windows, was the reflection of the room, hanging there in the blackness. The settee, the coffee table, the lamps and in the midst of it all, a woman I didn’t yet know, Helen Mack, silent and still, glass in hand, looking back at herself.

Crack. I started. Stiffened as I listened. Could it be a large animal which had strayed too close? I reached for the lamp and switched it off, hiding myself