Page 16 of A Good Heart is Hard to Find
This was why she knew about Rosemary’s accident so quickly, for her ear wasn’t just pressed permanently to the ground for gossip, it sent down invisible suckers, and thus it was that she phoned me, agog for a reaction to something she assumed I knew.
‘Isn’t it great news about Rosemary?’ was her openinggambit. ‘Unless they arrest Max, of course. It does sound dodgy that she should fall out of her wheelchair hard enough to hit her head and kill herself when she’s paralysed from the waist down, though, doesn’t it?’
With astonishment I watched the hand holding the phone suddenly wilt like a dead stalk – most peculiar. Then myknees followed suit, and everything shifted dizzyingly, like it didin one of my recurring nightmares, the long dark corridor ones.
‘Any moment now,’ I thought with resignation, ‘and I’ll start somersaulting backwards towards the cupboard door.’
The door I really don’t want to openever.
‘Cassy? You’re very quiet. Are you still there?’ demanded Jane’s barracuda-toothed voice, piercing my shock and enabling me to lift the receiver to my ear again.
‘You didknow, didn’t you? Or – no, don’t tell me Max hasn’t even phoned you yet? I’m the first with the news?’
‘No. Yes … I mean, he must have tried and I was out or … or something,’ I hedged lamely. ‘Jane, are you absolutely sure about this? Rosemary’s dead?’
‘Yes, two days ago. He came home and found her on the sun deck. Or ratheroffthe sun deck.’
‘But what about the live-in carer? Max said they’dgot one through an agency.’
‘Rosemary’d argued with her and sent her packing, that’s what I heard. Probably caught her flirting with Max. After all, he may be getting on a bit, but he’s still attractive. Bet he looks good with a Californian tan.’
‘Max wouldn’t flirt,’ I said automatically.
‘And you really hadn’t heard a thing? Well Iwasgoing to congratulate you, since you can at last be madea respectable woman of, and then even Ma and Pa might speak to you again. But if he hasn’t told you, then perhaps he’s tired of you, or found someone else or something?’
‘Thank you for that kind thought,’ I said coldly, but she was only saying what I was thinking. Whyhadn’the phoned me?
‘Oh well,’ consoled Jane. ‘Perhaps it’s because they’ve arrested him. Two major accidents in one lifetimeis a bit of a coincidence.’
‘Of course it’s an accident!’ I said hotly. ‘Max would never have hurt her! Think how he’s stayed married to her all these years, and looked after her. And you can’t blame her skiing accident on him!’
‘I suppose so, and of course if hewasgoing to kill her so he could marry you, he’d have done it when you were young and pretty, wouldn’t he? I don’t suppose he’s botherednow.’
‘That wasn’t quite what I meant. He didn’t love her, but he was fond of her – and her death has probably hit him harder than he’d expected, that’s why he hasn’t got round to phoning me. It would be sort of disloyal.’
‘Not half as disloyal as seducing one of his students, and then keeping her as his mistress for the last twenty or so years,’ Jane pointed out helpfully.
‘He hasn’t keptme!’ I protested, though I suppose it was true that hedidseduce me.
She ignored that. ‘He’s probably bumped her off because he’s picked up some nubile young student out there. Some of them go for the sophisticated father-figure stuff. Gerald’s friend over there said that female fitness trainer they’ve hired is young and quite pretty, too.’
‘You’d better not repeat any of your fragrant littletheories to anyone else,’ I warned, but I knew she wouldn’t: Jane only lets her mask slip and her mouth off-leash with me, and, to some extent, our brothers. Even her husband still thinks she’s Little Miss Angelic.
‘Don’t be silly. Anyway, now you know, you can phone Max, can’t you?’
‘I don’t have his number. He always calls me: I couldn’t afford all those transatlantic calls.’
‘You mean hedidn’t leave you any way of contacting him? Not even in an emergency?’
‘He’s never been here when I’ve had any emergencies. I’m used to coping alone.’
‘I’ll find his home number for you,’ Jane offered eagerly. ‘Now, who would be best, and why would I want to know …? Oh yes, that would work,’ she mused. ‘Right, I’ll get back to you later with the number, but only on condition that you call meand tell me everything he said, mind.’
Like hell I will.
‘Thanks, Jane,’ I managed to say between gritted teeth, but only because I really needed that number and she was the only one who could get it for me. ‘You might have to leave it on the answering machine because I’m doing a singing telegram later.’
‘You can’t be serious! After that news? Surely you’d rather hang on until you’ve spokento Max?’
