‘Yes, she was. She and I did classes together. We were both doing science A levels. That’s not popular, you know. The popular girls do arts, and non-subjects like media and fashion.’ She mentioned them witheringly. ‘Nowadays it’s more important to be pretty and fashionable than clever. Even those that have a brain try to hide it. It’s so stupid.’
‘Even Zellah? Did she try to hide it?’
‘Not at first,’ Frieda said. ‘Frankly, she was even more intelligent than me. She was brilliant. And not just at academic subjects. She could draw, too, and she did music, and ballet.’ She saw Slider’s glance towards the piano and said, ‘Yes, I can play. I’ve taken piano since I was six. But I’ll never be any good at it. A lot of music is mathematics, and I can do that side of it all right, but I don’t have the artistic talent. I can’t put the feeling into it.’
‘And Zellah could?’
‘Yes. She was artistic and academic. It’s very rare.’
‘Like being both a cat person and a dog person.’
She looked at him with something like scorn, as if he just didn’t get it. ‘She was a polymath,’ she said sternly.
‘So what changed?’ he asked.
Her mouth turned down. ‘Boys,’ she said witheringly. ‘She started to get silly about boys. That’s all they think about, the popular girls – people like Chloë Paulson and Sophy Cooper-Hutchinson. Always preening themselves and wearing make-up and hanging around waiting for the St Martin’s boys to come out. It’s so stupid.’ She looked at him sharply as if he had said something. ‘Oh, I know what you’re thinking – that it’s just sour grapes? It’s not. I know what I look like. And I know I’m never going to look any different. But it’s not that. I don’t care, you see. I’ve got a brain, and that’s worth any amount of good looks. Good looks go off, you know, but your brain lasts your whole life. I mean to do something with mine. And before you ask, no, I’m not worried about getting married. I don’t care about it. Not now. I’ve got too much else to think about. Anyway, I expect in the end I’ll marry one of my cousins – I’ve got hundreds, and they all seem to marry each other. But not until I’ve excelled in my field.’
‘Have you chosen your field yet?’ he asked, hoping to get back in her good books with an intelligent question.
‘Genetics,’ she said with the same light sureness. ‘There’s the potential to cure every known disease, condition and syndrome through genetic manipulation. The possibilities are literally endless. All the great medical discoveries of this century are going to be in genetics.’
‘I see you set yourself high standards,’ Slider said. ‘And I can understand how you felt Zellah had let herself down.’
‘She did,’ Frieda said hotly. ‘She had everything – brains, talent. She was even beautiful. I mean, she really was – ten times more beautiful than those other girls, if that means anything, which it doesn’t. But she never seemed to know how lucky she was. Suddenly she wanted to be popular, and hang around with the in girls, no matter how vapid they were.’
‘You didn’t understand it,’ Slider suggested.
‘Not from her. I mean, when we were younger, we all used to hang out together, and it didn’t matter. Sophy and Chloë and Zellah and me, and another couple of girls, Matilda and Polly, but they’ve left now. And then it all changed.’
‘When did it change?’
‘About eighteen months, two years ago. It used to be that ballet and ponies were the thing, and then suddenly it was nothing but boys. I stopped really liking Sophy and Chloë, but I thought Zellah was different. But she seemed to want to be in with them, so I stayed with her too, for a while. But it all got too silly.’
‘In what way?’
‘Sophy and Chloë were obsessed with sex,’ Frieda said scornfully. She clasped her hands between her knees, her toes pointing away from each other. A child’s unselfconscious pose. ‘It was all they talked about. It was like a competition between them over who could be most outrageous, have the most boyfriends, be the first to go all the way. It was just pathetic.’
‘Do you think they did go all the way?’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said shortly. ‘The thing was, Zellah went along with it, competed with them, boasted even worse than them. I’m sure they were convinced she had. They thought she was terrific for it. For being the first. How could anyone be so shallow? I couldn’t understand why Zellah did it.’
‘Maybe she just wanted to be liked.’
‘For that? Why?’ She seemed angry about it.
‘Did she have a lot of other friends?’
‘Not really. I was her best friend, up till then. She wasn’t allowed to have girls home, or to go out much after school, so it made it difficult for her. She was always a bit of a loner.’
‘Well, doesn’t that explain why she might want to try to fit in with girls like Sophy and Chloë?’ Slider said.
He was also thinking puberty, but the onset of that was not something he could or would discuss with Frieda, who didn’t look as if she was much bothered with it yet.
‘But she had me,’ Frieda said. ‘Or she did until she took up with that awful Mike.’
‘Was he awful?’
‘She didn’t think so. She was mad for him. Sophy hated him. After that they didn’t hang around together so much. Oh, but then she remembered she did have another friend,’ she added with a hint of bitterness. ‘When it was convenient to her.’
‘You?’
‘I covered for her. When she wanted to see Mike, I let her pretend she was visiting me. It was one of the few things her father let her do. She’d say she was coming to see me after ballet on Saturday, or after school, but really she was seeing Mike.’
‘Do you think she was in love with him?’ Slider asked, stroking the cat. It had settled, couching on his lap, eyes closed with bliss.
She considered carefully. ‘I think she was infatuated,’ she said decidedly. It was almost comical, the contrast between the adult vocabulary, and the little-girl form before him. ‘She thought she was in love, but when the real thing came along, she realized it was different from what she felt for Mike.’ She looked at him sternly, determined to keep him straight. ‘She didn’t say all this to me, you understand. It’s what I deduced. She never spoke much about her feelings. She was a very private person, really. But she was mad about Mike, but when she met the new man, she dropped Mike like a hot potato. I almost felt sorry for him – not that I think he was the type to care. But she really, really loved the new man. It was different. I could see it was different.’
Slider was almost holding his breath. ‘And who was the new man?’
‘I don’t know,’ Frieda said.
Well, what had he hoped for? It was never that easy.
‘All I know,’ she went on, ‘is that he lived not far from here, because she spoke once about walking from here to his house. And he was a lot older than her. She said something about it being nice to be with a real grown-up and not just a boy like Mike. She went all dreamy-eyed when she mentioned him. But if ever I asked who he was, or anything about him, she clammed up. I got the impression,’ she said in her careful way, ‘that there was something wrong.’ She stared down at the dog for a moment, who wagged hopefully back, but her mind was elsewhere. ‘I know it’s a terrible thing to say,’ she said at last, looking up at him, ‘but I’ve wondered if . . . well, if he was married.’