I didn’t notice that Nick had gone, truly gone, until the police came to talk to me. I was angry. This wasn’t my fault. What had he done to himself? I told the Inspector that he’d informally assisted with a research project; that was all. That he seemed to be a generally untroubled person. The Inspector asked me if I was worried about him. What kind of question is that? What would my answer matter in the investigation? I didn’t know if I was. Polly and her mother disturbed me more.
Most distracting of all, I knew who S. M. Madison must be. After Linda Paul abandoned me, where did she go? She wouldn’t stop writing, would she? She wouldn’t. That fantasy of sacrifice came from the nanny, a woman who’d never written anything. S. M. Madison had written a book every two years since 1963.
So I’ve known since the day Nick was gone.
I didn’t tell anyone, not even Harry. I didn’t know what he’d do if I did. He might try to protect me. He might close the book permanently. I couldn’t let him do that.
“Harry,” I said, truly begging, “please read it to me.” Unthinkingly, I rested my hand on his forearm. A static charge jolted us both, reminding me how long it had been since I’d touched him. “Please,” I said again. I meant it desperately.
So Harry read on.
In the end, Gloria died. The children moved. I’d made Harry read the entire book, every word, one by one. A review on the back of the jacket congratulated S. M. Madison’s bravery and originality in depicting an alternative to the self-sacrificing mother figure that society has colluded to perpetuate. Suddenly I, one of the first female Fellows at Magdalene and the first blind graduate of my college, was put on the defensive as a party to woman-stifling, antifeminist society. My eagerness to accept the fantasy concocted by the one who raised me, to see myself and the mothering of me as more valuable than anything else she might have done, made me an accomplice. Some feminists think men are the enemy, but I knew myself for what I was. Children are the enemy here. It’s not men who demand a woman’s undivided attention, it’s children. It’s the children who wake her up, and the children who come to her for everything, every little thing. It’s the children who can’t dress themselves or feed themselves or go on without her attention and approval. My anger was tempered into pity for my mother, and guilt. What had I done to her? What had my existence done?
Harry’s voice was parched. He asked me again, “Are you all right?”
Why couldn’t he stop that? What was wrong with the man?
“I’m going to sleep,” I said. I rolled onto my side. I didn’t hear the click of a switch, so he must have stayed up. He had books of his own to read.
Harry would have thought I’d gone out.
The next morning, I woke before he did, dressed, and drank my coffee at the kitchen table.
There was the scrape and thud of a magazine being thrust through our mail slot. I wanted to catch Lawrence, our postman, to hand him a card I needed mailed. Today was Richard’s wedding, and I had yet to post it.
We have a cluster of bells attached to our front door. I made those bells shake.
But it wasn’t Lawrence at the door. Of course not. It being Richard’s wedding, it was Sunday. The magazine-person was someone who smelled of cosmetics. That, and finding myself standing on a pile of yesterday’s mail, disoriented me. “I’m sorry,” I said, stepping back and bending to retrieve the mail from the floor. Both Harry and I must have used only the side door yesterday.
The magazine-person’s voice confirmed her gender. “So sorry to have disturbed you,” she said. “I’m an estate agent. Rebecca Phillips-Koster. I’m selling the house across the road.” She crouched with me. “I was just delivering these informational brochures around the neighbourhood.”
I assumed she was proffering one, but my hands were full of yesterday’s mail. She twigged soon enough that I don’t see, and compensated with a flourish of attempted assistance. She pulled at the letters in my hands, to aggregate them with her magazine. I was shocked enough that I let go. She layered them all into a neat pyramid, smallest mail on top, and returned the stack to me. We stood. “Shall I tell you who they’re from?” she asked loudly.
The pipes in the wall rattled; Harry was showering. He would only have heard the shaken bells on the door, not the obtuse Ms. Phillips-Koster exaggerating her pronunciation for my sake.
“Oh dear,” she said. “This one’s been opened.”
“Which one?” I’d felt a tear in one envelope, but had assumed it to have been an accidental mangle from some post-sorting machine.
“It was mailed from this house. It’s being returned. ‘No such person at this address.’ Tsk. Laziness-ripping open an envelope before bothering to glance at the name. Oh, look-” She plucked another from me. “There’s another being returned. This one hasn’t been opened.” She told me who they’d been written to, and handed them back to me.
“Thank you,” I said, meaning ‘good-bye.’ She chattered about how good I was to have sent my holiday letters out with so much time to spare, and that the same happened to her every year: returned letters due to changed addresses. “Not everyone,” she commiserated, “can be so organised as we-”
I closed the door.
I carried the stack of mail into my study, and overturned it on my desk. The two returns were now on the bottom, thoroughly covered and held down. It was important to keep them under control.
Now I knew where she was. The letters had told me.
I’d written to the few Susan Maud Madisons I’d discovered, including author S. M. Madison. I’d contacted her through her publisher; no personal information about her had been available. A Susan M. Madison lived in Cambridgeshire, at Rose Cottage on Cantelupe Road. Both had returned my letters unaccepted. But one had been opened. And the estate agent had noticed that “return to sender” had been written on each in the same terse handwriting. I’d found her.
I’d wait. I didn’t want to explain it to Harry. I didn’t want to say the words out loud. Soon, he’d come downstairs, drink coffee, and go out. Eventually. By patience, I could earn the means to go upstairs to the computer, uninterrogated. I could print directions to Rose Cottage, and phone for a taxi. I’d see her today. If I could just keep still, I wouldn’t have to speak to anyone else before I spoke to her.
So it was my fault that Harry thought I was out. He’d heard the door; I was quiet here. What else would he assume?
My study is a small room. It had been added on by the previous owners as a large cupboard, had no windows, and had never been rigged for electricity. I had a desk in there, with a chair tucked under it, and a chaise along the wall, too full of books to sit on. Our computer was of necessity upstairs, in a room full of power outlets. I worked up there. I used my study to read, and to be alone. With the door closed, there was no tell-tale line of light from under the door or sound of typing to indicate occupancy. Harry wouldn’t have known I was in there.
So it’s my fault that he did what he did. He’s not a monster. He never would have made me listen.
The doorbell rang, followed by the bell cluster jingling. Harry’s feet on the stairs. The knob, and a click.
“Is Dr. Paul here?” a woman asked. She sounded too mature to be one of my students, thank goodness. I’ve had enough of students. They remind me of Gloria’s children.
“Oh,” this woman said, to what I assume was a shake of his head. “Well, I wanted to thank her. And you, of course. Mr. Paul?” That happened to him often.
“Call me Harry,” he said, not bothering to correct her.