The Keeper of Lost Things(18)

CHAPTER 13


Eunice


1976

Arrogantly sprawled across Eunice’s desk, Portia flicked cigarette ash into a pot of paper clips. Eunice had nipped across the road with Douglas to fetch donuts from Mrs. Doyle’s, and Bomber was seeing a client out. Portia yawned and then sucked greedily on her cigarette. She was tired, bored, and hungover. Too many Harvey Wallbangers with Trixie and Myles last night. Or rather this morning. She hadn’t got in until 3 A.M. She picked up a manuscript from the top of the pile which she had carelessly tumbled as she arranged spiky limbs into praying mantis posture.

“Lost and Found: A Collection of Short Stories by Anthony Peardew,” she read aloud, with singsong derision. As she flipped over the title page it ripped free of its treasury tag.

“Oopsy!” she sneered, Frisbee-ing it across the room. She peered at the first page as though she were sniffing milk to see if it had turned.

“Good God! What a load of drivel. Who wants to read a story about a large blue button which fell off the coat of a waitress called Marjory! And to think he wouldn’t publish me; his own sister.”

She threw the manuscript back onto the desk with such violent disdain that it toppled a half-empty cup, soaking the pages with coffee-colored scorn.

“Shag and shit a pig!”

Portia cursed as she retrieved the soggy sheaf of papers and hastily hid it halfway down the precarious stack of the “slippery slope” just before Bomber bounded back into the room.

“Absolutely tipping it down out there now, sis. You’ll get soaked. Would you like to borrow an umbrella?”

Portia looked up and about as though trying to locate an irksome bluebottle, and then addressed the room in general.

“Firstly, do not call me ‘sis.’ Secondly, I don’t do umbrellas, I do cabs. And thirdly, are you trying to get rid of me?”

“Yes,” called Eunice, bundling back up the stairs; a muddle of mackintosh, damp Douglas, and donuts. She dumped Douglas on the floor, the donuts on Bomber’s desk, and hung up her dripping mackintosh.

“I think we might need a bigger boat,” she muttered, tipping her head ever so slightly in Portia’s direction. Bomber bit back the laugh that threatened to escape. Eunice saw that he was teetering and started “duh-da-ing” the soundtrack from Jaws.

“What is that ridiculous girl going on about now?” Portia squawked from her perch.

“Just a cinematic reference to the inclement weather,” Eunice replied cheerfully.

Portia was unconvinced, but more concerned by the fact that Douglas had wheeled himself as close to her as he could manage and was about to shake his wet fur in her direction.

“Get that blasted rat away from me,” she hissed, retreating, and promptly fell backward onto Eunice’s desk, scattering pens, pots, and paper clips in all directions onto the floor. Eunice swept Douglas into the kitchen and soothed his hurt feelings with a donut. But Portia’s rudeness had finally toppled even Bomber’s extraordinary equanimity. His customary geniality slipped from his face like a landslide after a storm. Thunderstruck, he grabbed Portia by the wrists and heaved her from Eunice’s desk.

“Clear it up,” he commanded, gesturing at the mess she had made.

“Don’t be silly, darling,” she replied, picking up her bag and searching inside it for her lipstick in an attempt to disguise her surprise and embarrassment. “I have people to do that sort of thing.”

“Well, they’re not here now, are they?” fumed Bomber.

“No, darling, but you are. Be a sweetie and call me a cab.”

Red-faced, she dropped her lipstick back inside her bag and clip-clopped downstairs in her ridiculous heels to wait for the car she knew her brother would order. Portia hated it when he was cross with her but she knew that she deserved it, and the fact that he was right made her worse. She was like a toddler stuck in an eternal tantrum. She knew that she behaved badly, but somehow couldn’t seem to stop herself. She sometimes wished that they could go back to when they were children and he was the big brother who doted on her.

As Bomber watched her go, he tried and failed to recognize in this brittle woman even the faintest trace of the affectionate little girl that he had once loved so dearly. For years now he had mourned the sister he had lost so long ago, who had hung on his every word, ridden on the crossbar of his bicycle, and carried his maggots when he went fishing. In return he had eaten her sprouts, taught her to whistle, and pushed her “as high as the sky” on her swing. But she belonged to the distant past, and his present was poisonous Portia. He heard the cab door slam and she too was gone.

“Is it safe to come in?” Eunice poked her head around the kitchen door.

Bomber looked up and smiled apologetically.

“I’m so sorry about this,” he said, gesturing at the floor around her desk.

Eunice grinned.

“Not your fault, boss. Anyway, no harm done.”

They gathered the things up from the floor and restored them to their proper places.

“I spoke too soon,” said Eunice, cradling a small object in her hand. It was a picture of a lady holding flowers, and the glass inside the gold-colored frame was smashed. She had found it on the way home from her interview and had kept it on her desk from her first day. It was her lucky charm. Bomber surveyed the damage.