Forget Her Name(47)

I know it makes no sense to believe Rachel could be behind this, because she passed away over ten years ago. But not knowing for sure is driving me mad. So can you please tell me – very clearly and in as much detail as possible – what happened that day in Switzerland? That would put my mind at rest.

I’m sorry, I know this must be really distressing. Rachel was your daughter. But she was my big sister too and, despite everything, I loved her. So I want to know what happened to her, even if it turns out it was somehow my fault that Rachel died. Because that’s the only reason I can think why you would try to stop me talking about it.

Anyway, Dominic says I don’t open up enough, that I bottle stuff up and it makes me ill. So this is me, opening up.

With all my love

Catherine

After that I leave the café. It’s so cold outside, I pull up the collar of my coat, wishing I’d brought a scarf. The sky is grey and leaden again. But the shopfronts look gorgeous, all lit up for Christmas with flashing baubles and tinsel garlands, window edges white with spray-on snow, carols playing as I pass the open doorways.

I go back to Mum and Dad’s house, feeling as if a weight has been lifted. Dominic was right to tell me to write the letter. It was absolutely the right thing to do.

To my surprise, the front door is ajar.

I go in and stop a moment, listening. The house is quiet, except for some rustling further down the hallway.

‘Hello?’ I say.

There’s a sudden silence.

The passage is dimly lit, but there could be somebody there. Is that a shadow moving, or is it my imagination?

‘Hello?’ I repeat more loudly, my back to the front door.

Kasia appears in the kitchen doorway, a dripping mop in her hand. A strong smell of bleach wafts down the hall. She stares at me, clearly impatient. ‘Yes?’

‘Where is everyone?’

The cleaner shrugs, a slight flush of exertion in her sallow cheeks. ‘Your father . . . he goes to the office. I think your mother goes Christmas shopping.’ She glances down at the trail of drips left by her mop, her expression distracted. ‘I clean the floor.’

She’s wearing make-up again, I notice. Black kohl eyeliner, mascara, dark-green eyeshadow. As I recall, she never used to wear make-up to work. Now I rarely see her without it.

I remember the tension I’ve sensed between her and Mum since moving back in. I thought it was over me, that the presence of two more people in the house had laid unwanted extra duties on Kasia. But perhaps there’s another reason. A more sinister reason.

‘When did my dad go out?’ I ask.

Kasia shrugs, still studying the wet floor. ‘Five minutes? Ten? You just miss him.’

Her lipstick is smudged and her hair tousled. The top three buttons of her white blouse are undone. Her short skirt looks remarkably unsuited to housework.

I’ve seen my dad looking at her covertly.

No . . . impossible.

Dad wouldn’t be unfaithful to Mum. Not in a million years.

Or would he?

Kasia’s married, too. Or has small kids, at any rate. She could be divorced, I suppose. I realise with a shock that I don’t actually know much about Kasia Lecinska. Except that her Polish surname is pronounced ‘let-chin-scar’ and she didn’t like me moving back in here with Dominic. That last is just instinct on my part, of course. A chilly atmosphere whenever I walk into a room where she’s working.

But perhaps Kasia wishes we weren’t here at all. Perhaps there used to be less chance of being disturbed while my mother was out of the house . . .

That bright-red lipstick.

Everything inside me comes to a boil.

‘Did you do it, Kasia? Last night. The writing on the wall.’ I study her suddenly startled face. ‘Was it you?’





Chapter Twenty-Eight Kasia is instantly on the defensive. ‘I don’t know what . . . what it means,’ she says warily, her accent thickening.

‘I think you know perfectly well what I’m talking about. Someone wrote my name on my bedroom wall last night. Along with a hangman’s noose. You understand what a noose is?’

I demonstrate with a quick-jerk gesture of being hanged, and she gazes back at me in horror.

‘Oh, for God’s sake.’ I fumble in my coat pocket and drag out the offending lipstick, a smooth black tube. When we got home last night, I found my mother had closed it and left it on my dressing table. Pulling off the lid, I screw it up to show her the mashed stump of scarlet lipstick. Or what’s left of it. ‘With this. See?’

Kasia looks at it, her brows contracting. ‘Lipstick?’ She sounds perplexed. ‘On the wall?’

‘A sick joke.’

‘Yes.’

‘You did it.’

Her eyes widen, then she understands. ‘No.’

‘Who else could have done it?’

‘I don’t know.’ She backs towards the kitchen door again, staring at me, the wet mop banging against her leg. ‘I clean the floor. Your mother asks me.’

And with that, she’s gone.

I’m half tempted to follow her into the kitchen, but don’t. What good would it do?

I twist the lipstick down and replace the lid. The click is loud in the silence.

I don’t care what my parents believe. I didn’t do it.