The Surface Breaks(42)
One night, as Daisy untangles the day’s complicated hairstyle, I find myself rushing to the toilet to vomit. There are black spots bursting in my eyes as I heave over the toilet. It is like I am trying to dislodge some of this torment and spew it out of me. Daisy rubs my back, murmuring, shush, shush, my pet. I slump on the bathroom floor, watching my feet warp, as if my eyes were made of flawed glass. The Sea Witch’s spell is falling apart, taking chunks of my flesh with it.
“We need to call a doctor,” Daisy says. “This is too serious, I can’t—”
I rear away from her, shaking my head. “Okay,” she says gently, as if taming a wild beast. “But it doesn’t feel right, Grace. I’ve never seen anything like this before and it’s getting worse, not better. I could lose my job. If Mrs Carlisle finds out I kept this from her…”
We both start at the sharp knock, Daisy kicking the basin of bloody water under the bed.
“Grace?” A voice from the other side of the door. A woman’s. “It is Mrs Carlisle. May I come in?”
Did she hear what Daisy said?
Daisy manages to pull the duvet over my legs just as the door opens. “Good evening, m’am,” she says.
“Thank you, Daisy,” Eleanor replies. She is dressed in the violet dress she wore to dinner. (Spindly candles in silver candelabras, flowers blooming through the centre of the table, but no Oliver… “Busy, I’m afraid,” Eleanor had told the guests and they waited until the president of a neighbouring country engaged her in conversation before they started to gossip. “I mean, really,” they whispered, “how can Eleanor Carlisle be trusted to run an entire company if she can’t get her own son to attend a dinner party? The market is so volatile right now, did you see that latest report from…” These people have no uneasiness about speaking this way in front of me, of course. No one is wary of a girl who is mute.)
“You may leave,” Eleanor tells Daisy now. “I would like to speak to Grace before bedtime.”
Daisy doesn’t move, standing by my bed as if she is my guard; like the armed escort that flanks my father on the rare occasion he leaves the palace.
“Daisy,” Eleanor says. She sounds like Oliver, the same imperious tone, barely masked irritation at not being instantly obeyed. “I asked you to leave so that I can speak to Grace in private.”
“Yes, Mrs Carlisle.” Daisy backs out of the room, widening her eyes at me in warning behind Eleanor’s back. What is she trying to tell me?
“So,” Eleanor says when we are alone. “May I?” She gestures at the bed and I nod in acquiescence. It’s oddly intimate when she settles beside me. We only ever sit at opposite sides of the breakfast table but when we are this close, I can smell her perfume, floral with a hint of something woody, can make out the criss-cross of fine lines around her eyes and mouth.
“I see you, you know,” she says. “Night after night. I see you going down to the water. What is it about the sea that fascinates you so?” I shrug, the very picture of guilelessness, for how can I tell her that I need the sea? I need a respite from all the noise and the clamour of this world. She catches hold of my elbow. “You really are astonishing to look at,” she says, but there is no emotion in her tone. She doesn’t say it the way others have said it, as if beauty is something I should be celebrated for, as if my face is all I need to be deemed worthy of love and respect. She doesn’t say it like Oliver does either, like he’s blaming me for making him feel something he does not want to feel.
“I have heard tell of another woman with eyes so blue and hair so red,” she says, twisting her wedding ring around her finger. “One whose beauty could rival your own. It’s quite some time ago since I first heard of her, I never actually saw her. Not in real life, anyway.” She laughs, a dry humourless sound, like the cracking of a whip, and I feel very cold. Is she talking about…? “But her face, oh, her face haunts my dreams.” She peers closely at me. “And sometimes I cannot tell the difference between her face and that of your own. Isn’t that peculiar, Grace?”
I shrug again, surreptitiously wiping my sweating palms on the bedcover.
“I’ve seen the way you look at my son,” she says. “There’s no need to be embarrassed.” She reaches out to take my hand in hers, and grips it too tightly, rubbing at my knuckles as if she wants to wear the flesh away. “Oli is a handsome boy, and charming when he chooses to be. But I don’t want you getting hurt, Grace. You don’t want to know what it’s like loving a man who is in love with another woman. It can send you…” She laughs in that strange way again. “Well, it can send you quite mad.” I stare at Eleanor’s hand, the heavy jewelled rings on her fingers. All paid for by Eleanor, with Eleanor’s money. Everything in the house belongs to her.
“Oliver’s girlfriend died,” she says. “Did you know that?” Viola, with her blunt haircut and those long legs. The way Oliver looked at her: he has never looked at me like that. “Oliver and Viola were childhood sweethearts,” Eleanor continues. “The Guptas are an important family in this county, and Viola was much sought after, beautiful as she was.” She was beautiful, Viola. I wish I had her brown skin and her brash laugh. I wish I had her voice. I wish I had any voice at all. “Oli and Viola would have been married within a few years, and we were all delighted. A very suitable match; it’s not like Oliver Carlisle could marry any old stranger he picked up on the street. Or the beach, as it were.” I bite my lip to stop its tremor. “But I do not tell you this to hurt you. I tell you this for your own good. My son is grieving, more deeply than you could ever understand.” And what do you know of me? I want to ask her. What could you ever know of the sorrow that I have endured? “Oliver does not see you in that way,” she says. “Not now, not ever. It’s important for you to retain a little dignity. That is all I came here to say.”