The Housekeepers(75)

It wasn’t a denial.

Mrs. King stepped forward. “I’ll guess what he said, then. He got himself worked up. Said he couldn’t keep a secret. Wouldn’t meet his Maker without reconciling his affairs.”

Miss de Vries considered this. “No,” she said, reaching for a pear, polishing it idly against her dark sleeves.

“No?”

“He wasn’t thinking of his soul, Mrs. King. He was thinking of…” She shook her head again, a smile playing on her lips, something strangely close to disgust. “He was thinking of his future.”

She began peeling the pear. Her motions were faultless. She handled the blade with such dexterity, such absolute precision. Mrs. King couldn’t help but recognize that trait too.

“His future,” Mrs. King repeated.

“His name, his precious name, that wonderful thing he’d made for himself.”

Mrs. King frowned. “But there was no risk of anyone forgetting that.”

Miss de Vries’s eyes widened. She took a step back, let out a mocking laugh. “No risk?” She raised her hands. “But that’s too splendid! You are like him. Just as dense and self-involved as he was.” Her face darkened. “You think all this will last forever? This place, this house? The name ‘de Vries’？” She gave Mrs. King a long look. “It’ll be gone by next Whitsun, if I’ve anything to do with it.”

Mrs. King studied her. In that moment, she remembered the girl Miss de Vries had been. In the days when she still lived in the schoolroom, when she wore her hair loose and wild, when her skin was scuffed and greasy. When she was still being trained, when the governess was strapping rods to her back and shoving marbles in her mouth. Eyes hard and bright and furious, all angles and points, voice unsteady.

“I see,” Mrs. King said. She reached for Miss de Vries. She wanted to touch her, to cross the divide. There had always been a pane of glass between them: they had preserved it perfectly. “I understand.”

Miss de Vries drew back, a swift movement. She balanced the knife between her fingers, and said, with something approaching a laugh, “D’you know what he told me? ‘You’ve got it the wrong way round. Mrs. King’s the one with rights on you.’”

Lockwood’s mouth went slack, aghast. Guests tripped into the supper room, making for the buffet tables, voices shrill on the air. Miss de Vries stood upright, her carriage perfect, ignoring them. Eyes on Mrs. King, skewering her, anger coursing.

Mrs. King remembered what Mr. de Vries had said: Tell anyone you like. Urging Mrs. King to do it. Longing for her to destroy his other daughter. “He wanted to punish you.”

“Yes.”

“For wanting to be married.”

“For wanting to be free.”

“And?” said Mrs. King, gently. “What did you say?”

Miss de Vries laid down the knife. “I said, ‘I don’t want to talk about it.’ He didn’t like that. I’d never spoken to him like that before. He started coughing.”

A dark flash in her eyes.

“Did he?” said Mrs. King.

“Yes. He couldn’t speak. I thought the nurse would come; he was making such a racket. But you know how it is upstairs. You can’t hear a thing when the doors are closed.”

The guests were helping themselves to cold cuts, to pieces of ham, to slices of tongue. They gave Miss de Vries sidelong looks, trying to identify Mrs. King. Lockwood smiled at them, his face glassy and pale, moving to obstruct their view. His mind was working furiously: Mrs. King knew the signs. He had the faintest sheen on the surface of his skin, looking around for his clerks, debating whether he needed witnesses.

Mrs. King turned to her sister. Miss de Vries was that, after all. Formed of the same materials. An equal, when all was said and done. “He didn’t say anything else to you?” she asked.

Miss de Vries smiled. “Not another word.”

She folded her hands. So neat, so tidy. The scrag ends of the matter chopped off and swept out of sight. Too clean, Mrs. King thought.

Then Miss de Vries added, voice low, “I should have got rid of you years ago. I should have taken better care.”

Mrs. King shrugged. She did it to hide her anger. “Perhaps I should have got rid of you.”

She saw Miss de Vries react. Pleasure, a vicious bite. The urge to fight.

“Me?”

“We could have done it. The girls and I.”

Miss de Vries paused. A tiny frown appeared on her forehead. She didn’t understand. “The girls?” she repeated.

“Any number of girls, from the sound of things,” said Mrs. King, voice low.

She felt Mr. Lockwood grow still beside them. And she saw Miss de Vries grow even stiller, her face shuttering up.

“Do you know about that, Madam?”

Something strange happened in that careful, watchful gaze.

“Don’t,” she said, voice taut.

Her eyes went sideways, a single rapid glance, to Mr. Lockwood—and then away again. But Mrs. King understood at once. It was fear. Miss de Vries had buried her father, and she wanted everything about him to stay hidden deep, deep in the ground.

Mr. Lockwood raised his hand to his mouth, touched his bruised lip. “I would take care, Mrs. King,” he said.

It made Mrs. King laugh in anger. “Of what?” she said, turning to look fully at him.