The Safekeep(39)

“Adamant about what?”

“You’d promised him another date.” Hendrik had his bag over his shoulder, the beach blankets over an arm. “Apparently.”

“I didn’t—” But something of the like had been said, Johan asking, Soon? and Isabel only humming, a vague yes. The smell of wine on his breath, his hand too close to her breast. “I meant eventually. Not—not within days!”

Hendrik shrugged. “Well,” he said. “He’s coming for dinner tonight, so that’s that.”

“Dinner.”

“You didn’t give me instructions, Isabel. You just sent me at him.” He walked toward the house. Isabel went after, half a step behind, angry and saying he had no right to invite anyone on her behalf, and that she could not cook, that Neelke was gone for the day and that she had no means to make dinner, and that she—

“Go do groceries, Isabel. Figure it out.” He opened the door awkwardly: smoke between his lips, arms occupied, only one hand to shimmy at the key. “Besides,” he said. “He’ll expect you to cook for him sooner or later, anyway.”

Sebastian was following behind them, slow. Eva did not. She remained behind, picnic basket at her feet. She looked like a chastened child.

Isabel said, “What do you mean, sooner or later?”

“What do you think,” Hendrik said, and went inside. Isabel stood, frozen in the entryway. Sebastian, when he reached her, said, “It’ll be all right, Isabel.” He touched her arm—a squeeze, a comfort. Isabel looked at it. Looked at him. He let her go. He cleared his throat and went after Hendrik.

Across the path, Eva remained, eyes down. Isabel waited. Mouth dry, throat dry. Eventually, Eva picked up the basket, made her way over, too. She took her time, rearranged the weight, from this arm to that arm, back and forth. At the door, several steps away, she stopped. Said, “I can help you cook, you know.”

Eva’s night of bad sleep showed on her face, too. Her hair was a yellow dusting catching the noon light.

“No,” Isabel said.

“I can.”

“Why would you?” She meant the question seriously. She wanted to hear the answer.

Eva said, “Perhaps…” She hesitated. “Perhaps it will be a good thing. Better than—Oh, it’ll be good for you to have the company of… You’ll enjoy it, it’ll be fun, you’ll see. You’ll have fun, and you’ll see that—you’ll see, you’ll see that…”

Eva could not finish her thought. She wanted Isabel to understand something that Isabel did not understand.

“I’ll see what?”

“Isabel.” A quick glance at the door—back. “Isabel. He likes you.”

It was the way Eva said it: big-eyed, pleading almost. She wanted Isabel to move in a direction—away. Isabel said, “You want to be rid of me.”

Eva didn’t reply. She made a sound, a cut-off sound, and Isabel did not wait for the rest: “Understood,” she said, and walked away—down the path, down the road. Beyond the house: into the farmland, two cows on a field. The horizon, cut only by a stand of trees. She looked behind her once and saw Eva, a distant dot, unmoving, still framed by the darkened doorway.



* * *



Isabel walked for an hour. Her dress dried on her skin. She tried to call some cows over to pet, and only one came, and left soon when she understood Isabel had no food to offer.

Hunger pushed her homeward. She came in through the kitchen. Eva was there, an apron over a clean dress. She was cooking. A pot on the fire, the door open to let the steam run out. Isabel’s heart gave one heavy, sad thump.

Eva turned to Isabel quickly, wiped her hands on a towel, took a step like she wanted to say something—fall into an explanation, a conversation. Isabel did not allow as much, did not want to hear it and have to face what was happening: the ruse of the dinner, the way it seemed to be designed to push Isabel away. Hand her off to someone else. She went to the pantry, said behind the door’s protection: “Hendrik and Sebastian left?”

“Yes,” Eva said. A high-chested breath. “They said to say goodbye. They said…”

Isabel held on to the door handle. She felt the sun’s mark on the back of her head. “They said?”

“Ah. Hendrik hoped that you could…”

Isabel took a half loaf to the table. She did not sit down, buttered a slice standing up. She pushed her hair back one-handed, sweat on her forehead. She ate too fast. An embarrassed heat crawled up her cheeks as Eva watched her. She said: “Hendrik hoped you would come to thank him later.”

Thank him. Humiliation wrapped itself tight around her throat. Isabel held the last piece of bread in her hand. “How kind.”

“Isabel. I do… I do care for you, you know. It’s not that I—”

“Don’t make a mess of the kitchen. Clean up after you’re done.” Isabel put down the last bite, wiped the crumbs from her fingers. Her voice was hard and steady, just as she wanted it. “Don’t touch the china in the vitrine.”

Upstairs, in the bathroom, she wiped at her face with a rough towel, ran a bath, and lowered herself in. There was a bruise on her thigh she could not place. Sunlight came in through the crocheted curtain, patterns on the water, on the floor. Steam rose. The ventilation connected with the house below, and over the quiet lap of bathwater Isabel could hear the clattering of pans, of pots. Of spoon to the rim of a bowl. Of the gas being turned up high, the rush and then catch of fire.