She was still weeping when they reached the lane. She wept as she handed the money to the taxi driver, as she followed her sister to the front door, as she took in the mess of the house, its dank smell of damp and ashes.
“Please stop,” Angela said. “Please, for Christ’s sake, stop.”
Angela took herself upstairs; Carla could hear her running water for a bath. Carla made tea—black, there was no milk in the fridge, there was nothing in the fridge save for some ancient cheese and an open bottle of white wine. Carla took two mugs upstairs; she sat on the loo seat while her sister soaked.
“I didn’t even mean to get drunk,” Angela said to her. She was sitting up, dabbing gently at her bloody knees with a flannel. Carla could see her shoulder blades moving; they looked ready to break through the skin. “I had a couple of glasses—three, maybe? Something else in the pub afterward? It was a work thing, you know. No one saw me, I don’t think. At the taxi rank. God. I hope nobody saw me. It was just so sudden. One moment I was fine and then I sort of just . . . woke up and there was this man, towering over me, calling me a drunk. . . .”
I thought you didn’t remember, Carla thought, being in the taxi queue. She said: “You weigh nothing, Angie. Had you eaten anything before you went out?” Angela shrugged. “How long . . . have you been like this?”
Angela looked back over her shoulder, her expression dulled. “Like what?” She turned away, her face to the wall. She picked at the mold on the grouting between the yellowing tiles.
Carla helped her out of the bath, fetched paracetamol from her handbag, found some antiseptic in the bathroom cupboard, which she applied to Angela’s cuts. She helped her to bed, lay at her side, holding one cold hand, her thumb gently stroking the back of her sister’s fingers. “I should have known,” she said, “that things had got so bad. I should have known.”
I should have forgiven you, she thought. I should have forgiven you by now.
They fell asleep.
* * *
? ? ?
Angela woke hours later, a cry in her throat. Carla jerked awake in fright.
“Is he here?” Angela whispered.
“Is who here? Who? Angie, who are you talking about? Is who here?”
“Oh. No, I don’t know. I was dreaming, I think.” She turned her face to the wall. Carla settled back down, closing her eyes, trying to return to sleep. “Did you know,” Angela whispered, “that I was seeing someone?”
“Oh. Were you? I didn’t know. Has something happened? Did you break up?”
“No, no. Not now,” Angela said, her lips smacking. “Then. I was seeing someone then. I never told you this, did I? He was married. He came to the house sometimes.”
“Angie.” Carla put her right arm around her sister’s waist, pulled her closer. “What are you talking about?”
“Lonsdale Square,” Angela said. Carla withdrew her arm. “When I was living in Lonsdale Square with Daniel after Dad died, I was seeing someone. The night before . . . the night before the accident, we were together, in the study. Watching a film, on the screen there, you remember?” The projectionist’s screen, their father had it installed, for watching home movies. “We were drinking, and . . . well. I thought the kids were asleep, but Daniel wasn’t. He came downstairs, he caught us.” Her breathing was slow, ragged. “He was so upset, Cee . . . he was just so angry, he wouldn’t calm down. I told him—my friend—to go. I told him to leave and I took Dan upstairs. It took me a long time to calm him down, to get him to sleep. Then I went to bed. I went straight to bed. I never went back downstairs again, to the study. I never went back down to close the door—”
“Angie,” Carla interrupted, “don’t. Don’t do this. We always knew—I always knew—that you left the door open. It was—”
“Yes,” Angela said quietly. “Yes, of course you knew. Of course.”
SIXTEEN
Laura pressed her phone to her ear, hunched up her right shoulder so that she could hold it there, hands-free. She was in her bathroom, searching through the medicine cabinet for some antiseptic to put on the cut on her arm. In the sink, dampening, its ink blurring, lay a letter she’d received that morning informing her of a change of date for the hearing about the fork thing. As she swept little bottles off the shelves and into the sink, onto the letter, she started to laugh.
“The fork? The fork, the fork, the fork! The fork is a red herring!” She laughed harder, at the connection her mind had made. “Perhaps the fork was a herring fork?” （It wasn’t, it was a cocktail fork, she knew perfectly well.）