She hoisted the final bag on to her shoulder and prepared to carry it inside, but then she saw that there was a small cardboard box hidden underneath. Boxes tended to be filled with knick-knacks, the sort Pip had rarely seen before and which fascinated and repulsed her in equal measure. Mass-market moulded glassware; cheap plated jewellery, the base metal showing through and destroying any illusion of authenticity; and badly chipped and mismatched cups and saucers, fit only for landfill, that someone had thought others might be prepared to pay good money for. The whole enterprise continued to astound Pip by its very awfulness. But emptying boxes filled with ugly things was infinitely preferable to sorting through overwashed （or in some truly revolting cases, underwashed） garments. Plus, there was always the outside chance of uncovering some treasure.
Audrey was still in the back room with the kettle, so if she was quick, Pip might manage to go through the box herself. With a burst of speed, she lifted the box and rushed inside with it.
It was heavier than she’d expected, and nothing shifted about inside as she walked. It must be books. Books were her favourite find. Second-hand books didn’t turn her stomach in the way other possessions did. Their history was intriguing rather than something best not thought about. Generally, the donations were thick paperbacks, the sort you bought at an airport and then left on a swap shelf before flying home, but occasionally there would be an ancient hardback covering some antiquated skill or a biography of a long-forgotten star of the silver screen. Pip liked those best. It felt good to read about other people’s lives, lose herself in them for a while and have her mind taken away from her own troubles.
She placed the box on the table and cast a quick glance in the direction of the staff room, such as it was, but there was no sign of Audrey. The pleasure of going through its contents would be hers alone.
4
Pip lifted the lid of the cardboard box and peered inside. She had been right. It was full to the brim with books. She plucked a couple from the top of the pile. Judging from their covers, with the unfamiliar fonts and yellowing images, they were at least fifty years old, if not older, and she didn’t recognise any of the titles.
She dug a little deeper and pulled out a selection of paperbacks with the distinctive orange and white jackets of vintage Penguins. Again, there was nothing amongst them that she had heard of, and her excitement began to wane. Boxes of books, it seemed, weren’t always as much fun to open as boxes of knick-knacks. Eventually, she reached the very bottom and her fingers touched something that felt different to the thumb-worn paperbacks. It was hard and smooth with rigid edges and corners and, her curiosity piqued, Pip drew it out to examine it.
It was clear at once that this wasn’t a printed book. She peered more closely at the cover. It was an appointments diary for 1983. Pip sighed. This was just like the bin bags full of unsaleable clothes. What did people think the shop would do with an old diary? Maybe Audrey’s grandchildren could use it for scrap paper, she supposed, but they could hardly sell it.
She started to flick through the pages; but rather than being blank, as she had assumed, every available square inch of space was filled with a neat flowing script.
It fell open on a date in February, inviting her to read but Pip knew she shouldn’t. Diaries were private, personal; everyone knew that. Reading another person’s diary was one of life’s most heinous offences. But it was also one of the most tantalising, and this one was almost forty years old and had been discarded in a box full of charity donations. Whatever rights to privacy there might have been once had surely been forfeited. Pip let herself read.
Friday 25th February
Sometimes I really hate Joan. I know we’re stuck here together with nowhere else to go and we have to make the best of a bad situation, but I swear she makes everything ten thousand times harder than it needs to be. And she’s such a cow to me. She does it on purpose, I’m sure she does – I can picture her sitting in her bedroom just thinking up new ways to torture me and poor little Scarlet, as if any of this mess is her fault.
But today her vileness reached new depths. Scarlet’s blanky disappeared. I know it’s only an old cot blanket and almost worn to rags, but Scarlet adores it. She carries it round with her all the time and she won’t go to sleep unless she’s holding it and rubbing its satin edge up against her darling little cheek.
Anyway, it was her nap time but there was no sign of blanky anywhere. She cried as if her tiny little heart would break. I tried comforting her but she was having none of it. I gave her no end of other things to hug but nothing else would do. And the more tired she got the worse state she got herself into. So I asked Joan if she could help me find it, but she refused and kept going on about how it was irresponsible of me to let Scarlet get so attached to one thing. She couldn’t have been more cruel about it. And all this time poor darling Scarlet was screaming and screaming as if someone was trying to murder her. In the end, she got beyond herself and just cried herself to sleep in my arms. She was completely exhausted by the whole ordeal.