Paul Braddon: The Actuality

Evie crosses the parquet and comes to a stop in front of them, not sure what to do with herself, as, despite the size of the room, there is only this group of seats, and they are all taken.

They are all looking at her, including her husband and Daniels, who remains beside the door. Should I say something? she asks Simon. Being the centre of attention from so many people is terrifying. The sunlight through the glass dome above warms her face. It is like being under a spotlight.

No, let them begin. Easy advice to give. But she feels fairly alone here and anything is something.

‘So, you are Evie,’ the policewoman says, as if her presence is to clear up an inconvenient mystery, like in an old-style whodunnit. ‘We’ve heard all about you.’

Evie nods, wondering what she can mean by this, and feels her anxiety mount.

‘I understand that you are Mr Davenport’s niece,’ the woman continues.

‘Yes,’ Evie says. She is so worried about putting a foot wrong, she can barely think. Why does her husband prefer to pretend her to be what she is not?

‘And how long have you lived here with Mr Davenport?’

She tries to calculate. If she came here as a small child then that would make her… but what age is a ‘small child’? Five or six? Nine or ten? She needs to come up with an answer.

‘Since your parents died, I’ve been told,’ the woman continues.

‘Since my parents died,’ Evie repeats, not sure whether she should feign sorrow or whether that would just make them more suspicious.

‘In a hova collision,’ the woman adds. ‘Mid-air, at high speed apparently as well, very sad, too many reckless drivers and usually without insurance.’ She frowns. ‘Evie, you are a lucky girl to have such a kind uncle in Mr Davenport. This is quite a paradise to have grown up in.’ She glances towards the garden, which, although bare, is burnished with a golden glow. ‘Most orphans don’t get to live in such a lovely home.’

‘I guess not,’ she says. The mention of orphans makes her recall her husband’s early gift to her of a collector’s edition of Jane Eyre – feeling very much at that moment like Jane herself being interrogated by her aunt.

‘And where did you go to school?’

School? In her panic, Evie’s mind fills with an image of plainly dressed girls in the hall at Lowood – Jane’s school in the Brontë novel. If only she’d used her plentiful time to read more widely. How many hours has she spent gazing into space, rather than educating herself? She glances over to her husband but he is staring at his knees. She thinks of saying that she didn’t go to school, which is of course the truth, but fears that will lead to even harder questions. The silence is oppressive. ‘Lowood,’ she murmurs, loathing herself for not being able to do better. Ashamed by her failure after all these years to even start to patch up her ignorance of the outside world. The seeds of early curiosity smothered by the lack of any opportunity to visit it.

Oh dear , Simon says and Matthew draws breath. She is falling short of even their minimal expectations.

‘Lowood? I haven’t heard of it – is it outside the borough?’ the woman asks cheerily.

‘It’s a boarding school,’ she murmurs. If the streets down there are as bad as Daniels tells her, then the rich, kind Mr Davenport would surely send his precious niece somewhere better. ‘It was very good,’ she says, feeling the temptation to fill the silence. ‘I had lovely teachers, who taught me amazing things.’

‘How nice for you,’ the woman replies. ‘It sounds like you did better than most. It is sadly the case that in many schools, girls are being prepared for nothing more than the production line or domestic servitude. I hope all the commotion last night didn’t interrupt your sleep.’

‘No,’ she says, mechanically, finding a question at last which is simple to answer and coming up with one of Daniel’s platitudes. ‘It’s better to be safe than sorry.’

‘Exactly. And this visit is just to follow up, to make sure that no one has seen anything suspicious.’ The woman is talking down to her, she is certain of it; it is easy to recognise because it is something she is used to.

Shall we tell her about the hovacar? she asks Simon inwardly, hoping he will say no, but not wanting to make the decision alone.

No, we’ll keep that to ourselves , he murmurs, his tone sounding far from certain.

‘I’ve not seen anything suspicious,’ she says quietly, trying to come across as if she isn’t concealing anything, which is much harder when one is.

The woman stares at her quizzically, her head slightly on one side, while Evie shuffles from one foot to the other. She thinks the woman is about to announce that she has seen through all her lies, but instead she sighs and looks down.

‘Well, I think we’re done,’ she says. ‘Now that we’ve met everyone, we can be on our way.’

Evie breathes out, a wave of relief washing through her.

The woman collects her bag from the floor and lays it on her lap. ‘So, tell me Evie,’ she says as she searches inside, ‘what are your plans?’

‘My plans?’ She dropped her defences too soon. This was meant to be over.

‘For when you leave?’

Leave? What is she asking?

The policewoman glances at her companion who slouches more deeply still. ‘I was only thinking that as a young woman, you’d be wanting at some point to make a life of your own. Build a career… Who knows, one day get married and even, if you are lucky and I know it’s not so easy these days, have a family.’

She may be trying to trick you , Simon says.

The woman waits for her reply.

What do I say? She can’t answer that none of these options are a possibility for her.

I don’t know, but come up with something, she’s staring at you like you’ve a spring loose.

Behind her, Daniels shuffles his feet and the doorframe creaks against his back.

‘I don’t ever want to leave,’ she murmurs in a rush, tangling her words in the effort to get them out. It is a surprise she is intelligible at all.

‘No?’ the woman says. Her lips form a ring and she makes a hollow laugh. ‘Never! It’s really as good here as that! Well! Congratulations to Mr Davenport,’ looking across at him, ‘I think he should win a prize. Maybe he’ll let us all move in.’

Daniels shows the police out and while he waits, arms folded, watching the door to the elevator slide across, Evie walks slowly to the threshold and stands in the doorway gazing out. The lobby is windowless, carpeted and anonymous, mysterious to her – the foreshore of an unexplored land. She has never gone further than this point, has been prohibited from doing so from Day One.

Daniels turns and, seeing her there, gives her a small, sad smile, the meaning of which is unclear, before ushering her back inside.

‘How did I do?’ she asks. She has been hoping for reassurance and an explanation as to what is going on, and his gloom makes the need even more pressing.

‘Great, you did great.’ He walks down the corridor towards the library and closes the door behind him, before she can follow him in.

She listens with her ear to the panel but Daniels and her husband are the other side of the room and talking too quietly for even her to hear.

She quickly goes outside via the kitchen and tiptoes back along the exterior wall until she reaches the library window where she stops behind the thick trunk of the Empress palm.

‘What interest do these people possibly have in us?’ she hears Matthew ask, standing with his stomach against the sill, staring out. ‘I just don’t get it.’ He is perplexed and indignant and she thinks even a little shaken too. He is not used to being invaded.