Free And When She Was Good by Laura Lippman Page B

governor, one of a group of women released for their violent crimes after the circumstances were shown to be connected to domestic violence, Audrey had somehow come across the Women’s Full Employment Network and taken the firm at its word. She was a woman. She needed full employment, and no one would hire her.
    Heloise was touched, but Audrey was not suitable for one of the six positions she kept on her roster, all of which were labeled “legislative liaison.” It grieved Heloise to judge another woman this way, but Audrey was unattractive, with thick glasses and hair worn in the most unflattering braids, crowning her head. In a film one would take off the glasses, release the hair, and a beauty would be revealed. In real life, Audrey without her glasses had the sleepy, unfocused eyes of a newborn kitten, and her hair, when loose, was a Medusa-like mass. There would be no transformation.
    Not that it mattered. Audrey disapproved of adultery. She had been faithful to a very bad husband. Certainly, more fortunate men and women should be able to maintain their vows. So when Heloise softened and decided to give her a job, it was simply as the “au pair,” although Scott was in grade school and needed little supervision. The whole point of Heloise’s job was to work a schedule that allowed her as much time with Scott as possible.
    Audrey was sheltered. Audrey was a small-town girl. But she was not stupid. She sussed out Heloise’s real job just as she sussed out everything else in life—by watching television. All it took was one Tori Spelling movie on Lifetime and Audrey had figured it out. A straight shooter, she came to Heloise the next day and said, “You’re running an escort service, aren’t you?”
    â€œI am running a lobbying firm dedicated to women’s issues, primarily pay equity.”
    â€œDo the girls who work for you—do they have sex for money?”
    â€œThat’s illegal, Audrey. My girls meet with men who have the power to change things and use their best persuasive skills to convince them to introduce legislation that could help us toward our goal.”
    Audrey’s eyes, behind her glasses, goggled. An old cartoon jingle flitted through Heloise’s mind. Barney Google with the goo-goo-googly eyes. She flinched at the memory, then pinned down the reason: Hector Lewis used to sing it, tunelessly, when tending to some small chore. He did only small chores.
    â€œHeloise, please don’t lie to me,” Audrey said. “I owe you everything. You gave me a job when no one else wanted to hire me. You trust me with your son. Trust me with this.”
    But Heloise couldn’t, not right away. She told Audrey that WFEN was highly specialized, that it might seem to be similar to an escort service, but it was serious. Deadly serious. She said that Tori Spelling movies were not very realistic, in her experience. (She was right about that. Later she caught the film that had sparked Audrey’s curiosity, and it had much more in common with the turn-of-the-century melodramas about virtuous young things who can’t pay the rent and fall into bad company. She gave Audrey a copy of Sister Carrie, hoping to improve her mind.)
    Still, Audrey had put her finger on something key: Heloise trusted her with the most precious person in her life. But that was part of the problem, too. Audrey had to be Scott’s buffer. It was dangerous for anyone close to Scott to know everything about Heloise. Compartmentalize, compartmentalize, compartmentalize. Sometimes she felt that her entire life was about creating boxes and storing pieces of herself in each one. She never got the boxes mixed up, but it required ferocious concentration on her part, an eternal vigilance. How could she trust anyone else to keep it straight? No one else had as much to lose.
    A few months after their conversation, Audrey was driving Scott home from school in Heloise’s car, a nice