Free The Jeweller's Skin by Ruth Valentine Page B

There, she thought, they’ll never know he was here.  Then she took off the nightdress, and laid it, carefully folded, at the head.  The red was fierce against the dark blue.
    She put on the white drawers and petticoat.  They were much too big, but the cotton felt pleasantly crisp still from the laundry.  Dressed in the woman’s underclothes, she took the duster, and wiped the top of the chest of drawers, the back of the upright chair, the night-table.  In the back of her mind the young married woman she’d been was indignant at having to learn such menial work.  I am not Narcisa, she told this person: I am Florence Parsons.  She opened the window and flapped the rug outside, singing an old song under her breath, pretending that the words were in English.
    Her mother joined in.  She didn’t see her at first, but heard her voice, sweetened and amplified in the narrow room.  When she turned from dusting the mirror her mother was there, in the armchair, very pale in her grey turn-of-the-century dress.
    She began to weep.  ‘I thought you’d gone,’ she said.
    Her mother went on singing.
    ‘I’m not that woman,’ Narcisa said, and took off the clothes.  ‘Look,’ she begged, naked.  ‘You can see I’m Narcisa.’
    Her mother looked steadily at her breasts and the stretch marks on her belly.
    ‘I know,’ she said, ‘I know, but I couldn’t help it.’
    Her mother stood up and Narcisa rushed forward to hug her.  She fell onto the empty chair, and howled, over and over, beating her forehead on the upholstered seat.
    Then the door opened.  There were hands gripping her arms, and shouting voices.

Part 3
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    1946
    -
    1947
     

After effects
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    The snow had stopped.  On the pavements the morning’s covering had been scuffed to slush.  The roadway was already clear, with a black sheen that might soon turn to ice.  Most of the roofs on the High Street were patterned in white with the outline of the slates; only the pub, where the upstairs room must be warmed, and Johnson’s the draper’s were dark, with little slicks of white snow at the edges.
    The town was not unattractive like this, Anthony thought, looking out from the window of the Warming Pan Tearoom.  The clock-tower outlined in snow was rather fun.  The street was wide: he seemed to remember a market.  Still, you would never think it was so near London. A country town; narrow, he supposed, conservative, in the way of such places.  And burdened with the asylums - five, were there?  What on earth had possessed the LCC to build so many?
    ‘You wouldn’t like a pot of tea while you wait, sir?’  The waitress was middle-aged - his age, he supposed - with dyed black hair and that dry, lined skin that women seemed to have when they smoked a lot.
    ‘Perhaps I will; that’s a good idea, thank you.’  He watched while she fussed with the crockery.  She was bored, he supposed.  And then men didn’t come in on their own, did they?  It was a women’s place, for chatting in; no doubt she thought he would be feeling awkward. 
    ‘A bit better this afternoon,’ she said, bringing the tray.
    ‘You know, I rather like it like this,’ he said.  She unloaded the tea-things and arranged them in front of him.  ‘Makes me feel like skiving off and tobogganing.’
    She straightened and laughed, a hoarse guttural laugh, incredulous.
    ‘Didn’t you ever do that when you were a child?’  He was being personal, but he knew she would like it: a tough woman nobody asked about her childhood.
    She put the tray down on the next table.   ‘Oh, I’m not from round here,’ she said.  ‘I’m a Londoner.  Borough, I grew up, right near the market.’
    ‘Not far from the river,’ he began to say; but from the corner of his eye he saw Narcisa, leaning her bicycle against the lamp-post.  ‘Here’s your friend, then,’ the waitress said in her professional voice, as the