The Darkening Hour (27 page)

I get off the bus on Creek Road and walk along the High Street, avoiding the rubbish that’s collected on the pavement, recoiling at the ripe smells that always linger at
the end of a market day. I wish again that I lived in a more salubrious area. The possibility is vanishing fast, now my career’s taken a nose-dive.

By now I’m craving a piece of my white sliced bread and a cheese triangle – the only thing along with a martini that might afford some comfort when I get in.

I don’t like to ask Mona to buy the bread for me – it’s a pride thing – so I pop into the minimarket, grab some Kingsmill and a packet of The Laughing Cow cheeses and
move towards the counter where the lottery tickets and game things I never buy and don’t understand are on sale. At the end of the aisle I stop. There, talking to the person behind the
counter, is Mona, gesticulating, for all the world as though she belonged here.

I wait for Sayed to finish serving someone, then call him over.

‘Have you had any luck? Have you got any news of Ali?’

‘Been asking around,’ he tells me. ‘There’s a man who says he has contacts at an immigration detention centre up north. Says he can give you the details, but it’s
all a bit hush-hush. Don’t know why. He wants to meet you.’

My heart leaps.

‘Tell me more! Who is this man? What contacts? When—’

‘Hey, calm down, man. He
thinks
someone might have seen your Ali, he isn’t sure. A guy who sounds a bit like the way you describe. Dark skin, blue eyes. Moroccan Berber.
Seeking asylum over here. Ended up in detention – he’ll be waiting for the authorities to check over his application. But the guy who found him, Hamid, he’s cagey. I don’t
know what his business is. All I know is, he says if you want the info you need to meet him. You must take all your documents, passport and so on. He says he can’t do anything without those.
And he’ll need money.’

My heart sinks.

Ummu phoned only this morning to tell me the result of her scan.

‘They found something in my lung, Mona. It means I need an operation and some treatment. More cost, I’m afraid to say. They can do it soon, if you can just send as much money as
possible.’

‘How much?’ I ask Sayed.

‘He’ll tell you. He lives on the creek.’

‘Can you find out more?’

‘I can ring him if you like.’

‘Please.’

When he’s finished the call, Sayed looks at me. ‘He says he can meet by the statue of Peter the Great. I know where it is, can do you a map. One o’clock, tomorrow.’

I stare at Sayed. He looks so nice with his green eyes and his smiley face, I want to trust him. But has this Hamid really seen Ali, or is there some other thing going on? Do they want to use me
in some way? And why does he want my documents?

I’ve heard about women coming to Europe thinking they’ve found work, and then being forced to sell themselves. I’ve heard of others who have simply disappeared, their families
left distraught at the lack of contact. I’ve heard stories that make me grateful for everything Dora asks me to do, cleaning the toilets included.

I don’t want to put myself in a situation that might be far more dangerous. But if this man
has
seen Ali, if Ali is locked up unable to contact me, then . . . this might be our
only chance to find each other. One I can’t afford to lose. Thoughts race through my head as Sayed sketches a map on a piece of paper, showing me where the statue is on the river.

‘Meet there at one tomorrow,’ he says. ‘Bring all your stuff. Hamid was very clear about it: without your papers, he can’t help you. And, if you find your husband, you
won’t want to go back to that woman to work, will you? So you’ll need them. Or, if you’re found wandering undocumented, Immigration will have you out. Just like that.’

‘OK,’ I say, pushing the loaf into my bag, the cheese Dora will also want when she gets in. My heart speeds up. I know that even with my passport, it is illegal for me to look for
other work here. I came as Theodora’s domestic worker, and my visa forbids me to seek other employment. If I take this step, I’ll risk losing my right to stay here. But if Ali’s
in a detention centre he’ll be desperate. Lonely, waking every day longing for me to find him, to help get him out. He would do it for me! So I must do it for him.

‘What, so I need to be at the statue at one o’clock tomorrow? But who is this guy? How do I know he’s trustworthy? Is he your friend, Sayed?’

Sayed looks at me through his laughing green eyes and winks.

‘Not exactly a friend,’ he says. ‘I must admit. But he’s got contacts. And he might be your only hope.’

I take a step back and hover behind the Bombay Mix and the poppadoms as the man behind the counter passes a piece of paper to Mona.

He seems familiar with her – intimate, almost, the way he leans on the counter as if he wants to be closer to her. He points out of the door as if he is giving her directions, too. I move
around to the front of the aisle and approach them.

‘Tomorrow, then?’ the man is saying. ‘The statue is of Peter the Great.’

They’re arranging to meet, like me and Max, beside a statue! The statue of Peter the Great that I pass whenever I walk downriver to Greenwich.

Mona looks up. She gasps audibly and takes a step away as if I were about to bite her.

‘I came to get a magazine,’ I say, not wanting to admit to my bread compulsion.

The man at the counter has slicked-back black hair and oddly lit-up green eyes. I’ve never had a conversation with him. Now I see that he’s handsome with those lucent eyes and lips
that turn up at the corners as if he can’t help smiling.

I don’t make conversation with the shopkeepers in the High Street. A lot of them are crooks, running fronts for other businesses. There are dealers who hang around at night in their Audis
and BMWs, and the arches behind the High Street house dodgy enterprises run by heavy-looking gangsters whose paths you wouldn’t want to cross. I’m cautious about who I mix with around
here, and I’ve warned Mona to be circumspect too. I’m concerned for her that she’s mixing with someone who’s clearly not to be trusted.

‘I got your bread,’ Mona says. ‘Look – I have it here in my bag.’

She opens the big pink floral shopper she uses and shows me: she’s got Daddy’s fruit and some chocolate Christmas novelties, but she’s even remembered my bread, and the little
processed cheeses I’m ashamed to like so much. Stupidly, I find myself blushing.

‘Oh. That’s good,’ I say awkwardly. ‘So I can put these back.’

She shrugs. ‘As you like,’ she says.

I imagine she and the man exchange a look as I retreat, to put my purchases back on the shelves.

‘It’s gone six o’clock,’ I say into her ear. ‘You need to come on home or you’ll be late getting Daddy ready for bed.’

‘Yes,’ she says. ‘I know. Thank you, Sayed, for your help. I’ll see you tomorrow.’

‘Sure,’ he says.

As soon as we’re alone, walking towards my house, I speak.

‘You were arranging to meet that man?’

She lowers her head. ‘Sayed,’ she says. ‘Yes.’

‘Mona, you’re here to work. For me.’

‘But I’ll be meeting him at lunchtime,’ she says. ‘While Charles is having his sleep.’

I stop. Place a hand on her shoulder and turn her to face me. We’re under a tree whose roots have pushed up the paving stones, so that I, on the elevated part of the pavement, gain the
advantage by appearing quite a bit taller than her.

‘You can’t leave Daddy to sleep,’ I say. ‘What if he wakes up and wanders out? You have to stay in the house with him, now that Leo has gone.’

‘It would only be for an hour.’

‘Who makes the rules around here?’ I ask.

She hesitates, cowers a little.

‘You do,’ she says eventually.

‘Yes, I do. You’re not to chat with the local shopkeepers or to meet with them. It’s not what you’re here for. You’re here to work for me. Apart from anything else,
you know nothing about them. They could be dangerous. I’ve already told you.’

She stares at me, but she doesn’t object.

We arrive at my front door. The
putti
look on as I turn the key in the lock and Mona stands on the threshold as if hesitating about going in. I give her a little push, just a gentle one
to urge her to go ahead of me, but she stumbles on the step and falls forwards, putting out her hands to catch herself.

‘Oooh!’ she says.

To avoid tripping over myself, I step over her, my foot catching her thigh as I do so.

She stands up, gathering the shopping that’s tumbled out of the bag, and follows me.

In the kitchen I notice that she’s left the floor grimy. It looks as it used to before I employed her. She’s been slacking, just when I need the house to look its best for Max.

I get out a bowl, bleach, and a small, worn washing-up brush that I no longer use for the dishes. I hold out the brush and point at the tiles.

‘But your supper . . . Your father . . .’ she begins.

‘You are my
maid
,’ I remind her. ‘
You
don’t decide what you do and when.
I
do. You will clean this floor once you have put Daddy to
bed.’

She stares at me.

‘This is my house, Mona. I make the rules. It’s not your house. Not your street. Not your home. Mine.’

I hear her scrubbing the kitchen tiles until well into the evening. I consider saying she can stop now, but the thought of her in the shop laughing and making plans with Sayed
stops me.

When Mona’s finished, when the kitchen floor is to my liking, I tell her, ‘Tomorrow I want the drawing room tidied, and the ironing done. Oh, and by the way, you must press the
creases in the sheets when they’re folded. I want the house looking its best. Max is coming to stay.’

When she’s gone to bed, I take the bottle from the fridge, mix myself a martini and make myself a pile of my special cheese sandwiches.

Satisfied that I’ve dealt with Mona effectively, asserted my authority and put her back in her place, I take my drink through to the drawing room. The moment I sit down, however, I recall
a conversation I had with Leo shortly before he went to his father’s for Christmas. A conversation I’d dismissed.

He’d been sitting on the sofa eating a pizza out of the box and swigging at a can of Red Bull when I came in to help him wrap some gifts.

He didn’t look up when I entered, but simply grunted, ‘You know she’s leaving.’

‘What do you mean leaving?’ I demanded. ‘Where would she go?’

‘She wants to look for her husband.’

‘Leo, Mona is a widow.’

My son shook his head. ‘One of her stories,’ he said. ‘He’s alive somewhere, she just doesn’t know where.’

Are they all the same, these so-called maids? I thought. Wriggling their way into our houses to work under false pretences?

Mona’s face came back to me, the day she arrived. How she hadn’t looked as I had pictured her. What else had she told me that wasn’t true?

‘How do you know she’s leaving?’ I still didn’t believe it.

‘She told me she’s going to find her husband.’

‘Whatever Mona thinks, leaving’s impossible without my permission. She’s illegal here without me. Her visa precludes changing employer. Anyway, she can’t leave. I
can’t manage without her.’ I was taken aback by the desperation in my voice.

‘Find someone else?’ Leo shrugged.

It was all right for him. He had no responsibilities whatsoever.

‘It isn’t that easy!’ I snapped.

Leo was a mystery to me. Most of the time he didn’t speak to me, unless it was to ask for more beer or food or money. I assumed he didn’t notice what went on around him, that he was
oblivious to everything except his computer games and his violent films. But every now and again, he would make a comment that surprised me, something acerbic or astute, as if he’d woken
temporarily from a sort of coma with heightened perceptions.

‘What? Not easy to find someone Grandpa will put up with?’ he asked.

‘Yes, I suppose that is what I mean.’

‘It’s not surprising there aren’t people queuing up to clean big houses and change grumpy incontinent old people, is it?’ Leo said. ‘You’re right. You were
lucky to find Mona. It won’t be easy to find anyone else. Anyone better.’

But Mona’s lucky too, to have the job in the first place, I thought. I’d given her cupcakes, for goodness’ sake. I’d given her a comfy room with a garden view. And I was
paying her!

It occurred to me then that I did, in effect, own her. After all, Roger brought her here for me. She couldn’t have got into the country without him and couldn’t stay here without me.
She wouldn’t last a minute away from my house. If she tried to get away, all I had to do was tell the police – and she’d be straight back. She belonged to me!

‘She has to stay.’ I tried to sound calm. ‘As you point out, Daddy’s become very attached to her. No one else will do, it’ll confuse him.’

Max was coming soon: I needed Mona to take Daddy to Anita’s. As Leo took another swig of Red Bull, I said, ‘And it’s not as if you lift a finger to help. I can’t cope all
on my own, not with Daddy the way he is. And not unless you, Leo, either get a job or you start to help a bit more.’

‘I’ve got a job,’ he said then, knocking me sideways. ‘Starting when I get back from Dad’s. In a bar. And I’m thinking of moving out.’

‘Well, that’s good,’ I say slowly, shocked. ‘Which bar? How did you . . .?’ but he’d gone.

Now I go through to the kitchen, mix another martini, sit down and put my head in my hands. Why does Mona
want
to leave? Leo said she was looking for her husband. Then
why did she tell me she was a widow?

Doesn’t she realise that without me, she’ll be sent straight back where she came from? And I suspect – though I scarcely know what’s true and what isn’t about her
any more – that she would have no work if she did so. Whatever the story is, she should be grateful for all I’ve done for her, not shoving it back in my face!

She’s even planning to meet that shop man – and beside a statue! I don’t know why this detail bothers me so much, but it’s a fact that seems to mock me. She has stolen
something intimate from me, even if it is just a silly romantic notion – meeting beside a statue. Where did she get the idea? I remember Max’s text again, the one she had looked at. Has
she deliberately taken the idea and twisted it for her own amusement? It occurs to me she must have information on her mobile. I’ve taken her charger, so she can no longer use it. But I know
where she keeps it. Within seconds I’m scanning down through all her contacts, looking for clues, ideas, Ali’s number maybe. It’s hopeless, all in Arabic script. But then I spot
something and rage flares up in me. Max’s number! I look twice. Sure enough, she has Max’s mobile number on her phone. I think of the day of the dinner party when I found her in the
kitchen, looking at his message. So this is what she was up to!