Forget Me Not (19 page)

‘I feel it could be better,’ I agreed, glancing at the huge painted rainbow on the wall.

‘Milly’s comprehension is fine,’ I heard Mrs Avis say. ‘But she’s two and three-quarters so she should be able to form fairly coherent little sentences by now.’

‘I know.’ I looked out of the window at the colourful climbing frame with its red plastic slide. ‘But I suppose children develop at different rates.’

‘They do …’ Mrs Avis steepled her fingers. ‘But the thing that’s bothering us is that Milly’s using quite a bit of Spanish.’

‘Oh dear. Does she do that here too?’ Mrs Avis nodded. I sighed. ‘She’s picked it up from our Colombian au pair.’

‘Doesn’t she speak English?’

‘Not much. She goes to language school for three hours every morning but seems to be a very slow learner.’

‘So she speaks Spanish to Milly?’

‘All the time. I have mentioned it.’ I sighed. ‘But I’ll discuss it with her again – with Milly as interpreter. Anyway –’ I stood up, relieved that the problem wasn’t more serious – ‘I’m glad you told me.’

Mrs Avis was still sitting down. ‘But I’m afraid that’s not all. I’m sorry to say that there have been a couple of biting incidents lately involving Milly.’

I sank back on to the chair. ‘Milly bit someone? But she’s
never
done that. She’s very sweet-natured.’

‘Well – let me rephrase that: she tried to bite one of the other children – twice, actually – but was stopped.’

‘Who was it?’ I asked.

‘I can’t say, because with biting or hitting our policy is not to mention any names, but to deal with it ourselves.’

‘I see. Well, at least nothing really happened, as it turned out.’

‘No. But the reason why I wanted to talk to you is because I have wondered whether Milly’s current confusion over language is contributing to a degree of frustration which might be leading her to indulge in this sort of behaviour.’

‘Maybe,’ I said. ‘It’s possible.’ Or maybe it’s because she has an absentee father, I speculated miserably, and is destined for delinquency.

‘I just felt that you should know.’

‘Thank you.’ I stood up. ‘I’ll do what I can to make sure that it stops.’

‘It’s a big problem,’ I said to Dad a couple of days later. Luisa had gone swimming – I’d got her membership of my health club because they had a half-price offer on for Easter – Milly was in bed, and Dad and I were having supper. He comes round two or three times a week at the moment. I don’t mind, as he’s lonely, he’s still adjusting to London and I worry that he doesn’t eat properly when he’s on his own. ‘Milly’s never tried to bite
me
,’ I went on as I helped him to some potatoes. He still hadn’t had a haircut I noticed. It was well past his collar.

‘Would you consider getting a new au pair?’ Dad asked. I tried to imagine the house without Luisa’s warm presence.

‘Not unless I have to.’ I gave the French dressing a shake. ‘I like Luisa and Milly adores her. And she’s very careful about Milly’s egg allergy – so I trust her on that front. But she’s going to have to learn to speak English,’ I went on crossly. ‘That’s why she’s here after all.’

‘I’ve only ever heard her speaking Spanish,’ Dad said. ‘I’ve been amazed at how much of it Milly seems to understand.’

‘So have I, but little children soak it up at that age. I hope it’s good Spanish she’s picking up,’ I added anxiously. ‘With a nice accent and everything. But what Luisa’s doing at her language school I really don’t know.’

‘You need to find out,’ Dad said as I poured him a glass of burgundy.

‘I’ve been meaning to ring her teacher but he’s only there in the mornings and I don’t have his number.’

‘Can’t the school get it for you?’

‘They don’t give them out. Anyway, they’ve broken up for Easter until the end of next week.’

‘I know how you could check what she’s been doing.’

‘How?’

‘Easy. Just look in her exercise books.’

I helped myself to some salad. ‘I suppose so … But she keeps them in her room and I don’t like to snoop.’

‘How long has she been with you, Anna?’

‘Two and a half months,’ I replied dismally. ‘She arrived in late January.’

Dad flicked out his napkin. ‘Then I think you have the right to … investigate. Firstly, you’ve paid for her course and secondly, her failure to speak English is causing Milly behavioural and learning problems.’

Put like that, I was convinced. So on Good Friday, when Luisa was going to see a film with a friend, I waved her goodbye, bundled Milly off to bed, then, feeling treacherous, sped up to the third floor.

Luisa’s bedroom door was shut. I gently turned the handle and pushed it open. The room was immaculately tidy – I was impressed. The bed was made, with the bedspread pulled up and the cushions arranged neatly on top. The floor was clear, apart from her guitar, which was leaning in the corner, and a pile of sheet music. I flicked through it. She’d been learning classic ballads by Nanci Griffith, Joan Armatrading, and Don McLean.

I advanced into the room, my heart pounding, one ear alert for Luisa’s unexpected return. I quickly scanned the room for her blue book bag, but couldn’t see it. She was so tidy that she’d left nothing out. All there was was a photo of her parents standing outside their small farmhouse in Bogotá, her hairbrush and a couple of books. On top of the wardrobe was the little blue suitcase she’d arrived with. I opened the wardrobe door. I looked among her shoes for the bag but it wasn’t there, then I lifted my eyes. To my surprise the wardrobe was quite full – she must have bought some new clothes; and now I thought about it I realised that she had been looking smarter of late. There were a couple of silk shirts, a Chanel-type jacket, a navy pea-coat, which was infinitely nicer than her puffa jacket, and a glamorous-looking evening dress. I fingered the red velvet – then looked at the label: Joseph.

‘How could she afford that?’ I heard myself say.

I shut the wardrobe door and continued my search. I peered under the bed, but could see only her slippers. I looked under the dressing table, but her book bag wasn’t there. Now I went to the chest of drawers. On top of it was the small TV, in the top drawer was just her underwear, neatly folded, then in the one below her T-shirts and trousers, and a couple of jumpers. I opened the bottom drawer and there it was – her blue rucksack. I pulled it out and as I examined its contents my heart sank. The large English textbook had hardly been opened and the two exercise books were blank, except for three or four pages of simple vocab.

‘She’s done
nothing
,’ I breathed through clenched teeth. And I was just about to put the bag back, wondering how to confront her about the issue without letting on that I’d snooped, when something caught my eye – a gold biscuit tin, which had been pushed to the back of the drawer. Fury with Luisa overcame any finer feelings about respecting her privacy. I prised off the lid.

‘Good
God
…’

Inside was a thick wad of fifty-pound notes. I did a rough count – there were about eighty of them – four thousand pounds. I put the lid back on it, my head spinning. So that explained the new clothes and the presents she’d bought for Milly. But where could she have got so much cash?

Suddenly I heard Milly cry. Heart pounding, I put the tin back where I’d found it, shut the bedroom door and ran downstairs.

‘What’s the matter?’ I panted.

‘Want poo,’ she whimpered.

‘Don’t worry, darling.’ I went to lift her out.

‘No,’ she protested. ‘Want
Pu
.’

‘I don’t understand, sweetie.’

‘Winnie
el Pu
! Want
music
!’ Milly pointed to the end of her cot, strapped to which, I now saw, was a brand-new ‘Winnie the Pooh’ musical
son et lumière
box.

‘Did Luisa give you this?’ I asked wearily.

‘
Sí
, Mummy.’

‘Oh. Well …’

‘
Música, Momia
! NOW!’

‘OK … OK. Here we go.’ I wound it up, settled Milly down again, then tiptoed out as the music tinkled forth and the light box cast moving shadows on to the ceiling of Tigger, Piglet and Pooh with his pot of honey.

‘Nighty night, darling,’ I called out softly.

‘Buenas noches, Mamaíta!’ she said.

SEVEN

‘Does she have a part-time job?’ Cassie asked as we sat in her tiny, chintzy sitting room in Chelsea the following Tuesday evening. I’d dropped in on my way back from The Boltons to ask her advice: Cassie may lack judgement, but she’s far worldlier than I am and knows the casual employment market better. ‘Does she work in a bar, for instance?’

‘No.’

‘Would she tell you if she did?’

‘She’d have no reason to conceal it.’

‘She might think you’d worry that she’d be too tired to help you.’

‘True, but even if she didn’t tell me I’d know because she’d come back very late, reeking of booze and smoke.’

‘But she must be doing
something
because she goes to college in the mornings, right.’

‘Yes. Every weekday morning.’ I felt a stab of annoyance that I’d paid all her fees when she had more cash than I did. I felt even more irritated about the health club, though to be fair to Luisa, she had vigorously resisted my offer to pay the subscription.

Cassie picked up her glass of champagne – it’s the only thing she drinks. ‘Then she looks after Milly until … ?’

‘Five thirty.’

‘Which just leaves nights and weekends.’ She sipped her champagne, then narrowed her eyes. ‘Do you think she’s on the game?’

I stared at her. ‘No – she’s not … like that.’

‘Having met her, I’d tend to agree, but’ – she raised a suggestive eyebrow – ‘still waters and all that.’

‘But Luisa doesn’t go out a lot in the evenings; sometimes she meets a friend, but she’s often at home just playing the guitar or watching her TV. I assumed she couldn’t afford to go out much.’

Cassie picked up her knitting – a wedge of bubblegum-pink yarn hung off one needle. ‘Bank heist?’ she suggested as she looped the wool round her forefinger.

‘No. And I’m sure she hasn’t been mugging old ladies either – or shoplifting. Perhaps she’s had a lottery win – does that pay out in cash?’

Cassie shook her head. ‘Cheque. I once won five hundred pounds so I know.’ She turned the needles round and began a new row. ‘Maybe she’s been gambling. When I was a croupier there was a nanny who made eight thousand pounds in one night from three games of blackjack with an initial stake of ten pounds.’

‘I can’t imagine Luisa in a casino. But she had four thousand pounds left,’ I went on. ‘And she must have spent at least a thousand, with the new clothes she’s bought and her mobile phone bill and other things – so that’s five thousand she had to start with. How could she have saved five grand in just three months on seventy pounds a week au pair’s pocket money?’

‘She couldn’t have done. Knit one, purl one …’ Cassie looked up. ‘So, as I say, it’s got to be drugs. Blast – I’ve dropped a stitch … she’s from Colombia after all. What do her parents do?’

‘They’re … farmers,’ I said. ‘Oh.’

‘That’s it then – she’s selling cocaine. I don’t know why you hadn’t thought of that.’

‘Because she doesn’t seem … the type.’

Cassie shook her head. ‘It’s not always easy to tell. Plus she lived in Marbella, didn’t she?’

‘Yes. With her last family.’

‘Well, there’s a lot of it over there.’ I suddenly remembered the husband’s remark about Luisa hoping for ‘better opportunities’ in London. Cassie frowned at the knitting. ‘Damn – I’ve got the tension wrong. I’d have another little snoop if I were you.’

When I got back I asked Luisa to take Milly to the park, then I ran upstairs to her room, this time without a shred of guilt. Because if Luisa
were
selling drugs and were caught, and it somehow got into the papers, the negative publicity could ruin my business. I imagined the headlines – the tabloids would milk the GMTV connection, however slight – BREAKFAST TELLY GARDENER IN COKE BUST! More important, if Milly were to find any and swallow them … I shuddered.

I quickly went through Luisa’s drawers again. I opened the gold tin and saw that she’d made another
£
300 in just the last few days. Then I began searching for little packets of white powder. I opened the wardrobe, and checked in her pockets and shoes. I searched her guitar case and even inside her guitar, and in her CDs, and inspected her books in case any were fake. I looked in her suitcase, her jewellery box and ran my hands along the top of the pelmet, but all this produced was a little blizzard of dust.

Perhaps there was an innocent explanation? I wondered, as I pushed on the door of Head Girls, my local hairdresser, two days later. My nose wrinkled at the ammoniac aroma of bleach. Perhaps Luisa’s parents, knowing that she was going to be in Europe for at least two years, had given her the cash as an emergency float. Or perhaps it was money she’d saved from her last job. In which case why, when we had discussed the costs of her language course, had she given me the firm impression that she was broke? No, she’d obviously accumulated this money recently. But how?

I couldn’t possibly ask her outright as she might leave, then I’d have no help – plus I didn’t want her to go unless it was unavoidable. Nor was I going to accuse her of anything without proof – that would make me no better than Citronella. If Milly were a year younger, I could pretend that she’d wandered into Luisa’s room and found it, but at nearly three, Milly was likely to deny that she’d done any such thing.

As I sat in the waiting area, listening to the buzz of the dryers, I picked up a copy of
I Say!
magazine and read the True Life Confessions with thrilled disgust. ‘My Gran Stole My Man!’; ‘My Husband Swapped Me for a Porsche!’; ‘My Mum’s Secret Life!’. I’m afraid I lap up such stories when I get the chance, which is usually only at the hairdresser’s. I shuddered. ‘My Boyfriend Was Eaten by a Shark!’

‘Hi, Anna,’ said Sandra. ‘I haven’t seen you for so long I thought you’d defected to another salon.’