It does not surprise Molly to find Blue collapsed in the passageway. The girl is pale and shaken, and Sabina tries to rush to her but is slowed by the water. Molly reaches Blue first, asks if she is all right, and follows her gaze along the torchlit corridor to see if she can spot what Blue is staring at.
It is empty. The door to Milton’s bedroom is shut tight, so too those of the therapy and art rooms. There is nothing there, nothing but a sour, sharp smell that stings Molly’s nose. Nothing but a cool feel to the air that makes her skin prickle in gooseflesh, makes the hairs on her neck and arms lift.
There is nothing there.
The same phrase had been her mantra last night when she had seen the spectral-pale Milton rifling through the filing cabinet, looking for God knows what. It is the same phrase she repeated to Joshua just that morning, when she told him what she had seen, and he had spooked and she had reassured him. There was nothing there, not one shred of proof that they had done anything other than run a retreat and run it well.
Still, Joshua had wanted to get rid of the last thing they had, the one thing that Molly could cradle to her chest at night when that house was quiet and she was awake, alone with her own grief, her own disappointment, and remind herself that once she had had it all. He wanted her to destroy Eleanor’s photograph.
Molly would sooner burn every photo she had taken of her dearest guests, every picture of them sleeping and resting and proving that she was just as good a carer as they needed her to be. She would rather tear every page from the guestbook, delete every online review. She would not give up that photograph.
And she did not tell Joshua that Blue had seen it. Nor would she.
Muscle memory takes over now; habit takes over. Molly sees that Blue is upset, and she waves her into the kitchen. Her voice tells the girl to sit down, rest, not to push herself, whilst her feet carry her to the Aga, where there is still some warm soup in the pan. Molly’s mind is on other things. As her body moves and mouth speaks, her thoughts remind her that Blue is the cause of all this. She pulls out a smaller pan. Fills it with milk and powdered cocoa.
The kitchen is lit by thick white candles. Molly strikes a match, starts to light those that went out when the door opened and the draught swept through. She says that she thought Blue was asleep, and Blue says yes, but she needed a drink and will just get one now quickly if that’s OK and then go back to bed and Sabina says, in a voice that’s too bright for the circumstances, that it’s a good idea, that she’ll go too because they’re all so tired and need their sleep.
Molly knows she is being lied to. Did Sabina think she wouldn’t notice the rucksack and boots? It is clear to her that Blue has said something, enough to put Sabina on edge, perhaps even enough to win over the old man.
A bubble of laughter is caught in her throat. I have seen you lying helpless in your bed, Molly thinks. I have stood over you whilst you slept; I could have hurt you, but I didn’t. I cared for you, I tried to love you. Molly wonders if she has caught a fever, if the rain has made her body ill and her thoughts hot. If her racing mind and racing pulse are symptoms of malady or madness. She wonders if Sabina thinks her stupid.
Sabina tells her it’s best if they all go to bed, that the worst of the flood has been dealt with, that some sleep will do them good and they can all pitch in to help in the morning when Joshua will be up and hopefully well enough to talk.
Molly is far from stupid. She catches the look Sabina throws to Blue, the silent communication that Molly’s husband of twenty years is out of action, that somehow this makes them safe. Molly will not be bamboozled by another woman’s quick tongue and sidelong looks. She tells Blue that Joshua is exhausted after his effort to find her, but he’s all right, though so tired he could barely string a sentence together before he fell asleep, warm and safe, in his bed. Molly says she feels so much calmer now her husband is home. All the while her thoughts scream that this is all Blue’s doing and how dare she look at Molly with those amber and turquoise eyes as though she’s innocent.
Molly is calm, despite her strange fervour, despite her sick head. Joshua told her everything that happened out there in the woods. And Molly will deal with it.
She wants to laugh in Blue’s face. She wants to slap her.
She does neither.
What was it Joshua always says? Take opportunity when it comes because hell only knows when it will come again. It’s how he did so well in business, it’s how they came to buy this fine house, it’s how they found their sweet daughter. You see an opportunity, and you take it. You see a stock priced too low, and you buy it; you see a house that’s been deserted, and you bid on it; you go back to work after your fourth round of failed IVF, and your first patient is a scrawny young man who can barely look after himself, let alone his young sister who needs a mother not a brother. So you give him enough methadone to end his struggle, forever. And you find that child in need of a mother not a brother, rescue her before word gets out that her brother is dead, before social services know she’s in dire need or the police come knocking on her door, or her neighbours try to look after her themselves, and you mother her. You mother her. And in time, the girl will be grateful for it. She will learn to love you back.
Sit down, and I’ll make you some food, too, Molly says, and Blue hides her shock very well. She doesn’t want to impose, she replies, and there is all this water around, and Molly probably wants to get back to Joshua. Molly says it’s no imposition, that Joshua is asleep, and Molly has already fed Sabina and would like to feed Blue, too. Have some soup with me, Molly says. Have some warm cocoa to help you sleep. Molly adds, with well-practised tears in her eyes and a voice that really does sound like she cares for them and doesn’t know precisely what Blue did to her husband, that she feels lonely and could do with the company.
The candles flicker yellow light on the walls and the windows and the faces of the women. Outside there is light rain and strong wind. Joshua is safe, and Molly is calm, and the weather need not be feared. Water can reveal things, and it can hide things, and it can give you time. The flood is an opportunity.
Sit down and eat, Molly says, and then you can sleep for as long as you want.