Grace restrains herself. She almost blames herself. She should have known that Betty would pull a stunt like this. It is all her fault. She has to rectify the situation.
‘Of course you could do that. But just one thing in my experience; they deny it, which is fine, but without conclusive proof you have nothing.’
‘That’s true. If he is cheating he’s bound to deny it. I mean, if he is cheating then he’s being devious and so another lie won’t mean anything to him.’
‘But what if he’s innocent?’ Betty asks. She has stopped thinking, and she’s lost control of herself. She is just a mouthpiece for the part of her she has been trying to suppress.
‘Well, I don’t think—’
‘Then I will find that out for her. Which would be wonderful really.’ Grace’s smile is almost cracking her face.
‘Yeah, but what if he’s not cheating and then he meets you and he propositions you? Then he’ll be seen as a cheat, but he wasn’t cheating before.’ Betty digs her nails into her palm, but that doesn’t seem to help.
‘The chances are that if he does proposition me, he has cheated before. Why would he, otherwise?’
‘Mrs X, excuse me but have you taken a good look at her?’ Mrs X appears confused, but stares at Grace. ‘She is simply stunning, isn’t she?’ Mrs X nods. ‘Well, I don’t think that it’s any reflection on you if a woman like Grace turns up, looking amazing, and starts flattering your husband and he falls for it. Most men would. I am not saying that you shouldn’t find out for sure, but you really think sending her in is a good idea?’ Betty knows that she has just signed her own death warrant. She is angry with herself but she is still unable to stop. All her frustrations about Grace’s job come tumbling out, along with anger at the previous night. She is a slave to her emotions.
‘Well, I really don’t...’ Mrs X tails off and Grace feels totally inadequate. She knows she is not the most intelligent person in the world but she never thought that anyone would run rings around her the way Betty is doing.
‘Yes, but that isn’t how it works. There has to be suspicion. Suspicion, if it’s genuine (which in this case I can tell it is), has to be caused. It doesn’t just appear and it always has foundation. Now, it might be that he is having problems at work that he isn’t telling you, but that is what I will discover.’
‘I just don’t think that you should put your family at risk,’ Betty says, unable to see how that will rectify the situation but hoping it will, somehow.
‘Betty, shut up, please,’ Grace replies angrily.
‘Because it is a risk, as I discovered last night. You turn up in your sexy outfit, and you let the men drool all over you while you flatter them and pander to them and then you say that they are the cheats. You’re the cheater. Agent provocateur.’ Betty looks at her shoes; she is almost cowering from her words.
‘How dare you? How dare you?’ Grace is on her feet, Betty is as well. The client sits and stares in shock. Suddenly Grace remembers where she is.
‘I am so sorry. Mrs X, this is unforgivable, not to mention unprofessional behaviour. I’m sure you wouldn’t hire me in a thousand years after that little tirade, so we’ll leave now.’ Without giving the open-mouthed Mrs X a chance to reply, Grace roughly grabs Betty by the arm and marches her out of the house.
‘How fucking dare you?’ she screams when they are on the pavement. She had plenty of fights when she was younger, screaming and physical ones. She actually is something of an expert.
‘How dare I? How dare you? Firstly you try to turn me into the same sort of tart as you last night, then you pretend to be sympathetic to a woman who has a nice home, a husband and two children just so you can wreck her happiness.’
‘She doesn’t seem very happy, does she? Last night was because you were being so superior. I heard the condescending tone in your voice, the disapproval dripping out of you. Well, you can afford it, can’t you, with your perfect marriage, but did it ever occur to you that others aren’t quite as fortunate?’
‘And did it ever, ever occur to you that you should leave people alone to work out their own problems?’
‘It’s so easy for you, isn’t it? The world you live in, people are nicer to each other. They don’t cheat or bully. But not everyone has it that way.’
‘You know nothing about me.’ Grace is stunned by the intensity in Betty’s voice. Her words are ringing in her ears. Marriage wrecker. She looks at her and wonders why she hates her so much. Was it really the chino man? She suspects it is more than that. The old Grace is making a brief appearance. Here for one time only. She squares up to Betty. ‘And you know nothing about me.’ She pulls her arm back and slaps Betty hard round the-face.
Grace has not hit anyone since she left school, and then it was only to defend herself. Betty has had her hair pulled, been called thousands of names, but she has never been slapped. The rain is getting heavier as they both stand there, shocked, surprised, unsure of where to go now.
‘You bitch,’ Betty hisses, choking back tears.
‘You deserved it,’ Grace replies. She is also close to crying. She is no longer going to be bullied. Never again. They stare at each other for a few moments before turning on their heels and walking away in opposite directions.
Grace turns the corner and leans against a wall. She feels winded, and she has no idea what happened. She knows that she looks a sight, dripping wet and almost hyperventilating, so when she spots a coffee shop she goes inside and orders an espresso. She sits down, still shaking with rage and cold, and pulls out her phone.
‘Nicole,’ she says before the tears get the better of her.
She finds a taxi. Nicole talked to her as if she were a child, and although that was unfamiliar, it was comforting. She arrives home and goes inside. Ten minutes later, the buzzer goes and Nicole is there.
‘I’m sorry,’ Grace says, and she tells her the whole story.
Nicole does not have children, but she has maternal instincts. As Grace is recounting the full horror of her week with Betty, Nicole manages to run her a bath, get her to take her wet clothes off, and then put her in the bath. She sits on the loo seat next to her, listening.
‘When you called me that first day, I should have talked you into calling it quits.’
‘I didn’t know this would happen. Anyway, I should never have done what I did last night.’
‘No, you shouldn’t, because you were working, Grace, and that comes before getting your own back, but I understand. I can’t believe she asked you if you slept with the men. I can’t believe she called you a marriage wrecker.’
‘And a slut.’
‘And, what else was it?’
‘Agent provocateur.’
‘That’s quite funny. Sorry, Grace. Anyway, there is no need to worry. We’re pulling out and I’ve a good mind to sue Modern Woman for the lost job.’
‘I should have been able to save it.’
‘No, you shouldn’t. Now stop beating yourself up. It’s over. Finite. Now get out of the bath before you turn into a prune, and I’ll get some coffee.’
‘I’m sorry to drag you away from the office.’
‘Oh, for God’s sake, stop apologising. It’s a quiet day in the land of the spies.’
Later, when Nicole gets back to her office, she calls Modern Woman and informs Fiona that she will no longer do the profile. And she tells her why. Leaving nothing, especially her anger, out.
Betty makes her way home, desperately trying to find a cab. Typically, they are all full on a rainy London afternoon, so she hikes until she finds a tube station. It takes her forty-five minutes to get to her stop and she is feeling wretched and uncomfortable. As soon as she gets in, she takes a hot bath, she puts on her dressing gown and she crawls under her duvet where she cries herself to sleep, ignoring Fiona’s angry voice on her answer machine.
Chapter Twelve
‘I can’t believe it,’ Johnny says when Betty tells him what happened that day. ‘I mean, why did you lose i
t so badly?’
‘Firstly I was still angry at her making me part of her job, and then you should have heard her. She was advising this woman to get her to honey trap her husband. The woman had two kids and had been married for ten years. Ten years. She suspects him of having an affair and I just suggested that she should confront him rather than hire her.’ Betty is trying to justify to herself, and to Johnny, her outburst.
‘Baby, you’re supposed to be doing an article on this woman and honey trapping, not ruining her business.’
‘But she has been so awful.’
‘I know, but it’s not professional.’
‘I could lose my job.’
‘Don’t be silly. Fiona won’t fire you.’
‘But there is no way we can continue this article.’
‘Look, persuade Fiona to get someone else to do this one and you can do another, feature. I know how much you resented having to do it in the first place.’
‘You know it hasn’t always been easy for me, not the way she said, but since I met you, well, everything’s been so perfect.’
‘I love you so much, Mrs Parkin.’
‘I know, and I love you too.’
‘You hit her?’ Eddie (who has been called over as an emergency comforter) looks horrified. He is seeing more of Grace than ever, but he is not sure he likes the reason behind it.
‘She deserved it. She told a potential client not to hire me.’
‘Oh.’
‘Yes, oh.’
‘But what did you do to her?’
‘Nothing. I was perfectly civil.’
‘Grace.’
‘Well, she was so high and mighty. Flashing her wedding ring around all over the place, being condescending, and making out that I was nothing better than a slut. I think she was getting revenge for me making her join me on that job.’
‘Probably.’ He knows better than to argue that she is also to blame.
‘Well, you know, I thought that maybe it might teach her not to look down her snotty little nose at me.’
‘Grace, what if she writes a really awful piece about you?’
‘She won’t. Nicole called her editor and told them that I would not be taking part anymore.’
‘I’ve never seen you so rattled.’
‘There’s always a first time.’ Although they are sitting on the sofa, and the fish are happily swimming in front of them, Grace is swinging her leg and fiddling with her hands. She is clearly disturbed by events. Eddie is seeing a new side to her and it actually makes him think that maybe she is more human than she lets on. He shouldn’t feel happy when she is miserable, but he does a bit. She has proved to him that she needs him over the last few days, and this makes him feel pretty good.
The following morning Betty wakes up with a feeling of dread in the pit of her stomach. She looks round the room; everything is the same. The striped yellow and white wallpaper, the large wooden bed, the pale blue curtains and duvet. Everything is exactly the same as it was yesterday, but it isn’t. Because today she may not have a job. Fiona sounded so angry on the hundred or so messages she left.
She looks at Johnny, sleeping beside her. His hair stuck slightly to his forehead. His arm hooked over his body. His breathing, quiet but audible. He is truly beautiful. She kisses the top of his head gently. She may not have a job but she will always have Johnny – of that she is sure. This makes her realise that she will always be better off than Grace the marriage wrecker, because she has an unwreckable marriage.
It is early, but she knows that sleep isn’t going to happen, so she gets up and makes a cup of coffee. She will go into the office to face Fiona, although Fiona won’t be there much before nine thirty, so there is no rush. She also has the party to prepare for that Saturday night – Johnny’s party. It means so much to him that she will not ruin it. Even if she is sacked from the job she loves so much, she will make it the best party ever for the best husband ever.
She thinks back to her first meeting with Grace. How had their relationship deteriorated so fast? She didn’t like her before she met her, but she had once interviewed a woman who would only sleep with married men and she’d managed to remain civil. Betty wonders if she has been too childish, but then she shakes the feeling off. Grace is a woman that every woman should be wary of. She has merely told her exactly what she needed to hear. With luck, Grace will think next time she is destroying someone else’s marriage.
She makes a cup of coffee for Johnny and takes it upstairs to him. She almost feels sorry for Grace, because despite her sugar daddy, and the fiancé that abandoned her, she blatantly has no idea how to love.
Grace wakes and hears him snoring gently next to her. She gives him a tiny nudge and it wakes him. ‘What?’ he says.
‘You were snoring.’
‘I was?’
‘Yeah. Sounded like an earthquake.’
‘Could you make me some coffee?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Well, I do have to go to work.’
‘Fair enough, and I did keep you up moaning for hours last night.’
‘I could say something about that, but I won’t.’
‘Good bloody job. You know what I mean.’ Grace stops and bites her lip. ‘Eddie.’
‘Yes?’
‘Thank you. I do appreciate it, you know.’
He gets out of bed and kisses Grace on her forehead. ‘Any time, Grace, any time.’
Betty looks haggard as she goes into the office. Despite all the reassuring pep talks she has been giving herself, she still feels sick with nerves. She wishes she had never set eyes on Grace and she is unsure how she is going to get out of this mess.
‘Fiona wants to see you.’
Betty smiles at Hannah although she is clearly grimacing. ‘Right.’
‘Betty, what have you done? She’s been screaming for you, and I did try to call.’
‘Sorry, Hannah. I’ve been a bad, bad girl. Anyway, I’ll fill you in later. For now I’d better go to my execution.’ She swipes her arm across her neck and manages a smile.
‘You’d better hurry up.’
‘I’m on my way.’ She dumps her coat on the chair with her bag and goes up to the headmistress’s office. She knocks before she goes in but doesn’t wait for Fiona to respond. She opens the door, feeling nervous. It does unfortunately remind her of being a schoolchild and that is something else she blames Grace for.
‘Hi, sit down.’ Fiona’s face does not betray anything. But then she never does. She has the same expression on her face when she is happy or angry, which infuriates all her staff. Betty sits down.
‘I had an interesting call yesterday.’ Fiona stares straight at Betty, who flushes and looks away. ‘Nicole, the boss of Grace Regan, our very lovely case study, said that not only did you insult her, you also sabotaged a potential client.’
‘I think sabotage is a bit of a strong word.’
‘Really? But you did lose her potential business?’
‘Sort of.’ Betty begins to squirm.
‘She threatened to sue.’
‘She won’t.’ Betty prays that she won’t. It is one thing to annoy Grace, but quite another to annoy Grace’s boss, whom she hasn’t thought about at all. She feels even more uncomfortable.
‘How do you know? Betty, she is furious with us, with the magazine. Because of you and the way you behaved. What on earth were you thinking?’
Betty is catapulted back into childhood, when she was always in trouble for things. That was what happened when you were ugly and awkward. The pretty, confident girls would only speak to you to get you to do things for them that no one else wanted to do. The humiliation still burns. ‘Betty, go and steal a lipstick for us’, ‘Betty, go and buy us some fags, don’t be so wet’, ‘Betty, go and put a drawing pin on Miss’s chair.’ Of course Betty did all these things, and more because she thought, just for a minute, that it might make her accepted, and it might make her popular. Of course, it never did, and she always got caught, got i
nto trouble. The line, ‘What were you thinking?’ said by a thousand different people for a thousand different reasons is tattooed on her memory. It will never ever go ...
‘Betty, are you with us?’ Fiona’s sharp tone snaps her out of her daydream.
‘Sorry.’ She is not sorry, but she is not feeling very bold. ‘Fiona, I don’t know what I was thinking. It’s just that she’s so awful. I saw her in action. The men she was supposed to be testing didn’t stand a chance. Not only is she stunning but she dresses like a high-class hooker. Then she flirts for England. If a man had never ever been unfaithful in his life, he would be with her.’
‘So you’re saying that any man would fall for her?’
‘Yes, which is why what she is doing is immoral.’
‘What about Johnny?’ Fiona is glad she remembers his name correctly. She is so averse to talking to anyone about marriage that she had to retrieve it from the back of her mind.
‘Not him, no way him.’
‘Betty, you’re not making any sense. You hate this woman because even if a man wasn’t unfaithful he would be with her, but Johnny wouldn’t be.’
Betty flushes crimson. ‘Johnny is different. But other men aren’t as strong as him.’
‘Don’t give me that bull. Betty, if a man wants to cheat he wants to cheat. Johnny is not an exception. He is not unique. You can’t apply one rule to him and then another to the whole of mankind. Grace is hired by women to see if their husbands are cheats. Most of them are. But she is only hired by women who are suspicious and usually have reason to be suspicious.’
‘She acts like a tart and she enjoys wrecking marriages.’
‘She said that?’
‘Not exactly, but you should have seen her when the man we were testing propositioned her. She looked so smug. His wife was sitting at home waiting to hear if she still had a marriage or not and Grace was smiling. Happy. She just made me so mad.’
‘Right, but this is all personal and you were supposed to be doing a job.’
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