The Beloved Girls

by Harriet Evans

  And she shut the door in Catherine’s face.

  Catherine stood silently for a moment. Then she shrugged, and knocked on the door again, softly. She looked over her shoulder, at the trickle of pedestrians making their way down the street. A little boy in yellow wellies, just like the ones Tom had had, followed by a childminder, carrying his bags and coat. Two glamorous Russian ladies. An ancient man in red cords, who reminded her of Quentin Holyoake. Time ticked on. A dog barked. A helicopter went overhead. There was no answer.

  So Catherine knocked again, as hard as she could, ringing the bell at the same time. Then she bent down and pushed open the letter box.

  ‘I’ll stay here and shout until you let me in,’ she bellowed. ‘I’m not going anywhere. I have to talk to you.’

  The door opened again. Merry peered out. ‘Get inside.’

  Inside, junk mail littered the communal hallway. The windows on the stairs were filthy, coated with years of London dirt. Merry hurriedly led her up a wide, curving staircase, carpeted in worn-out shagpile. Catherine followed her meekly. It was nice to be inside. She’d been mostly outside for two days.

  ‘Come in,’ Merry said, gesturing. ‘Quickly, please.’ Catherine saw her glance up and down, taking in the grubby trousers, the thin navy jumper and scarf, the messy hair. ‘Take your – coat off,’ said Merry, wrinkling her nose. ‘I have to do something. Back in a second.’

  Left alone, Catherine advanced slowly into the room. Years of advocacy, examining evidence and sussing out clients, and years of playdates with her own children meant she was expert at summing up families, and houses. The ones she liked best were the ones where your assumptions were challenged: the house in chaos with empty Fruit Shoot bottles, dirty nappies and baby wipes scattered on the floor but a pile of library books on the window sill. The ageing hipsters with bare floorboards and minimalist Scandi designed furniture who unexpectedly offered you a slice of Colin the Caterpillar cake with your cup of herbal tea.

  As she glanced around Merry’s home she felt she was destined to be disappointed. In contrast to the communal areas, the interior of the flat was a vast, chilly, hollowed-out space. There would be no surprise inflatable llamas hidden behind the Eames chair here. Where once there must have been panelled connecting doors linking to another room, now there was nothing, just white blank floors and walls and, in one corner, a curling iron staircase, down which pale silver light glowed from the floor above. Other than faint traffic noise it was very quiet.

  The only personal touch was on the mantelpiece, where there were four or five gilt-edged invitations, addressed to ‘Darling Melissa’ and ‘Ms Melissa Hunter’: gallery openings, receptions, fundraisers. At each end of the mantelpiece was a photo of Merry. One was of her laughing in a group of people that included a famous philanthropic Hollywood star. He was smiling at Merry, whose flawless skin shone, her eyes glittering. The other photo was black and white, and showed Merry at Vanes, aged about three, Catherine guessed. Her arms folded, her rotund tummy extended, a comical frown across her brow, almost hidden by her heavy dark fringe. Next to her, on the lawn, sat Rory, as a puppy.

  Merry reappeared, silently, as Catherine was debating whether to help herself to a glass of water or whether that wouldn’t be on.

  ‘Love the place,’ said Catherine, gesturing at the empty, echoing space.

  ‘Sit down,’ Merry said, pointing to a sofa so pale it seemed to blend into, and become indistinguishable from, the spotless floorboards. She reached for Catherine’s bag. ‘Can I hang this up?’

  But Catherine snatched it away so fast she flinched. ‘No. Thank you. Sorry. It’s got all my . . . It’s got important things in it.’

  Merry stared at her. ‘Uh. OK.’ Her phone lit up with a message. She looked down at it, then up at Catherine, and flashed her a smile. ‘What can I get you? A cup of tea?’

  ‘Oh, a glass of water, please, Merry,’ said Catherine. The phone lit up again. They both looked at it.

  ‘Sorry. I have a gallery opening tomorrow, hence why I’m working on a bank holiday and everything’s rather chaotic.’

  ‘It looks it,’ said Catherine.

  Merry got up without replying and padded over to the kitchen, a white passageway that Catherine could see led through to another reception room, with a vast pale oak table at its centre.

  ‘I didn’t mean to joke. This place is beautiful,’ Catherine said. She shook her head, wondering. ‘It’s – it’s not what I’d have expected of you. That’s all I meant. The Merry I knew at fourteen, anyway.’

  ‘Yes, well. It’s quite different from Vanes, isn’t it? I took time picking every single item out. I wanted to be quite sure nothing reminded me of home.’ She handed Catherine a glass of water. Catherine drank it in gulps, and put it down noisily on the glass table in front of her. It made a clattering, cracking sound. Merry winced.

  ‘So how have you –’ Catherine began, but Merry put up a hand.

  ‘No, no. No. I’m asking the questions, thanks. You were in the newspaper, did you see it? I did. They said you’re my sister, which is kind of strange, wouldn’t you agree?’ Merry rubbed at a droplet of water that had fallen onto the table.

  ‘No,’ said Catherine. ‘No, I didn’t.’ She wiped her mouth and sat back on the sofa. Merry watched her. ‘What did it say?’

  ‘They say you’d been acting strangely. That your study was broken into whilst you were away. The Times had it that someone was following you. Something to do with that guy, you know, the one you defended.’

  ‘Grant,’ said Catherine, slowly. ‘Grant Doyle.’ She put her hands to her face. ‘Did it say how he was?’

  ‘He’s still in hospital. That’s all they’ve mentioned.’

  Catherine’s fingers twisted in and out on themselves. She whispered, in a low voice, ‘Poor Grant. What have I done? That poor boy.’

  ‘Poor boy nothing,’ said Merry. ‘He murdered someone. I wouldn’t worry about him.’

  ‘I was his barrister. His defender, and I threatened him,’ Catherine said in a rush as if she was confessing. ‘He’s barely eighteen.’

  ‘People were talking about it, at the gallery this morning. At work. They were wondering if you’d run off because you knew something about him or he had something on you. And I had to sit there and smile, pretend I’d never heard of you. Catherine Christophe, that missing woman?’ She put on a high-pitched, silly voice. ‘Sure, I’ve heard of her. She stole my sister’s identity, she might even have killed her.’

  ‘I didn’t steal anything.’

  But Merry, swifter than Catherine this time, leaned forward and snatched the rucksack away from Catherine. With quick, nimble fingers, so like her mother’s, she opened it, rummaging around.

  ‘Give it back to me.’

  ‘Absolutely not.’ Merry pulled out a shiny nylon bum-bag. ‘What elegant accessories you have these days, Janey.’ Swiftly, she took out Catherine’s passport.

  ‘I see your birthday is the thirty-first of August. If you’re not impersonating her, then how come you’ve stolen her passport?’

  Catherine reached for the passport, pressing it tightly between her fingers ‘I didn’t. I told you. I didn’t steal anything. Merry, I came to explain. To say I’m sorry –’

  Merry was laughing, the hollows under her eyes pronounced. ‘Listen. I’ve done what Mummy wanted. As always. I’ve kept out of this for almost thirty years. How did you get her name, and your photo? How come it’s your photo?’

  ‘I said my passport had been run over. It was.’ She’d been proud of that idea. She’d balanced the hard, black and gold cardboard on a stone outside the hostel in Toulouse then backed the hire car over it, up and down, so that it ripped down the middle, and was crushed, the photo saturated in mud from the gutter, the whole thing unrecognisable. ‘I went to the British consulate in Toulouse and cried. I said it had fallen out and I’d found it like this on the street. I had Kitty’s name on the ferry tickets, as proof of travel, and my birth certifi
cate with me. It was no problem, not back then.’ She corrected herself. ‘Kitty’s birth certificate.’

  Catherine observed wryly that, despite the disdain and horror on her face as she relayed her story, Merry could not help but look a little impressed at this. ‘You still stole her identity though.’

  ‘It wasn’t stealing.’ Catherine swallowed. ‘She gave me all her documents. She told me I had to take them. You weren’t there – I didn’t have any other options. You have to understand that. What she – what happened.’ It was very strange saying any of this, after so long. Her mouth was completely dry.

  ‘Forgive me,’ Merry said, crisply. ‘Forgive me if I don’t, quite.’

  Catherine pulled the rucksack back onto her lap and tucked the documents inside. She was silent for a moment.

  ‘A couple of things started up this year. And I – I found I couldn’t cope any more. I think that’s what’s happened to me. The house came on the market, and I found out right after the trial had finished. I had to bring my mother back to the UK and put her in a home. She doesn’t know who I am. My daughter was turning eighteen. And then –’

  I’ve seen her. She’s come back, Merry. She’s still here. She follows me around. And she’s not who . . . she’s not who I thought she’d be. It’s all wrong.

  But she couldn’t say it.

  ‘All of those things. All together, clicking into place, like a sort of machine in my mind, it – it – brought her back again. And it wasn’t the story I’d imagined for her.’

  ‘What story?’ Merry said, and her tone softened. ‘Kitty, do you mean?’

  ‘What happened to her. I think about it all the time.’ She hugged the rucksack to her, tightly. ‘Whenever I couldn’t sleep or when I was feeding the children and trying not to go mad with tiredness, or when I’m walking to work or there’s a long, very boring closing argument I . . . I’d think about what she’s doing. What she’d have become. I think she’d have been a designer, like Sylvia, don’t you?’ Her eyes shone. ‘Orla Kiely, or Cath Kidston, or someone like Donna Wilson. Colourful, edgy, British style. She’d sell Sylvia’s prints, too. And she’d live in a house in Hampstead – I’d picked it all out. And she’d wear cashmere joggers, and be awfully stylish. She’d never marry anyone but be really glamorous, and popular, and out at all the best parties – she’s Kitty Hunter, remember?’ She glanced around at Merry’s cool, echoing home, at the invitations.

  ‘Catherine –’

  ‘And I had her winning awards. And opening shops. In 2019 she’s going to open three more concessions. One in Bicester Retail Park.’ She smiled. She didn’t care any more. ‘And 2020’s going to be her biggest year. I had her opening stores all round the world in 2020. Hong Kong, New York, Sydney.’ She smiled. ‘I know it sounds crazy. But it helped me . . . remember her. Because there’s no one else to talk to about it. I go to another place, instead of the horror of it, when I start thinking about that summer, about what happened to her, if she’s still . . . I left her.’ She shook her head. ‘I’m to blame.’

  Merry was silent for a long time. ‘Oh Janey,’ she said, eventually. ‘Jesus. I don’t know what to say.’ Her pale face, with its dewy, perfect skin, was drawn.

  Catherine squeezed her eyes tight shut. ‘All the things happening this year – Mum, Carys, the trial, the anniversary. I couldn’t control my thoughts any more. I – I smashed up the study.’

  ‘You broke into . . . your own study?’

  ‘I didn’t know what else to do. It was the night before we went away. At Easter. I was working late, and the others were all out. I had to release – something.’ She shook her head. ‘Oh God. What have I done? What did I do?’

  She had set aside the evening to tie up Grant Doyle’s paperwork: the billing, some queries from the solicitor, but she found she couldn’t. Instead she had sat scribbling things down, as she sometimes did, things Kitty might say, memories they had. She’d done it for years. She thought it helped keep her alive.

  And that night she had googled the Hunters, for the first time ever. She had never let herself look them up. She was always afraid of what she might find out, how it would affect her ability to be this new person. But, that night, she couldn’t stop herself. It was too much, finally, and she’d clicked on a story.

  HOUSE OF TRAGEDY UP FOR SALE

  Ancient chapel where Charles Hunter and his sister were killed during bizarre ‘Collecting’ ceremony and eldest son severely injured to be included in sale; campaign to have it listed underway

  Like the time she’d been in a café with Jake and a bee had flown in, or the time a woman called Polly, on a tour of one particularly competitive London day school, had looked at her a little too closely and said: ‘You know, I’m sure I’ve met you before. You weren’t at Letham’s, were you? No? Are you from Exmoor?’, or when she’d just started her pupillage, and didn’t reply when a senior criminal barrister called for her help during a trial: ‘Catherine!’ he’d shouted at her afterwards. ‘What’s wrong with you! Don’t you answer to your own name, goddammit?’ Like those other times, when Catherine was threatened, she had no means of coping. She had never learned how to. She shoved it away, deep down, where it couldn’t disturb her, time and again.

  This time some final tie binding this tightly woven, other her together was loosened. She had felt it slipping away, had, quite calmly, stood up. She had pulled everything off the shelves, inadvertently breaking the window, smashing mugs and pulling open box files, scattering papers everywhere. She was glad, as ever, that Mr Lebeniah was deaf, that they were on the end of the terrace, that the people in the houses that backed onto hers were either away again or absent whilst their basement extension was completed.

  As it was happening it was liberating. She told herself this would make her feel better, that it would sate something inside her, and she kept thinking of the girl she’d defended for strangling her abusive stepfather who used to cut herself, to release something, to control something she could not control. All the time very quietly, sobbing so hard, wishing there was someone, anyone, who understood. But there never was. When she had left Kitty behind, she had accepted she would always be an outsider.

  She had locked the door on the study, and gone downstairs, tidied up the kitchen, so that when Carys and then Tom got back, they found her pottering around as normal, and when Davide arrived home, late and a little the worse for some excellent Puligny-Montrachet after a dinner with clients, he found Catherine in bed, attempting to concentrate on Wolf Hall.

  ‘All set for tomorrow?’ Davide had said, sliding into bed and snuggling against her.

  ‘Oh, so much. I can’t wait to get away.’

  He smelled of cigars, and wine, and aftershave, and he undressed her, and she climbed onto him, and afterwards slept very well, because that door was now locked and no one would go in.

  Except she left the key on the hall table, and when they got back ten days later Carys did go in, to get an envelope. Would any of this have happened, this unravelling? If she hadn’t left the key on the table for Carys to unlock the study? If Eileen hadn’t come back, if Vanes wasn’t being sold, if Grant hadn’t got precisely, completely under her skin. Catherine stared, unseeing, at the floor. What if Quentin hadn’t had his stroke? What if she hadn’t broken her toe? She just didn’t know.

  Most of all, she didn’t understand Kitty’s return. The idea that she was real was as frightening as the idea she was imaginary. The letters that kept arriving – had she written them? Catherine thought she had. Sitting there on the sofa, she was certain she had. Hadn’t she? But she couldn’t remember now.

  She’d tried a mindfulness course a few years ago, and it had been a laughable failure. ‘You?’ Davide had said, when she got home that evening and she’d told him. ‘You only think ahead, chérie. I do not think being mindful is part of your – your make-up.’

  He had no idea. How every thought was monitored, every impulse measured, how she looked over her shoulder, up at the sky,
around the family table every day, every night, looking to see when the wind would change, when she would have to take herself off, slice herself out of the family, so that they could get on without her.

  The buzzing was so loud in Merry’s empty flat now that Catherine shook her head. ‘Anyway, that’s – that’s what – it is.’ She picked up the empty glass and put it down again. The room was chilly. ‘How have you been all this time, Merry? You mentioned a gallery opening – what exactly is it you do?’

  Merry gulped. ‘Sorry?’

  Catherine said politely: ‘What do you do? I don’t know anything about you, Merry. And I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Jesus.’ Merry laughed, her mouth wide open. She had two black fillings. ‘You really want to do this now? Fine. I had to leave Letham’s, after it happened, because Mummy said there was no more money for school fees. I studied Art History at Edinburgh, and then I moved to London. I own a gallery in Fitzrovia, and I represent young British artists. I’m off to Miami in December, we’re launching someone new tomorrow evening, and I’m hoping to take him there. I have several clients I’m really excited about. I’m single, though I was engaged briefly fifteen years ago . . .’ she paused. ‘I couldn’t – anyway. But, no, life is good.’ She glanced round the flat, smiling, nodding. ‘So I’m fine. I’m really fine.’

  ‘That’s nice,’ said Catherine. She had to get rid of the sounds in her ears, people calling out for her. ‘How often do you go to Miami?’

  Merry gave a shaky laugh. ‘You turn up after thirty years and what you want to know is whether I’m a frequent visitor to Miami. What next? Am I excited about the Royal Wedding? Do I prefer hummus or guacamole?’ Catherine shrugged. ‘What about your kids, for God’s sake? Won’t they be worried sick about you? Your poor husband. You just left him at the station?’

  Catherine looked up at her. ‘I sent them a postcard. To say I had to go away for a few days. That I wouldn’t – do anything silly.’

  ‘The police don’t seem to think that. It’s bank holiday Monday, Catherine. They won’t have got it, not if you posted it Friday evening. It’s 2018, there are other ways.’