people.”
Isabel stared down at the table. She had more than enough to do over the next few weeks. And yet she had never turned down a direct plea for help. Jillian was not to know it, of course, but Isabel found it very difficult indeed—practically impossible—to say to somebody in need of help that they would get no assistance from her.
“All right,” said Isabel.
Jillian reached out and took Isabel’s hand and squeezed it. “You’re an angel.”
I’m not, thought Isabel. I’m weak.
“Look,” said Jillian. “I’m not sure how you do these things, but why don’t I send you a photocopy of each candidate’s application? There’s a curriculum vitae with each of them—that’ll tell you all you need to know.”
“And more than I
Jillian looked blank. “I don’t see …”
“Confidentiality,” said Isabel.
Jillian laughed dismissively. “Oh, we never bother with that.” She paused. “Do you?”
Isabel looked at her in a bemused fashion. “But you yourself said that you wanted me to do this because you didn’t want it to get out. That suggests that you attach at least some importance to confidentiality.”
Jillian was brisk. “Where necessary,” she said. “But not otherwise.”
CHAPTER FOUR
JILLIAN MACKINLAY,” said Isabel from her chair at the kitchen table.
Jamie barely looked up from the stove. He was cooking dinner that night, and with Charlie safely tucked up in bed and asleep by now—he had been tired out by five o’clock and had had been given an early supper and bath—the house seemed quiet. Any sudden absence of children, Isabel noted, made the normal silences of the evening seem more pronounced; a small child could be a centre of noise, like a cyclone moving across the weather map, until suddenly, at bedtime, the storm subsided and quiet returned.
“Jillian who?”
“Mackinlay,” said Isabel. “We met them at the Stevensons’. It was some time ago …” She thought quickly; in the lives of most of us, there is a time before our partner and a time after our partner: in her case, BJ (Before Jamie) and AJ (After Jamie), although AJ suggested that Jamie was in the past, which he was not, and so DJ (During Jamie) might be more appropriate. She was sure that this meeting at the Stevensons’ had been in the DJ years.
“Can’t remember,” muttered Jamie.
Of course he could not, thought Isabel; they met so many people on the social round—such as it was—and one could not be expected to remember every conversation at every drinks or dinner party. Most such conversations were instantly forgettable anyway, merging into one another, smoothed out by banality.
“There’s no reason for you to remember her. I almost didn’t when I saw her this morning, but then she helpfully told me exactly who she was. People sense it when you haven’t got a clue who they are.”
“Garlic,” said Jamie.
She looked at him quizzically. “Garlic?”
“Sorry. I’m trying to get this right. I haven’t put any garlic in and she said that I should. Or I think that she did.”
“She being?”
Jamie dipped a spoon into the contents of the pot and tasted the result. “Mary Contini.”
“Check the recipe.”
He put down the spoon, shaking his head. “I don’t know where I put the book. It’s somewhere, but I don’t know … Do you think garlic makes a difference?”
Isabel smiled. “Yes, of course. Garlic in a dish makes it taste garlicky.” She paused; what was wrong with Jamie this evening? “Don’t you agree? Whereas dishes without garlic …”
Jamie sighed. “Don’t taste of garlic.”
She looked at him. The sigh was uncharacteristic; it suggested that he had found her comment tiresome, a weak attempt at humour.
“Do you want me to take over?” She had not asked him to cook that evening—he had volunteered. He was a good cook, she had discovered, and unlike many men he seemed prepared to stick closely to the recipe—or most of the time, at least. Men, she had noticed, were inclined to be slapdash in their measuring of quantities and even choice of ingredients; her father, who belonged to a generation of males who rarely ventured into the kitchen, had occasionally cooked but had been gloriously cavalier in his methods, substituting mint for basil and, on one famous occasion, onions for potatoes.
Jamie declined Isabel’s offer, but not very graciously, she thought. He was rarely irritable, and there seemed to be something on his mind this evening. Should she ask him? She watched him at the stove. Yes, his body language gave it away; there was something tense about his position, as if he were feeling hostility to the task he was performing, as if he were poised to move away. He was standing, she thought, in the way of an opera singer about to stride off the stage in a display of high dudgeon.
“Should I …”
He did not let her finish. “I’m fine. It’s just that I wish I had the recipe to hand … Garlic.”
“Put it in. You can’t go wrong with garlic.” You could, of course.
He mumbled something she did not catch. Then he gave the casserole dish a final stir, replaced the lid and
