Sisters

by Prue Leith

  Neither Eduardo nor Poppy were there. Carrie wasn’t surprised—she’d guessed Eduardo would avoid her, and Poppy was only due home late after the theater.

  All the same, she was disappointed.

  “Where’s Eduardo?” she asked Guillia, hoping her voice betrayed no eagerness. “I thought he was coming home last night.”

  Guillia shrugged without answering. Rude cow, thought Carrie.

  Angelina helped Carrie string the hammock between the ancient walnut and the apple tree and Carrie left the children playing in it while she set up. By the time Nick arrived at noon with his usual vanload of aluminum camera cases, tripods and lighting umbrellas, the lace-covered table was just about ready.

  It boasted a triple-tier cake-stand of cake, sandwiches and scones, all for the moment swathed in clingfilm. A stemmed stand sported a pyramid of strawberries, unhulled and almost plastic in their perfection. Poppy’s Royal Doulton teacups and saucers clustered round her silver teapot and sugar basin, now gleaming from Carrie’s attention with toothbrush and silver polish.

  Orange juice glowed in a fat-bellied glass jug. A mahogany tea tray, inlaid with ivory, was propped against one deckchair, and a wooden tennis racket and white cable-knit sweater lay on another.

  Angelina eyed Carrie’s jam jar of buttercups and wild scabious with all the scorn of a ten year-old. “We’ve got proper vases for flowers, you know,” she said.

  “Ah, but you see, you are going to hold the jam jar, as if you’d just picked the flowers in the orchard. You are supposed to be innocent flower-loving children.”

  Angelina rolled her eyes to heaven, gave an exaggerated sigh, and did a cartwheel on the grass.

  “For God’s sake, ’Lina. Not so near the table. I don’t want your feet in my strawberries.”

  Angelina laughed, and cartwheeled to the hammock which she commandeered from her protesting siblings. “My turn,” she said, tipping Tom and Lorato out onto the grass.

  Guillia put her head out of the drawing room window and called the children. She spoke in Italian, which Carrie knew was intended to exclude her. Guillia wanted the children to go shopping in Witney. But Carrie protested, “Guillia, please. I need them. Nick has to get some pics of them in the hammock, and they are happier here than in a hot car. I’ll look after them. You have a break.”

  At first Guillia tried to insist, but gave up when the children added their objections to Carrie’s. In that case, she said stiffly, she’d not be back for lunch. She’d take the opportunity to go to the cash and carry in Oxford.

  So much for having a break, thought Carrie. If the woman wants to be a martyr, fine. The longer she’s gone, the better.

  Carrie felt childishly pleased to see her go. She immediately handed round slices of treacle tart, which they ate with their fingers.

  “Is this our lunch?” asked Lorato. “It’s better than soup. Granny made soup for lunch.”

  Carrie thought about the pot of potato and leek soup sitting next to the Aga. “Which would you prefer? Treacle tart or soup?” she said.

  Tom and Lorato looked up at her, baffled.

  “We could have the soup after the treacle tart if you like. A backward lunch.”

  “No soup,” Tom said. “Don’t want soup.”

  Carrie laughed and scooped him up. “OK, then. We’ll fill up on strawberries and ice-cream. What do you think, ’Lina?”

  Angelina looked worried. She smiled hesitantly and said in her grown-up way, “Of course, we’d prefer treacle tart and strawberries. But won’t Nonna be hurt? Or cross? If we don’t eat her soup?”

  Carrie put down the squirming Tom and put an arm round Angelina’s shoulders. “You are a lovely girl, Lina, and you are right. We’ll throw away her soup, then she won’t know we didn’t eat it.”

  “That would be a criminal waste,” said Angelina, sounding exactly like Poppy. “And dishonest.”

  For a second Carrie was put out. Even ten-year-old Santolinis lectured her on her morals. Then she laughed. “OK, goody two shoes, we’ll put it in the fridge and confess. You can have it for supper.”

  Carrie rummaged in the children’s cupboards for the clothes they’d worn when she took the photographs in June. She found Tom’s Nike sweatshirt and Angelina’s sundress and denim jacket, but she couldn’t find Lorato’s dungarees. Carrie pulled out her swimming things. She can wear these, she thought, as if she’s just shed the dungarees. She carried the clothes downstairs.

  Lorato wriggled into the bottom half of her swimming costume, demanding help with the bikini top. Carrie tried to persuade her to abandon the top. Bikini tops for infant girls was a naff idea. But Lorato was insistent. “Go swimming. Go swimming,” she shouted. As soon as the top was done up, Lorato ran to the linen cupboard and came back with a towel. “Go swimming,” she repeated.

  “Not today, darling. But you can go under the sprinkler. Come on.” She tried to take Lorato’s hand, but she flung herself on the floor and yelled, “Go swimming in the river. In the riv . . . ve-e-r!”

  Angelina appeared, stepped over her screaming sister with barely a glance, and said, “It’s really boring. They both do it. Only Tom has tantrums on his back, and Lorato on her front.” Lorato was by now hitting the carpet with her fists and her forehead.

  Carrie bent to try to pick her up, saying, “C’mon, Lorato, don’t be an idiot. You can swim under the sprinkler.”

  Lorato’s screams went up a scale, and Angelina said, “It’s best to leave her. She’ll stop soon. Mum says it’s the terrible twos.”

  Carrie showed her photographs to Nick. He was impressed, asking, “Is there no end to your talents?”

  Carrie was pleased. “I learned the rudiments years ago so I could get the photographer’s fee as well as the writer’s. Papers and mags pay you guys more than us hacks, so I figured I should be able to do both.”

  Carrie had been nervous that Nick would refuse to have anything to do with pictures he had not taken. But the challenge appealed to him, and he promised to fiddle around with them so no one would notice that Angelina’s dress was looser and longer in some shots, and that Tom’s complexion varied from deep South African tan to English pallor.

  Lorato reappeared, tantrum forgotten, and by 2 p.m. Nick had taken all the shots round the tea table and in the hammock, and the children were released. The sky had cleared and the early autumn day was surprisingly hot. Carrie left the children playing in the hammock while she and Nick did the kitchen photos: flapjacks in an oven tray, drop-scones being flipped on an iron griddle, lemon curd thickening in the pan.

  By 3:30 they were through, and Carrie left Nick to collect up his kit and load his van while she cleaned up the kitchen, then took some lemonade into the sitting room, where the children were now watching The Lion King. Or rather Angelina was watching and at the same time cleaning her pony’s saddle. Tom was playing with Eduardo’s chess set, and Lorato was fast asleep in Poppy’s armchair.

  Carrie felt an uneasy squeeze of guilt. The little ones were supposed to have a nap after lunch, which had gone by the board. Both Lorato’s face and the sand-colored leather chair were smeared with jam and Angelina’s leather dressing stood on the floor only inches from the pale Tabriz carpet. Carrie remembered there was a Santolini rule about no children in the drawing room on their own—presumably to protect such things as Eduardo’s chess set and the furnishings.

  Carrie fetched a cloth and wiped Lorato’s face and the chair, saying, “’Lina, I’m going for a quick shower. Look after these two, won’t you? Don’t knock over that leather dressing and don’t let Tom spill his lemonade, or we’ll all be for the high jump.”

  Angelina did not respond. She was deep in Disney.

  Carrie heaved herself upstairs. She was exhausted by the heat of the Aga and the pace at which they’d been working. She hoped Guillia would not get back just yet.

  As she pas
sed the open door to Eduardo and Poppy’s room she suddenly reversed her steps and went in. She walked straight to the wardrobe and opened one side. Poppy’s clothes. She shut the door and opened the other side to see Eduardo’s jackets in a neat row. She pushed her face into the cupboard and breathed in. The smell of Eduardo was overwhelming and she felt the tears form in her eyes and throat. She opened one jacket, without removing it from its hanger, and buried her face in its smooth, silky lining. It felt good against her hot cheeks and she stayed there for half a minute.

  She pulled away, shut the cupboard doors and went into her sister’s bathroom. It was large and modern, with white marble tiles, glass shelves and stainless-steel fittings. The only old-fashioned thing in it was a great Victorian bath on legs, standing almost in the middle of the room.

  Why not? she thought. It’s a much nicer bathroom than the spare-room shower. She turned the catch that released the great brass cylinder into the plughole and turned on the taps. They gushed with gratifying force.

  She lay back in her sister’s Givenchy bubbles and closed her eyes.

  She woke with a start. Someone was pounding up the stairs. It was Angelina, shouting, “Carrie, Carrie. Quick. Where are you?” She heard Angelina run past the bedroom door and into the spare room, still shouting.

  “I’m here. Angelina, what is it?” Carrie leapt out of the bath, her heart pounding. She knew with absolute certainty that something terrible had happened. Angelina crashed into the bathroom, her face contorted with fear. “Lorato’s in the river. She’s drowning.”

  Chapter 18

  Carrie thought: 4 mins. She was sure you have to get them breathing in four minutes. How long since she went into the river? You could run across the garden and the field in a minute. With shoes on. The paddock’s too stony for bare feet. Put some shoes on.

  “It’s OK, Lina. I’m coming.” With the calm of panic Carrie pulled her sneakers from the tangle of clothes. Her mind, clear as morning, raced down a straight, logical path: Dry your feet or you won’t get them into the sneakers. Do up the laces or you will trip.

  Angelina was desperate. “Carrie. She’s drowning. She’s going down the river. We’ll never catch her. Oh please, please. Hurry, Carrie. Come ON . . .”

  Tying her laces with rapid precise fingers, Carrie said, “I can run faster than you, but I need you to show me where she is, so you start now, and run as fast as you can to the river. I’ll catch you up.”

  Angelina bolted out of the door and down the stairs, three at a time. Carrie was behind her within seconds, but ran into the kitchen to grab her mobile phone, its earpiece and lead still attached, from the work-top. Then she raced after Angelina, 100 yards ahead of her across the garden.

  Carrie, her mind still extraordinarily focused, punched in 999 as she ran naked across the backyard. At the end of the garden was a rough stony paddock, with the dried clay in hard ridges and lumps from the passage of tractors and horses. Carrie leapt like a goat across the uneven ground, concentrating on landing securely, on not twisting an ankle.

  It seemed an age before she was through to the more even field and had caught up with Angelina. The child was sobbing and gasping as she ran downstream along the riverbank.

  Carrie pulled Angelina to a stop. Putting her hands on the child’s thin shoulders, she forced her to look at her. Her voice was hard and urgent. “’Lina. Stop crying. You have to be brave. Where did she go in, darling?”

  Before Angelina could answer, Carrie saw her.

  Lorato was in the middle of the river. Face down. She wasn’t moving and her body twisted slowly in the eddying water.

  Carrie thrust the mobile phone and lead into Angelina’s hands. “Take this,” she said, her urgent face a few inches from Angelina’s. “When they answer, ask for an ambulance. Tell them your address and what has happened. OK?”

  Angelina, her bottom lip trembling and her eyes wide and tear-filled, nodded and held the telephone to her ear.

  Carrie scrambled through the wire fence and ran full tilt at the river, diving into the weed and striking out toward Lorato. She was with her in seconds. She grabbed her under the arms and pulled her upright. Her head flopped forward. She was lifeless, and her face and neck were a dark purple-black.

  Carrie had some memory that you did backstroke when life-saving, but the river wasn’t deep, and she simply held Lorato out of the water and somehow scrambled to the bank.

  She could not remember what she’d once learned about resuscitation. She held the child upside down and squeezed her, then thought she’d been told this was wrong, and stopped. She could not tell if any water came out of Lorato’s mouth. Water was dripping everywhere.

  She lay Lorato on her back, remembering to tip her head back, chin up. Oh Christ, how do I know if she’s breathing? Or find a pulse? Carrie put her cheek against the child’s mouth, and looked along at her round inert chest. Nothing. There was nothing, no movement, no breath. Oh God, Oh God, she thought, what next?

  Then suddenly her brain cleared and she knew what to do. She put a finger into Lorato’s mouth and peered inside. The child’s tongue was relaxed and she could see down her throat. Carrie pinched her nostrils closed with one hand and put her mouth over Lorato’s to blow into her. But she could not get a grip on the small wet nose and her fingers got in the way of her own mouth. It was hopeless. Carrie let go of the child’s nose and opened her own mouth wider to cover both Lorato’s mouth and nose. She blew steadily for a few seconds. While she blew, she squinted down Lorato’s body and saw her chest rise. That’s right, she thought, that’s right. Now let her breathe out.

  She waited while Lorato’s chest subsided then breathed into the child once more. Lorato’s skin felt cold and her lips blubbery. Nothing happened. She did not cough into life as in the movies. Oh Jesus, she’s dead. She’s dead. Her heart must have stopped. Oh why don’t I know how to find a pulse?

  “Lorato. Lorato. Breathe, darling. Breathe.” She pinched Lorato’s cheek, quite hard, hoping the pain would jerk her into life. Still nothing. Lorato’s eyes were half open, but unseeing.

  Carrie shifted her knees slightly to kneel up next to the child. She put her hands on her chest. She pressed down, not sure if you did this to start the heart or expel the air. Then she again breathed into Lorato’s mouth and nose. Is this what you do for people full of water, or only for electric shocks and heart attacks? Why don’t I know?

  “The man says I must put you on.” It was Angelina, holding out the mobile phone.

  But Carrie knew she’d need her hands. “Is the lead pushed into the phone? ’Lina? Give me the earphone end.”

  Angelina did what she was told, and Carrie put the earpiece in her ear. “Hello” she said.

  She heard a male voice. “You are Carrie, is that right? My name is David.”

  “Yes, yes.” She felt pathetically grateful that he knew her name. Angelina must have told him. Funny, she had not heard her talking on the phone at all. “Yes, I’m Carrie. I don’t know what to do. I . . .”

  “Stay calm, Carrie. You are doing a great job. You will do better if you take your time. Is Lorato on her back or her front?”

  “She’s on her back.”

  “Is her throat clear? No weed in it? Will you check for me, please?”

  “Yes, it’s fine. I checked. There’s nothing there.”

  “Good. Now, Carrie. I want you to hold Lorato’s nose shut with one . . .”

  Carrie interrupted, her voice urgent. “Her nose is too small. I tried. But I can do it over mouth and nose together.” Oh God, he’s not going to waste time quarreling over technique, is he?

  But his voice was reassuring.

  “That’s fine, Carrie. Just breathe into Lorato’s mouth and nose, putting your own mouth right over hers and blow gently for two seconds. OK? Count ‘And One And Two’ OK? Then wait until her chest subsides.”

  Car
rie did as she had before, then, as she took her mouth away, she said, “Now what? What now? Nothing’s happening!” Now there was a paramedic in charge, Carrie could feel the panic rising.

  “Keep calm, Carrie. You are doing great. Now keep going, exactly as before.”

  She obeyed, but in the gap between breaths, while Lorato was breathing out, she said, “But don’t I have to do the chest thing? She’s not breathing. Maybe her heart . . .”

  “Just do as I tell you, Carrie. We need to do a minute of this first.”

  Carrie did as she was told, making an effort to count slowly, not to hurry. But afterward Lorato was as still as before. She said, “It’s not working. Nothing’s happening. She’s . . .”

  “OK, Carrie. Now, I want you to get your own knees close to Lorato’s chest, so when you straighten up you are over her. OK? Now put one hand low down in the middle of Lorato’s chest, with the heel of your hand on her breastbone. Your arm should be straight.”

  “Only one hand? . . . I thought . . .”

  He interrupted. “You only need one hand, Carrie. She’s only little.”

  Carrie said, “Yes, yes. Do I push slowly or in jerks?”

  “Press firmly, like a bounce. You want to press the breastbone down about an inch. Do it five times for me, OK? You are squeezing Lorato’s heart to make the blood flow in and out.”

  Carrie pressed down on Lorato’s chest. She was surprised how easily Lorato’s ribs squashed. She released the pressure then pushed again, counting Three, Four, Five, then said at once, “What now? What do I do now?” She seemed to have been here forever, powerless with the inert Lorato.

  “OK, Carrie. Now do another breath, then another five compressions. One breath, five compressions.”

  “Oh God . . .” Carrie could feel the swell of panic again. But the paramedic seemed to sense it, and steadied her with, “Carrie, you have lots of time. Don’t think about it. Just do what you have to do.”