The Grace Girls

by Geraldine O'Neill

  Just before lunch, Mr Walton came across the office to speak to her.

  ‘Heather . . . would you mind stepping into my office for a wee minute, please?’

  ‘Not at all,’ Heather said. ‘I’ll just put these files back in place and I’ll be straight in to you.’ At the back of her mind Heather felt vaguely aware that it was unusual for Mr Walton to bring members of staff into his room at lunchtime. He usually went out on the dot for his own lunch. She wondered if there was some kind of a problem, but couldn’t imagine anything that it could be. He had been fine with her earlier on this morning and gave no indication of anything being wrong.

  She shrugged to herself, unable to summon up enough curiosity or interest for it to worry her. Like the way she had worked all morning, she would deal with the situation when it arose.

  The buzzer went again, signalling that it was one o’clock, and everyone started lifting jackets and coats and heading in the general direction of the door.

  ‘Are you coming with us for lunch?’ Marie Henderson, the quiet girl that Sarah always sat with, asked as Heather was lifting her handbag. ‘We’re going down to the Trees.’

  Heather looked down at the floor. ‘Mr Walton wants a word with me, so I could be a wee while . . .’

  ‘We’ll wait if you want,’ Marie offered, looking back anxiously at Sarah, Danny and Maurice.

  ‘No,’ Heather said, cutting her off. ‘If I feel like coming I’ll catch up with you.’

  Heather tapped on Mr Walton’s office and walked in.

  ‘Sit down, sit down,’ he said warmly, motioning to the comfortable leather chair facing his own.

  Heather did as she was told and sat down in the chair. Then she waited.

  He sat forward in his chair, resting his arms on the tooled-leather table, the fingers of both hands linked together. ‘I’ve asked you to come in because I’m a little bit concerned as to how you are . . .’ He halted. ‘Is there anything wrong, Heather? You don’t seem quite yourself.’

  Heather looked up at him blankly, vaguely knowing she should say something – but quite, quite unable to find a single word.

  ‘Are you feeling ill?’ he asked now, in a concerned, fatherly way. ‘You don’t look yourself at all . . . several of the staff have said they’re a wee bit worried about you.’

  Heather took a deep breath and finally found a small wisp of a voice. ‘I wanted to ask you if I could have the day off tomorrow . . . to go to a funeral. It doesn’t matter about the day’s pay . . .’

  ‘Of course,’ Mr Walton said quickly. He sat back in his chair. ‘Is it somebody close, Heather? A relative?’

  A picture of Gerry suddenly swam into her mind and she felt all light-headed and strange.

  ‘It’s a boy,’ she whispered, vaguely wondering if she should have said man or lad. ‘He was my boyfriend up until I started work here.’

  ‘What happened?’ Mr Walton asked. ‘Was he sick?’

  Heather shook her head. ‘It was a road accident . . . he got knocked down early on New Year’s morning.’

  ‘Good God . . .’ the office manager murmured. ‘That’s very tragic.’

  Heather suddenly felt all dizzy; she took a big gulp of air, trying to steady her breathing.

  ‘You see,’ she went on in the strained stringy voice, feeling that she should explain it fully for some reason, ‘he was trying to catch up with me. He wanted to see me home . . . He was crossing the road and then a taxi came flying round and didn’t see him . . .’ She felt immediately guilty, telling it as though it was the taxi-driver’s fault – but she couldn’t tell him that Gerry was drunk and that in all probability it was his own fault. That just seemed too cruel an explanation to voice.

  Mr Walton’s head was bobbing up and down, indicating that he understood. ‘Of course you can have the day off, Heather,’ he said, standing up. ‘It’s perfectly understandable that you’d want to go to the funeral . . .’

  Heather stood up quickly now and the dizziness suddenly increased along with a whooshing noise in her ears. She bent down to retrieve her handbag from the floor and suddenly the green flowery carpet seemed to be moving up towards her.

  ‘Are you all right, Heather?’ Mr Walton said, moving quickly around the table towards her.

  ‘I’m fine,’ she replied. And then everything suddenly went black, and Heather Grace keeled over in a dead faint on Mr Walton’s office floor.

  Chapter 51

  Looking back on it, Heather could never really remember the journey out to her Auntie Claire’s house in the taxi or how it was decided that she should actually go there instead of going home.

  When she came round in Mr Walton’s office, Muriel Ferguson and some of the older women were standing around her, talking to her in encouraging, gentle voices. She had tried to sit up, but as soon as she did, the dizziness and the spinning in her head started again. This went on for quite a while until she was able to sit up and drink a cup of sweet tea and force down two digestive biscuits.

  She had a vague recollection of people coming in and out of Mr Walton’s office to see how she was. Danny had stood at the office door with a shocked look on his face, asking her if she was feeling OK and Sarah had come over and knelt beside her, saying she hoped she felt better after she got home and how sorry she was about the stupid argument they’d had. She’d also gone on to say something about Gerry and the funeral, and Heather had felt suddenly sick when she realised that the whole office must have been talking about it.

  She remembered Mr Walton asking her if any of her family had a phone, and how long did she think it would take her father to drive out and collect her. Then he had asked her if she knew anyone nearer, maybe someone related to her, who lived in Glasgow. Sarah had butted in then, suggesting that Heather might like to come home with her, she explained how Heather had stayed a night over Christmas and how her mother and father would be delighted to have her.

  Mr Walton thanked Sarah for her kind offer, but said they would have to let her family know and then decide what to do. It had been decided from the onset that, whatever happened, Heather was in no fit state to go home on the train or the bus alone.

  Heather knew she must have given somebody the little card she had tucked in the back of her purse with Claire’s address and phone number on it, because Muriel Ferguson had given the card back to her in the taxi after she’d shown it to the taxi-driver.

  ‘This looks like it!’ Muriel announced in a high, almost excited, voice, as the taxi came to a stop outside a detached granite two-storey house on a tree-lined avenue. It was set back off the road on a rolling incline, with several sets of steps running up through neatly trimmed gardens on either side. She turned to Heather. ‘You did say you’ve never been out to your aunt’s house before, didn’t you, Heather?’ she checked again.

  How strange she’s never visited here, Muriel thought, but deduced the aunt and uncle had only recently moved into the area. But as she looked at the fine-looking house and all the others around it, she found it even stranger that Heather hadn’t bragged to everyone in the office about her aunt who lived in the big house in Glasgow.

  Heather nodded – her head still fuzzy and sore from where she’d banged it on the office floor when she fainted. ‘I’ve never been out here before,’ she confirmed. ‘So I’m sorry I can’t direct you.’

  The door of the house opened and a slim dark-haired figure in a sweater and neat jeans came rushing down the steps. ‘I’m Heather’s aunt – is she all right?’ she called out in a clear Irish tone.

  Muriel Ferguson had got out of the back of the black cab first when the driver had come to open it. ‘She’s improving,’ she said, nodding her head gravely. ‘But she’s not been at all well at work.’ She stepped away from the vehicle and lowered her voice so that Heather wouldn’t hear her. ‘She’s fainted several times . . . kept going in and out of consciousness.’

  Claire stood there listening with a very concerned look on her pretty face. ‘She’ll
be fine now, we’ll get her straight into bed.’ She moved towards the taxi, and then got into the back of it beside her niece while Muriel spoke to the taxi-driver, checking that he would wait a few extra minutes to allow them to get Heather safely into the house.

  ‘How are you, Heather?’ Claire asked gently, patting her niece’s hand. ‘Are you feeling a wee bit better? Are you well enough to walk up to the house?’

  Heather nodded her head very carefully. ‘I’ll be fine,’ she told her aunt in a weak voice. ‘I walked out to the taxi from the office.’

  ‘Come on then,’ Claire said, smiling encouragingly at her niece, ‘we’ll get you out now and into the house.’

  ‘I’m really sorry for being a nuisance,’ Heather told her as she followed her aunt out of the low taxi door. ‘I feel really silly for fainting in the office.’

  ‘You’re not the first, my dear,’ Muriel told her in a chirpy voice, ‘and you won’t be the last.’

  Five minutes later Heather was propped up on the cream and wine and blue paisley-patterned velvet sofa in her aunt’s house with the deep-buttoned back and arms. She had two blue-tasselled cushions under her head and a fluffy eiderdown on top of her.

  ‘And you don’t need to worry about a thing, I’ll let them all know back at Seafreight that you’re safe and sound,’ Muriel said in her officious voice. Then, when Claire ran out to the kitchen to bring in some logs to brighten up the fire, the secretary glanced around her, taking in the expensive but discreet furnishings and the tasteful cream and beige walls, hung with a mixture of classic Glasgow and Edinburgh prints and several original watercolour and oil paintings. There was also a large framed photograph of what looked like a family standing at the front of a simple, white-washed farmhouse out in the country.

  Muriel’s gaze flitted to the white marble fireplace, which had a coal fire burning in the grate, and then at the mahogany table at the window, with the large oriental vase filled with cream and orange lilies. To one side of the vase there was a silver-framed wedding photograph of Heather’s aunt and her older-looking husband and on the other side a small religious statue. On closer inspection, she recognised it as the Sacred Heart – a well-known Catholic symbol. Muriel Ferguson was Church of Scotland herself, and didn’t have any close friends of any other denomina­tion, but she did have an aunt in a nursing home in Paisley with a Catholic friend who had lots of these kind of statues.

  Muriel was most impressed by Heather’s relatives living in such an elegant place and more than a little surprised. It was quite obvious from her respectful attitude that Heather came from a very decent hard-working family, and Muriel presumed from the things that she’d heard the girl say about her mother sewing and the father being a school caretaker that they were fairly ordinary. But this particular strand of the family were not quite so ordinary. They were obviously of a different standing – they had to be to be living in this particular part of Glasgow.

  She was amazed that Heather hadn’t let it be known that she was so well connected – Muriel certainly would have. She had learned the importance of status long ago. What was the point in keeping social advantages like this to yourself? People only treated you as they saw you, Muriel thought, so it was most important that they should know all the facts. Claire came back in carrying a basket of small logs. She sat it down at the side of the fire then, after giving the glowing coals a good poke, she proceeded to throw half a dozen logs into the middle of it.

  ‘I’ve turned the radiators up as well,’ she told Heather. ‘I don’t want you getting cold on top of everything else.’

  ‘It’s lovely and warm in here already,’ Heather said, thinking how luxurious it was to have central heating in your own house. Apart from small electric fires for emergencies, they only had coal fires back in their house and if you didn’t keep your eye on them in the winter, it was absolutely freezing.

  Claire offered Muriel tea or coffee, but the secretary declined, saying she would love nothing better than to sit down and relax in such a lovely room, but unfortunately work and the taxi at the front door beckoned. Another time, she told Claire, when she wasn’t under pressure from work.

  She followed Claire out into the magnolia-painted hallway with a high decorative ceiling and as she shook hands with the sophisticated Irishwoman at the front door, Muriel reckoned that the old granite house must be one of the most expensive in the location.

  After she’d seen the middle-aged secretary off in the taxi, Claire came quickly back up the steps and into the house. She lifted a good-sized footstool, which was covered in the same paisley-pattern velvet as the sofa, and plonked it down on the floor beside her niece.

  ‘You’re a very sensible girl,’ she told Heather, pushing the sleeves of her jumper up to her elbows. ‘You were right to come out here rather than travelling all the way home on your own.’

  ‘I’m really sorry . . .’ Heather said in a low, cheerless voice. ‘Causing all this fuss at the office . . . and then disturbing you.’

  ‘Of course you’re not disturbing me!’ Claire said in a warm reassuring voice. ‘I was doing nothing apart from raking up a few leaves and tidying around in the garden. I’m really sorry you’re not well, but I’m delighted to have you as a visitor.’ She smiled now and patted Heather’s arm. ‘Didn’t we talk about you and Kirsty coming out after Christmas anyway?’

  Heather nodded and managed a little smile. ‘It would have been far nicer if I wasn’t sick . . . I feel a bit stupid. Imagine fainting in my boss’s office . . .’ She closed her eyes and shook her head.

  ‘I wouldn’t worry about that,’ Claire told her. ‘I’m sure plenty of people have fainted in offices over the years.’ There was a little pause. ‘Now, you’re welcome to stay here on the sofa,’ she said, patting the quilt, ‘or we can take you through to one of the spare bedrooms. The beds are all made up so it’s absolutely no trouble. It’s your decision.’

  ‘I still feel a wee bit dizzy,’ Heather said, ‘so maybe I’d be best staying here for a while.’

  ‘Grand,’ Claire said. ‘I think a sleep would probably do you the world of good – you look very tired.’ She paused. ‘Did you feel sick before you went to work this morning?’

  ‘I felt funny,’ Heather admitted. ‘And I’ve not really slept much the last few nights . . .’

  Claire looked at her now as though she was going to say something, but then thought better of it. ‘Have a wee sleep now, we can chat later.’

  While Heather slept, Claire went out into the hallway to the phone. She dialled Directory Enquiries and got the number of the parish priest in Rowanhill. It was the last place she wanted to phone, but apart from phoning the police or the doctor, she didn’t know anyone in Rowanhill who actually had a phone. She would just pretend to herself that she was making a call from an office and this was just a stranger on the other end of the phone. She dialled the number and then took a deep breath. After a few rings a man’s voice came on the line.

  It was the parish priest, Father Finlay – the priest that Mona worked for.

  Very politely and precisely, Claire explained the situation to the priest and asked if it were possible that a message could be relayed to Sophie and Fintan that Heather was safe and being looked after at her Aunt Claire’s house.

  ‘Could I ask asking who’s calling?’ the priest asked.

  ‘Claire . . . Claire McPherson.’

  There was a pause. ‘Would that originally have been Claire Grace?’

  Claire’s heart started to beat quicker. She might have known she wouldn’t get away with things that easily. ‘Yes, Father – I was Claire Grace,’ she replied, ‘and now I’m Claire McPherson.’

  There was a longer pause. ‘The Chapel House isn’t a telephone service,’ he said in a curt voice, ‘but given the circumstances . . . we’ll try to do our best.’ His voice rose now, to the familiar one used in the pulpit. ‘The Catholic Church try to look after their own, and the other members of the Grace family have always
followed the correct religious path.’ He stopped again. ‘Mona Grace should be in here shortly, I’ll pass the message on to her.’

  ‘Could I just give you the house number, please?’ Claire asked, struggling to keep her voice steady. ‘So they can speak to Heather themselves.’

  ‘Go on,’ the priest said curtly.

  Claire recited the number and as soon as she came to the last figure the line clicked off.

  Chapter 52

  Sophie and Fintan sat on either side of the kitchen table.‘I think we should go out to Glasgow and collect her,’ Fintan said in a quiet but definite tone. When Mona had come down from the Chapel House with the message, young Patrick had been quickly dispatched to get him at the school boiler house. The children weren’t due back in school until next week, but the boilers still had to be checked regularly. ‘We can’t have Andy McPherson coming in from work at seven o’clock and then doing a double journey out to here . . .’

  Sophie nodded her head. ‘But what about the chapel?’ she asked. ‘The body’s being brought to the chapel tonight.’

  ‘Oh, Jesus, I forgot,’ Fintan said, clasping his broad hand over his mouth in thought. The business with Heather had taken over everything else. ‘Look, you go to the chapel tonight, and when Kirsty comes in from work her and me can go into Glasgow then. I’d rather have her with me to sit in the back with Heather when we’re coming home, just in case she’s not feeling too good. We can all go to the funeral in the morning then, depending on how she’s feeling. If it’s only a faint, she could be as right as rain in the morning.’

  ‘I’m not sure Heather is fit enough for the funeral, whatever she says,’ Sophie said in a low voice. ‘I’m worried about her . . . I didn’t want her to go into work this morning but she insisted.’ She sighed. ‘When Mona came rushing down here I knew there was something wrong . . . I felt it all day.’ She pressed a finger and thumb on the bridge of her nose now, trying to ease the tension that was building up.