A Cat, a Hat, and a Piece of String

by Joanne Harris

  It was nothing concrete, you understand. Just a look in Lorraine’s eye when she went about her duties; the way she spoke to us, calling us dearie in that hard, contemptuous voice. It was the way her fingers dug into my shoulder and the small of my back as she lifted me from my chair on to the toilet. I’d try and keep it in if it was Lorraine’s shift; wait until someone else came on duty, but sometimes it was inevitable, and at those times her fingers knew exactly where to go, searching and probing for the nerve spots like a prospector digging for gold. From time to time I’d give a yell, and she’d apologize, but I could tell she was grinning inside.

  Once more, we tried to complain. Chris came with us again, but said nothing; and Maureen listened to us with an ersatz smile, and hinted that we might possibly be growing just a teeny-tiny bit forgetful. Our evidence – my flowered teacup, found broken in the kitchen waste bin – was disregarded. I might have dropped it there myself, said Maureen, and forgotten all about it. Anyhow, why would Lorraine do such a thing? And what would a girl like Lorraine want with Hope’s old letters?

  Of course, we couldn’t tell her. But other things had disappeared too, insisted Hope.

  ‘Valuables?’ Maureen’s eyes lit.

  ‘Not exactly.’ We’re not allowed valuables at the home, though I have a little jewellery – my pearls, a brooch, a couple of rings and a bracelet – concealed in the seat of my wheelchair.

  ‘Oh.’ She seemed disappointed. ‘Because if any money disappeared—’

  ‘No,’ said Hope firmly. ‘I must have made a mistake.’

  And at that she turned me round and began to wheel me briskly away. There was a time when I might have questioned that; but Hope sees more than I do, in spite of her blindness, and I knew that she had recognized something then in Maureen’s voice that had alerted her to danger.

  Of course I had noticed Maureen watching Chris. I knew she disliked him, too; but until then it had never occurred to me that she might suspect him of those thefts. He knew, though; that’s why he was so quiet, and that’s why he kept his distance afterwards, as if he sensed we might bring him – and that silly old criminal record – back under scrutiny. Lorraine knew it too; and by the second week she had become increasingly cocky. Hope’s perfume disappeared; so did the World’s Best Grandma pillow on my bed. She knew we wouldn’t complain; if we did, we would simply bring more trouble on to our friend.

  During the next few days, we noticed that Maureen was there less and less. She had taken over the administrative side of things, or so Lorraine told us, which meant that she was often away, leaving Lorraine to oversee the other carers. With terrifying speed, the Meadowbank way became Lorraine’s way.

  Our privileges, we found, were suddenly curtailed. Residents who toed the line were favoured; others were targeted for special attention. Thus it was that the flowers Tom brought me were removed from my room ‘for hygiene purposes’; that Hope’s cassette player was confiscated as ‘an electrocution hazard’ and that Chris was demoted from his largely unofficial post of staff carer to window-washer and handyman, with strict orders not to gossip with the residents.

  Soon after that, Mrs McAllister’s cache under the mattress was discovered. There was nothing in it of value – biscuits, soap, toys, stockings and Mrs McAllister’s perennial favourite, teeth – but Lorraine made a terrible fuss. As a result Mrs McAllister was to be shut up in her room for most of the day, with instructions to the staff to confiscate her dentures except at mealtimes. She made it sound perfectly sensible; obviously, Mrs McAllister couldn’t be trusted with her own dentures, and Lorraine didn’t see why Meadowbank staff should spend hours every mealtime looking for residents’ teeth. It was ridiculous; they were busy; and anyway, it wasn’t as if the old dear needed them for anything.

  Sensible or not, it was a contemptible piece of bullying. Hope and I knew it; but by then we had learnt caution. Lorraine was out to get us, and we knew that the slightest bit of provocation might bring down her anger upon us. And so we endured; stoically at first, then with deepening misery.

  Without Hope, I think I might have given up. But there’s steel in Hope, under those Cambridge manners. We’d go to her room in the evenings (it was furthest from the lobby, and Lorraine), drink tea in the Meadowbank cups and talk. Sometimes I read aloud – Hope likes her books, and without the cassette player she was once more reliant on my reading – and sometimes we went through holiday brochures, which I would describe to her in loving detail, and imagined the journeys we would make if we were free. Most of all, though, we talked about Lorraine.

  ‘The worst part of it is the helplessness,’ said Hope one night. ‘I mean, children are helpless, aren’t they, but at least they have something better to look forward to. Old people don’t. They’re not going to grow big and strong and face up to their bullies. Bully an old person, and they’re yours for life.’

  It was a depressing thought. Once more I remembered Jacqueline Bond.

  ‘What happened to her?’ asked Hope, and I realized she was thinking along the same lines. That happens, you know; like an old married couple, we read each other’s thoughts.

  ‘She left,’ I said. ‘One day she just wasn’t there any more.’

  ‘Sounds good to me,’ said Hope. ‘Was she expelled?’

  ‘I don’t remember.’

  Hope thought about this for a time. ‘It’s a pity,’ she said, ‘that you never stood up to her. It would have been cathartic, and would have done you good. Still—’ She gave one of her rare, sweet smiles. ‘It’s never too late for a bit of catharsis. Don’t you agree?’

  I did; but I didn’t see what we could do about it. There was no point in complaining to Maureen; clearly something more drastic was required. But what could we do?

  Over several days, we considered the possibilities. If Chris had been around, he would have noticed at once. Hey, Butch! he would have said. Planning a jailbreak? But Chris was looking uneasy from his place at the outer edge of things; Chris knew that a single step in the wrong direction might send him flying off. I could see it in his eyes as he brought Lorraine her tea in the morning; in his new, careful walk as he came and went.

  But we were planning. We’d read once, in an old newspaper, the story of the pensioner who had held up a number of post offices unchallenged and at gunpoint, not even bothering to cover his face. To most people, one old man in a flat cap and muffler looks much like another, after all, and who would think to suspect a pensioner?

  ‘Remember this, Faith. We only have one chance,’ said Hope one night as we sat in her bedroom, talking. ‘If we do anything to put Lorraine on her guard, she’ll be on to us like a poultice. Whatever we do must be quick, clear and unequivocal.’ She talks like that, you know; the Cambridge professor as was. ‘And public,’ she added, with a sip at her tea. ‘Most of all, it must be public.’

  All very well, I suppose; but what public did we have? We hardly left our rooms any more, except for meals, which were dull and unappetizing, and for our monthly check-up with the Meadowbank nurse. News of the outside world came from Tom, Chris and occasionally the staff hairdresser (who offers three approved styles, all of them identical, and a range of unappealing treatments such as corn removal and lymphatic drainage). We always have an Open Day in January, but at this rate of deterioration Mrs McAllister might not last the month, let alone till next year.

  We racked our brains, but nothing came. Easter approached; Lorraine had a little party to celebrate her promotion to deputy supervisor; after which our movements became even more restricted, with long application forms to fill in for the most elementary requirement, special times of day allocated to visiting and all our favourite TV programmes forbidden on the grounds of unsuitability.

  Then came my brainwave. I have to admit that I sat on it for a while, hardly daring to imagine we could carry it off. Hope was the one who should have thought of it, I told myself; clever Hope, with her BBC vowels and fierce independence. But in those last few days Hope had begun to fa
de. Not like poor Mrs McAllister, and not in any way that the others would have noticed; but I could see it. She retained her dignity, of course; she was calm as ever; talked to Mrs McAllister, who called her Maud and wept on her shoulder; always took care of herself; never wandered around in her dressing gown during the day, as so many of them do; but I could see that there was something missing in my old friend, that spark, perhaps; that cheery gleam of revolt.

  Then it happened. I was watching Chris fix the smoke alarm (Lorraine had caught Mr Bannerman smoking in the toilets again). It was one of Maureen’s days in the home, and Lorraine was on her best behaviour. So was Chris; working in silence, not looking at me; not even whistling. Usually he talks; about football; television; his little girl, Gemma; his mother-in-law; his ex-wife; his garden; his nights out with the lads. Today Lorraine’s shadow was over him, and he started guiltily at the sound of my voice.

  ‘Tea, Chris? You haven’t had a break all day.’

  ‘Sorry, Butch.’ It sounded almost right; but I knew Chris, and I knew it wasn’t. ‘Work to do. Gotta test this when it’s done.’

  ‘The smoke detector?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Good idea,’ I told him. ‘Don’t forget the staffroom.’

  He smiled at that, as I knew he would, but made no comment. Lorraine enjoys her Silk Cuts, and I was prepared to bet that some regulation or other would ensure she continued to enjoy them. As for the rest of us, if Lorraine could have installed pleasure detectors in every room, I reckoned she would have done it already, and cut off the supply. I said as much to Chris, and watched his smile turn into a grin.

  ‘You might say that, Butch,’ he said. ‘I wouldn’t dare.’ And it was then – right then, on the word dare – that I had my brainwave.

  The Meadowbank governors (great sticklers for rules) insist on a complete fire drill at least twice a year. It’s just like school, really: the alarm goes; we line up on the grass; someone keys in a number code to the alarm box so that the fire brigade doesn’t actually have to turn up and two of the duty staff run round the building checking all the rooms while Maureen stands by, ‘reassuring’ everyone in her most Wagnerian tones (Now then, dearie, don’t panic. It’s just a drill, remember. I said it’s JUST A DRILL!), spreading confusion as a sower spreads seed.

  It’s quite funny, really; however much warning she gives, some people always forget; or they’re not wearing their hearing aid; or they’re on the toilet (and at our age, sweetheart, that takes time!) or they’re watching TV and don’t want to leave. Last year it took us nearly half an hour to clear the building, and that was with the best effort of every staff member on the team. Someone forgot to key in the code; with the result that the police and the fire brigade turned up, and we were all subjected to a lecture of nursery-nurse severity by Maureen, telling us that if there had been a real fire we would all have been burnt alive.

  Now, with the installation of the new smoke detectors, there would have to be another fire drill. I guessed Lorraine had insisted upon it; it would be an excellent opportunity for her both to exercise her authority in front of Maureen and to cause as much disruption and unhappiness as possible among the residents of the home. It would be public, I told myself; and in the noise and confusion, maybe – just maybe – Hope and I would have our chance.

  I suggested it to Hope later that evening. She had been with Mrs McAllister, who was having one of her bad days, and although Hope remained as patient as ever, I could see the strain beginning to show. But Lorraine was off duty – dim Claire was at the front desk, chewing gum and reading Goodbye! magazine – and we made a nice enough evening of it, with a stack of travel brochures (that week we were doing Italy), a couple of biscuits filched from the kitchens and a lot of imagination.

  ‘Where to tonight?’ said Hope, stretching her back so that it popped.

  ‘I thought we might do Rome.’

  She shook her head. ‘I’ve had enough of antiquities for one day,’ she said wryly. ‘Give me something – pastoral.’ And so I obliged: planned routes – London–Paris–Milan–Naples – and then by boat to the islands – Sicily, Ustica, Pantelleria – to orange groves and bright misty mornings and fat purple olives and salted lemons and anchovy toasts and boisterous wines and lithe young men of heroic beauty and snowy egrets flying in that impossible sky. It’s our kind of travel, and I have learned to describe it so that Hope can see it as clearly as I can myself. I don’t suppose we’ll ever really go to those far-off places; but we do dream. Oh yes, we dream.

  Hope was lying on her bed, eyes closed, enjoying one of my best sunsets and an imaginary glass of Sicilian red.

  ‘This is the life,’ she said, but in such a wistful voice that I felt quite alarmed. Usually she joins our little game with great good humour, inventing outrageous details to amuse me (young men swimming naked on a deserted beach; a fat woman aquaplaning as a brass band plays a Souza march). This time she lay passive, not smiling, but straining – wanting so hard – to be there, and I knew she was thinking about Priscilla. Priscilla and the box of postcards – that last, broken link between herself and her vanished daughter.

  ‘At least I know she’s still all right,’ said Hope, whenever she received one of those infrequent postcards. ‘Imagine not knowing. Imagine losing her altogether, like Mrs McAllister’s Peter—’

  As if she wasn’t lost already, I thought. Selfish, silly Priscilla, too lost in her own complicated affairs to think of anyone else. ‘She’s getting worse, you know. I saw it today. She’s giving up, poor old thing.’

  ‘Perhaps not.’ I was thinking of my plan: the risks; the timing; of what we’d lose if it didn’t work. But my heart was beating fast; my breath caught; sixty years ago, dancing used to feel like this.

  Hope picked up on it at once. ‘Why?’ she said, sitting up. ‘Have you thought of something?’ I told her; and little by little I saw her face change, come back into focus like a Polaroid, like a face on the water.

  ‘Well?’ I said. ‘Do you think it might work?’

  ‘Yes, Faith.’ She nodded. ‘I really think it might.’

  It was the next morning that Lorraine announced the fire drill. We’d been awake most of the night, Hope and I, talking and planning like naughty schoolgirls; pillows in our beds arranged to look like sleeping bodies in case someone (Lorraine, who else?) came round and looked through the peephole.

  Now, Lorraine addressed us all in her best official voice, announcing the drill for precisely two o’clock that afternoon. A few groans accompanied the announcement; it was the time when most of us would have been listening to The Archers.

  Lorraine looked reproachful (Hope and I guessed she must have planned it this way) and treated us all to a little lecture on how selfish we were, how much work she did on our behalf, and how she was really the only one who cared enough about us to ensure our safety from smoke, fire and electrical hazards.

  ‘Now Maureen has told me what a very poor response she got last time there was a fire drill,’ she went on. ‘I hope that this time you’ll really make an effort, and evacuate the building in ten minutes or less. Otherwise’ – and she gave that smile of hers, nothing but teeth, and false all the way up to the eyes – ‘I might have to Take Certain Measures.’ A Lorraine phrase, that, if ever there was one, and she was looking right at Chris as she said it.

  Well, Hope and I both knew what that meant. Lorraine had been looking for an excuse to get at Chris ever since he complained to Maureen about Mrs McAllister. I could see he knew it too; his mouth tightened and he looked away. Ten minutes was an unfair, impossible time, and Lorraine knew it.

  I looked at Hope, who was smiling serenely ahead, and Mrs McAllister, on my other side, sitting in one of the Meadowbank chairs, her face all squashy-looking without her teeth.

  ‘Now I expect anyone who can walk to be out of the building in the first five minutes,’ continued Lorraine in her brisk voice. ‘Then we’ll handle the rest of you, just as we did last time. What
I don’t want to see is people trying to bring bags and coats and God knows what with them. Leave all personal possessions in your rooms. D’you hear? In your rooms. Don’t worry. This isn’t a real fire. Your things will be perfectly safe.’

  I suppressed a little smile. My legs may be no good, but there’s nothing wrong with my brain. I’d caught that look, the sideways glance towards me in my wheelchair. I knew what she was thinking, and I fingered the tapestry cushion in the small of my back, where I still keep my few remaining valuables.

  Nothing much, you understand. A few pieces of jewellery, too good for everyday wear, that I’m keeping for Tom’s little girl. A small bundle of banknotes (we’re not supposed to have money, but it’s nice to have it from time to time). There’s no real way to keep a secret, here at the Meadowbank Home, and I suppose most people know about the cushion by now, but they’d always turned a blind eye to it before – after all, what harm could it do to let me hang on to a few bits and pieces?

  Lorraine was different, of course. I’d seen her eyeing up my wheelchair a few times before, though I’d never given her a chance to get a look at the cushion. This was her chance, though; the fire drill, the thinly veiled excuse about leaving personal items in rooms, and I could see that her little eyes fairly lit up at the thought that she might finally get her paws on something worthwhile.

  ‘When you’re all lined up outside, Chris and I will check the building. No one is to move until it’s all been checked.’

  She handed Chris a set of passkeys. That, too, was like her. Most of the time she never seemed to notice Chris at all; but now, with thieving on her mind, she wanted him near, a handy scapegoat if things went wrong, and a likely suspect if anyone complained of valuables going missing.

  Hope reached for my hand and I felt the brief pressure of her fingers against mine. On my other side, Mrs McAllister was mumbling anxiously to herself, her old head nodding repeatedly as if to underline a point. I reached for her hand too, and felt it tighten on mine like a frightened child’s.