The Darkening Hour (2 page)

As the plane took off I saw myself as a kite. My beloved daughter Leila holding the string, letting it unwind as I rose away from her into the sky until somewhere over Spain, she had to let go.
Then I felt scared. I was a kite without a string, at the mercy of the winds. The Robertses were huddled behind a thick blue curtain in Business Class. The English couple behind me were busy with
their child who’d been running up and down the aisle for the whole flight, unconcerned that his movement might upset the plane. The man in front had his headphones plugged into his ears.
Other passengers slept or murmured.

I’d never felt so alone.

Leila wasn’t worried. As far as she was concerned, I was going away for a little while to earn some money so she could go to school like the other kids, have new things.

‘Don’t show her you’re upset,’ Ummu, my mother, warned me. ‘Think of the money. She’s going to be fine.’

And she was. Waving one hand, clutching Ummu’s with the other, she skipped as they turned away to go to the souk. The furthest I’d been from Leila before, to clean up another
woman’s mess, was over the Bouregreg.

Ummu was thrilled when I told her I’d got this job.

‘
Alhamdulillah
! Praise be to Allah!’ she cried, throwing her soapy hands in the air. She’d been scrubbing sheets in the sink, her arms deep in cold water. Now she
stood up and clutched my hand in her wet ones. Looked at me through dancing eyes. I could hear the tiny pop of soap bubbles on her arms.

‘I can hardly believe it! London!’ she shouted. She always speaks too loud; it’s something even her friends complain about.

‘So we’re going to be OK,’ I said. ‘The bottom wage over there is more than we could dream of here.’ I was trying to sound cheerful, though I was filled with
trepidation. Working in other women’s houses was not my chosen profession for a lot of reasons.

‘It’s a blessing, Mona, now I’m too blind to work and you’ve lost your job at Madame’s.’

Blind is an exaggeration. My mother’s eyesight is poor – the result of too many years weaving carpets in bad light – but she’s not blind. She sees what she wants to
see.

However, we have no choice if we want to make ends meet. And I have another incentive, one that overrides any reservations I have about leaving Leila. If Ali is in Britain, as I now believe, I
can help him if he’s got into trouble. We’ll be together again, me and Ali and Leila – a family, as we were meant to be.

‘I’ve been thinking. After five years in Britain you get citizenship,’ Ummu went on, ‘like Rachida. Five years, Mona. By then you’ll be reading and writing in
English with an excellent job in some top office somewhere. You won’t have to clean for other women any more.’

‘Ummu, it’s not going to be five years,’ I said.

But now I’m here, moving through the endless city, more streets, more flats, more traffic lights, more shops, but less grand now and darker and more hostile – I
wonder, will I ever see Ummu or Leila again?

The car has turned up a quiet street, we’re pulling up outside a house. Even this has statues on the doorframe, two small, naked babies with wings.

‘Your new home,’ Mrs Roberts says, turning around and smiling at me.

Mona arrives with the first autumn rains, golden leaves blowing about her feet.

Exactly a year since Mummy died.

‘My gift from the south,’ Roger jests, brushing his polished shoes on my doormat.

She’s not as I pictured her. The word ‘widow’ had conjured someone elderly, dressed in black. Fierce, but reliable. Instead the woman on the steps is my age. Short, huddled
into a cheap blue anorak, strands of dark hair poking from her headscarf. Enormous, earnest brown eyes. I think of those statues of the Madonna in the quaint religious shops up on Deptford High
Street, their beatific faces, the epitome of humility.

A little tableau presents itself: this woman, with the
putti
that flank my doorway fluttering above her, the church spire over the road piercing the orange glow of the London sky. My
first reaction is relief.

Claudia is getting out of the car behind them. She tiptoes over the cobbles as if there might be some malodorous remnant of Victorian London still lingering in the gutter. This is Deptford in
the twenty-first century and not the rough end, but she makes blatant her prejudice.

‘Come in,’ I say, and they sidle past Mona.

Any regret that remained over our separation is dispelled for me as Roger wipes his shoes on the doormat and walks down my hallway, shoulders clenched, afraid of the walls brushing against him
and leaving a mark.

He’s dressed in a cream suit and tie, as if he’d stepped out of another century. If it wasn’t for the fact that Claudia had something to do with this, his sartorial innocence
might have tugged at my heartstrings; Roger has always been out of step with the times, and once, I must have found this endearing.

Mona perches on the edge of a kitchen chair. I pour the others gin and tonic, and she stares ahead, with a blank expression, as Roger and I talk. In spite of the circumstances of our separation,
we’ve managed to stay on speaking terms. Thanks to Leo, our son, I think. Which is odd, given what a worry he is on a daily level.

‘So, here she is, Dora. All set and ready to work. I’ve told her about your father, and she’s quite prepared.’

‘Thank you, Roger.’

‘How’s Leo?’

‘He’s . . . better. Better than he was, anyway.’

‘Got himself a job, I take it?’

‘He’s been trying. There isn’t much out there. And he’s not in a great position.’

‘If he hadn’t flunked his exams . . .’

‘I know.’

‘An internship – that’s the way these days. You must be able to find him something, surely, Theodora, with your media connections.’

If Claudia wasn’t witnessing our exchange I’d have objected to this. Roger’s sentence is loaded with unspoken resentment. I control myself, however.

‘Internships are as hard to get as jobs, Roger. And you’re missing the point, that his self-esteem’s taken a battering . . .’

‘All the more reason for him to get out there. He needs a rocket up his arse, that boy.’

I laugh. ‘You can try the stick approach if you like. It won’t work. You’ve no idea.’

I kick myself as I hear my voice crack. I don’t want to get upset in front of everyone, but I can’t bear to hear Leo misunderstood. Any more than I can bear to witness my son, my
beautiful boy, so changed. I swallow. Nor do I want to be judged for what’s happened to him since he moved in with me.

‘He’s here,’ I say quietly. ‘Why don’t you talk to him yourself?’

‘I’ll pop along and have a chat,’ says Roger, squeezing Claudia’s shoulder. ‘Where d’you say he is?’

‘In the drawing room.’

I’ve walked into another trap. Roger will accuse me of letting Leo dominate the TV.

‘Be careful, Roger. He’s volatile. Easily upset.’

‘Volatile. Taking advantage, more like. I’ll sort him out.’

I feel all the old self-doubt creep in as Roger straightens up. I should argue, but I haven’t the strength. And I’m in his debt at the moment, because of Mona.

‘Don’t be long, darling,’ Claudia simpers. ‘The table’s booked for eight. It’s sticky getting through London at this time.’

‘I’ll only be a minute,’ he says.

When he’s gone, I’m left in the kitchen with Claudia and Mona. We make an awkward trio. Mona still hasn’t spoken, and Claudia’s refused to sit down, is clicking her
kitten heels on my quarry tiles, twirling her glass in her hand. I expect she’s worried about getting Endymion’s hairs on her Aquascutum trench-coat. I wonder why she doesn’t want
to talk to Leo. After all, she’s the stepmother; he lived with her for several years before coming back to me.

‘Mona, I expect Dora would like to show you your living quarters,’ she says. ‘Wouldn’t you, Dora?’

Of course, you don’t socialise with staff in Claudia’s world, the world I left behind.

‘Living quarters’ is a slight exaggeration. Mona’s to sleep in the room beyond the kitchen that was my study, then Leo’s homework den. Through a chink in the door that
has been left ajar I’m aware of the bumpy silhouettes of clothes heaped on the floor, a teetering pile of books and magazines on a table. Since Leo dropped out of sixth form, at the end of
last year, the room has mostly been used as a dumping ground. It’s full of his old school files and books, DVDs he no longer watches, clothes he’s outgrown.

I move towards the door ahead of Mona, shielding it from Claudia’s prying eyes, I don’t want her to spot the mess. I’d meant to tidy it but haven’t had a spare moment,
with work, and Daddy. Something Claudia with her many domestic staff would never understand.

On closer examination Mona is, I guess, a few years older than me. Crooked teeth. Poorly nourished, pale brown skin. A spattering of dark freckles on one cheek.

A warmth washes over me as I draw the curtains for her, chase Endymion out, smooth the cover on her bed. Everything about her – her cheap clothes, her unmade-up face – is a comfort
after Claudia’s hard surface. I’d like to hug her.

I show her the small washroom and toilet outside the room.

‘I’ll let you unpack,’ I say.

She takes off her coat.

Now her hood’s down I see her black hair is straight, limp and rather greasy. There’s a tiny pillow of flesh beneath her chin. The body, though it’s well covered in more layers
of clothing, is rounded. She wouldn’t have access to a gym, will be ignorant about healthy eating, has probably never had dental care – it’s expensive where she comes from.
I’m helping her, I think. I’ll improve her life. A fair exchange – after all, she’s here to improve mine.

‘I’ll show you around tomorrow and introduce you to Daddy. You must be tired. Do you want anything to eat? To drink?’

She stares at me.

‘Eat,’ I say loudly, miming. ‘Drink?’

‘Ah. No, thank you.’

She almost bows. I wave a hand in the air, indicating that such subservience isn’t necessary and leave her, shutting the door behind me.

In the kitchen Roger’s already back from his encounter with Leo.

‘I made him switch off the TV. Told him if we were going to talk I wasn’t doing it to a soundtrack.’

‘And?’

‘He’s picked up some unattractive habits from somewhere. He’s verging on the surly. What’s going on, Dora?’

‘It’s like I said. He’s low. The doctor thinks depressed.’

Claudia looks up at Roger. I wonder whether she’s had Botox. There’s a rigidity in her face, as if it could never give anything away even if she wanted it to.

‘Depressed? He’s had every advantage, Dora. I’ve spent more on his education than anything – this house included!’

‘It’s not the money, is it? It’s not the education. He’s been affected by us – it hasn’t been easy for him.’

That’s when Roger comes at me with the punch he knows will hurt.

‘Us? Or you, Dora? You’re the one who puts your work before everything.’

‘Look, Roger, I don’t wish to discuss this now. I’m sure Claudia doesn’t want to hear it, do you, Claudia? We can meet another time to talk it through.’

Roger sighs. ‘I’ll take him out for lunch while we’re here. He needs some ultimatums.’

‘So.’ I’ve had enough of this. ‘Thank you for bringing her.’ I nod towards the study. ‘Does she speak much English? She seemed to know a few words.’

‘You’ll have to speak slowly. She’s picked up what she knows at Madame Sherif’s house. I believe they were English-speakers.’

‘How old is she?’

‘No idea. You can check her passport. But as you may remember, they don’t register births the way we do.’

‘I don’t suppose it matters,’ I say. ‘As long as she’s healthy. Daddy sometimes needs things shifting. He sometimes needs lifting himself.’

‘Oh, she’s very healthy,’ he says.

‘Could I use your bathroom, please, Theodora?’ Claudia pipes up then, and, knowing she won’t want to share with Mona, I direct her upstairs.

When she’s gone, Roger leans over to me, speaking into my ear.

‘If she pushes the boundaries, let me know,’ he mutters. ‘You don’t want a repeat of Zidana.’

‘God, Roger. Don’t bring that up, it was years ago.’

‘I know, and we managed to sweep it under the carpet. But we were lucky. If anyone had found out . . .’

‘But they didn’t. And we’ve moved on.’

‘Nevertheless. If things get . . . let me know. Better to nip it in the bud.’

I stare at him. I’d thought the incident with Zidana, a young maid we’d employed in Rabat when Leo was still at school there – had been forgotten. I wish he hadn’t
mentioned it.

Roger changes the subject as Claudia comes back downstairs.

‘Look,’ he says, ‘these are Mona’s papers. You know the ropes – her visa states she’s here for domestic purposes only. And she’s yours. In effect, she
belongs to you. Can’t switch employer. If it doesn’t work out, it’s straight home with her. She owes for the passport and ticket, so you can knock that off her first
wages.’

‘Thanks, Roger.’

‘As I said, we’ve had her friend Amina for the last year and she’s fabulous.’

‘I do appreciate this. What with Daddy living downstairs now, and with work and things, I couldn’t have coped without help.’

‘Make sure you keep her in line,’ says Claudia. ‘Don’t take any nonsense. She may be here to look after your father primarily, but she’ll clean, cook, whatever.
These girls expect to stay busy.’

‘Yes. Thank you, Claudia. I know.’ Has she forgotten I was once married to her husband? That I had staff too?

‘Darling!’ Roger calls over my shoulder.

Claudia drains her gin. ‘Coming.’

Watching him hold open the door for Claudia, I know for certain that I did Roger the biggest favour by finally getting out of his life. Claudia slots so beautifully into the role of
diplomat’s wife, in a way I never could.

But as their expensive hire car disappears back down my street, sending spray up from the puddles, I feel a momentary regret that the lifestyle they inhabit is mine no longer.

In the dark, I think of Leila.