Little Face by Sophie Hannah by Sophie Hannah

Author:Sophie Hannah [Hannah, Sophie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2011-02-23T00:13:16.506000+00:00

19

Monday, September 29, 2003

FEELING WORSE AFTER seeing Simon, I park the car and prepare myself, once again, to walk into the big, cold, white house that is supposed to be my home. I see Vivienne watching me from the window of Florence's nursery. She does not retreat when she sees me look up at her. Neither does she wave or smile. Her eyes are like two perfectly engineered tracking devices, following my progress along the drive.

When I open the door, she is in the hall, and I do not understand how she could have got there so quickly. Vivienne manages to be everywhere, yet I have never seen her hurry or exert herself. David stands behind her, watching avidly. He doesn't even look at me as I come in. He licks his lower lip nervously, waiting for his mother to speak.

`Where's Little Face?' I ask, hearing no baby noises, only silence vibrating through the house. Hollow, screaming silence. `Where is she?' There is panic in my voice.

No answer.

`What have you done with her?'

`Alice, where have you been?' says Vivienne. `I thought you and I had no secrets from one another. I trusted you, and I thought you trusted me.'

`What are you talking about?'

`You lied to me. You said you were going into town to do some shopping.'

`I didn't find anything I wanted.' My lie was pathetic, I can see that now. As if I could even think about shopping in my present distraught state. Vivienne must have seen through my story right from the start.

`You went to the police station, didn't you? That policeman telephoned, Detective Constable Waterhouse. Is it true that you told him your mobile phone had been stolen?' She places a disgusted stress on this last word.

`I was going to go shopping,' I say, thinking quickly. `But then my phone wasn't in my bag. . . '

`Detective Constable Waterhouse said you were hysterical. He was extremely worried about you. So am I.'

Defiance rises in me like a fountain. `My phone was in my bag this morning and I know I didn't take it out! One of you two must have. You've got no right to take my things without permission! I know you both think I'm sick in the head, and so does Simon, but even sick people have got a right not to have their private possessions stolen!'

`Simon,' David mutters under his breath. His sole contribution.

`Alice, can you hear how irrational you sound?' says Vivienne gently. `You misplace an object, and your immediate thought is to involve the police. I found your phone in your room, just after you went out. No-one took it anywhere.'

`Where's Little Face?' I ask again.

`One thing at a time.' Vivienne has never believed in the natural ebb and flow of a dialogue. As a child, one of her hobbies was to produce a written agenda for every family dinner. Vivienne, her mother and her father would take it in turn to speak, to deliver their `daily report', as Vivienne called it. Her turn always came first, and she took the minutes as well, in a notebook.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.