When the World Was Steady by Claire Messud

Author:Claire Messud [Messud, Claire]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-307-80656-7
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2011-09-21T04:00:00+00:00

Melody Simpson expected it to be Virginia. She so expected it to be Virginia that she cursed her aloud as she made her way to the door. Which then necessitated apology, when the caller proved to be Angelica.

‘Won’t you come in, Angelica? How have you been?’ Her own voice struck her as so painfully artificial that she almost commented on the fact.

She turned off the television before looking her visitor in the face. Not that she had anything against Angelica, but the young woman was plump. Plump, flushed and squishy. A physical type Mrs Simpson found distasteful; her Emmy bore her bulk with a compact sophistication, like a German car. A different proposition altogether. ‘I know Virginia was eager to see you,’ she said, ‘but she’s not here just now. I rather thought she’d gone to visit you.’

Angelica flushed pinker and shook her leonine blonde mane. ‘Oh dear. Oh crumbs,’ she breathed. ‘I hope we didn’t cross each other without realizing it. I knew I should’ve come earlier.’

‘She’s been gone a couple of hours now, so I doubt it. Unless you’ve been wandering the streets for that long?’ Mrs Simpson tacked on a chuckle, as near as she could manage to good-natured. To her dismay, Angelica sat.

‘It’s not like her, is it? Where would she have gone, if not to my house?’

Melody Simpson shrugged. ‘She’s a bit dopey, you know, with the stuff the doctor prescribed. I suppose she could be wandering the streets. I don’t know.’

‘It’s hardly something to be amused about! I feel terribly guilty.’

‘You? Why?’

Angelica fidgeted, but then looked Mrs Simpson clear in the eye and said, as if reciting confession, ‘I knew Virginia needed me, and I was seeing a chap in my building, for dinner, and I thought I wouldn’t come round till afterwards. I put myself first, and it was very wrong, and now look.’

‘At least you were seeing someone. Very healthy. Although it can’t have gone too well, or you wouldn’t have come round at all, eh?’

‘I frightened him a bit, I think. Shall I make us some tea?’

‘I’m not so feeble as I look. Sit still and I’ll take care of it.’

Angelica could not sit still, and she followed Mrs Simpson to the kitchen, where she stood vigorously stroking Bella, who lay on the kitchen table. Great tufts of Bella’s fur floated around in the wake of Angelica’s hand. One clump, Mrs Simpson noted, wafted into the sugar bowl.

‘Shouldn’t we do something?’ Angelica asked. ‘It’s getting dark.’

‘Such as?’

‘Call the Reverend, or Frieda, or someone. Find out where Ginny’s got to.’

Mrs Simpson didn’t answer.

‘You did say, if I understood, that her illness was some kind of a breakdown, didn’t you? For heaven’s sake, she could have jumped off the railway bridge.’

This shook Mrs Simpson slightly, but she was determined to be firm. ‘Angelica, I am no longer my daughter’s keeper. She is almost twice your age. We have reached the point where she is free to dance with the dustman, inject herself with heroin or fly to the moon and I will not intervene.

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