Page 38

A quiet terror punctured her. She could hear the jagged rush of her breathing. Without thinking, she yanked the pages from the book. They tore into her hand, the words split apart. What was shedoing? Quickly, she looked around but saw no one. She stuffed the pages into her purse and slammed the book shut.

Vivian stumbled out of the library and into the sunset. The simmering heat had cooled. Shakily, she lit a cigarette in the parking lot and after she smoked, she drove home. On the way she was soothed only by the roar of the engine and the breeze flapping her silk scarf. She clutched the wheel tightly. She thought she had been the only one hiding parts of her past, but her husband had been too.

When Vivian finally got home, she stopped in the kitchen to get a cup of hot water. Edith, the housekeeper, was washing the last of the dishes.

“I’m back,” she said in Mandarin, pouring from the canteen. “Where are the girls? And Josiah?”

Edith turned, her hands in rubber gloves holding a dripping sponge. She stood straight, making her seem tall despite her small stature. Her hair was pulled back and fastened with a silver clip. “Rennie’s asleep. The twins are upstairs. My daughters are in their room. Josiah’s watering the fuchsias in the backyard.” The housekeeper paused her washing. “It’s late. Would you like me to make you some dinner?”

“I ate on the way home.” It was a lie. Vivian was far too on edge to be hungry. She stared down at her purse. The pages she’d torn out of the library book were still there. She peered around the house, taking it in anew. Amos Dalby had livedhere.

Laura Dalby had been murdered here.

“Lian-er?”

Vivian jumped. “Aiyah! Don’t frighten me like this.”

“I’m sorry.” Edith peered at Vivian more closely. Her eyebrows knotted together. “What were you looking at? You look pale.”

Vivian yanked her scarf off. “Oh. Sorry. I’ve had a long day.”

“What happened? Can I cut you some fruit?”

Vivian gripped her keys so tightly they pressed into her palm. Should she tell Edith what she’d learned in the library? They told each othereverything, and when Richard wasn’t around, they were free to speak in Mandarin as much as they pleased. But right before she opened her mouth, she decided against it. The kitchen counters were spotless. The girls were in bed. This house seemed so peaceful right now, she didn’t want to disturb it.

Instead, she unbuttoned her blouse cuffs, grabbed a bottle of red wine off the rack, and smiled. “Pleasecome drink this with me.”

“There’s still dishes to do.”

“You can do that later. Richard is filming and I can’t finish a bottle by myself. You know I’ll get sick.”

Edith wiped her hands on a towel, shaking her head as though this was a terrible imposition. “All right.” She smiled as she pulled the rubber gloves off. She rolled down the sleeves of her plain cotton blouse and rebuttoned them.

When Vivian had asked Richard if she could hire a Chinese housekeeper, he agreed immediately. They had hired Edith first, and then her husband, Josiah, when Edith said he took good care of plants. Edith took care of her daughters and cooked them Chinese dishes when Vivian was away on set or at auditions. Josiah coaxed the garden to bloom like it never had before. He was the one who suggested dividing it into four sections in a cross shape around the fountain, divided by walking paths, sculpted in perfect symmetry. During the summer months the garden burst with roses and hydrangeas and honeysuckle and chrysanthemum; in the winters he took careful care of the camellias and sweet pea shrubs. It was only a matter of time before Vivian invited them to move their two daughters into the lower wing of the house, into the guest rooms that were never used. The Dengs were churchgoing and fiercely loyal, with no shortage of gratitude, and Vivian liked feeling generous. The first time Edith stepped foot in the house, she looked around her in wonder, at the sloping spiral staircase and the chandelier that twinkled with hundreds of crystals, and then at Vivian. In that moment, Vivian knew what Edith was thinking: that never could she have imagined a Chinese family occupying a house like this.

Things were different when it was just the two of them. When Richard was around, they all spoke English to one another and maintaineda certain sense of formality, even if he was nothing but warm to the Dengs. But Vivian and Edith shared recipes and celebrated holidays together and sang karaoke in the car. Double happiness,?. That was the phrase that decorated the rim of their porcelain bowls. To Vivian it no longer just represented her happy marriage; it represented their two happy families, too. Now Edith knew her way around the house as well as Vivian did. And when Richard was gone on trips, or away filming like he was now, the formality melted away.

Vivian poured Edith a full glass of merlot.

“Lian-er,” Edith chided, watching the glass fill. Edith called her by her nickname. It warmed Vivian’s chest. When she called her Lian-er, Vivian knew she was safe to tell her everything. “We can’t get drunk in the middle of the week.”

“Why not?” Vivian tried to sound playful. “Who’s to stop us?” She took a sip of wine and massaged her neck. Edith tapped her fingers around the base of the glass and smiled. “Well. Meng-Meng might come down for a cup of milk later.” Edith used Rennie’s childhood nickname, too.

“She was the most peaceful one to carry, you know. The twins were the worst.??, the two of them would kick me so much I couldn’t sleep. But Meng-Meng, she slept when I did. Through the night.” She leaned forward. “I have these bad dreams sometimes… nightmares. My mother had nightmares too. But the whole time I was pregnant with her, I rarely had one.”

She said this absentmindedly, but immediately she could feel the weight of Edith’s gaze settle upon her, and a new fear swept over Vivian. Could Renata have inherited her dreams, and that’s why she could never sleep? Was it possible she had absorbed Vivian’s nightmares in the womb?

“What kind of nightmares?” Edith asked, interrupting Vivian’s spiral.

“Just…” Vivid images rose behind her eyes. A nondescript face, the eye sockets filled with dirt, turned directly toward her. Floors slick with blood. Then something clicked. She thought of what she’d read that afternoon, how Laura Dalby had been murdered here and shehadn’t been found until the next morning. There must have been so much blood….

She jumped and knocked into her wineglass. It tipped over and shattered on the countertop.

“Lian-er!”

Vivian looked down. The wine had splashed onto her dress and pooled in her lap. She gasped and pushed herself off the chair.

“Don’t touch the glass. I’m going to clean this up.” Edith was tugging back on the rubber gloves. “Lian-er, what’s going on?”