I think Maria meant she wanted someone of her own age to talk to. It must be very lonely living way out here.’
She contemplated my answer, then lowered her breathy little voice. ‘I’m not lonely,’ she said, without taking her eyes off me. ‘I talk to Amber.’
I wondered if perhaps her ‘talks’ with her deceased sister had been enough to fill the void of what otherwise must have been a very lonely little world. I saw that she was watching me closely.
‘Is it all right for me to talk to Amber?’ she asked, her eyes fixed anxiously on mine. ‘I don’t think Daddy or Tara would like it.’
She was probably right. With a child’s intuitiveness she had realised that the subject of Amber was somehow out of bounds and, perhaps not wanting to upset her father or Tara, she had withdrawn from them and lived with her sister’s memory alive and well in some secret place inside herself.
I rested my elbows on the table and leaned towards her. ‘It’s perfectly all right and normal for you to miss your sister. Thinking about Amber and talking to her inside your head just means that you loved her very much. A part of her will always be with you.’
Jadie smiled. I pushed back my chair so she wouldn’t see the tears glistening in my eyes and went to the kitchen window to stare out at the white lawn sparkling under an ice-blue sky at the side of the house. The snowman was still there, wearing the colourful scarf and Jadie’s woollen hat. Without looking round I felt Jadie come to stand beside me. She slipped her small hand inside mine and I gave it a quick squeeze.
‘Amber says she loves you,’ she said quietly.
‘Look at all the mess you’re making,’ Tara chided Jadie irritably. ‘Why don’t you get out your colouring pencils instead and I’ll throw all this rubbish away?’
‘No!’ wailed Jadie. ‘Those are my snowflakes. Daddy showed me how to do them.’
Tara stared at her. ‘I can’t believe you’ve decided to talk to us after all this time. If there’s nothing wrong with you why didn’t you talk for the doctors, eh?’
Jadie hung her head and I glared at Tara, annoyed by her insensitivity.
‘And don’t you go looking at me like I’m some sort of heartless monster,’ she flung at me. ‘You haven’t been trying to decipher her sign language for the last two years. You have no notion what it’s been like, playing bloody charades all day every day, sometimes not having a clue what it is she wants. On top of everything else we’ve had to cope with, it’s not been a picnic, I can tell you.’
I lowered my voice so that Jadie couldn’t hear me: ‘I’m sure it must have been hard—’
‘You have no idea!’ Tara snatched cups and bowls off the table and turned to the dishwasher so I couldn’t see her face. She loaded it noisily, then turned back to me suddenly. ‘The doctors told us Jadie’s refusal to speak was an anxiety thing. Apparently it affects about one in a thousand children and it’s not because she couldn’t speak—she just refused to, and the longer she went on doing it the harder it was for her to start again. We tried everything to help her but she’s a stubborn little thing—gets it from her father no doubt.’ She sniffed loudly, rubbing her nose with the back of her hand. ‘Do you have children?’
I fell silent, considering the possibility for the second time since I had been in this house, groping inside a head that seemed devoid of memories. It was like looking at a blank wall and I found myself quelling a sudden upsurging of panic. ‘I don’t think so,’ I said at last.
A pang of sympathy crossed Tara’s face. ‘Then you have no idea what heartache they can bring. I worked here when Amber was still with us and I loved both those little girls like they were my own. We lost Amber and then their mother left, and we’ve been waiting…’
I glanced towards Jadie, horrified at what Tara might be going to say, but she shook her head, sniffed loudly and finished, ‘…waiting for Jadie to speak. And it’s been hard on me and harder on her father. And then you blow in with the snowstorm and suddenly Vincent is playing with his little girl for the first time in two years and Jadie decides to talk…’
She bit her lip fiercely, fighting back tears and I stood still, unsure how to react. After a moment I unrooted my feet and hurried over to put a tentative arm round her shoulders.
‘I can see how much you care for them both,’ I said, wishing I wasn’t partly the cause of her distress, ‘and I can also see that you are important to both of them. They probably couldn’t have coped without you all this time. I’m just here by chance and maybe Jadie chose to speak simply because she was ready to. I’m sure it had nothing to do with me.’
‘Yes, well, whatever,’ Tara said in a strangled voice. She shrugged me off.
‘Jadie, come and give Tara a hug.’ Feeling decidedly awkward I turned to the child, who released the pile of snowflakes she’d been clutching protectively, slid off her chair and came to put her arms round Tara’s middle.
Tara smiled down through the glint of tears to the top of Jadie’s fair head. I left them to it and turned to finish clearing the table, but Tara was having none of it.
‘You’re a guest,’ she insisted, breaking free from Jadie’s embrace and hurrying to take the dishes from me. ‘This is my job.’
I stood back and watched as Tara finished loading the dishwasher. Jadie, taking no chances, picked up her scattered snowflakes and took them over to the windowsill, where she held them up to the light one at a time.
‘They’re lovely,’ I told her.
She turned to me, beaming. ‘What are we going to do next?’ she asked.
With an inward groan I realised that I had made myself the playmate of a six-year-old. But I had some grown-up things to attend to first.
‘I’m going to see if your daddy minds if I use the telephone,’ I told her. ‘I need to ring the police to see if anyone’s reported me missing.’
Jadie giggled. ‘It’s funny you think you’re missing, when you’re right here.’
‘I won’t be long.’ I shot a sideways glance at Tara, slipped out of the kitchen and walked along the passage towards Vincent’s office. Raising my hand to knock, I paused with my hand in midair as a torrent of swearing assailed my ears. The door was ajar, so I peered in. Vincent was sitting in profile, staring at his computer screen in consternation.
I gave a discreet little cough and he spun round, half rose from his chair and slammed his laptop closed with a snap of annoyance.
‘The damn thing says there’s no signal.’ He glanced across at me with a belated attempt at nonchalance. ‘It was working perfectly first thing. I don’t know how I’m supposed to keep in touch with the outside world when I can’t even use the internet.’ He sank back down in his leather swivel chair and tapped his fingers impatiently on the closed lid as if willing it to come to life.
‘Used up all your miracles today?’ I suggested glibly.
‘What?’ Vincent scowled at me and then his expression cleared. ‘I’m sorry. I’m working on something rather important and a lot can happen in the financial world in a few hours. It’s got me rattled, but you’re right,
