Read Online Mapping the Edge by Sarah Dunant - Free Book Online Page A

guilt, but from the need to hold her in her arms and know that nothing had changed. She would have liked to have a bath—his smell was all over her—but the pipes ran next to Patricia’s room and would have made discordant music in the middle of the night. She stripped off her clothes, brushed her teeth, and crept into bed, for that second the subterfuge making her feel like an unfaithful lover.
    Lily, like a heat-seeking missile, had located her body and moved into it. The cotton nightgown was rumpled up around her waist, and her flesh was warm and soft. Child after adult, female after male, the contrast was profound and delicious. I love you, she thought. What happened tonight doesn’t make any difference. She wanted to wake her up and tell her that. She moved her grip and Lily started to cough, once, twice, then enough to wake herself.
    â€œMum?”
    â€œYes, darling?”
    â€œHello.” And the voice was richly croaky, like dark wood splintered along the seam.
    â€œHello. You got a cough?”
    â€œMmn.” She was still half-asleep. But when she coughed again it was more like a bark, the throat angry.
    â€œYou okay?”
    â€œI want some water.”
    Anna slid out of bed and filled her a glass from the bathroom tap. Lily was sitting up now, eyes blinking open, solemn. She grasped the glass with both hands and gulped it down noisily; Anna could hear the liquid traveling down her throat.
    â€œYou smell funny,” Lily said, wrinkling up her nose as she handed back the glass.
    â€œDo I?” Anna had replied, marveling at the radar detection. “It’s hot out. I’ve been sweating.”
    â€œWhere have you been?”
    â€œWorking.”
    â€œDid you have a nice time?”
    â€œIt was all right,” she said as she slid herself in next to her. “Come on now, get back down under the covers.”
    â€œI cried at bedtime, you know.”
    â€œDid you? Why?”
    â€œI missed you.”
    â€œOh, you silly duck. Patricia was here.”
    â€œMmmn. She called me a silly duck, too. But she said I could sleep in your bed.”
    â€œAnd that made you feel better?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œI see.”
    â€œBut that’s not why I cried.”
    â€œOf course not. Now, come on, let’s go back to sleep.”
    â€œIt’s like cigarettes.”
    â€œWhat is?”
    â€œYour smelliness. Eleanor’s dad smells like that. Eleanor told him that he’s going to die, but she says he doesn’t care.” She was wide awake and cooking now, enjoying the transgression of being awake in the night.
    â€œHmmn. Well, we’re all going to die sooner or later. I bet Eleanor’s dad doesn’t smoke that much, anyway.”
    â€œHe does. She gets the packets out of the bin.”
    â€œLittle snitch.”
    â€œWhat’s a snitch?”
    â€œNothing. Hey, it’s the middle of the night. Aren’t you tired?” Anna said, but not with any real passion. She loved Lily’s noise and curiosity, enjoyed these illicit night communions as much as her daughter did.
    Lily lay quiet for a moment. Then: “Mum. Paul is sort of my dad, isn’t he?”
    â€œYeah, darling. Sort of.”
    Pause. “So will Michael be like another dad now?”
    â€œNo, Michael’s just a friend. You do like him?”
    â€œOh yeah, he’s really funny. But I don’t want another dad. One’s enough.”
    In the darkness Anna pulled her daughter to her closely. “Yes, one’s enough. How about mothers, though? Do you want another one of those?”
    â€œNo, silly,” she chirruped, curling her arms and legs around Anna’s body like a monkey.
    Afterward Anna had lain awake reflecting on how easily she had moved back from him to her, the lover and mother separating out like oil and water. The next morning she had come back from taking Lily to school to hear the phone ringing through the