Read Online Pish Posh by Ellen Potter - Free Book Online Page B

covered with pencil and charcoal sketches. They all looked somehow similar and yet different. It took Clara a moment to realize that all the drawings were of the view outside the window.
    â€œDid you draw those?” Clara asked.
    â€œWhat?” Audrey asked.
    â€œI said,” Clara repeated in a loud, irritated voice, “DID YOU DRAW THOSE?”
    â€œYes,” Audrey replied.
    â€œThey’re not very good,” Clara said.
    â€œNot very, no,” Audrey agreed. There was something very dignified about Audrey, a fact that Clara hadn’t noticed before. She didn’t like it either. A soup cook should not be dignified.
    â€œThen why do you continue to do it?”
    Audrey picked up the sketch pad, placed it on the floor, and sat down heavily in the rocker, as if she were suddenly exhausted. After a minute, she replied, “Have you ever felt that if you focused on something long enough, you would find what you were looking for?”
    â€œOn occasion,” Clara said, thinking about the times when she tried to recall memories from her childhood.
    The sunlight from the window washed across Audrey’s face, and Clara looked at her carefully for the first time. Funny, although she’d seen Audrey nearly every day for years, she had never noticed that she had an odd scar that crossed her chin and angled up, like a check mark. Perhaps she’d never noticed because the kitchen lighting was dim, or maybe it was simply that Clara had never bothered to look at Audrey too closely. Yet, now that she did, she noticed something else. This Audrey was made of fine stuff. Her features were smoothly molded, almost aristocratic. Her hands were slender and her neck was long and elegant. Clara thought of her own mother’s hands, which were thick and lumpy at the knuckles. She frowned, annoyed at herself for being so distracted. After adjusting her sunglasses and folding her arms across her chest, she asked Audrey what she had come there to find out.
    â€œTell me how you know Dr. Piff,” Clara demanded.
    â€œThat’s really none of your business,” Audrey replied.
    Clara felt the blood rush away from her face as fury bloomed in the middle of her chest. For a moment, she was at a loss for words.
    â€œOf course it’s my business!” she cried finally. “Everything that happens in the restaurant is my business!”
    Audrey did not rise from her seat. Instead, she gazed out the window, rocking slowly in the chair, and calmly replied, “But you are not in the restaurant, Miss Frankofile. You’re in my home. ”
    This made Clara so angry that she actually stamped her foot. “I absolutely demand that you tell me how you know Dr. Piff!” She was suddenly, painfully aware of how childishly high-pitched her voice sounded.
    â€œAnd I absolutely refuse,” Audrey said simply.
    It was unbelievable to Clara that this soup cook, this Nobody, would speak to her like that, and in a fit of rage she walked over and slapped Audrey across the face. She had never hit anyone before, and it made her palm sting. She looked at her own hand and saw that it was red, and that her fingers were thick and knobby like her mother’s. She did not want to look at Audrey, whose skin had felt cold and soft against her hand, but she forced herself to and found that the soup cook was looking at her with something like pity.
    Clara’s face turned as red as her palm. “You’re fired,” Clara declared.
    For the first time a look of fear passed across Audrey’s face, which effectively erased the look of pity. Clara was satisfied.
    â€œDon’t bother to come to work tonight. You’ll only be sent away, ” Clara added before she turned and left the apartment. She stomped down the stairs and threw open the kitchen door so violently that Lila looked up from her reservation book.
    â€œSomething wrong?” Lila asked.
    â€œI hate being treated like a