so more times. âCut,â shouted the director.
Lally Lyn whispered something reassuring in her ear and she smiled.
She tried again.
âCould the audience â would you mind? â scooting off?â called an assistant director, wiping his forehead, and the loiterers slowly moved away.
Village children were encouraged to keep playing in the background while Lally and Jennifer spoke: Rosemary and Bob played catch with Peter and Jane and the post office children. Eva joined them, wearing laddered stockings on this hot day, a pinafore and velvet ribbon, and she blew her nose on her grandmotherâs lace handkerchief. With her colourless hair, she looked like a drab spirit among the healthy rosy children in their bright skirts and shorts.
âGirl in apron,â called out the first assistant director. âCould you please get yourself out of the shot.â
Eva ignored him and carried on playing. âCatch!â she called to Bob, then to Freddie.
âThe girl in the white dress and grey apron, we are catching you on camera,â called the first assistant director on a loudhailer, and Eva stiffened. She heard laughter. She stared at the film set. Her beautiful sister stood in the middle like a glorious statue bathed in heavenly light. Evaâs face seemed to burn. In her head, she was there, there shining instead of Jennifer. There and normal and loved and praised. She could say that stupid line. She clutched her grandmotherâs dress, her link with her, and wondered whether she might combust. She glanced at one of the windows in her house.
âI want to
play
with the others,â she said to the assistant director who strode over to her.
âNot in that get-up. Sorry, lovey.â
âI should like to
be
in the film.â
The assistant directorâs mouth twitched. âSorry, lovey, you havenât got the right look,â he said.
Eva stayed still. The assistant director gestured to a colleague who strode over, and they each took an arm and hauled her off the grass.
âGrandmamma,â she said, looking at her home again, that picture-pretty cottage dozing on a village green. It had been cowed, violated, but the sun glanced off a skylight and at the sight of that, the sign of it, she was resolved.
Rowena went upstairs to tidy some sheets, a job she had been putting off, because whatever she told herself, she simply didnât like going up on that side of the house. Bobâs room was the problem. It was still, in her mind, the bedroom of old Evangeline Crale. It was where she had starved herself. Rowena shuddered quite violently.
In the face of Evaâs fury, Rowena could barely think about it; yet for all her dismissal, guilt gathered there, as stagnant, sour-edged and undeniably present as the pool of water downstairs. What Rowena always pictured as she lay stroking Bob to sleep was Mrs Crale as she had been when a neighbour had visited her, her head turned to the wall, her eyes close up to the daffodil-print paper that still lined the room. As Rowena lay there kissing little Bob, she gazed at the yellows that slightly overshot their brown outlines and bled into the chalk background. Those cataract-clouded blue eyes in porcelain-delicate skin had studied the same patterns. Rowena could almost smell Mrs Crale there as she willed her life to seep away: her skin, her saliva and tears impregnating the faintly worn wallpaper by the bed. Would she find white
hairs
if she looked on the floor, she wondered, and shuddered.
Rowena sped past the door now, and into the comfort of sunlight in the room baby Caroline shared with Eva, when Eva, who had been a semi-nocturnal creature even from the beginning, was ever there. Caroline didnât stir. Her mouth was open, dribble emerging from it in a shining trickle. Rowena watched her. For a few moments, she didnât breathe. Rowena snatched her up, suddenly fearing for her children in ways she couldnât specify,
Lally Lyn whispered something reassuring in her ear and she smiled.
She tried again.
âCould the audience â would you mind? â scooting off?â called an assistant director, wiping his forehead, and the loiterers slowly moved away.
Village children were encouraged to keep playing in the background while Lally and Jennifer spoke: Rosemary and Bob played catch with Peter and Jane and the post office children. Eva joined them, wearing laddered stockings on this hot day, a pinafore and velvet ribbon, and she blew her nose on her grandmotherâs lace handkerchief. With her colourless hair, she looked like a drab spirit among the healthy rosy children in their bright skirts and shorts.
âGirl in apron,â called out the first assistant director. âCould you please get yourself out of the shot.â
Eva ignored him and carried on playing. âCatch!â she called to Bob, then to Freddie.
âThe girl in the white dress and grey apron, we are catching you on camera,â called the first assistant director on a loudhailer, and Eva stiffened. She heard laughter. She stared at the film set. Her beautiful sister stood in the middle like a glorious statue bathed in heavenly light. Evaâs face seemed to burn. In her head, she was there, there shining instead of Jennifer. There and normal and loved and praised. She could say that stupid line. She clutched her grandmotherâs dress, her link with her, and wondered whether she might combust. She glanced at one of the windows in her house.
âI want to
play
with the others,â she said to the assistant director who strode over to her.
âNot in that get-up. Sorry, lovey.â
âI should like to
be
in the film.â
The assistant directorâs mouth twitched. âSorry, lovey, you havenât got the right look,â he said.
Eva stayed still. The assistant director gestured to a colleague who strode over, and they each took an arm and hauled her off the grass.
âGrandmamma,â she said, looking at her home again, that picture-pretty cottage dozing on a village green. It had been cowed, violated, but the sun glanced off a skylight and at the sight of that, the sign of it, she was resolved.
Rowena went upstairs to tidy some sheets, a job she had been putting off, because whatever she told herself, she simply didnât like going up on that side of the house. Bobâs room was the problem. It was still, in her mind, the bedroom of old Evangeline Crale. It was where she had starved herself. Rowena shuddered quite violently.
In the face of Evaâs fury, Rowena could barely think about it; yet for all her dismissal, guilt gathered there, as stagnant, sour-edged and undeniably present as the pool of water downstairs. What Rowena always pictured as she lay stroking Bob to sleep was Mrs Crale as she had been when a neighbour had visited her, her head turned to the wall, her eyes close up to the daffodil-print paper that still lined the room. As Rowena lay there kissing little Bob, she gazed at the yellows that slightly overshot their brown outlines and bled into the chalk background. Those cataract-clouded blue eyes in porcelain-delicate skin had studied the same patterns. Rowena could almost smell Mrs Crale there as she willed her life to seep away: her skin, her saliva and tears impregnating the faintly worn wallpaper by the bed. Would she find white
hairs
if she looked on the floor, she wondered, and shuddered.
Rowena sped past the door now, and into the comfort of sunlight in the room baby Caroline shared with Eva, when Eva, who had been a semi-nocturnal creature even from the beginning, was ever there. Caroline didnât stir. Her mouth was open, dribble emerging from it in a shining trickle. Rowena watched her. For a few moments, she didnât breathe. Rowena snatched her up, suddenly fearing for her children in ways she couldnât specify,
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