The Gift of Girls by Chloë Thurlow Read Free Book Online

nothing. Nothing. I sat like a prisoner in the dock waiting for the judge to don the black cap.
    He appeared in the door, tall in his dark suit like a monster in a child’s nightmare.
    ‘Come through to my office, please,’ he said.
    I pulled my jacket on and followed.
    He waited for me, closed the door and sat in his chair behind the wide desk. There was no chair in front of the desk and I stood before him as I had stood many times before Sister Benedict.
    ‘Do you have anything to tell me, Magdalena?’ he asked.
    I lowered my head. ‘Yes,’ I replied.
    ‘What is it? Speak clearly, please.’
    I coughed and tried to look back at him. Tears had started to form in the corners of my eyes. ‘I moved £3,100 from your account.’
    ‘That’s the first bit of honesty we’ve had from you.’
    ‘I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I was playing blackjack and I thought I was going to win. I lost all my savings, and then, then I just …’
    I ran out of words. The tears were streaming down my face. On the desk was a parcel in a large plastic bag. He drummed his fingers on the surface, the sound for some reason reminding me of the headboard in Melissa’s room tapping against the dividing wall.
    ‘Now we know what you have done, what I want to know is what we are going to do to rectify the matter?’
    ‘I’ll do anything, anything.’
    ‘Anything?’ he said.
    The words were like an echo from the past. I had a sense of
déjà vu
. I had a sense that my life, my destiny, was not in my own hands.
    ‘Yes,’ I said with a little more confidence. ‘Yes, anything.’
    ‘Magdalena, let us be very clear what you mean. Are you offering to repay your debt with sex?’
    He made it sound so sordid. I took a deep breath. ‘Yes,’ I replied.
    ‘You are absolutely sure?’
    ‘Yes.’
    This is what it had come to. I had slept with Sandy Cunningham to learn the system. Now I was offering my body to Simon Roche to pay off what I had embezzled. I was a slapper, a slut, a whore, a fallen woman. I was Mary Magdalene, unchaste, the
peccatrix
, the prostitute, the fallen woman. As if with some terrible inevitablity, I had become my namesake.
    Simon was quiet for a moment and made a spire with his long fingers.
    ‘You know, at any good hotel the concierge will arrange to have a whore sent to the room. Do you know how much that will cost?’ he asked.
    ‘No.’
    ‘About £100,’ he answered. ‘I can go to Kings Cross and find a girl your age, even a good deal younger, and pay half that amount. There are a lot of girls like you, Magdalena.’
    Girls like me? What did he mean? He made me feel small and dirty and insignificant.
    ‘I am so, so sorry …’
    ‘Now, Magdalena, when you say
anything
, do you actually mean
anything
?’ he asked.
    ‘Yes, yes, I do. I really do.’
    ‘You must remember when you came here for the interview, I told you that I reward those who respect my trust, and those who betray it I punish with extreme severity?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Taking money from my company accounts makes me feel as if I have been violated. I have been humiliated. I have been made a fool of,’ he said. ‘Do you appreciate that?’
    ‘Yes, Mr Roche.’
    ‘That is what I am offering you.’
    What did he mean? Violated? Humiliated? What was the alternative? He must have been reading my mind.
    ‘The alternative is that I call the police and let them deal with the matter.’
    ‘No, no, I’ll do it. I really, really will. I’ll do anything.’
    ‘Magdalena, take off your clothes and fold them here on the desk.’
    ‘I beg your pardon?’
    ‘Magdalena, did you hear what I said?’
    ‘Yes.’ My voice had become a whisper.
    He sat back in his chair and I stood there before him, trembling slightly. I couldn’t believe this was happening. It seemed unreal, like a dream. Like a nightmare. Men really are weird, I thought. I knew by the look in men’s eyes as I passed that they fancied me. I’d known that since I was about fourteen, and