The Missing Hours by Emma Kavanagh Read Free Book Online

heads snap around, drawn by the sound of the door, their faces a battle of expectation and fear. Then they see us. And, like an act that has been rehearsed, their heads sink.
    Tara recovers first, pushing herself awkwardly from her chair, her small bare feet slapping against the cold kitchen floor as she runs to her aunt, her face crumpled. I watch Heather as Orla takes the younger girl in her arms, watch as she studies the knots in the wooden kitchen table, digging her thumbnail in so hard that I know it must hurt. I am expecting her to cry. But instead she simply sits there, stabbing at the table with her fingers.
    ‘A’tie Ora? Did you bring Mummy home?’ asks Tara, releasing her aunt from her grip so that she can peer behind her, face expectant.
    ‘Not yet, sweetheart.’ Orla sounds like she will cry, like there is a battle for control raging within her.
    I carry on watching Heather. She is still wearing those red patent leather shoes. She is still wearing her coat. I feel the neighbour – Vida Charles, was it? – looking at me, glance up to see her shrug, shake her head. It occurs to me that she seems irritated that her kindness and maternal generosity have gone unappreciated.
    ‘Heather?’ says Orla. ‘Are you okay?’
    The little girl nods. She has dug a gouge now into the untreated table, and I sense Vida notice it, see her mouth open to object. I don’t know why. It’s not her table. An objection on general principles, I suppose. I catch her eye, shake my head once, and she subsides, her mouth moving like she couldn’t quite catch the words in time and that even unbidden they have escaped her.
    ‘Can I have a cuddle?’ Orla opens her arms to her elder niece, waits.
    Heather sits, staring down at the gouge, then pushes herself back from the table, her head down, footsteps those of a man facing his execution. Her aunt enfolds her in a hug, and I think that the little girl will relent, but her back is stiff, her arms pokers at her sides.
    Then I hear Orla, her voice a secret that only Heather is meant to hear. ‘She’s coming home, Heather. Mummy is coming home.’
    The little girl goes even more rigid, if such a thing is possible, looks like someone has sent a jolt of electricity right through her, and her expression breaks, the flat sea suddenly flaring up into a storm. She starts to cry, long, shaking sobs, her face buried in her aunt’s shoulder.
    I look away. God forgive me, I look away. I cannot see any more.
    My eye catches Vida’s and I indicate the door, an invitation and a summons, turning before I know that she has accepted, until I am in the quiet sanctum of the hallway. I can still hear Heather crying, but it is quieter now, and the jagged edges that rip into my heart are blunted.
    I look to Vida. ‘Let’s go into the living room, shall we?’
    It is quieter in here, dark. I move towards the window, look to the sky. The clouds are massing again, dense, a storm waiting to break upon us. It feels like a portent.
    ‘Well,’ says Vida, ‘awful, isn’t it? Just terrible for those poor children. Imagine losing your father like that, at their age too. And now their mother gone off who knows where. It just breaks your heart. And they’re such pretty little things too.’ She stops, considers. ‘Well, the younger one is. I could just take her home with me. Sullen, the older one. Spoilt, I dare say.’
    I think of Heather, her narrow arms holding her little sister tight, singing to her, not letting herself cry, because she is the eldest and she must be the protector now, and I feel anger bubbling up inside me.
    ‘She’s under an awful lot of strain,’ I say, my voice harder than I have heard it in a long time. ‘I think she is holding it together admirably, given that she is only seven.’
    Vida glances at me quickly, then nods. ‘Oh yes. Terrible times. Like I said, poor things. So,’ she said, ‘do you think it’s tax fraud?’
    ‘What makes you say that?’
    ‘Well, there’s no