"Right! But...er...Claire, what are you going to do?"

"Kill the fucker."

"No, Claire, go easy now," stuttered Judy.

"Oh relax, Judy," I sighed. "I'm not going to kill him. But I'm going to hurt him real bad."

"That's okay then," she said with relief. "He's not worth going to prison for."

"Thanks for your plain-talking advice," I said. "You're right. He is a boring fucker, isn't he?"

"Completely," she said with passion.

"I'll talk to you soon," I said. "Good luck. Bye."

So now what?

I supposed I'd better wait for James to call me.

But I was no longer confused. James had made me very, very angry. And I thought it was only fair that I should let him know. In person.

James called back a short time later. He seemed delighted that I had called him.

I could barely bring myself to be civil to him. My anger kept threatening to boil over.

"Claire, lovely to hear from you," he said.

"What are you doing tonight, James?" I asked brusquely.

"Um, well nothing," he said. I like to think that he was a little bit shocked by my abrupt tone.

"Good," I said. "Be in around eight o'clock. I need to talk to you."

"Er, what about?" he asked, sounding a little bit anxious.

"You'll see," I said smoothly.

"No, no, tell me now," he said, sounding quite a bit anxious.

"No, James, wait until tonight," I said pleasantly but very, very firmly.

He was silent.

"Eight o'clock tonight then, James," I concluded pleasantly.

"Okay," he muttered.

345

I hung up the phone.

Still thinking about what I had recently found out.

You know, I had known that I wasn't as bad as James had made me out to be. And really, that wasn't just because I didn't want to believe that I was a bad person. Although I didn't want to believe that I was a bad person, but...anyway, you know what I mean. I had had a feeling that James had been lying to me, or at least exaggerating greatly when he told me what a horrible, childish, selfish, inconsiderate bitch I had been throughout our marriage.

But I couldn't see what reason he had to lie to me about it.

And I had a feeling that he had tried to cut me down to size--well, at least to a size that suited him--by telling me that I had been such a person.

He hadn't liked my confidence. He had been frightened by it. So, in a nasty cynical way, he decided to completely undermine me so that I'd be dependent on him.

What a bastard.

You know, I think I'd hated him less when I found he had been having sex with Denise. This was a worse kind of betrayal.

"Mum," I called down the stairs.

"What?" she shouted from the kitchen.

"I need you."

"What for?"

"I need you to watch Kate tonight. And I need you to drive me to the airport."

"What on earth are you talking about?"

"I'm going to London. I need you to watch Kate," I said reasonably.

"Is it Tuesday already?" she asked in confusion.

"No, Mum, today is Friday. But I'm still going to London."

"And will you be going again on Tuesday?" she asked, looking a little bewildered.

"Maybe," I said. I couldn't answer her. I didn't know myself whether I would or not.

"What's this all about?" she asked suspiciously.

"I've got some things to work out with James," I said.

"I thought you had worked things out with James," she said, reasonably enough, I suppose.

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"So did I," I said sadly. "But other--what shall I call it--evidence has come to light in the last hour or so, so I have to go and see him."

"When will you be back?" she asked.

"Soon," I promised. "Please, Mum, this is important. I need your help."

"Oh, all right then," she said, sounding a bit nicer. "Take as long as you need."

"It won't be more than a day or so," I said.

"Fine then."

"I'll need to borrow money."

"Don't push your luck."

"Please?"

"How much do you need?"

"Not much. I'll put the flight on the card. But I'll need money for incid- entals. You know, subway fares, brass knuckles, the usual."

"So long as I get it back by next week, I can give you fifty."

"Fifty is plenty," I said.

Well, I hoped it would be. I had no idea where I would be sleeping to- night. But something told me it wouldn't be in my double bed in London with James.

Never mind. I had an ex-boyfriend or two who had never really gotten over me. So I would at least have a roof over my head.

As well as an erection in my back.

I dressed to kill.

I thought it would be appropriate.

But not as you might have expected, in battle fatigues, a hard hat with a net with leaves in it and a couple of rounds of ammo slung across my chest. Oh no, I wore a sexy, short, black skirt with a black jacket and sheer stockings and high, high heels. I would have worn a little black pillbox hat with a veil if I'd had one. But luckily I didn't.

I wanted to look like a killer bitch from Hell. But in retrospect I suppose the hat would have been overdoing it.

I would just have looked like one of those glamorous widows who look beautiful at graveside but whom the townspeople hate because they suspect her of killing her husband and

347

inheriting the money that he had intended to leave to the town to build a new hospital.

Mum looked a little bit taken aback at my dramatic appearance as I came down the stairs but took a look at my determined, angry face and thought better of commenting on it.

"Are we ready?" I asked.

"Yes," said Mum. "I've just got to find the car keys."

I sighed. This could take days.

While Mum was running in and out of rooms and emptying handbags onto the kitchen table and feeling around in coat pockets and muttering to herself like the white rabbit (it was the white rabbit, wasn't it?) in Alice in Wonderland, the front door opened and Helen arrived with her usual pomp and ceremony.

"Guess what?" she yelled.