‘So go have a bath or a shower, whichever you prefer, and call me when you’re done. If you decide to take a shower, be sure to close the shower door!’
The girl obeyed with such timid alacrity that Marion sighed deeply, thinking it a miracle that her own family and her husband’s had always been spared from the cruelty in the world.
‘Mrs. Michaels?’
Lorne looked Marion a question over his paper, to which she smiled.
‘I told Monica to call me when she’s done. I just want to make sure she’s done it right, and not left a mess for me or anyone else to clean up.’
As Marion got to her feet and Lorne resumed reading, he commented with studied absence, ‘While you’re busy making the girl over, don’t neglect her table-manners.’ He smiled when he received the expected reproachful swat.
‘Are you decent?’
‘Um . . . I think so.’
Marion opened the bathroom door, stepped inside, and gaped.
The bathroom was spotless.
‘What on earth . . . I hope you cleaned yourself as well!’
The girl stood watching her apprehensively, as though she were used to being hit. Her hair wasn’t brushed, but the shower had more or less straightened it so that it hung damply; not in a puffed-out tangle like it had been. And without the soiled, baggy clothes, wrapped tightly in a towel, the girl seemed to have shrunk to a petite figure about half her original size. Marion realised at once that she was a very pretty young woman. And in the same instant, realised why the girl worked so hard to conceal the fact.