In Sickness and in Lies novel · Chapter 30 of 32

Chapter 30: Fourteen Stones

Cilla stopped in the doorway of my mother's room, and she did not come in.

She had a gray coat on, and no gloves, and her suitcase handle in both hands.

"I'll go," she said. "I only wanted to say it to her face."

"Say it to me first," my mother said.

Cilla flinched.

My mother pointed with her left hand at the chair Desmond had sat in.

Cilla crossed the room and sat down on the edge of it.

"You brought me soup," my mother said, pausing between the words. "In the first week. It was good soup."

"It was from a deli."

"Still good." My mother's eyes did not leave her face. "You looked at my chart. You knew... whose name was on the bill."

"Yes."

"You said nothing."

"No, ma'am."

"Why?"

"Because I was afraid of him." Cilla's voice was steady and very small. "And because I wanted the house. Both. I'd like to say it was only the first."

My mother looked at her for a long time.

I stood by the window and kept my hands in my pockets.

I had promised not to say her name in a courtroom, and I had kept it, and that was the whole of what I owed her.

"Go home to your sister," my mother said at last. "Be useful. Don't wear... his stones."

"I won't."

"Go on."

Cilla stood.

She bent as if to touch my mother's hand, thought better of it, and left.

I followed her to the curb.

The taxi was already waiting at the entrance, with its engine running and the trunk open.

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