Chapter 20: The Gala

The gala was held in the old hotel ballroom on Beacon Street, under three chandeliers.

Three hundred guests sat at round tables with white roses in the centre.

I had made the roses. Constance had never cancelled the order, because it would have been talked about.

Fran had zipped me into a green dress she'd borrowed from a cousin. She sat beside me now with her chin up, ready for murder.

Ansel had sent a car for me and a card that said only: Come and watch.

He sat at the head table with Hal on his left.

He didn't look at me once. His hands lay flat on the cloth.

Constance rose after the soup.

She wore black silk and the pearls again, in plain sight.

I thought: she will not even hide them.

"Friends," she said, to the applause, "two years ago we lost our light."

She spoke for a long while. She mentioned the children's wing, and the scholarships, and her daughter's smile.

She did not mention me, but she looked my way once, thin and bright.

When she sat, the room rose to its feet.

Ansel rose with them.

He walked to the lectern while the clapping was still going, and Constance's smile slipped.

"Mrs. Aldous," he said into the microphone. "Thank you. May I?"

She couldn't refuse him in front of three hundred people.

He waited for the room to settle.

"Rosalind was the best person I knew," he said. "That's what I told myself for two years."

The ballroom went quiet.

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