The Saint Zita Society by Ruth Rendell

Lucy’s conduct with the wicked man who was a TV actor continued to worry Rabia, but since it had first come to her notice several months ago now, she had set it against her love for Thomas. It was wrong to think this way, but if she told Lucy what she knew, no doubt Lucy would dismiss her, and if she told Mr Still, Lucy would know she had told him and still dismiss her. She would never see Thomas again. Her heart would break. Rabia was no fool and she was well aware that Thomas had taken the place of Assad and Nasreen, her dead children, and that she gave him twice the love she had given to each one of them.
    There was nothing to be done except hope the wicked TV man would tire of Lucy or she of him. Such things happened. Rabia knew this, not from experience but from the kind of TV dramas the wicked man took part in. There were no characters in them like herself or like Beacon who was also possessed of a strong moral sense. She knew this because Montserrat had told her that her own task would be considerably helped if only Beacon would call her when the boss was getting into the Audi in Old Broad Street. That would give her twenty minutes at least to hustle Rad Sothern out of the house before Mr Still walked in the front door. She hadn’t actually asked Beacon but she had given him what she calleda ‘hypothetical scenario’ she translated for Rabia as ‘the kind of thing that might happen’. A friend of hers, she had said, was in that particular situation. The driver might have helped her out, didn’t Beacon think? Beacon did not.
    ‘That driver should tell his boss,’ said Beacon, giving Monserrat a nasty suspicious look.
    Rabia made no comment. She was hugging Thomas at the time and Thomas was lovingly kissing her cheek.
    ‘I just have to rely on guesswork,’ said Montserrat.
    Preston Still took a week’s holiday in October and he and Lucy went off to stay in a fashionable hotel on the Cornish coast. The children were left at home with Rabia and Montserrat. Zinnia was also roped in to stay in a room on the nursery floor.
    ‘He’ll sort of miss his kids,’ said Zinnia. ‘She won’t. Don’t know why she had them. Mind you, the only notice he takes of them is to ask if they’re ill.’
    Rabia agreed but said nothing. She rather enjoyed being the most important one of the three left in charge and discovered in herself a talent for organisation. Monserrat was to see to the girls’ tea and make sure they did their little bit of homework while Zinnia attended to their clothes and the laundry. Rabia took Thomas over to the
other
nursery, the plant one, and rather regretted paying the visit when her father said that Khalid Iqbal was to be found in the tropical house and she should go along and say good afternoon to him.
    ‘No, Father, if Mr Iqbal wishes to speak to me he must come to me. I am going to take Thomas to see the white mice and the ferret.’ For the nursery offered for sale small mammals as well as tropical fish and a multiplicity of plants.
    The mice were even more popular with Thomas than the fish. He put out his hands to their cage, trying to grasp oneof them through the bars. Moving his pushchair away, though ever so gently, provoked yells and a storm of tears, so that when Khalid Iqbal approached along the path from the arboretum, Rabia was holding the weeping Thomas close, his wet cheek against her cheek.
    The sight of the woman he hopes to marry lovingly carrying a child adds to the attraction she has for a man. This may specially be true of a man from a culture where children are much prized. Khalid greeted Rabia with a fulsome smile and a request after her health.
    ‘Mr Siddiqui has kindly invited me to take tea with him on Saturday afternoon and said he hoped you too would be there.’
    To herself Rabia said, Oh, has he? We’ll see about that. Aloud, ‘My father should have told me first. Saturday afternoon will be impossible, I am afraid. I am in charge of the household at number 7