Half Broken Things Read Free

were actually two hardworking outside lungs, round and wide, inelastic and over-inflated. Jean now pictured them rising and falling and pulled her purple cardigan round her own neat shoulders, swaying in a wave of panic that suddenly washed through her. She waited with the receiver held some distance away, trying to calm herself, while Shelley caught her breath at the other end. She guessed that Shelley would be at her desk, winding the telephone flex around the ringed index finger of her free hand, her unbuttoned jacket of the navy businesswoman sort skimming the sides of her blouse-clad bosom with the whish and crackle of acetate meeting acetate. Possibly this was adding to the gusts of noise that Jean could hear over the phone, now, as if some battle that she could not see were being fought somewhere in the distance.
    â€˜Right, well, Jean,’ Shelley managed at last, ‘so you’ve had our confirmation. Basically I just wanted to check if you’ve got any queries. You’re okay as regards the contents of the letter, are you? Unfortunately we won’t be in a position to offer you any further employment after the expiry of this current contract. I mean, we had said, hadn’t we. I did say.’
    Jean said nothing, knowing that her silence would be considered a difficult one.
    Shelley told her, ‘We don’t like terminating people but it’s company policy. Town and Country’s not in a position to keep people on past retirement age, we’re not allowed. It’s the insurance.’ Breathing of a struggling, bovine kind followed this long speech. ‘I mean, you’ve done sterling work. But you’ve already had four years past sixty. Right. So.’
    Still Jean said nothing, so Shelley changed tack. ‘So, you’re doing okay, are you, Jean, as regards the location of the property? Okay popping out and getting your bits and pieces? Because they did say it’d be better for a car owner as you’ve got over a mile to the village and it might be lonely. They said really it’d suit a slightly younger person with a car and maybe a part time job in the area, though I did tell them you were very professional and okay with a mile. You are okay, Jean, are you?’
    â€˜There’s been a breakage,’ Jean announced. ‘Today, while I was dusting. A teapot on the sideboard. Blue and white, Chinese, with silver mountings. Not very large.’
    There was another wait while Shelley prepared the tone of her reply and Jean heard the breathing grow unmistakably irritated. ‘Well, you’ve just proved my point. We have to fork out the excess on that now. You’ll need to find it on the inventory and notify us and we’ll have to tell the owners. You have got the inventory, haven’t you? It was in with the rest of the paperwork, with our letter and the owners’ list, you know, all their do’s and don’ts?’
    â€˜Yes, I’ve got the paperwork. And the list, all the do’s and don’ts. Plenty of
them
.’
    â€˜Yes, well, that’s their prerogative. People can go a bit over the top, especially when they can’t meet the sitter themselves. The Standish-Caves had to fly out the day before you arrived, that was all explained, wasn’t it?’
    The list of instructions and grudging permissions for the house sitter that had come from the owners, via the agency, filled several typed pages. They were wide-ranging: no open fires, no candles, do not use the dining room or drawing room, use TV in small sitting room, use only kitchen crockery, do not use the cappuccino machine or the ice cream maker, always wear gloves to dust the books, beeswax polish only—no silicone sprays, you are welcome to finish any
opened
jars, unplug the television at night. Jean hugged her cardigan closer.
    â€˜You’d think I’d never house-sat before. You’d think I don’t know the first thing.’
    â€˜Well, you