Going Loco Read Online Free PDF Page B

obviously the very least she owed her reputation.
    None of Viv’s friends had come face to face with Linda, so it was quite a surprise that she looked like Kylie Minogue. Belinda had imagined a composite of stereotypes. Lumpen librarian in a thick skirt and frilly blouse. Rubber gloves in primrose yellow. Intimidating. Carrying a bucket. A Cordon Bleu, perhaps, pinned to her sensible apron.
    But the woman reading the magazine in the kitchen was in her early thirties and pretty. She wore fitted jeans and a spotless white T-shirt, with strappy shoes. Her auburn hair was thick and long, and when Belinda noticed her hands – small and clean, with nails beautifully polished, like mother-of-pearl – she felt an unaccustomed jolt of envy.
    Hearing Belinda in the doorway, this youthful vision of unlikely cleaning lady assumed it was Viv. ‘I wish you’d let me do the rest of it, Viv,’ she said, indicating rather a lot of washing-up on the kitchen surfaces, ‘but I have to say I’m enjoying this
Lancet.
Oh, hello.’
    Something about this greeting puzzled Belinda but, on the other hand, she was so fuddled by drink she could barely remember her mission.
    ‘Psst. Are you Linda?’ she hissed.
    Linda was evidently amused. ‘Yes,’ she hissed back, exaggeratedly.
    ‘Shh,’ said Belinda. ‘I’m Mrs Johansson, but you can call me Belinda.’
    ‘All right, Mrs Johansson.’
    ‘Listen, Linda. I’ve got something to ask you.’ Belinda staggered slightly. ‘I want to ask you to work for me.’
    ‘That’s nice,’ said Linda. ‘I wondered when you would. That’s a lovely top.’
    Belinda looked down at it, but couldn’t focus. ‘Are you sure? It’s not black, you know. It’s brown.’
    Linda smiled.
    ‘Shall I come tomorrow?’
    ‘Wow, yes. If you’re sure. Blimey, that was easy.’
    Belinda turned, and steadied herself in the doorway. ‘Dr Ripley may not be happy about this,’ she added, over her shoulder. She felt she ought to mention it.
    ‘That’s OK,’ said Linda.
    ‘Really?’
    ‘Leave it to me. Are you all right?’
    ‘I’m OK,’ said Belinda. ‘Thanks.’
    Stefan tried never to argue with his second wife. Things had gone badly enough with the first one. But that night, as he drove home late through South London, he was impatient. Because for some mad reason Belinda had gone behind Viv’s back and attempted to steal her cleaning lady. Moreover, she’d informed him as if he would be pleased.
    ‘This underhandedness is a rum go, Belinda,’ he said. ‘Honest to goodness, I feel I may blow my top.’
    ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. Stefan drove too fast when he was angry. She’d only said Viv was a cow who regularly pierced her heart with a hundred poison quills, and now they were going to get killed jumping traffic-lights.
    ‘Listen. Viv is a lovely person. Your behaviour beggars description.’
    ‘No, Stefan. You’re wrong. There’s a subtext. Underneath all Viv’s loveliness towards me she actually hates me and she wants me dead. It’s a sibling-y kind of thing.’
    ‘You hate her, more likely. Because you make a meal of everything and to her it’s a doodle.’
    ‘Doddle.’
    They stopped too late at some traffic-lights, and the car slewed with the braking force, jolting both of them forward. Belinda judged that this was not the right moment to mention how much she disliked Stefan’s driving.
    ‘Tell me you won’t hire this Linda.’
    ‘I can’t. Besides, Stefan, it was your idea. You can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs.’
    He put the car in gear, revved high, and let out the clutch so that they shot forward at forty miles an hour.
    ‘Belinda, I tell you straight. It is not just the Linda thing. I am fed up to the back teeth, you are coming a cropper and I will not fiddle while Rome burns. Maggie says to me tonight, “Belinda is wedded to her work, not to you, Stefan.” You cry on the telephone to the man. I don’t want you going loco, Belinda. It happened to me