[MaC] Interviewing Esme

[Ree Moorhead Pruehs]

 > > Cyril glanced out the door, torn between following the commotion back
 > > upstairs or staying to help Esme.  He worried increasingly about
 > > Florence, but Esme appeared to know something about what was
 > happening
 > > here.  He ventured a question to his distraught neighbor.  "Esme,
 > > dear," he asked gently, "what do you know?  How did you know about
 > > Nola's ...condition."
 > >
 > Esme gave a little gulp.
 >
 > "I ... I ... knew ... She told me that it was a friend of hers.  She wanted
 > to know ... But I couldn't help her!  Of course I couldn't!  How would I
 > know anything about that?"

"Of course, you couldn't," Cyril answered cautiously, since he had no
clue what she was talking about.  He glanced at Vangie and Arabella to
see if this made any more sense to a woman than it did to him.  He also
glanced nervously at the door, as it sounded as if the crowd upstairs
might be in the vicinity of his own flat.

=Because you always made it a point that you -didn't- know, you didn't 
hear, you never saw anything,= thought Vangie.

Arabella nodded slightly. She, for one, would have been hard pressed to 
find such 'help' had she been approached. Some women knew where to obtain 
the necessary expertise, of course, or these things would not happen. 
Esme's words also reinforced her original thoughts that someone else had 
been involved with the poor girl - for really, if Marty Fitzroy had gotten 
Nola Diamond in her condition, would she have turned for help to Fitzroy's 
wife?

"Mrs. Fitzroy," she asked, "you seemed anxious long before the tragedy 
occurred. What has been upsetting you so?"

"Nothing," said Esme nervously, twisting her handkerchief even more.  "I'm 
just worried about my sister, that's all, with all this dreadful bombing. 
She ... she lives in the East End.  In Bethnal Green."

"That," Vangie declared, her alto voice a quelling knell of certainty, "is 
not all you're worried about. Isn't it time you told the truth? You've told 
at least two lies tonight...and those are only the ones I know of."