“I can quite imagine.”
“Plus, of course,” I added, this on the spur of the moment, for I had not thought this particular line through, “I’m keen to get out of London. It’s so busy and polluted, I guess I’m just looking for a change of scenery.”
“That I can quite understand,” Mrs. Elincourt said with a smile. “Bill and I had the same long night of the soul a few years back. Rhiannon was about eight or nine and we were beginning to think about secondaries. Maddie was a toddler, and I was so sick of pushing her around dirty parks and having to check for needles in the sandpit before I let her play. This just seemed like the perfect chance to break away completely—build a new life, find a really super independent school for Rhi.”
“And are you glad you made the move?”
“Oh, totally. It was tough on the children at the time, of course, but it was definitely the right thing. We adore Scotland—and we never wanted to be that kind of family who buys a second home and then puts it on Airbnb for nine months of the year. We wanted to really live here, become part of the community, you know?”
I nodded, as though second-home dilemmas were part of my everyday existence.
“Heatherbrae House was a real project,” Sandra continued. “It had been totally neglected for decades, lived in by a very eccentric old man who went into a care home and then allowed it to fall into disrepair until his death. Dry rot everywhere, burst pipes, dodgy electrics—it was a case of really stripping it back to the bones and completely revamping it. Two years of absolute grind, reconfiguring the rooms and doing everything from rewiring to putting in a new cesspit. But it was worth it—and of course it made a wonderful case study for the business. We have a whole folder of before and after, and it really shows that good architecture can be as much about bringing out the spirit of an existing house as creating a new one from scratch. Though we do that too, of course. Our specialty is vernacular architecture.”
I nodded as though I had a clue what this meant and took a gulp of wine.
“But that’s enough about me and the house—what about yourself?” Sandra said, with the air of getting down to business. “Tell me a bit about what attracted you to nannying?”
Wow. That was a big question. About a dozen images flashed through my mind, all at once. My parents, shouting at me for getting Play-Doh in the carpet tiles at age six. Age nine, my mother, shaking her head over my report card, not bothering to hide her disappointment. At twelve, the school play no one bothered to come to. Age sixteen, “What a shame you didn’t revise more for history,” instead of congratulations on the As I got in maths, English, and science. Eighteen years of not being good enough, not being the daughter I was supposed to be, eighteen years of not measuring up.
“Well . . .” I felt myself flounder. This was not part of the story I had practiced, and now I cursed myself for it. It was an obvious question, one I should have prepared. “Well, I suppose . . . I mean . . . I just like kids.” It was lame. Very lame. And also not completely true. But as the words left my mouth, I realized something else. Sandra was still smiling, but there was a certain neutrality in her expression that had not been there before, and suddenly I understood why. A woman on the cusp of her thirties, going on about how much she likes kids . . .
I hurried to repair my mistake.
“But I have to say, I’m in awe of anyone who wants to be a parent. I’m definitely not ready for that yet!”
Bingo. I could not miss the flash of relief that crossed Sandra’s face, though it was quickly suppressed.
“Not that it’s an option right now anyway,” I said, feeling confident enough for a little joke, “since I’m firmly single.”
“So . . . no ties to London then?”
“Not really. I have friends of course, but my parents retired abroad a few years back. In fact, once I’ve sorted things out with Little Nippers there’s really nothing keeping me in London. I could take up a new post almost straightaway.”
I carefully avoided saying your post, not wanting to seem like I was making assumptions that I would get the job, but Sandra was smiling and nodding enthusiastically.
“Yes, as you can probably tell from our talk earlier, I’d be lying if I said that wasn’t a significant factor. We’re coming up to the summer holidays, and we absolutely must get someone in the position before the schools break up or I’ll be sunk. Plus there’s a really, really important trade fair in a few weeks, and both Bill and I really need to be there.”
“What’s your deadline?”
“Rhi breaks up towards the end of June, which is what . . . about three or four weeks? But the trade fair begins the weekend before she breaks up. The truth is, the sooner the better. Two weeks is doable. Three weeks is . . . well, just about okay. Four weeks would be starting to get into disaster zone. You said your notice period is four weeks?”
I nodded. “Yes, but I was figuring it out while I unpacked, and I have at least eight days holiday owing, so I can definitely get it down to just over two weeks, if I factor in my leave, and maybe even less. I think they’ll be prepared to negotiate.”
In actual fact, I had no idea how helpful they would be, and my suspicion was, not very. Janine, my boss and current head of the baby room, wasn’t my biggest fan. I didn’t think she’d be particularly sorry to see me go, but I didn’t think she’d bend over backwards to help me. However, there were ways and means—nursery workers weren’t allowed to come into work for forty-eight hours after a vomiting bug. I was prepared to have a lot of vomiting bugs around the middle of June. Again, though, I didn’t say that to Sandra. For some reason, no one wants a nanny with a flexible moral code, even when she’s flexing it to help them out.