Waiting until the woman had dealt with the call, Alice approached the front desk. “Now, how can I help you?” She gave Alice an encouraging smile.
“I was…thinking about volunteering here.” Alice felt a twist of guilt at her latest lie. She’d become used to giving a false name and probing people for information about Ella, but somehow it seemed even worse to be deceiving this worthy, charitable woman. “I was wondering if you had any information, about what it entailed?”
“Of course.” The woman’s face relaxed. “Although, I have to warn you: it’s a serious commitment. You’ll have to go through training and pay for a criminal check, even to do the most basic admin work.”
A criminal check, that’s what that first payment must have been. And, of course, it had come back clean. Alice Love had no record at all.
Alice nodded. “I understand. I just thought I’d come and find out more.”
“Well, why don’t I give you a quick tour? I’m Hazel, by the way.”
“Ella, nice to meet you.”
The woman led her out of the reception area, down a narrow hallway. The carpet was faded, and posters were peeling from the wall, but it was clean and well kept. “Through here we have our help-line area.” A bald man was set up at one of the desks, talking on the phone in a low voice. He nodded at them, before continuing the conversation. “And here we have the classrooms, for workshops and seminars.” Hazel’s beaded bracelets rattled as she pointed out the different rooms. Alice glanced through a glass partition. A group of women were sitting on a circle of chairs, copying details from a whiteboard. They looked tired, as if they wished they were anywhere but there. “Upstairs, there’s short-term housing facilities for up to five families,” Hazel continued, “with shared dormitories and a kitchen.”
“For victims of domestic abuse?” Alice ventured. She felt painfully self-conscious, intruding somewhere she had no right to.
Hazel nodded. “That’s our primary focus, but we also offer help for rape, abuse, all kinds of things.”
“Oh.” Alice looked around, unnerved. She’d never been one to sense the atmosphere in buildings—that kind of fluttering had been left to Flora—but there was a definite emptiness hanging in the corridor. She couldn’t even begin to imagine what its inhabitants had been through. “And the volunteers?” Following Hazel back to reception, Alice began her subtle questioning.
“There’s a range of different things.” Edging into the tiny kitchen, Hazel gestured toward the kettle: “Tea?”
“No, I’m fine. Thanks.”
She flipped the switch on and rinsed a mug in the sink. “We’re always looking for help-line staff,” she told Alice, over the running water. “Training for that takes a month, to qualify you in basic counseling. But we do need someone in the office. Our last volunteer just left us.”
Alice spied her opening. “Was that Alice?” she asked casually.
Hazel blinked. “That’s right. You know her?”
“Not well,” Alice covered quickly. “But I heard her mention this place. Did she work here long?”
“No.” Hazel’s face tightened. “She stopped coming about a month ago, really left us in the lurch. Something like this is a commitment,” she added, giving Alice a stern look. “A lot of people rely on us.”
Alice nodded quickly in agreement. “I’m sure she didn’t mean to,” she found herself saying. “I heard something about her sister being taken ill. An accident, in Australia.”
“Oh, no.” Hazel softened. “That’s terrible.”
Alice nodded again. Why was she making excuses for Ella, after everything? But for some reason, she didn’t want Hazel thinking badly of her. Every week, Ella had trekked out to this miserable corner of the city to do something good. And that was more than Alice had ever done. “I think everything’s all right now,” she added. “But it must have been a shock, for Alice. Probably why she left without warning.”
“Well, if you see her, send our love.” Hazel poured out the water, adding a tea bag and sugar. “She was a good worker. Kept to herself, but she was very conscientious. She set up the whole database and managed everything by herself.”
Alice nodded, even more confused. She was used to people telling her how outgoing Ella had been or what fun she’d brought to the cooking class or dance group, but this sounded like a different person.
“I should probably leave you to it.” Alice’s discomfort finally became too much. “If I take some leaflets…”
“Sure, I’ll just find you the info.”
Drifting back to the reception area, Alice hovered while Hazel assembled an information pack. As she waited, a man in a reflective jacket appeared, from what Alice presumed was the main office. “The estimates will be done next week.” He turned to the red-haired woman who followed him out. “But we should be set to start work by the end of the month.”
“Wonderful!” She looked genuinely thrilled, giving Hazel a thumbs-up as she showed him out.
Alice gave Hazel a questioning look.
“We’re extending, into next door,” she explained. “We’ve owned the building a while, but it’s been in such a bad state, we haven’t had the funds to fix it up.”
“Oh, shame,” Alice murmured, taking the handful of leaflets she offered.
“But we had a great big donation, just a few weeks ago,” Hazel continued chatting. “So it’s back on. There’ll be room for more temporary housing and education facilities. It’s amazing what thirty thousand pounds can buy!”
“Thirty thousand?” Alice looked up.
“That’s right. Well, thirty-two thousand, really. Isn’t it wonderful?” Hazel clasped her hands together, obviously contemplating what good the money could do. “And it was anonymous too, so we’ll never know who to thank.” The phone rang again, so Hazel gave her a bright smile and mouthed good-bye as she answered. Alice forced a smile and backed away, almost tripping on a stray jack-in-the-box toy in her haste to leave.
Thirty-two thousand pounds.
Alice felt a strange bubble of laughter well up in her throat as she stood on the grimy pavement outside, breathing in wafts of exhaust fumes but barely noticing the traffic or bustle around her. Thirty-two thousand pounds.