Illustrations by Andrea Ucini.
PatriciaHighsmith
Sat 9 Jan 2021 04.00 EST
Last modified on Fri 15 Jan 2021 08.48 EST
âEllie, eat your breakfast,â Elspethâs mother said from behind her, in the kind of voice she used when she was thinking about something else. âJust look how thick the cream is this morning.â
âMm-
hmm,â Elspeth murmured politely. She wrung her hands in her lap and looked down at her oatmeal that was still steaming though surrounded by cream like a grey castle in a lake.
It was no use for her mother to pretend that the cream just happened to be thick this morning. It was thick because they were in New York. Everything they had this morning was boughten and very expensive. The coffee smelled shiny black, she could taste the bacon in the air. Yet beneath the breakfast smell was the smell of the room itself, an unfriendly and mixed-up smell of sweetness like ladiesâ perfume and powder, the clothiness of carpets and upholstery a