"Claire, has this happened before?" I asked gently, crouching beside her chair. "You mentioned three weeks. Has this been a daily occurrence?"
Claire nodded, tears still sliding down her face. "Almost every morning since you left for Singapore. She started small, at first, just asking me to bring her tea, or to help her with small tasks around the house. Then it escalated, gradually, into this. I kept telling myself it would stop, that maybe I was overreacting, that perhaps this really was some family expectation I simply hadn't understood before we married."
"Where's Rosa?" I asked, remembering the housekeeper's conspicuous absence.
"Margaret gave her the week off," Claire said. "Right after you left. I didn't think anything of it at first, but looking back now—"
"She removed the one person in this house who might have witnessed what was happening," I finished, understanding dawning with sickening clarity. I turned to face my mother directly. "You deliberately sent Rosa away so there would be no witnesses to whatever you've been doing to Claire while I was gone."