She walked over to the window and opened it.
“I’m getting a funny smell. An odour of perversion, corruption, poison even. It’s in your blood. And hers too. Always was.”
“Sarah’s missing, Rebecca. Did you know that?”
“I tried to free her of the disease. I tried to close the book. It was what a mother had to do. It’s not hard to print a story or buy a car. And I hadn’t been a mother before. That was my disease. The Greville Hartley heritage. And then nothing but lies.”
Paul was lost.
She turned back from the window and clasped her hands in front of her.
“What’s your name?”
“Paul Boyd. As if you didn’t know.”
“Is it now? The other one changed hers too. Am I making sense? Or am I talking double Dutch. It’s a funny expression, isn’t it? I sometimes wish I’d made different choices. I imagine you do too. Like not letting my baby suffer. The only one I ever loved. Lost now… I could never have put up with both of them. I don’t regret it. Goodbye.”
Paul wondered why he had come. He had nothing to say to her. And it appeared she had little of any value to say to him.
“Good bye, Rebecca.”
“I’ll not kiss you goodbye. A kiss is an X. X marks the spot. X-ray eyes. X-rated love. I can see now, I always could. Perhaps you can too. Join the club. I was never in it myself. Although I’ve served time in a way, just like you. Hard labour. Not my pre-destined fate. I hope you suffered. I know she did. Envy.”
Paul looked around the room, at Rebecca’s world. It was like an anonymous hotel room. Beige and pale blue and more beige. There was nothing personal here. There were no photographs on display. No pictures of Greville or Sarah or the house, or even of Robbie. Nothing to remind her of whence she came. Maybe she was better off that way. And maybe she knew it.
Back at the cottage, he dug out the envelope of photographs from one of the boxes and flicked through them. He found one he’d only glanced at before. It was a postcard, sent by Sarah when she was on holiday in the South of France. The postmark was July 18th 1988. It was sent from a village called St Laurent-du-Loup. It was a personalised original photo, with lines for writing and a square box for the stamp printed on the back. The photo showed a handsome villa, two storeys high, with eight windows with ochre shutters and a red-tiled roof. Paul knew they were called canal tiles.
Sarah had written: Dear Paul, the sun is shining and it’s very hot. Today we went swimming and tomorrow we are going to the mountains. Lots of love, Sarah. XXX
PS. My room is marked with a kiss! Mum said that’s where I was born!
The second upstairs room to the left had a large X over the window.
He unfolded one of the letters Linda Deighton had given him. It was in a plain brown envelope, with his name on it. It had been unopened. Sarah had sent it from St Laurent in July of 2000. She said that she had looked for him and been unable to find him. She hoped that Linda may have more luck. She had come to France to get away from her parents who were furious about her leaving school, but she had agreed to go to New York and to study there, a compromise arrangement that seemed to suit everyone. She wasn’t staying in the villa, but next door, with Mme Rosa, the lady who had brought her into the world. She said she missed him and hoped he was well and that she loved him. And always would.
Chapter 36
July 17th 1995
I haven’t slept all night. They’ve told us that we can say goodbye in the morning, before they go abroad.
They’re all going. Greville, Rebecca and Sarah. And even Chrissie, the maid. Sarah’s left Rushworth College and she’s being sent to a school in Switzerland. Some people call them ‘finishing schools”, and it’s very apt. It’s certainly finishing something.
So they’ve said we can say goodbye but I’m not sure I believe them.
Greville and Rebecca and Mum and Dad have all been very weird. Quiet and secretive, and I know they’ve been talking together.
We sort of half expected them to be mad, angry and surprised, but it’s as if they were more disappointed, scared even, and I don’t understand that.
Something makes me look out of the bedroom window, and across the Castle grounds I can see someone walking. And it’s only half past six in the morning. They’re not supposed to be leaving till eleven. A car backs up to the front door and I think it’s a taxi.
I pull on some clothes and jump out of the window and run across the grass and I can see Sarah getting into the taxi and then Greville. I haven’t seen her since the other night when Greville and Rebecca came back early from Manchester. We were separated. Torn apart. In every way.
Sarah’s wearing a light green jacket and her hair looks golden.
I shout out, but she doesn’t hear me.
The taxi starts up and I run on but it’s half-way down the drive and then it’s gone.
I listen to it turn into the lane and drive down the hill and then all I can hear is the wind rustling through the trees and my own heart pounding in my head. It’s echoing there, as if there was a hole in my head and my heartbeat was banging inside it, trying to get out.
Sarah’s gone, and I don’t know if I’ll ever see her again.
Chapter 37
Monday April 29th 2013
The plane touched down at 10.15 and by 11 o’clock Paul was on the road in a rented VW Golf. He followed the coast from Nice airport along the A8 as far as St Pierre and then cut inland. The road wound and twisted as the hills closed in. After drifting through a few forlorn, empty villages he crested the first ridge. He turned off from the main road and snaked along a narrow valley, passing groves of olives and citrus fruits, the scents and perfumes wafting in through the open window.
After a badly-marked crossroads he stopped and checked his map – foregoing the satnav, which he hated – and looked up towards the north-east at the next line of hills ahead of him, green and grey and semi-wooded, with the sun twinkling off invisible windows and greenhouses. His phone rang. He looked at the screen and saw that it was Dave. He pulled in at the side of the road and took the call.
“Hey.”
“Hey, yourself. Where are you?”
“Nice.
“Oh, nice.”
“Yeah, right.”
“Are you sitting down?”
“I am actually, yes, I’m in a car.”
“They’ve found Sarah.”
“What?”
“She’s fine… she’s all right.”
“What? Where? What happened?”
“We got a message yesterday… her credit card had been used in Innsbruck on Saturday. They checked it out, thinking it might have been found or stolen or something… and it had been used at Innsbruck station…”
“Innsbruck…”
“Yeah, anyway, the next thing they know is she shows up in Venice. She’d taken the train, the same route, and she went to Venice and she went straight to Police HQ in Venice and told them what happened.”
“When was this?”
“Last night. Apparently she called Morgan yesterday morning…”
“Yesterday morning, Sunday morning…?”
“Right… and he flew out and they were reunited right there at the Scudetto or whatever yesterday evening…”
“The Questura.”
Silence.
“So she’s fine”, Dave said. “It’s all over.”
“What did she say happened?”
“Just that she’d freaked out and gone into hiding and done some thinking, it’s all a bit vague…”
“I can imagine…”
“The press got hold of it first thing this morning. I think they’re giving a press conference in an hour or so, you should try and catch it. The Cipriani put them up last night, presidential suite, the full bit, and then they’re jetting off to Kuala Lumpur or somewhere.”
“It’s all right for some.”
“You don’t sound… pleased, or relieved.”
“I’m not sure
if those are the words I would use…”
“Sarah’s alive and well, Paul. You have to admit that’s the most important thing.”
“Sarah being alive and well… yes, you’re right, definitely.”
“So maybe you can…”
“Let it go?”
“Well…”
“Yes, maybe I can. Maybe. Thanks for calling.”
“I thought you’d want to know.”
“I appreciate it. By the way, I saw Neil Morgan on Saturday night. He was packing, loading a couple of suitcases into his car. As if he was going on a trip. When did you say she called him?”
“Sunday morning. And believe it or not, her phone records check out. They’ve been monitored all the time.”
“Fine. Thanks again.”
“I’m worried about you, mate.”
“It’s probably not me you should be worried about.”
“Whatever. Take care.”
“You too. Love to Cath. Bye.”
He drove on, the sun high in the sky now and the light hurting his eyes. His head was throbbing and he could feel his neck cracking whenever he turned his head. He put on some sunglasses and glanced at himself in the mirror. With the bandage on his head he looked like the invisible man. He wasn’t even a shadow any more, it was worse. He was invisible. To himself. The blood pulsed and pounded around the hole in his head and he wondered what he was doing and why. He felt like he was falling into the hole.
He plugged his phone into the car’s stereo system and found a track and put it on full blast: New Order’s ‘Temptation’.
Oh, you've got green eyes
Oh, you've got blue eyes
Oh, you've got grey eyes
And I've never seen anyone quite like you before
No, I've never met anyone quite like you before
Chapter 38
Monday April 29th 2013
He reached St Laurent by midday and stopped for a coffee at the first place he came to, a rundown old post-house next to a derelict petrol station in the lower part of the village. The only person in the place was the barman. A bald man in a Bob Marley T-shirt with two fingers of his left hand missing, badly in need of a shave and a shower. Paul asked a couple of questions and was grudgingly given a couple of answers. But only after he laid a twenty euro note on the bar. The coffee was dreadful.
The villa stood on the crest of a hill, with a steep rocky slope behind it and the grounds falling away to the right and left, with clusters of palms and olive trees breaking up a vast lawn. The view over the foothills as far as the Med was spectacular. Paul took out the photo he had found among the letters and compared it with what he could see now. He looked at the window Sarah had marked with an X. The house hadn’t changed much in 25 years, but the vegetation had grown wild with vines and bamboo and creepers, and now obscured a number of outhouses, a garage and a greenhouse that were clearly visible in the photo.
Rosa Vidal lived in a small, square house next door, fifty yards to the left.
He opened a gate and walked up a paved path, skirting round rough-stone terraces with beds of lavender and lilies, and he reached the front door and knocked.
A curtain was swept aside and an elderly woman looked out.
“Qui êtes-vous?” she said.
“Je m’appelle Paul, je suis un ami de Sarah Hartley.”
She stared at him through the glass for perhaps five seconds then let the curtain fall back into place and opened the door, ushering him in, and she quick-stepped her way towards a kitchen Paul could see at the end of a short corridor. Then she stopped and turned round and looked at him again, cocking her head to one side as if she’d heard a phone ringing somewhere, then spun round and called out to him over her shoulder.
“Come, come… we’re in here!” she said, in English.
Paul walked into the kitchen, expecting to find someone else there, but there was only a fat grey cat sitting on the kitchen table, licking a paw. The cat looked at him disdainfully and then jumped off the table and slid through a cat-flap in the back door.
“He’s not a people cat”, she said. “Sit down, sit down…”
He sat down.
She perched on the edge of a seat opposite him and stared into his eyes as if she were looking for the first symptoms of glaucoma.
Mme Rosa was a portly woman of about 70, and made Paul think of a guinea pig. She had a pert, pursed mouth with small, sharp teeth and beady eyes and she seemed to switch from watchful immobility to active scurrying almost instantaneously.
“So you’re Paul.”
“That’s right.”
“Sarah’s friend.”
“You know who I am?”
“Oh yes. She talked about you. Paul this and Paul that. She drew pictures of you too when she was little. I don’t know where they’ll be. But I never throw anything away… do you want me to look?”
“Maybe later… do you have a television?”
“No, I don’t. Why?”
“Sarah’s been found, apparently… you did know she was missing?”
“I saw it in the paper, yes. I wasn’t too worried, though.”
“Why not?”
She patted a hand against her heart.
“I can feel it, when something’s wrong. With all my little ones. And I might have felt a flutter, but I knew she wasn’t… gone. I mean, really gone.”
“I see.”
“Were you looking for her?”
“Sort of.”
“Would you like a drink?”
She jumped up and walked briskly over to the fridge and opened it.
“Coca-Cola, Orangina, Seven-Up, Sprite, Perrier, milk, apple juice or iced tea?”
“Some fizzy water would be good, thank you.”
She pulled out a bottle and found a glass and set her eyes on him again.
“You don’t look much like her.”
“You mean my mother?”
She over-filled the glass and the table was a wash of tiny bubbles.
“Yes, Joanne… lovely woman. Lovely eyes…”
Something caught in her voice and she cleared her throat.
“So you were here, back then, when Sarah was born?”
“Of course. It was very handy, what with my Michel working for the Hartleys, and me being the village midwife. It made sense for them to do it here. Keep it in the family.”
She mopped up the water and handed him a glass. He took a couple of aspirins and drank some water. Her eyes flicked about and she seemed to be thinking about what she’d said.
“You worked for the family?”
“My husband did, God rest his soul. He passed on four years ago. He used to look after the house, the garden, all kinds of things. Very busy when they were here, not so much when they weren’t. So he worked a bit down at the Renault garage in Contes.”
The Vidals were the French Boyds, Paul thought. And this was the Cottage on the Riviera.
“Was there something you wanted to know?”, she said. A little anxiously, Paul thought.
“Well, I was in the area, and I remember Sarah saying she was born here, and I’ve never seen the villa before, so I just thought I’d drop by, have a quick look, say hello, you know…”
“Right.”
She seemed reassured.
She bustled out of the room and came back a minute later with a photo album.
“Let’s take a trip down memory lane then, I don’t often get the chance…”
She sat down and pushed the album towards him.
“No, hang on, we’ll go in the other room, there’s more light. Come on.”
Paul followed her through into the living-room, where broad French windows looked over a patio and a small fish-pond.
She sat on a sofa and patted the seat next to her. He sat beside her.
“Right then, let’s see what we have.”
She opened the album.
The first twenty pages were all shots of mothers with babies, in beds, sitting in armchair
s, at christenings or at breakfast tables.
She pointed out different places and identified women and babies and family members and priests.
“This is Christine. She’s a singer now, quite famous… And this is poor little Jean-Pierre, who got meningitis…”
“Who’s this?” he said, pointing at one picture.
She peered at it and he saw her eyes crinkle.
“That’s my sister Marieke, and little Kristel.”
“Where was it taken, it looks nice?”
“That’s near where they live. Just round the corner.”
“You speak very good English Mme Rosa… And I suspect you’re not French. Where are you from?”
“I used to be Dutch. I took the French nationality when I got married. Look, here’s Sarah!”
She turned the page and Paul saw Sarah, just a few days old, in Rebecca’s arms. Rebecca looked as though she were carrying a case of nitro-glycerine and was afraid it would explode at any second. He could see the villa behind them.
“And here’s another one.”
In this picture, Sarah was perhaps five years old, and she was in a swimming-pool with armbands on, screwing her eyes up in the sun and squinting at the camera.
There were more pictures of toddlers, and then a series of older children, snaps sent by parents as souvenirs of the infants Rosa had brought into the world.
“137 of them”, she said, as if she were reading his thoughts. “And I know all their names. Try me.”
He humoured her, pointing at a child or a teenager, and she cited the first, middle and surname of each one without batting an eyelid.
“And this one.”
Paul pointed at a picture of a girl of around 16, with short black hair gelled into spikes and a vicious looking piercing in her nose.
“Oh, that’s my niece, during her punk period. But I should show you some photos of my Michel, hang on a second….”
She leapt up and went into the hall and he heard her rummaging through some drawers and a cupboard.
As he shifted position on the sofa, a photo fell out of the album onto the floor. He picked it up. It was a photo of Rebecca, the same one he had found in the hiding-place. He turned it over. There was a date scrawled on the back.
The King's Shilling Page 21
