by Sarah Rayne
The second man was staring in utter horror at what had been done, his own escape struggles momentarily suspended. Had they been friends, these two men? If not friends, they would certainly be allies in this place, just as Alice and the women in her hut were allies. The assistants were still clustered around the machines attached to both men, noting down figures and comparing them, and adjusting settings. Alice glanced at Alraune again, hoping he would look round and see her, and that she might somehow send a message of love or comfort to him, but he was watching the machines. Alice did not know if he realized she was still there.
The attendants were busy with the machines, scribbling down figures, adjusting settings, and Mengele waited patiently until they stepped back, nodding to him. Then he bent over the first man again, and the needle glinted as it came down a second time.
From out of the tangled confusion of pain and horror and disgust, two things emerged with terrible clarity in Alice’s mind.
One of these was the reactions of the still-untouched victim. As Mengele drove the needle into the first man’s remaining eye he began to scream. He’s realized what’s ahead of him, thought Alice, appalled. He’s seen his friend cold-bloodedly blinded, and he’s guessed that he’s about to suffer the same fate.
Mengele turned to the trolley to select a second needle, and the second man’s screams increased, shrilling through the small room. As Mengele walked towards him, the screams faded and gave way to a wet retching.
‘Wipe his face,’ said Mengele impatiently. ‘I cannot work with a man’s vomit on my hands – you should know that by now.’ He lifted the syringe again.
The second thing to strike Alice very forcibly and very clearly, was that Alraune had watched everything with silent absorption. And that he appeared entirely untroubled by any of it.
‘So much pain,’ said Francesca softly, when Michael finished speaking. ‘And yet all that courage and all that humanity throughout. Alice and those women—’
‘Remarkable, weren’t they?’
‘It reminded me a very little of Anne Frank hiding in the attics to escape the Nazis,’ said Fran. ‘Her diaries are unbearably sad, but the people she described were so brave. Or that Frenchwoman – Odette somebody, who was imprisoned as a spy.’
Michael said, ‘And Mahler’s niece, Alma Rosé, who led an orchestra inside Auschwitz. Alice met her a couple of times, I think.’
‘It’s an incredible story, Michael.’
‘You believe it, though? You believe what I’ve told you? I do know how far-fetched it must sound.’
‘I believe you now that I’ve seen your own photo of Alraune,’ said Fran slowly. ‘Until then I was – well, I was questioning it all. But you couldn’t have faked that photograph in your wallet. You couldn’t have known I’d find the photo of Alraune as a child, either. And they’re unquestionably photos of the same person.’
‘The child is father to the man.’
‘I had been thinking of Alraune as a girl,’ said Fran, thoughtfully. ‘Trixie always referred to Alraune as “she”. That’s because of the film, I suppose. And that photograph could be a girl or a boy, couldn’t it?’
‘Yes. But if you look at the shot with my mother—’
‘She’s not pretty exactly, but she has a quality,’ said Fran, thoughtfully. ‘What happened to her? To both of them? Or am I stepping over the line asking that?’
He hesitated. ‘Not exactly,’ he said. ‘And one day I will tell you. Not yet, though.’
‘OK. He – your father – is actually very good-looking.’
‘Yes, he was,’ said Michael. ‘He had a magnetism.’
Fran picked up the photo of the child again. ‘Do we need to show anyone this? Is it likely to be connected with Trixie’s murder?’
‘I don’t know. But Trixie was delving into the past, wasn’t she? If she found Alraune’s photograph, she might have found other things – I can’t think what other things they could be, but I do know Alice didn’t tell me everything about Alraune. So I suppose there could be something in the past I don’t know about.’
‘Something to cause her to be killed?’ said Fran doubtfully. ‘To – to shut her up about something?’
‘It’s only a wild theory. I don’t really think it’s likely.’
‘Michael, what happened to Alraune after Auschwitz?’
‘That’s one of the things I don’t know,’ said Michael. ‘I think he lived mostly abroad until the early Sixties,’ said Michael. ‘Then he came to England – he was in his early twenties by then. He changed his name of course; he lived for a while in Salisbury, so he took the name Alan Salisbury. Very English, isn’t it? After I ran away, I shortened that to Sallis.’
He frowned and made an abrupt gesture as if to shake off the past. ‘I think I’d better let Inspector Fletcher know Trixie had Alraune’s photograph,’ he said. ‘She can make of it what she wants. And truly, Francesca, that’s enough about me. More than enough. Tell me about you. I’d like to know – that’s why I drove out here.’
‘To see me?’
‘To find out about you,’ he said. ‘You’re “Mrs”, but you don’t wear a wedding ring. That’s one of the things that’s intriguing me most.’
‘There’s nothing intriguing about it,’ said Francesca. ‘It’s boringly ordinary. I was married to a rat, and the rat deserted the ship for a blonde.’
‘How ridiculous of him. I’m very glad to hear he’s no longer around, though.’
Fran did not say she was starting to be quite glad as well. She said, ‘I’ll make us some coffee, shall I?’ and got up to switch on the kettle, running hot water on the plates stacked in the sink. She reached for the washing-up liquid at the same moment that Michael leaned over for the tea-towel; his hand brushed hers, and there was a sharp jab of excitement beneath her ribcage. Ridiculous, of course, but still…
But still, when his hand took hers again, there was a soaring delight. Fran discovered that she had turned from the sink to face him. He was standing so close to her that she could see the little flecks of light in his eyes. She was just trying to decide whether to make some light, subtly inviting remark (although she had rather forgotten how to do that kind of thing and she had never been particularly good at it anyway), or to step back and finish the washing-up and pretend nothing had happened.
Before she could decide, she discovered that she was in his arms without quite knowing how she had got there or which of them had moved first. His kiss, when it came, was at first gentle and exploratory, and then was not gentle at all. When finally he released her, his eyes were glowing.
Fran said, breathlessly, ‘When you let the barriers down, you do so quite spectacularly.’
‘I didn’t mean to put up barriers. Sometimes it just happens. But I’ve wanted to do that ever since I opened the door of Deborah Fane’s house and found you on the step,’ he said. ‘You looked like a defiant urchin – all tousled hair and accusing eyes.’
‘I thought you looked like an extremely urbane wolf,’ said Fran, involuntarily. ‘One who might prowl the groves of academe.’
‘A book of Elizabethan sonnets in one hand and the key to the bedroom in the other?’
‘Something like that. As a matter of fact, I nearly got back in the car and drove away like a bat out of hell.’
‘I’m glad you didn’t. Could we have dinner tomorrow night? I’ll leave the bedroom key behind, although I can’t promise anything about the sonnets. You’ve got the kind of face that could inspire someone to be quite poetic.’
‘I wouldn’t mind if you recited limericks,’ said Fran. ‘And I’d love to have dinner with you tomorrow – oh, blast, no, I can’t. I really do have a parent evening tomorrow.’ In case he thought this was a put-off, she said, ‘I could manage Tuesday or Wednesday, though.’
‘Tuesday? Eight o’clock? And we’ll try to get to the Italian place this time, shall we?’
Francesca’s instant reaction to this was that the Italian restaurant was only a
short walk from this house, and that he would bring her home, and that she would almost certainly ask him to come in for a final drink or a cup of coffee…Don’t plan too far ahead, though. Don’t let your mind run away too wildly.
Still, there was no harm in thinking that she could serve the coffee in Trixie’s little sitting-room on Tuesday – the furniture was a bit weather-beaten, but there was an open fire and she could lay the fire ready for lighting as soon as she got home from school. She might as well use some of the applewood logs a neighbour had let Trixie have last month. And he liked music, and there was her own CD collection upstairs. Mozart and apple-scented firelight and some really good filtered coffee. Perhaps a brandy with it. She would set the glasses on the little low table, and the firelight would glow on them. I’m sounding like a romantic fourteen-year-old. I don’t care.
She would not get too stupidly dreamy, though. For the moment it was enough to smile at Michael, and say, ‘Tuesday at eight it is. I’ll look forward to that.’
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Since that splintering second of recognition at Quondam, Edmund had struggled to control a scalding jealousy of Michael Sallis. Once you allowed an emotion – almost any emotion – to get the upper hand, you stopped thinking and reasoning, and you lost a certain detachment.
But the angry hating jealousy was threatening to overwhelm him, blotting out all other considerations and making it difficult to focus on anything else.
Alraune’s son. That was who Sallis was – Edmund knew it quite definitely. After those first few puzzled moments, he had looked from Sallis to the screen and he had suddenly seen the extraordinary resemblance to the young Lucretia von Wolff. A direct descendant? Was that possible? But Michael resembled Lucretia far too closely to be anything else. So who was he? Whose son could he be?
It was unlikely in the extreme that Sallis was a secret son of either Deborah or Mariana. Those two had lived open and conventional lives, but both of them had been sufficiently Lucretia’s daughters not to have troubled overmuch about having an illegitimate son. Deborah, in fact, would probably have relished it. Edmund was inclined to absolve both Deborah and Mariana.
That left the third of Lucretia’s children. Alraune. And Alraune had not been a legend as so many people had said, but a real person, born in December 1940 – the birth certificate in Deborah’s house had been testimony to that. And so far from dying mysteriously or vanishing without explanation, it looked as if Alraune had grown up and had had a more or less conventional life – marriage presumably, and a son.
Alraune had grown up. This was the thought that was sending the corrosive waves of hatred and jealousy scudding through Edmund’s body. Alraune had not been that secret intimate ghost whose presence he had felt so strongly at Ashwood, and whose emotions he had shared. All you need to believe in is the practice of mord, Alraune had said that day. And there had been that burst of childish glee. Remember the eyes, Edmund…Remember mord…
Alraune was mine! cried Edmund silently to Sallis. Alraune was that fragile little ghost who guided my hand when I killed Trixie Smith! We shared mord, Alraune and I, and we shared that killing! The thought of Sallis knowing Alraune – growing up with Alraune as a parent – was almost more than Edmund could bear.
But it was important to stay in control. To fight that black and bitter tide of hatred that threatened to swamp his reason. He forced himself to think on a practical level. How much might Alraune’s son know about Ashwood? Had Michael listened to the stories of the past, as Edmund had? A child ‘listed as Allie’ had been at Ashwood that day: had it really been Alraune? (‘You don’t need to believe in me, Edmund…All you need to believe in is the practice of mord…The ancient High German word that means murder…’)
How much had Alraune seen and understood that day at Ashwood? Enough to pass it on to Michael, years afterwards? ‘Once upon a time, Michael, there was a place called Ashwood where a murder happened, and there was a man called Crispin Fane who committed that murder and no one ever knew…But I knew, Michael, I knew because I saw it all…’
There was no way of knowing how much Sallis had been told, but Edmund was not going to take any chances. There was also no way of knowing if Sallis, or indeed Alraune, might have talked to anyone about the Ashwood murders, although on balance Edmund was inclined to think not. The police did not seem to know much about Alraune, and Sallis did not seem to have told them anything. And although Alraune’s birth certificate had been in Deborah’s house, if she had known of Michael’s existence she had never talked about it, just as she had never talked about Alraune.
Edmund was not, of course, some vulgar, out-of-control serial murderer who killed for the sake of it, and who was destined for the flashier pages of the tabloids followed by a life sentence inside some grim institution. But the jealous hatred of Michael Sallis was seeping into every corner of his mind, and he could not bear to think of Alraune as other than his own – helping him, encouraging him. ‘Go on, Edmund, go on…’ Alraune had said that day in Studio Twelve.
And if Michael had grown up with Alraune, as presumably he must have done, even if he had broadcast his parentage to the entire western world, he was still far too much of a threat to be allowed to live.
Edmund remembered that he had never liked the man since the day he came to Deborah Fane’s funeral, and it was at this point that he knew he was going to enjoy killing Michael Sallis.
The first step had been to get Sallis somewhere on his own, which Edmund thought he had already achieved rather neatly. Once he might have considered Ashwood for the setting, believing Alraune to be there and trusting to Alraune to help him. But Alraune could no longer be permitted into Edmund’s thoughts, and in any case, Ashwood was still the scene of DI Fletcher’s murder investigation. Also, Sallis would never go there without a lot of questions.
But accidents could happen in old houses, especially rather remote old houses that had been lived in by an elderly lady who might not have been as assiduous in having things like electrical wiring or gas pipes checked…
It took longer than might have been expected to go through the house, and decide which pieces of furniture would be most useful to the house’s new incarnation, but Edmund was meticulous about considering every item.
‘We’ve definitely decided to use the place as a halfway house,’ Michael said, as Edmund made diligent notes about wardrobes and tallboys and library shelves, and stuck gummed labels on to each item so that the removal men would not cart them off to the sale rooms by mistake. ‘We’ll probably put another little bathroom in if the funds stretch to it – that little boxroom on the half-landing might do for that – but other than that we’ll just give everywhere a lick of paint…oh, and mend some of the tiles on the roof where they’ve become unseated.’ He stood in the hall, looking about him. ‘In a way it’s rather a shame that it won’t be a family house any longer,’ he said. ‘It’s a lovely old place. You and your cousin must have had some good times here.’
‘Yes, we did.’ You’re looking in from the outside, thought Edmund. You’d have liked to share in all that, wouldn’t you? You’re thinking you had as much right to this place as I did, and you’re resenting it like fury. It rather pleased him to identify these fragments of emotion from Sallis, and with the idea of administering a further jab, he said, ‘My aunt loved us to stay with her in the long summer holidays. We used to have picnics by the river, and cycle rides through the lanes. And huge Christmas parties – all very traditional. Roaring log fires and spiced punch and presents under the tree.’
‘Wonderful for you to be able to look back on those years,’ said Alraune’s son politely, and Edmund smiled. Last night he had thought that he would know when the moment to set the plan in motion arrived, and he knew that the moment was now. A little hammer-pulse of excitement began to beat in his mind.
Sallis was looking at his watch, and saying something about it being well after one o’clock. ‘Before I set off for home I think I’ll have somethin
g to eat in the village, though. The White Hart does food, doesn’t it?’
‘Only bar meals at this time of day,’ said Edmund. ‘But they’re quite good.’
‘Do you have to be back at your office, or could you have some lunch with me?’
Edmund had not expected this but he took it in his stride. ‘I don’t see why not. Yes, thank you.’ Now, said his mind, and at once the little hammer-pulse quickened. As they went out to the hall, as if it had just occurred to him, he said, ‘Before we go, would you mind giving me a hand with that box of books in the corner? It’s not very heavy – not hernia weight or anything like that – but it’s a bit awkward. It’s only got to go as far as the boot of my car…’
Sallis was entirely unsuspicious. He said, ‘Yes, of course. Hold on, I’ll prop the door open, and we’ll carry it out between us.’
And of course, gentle impractical Mr Fane was not accustomed to humping packing cases around. He was more used to sitting behind a desk, and when he needed something moving or mending or adjusting, he rang a suitable workman. A bit of a wimp, really; hopeless when it came to understanding how you walked backwards when carrying something, or how you manoevred around an awkward corner. It was inevitable that he should dither a bit, and that the dithering should result in him fumbling his hold of the heavy case.
He fumbled it quite badly, in fact. The packing case slithered from his hands just as they were going past the stairs, and Michael Sallis made an instinctive grab to stop it falling against the carved newel post. There was a moment when he took the full weight, and then the heavy corner smashed down with a rather sickening dull crunch. It might have gone on his foot – Edmund had, in fact, been aiming for that, but it went on his left hand as he snatched at the corner. Almost as good. Blood gushed to the surface from a deep gash made by the case’s sharp corner, and a huge blind weal rose across the knuckles.
