‘I was born during the war and left at the doors of The Albrecht Trust before I turned one. I didn’t spend long there. After about two or three months, a family who lived in Lienz adopted me. They gave me a happy childhood. I excelled in school, went to university, got my law degree and began practising in Vienna. I’d been working as a lawyer for a couple of years when I received a visitor at my office. She was an elderly lady, dressed all in black. Her name was Maria Lemanski. I thought she was a prospective client, but when she sat down in my office, she broke down in tears. Once she had calmed down she started from the beginning.’ Frederik trained his eyes on me. ‘She had come to tell me that my real parents were Sebastian and Isabella Albrecht.’
I shot forward in my seat. ‘What?’
‘That’s right,’ said Frederik. ‘When Isabella, my mother – your grandmother – discovered her husband was a threat, she planned to flee with me and your mother, but she needed to do it in a way that wouldn’t draw attention. She confided in Maria, our nanny – the lady who had come to see me – swearing her to secrecy. Your grandfather was away for several days, and the women decided to take the opportunity to make their escape. So in the middle of the night, Maria took me away, slipping through a tunnel under the house. She said she left me at the steps of The Albrecht Trust. A letter from your grandmother had been tucked into my clothes, requesting Frau Werner at the Trust to contact her in the strictest confidence. But as luck would have it, the letter disappeared.’
Frederik reached for his glass of water, balancing its base in the palm of his hand. ‘Your grandfather, however, returned from his trip two days earlier than expected, the day Isabella, Annabel and Maria were due to leave. He noticed that the baby boy was missing. So Isabella claimed that she had killed his son, that she had, in her words, thrown the body away. Maria claimed that Isabella had had some sort of breakdown. The household was turned upside down. Shortly afterwards, your grandmother was taken away. Your grandfather wanted to avoid any undue attention so allegedly the staff and police were paid to keep quiet. A few days later, Maria managed to visit The Albrecht Trust to seek the baby out. She said she saw me. She even took me in her arms. The staff told her they had named me Frederik. They thought it suited me. The name change prompted her to do what she believed was the right thing – she said nothing about my identity and left me there – and prayed for my safety every day after that.’
He returned his glass to the coffee table.
I had a fleeting moment of satisfaction at the neat ending, but then the real impact of his story sank in, negating any sense of happy fulfilment. Over a matter of weeks, I had dredged up disturbing things – murder, abuse – that tarnished my family’s history. Secrets had kept the Albrecht name intact, until now. Frederik’s tale, even when related in his frank, unemotional manner, told of acts that were both horrific and desperate.
How could he be a living relative? I regarded him, wondering whether he had ever really absorbed the story, whether he ever felt the gravitas of it. He appeared quite numb to it all. He was an innocent in this, just as my mother had been. Just as I had been. Yet he had covered it up, just like my mother had covered up so much.
‘I presume my mother knew?’
‘No.’
‘Oh come on, Frederik!’
‘There was no birth certificate – no record of my birth whatsoever, in fact. And after that meeting with Maria, I never saw her again.’ He smoothed down his trousers and put on his glasses. ‘I did seek out your mother. I was sure she’d know about me. We met through a mutual acquaintance. She invited me to her house where I also met your father. I saw the Schiele hanging in her drawing room – I believe she’d just acquired it. Unprompted, she told me it reminded her of her family, saying only that her mother had died, as had her younger brother Thaddäus.’ He smiled. ‘I came away from that meeting with two things: a new client, and knowledge of the name I’d been given at birth.’
‘So she had no suspicion of who you really were?’
He shook his head. ‘Not as far as I ever knew.’
‘But didn’t you try to tell her after you got to know her?’
‘I thought about it, but we’d become good friends. Her reputation – the reputation of The Albrecht Trust – meant everything to her, and to me. I didn’t have the heart to shatter that illusion, and besides, I had no real proof other than the words of a woman I never saw again. Your mother looked out for me, I suppose, like an older sister would. That was sufficient. And when she died …’ He ran his thumb around the palm of his hand. ‘I saw you that day I visited her grave. You were jogging towards the cemetery entrance. I didn’t want you to find out either. You’d been through enough already.’ He looked over my shoulder where I knew the picture of him and my mother was standing. ‘Until recently, I had no idea what type of threat my father was supposed to have been. Maria refused to go into details when I asked her. Like you, I try to avoid thinking about it. But it’s hard.’
I studied his face. ‘You look nothing like my mother.’
‘Long ago I noticed we both had a mole, shaped like a comma in the same spot just above our left wrists. Perhaps she saw that too.’ He shrugged his shoulders. ‘I used to notice we had similar mannerisms. They were enough for me.’
There were too many questions jostling for attention, though one shouted louder than the rest. ‘Do you think my grandmother did have a breakdown?’ I asked.
Frederik thought about it, then with a wry smile said, ‘She didn’t murder me, did she?’
But there were other things that still didn’t fit. ‘That day you saw me at the cemetery – was it you who left the coat of arms at her grave?’
Frederik nodded.
‘How come you had that?’
‘I went through a sticky patch with my law firm. I didn’t agree with the practices of a couple of my fellow partners. I could’ve walked away, but your mother told me to stand firm and gave the small shield to me. The motto – teach me whatever’s true – seemed appropriate at the time.’
‘But why leave it at her grave?’
‘I felt she had only loaned it to me. I had tried to return it to her on several occasions, but she had always refused – over my dead body, she would say. So that’s what I did.’
It was bittersweet, this reunion of sorts between Frederik and me. When I left, there was no film-ending hug; we did embrace, but it was with a stiff-limbed awkwardness that only time could loosen. Our embrace turned into a handshake, a gesture of intent that our common cause – The Albrecht Trust and the memorial garden I wanted to create – would draw us together.
Later that day, I left Vienna. Frederik’s story began to sink in, but it did little to fill the hollow in my heart. I knew it would take a long time to recover from what had happened, but I decided to face it head on rather than scurry away from it, as I had tried to do after my mother’s death. Besides, there was too much to hide from.
In London, I filed through security, passport control, the airport, lost in my own world. When I arrived at my building on Wimpole Street, I nodded at the familiar Coade-stone head with something like relief. Yet on entering my apartment, it came as a surprise to see my own belongings. For a moment, I wondered why I felt like that. Then I realised how much I had changed in the time I’d been away.
OBER ST. VEIT, VIENNA, 26TH AUGUST 2004
Footsteps outside on the driveway draw Annabel to the hallway. The jar of painkillers jangles in her dressing-gown pocket, reminding her of the tiny bell Mama used to ring to signal the departure of the Christkind on Christmas Eve. The cancer’s so far gone now, the tablets do little to deflect the pain; they just send her into a dream-like state that she can’t bear. At first she wondered if the pills had conjured up the sounds outside, but the light from the chandelier in the atrium triggers voices, foreign and quite unfathomable. As she listens to the footsteps running out of her driveway, she smiles. If someone did break in, she wouldn’t mind if they killed her while they were at it.
Rather that than this sloth-like death she’s having to endure. Then again, she’d like to see the look on their faces when they discover that almost everything in the house is a fake or hails from foreign flea markets she’s visited over the years. Perhaps she should invite them in for a cup of tea.
Annabel grimaces as her stomach cramps, and for a moment she doubles over, her arms wrapped around her torso. Really, she should sit down; really, she should be lying down, as Vivienne keeps urging her. Her friend is forever telling her to rest, to stop rummaging through old memories in the attic. But she can’t help it: the discoveries she’s made keep her going back for more. She’s pieced together scraps of information that suggest her father was more of a monster than she had ever imagined. It’s a cruel realisation, and an obvious one, in light of everything.
Guilt presses down on her. Hiding her own trauma seemed to be the best thing to do. And then Christopher had come along, a conduit for her to get it all out, and she’d felt better for it. But maybe she should have pressed further to find out more about her father. Jumbled memories, snatches of conversations, scenes she walked into as a child that she shouldn’t have – one could read anything into them. And then Christopher died and she had swallowed her secret again, when really she would have been better confronting the truth and facing it head on. Perhaps I would never have had to push Max away, Annabel thinks.
If only Max would call her. She wants some word of him, some sign from him, but his silence is to be expected, she supposes. It was never easy for her to distance herself from him. There were times she thought she’d capitulate, but that scene in the garden – seeing her precious boy being led away to his probable death; the prelude to the car accident and the arrival of the police – these things always returned to her without fail, stoking her fear for him.
But now? If Max could help her find her forgotten childhood friend Oskar Edelstein – if he’s still alive – he could help fill the gaps, because he had seen something too. The You knew on the back of the photograph pointed at Oskar as well as at Annabel. And if that was the case, then maybe this could all be put to rest and Max could finally come home to her. Then Annabel could tell her son how sorry she is and hold him in her arms again without any lingering trepidation. She blinks away the tears.
Shaking her head, Annabel goes to the study intending to call her son. Time won’t wait. She picks up the phone and frowns. There’s no dialling tone. She presses the on–off button several times, but the telephone’s about as useful as a child’s toy. She could go to the drawing room phone but she hasn’t the energy, and without anything to distract herself, the pain’s become all encompassing.
She slumps down on the chair behind her desk, taking slow deep breaths through her nose and exhaling through her mouth. It’s like labour all over again, she thinks. With an unsteady hand, she pulls out the jar of painkillers from her pocket. What would it take – five? ten? twenty? There are at least fifty in the bottle. She eyes up a glass of stale water sitting on her desk, another thing Ludmilla’s forgotten about. The woman’s become worse as Annabel’s health has deteriorated.
But it doesn’t matter any more.
Annabel unscrews the top of the bottle and takes out the recommended two tablets. Poised to swallow them without liquid, she hesitates. Goosebumps ripple along her skin and the hairs at the nape of her neck stand up. She sees the cloud of her breath hang in the air. Strange, her pain’s vanished too. In the hall, the chandelier lights flicker and a calm stillness descends on the house.
Turning to the doorway, Annabel says, ‘Well, you’ve been away a long, long time.’
CHAPTER TWENTY
As soon as I set my things down, I went straight to the drawer in the spare bedroom to fetch the folder of paperwork Frederik had given me and found the envelope marked with the insignia of the Dorotheum. Its contents provided information on the location of the genuine Schiele, together with the necessaries to retrieve it and the other two paintings, which I noticed were two early works by Franz von Zülow.
Felix Llewellyn had passed on details of the lawyer in charge of the Edelstein estate, telling me that Oskar had left everything to his housekeeper, Angela. I set the ball rolling to verify the provenance of the Schiele and then handed everything over to Oskar’s lawyer. On hearing the story, all he could say was, She’s incredibly lucky. It made me think of luck’s erratic pendulum, swinging away from me; any hope I had of the painting remaining in my hands disintegrated with each passing day. I struggled to shrug off the sadness at losing so much. Wherever I went, it hung like dust particles in the air around me.
I didn’t jump into finding a job and I took my time to get back in touch with my ex-boss. I also dropped the case against my old firm, wanting to distance myself from it and its ivory-tower world. Besides, even if I did win, it wouldn’t fill the hollowness I felt.
The memorial garden was my only focus. I worked with a Hietzing-based landscape architect who designed a beautiful space, with quiet enclaves for reflection and a large wooden play area for children. A white stone wall was to mark the far end of the garden, with steps leading up to a small platform from where visitors could look out over Vienna. Frederik laughed at my suggested name for it – The Brosel-Anakan Gardens – but then agreed the anagram was a fitting gesture.
He also personally stepped in to establish a case for the garden with the city authorities on my behalf. We pulled the memorial garden under the umbrella of the newly named Noble Stone Trust. His connections assisted with obtaining the necessary permissions and it looked likely that we would get the green light. A complicating factor was what to do about Eva Schwartz’s remains: I thought it right to have them buried there; Frederik argued against it. Eventually, he accepted my decision.
On the first Saturday in February I drove down to Prussia Cove. A southerly breeze seasoned with brine brushed my face as I joined the gathering at the cliff’s edge. There were only a few of us: Angela, Felix and his wife, and a couple of others – and Ripley, of course. He sat on his haunches by Angela’s side, his eyes downcast and his tail still, but when he saw me, he padded over, his tail gently wagging. And I, in turn, crouched down to greet him, burying my face in his coat, ruffling the hair between his ears, hearing only sorrow in his low whine.
We took it in turns to scatter Oskar’s ashes over the grey corrugated sea below. It swept in and out, in and out, accepting our offering while a lone gull swooped beneath the clouds, its wings outstretched.
We didn’t stay long. As I turned to leave I noticed Angela hanging back. I went over to join her, noticing a postcard in her hand. The wind had pushed strands of hair across her face, which she made no attempt to push away, and I could see the faint tracks of tears on her cheeks.
‘Mr Edelstein wrote just two words on this one,’ she said, bending down to clasp Ripley’s leash back on his collar. ‘Another adventure.’ I took the leash from her as she pressed a tissue to her eyes. ‘I hope he’s with Mrs Edelstein.’
‘Do you believe that? That we get to see our loved ones again?’ I asked, stroking Ripley once more.
‘I like to think so. Gives us something to look forward to after we go.’ She flipped the postcard over to the picture of the Donnerbrunnen. ‘He was very fond of you, you know – talked a lot about you, he did. I can’t believe he’s gone – just like that.’ She swallowed and took a moment to compose herself. ‘And I can’t believe he left everything to me.’
‘Do you know what you’re going to do?’
Angela shook her head. ‘I’ve no idea. I can’t bring myself to go into his house. Not yet.’ With a fresh tissue she wiped away more tears. ‘But there’s one thing I have decided. That painting – I know it’s been confirmed that it belonged to Mr Edelstein’s family, but I don’t want it. I saw a photo of it and …’ She pressed her lips together and shook her head. ‘I want to sell it. Give the proceeds to the tsunami effort.’
I stared at her. ‘Are you sure?’
‘I know its value,
but money won’t bring him back, will it?’ she said with quiet determination. She looked up at me. ‘I want your help – to sell it, I mean.’
There was no persuading her to do otherwise.
As we expected, the city authority and local Gemeinde gave their permission for our memorial garden, complete with burial plot. There was one caveat: that Eva’s resting place should lie, fenced off, in the furthest corner of the garden.
Work began in late March. Frederik oversaw everything on my behalf, and from time to time Vivienne would wander up Himmelhofgasse and report on its progress. While I still couldn’t go near the place, I promised myself that I would visit when it was finished. In the meantime, I patched things up with Lana. This time, there was an intimation that the relationship had the potential to be more lasting. Although I eventually told her about my mother, Oskar and my grandfather, I couldn’t tell her about the presence, nor how the fire really started. I knew there would be a time when I’d have to tell her everything, but just not yet.
In mid-July, on my mother’s birthday, Frederik and I joined Vivienne in the short walk from her home to The Brosel-Anakan Gardens on Himmelhofgasse. There was no one else there, just the three of us, Vivienne in the middle, her arms looped through each of ours. As we rounded on to that street, panic butterflied in my stomach and the tremor in my hands kicked in. Vivienne gave my hand a squeeze and the dread ebbed away.
We entered through an arched gateway covered in honeysuckle – the only nod to the house – and into the park, for that’s what it was in reality. It was larger than I’d imagined and the huge transformation soon displaced any initial misgivings I had. Sunshine dappled the expanse of lush greenery. Roses, begonias and other flowers I couldn’t name splashed colour everywhere. There were no ravens or crows to sour the place, just the odd blackbird and a couple of chaffinches perched on the edge of the stone birdbath in the centre. Pleased with the way it had turned out, I could picture families coming here for picnics, or people sitting on the benches under the shade of the trees seeking peace.
The Silent Children Page 24
