The Stranger Upstairs

by Melanie Raabe

  ‘Do you think that makes it any better?’ I ask, but I don’t wait for an answer.

  ‘I know you’re in cahoots with Johann Kerber,’ I say.

  Suddenly I have his full attention. He blinks at me, his dark eyes alert.

  ‘I can give you the money he’s promised you,’ I tell him. ‘There’s no need to hurt me or Leo to get it.’

  For a moment it’s quiet again, then the stranger shakes his head wearily. ‘It’s not quite as easy as that.’

  I remember the tone of his voice when he was on the phone—the fear. ‘Why not?’

  He doesn’t reply.

  ‘You said you didn’t choose to play this part. I’m prepared to help you.’

  He laughs. ‘You want to help me?’

  ‘I want you out of my house,’ I say. ‘And I’m prepared to pay you to go. I’m not bluffing.’

  ‘That’s not the point.’

  ‘What’s the point then?’ I ask.

  He hesitates. My nerves are quivering with tension.

  ‘May I give you some advice?’ he says. ‘Be patient. This business will soon be over.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  He sits down. ‘Only two more days,’ the stranger replies, without looking at me. ‘Two days and you’re rid of me—if you don’t lose your head.’

  I look him in the face—and against all reason I have the feeling he’s telling the truth.

  ‘I want to know what’s happened to my husband,’ I say.

  ‘You’ll know everything soon enough. Give me two days.’

  I don’t understand what’s going on—why the stranger is suddenly so cooperative, or why those two days are so crucial. Why should I trust him? I want to believe him—hope gleams red and sweet and enticing as a toffee apple. But what if I put everything on hold for two days, only to find that he’s cleared off, taking with him all he knows about Philip?

  He’s averted his eyes again.

  ‘What’s going to happen in two days?’ I ask.

  He doesn’t reply. I think of the man I saw him talking to in town.

  ‘Is Philip alive?’ I ask.

  The stranger doesn’t reply.

  ‘Is my husband alive?’

  Silence.

  ‘Please,’ I implore him. ‘Just tell me that.’

  ‘Two days,’ says the stranger. ‘Give me two days, and I’ll give you all the information you want.’ He turns to look at me. ‘I promise,’ he says.

  I let his words sink in. ‘I believe you,’ I say, but I’m not sure that I do.

  We are silent for a while.

  ‘Two days?’ I ask.

  The stranger nods.

  I think for a moment, then come to a decision.

  ‘If I’m going to be spending another two days under the same roof as a man I don’t know, you could at least tell me your name.’

  Again, it falls quiet in the room, the ticking of the clock on the wall the only reminder that the world is still turning. I’ve already decided the stranger isn’t going to reply when he clears his throat.

  For the first time, he sounds sincere.

  ‘Vincent,’ he says softly. ‘I’m Vincent.’

  The stranger

  Silence descends on the room. She stares at her knees.

  That was the right thing to do, I think. The right thing. When I saw the exhaustion in her face, I realised it was time to change tactics. Hope, I thought. If I can bait her with anything, it’s hope. I decided to try something new: reassurance instead of provocation.

  After talking to Grimm, I realised that I’d have to buy myself some time. It’s crucial that she doesn’t panic and take off, and I was worried that she might.

  I think of the phone call.

  I registered with annoyance how violently my hands were shaking as I asked him my most pressing question.

  ‘I can’t tell you for certain yet,’ he said, ‘but—’

  ‘When can I expect an answer from you, then?’ I asked. ‘A definitive answer?’

  Grimm was silent. ‘Give me two days,’ he said at length.

  ‘Two days? How am I to keep this up for another two days?’

  ‘I don’t know what else to say to you,’ he replied.

  Then I heard her at the door. I decided to take the opportunity to improvise a bit. ‘I don’t think she’ll go to the police,’ I said, loudly and clearly.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ said Grimm.

  ‘I don’t know!’ I said.

  Grimm said nothing, confused.

  ‘I find it very hard to say,’ I added.

  ‘What do you find hard to say?’ asked Grimm.

  ‘If she does go to the police, she’s doing herself more harm than anyone else…’ I said. There seemed little doubt that she was still eavesdropping.

  ‘I see,’ said Grimm, who had finally twigged. ‘You can’t talk just now.’

  ‘I don’t think that will prove—’ I said.

  ‘All right then. We’ve settled everything anyway,’ Grimm replied.

  ‘I’m not going to—’ I said.

  ‘Goodbye,’ said Grimm.

  ‘Who do you think you’re talking to? I wouldn’t do a thing like that!’ I said loudly.

  There was a click. Grimm had hung up.

  ‘Forget it. I wouldn’t dream of it!’ I said.

  Dialling tone.

  ‘No violence, that was the deal!’

  I gave my voice a hint of moral indignation, then left a pause for my imaginary interlocutor.

  ‘I’ll see if I can reason with her.’

  Pause.

  ‘It’s worth a try, isn’t it?’

  Pause.

  ‘You promise me that Sarah and her son will come out of this unscathed, if I manage to pull it off?’

  I wondered whether I was laying it on too thick. Never mind.

  ‘Promise?’

  Pause.

  ‘Okay. Okay, thanks. Yes. Goodbye, then.’

  I hung up.

  How harmless she can look. But I feel no pity for her. She can shed as many crocodile tears as she likes—I won’t be taken in, and I won’t turn my back on her for a moment. I’m not that stupid. I know her so well now—maybe better than she knows herself.

  In two days I will know everything. And then, if things turn out as I suspect they will, God help her.

  Sarah

  I look at him long and hard. He’s certainly managed to take me by surprise. Vincent, then. I remember seeing the name written in the book I came across when I was going through his things.

  It doesn’t matter whether or not his name really is Vincent. The fact is, he’s clearly determined to make sure I keep my mouth shut for another two days—even if he’s not prepared to whack me over the skull and leave me in a pool of blood somewhere that I won’t be found until he’s well out of the way. Oddly enough, this realisation doesn’t reassure me in the slightest. My mind only returns over and over to the same question: What is going to happen in two days?

  ‘Two days,’ he says again. ‘Okay?’

  I don’t reply.

  ‘Okay?’

  I nod.

  ‘Good.’

  I hear the phone ringing again downstairs and frown. I don’t want to answer it, but then I think of Leo, and of that tree house he loves so much. I think of cuts needing stitches, of broken bones, of all kinds of catastrophes. I leap to my feet and hurry to the phone, the stranger trailing behind me.

  ‘Hello?’ I say.

  I hear breathing.

  ‘Hello?’ I say again.

  Nothing.

  ‘Who is it?’ I ask.

  There’s a click down the line. Whoever it was has hung up.

  ‘Who was it?’ asks the stranger.

  ‘Wrong number,’ I say.

  Then the phone starts up again. That withheld number. Quickly I pick up.

  ‘Hello?’

  Again the breathing. Again the caller hangs up. Furious, I replace the phone in the charging dock. Is the stran
ger playing games with me again?

  He looks at me questioningly. I just shrug.

  ‘Try to get some sleep,’ he says. ‘Tomorrow’s another day.’

  Philip hated such platitudes and always made fun of me if I used them. Good things come to those who wait. It takes two to make a quarrel. Truth is stranger than fiction. Tomorrow is another day.

  ‘You look pale,’ says the stranger. ‘Can I get you anything? Glass of water? Cup of tea?’

  I force myself not to laugh at the fact that this Vincent, or whatever his name is, has offered to make me a cup of tea. Besides, I’m glad of the opportunity to get rid of him.

  ‘A cup of tea,’ I say, sinking onto the sofa and watching him disappear towards the kitchen.

  I can’t carry on like this. How many sleepless nights have I had now? I should at least eat something. Have I eaten since throwing up my breakfast yesterday when Barbara Petry was here? Was that yesterday even? Or was it the day before? Never mind, none of that matters. Concentrate, Sarah. What matters is this: are you going to go along with Vincent’s game and trust that it will all be over in two days? Or are you going to call the police?

  The first option is pretty appealing, I think.

  Make up your mind, woman. Trust him or call the police. But if you’re going to call the police, do it now.

  I get up and take the phone from the charging dock. I hesitate. Then I enter Miriam’s number. I have to tell somebody. I have to talk to somebody.

  I don’t hear the stranger return.

  ‘What are you doing?’ he asks, and I drop the phone, panicked. ‘What is this, Sarah?’ he says. ‘I thought we had an agreement. What are you going to tell the police anyway? That your husband has a doppelganger? Or a wicked twin? Listen to yourself. Look at yourself. You’re crazy. Who’s going to believe you?’

  I can only stand there and stare at him.

  ‘Think of the way you’ve been carrying on in the past few days—do you realise you’ve been running about like a raving lunatic? Capering about on the road at night, shrieking. Telling staff at the Foreign Ministry some crap about an impostor. And then you have the nerve to drag a poor sick old lady into your paranoid schemes.’ His voice was cold and flat at first, but now he’s almost shouting. ‘You’re out of control. Maybe I’m the one who should call the police! How do I know you’re not going to creep into the kitchen in the middle of the night and fetch yourself a big knife? Eh? Yes, maybe I ought to make a few phone calls—and have you committed!’

  I’m so angry that everything goes black, just for a moment. At last it’s out. At last, he’s admitted it. That’s what it’s all about then. That’s what it’s been about all along—having me committed. I reach for the phone, on the floor at my feet, but he is quicker, and I try to tear it from his hand. We wrestle over it, but he won’t let go—he clutches it tight. I give up—let go—stagger backwards.

  ‘Do you really think you can get rid of me?’ the stranger gasps. ‘Drive me away? Do you?’

  I turn and leave the room, but he comes after me. ‘You’re crazy!’ He flings the word at me, then pauses briefly—catches his breath. ‘Who’s going to believe you, Sarah?’ he asks. It’s more of a statement than a question. And again, maliciously: ‘Who’s going to believe you?’ His face is red with fury. ‘Let me tell you one thing,’ he says. ‘I don’t buy your masquerade. You’ll pay for what you’ve done.’

  He turns to go and I watch him, perplexed. Then suddenly he stops in his tracks and I see him turn back to me in slow motion. Something in his face has changed. His anger has vanished—he seems quite calm now. The frown line bisecting his forehead is gone, his mouth no longer contorted with hate, his face like the smooth surface of a lake. I feel scrutinised, have trouble holding his gaze.

  He stands like that for a long time.

  ‘What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done?’ he asks eventually.

  And suddenly time stands still.

  Something is there. Big and heavy and forbidding.

  I can only make out shadowy outlines in the dark, like the silhouette of a tower emerging from the darkness, as if out of nowhere. Yes, there’s something there.

  The door from my nightmares is opening.

  Headlamps in the darkness.

  Moths on the windscreen.

  The rumbling noise.

  Philip and I.

  Blood.

  At first it’s only fragments, disconnected images.

  The stranger continues to stare at me for a moment. Then, without a word, he turns and plods upstairs. I hear a door click shut. I don’t care. I don’t care about him. I suddenly know that I have to face up to my past if I’m to carry on in the present.

  I run my hand over my eyes, trying to turn my gaze inward, but my memories elude me, again and again. My attention is caught by a soft papery noise. I can’t immediately work out where it’s coming from, but then I see a big moth beating its black wings against the wall. I remember Philip once catching a moth in the hollow of his hands and releasing it into the darkness, and I remember us driving through the night once with all kinds of nocturnal creatures—moths and beetles and who-knows-what-else—making ugly cracking sounds as they smashed against the windscreen. I remember.

  Past and present touch, as gingerly as young lovers.

  And now the pieces come together to make a whole—haltingly at first, as if my memory wanted to spare me. But soon everything has fallen into place.

  Asphalt.

  Darkness.

  The two of us.

  Blood.

  It’s as if a spell has been broken. The dream images that have been dogging me in recent nights have overcome the barrier between sleep and reality, and now haunt my waking moments too. Impossible to sweep away, they cling to me, wrapping me about like a cocoon.

  I close my eyes.

  I hear the noise of the engine.

  Before me lies a dark road.

  The road gleams black as licorice.

  I know this place. I’m not alone here—Philip is with me.

  All around us is darkness. Woods.

  I’m afraid of the woods, always have been—afraid of their silence, which reminds me of that moment of silence before something terrible happens. They are so old and, ultimately, so alien. Inscrutable. I can imagine nothing creepier than wandering through the woods at night. Who knows what’s hidden there—what might suddenly murmur in your ear.

  I put my foot to the floor and the car ploughs through the darkness. The beam of the headlamps grazes the edge of the woods: dense undergrowth, tree trunks and sometimes a pair of shining eyes—or at least that’s how it looks to me. Whenever a bend appears in the milky glow of the headlights, I’m forced to brake abruptly to avoid coming off the road.

  Philip objects to the way I’m driving, but I ignore him. If he hadn’t insisted on getting his own way, we’d be at home with our son now, not driving through these woods, their hostility almost palpable.

  We’re on our way home from the house on the lake that once belonged to Philip’s parents and is now his. A romantic evening—just the two of us. It’s the first time since Leo was born that we’ve left him with a babysitter overnight. Philip’s idea, not mine.

  The evening wasn’t a success. We circled each other like stars whose paths will never cross. Once Philip made an awkward attempt to kiss me and I turned away. He said it was more than a hundred days since we’d last kissed—a hundred and five, to be precise. I suppressed the urge to make fun of his obsession with counting days and said instead that kissing was meaningless, only biochemical processes being played out, a way of sounding out your partner for genetic compatibility—that was all there was to it. Philip looked at me dumbly and then opened the second bottle of wine.

  We’d both put away a fair amount by the time the call came from the babysitter: Leo had a high temperature and wouldn’t stop screaming. What should she do?

  We got in the car immediately.

  And of course, we
argue, the way we have done ever since my first miscarriage, when Philip accused me of not taking it easy enough—it was my fault the baby had died. Constanze must have put that idea in his head, but I’ll never forget the moment he hurled those words at me. How do you forgive a thing like that?

  I say we should never have left Leo. I certainly hadn’t wanted to. This stupid ‘date night’, as Philip called it. Ridiculous. As if I’d ever enjoyed myself in that stuffy bourgeois house on the lake, where the ghosts of Philip’s embittered parents hovered over our bed at night and watched us argue during the day with their gloating grins. The thousand-eyed woods all around us.

  Philip says I always liked being there in the past. I tell him it’s not true—I may have pretended I did, but I always loathed that house on the lake, just as I loathe our villa in Hamburg—its cold elegance, Constanze’s creation and her legacy, that chill that’s worked its way into my marrow.

  Philip says he doesn’t recognise me—I’m no longer the woman he married.

  For a moment I see myself from the outside, yelling and cursing, striking the steering wheel with the flat of my hand, very angry, very unhappy, but inside I’m thinking that I don’t recognise myself either. Not me, not you, and certainly not us.

  We drive in silence for a while. I turn the radio on. Philip turns it off again even before I’ve worked out what song is playing. I say nothing. My thoughts stray to Leo again and automatically I rein in the speed. Of course I want to get back to him as fast as possible, but I should drive carefully for that very reason. It is quiet in the car. It smells of the damp earth on the soles of our shoes. I take deep breaths until I’m calmer. It’s quiet now, the only sound the rush of asphalt under the tyres.

  Babies often run a temperature, says Philip after a while. Leo is sure to be fine again in the morning. I snort—as if I didn’t know all that myself.

  I tell Philip that, after the shock I’ve had, I definitely won’t be coming with him to his mother’s birthday party the next day—that we’ll have to see how Leo is first, anyway. Philip answers that he hadn’t been expecting it—I always found some way of wriggling out of my family duties.

  I’ve forgotten what I replied. I only remember that Philip spoke those fateful words which sent everything spinning out of control.