Chosen (32 page)

‘Well done, Stell,' I said.

‘You're not having him,' she said. ‘I've changed my mind.'

Our eyes met for a moment and then she blinked. ‘Just go away,' she said.

‘All right,' I said.

Adam started and looked at me. ‘Martha? We can't leave without our son.'

‘We can,' I said, just as Stella was saying, ‘
My
son.'

He looked at me. I'd not seen him look so helpless since I met him at the prison gates. His mouth hung open and his hands dangled empty at his sides. ‘Can we see the baby?' I asked Stella. ‘Before we leave?' Aunt Regina and Kathy had come upstairs by then.

‘All right, dear?' Aunt Regina said to Stella. ‘Do you want them to go?'

That word
them
stung like a wasp.

‘Come on,' Kathy said, ‘off, out. Sling your hook.'

I blessed her for saying that because it woke Stella's contrary streak. ‘They can see him if they want,' she said.

‘Sure, dear?'

Stella nodded and Aunt Regina reached across her for the Moses basket. Kathy was lurking around the doorway, flexing her fists and scowling like a bouncer.

‘Adam
is
his father,' Stella said, a flick of enjoyment in her voice.

The baby was asleep. He was lying on his side and wearing a cotton hat. All we could see was a wisp of sooty hair, a closed eyelid, a tiny nose and lips like a crumpled moth.

‘Seth,' Adam said, and reached out gently and touched his cheek.

‘Can I hold him?' I asked.

‘Shame to wake him,' Aunt Regina said.

‘I might
not
call him Seth,' Stella said.

‘But we
agreed
,' Adam said.

Stella gave a little shrug. ‘I might have changed my mind.'

‘What do you want to call him then?' I asked.

‘Bogart,' she said, narrowing her eyes. ‘Or Bogbaby.'

‘How nice,' I said.

A corner of her lip lifted in the ghost of a smile. ‘Well, anyway, you can go now,' she said. ‘I need some sleep.'

I took Adam's hand. He was staring down at Seth. ‘Come on,' I said, and tugged him away.

‘Oh, and you can keep your twenty thousand pounds,' Stella said, and I felt Aunt Regina's disgust ripple after us down the stairs and out.

†

We went back to the hotel and prayed. It was a gloomy room with olive walls and dark green drapes. A print of a carp added to the underwater atmosphere. I couldn't actually pray but I knelt with Adam. I could see our reflection in the mirror on the wardrobe door. It looked like a painting: two people in the green gloom, praying. My eyes met my own eyes and it was like electricity. I got a raw, shocking glimpse through a gap that had opened in my own life of how lost I was. What was I doing? No wonder Aunt Regina had looked at me the way she did.

I watched the mirror-Adam: head bowed, forehead furrowed, lips moving. The damaged hand clasped in the other. In his beard there was a blob of jam left over from breakfast when we had been nervous and jubilant that this would be the day he would get his son.

We kept phoning until they stopped answering. We tried to visit, but each time Kathy came to the door and wouldn't let us in. On the third morning after our disappointment, I woke to find Adam on his knees under the print of the carp. He sensed that I'd woken, opened his eyes and smiled.

‘It's all right,' he said. He got up and sat on the bed, and took my hand. ‘I had a dream.'

I shut my eyes against the jeering chorus that set off inside me. I pressed my lips together.

He waited until I looked at him. ‘The child must stay with Stella till he's sixteen.'

‘
Jesus
told you this?'

He gave me an irritated look and withdrew his hand. I'd not meant my voice to come with a serrated edge.

‘I saw the boy waving to his mother and coming, with his arms open, to me.'

‘How did you know he was sixteen?'

‘I knew. And in the dream I felt blessed.'

‘OK,' I said. His eyes were on me, willing me to look at him and to smile, but I couldn't. The dream was convenient, just as Stella said. It was expedient. Eventually I met his eyes and smiled. ‘OK,' I sighed. I looked at the pile of baby things I'd bought from Mothercare. ‘We might as well take that stuff back.'

‘No, we'll give it to Stella,' he said. ‘We'll go in peace, bearing our gifts and let her know we relinquish our claim.'

‘For now.'

‘No need to mention that,' he said.

I phoned to leave this message, and was surprised that Stella answered.

‘Oh good,' I said. ‘I thought you weren't picking up.'

‘Reflex.'

‘Who is it?' I heard Kathy booming.

‘You're not having him,' Stella said.

‘We're going back to the States,' I said. ‘He's your baby and you should keep him.'

‘Thanks very much.'

‘We've got some presents for you, shall we bring them round?'

‘Give it to me.' It was Aunt Regina. ‘Melanie,' she said, in a voice of strained patience, ‘what do you want now?'

‘We've decided to go home,' I said. ‘It was wrong of us, it was all wrong, I see that now. You were right. I'm ashamed.'

Adam was glaring at me, and I turned so that I couldn't see him. I stared at the carp instead. The light was reflecting off the darkly varnished surface.

‘We're flying back tonight, but we've got all this baby stuff we bought. Can we drop it round?'

‘You can leave it in the garden. It's not raining.'

‘Could I see Stella?' I said.

‘What are you up to?'

‘Nothing, honestly, just, I'd like to say goodbye.'

The receiver was muffled for a moment and I could hear them arguing. Aunt Regina came back on the line. ‘You can come in for five minutes before Dodie gets back from school. Just you. We won't have that man in the house.'

Adam didn't like it, of course, but consented to wait in the car while I unloaded the baby things. When I rapped the fox doorknocker, Aunt Regina opened the door immediately.

‘Stella's in the sitting room,' she said.

‘Auntie?' I put my hand on her arm. If only she'd smiled at me.

‘The clock is ticking,' Kathy said, looming up behind her and tapping her watch.

I went through. There was no sign of the baby in there, except for a changing mat on the floor. Stella was curled up in an armchair. Her towelling dressing gown was freshly washed and smelled of Persil. Her hair was clean for once and buttery fair in the sunshine that slanted through the window and caught the ends of her long pale lashes, making clear water of her eyes.

‘I suppose you want to see him?' she said.

‘That's not why I'm here.'

‘Kathy said you were up to some trick. She was all for calling the police.'

‘No tricks. Stella, did you plan this all along?' I said. ‘To keep him?'

She shrugged.

‘Well, I'm glad you're keeping him,' I said, and I found I really meant it. ‘You're his mother.' She studied my face to
gauge my seriousness. ‘You know what Adam's like, I sort of get drawn in.'

‘Yeah, blame Adam.'

‘No, I don't mean that.'

‘You know what you are,' Stella said, ‘you're Adam's puppet.'

‘I am not!' I realized I could hear someone creaking outside the door, ear to the wood no doubt.

‘Anyway, what do you want?' Stella said.

‘Just to say goodbye,' I told her. ‘We're going back.'

‘Bye then,' Stella said. She put her thumb to her mouth and bit savagely at her cuticle.

‘If you ever need any help, or you want me to come and stay or anything . . .' I said.

She wound a strand of hair tighter and tighter round one of her fingers until the end bulged dark with blood.

‘Sorry, Stell,' I said in a small voice.

She shrugged. I got up and stood. I wanted to kiss her or hug her or something but there was a sort of force field around her that I dared not enter.

‘Remember what you promised me?' she said, and darted me a look.

I nodded and my heart beat thickly with the memory of it. I thought she'd forgotten. ‘But you've got a new baby –'

‘Not yet,' she said quietly. ‘Now, just go.'

I stood looking down at the top of her head. The door opened and Aunt Regina beckoned me out. I looked back at Stella, who hadn't moved, hoping for a smile, but she was frowning at her knees.

‘Bye,' I said, and followed Aunt Regina out into the hall.

‘You can have a look at Seth if you like,' she said. She was regarding me in a kind but wary way. Seth was in his basket in the dining room, awake, lying on his back. He had a funny round little head and his black hair spiralled upwards like a puff of smoke. His eyes were that indeterminate hazy blue that could turn any shade.

‘Do you think she'll be OK this time?' I said. ‘I mean, what if she gets ill like with Dodie?'

‘We're here,' Aunt Regina said. ‘You don't need to worry. Now you'd better go.'

‘Aunt Regina?' I began.

‘We all make choices,' she said firmly. ‘And you have made yours.'

‘Auntie –' I tried again, but Kathy stepped between us, looking significantly at her watch.

I felt like a stupid fish, my mouth opening and shutting. I thought of the glossy carp. I couldn't formulate what I wanted to say and I could feel clouds gathering inside me. ‘I'll go then,' was all I said, and I let myself be propelled towards the door. I looked back at Aunt Regina, but she had turned her face away.

†

We arrived back at Soul-Life with no child and I was clearly no longer pregnant. Adam had an explanation. We wanted the child brought up in England, in secret safety in case of trouble. Even back then, there were grumbling problems within Soul-Life – families trying to get their children back, internal disagreements about protocol, financial complications – and our prolonged absence had exacerbated these. Soul-Life's golden age was over, but while Adam remained strong, we kept it under control. His vision kept it under control.

I went along with the story. I didn't want despair to bring back Adam's disease. It's an interesting word: dis– ease. I wanted him to be easy again in his dreams and visions and beliefs. For that he needed absolute faith in me. I saw that. I knew that. I was his rock. It had never been so clear before.

The first time we'd met, when I sat on him – though he has it that he saw me walk across the room – I thought I needed someone and I thought that it was him. But every day after we got back from our futile trip, a few more flakes of illusion fell away and left my vision clearer. The strength had been within me all along. If we hadn't met I would've
been all right. Maybe even Stella would've been all right. How could I allow that thought and not go mad?

‘We all make choices,' Aunt Regina had said. And she was right. And I couldn't unmake my choice. This was the path I'd chosen, and now Adam needed all my strength. Through a lawyer, Stella negotiated extortionate child support until Seth was sixteen, when Adam could take over his upbringing. Who knew if she'd stick to it when the time came? There was nothing we could do except wait. For once, even Adam had doubts. My role was to reassure him. But the stronger I seemed on the outside, the more I broke apart inside. I had to admit to myself that I didn't believe in Adam's visions. I believed he
had
the visions but I stopped trying to believe they were any more than delusions. But what delusions that could persuade so many!

I considered leaving. If I could have left in the few months after our return, then maybe I would have done so, though leaving Adam would have torn my heart out. One day, in a fit of despair, I went into the office while Obadiah was out and phoned Aunt Regina.

‘I want to come home,' I said. ‘I'm so sorry.'

‘Best stay away, dear,' she said. (She
did
say ‘dear', and I treasured that tiny crumb of comfort.) ‘Stella's on a reasonably even keel and we don't want that upset.' We talked on for a little while. She told me about Kathy's arthritic knee, a glut of pears, the birth of another kid. I had nothing to contribute. Nothing about Adam or Soul-Life would have interested her.

‘Best not ring again,' Aunt Regina said, when our conversation had run aground. ‘Best let things be.' Her voice sounded kind, but then it vanished into the click and hum of all the miles between us. I thought of running, then. I thought of returning to India. I could live as I had before, in cheap and grubby anonymity. My mind began to fold and shrink against itself; memories disappearing into creases. Shuttering of light and stuttering of meaning. I think that I was ill, maybe like Stella was ill. It had never happened before but now my mind reached the edge of a
slippery slope and I slid into the darkness. I was put into a room alone.

Every day Adam came and held my hand and talked and talked and pulled me back as surely as a fisherman. He reeled me in again. We prayed and meditated. He thought it was the disappointment of not having the child with me. Perhaps there was some of that. Adam was right that I suffered from the lack or loss of a baby in my arms, but it was more than that. It was a loss of faith, not just in God and Adam and his visions, but in myself and the way I'd chosen to live my life – and that is worse.

And then Adam's disease returned. He became so ill we all thought that he would die. From somewhere I found the strength to nurse and meditate and pray with him. Hannah and Obadiah took more responsibility for how things were, how the money was, the bad press Soul-Life had begun to generate. As if there was something dangerous going on within our walls, when all it was was love. Even if it
was
deluded, it did no harm.

While Adam suffered his relapse I became the fisherwoman and my hand in his hand the line that reeled him in. You see the human love we gave each other? Beyond all else, despite all else, there was a solid mortal love between us. From that time my soul was split. I lived the life, the soul life, and no one lived it more thoroughly than me, but I lived it with a voice up on my shoulder, a parrot with Stella's face perching there and making a mockery of everything I said and did. You can't imagine the pain of that. To live without integrity is the greatest burden a soul can ever bear. But I bore it. What else could I do? Out of love for Adam I bore it for another fifteen years.