Her Fearful Symmetry (41 page)

“Bye.”

“Bye.”

Valentina dialled her dad’s work number and got his voicemail.
I’ll call later,
she thought, and didn’t leave a message.

I
T WAS almost dawn. Jessica stood at the window in the cemetery’s Archives Room, looking out over the courtyard at the Colonnade. The room was dark. She had lain awake most of the night worrying over the letter she had written to one of the cemetery’s vice presidents. Finally she had left a note for James and walked down here to put it right, but even though her head was crowded with the phrases that would convince the vice president of the logic of her request, she had not been able to sort out the tangle of her argument. Jessica leaned against the window sill, her hands clasped together in front of her and her elbows jutting at right angles. The trees and graves above the Colonnade were dark and hazy in the indeterminate light. The courtyard reminded her of an empty stage.
So much work,
she thought.
No one realises how we worked. Every sett in that courtyard laid by hand-

Suddenly the courtyard was filled with light.
Foxes,
she thought and swept her eyes left and right, to see them.
They’ve set off the motion detectors.
But then a man walked across the courtyard. He didn’t seem fussed by the lights, didn’t hurry or change his course. Jessica craned her head forward, trying to see him better. It was Robert.

Damn the boy. I’ve told him not to use that door!
Jessica rapped on the window as hard as she could, not minding the pain of arthritic joints on cold glass-she was angry enough not to notice; later she would wonder why her hand was swollen and throbbing. Robert continued walking, unheeding. Jessica grabbed her keys and torch and got herself down the stairs and through the office, into the courtyard. She stood not quite under the chapel archway and shouted his name.

Robert stopped.
I’m for it now.
Jessica walked quickly towards him. He thought,
She’ll fall, walking so fast.
She had forgotten to switch on her torch and carried it as though she had brought it along as a weapon rather than a source of light. He roused himself and walked to her to shorten the distance between them. They met by the Colonnade steps, as if choreographed. Jessica paused to catch her breath. Robert waited.

“What on
earth
do you think you are
doing
?” she finally said. “You
know
better. We’ve
discussed
this, and yet
here you are-
flagrantly strutting about at the crack of dawn
in the cemetery-
where you have absolutely no right to be! I trusted you, Robert, and you have let me down.” She stood hatless and fuming, glaring up at him, her hair spiky; she was wearing her gardening clothes. Robert was startled to see the glint of a tear on her cheek. It undid him.

“We have rules! The rules are there for legal and safety reasons!” Jessica was yelling now. “Just because you have a key does
not
entitle you to come in at night! You might be attacked by intruders, or fall into a
hole.
You might trip on a root and concuss yourself-you don’t even have a radio!
Anything
could happen: a monument might fall on you,
anything
-think what the insurers would do to our rates-the publicity if you got yourself injured, or killed! You’re just bloody selfish, Robert!”

They stared at each other. Robert said gently, “Can we go into the office to talk? You’re going to wake the dead.”

Jessica lost whatever control she had had over her temper.
Why can’t he take it seriously? I’ll make him see it’s no joke!
“No! We are not going into the office to talk! I am going to have your key, please”-she held out her hand, in which she already held her own keys-“and you are going out the front gate.” Robert didn’t move. “Now!”

He dropped the key into her palm, turned towards the gate. She followed him as though escorting a prisoner. They reached the gate; she unlocked it; he pulled the massive thing open and slipped out, pulled it shut again. They faced each other through the bars. “What now?” he asked.

“Go,” she said quietly.

He bowed his head, walked away and up Swains Lane. Jessica stood watching him.
What now?
Her heart beat fast.
No one saw him but me-they needn’t find out.
She watched Robert until he vanished up the road. She had an urge to follow him, to say-what?
I’m sorry? No, certainly not. He put us at risk, thoughtless, careless…
She stood at the gate overcome with emotion, but unable to parse it-angry, hurt, anxious with affection, indignant. She could not sort herself out at all.
I’ve got to talk to him immediately,
she thought, and then:
But I’ve sent him away.
She turned the key in the lock and slowly walked back to her office. It was just after five o’clock. James might be awake. She picked up the telephone receiver, then put it down again.

Jessica sat in her chair, watching the room lighten.
I was right,
she thought.
I was quite right.
When it was day she got up and made tea. Preoccupied, tired, she spilled the milk and thought,
That’s an omen. Or a metaphor.
She shook her head.
What shall we do now?

M
ARTIN WAS stumped. He had been working all afternoon on a cryptic crossword in celebration of Carl Linnaeus’ three hundredth birthday, but the clues wouldn’t come to him and the thing felt inelegant and lumpen. Martin stood up and stretched.

Someone knocked. He said, “Yes?” and turned towards the door. “Oh, Julia. Come in.”

“No,” she said, stepping into the room, “I’m Valentina. Julia’s sister.”

“Oh!” Martin was delighted. “At last! Such a pleasure to meet you. Thank you for coming-would you like some tea?”

“No, I-I can’t stay. I just came to tell you-you know the vitamins Julia’s been giving you?”

“Yes?”

She took a breath. “They-aren’t really vitamins. They’re a drug called Anafranil.”

Martin said gently, “I know, my dear. But thank you for coming to tell me.”

Valentina said, “You knew?”

“It’s printed on each capsule. And I’ve taken Anafranil before, so I know what it looks like.”

Valentina smiled. “Does Julia know you know?”

Martin smiled back at her. “I’m not entirely sure. I think perhaps we shouldn’t mention this conversation to her, just in case.”

“Oh, I wasn’t going to.”

“Then I won’t either.”

She turned to go and Martin said, “Are you sure you won’t stay?”

“No-I can’t.”

“Come back, then, any time you like.”

Valentina said, “Okay. Thank you.” He heard her steps receding as she walked through the maze of boxes, and then she was gone.

R
OBERT THOUGHT afterwards that it had been like watching ballet.

“Are you ready?” he asked.

Elspeth did not want Valentina to say yes. She wanted to pause in this moment before, before whatever was about to happen, before temptation, before disaster, before Elspeth had to do the thing she did not want to do.

Robert watched Valentina. She stood quite still. He wondered if he should open a window; the weather was still unseasonably cold for June, but who knew how long her body would lie there until Julia returned? The light was waning rapidly; crows were calling to each other in the cemetery. Julia was upstairs. Valentina closed her eyes. She stood at the foot of the bed, one hand curled around the bedrail. Her other hand clenched and unclenched around her inhaler. She opened her eyes. Robert stood only a few feet away. Elspeth sat in the window seat, elbows on knees, head in hands, her face tilted at an angle that denoted contemplative sadness. Valentina watched Elspeth and felt a spasm of doubt.

Robert hesitated, then stepped towards her. Valentina put her arms around his waist and pressed her cheek against his shirt.

She wondered if the button of the shirt was imprinting itself on her cheek, and whether it would stay that way once she was dead. He did not kiss her. She thought it might be because Elspeth was there.

“I’m ready,” she said. She stepped back, into the middle of the bedroom rug, and took a puff from her inhaler. Elspeth thought,
How insubstantial she already looks, just a shadow in this dim light.

Robert retreated to the doorway. He could not articulate his feelings at all: he waited for something to happen. He did not believe that it would happen; he did not want it to happen.
Don’t, Elspeth-

Valentina closed her eyes, then opened them and looked at Robert, who seemed far away; Valentina thought of her parents watching her and Julia move through the security line at O’Hare the day they’d left Chicago. Intense cold permeated her body. Elspeth moved through her, simply stepped into her; it reminded Valentina of looking at old stereoscope pictures, trying to bring the images together.
I will die of cold.
She felt herself seized, detached, taken. “Oh!” An interval of nothing. Then she was hovering close over her body, which lay collapsed on the floor.
Ah-
Elspeth knelt beside the body, looking up at her. “Come here, sweet,” Elspeth said.
She sounds kind of like Mom. That’s so weird.
She tried to go to Elspeth, but found that she could not move. Elspeth understood and came up towards her, gathered her in her hands. Now Valentina was only a small thing, cupped in Elspeth’s hands
like a mouse
. The last thing she thought was:
It’s like falling asleep…

Robert saw Valentina go slack. She fell: knees gave way, head lolled. She folded up and hit the floor with a thud and a crack. Then there was no sound in the room except his own breathing. He stood in the doorway and did not go to her because he did not know what was happening, unseen things must be happening, and he did not know what to do next. The girl, crumpled on the carpet, continued to be utterly still. Finally he walked the short distance across the room and knelt beside Valentina. She was not bleeding. He couldn’t tell if she was broken; she looked broken, but he could not touch her; she lay as she had fallen and he knew he must not touch her.

Elspeth looked down at him looking at Valentina. She could feel Valentina, heavy and smoke-like, caged in her hands.
Put her back, now. Put her back while there’s some chance of it being all right…
She wanted Robert to move Valentina, to straighten her limbs and compose her hands. Valentina’s head was arched back, she lay on her right side with her arms flailed out in front of her, legs tucked neatly together. Her eyes were rolled up, her mouth was open, her little teeth showed. The position of Valentina’s body seemed wrong, an insult. Elspeth wanted to touch her, but her hands were full.
What now? If I let go, will she just disperse? I wish I had a little box-
She thought of her drawer.
Yes, I’ll put her in there.
She would take Valentina with her into the drawer. They could stay there together, waiting.

Robert stood up. He left the room. He wanted to forget what he had seen, before he reached the front door. He stopped with his hand on the knob. “Elspeth?” he said. In answer there was a momentary cold touch against his cheek. “I won’t forgive you.” Silence. He imagined her behind him, resisted the urge to turn and look. He opened the door, went downstairs, stood in his kitchen drinking whisky as the light failed, waiting for Julia to come home and find the body, listening for her cry of distress.

Julia came downstairs an hour later. All the lights were off in the flat. She walked through the rooms flipping switches, calling “Mouse?”
She must have gone out.
“Mouse?”
Maybe she’s downstairs.
The flat was cold and seemed curiously empty, as though all the furniture had been replaced with optical illusions. As Julia wandered from room to room she trailed her fingers across the dining-room table, lightly touched the top of the sofa and the spines of the books, reassuring herself that everything was solid. “Elspeth?”
Where is everybody?

She came to their bedroom and snapped on the light. She saw Valentina lying contorted on the floor, as though frozen in a painful dance. Julia moved slowly; she went to Valentina and sat beside her. She touched Valentina’s lips, her cheeks. She saw the inhaler clasped in Valentina’s hand and pressed her own hand to her own chest, unthinkingly.

Mouse?
Valentina seemed to be trying to see above her; her eyes were rolled up and her head thrown back as though some event of extreme interest was happening right over her head. “Mouse?” Valentina did not respond.

Julia whimpered. She felt cold on her face and hit out at it wildly. “Fuck you, Elspeth! Fuck off! Where is she? Where is she?” Then she began to wail.

Elspeth sat on the floor with Julia. She watched as Julia clutched Valentina in her arms and keened over her body.
I never wanted to do it, Julia.
She thought about her own twin, about the phone call someone would have to make to her, soon. Elspeth knew, watching Julia, that nothing would ever be right again.
It’s my fault, all of it. I’m sorry. I am so, so sorry.

Elspeth and Valentina stayed in the drawer together while Valentina’s body was confirmed dead by paramedics, then certified dead of natural causes by the doctor she had seen at the hospital, and removed from the flat by Sebastian, while Julia cried and Robert phoned Edie and Jack. There were hours of stillness, light, dark.

Robert had a long talk with Sebastian that resulted in mutual tension. “I can understand that you don’t want her embalmed,” Sebastian said. “I can understand why you don’t want me to set her features; that’s fine. But why on earth do you want me to shoot her up with heparin?”

“It’s an anticoagulant.”