The Kirilov Star (27 page)

They both stood up, facing each other. She looked up into his face, wondering if he might persuade her to stay, but he said nothing. ‘Too late to go to Norwich now,’ she said in an effort to bring herself back to the real world. ‘I’ll have to go another day.’

‘You know the way back?’

She didn’t think he was asking if she knew the way home, but if she could find her way to the cottage again. ‘Yes.’

He accompanied her out to her car which stood in the yard. The gate was open ready for her to drive straight out. ‘Safe journey,’ he said, as she settled in her seat and switched on the engine. It sprang into life, almost drowning his softly spoken words. ‘I love you.’

She could hardly see to drive for the tears that filled her eyes. Impatiently she rubbed them away and resolutely set course for home. In the rear-view mirror she saw him watching her go, a lonely, rather gaunt figure with one hand raised in farewell. Alex.

In the event, she and Robert did not go walking in the Dales the weekend of Bobby’s party. Robert rang on the Thursday evening to tell her something had come up at work and he had to remain in London over the weekend. She commiserated with his disappointment. ‘Another time,’ she said.

‘What will you do? Will you stay and endure the party?’

‘No, I don’t think so. I’ll stay with an old wartime friend in East Dereham. She’s always asking me when I’m going over to see her.’ It was the first time she had lied to him and
she hated herself for it. And as often happens, one lie led to another.

‘I never heard you mention a friend in East Dereham.’

‘She’s only just moved there and got in touch again. She lived abroad until recently which is why we never visited.’

‘Have a nice time, then.’

‘I will. Don’t work too hard.’

‘I won’t. I’ll be home next Friday as usual.’

‘There, that wasn’t that difficult, was it?’ Pamela asked when Robert rang off. For months she had been trying to persuade him to take her to France on the
Merry Maid
. ‘We hardly ever go sailing these days,’ she grumbled.

‘I have to go home sometimes. I can’t stay away every weekend. Lydia needs me.’

‘No, she doesn’t. She doesn’t want you.’

‘I didn’t say that – not exactly.’

‘That’s the way I read it.’

Pamela Osborne was several years younger than Lydia. During the day, she wore her long blonde hair up in a French pleat. She had blue eyes and full red lips, an enviable figure and long slim legs, made to seem longer by the excessively high heels she always wore, except when she was on the boat. Then she wore canvas deck shoes, baggy trousers and overlarge jumpers, and she tied her hair back in a youthful ponytail. He found her exciting, the more so because of the secrecy involved. Having two women loving him flattered his ego, though he was not sure, had never been sure, of Lydia’s love. The guilt came because he could not find fault with her as wife and mother, and it was her money that allowed him to lead the comfortable life he had and to buy the yacht
and indulge his passion for sailing and for Pamela.

He had met her at a party given by one of his friends at the Admiralty. It was a spur-of-the-moment invitation, too late for Lydia to make arrangements to come up to London and go with him, and he had gone alone, not expecting to enjoy it. Pamela was alone too, and they began a polite conversation, each balancing a glass of gin and tonic in one hand and a plate of canapés in the other. They had discovered a mutual enthusiasm for sailing and they discussed the merits of different craft and one thing led to another, and before the evening was out, he had invited her to come sailing with him and she had accepted. It was easily arranged; Lydia would not have wanted to come even if he had asked her.

They had sailed from Ipswich, where the yacht was moored, round the coast to Mersea Island, where they had stopped for a pub meal before returning. He told himself it was all very innocent, but underneath he was aware of currents of sexual attraction and on the second occasion he had made some excuse about storms brewing and they had stayed at the pub all night. A year later, she was as good as living at Balfour Place. He felt guilty about it but he assuaged it by telling himself, and Pamela, that he was not Lydia’s first love and that she still hankered for the old one. It had been nearly six years since his meeting with Alex, and as Lydia had long since ceased to talk about Yuri, there had been no occasion when he could have said anything. Or so he told himself. And the longer he delayed the more impossible it became.

Sometimes he wondered if Lydia had guessed about Pamela. Just lately she had been acting a little strangely – subdued, almost in a dream some of the time, at other
times overanimated, as if she had a lot of excess energy she needed to expend. And their lovemaking, never very passionate or frequent, had become almost non-existent. It could, of course, be her time of life. He began to wonder what would happen if his affair came out into the open. It was a question he did not like to ask himself and he pushed it out of his mind in the hope it would never happen. He did not want to give Pamela up; she fulfilled a need in him that he had not even been aware existed before he met her. Neither did he want his marriage to break up; that was like a comfortable pair of slippers, worn but still too good to throw away. And at the moment he was enjoying the best of both worlds.

Lydia found Alex feeding the pigs, who snorted and squealed and nudged each other out of the way to get at the trough. He was wearing an old pullover, with holes in the elbows and grubby jeans tucked into wellington boots. She stood a little way off, not wanting to go any closer for fear of dirtying her shoes, but drinking in the sight of him, feeding her hunger for him just by watching him doing the mundane tasks he did every day.

He emptied the bucket and turned, seeing her for the first time. ‘Lydia, I didn’t hear you arrive.’

‘You did say “just turn up”. You meant it, didn’t you?’

‘Of course I did.’ He put the bucket down and came towards her. ‘I’m filthy.’

‘I don’t care.’ She reached up and pulled his head down to kiss him.

He stood with his arms held out sideways so he didn’t dirty her jacket. ‘Go indoors,’ he said when she stopped to draw breath. ‘I’ll finish up out here and then I’ll be with you.’

She went back to the car, fetched her overnight bag and went in by the kitchen door. The dog left his basket by the hearth and came towards her, wagging his tail. She stooped to fondle it. ‘You might look ferocious, but you’re not much good as a guard dog, are you?’ she said.

The remains of Alex’s breakfast stood on the table: a box of cornflakes, a pot of cold coffee, a mug, a plate and a bowl, milk in a bottle, a packet of sugar, a toast rack with one cold piece of toast in it. She took off her jacket, cleared it away and washed up. He came in just as she finished. ‘You didn’t have to do that.’

‘I wanted to.’

‘I’ll go and clean up and then I’ll be with you. Put the percolator on again, we’ll have fresh coffee.’ It was then he noticed her bag on a chair. ‘You’ve come to stay?’

‘Just for tonight. If you’ll have me.’

‘Have you? My God, do you need to ask?’ He left the room and she heard him galloping up the stairs and moving about above her. She picked up her bag and followed him. He was crossing the landing to the bathroom, wearing only his underpants. She dropped her bag and stopped him. ‘Since you seem stripped for action …’ she murmured, pressing herself close to him and nuzzling her lips along his collar bone to his throat.

‘Lidushka, have you no shame?’ he asked, laughing.

‘None at all where you are concerned.’

He walked backwards into his bedroom, taking her with him, and fell back on the bed with her on top of him.

‘Now,’ he said some time later, as they lay naked side by side. ‘Tell me what brought you here today. I didn’t expect to see you again so soon. Has something happened?’

‘You happened. Oh, Alex, I don’t know how I’ve endured the last three weeks, thinking about you all the time, unable to sleep and then dreaming in the daytime, trying to act normally and not being able to …’

‘Has Robert guessed?’

‘I don’t think so, but I can’t be sure. We were supposed to be going away for the weekend to keep out of the way of Bobby’s party, but Robert said he had to work. He’s never done that on a weekend before. He has a nine-to-five desk job which I know he hates, so it surprised me. I said I was going to stay with an old friend from wartime who has recently moved to East Dereham from abroad.’

‘Why East Dereham? It’s only half a dozen miles from here.’

‘I know, but I’m not a very good liar, so I thought it best to stick to the truth as far as I could. You are a wartime friend and you have moved here from abroad, and if anyone who knows me saw and recognised my car, it wouldn’t cause comment.’

He laughed. ‘You devious little minx!’

‘You don’t mind, do you?’

‘Mind? How could I mind when you are all I want, all I’ve ever wanted. I wish I had you all the time.’

‘Don’t let’s think of that,’ she said, stirring in his arms to take his hand and kiss the palm. ‘Let’s just enjoy the weekend. I’ll help you feed the animals and we can go for long walks and eat and sleep and wake up in the morning side by side.’

‘The last time we did that was in Moscow,’ he said. ‘So much water under the bridge since then, so much to regret, so many memories …’

She put her fingers over his lips. ‘No, no more of that. I
don’t want to be sad. Let’s get up and have that coffee and decide what we’re going to do.’

They bathed and dressed and drank coffee, sitting over it talking, remembering times in the past they had been together, relating events that had happened when they were apart. He told her about how he had set up the smallholding with his back pay. Then he showed her round. She inspected the pigsties, the chicken runs, the vegetables growing in long straight rows, all neatly hoed free of weeds. ‘You are tidier outdoors than in,’ she said as they returned to the kitchen.

‘I suppose I am, but this brings in money and the house doesn’t. And there’s only me.’

‘It’s very different from being a diplomat.’

‘That’s why I did it. I needed peace and quiet to recoup.’

‘You are still too thin.’

He laughed. ‘You should have seen me when I first came out of the gulag – skin and bone I was. Now, at least I’m strong and healthy.’

‘And as handsome as ever,’ she said, smiling.

He ignored that. ‘What would you like to do now?’

‘Let’s go for a walk.’

He stood up. ‘A walk it is. Old Patch could do with a run and I know a good pub where we can eat.’

The heath was covered with heather and bracken and scrubby little trees. A kestrel hovered overhead and then swooped on its prey, a rabbit bobbed up out of a hole and seeing them disappeared down it again. A handful of people walked in the opposite direction and they said good morning and went on, coming out onto another country lane which led to a village and a pub. It was crowded with
people out enjoying a Saturday evening meal. They found seats in the corner and ordered fish and chips and peas. The food, if a little uninspiring, was substantial and well cooked. Returning to the cottage, tired and content, they made cocoa and went to bed, though it was still only just dusk.

But the next day had to be faced, and after a morning in which he did the chores outdoors and she tidied the house and made soup for lunch, they sat silently contemplating their imminent parting. ‘I wish I didn’t have to go,’ she said, when it could not be put off any longer.

‘I wish it too. Having you here has made it into a home. It was never that before, simply somewhere to eat and sleep.’

‘Alex, you know I can’t leave Robert, don’t you?’ The words were torn out of her.

‘Yes.’

‘If you can’t accept that, I mustn’t come again.’ As she said it, she knew how hard it would be to keep away, but she would have to try for Robert’s sake, for the children’s sake and for her own peace of mind. And for Alex too. Because she wasn’t being fair to him.

He understood her so well, could read her mind and knew exactly the torment she was going through. ‘You must do what you think is right,’ he said. ‘But never doubt, I will always be here, to come to the rescue if you need me …’

‘Like a knight in shining armour,’ she added with a cracked laugh.

‘The armour is a little tarnished now,’ he said. ‘But it is still available.’ There was silence for a moment, then he said, ‘Lydia, you know I said I had been looking for Yuri in Minsk?’

‘Yes.’

‘I didn’t find him there.’

‘I realised that. You would have told me if you had.’

‘Oh, Lydia, I am so sorry. I should have, I really should. You have every right to know.’

‘Know what? Tell me, tell me at once. He’s not … not dead, is he?’

‘No, far from it. After I came back from the gulag, I went to Kirilhor. I was simply looking for somewhere to lie low until I could get home and I thought of Ivan Ivanovich. I had no idea Yuri would be there.’

‘He’s back at Kirilhor?’ That was the last place she expected him to be.

‘He was six years ago. He would have finished his education and found a job by now, though I doubt he’d move far from Olga Denisovna.’

‘Olga!’

‘Yes.’ He took a deep breath. ‘She didn’t die. She was still in hospital in Minsk when the Germans invaded Russia. She was evacuated to Moscow with all the other patients and recovered, though badly knocked about. She spent the rest of the war years keeping her head down, working as a cleaner at the hospital. After the war she went looking for Yuri. She was luckier than you. She found him in an orphanage and claimed him as her son. He has grown up believing himself to be Yuri Nahmov.’

Her heart sank. ‘So he doesn’t know about me?’

‘No. He thinks Olga Nahmova is his mother.’

‘How could she do that – how
could
she?’

‘She sustained head injuries in the explosion and it may be she actually thinks he is her son.’

‘But you told him differently.’