Wake: A Novel (15 page)

“I thought we might go down together.” He leans forward. “Make up for Sunday. Leaving you at Paddington. Dereliction of duty and all that.”

“I don’t know, Ed.”

It makes her feel queasy somehow. A public burial, all the pomp and state.

“Don’t you think it’s all a bit…”

“What?”

“Hypocritical? As though it could make a difference. Make people forget.”

“I’m not sure it’s to make people forget, Eves. Surely it’s remembrance, if it’s anything at all.”

She shrugs. “Perhaps.”

“Well, think about it. We could make a day of it. Go on somewhere afterward. I’d love to go with you, if you’d like.”

She is pleased, despite herself. “All right,” she says. “Thanks. That might be nice.”

The steaks arrive. Thin, peppered, cooked in cream, and steaming, with buttered potatoes on the side. She loads her fork, looks up, and notices her brother isn’t eating. “Aren’t you hungry?”

He shrugs. “I might eat in a bit.” He opens his cigarette case. “Do you mind?”

“Not at all.”

He smokes, and she eats, in companionable silence.

“So,” he says, when she has nearly finished. “Come on, then. What’s this really all about?”

She has a last mouthful of steak and cream, then puts her fork down on her plate. “I had a man,” she says, “come to the office yesterday.”

“Yes?”

“I think he was looking for you.”

“For me?”

“I think so, yes.” She takes a piece of bread from the basket and crumbles it onto her plate. “His name was Rowan Hind.”

Her brother’s hand has stopped, quite still, the smoke from his cigarette traveling straight up into the air. She can hear the chink of glasses from the waiter behind her, the scrape of the forks of the diners to her left.

“Rowan Hind?”

“Yes.” She puts the bread and cream in her mouth, chews, swallows.

He takes a sip of wine. There’s a small groove in the middle of his brow. “What did he look like?”

“It’s quite an unusual name.”

“Yes, it is.” He nods. “And I’m sure I’ll remember. Remind me. Any distinguishing features?”

She leans back in her seat. “Not really.” She takes a cigarette for herself. When she thinks about it, the most distinguishing thing about him was his utter ordinariness. “He was small. Hungry-looking. He’d been a private. Invalided out in ’17.”

“And what was the injury?”

“Lost the use of his arm.” She lights up. “Though it was still there, in a sling. And nerves, I think, as well.”

“Right.” He nods. “Well. And why had he come to you?”

“To find you.”

He looks astonished. “But that’s ridiculous. How in hell did he know—?”

“He didn’t. He had no idea I was your sister. It was chance that brought him to me.”

“And did you tell him who you were?” He leans closer.

“Of course not. It would have been unethical.”

She looks at her brother’s face, at the vein beating at his temple, the skin stretched tight across his skull. “But I gave him the address of the records office. If they take pity on him then they might tell him where you live.”

“Unlikely.”

“Why?”

He sits back in his chair, takes a big swig of wine, and looks down at his steak; a thin skin has formed where the butter in the sauce has congealed. “Excuse me a minute.” His napkin drops from his lap to the floor as he stands. She leans down to pick it up, and puts it beside his place.

“Have you finished?” The waiter is at her elbow.

“Yes, thank you.”

“Would you like some dessert?”

“Thank you, no. I think we’ll just have the bill.”

She drums her fingers on the tablecloth and drinks down her glass of wine. There’s still most of the bottle left. She pours herself another large glass. Behind her, she hears the sound of a lavatory flushing and a door shutting, and then Ed reappears, standing to her left, just behind her chair. “I should be getting back.”

“I’ve asked for the bill,” she says, twisting around, her tone conciliatory. “Sit down till then.”

He sits. His leg is jiggling under the table, making the glasses judder and ring as though a tube train were passing underneath.

“Ed? Are you all right?”

“Fine.” He cannot look her in the eye.

“It’s just odd, isn’t it?” She leans forward. “Why would a private be looking for you? After all this time?”

“How should I know?” he snaps. “Come on, Eves. You know what people are like. They get ideas. Fixed in their heads. They can’t move on. Surely you of all people know that?”

That stings.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

He opens his hands. “Take it how you want.”

“No. Tell me. What? What do you mean?”

He leans toward her. “Listen, Eves. Don’t take this the wrong way, but you should try to get a bit of air round things. It might stop you brooding quite so much.”

She can feel the familiar acid of anger seeping through her, turning the afternoon, curdling her steak and wine and cream. “Is that what I’m doing, then? Brooding? Forgive me. I wasn’t aware.”

He takes another swig of wine and then looks around for the waiter, his face clenched, impatient. He looks just like their father, suddenly. In a flash she sees him, in fifteen years, the same assurance, the complacency, the set of the jaw.

“What’s the man doing? For
Christ’s
sakes.”

“Ed—”

“What?” He flings her a look.

“You’re saying you have no recollection of a Rowan Hind?”

“I didn’t say that
.
I’ve told you. The name. That’s all. Do you know how many men I had under my command?”

She doesn’t. “A hundred?”

He looks scornful. “Two hundred and fifty. There or thereabouts. You think I remember every little private that lost his mind?”

“I didn’t say he lost his mind.”

She feels something then, a chill, settle in the air between them.

Her brother pauses. “Eves,” he says very quietly, “what exactly did you want to achieve by my coming here?”

“I—” She closes her mouth. She doesn’t honestly know: information of some sort, but what?

“Leave it.”

“What was that?”

“I said leave it. You’re meddling.”

“Meddling?”

“Yes. Eves. That
job.
It’s depressing. For God’s sake, it’s not good for you. It’s not as if you even
need
to work.”

“No. Well. We don’t all want to stay in bed till midday. Remind me again—what, other than order decent wines, is it that you actually
do
?”

His leg is jiggling again. He puts his hands on the table, as if to still it, but it doesn’t work. “I’ll pretend you didn’t say that,” he says. “Shall I?” The air between them feels tinder dry, as though it needs only a spark to set it alight.

She turns to see the waiter at her shoulder, the saucer and the bill in his hand. She goes to open her bag, but Ed is already up. He throws down some notes and leans across the table, his lips brushing lightly against her cheek. “I’ll see you soon, Eves. I hope you’ll be feeling better by then.”

He is out the door by the time she has got to her feet.

The shop is small and intimate, tucked away down a side street at the back of Shepherd’s Bush. It smells of shaving foam and leather and men. It took a bit of persuasion, but eventually Hettie got it out of Di:

It doesn’t look like much from the outside. You’d never know it was the place. It looks more like a barber’s. Which is what it is.

Ignore the men—they’ll stare at you, but don’t take any notice. Just ask for Giovanni. Say I sent you. He’s the best.

The decision was easy in the end.

It wasn’t even easy; it was already made.

And now here she is, sitting in a cracked leather chair, in the middle of a busy barber’s, with what looks like a white tablecloth tucked into her dress and an old Italian man wielding a pair of scissors behind her head.

“How much?” he says again. It sounds like
Howa mucha?

Hettie can see two men standing, staring at her through the window. But she doesn’t care.
She doesn’t care.

“All of it,” she says.

He walks around her, a full half circle, lifting hanks of hair and letting them fall. “All. Of. It,” he repeats to himself as he walks, then comes to a stop. “You have beautiful hair,” he says, his eyes finding hers. “But it looks terrible. You look like a horse.”

“I know,” says Hettie. “That’s why I want it cut.”

“Not a horse.” He corrects himself. “Little horse.”

He lifts a handful and holds up his scissors. The blades flash in the afternoon sun.

“This will be a pleasure,” he says.

Snip!

He holds the first hank in his hand. A trophy. A severed pony’s tail. For a moment, she is horrified. For a moment, she expects there to be blood.

Snip!

She sees her mother.

Snip!

Your father! Your father loved your hair.

Snip!

She sees her dad, the lines on his face. The way they softened when he smiled.

Snip!

Sorry, Dad.

Snip!

I’m so sorry that you died.

Snip!

Filthy little flapper.

Snip!

Snip!

I’m thinking of blowing your cover.

Snip!

Snip!

Snip!

Do you like blowing things up?

Snip!

The future is coming.

Snip!

It’s getting closer.

Snip!

It

Snip!

Is

Snip!

Almost

Snip!

Here!

The shock of the air. Her neck revealed.

The man steps back. “Beau-ti-ful,” he says.

“Killing,” Hettie whispers, as her eyes meet his in the glass.

I hope you’ll be feeling better by then.

It rattles round and round in Evelyn’s head. How
dare
he? As though something were wrong with her, as though she were
ill,
and that is why she has dared to question him—question any of them. As if all of it, the whole bloody war, were nothing more than an extended gentlemen’s club.

The rain is still falling, and the pavement is hazardous, clogged with pedestrians and umbrellas. She clashes with a man ahead who is moving slowly and she stumbles, catching herself against his heel. She has to grab an iron railing to steady herself.

“Watch where you’re going, can’t you?” He is old but upright, the bearing of a military man, his ringing voice cutting through even a wet afternoon like this. Evelyn stands, swaying, staring after him. There are too many men like this: They are everywhere, and she is sick of them, of their florid intactness; it is the old who have inherited the earth. “Oh, go to hell,” she spits.

The man opens his mouth as though to bark a response, and then closes it again. He turns first, impeccably upright, and walks stiffly away. Evelyn is immediately ashamed. She grips the spikes at the top of the railing. The world around her is hazy. Now that she has stopped she is starting to realize just how unsteady she is. How much wine did she drink in the end? Nearly the entire bottle on her own. She’s in her cups, all right. She’ll have to gather herself before she gets back to work. She shakes her watch from her cuff and stares blearily at its face. She’s already late but can’t arrive like this. Her flat’s not far from here; there’s a shortcut she can take if she turns right now. She could go home for a minute and sort herself out. It’s tempting, and it’s much better to be late than drunk. She pushes herself away from the railing and turns onto a side road, moving fast, almost running, skirting the puddles, lifting her umbrella high.

The flat has the blank, slightly surprised feeling of a weekday afternoon. The air is still, a little stale. Several days’ worth of dirty dishes are piled in the sink. Her bedroom curtains are drawn. She can’t remember the last time she opened them. She does so now, and a movement in the flat opposite catches her eye. Someone is over there, in the shadows; she can’t quite see them in the depths of their room. She stands there for a moment longer, looking out, but the view blurs in the rain.

She turns back and winces. Her bedroom is atrocious in the daylight. A pit. Why has their char not been? Then she remembers. She is away, visiting her mother; Dorset, Devon, something like that. Doreen left a note about it last week. She takes off her wet coat and blouse and leaves them on the bed, then goes to the bathroom and runs cold water into the sink. She lifts her face and stares at herself in the glass.

Her brother was lying.

Liar,
Edward Montfort.
Liar.

She splashes freezing water onto her skin and gasps.

He knew exactly who Rowan Hind was; she could see it all over his face.

So what has he got to hide?

She splashes the water again and again until the top of her camisole is wet through. She pulls that off, too. Then she brushes her teeth thoroughly, dries herself off with a towel, and goes back into her room.

In the flat across the road the shadows move. Evelyn jumps. She had forgotten that she had opened the curtains. She is naked from the waist up. The rain has lifted now, and the view is clear. The shadows thicken, then part and reveal themselves to be a man—a man in a wheelchair staring out over the street toward her.

As she stands there, watching him, he wheels himself closer to the glass. She can see the pale line of his skin, his hooded eyes, and the shadows beneath. He is younger than her; from where she stands he seems no more than twenty. He has a beautiful face, and he is looking straight at her—straight into her eyes.

She can feel the skin around her nipples contract.

Her cigarettes are lying on the corner of the bed. She can just see her case and lighter from here. Carefully, and without turning, without taking her eyes from the boy’s face, she bends and picks them up.

She lights one, inhales, and lets out the smoke, letting the lighter fall. It lands on the bed beside her with a soft thud. The boy unbuttons his trousers. She watches as he reaches his hands inside. She can feel the air across her skin; hear her breath, low in the room. She takes another deep pull at her cigarette. The boy’s hand begins moving slowly up and down. He doesn’t take his eyes from her face. She opens her legs slightly, feels the friction of her knickers against her skin: the swollen pulse of herself. She pulls again at her cigarette. They stay there, eyes locked together as he moves faster, faster. Her breath catches in her throat. When she sees him slump she lets out her breath in a sigh.