He has been speaking for perhaps ten minutes when there is a commotion and the usher rushes in with several sheets of paper which she places before the chairman. He skims through them and then passes them to the other two panellists.
“And he would be present in person to testify his love for my client, were it not that a chest infection, coupled with his extreme age and frailty, have prevented him from travelling here today.” The young man’s voice rises to a climax. The chairman politely waits for him to finish, then he holds up the papers which the usher brought in.
“I would find your speech most convincing, Mr Ericson,” he says, “were it not that just at this moment we have received a fax from Mrs Mayevska’s husband’s solicitor in Peterborough, with details of a divorce petition he has filed in respect ofyour client.”
Valentina jumps to her feet, and turns to where Vera and I are sitting.
“This is doing of this evil witch sister!” she cries combing the air with her scarlet nails.
“Please listen, Mr Sir,” she puts her hands together in a gesture of prayer and appeals to the chairman, “I am love husband.”
The interpreter, miffed at being excluded from the drama, butts in:
“She says that the sisters are evil witches. She wants to say that she loves her husband.”
Vera and I keep quiet and look prim.
“Mr Ericson?” the chairman asks.
The young man has gone scarlet beneath his pale hair.
“I would like to ask for a ten-minute adjournment while I consult with my client.”
“Granted.”
As they file out of the courtroom, I can hear him hissing beneath his breath to Valentina something like, “…you’ve made a complete fool of me…”
Ten minutes later, Mr Ericson conies back on his own.
“My client is withdrawing her appeal,” he says.
“Did you see the way he winked at us?” says Vera.
“Who?”
“The chairman. He winked.”
“No! I didn’t see. Did he really?”
“I thought he was so sexy.”
“Sexy?”
“Very sort of English and crumpled. I do so like English men.”
“But not Dick”
“Dick was English and crumpled when we first met. I liked him then. Before he met Persephone.”
We are sitting side by side with our feet up on a wide sofa in Vera’s Putney flat. In front of us on a low table are two glasses and a bottle of chilled white wine, almost empty. Dave Brubeck plays quietly in the background. After the alliance of the courtroom, it seemed the most natural thing in the world for me to come back here. It is a cool white-painted flat, with deep pale carpets and very little but very expensive furniture. I have never been here before.
“I like your flat, Vera. It’s so much nicer than where you used to live with Dick.”
“You haven’t been here before? Of course not. Well, maybe you’ll come again.”
“I hope so. Or maybe you’ll come up to Cambridge one weekend.”
“Maybe.”
When Vera lived with Dick, I visited their house once or twice-it was full of polished wood and elaborate wall-paper which I found pretentious and gloomy.
“What do you suppose it means, Vera-that she’s withdrawing her appeal? Will she give up altogether? Or do you think it just means she will ask for another date?”
“Perhaps she will simply melt away into the criminal underworld where she belongs. After all, they can only deport her if they can find her.”
Vera has lit a cigarette and thrown off her shoes.
“Or it could just mean she will go back and work on Pappa. Get him to back down on the divorce. I’m sure he would if she went about it the right way.”
“He’s certainly stupid enough.” Vera watches a long finger of ash glow at the end of her cigarette. “But I think she will go to ground. Hide herself in a secret lair somewhere. Live off fraudulent benefit claims and prostitution.” The ash falls silently into a glass ashtray. Vera sighs. “Soon enough she will latch on to another victim.”
“But Pappa can divorce her in her absence.”
“Let’s hope so. The question is how much he has to pay her to get rid of her.”
As we are talking, my eyes wander around the room. There is a vase of pale pink peonies on the mantelpiece, and beside them a row of photographs, mainly of Vera and Dick and the children, some in colour, some in black and white. But one photograph is in sepia, in a silver frame. I stare. Can it be? Yes it is. It is the photograph of Mother wearing the hat. She must have taken it from the box in the sitting-room. But when? And why didn’t she say anything? I feel an angry colour rising in my cheeks.
“Vera, the photograph of Mother…”
“Oh, yes. Delightful isn’t it? Such an enchanting hat.”
“But, it isn’t yours.”
“Not mine? The hat?”
“The photograph, Vera. It’s not yours.”
I jump to my feet, knocking over my wineglass. A pool of Sauvignon blanc forms on the table and drips on to the carpet.
“What’s the matter, Nadia? It’s only a photograph, for goodness’ sake.”
“I must go. I don’t want to miss the last train.”
“But won’t you stay the night? The bed’s made up in the little room.”
“I’m sorry. I can’t stay.”
What does it matter? It’s only a photograph. But that photograph! But is it worth losing a new-found sister over? These thoughts race through my mind as I sit on the last train home, watching my reflection in the window as it fleets over the darkening fields and woods. The face in the window, colours washed out in the dusky light, has the same shape and contours as the face in the sepia photograph. When she smiles, the smile is the same.
Next day I telephone Vera.
“So sorry I had to rush off. I’d forgotten I had an early morning appointment.”
Twenty-One. The lady vanishes
A few days after the botched tribunal, Eric Pike calls round at my father’s house in a big blue Volvo estate. He and my father sit in the back room amicably discussing aviation, while Valentina and Stanislav run up and down the stairs piling all their possessions in black bin bags into the back of the car. Mike and I arrive just as they are ready to leave. Eric Pike shakes my father’s hand and takes the driver’s seat, and Stanislav and Valentina squeeze into the passenger seat together. My father hovers on the doorstep. Valentina winds down the window, sticks her head out and shouts, “You think you very clever, Mr Engineer, but you wait. Remember I always get what I want.”
She spits, “Phphoo!” The car is already moving forward. The gob of spit lands on the car door, hangs for a moment, and slides slimily to the ground. Then they are gone.
“So are you all right, Pappa? Is everything all right?” I give him a hug. Under the cardigan, his shoulders are bony.
“All right. Yes everything all right. Good job. Maybe one day I will telephone to Valentina and seek reconciliation.”
And now for the first time I hear a new tone in my father’s voice: I realise how lonely he is.
I telephone Vera. We must make plans for how Father is to be supported now that he is on his own. Big Sis is all for getting him certified and carted off to a residential home.
“We must face the truth, Nadezhda, unpalatable though it is. Our father is mad. It’s only a matter of time before he gets into some other lunatic scheme. Better put him where he can cause no more trouble.”