WE COLLECTED first our luggage and then the rented Ford Mondeo from the airport hotel parking lot, where I had left it the previous Wednesday. Fortunately, it had an automatic gearbox, and driving mostly one-handed was relatively simple, so we joined the crawl-crawl, non-rush rush-hour traffic along the M4 into London. Caroline insisted on going to her flat to get some fresh clothes even though I wasn’t very keen on the idea, if only because East Hendred was in the opposite direction. I personally didn’t have any fresh clothes. Other than a couple of items I had abandoned at Carl’s house, all the clothes I owned were here in my suitcase.
“I absolutely have to go home,” said Caroline. “I also need some fresh strings for my viola, I have only two left.”
“Can’t we just buy some?” I asked her.
She just looked at me for an answer, her head to its side, her mouth pursed.
“OK, OK,” I said. “I’ll take you home.”
So we went to Fulham, but I insisted on driving up and down Tamworth Street at least three times to see if anyone was sitting in any of the parked cars, watching her flat. Neither of us could spot anyone, so I stopped the car on the corner, and Caroline went into her flat while I sat outside keeping watch with the engine running. No one came, and there were no shouts, but I felt uneasy nevertheless.
I was beginning to think that Caroline had been rather a long time when she reappeared and came sprinting back to the car. She threw a carryall onto the backseat as she jumped in. There was something urgent about her movements.
“Go,” she said, slamming the door. I didn’t need telling twice, and we sped away. “Someone’s been in my flat,” she said.
“How do you know?” I asked.
“I thought it was a bit odd when I went in,” she said, turning her head to see if we were being followed. “There was a dirty footprint on one of my letters on the mat under the letter slot. I told myself that I was being paranoid. That footprint could have been on the letter before it was pushed through the door. But I am also certain someone’s been in my bathroom, in my medicine cabinet.”
“How?” I asked again.
“My bathroom cabinet is so full of stuff that it tends to all fall out when you open the door. It takes a knack to stop it happening, and someone didn’t have it. Everything in there is now in a slightly different place.”
“Are you sure?”
“Absolutely,” she said. “Trust me. I know exactly what’s in my bathroom cabinet and where. I went to get some aspirin, and everything had definitely been moved. Only slightly, mind, but I’m sure.” She looked around again. “Max, I’m scared.”
So was I. “It’s fine,” I said, trying to sound calm. “There’s no one in there now, and no one’s following us.” I was repeatedly looking in the rearview mirror to make sure I was right. We pulled down another quiet residential street, and I stopped the car. We both looked back. Nothing moved. We waited, but no one came around the corner after us.
“Why would someone have been in my flat?” she asked. “And how did they get in?”
“Maybe they wanted to find out when you were getting back.”
“How would they do that?” she said.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Perhaps they planted something to tell them.” It all sounded so James Bondish. It was all so unlikely, but why else would anyone go into the flat?
We drove westward out of London and back onto the M4 motorway. I stopped at a service station at Heston, and Caroline called her upstairs neighbor using a pay phone outside while I sat nearby in the car.
“They said they were sent by the landlords,” Caroline said, getting back in the car. “Checking for water leaks, or something. Mrs. Stack-that’s her, upstairs-says she let them in all right, but at least she did wait there while they checked the kitchen and bathroom. There were two of them. Well-dressed men, and not very old, she said, but she’s half blind and anyone to her is not old if they are under seventy-five. She seems to think that I’m still in primary school. She keeps asking me about my mummy and daddy.” Caroline rolled her eyes.
“I wonder how they knew she had a key,” I said.
“I asked her that,” said Caroline. “Apparently, they didn’t. Seems they knocked on her door and asked her if she knew where I was. She asked them why they wanted to know, and that’s when they said something about a possible leak in my flat. That’s when she told them about having a key. Apparently, they didn’t bother checking her flat for anything, though.”
“Then we shall assume that one of them was Mr. Komarov, or, at least, that he sent them even if he wasn’t there himself,” I said. “I wonder who the other one was.”
BY THE time we reached East Hendred, my wrist was hurting badly again, and I could hardly keep my eyes open due to tiredness. I had driven down the motorway watching the cars behind me almost as much as the road in front, and Caroline had gone to sleep in spite of promising that she wouldn’t. I, meanwhile, had continually speeded up, then slowed down, all the way from London, and had even left the motorway at Reading to go twice around the roundabout at Junction 11 to ensure that no one was following us.
I wakened Caroline as we approached the village, and Toby came out to meet us as the car scrunched across the gravel driveway in front of the house. It was always a strange experience for me to come back here, my childhood home, to find that it was my brother and his family, rather than my parents, who were the residents. Perhaps it was another reason why Toby and I saw so little of each other.
“Toby,” I said, climbing out of the car, “may I introduce Caroline, Caroline Aston.”
They shook hands. “You’re so alike,” Caroline said, looking back and forth at us both.
“No we’re not,” I said, purposely sounding offended. “He’s much older than me.”
“And more distinguished,” said Toby, laughing. He put a hand on my shoulder “Come on in, little brother.”
It was as good a greeting as we had shared in years.
I went in through the so-familiar front door and was greeted by Sally in the hallway. We kissed, cheek to cheek. Politeness only.
“Sally,” I said, “how lovely to see you. This is Caroline.”
They smiled at each other, and Sally, ever well mannered, leaned forward for a kiss.
“Max,” she said, “how lovely.” I didn’t know whether she meant it was lovely to see me or whether Caroline was lovely. I didn’t particularly care just as long as we weren’t fighting. “I’m so sorry to hear about your house,” she said almost sincerely. “And your arm.” She looked at the end of the cast sticking out below the cuff of my shirt. I smiled my thanks to her. I had told Toby on the phone that I had a broken wrist but not how I came by it.
“Where are the children?” I asked, looking around.
“At school, of course,” said Sally. “Philippa, our youngest, is now six.”
“Really,” I said. It must have been a long time since I was there. My niece had been a toddler on my last visit.
Toby jumped into the awkward pause. “Well, I expect you two would like to lay your heads down for a few hours.” I had explained to him coming from the airport that we had both hardly slept on our flights.
“Thank you,” said Caroline, “I think we would.”
On my way upstairs, I looked briefly into the room that had been mine for the first eighteen years of my life. It didn’t really appear much different. My elder nephew was the current occupant, as was clear from the JACK’S ROOM plaque screwed firmly to the door. His bed was in the same position as mine had always been, and his chest of drawers in the corner was the very same one that had held my clothes for so long. It made me yearn for my childhood, for the happy years spent growing up in this house, and for the assurance of youth that nothing nasty can ever happen. That utopia had lasted only until the brick truck had broken the spell.