87
The room was small, the window panes so rotted and waterlogged that the paint barely still stuck to the wood, and the putty was crumbling. The glass shook in the wind. The sky was grey, flecked with rain, and the sea beyond the promenade railing a heaving, ominous slurry.
There was a single bed, a television he had never watched, a table, a washbasin, a mirror, a couple of chairs, and his Bible. His crucifix hung on the wall in place of a print of Constable’s Haywain, which he had taken down and placed on top of the wardrobe.
Every morning he rose in this small, cold room, in this foreign city, said his prayers, then opened his laptop and logged on to the internet in anticipation. But so far, he had been disappointed. Every day he watched the flow of data in disgust. Effluent pouring into his mailbox. Every morning he was presented with fresh opportunities to make his fortune, to make the acquaintance of ladies who wished to lure him to their pages. He noticed them, oh yes, and they made him angry, and they made him sad and they made him glad.
Glad that soon he would be going away from all this, abandoning it to its own putrefaction. Soon he would be in the arms of Lara, and they would make children, make them their own way, God’s way, not the Devil’s Spawn’s way.
Children, obey your parents in the Lord for this is right. Honour your father and mother – which is the first commandment – with a promise – that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth. Ephesians 6: 1-3.
He should not have this possession, for it was a sinful object, but he could not be without it. It was all he had of her. Lara had given it to him the morning they had parted. A small colour photograph of her standing in a simple summer dress, on the deck of the Californian ranch house where they had met. She was smiling, her long black hair tumbling over her bare shoulders, over her skin that was like silk. It was more than three years ago, but he could still remember the scents of her body, every smell, every touch, every word, promise, every caress of her breath against his face. I will wait for you, Timon, my darling angel, I will wait for you until the end of time.
Soon, Lara, God willing, soon!
Seated at the wooden table, beneath the miserly warmth of the single bar heater on the wall, he looked down the list of new emails, sifting through the filth, and suddenly, today, Monday morning, he felt a beat of excitement as he read the email that came with no signature and from an address he did not recognize.
He turned rivers into a desert, flowing springs into thirsty ground, and fruitful land into a salt waste, because of the wickedness of those who lived there. He turned the desert into pools of water and the parched ground into flowing springs; there he brought the hungry to live and they prepared the foundations of a city where they could settle. They sowed seeds and planted vineyards that yielded a beautiful harvest; he blessed them, and their numbers greatly increased, and he did not let their herds diminish. Psalm 107.
It was the message for which he had been waiting six lonely weeks. It was the call for him to do his duty and then, finally, to come home!
He logged off, his heart soaring. Thinking hard and quickly. There was a lot to be done, so much, but he was prepared, it would not take long.
He ate breakfast downstairs at a table on his own, saying a silent grace, avoiding eye contact and conversation with other guests. As he ate, he ran through his mental shopping list. Some of the items he had obtained already, by mail order, via the internet. He had been taught of the need to buy everything separately, in separate shops, in separate towns. Being a foreigner, he would be remembered more easily than a native English person. He would stick out. An American in Sussex, in January. A curiosity.
But he would be gone long before it mattered.
88
At midday on Tuesday morning, Dr Sheila Michaelides sat at her pine desk in her consulting room. She looked distinctly frosty.
Through the window behind the psychologist, Naomi watched rain falling on the lush green walled garden. She could see a thrush on the grass, digging with its beak, tugging out a reluctant worm.
‘Why didn’t either of you tell me the truth about your children?’ the psychologist said.
‘I’m sorry,’ Naomi said. ‘I’m not with you.’
‘Aren’t you? Dr Dettore? I think that name means something to you, doesn’t it?’ Her expression hardened to ice.
John and Naomi looked at each other, increasingly uncomfortable.
‘Yes, we went to him,’ John said.
‘But not for the reasons you might think,’ Naomi added.
‘What reasons might I think, Mrs Klaesson?’
Naomi twisted her hands together in silence. ‘That – that we – wanted-’ Her voice tailed.
‘Designer babies?’ the psychologist said.
‘No,’ Naomi said. ‘Not that at all.’
‘Oh?’
Naomi pointed at the photographs of the two small, laughing boys on her desk. ‘Are those your sons?’
‘Yes, they are.’
‘And they’re healthy, normal little boys?’
‘Not so little. Louis is twenty and Philip is twenty-two.’
‘But they are healthy, normal?’ Naomi said.
‘Let’s concentrate on your children, Mrs Klaesson, if you don’t mind, that’s what you’ve come to me about.’
‘Actually, I do mind,’ said Naomi angrily.
‘Hon,’ John said, cautioning.
‘Don’t hon me,’ she snapped. Then, turning her focus back on the psychologist, she said, ‘We went to Dr Dettore because he offered us hope, he was the only doctor in the world at the time capable of offering us hope, OK?’
‘What kind of hope did he offer you?’
‘A normal child. One that would be free of the bloody awful gene that John and I were both carrying. That’s all we went to him for. So that he could give us a child free of this gene.’
‘He talked you into having twins?’
‘No,’ John said. ‘We wanted a son, that was all. We never asked for twins.’
There was a long silence, then the psychologist said, ‘Are you aware of any of the other children who have been born to parents who went to see him?’
‘Some,’ John said.
‘Three sets of twins, all born to parents who went to him, have been murdered in the past couple of years,’ Naomi told her. ‘There’s a link to some freaky religious group – a bunch of fanatics.’
‘That’s why we don’t talk about it,’ John added. ‘We’ve been advised to keep quiet.’
‘A little hard when it’s out on the internet,’ Sheila Michaelides said.
‘That’s why we keep a low profile,’ John said.
‘What difference does it make to you?’ Naomi demanded. ‘Are Luke and Phoebe second-class citizens because they were conceived in a different way? Is that what you are telling us?’
‘Not at all. But if you remember, I asked you both if there was anything you could tell me that might have some bearing on your children’s behaviour; you never mentioned that you had designed their genetic make-up – I think that might have been helpful for me to know from the start. Don’t you?’
‘No, I-’ Naomi stopped in mid-sentence as John raised a calming hand.
‘Hon, she’s right. We should have told her.’
Naomi stared down at the carpet, wretchedly. She felt like she was back at school, being scolded by a teacher. ‘Dr Michaelides,’ she said. ‘This is not how it might seem to you at the moment. We just wanted Dr Dettore to make sure those bad genes were taken out.’
‘That was all?’
‘More or less,’ Naomi said.
‘More or less?’ the psychologist echoed.
There was an awkward silence. Finally John said, ‘We agreed to make a few positive changes – just to help enhance our baby’s abilities in some areas.’
Dr Michaelides looked at him sceptically. ‘What areas, exactly?’