The girl stood on the pavement, snow sticking to her hair. She shouted something, but it was taken by the wind — and, anyway, the blind man had already disappeared into a building; he couldn’t help her. She found her keys and unlocked the door of her car. She didn’t notice the van that was parked behind her. From where he was sitting, hands on the steering-wheel, Mazey could see the shape of her head framed in the rear window. He thought of a morning by the stream. The shape of the girl’s head on the ground, hair covering her face. And then, when he had finished, she jumped into the water and she stood there, and her dress spread around her on the surface like the green pad of a lily …
It took her a while to start the car. But when she drove away, she drove fast. This time he was ready. He followed her to a tall grey house on a street not far from the flower market. Then, as she opened her car door and got out, he walked up to her and hit her with a jack. She slumped against the side of her car as though she had suddenly, and mysteriously, fallen asleep. He lifted her into his arms and –
‘You’re making this part up,’ I said.
‘You think so?’ Edith Hekmann’s voice was sharp. When I didn’t answer, she said, ‘What about the rest of it? Was that made up?’
‘I don’t want to hear any more.’
‘Yes, you do.’ After pausing for a moment, as if to emphasise the truth of what she’d said, she continued:
He lifted the girl into his arms –
I knew what she was doing now. This story was her revenge on me. I was going to hear it whether I liked it or not (and if I didn’t like it, maybe that was even better). There was a door in the room, but I would never find it, not until she’d finished talking. I tried not to listen, but her voice got through. Perhaps, after all, she was right. There was a part of me that had to know.
— into his arms and carried her to the van. He opened the door on the passenger side and lowered her on to the seat. But when he closed the door, her head fell sideways, the skin above her eyebrow flattening against the window. He opened the door and she collapsed. He had to push her further along the seat, further in. He closed the door again. This time she stayed sitting up. He looked left and right. There was nobody about. She lived in a quiet area. And besides, it was late. Probably three or four in the morning.
As he turned out of her street he slid his tape into the stereo. There was a calmness then. Snow lay on the windscreens of parked cars. Houses came and went like dreams — bright and strange, but instantly forgotten. He heard a sigh. The girl had woken up. Almost immediately she bent over and was sick on the floor. A hot, bitter smell filled the inside of the van.
He took the route he would have taken if he’d been driving home. He recognised the buildings, the roundabouts, the signs. Everything was comforting, familiar. Even the girl who was in the van with him. Once, though, she opened the window and started shouting. He had to hit her on the head again to keep her quiet. She slept for a long time after that.
She was still quiet when he turned off the road, into a building site. He stopped the van. He put his arms around her and lifted her out through the driver’s side. He laid her carefully on the ground. It was a damp, muddy place. A cold wind blowing. Plastic sheets shifted and billowed against the scaffolding. Mazey stared at the photograph in his hand, then he stared at the girl who was lying below him. Somewhere not too far away there was the sound of metal knocking against metal.
When she opened her eyes, he bent down and held her wrist. He meant to be affectionate. But then he remembered that she didn’t like him to touch her and he took his hand away.
‘Where’s the baby?’ he said.
‘What baby’s that?’ she said in a faint voice.
‘Your baby,’ he said.
She frowned slightly. ‘I don’t have a baby.’
‘You have a baby,’ he said. ‘You hid it.’
She tried to sit up, but he put one hand on her chest and pushed her down.
He asked her again. ‘Where’s the baby?’
She closed her eyes and would not answer.
He picked up the jack and hit her with it, then he put it on the ground beside her. He undid the buttons on her leather coat and opened it. Grasping her sweater by the hem, he lifted it up over her body until it covered her face. It wouldn’t go any further. His hands hovered in the air above her, undecided. He took hold of the vest that she was wearing underneath. Pushed it up over the sweater. Her arms were still trapped in the arms of her coat. They stretched out on either side of her, bent at the elbows; she looked oddly relaxed. He tucked his fingers under the waistband of her skirt and pulled at it until the zip broke. He tugged it down below the level of her hips. Her underpants came with it. Next, he took his pen-knife out. He chose the longest of the three blades and snapped it open. Tested it against his thumb, the way he’d been taught. Placing the tip of the blade in the middle of her rib-cage, just at the point where the two halves joined, he pressed down hard. He cut in a straight line until the blade ran up against her pelvic bone. Blood slid across her belly. He put the pen-knife down and reached inside her. There didn’t appear to be anything alive in there –
I didn’t recognise the woman at first. She was bathed in radiance and I was walking towards her. I weighed almost nothing. The ground didn’t seem firm enough to be the real ground. Her hair wasn’t hair at all but light. Her hands reached out eagerly to welcome me.
She showed me some clothes that were dirty and her face was troubled. What should I do? she seemed to be asking. What can I do? I didn’t know. I, too, was filled with despair.
‘Mr Blom?’
A voice was calling me. I didn’t want to answer it.
Time passed miraculously fast and suddenly the clothes that she was holding up for me to see were clean and white, and she was smiling. I wanted to rejoice with her.
‘Mr Blom?’
‘What is it?’ I was irritable. ‘What?’
I could feel carpet under my left eyebrow. Under my cheekbone as well. And my right hand.
‘You passed out.’
It was Edith Hekmann’s voice.
‘Probably all that talk of blood,’ I heard her say. ‘Some people faint even at the mention of it.’
I pushed myself up off the floor and sat on the edge of the bed with my head between my knees. She talked on. I didn’t have the strength to stop her. After a while I lay back. Then I turned over, on to my side. The blankets were warm beneath me. I felt peculiarly comfortable all of a sudden. Peculiarly well.
— He wrapped her in her leather coat and lifted her and put her in the back of the van. He covered her with a piece of blue tarpaulin. Not far from the van there was an oil-drum filled to the brim with rainwater. He washed his hands and arms in it. He didn’t panic; it wasn’t in his nature. He just climbed into the van and turned it round and drove out of the building site. The snow eased as he moved north. For a while there was sleet. Then, finally, just rain.
When it was light, he pulled into a petrol station. The man who worked the pumps wanted to talk. First he said something about how early it was. Mazey just nodded. Next he mentioned the weather. Mazey agreed with him. Then, as he walked round the van to put the pump back on its bracket, he said, ‘You’ve got something bleeding in there, mister.’
Mazey looked up from the money he was counting.
‘There’s something bleeding in the back of your van,’ the man said.
‘Deer,’ said Mazey.
‘Making one hell of a mess.’
Mazey nodded.