‘Come on.’ She took his hand again and walked him towards the other children. Stefan followed. He could see Tom’s doubts had already gone.
‘This is Hanukkah,’ she continued. ‘It’s about a bad, bad king and the people who kicked him out and sent him packing. We light candles to remember that.’ She caught the rabbi’s eye, and pushed Tom gently forward.
‘And what’s your name?’ asked the rabbi.
Tom looked back at his father for reassurance. Stefan nodded.
‘It’s Tom, Father.’
The other children giggled. Tom didn’t understand why, but it felt welcoming and good-humoured enough, so he just smiled back at them.
‘All right, Tom. First the battle, then the miracle. Well, if God’s going to take the trouble to give us a miracle he expects us to put some work in too. That’s the battle. I think it’s fair, don’t you? Now, we have a wicked king, a very wicked king, more wicked than you could ever imagine. Antiochus was his name.’ The others hissed and booed. ‘And we have a hero, Judah the Maccabee, fighting the evil king, to save Jerusalem. He was a brave man and his soldiers were brave, but there were only a few of them, and at first Antiochus chased them all into the hills with his great army.’
‘Like Michael Dwyer and Sam MacAllister,’ said Tom. ‘They hid in the mountains behind our farm, when they were fighting the redcoats.’
‘Yes, it was just like that, Tom. And like Michael Dwyer, Judah and his men had no weapons, no food, no shelter. In Jerusalem the wicked king’s soldiers were eating the people out of house and home and putting up statues of the Greek gods in the Temple of the Lord.’ More hisses and boos; Tom joined in. ‘Everyone thought the war was over and Antiochus had won!’
Hannah and Stefan had walked a little way back towards the doors.
‘He’s like you,’ she said quietly.
‘Is that a good thing?’
‘I wouldn’t say it’s so bad.’
They were silent for several seconds. She seemed reluctant to speak.
‘You wanted to talk to me, Hannah?’
‘I wanted to know if there was any more news?’
‘There’s nothing new.’ The question had been surprisingly vague. It was the same question she asked every day. After three phone calls he had assumed she had something to tell him. And he wasn’t really sure she had forgotten about his day off. He knew there was something else going on.
‘I know you’re still not telling me everything, Stefan. I’m trying to understand that, but I’m also waiting for more. I think you owe me more.’
He was surprised, almost hurt. It sounded like she was using the fact that they had slept together as a lever. But as he looked into her deep eyes, the honesty and the openness told him instantly that she wasn’t. It was simply that she believed he owed her the truth, whatever that meant. And the part of him that wasn’t a policeman said she was right. But there was still something else, something different about her unfamiliar awkwardness.
‘Is something wrong?’ he asked, trying to read her face.
‘The thing is, I have to go. That’s why I needed to talk to you.’
She tried to throw the words away, as if they weren’t that important, but her face told a different story. She didn’t like what she was saying.
‘Go where?’
‘I have to leave Ireland.’
It was the last thing he expected to hear. There was no reason why Hannah shouldn’t leave Ireland, but it was out of step with everything that had happened since they met. All her attention had been on Susan Field.
‘You mean you’re going back to Palestine?’
‘Eventually, yes. I need to go to England. I have some work to do.’
It felt like a brush-off. She was only telling him part of it. He realised he hadn’t ever asked what she did. And she hadn’t told him. He realised how little he knew about her again. He knew about the death of her friend. He knew something about her childhood, from Susan’s letters and an hour in a pub. He knew there was a man in Palestine, Benny; a farm where they grew oranges. It wasn’t much. Perhaps she’d never intended him to know much.
‘Back to the oranges?’ he smiled, trying to make a joke of it.
‘What?’
‘Doesn’t your fiance grow oranges?’
She moved closer to him. This wasn’t easy for her. She wanted to tell him that he mattered to her. She wanted him to understand that there were reasons she had to go. But she couldn’t explain the reasons. Not now.
‘I’m sorry. I was never going to be home very long.’
‘I wish I’d known that.’
The sound of laughing children filled the synagogue.
He knew she had more to say. And he knew she wouldn’t say it.
‘I want to know what happens, Stefan.’
‘Yes, naturally. If you tell me where you are — ’
‘If you find anything, my father will be able to contact me.’
Now she wouldn’t even give him an address.
‘I’m not going because I want to, Stefan.’
‘When do you go?’
She took a moment to answer.
‘The day after tomorrow.’
‘And that’s that?’
‘No,’ she said, shaking her head. ‘Could we see each other tonight?’
He took a deep breath and nodded; he was still surprised.
‘Thank you,’ she said, taking his hand.
He looked at her, not at all sure what to make of her behaviour, then all of a sudden he was conscious of the time and the train and his mother and father waiting at Kingsbridge Station. There wasn’t time to say any more.
‘I’ve got to get Tom to the station. My parents will be there.’
‘I’ll be at Neary’s tonight, Stefan.’ She let go of his hand.
They walked back towards the children, now gathered tightly round the menorah. The rabbi held the lighted shammus candle that sat between the eight others, four on each side, as he said the blessing. The Hebrew words were as unfamiliar to Stefan as to Tom, though Stefan had heard similar words spoken over Susan Field’s body. For Tom they were no less impenetrable than the Latin he heard at Mass; he happily assumed it was the same language he heard every Sunday. As the rabbi spoke he translated the words for Tom. ‘Barukh atah Adonai, Eloheinu.’ Blessed are you, Lord God. ‘Melekh ha’olam.’ King of the universe. ‘She’asah nisim la’avoteinu bayamim haheim baziman hazeh. Amein.’ Who wrought miracles for our fathers at this season long ago. Amen. He gave the shammus to the youngest children in turn, then to Tom, guiding his hand to the fifth candle; the others would remain unlit today. As the rabbi took the shammus and put it in the centre of the menorah, Tom crossed himself and bowed his head. The other children giggled good-naturedly again; he didn’t notice. Stefan rested his hand on his son’s shoulder. He knew who Tom’s silent prayer was for.
Hannah and Stefan sat in Neary’s again that night. It was only the second time they had been together like this. He knew it would be the last time too. She didn’t want to talk about leaving Ireland, or about where she was going, and he didn’t ask her. They were both conscious that there were things they weren’t saying and couldn’t say. Then quite unexpectedly, she asked him about Maeve. He was surprised that it made things easier. He told Hannah about the camping trip in the mountains and the night by the lakes at Glendalough. How he woke in the morning to find he was in the tent on his own with his two-year-old son. He knew what Maeve was doing. She was swimming in the lake. They had swum together the evening before. But when he went outside he couldn’t see her. It was midday before the body was found. He would never know whether it was the cold of the water, or cramp, or whether she had just swum too far. She had drowned. It was as sudden and as meaningless as that. He told the
