When she woke she found her watch had stopped a little after two. The wick at her side flickered in a pool of wax, close to drowning. She got to her feet, limping around the landing until the pins and needles had left her foot, and then went into the back bedroom in search of a fresh candle.
There was one on the window ledge. As she picked it up, her eye caught a movement in the yard below. Her heart jumped; but she stood absolutely still so as not to draw attention to herself, and watched. The figure was in shadow, and it wasn’t until he forsook the corner of the yard that the starlight showed her the young man she’d seen here the day before.
She started downstairs, picking up a fresh flame on the way. She wanted to speak to the man; wanted to quiz him on the reasons for his flight, and the identity of his pursuers.
As she stepped out into the yard he rose from his hiding place and made a dash for the back gate.
The name could mean little to him, but he halted nevertheless.
‘Who?’ he said.
‘I saw you yesterday. You were running –’
The girl in the hall, Cal realized. The one who’d come between him and the Salesman.
‘What happened to you?’ she said.
He looked terrible. His clothes were ripped, his face dirtied; and, though she couldn’t be sure, bloodied too.
‘I don’t know,’ he said, his voice scraping gravel. ‘I don’t know anything any longer.’
‘Why don’t you come inside?’
He didn’t move.
‘How long have you been here?’ he said.
‘Hours.’
‘And the house is empty?’
‘Except for me, yes.’
With this ascertained, he followed her through the back door. She lit several more candles. The light confirmed her suspicions. There
‘Is there any running water?’ he said.
‘I don’t know; we can try.’
They were in luck; the Water Board had not turned off the supply. The kitchen tap rattled and the pipes roared but finally a stream of icy water was spat forth. Cal slung off his jacket and doused his face and arms.
‘I’ll see if I can find a towel,’ said Suzanna. ‘What’s your name, by the way?’
‘Cal.’
She left him to his ablutions. With her gone he stripped off his shirt and sluiced down his chest, neck and back with chilly water. She was back before he was done, with a pillow-slip.
‘Nearest thing I can find to a towel,’ she said.
She had set two chairs in the lower front room, and lit several candles there. They sat together, and talked.
‘Why did you come back?’ she wanted to know. ‘After yesterday.’
‘I saw something here.’ he said, cautiously. ‘And you? Why are you here?’
‘This is my grandmother’s house. She’s in hospital. Dying. I came back to look around.’
‘The two I saw yesterday,’ Cal said. ‘Were they friends of your grandmother’s?’
‘I doubt it. What did they want with you?’
Here Cal knew he got into sticky ground. How could he begin to tell her what joys and fears the last few days had brought?
‘It’s difficult …’ he said. ‘I mean, I’m not sure anything that’s happened to me recently makes much sense.’
‘That makes two of us,’ she replied.
He was looking at his hands, like a palmist in search of a future. She studied him; his torso was covered in scratches, as though he’d been wrestling wolves.
When he looked up his pale blue eyes, fringed with black lashes, caught her scrutiny. He blushed slightly.
‘You said you saw something here,’ she said. ‘Can you tell me what?’
It was a simple question, and he saw no reason not to tell her. If she disbelieved him, that was her problem, not his. But she didn’t. Indeed, as soon as he described the carpet her eyes grew wide and wild.
‘Of course,’ she said. ‘A carpet.
‘You know about it?’ he said.
She told him what had happened at the hospital; the design Mimi had tried to show her.
Now any lingering doubts about telling the whole story were forgotten. He gave her the adventure from the day the bird had escaped. His vision of the Fugue; Shadwell and his coat; Immacolata; the by-blows; their mother and the midwife; events at the wedding, and after. She punctuated his narrative with insights of her own, about Mimi’s life here in the house, the doors bolted, the windows nailed down, living in a fortress as if awaiting siege.
‘She must have known somebody would come for the carpet sooner or later.’
‘Not for the carpet,’ said Cal. ‘For the Fugue.’
She saw his eyes grow dreamy at the word, and envied him his glimpse of the place: its hills, its lakes, its wild woods. And were there maidens amongst those trees, she wanted to ask, who tamed dragons with their song? That was something she would have to discover for herself.
‘So the carpet’s a doorway, is it?’ she said.
‘I don’t know.’ he replied.
‘I wish we could ask Mimi. Maybe she –’
Before the sentence was out, Cal was on his feet.
He’d meant Mimi, who else? As he pulled on his shirt he told Suzanna what he’d heard.
‘We have to go to her,’ he said. ‘Christ! Why didn’t I think?’
His agitation was infectious. Suzanna blew out the candles, and was at the front door before him.
‘Surely Mimi’ll be safe in a hospital,’ she said.
‘Nobody’s safe,’ he replied, and she knew it was true.
On the step, she about-faced and disappeared into the house again, returning seconds later with a battered book in her hands.
‘Diary?’ he said.
‘Map,’ she replied.
VIII
FOLLOWING THE THREAD
1
imi was dead.
Her killers had come and gone in the night, leaving an elaborate smoke-screen to conceal their crime.
There’s nothing mysterious about your grandmother’s death.’ Doctor Chai insisted. ‘She was failing fast.’
‘There was somebody here last night.’
‘That’s right. Her daughter.’
‘She only had one daughter; my mother. And she’s been dead for two and a half years.’
‘Whoever it was, she did Mrs Laschenski no harm. Your grandmother died of natural causes.’
There was little use in arguing, Suzanna realized. Any further attempt to explain her suspicions would end in confusion. Besides, Mimi’s death had begun a new spiral of puzzles. Chief amongst them: what had the old woman
