The Lie of You: I Will Have What Is Mine (31 page)

He took my hand back and started to stroke it. I said nothing.

‘My love,’ he said. ‘I’m going to look after you now.’

‘You never guessed that I was ill?’

‘No. You looked very white the last time I saw you. You said you’d had flu.’

‘Not flu; I was having a bad gravity day. I have good days and bad days, Markus. Though I seem to be having more bad days recently... Will you make me some green tea? There are teabags in the kitchen.’

He came back with the tea for me.

‘I’m going to change Billy’s nappy’ he said.

‘Everything is upstairs in the bathroom,’ I said.

He left the room with Billy and I thought about what he had said. They would be looking for us and as I had found out over the last few days, having a baby with you changes everything. There is no time for anything else but the baby’s needs.

When he came back downstairs I agreed that he should take Billy back to her. Markus said he would drive back at once. He had to. Time was running out. I insisted on going in the car with him. I did not want to be on my own. So he carried Billy to the car and then he helped me into the passenger seat and we set off.

OCTOBER

When I got home I found a letter from Hector lying on the hall table with the rest of our mail, so he must have heard about Billy being kidnapped. I stood in the hall and opened his letter right away and read it through. It was so sensitively written and offered no false reassurances. He wrote that he was thinking of me a lot, that I should call him any time if I needed someone to talk to, and he signed it
From your friend and fellow veteran
, which I found touching. He was referring back to our lunch, of course, and I remembered how easy I always found him to talk to. He was a genuinely kind man: that was clear from the day he helped the old man on the boat and now he had taken the time to write to me and offer support.

I took the lift to our floor and opened the door into our silent flat. Markus was still out and I felt the absence of my Billy so acutely. I cannot bear to go into his room at the moment because his empty cot feels like a reproach to me, a reproach that I did not protect him. I had to tell Markus that the photographs of Billy and Heja are not being used today. He will be relieved to hear that. I called his mobile again and it went straight to voice-mail, as it had done all day. He does not want to talk to me. So I left a message about the latest developments and asked him to please come back to the flat. I told him I was scared and I needed him to be there.

When he gets here I will have to tell him what Robert said about her. I can’t tell him that Heja is dying over the phone. It has to be face to face for that.

I called Jennie and told her what was happening too. She said, ‘Let me come up and be with you, darling.’

And I said, ‘Yes, please come, I’m so afraid she’ll hurt him.’

And then at last I called my mum and dad and told them everything. It was an awful, painful phone call and my mum was crying so hard and my dad was being calm and strong. He said they would get the next flight over.

I lay on my side in our bedroom and stared at the digital clock, watching the numbers change, working out exactly how the numbers changed one into the other. Each number was made up of straight lines. Number one was made up of two short lines. The zero was made up of six, two on either side, one at the top and one at the bottom. The number eight had the most lines. It was made up of seven lines, like the zero, with a line across the middle. How many more minutes and hours did I have to live through without Billy? I was freezing and too exhausted to even get under the covers.

After many hours, I don’t know how many, I heard a key in the door. That will be Markus, I thought. I couldn’t make myself move. I felt so cold and without an ounce of energy.

‘Kathy!’ he called out.

I got up wearily and opened the bedroom door and Markus was standing there in front of me with Billy. He held Billy out to me. Billy was in my arms again and it was the most joyful moment of my life, an even greater joy than the moment of his birth.

I hugged him, smelled him and kissed him. I was crying and laughing and kissing my baby again and again.

‘Thank you, thank you, thank you... Where did you find him? How did you find him?’

We walked into the kitchen together.

‘I was able to track Heja down. And I know why she did it too.’

He looked at me and said quietly, ‘She’s very ill. She’s dying.’

So he knows. I said nothing. I had Billy and I was just kissing him and smelling his head and his smell was like a wonderful drug I couldn’t get enough of.

‘Tell me everything, first I have to change him.’

I went into Billy’s room and took off his Babygro and kissed his fat little stomach and he laughed in delight. What a joy it was to be changing his nappy again.

‘Jennie’s on her way here,’ I called out.

Markus had gone into our bedroom and I heard him opening some drawers. I got Billy changed into a new nappy and a Babygro. I couldn’t stop kissing him. I wanted to feast on his skin and on his presence.

‘I’ll never leave you again, my darling boy,’ I said to him, picking him up and resting him on my hip. He seemed unharmed, just happy to be with his mum. Markus had gone into the bathroom now.

‘I must call Mum and Dad at once. They’re on their way here. And Nick, of course...’

‘No, Kathy.’

He came out of the bathroom with his wash bag.

‘What do you mean?’

‘Don’t call Nick just yet, please.’

‘Why not? What’s happening?’

He went back into our bedroom and I followed him in there with Billy. I saw him put his wash bag into a holdall and then his drawing pad.

‘What’s in that bag?’

‘I have to go away.’

‘You’re going?’

He zipped his holdall closed and it dawned on me. ‘You’re going to her, aren’t you?’

‘I have to go now.’

‘You’re going to Heja. She stole our baby and you’re going to her now.’

He picked up his holdall and walked towards me. I wanted to hit him, scratch him, hurt him. I was holding Billy so I just screamed at him.

‘How
can
you? She’s a monster!’

‘Look after Billy. He’s safe and that’s all that matters,’ he said.

He moved forward and tried to kiss Billy then. I pulled away from him.

‘Get away from us. You’re not fit to go near Billy.’

He gave me the saddest look and he left the flat with his bag.

OCTOBER

I sat in the car and waited for him. I could have worried that he would stay with her and call the police, yet I had no fear at all that he would not return to me. The streetlamps were on and the road was quiet, with the odd swish of a car passing. I rested my head against the car window. I felt spent.

He came out of the apartment block, his face set. He slung his bag on the back seat, got in next to me and turned the engine on.

‘You’re angry with me,’ I said.

He did not reply. He just looked straight ahead as he drove us out of London. Finally, after he turned onto the motorway and was in the fast lane, he said, ‘How long did you rent the house for?’

‘For October and November.’

‘Did you intend to stay there?’

‘I wasn’t sure what I was going to do. I needed you to come back to me, Markus.’

‘We have to move fast. They’ll be on our trail once Nick has my car registration number.’

‘Who is Nick?’

‘He’s the detective on the case. You committed a crime, Heja, and they’re after you.’

Then he told me that the police had tracked down the number plate of the hired Volvo. It would not be long before they found the Volvo sitting in that car park in Deal station. They would assume we were in Kent then and would start asking around. It would not take them long to track us down, he thought. Someone would have spotted me over the last few days. He was angry with me, but I also knew that he was thinking hard about what we should do next. I knew he would do everything in his power to stop the police arresting me. He has always had a deep antipathy to the police.

Finally we turned into the rutted road that led to the cottage.

‘You certainly chose a secluded spot,’ he said.

Then we were in the cottage and it was just the two of us alone together at last. We stood there in the small hall and looked at each other, and I said, ‘Thank you.’

I went to turn the heating up. Markus looked in the fridge and took out some eggs. He looked in the cupboard.

‘No pepper and no coffee! I’ll have to get us some proper supplies tomorrow.’

He beat the eggs and cooked us an omelette. It was as if we had reverted to an earlier way of being together. Few words were spoken. After we had eaten we went into the little sitting room and he pulled the curtains closed and sat down. I went over to him and sat on his lap and put my arms around his neck.

‘I’m going to have to fatten you up. You weigh nothing,’ he said.

‘I was so frightened that first time you saw me again. I thought you would see that I was ill.’

‘You looked good to me.’

‘I’ve spent years presenting myself to the world as if I was fine.’

‘And no one knows? You didn’t tell your father or Robert?’

‘I would never tell Robert and my father has suffered enough.’

‘He would want to help you, Heja.’

‘He’s not well, Markus. He has a heart condition.’

‘I always liked your father very much. He said to me once that you hadn’t had it easy and I was to look after you.’

We kissed then and I said I wanted to go to bed. I wanted him again after all the wasted years.

We lay in our naked embrace. His body has thickened a bit. His smell is the same. He said nothing although I know he noticed how thin I have become. As he stroked my back slowly it was as if he was counting the bones of my spine one by one. When I turned round to face him my hip bones jutted against his groin. He seemed scared that he would hurt me if he penetrated me. I wanted him inside me again. Afterwards I rested with my head on his shoulder.

‘If only I could have had our baby,’ I said.

‘If only...’

‘Sorry I let you down.’

‘You didn’t let me down!’ He said it vehemently. ‘You had no choice.’

‘No choice at all. I’m the last of the Vanheinens. It ends with me.’

The next morning when I woke up a sea mist lay thickly over everything. I saw Markus standing at the cottage window and you could hardly see the trees at the edge of the field. I felt weak and shivery and didn’t feel like getting out of bed.

‘We can’t travel anywhere today, Markus, I feel too shaky. I need to rest.’

‘I’ll make you some tea.’

I heard him use his phone once to call his work and explain that he had to be away for a while. His voice was tense and it seemed that someone on the other end was pushing for more information as Markus said, ‘I will call again when I can, I have to go now.’ Then he came back into the bedroom, bringing me a cup of green tea.

‘Do you have your mobile with you?’

‘No, I left it at the flat.’

‘Good.’

He turned his mobile off and took the battery out.

‘I won’t be long. I’m going to walk down to Deal to get some food for us and a newspaper. I need some coffee.’

‘Won’t you take your car?’

‘Best I leave it here.’

I heard him leave the cottage. I got up and found my handbag. In the inner pocket was a small tin. It was one of those tins that used to hold gramophone needles. It was a gift Markus had given me years before, when we were students. He said he found it in a junk shop. On the lid was a picture of the His Master’s Voice
dog. He will do it for me, I know he will. He has come this far.

It was about two hours later when I heard Markus unlocking the front door. I was in the sitting room, wrapped in a blanket, and as he walked into the room he brought a blast of sea air in with him. He looked so healthy and so vital.

‘I got us four beautiful fresh mackerel. A fisherman was selling from a kiosk on the beach. He wasn’t doing much business today,’ he said.

We spent a quiet afternoon together. The mist did not lift all day. We did not talk much about what we were going to do next. Markus had been thinking about options and wanted to discuss them, I said tomorrow, it can wait till tomorrow. We talked about the years we had been apart. I told him about Arvo Talvela and how in my greatest trouble he had helped me. And then Arvo had died suddenly and I knew that I had to find Markus again. Arvo had always said that I had to tell Markus about our baby. I was sorry I had taken so long to tell him. We did not mention her or Billy once.

Later he ran a bath for me and I lay in the warm water for ages, hoping it would bring more feeling back into my legs. I had not dressed all day. That is the kind of thing an invalid does, stays in their night things all day. Tomorrow I will get dressed. No matter how weak I feel, I will get dressed. I went downstairs to the kitchen, carrying my little tin with me.

Markus had the news on and I just looked at him and he knew what I was thinking and said, ‘No mention of us. I’m going to cook us those mackerel, with lots of lemon and pepper.’

I put my little tin onto the kitchen table.

‘You’ve still got that tin I gave you.’

‘Yes, and this little tin is a great comfort to me.’

I opened it and showed him the small white pills it contained.

‘There are enough strong painkillers in here to finish me off.’

‘Oh, Heja...’ He hugged me tightly.

The next morning dawned mild and golden, the kind of day you long for in the dark days of winter. The sun had burned off the sea mist. The trees at the edge of the field were a palette of russet, amber and ochre. Markus made green tea for me and coffee for himself and brought it up to the bedroom. I sat up against the pillows.

‘I’m going to make us a picnic and take you to Dungeness today,’ he said.