The Night Book Part 26

He tipped back his cap and squinted up at the sky. They sat side by side, their feet stretched out. A breeze came down over the gla.s.shouse roof and swarmed across the surface of the pond, breaking it into ripples.

Roza said in a faraway voice, 'I feel so good today. You know where I'd like to be? I'd like to be lying on the burning black sand far away. Lying on the sand under the sky, no one for miles, just the great desert of dunes.' She glanced at him and said in a high voice, 'It's always a surprise to me who I like - and I like you. In fact I always liked you, or I wouldn't have helped you.' Her voice trailed off strangely.

He'd straightened up and was staring, shaking his head.

She said intently, 'I'd like to be lying on a hot black dune, to be there and nowhere else. No mind, only body. To go back there, back where everything began, before everything was lost.'

He put up his hands. 'Roza,' he said. 'Mrs Hallwright.'

'To go back to what I lost.'

'Roza, what are you ... ?'

She gasped. 'No one knows what I lost.'

She turned to him. Her eyes were desolate, the pupils large and black. She opened her mouth and screwed up her face in a silent howl; the words came out in a whispered scream, 'Oh my G.o.d.' She bent over, clutching her stomach.

He grabbed her arm, aghast.

'You don't know what I lost,' she repeated. Agitated, she attempted to rise and he gripped her arm instinctively, trying to quell her.

She looked at him. Tears spilled. 'I want to go back there. Back to the black sand and kill myself.'

'Roza, what the h.e.l.l is this? What are you talking about? What have you lost?'

She laughed, a strange, spiteful little chuckle. 'Your face. It's hilarious. You should see the look on your face. I lost what's most important. No, worse - I gave it away. I'm the living dead.'

Ray looked around. The courtyard was still empty. He needed to get up and leave straight away, but what might she do, wander around the Domain, go off, mention his name? For a moment he was furious with the crazy b.i.t.c.h. He needed to control this, get them both somewhere private.

She was looking at the pond with horror. The giant goldfish swam in slow circles, their scales gleaming dully in the murky water.

She said in a faint voice, 'There was a wall of silver. I was happy. It was so beautiful. But a black hole opened up, and I fell through.'

Ray didn't move.

She said, 'Ray, this is the crisis of my life.'

A goldfish flashed its shining scales. Trails of bubbles. The flowers turning on the surface of the pond.

She said, 'I helped you. Will you help me?'

'What can I do?'

'We need to get out of here,' she said. 'There's a man standing behind the wire, and he's looking straight at us.'

He told her what to do. He looked into her eyes trying to gauge how much she was taking in. He looked into the parallel universe, there inside her eyes. She said, 'I hate the geese. I don't want to walk near the geese.'

Ray pinched the bridge of his nose with two fingers.

'Sorry,' she said. 'I'm so sorry.'

His voice was strained. 'Go around the geese.'

'Oh G.o.d, Ray,' she laughed, and then swayed. He caught her arm and thought, She can't drive. So what are we going to do about her car? He thought for a second. 'Go around the geese, across the gra.s.s and I'll pick you up on the road behind the hospital.'

'Okay. No.' She wrung her hands. 'Can't we walk together?'

'I'll go and get the car, and you go over there and wait. Can you do that?'

'Yes. No.'

He looked at her carefully. Her face had traces of tears, but suddenly, in the midst of her crisis, she was laughing. He thought about packing her off across the park, driving away, never having any contact again. He groaned.

'Right. Your crisis is my crisis,' he said simply. 'We go to your car. I'll drive you home.'

The man behind the wire hadn't moved.

They walked together. Ray couldn't see anyone following. They reached her car and he slid into the driver's seat, pleased to note the tinted windows.

'You got a cellphone?' he said.

She nodded. She licked her lips. Her face was pasty.

'Ring your work and tell them you're sick.'

She rang and spoke to someone. Her voice was high, but her tone was light, almost natural. He thought about leaving her to drive herself. But what if she had an accident on the way home? If she drew attention to herself, injured herself, any inquiry might lead to him. Was this paranoid? But they had been seen together. He might be questioned, blamed, there could be scandal. Journalists would go crazy, make up stories. It was like being stuck in a web - every way he turned he was more tightly caught.

She put her phone away and said, subdued, 'I'm all right now. I'll go home.'

'I don't think you should drive,' he said flatly.

She raised her chin, giving him a challenging, antagonistic look. 'I'm a good driver.'

He let out a short laugh. 'I'm sure you are. Under normal circ.u.mstances.'

'I don't know what you mean,' she said evasively. 'I've been upset, that's all. I'm all right now.'

'Oh come on. Stop the bulls.h.i.t.'

'What bulls.h.i.t?' She began pulling on the door handle but her hand slid off and she yelped with pain.

'What have you been taking?'

'Nothing.'

'Roza. I'm police. Ex-police. You can't bulls.h.i.t me.'

She drew herself up. 'How dare you.'

He smacked the steering wheel. 'How dare I? How dare you? You know the risk I took coming here today. And you repay me by acting like a madwoman, in public. You know my reputation's wrecked and you want to get me in more trouble.'

She retorted, 'You asked for more help with your ma.n.u.script. You wanted something from me.'

He paused, then said heavily, 'I only agreed to meet you today because I could tell there was something wrong with you. On the phone. I was ... I don't know ... concerned.'

'So you came to help me.'

'Yes.'

'Despite all your troubles. Despite the possible consequences of us being seen.'

'Yes.'

'You didn't need to come.'

'No.'

'Well. Don't blame me then.'

He laughed. 'You're unbelievable. f.u.c.king unbelievable.'

She was staring straight ahead. Her mouth twitched. She turned and glared, then her expression softened and she said, 'You're right, of course. I'm sorry.'

He said quietly, 'Roza, what were you talking about before? What did you lose?'

She looked away. 'I had a baby when I was sixteen and I gave her up for adoption. And I started drinking because of it.' She turned to him. 'My husband knows I'm a recovering alcoholic, but he doesn't know about the child. It's my secret.'

He held up his hands to stop her. 'No. I told you not to confess things. You shouldn't, to anyone.'

'Well, I've told you. Too late.'

'Have you told anyone else?'

He saw her hesitate. 'No,' she said.

'Well, don't. Get yourself better, and keep your mouth shut. You've got to look after yourself.'

She muttered something.

'You haven't been drinking today, have you?'

'No.'

'It's something else.'

'Yes.'

There was a long silence. Ray sat, polishing the steering wheel with the heel of his big hand. Finally he said, 'Christ. You've got to keep it together. The election.'

He thought about Hallwright. The poor b.a.s.t.a.r.d. No one knew he had this little complexity to deal with. The missus in the park with Ray Marden, Mr Persona Non Grata. And she off her face. Going bananas.

Another silence.

He said, 'There's nothing wrong with having had a baby at sixteen. Not these days. Why couldn't you just tell him? No one's going to care about it.'

'But I didn't tell him when we met - I left it too late to tell. It's complicated. He'll think I should have kept it,' she added.

Ray digested this. 'The election - I want your husband to win. Your secret's not the problem, it's this.' He made a sweeping gesture. 'You, me, all this.'

'My cracking up,' she said. She sounded so desolate.

'You're not cracking up. You're going to be fine. It'll be all right.'

She said emptily, 'You want him to win.'

'Don't you?'

'Yes. It's what he wants. I have to keep it together so he can win.'

He said sharply, 'That sounds like self-pity.'

'It is. It is. I'm disgraceful. I'm so ashamed. But couldn't you tell me it's not just about him. Couldn't you say we're friends?'

He frowned, looked away. 'You go to meetings? AA and that? What you need to do is go home, rest, get better, then go to a meeting. Right? Keep yourself sober. And no more confessions, to anyone. I'm not going to let you down, but others might. I'm telling you this for your own good, your own safety. And your husband's. You get it?'

'Okay.'

She turned down the mirror and looked at her eyes, fixing her make-up.

He looked around the empty, sunlit park. The tinted gla.s.s made the gra.s.s look sepia.

Trying to steady her voice, she said, 'Ray? Do you think you could drive me home? The house is off Sherlock Avenue.'

He made a face. 'Sure,' he said. 'Why not? Let's you and me arrive at the future prime minister's house. Let's roll up with a bra.s.s band.'

Roza laughed and seemed finally to be pulling herself together. 'I'm sorry, Ray.'

He started the engine and swung the big car out onto the road, driving with excessive caution. They took a few detours, avoiding the central city and sticking to smaller suburban streets.

She was thinking along the same lines. 'What would people think if they saw you and me in the car together? Isn't it strange? We're not doing anything wrong, and yet people would make such a fuss.'

Fuss isn't the word, he thought.

'Sometimes I want to get away from all that, to be free.'

He turned into the top of Sherlock Avenue, a quiet street lined with huge, plush houses. He parked and said severely, 'You're not free. You're in this with your husband. He needs you to not let him down.'

Her voice trembled. 'You don't think much of me.'