Part 34 (1/2)

'After I got away and had enough money I had you traced.' I gave what I could, I've followed your success ...' The appeal sought recognition, appreciation.

'Yes, I understand that.'

'I've had a family ... a daughter ... a grandson, but through all these years I have never forgotten you ... I have thought of you, wondering how you have grown.

'Yes, I am sure.

'You were one of the reasons my life was worth anything.'

'Yes.'

'And now, when all the others have gone, it is you that has come to see me ... I am overwhelmed ...'

Perhaps it was the crippling tension of the moment, perhaps it was his saturation in culture, but in a flash Salomon Lachaise suddenly remembered a devastating pa.s.sage from Virgil's Aeneid, where Aeneas towers triumphant over the fallen Turnus, a man of great strength, having defeated him in single combat; Aeneas raises his sword to carry out the execution, but Turnus pleads for his life, for the sake of his father; Aeneas checks the fall of his arm and hesitates ... but then his eye catches the belt of Pallas, a trophy upon the shoulder of Turnus ... Pallas, his dearest friend, slain without mercy ...

Salomon Lachaise said, his voice cracked and low: 'What of the others, my mother's family the thousands, the sons and daughters-'

'There was nothing I could do.'

'You did a great deal: The old man wheedled, as if for the hundredth time, 'I had no choice.'

'Yes, you did. You have forgotten too much.'

'Please, Salomon, listen ... can't you forgive ...' The pleading became a wail.

'I do not have that power. And neither does G.o.d. It belongs to those you abandoned. Now hear me.

Schwermann became instantly still, as though his heart had ceased to beat. He simply breathed, a functioning suddenly foreign to his waiting, expectant body Salomon Lachaise stood up and said: 'I raise in my hands the dust from which you were made and I cast it to the wind. May you never be remembered, either under the sun or at its setting.'

He turned away from the dividing gla.s.s. And from the prisoner on the other side, soon to be freed, came the sound of a withered, resentful moan.

Salomon Lachaise had finished speaking. The wild chase of water beneath their feet grew loud. Anselm repeated what he'd read in the papers: 'The police found capsules in two of his jackets, sewn into the same corner below the left pocket, with a loose thread ready to be pulled when needed.'

'So I understand.'

'Presumably they were taken out and put back after every visit to the dry cleaner's.'

'Yes, I expect you are right.'

Anselm thought of the private ritual, the unpicking and the sewing up over the years, the constant preparedness to escape a judgment imposed by anyone other than himself. Before Anselm could pursue his reflections, Salomon Lachaise said, with closing authority: 'I shall never talk of him again.'

As at a signal, they both clambered on to their knees and stood, Anselm helping his companion gain balance. Strolling back to The Hermitage, Anselm said, 'What will you do now?'

'Travel. I want to keep moving. I have no commitments, no dependants.'

'You'll remain in Geneva?'

'Yes. As much as I have left the University, it remains something of a home. Anyway' - he smiled brightly - 'I intend to arrange a small exhibition of young Max's paintings. Have you seen them?'

'No.'

'You should. They possess alarming innocence. I shall try to use the ignominy of his background to his advantage. Otherwise it will remain a curse.

'That is kind.'

'Nothing done for pleasure is kind.'

They reached The Hermitage shack, and Anselm made to amble back to the Priory. Pointing at the open door, Salomon Lachaise said, 'Can you join me for a final gla.s.s of port? I never go anywhere without a bottle.'

They sat on wobbling wooden chairs, sipping in silence, until Anselm said, 'Would you like to meet Agnes Aubret?'

Salomon Lachaise, with tears in his eyes, could not reply.

Chapter Forty-Seven.

1.

Lucy met her father in the n.o.ble gardens of Gray's Inn. As they entered, she pointed at the stone beasts on the gate columns. 'Griffins,' said her father knowledgably. 'Protectors of paradise. Don't they teach you anything about myths these days?'

His suit was crafted to his body immaculately creased and cut. In his own world, thought Lucy he was powerful and successful and wore the uniform of esteemed competence. When they found a bench, he dusted off dry particles of nothing with the back of a hand. Sitting like two lone strays at a matinee, each with their legs crossed, Lucy began the stripping of her father.

'Dad, none of us are who we think we are.'

Her father, enjoying a tease, replied, 'And I suppose no one else is who we think they are.

'No, quite right.' She cut through the smart cloth of known appearances to the soft epidermis. 'It's true of Gran' - he looked suddenly wary - 'and it is especially true of you.

Lucy explained to her father how he had been saved from Ravensbruck by Agnes, that he was born of unknown, murdered parents, from an unknown place, that they were buried no one knew where. And she told him Agnes was the mother of a son whom she'd lost, a son who had been found. He listened, entranced and dismayed, fingering the constricting knot of his tie. When Lucy had finished he sat stunned, as though waiting for the lights to come on in a theatre, the only one left in a curved, empty stall.

'Do you know,' he said faintly 'I think she nearly told me once.

'When?'

'Years and years ago ... before the rot set in ... I was fifteen or sixteen and I gave her a mouthful about her silence' - again he reached for his restricting collar - 'I said she'd never cared, not even when I'd fallen as a boy and cut my knee.'

'What did she say?' asked Lucy Her father sat upright, the movement of feet scuffing a gleaming shoe. He wiped his dry lips with a handkerchief and said, 'Nothing, actually at first. But her face crumpled ... in a way that 1 have never been able to forget ... and just when I thought she was going to tell me something she was gone, into herself ...'

'She didn't speak?'