Fog Heart (16 page)

‘Leave her be,' Roz told him.

‘There's no pulse,' he said. ‘She has no heartbeat.'

‘It's just that you can't hear it.'

‘I'm damn sure I'd hear a heartbeat,' he said angrily.

‘It's all right,' Roz insisted. ‘This happens. She'll come out of it later, if we leave her be.'

Jan was still crying softly to herself, eyes locked on Oona. The show was over, apparently. Oona was all right? Well, fine. Let her lie where she fell. Blood and screams. It had unnerved him, and now that he was beginning to think again he felt annoyed and put-upon. Words and associations, blood and screams. It was eerie at moments, yes, and finally disturbing, in a way – but if there was a point to all of that, it escaped him.

Charley would have preferred the voice of a ten-thousand-year-old Indian chief, telling them that mankind was despoiling the planet and that they had to change course before it was too late. Well, yes, Chief, now that you put it like that, we have to agree, and we'll get on to it right away. Next time call collect if it's that kind of Big Picture message.

He put his arm around Jan as they left the enclosed area and went to the front room. He noticed that she seemed to be keeping a significant inch or two of space between them.

‘Are you all right?'

She merely glanced at him, then away. Apparently not. But at least the tears had stopped. Charley had the uneasy sensation of failure to do the right thing. Somehow. But he hadn't a clue what it was or how to correct the fault. That gave him a feeling of peevish inadequacy and a desire to leave. And a desire to get some serious drink inside him.

But first, the folly-up. Charley made an effort to appear interested as Roz talked to them about meanings, how they should reflect on what they'd heard, and more like that. Jan listened. Said nothing. Jan was sad. Too sad, even for Jan.

A curious shift had taken place. He could see it in the way Roz talked to Jan. This had started out as Charley's problem but now Jan had moved to the centre of it. Jan was the focal point. Jan would want to come back for another session, with or without him. It was obvious from the look on her hungry face, as well as the way Roz concerned herself with Jan.

That bothered him, but only a little. He knew that he would be expected to tag along in future, to be there for Jan. Had it ever been any different?

‘Your wife has a very strong influence,' Roz said to him, by way of casual explanation. Of something, no doubt.

‘Really?'

‘Yes. Her presence was an enormous help to Oona.'

‘How so?' he dared ask.

‘In all of it, the entire experience,' Roz answered. ‘Women are more sensitive than men, somehow, and that helps.'

Oh, yes. Women are more sensitive. He'd heard that before. Funny how it was always some woman telling you.

‘I see.'

Jan was quiet in the car. Too quiet. Charley said nothing until they were back at the apartment. He got himself a towering highball, rye and sweetness. He fired up a large Dominican. He went to Jan, who was pottering about mechanically in the kitchen, rearranging cups and glasses with runic obscurity.

‘She never mentioned Fiona at all,' he said.

‘Believe me, that doesn't matter.'

‘Jan, what we heard tonight was a jumble of words,' Charley said, trying to keep a civil tone. ‘Some of them might seem to mean something to you or me, but they don't add up to a single coherent thought or message. They were tossed out there for us to play with, and turn them into something.'

‘You saw her,' Jan said sharply. ‘You saw what happened to her. The changes she went through.'

‘Fainted, I suppose. Overdid the hyper bit.'

‘Her body.'

‘What about it?'

‘The marks on her,' Jan said fiercely. ‘She didn't just see something, like in a vision. She experienced it all over again, in her own flesh.'

‘No, no, I don't buy that one.'

Jan shook her head. ‘You missed it.'

‘What?' Charley demanded. ‘What did I miss?'

‘Fiona is here. Fiona has come for us.'

12

Some of the offerings were so beautiful that Oliver felt close to tears. It was hard to explain, even to himself. He had tried on a few occasions to share his love of stamps with Carrie, but the words always seemed to elude him. She understood the collecting bug and she knew that some stamps were valuable while others were not, and of course she could see the pleasure Oliver got from it. But the passion? Carrie didn't get that at all.

To Oliver stamps were a dazzling universe of miniature art, intricate, layered in arcane history, utterly pure and beautiful. Real stamps, not the modern rubbish with its hideous colours and revolting graphics. Oliver wouldn't touch anything that had been issued since 1945, and most of his collection dated from the nineteenth century. He had been bitten early, and devoted to it ever since. Thanks to his father. The hours the two of them spent together poring over stamps had been the best in Oliver's boyhood.

The Kohler preview left him shaky with delight. He wandered away from it and settled himself in a narrow
bierstube
a short distance from Wilhelmstrasse. Lately, he had been drawn to old German and Swiss cantonal covers: whole envelopes adorned with frankings and cancellations, multiple stamps and other postal markings that were added
en route,
as well as a handwritten name and address. A good cover was an artifact that combined history, geography and a personal human element – an echo from someone's long-forgotten and inconsequential life. A kind of beautiful ghost.

He had Carrie and Lugano coming up at the weekend. He was looking forward to it. It almost hadn't been going to happen at all. Carrie had wanted to come but felt she couldn't take the time off. She had too much work to do now, including the job for her Belgian, and a list of other people who couldn't be kept waiting long. Oliver persuaded her that she could spare two work days. Carrie would fly out Thursday night and arrive in Lugano Friday morning. They would have three days and nights together. She could catch a Monday morning return flight and be back home at the apartment late that afternoon.

A curious peace had taken hold since that shattering first session with Oona. Carrie was in contact with her father. She believed it, and that was all that mattered. Communication wasn't easy – in fact, it was pretty damned hard to figure out just what the old boy might be trying to say to her. But the contact was a reality to her. It gave Carrie a rationale to continue with the psychic process.

It was a bit different for Oliver. Panic. Fear. His life was ending, and not the way he wanted. Oona appeared to know him much too well. That could be a problem. Was a problem. A major problem. Had to be addressed. Solved.

He bought another beer and flipped through the pages of the Kohler catalogue again. No doubt about it, he could spend thirty thousand dollars in Wiesbaden without giving it a second thought. But that would be extravagant for one auction.

At least there was no immediate rush to deal with Oona. She only did two or three sessions a week. Took too much out of her, and she had to recharge her emotional batteries. Something like that. She had other clients, and couldn't take Carrie – and him – again until the end of the month. Time enough for Carrie to reflect, and to prepare herself for the next message from Daddy. Time enough for Oliver to plan, and act.

Question. How much did Oona understand of what she appeared to know? Maybe none of it. That would be great, but he couldn't take a chance. The girl had already made a point of establishing a small zone of secrecy with him by not letting Carrie know that she had met him the week before. A small point, perhaps, but one worth bearing in mind.

Question. How did Oona know about him? Several years ago, Oliver had made an unplanned stopover in Bombay, while
en route
from Bangkok back to London, his suitcases crammed with samples of lush Thai silk. He had never been to India. It was an impulse, a whim. Why not? He could afford to indulge himself like that. A couple of days in Bombay. He might even take a train down the coast and investigate the fabled hippie haven of Goa. Check the scene, meet a few stone burn-outs, drink some beer on the beach. There might be a semi-exotic female waiting for him …

But it had been in Bombay, not Goa. And at Ballapul, not Chik Pavan. The little man whose voice Oona had rendered so well that the hair on Oliver's neck had bristled at the first sound of it. The very words. Oona could never know that, not unless the unfortunate little man had come to America and had told her. But he hadn't. He was dead. Oliver had killed him. You have to, if you want somebody dead.

It had been unnecessary and unfortunate, but there you are. His attitude was fairly simple. If the situation comes down to your life or mine, you go first. Oliver hadn't asked for it to happen the way that it did.

Answer. Oona was genuine. On some level, in some way, Oona had an ability to know dead and buried parts of your life. Parts no one else knew, and that you never even thought about any more. Oliver had no idea how she did it, how she arrived at or received this information, but the precise mechanism was beside the point. Oona was genuine. No other explanation would hold.

But her ability was clearly limited. If you thought of it as a powerful searchlight, capable of penetrating the dark nights of the past, then it was also huge and unwieldy. Apparently Oona had little control over it. Moreover, she didn't understand the half of what she revealed. By herself Oona was dangerous, like a tin of explosive chemicals that required proper handling.

But when you added Roz to the mix, all bets were off. There was something very worrying about the efficient note-taker on the edge of events. Calm, cool, capable. Cunning. Calculating. He had to assume the worst about her. Roz was the one who would fit the pieces together. Oona could supply the knowledge. Roz would understand it and use it. Roz was a cunt.

Oliver's eyes went back to the photo of a German cover that broke his heart. A letter envelope sent from Munich to Leicester in 1861. There were five Bayern stamps on it, two 18 Kreuzers in orange-red, and three coat-of-arms lower values in a vertically cut franking strip. Besides the original München cancellation it had acquired a couple of thimble postmarks in England, along with a triangular handstamp that was either a mistake or a display of excessive zeal and self-importance on the part of some provincial clerk. A beautiful specimen, right down to the elegantly looping penmanship in the name and address.

Too expensive, certainly.

Oliver had some ideas. There were any number of things that he could do, but the first step was knowledge. The more he knew about those two women, the better able he would be to handle them appropriately. He didn't want to hurt them, far from it. Oliver found Oona almost irresistibly attractive, with her gorgeous hair and slender neck. He would love to gain one-to-one access to her, so to speak. New Haven was a bit close to home, though, and he still had Roz to consider.

Anyhow. They must be rendered harmless to him.

He finished his beer and checked his watch. Fuck. He went to the bar and got another beer. Ten minutes later, he glanced up from the Kohler catalogue.

‘Where the hell have you been?'

‘Shopping,' Marthe replied breezily, as she put her bags down on the floor. ‘You know how they say, darling. So much leather, so little time.'

Oliver blinked. Perhaps it was witty in German.

‘Come here and stand in front of me.'

Marthe did so, her back to the bar. The place was quiet, an unemployed type working the pinball machine and a couple of soggy drinkers trying to stay on their bar-stools. The barman, a Turk, had his nose in the newspaper. Oliver put his hand up Marthe's skirt and eased a finger into her. She was always ready.

‘I like that,' she said.

‘You do?'

‘Oh, yes.'

‘In that case.' Oliver took his hand away from her.

‘Oh,' she said, with a pout.

‘Let's go back to the Schwarzer.'

‘Buy me a drink first.'

‘You can have one there.'

‘But my feet are in pain here.'

‘You must be very happy, then.'

She smiled. ‘If you don't buy me a drink, you won't get to see what I bought, and that would be to miss something.'

An empty threat, but Oliver bought her a drink. When he and Marthe got back to the hotel he found a message waiting for him. A note from Carrie, sent by fax.

Oliver, can we make it Paris in September instead? Too much is happening here & I'll hate myself & be lousy company if I take time off now. Buy something beautiful and TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF PLEASE! XXX – C.

‘Fuck.'

Oliver tossed aside the fax. Marthe picked it up and began to read it. Oliver went to his bottle of duty-free and poured a large measure of single malt. She could stay at home. That was all right. He didn't mind that. But he disliked surprises.

‘So, what's the problem?' Marthe said, dropping the fax on a side table. ‘Now we have the weekend. It's better.'

Oliver lit a cigarette. Think. ‘No.'

‘No what?'

‘I'll see you in Munich on Monday, as scheduled.'

‘But why?'

‘There's something else I have to do.'

*   *   *

‘You may be in danger,' Oona said.

‘Danger?' The word didn't sound quite real to Carrie. She put down the cup of tea and switched the phone to her other hand and ear. ‘What do you mean?'

‘I was thinking of you a little while ago, and the sense of things began to come back to me,' Oona explained. ‘And it's more a sense of danger now than it was at our session. It was then as well, but not nearly as much. It feels stronger and closer now, and I wanted to let you know.'

‘Danger – but from whom, or what?'