by Graham Smith
Before we leave, I have a question for the manager.
‘When did Ms Rosenberg first take out this safety deposit box?’
He shrugs. ‘I don’t know. It’s been open as long as I’ve worked here and that’s coming up on twenty-five years.’
Judging by his age, I’d say he must have started here the day after he left school and worked his way up to manager.
There’s no way those envelopes have been waiting for me for twenty-five plus years.
‘When did she last come in and ask for this deposit box?’
The manager looks to the wall, in thought, before answering. ‘I’m not sure exactly, but I’d say it was about a month ago.’ He flaps a dismissive hand. ‘We only have a dozen of these security boxes in use, and in all my time here I’ve only known Ms Rosenberg to access hers on a couple of occasions.’
What he says makes a certain amount of sense. Ms Rosenberg must have updated the information in it to correspond with the changes to her will that Pauline told us about.
My desire to open the envelopes is growing by the second, but I’m more convinced than ever that they should be opened somewhere where only Alfonse and I will see their contents.
5
Cameron lifts his eyes from the paperwork strewn across his desk and rubs his nose. He hopes he’s wrong in his suspicion that the tickle is the beginning of a cold.
Whether he’s getting a cold or not, he has work to do. It’s not the type of work he can boast about in the bars that he frequents on a nightly basis. Rather it’s the sort of job you keep quiet about, say nothing to anybody, and hope like hell that the wrong people don’t find out what you do for a living.
The house he lives in is functional with a lot of clean space and bare walls. To some people it would be empty and lifeless; to him it’s just perfect. He has no need for clutter and no desire to burden himself with belongings that have no practical purpose.
Possessions are anchors to a free spirit, who drifts with the wind and makes occasional lurches upstream when he senses a better opportunity.
The thought of calling his work “a way to make a living” always raises a wry smile from Cameron, as he knows that his job may one day be the death of him. Not the industrial accident kind of death: the buried-in-a-shallow-grave-with-a-bullet-in-the-back-of-the-head kind.
He blows his nose on the pristine handkerchief that he keeps in his pocket, and returns his eyes to the rows of columns. To a lot of people, they’re just rows of numbers, listing income and expenditure for a lot of different businesses, but to Cameron they’re something else. To him they are evidence, confirmation and opportunity.
Evidence for his employer.
Confirmation of the suspicions he shares with his employer.
Opportunity for him, and him alone.
With his sixtieth birthday fast approaching, Cameron wants to settle down to a life that doesn’t involve regret, fear and debt.
He’s a smart man and he knows that, were it not for this opportunity, he wouldn’t be able to dream of a future without fear and debt. The regrets he learned to cope with long ago.
Yet here it is. The possibility of enough money for him to see out the rest of his life in comfort has dropped into his lap with the softness of a falling feather.
There are risks attached to the opportunity, but he lives with risk daily and, if all goes to plan, there will be sufficient money available for him to start over with a new name, in a new location. He’s good at doing that. He’s done it twice so far, and he’s already laid the groundwork in case he needs to move on at short notice.
His pen traces row after row as his brain seeks out weaknesses he will be able to exploit. The more he assesses, the more he formulates his plan to seize the opportunity that has been granted to him. His planning is in the early stages but, if he gets things right, he’ll be able to make sure the finger of blame is pointed elsewhere.
Whatever happens he knows that, if he puts his plan into action, he’ll either live a life of luxury, or die screaming.
6
It took all my self-control to not open the envelopes once we’d climbed back into my Mustang, but Alfonse made the excellent point that we’d be better waiting the five minutes it would take us to get to his apartment, so I could give the contents my full attention.
He switches his coffee machine on while I sit myself at the breakfast bar and tear open the first envelope, only to find a typed letter:
Boulder
If you’re reading this, I’m dead.
Not that you would, but I don’t want you to weep for me.
What I want, is for you to do something I had neither the skill nor the nerve to do.
In the second envelope there are clues for you to follow. They will explain why I left New York, fearing for my life, forty years ago.
I would like to have been less cryptic with my methods, but behind my brash exterior, I’m still the scared little girl who trembled listening to the tales her parents told of the pogroms, and of how entire families were snatched in the night and never seen again.
I cannot claim to know you well, but what I’ve seen of you tells me that you believe justice should be delivered to those who deserve it.
Many years ago, through fear for myself and my beloved Halvard, I failed to ensure that justice was delivered, by running away to Casperton.
I’m asking you to deliver this justice for me.
Please, Boulder. Show the courage inside you, follow my clues and find what I left. When you find it, raise all the hell you can behind a cloak of anonymity.
I implore you, if you do take on this task, not to expose yourself. You may think me melodramatic, but when you see what I have left for you, you’ll understand that attaching your name to any of this, is akin to putting your head in a noose and insulting the hangman’s wife. Your buddy, Devereaux, will be able to put this information in the right hands without anyone knowing where it came from.
Read the second letter now, and know that if you choose to have nothing to do with an old woman’s regrets, I cannot blame you for fearing to do something I dared not.
Ms Rosenberg
P.S. I’m guessing that by now you’ve learned my Christian name. If you tell it to anyone I shall haunt you until the end of time.
* * *
I can’t help but chuckle at the postscript she’s left me. It shows the prickly, vivacious carapace that encased a soft heart, and, what I can only guess is a lifetime of regret and self-recrimination.
As the pieces of her life are being shown to me, I’m starting to form a picture of her that she didn’t present to the world. Behind her bluster and putdowns, she was still pining for the man she’d left behind in another place and time.
I can imagine her torturing herself with questions about Halvard’s happiness; whether he had found a new girlfriend and settled down to raise a family. She’d probably tried to imagine what he looked like as he’d aged.
I begin to wonder what she had done by way of tracking him. Had she scoured online obituaries – the print ones in major newspapers? Had she hired a private eye to track him down and update her on how Halvard’s life had turned out?
Everything I think of paints a picture of a lonely old woman, filled with regret at a road never travelled.
My thoughts return to the real purpose of the letter. It’s a clarion call to arms. She’s given enough details to pique my interest but held back on the real story. The letter is also written in the way a psychologist would call coercive, as she invokes words like courage and justice to request my help. There is a get-out clause for me, but it’s laden with reverse psychology.
Every part of me is intrigued by her big secret and, combined with the guilt I carry for her death, I feel compelled to open the second letter and follow her clues.
Except it is never quite that simple. I’m of a different generation, religion and mind-set to Ms Rosenberg. What she deems as a worthy and understandable clue, may well be indeciphera
ble for me.
The chances of failure are high, and there is the certainty that if I do fail, I’ll have let her down in death as well as in life.
‘Jake.’
I look up at Alfonse. He’s holding the first letter. ‘What?’
‘Stop beating yourself up for something you haven’t done yet and open the other letter.’
I’d scowl at Alfonse but there’s no point: he knows me too well and would know that the scowl was really aimed at myself.
There’s no way I can, in good conscience, refuse Ms Rosenberg’s request, and I’m aware that my delay in opening the second letter is nothing more than my psyche girding its loins for whatever may come next.
Alfonse and I know that as soon as I find the clues in the second letter I’ll be hooked, and will follow them doggedly until I have solved them all.
I open the envelope and pull out a sheet of paper and another key for a safety deposit box.
I lay down the key and look at the paper; I see a list of names.
My coffee goes cold as I puzzle over the names.
* * *
Watson
Marshall
Evans
Devereaux
Clapperton
Devereaux
Boulder
Devereaux
Boulder
Clapperton
* * *
They don’t make sense to me, not on any level. I’m on there, as are Alfonse and Chief Watson. I don’t know who the Marshall or Evans are, but I’m guessing the Clapperton is her editor at the Gazette.
What’s even more puzzling is the repetition of our names. I get two mentions, as does Clapperton, Alfonse gets three mentions, and the other names feature only once.
I pass the paper to Alfonse, and have a look at the key. It looks old and there are a series of numbers etched into both sides. One set of numbers has faded with age and the other looks as if it has been added recently.
* * *
1 7 7 3 6 7 6 2 2 4
* * *
I figure that the old ones denote the box number and the new ones are relative to the list of names. I can’t see how yet, but I’m determined to figure it out.
7
I can’t help but pace back and forth across the waiting room. John, on the other hand, sits with his legs crossed at the ankles in a way that suggests he’s calm and relaxed.
It should be the other way round. He’s the one who needs bone marrow if he wants to see his children grow up. I’m nothing more than a possible donor. Well, perhaps a little more: I’m the half-brother he tracked down to hopefully save his life.
I want to ask what’s keeping the doctor, but it would be a stupid question. As always, I’ve arrived early.
John has leukaemia and needs a bone marrow transplant. His sister, Sarah, is pregnant and he’s flat out refused to ask her. Like me, he doesn’t have any aunts, uncles or cousins. So, left with no other option, he travelled to Utah and, metaphorically speaking, knocked on my door.
If learning that my family tree has a whole other branch wasn’t enough to sideswipe me, the reason he’d looked me up was an unexpected gut-punch.
We met up a couple of times for a coffee or a bite to eat. Our conversations were stilted at first, but after a while we found that we had a surprising amount of similarities. Our music and film tastes run along the same lines but, where I’m a reader, he’s a devoted TV fan.
I’ve seen pictures of my nieces, and his sister’s son. I know their names and their ages.
What I haven’t been able to get past, so far as John and his sister are concerned, are their names.
I don’t mean their surnames. I was a MacDonald myself until mother remarried and I became a Boulder.
It’s my newfound siblings’ Christian names that trouble me: they are John and Sarah.
I’m Jake, and my sister is Sharon.
My father and his new wife chose the same initials for their children as my father did with my mother. This kind of coincidence doesn’t happen by accident – not when the initials are even gender matched. Had they been called Simon and Jenny I wouldn’t have batted an eyelid; but John and Sarah? Those names had me thinking all manner of things about my father.
On the one hand I wondered if he was trying to replace the children he’d lost, but on the other hand I hated him for supplanting us. I don’t know which version is right and it’s not like I’ll ever find out. It’s nigh on thirty years since my father left our home, and just over twenty since he walked out on John’s mother.
It’s unkind of me to even think it, but I can’t help speculating if there is perhaps a James and Susan out there, or a Jason and Samantha.
Whether there is or isn’t, it doesn’t matter. Right now, my every thought is on whether or not I’ll be a match. If I am, I’ll be able to save my half-brother’s life and, in some karmic way, atone for the fact that I couldn’t save Ms Rosenberg’s.
A buzzer sounds and a tinny voice announces my name.
I toss a “here goes” look towards John, and lead him down the corridor.
Dr Becker has been the family doctor since we moved here. As the years have passed I’ve seen his waist expand in perfect synchronicity with the receding of his hairline. He’s a kindly man who genuinely cares for his patients.
His face is grave but I don’t read anything into it. Grave is his natural expression.
‘Come in, Jake, take a seat.’ He glances at my half-brother. ‘I’m guessing you’re John?’
I make sure John takes a seat before I do.
There’s a folder on Dr Becker’s desk and I can see my name on the label.
Dr Becker doesn’t miss much, and he picks up on where my eyes are. ‘I’m not going to beat about the bush here, Jake, John. I’m afraid the results are negative.’
I’m at a loss for anything to say.
John isn’t. He looks at Dr Becker with a forlorn expression, thanks him, and stands to leave.
I grab John’s arm and look at the doctor. ‘Are you sure?’
‘I’m afraid so.’ Dr Becker’s expression softens. ‘You’re aware of the Human Leukocyte Antigen markers we test to see if you’re a match?’ I nod. ‘We got a match on five out of eight, but you need six HLA markers to match before any hospital will even consider it.’
I want to swear and rage at the world in general, but I don’t. If John is taking this news in a respectful way, I must too.
With me being out of the running for a transplant, our – or should I say John’s – options are slim to zero. Sharon’s results came back yesterday, and they too proved negative.
Like blood, many people donate their bone marrow to be used by strangers. Because John’s blood is the rare AB negative – as is mine and Sharon’s – the odds of him finding a match from an unknown donor are much slimmer than usual.
John is stoic and silent as we clamber into my car.
I don’t know what he’s thinking but, if I had to guess from his expression, I’d say he’s trying to find a way of breaking the news to his wife.
It’s a train of thought I’m determined to derail.
‘There’s only one thing for it: we’ll have to find our father.’
I can’t use the word “dad”. Dads are loving and caring. They teach their kids things; nurture and support them. They build toys on Christmas Eve and go out searching for batteries on Christmas Day. Dads get kites down from trees and defend you when your mother complains that you’ve come home covered in mud.
Nor can I use our father’s given name. To do so would afford him a respect he doesn’t deserve.
I think of him as Father. Not as “a father”, just “Father”. Like the stern Victorian patriarchs who only saw their kids once or twice a week and expected children to be on their best behaviour at all times.
‘How?’
‘I have no idea how to find him.’ I toss John a smile. ‘But I know a man who will.’
Alfonse already has one old man to find: Halva
rd Weil. What’s another?
8
As usual when he’s working at his computer, Alfonse is oblivious to the world around him. I’ve let myself into his apartment, made us a coffee, and sat puzzling over the twin problems of finding a father and making sense of Ms Rosenberg’s clues, without him even looking up.
His hand releases the mouse long enough to reach for the cup I’ve placed on his Simpsons coaster.
Whichever way I look at it, the trail to find my father will start with my grandparents. I haven’t seen them since I visited Glasgow a decade back and they were pushing towards frail then – Granny told us the same things numerous times, while Grandad sat with rheumy eyes and his typically proud expression.
The Christmas letter they send each year is increasingly hard to read as Granny’s handwriting worsens.
It goes against my instincts to try to find my father. Many years ago, Sharon and I resolved together that we would forget about the man who’d walked out on us without a goodbye. We told each other we were better off without a father, that we didn’t want the return of one who didn’t have the guts to be honest with his kids. Together we welcomed Neill Boulder into Mother’s life, as it was obvious that he put a song in her heart and the smile back on her lips.
Neill possessed enough tact not to try and replace our father. Instead he assumed the role of a favoured uncle. He would offer advice when it was requested and silence on matters we didn’t share with him.
He is a good man who chose to take on a sullen girl, and a boy who couldn’t help but get into one scrape after another. I was never the kind of teen who stole, or got involved with drugs, but I did more than my fair share of fighting and there were several incidents when I was caught in compromising situations with different girls.
Now I’ve decided to look up my birth father, Neill’s feelings must be considered – along with those of my sister and mother.