Lovers and Liars Trilogy

by Sally Beauman

  “I hate the world,” she told Tom, who was still up and watching a late movie.

  A small bump on the sofa, which in the dim light Lindsay had mistaken for cushions, uncurled itself and sat up. It proved to be Tom’s quiet, sweet-faced, and somewhat formidable girlfriend. Her name was Katya. Tom put his arm around her.

  “Never mind,” he said in a kind way, eyes still fixed on the screen. “The world doesn’t hate you. Nor do I.”

  “Nor me,” said Katya. “Hi.”

  Lindsay felt cheered. She went to bed, tossed the fat airport novel on the floor, kicked it under the wardrobe, and read Updike for two hours. At one in the morning she got out of bed, retrieved the fat novel, and turned to the end. The hero was a veritable Lazarus, it seemed. He came back to abundant life on page 502, seduced the heroine again on page 503, quarreled with her magnificently on page 510, and after an eight-page sexual marathon, led her altarward on the penultimate page.

  Like Rowland, Lindsay was a traditionalist when it came to stories: she had a weakness for triumphal love. Comforted by this rousing ending, she returned to bed and slept well.

  Rowland, meanwhile, lay in his bed on the top floor of his Huguenot house with its view of Hawksmoor’s spire. Across the street, as he had first observed shortly after Lindsay’s departure, a white Mercedes convertible was parked. He had no inclination to check whether it remained there, but lay on his back, wakeful, watching the time go past.

  He thought back through the story Lindsay had recounted. He thought of her, and of Gini, then Cassandra, who was dead, and Mina, who was still missing, and finally of a young man with dark hair, a young man in his twenties, a young man of undisclosed nationality, Mitchell’s candy man, Star.

  At three he fell into a light sleep; he dreamed of a shadowy Esther, and a shadowy New Orleans. Although he retained a clear sense of direction, he was dazed. They walked together along Decatur, up Dumaine, along Bourbon to Canal. Esther was trying to tell him something, but he could not hear the words.

  He awoke with a start and lay there, fighting the restlessness such dreams always caused. Hours inched by; he felt the peculiar turmoil of exhaustion and sleeplessness; he felt under siege from the demands of the present and the past.

  At five, abandoning the possibility of sleep, he rose, went downstairs to his cold kitchen, and made coffee. Sitting there at the table, he finally submitted, and let the past back into his mind. It was not such a very long history: he had met Esther, a DEA operative, within a month of his taking that assignment in Washington, D.C. Until then, he had spent most of his free time on the fringes of Georgetown, in the company of fellow English journalists. It was a close-knit, gossipy, expatriate community, inward-looking, dependent on American contacts for work yet treating Americans, Rowland found, with a curious, faintly derisive patronage; this patronage, he noted—and it angered him—modulated in private, and after drinks, into scorn. The clannishness, the clubbiness, was already beginning to pall, and Rowland was already finding that he was gravitating more and more to the company of American journalists, when a friend at the Post introduced him to Esther.

  On the occasion he first met her, in a fashionable downtown restaurant, she drew his eye for several reasons: she was unusually tall; she was beautiful; she was formally and exquisitely dressed—and she was the only black woman in the room. Rowland, the outsider, the displaced person, the man who never felt English, or Irish, who had never had the sensation he belonged, shook her hand. She gave him a long, cool, quantifying look: Rowland felt an immediate, and astonishing sense of recognition, the signaling of like to like; it was followed by a rare exhilaration, then some ruthlessness on his part. The friend who had introduced them was ditched, unceremoniously, within the hour. Moving on with her somewhere, anywhere, the place was immaterial, they ended up at three in the morning at a street near his house. Esther was a Smith graduate; she had a law degree from Harvard; her great-great-grandmother had been a slave. These facts mattered very much, and not at all.

  “Come home with me,” Rowland said.

  She gave him one long, still, grave, considering look.

  “I just might do that,” she replied.

  A week later they rented an apartment together near Dupont Circle. A month after that, Rowland proposed; Esther, more cautious than he, refused.

  “Very well,” Rowland said. “I shall repeat the suggestion a year from now. In the meantime, I’ll just make myself indispensable.”

  “You’re indispensable now,” she replied dryly. “As I suspect you know.”

  A year passed; during that year Rowland’s newspaper decided to send him to France. Rowland rejected this assignment, and subsequently resigned. To his surprise, he found it was an easy decision: Esther’s work tied her to Washington; his did not, but he found that he had plenty of freelance work there from both British and American papers. His English friends doubted the wisdom of this move, and Max—visiting from London—castigated him for it. Their demurrals made Rowland impatient; he did not doubt his own abilities; he knew he could alter the course of his career; he intended, and needed, to be with Esther: the choice was effortless, and no sacrifice was involved.

  “Marry me,” Rowland said to her—and being meticulous about such things, he reiterated his proposal exactly one year later, to the hour.

  “I just might do that,” Esther replied.

  A date was arranged; the week before, they were due to visit her brother again, in New Orleans. Her brother, host to them on several previous occasions, had promised to be Rowland’s best man. At the last minute Rowland was forced to cancel that visit to cover an urgent story. He was writing up his copy, was near to completing it, when Esther announced she was just going out to the grocery store.

  He had glanced around quickly from his desk; Esther had smiled, waved a hand at him, and told him to hurry up and finish writing. Now, sitting in his kitchen, his coffee cold and undrunk, Rowland looked at that tiny, frozen frame: the last time he had seen her alive. Had he not changed the date of their visit, she would still have been alive; they would have been married, might have had—would surely have had—children. My fault, he thought as he always thought at this point. My fault, and I didn’t even say good-bye.

  The boy who killed her, a crack addict just sixteen years old, stopped her on the way back from the store. Two blocks from their house. He demanded her purse—and, according to the witnesses, Esther at once gave it to him. For no known or comprehensible reason, the boy shot her anyway. He raised his gun and fired into her neck at point-blank range. Esther fell; she bled to death on the sidewalk. Mindful perhaps of AIDS statistics, the little clutch of bystanders who gathered around her did nothing; no one administered first aid.

  That fact, which had made him so bitterly angry at the time, still made him so now, six years later. It would, almost certainly, have made little difference—or so Rowland was subsequently informed. Still, it remained for him an act of iniquity: even if those witnesses could not have saved her, surely one of them at least could have held her, cradled her, talked to her as she died?

  He found the manner of her death unbearable, and sometimes he believed that his own inability to abandon mourning was connected not simply to her death, but to the way in which she died. It was as if he had to compensate for that act of omission and for his own act of omission in not saying good-bye. The futility of this task, of which he was aware, did not deter him. Max had told him once, sharply, to stop doing penance. Rowland, hearing the accuracy of the remark, turned away in silence. He felt penance had been imposed upon him: choice was not involved.

  Now he never spoke of Esther to anyone, under any circumstances. He preserved his grief with this privacy, and when—with the passing of time—he sensed that this grief was less intense, it made him ashamed.

  Grief, he was beginning to discover, could not be activated at will, no, not even predawn, alone in a cold house, in an empty room. Esther was beginning to slip away from him. He could still rec
apture the sound of her voice, and sometimes the exact quality of her gaze, but her image was more shadowy than before. He could sense her, escaping his grasp, edging away from him into that netherworld the dead occupy, while more vivid figures, living figures, moved to the fore.

  Was this release, or betrayal? Could you betray the dead? Once he would have answered that last question in the affirmative; now he was unsure.

  He waited another hour, and then—at seven—called Gini, who was still in the country with Charlotte, but preparing to catch an early flight to Amsterdam. There she was going to see Anneke’s parents, who might or might not have information about Star.

  “Ask if he could be American,” Rowland said. “Ask if he could have American connections.”

  “Why? Rowland, I’m not hopeful they’ll know anything anyway.”

  “Never mind. Just ask.”

  When he had hung up, he felt angry with himself. He was doing what he most despised, breaking every rule in his own book. He was seeing connections where none existed—but then, that was not surprising, he told himself. For several reasons, among them lack of sleep, his judgment was impaired.

  “Is there any chance this Star could be American?” Gini asked. “Or could have American connections? Did your daughter Anneke ever mention making American friends?”

  Across the room from her, Erica van der Leyden shook her head. “No. Apart from the note Anneke left, she never mentioned this man. I don’t recall her having any American friends. We lead a quiet life. Anneke was at school all day. When she came home, she had homework to do. If she was out, it was always with friends I knew. My husband and I never allowed her to wander around Amsterdam on her own, going to cafés, that sort of thing. Anneke had a strict upbringing. My husband and I are old-fashioned.”

  “Of course,” Gini said politely, wondering whether there was any point in continuing. She had been here, in this lovely, tranquil, exquisitely furnished room for nearly an hour. To enter it was like stepping into one of the Dutch interior paintings she had always loved. A Delft-tiled wood-burning stove stood in the corner; tall windows overlooked one of the loveliest canals in Amsterdam. Erica van der Leyden was as civilized and as understated in appearance as the room; she spoke perfect English; she was about thirty-six, dressed in conservative clothes, low-heeled shoes, a well-cut skirt, a sweater, and pearls.

  Only her hands revealed the grief she experienced and the tension she felt. She could not keep them still. Every time she had to speak her dead daughter’s name, her hands clenched. Gini pitied her deeply. She could see that Erica van der Leyden was a woman fighting desperately to stay calm, a woman hanging on by the slenderest of threads.

  There was only one discordant element in this room, and that was the teenage girl now slouched in a chair to Gini’s right. She had been introduced as Fricke, Anneke’s elder sister, and was about sixteen. She was not prepossessing, and Gini suspected she both knew that, and chose to emphasize it. She was overweight, with heavy eyeglasses, and long, fair, greasy hair. She was wearing jeans and a turtleneck sweater, and she, too—to judge from the few sullen remarks she had so far made—spoke excellent English.

  Her mother had already made two attempts to persuade her to leave the room. Neither had been successful, for all that strict upbringing. Rising to her feet now, Erica van der Leyden made a third.

  “Fricke, I’m sure you must have some studying to do.”

  “I’ve already done it.”

  “Then if you would leave us alone, please, for just a short while. You can see—this isn’t easy for Miss Hunter or for me.” She hesitated, then said something more sharply, in Dutch. Fricke gave her another sullen stare and did not move.

  “Why shouldn’t I stay? I’m Anneke’s sister. I don’t suppose it occurs to anyone I might have something useful to say.”

  The rudeness, and the fact that she spoke in English so Gini could not mistake the rudeness, seemed to please her. Erica van der Leyden flushed, and Gini quickly intervened.

  “No, please. Don’t ask Fricke to leave on my account. It’s true. She might well remember something—something that seems unimportant perhaps.”

  Fricke made a small grimace that might have implied satisfaction, or scorn. Her mother gave a resigned gesture of the hands and returned to her chair. She gave Gini a bewildered, helpless look. Gini could feel this interview slipping away from her. She leaned forward.

  “Perhaps, Mrs. van der Leyden, if you could describe Anneke to me. I know it must be painful, but under the circumstances…”

  “Of course.” Her hands twisted in her lap. “Another young girl is dead. A third is missing. My heart goes out to their parents. I wish I could assist, but—”

  “If you could just tell me the kind of things Anneke liked, that might help. Did she like to go to the movies, or dance? Did she like music?”

  “Well, she liked music, I suppose—modern music, as most girls of her age do. She was interested in clothes. She used to buy fashion magazines, didn’t she, Fricke? We had some arguments, as mothers and daughters do, about hair, and makeup and clothes—but nothing serious. Anneke was a very sweet girl, not as clever as Fricke, of course, but imaginative. Gregarious. She had lots of friends. She had pen pals too, all over the world. She loved receiving letters and cards. And then she was quite good at languages. She liked to travel. We had all been to Italy, and Spain, and to Switzerland to ski. She made a school trip to Paris last year, and another, the year before, to London, which was a great excitement. She took ballet classes. She was good at dancing, very graceful…”

  It was the very ordinariness of what she was describing that undermined her: Gini saw the realization come into her face—that the girl she was describing might be any young girl from a reasonably privileged and educated background. Her own inability to convey her daughter’s uniqueness—that was what made her suddenly choke on her words. Tears rose to her eyes. With a gesture of apology she rose and turned away.

  Gini expected Fricke to go to her mother then, and attempt to comfort her, but the girl did not move. She continued to sprawl, exactly as before, watching with an air of surly condescension. Gini stood.

  “Mrs. van der Leyden,” she said. “This is distressing you. I’m sorry. Perhaps it would be better if I left now?”

  “No. Please. You’ve come a long way. I said I would see you. Perhaps—there’s a photograph of Anneke I would like to show you. I’ll get it. If you would excuse me one moment…”

  She left the room. In the heavy silence that followed, Gini returned to her chair. She picked up the note Anneke’s mother had produced earlier, the note that Anneke had left behind. It was dated the second of April, the previous year. On an attached sheet of paper, for Gini’s benefit, was a neatly inscribed translation. It read:

  Dear Mother and Father,

  Yesterday I met a new friend, called Star. He is a wonderful man, and very kind. I’m going with him to England for just a few days. I’ll be back Friday. I’ll call from England. Don’t worry.

  Lots of love,

  Anneke

  Nine months later she was dead. Her parents never saw her alive again. It was the stuff of every parent’s nightmares, and the note’s insouciance, its naïveté, chilled Gini to the bone.

  “She actually believes all that, you know.”

  Fricke spoke so suddenly that Gini started.

  “I’m sorry?”

  “My mother.” Fricke rose. “She actually believes all that rubbish she said now. Pen pals. Ballet lessons.” She gave Gini a measuring look. “I suppose you believed it too.”

  “Not necessarily.” Gini returned that look coldly. “Your mother was trying to help me. She may be mistaken in what she said.”

  “Oh, yeah? She’s mistaken all right. My father too. They didn’t understand Anneke. They didn’t know her at all.”

  “Look, do you have something to tell me?”

  “I might have.”

  “Then why don’t you get on with it and
stop wasting my time?”

  The girl flushed, then gave a shrug and turned away. Gini waited. Her instinct was not to prompt and not to plead—and it seemed to be correct, for it was Fricke who was the first to give way.

  “I can’t talk to you here.” She hesitated. “You know the Leidseplein? It’s a big square, near the Vondel Park.”

  “I know it. I’ve been to Amsterdam before.”

  “There’s a café there, on the north corner. It’s called the Rembrandt. I’ll meet you there in half an hour. I have a violin lesson then. I’ll skip it. She’ll never know…”

  “Fricke—”

  The girl was already moving toward the door. She gave Gini one last, sneering glance.

  “If you’re there, fine. If you’re not—who cares… You reporters are all crap anyway. When Anneke first disappeared, they were all on the doorstep, they phoned all the time. Now that she’s dead—what happens? Nothing. They’ve all gone on to the next fucking tragedy.”

  She brought out the two expletives with some care. Gini did not react to them or to her comments, and this seemed to disappoint her. She left the room.

  Gini remained only a short while longer with Mrs. van der Leyden. Yes, she learned, Anneke had kept a diary and address book, but she had taken them to England, and they had never been found; the police had already been through all her other personal papers, which had provided no information, and which were now packed away. No, there had never been any hint of serious unhappiness or disturbance on Anneke’s part. She was a contented, well-adjusted girl with nice friends from good families.

  This portrait did not convince Gini, and she knew it did not truly convince Anneke’s mother either; that was why she stressed its accuracy so desperately and at such length. She continued to speak in this way as she led Gini down the stairs and across the hall. There, her hand on the front door, she abruptly stopped. “Sometimes she would have these little moods, of course,” she went on, pleading in her eyes. “As all teenagers do, as Fricke does. It’s nothing. It passes. It’s part of growing up. She knew how much we loved her. She loved her family in return.”