A Double Life
Page 20
We sit down at the edge of the orchard. A cider smell comes from the fallen apples. “I’m Colin Spenser’s daughter,” I say.
Mark won’t look at me. He hunches over his knees, the heels of his hands pressed against his eyes.
“My father died recently.”
“What happened?” asks Mark.
“He drowned.”
Mark slumps against the bench. “Do you want me to turn myself in?” he asks.
“No. I know you have children.” He huffs then. He has two teenage daughters, Sophie and Meg. “I want you to tell me what happened.”
“He said I’d be saving you,” he says.
“How did you meet?”
“At a pub in Kilburn, when I was twenty. I wasn’t doing very well.” I don’t ask what he means. He has a public record, he was arrested for possession of amphetamines, the first time when he was eighteen. “I was at the pub every day, he started to come in often, and we talked.”
“What did you talk about?”
“Football, mostly, at first. Politics, music. He asked about my family. I liked talking to him. I didn’t have many friends.”
“What was your family like?”
“I grew up in foster care.”
That’s it, then. That was why he was chosen.
“He told me about his family. He said that he and his wife were separated and she had custody.” He stops for a long time then, his head tilted back, his mouth opening and closing. “He said she abused you.”
“What?”
“He said she made fun of you, from the beginning. He said after he moved out, he started to notice bruises on both of you, and burn marks. He tried to get custody, but the judge gave you to your mother during the separation, he said fathers almost never win their cases. He said he wanted to run away with you both, but was scared he’d be caught. He came in one night in tears, and showed me a picture of his daughter with scrapes on her arm. He said he’d brought it to the police and they still wouldn’t do anything.”
“When was this?”
“The first week in November.”
“I fell off my bicycle in November,” I say. “I had to go to A and E.”
I don’t remember my father taking the picture. He may have done it when I wasn’t looking. Mark is crying now, screwing his thumbs into the backs of his eyes.
“How did he ask you to do it?”
“He didn’t ask, really. He said she was going to end up killing the children, and then we were talking about what night. He said he’d pay me. He gave me the information for a savings account and said he’d put twenty thousand pounds in it, but I wasn’t going to collect the money. That wasn’t—”
“I believe you.”
“I was supposed to meet him afterwards in Eaton Square. I was nervous. I hadn’t slept in a few days, and bought an eighth of meth. It was more than I’d ever done before, I was out of my mind.” His eyes are cracked with red. “I saw the woman’s face afterwards. It wasn’t her. I thought I’d gone into the wrong house.”
“Did you hear another woman?”
“No.”
“Did my mum see you?”
“No, I don’t think so. Colin must have realized something was wrong when I didn’t meet him. I’d come late, too, he must have been waiting for a while. He came into the house and told me to get out.”
Mum didn’t lie, then. My father came up from the basement and started to beat her. She didn’t know another man had been in the house.
“I went to the police station the next day. I was going to tell them everything, but I couldn’t go inside.”
“Did you ever speak to him again?”
“No. How did you find me?”
“Your name was in his search history. He might have been worried you’d confess.”
His body is shuddering now, and the bench shakes beneath us. Mark was younger than Emma at the time. “She would forgive you,” I say.
I don’t know if this is true. I try to decide as we say goodbye, as I walk to my car and drive away. I think she would agree with me that the important thing now is his daughters. Sophie and Meg. It can’t all start over again, for them this time.
* * *
—
WHEN I ARRIVE at Penbridge, Robbie is at the bottom of the garden, playing chess with another of the rehab residents. I watch for a while. Robbie is laughing, and they talk steadily as they play. They seem to be friends. When he looks up, he notices me without surprise. He says something to his friend, and crosses the lawn.
“Robbie,” I say. His face is calm and steady, like he already knows the ending of the story I’m about to tell him.
39
I STAND AT THE EDGE of the loch and pull up my wet suit. I had to order a special one to fit me now. As I wade in, my body is warm inside the wet suit, even in the icy water.
The loch is mercury-colored and ringed with black mountains. It’s spring now, you can tell there was snow here not long ago. On shore, Jasper is sitting on his haunches, near the tent where Nell is still sleeping. We’re in the Highlands. Nell chose Glen Lyon for the shape of the loch and the mountains, and the ring fort nearby.
I dive under the surface. I haven’t developed a fear of holding my breath, after what happened. Other things have become difficult. There’s a particular sound, a hollow thud, like rocks hitting each other, that I can’t stand. And I don’t wear my hair back anymore, since it can feel like a hand pulling on it.
But the ocean doesn’t alarm me, which is good, since I see it so often. I moved to Edinburgh three years ago. My flat’s on Windsor Street, at the base of Calton Hill. Every morning, I take the dog up the hill. From its crest, I can see the roof of the practice in Stockbridge where I work. The view stretches over crooked lanes of stone houses, bridges, chimneys, and warehouses to the Firth of Forth.
I paddle across the loch. Mum was right about swimming while pregnant, I do feel like a submarine.
Liam has been one of my best friends since I moved to Edinburgh. He’s a GP in Leith, we met at a training day. We went out a few times last summer, before settling back into friendship. In October, I asked him to meet me at a restaurant in Merchiston. “I’m pregnant,” I said. “It was an accident. I don’t know if you remember, there was that time when—”
“Is it mine?” asked Liam, his Scottish accent booming through the restaurant.
“Yes, but I don’t expect anything, you don’t need to be involved.”
“Can I be involved?” he said. He was beaming. “I didn’t think I could have children.” We stayed talking at the restaurant until it closed.
Last weekend, I found the diagram of Mum’s family tree. I carefully taped it to the wall, and drew a new line to the place where, in two months, I’ll write my daughter’s name.
For now, though, we’re in a loch, in spring, under a white sky and black mountains, and both of us are kicking.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Thank you to:
Lindsey Schwoeri, my editor, for bringing your enormous talent, creativity, and skill to this book. You’ve been wonderful at every stage, and I’m very grateful.
Emily Forland, my agent, for being both tremendously kind and a razor-sharp reader and guide.
Allison Carney, Gabriel Levinson, Lindsay Prevette, Gretchen Schmid, Andrea Schulz, Kate Stark, Brian Tart, Olivia Taussig, and everyone at Viking Penguin.
Federico Andornino, Rebecca Gray, and all at Weidenfeld & Nicolson.
Michelle Weiner at CAA.
Michael Adams, Marla Akin, Debbie Dewees, James Magnuson, and the Michener Center for Writers and Yaddo.
Dr. Noelle Quann, for talking to me about being a GP.
A Different Class of Murder by Laura Thompson and Trail of Havoc by Patrick Marnham, two fascinating studies of the Lucan case.
My friends, and es
pecially Nick Cherneff, Kate DeOssie, Donna Erlich, Jackie Friedman, Allison Glaser, Lynn Horowitz, Allison Kantor, Suchi Mathur, Justine McGowan, Madelyn Morris, Althea Webber, and Marisa Woocher.
My family, and especially Jon Berry and Robin Dellabough.
And Jeff Bruemmer.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Flynn Berry is a graduate of the Michener Center for Writers and the recipient of a Yaddo fellowship. Her first novel, Under the Harrow, won the 2017 Edgar Award for Best First Novel and was named a best book of the year by the Washington Post and The Atlantic.
What’s next on
your reading list?
Discover your next
great read!
* * *
Get personalized book picks and up-to-date news about this author.
Sign up now.