by Ruth Dugdall
The car felt humid, so Cate cracked the window open just as a line of lightning snagged the sky, with a grumble of thunder following on its heels. The storm would soon be on top of her and she would see nothing if she remained in the car.
Beauty Asiatique had purple orchids in the window, and there were opened fans in rainbow colours taped to the glass. Alongside the lilies were plastic banks of nail varnishes in ruby colours, cherry and damson. Before she could give herself time to think twice, Cate pushed the door open, with General on a short lead at her side, and it sent a wind chime tingling in rapid chorus, announcing her arrival. Near the window were two tables, both set up for nail work, and at the furthest one a pretty girl with a ponytail of black hair was bent over a large brassy woman’s curled talons. The girl only looked about fifteen.
“And it’s so expensive here,” the customer was saying to her in an Australian accent. “How do people even eat out? I mean, it’s two hundred dollars just for a decent meal. And that’s not including wine.”
The girl kept politely nodding, but was otherwise fixated on the woman’s nails that she was painting deep purple, her shiny hair falling forward over her exquisitely shaped face, so tiny that the Australian seemed huge and vulgar across from her.
It didn’t look like a beauty parlour. Not that Cate’s experience of such things was extensive but, of the few salons she had graced, they shared a medical feel, were bright and clean and the walls tastefully decorated with silver mirrors and with posters showing clear-faced young women.
Beauty Asiatique had red painted walls and the air was scented with cooking spices. At the back of the room a bamboo curtain bloomed and out stepped an older woman, short but making up for it with girth, older and less submissive than the girl. She had the weary expression of a woman who had seen something of the world and no longer expected it to give her any hand-outs.
“Bonjour, Madame. Je peux vous aider?”
Cate thought hard then said, “Je voudrais prendre un rendezvous, sil vous plait.”
The woman pinched her lips upwards in what may have been a smile and said sympathetically, “Of course, Madame. For which service?”
The whiney Australian was still chattering, but her nails looked perfect. The older woman followed Cate’s glance.
“You would like a gel colour?”
“Yes, please.”
Cate was guided to the nail bar to choose a colour. “Please, wait here. Tina will be with you shortly.” Pulling General to sit by her side, Cate took the free seat facing the back of the Australian who was now regaling the young beautician with a monologue on her opinion of Luxembourg, thrilling at the closeness of Ikea but complaining about her Portuguese cleaner’s tardiness. General was more alert than usual, and despite Cate telling him to sit, he whined and tried to pull towards the bamboo curtain.
“Lay down, General. Or I’ll have to put you in the car.”
Whilst seeming to be studying the colour options of nail varnishes, Cate assessed her surroundings and wondered why it had featured in Olivier’s phone. She picked up a leaflet from a pile on the window ledge. It was advertising a swimming pool in Saarburg and there was a picture of water cascading into several circular pools. She folded it and put it in her bag, thinking Amelia might like to go, then turned her attention back to the salon.
When Cate was in training her practice teacher had said once that everyone who worked with crime, be they probation or police, got a thrill from it. “We’re closer to the criminals than to other civilians,” he’d said. “We prefer a life with crime because it’s more interesting.”
At the time, young and earnest, she had disagreed. “I want to do this job because I’d prefer a world without crime,” she’d insisted. “Not for any sort of kick.”
But now she wasn’t so sure. She could have taken a different path in Luxembourg, and remained oblivious to the darker side of life going on around her, but instead she was delving into her lover’s secrets, sniffing out crime like a well-trained spaniel. After all, she wasn’t really that interested in having buffed nails.
Finally, the Australian woman paid, peeling off five euro notes with the pads of her fingers, keeping her nails up so as not to mark the gleaming surface. The young girl held the door for the customer, and when she was gone came over to where Cate waited. Cate saw now that the girl really was young, she seemed little more than a child and she revised her earlier guess to fourteen. The beautician, though surely she’d had little training, at her age, smiled shyly, her head bowed submissively, and then she took the seat opposite and reaching for Cate’s hand before she had even engaged eye contact. The girl’s small hand was damp with nerves, and Cate allowed her to dip her nails into a bowl of warm water, not wishing to make the girl more anxious than she already was.
“You choose colour, Madame?” the girl asked, and Cate selected a neutral shade, thinking that Amelia would have told her off for being so pedestrian. It was a simple pink, barely a shade above the natural colour of her nails.
As the girl worked, Cate wondered what she was doing and how this was helping Ellie. She wasn’t a detective, she should just have her nails done and go home. Olivier was taking them out for dinner, to a restaurant over the border in Belgium, and that was all she should be thinking about.
Her mobile sprung to life, beeping out a jocular ringtone until she silenced it by accepting the call. It was Eva.
“Where are you?” she demanded, and Cate could picture Eva’s pretty but serious face as she spoke.
“Having my nails done.”
There was a pause and then Eva said, “Well, you need to come here now, things have escalated.”
“What’s happened? Has Ellie come home?”
There was a pause. “No.”
Cate felt dread creep up her spine. “Is she…?”
Eva cut her off. “Bridget has just called me, she’s in a terrible state. She’s just left the police station. They just told her they no longer think Ellie has run away.”
“Well, that’s good,” Cate said, aware that Tina appeared to be listening to her call. “They are finally taking it seriously.”
“They’re taking it seriously alright,” said Eva. “They interviewed Bridget in a police cell, for god’s sake. They think she’s responsible, Cate. They’ve let her go home, but I just know they’re investigating her. It’s easier for them, to blame the family. It means the sickness is domestic, an isolated case. It’s not the whole city that is diseased.”
“One thing the Belges have got totally right, is their beer.”
Cate watched Olivier sip at his Orval in its matching glass, wondering if he was going to tell her that he had interviewed Bridget. Wondering also why he had suggested this drive out for tea, to Bastogne. It was a summer evening, warm and light now the rain had stopped, but forty minutes still seemed a long way to drive on a school night.
The beer was dark as chocolate with a creamy head and she took a sip too, then pushed it back to him. It looked nicer than it tasted. “Wow, that’s strong.”
Olivier grinned. “Exactly.”
“I don’t like this much,” Amelia said, picking apart her croque madame, opening up the toast and scraping off the thick ham slices, then nibbling on what was basically cheese on toast, leaving the rest untouched.
“We’ll order you some frites,” Olivier told her. “You’ll like those, another thing the Belges have got down to perfection.”
They had the window table and directly across the road from the bistro was a nail bar. Cate noticed it was similar to Beauty Asiatique in its red colour scheme, also the same purple orchids along the upper window. Olivier kept glancing across at it, and Cate had a feeling they were not simply here for the Belgian specialities.
“And the chocolates, they’re good at those,” she added, an afterthought to prove she was not thinking about Ellie, but Olivier wasn’t listening. He was watching the door of the nail bar, and the young man who had just walked out. He was stocky, not tall,
but held himself with a certain confidence as he walked towards a white van, and climbed up next to a man who was in the driving seat. The van did not pull away, and Cate saw it was advertising a swimming pool. The picture seemed familiar, but she couldn’t think why.
Amelia pushed away her plate. “Chips and chocolate it is then. Anything is better than that.”
Cate finished her salad and Olivier’s attention returned to them.
“Mum, Isabella was showing me her tracker yesterday. Most of the girls in my class have got one now. Can I get one?”
Olivier snapped to attention. “What nonsense! Those parents have more money than sense. There is no need for you to be tracked, Amelia, Luxembourg is the safest city in the world.”
Amelia shook her head stubbornly. “But my German teacher, Madame Schroeder, is telling us about self-defence, so she can’t think so.”
“That Madame Schroeder needs to watch it. She’s overstepping her remit. The police may need to speak to her about causing unrest.”
Olivier was angry and Cate had a flash view of what he must be like in an interview room, of how scary he must be if you were on the wrong side of the desk. Had Bridget experienced this, when she was questioned today?
Cate had headed straight to the school after leaving the beauty salon, and returned Gaynor to her home. Achim had opened the door. She had asked after Bridget, who she had seen standing at the lounge window, looking out. Achim hadn’t gone into any detail, simply said that the police had needed to speak with them. But why at the police station? Cate knew enough to think this was odd, and would have liked to ask Olivier. Wondering whether, if the police had no leads, they were instead focusing on the family.
Now Cate felt a pressing need to defend her new friend. “I think Eva,” she quickly corrected herself, “Madame Schroeder, simply wants to protect the girls she looks after, because of Ellie going missing. Parents are worried for their children, Olivier. It’s natural.”
“Maybe so. But not all parents are the same, Cate. You must know that, with all you have seen. We must keep an open mind.”
“What are you saying, Olivier?”
There was a silence and his face was serious, but he said nothing more, as always.
She knew she was pushing Olivier, but she couldn’t stop. “I don’t believe Bridget has anything to do with Ellie’s disappearance.”
“Cate, you do not know this woman. By all means take her daughter to school, assist her if you must, but please do not make the mistake of thinking that you know what has happened with Ellie.”
But it was too late, Cate was unable to remain silent. “I heard that Bridget was questioned at the police station today. Isn’t the poor woman going through enough stress, without that?”
Olivier’s shoulders were tense and his eyes seemed very dark. “That is not for you to judge, Cate. It is for the police to investigate, and it does not help with hysterical teachers scaring the children. There is always danger in a city.” Then, noticing Amelia’s alarmed face, he reached forward to touch her wrist. “But Luxembourg is a very safe city. The safest in Europe. And you have me to protect you.”
Then he lifted a euro coin from his pocket, and hid it in the linen napkin, making it reappear from behind Amelia’s ear so she laughed and begged him to do it again.
Cate returned her gaze to the window and the nail bar opposite. The van had pulled away and the young man was returning to the beauty salon. She could see him better from this angle, and noticed his distinctive yellow-blonde hair and skin as pale as alabaster. His clothes, she now saw, were old-fashioned and formal, a shirt and suit trousers, too hot for the weather. An unlikely customer at a nail bar, she thought. And judging by Olivier’s keen interest, she could see that he thought so too.
After their meal they caught the last opening hour of the Bastogne War Museum, and Cate was distracted from recent events by the tourism of remembrance. They sat inside the mini-theatre that was created to look like a forest, on seats made to replicate logs. A snowy landscape was set around them, above them was the projected image of planes, and they could see mannequins dressed as soldiers. For several minutes Cate was absorbed, but then she became aware that Olivier was not concentrating on the presentation, but was once again tapping a text message into his phone. Amelia pressed close to her mother, unsettled by the noise of gunfire around her.
“It’s okay,” Cate told her daughter. “Nothing’s going to happen to you.”
The final part of the tour was a short walk outside, with a view towards the Mardasson Memorial, the monument to fallen American soldiers. The evening sun gave Cate warmth and she tried to take in the breath-taking majesty of the monument, but Cate was blind to the view, lost despite knowing exactly where she stood, and wanted nothing more than to go home. Her real home, in England.
At that moment, Olivier had taken her wrist, waited until she was looking fully at him and said, “If you ask me again to breach confidentiality on this case, if you say any more about some danger you imagine exists in Luxembourg, then I will have to reconsider.”
He did not elaborate on what, nor did she ask, struck dumb by the cold tone of his command.
Olivier shifted his hold from her wrist to her hand, firm and controlling, but also the same hand that had been so gentle just last night, playing her body with ease so she made sounds, felt things, she had never allowed herself to before.
His threat was a moment, and it was gone. The beauty around them remained, Amelia was oblivious to what had just happened. “It’s like a fairy tale forest. Do you think there are any deer?” she asked, running off to look.
“She’s so happy here, Cate,” Olivier said. “Just relax, and you could be too.”
“I think I saw something!” Amelia ran back to the dusty path, her legs covered with dirt but also kissed by the sun, her hair blonder than since they arrived. She looked so pretty, so happy. Cate hated herself for ruining it.
Olivier squeezed Cate’s hand, and she felt him watching her anxiously, worried he had gone too far. “You know, I love you, Cate,” he said.
Cate turned back to him, in shock. He had not said this before. He pulled her forward, so they were again walking side by side.
“I may be a difficult man, with strong views,” he said. “But I think we are a good match. We just have to learn how to be with each other, and I think you are finding it hard to not be a probation officer. You are imagining worse crimes, something domestic becomes a kidnapping, to keep your brain busy. Perhaps you should start some voluntary work, would this help?”
Cate felt her anger soften and turn against herself. She too was in love, and Olivier had given both her and Amelia a chance to be happy. He was right. He was in the best place to judge if Ellie’s case was domestic or something wider. She should let it go.
“What kind of voluntary work?”
“At the prison, maybe. There are many inmates who have no visitors, and who prefer to speak English. Would you like me to arrange something for you?”
Just then Amelia gasped, and the three of them watched as a deer crossed their path, just a few yards away. It stopped, gazed at them, as from behind its young offspring darted, coming level with its mother and waiting until by some secret signal she indicated that they must leave. Mother and young ran into the protection of the trees. Only then did they hear a crack in the air. Men, following. Evening hunters.
Later, back at their flat, Cate stood in the bathroom brushing her teeth. It was a moment of solitude, just her and the mirror, the sound of the brushing, the thoughts in her head. She found that away from Olivier her thoughts ran differently, in a straight line: Eva’s advice on self-defence during German class, the leaflets at school and the texts on Olivier’s phone. Suddenly she had the creeping suspicion that his anger towards her was because she was onto something.
Their relationship, her first chance at love since her divorce from Tim, and she was risking it all.
She spat out her toothpaste, leaned over t
he sink and gazed at her own reflection. She wasn’t young anymore, her hair was turning more brown than red at the roots, her skin was less taut, though her eyes still gleamed brightly and she knew she was lucky. A handsome man, a life abroad, and she was jeopardising it. Better to be right and single or in love? She couldn’t fix anything anyway. So long as she kept Amelia safe did it matter what else might be going on in the city?
Compromise and silence. This might be what it took to have a successful relationship, a feat her parents failed at, as she had with Tim. Olivier’s parents seemed happily married, he didn’t have any divorce behind him. Maybe he knew more about what was required to keep a relationship healthy. She should stop rocking the boat.
“Mum?” Amelia called out from her bedroom. “Can you read to me?”
Cate splashed cold water on her face, gave herself one last look and then she went to read to Amelia.
Amina
“Malik say he wants to find a wife,” Jodie tells Amina that morning. They are sitting cross-legged on the thin mattress, both combing through their hair, yawning.
Amina listens to Jodie with growing anxiety. She is very pretty and Amina fears for her friend.
“Does he mean you?”
Jodie snorts, so hard she has to swallow. “I say to him a wife would want nice house, sparkling jewels. He just wants the nasty thing! If there’s no house, no garden, no ring, then there’s no wife and no nasty either.”
Amina doesn’t see why this is so funny, she wonders at Jodie who always seems to know so much more than her, yet she isn’t worried about ridiculing Malik in this way. Omi would say that such talk was disrespectful, and Samir would say it was sacrilegious. But Amina isn’t thinking either of these things, she is just worried for her friend, that her big dreams will come to nothing and she’ll end up as trapped in Luxembourg as she would have been in Algeria.
She wonders if Samir has returned from Paris, if he knows she has left. If the Algerian police are still visiting Omi, all the time, demanding to know where he is. He may be dead.