by Irene Black
“No,” she’d said. “We’ve definitely never met.”
There, you see, he’d told himself as he drew up at the end of his lane, she’s in my head again. I can’t get her out.
“This woman, Hannah,” he now said to his father. “She is troubled. She believes she is in grave danger. But I don’t know. Maybe what she is telling is true. On the other hand...”
“And you are becoming very fond of her, I think.”
“Is it so obvious? Something about her fascinates. A crazy enchantress.”
“And knowing my son, she will be very pretty, too.”
“More striking than pretty, I think. No typical English face at all. Such expressive eyes—green, they are, and wonderful hair. It is a very intelligent face, a strong face.”
“My son, my son. Beware of strange ladies with strong faces. Take care that you are not too deeply involving yourself in a hopeless cause. At any rate, I can see that you are currently in no fit state of mind to make any decision about that girl in Mysore. We must pray this enchantress breaks her spell on you in due course. But how to explain your present distraction to your mother? It is going to be no easy task, I think.”
Ashok squeezed his father’s arm. “I know you’ll find a way. Now I must turn in. I am very tired. Goodnight, Bapa. And...thanks.”
“Huh! For what?” Srinivasa shook his head in the darkness and muttered to himself. “What to do? You give the boy an English education, and so how can you complain when he behaves like an Englishman?”
* * * *
At eight o’clock the following morning, a knock came at Hannah’s door.
“It’s me. Ashok.”
Hannah had been dressed for some time. Confused feelings resulting from the evening with Ashok, mingled with doubts about the box of pearls, had nagged away enough to prevent a good night’s sleep. When she woke up, she suddenly thought, for the first time since Hyderabad, about the impending US publication of Fair Game. Hal had warned them that Bannerman would go down fighting. Had he made his move yet? Damn. It would be the middle of the night in England. Can’t really wake Duncan. Have to leave a message on his bloody answer-phone again. And this time I do want to talk to him. She dialed the number of his private phone, the one he kept locked in his garden room. She left the usual message. “Thursday—Chamundi Hotel, Bangalore. How’s Bannerman? I’ll ring again. Cheers.”
When Ashok arrived, she was sitting by the window, looking at the hotel garden and waiting for his telephone call. She unlocked the door and let him in.
“Sorry I didn’t call first. For some reason I felt uneasy and thought I’d better come straight here.”
“You must have a sixth sense,” she said and showed him the pearls.
Ashok tipped them out onto the table.
“No doubt about quality. These are excellent. Not cheap. At least fifty of them here. And that clasp—gold. Looks to me as if you’ve got an admirer. I’d like to be able to say I sent them, but I can’t.”
Hannah suppressed a tingle of pleasure. He was probably simply being polite.
“It’s the fact that they’re from Hyderabad that troubles me most,” she said.
“That’s not surprising. Hyderabad’s a center for pearls. Anyone wanting to buy pearls would be likely to end up with a Hyderabadi label. You realize that if it is him, it means you can’t have done him much damage when you tipped him from the top of the taxi.”
“I know. But why send me an expensive gift?”
“He’s obsessed with you, one way or other.”
Hannah shook her head. “Obsessed with hatred. I’m sure of that. It just doesn’t fit somehow.”
“Look—someone’s written something on back of that velvet.”
Together they scrutinized the scrap of writing.
“RIP. Oh my God! Rest in peace. I told you. He means to kill me.”
“Calm down. It probably doesn’t mean that at all. How about ‘rip’, as in ‘tear’?”
“That’s a bit far-fetched, isn’t it?”
“No more than your suggestion. Perhaps there’s something stuffed inside. Let’s see.”
He tore the backing off the velvet and examined it carefully.
“Just bits of foam rubber.”
Hannah suddenly gave a short laugh. “Look! R.I. Poonamchand. It’s just his initials. Someone wrote them on the back of the velvet. When it was delivered from the makers, presumably. So that it would end up at the right dealer.”
“What?” He gave a moan. “Well, I’ll be... Shows how easy it is to jump to conclusions.”
“Maybe, but it doesn’t alter the fact that he must have sent them. What the hell’s his game? If only there was some way of pre-empting him. I’m sick of being a victim. I want to go out and get him.”
“You know, I was thinking the same,” Ashok said. “We’ve got to turn the tables on this fellow, go on the offensive—smoke him out and come up with some evidence so we can get him arrested. I had a thought about your photography. Presumably you took some pictures at Golconda. Any chance that you snapped our burkha woman without realizing? Don’t know what it would tell us anyway, but maybe a clue is there. Or you may have caught that man on another picture. Anyway, it’s worth getting your pictures developed.”
Hannah groaned. “I did take some photos at Golconda. In fact, I took some everywhere. Only thing is—I left the camera at the Pandava, and the film’s still in it.” She shrugged. “Expect they’ve sold it by now—especially since I didn’t pay my bill.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure. Anyway, it’s worth giving them a ring. Got the number?” He went to pick up the receiver.
Hannah stopped him. “Ashok, there’s something you should know. Sit down.” She ran her fingers through her hair. “Oh, my God. How the hell am I going to break this to you?”
Ashok, clearly baffled, sat down on the chair by the window. Hannah stood, looking out at the waving palm trees, not daring to catch his eye.
“I haven’t been exactly honest with you. For a start, my name isn’t Rosen. That’s my mother’s maiden name. I didn’t want you to know my real name. You’ve called my bluff now—I couldn’t let you ring them and ask for Hannah Rosen’s belongings.”
“So you lied about your name. Is that such a big deal?”
“There’s another reason why I didn’t want you to know my name.”
“Go on.” The tension in his voice made Hannah’s confession all the more difficult.
“I’m not a professional photographer, not really. Except for the current assignment. Normally it’s just my hobby. I’m a writer.”
Ashok stared rigidly down at his feet.
“It wasn’t a coincidence that I sat next to you on the plane. I heard the check-in clerk call you by name. I wondered if… So I asked for that seat. I’m Hannah Petersen.”
The silence was unbearable. Ashok finally broke it.
“All along I think I knew.”
“Oh?”
“As soon as I saw you, something nagged at me. Perhaps it was your name. I shoved my suspicions to the back of my mind. Too much of a coincidence. Told myself there are hundreds of Hannahs. But I was sure I’d seen you before, just couldn’t, or perhaps didn’t want to, remember where. Now, of course, I realize it must have been the picture on the back cover of your book.”
She nodded, grimly. “A Small Life. I guessed you’d have read it.”
“Then you guessed wrong.” There was a sharp edge to his voice. “I’ve picked it up countless times but couldn’t bring myself to open.”
Another silence, charged with unspoken questions. This time Hannah broke it, in an attempt to lighten the atmosphere.
“I’m surprised the picture even rang a bell. I look so much older now. Not much wiser though, it seems.”
He got up and stood next to her. Together they stared, unseeing, at the garden, lost in individual memories of the person who had, unwittingly, drawn them together.
“No point in trying to avoid the
issue.” There was a catch in Ashok’s voice as he said the name. “Maighréad.”
“Yes, Maighréad.”
Now she turned and looked at him. “She really loved you, you know.”
He shook his head. “I couldn’t compete with you. It was you who saved her from that dreadful marriage, brought her to England, looked after her...”
“How much did she tell you? About me?” She had intended to stop there, but now she felt compelled to drive the confession to its bitter conclusion. “About...about us I mean.” She spoke quietly and averted her eyes from his face.
“Everything. She couldn’t let go of you. She had some crazy idea that she could hang on to both of us, that I’d understand. For a while I went along with it. But when it came to making a commitment, I just couldn’t accept that she was...that she was...”
“Go on, say it! Or does it disgust you too much?” Hannah’s words cut like broken glass on bare feet. “Say it! Bisexual. That’s the word you can’t say. Well, if she was bi, then so was I.”
“Was?”
“Am, was, I don’t know. What’s the difference? I’m a pervert, aren’t I? In your eyes anyway. You just made that very clear.” Hannah’s face was taut, her expression grim.
Ashok stood, drawn and silent, in shock.
“You’d better go.” Hannah turned her back on him and stood staring ahead at nothing.
Ashok made no move. She wheeled round again to face him.
“Go, go! Leave me alone. Just go!”
He turned and walked out of the room, shutting the door quietly behind him.
* * * *
The day he got back from New York, Duncan was jetlagged but determined to stay awake. He shook off Felicity’s attentions and went to the garden room, carefully undoing the three locks on the door that kept it secure. He couldn’t clear his head. Hannah-Felicity-Felicity-Hannah. They were both driving him mad. He sat down at his desk and shot a wistful glance at the picture on the wall—Hannah’s green eyes smiling up into his own. God, he’d adored her. Still did, if he was honest with himself. And, there was no getting away from it, the similarity between Hannah and Felicity was striking, but whereas Hannah had been created tenderly and naturally by a loving god, Felicity had been pieced together hurriedly by a robot, like a Barbie doll copy of the original. Dammit! Why, oh why had he blown it with Hannah? Why couldn’t it have lasted? It was his own fault, he knew. It was only after she’d left him and gone back to the cottage in Burfold that he forced himself to face the truth about the way he had treated her. He’d wanted to run her life personally as well as professionally. What a fool he’d been. Nobody ran Hannah.
But it had, until recently, worked out quite well with Felicity, hadn’t it? They had their difficulties, it was true. And then there was this fixation of hers with Hannah. Duncan would never quite understand that, but it wasn’t a problem. Quite the contrary. So what had gone wrong? Why couldn’t he get it out of his head that Felicity was seeing someone else?
Angrily he pushed the “Play” button on the answering machine. “You have three old and one new message,” it told him. “New message: Oh, hallo. It’s James here. Just phoning to say I’ve got something that might interest you. Can you give me a call? Friday the twentieth of December. Twelve-fifteen p.m. End of message.”
James was a literary agent and a good friend of Duncan’s. Manuscripts that he recommended were usually worthy of consideration. Duncan glanced at the clock on the computer monitor. Four o’clock on a Friday. Would James still be at work? Worth a try. He picked up the telephone to call him back. Then he replaced it slowly onto the base unit. Something was troubling him. Something about the message was not right. What did it mean—three old and one new message? He was sure he had cleared the machine after dealing with the last messages. Except for the two from Hannah—one to say she was in Hyderabad and one about going on to Madras. He left these on purpose. It was a good way to store them. He pressed “Play” again. This time it said, “You have four messages.” It repeated the two saved messages from Hannah. But before repeating the message from James, it said, “Message three: Thursday—Chamundi Hotel, Bangalore. How’s Bannerman? I’ll ring again. Cheers. Thursday the nineteenth of December. Two-fifteen a.m. End of message.”
Duncan sat back and rubbed his chin thoughtfully. He hadn’t heard the last message from Hannah before. The truth was forcing its way unpleasantly into his mind. Someone else had listened to Hannah’s message. There was no other explanation.
Duncan got up slowly, unlocked the door, and left the garden room, locking the door again carefully.
* * * *
When Ashok walked out, Hannah knew it was her own fault.
“Damn,” she said, as the door closed behind him, “damn, damn, damn!” Why had she made such a fool of herself, turned it into a drama, made it so obvious that she’d hoped for more than friendship from him? If she’d played it cool, he’d still be here. Now she’d scared him off. She hated herself for the weakness of her reaction, unable to accept that any man could affect her in this way, and yet she was unaccountably devastated at losing him.
Moments later the door opened.
“Hannah.” He sounded chastened but still shocked.
“Forgive me,” he said.
Hannah had her back to the door. She stiffened then remained rigid for a moment before wheeling round to confront him, her face still feeling flushed with confusion and anger.
“I’m so sorry,” he said.
Then they were in each other’s arms, doubts swept away by a greater truth than the sum of splintered fragments of reason; lost in a realm where desire and love lose definition in the urgency of their fulfillment, the barrier of human isolation is vanquished, something like peace quenches inner turmoil, and all seems to bear out the inevitability of destiny.
Afterwards they lay for a while, holding one another lightly in sated stillness. Hannah turned her head towards her lover. She smiled. “Let’s just stay here, forever.”
Ashok pressed her hand lightly. “Hide away, you mean? Opt out? Not you, Hannah. That’s not your way.”
“My way? Until yesterday, I was sure I’d lost my way. Now, suddenly, here with you, I seem to have come home.”
Ashok didn’t reply. For a moment she felt that he was slipping beyond her grasp. His eyes spoke of distant things about which she knew nothing.
She regretted her sally into romantic fantasy and tried to extricate herself. “You’re miles away. What is it?”
“Mm? Oh, just thinking about yesterday morning.”
“Oh?”
“Nothing, don’t worry.”
“For some reason I get the impression that I’m not the only one with secrets.”
Ashok kissed her gently on the forehead. “Nothing for you to be worrying about.”
“Hey. Stop patronizing me.”
“Do you know? I forgot you’re a celebrity. Presumably, I should be overcome with awe.”
“Of course you should. I thought you already were.”
“How did you guess? I’m trying not to show it.”
“Idiot!” She punched him on the arm. “I’m not that sort of celebrity. People have heard of me, but no one recognizes me on the street—not unless they happen to watch BBC Two or Channel Four in the early hours.”
“I’m usually either at hospital or asleep at that time. If I am up late, I’ll be listening to music or watching a film.”
“Can’t say I blame you. I wouldn’t watch me either. Still, you have to do these things if you want to sell your stuff. The critics watch, even if no one else does.”
“Suppose I’ll have to start reading your books now. Though personally, I don’t hold with the idea of career women.”
Hannah’s jaw dropped. She stared at him.
“No,” he continued. “In my opinion women are superior by nature to men, therefore it’s totally unfair for them to compete in the job market. So they should stick to the kitchen.”
Had
she heard him correctly? Surely he didn’t mean it? She raised herself up onto one arm. Her hair fell across her face. “You’re joking, of course?”
“Not at all. This is Indian logic.”
“But it’s outrageous. An educated man like you. How can you possibly believe such utter tr—?”
He was laughing at her. Trying to restrain himself, but his eyes said it all. Got you! “Relax. Don’t take everything so seriously. I’m surprised you’re so gullible.”
“I’m not gullible. Can’t afford to be. You did sound pretty convincing.”
“Sorry. Can’t help teasing people when they lay themselves open to it.”
“Well, you certainly know how to go for the jugular.”
“Didn’t take a fantastic IQ to figure out that’d get you going.”
She changed the subject. “So you’re not going to tell me?”
“What?”
“Your secret.”
He smiled awkwardly but said nothing.
Hannah looked at him steadily. “Oh what a tangled web we weave.”
“When first we practice…” He stopped abruptly.
“To deceive?”
He sat up. “Don’t be silly.” But he avoided her eyes as he said it.
That’s right, Hannah told herself. Don’t be silly. What’s it got to do with me anyway? Ridiculous to be possessive about a man I’ve only just met. Making a fool of myself again. Pull yourself together, girl! She forced a cheerful grin. “You showering first, or am I?”
He looked at her, smiling easily now. The hint of a raised eyebrow was the only answer needed. He got up and reached for her hand.
Later, she dried the glistening drops of water off his back and felt intoxicated. She had stepped out of the dry world of journalism into realms that she had, until now, taken to belong in the rich imagination of poets and storytellers. She sighed. Ashok turned and stroked her cheek with the back of his hand.
“Now who’s miles away?”
“Just thinking about this crazy never-never land. A mythical land of a million gods, where dreams come true. Even ones you haven’t dreamt yet.”