Loose Ends

by Susan Moody

  There was a pit of dread in Magnus’s stomach as he looked down at Kate. If she died . . . if she was dying . . .

  Years ago, his closest friend through school and university had contracted an aggressive cancer. John had fought hard, had gone the whole alternative medicine route, coffee enemas, acupuncture, raw carrot juice, positive thinking, but in the end, it hadn’t delayed the inevitable. Magnus had gone many times to sit beside him during the final stages, watching the flesh disappear from John’s face, the bones of nose and cheekbone, the brow, begin to jut, and his eyes grow ever more opaque. Don’t die on my watch, he used to think, each time he took his seat at the bedside. Please, John, I don’t want to see you dead, I don’t want to realize that the days we enjoyed together as boys, as students, are finally over, the plans you had for your marvellous future are gone for ever. Watching the dying man, holding his hand, a gesture he would never have contemplated had there been anything of their shared normal lives left, he had marvelled at the sense that all there had ever been of John now lay crammed inside the walls of his skull, all the feelings and experiences, the joy and the disappointments, the times he had sniffed a flower or downed a pint, the taste of food on his tongue, the feel of wind against his cheek, all fined down to this body, still physically alive but in most real meanings of the word, already absent.

  Was that going to happen with Katie? With the others gone, it rendered her stillness even more poignant. He sank down on to the chair beside her bed, trying to hold back tears (‘Big boys don’t cry,’ his father used to say, and he’d always wanted to tell him he was wrong and that big boys did indeed sometimes cry). With Kate’s hand in his, he sat in silence for many minutes, until she began to stir.

  ‘Kate,’ he whispered. ‘Are you awake?’

  ‘Magnus . . .’ Kate was peering at him through the slits of her eyes.

  ‘Kate, oh Kate.’

  ‘Are you real?’

  ‘Yes.’ Lightly he laid his hand on one of her bandaged arms. ‘Of course I am.’

  ‘Dad . . . Annie . . .’

  Magnus couldn’t speak. He wasn’t sure if she was supposed to know that she was the only one who had survived the car crash, that the rest were dead.

  ‘They’re dead, aren’t they?’

  He nodded, not sure if she could see him or not.

  ‘I saw . . . fire. Someone was . . . screaming.’

  Magnus gulped. Oh Christ . . . ‘Don’t think about it, Katie.’

  ‘I can’t remember much. Luisa, some men . . . I just can’t remember . . .’ Kate turned her head and tears welled from her swollen eyes. She breathed through her mouth, making small snoring sounds, and Magnus realized she had fallen back to sleep.

  Señor Gonzalez appeared after a while, and after another nightmare journey of dangerous driving and foul-mouthed imprecation, dropped him back at his father’s flat in the middle of the city, saying that he would return later and take him home for dinner with his wife and children.

  ‘So,’ Gonzalez said the next day, looking up from the papers in front of him. ‘I think that is all pretty clear, is it not?’

  ‘Thank you,’ Magnus said. There had been a lot of legalistic jargon, but in view of the deaths of Luisa and Annie, the bottom line was that his father’s surprisingly large estate would be divided between himself and Kate. He felt utterly helpless. He wanted to tell Gonzalez that he didn’t want the money, he wanted his father back. He wanted to explain that he had in fact barely known his father, that he had been sent to boarding school at the age of ten, that until he left school, he had spent his summers in Quito – or at the research institute on Santa Cruz, where both his father and Luisa had worked when they were not at the university – but had always hoped there would be a time when he and his father would become friends, rather than maintaining the distant relationship that so much time spent apart had engendered. And now he had been cheated of the opportunity and it could never happen. In the absence of anyone else, he longed to throw himself on Señor Gonzalez’s navy-blue double-breasted bosom and howl aloud his sense of loss and isolation.

  Instead, he had listened in silence to the terms of his father’s Will, not really concentrating, too distressed to take much in. It was not until later that he would really absorb the facts and find his brain already busy wondering how best to deal with the money, not just for himself but for his sister too. As he flew home with Kate at his side, purple-cheeked and shaven-browed, he had a Pre-Raphaelite image of himself sitting on the sofa at home with his sister in some sort of flowing white gown seated upon a footstool at his feet, her thick red hair spread across his knee (never mind that she was a blonde) while he gently but firmly advised her as to stocks and shares and prudent investments – though he dimly recognized that if this unlikely scenario was to have any chance of success, not only would he have to do some intensive and uncongenial homework in order to be in a position to advise anyone on such arcane matters but he would also have to purchase a footstool. As for Kate agreeing to sit at his feet . . . He sighed.

  ‘Is there anything else, Dottore?’

  Magnus fidgeted in his chair. ‘I know it sounds a little ridiculous, in the light of the accident and so on, but do you know what happened to Anna-Margarita’s – my little sister’s – cockatiel? He was called Brixton—’

  ‘A bird?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  Gonzalez raised groomed eyebrows which perfectly indicated that anyone who could wonder about a caged bird at this time of grief and horror must be singularly lacking in all human emotion. Had he pursued it, Magnus would have pointed out that the brain tends to dissociate from reality when faced with grief and horror, not that the whereabouts of a cockatiel could be classed as either, but the lawyer merely nodded. ‘We can ask the landlord,’ he said after a pause during which Magnus tried not to feel unfeeling. ‘There was also a cat, I believe.’

  ‘Was there?’

  ‘Cuddles?’

  For a wild, and mercifully brief, moment, Magnus thought that Gonzalez was making some kind of homoerotic move on him – it was the interrogative lift at the end of the word which had caused the confusion – until he realized that this must be the name of the cat, a sobriquet almost certainly bestowed upon the unknown animal by Annie. His eyes watered again as he pictured her hugging a tiny kitten to her chest, nuzzling her chin on its soft head, pulling a length of string along the floor for it to dart after . . .

  ‘The landlord will have removed these animals and taken them to a shelter of some kind, of this I am positive,’ Gonzalez assured him.

  ‘Good, good . . .’ Was a cockatiel an animal, Magnus wondered, or, for that matter, were birds animals? Of the animal kingdom, definitely, but surely separate and distinct. ‘What about my stepmother’s family?’

  ‘I have of course contacted them.’

  ‘She was Catholic, I believe, but in any case, presumably they will wish to make their own funeral arrangements.’

  Gonzalez smiled briefly. ‘It is already arranged.’

  ‘This is my colleague, Señor Carlos de Leon,’ Gonzalez said, two days later. He indicated a sallow man in his late thirties, who sat sideways on to his desk, holding a briefcase on his knee. Magnus nodded.

  ‘Señor Carlos is the landlord of the flat where your parents lived,’ Gonzalez said, his eyes skittering about the room.

  ‘I see.’ There was a fan high up on one wall, which turned at a brisk rate, sending gusts of stifling air across Magnus’s face and lifting his hair every few seconds.

  ‘Papers,’ Señor Carlos said. He patted the leather envelope he held. ‘There are papers to sign. The rent is paid up until the end of next month, so if everything is in order, I shall reimburse this money to the estate of your late father. Meanwhile, I shall come to the apartment to check on the extent of the damage.’ He spoke as if no-one was going to put anything over on him, he was fully cognisant of the ways of tenants, particularly English ones, as well as the fact that Professor James Lennox
was in the habit of taking a sledgehammer to the walls, or carving four-letter words into the kitchen counters, though Magnus himself had seen nothing untoward in the flat beyond some worn-looking paint, scratches here and there on the woodwork, or cracked tiles in one of the bathrooms, which had probably been there since the apartment block was built.

  ‘That’s fine,’ said Magnus. ‘When would you like to come?’

  ‘You do not have to be present, Señor Lennox. I can go in and out quite quickly. I imagine you are very occupied so there is no need for you to disturb your present arrangements.’

  ‘I have none,’ Magnus said. ‘Besides, I think I should be there, don’t you? In case anything goes missing – not,’ he added hastily, in case the other man took offence, ‘that I imagine it would, but I know my father would prefer me to be there.’ Seeing the look of annoyance on Señor Carlos’s face, he added feebly, ‘My father’s papers . . . journals . . .’ Nervously he smoothed down his fan-ruffled hair.

  ‘Very well, I shall be there at three o’clock this afternoon, if that is satisfactory.’

  ‘Fine.’

  ‘Though I repeat that it is not necessary for you to attend.’

  The man’s obvious desire for Magnus not to be present when he came to inspect the flat made Magnus all the more determined to be there. Señor Carlos might be a colleague of Señor Gonzalez (was he a lawyer? Or did the law firm have associated companies of estate agents and the like?) but that did not make him automatically above suspicion. He needed to make absolutely sure that nothing went missing – Luisa’s jewellery, his father’s computer, paintings or artefacts that might have some worth – though the words ‘stable doors’ and ‘bolted’ went through his mind. Señor Carlos had already had several days to search the apartment for anything he might want. If Magnus were to mention something was missing, he had only to shrug, talk about the crime rate, the ease with which burglars got in and out, and there would be nothing Magnus could do.

  He addressed Gonzalez. ‘I shall need the name of a firm of shippers,’ he said, ‘to get the important stuff back to England. And also the local equivalent of Oxfam, or the Red Cross – some charity that could make use of items which are no longer . . . viable.’ It seemed an odd word but he couldn’t think of any better way to put it. Annie’s soft toys, for instance – her bedroom was full of them. She’d been so cute: big dark eyes like her mother’s, glossy black hair, skin as smooth as coffee ice-cream. He touched a finger to his wet cheek; it was almost impossible to take in the fact that she was no longer around.

  Kate

  Six

  Four more shifts and then she was out of here. Kate transferred her weight from one tired foot to the other, kept an eye on the punters, chatted with the people standing at the bar. Four more shifts – two double shifts, to be precise – and then she was taking a few days off before starting at TaylorMade Travel, though increasingly she wondered why she’d taken the job. It was hardly a career, and had few prospects, apart from the prospect of cheapish travel.

  The door of the wine bar was pushed open and in strutted Stefan Michaels, with two men in tow, one about the same age as he was, a brother, by the look of him, the other old enough to be their father. Which he probably was, Kate thought, since there was a definite family likeness. The father was tall, distinguished, olive-skinned, his grey hair styled en brosse. There was something teasingly familiar about him. The brother looked much the same, only younger, while Stefan was of a smaller build and, despite a certain gym-primed muscularity, not as . . . masculine was the only word she could come up with, less a man who spent Saturday afternoons playing football and more the sort who enjoyed cataloguing his string collection.

  She turned away and busied herself with clean glasses. Only four more shifts to go – and tonight she’d get Rachel to serve their table if they wanted anything more than a drink.

  ‘Hello, there!’ Stefan’s voice was warm, genial, and she turned with a little sinking of the heart. At the sight of his complacent expression, she felt again a swell of aversion. The father – if that’s what he was – had gone to find a table, and since Rachel was busy further down the bar, she had no choice but to take his order herself.

  ‘Good evening,’ she said, not meeting his eyes. ‘What’ll it be?’

  ‘Don’t you remember, Kate?’ He spoke in a possessive sort of way, as though he and Kate were not only old friends, but intimate ones, which made her want to push her face into his and demand that he stop using her name in that overfamiliar way, leave her the hell alone.

  ‘Remember what?’

  ‘My usual order.’

  ‘I’m afraid not. Far too many people come through here for me to keep tabs on everyone’s “usual”.’

  The man beside Stefan nudged him, snickering slightly.

  ‘We’ll have something different tonight: a bottle of your best champagne.’ Stefan sounded annoyed. ‘My brother here is celebrating some good fortune, and we must drink to his health.’

  ‘Congratulations.’ Kate handed him a paddle with the number eighteen on it. ‘Sit down and someone will bring your champagne over to your table.’

  ‘Not someone,’ Stefan said. He leaned across the polished mahogany of the bar. ‘You.’ He’d swapped his gold ear-stud for a diamond one, and was wearing two gold chains around his neck. There was a ring on the fourth finger of his right hand, big and ornate, like an American class ring.

  Dressed for success, Kate thought. What a little ponce. ‘I don’t serve Table Eighteen, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Then give us another table, one which you do serve.’

  Kate could see Fredo watching the exchange. He raised his eyebrows at her, asking if she needed help, and she shook her head, indicating that she could handle it. She reached under the bar counter and brought out another paddle, number six. ‘I’ll be right over,’ she said reluctantly.

  She took her time finding a silver bucket, ice, flutes. She placed them on a tray and took the bottle over to Table Six, where she deftly removed the cork from the bottle and poured three glasses. ‘There you are,’ she said and turned.

  Stefan seized her arm. ‘You must bring another glass, Kate, and join in our toast.’

  Must? ‘I don’t like champagne,’ she said.

  ‘Oh, but we would really appreciate it if you would.’ It was the father. He smiled at Kate, his expression courteous. ‘Stefano has told us so much about you.’

  Stefano, eh? She raised her eyebrows. ‘That’s surprising, since he doesn’t know anything about me.’ She avoided looking at Stefan.

  ‘I believe he knows enough.’ The father had a pleasant voice and seemed altogether different from his son. ‘Please join us in a toast. Tonight of all nights.’

  (‘Be sweet, Kate . . .’) ‘Some good fortune, I understand.’

  ‘Indeed so. My clever son Silvio has finally pulled off a deal he’s been working on for some weeks.’ The man put an arm round the other man. ‘We are pleased for him.’

  ‘I see. Well, congratulations, and thank you for the offer, but unfortunately, we’re not allowed to drink while we’re on duty.’ Smiling, Kate looked at Stefan. ‘And you’re the not-so-clever son, are you?’ It was no more than a teasing remark, and one she wished un-said immediately, alarmed by the way his face darkened, especially when his father and brother broke into appreciative laughter.

  ‘Is that what you think of me?’ he demanded.

  Only two more double shifts . . . ‘Actually, I don’t think of you at all,’ she said, with a smile. ‘Why should I?’ If that didn’t give him the message that she was, like, sooo uninterested . . . He moved his arm and she tensed, almost expecting him to strike her.

  The father looked from one to the other with an amused smile. ‘That is a shame, Kate,’ he said. ‘I understood from my . . . um . . . not-so-clever son that you and he—’

  ‘Look, it was just a light-hearted comment,’ Kate said. ‘For all I know, your son could be a . . . a brain surgeon or someth
ing.’

  ‘Brain surgeon, that’s a good one!’ Father and brother laughed easily at the thought. ‘I assure you he is not,’ the brother – Silvio – said. ‘But that’s not the point. I believe he was going to ask if you would have dinner with him, one of these evenings.’

  Kate stared at him. How in the world had this situation escalated to the point that some semi-stranger like this Stefan felt he had a right to discuss asking her out for dinner with his bloody family? What had he been saying about her, what had he implied? And how should she handle it? With humour, she decided. Treating it as a joke was the best approach. She lifted the champagne bottle and refilled their glasses. ‘Oh,’ she said, cucumber-cool, ‘I’m afraid I’ll be washing my hair.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Whenever. Besides, you couldn’t afford me!’

  The father and Silvio laughed again, while Stefan half-rose. His expression was grim. ‘I am not poor,’ he said quietly. ‘I offer to take you to the most expensive restaurant in London. Or I fly you to Paris, to the Tour d’Argent. To New York, or Rome or—’

  ‘Steady,’ Kate said, holding up her hand to stop him. ‘It’s very kind of you and I’m very flattered, but I’m afraid I have to refuse. My boyfriend would be most annoyed if I started flying off to New York to have dinner with some strange man.’

  ‘Boyfriend?’ The father looked at his son. ‘Stefano, I thought you said you and she were—’

  ‘She doesn’t have a boyfriend,’ Stefan said.

  How did he know that? Looking at his expression, Kate felt a frisson of something close to fear. Perhaps she’d taken the wrong tack, handled the situation in the worst possible way. Perhaps the family was Sicilian and she’d violated some code of honour which could only end in vendetta, generations of Stefan’s family coming after generations of hers in order to avenge the insult she’d offered him.