Butterfly on the Storm

by Walter Lucius

  Her heart stopped for a moment when the Touareg’s lights appeared again in her mirror. She pressed down hard on the accelerator again and suddenly realized she was entering the Amsterdamse Bos. She raced along a narrow tarmac road beside a wide ditch.

  When, after several sharp turns, she saw a dark lane to her right, she quickly turned off the main road. After a hundred metres she braked and turned off the engine and headlights. Holding her breath, she watched in her rear-view mirror as the Touareg sped past at full speed.

  She waited until she’d calmed down; grabbed the wheel to steady her hands. She was shivering, as if it was suddenly a few degrees colder. In the distance she heard the dull thud of an approaching thunderstorm.

  She started the car again. Cautiously and without lights she backed up on to the tarmac road. Just before she turned, the Touareg reappeared out of nowhere from the other direction. Her right hand gripped the gearstick and she stamped on the accelerator. The speedometer read eighty when she realized she was going to hit the row of trees at the end of the road like a brick wall. She turned the wheel so quickly that the Fiat flipped over twice and then came to a halt standing on its wheels again.

  Smoke. Hissing. Torn metal. The dust from the exploding airbag filled her nose and mouth. The unmistakable smell of leaking gasoline. The bittersweet taste of blood gushing from a wound on her forehead. Impending nausea. She pushed the door open, rolled out on to her hands and knees, and sat up. She somehow managed to stand and stumbled into the woods. Bright flashes of lightning distorted her vision. Trees suddenly reached diagonally into the sky. Branches were arms that wanted to grab her. Tree roots turned into traps.

  She recognized the airport’s runway marker lamps in the distance and convinced herself that it was the finish line of this sinister chase. She would shake him off. The lights would save her life. She was home free.

  She ran right into him.

  As if he’d been waiting for her all along.

  27

  Farah loved the smell of old leather that greeted her every time she opened the door of her Porsche Carrera. She relished the deep throbbing of the air-cooled engine whenever she accelerated and the intimation of power as she felt the tyres grip the tarmac. Like no other, she understood why people went for a drive when they had something on their mind. The more she let her classic muscle machine rip, the clearer things became in her head.

  She sped over the ring road with the sole aim of driving as long and as fast as it took to get some sort of handle on the meeting with Valentin Lavrov. What intrigued her most, strangely enough, was how the statue of the river goddess had ended up in Lavrov’s office among all those modern monstrosities, and so prominently displayed too. Lavrov had done his homework on Farah. But since he couldn’t have possibly known about her emotional bond with the figurine, it had to be a coincidence. That said, there were three things Farah didn’t believe in. Marriage, heaven and coincidence.

  Had she disclosed something she shouldn’t have with her question about the Bentley? And what about the way Lavrov looked at her after she mentioned his resemblance to former commander Michailov? She could drive for days, but this time the answers wouldn’t just present themselves. She’d have to go to Moscow. She’d have to capitalize on the position of trust which she appeared to have acquired this afternoon.

  With her speedometer now indicating 150 kilometres per hour, she felt the urge to call David. She usually phoned him when she’d experienced something remarkable or she was worked up about something. David was an excellent listener and great at dispensing constructive advice. But she didn’t miss him just for that. The thought that an intense six months together had simply evaporated, just because of a single slip-up, was unbearable.

  Fifteen minutes later she drove up the driveway of the house by the pond. The front door swung open and the sight of David standing there, laidback as ever while he waited for her, made her feel both warm and guilty. It would take quite a few awkward words, lots of evasive answers before their first tentative touch. But eventually they’d hug and she’d push him up the stairs to the bedroom.

  That course of events seemed unlikely when she got closer. The look in his eyes suggested that his antagonism had only increased. It had been encapsulated, that was all, the way burning hot uranium is contained by a shield of reinforced concrete.

  ‘Come in,’ he said without touching her. ‘I want to show you something.’

  She followed him inside. In passing she spotted a few boxes in the hallway. On the table inside lay today’s copy of De Nederlander. David picked it up and opened it to the page that featured paparazzo Eric Sanders’ most recent shots. A photo picturing her beside Parwaiz’s grave was accompanied by the screaming headline: FARAH H. SINGS ISLAMIC BATTLE HYMN AT FUNERAL. Another photo, which showed her kissing Joshua on his canal boat, was captioned with words that left a bad taste in her mouth. In her leisure time Farah H. does not adhere to the letter of Islamic law. Dressed only in a T-shirt, she spends her mornings on the canal boat of a handsome detective for whom she recently left well-known documentary filmmaker David van Rhijn.

  ‘How long has this been going on?’ David asked.

  ‘This hate campaign? A couple of days.’

  ‘No, Farah, I mean this!’ David practically stabbed his finger through the photo of the canal boat flirtation. ‘How long has this been going on? You sneaking around with this detective?’

  ‘Do you actually believe what it says?’

  ‘So it didn’t happen? This was Photoshopped?’

  ‘It happened once.’

  ‘And this one time was captured by a photographer?’

  His suppressed anger flared up.

  ‘Why didn’t you want me to come to the funeral?’ he asked unexpectedly.

  ‘After what happened last night?’

  ‘I’ve got a good headline for what happened last night,’ he hissed. ‘Woman owns up to persistent cheating, man gets angry, woman runs off to cry on new boyfriend’s shoulder.’

  ‘That’s not what happened and you know it. Allow me some dignity.’

  ‘And what do you allow me?’ He brandished the newspaper. His ultimate piece of evidence.

  ‘It’s simple, David. Either you believe these lies, or you believe me.’

  ‘It’s that simple, is it?’

  ‘It’s that simple, yes.’

  ‘As simple as putting stuff in boxes,’ he said without any emotion. ‘They’re in the hallway. Take them and get lost.’

  All of a sudden she felt pity for the man opposite her. But it wasn’t the sort of pity that included compassion. It amazed her just how badly she’d misjudged this man. Warm-hearted, intelligent and funny, he now seemed adrift in his hostility and was desperately digging in his heels.

  She walked back to the hallway and quickly glanced in the boxes. They were filled with her jeans, trainers, knickers, bras, T-shirts, make-up and books. She hesitated briefly before picking up the first box and carrying it to the Carrera. Perhaps it really is that simple, she thought as she walked back and forth. The end of a relationship made tangible by a handful of boxes. Just like the end of a life is sealed in a coffin.

  28

  As the KLM Boeing 747 from Johannesburg touched down on the Buitenveldert runway at Schiphol Airport, Paul was busy blowing into the paper bag Sandrine had handed him. Twenty minutes later, they faced each other again beside the luggage carrousel. She had her suitcase, he was still empty-handed.

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘You’re welcome,’ Sandrine said. ‘All the best, Paul.’

  He tried to smile, but it made him feel like a second-rate actor in a low-budget film. She rubbed his shoulder and kissed him on the cheek.

  As soon as she disappeared behind the frosted glass windows of the arrivals hall, he felt a pang of loneliness. He picked up his bag and shuffled through the doors past the customs official, who looked straight through him. He was back in the Netherlands. Home. But it didn’t feel like it. In the
huge hall, he watched the anticipating faces of the people waiting.

  As a boy he’d stood here with his mother, waiting for his father, who’d travelled to Cambodia a month earlier. Every morning for weeks, he’d lit a tea light in front of the wooden statuette of a small Thai angel with outstretched hand. Then he and his mother had breakfast together, and every morning she promised to come and pick him up from school the minute she received word of Dad’s homecoming. As the days went by, he noticed his teachers were watching him with ever greater concern while the other kids at school were doing their best to be nicer to him than usual. During the weekly football game, his team mates were clearly making a point of passing him the ball and putting him in a position to score. In the weeks that his father was missing, Paul became top scorer of his team.

  On a Wednesday afternoon, when he was not at school, a car pulled up outside. A black Chevrolet with a CD licence plate. Corps Diplomatique. A uniformed driver got out and opened the rear door for a tall man with glasses wearing a dark suit. The man stared impassively at the farm while a young woman carrying a large bag got out of the other side of the car. Together they walked to the front door.

  His mother opened it without uttering a word and was equally reticent throughout the man’s faltering monologue. Every now and then he took his glasses off to clean them, which Paul understood to be a ploy to give his mother time to process the news.

  Human remains had been found. Somewhere in an isolated location north of the Cambodian capital Phnom Penh. It had been virtually impossible to identify the body, but perhaps Mrs Chapelle might recognize a few items of clothing, a shoulder bag, a writing pad with notes? His mother had nodded quietly. Her subsequent question had sounded chilling.

  ‘When is he coming back?’

  The man put his glasses back on. ‘This evening.’

  For the first time in his life Paul saw a lead-lined coffin. His mother broke down completely when they were told the coffin couldn’t be opened.

  ‘Please bear in mind, Mrs Chapelle, that your husband was dead for some time before the body was found … You’re better off remembering him the way he was when you last saw him.’

  Paul placed his hand on his heart and then reached for the cold lid of the coffin, hoping to bring his father back to life in this way. But whether it was his mother’s sobbing, the soldiers’ pitying looks or his lack of conviction, nothing happened. No tingling sensation. No resurrection. Only a crushing emptiness.

  Whenever he was at Schiphol, these memories came rushing back. In places where people bid each other farewell for longer or shorter periods of time, or fell into one another’s arms again, he could only think of his father, the man he’d never been able to say goodbye to.

  Then he heard his name being called.

  29

  Dimitri remembered the name he’d given the goose he once caught as a little boy: Snegurochka, the Snow Maiden. She put up a fight and threatened to bite, hissing frightfully all the while. But as soon as he had a firm hold on her, with one hand around her neck and the other around both her legs, the creature appeared to freeze.

  He knew it was an instinctive reaction, the brain transmitting to all muscle groups that escape from this grip was impossible. It would be better to remain in a state of wakeful, feigned sleep and wait for that split-second weakening of the grip that might offer the chance of fighting back.

  It was just like this with the woman he’d seen crawling out of her spinning car and staggering into the forest. By drawing an imaginary line, he made an outflanking manoeuvre. He’d done so very calmly, paying close attention to the tree stumps and roots that might trip you up when you walked too fast, like she did. When he heard her approach, he waited, very quietly, for the moment she’d be really close. And then she bumped into him. As if he was a walking magnet.

  Now, as he carried her out of the woods, she lay outwardly submissive in his arms. And although deep down in her subconscious she must have realized escape was impossible at this point, he knew that if his grip weakened for just a second, every last instinct, muscle and organ in her body would rally to force an escape.

  He put her down on the bonnet of the Touareg and touched her head wound. She began to groan softly. She opened her eyes and gave him a distant look. He smiled at her as he unbuttoned her blouse, and lapped up the trickle of blood that oozed out of her head wound, down her chin and over her right breast.

  She whispered something. He couldn’t understand her. She was whispering in her own language. She was a stranger and yet she felt familiar. Then she switched to English. He caught the word ‘boy’. It sounded loving, as if she was trying to reassure him. He leant over and licked and bit her nipples which stiffened while she sobbed and carried on whispering in English. He picked up ‘please’ and realized she was surrendering. He felt the fear of the goose which was about to die as he yanked off her knickers under her skirt.

  Her body tensed as if some electrical pulse shot through it when he thrust inside her. He tried to control himself and moved his pelvis in a measured way. With each thrust he heard her body underneath him banging dully against the metal bonnet. He was aware of her flailing arms and pressed his face against her breasts.

  The moment he came inside her he stood up straight, in glorious ecstasy. At that same moment he heard the shot from his Zastava and felt the pain flare up in his right shoulder. He was flung off her as though hit by lightning, and as he fell to the ground bleeding he saw her dark silhouette merging with the black of the Touareg.

  30

  The last time Edward had seen his nephew cry was at Raylan’s funeral. He remembered standing beside Isobel and holding her. But Isobel had been in a different world. One in which she was trying to swim against the current of time in the hope of somehow reviving the love of her life. Little Paul had joined them and taken his mother’s hand. And so, locked in grief and longing, the three of them had slowly turned to stone.

  Edward thought back to when he and Isobel and a seven-year-old Paul had waved goodbye to Raylan at Schiphol on his way to Cambodia thirty years ago. He wondered whether his brother-in-law had known deep down what fate awaited him when he went through Security and, contrary to habit, turned around and stood for ages, without calling out, without waving, like a living statue, as if he wanted to take one last look before turning away and disappearing for ever.

  Paul looked just as lost among the crowd in Schiphol’s arrivals hall, Edward noticed, as his father in the departure lounge all those years ago. The same drawn features in a face that remained attractive despite stress and fatigue, despite being unshaven and sallow. Like father, like son.

  He strode up to Paul, threw both arms around him and pressed him close. Paul extricated himself from the embrace with some difficulty and wiped his tears on his sleeve.

  ‘Haven’t you got something better to do than to reduce a man who’s just flown for twelve hours to tears?’

  ‘If I’d known you’d become such a softie, I’d have had a ball pit installed for you here. Looks good, the bandaging. And the stitches. What happened?’

  ‘Later, Ed.’

  ‘Is that all you’ve brought?’ Edward pointed to Paul’s small suitcase.

  ‘I’m here too. And I come with lots of baggage.’

  31

  From the moment he laid her over the bonnet of the Touareg, Danielle could no longer think, no longer react. All she could do was accept what was coming. She was in a kind of sleep state where she could only whisper – beg for mercy. When he entered her with his hard, muscular body, she weakly tried pushing him away with her arms.

  How she did it, she no longer knew, but all of a sudden she felt the metal in his coat pocket and she clasped her hand around it. She had gathered all the strength she could muster and shot at the grunting silhouette hanging over her. The impact threw him off of her, and she slid off the bonnet. The gun fell out of her hands.

  Reeling with dizziness, she staggered into the woods. She couldn’t remember
the number of times she’d almost collapsed. It didn’t matter. She had to disappear among the trees. Low hanging branches whipped against her face, but she tried to stay on her feet and to keep going; Just keep going, she thought, hoping against her better judgement that somewhere a kind of salvation lay ahead.

  Until she suddenly saw all the trees in front of her falling and realized that she was the one taking the fall.

  32

  A large video screen in Schiphol’s arrivals hall was showing a live broadcast of The Headlines Show. Paul saw footage of a young and attractive Middle Eastern woman wearing a black headscarf and standing beside a grave.

  ‘Oh no,’ Edward sighed next to him. ‘This can’t be true. Dear God, tell me this isn’t happening …’ Meanwhile, the voice of the presenter with the cherry-red mouth echoed through the arrivals hall.

  ‘This is a side to Farah H. we haven’t seen before,’ she crowed triumphantly. ‘Here she is at a funeral, singing an Islamic battle hymn.’

  ‘Your new colleague,’ Edward said dully. He nodded at the screen.

  ‘Who? That twat with the cleavage?’

  ‘No. Her.’ Edward pointed to the screen. Paul realized it was the same woman from the funeral, except this time she was on the deck of a houseboat, dressed in only a T-shirt and kissing a man who clearly had his hand between her legs.

  ‘Jesus on a stick,’ Edward muttered. ‘I didn’t realize it was this type of photo.’

  ‘What’s this all about?’ Paul asked.

  The presenter reappeared on screen. ‘But in her leisure time, Farah H. tends to flout Islamic law. Here she is in a different capacity, that of a man-eater.’

  ‘This is about Farah,’ Edward clarified. ‘They’re throwing mud at her. Don’t ask me why. I was at the funeral this morning. Just about everybody was in tears while she sang that song. What times are we living in, for God’s sake?’