In Her Shadow

by Douglas, Louise

  ‘It’s not far. Magdeburg is still a big place, though.’

  ‘I know. But they – Ellen’s family – lived in a grand house overlooking the river. It was called Schloss Marien. I’m sure it can’t be that hard to find. I’d just like to see it. We’re so close …’

  ‘It would be a shame not to,’ John agreed. ‘How are you going to get there?’

  ‘I don’t know. I haven’t worked that out yet.’

  John ate a pretzel from a little glass bowl on top of the bar and checked his watch.

  ‘My laptop’s in my room. We could look the Schloss up when we get back, see if there’s a bus or something.’

  ‘That’d be brilliant.’

  John’s phone beeped then. He took it out of his pocket, looked at the screen, and smiled. He turned the phone towards me. Charlotte had sent a photograph of their two little daughters in their pyjamas, waving into the screen. The message was: Night night Daddy.

  ‘Sweet,’ I said.

  ‘Sorry.’ John put the phone back in his pocket. ‘Before I had kids of my own I couldn’t stand people who were always going on about theirs. Charlotte knew I’d be thinking about them.’

  ‘They’re pretty girls,’ I said, but there was a feeling like lead in my stomach.

  We finished our drinks and went outside to find a taxi to take us to the Haus der Kulturen der Welt. The street was still busy. There were two lanes of traffic travelling in each direction, buses, cars and taxis mostly, their engines making a thunderous noise, and horns sounding every now and then. The air retained the day’s warmth but I held the cardigan tight over my shoulders and felt self-conscious in my make-up and heels. The heads of people in the passing cars were turning to stare at John and me in our formal clothes. John kept stepping out into the road, trying to hail a taxi. They were all busy and rushed by in a wind of exhaust fumes.

  I looked down at my feet, which seemed oddly naked in the strappy little shoes. I remembered how I used to sit on Ellen’s bed, leaning back on my hands, while Ellen held my foot on her lap and glossed the nails for me, how Ellen’s dark hair fell down over her face, how she tucked it behind her ears. I remembered Ellen’s gentleness, her crossed legs, her concentration as she slowly painted a line down each nail, the chill of the brush on each of my toes in turn and the sweet, chemical smell of the polish. I felt a shiver of sorrow.

  I looked up, across the busy street, and I saw her.

  For the third time in as many weeks, I saw Ellen.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  DAD CAME INTO the kitchen and said, ‘The Brechts are back. Just saw Ellen getting out of a cab.’

  I put down the pasty I was eating and looked up at him.

  ‘Ellen’s back?’

  ‘Yep.’

  ‘Is her father there?’

  ‘He stayed in the taxi.’

  I ignored Trixie’s hopeful face, put on my trainers, grabbed my bike and cycled up the lane to Thornfield House. The flowers that had bloomed in the garden while the Brechts were away were still attached to their stems. Ellen’s bedroom window was open, and Nirvana was blasting out. It was the first time I had ever heard any music that was not classical or piano coming from the house. I dropped the bike on the drive, scooped up a handful of gravel and threw it at the window. Ellen’s head appeared. She waved, disappeared, and emerged seconds later through the front door, throwing herself at me. We swung round together, hugging and kissing. We were both laughing. I was genuinely happy to see her, from the bottom of my heart. I felt as if I had come home, as much as she.

  As we embraced, I remembered how Ellen was, the solidity of her and the fresh apple smell of her, the slipperiness of her hair against my cheek. My love for her was pure, for once untainted by jealousy and resentment. And relief rushed through my veins, because she was fine, Ellen seemed perfectly fine. I hadn’t seen her looking so happy and healthy and untroubled for years – not since before her mother died. Nothing terrible had happened to her; she had not been hurt, she was going to be all right. I was thinking, This is the beginning of the future. Everything will be good from now on. And at exactly the same moment as I thought those things, a rush of fear hurtled through my bloodstream, finding every tiny capillary, tingling my fingertips, making my hair stand on end. It was a premonition, like the three sea gulls overhead, but of what, I did not know.

  ‘Is your father out? Are you on your own?’ I asked, stepping back and looping my arm through Ellen’s. ‘Are things better? Are you really OK?’

  Ellen was still smiling. She shook her head to toss her hair back over her shoulders. It was longer than it had been the last time I saw her, and glossier. She was wearing a jade bracelet and new clothes, a short skirt and a cotton shirt with a vest underneath. Her skin looked healthier, her cheeks were fuller, she had put on weight and she looked far better for it.

  ‘Everything is fine,’ she said. ‘I’ve been treated like a princess by my grandparents and Papa’s had lots of therapy.’ She sucked in her cheeks, crossed her eyes and spun a forefinger at her temple. ‘My Tante Karla has come back with us to keep an eye on him. She says she’ll keep him in line! And you’re here and they’re out – so I’m free to do as I please! What shall we do? Shall we go to the beach?’

  ‘Won’t your father mind?’

  ‘He and Karla have taken the taxi on into town to buy groceries. Give me two seconds …’

  ‘Don’t go back inside! What if your father—’

  ‘It’ll be fine.’

  Ellen ran indoors and I stepped backwards, closer to the wall, into the shadows cast by the roses, in full bloom now, growing up the trellis. The garden was full of flowers. It was overgrown and wild, but it looked like a normal garden again. I gnawed my thumbnail. Two white butterflies danced past and a robin hopped around on a patch of formerly manicured lawn that was now sending up long grassy spikes. I watched a spider slowly sink down a thread suspended from the highest part of the porch over the door. It was small and brown, purposeful. When it reached a point about four feet below the porch roof, it stopped and spun on its thread.

  I heard a car engine on the road; it slowed as it approached Thornfield House.

  I pressed myself closer against the wall, but the car sped up again and drove by.

  Ellen returned with a bag slung over one shoulder. She pulled the door gently shut behind her. ‘Come on,’ she said, grabbing my arm. ‘Let’s go.’

  ‘What were you doing? You were ages.’

  ‘I had to tell Mrs Todd I was going out,’ Ellen said happily. ‘She’s in such a tizz about Tante Karla being here she said she was glad I was spending some time with you.’

  ‘I can’t imagine Mrs Todd in a tizz.’

  ‘She doesn’t want my aunt in her kitchen. She’s banging stuff around.’ Ellen frowned and pursed her lips, and did such a wickedly accurate impression of Mrs Todd angrily rearranging her implements that it reminded me how much fun she used to be.

  ‘I’m so glad you’re back,’ I said, swinging on Ellen’s arm.

  ‘So am I!’

  We walked through the churchyard and out into the fields. It was a warm, oppressive day, and as we crossed a field full of cornflowers and poppies, Ellen said she wanted to rest.

  ‘Are you all right?’ I asked.

  ‘Just tired.’

  We dropped into the long, feathery grass. Myriad small butterflies and moths were busy about us. Ellen took a plastic bottle out of her bag and offered me a drink. I stripped seeds from different kinds of grass, while she lay on her back for a few moments, and closed her eyes. The skin on her face had gone very pale. I thought it must be the sunlight bleaching it. I brushed a fly off her cheek. She was wearing new studs in her ears. Her mother’s necklace was tucked beneath the neck of her shirt. Her legs and arms were tanned; only her face was pale.

  ‘It’s nice to lie here,’ she said sleepily, covering her face with her arms. ‘It’s a different kind of grass in Germany. It’s greener and not so soft.’


  ‘You had grass-homesickness,’ I said.

  She laughed and then she yawned. She stretched her arms above her head.

  ‘How’s Jago?’

  ‘He’s fine. He’s out fishing.’

  ‘Has he missed me?’

  ‘No.’

  Ellen opened her eyes wide.

  ‘Of course he has.’ I sprinkled seed into the little cups made by Ellen’s clavicles. ‘We both have. We missed you like anything. He’ll be over the moon that you’re back.’

  Ellen smiled. She pushed herself to her feet, brushed away the grass seeds and then reached out her hands to pull me up.

  ‘Come on,’ she said. ‘Our beach is waiting for us.’

  The coastal path was busy with walkers in their boots, their maps strung in plastic around their necks, their dogs and canvas hats. Ellen and I waited patiently for the opportunity to climb the fence. She sat down on the bank, amongst the torn-petalled pale purple knapweed, and put her head on her knees while we were waiting.

  ‘You OK?’ I asked again, and Ellen said she was fine.

  ‘It’s just that the flight and the long car journey back from London drained me of my energy,’ she said. ‘And I’ve got so fat. Oma kept giving me food whether I wanted it or not. I need some Cornish sea air to make me feel like myself again.’

  Eventually we made it down to the beach. Ellen was astounded by the supplies that I had, under Jago’s instruction, stashed in the cave.

  ‘What’s all that?’ she asked.

  I shrugged with self-deprecatory pride. ‘A little tent,’ I said. ‘A sleeping bag. Blankets. A primus stove. Candles. Water. Food. So if ever you need to get away, you can.’

  Ellen jumped on me, wrapped her arms around my shoulders and her legs around my waist, and she held on to me, shouting, ‘You did this for me?’

  And I yelled back: ‘It’s all for you, Ellen, all of it!’

  That day, the sea was green and frilly at the edges, little splashy waves frothing as they broke over the pebbles like egg-white in a frying pan. We took off our shoes and paddled. I stopped when the water reached my ankles, giving my feet time to adjust to the cold. Ellen walked past me, she walked until the hem of her skirt was darkened by the water soaking into it, and then she stood, looking out towards the horizon. I felt a clutch of something inside me, something nasty. It was the same fear I’d felt before, the anticipation of trouble. I shook the feeling away, swung my leg and kicked up a spray of water, soaking Ellen’s back. She raised her hands to the side of her head in a parody of an old-fashioned screen star, squealed and turned, kicking water back at me. Within seconds we were having a proper water-fight. We were laughing and shouting, messing around, having fun. When we were both as wet as it was possible to be, we went back onto the sand, stripped down to our underwear and laid our clothes out on the rocks to dry. Ellen’s make-up had run. She knelt, with her hands in her lap, holding her face up to me like a child while I wiped away her mascara with a corner of my T-shirt. Her skin shimmered in the sun. It was smooth, covered in a million tiny goose pimples. Tiny white salt crystals were forming at the bases of the little hairs on her arms.

  ‘Why is your face so pale when your legs and arms are so brown?’ I asked, and Ellen shrugged and said, ‘Oma made me wear a straw hat to save my complexion.’

  Something was different about Ellen. I couldn’t work out what it was. I had expected her to have been changed by the trauma she’d witnessed, but if anything, she was calmer now. She was less nervy, more passive. The time with her family had, I reasoned, done her the world of good.

  We lay together, dozing, until the sun dropped below the cliff-line, shadows were creeping over the sand and the sky was lined with pink fish-scale clouds.

  ‘Won’t your father be worried about you?’ I asked Ellen.

  ‘He can’t make a fuss. Not in front of Tante Karla.’ Ellen propped herself on one elbow, pulled a comedy face and wagged her finger. In the voice of an admonishing woman, she said, ‘Um Gottes willen, Pieter, das Mädchen ist jetzt fast erwachsen!’

  I giggled. ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘“The girl is practically an adult, stop treating her like a child!” My aunt’s really nice,’ Ellen said, lying down again. ‘In Germany, we walked in the gardens and fed the ducks in the pond, and when it was raining we listened to the Rolling Stones and had a Kaffeeklatsch – that’s coffee and cake and chat, just for female people. She made me tell her everything.’

  ‘Everything?’

  ‘Well, almost everything. I didn’t tell her about Jago. Well, I did – I mean, I told her there was someone I liked but not his name or any more than that. I didn’t tell her, you know, that . .’

  I nodded.

  ‘She made Papa see sense. She sorted him out. She won’t put up with his moods. As long as she stays with us, everything’s going to be fine,’ said Ellen. ‘I’ll probably have to play the piano tonight, because she loves listening to it, but even that’s OK because she likes happy stuff. She’s given me some new music to learn. She told Papa that listening to requiems and dirges all the time was counter-productive and not healthy for a young woman of my age.’

  ‘She sounds really nice.’

  ‘She is. You’ll have to come and meet her.’

  When the sun was altogether gone, we dressed in our damp clothes, cold now against our skin that was prickly with sunburn, climbed the tunnel steps and headed back to Trethene. It was too dark to go across the fields and the lanes were busy with holiday traffic. We kept having to press ourselves against hedges to make way for big, shiny cars weighed down with bicycle racks, surfboards and roof carriers. Lobster-faced children stared at us through the windows. The car park outside the pub was full and the garden benches were packed. The waiting staff scuttled amongst the tables with trays of condiments and soiled plates. At Thornfield House, the garden lights had been switched on for the first time since Anne Brecht died. A tall, short-haired woman wearing sandals and spectacles was watering the plants in the front garden, which already looked a little tidier than before.

  ‘Tante Karla – we’re back!’ Ellen called.

  ‘Hello, Ellen,’ the woman said warmly. ‘And you must be Hannah. Let me come and give you kisses!’

  I laughed and allowed myself to be embraced.

  ‘You are a beauty,’ she proclaimed, holding me at arm’s length in order to take a good look at me. ‘Isn’t she beautiful, Ellen? Ja?’

  Ellen grinned and toed the gravel on the drive.

  Over Karla’s shoulder, I could see Mrs Todd, standing beyond the open door, just inside the hallway of Thornfield House. She was in the shadows, watching us.

  Aunt Karla told Ellen to go and shower and make herself presentable for dinner. Ellen hugged me and whispered, ‘Tell Jago I can’t see him tonight, but I’ll try and come down to Polrack tomorrow or the day after. Tell him not to come here until he’s heard from me.’

  ‘All right.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Ellen gave me another hug. ‘You’re my best friend, Hannah,’ she said. She kissed my cheek. ‘I’ll always love you.’

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  AND SHE WAS there – Ellen was there – in the centre of Berlin, standing on the other side of the street, talking to someone. She wasn’t looking at me, but there was no doubt in my mind that it was her, wearing a dark-coloured summer dress and dark shoes, with sunglasses holding back her hair.

  Pedestrians on the opposite pavement blocked my view for a moment. I blinked and held my breath as the crowds drifted away, but Ellen was still there. She had turned her back to me and was looking in a shop window.

  This did not feel like a hallucination. This felt real. Tricks of the mind didn’t look at shop displays. They didn’t!

  I looked from John, to the road, and back again.

  The traffic was roaring, hurtling towards me, but there was a break behind it where the next tranche of vehicles had been stopped at the lights. I waited for the break, then, clutching my c
ardigan and my bag, I took a deep breath, stepped off the kerb and began to run.

  I heard John’s shout behind me, but I didn’t stop to look back. It was difficult running in my high heels, and I had to stop to take them off. By the time I’d done that, the lights had changed. The traffic was coming again, bearing down on me. I made a dash for the centre of the road, where there was a small pedestrian island. I heard the horns blaring – I’d looked the wrong way. There was a third stream of traffic, some kind of contraflow. I was confused. I couldn’t tell which direction the cars were coming from. I stood still for a moment, my head spinning, trying to work out which was the safe way to run, when I felt myself pulled clear, into the island in the centre of the carriageway. All around me, horns bleeped. I heard angry shouting.

  ‘For fuck’s sake!’ said John, holding tightly onto me, restraining me by the arms. ‘What are you doing, Hannah? Are you trying to get yourself killed?’

  I ignored him and looked back across the road. Ellen was gone.

  He was still ranting.

  ‘You just tried to run across four lanes of traffic! You stopped in the middle of the bloody carriageway to take off your shoes! What were you thinking, Hannah? Are you mad?’

  ‘I didn’t – I—’ I looked over his shoulder. Where had she gone?

  ‘I need to get over there,’ I said.

  ‘Where? Why?’

  I turned to look at John. His shirt had come untucked from his trousers and his bow tie had unknotted itself; the dash across the road had messed up his hair. The most striking thing about him was the concern in his eyes. I looked down.

  ‘I saw her again.’

  ‘Who, Hannah? Who did you see?’

  I picked my cardigan up off the ground. It was dusty and one cuff was torn. My feet were dirty too.

  ‘I saw my friend Ellen,’ I said. ‘Ellen Brecht.’

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  TANTE KARLA TREATED her brother, Pieter, Ellen’s father, to a trip to the Colston Hall in Bristol to see Fidelio, which was her favourite opera. They were due to return in the early hours. Mrs Todd stayed behind in Thornfield House with Ellen. The housekeeper was getting on by then, and the events of the past weeks had exhausted her. When Ellen said she was going out for a few hours, Mrs Todd didn’t even ask where she was going.