Deception!

by Elizabeth Ducie

  Mercy ignored him and pushed Charlie towards the sofa.

  ‘I won’t tie you up again—unless you give me cause to mistrust you. And you’re not going to do that, are you, Rose?’ Then she hauled Hawkins to his feet, untied his ankles, and pushed him down on the sofa next to Charlie. Finally, she kicked off her shoes, curled up on a banquette at the other side of the room and pointed the gun at both of them.

  ‘Right, we’re going to do some storytelling. I always loved storytelling when I was a child. How about you, Rose?’

  ‘Yes, I did, Mercy,’ she replied. ‘But I’m not sure this is the time for storytelling. How about you explain what’s going on.’ Mercy laughed. It wasn’t a pleasant sound.

  ‘I’m surprised you haven’t worked it out already. You’re so smart.’ Charlie didn’t have to fake the confusion she was feeling.

  ‘Mercy, I thought we were friends—’

  ‘Friends! That’s really funny. Why on earth would I want to be friends with someone like you? We have nothing in common!’ She stared at Charlie who thought she might just possibly detect a hint of regret in the other woman’s eyes. But then it was gone. ‘I gave you your chance, Rose. Asked you to stay with me. You could have shared it all with me. But you made it quite clear you weren’t interested in me. And I don’t take rejection well.’ Her voice wobbled a little at these words, and Charlie dared to hope Mercy would have second thoughts. But then she took a deep breath and laughed harshly. ‘So, my little British ‘friend’, at this point you’re nothing more than a useful device. But don’t be hurt; you’re still an important part in my plan.’

  ‘And just what is your plan?’ asked Hawkins wearily.

  ‘Oh, no, Tata dear, let’s not rush things and spoil the fun. We’ve got all the storytelling to go through first.’ She sat up straighter and pointed the gun at Hawkins’ head. He flinched but kept silent. ‘Right, now last night I told you the story of my early life in Mozambique. Let’s just say I didn’t tell you the whole truth. Oh no, there’s quite a bit more to tell. But first,’ she pointed at Hawkins, ‘I want to hear your story. I want to hear how you came to be in Mozambique; and why you left; and what you’ve been doing since then.’

  Hawkins was shaking his head almost before she’d finished speaking.

  ‘Mercy, you know all this. I told you my story when we first met.’

  ‘Oh, I know you told me the sanitised version,’ she sneered, ‘but now I want the truth. I’ve been doing some research and I know some of it already. But I want to hear it all—from your own mouth. And believe me when I say I’ve been doing my homework. So if you try lying or missing parts out, then I will know about it.’

  This should be interesting, thought Charlie. I wonder how much will tally with what we’ve already found out. She wondered where her phone was; it would be perfect if she could get a recording of Hawkins’ story. Of course, he might deny everything afterwards, or say he was forced to speak under coercion, but it would certainly help their case.

  Then she realised she was kidding herself. She was stuck on a boat moored off a remote coast and Mercy was holding a gun to her head. Bringing Michael Hawkins, or even Sir Fredrick Michaels, to justice was the least of her problems right now.

  CHAPTER 34

  Night had fallen by the time Michael Hawkins stop talking. There was a short silence before Mercy stood suddenly and snapped on the overhead lights.

  ‘Such a pretty story, Tata dear, but I think you’ve left out a couple of major elements.’

  Charlie had been so absorbed in listening to him tell his story she’d almost forgotten about the predicament they were in. But now the sneering voice of her tall African friend—or she supposed that should be former friend—pulled her straight back into the here and now. Hawkins was looking confused.

  ‘No, I don’t think so; I’ve told you everything,’ he said.

  ‘Well, I suppose that’s true, in a way,’ said Mercy. ‘After all, once you left Africa, you no longer knew or cared what happened to my mother, did you?’ Hawkins said nothing, but just stared at his daughter. ‘You had your new life and your new wife. So what did it matter what happened to poor little Grace?’ She stood up and walked over to Hawkins, who flinched and pulled his head away as she waved the gun in his face. ‘Well, we’ve heard your story; now I’m going to tell you the bits you missed.’

  The day you disappeared, Grace had a surprise for you. She’d suspected for a while she was pregnant, but that morning she’d been to the doctor and had it confirmed. She shopped for all your favourite foods: prawns, peri peri chicken and fresh mango. She dressed in her smoky nut brown silky dress—you remember, Tata, the one you bought her because you said the colour reflected in her eyes—and dressed the table up real special. Then she sat and waited for you to come home. But you never did, did you?

  She waited for seven days, wondering where you were, whether you’d had an accident, scared to go out and ask your friends, frightened of what she might hear.

  Then the week after you left, a rumour started circulating: you’d fallen out with the army chief, and Stefano had been forced to kill you. She didn’t believe it for one minute. She always said she would have known if you were dead. And even when that body washed up in the harbour, a body so battered by the waves and eaten by the fishes that it was unrecognisable, but wearing your clothes and with your cigarette case in his pocket, even then, she didn’t believe it. And she was right, wasn’t she? Because you weren’t dead. You were living it up on a luxury liner with your new woman.

  Two days after you were declared dead, Stefano went to visit Grace. He wanted her out of the apartment. She broke down, telling him there was a baby on the way—that’s me, remember?—and she had nowhere to go, no friends or family in Lourenço Marques. He suggested she go back to her home town, but she didn’t believe her family would have her back.

  Stefano finally relented. He told her she could stay in the apartment for free until the baby was born, but after that she either had to find somewhere else to live or work for him. And at the time, that sounded like a great deal.

  Well, in time, I was born and Grace told Stefano she would stay and work for him. She thought he was offering her a job in one of his bars—and so he was to start with. The story I told you last night—you know, the one where I spent evenings in the little back room while my mother served the customers—that was true. But what I didn’t say was that as my mother recovered from the birth and started looking happier and healthier, she attracted the attention of the wrong sort of customer. The sort of customer who took a woman upstairs to one of the special rooms, used her, abused her and then left, laughing.

  Grace tried to object, told Stefano she was a good girl, a good mother. But to no avail. He insisted she do what he told her to. And gradually, she spent more time in the rooms upstairs and less time behind the bar.

  I was about five when I realised there was something wrong with my mother. When she came to collect me in the mornings, she would be confused, slurring her words. Sometimes she would cry, shout at me for the slightest thing; other times she would ignore me for hours on end and I would have to beg some food from the woman who ran the cake shop at the end of the street. It was a couple of years before I realised Stefano had turned my mother into a junkie in order to keep her under control.

  We rubbed along like this until just before my eleventh birthday. Then one evening, Stefano called me over to his table. I was big for my age, but I was still a child. A child, Tata!

  There was another white man sitting at the table with him. I’d seen him in there before; very tall, running to fat and with a heavy moustache and beard.

  ‘Ah, Mercy, my dear,’ Stefano said, pulling me towards him and putting his arm around me, ‘I want you to meet someone who’s especially keen to get to know you. This is Marco Gomez, Lourenço Marques’ great army chief. He’s a very important man.’ The other man leaned forward and took my hand in his huge paw. He smiled at
me, a smile that sent shivers down my spine, and when he spoke, his breath was like the river water when the tide is low and full of stinking garbage.

  ‘My dear, I’ve seen you several times in here and wanted to meet you. Sit down, join us.’

  I was trembling, not sure what was happening, certain it was not good. But Stefano steered me to a spare seat and pressed my shoulder really hard—I can still remember his fingers digging into me—and poured me a drink.

  I was so frightened, I drank the whole thing without asking what it was, and although it was thick and creamy, like milk, there was something else in the background; something fierce and strong.

  For a while, the two men ignored me and talked to each other about things I didn’t understand, couldn’t follow. I wondered if they had forgotten me and even tried to slip away, but as soon as I stirred, Stefano put his hand on my arm again.

  ‘Now, young lady,’ he said. ‘I want you to be nice to Marco; he’s a really good friend of mine.’ Gomez stood and held out his hand to me. Stefano smiled and nodded. ‘Go on, child; go with him.’

  So I did. I walked across the room, hand in hand with that odious man, climbed the stairs with him and entered my own private hell. I was ten!

  Afterwards, he walked away without a backward look. But at the door, he paused and said one thing I have never forgotten.

  ‘Your father took my love from me. Now the debt is paid!’

  I lay on that stinking bed for hours, sobbing. At some point, my mother found me. She seemed quite lucid that day, gathered me up, took me home, bathed my wounds and swore she would never let anyone hurt me again. But of course, that was a promise she was unable to fulfil. The next night, she was back on the drugs, back whoring again and there was no-one to protect me.

  By the time I was fifteen, my mother was unable to work. She was old before her time, losing her looks and riddled with disease. There was this new sickness going around. Some said it came from monkeys, others thought it was a curse from God. But wherever it came from, it spread rapidly and killed people way before their time.

  Stefano tried to make me take my mother’s place in his brothel. And there were a few times when I did what he asked. After all, nothing could be worse than being raped by a vicious thug at the age of ten. And some of the punters were even kind to me, giving me extra money which they told me to hide when I left the room.

  One mistake I was determined not to make was to follow my mother down the drug route. I refused all offers from Stefano and never again ate or drank anything in any of his restaurants.

  By the time my mother died, it was a blessed relief. Her body was destroyed; so was her mind. Once she stopped working for Stefano, he stopped feeding her drug habit. I locked myself with her in the apartment and held her hand as she sweated, shouted and screamed her way through cold turkey. It was dreadful, painful and dangerous, but I didn’t want her to remain dependent on a drug we couldn’t afford. It took weeks, and in the end, she was free of it, but by that time her mind was gone. For the rest of her life, just a few short months, she sat in the apartment staring at the wall, often with tears rolling down her cheeks, sometimes calling your name. She only ate when I fed her, took no interest in her appearance, and in fact, if I didn’t insist, she sometimes didn’t even get out of bed all day.

  Meanwhile, I was trying to keep us fed and the rent paid. Stefano tried to evict us, and we would have been out on the streets if it wasn’t for, of all people, Marco Gomez. He visited me once or twice more in the brothel but I was older, better able to deal with his cruelty. When Stefano suggested we must leave, I went to see Gomez and begged for his protection. I promised him once my mother was at rest, I would go to him and live as his mistress. And the stupid man believed me! He actually believed a child he’d raped and brutalised would agree to live openly with him when she was older. But it worked. Stefano never threatened me with eviction again.

  My mother was just forty-three when she died. No age at all for a normal young woman, but her life was anything but ordinary. And we have you to thank for that, don’t we, Tata? As I stood by her grave on that arid hillside one sweltering morning in June, I swore I would find a way to be revenged on you for my mother’s life and death. Of course, at the time, I had no idea how I would do that, since you were apparently long dead. But my mother swore to her dying day you were still alive. And when Stefano’s son told me all about your new life in Brazil and your wish to be reunited with Grace, I knew my chance had come.

  CHAPTER 35

  Charlie choked back tears as she listened to Mercy’s story. She couldn’t imagine what it had been like for the young girl, but she was beginning to understand the rage she was feeling against her father. Hawkins himself seemed shaken by the revelations. He said nothing, but Charlie could see he was struggling to remain composed. He stared at his feet, apparently unable to meet his daughter’s eye.

  ‘So, now you know, Tata dear,’ said Mercy, ‘all about the lives you wrecked after you’d thoughtlessly fled back to England.’

  ‘But I never forgot your mother,’ Hawkins said, his voice little more than a whisper. ‘That’s why I asked Stefano to send Mikhail to Africa.’ He finally raised his head. ‘Mercy, I know there’s nothing I can do to make up for the terrible suffering you and your mother endured, but I hope I can make the future better for you.’ Mercy laughed. The sound sent chills down Charlie’s back.

  ‘Oh, you’re going to make my future very good indeed, Tata,’ she said, ‘but unfortunately, you’re not going to be around to see it.’ She stared at him for a few moments, as though debating with herself, and then nodded. ‘But I guess there’s one final part of the story you might as well hear.’

  Mikhail didn’t have to go to Africa to find me. I wasn’t there. In fact I hadn’t been there for twenty years.

  One day, not long before my mother died, she gave me a message to take to Stefano. She wanted to see him. Well, to start with, he refused, but I told him she was dying, and he finally agreed. When he arrived, Mother sent me away. But I didn’t trust him, so crept back and listened at the window. My mother was lying in bed; Stefano stood by the door, looking like he couldn’t wait to get away.

  ‘Stefano, I don’t have much time,’ my mother said, ‘so I need you to tell me the truth. What happened to Michael? What happened to my husband?’

  ‘Grace, we’ve been through this many times,’ he replied harshly, ‘Michael did something very stupid and he had to pay the price.’

  I could see my mother was getting frustrated with him.

  ‘I don’t believe you! I’ve never believed you! I would know if Michael was dead.’

  ‘But you saw the body!’

  ‘Pah! That thing you pulled out of the harbour? That wasn’t my Michael. I know it and you know it!’ She stopped, taken by a violent coughing fit and pointing to the glass of water on the table. Stefano handed it to her and then sat on the chair next to the bed. When she’d finished coughing, he took her hand.

  ‘Grace, I’d like to help you, but I can’t. I’m sorry.’

  My mother was silent for so long, I wondered if she’d fallen asleep, but finally I heard her sigh.

  ‘Alright, Stefano, I won’t ask you again. Not for me, anyway. But I’m worried about Mercy. She’s going to be all on her own. For her sake, I’m begging you. Please find Michael, wherever he is, and tell him he has a daughter. She’s his responsibility now. He needs to look after her.’

  Stefano was shaking his head.

  ‘Grace, I don’t think that’s a promise I can keep. But, I promise you I will do what I can for your little girl.’

  My mother didn’t tell me about the conversation with Stefano, and I didn’t tell her I’d been eavesdropping. And two weeks later, as I stood at her graveside, Stefano took me to one side.

  ‘Mercy, what are you going to do now?’ he asked.

  ‘Oh, I’ll be alright,’ I said. I might only have been fifteen, but I was used to loo
king after myself.

  ‘Marco Gomez tells me he has an arrangement with you?’ My heart plummeted at those words and I looked around wildly, to make sure my tormentor and would-be patron wasn’t nearby. I’d been trying to forget the promise I’d made out of desperation. Stefano went on. ‘If you’re happy to go through with that, then that’s fine. But,’ he looked shrewdly at me, ‘you’re not happy with it, are you?’ I pressed my lips together to stop them trembling, and shook my head. ‘Well, I have a suggestion to make. This civil war looks like it’s not going to be settled any time soon and I’m getting too old for all this. I’m going home; to my wife, my children. Come back to Ukraine with me.’

  At first, I thought he was joking, making fun of me. I hadn’t even known he had a family. But eventually, I realised he was serious. For more than ten years, Stefano had been spending part of each year back in Kharkov. His wife, Katya, had given him three children, a daughter and two sons. And now he was offering me a home with them. I don’t know why he did that. Maybe he felt guilty about my mother, or about how I’d been treated. I never asked him. I was just happy to have an escape from Marco Gomez.

  The next twenty years were tough, but nothing compared to the previous fifteen. I was older than all Stefano’s children and although Katya was kind enough, the rest of the family treated me as the intruder I was. The sight of a black face in the Soviet Union was unusual and many times I was harassed on the street. But I ignored the problems and concentrated on learning everything I could. I went to school, then college. When Stefano found I was quick at figures, he involved me in the business, at least the local ones. By the time I was twenty-five, I was running several of his factories for him and was known as a tough character who wouldn’t be taken for a fool. You mentioned ‘poor Nico’ earlier on, Tata. Well poor Nico thought he could get the better of me. He found out the hard way I don’t like to be crossed.