by Marc Levy
“He’s my neighbor.”
“He was also your neighbor last week. But back then things were decidedly more formal. You weren’t on a first-name basis; it was still Miss Pendelbury and Mr. Killjoy. What broke the ice?”
Alice refused to talk. Carol looked at her pointedly, one hand on her hip, the other holding the kettle suspended in midair. She raised her eyebrows.
Alice finally gave up. “We just went back to Brighton together.”
“That was your mysterious Christmas invitation? What an idiot I was. And I thought you’d just made something up to throw the boys off your trail. I kept kicking myself for letting you stay behind in London alone instead of insisting you come along with me to see my parents. And the whole time Miss P was out on a seaside romp with the boy next door.” Carol paused. “Has it ever crossed your mind to buy some real furniture?” Suddenly, her eyes lit up. “Wait a minute! Don’t tell me that when he barged in last time it was just an act to get rid of us and spend the rest of the evening together!”
“Carol!” hissed Alice, pointing toward Daldry’s flat. “Stop talking and sit down. You’re more exhausting than the flu.”
“Oh, you don’t have the flu; you’ve just got a bad cold,” said Carol, fuming.
“I hadn’t planned on going back to Brighton. It was an unexpected and generous offer on his behalf. And you can stop smirking—there’s nothing between Daldry and me apart from a civil, reciprocal appreciation for each other. Besides, he’s not really my type.”
“Why did you go back to Brighton?”
“I’m too tired to go into it now.”
“I’m touched to see you so affected by my care and empathy.”
“Oh, give me a slice of that fruitcake and hush,” Alice said, just before sneezing.
“See? Nothing but a cold.”
“And just when I was about to get back to work,” said Alice, pushing herself back up. “I’m going crazy from sitting around doing nothing.”
“Get used to it. Your seaside joyride is going to cost you at least a week without the use of your nose. Now, go on. Tell me why you went back.”
Carol listened intently as Alice told her about the second trip to Brighton. When she was done, Carol let out a long whistle, looking just as upset as Alice. “I would have been terrified too. No wonder you fell ill as soon as you got home.”
“Very funny.”
“Come on. It’s ridiculous twaddle. What on earth is ‘nothing you believe is real’ supposed to mean? In any case, it was very kind of Daldry to drive you such a distance, though I know plenty of other men who would have gone even farther to take you for a ride, if only they had a car. Life really isn’t fair. Here I am with so much love to give, and you’re the one surrounded on all sides by panting suitors.”
“Suitors? I’m alone all day long, and it’s not any better at night.”
“Do I have to remind you about Anton? If you’re alone, it’s your own fault. You’re an idealist who doesn’t know how to take advantage of opportunities when they present themselves. But maybe you’re right to be that way.” A note of sadness had crept into her voice. “I should be going. I’m going to be late for my shift. I don’t want to be in the way if your neighbor comes back.”
“Oh stop. I told you, there’s nothing between us.”
“I know, not your type, and besides, Prince Charming is waiting for you in a distant land . . . You should take a holiday and find him. If I had some money, I’d gladly come along for the ride. A trip with just us girls would be such fun. It’s warm in Turkey, and I hear the men have beautiful golden skin.”
Alice fell back into her pillow. Carol pulled up the covers from the foot of the bed to tuck her in.
“Sleep well, love,” she whispered. “I know I’m a jealous wench, but you’re my best friend and I love you like my sister. I’ll come back when I get off duty tomorrow. You’re going to feel better soon.”
Carol put on her coat and left. She ran into Daldry in the corridor as he was heading out to do his shopping. They went downstairs together.
“She’ll be better soon,” she told him once they were in the street.
“Wonderful news.”
“It was very kind of you to have taken care of her like that.”
“It was the least I could do,” he said. “As a good neighbor.”
“Goodbye, Mr. Daldry.”
“Yes, well, I’d just like to say, even though it’s none of your business . . . she’s not at all my type of woman either. Not in the least!”
He stormed off without saying goodbye.
4
It was a week that felt as if it would never end. Alice didn’t have a fever anymore, but she could barely taste her food, let alone smell anything. Daldry hadn’t returned to visit, and although Alice had gone and knocked on his door several times, his flat remained silent.
Carol came to visit Alice between shifts, bringing her groceries and newspapers she took from the hospital waiting room. Once she even slept over, too exhausted to walk the three blocks to her flat in the cold. In the middle of the night, Carol had shaken Alice to wake her from the nightmares that returned almost every time she fell asleep.
On Saturday, just as Alice was thinking about getting back to work again, she heard footsteps on the landing. She pushed back her chair and hurried to the door. Daldry held a small suitcase and was about to go into his flat.
“Hello, Alice,” he said without turning around. He unlocked his door and hesitated. “I’m sorry I didn’t have time to see you before I left. I had to go away for a few days.” He kept his back turned.
“There’s no need to apologize. I was just worried when I didn’t hear you moving around.”
“I should have left a note.” He rested his head against the door.
“What’s wrong?” asked Alice.
Daldry turned. He was pale and hadn’t shaved in days. There were dark circles under his eyes that were red and swollen from crying.
“Oh dear, what happened?”
“My father finally died on Monday. The funeral was three days ago.”
“Come over. I’ll make you some tea.”
Daldry abandoned his suitcase in the hall and followed Alice into her flat, collapsing into the armchair with a groan. He gazed distantly at the skylight. Alice made the tea and handed him a cup. She pulled up the stool and sat across from him, respecting his silence. A long time passed and neither of them moved. Daldry finally sighed and got up.
“Thank you,” he said. “That was just what I needed. I’m going to go home, take a bath, and go to bed.”
“Before you go to bed, come back for dinner. I’ll make an omelet.”
“I’m not very hungry.”
“Well, you’ll eat anyway. You have to eat,” said Alice firmly.
Daldry returned a short while later, wearing a turtleneck sweater and a pair of flannel trousers. He still looked haggard and hadn’t shaved.
“I’m sorry about my appearance,” he said, “but I left my razor at my parents’ house and it’s a bit late to go out and buy a new one.”
“The beard is becoming on you,” said Alice, welcoming him inside.
They ate seated on either side of the trunk. Alice had brought down some of the gin she kept cold by leaving it on the roof next to the skylight. Daldry wasn’t hungry, but he needed no coaxing to drink. He forced himself to eat a bit of omelet for form’s sake.
“I had promised myself,” he said, interrupting a long silence, “to talk to him man-to-man, to explain why I had chosen to be a painter. I never judged him for his choices—I jolly well could have . . . but I wanted to tell him that he ought to show me the same respect.”
“I’m sure he admired you, even if he never showed it.”
“You didn’t know him,” said Daldry, sighing again.
“Still, no matter what you may think, you were his son.”
“I suffered from his distant character for forty years. I’d got used to it. But str
angely, now that he’s not there anymore, the pain is even sharper.”
“I know what you mean,” said Alice quietly.
“Last night I went into his office. My mother found me going through the drawers of his secretary’s desk. She thought I was looking for his will, but I told her that I couldn’t care less about my inheritance. I just wanted to find something, maybe a note or a letter, that he might have left for me. Mum just put her hand on my shoulder and said, ‘My poor darling. He didn’t leave anything like that.’ I didn’t cry when they lowered his coffin into the ground. I haven’t cried since the summer I was ten and I had to have stitches in my knee after falling out of a tree. But this morning, when the house I grew up in was shrinking in the rearview mirror, I couldn’t hold back the tears. I had to pull over. I felt such a fool, sitting in my car and weeping.”
“You’ve just lost your father. It’s normal.”
“You know, it’s strange; I think that if I had become a pianist, he would have taken a certain pride in me. He might have come to hear me play. Painting never interested him. He didn’t consider it a real job. At best, it was a pastime. But at least his death gave me the occasion to see my family all in one place again.”
“You should paint his portrait and hang it in an important place in your family’s home—in his old office, maybe. I’m sure he’d be touched, wherever he is now.”
Daldry burst into laughter.
“What a ghoulish idea. I’m not so cruel as to do such a thing to my poor mother. But enough of this sniveling, I’ve kept you long enough for one night. The omelet was delicious, and the gin, of which I’m afraid I drank a bit too much, was much appreciated. Now that you’re over the flu, one of these days I’ll give you another driving lesson.”
“I’d like that,” said Alice.
Daldry said good night and turned to leave. For a man who normally carried himself with pride, he seemed slumped and hesitant. He changed his mind and turned around to take the bottle of gin before leaving for good. Alice was exhausted and went to bed as soon as Daldry was gone. She fell asleep almost immediately.
“Come with me,” a voice whispered. “We have to leave.”
A door opened into the night. There was no light in the street outside and the houses’ shutters were closed and latched. A woman took her by the hand. They crept down the street together as quietly as possible, staying in the shadows cast by the moonlight. They carried lightly packed bags. Alice had a little black suitcase with a few things in it. When they came to the top of the long flight of steps, they could see the entire city spread out before them. In the distance, flames licked the sky, staining it a violent crimson. “The entire neighborhood is on fire,” said a voice. “They’ve gone mad! But you’ll be safe over there. They’ll protect us. I’m sure of it. Come along. Follow me, my love.”
Alice had never been so afraid. Her bare feet were sore. It had been impossible to find shoes in the chaos that reigned over the city. An old man emerged from a coach-house door that opened onto the street. He signaled for them to turn back, gesturing toward a barricade farther down the street where a group of armed young men stood in wait.
The woman hesitated a moment. She carried a baby wound up in a scarf against her breast and stroked its head to keep it quiet. Their course through the night continued in the opposite direction.
A narrow path led to the top of an embankment. They passed a silent fountain—there was something reassuring about the stillness of the water in its basin. To their right there was an opening in the long fortified wall. The woman seemed to know the place, and Alice followed her. They crossed an abandoned garden. The tall grass stood still in the windless night, and thistles pricked Alice’s legs as though they were trying to hold her back. She opened her mouth to complain but knew she must keep silent.
In the depths of a sleepy orchard, they came upon a ruined church. They crossed the rubble of the crumbling apse. The pews lay overturned, charred from a fire. Alice lifted her head and saw the remnants of centuries-old mosaics on the vaulted ceiling overhead. The faded face of Christ, or perhaps an apostle, seemed to watch over her. A door opened, and Alice passed into the second apse. In the center of the room stood a tomb covered in porcelain tiles, immense and monolithic. They went past the tomb and into an antechamber, where the bitter smell of charred stone mingled with the familiar scents of thyme and caraway—herbs that grew in the empty field behind her house. Even though they were mixed with the acrid smoke, she managed to make out their familiar smells.
The burnt church was now nothing but a distant memory. The woman took her through a gate, and they ran down another narrow street. Alice was exhausted, and her legs began to give way. The hand holding hers let go, abandoning her. She sat down on the paving stones. The woman continued without turning back.
Rain began to fall. Alice called for help, but the rain was too heavy. Soon the woman’s outline disappeared in the distance. Alice sat alone in the street, chilled and wet. She cried out, the long, bellowing cry of a wounded animal.
Hail ricocheted off the skylight. Gasping for breath, Alice sat up in bed, searching for the switch on the lamp beside her bed. With the light on, she looked around the room, taking in the familiar objects one by one.
She pounded the mattress with her fists in frustration, furious to have fallen victim to the same exhausting nightmare that kept returning night after night. She got up and went to her worktable, opened the window that looked out onto the rear of the house, and took a deep breath of the cold night air. The lights were on in Daldry’s flat. His invisible presence was strangely reassuring. In the morning, she would ask Carol for advice. There must be some remedy to calm her sleep. Alice just wanted to make it through the night—one long, gentle night, free from the horror of being pursued like an animal through unfamiliar streets.
Alice spent the following days hard at work. Every evening she put off going to bed, fighting the urge to sleep and battling the fear that took hold of her as darkness fell. And every night she had the same dreams that ended with her crouched on the pavement and soaked by the rain.
She went to see Carol at lunchtime. After asking for her at the hospital reception desk, she waited a good thirty minutes in the lobby among the gurneys and stretchers, watching the ambulancemen unload patients from their vehicles, which arrived with jangling bells. A woman begged the nurses on duty to take care of her sick child. A raving old man wandered among the benches where the other patients waited their turn. A pale young fellow smiled at Alice. The arch of his left eyebrow had been cut open, and a thick trickle of blood flowed down his cheek. Another man, of about fifty, held his side, racked by what seemed like dreadful pain. Sitting in the middle of so much suffering, Alice felt guilty realizing that her nights might be full of horror, but poor Carol’s days weren’t much better. Just as she was thinking about this, Carol appeared, pushing a gurney whose wheels squeaked as they rolled across the linoleum.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, surprised to see Alice. “Are you sick again?”
“No, I just came to take you to lunch.”
“What a nice surprise. Let me park this one here and I’ll be right back,” she said, nodding to her patient. “They could have at least told me you were here. Have you been waiting long?”
Carol pushed the gurney over to a colleague, and left briefly to get her coat and scarf. She hurried back to Alice and led her out of the hospital.
“Come on,” Carol said. “There’s a café around the corner that’s not too terrible. Practically the Ritz compared to our cafeteria.”
“What about your patients?”
“This place is always full of people. If I’m going to be able to do anything about it, I have to eat from time to time. Let’s go.”
The café was packed with customers waiting for a seat when they arrived. Carol smiled and caught the attention of the owner, who nodded to a free table at the back of the room from his position behind the counter.
“Who d
o you have to bribe to get service like that?” asked Alice as she settled into the chair.
Carol chuckled. “I lanced a boil on his backside last summer. He’s been eating out of my hand ever since.”
“I never realized . . .”
“What a glamorous life I lead?” teased Carol.
“How hard your work is.”
“Oh, I like what I do, even if it isn’t easy every day. I used to bandage up my dolls when I was a little girl. I remember it worried my mother. Anyway, what brings you to this part of town? I don’t suppose you came to the hospital in search of inspiration for one of your perfumes.”
“I just came to have lunch with you. Do I need another reason?”
“You know, a good nurse doesn’t just dress her patients’ wounds. She can also tell when something isn’t right in their heads.”
“But I’m not one of your patients, Carol.”
“You certainly looked like one when I found you in the lobby. You can tell me if something is wrong.”
“Is there a menu?”
“Forget the menu,” said Carol. “I don’t have much time, so we’ll just have the special.”
A waiter brought them two plates of mutton stew.
“I know it doesn’t look like much, but you’ll see, it’s not half bad.”
Carol tucked in, while Alice picked skeptically at her plate.
“You might have more of an appetite if you got what’s bothering you off of your chest,” said Carol, talking with her mouth full. Alice poked at a piece of potato with her fork and made a face. “Fine. I’m probably just being stubborn and presumptuous, but a little while from now when you’re taking the bus home, you’ll think what an idiot you were for having wasted half of the day without even having tasted this stew. Especially since you’re the one that’s footing the bill. Come on, tell me what’s bothering you. You know the silent treatment drives me mad.”
Alice finally told her about the recurrent nightmare that had been plaguing her sleep, and the unhappiness that weighed upon her waking hours.
“Let me tell you a story,” said Carol. “I was on duty the night of the first Blitz bombing. The wounded were pouring in. Most of them were burn victims coming in on foot, as best they could. Some of our staff had deserted the hospital to take shelter, but most of us had stayed at our posts. I was there out of cowardice, not courage; I was too scared to go out into the streets, and petrified at the idea of burning to death in a firestorm. After about an hour, the number of patients coming in dropped off, and the head doctor on duty, Doctor Turner—who, by the way, is so handsome he could turn the head of a nun—gathered us together to tell us that if nobody was coming in, it was because they were caught under the rubble and that we ought to go out and search for them. We were dumbstruck. He told us that none of us were obligated to go, but that those who weren’t afraid should take the stretchers and head into the streets. There were lives to be saved out there.”