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.On the piano a book of Mozart lay open, though no one else in the family played.At the far end of the room Jenna’s old bicycle stood propped against the dining table.As kids the two of them had pedalled miles together, into town, up across the fields.Jenna wasn’t allowed to bicycle alone; -a young patient of Alan’s had been attacked once, and he was haunted by it.From the large basket strapped to the handlebars it looked as though Helena used the bicycle now.In the hall, Alan was calling for him.From old habit, Joe left his coat hanging over the newel post before following Alan into the kitchen.Helena was standing silhouetted against the window, leaning back against the sink with her arms folded low across her waist.She was so still she might have been waiting there for ever.‘How are you, Helena?’ As he bent to kiss her, she tilted her cheek a little towards him, but if she offered a reciprocal kiss he missed it.‘Coffee?’ she asked.She made no effort to talk as she pulled out the mugs and spooned the coffee, and Alan filled the silence with a stream of nervy chatter which rang too jolly and too loud.Eventually Joe said, ‘How’s Marc, Helena?’She looked up as if emerging from a dream.‘Oh, he’s fine.’‘What’s he doing nowadays?’‘Oh, this and that.’From what Joe remembered.Marc had done little else but this and that since leaving school.There had been a job in a video shop, he seemed to recall, and something with a homeless charity, though that might have been as a volunteer.Helena added, ‘He wants to train as a teacher.’Alan chipped in, ‘He was talking of doing medicine, but it’s no good, he’s twenty-seven and he hasn’t got the A levels.’Helena said in a tone of correction, ‘It’s not the qualifications, it’s the time and the cost.’ She passed Joe his coffee.‘Teacher training takes a year.He might just be able to do it.’A look of understanding passed between them - this was what the sale of the damp house by the timber yard was about, this was why Joe was here.‘He can’t go into student accommodation at his age.And he wants to keep his cottage going.We can help out a bit, of course we can,’ Helena added, ‘but you know us, Joe, we were never going to be rich.’ In the moment before she turned away, she gave the vestige of a smile, her eyes flickered with brief light, and for an instant it might have been the old days again.Returning to the counter, she drew out a stool and by the time she eased herself onto it the abstraction was back in her face.Joe couldn’t help noticing that she wasn’t looking her best.Her hair, a dark pewter-grey, was dull and compacted around the crown, as though pressed down by an invisible hat, and sprang out around her face in an unruly halo of waves and spikes.He hadn’t seen her for a couple of months, but it seemed to him that she was also dressing with less care.Her cardigan, in an indeterminate tone of beige, had a stain on the front and a frayed sleeve.Alan was repeating an old refrain.‘No, my love, if you’d married me for my money, you’d have left me years ago, wouldn’t you?’ His forced laughter filled the room.‘Years ago,’ she recited mechanically.In the hall the phone rang a couple of times and was picked up by the answering machine.‘Well!’ Alan rubbed his hands together, as if to summon everyone to the business in hand.‘Well!’ His nerve failed him, he shot Helena an anxious glance before appealing to Joe.‘What was it you wanted exactly, Joe?’‘Jenna’s national insurance number, if you have it.’He feigned a look of surprise.‘Ah, right.’‘And a photograph, if that’s possible.’‘Of course.I’ll go and find them.Tell me where to look for the insurance number, my love.’ He hovered in front of Helena, poised to do her bidding.She put her coffee down and slid off her stool without a word.Alan argued, ‘No, no - let me go.’She shook her head as she moved towards the door.‘I know where to look.’After she’d gone, Alan muttered, ‘She’s in charge of all that sort of thing.’ He wavered between pursuing her and staying put, shifting from one foot and back to the other in a pantomime of indecision.Pursuit finally prevailed, and with an apologetic flap of one hand he hurried out of the room.Joe rinsed out his mug and stood it in the rack.Nearby, a pinboard hung askew.-Amongst the sheaves of paper and postcards three photographs jostled for space.All were of Marc: Marc slumped in a chair, sporting earrings, garishly bleached hair and a scowl; standing on a path wearing a suit at least one size too small and a flower in the buttonhole, expression unreadable; and in a studio pose, stiff and self-conscious.All appeared to have been taken some years ago.The camera had done its best, but there was no escaping the fact that Marc had inherited Alan’s physique.He was chubby, with a round face, broad nose and small eyes, but while Alan’s looks were thoroughly redeemed by his lively benevolent expression, Marc had the sulky look of a someone who feels that life is failing to deliver.Alan reappeared, followed by Helena, who was holding an envelope at arm’s length, like something that was dangerously hot.Joe looked inside and saw a piece of paper with a number written on it and a long narrow photograph.The photograph wasn’t one he’d seen before, but he knew instinctively what it was and his heart tightened.‘I thought you’d have had plenty of pictures of Jenna,’Helena remarked.Glancing up, he couldn’t make out if she’d meant this in a spirit of regret or accusation.‘Mine were all taken rather a long time ago, Helena.’‘Well, that’s the most recent we have.’The photograph showed Jenna on her wedding day.Joe hadn’t been there to see her - none of them had - yet the cream dress, the flowers in her hand, the pose, the rhetorical stone doorway in the background, all pointed to the steps of a registry office.Her expression was difficult to read [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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