Guilt. All the way back to the trailer I told myself: this is not your fault. The way Grazyna explained it over the phone to me Agnieska had been under a lot of stress during the past couple of days. Yesterday around 9.30 p.m. she’d called her up, saying she had this ‘crazy bad pain’ in her chest. Grazyna rushed over. She found her semiconscious on the kitchen floor. She called an ambulance. She told me that, before she drifted into what seemed to be a coma brought on by the embolism cutting off oxygen to the brain, she whispered to her:

‘Tell Brendan I know I was a terrible wife to him. Ask him to forgive me; to pray for me.’

‘I should have been there,’ I said.

‘I’m saying nothing, Brendan. Except that she also told me she forgave you. Personally I fear Agnieska got far too emotionally involved with this fight Then, when you disappeared I’m afraid that was too much for her. Where have you been for the last twenty-four hours?’

‘Didn’t your sister tell you that she locked me out of the house?’

A silence. Then:

‘Yes she did tell me that … and why.’

‘After that happened I checked into a motel. Turned off my phone. Something I now regret doing.’

‘Get here now. You need to get Klara here as well. She has to say goodbye to her mother. Where is she now exactly?’

‘Working,’ I said. ‘But I know how to find her.’

‘When can you be here?’

‘A few hours. Will she hang on?’

‘I can’t say. When the ambulance men brought her to Dignity last night the ER team informed me that there was little they could do for her; that she was essentially in the throes of death. As the costs of keeping her in hospital were frightening, and as I couldn’t reach you and am sure Agnieska would prefer to leave this life in her own bed, I had to make a decision on your behalf this morning. I had my sister brought back to your home.’

‘Thank you, Grazyna. Is she suffering, in pain?’

‘She’s beyond that now.’

‘Does she have other people with her?’

‘Our brother is on his way to her from Fresno. I’m so sorry about all this, Brendan. Please get here as soon as possible – and please know that I am not just praying for Agnieska, but for you as well.’