He regretted very little, but he was sorry he hadn’t done more for Lidiya. ‘It’s too late to tell your mother, so I’m telling you instead. I’m sorry. I wish I’d done more for her.’

Lidiya would have scoffed at his apologies. Apologies, she would say, are no good to her now. Apologies don’t undo the damage he did; apologies don’t make all the pains disappear. If Mikhail had apologised forty years ago, or thirty or even twenty years ago, it might have been different; but he loses nothing by apologising now, he risks nothing. Her mother would reject his apologies, would regard them as empty. People like him would say anything to get what they want, she’d say. They’d lie, they’d distort, they’d cheat. And what he wants now is an easy old age in a country that is utterly foreign to him. And he needs you, his niece, and he’ll say anything to bring you onside.

Her mother would probably be right, but somehow Lidiya’s judgement didn’t hold as much weight in the Australian context. In fact, it occurred to Galina as she walked home after coffee with Andrew, that all these old animosities don’t transport well at all. It’s as if they lose muscle during the long journey.

She unlocked the door and entered the saddlery. The smell of Mikhail’s cigarettes hit her; she suspected the smoke had seeped into the furniture, into the bed coverings. When he was gone, as surely he would be soon, she would have to wash everything. Actually, there was much she wanted to throw out, and she felt herself smile: how very un-Soviet to throw out anything that retained a skerrick of usefulness.

She poured herself a glass of water and went out to the courtyard. Mikhail was playing cards at the Russian club — not with Alexei, who was babysitting his grandchildren, but with some other fellows he’d met. She’d sent him off this morning with a sandwich lunch, so she didn’t expect him home until mid-afternoon. Time enough to work up her courage.

She must stand up for herself. Mikhail must go.

When her uncle first turned up in Australia, she wanted revenge for the suffering he had caused her mother and grandparents. The desire for revenge had now gone. Revenge didn’t reverse the earlier wrongs; it changed nothing about those old hurts, nor did it bring justice. No matter what she might do to Mikhail, the losses would still be her losses, the pain her pain. But neither did it seem fair that he got off scot-free. And she wondered if evading punishment was another privilege of the privileged class. Bad, powerful men rarely got their comeuppance.

Whatever happened, she must take her life back.