The baby cried again and the sound was like the keening of the wind, or the call of a lost animal. If only she could move, but her body wouldn’t obey her brain’s commands, and the pain in her stomach grew along with her sorrow and, because she could do nothing else, she started to weep. Maybe, she thought, each tear would be one fewer that her baby would shed after she had gone. It wouldn’t be long now. She felt that instinctively. Darkness was falling, like fog descending.

34

Marina

February 1992

Kenneth gets as far as the centre of the room before he stops. He pokes the rug with his cane as if roughly tracing the pattern.

‘The boiler?’ Marina says.

He looks up. His face is grey, devoid of colour, eyes almost hidden in their pouches of skin.

He has no toolbox. The observation flutters in Marina’s mind like a fat moth.

‘I am meticulous,’ he says at last, ‘in checking facts and figures, financial and personal. I am meticulous.’ He stops, clears his throat. ‘I realise this is partly what I pay the estate agent for, but at the same time . . . At the same time, I like to do it myself. I like . . . I like to be certain about the details of my clients. You might say,’ he adds, ‘that it’s my hobby.’

Marina shifts on her feet. A pulse throbs at her temple. She presses her fingers to her skull. She is wrong-footed. He has no toolbox. He is not here to fix the boiler. What then?

‘The thing is,’ he continues, resting the cane against the side of a chair, ‘it has come to my attention that there’s been a mistake. Yes, a mistake.’

There is a beat. ‘What do you mean?’

He is shaking as he balances the briefcase on the chair and awkwardly snaps it open. He pulls out a sheaf of papers with trembling hands, selects one, and brandishes it at her.

‘I have your name down on the contract as Zoe Alexander. Yet, when I examine the photocopy of your passport, I see that your name is not Zoe Alexander. It’s Marina Alexander.’

He looks at her directly, eyes watering.

She meets his gaze. ‘Zoe is my middle name.’

He nods, grimaces. ‘I know that. Yes. I can see that. The estate agent told me that you prefer to go by the name Zoe.’ He taps the piece of paper with one gnarled finger. ‘However, see here, the whole name needs to be recorded, not half. I don’t like slapdash errors and . . .’ He pauses, stares at the centre of the rug. ‘I don’t like being misdirected.’