Maria set herself goals: by the end of January she would be walking around the apartment; by the end of February she would walk to the park. And in March she would start searching for Mikhail and Katya in earnest. She wanted them back in Leningrad with her and their siblings in time for the summer, and she wouldn’t take no for an answer.

Chapter 46

Sydney, October 1975

VAL WAS THRILLED WHEN A LETTER ARRIVED TELLING her she had been accepted on the history course at the university, starting the following January, and straightaway she began working through the recommended reading list. She felt self-conscious about the gaps in her knowledge. History had been taught in a piecemeal fashion at her school. She knew about Captain Cook and the convict colony at Botany Bay; she knew about the Federal Constitution declared in 1901 and about all the Australian soldiers who had died at Gallipoli in the First World War. But what had happened in between? And how about the rest of the world?

The course would last three years, and at the end she would have to submit a dissertation. She decided she would like to write about the fate of the Romanovs. It was a subject on which she had firsthand information, and Bill Koskov might be able to help if any documents had to be translated from Russian.

Until the course started, she continued working at the telephone exchange, and he often stopped by to say hello. Bit by bit she learned more about him. He was single and lived with a sheepdog called Bess in a house across the bay at Manly, where he was in easy reach of good surfing beaches. He cycled to the university from the ferry dock every morning and then back in the evening, in all weathers, so he must be sportier than she had thought. And he liked going to the movies. Val had never been to the cinema because Tony didn’t fancy sitting still in the dark without a beer in his hand. Bill was aghast when she told him that she hadn’t seen Jaws, or Picnic at Hanging Rock, or The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

“These are classics,” he exclaimed. “You’re missing out on the cultural landmarks of your time.”

Val shrugged, with a smile. “Kinda goes with the territory when you have a little one.”

“Don’t you have a friend who can babysit?” he asked. “Come and see One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest with me next Saturday. Jack Nicholson’s in it and the reviews are ecstatic.”

Val was taken by surprise. Did he mean this to be a date? No, it couldn’t be. “I’ll, erm, ask a friend and let you know,” she replied.

She rang Peggy, who was instantly enthusiastic.