There was an instant of panic – the animal in her responding to this defeat of her mind’s autonomy. Then the panic broke before a vision.
Of what, she wasn’t certain. A pattern of some kind, a design which melted and reconfigured itself over and over again. Perhaps there was colour in the design, but it was so subtle she could not be certain; subtle too, the shapes evolving in the kaleidoscope.
This, like the perfume, was Mimi’s doing. Though reason protested. Suzanna couldn’t doubt the truth of that. This image was somehow of vital significance to the old lady. That was why she was using the last drops of her will’s resources to have Suzanna share the sight in her mind’s eye.
But she had no chance to investigate the vision.
Behind her, the nurse said:
‘Oh my god.’
The voice broke Mimi’s spell, and the patterns burst into a storm of petals, disappearing. Suzanna was left staring down at Mimi’s face, their gazes momentarily locking before the old woman lost all control of her wracked body. The hand dropped from Suzanna’s wrist, the eyes began to rove back and forth grotesquely; dark spittle ran from the side of her mouth.
‘You’d better wait outside.’ the nurse said, crossing to press the call button beside the bed.
Suzanna backed off towards the door, distressed by the choking sounds her grandmother was making. A second nurse had appeared.
‘Call Doctor Chai,’ the first said. Then, to Suzanna, ‘Please. will you wait outside?’
She did as she was told: there was nothing she could do inside but hamper the experts. The corridor was busy; she had to walk twenty yards from the door of Mimi’s room before she found somewhere she could take hold of herself.
Her thoughts were like blind runners; they rushed back and forth wildly, but went nowhere. Time and again, she found memory taking her to Mimi’s bedroom in Rue Street, the tall-boy looming before her like some reproachful ghost. What had Gran’ma wanted to tell her, with the scent of lavender?; and how had she managed the extraordinary feat of passing thoughts between them? Was it something she’d always been capable of? If so, what other powers did she own?
‘Are you Suzanna Parrish?’
Here at least was a question she could answer.
‘Yes.’
‘I’m Doctor Chai.’
The face before her was round as a biscuit, and as bland.
‘Your grandmother, Mrs Laschenski …’
‘Yes?’
‘… there’s been a serious deterioration in her condition. Are you her only relative?’
‘The only one in this country. My mother and father are dead. She has a son. In Canada.’
‘Do you have any way of contacting him?’
‘I don’t have his telephone number with me … but I could get it.’
‘I think he should be informed,’ said Chai.
‘Yes, of course,’ said Suzanna. ‘What should I…? I mean, can you tell me how long she’s going to live?’
The Doctor sighed. ‘Anybody’s guess,’ he said. ‘When she came in I didn’t think she’d last the night. But she did. And the next. And the next. She’s just kept holding on. Her tenacity’s really remarkable.’ He halted, looking straight at Suzanna. ‘My belief is, she was waiting for you.’
‘For me?’
‘I think so. Your name’s the only coherent word she’s spoken since she’s been here. I don’t think she was going to let go until you’d come.’
‘I see,’ said Suzanna.
‘You must be very important to her,’ he replied. ‘It’s good you’ve seen her. So many of the old folks, you know, die in here and nobody ever seems to care. Where are you staying?’
‘I hadn’t thought. A hotel. I suppose.’
‘Perhaps you’d give us a number to contact you at, should the necessity arise.’
‘Of course.’
So saying, he nodded and left her to the runners. They were no less blind for the conversation.
Mimi Laschenski did not love her, as the Doctor had claimed; how could she? She knew nothing of the way her grandchild had grown up; they were like closed books to each other. And yet something in what Chai had said rang true. Perhaps she had been waiting, fighting the good fight until her daughter’s daughter came to her bedside.
And why? To hold her hand and expend her last ounce of energy giving Suzanna a fragment of some tapestry? It was a pretty gift, but it signified either too much or too little. Whichever, Suzanna did not comprehend it.
She went back to Room Five. The nurse was in attendance, the old lady still as stone on her pillow. Eyes closed, hands laid by her side. Suzanna stared down at the face, slack once more. It could tell her nothing.
She took hold of Mimi’s hand and held it for a few moments, tight, then went on her way. She would go back to Rue Street, she decided, and see if being in the house jogged a memory or two.
She’d spent so much time forgetting her childhood, putting it where it couldn’t call the bluff of hard-won maturity. And now, with the boxes sealed, what did she find? A mystery that defied her adult self, and coaxed her back into the past in search of a solution.
She remembered the face in the tall-boy mirror, that had sent her sobbing down the stairs.
Was it waiting still? And was it still her own?
1
The shaking had begun a few minutes after events at Rue Street, almost twenty-four hours ago now, and it hadn’t shown much sign of stopping since. Sometimes it made his hands tremble so much he could hardly hold the glass of whisky he’d nursed through an all but sleepless night, other times it made his teeth chatter. But most of the shaking didn’t go on outside, it was in. It was as if the pigeons had got into his belly somehow, and were flapping their wings against his innards.
And all because he’d seen something wonderful, and he knew in his bones that his life would never be the same again. How could it? He’d climbed the sky and looked down on the secret place that he’d been waiting since childhood to find.
He’d always been a solitary child, as much through choice as circumstance, happiest when he could unshackle his imagination and let it wander. It took little to get such journeys started. Looking back, it seemed he’d spent half his school days gazing out of the window, transported by a line of poetry whose