THE HOURS BEFORE: A Story of Mystery and Suspense from the Belle Époque (5 page)

The man stares in silence, looking the two women up and down slowly, and non-too respectfully. Their fine clothes, the tiny glints of opulence and wealth shining from their wrists and throats seem to fascinate him for an inordinate length of time - so for one terrible moment Deborah is convinced they have surprised a thief.

‘Who are you?’ she demands, almost screaming the question in her surprise and anxiety, and Rachael, coming in directly behind, repeats the same question even more forcefully.

But the youth merely shrugs his shoulders, coughs and in an amused kind of voice echoes back: ‘Well ... Who are
you?
’

With much strained cordiality, the two women do explain, and extract, in turn, a certain measure of grudging explanation from the fellow himself, who - they eventually learn - goes by the name of Hanno.

‘Hanno! Hanno who?’ Rachael demands, taking command of the situation and compelling the youth back along the corridor with her glaring eyes - and where, by the light of a window they can get a better look at him, an exercise that does not improve his appearance very much.

‘Just Hanno. That is all,’ he replies and in a drawling kind of accent that might be Austrian or Hungarian. ‘
Hello Hanno!
people say when they see me coming,’ he adds, flippantly and smiles an open-mouthed grin.

‘Do you live here?’ Deborah inquires, not amused and still transfixed by the man’s awful appearance - his untidy hair all hacked about by various whimsicalities of fashion; and even, she is horrified to see, what looks like bites from some insect or parasite all over his neck. It is appalling, like some dreadful worm they have disturbed within a sarcophagus.

‘No, I am not living here,’ he replies and coughs again, a feeble sort of cough, perhaps that of a consumptive. He smells repugnant, too - and the piercing of his ear looks to be infected and even leaking pus. Deborah feels nauseous.

‘Are you acquainted with my daughter?’

‘No.’

‘Then what on earth are you doing in her apartment?’

‘I too … I have a key,’ the youth replies, and not without a certain audacity as he produces the object itself from his pocket - a grubby kind of label, like a luggage label with a piece of brown string attached, and which he twirls around his finger several times before snatching the key tightly into his palm again. And then, before either of the women can recover their composure sufficiently to interrogate him further, the rogue pushes his way between them, forcing his way past with his filthy, sweaty hands, and in an instant is gone. They think of giving chase for a moment, but there seems no point. Overwhelmed with distress at noticing already all of her daughter’s familiar things around her - Poppy’s dressing table; Poppy’s hand mirror and the little porcelain bowl with rose petals around which she always placed her brooches and earrings, they both know they can do nothing more. All becomes deathly silent for a moment, before Deborah clutches her hands to her face and groans in anguish.

‘He touched me!’ she cries, grabbing her friend’s hands in hers as she hurries to her side. ‘He put his hands all over me as he went.’ At which she staggers to the bathroom and is violently sick.

Fearful of how the day might end, and yet unable to remain in Poppy’s apartment a moment longer after the dreadful incident with the intruder, they elect to simply open the windows to air the place and to take a walk outside - surrendering to an impulse for a little sightseeing, after all. And here, in the pleasant warmth and golden light of the late-summer evening, Deborah shows her friend around the
Altstadt
- the old quarter, with its celebrated university, its ancient buildings of stone and brick, its quaint half-timbered shops and hidden courtyards - while above, on a high prominence of the hillside, the sprawling ruins of a castle stand as a reminder of less peaceful times when death and fear and plague once stalked the streets. Deborah likes the castle - even more today than on her previous visit. Barren and slightly intimidating, it reminds her of how others in times gone by might also have suffered, fought battles and shed tears; their lives held hostage to cruel destiny.

‘Oh Rachael, why did I not foresee this?’ she sighs. ‘I used to be such a confident and resolute person, but now I feel so uncertain - uncertain about everything. All my good fortune and skills of divination have deserted me - and all so quickly. What price now the smart, clever person I used to be - the famous
Queen of the Cards
?’

‘Don’t punish yourself,’ Rachael protests with kindness as they continue their way, arm in arm. They have taken a promenade along the riverside, rejoicing in the sunlight and fresh air and twirling their parasols from time to time - a private signal between the two of them whenever either senses she is being watched or admired. ‘Perhaps there are just some things we cannot foresee,’ Rachael adds with unwonted seriousness, ‘and probably just as well, if what happened back there is anything to go by. What a horrid, despicable creature!’

Deborah can only nod her agreement. ‘It’s just that it’s so unlike my daughter to have ever become associated with anyone quite so … well, quite so repulsive,’ she remarks. ‘I just don’t understand what he was doing there.’

‘Do you know - sometimes I wish I was a man,’ Rachael states with an abrupt change of tone, becoming cross. ‘I mean, if we had been men earlier on, you and I, we could have given chase to that wretched little beast. We could have collared him and beat him until he told us what he was up to. But we can’t. We are obliged to be dignified. We are imprisoned in all these long dresses and petticoats; encased in corsets even over our bottoms these days. And what with having heels so high above the ground like this, I sometimes wonder we can ever keep ourselves upright at all. It’s just like they say, the comedians when they make fun of us - that we are no longer dressed in any conventional sense, the modern woman:
we are assembled.
And as for everyone talking about our rights … well, it may come or it may not, the vote. And I do think politics are important. But sometimes I think I would exchange all the ballot papers in Westminster just to have a little more choice between normal things - between being a Goddess and something a bit more manageable - just to be able to put on a pair of trousers sometime and go climb a mountain.’

‘Indeed, yes!’ Deborah exclaims with amazement - not least at the mental picture of her friend in trousers. It makes her smile, and as she does so she realises it is the first time in days she has been able to accomplish such a feat.

Feeling more settled by this time, they take a little sustenance and a fine glass of claret together at a restaurant in one of the better hotels. Here, however, and being removed from the merry streets and the daylight, Deborah feels an inevitable return of her sorrows. She just cannot help it. Sensing this, and her friend’s unaccustomed silence, Rachael leans forward from her seat at the table and gives Deborah’s hand a tender squeeze. ‘Sweetie - I suppose it might seem inappropriate to say this,’ she murmurs, ‘but one day you will be happy again. You know that, don’t you. None of us will ever forget your dear Penelope, but she of all people would not wish you to be so sad.’

‘Yes … yes, you are right, of course,’ Deborah responds, not sounding at all convinced. ‘But my only child, Rachael. My only child. How will I ever …’

‘Try to let go of all the grief even if just for a minute - a minute at a time,’ Rachael continues to advise - possibly recalling her own experiences upon losing her husband some years ago, ‘then the minutes will start to merge - until you will be able to let go of the pain for a whole hour; then for several hours at a time; then a whole day. And when you feel the time is right, when all the dust has settled … well, we could even take a break together - sneak off for a holiday somewhere. What do you think?’

That her friend should even consider such a thing at a time like this, comes as a shock to Deborah. But she is not angry. Another glass of claret smoothes the way. The allure of the proposal reminds her of happier days, occasions on which they would journey away, just the two of them, boarding the
Méditerranée Express
to the gorgeous azure skies and pine-scented hills of somewhere like Menton or the bays of Cannes or Nice - and where, more often than not, amid all the walks and promenades, the street
café
s by day and casinos by night, they would pursue adventures of a slightly risqué and amorous nature. Even during the early years shortly after her marriage to Hugh, even when some vestige of romantic attachment lingered, it was a prospect that invariably excited her.

‘It’s been a long while, hasn’t it, since we did anything at all like that?’ Rachael adds with an encouraging smile. ‘I reckon it’ll do you good - and me.’

Deborah can only surrender to a smile of her own as well. It is impossible, in any case, to do otherwise, because Rachael is fluttering her long, dark eyelashes - a trick for getting her own way and learned, as she herself would freely admit, long ago as a child on her father’s knee. She is offering Deborah a prospect, no matter how distant in time, of finding a way back from her misery - and, outrageous as it might seem, it is probably exactly what she needs.

‘Only if you promise not to go around fluttering your eyelashes at every handsome face,’ Deborah states by way of condition.

‘Why, what harm does that do?’ Rachael demands, pretending not to understand.

‘Fluttering at the gendarmerie - fluttering at the hotel manager?’

‘Well, it got our room changed for us that time, didn’t it?’

‘That, my dear, was despite the fluttering, not because of it,’ Deborah reminds her.

Upon which there appears at their side, as if their stolen moment of frivolity has conjured him up, the tall figure of a handsome wine waiter. And with the formalities of inquiring whether they had enjoyed their refreshments being completed, they flirt outrageously with him for a good while, asking various entirely unnecessary questions about the town and its attractions before they let him go.

‘No point in going on holiday if you can’t flutter a few eyelashes now and again,’ Rachael persists with her gaze following the unsuspecting man as he walks away.

And there can, thereafter be no dispute as to their destiny, at least some time in the not too distant future. The
Côte d’Azur
it shall be. That domain of bright colour and forgetfulness where mourning black can be set aside without shame. If at all possible, they will do it within weeks, they decide, rather than months - and thus, by slow degrees, and much kindness and coaxing on Rachael’s part, Deborah is persuaded to retrace her steps and return, as return they know they must, to the building and the apartment where Poppy had once dwelt. It is an experience, however, that proves almost as harrowing the second time around as the first, as together the two women must now sift through Poppy’s papers and belongings - of which there are precious few remaining. Perhaps someone from the police or even that horrible young man, Hanno, would already have been here and removed a substantial quantity.

Drying a tear from her eye as she works, Deborah glances with renewed interest at the sketchbooks and unfinished paintings her daughter had left behind, art being a newfound interest of hers and which she had mentioned in her letters. The works themselves are all in disarray; some tucked away in drawers, others against walls, most dictated by modern taste and fashion and failing to offer much insight concerning Poppy’s state of mind. But there are others, her more personally inspired pieces that eventually capture Deborah’s attention. She really must, she tells herself, return here some time when she has more leisure and decide which ones to keep, if any - for these, the most recent of her daughter’s efforts according to the dates upon them, are also the most disturbing - symmetrical, kaleidoscopic outlines with powerful central figures at the focus, figures drenched in lurid, gaudy colours, and always masculine in outline, a threatening supremacy to them, so that she catches herself wondering, just who or what it might have been, this insidious and possibly quite malevolent force presiding over the poor child’s imagination during her final days?

Other than that, there is precious little to be discovered among her other possessions. Had she intended to be away a long while, Deborah wonders? It seems so. No food has been left in the larder, and the bed has been stripped. There is nothing much to be discovered in the wardrobe, either, apart from one abandoned evening gown, which clearly she would not have felt she needed upon her last fateful journey. As for any other kind of clue, a letter, a diary, a booklet, a poster - anything that might have betrayed an interest in some sort of cult activity, there is nothing - absolutely nothing; while any fellow students or neighbours, anyone who might have been acquainted with Poppy, and who might therefore have been able to provide some background information ... well, in the time honoured tradition of students the world over, they have long since departed for their summer vacation. The place is as empty as Satan’s heart, and to Deborah every bit as horrifying. And after just one further hour of fruitless endeavour in the grim and desolate building, she and Rachael take a cab out to the railway station and here, reunited with their luggage, begin the long journey to the port of Calais and thence across the Channel and back to England - a place where, at that very same moment, far ahead of them and carried with slow dignity from a train in Victoria station in the heart of London, the coffin of Penelope Peters, an extravagant wreath of red roses attached to its top, is taken off by four men in black frockcoats who then hoist it upon their shoulders and carry it with solemn dignity along the length of the platform.

It is a grim, filthy evening - the early darkness of winter in England. A haze of drizzle mingled with a typical London fog permeates and blends unwholesomely with all the vapours and soot from the steam engines as the men are joined by two other figures, more distinguished in appearance but likewise dressed in most sombre black: Hubert Peters and his secretary Joseph Beezley, their top hats removed, positioning themselves to observe the modest procession as it passes - the red roses, amid the gloom of the station and its darkly clad travellers, appearing to be the only trace of colour remaining in the entire city - before they themselves turn to walk slowly behind, following the sorrowful spectacle across the concourse and out to the waiting carriage. The transfer goes smoothly, exactly according to plan; exactly as Beezley has arranged it. There are no waiting pressmen this time; no flash of photography; no commotion or shouts of anger. All is dignified and orderly, even amid the noise and bustle of the city. And within moments, with the clatter of hooves upon the cobblestones of the courtyard outside, the carriage is spirited away at a canter, down into Whitehall and southwards to a place of seclusion and peace.