The String Diaries (10 page)

‘Then one day, outside the village, they found the body. It had been buried for a while, and the face was gone. Sliced off. The gendarme failed to identify it. But my mother knew.’

Charles nodded, transfixed by her words, filled with concern for Nicole’s state as she talked. ‘What happened?’

‘One evening, my mother packed me off to friends. She plied my father with drink until he was virtually comatose, put him to bed and locked the door. Then she went downstairs, boarded up the house and torched it.’

‘My God.’

‘She collected me in the middle of the night and we headed north. We never went back.’

Nicole leaned back in her seat. She smiled at him, brushing tears from her eyes. ‘And that’s it. What do you think? Still interested in me?’ Her tone verged on hysterical.

‘Want me to play devil’s advocate?’

‘Sure.’

‘It’s difficult to say this without the risk of hurting you, but your father could have been ill.’

‘A degenerative disease that would explain his behaviour. Alzheimer’s.’

‘Perhaps. Or something similar.’

‘And my mother burned an innocent man.’

‘That’s the bit that’s difficult to say.’

Nicole nodded.

Then he asked, ‘So if Jakab burned in the house, why are you still running?’

‘Because my mother had one friend in the village she confided in. She called her a few years later to find out what happened. By the time the fire reached the upper floor, it had drawn the villagers out of their beds. They saw a man screaming at one of the windows. Some said later he appeared to be writhing.
Rippling
. He broke the window and threw himself out, from a height that would have killed or crippled most men. And then he got up and ran away.’

‘And he’s still after you.’

She picked up her cognac, gulped it. ‘And that’s why I’m in England. In Oxford. I’ve been researching all this time. There are texts here: original sources, documents I can’t access anywhere else.
Hosszú élet
means Long Life but it doesn’t mean immortal. I want to find out how much longer this can last.’

Charles breathed deeply. He found it difficult to respond to the enormity of what she had just told him. It was impossible to believe any of the more sensational aspects of the story. But clearly something tragic had happened to the Dubois family. Whether Beckett’s tales had any relevance suddenly didn’t matter to him. Eccentric or not, he would take another leap of faith if she asked him to, would put the mythology to one side until he had worked out what to do.

Reaching across the table, he took her hand. ‘Will you let me help you?’

She laughed, tears falling this time, and put her own hand over his. ‘Of course, Charles. Thank you.’

‘Will you let me read the diaries?’

‘If that’s what you want.’

‘Will you leave them with me for a while? Maybe one or two of them?’ She hesitated, then squeezed his hand and nodded. Charles glanced at his watch. ‘We’d better get back to the cottage. You sail for France in the morning.’

‘There’s one more thing, Charles.’ She still held his hand, and now she really did smile. ‘It sounds better in French.’

‘What is it?’

‘
Je crois que je vous aime aussi
.’

It was the most beautiful phrase he had heard.

C
HAPTER
8

Snowdonia

Now

A
wave of nausea threatened to overwhelm Hannah as the full impact of Sebastien’s words seized her.

Have you validated Nate since he got into the car with you?

She took a gasping breath. Another. Felt a buzzing in her ears, a dryness in her mouth.

Could she even conceive that the man downstairs was someone other than her husband? The possibility that Nate had not been the one to travel with them to the farmhouse brought consequences so dire she could hardly even consider them.

She searched her memory frantically for any proof that it was Nate –
her
Nate – that lay injured on the sofa in the kitchen. She reran their flight from her father’s place, the words they had exchanged in the car. What words, though? He had hardly spoken. Had hardly even told her what happened.

But he was dying!

And unless we’ve managed to stop the bleeding in time he may STILL be dying!

Unbidden, a memory rushed at her: the day she married Nate. No guests. No fuss. Her husband, her father and a single minister in a church on the shores of Lake Annecy. Charles booked them into the bridal suite of a hotel overlooking the lake, but Hannah bundled Nate into their car and drove him into the mountains instead. That night she made love to him on a blanket and they fell asleep watching a cold moon dust the lake with wedding diamonds. The next morning they drove back to the hotel in time for a breakfast served by staff who did their best not to notice the dirt on their clothes and the flush on their faces.

Tears blurred her vision. She clenched her fists, forced herself to lock away the memory. Focused instead on hatred. On rage.

She would not yet believe that her husband was gone, but she would go downstairs and find out. If it was Jakab she found – if he had supplanted Nate – then God pity him because the only thing left for her would be vengeance and hers would be terrible. She would destroy him. Utterly. Pulverise his flesh. Shatter every one of his bones. Stamp him into the earth. Gut him. Burn him. Obliterate him.

Hannah realised that she was shaking. Eyes gritty, she jumped up from the bed.

Sebastien climbed to his feet. ‘What are you thinking?’

‘I need to know.’

He nodded. ‘I’m coming with you.’

No need to be stealthy now, she reasoned. Either her husband lay on the couch downstairs or a monstrous counterfeit.

You left Leah with him
.

The grotesque reality of that thought swamped her, a capsizing black wave that closed over her head and pushed into her lungs.

You left Leah
.

Hannah gagged, stumbled. Would he harm their daughter? Everything she had read in the diaries described a creature whose mind was so broken, so incapable of empathy or love in the way she understood those concepts, that any attempt to predict its behaviour was an exercise in insanity.

The possibilities she had discounted moments ago were now so real they seemed like probabilities. As Hannah crossed the room she realised with horror that she had already started to grieve.

She had been raised to survive: to flee, to fight, to grieve, accept, protect. She had been taught by three decades of fear, of loss, of snatching moments of joy in a world of instability. She could not remember a time, even during her happiest moments –
especially
during her happiest moments – when she had not caught herself wondering when it would end, how it would end, and how the entries in her own diaries might read if they survived long enough to be passed down.

Act
.

Stop thinking. Don’t hesitate.
Act
. The mantra had served her tolerably so far. Looking into the future would immobilise her if she allowed it.

Earlier, after verifying Sebastien’s identity, she had put the shotgun back on the pantry shelf. The old man’s arrival had reassured her, and she had been more worried about leaving a loaded weapon within Leah’s reach than their immediate discovery. How costly might that mistake turn out to be?

Hannah stepped out of the bedroom, began to move down the stairs. As she passed the landing, the eyes of the stuffed falcon followed her with a dead stare.

She had little need for stealth. But she found herself creeping down to the ground-floor hall nevertheless. Little need for stealth, but little need either to alert him to her approach. She kept tight to the wall, minimising the creak of the treads beneath her feet. Sebastien followed, close behind.

At the bottom of the stairs Hannah paused, listening.

Wind. The knocking of window-panes. Rain bouncing like rice grains off the glass. Inside, the house breathed silence.

She padded along the floorboards to the kitchen. Winced at the hard shadows cast into corners by the dull light of the chandelier. Sought them anyway, rejecting her fear.

The first door on her right was closed. Dining room. Further down, the living-room door gaped open. The darkness within emitted a chill breeze. She remembered the smashed window she had seen. Remembered that she had not investigated it. Another mistake.

The hallway twisted a dog-leg before arriving at the kitchen. She would have to turn her back on the living-room doorway, on that black void.

And that’s when he would grab her. She’d feel his fingers slide around her throat, hear him whisper her name, and she would scream and kick and bite and claw and gouge but when she turned and saw the ghoul wearing her dead husband’s face, she would know she had lost everything.

Hannah stopped in the hall, and when Sebastien butted up against her she nearly cried out.

You left Leah with him
.

She turned away from the toothless mouth of the living-room doorway. Balled her fists. When nothing leaped out at her, she stepped into the kitchen.

Hannah had left candles burning and a fire crackling in the grate. As she entered the room the light was soft and warm. The sofa where she had laid Nate and they had treated his wounds was empty. The hose of the drip she had set up lay on the floor, discarded.

In the armchair where Leah had slept, a solitary cushion remained.

Hannah felt something wrench inside her. She opened her mouth. Wanted to scream. A million dark thoughts flooded her. Thirty years of nightmares condensed into a single moment.

Yet this was real. This was happening.

Don’t think about what it means. Don’t. Just think of Leah
.

Sebastien walked into the kitchen behind her. He hissed when he saw the empty sofa. His eyes flicked to hers.

Gun
, she mouthed, and he nodded in response.

The pantry door was ajar. Hannah slipped inside. She felt around for the shelf where she had left the weapon. Even as she wondered what she would do if the shotgun was missing, her hands touched the shelf and slid along the wood. Empty.

Hannah wasted a few more seconds, feeling blindly, knowing the truth but needing to convince herself that the weapon had really gone.

She backed out of the cupboard.

Sebastien still stood in the doorway, but he had turned to face the hall. She heard him take a slow, measured breath. ‘It’s OK,’ he said, the timbre of his voice startling after the silence of the last few minutes.

Something odd in his tone. Something terrifying.

She couldn’t make her legs work. ‘What is it?’

‘It’s OK,’ he repeated. ‘Everything’s OK. I’ve found Nate.’

Sebastien took a step backwards, then another. As he reversed into the kitchen, Hannah saw that the shotgun’s twin barrels were pressed against his chin. Sebastien backed further into the room. The shotgun followed. Holding it was a nightmarish, corpse-like version of her husband.

‘What you . . .’ he said to Sebastien, voice cracked and rasping. He licked his lips. Tried again. ‘What . . . you doing here?’

Hannah’s feet remained fastened to the floor. ‘Nate, where’s Leah?’

He advanced into the room, using the barrels as a prod to keep Sebastien at a distance, never taking his eyes off the old man. ‘Back up. Couch . . . Sit.’

‘Where’s
Leah,
Nate?’

‘Safe. When . . . he sh’up?’ A breath. ‘Show up.’

The knife block on the kitchen counter held six blades. It was two yards from her. ‘Just after we arrived. It’s OK. He’s a friend.’

Sebastien sat down on the sofa and rested his hands in his lap.

‘You d’know any . . . anything ’bout him, Han.’

‘Nate, he checks out. Please. Give me the gun.’ Nate swayed on his feet, rested a shoulder against the door frame. The barrels of the weapon swung towards her. She tensed. Wondered what a chest full of buckshot would feel like. Wondered if it would kill her instantly. ‘Nate, you’re going to pass out and you’re holding a loaded gun. Give it to me. I’ve got a better chance of shooting him than you have.’

Nate took his eyes off Sebastien for half a second as he glanced at her. Removing the hand that clutched the barrels, he wiped sweat from his face. A wrack of pain seemed to lash him. He bent, grimaced. If this was an act, it was the best she had ever seen. He looked like he could collapse at any moment.

Of course it’ll look good. It WILL be the best you’ve ever seen.

Then, when she was least expecting it, he handed her the shotgun.

Before she had even grasped what was happening, Hannah found herself holding the weapon. Quickly, she stepped away from him.

The safety lever was off. She thumbed it back on – could not risk shooting her husband.
If
that was who this corpse-creature turned out to be. She lifted the barrels and aimed. ‘I’m sorry, darling, I love you. I love you so much and I have to do this. I need you to tell me the name of the hotel where we stayed, the night of our wedding.’

Nate stared at the shotgun pointing at his head and then he looked at his wife. ‘I hope you don’t think I’m dishonouring you,’ he said, gasping for breath. ‘But you’ve never been the sort of girl to . . .’ He swallowed, winced. Reaching out a hand to steady himself, he closed his eyes as another tide of pain coursed through him. When he opened them again they were filled with love. ‘. . . to settle for a hotel bed when you had the chance of a tumble under the stars.’

Hannah sobbed then, feeling her life’s axis tilting, her world seesawing back into alignment. That they had lost their home, their livelihood, their peace, no longer mattered. Only her family mattered. What was left of it.

Leah. Nate.

He slumped further against the door jamb and she ran to him, holding the shotgun in one hand and cradling him with the other.

He pointed a finger towards Sebastien. ‘We haven’t finished here.’

‘Nate, he saved your life.’

‘Then he won’t mind a few questions.’

From the sofa, Sebastien said, ‘Hannah, remember what I said. Let him ask. It’s important.’

Nate nodded. ‘We’ve met before. Where?’

The old man smiled. ‘A number of times. But only ever with Charles. I remember a particular occasion when we had lunch in Budapest and you ordered a steak so rare you virtually had to drink it.’

Nate stared at Sebastien. His mouth twisted first into a grin, and then a grimace of pain. ‘You old dog. What brought you here?’

‘We have a lot to talk about. But it can wait. First we need to get you well.’

Clenching his teeth, Nate sagged in Hannah’s embrace. ‘Leah’s in the next room. Asleep still. You need . . . put her to bed. I need . . . lie down.’

Sebastien helped her guide him to the sofa. ‘Can I ask what you’ve done with Moses?’ he asked, as he reattached the drip to Nate’s arm.

‘Great guard dog,’ Nate muttered. ‘Threw a chocolate outside and he . . . out like a shot.’

It took Hannah a few minutes to carry her daughter upstairs and tuck her under the covers of the four-poster bed. Leah woke once, asking where they were, but Hannah managed to soothe the girl back to sleep.

Downstairs, seeing that Nate had also drifted off, she led Sebastien into the living room. She spotted the smashed window, resolved to fix it in the morning. With so many potential entry points, the security risk of a single broken pane was minimal. It did, however, make the temperature of the room uncomfortable. She closed the curtains and switched on the dim electric bulb that hung from the ceiling.

Settling into a chair, Sebastien said, ‘I can only try to imagine how traumatic that must have been for you.’

Hannah rubbed her face. She filled her cheeks with air and allowed them to deflate. ‘If I’d lost Nate . . .’ Finishing the sentence would bring tears and lower her defences. She left it hanging, watching as Moses nosed his way into the room. The dog collapsed at Sebastien’s feet.

‘Do you have a plan?’ he asked.

‘We can’t stay here indefinitely. But Nate’s in bad shape.’

‘He’s remarkably resilient. I have to admit, when he came at me with that shotgun, I didn’t think there was any chance it was really him.’

‘He’s a fighter, all right.’

‘I can’t pretend to know him well, but our paths have crossed a few times over the years, via your father. And it’s always been clear that everything he does, he does with you and your daughter in mind.’

‘It’s a largely thankless task.’

‘After what I just overheard in the kitchen,’ Sebastien replied archly, ‘I’m sure it has its rewards.’

She glanced over at him and noticed with surprise the wolfish grin on his face. ‘I’m not sure how I feel about someone as ancient as you are making dirty remarks like that.’

‘Ancient.’ He cackled. ‘You’re your father’s daughter, aren’t you?’ His expression darkened the instant the words left his lips. He clamped his mouth shut.

‘Do you think there’s any chance . . .’

‘Let’s not dwell on that tonight. We don’t know enough to speculate.’

‘We haven’t heard from him.’

‘No.’

‘So it doesn’t look good.’

Sebastien sat in silence. Then he said, ‘Tell me about your plan.’

‘It really depends on Nate. I don’t want to move him until I have to.’