Her parents had been killed in Egypt when she was ten. They’d gone to a Christmas Eve party at the Windsor Hotel in Cairo, leaving Clara at home with the nanny. She remembered them saying goodbye: her mother, beautiful in a dress of lavender silk with long white gloves fastened up to her elbows, a necklace glittering around her neck, her father stooping to kiss Clara, his face scratchy against hers. She’d inhaled cigar tobacco, starch and a trace of something musky. He’d called her ‘Bear’, put his large hand on her head. But she’d ducked away from his touch, refusing to turn and wave, because they were sending her to boarding school after the holidays, and she didn’t want to go.

  The bomb had been planted by the Muslim Brotherhood. There had been a spate of bombings in the city: soldiers had been killed, a horse, and two officials. Her parents had died instantly as they left the party, with Hanif, their driver, at the wheel, his fingers on the ignition.

  ‘Everything about England was grey and damp,’ she told Max. ‘I was lonely and homesick. I missed my parents. I missed the flame tree in our garden. I longed for the warmth of its scarlet flowers, the way I used to hold up my hand to catch red reflections on my skin.’

  When Max came home after work, he held his breath, hardly able to believe that Clara would be there. He entered the flat to smell cinders, charcoal: essence of burning. Clara even ruined macaroni cheese. He forked tasteless clumps of greasy pasta into his mouth and forced a smile. ‘Delicious.’

  ‘Liar!’ She threw a bit of burnt cheese at him.

  Max thought that it might help if she read a recipe book instead of a novel while she was cooking. But she laughed when he pointed this out, and Max didn’t care–his mother had taught him to cook, so he’d often roll his sleeves up when he got back and throw a stew together while Clara sat on the kitchen table, sipping wine and talking to him. Who needed food when there were fresh flowers spilling out of a vase, and music playing on the record player? She asked if she should be looking for a flat, but he said not unless she felt uncomfortable with the situation. He wanted her to stay. When his friends came over for a drink and a game of poker, she poured them beers and joined in with the ironic jokes about fast women and cowboys. He met a couple of her actor friends, listened to the gossip, watched her pick up their effusive gestures and breathy mannerisms. They went to see Lawrence of Arabia at the Odeon and Clara teased him all the way home about how much he looked like Peter O’Toole.

  By the time the nuclear weapons protestors arrived in London in April, the hard-packed snows had melted, leaving the streets naked and gritty, the roads blasted full of lethal potholes, and Clara had started her secretarial training. On the morning of the fifteenth, she didn’t go to the course and instead went with two friends from drama school to join the marchers in Trafalgar Square, with her CND badge pinned to her jacket.

  He got the phone call that afternoon. He’d run out of the office, shouting a hurried explanation to the receptionist as he went, tugging his jacket on. He took a taxi to St Thomas’ hospital and, after being directed by several nurses, down corridors and up flights of stairs, he found her sitting on a chair behind a green curtain, a patch of gauze over her forehead.

  ‘It turned nasty,’ she said, her voice small. ‘I got separated from the others. There was fighting. Someone pushed me. I fell. I can’t remember much more…’

  He heard on the news that there had been organised troublemakers there. He blamed himself. He should have known. Max took her home and put her to bed, brought her cups of hot chocolate and grapes, sat with her until she fell asleep.

  The next morning when he came to collect her breakfast tray, she was propped up against the pillows reading; she’d managed to drink her tea and eat a piece of toast and marmalade. He stooped to take the tray from her. ‘Had enough?’

  ‘Thanks.’ She smiled up at him, putting the book down over her knees. ‘I’m feeling much better. The headache has gone.’

  He nodded at the spread pages. ‘Any good?’ It was the new John Fowles. It had a picture of a butterfly on the cover. He turned his head sideways to try and read the title.

  She twitched her nose. ‘Yes and no. It’s great writing. But it’s depressing as hell.’

  ‘So I can distract you, then?’

  ‘Please.’ She gestured for him to sit next to her.

  ‘Well,’ he paused, remaining standing with the tray in his hands, ‘I was wondering what you thought about getting married.’ He cleared his throat. ‘I know it means not being a sinner anymore, but I thought if you didn’t mind, I’d like to make our relationship official.’

  She glanced away from him at the book on her knees and fiddled with it for a few moments, fingering the pages. He noticed that the bandage above her left eye looked grey in the sunshine, fraying around the edges. His mouth lost moisture. It was too soon to ask. He’d got it wrong. At the hospital, when he’d been at the desk, trying to find out where she was, he’d wanted to ask for his wife. He’d desperately wanted them to understand the importance of their relationship.

  ‘I know it’s sudden,’ he rushed his words, ‘but I love you. I’ve never been more certain… we can have a long engagement if you like…’

  ‘The thing is,’ she interrupted him, ‘I’ve always wanted children. Lots of children. We’ve never talked about it. And, well, you need to know that.’

  She lay back against the pillow, her face oddly settled, mouth closed. Her eyes were clear and direct. He could see that she was serious.

  ‘Of course,’ he said, relief filling him. ‘Children. Yes. I’d like that. So,’ he gripped the edges of the tray tighter, ‘is that a yes?’

  Later, when he was lying in bed with her, her head heavy on his shoulder, he asked casually, ‘How many were you thinking?’

  She laughed. ‘I used to want about ten. But now I’d settle for three or four.’ She moved her chin, settling more comfortably. ‘Four sounds about right.’

  ‘I see.’ He was careful not to brush up against the wound where black stitches puckered her skin. ‘We’d better get on with the wedding then.’ He kept his voice grave, teasing her. ‘Let me see.’ He nodded. ‘If we start with one every two years, we’ll have a whole tribe before we know it.’

  They had a summer wedding. She wore a white linen mini-dress; it swung heavily against her thighs, weighed down with clusters of fabric daisies sewn onto the hem. Grace Gale came, a few other relations on his side, work colleagues and friends. Some of the acting lot turned up. After the register had been signed, she and Max stood on the steps looking down on the King’s Road. It was hot, and she was glad of her cool dress. Confetti fell around them in fluttering pastels and one of Max’s poker-playing friends pointed a camera. ‘Smile!’ he shouted, crouching at the foot of the steps looking up at them.

  She went to the doctor in November, running home, her breath trailing plumes behind her as she pushed her way through shoppers, not looking at the glittering shop windows, ready for Christmas. She remembered how as a child at school she’d sketched children: an imaginary line-up of children that she would have when she was grown-up. There had always been one set of twins, and there would be a clever child with glasses and freckles and another who was slightly chubby. And then there would be the baby, plump and smiling, holding out its arms to her. Underneath each child she’d written his or her name, their age and characteristics. Beth, 5, likes dancing and sucks her thumb. Tommy, 9, good at cricket and clever at maths.

  She’d hidden her drawings when anyone looked over her shoulder, lowering her head towards the desk, her arm curled around the paper protectively. At night, lying in her narrow bed in a room full of sleeping girls, she’d told herself that one day she would be old enough to leave school and get married. And then she would have a husband and lots of children. They would all love her; and she would be safe. She’d fallen asleep reciting their names.

  ‘Hello?’ she called breathlessly from the hall, unwrapping her scarf, dropping her bag on the floor. Max didn’t reply, or even turn to look at her as she came in. He was glued to the television. Clara wondered what he was watching as she leant against him, kissing the top of his head, her eyes on the flickering screen. ‘What is it?’

  He pulled her onto his lap. ‘Kennedy’s been assassinated. God. It’s unbelievable. The end of an era,’ he shook his head wearily. ‘Nothing good can come of this.’

  She felt the shock of his announcement. Pressing her belly, Clara remained silent. She couldn’t tell him her news, not under such a momentous shadow. She watched the screen, as jerky newsreel showed Jackie Kennedy, immaculate in gloves and pillbox hat, waving to the crowds next to her handsome husband: the glamorous couple bright under the Dallas sun. What followed was hard to understand, it was so quick: the confusion of bodyguards jumping from the bumper, the car turning a corner, its silver grill grinning like a shark; the slump of the president, Jackie bending towards him. And then the second shot, the splatter of what appeared to be light, but what she realised, a second later, was the ricochet of bone shards and spurting fluid. Jackie clambering across the boot of the car, her body sinuous, writhing low, like an animal.

  Clara remembered how her father had rested his hand on her hair before he’d left for the party. ‘Goodnight, Bear.’ During countless sleepless nights, she’d tried to recall the weight of his fingers across her scalp. She’d learnt not to think of her parents in that explosion, blocking out the force of it, blowing the car into twisted metal and shattered glass. She’d concentrated instead on remembering the glow of the flame tree, the clarity of crimson reflections falling across her skin, a different kind of red, tender and kind.

  The school library had been a refuge. She’d hidden behind book stacks, away from the shouts from the hockey pitch and all the giggling conversations that excluded her. She’d lost herself in the private activity of sketching imaginary people, a new family to love. She’d willed those paper children to take life, understanding only vaguely that they needed to grow inside her, like seeds blossoming into flowers.

  She put her arms around Max’s neck, inhaling his familiar smell, feeling his hands on her waist, fingers long and strong as her father’s had been. And she swallowed her words, holding back the moment when she would tell him that they had begun their tribe.

  16

  Max slides the tray into the oven, apple slices layered in a haphazard jumble. He doesn’t do neat, by-the-book baking. He makes a mess, splatters the kitchen in liquid mix, apple peelings on the floor. But his food always tastes good. Faith is up in her bedroom. He looks at his watch. The pie will be ready to eat in about half an hour.

  Clara comes in from the garden, leaving the door open. The early-evening sun illuminates her, catches wisps of hair, turning them into a halo. He absorbs the blur of insect wings, songbirds’ voices. There is a streak of earth on Clara’s forehead. She goes to the sink to wash her hands. ‘Smells good,’ she says, under the rush of water.

  He moves towards her, close enough to inhale fresh air, the raw tang of green shoots on her skin, and puts out his hand to wipe away the earthy smudge. She flinches. A tiny impulse of distrust. He tightens his mouth and lowers his hand. ‘You have some mud or something…’ he gestures. Turns away. ‘I’m making apple pie,’ he says. ‘Won’t be long.’

  He’s made a salad, laid the table. Sophie has taken the evening off. Max is glad. Although she can cook basic meals, they are tasteless and bland. Food cooked without love is like food without salt, his mother told him more than once. If he can get home from the office early enough he is happy to make supper. He’s struggling to think of other, more useful things he can do for Clara and Faith.

  ‘You missed an exciting race today,’ he tells Clara. ‘Zola Budd running barefoot. She tripped the American girl, Decker. Crowd were booing her. Poor kid. She finished seventh in the end.’

  Clara makes a noncommittal noise in her throat, taking a towel from the oven rail to dry her hands. Max frowns. She hasn’t shown any interest in the Olympics. But he can’t think of anything else to say. Once he would have asked her if she’d made a start on the children’s book about the Wild Man she’d told him she wanted to write. Once they would have slipped into idle, pleasurable small talk, the kind that’s punctuated with old jokes and fuelled by familiarity. None of that is possible anymore. The door opens and Faith comes in.

  ‘Just in time, Shrimp,’ he begins, relieved. But he stops when he sees the look on her face.

  ‘I have to talk to you.’ Faith stands fiddling with her cuffs, pulling them down over her spindly fingers. She looks at the floor, wrapping one leg behind the other.

  ‘What is it?’ Clara asks, dropping the towel on a chair.

  ‘You’re wrong about Eva.’ Faith puts her chin in the air. ‘She’s not dead. She’s on the island and we need to go and get her.’

  Not this again. Max glances at Clara. But she keeps her face turned from him. He swallows, searching for the right words, but Clara is already speaking.

  ‘We’ve talked about this before, darling. I know it’s hard for you to accept, but…’

  ‘It doesn’t seem hard for you to accept!’ she blurts out, her cheeks stinging. ‘Dad and you, you just seem to think it’s OK to believe that she’s gone.’

  ‘Oh.’ Clara’s voice is small. ‘That’s not fair.’

  ‘It’s not fair that we leave Eva on the island–leave her there with something bad.’ She glares at them both. ‘Why can’t we just get a boat and go and look for her?’

  ‘Mum’s right. The island was searched,’ Max explains. ‘The coastguard looked along the whole of the coastline, including the island. They do this all the time. They know how to find people. There were several searches and there was a helicopter. She wasn’t there, Faith.’

  ‘But they could have missed her. People make mistakes, don’t they?’

  Max stares at her; he feels hollowed out, afraid. Faith is rigid, trembling. She curls her hands into fists under the saggy sleeves. The thought of getting a boat and sailing to the island makes him feel as though he’s falling. The swell of the sea, the feeling of a boat moving under him has become part of his nightmares.

  ‘The coastguard explained to us that she has been lost out at sea. It happens.’ He pushes the words out, watching Faith’s face harden. ‘People.’ He pauses. ‘Bodies. They’re never found.’

  ‘Faith,’ Clara says gently. ‘You know that the Wild Man isn’t real, don’t you? He’s made up. A myth. A legend.’

  ‘I hate you.’ Faith bangs her heel against the cabinet behind her. ‘I hate you both.’

  She runs from the room, her head down. Clara makes a move to follow her, but Max reaches out an arm. ‘Leave her.’

  Clara stands watching as Faith slams the door behind her. She grimaces. ‘God, she just won’t let this crazy idea go. Perhaps, I don’t know, perhaps we should do what she wants…’ Clara begins to pace around the kitchen table, her lips trembling, fingers flexing. ‘If we take her to the island then we can prove it’s not true.’

  For a moment he wonders if he could do it. There are friends he could borrow a boat from. He blinks, remembering the howl of the wind, waves rearing and the sky suddenly black. He rubs his forehead, touches the scar on his head where he had eight stitches. He frowns into the blank of his memory. The moment he lost his daughter. There are snatches of colour: the orange of his lifejacket, the red of the coastguard’s rescue boat, a man’s grey face when Max cried out, ‘My daughter?’

  ‘No,’ he tells Clara. ‘It would just get her hopes up and then she’d have to cope with being wrong. Can you imagine her disappointment? The coastguard told us we couldn’t even expect…’ he lowers his voice, ‘a body to wash up at this point.’ He stands close to Clara, appealing to her with open hands. ‘Faith has to trust us to know best. Maybe it’s better for her to be angry with us. Maybe being angry with us helps her cope, a kind of–I don’t know–a distraction from the hurt.’

  Clara wraps her arms around herself. ‘I hate this. I hate this not-knowing. If only they’d found her body. It would actually be better.’ She huddles further into herself, hunching her shoulders. ‘I want to see her, to be able to say goodbye… I need it… what do they call it? Closure.’ She gives a brief, dry laugh.

  Max goes to her, puts out a hand to touch her shoulder. She keeps herself tightly wrapped. ‘That storm, Clara,’ he says quietly. ‘It was the worst I’ve ever been out in. There’s no way she could have survived.’

  ‘Not without a lifejacket,’ Clara says in a dull voice.

  ‘No,’ he echoes. ‘Not without a lifejacket.’

  She shakes her head, avoiding his eyes. He sees her skin flush, colour rising across her throat onto her jaw, staining her cheeks. Don’t say it, he begs her silently.

  ‘I’ll never understand,’ she says, looking up at him. ‘I’ll never understand why she wasn’t wearing it.’

  Max grips his hands into balls, nails biting flesh. He wants to hit something. He wants to smash his fist into his head, to shake his memory free, remember what happened that day. When they’d shown him Eva’s lifejacket he had staggered backwards, his knees giving way, because he knew what it meant: her certain death, and his stupidity, his guilt. His never-ending guilt.

  He sniffs. The kitchen is filled with the stench of burning, the caustic scent of scorched food. He opens the oven–clouds of black smoke make him cough, his eyes stinging as he slides the ruined remains of the apple pie out. When he turns, Clara has left the room.

  17

  Billy’s knuckles are flayed to pieces. There are clots of dried blood crusting over raw edges, the wounds dark and sticky against his tanned skin. He punches the wall at night. The noise enters my dreams, bringing violence, hammers and fighting, until I wake with a start, understanding that the noise is real, his fists slamming into the pagoda. I put my hands over my ears, trying to block out the sound of bone on concrete, his breath coming hard and grunts of pain.