her collage of cuts and bruises. While she was soaking, he prepared supper. Some nights he ate with her, most nights he didn’t. Afterwards, he read by the peat fire in the sitting room, or went to his small office, shutting the door on her. She was free to do as she pleased. That meant going to bed as early as possible because she knew that in the morning the routine would resume and that there weren’t enough hours in the night for her to recuperate fully.
I’m sitting on a stone beside a cluster of mountain ash trees. Slender branches sag under the weight of dense clusters of brilliant red berries. According to Boyd, this is the sign of a harsh winter ahead. He might be right, but I predict some severe frost far sooner than that.
The weeks roll past as the tension between us grows daily. I know that I’m not helping matters because I react badly to his continual provocation. But that’s the way I am. I use aggravation as a spur.
I can feel the metamorphosis. The body I had is reducing, hardening, changing shape. I preferred myself as I was – happy, healthy, feminine – but there is another part of me that celebrates the new condition. It toughens me mentally to see the physical change. It’s difficult to rationalize. Perhaps it’s the sense that Boyd is only making his task harder. The more I improve, the less his jibes matter. And the more distracted that seems to make him.
Within the parameters of our narrow existence, this should give me some pleasure. But it doesn’t. I would like to ask what the matter is but I can’t. Just as when he asks me about my time as Petra, I refuse to give him an answer. Not because I don’t want him to know but because I don’t want Alexander to know. Perhaps part of the reason for my discomfort lies there; I don’t like to see a fiercely strong and independent man like Boyd acting as a mouthpiece for a snake like Alexander.
I’m watching from afar. He’s by the cabins, flanked by three assistants, two men and a woman, all ex-Army. By the edge of the loch, the latest batch of guests have congregated around half a dozen kayaks. They’ve come from Slough. They work in telesales, peddling advertising space in magazines specializing in second-hand cars, DIY, computing, kitchens and bathrooms. I wait until Boyd steps forward to address the group before retreating to the lodge.
Inside, it’s cool, dark and still. I hear the murmur of the Rayburn in the kitchen. Nothing else. I step into Boyd’s office, the only room in his home from which I am expressly forbidden. It’s a small cube with a single window onto the loch. A sturdy seasoned oak desk occupies much of the floor-space. Along one wall, there are four filing cabinets, all locked, which seems strange considering Boyd rarely bothers to lock his front door unless he’s away for a matter of days.
I sift through the papers on the desk; a phone bill with no numbers I recognize, some correspondence from Sutherland Council, a receipt for a Caledonian MacBrayne ferry ticket to Islay, several letters from companies booked with Boyd over the summer. I ignore the computer, suspecting he’ll know if I’ve tampered with it. Instead, I dial 1471 on the phone to see who his last caller was but they haven’t allowed their number to be passed on.
Some of the shelves are occupied by books, mostly history, no fiction. There are two dozen CDs above a mini-system. They’re all classical. Above the CDs, there are two rows of box files, each with headings down the spine. Most of them appear to be business accounts stretching back over a decade. On one shelf there are two small silver samovars. On the shelf beneath, there are framed photographs; Boyd in combat gear, hot scrub for a background, three other soldiers in the foreground, machine guns clutched as casually as friends; Boyd looking younger and with longer hair, Manhattan behind him – a snap from the top of the Empire State Building, I think; a head-and-shoulders portrait of a woman with light brown, shoulder-length hair, grey eyes, a petite nose and thin straight lips. I pick it up. Rachel.
There are other photographs of her, some with Boyd, some alone. In the ones that feature him, I see an entirely different man to the one I know. A man who used to smile, a man without emptiness for eyes. He looks warmly happy in every one. He hardly looks like Boyd.
All I’m aware of is the ticking of the carriage-clock on his desk.
I’m still holding Rachel. Something seeps out of the frame, through my fingertips and heads for my chest. Shame. Boyd has his reasons for banning me from this room and now I have my own. I watch him through the window. He’s still talking. I wonder what it was that Rachel possessed to make Boyd fall in love with her. And then I wonder what kind of woman would fall in love with a man like Boyd.
Boyd had his back to the sink. Stephanie was leaning close to the Rayburn, letting its heat warm the backs of her thighs. Outside, a storm rampaged. Earlier, she’d watched the clouds gather. The rain had arrived as the light died in the west. Four hours later, the tempest was intensifying.
‘When I heard you’d run after Malta, I wasn’t surprised. I warned Alexander. I said you would, right from the start. I told him, if she gets a chance, she’ll take it. But you were so good, he didn’t believe me. He thought I’d trained you too well for that.’
‘But you hadn’t?’
‘Depends on how you look at it. I take the view that I trained you well enough to think for yourself. Once you were out there, you weren’t a programmed machine. You were versatile. Imaginative. Beyond containment.’
‘Am I supposed to be flattered?’
‘You’re supposed to ask what went wrong.’
‘Maybe nothing did.’
‘You became Petra, didn’t you? That was never supposed to happen. Once you’d vanished, you should have stayed vanished.’
‘Nobody stays vanished. Not from them.’
‘You could’ve.’
‘They found me, didn’t they?’
‘Living under the surname Schneider,’ Boyd said, making no effort to disguise his contempt.
Stephanie wasn’t sure that had anything to do with it.
‘If you’d been more careful, you could’ve made it work. You could’ve created a brand-new life for yourself. A good life.’
‘I did. In the end.’
‘It should have happened straight away. You had enough talent to do it. Once you were free, you could’ve done anything …’
‘Like what? Settle down in Sydney or Reykjavik? Get a job, have children?’
‘Why not?’
‘I guess you don’t know me as well as you think you do.’
‘Maybe you didn’t try hard enough.’
Goaded, Stephanie retorted, ‘You mean, like you? Let’s face it, we’re not that far apart, you and I. Both of us are screwed up, neither of us able to live in the real world with real people, doing the nine-to-five.’
Boyd refused to rise to the bait. ‘Mentally, you’re in worse shape than when we first met. Then, you were just out of control. You were angry and aimless. Now? I don’t know what it is but it’s something more complex …’
His regret was wounding to her. Upset, she resorted to cheap sarcasm. ‘A shrink as well as a soldier. You’re a man of many talents.’
‘And you used to be a woman of many talents.’
‘If you see damaged goods, you should take a look at yourself. You made me.’
‘I know. And I’m aware of that responsibility. Now more than ever.’
‘It’s a bit late in the day, isn’t it?’
‘Why did you become Petra after Malta?’
‘That’s none of your business.’
‘You can’t carry on like this forever.’