After spending the past month as a cheerful amnesiac, drinking gin and making jokes while his world disintegrated, Jack Cade finally has his memories back. That means he knows exactly who Ellini Syal is, and how he feels about her. Unfortunately, he...
She managed to get down the stairs and into the front garden without being sick, but then she stumbled on the path and threw up in the rose bushes. It was a tremendous relief.
She stayed there for a second, relishing the coolness of the night air on her face, and the blissful emptiness of her stomach. But then the dread that Robin would find her in this helpless position dragged her to her feet, and she perched unsteadily on the garden wall, staring out into the road.
For the suburbs, and the lateness of the hour, it was still fairly busy. There were a few lighted windows on the street opposite. Ellini fixed her eyes on them, and wondered whether she was proud of her nausea. Was nausea almost as good as compassion? At least it implied she'd had second thoughts about what she'd done.
It was another ten minutes before Robin came out and sat beside her on the garden wall, swinging his legs idly.
"All kinds of interesting things in the study," he said, without looking at her. "An address book, which, when coupled with the daguerreotype on her bedroom wall, should tell us where to find the other Wylies. And fifty pounds in bank notes, plus the promised oysters and champagne. I thought we could have a little late supper when we get back to Lambeth."
Ellini sighed. "I suppose theft is so mild in comparison with your former crimes that you hardly think it worth worrying about?"
"Well, you can't be redeemed all in one go." He went on swinging his legs, and said, "You did well, mostly. I'm not sure how the redhead came to be standing behind you with a knife in her hand, but we'll go over all that later."
"Is Mr Whittaker-?"
"Stumbled out the back way," said Robin, with a happy shrug. "Very stiff upper lip. Very English. No tears."
"Do you think he'll kill himself?
"Possibly not. You gave him a task. They like that, the stiff-upper-lipped of this world. They like to be busy."
He was silent for a moment, as though weighing up the advisedness of what he was going to say next.
"You're really not very good at revenge, you know that? It's supposed to be enjoyable, not some solemn compromise. You're supposed to spit in his face, not patiently explain the situation. Still, you're doing well, for a beginner. This is only your second try. And I suppose the spectacular way you destroyed Jack in Oxford was just beginner's luck."
"I told you," said Ellini. "He's not destroyed. In fact, he's indestructible. He's probably having a whale of a time."
Again, Robin was silent. But she didn't care to analyse the silence – and, in any case, there wasn't time, because it was at this moment when the world dissolved in liquid notes, and memory possessed her like a demon. All the sensations of Oxford rose up in her mind and clamped themselves over her eyes, as though somebody had shoved an Oxford-tinted hood over her head.
"Oh no," she said, staggering towards the noise, and only just avoiding a horse and cart, because all she could see were the rooftops of Oxford, and you didn't have to worry about being run over up there. "Oh no..."
Oddly enough, the memory that the music brought back was not that horrible, dark-red one on the steps of the Turl Street Music Rooms, but the moment when she and Jack had been sitting on the roof above. He had tried to kiss her, and she'd turned her head, laughing, planting kisses instead on his jaw, his nose, his eyebrows.
"Don't – don't. Don't make me think about things. I'm so happy."
She stared through the memory and into the window across the street. It was some kind of penny-gaff, but more deserted and less raucous, as though the trouble-makers had long-since collapsed under the tables or stumbled home to bed.
This act was probably the last of the night, and might have been intended to do service as a lullaby, charming the fight out of any drinkers who would have been inclined to grumble about the words 'last orders' or 'closing time'.
In truth, it could have soothed a rampaging tiger – it could have turned Genghis Kahn into a pacifist. It was that good. But it did anything but soothe Ellini. She brought her head so close to the window that her breath misted up the glass and said, "How did he find me?"
By this time, Robin had caught up, and he must have overheard those last words, because he craned his neck in alarm, trying to make out the pianist on the stage. As soon as he had satisfied himself that it wasn't Jack, he turned back to her, nonplussed. "Who is it?"
"Nobody," said Ellini, trying to blink back the memories. "Nothing."
She forced herself to calm down and take a step back from the window. Nobody had found her. This was nowhere near where she lived. If he was after her, he'd have been playing at a penny-gaff in Lambeth, not St. John's Wood. The only question was why he was playing penny-gaffs at all, when he was accustomed to selling out concert halls.
"Do you know him?" Robin asked.
"No," she said, clutching at the windowsill to keep her thoughts from straying back to the Oxford rooftops. She didn't want to think about the memories she'd seen. She didn't want to follow the thread of her thoughts to their conclusion. So what if she'd been happy? So what if she still loved Jack? What was she supposed to do with the anger? Where was she supposed to put all that hate?
She stared at the pianist who looked exactly like his music – nervous, solemn, deep but contained. Thank god he hadn't taken his eyes off the keys. Would he recognize her? He had only seen her once, on a dark night, when she'd been covered in blood. But something told her it was the kind of encounter that would have imprinted itself on his memory.
Then she spotted the locked box by the open doorway, marked 'For the Performers' – an unscrupulous landlord's trick, because, as long as they had a tip-box, he could justify only paying them a pittance.
She wasn't sure what made her do it – she wasn't sure if she was trying to appease her memories, or pay them to go away – but she turned to Robin and said, "Give me the fifty pounds."
He was still too perplexed to be irritated, and handed over the bills without comment. She stuffed them all inside the box, withdrew from the doorway, and dusted her hands. "Let's go home," she said.
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