‘I want you to imagine something,’ she said. ‘We’ve been talking about these refuges away from the home. Somewhere you can get away to. I want you to imagine something. Imagine that you did have a secret. That you had something to hide and you couldn’t hide it in your home. Where would you hide it? Don’t think of it with your mind. Think of it with your heart. What’s your gut feeling?’
There was a long pause. Alan closed his eyes. Then opened them and stared at Frieda with a hunted expression. ‘I know what you’re asking. This isn’t about me, is it?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You’re playing a game with me. You’re using me to find out about him.’
Frieda was silent.
‘You’re asking me questions not to help me, not to sort out my problems, but because you think it might give you some hint about where to look for that kid. Something you can go to the police with.’
‘You’re right,’ Frieda said finally. ‘It was probably a wrong thing to do. No, it was definitely a wrong thing to do. But I thought that if what you said could give any help at all, then it was something we had to try.’
‘We?’ said Alan. ‘What do you mean “we”? I thought I was coming here for help with my problems. I thought when you were asking me questions it was to cure me. You know me. I’d do anything to get that kid back. You can do any of your experiments on me, that’s fine. Little kid like that. But you should have told me. You should have fucking told me.’
‘I couldn’t,’ said Frieda. ‘If I’d told you, it wouldn’t have worked – not that it did work, of course. It was an idea born of desperation. I needed to know what you would come up with spontaneously.’
‘You were using me,’ said Alan.
‘Yes, I was using you.’
‘So the police can start looking in lock-up garages and under railway arches.’
‘Yes.’
‘Which is probably where they’re already looking.’
‘I guess so,’ said Frieda.
There was another pause.
‘I think we’re done,’ said Alan.
‘We’ll arrange another session,’ said Frieda. ‘A proper one.’
‘I’ll need to think about that.’
They stood up, rather awkwardly, like two people who find themselves leaving a party at the same time.
‘I’ve got some last-minute Christmas shopping to get done,’ said Alan, ‘so it won’t be completely wasted. I can walk down to Oxford Street from here, can’t I?’
‘It’s about ten minutes away.’
‘That’s fine.’
They walked to the door and Frieda opened it to let Alan through. He started to leave, then turned round. ‘I’ve found my family,’ he said. ‘But it’s not much of a reunion.’
‘What did you want from it?’
Alan gave a half-smile. ‘Always the therapist. I’ve been thinking. What I really wanted is what you sometimes see in films or read in books where people go to the grave of their parents and grandparents and they sit there and talk to them or just think. Of course, my mother’s still alive. It’ll probably be easier to talk to her when she’s dead. Then I can pretend she was something she wasn’t – someone who’d listen to me and who’d understand me; somebody I could pour out my heart to. That’s what I’d like. To lie by the grave and talk to my ancestors. Of course, in films it’s usually some picturesque graveyard on the side of a mountain or somewhere.’
‘We all want some kind of family.’ Frieda knew that she was the last person to say it.
‘Sounds like something you got out of a cracker,’ said Alan. ‘I suppose it’s the right time of year.’
Chapter Forty
‘I’m making the pudding,’ said Chloë. She sounded unusually animated. ‘Not Christmas pudding. I hate that, and anyway, it’s got about a gazillion calories a mouthful. And I would have had to make it weeks ago, which was when I thought I was going to my dad’s, before he found himself something better to do. I could buy one, I suppose, but that would be cheating. You have to cook your own Christmas dinner, don’t you, not just put something in the microwave for a few minutes?’
‘Do you?’ Frieda walked with the phone to stand in front of the large map of London that was pinned to the wall. She squinted in the poor light.
‘So I’m making this pudding I found online, with raspberries and strawberries and cranberries and white chocolate.’
Frieda put her finger on the area she was examining and traced a route.
‘What are you cooking?’ Chloë continued. ‘I hope it’s not turkey. Turkey doesn’t taste of anything. Mum said you definitely wouldn’t cook turkey.’
‘It’s not exactly definite.’ Frieda was going up the stairs now, to her bedroom.
‘Don’t tell me you haven’t thought about it. Just don’t. Please don’t. Tomorrow is Christmas Eve. I don’t care about presents or stuff; I don’t care what we eat, actually. But I don’t want you not to even think about it at all, as if it doesn’t matter to you one way or the other. I couldn’t bear that. Literally. This is Christmas, Frieda. Remember. All my friends are having great family reunions or going to Mauritius with their dads or something. I’m coming to yours. You have to make an effort so that it’s special.’
‘I know,’ said Frieda, forcing herself to respond. She pulled a thick sweater from her drawer and threw it on the bed, followed by a pair of gloves. ‘I will. I am. I promise.’ The thought of Christmas made her feel a bit sick: a lost boy and a missing young woman, Dean and Terry Reeve free, and she was supposed to eat and drink and laugh, put a paper crown on her head.
‘Is it just us three, or have you invited other people? That’s fine by me. In fact, I’d like it. It’s a pity Jack can’t come.’
‘What?’
‘Jack. You know.’
‘You don’t know Jack.’
‘I do.’
‘You only met him once for about thirty seconds.’
‘Before you hustled him out of my sight. Yeah. But we’re Facebook buddies now.’
‘You are, are you?’
‘Yeah. We’re going to meet when he gets back. Is that a problem?’
Was it a problem? Of course it was a problem. Her trainee and her niece. But it was a problem for later, not now. ‘How old are you?’ she asked.
‘You know how old I am. Sixteen. Old enough.’
Frieda bit her lip. She didn’t want to ask, Old enough for what?
‘We could play charades,’ said Chloë, cheerfully. ‘What time shall we arrive?’
‘What do you think?’
‘How about early afternoon? That’s what other families do. They open their presents and mooch around a bit and then they have a blow-out meal in the afternoon or early evening. We could do that.’
‘Right.’
She pulled off her slippers; holding the phone between chin and hunched shoulder, she pulled off her skirt and tights.
‘We’re bringing the champagne. Mum said. That’s her contribution. What about crackers?’
Frieda thought of Alan’s parting remark and gave herself a mental shake. ‘I’ll bring the crackers,’ she said firmly. ‘And it won’t be turkey.’
‘So what –’
‘It’s a surprise.’
Before she left the house she called Reuben. Josef answered. Loud music was playing in the background. ‘Will you and Reuben come and have Christmas dinner at my house?’ she asked, without preamble.
‘Already we are.’
‘Sorry?’
‘We agreed. You cook me an English Christmas. Turkey and plum pudding.’
‘I was thinking about something a bit different. Like me not cooking it. What do you do in Ukraine for Christmas?’
‘It is my honour to prepare for my friends. Twelve foods.’
‘Twelve? No, Josef. One is fine.’
‘Twelve foods is mandatory in my home.’
‘But that’s too much.’
‘Never too much.’
‘If you’re sure,’ said Frieda, doubtfully. ‘I just thought something simple. Meatballs. Isn’t that Ukrainian?’
‘No meat. Never meat on the day. Fish is good.’