Banishing Verona Read online

  Verona explained her situation. A series of faint clicks emanated from the phone and Tiffany announced there was no problem getting a reservation on the evening flight to London. And yes, there was an aisle seat near the front: 24B. Verona was already calculating the hours until she stepped off the plane and saw Zeke, when Tiffany asked for the code on her ticket. She read out the letters and numbers.

  “Thank you, ma’am.” Tiffany paused, clicked. “That will be eight hundred and twenty-six dollars. Which credit card will you be using?”

  “But that’s almost twice what I paid for the round-trip.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Tiffany’s inflection did not change an iota. “The basis for your fare was that you stay over a Saturday night. If you want to fly back this evening, you automatically move to a higher fare bracket.”

  “What if it’s an emergency?”

  “If it’s an emergency, ma’am, you need to produce documentation—a doctor’s certificate, notice of a death. Is there anything else I can help you with today?”

  “Let me speak to a supervisor.”

  “I’ll have to put you on hold.”

  After two minutes of listening to the swelling Wagnerian music, Verona replaced the receiver. There was some tiny satisfaction in picturing the supervisor being disturbed for nothing.

  After an hour of useless fulminating, she retrieved her outdoor things and went downstairs. If she had to be in Boston she might as well see the city. At the advice of the concierge she took a train to the Museum of Fine Arts and strolled through their Asian collection, paying particular attention to the Buddhas and the gnarled rocks called philosopher’s stones. Perhaps some of the peace and wisdom would rub off on her. She was newly back, still wearing her coat and the hat she had bought from a street vendor, when Henry called. As soon as she heard his voice, she was yelling into the phone, not caring if he hung up. “How could you behave this way? Do you never think of anyone … . ?” Even as she heard herself ranting in a way that her midwife would surely deplore, some other part of her was exulting in the return of her hot-tempered self. And for once Henry neither interrupted nor contradicted.

  “I know I’ve been a bastard,” he said, when she at last paused, “and, even worse, a stupid bastard.”

  “Where are you?”

  “The West Coast,” he said, and quickly added, “Don’t ask. In this case ignorance is bliss. Suffice to say there’s someone here who I hope can help.”

  “Let’s hope they feel the same.”

  “Let’s,” he said lightly.

  “So there’s no reason for me to stay in Boston.” She would call Tiffany back and take the next flight that was less than stratospheric.

  “I’d rather”—he cleared his throat—“you did.” He began to explain how he was glad to have her comparatively nearby, how he expected to have the situation resolved within twenty-four hours, and then, when she protested that she didn’t see what sort of help she could be, given that they were on opposite coasts, he added that he was just a little bit worried about how it would look if she returned to England without either him or the money. “Nigel and George might get out of hand.”

  “That’s crazy.”

  “Yes, but so is everything else. I used to read about this kind of thing in the newspaper. It never dawned on me that it could actually happen. Please, Verona, now that you’re here, it only makes sense for you to stay. We can fly home together.”

  Grumpily, reluctantly, she promised to stay through tomorrow, on the condition that he phone her. They talked for a few minutes about the weather, bitter in Boston, mild on the West Coast, and about what she had seen at the museum. Henry too, it turned out, had whiled away the day visiting galleries. “We’ll have to report to Toby,” he said. “Bring him up-to-date on the American art scene.”

  Alone again, she took off her coat and walked over to the window. Immediately below was a church, the roof white with snow, the steeple bare. Opposite was a brightly lit office building crowded with cubicles and computers. As she watched the people come and go, the spooky thought came to her, as it had so often during childhood, that no one knew she was here.

  At school one year there had been a craze for those kinds of questions. What was your most embarrassing moment? Whom do you fancy? What are you afraid of? She had gone home and repeated them to Henry. What’s fancy, he’d asked. Do you mean like the little cakes? No, idiot, said Verona, whose own ideas on the subject centered upon a boy named Vaughan. It’s when a boy likes a girl or she likes him. She half expected Henry to say that that was stupid, but he had offered the astonishing suggestion that this must be why grown-ups got married. Verona felt her stomach somersault. Even as she argued fiercely against the shameful idea that she and their parents had anything in common, the conviction crept over her that Henry was right. What else could explain their mother and father’s improbable union?

  With embarrassment, Henry had no problem: his friend Nick’s birthday party when he had been exuberantly sick in the middle of Pass the Parcel.

  And what are you afraid of, Verona had insisted.

  If I tell, will you?

  Yes.

  I’m afraid of turning into Mum and Dad. And of losing you.

  He was eight, his knees knobbly, and his neck so long it looked as if he could swivel his head, owl-like, front to back. What are you afraid of? he said, his eyes fixed upon her.

  Nothing. Not a single blooming thing. And Henry, not doubting her for an instant, had nodded. At school, she added, I had to say something so I pretended I was scared of being buried alive. You know, like Edgar Allan Poe having a bell in his coffin.

  He didn’t know, but he’d nodded again, and they had both begun to speculate what that would be like. Would you end up eating worms and could you hear people talking aboveground? Worms might be okay, Henry had said, but I don’t like things over my face.

  In the street below, a woman with a fuchsia umbrella passed by. I was wrong, Verona thought, to doubt his story about the pillow. And several people know I’m here, four to be exact: Henry, Toby, Nigel, and George.

  Every day she forced herself to visit a major tourist attraction and investigate it as if she were planning to do a program; every day Henry would phone and talk optimistically about his prospects on the West Coast. After she spoke to him she would call Toby, who continued to counsel patience. And every day, every hour, she planned to call Zeke and failed to do so. She wanted to wait until she had definite news, but by the time she realized that nothing had changed, around six or seven in the evening, it was too late to call. Tomorrow, she would think, this will get sorted out and I will fly home. Periodically she checked her answering machine in London. Her new greeting claimed she’d be in and out for the next week, and only the most intrepid friends left messages. Her mobile phone, it turned out, did not work in America. When it grew dark she either went to the nearby cinema—it had six screens—or ate in her room and watched television. One night she went to the launderette.

  The baby, judging by its frequent twists and turns, seemed to enjoy her enforced leisure. Her reasons for concealing its origins were not entirely those she had confessed to Toby. True, she had wanted the romance, but she had also needed the privacy. After having an abortion in her twenties and a miscarriage in her early thirties, each with fairly minimal regrets, she had been taken aback to find herself, at the age of thirty-five, longing for a child, first with Jeffrey, later without him. Her parents were dead, her brother unreliable, but it was possible that she might still have her own small family.

  For several months, nearly a year, she had resisted the idea, worrying that she lacked the resources to be a good parent. Then in Thailand, on a halcyon afternoon, she had rescued one of her fellow guests from drowning, and something about that narrow escape had made her decide to go to a sperm bank as soon as she got home. She had cautioned herself not to get her hopes up—after all, she was thirty-seven—and she had been both thrilled and disconcerted to get pregnant after
a single visit. For most of the next six months she had oscillated between various fears: the baby would have problems, she would be a terrible mother, the baby would hate her for not providing a father, she would feel trapped. And then, only a few weeks ago, shortly before her last meeting with Henry, she had begun to feel a sense of calm happiness, almost as if the baby itself were pumping reassurance into her veins, and this happiness had persisted in spite of all the recent vicissitudes. In part that was why, day after day, she agreed to wait for Henry.

  Shortly after 8 A.M. on her seventh morning in Boston, her waiting was rewarded. Someone knocked at her door, and when she answered, there, standing in the brightly lit beige corridor, wearing a dramatic long black coat and a red scarf, holding a suitcase, was her elusive brother, not quite smiling.

  “Verona, sorry to be late. Traffic was dreadful.” He moved to embrace her and then—she was still holding the door—kissed her cheek. She smelled his stale breath and some combination of coffee and fried food. “Can I come in?” he said, and she stepped back.

  Inside, he took off his coat and laid it on the end of the unmade bed. While he surveyed her room, she studied him. His periwinkle blue pullover should have emphasized his good looks but merely drew attention to his bloodshot eyes and stubbled cheeks. His hair was newly cut. “You have a nicer painting than I did,” he said, nodding towards the Eakins print. “Otherwise this is identical to my old room. Can I use your shower? It’s still too early to check in.”

  Alone, Verona found herself examining the contents of his suitcase. Henry had set it on the bed to choose clean clothes and left it there with the lid open. She stared down at the folded shirts, the trousers, the sweaters, wondering when he’d learned to pack so neatly. As the steady drumming of the shower continued, she lifted out a shirt and shook it, lifted out another; she unrolled the socks, she checked the pockets of his trousers. She could not have said what she was searching for—a map showing buried treasure? an IOU from Henry to Nigel and George?—but she examined every garment. By the time Henry reappeared she was sitting on the bed, the case more or less restored to its original state. If he noticed that his possessions were a little disheveled, he didn’t say; he placed the clothes he’d been wearing on top and closed the lid. “That feels better,” he said.

  Over pancakes in the hotel restaurant, he kept up a steady flow of inconsequential conversation about Seattle, where it emerged he had spent the last week. Verona ate and listened; the prospect of her own imminent departure lent her patience. When he had phoned the previous evening to say he was taking an overnight flight to Boston, she had known at once from his breezy tone that his schemes had failed and once again phoned the airline. After breakfast, they collected their coats and went for a walk. Outside, the day was cold and windless; the clouds barely skimmed the tops of the tallest buildings. According to Henry, snow was forecast. They headed east. She caught several people, mostly women but one or two men, turning to look at him. Don’t, she wanted to say. Every admiring glance only helped to buoy him up. As they passed shops and restaurants, he speculated as to what would be the London equivalent of this street. “Regent Street? Or maybe somewhere in Knightsbridge?”

  “I booked a flight for this evening, seven P.M.”

  Henry stopped so suddenly that he rocked forward on his toes. “This evening? But we need to talk.”

  “Agreed.” The first flake of snow drifted down between them. “And you’re simply babbling about the scenery. I’ve been waiting for a week. I’m not going to wait any longer.”

  “Okay, okay. So I’m procrastinating. Please say you’ll stay, just until tomorrow. I promise I’ll tell you everything if only you’ll stay.”

  While the pedestrians parted around them, she returned Henry’s gaze. His almond eyes, clearer than when he first arrived, were so dark that she could not distinguish a single glint of green; for the first time she noticed faint lines around them. “All right,” she said. “One more day.”

  “Thank you.” Another flake drifted past as he suggested that they take the subway to Cambridge and discuss their troubles in a café there. They walked across a park and along a street lined with antiques shops to the station. As the train crossed over the Charles River, Verona saw in the distance the two sights she’d remembered from her earlier visit: the blue glass tower and the red sign; she pointed them out to Henry and he identified the Prudential Center and the Citgo sign. At Harvard Square station she once again called the airline to reschedule. By the time they came above ground, the snow was falling steadily. Momentarily she forgot their difficulties and stared in pleasure. How long since she had seen proper snow? Maybe two or three years, given London’s feeble winters. Mysteriously, when she looked closely, almost as many flakes seemed to be rising as falling. She followed Henry across the street, ignoring a tea shop and a café. Beside the latter an elderly man with hollow cheeks held a sign: SAVING FOR A SET OF DENTURES. PLEASE.

  They made their way across another street to a two-story wooden building, the steep roof fringed with icicles. Inside, the walls were painted deep reds and light blues. The customers were either reading or consulting their laptops. She squeezed past apologetically as she followed Henry to an octagonal table next to the window. A waitress took their order for a cappuccino and a mint tea. “Do you want milk with the tea?” she asked eagerly.

  “No, thank you,” said Verona and, as the girl’s smile faded, added, “thanks for asking.”

  “See,” said Henry, “that’s one of the few things they know about British people—we take milk in our tea.”

  While they waited, he again fell back on tourism—his visits to the Christian Science Mapparium, the USS Constitution, Faneuil Hall—but Verona could tell from the set of his shoulders that he knew there were no more hiding places. When he paused, she contributed her own visit to the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum; an easel marked the spot where a Vermeer had hung before it was stolen. “I can’t imagine what kind of person steals a painting they can never show to anyone. Is it because they fall in love with that particular painting? Or they like the idea of owning a masterpiece?”

  “Maybe for some people,” Henry suggested, “a Vermeer is beautiful but a stolen Vermeer is exquisite.”

  On the word exquisite, the waitress set down their drinks. Henry thanked her. As soon as she was out of earshot, he said, “Do you remember our grandfather?”

  “Jigger? Of course,” said Verona, taken aback. “I inherited his nose. That’s what I used to tell myself when the girls teased me at school. You have some notebook of his, don’t you?”

  “How do you know that?” Now it was his turn to be startled.

  “When Toby and I went to your house it was obvious that the men had searched it, so we followed their example. Toby found this leather-bound book. It was addressed to me so I kept it. I’ve only read the first half.” Her face grew warm as she recalled where she had left the book. As soon as she got back to London, she would ask Zeke to retrieve it from the Barrows’. Then she imagined him caught in the web of her lies. Perhaps she could persuade Emmanuel to go instead.

  Henry nodded. “I swiped it after he died,” he said. “He wrote something rather incriminating about me.”

  “What on earth could he say that was incriminating? He didn’t even know you.” This had nothing to do with why she had traveled three thousand miles; nonetheless, she succumbed.

  “More than you think. I went to stay with him once. I told Mum and Dad I was visiting you. I knew they’d never check.”

  This was even more surprising. “Why would you go and see Jigger? I mean, I can understand you wanting to get away from home, but to visit your grandfather? What about girls and wild parties?”

  Henry grimaced. “I wasn’t thinking love; I was thinking money. Dad was always saying that Jigger was rich, and I was worried he’d leave everything to some stupid charity. I wanted to propose myself as his heir.”

  “His heir? You were how old?”

  “
Sixteen, but I already knew that money was what mattered and I didn’t want to be hopeless about it, like the rest of you.”

  In the street outside, a police car drove slowly by in the snow. “So what happened?” she said, ignoring the insult. “How do you go about telling someone that you want them to hurry up and die and leave you all their money?”

  “That turned out to be a problem. In my imagination Jigger saw what a fine young man I was and announced that he was going to make me his heir. Unfortunately, that didn’t occur.” He described how he had phoned, pretending to be visiting the Lake District and asking if Jigger could put him up for the night. At first everything went swimmingly. Jigger had seemed pleased to see him. He made dinner and Henry plied him with the wine he’d brought, but his hints fell on deaf ears. “And then, in the middle of the night, he caught me searching his desk.”

  “Christ, what did he say?”

  Henry laughed. “I played the oldest trick in the book and pretended to be sleepwalking. I don’t think he believed me for a second, but it saved us from having a major row.”

  “You did used to sleepwalk, though. I remember finding you a couple of times. Once you were sitting by the fire, stroking the rug as if it were a cat.” She stroked the table to demonstrate. “I still don’t get it. What did happen to Jigger’s money? Dad got some, but not nearly as much as he’d hoped.”

  “He left it to you.” He spoke absently; he was looking at the next table where a young woman with waist-length hair was frowning over a notebook.

  “No,” she corrected. “He left me five thousand pounds, which you teased me about mercilessly, calling me the heiress. The money allowed me to move to London and work for a pittance for the BBC. It was hardly life-changing. Didn’t he leave the rest to a Lake District trust?”

  He leaned forward. His ears were scarlet. “He left it to you,” he repeated.

  Her brain was shuddering, struggling to grasp this new information. In the center of the table a bronze circle was embedded in the wood; she ran her finger round the circumference. “I don’t understand. If he left me the money, why didn’t I get it?”