name, too. Evangeline Cooper – it had been her grandmother’s surname before she’d married Mr Klippel, the owner of the local bank. Walter Klippel had died so long ago there were no pictures of him in the house, just a chair Evangeline’s grandmother never used because he’d sat in it a lot.
Then one night, when the fog was at its thickest, Evangeline heard a noise like a dog howling and she knew it had to be Patrick. The waiting was over; they’d come back at last. She felt mad with her parents as well as pleased they were back. She opened her window full out and the howling grew louder, and even though it sounded as though it came from miles away – from another country, almost – she just knew he was telling her they were on their way and she would not have to wait much longer.
Excited to the point where she was leaping on the spot, she decided to go down and meet them. Pulling a big warm jumper on over her nightgown and an old pair of boots onto her feet Evangeline ran out of her room and down the landing, yelling to her grandma as she went.
‘They’re here! Grandma Klippel, they’re here, they’re outside somewhere, I heard them, I heard Patrick howling, they’re here!’
Everything was right all of a sudden. The world stopped tipping crooked and straightened out at last. She didn’t care who she woke with her shouting, she was just relieved that the waiting was over. Her legs worked like pistons and she took off down the stairs without once needing to grip on to the banister.
‘They’re here, I heard them!’ Opening the front door was a problem but it was her time at last and she knew she was on a roll, so the catches slipped back without too much fumbling and then the cold wet air hit her face and made her laugh with relief.
‘Patrick! Mommy! Daddy! Lincoln!’ She knew they’d never left her really and she was too pleased to be mad with them for disappearing like that.
‘Evangeline!’ So she’d woken her grandmother after all. ‘Evangeline!’ The old girl could holler louder than she’d thought. Her voice had a high, rasping quality that made it more like a scream than just a yell.
Evangeline took off down the sand flats, towards the sound of Patrick’s howls, her brown frizzed hair streaming out behind her like a banner.
‘Evangeline!’ She wished her grandmother would be quiet so she could hear the dog instead. She’d forgotten where the sound was coming from and she couldn’t see further than a few feet in the fog.
The sand was wet and sucked at her feet. She ran until her legs were tired and then she ran some more with them aching. Her feet got heavy with the sand and then suddenly they were heavy with water. She stopped. ‘Patrick!’
There was water on her legs. It hit the top of her boots and then – colder even than ice – it fell inside the boots with a rush.
‘Oh my.’ It was all she could think of to say and it came out in one word, like a sigh. She looked back, but there was no back any more, it had all gone in the fog. The smell of the sea overwhelmed her and the hiss of the surf was all around. Her bones began to ache from the cold but she wasn’t scared yet.
Yoo-hoo!’ she hollered, so Darius would know it was her, and at that moment there was a sharp tugging at her legs as the cross-current came to take her away.
It was the chauffeur who snatched her back, as naked as nature intended, because Grandma Klippel had not given him the option of dressing after she tipped him out of his bed. The man had plunged into the surf like an athlete and wrenched Evangeline up just as the boots were being pulled off her legs by the current.
She popped straight up like a cork from a bottle, unable to differentiate between dark and light and the sea and the shore. He carried her off roughly, hurting her arms.
Her grandmother was waiting on the dunes, her hair as wild as the marsh grass. Her teeth were missing. She carried a storm-torch in her hands and she shone it full into Evangeline’s face.
‘What in God’s name were you up to, child?’ Her voice sounded spitty and stretched out and thin with anger and concern.
‘I heard them, Grandma, they’re coming back. I went to look for them in case they missed me.’ ‘You heard them?’
Evangeline was suddenly short of air. ‘I heard Patrick, Grandma, he’s barking out there somewhere in the dark. I think he smelt me, you know. He used to be a hunting hound and he can smell…’
Her grandmother dropped the torch suddenly and seized Evangeline’s face in her white hands. ‘Listen,’ she said. ‘Listen to what you heard.’
There was a noise, a noise somewhere out at sea. A lonely noise. The noise Evangeline had taken for Patrick’s howls.
‘It was a foghorn,’ Grandma Klippel said angrily, ‘just a foghorn. They’re not coming back. Now why won’t you believe me?’ Her voice sounded like the sea’s voice; whispery and tired and dull. ‘Evangeline, I told you you had to be good,’ she said, sadly. ‘I thought you understood.’
The chauffeur shook water off himself like a dog and droplets flew out from his body.
On the slow walk back to the house Evangeline looked out across the beach. ‘I know you’re out there somewhere, waiting for me,’ she whispered to her parents under her breath, ‘I know you’re just lost, that’s all. I’ll be good and I know I’ll find you, don’t worry. I promise.’
Budapest 1981
The first metro train of the morning rattled slowly out of the terminal at Vorosmarty ter, waking the boy up. His nose was running and his bones felt as though they had been cemented in the night. Andreas was dead. It was the first thought of the day every day. It came followed closely by self-pity and then, as he woke properly, by unbearable, crushing guilt. The guilt was like a large balloon in his chest that got inflated every morning. What had he done? Why was he alive? He had no right, no right at all, now that his brother was dead.
He saw Andreas every day. His brother was haunting him. The thought made him shake, but he knew it to be true. His brother never came close – he was always hiding in crowds and dodging round corners – but he’d confront him one day, Mikhail was sure of it.
He had no one else. His mother was gone. Once he had thought about her a lot, but now he no longer knew what it was he should be thinking. Andreas had been his only parent and he had loved him all the more for that. Then he had done the terrible thing, and now he was scared of him.
Someone was watching. Maybe it was the police at last. He knew they would come for him. He wanted to pee but instead he stood up slowly, shoving his hands deep inside his trouser pockets, and mooched off casually. His black hair looked wet with grease and his face was so pale you could see veins through the skin. He walked quickly but he didn’t run. If you ran you looked as though you were up to no good. Walking with your hands in your pockets looked like you were just on your way to somewhere else.
He could hear music playing – a violin or a cello. The sound came from the railwaymen’s huts nearby. There was a smell of fresh coffee, too. Mikhail felt his stomach begin to contract with hunger. The men in there would be shaving. He thought he could smell the soap – lavender, maybe. It was as though
