Brute Force

76

He rubbed his eyes. When he looked up, they were red-rimmed and raw. Lynn stared long and hard at me. There was no anger, no resentment any more; just that increasingly familiar resignation. 'She's dead.'

He sat back in the big leather chair. The rain was falling harder. Rivulets ran down the Predator's windshield. 'You never did remarry, did you, Nick? At least, you'd successfully managed to avoid tying any more knots last time I checked your file.'

I shook my head. 'Strange, really. Nice, steady job, good money. Always saw myself as a bit of a catch. Can't quite think what went wrong . . .'

Lynn managed a bleak smile. 'I met my wife at Cambridge. We read Classics together. She was beautiful, but serious – serious when it came to her chosen subject, although as game as the next girl when it came to letting her hair down. She adored Italy. Had spent some time in Florence on a foundation arts course before she went up to Cambridge. I don't know what she saw in me, really. Perhaps it was the fact that I was the only other student who shared her passion for all things Italian – not, funnily enough, that I had ever been to Italy when we met. I just loved the history – knew very little about the place itself.

'She promised me she'd show me all the things that she most loved about it; not just the stuff the tourists see, but the real Italy: the Etruscan tombs of Umbria, the Greek temples at Paestum, the place north of Naples where Aeneas came ashore, the food, the people . . .'

I still didn't know where he was taking this. I sat there and let him continue. Fuck it, we had to wait for the storm to pass.

'It didn't take us long after we graduated to tie the knot, much to the horror of her parents. Caroline was from a smart Norfolk family and, given the set that she used to socialize with, I knew that they had high hopes she'd marry a lord or a duke or an earl – of whom there are quite a few in that neck of the woods. Not for a moment, Nick, did they think that she would end up with someone like me.'

I said nothing, but the surprise must have shown on my face.

'It never bothered Caroline. It never bothered her that we lived in small, dingy junior officers' accommodation in Germany or Wiltshire or North Yorkshire. It never bothered her either that our two children came into the world in an NHS ward instead of some smart, private London clinic – the kind of place where she and her siblings were born.'

'You found the apartment together?'

'She showed me her Italy and because she had a little money we were able to buy the place outright – or rather, I should say, she was. I didn't have a bean, other than what I was earning. That's why there is no trace to me. She bought it in her maiden name; she even had an Italian fiscal number. I had nothing to do with it at all.

'When I joined the Firm, she wanted us to have somewhere – a place we could retreat to if I ever needed to get out of the UK quickly: you know, if the shit ever hit the fan, as you put it. Nobody else knew about it. Not even the children. They still don't.'

'How old are they?'

Lynn's eyes glazed over for a moment. He seemed to search the roof for answers. 'Miranda's twenty-one and Freddie's eighteen. Good kids, both of them.'

'Why didn't you mention them before?'

'Patience, Nick. We're getting to the heart of my somewhat sad, sorry little tale. Caroline took responsibility for the apartment. It was her money that bought it. Her money that renovated it and furnished it – her time and energy that made it the place you saw. There were no footprints to me at all. When the children were at boarding school and I managed to get some time off, we'd often jump in the car and drive there. The kids, Caroline's family, our friends – still no one knew. The apartment became a refuge. Our place. Somewhere we could shut out the world.

'But then, you know how it is, the job started to take over. There were fewer and fewer opportunities for me simply to up sticks and get away. The hours and the pressures continued to build.

'I found myself spending more and more time away, weekend after weekend, when I never got to see Caroline or the kids because of some bloody flap or other – PIRA up to their usual bloody tricks or some Palestinian group or other hell-bent on killing Israelis in London . . .

'Caroline became seriously depressed. She started drinking. I knew something was wrong, but I thought it was just where we were. Then, suddenly, the kids were grown up. We were in our fifties. Ground down by life. It was the usual cliché; both of us staring at each other across the breakfast table and wondering how we'd pissed our lives away. But I never thought for a minute . . .'

His voice tailed away.

'The day after I retired, a Saturday, I was tinkering around on the boat when I got a visit from our local bobby. I knew what had happened the moment I saw his face. We'd known him as a family a long time. He didn't dress things up. He just gave me the facts. Miranda was down for the weekend from London. She had found Caroline hanging from a rafter in the attic. She also found the suicide note. Caroline had lost the will to live in my grey, murky, compromised world, which was so different from the gentler, more appealing landscape of ancient ruins, Roman art and architecture, and archaeological digs.' He took a deep breath. 'What made it worse was that she didn't attach any particular blame to me for what happened. It was, she said, just one of those things . . .'

I thought back over my life, how I'd never spent long enough in one place to think much, let alone meet someone and settle down. As a result, I didn't know whether I pitied Lynn or thought he was a dickhead for having it all – all the things I'd never had, but sometimes half wished for – and sacrificing it for some half-arsed ideological crusade.

The only thing I was sure of was that you could never, ever know what went on behind the closed doors of another man's life.

'I tell you this, Nick, for one reason only. I haven't made a habit of talking about it. There is, in actual fact, no one to speak to.

'My children have not addressed a word to me since the funeral and, needless to say, nor have Caroline's family. What's more, my kids have just told me, through a solicitor if you please, that they never want to see me again.

'Our friends were almost all Caroline's friends; thanks to the job, I never had time, really, to make any or keep those that I'd once had. So, what you saw when you poled up at my house a few days ago was me packing up what's left of my life. I didn't tell you for the same reason I haven't discussed it with anyone – I don't want, have never wanted, your pity, or anyone else's.'

For a long time, neither of us said anything. Then Lynn got to his feet. 'I'm going to go and get my things ready. I'll see you on deck.'