A Traitor to Memory

I begin to see my life in a perspective that makes much clear to me, Dr. Rose. I begin to see how the relationships I've attempted to form or have formed successfully were actually ruled by that which I didn't want to face: my sister's death. The people who didn't know how I was involved in the circumstances of her death were the people I was able to be with, and those were the people most concerned with my own prime concern, which was my professional life: Sherrill and my other fellow musicians, recording artists, conductors, producers, concert organisers round the globe. But the people who might have wanted more from me than a performance on my instrument … those were the people with whom I failed.

Beth is the best example of this. Of course I couldn't be the partner in life that she wanted me to be. Partnership of that sort suggested to me a level of intimacy, trust, and revelation in which I could not afford to participate. My only hope for survival was to effect an escape from her.

And so it is with Libby now. That prime symbol of intimacy between us—the Act—is beyond my power. We lie in each other's arms, and feeling desire is so far removed from what I'm experiencing that Libby may as well be a sack of potatoes.

At least I know why. And until I speak to my mother and learn the full truth of what happened that night, I can have nothing with any woman, no matter who she is, no matter how little she expects of me.

16 November





I was returning from Primrose Hill when I saw Libby again. I'd taken one of the kites out, a new one that I'd worked on for several weeks and was eager to try. I'd employed what I thought was an intriguingly aerodynamic design, crafted to ensure that the height reached would be a record-breaking one.

On the top of Primrose Hill, there is nothing to impede the flight of a kite. The trees are distant, and the only structures that could get in the way of anything airborne are the buildings that stand far beyond the hill's crest, on the other side of the roads that border the park. As it was a day of good wind, I assumed that I'd have the kite aloft within moments of releasing it.

That wasn't the case. Every time I released it, began to jog forward, and played out the twine, the kite shuddered, tossed and turned on the wind, and plummeted to the ground like a missile. Time and again, I made the attempt, after adjusting the leading edge, the standoffs, even the bridle. Nothing helped. Eventually, one of the bottom spreaders fractured, and I had to give up the whole enterprise.

I was trudging along Chalcot Crescent when I encountered Libby. She was heading in the direction I had just come from, a Boots bag dangling from one hand and a can of diet Coke in the other. Picnic lunch, I assumed. I could see the top of a baguette rising out of the bag like a crusty appendage.

“The wind'll give you aggravation if you're planning to eat your lunch out there,” I said with a nod in the direction I'd just walked.

“Hi to you, too,” was her reply.

She said it politely, but her smile was brief. We hadn't seen each other since our unhappy encounter in her flat, and although I'd heard her come in and go out and had admittedly anticipated her ringing my bell, she hadn't done so. I'd missed her, but once I'd remembered what I needed to remember about Sonia, about Katja, and about my part in the death of one and the imprisonment of the other, I realised it was just as well. I wasn't fit to be any woman's companion, be that her friend, her lover, or her husband. So whether she realised it or not, Libby was wise to steer clear.

“I've been trying to get this one up,” I said, lifting the broken kite by way of explaining my statement about the wind. “If you stay off the hill and eat down below, you might be all right.”





“Ducks,” she said.

For a moment I thought the word was another strange California term I'd never heard before. She went on.

“I'm going to feed them. In Regent's Park.”





“Ah. I see. I thought … Well, seeing the bread—”





“And associating me with food. Yeah. It makes good sense.”





“I don't associate you with food, Libby.”





“Okay,” she said. “You don't.”





I shifted the kite from my left hand to my right. I didn't like the feeling of being at odds with her, but I had no clear idea how to bridge the chasm between us. We are, at heart, such different people, I thought. Perhaps, just as Dad had seen it from the first, it was always a ridiculous affiliation: Libby Neale and Gideon Davies. What had they in common, after all?

“I haven't seen Rafe in a couple of days,” Libby said, indicating the direction of Chalcot Square with a toss of her head. “I was wondering if something happened to him.”





The fact that she'd given me an opening prompted me to realise that she always had been the person to provide the openings in our conversations. And that realisation was what prompted me to say, “Something has happened. But not to him.”





She looked at me earnestly. “Your dad's okay, right?”





“He's fine.”





“His girlfriend?”





“Jill's fine. Everyone's fine.”





“Oh. Good.”





I took a deep breath. “Libby, I'm going to see my mother. After all this time, I'm actually going to see her. Dad told me she's been phoning him about me, so we're going to meet. Just the two of us. And when we do, there's a chance that I'll get to the bottom of the violin problem.”





She put her can of diet Coke into the Boots bag and rubbed her hand down her hip. “I guess that's cool, Gid. If you want it to be. It's, like, what you want in life, right?”