He leaned down and stroked the cat’s head. It purred for a second before it remembered to sink its yellow teeth into him.

50

Lydia heard the click of her bedroom door. Quiet footsteps padded across the floor. She opened her eyes a slit but could see nothing in the darkness. She didn’t need to see.

‘What is it, Mama?’

‘I can’t sleep, darling.’

‘Go and disturb Alfred.’

‘He needs his sleep.’

‘So do I.’

‘Poof, you can sleep in class tomorrow.’

‘Mama!’

‘Hush, I shall tell you about the Flamingo nightclub. One lucky woman was wearing a Fabergé brooch but her frock was quite frightful. Move over.’

Lydia shifted position in the bed and Valentina lay down on it, under the eiderdown but on top of the blankets, just the way Lydia had done at first with Chang An Lo.

‘Did you have a good time tonight?’

‘It was bearable. That’s about all.’

‘Did you dance?’

‘Of course I did. It was the best part. When you’re old enough I’ll take you to a dance and you’ll discover what fun it is. The band played the new jazz with…’

But Lydia didn’t listen. She leaned her cheek against her mother’s shoulder, let her musky perfume filter into her head. She wondered if Chang An Lo was awake. What was he thinking? She was frightened he’d leave. Just up and go. Without her. But they both knew that in the state he was in, he’d be caught. That he needed her. As she needed him. It was going to be hard. Of course it was. She wasn’t blind to that fact or to the uncertainty of the future for them, but to be together even for a few months while he healed would give them time. Breathing space. While they worked out the next step.

‘So?’

Dimly Lydia became aware that Valentina had stopped speaking.

‘So?’

‘So what, Mama?’

‘I said, so who is this Chinese Bolshevik of yours?’

‘His name is Chang An Lo and he’s a Communist. But,’ she added quickly, ‘he comes from a wealthy family under the last emperor and is well educated. A bit like yourself in a way…’

‘I am not a Communist and never will be.’ She spat out the words. ‘The Communists take a country that is great and noble and they smash it down with their hammers and sickles to the lowest level of a peasant. Look at my poor broken Russia, Rusmatushka. ’

‘Mama,’ Lydia spoke gently, ‘the Communists have only just started. Give them time. First they have to rid us of tyranny. Of the brutality that’s existed for hundreds of years. That’s what they’re doing right now in Russia. And that’s what China needs too. They are the only ones who will build a fair society where everyone has a voice. You wait, they will become the greatest countries in the world.’

‘Ah, you’re crazy, darling. That Bolshevik boy has poisoned your mind and filled it with gutter slime, so that you don’t see straight anymore.’

‘No, you’re so wrong. I see clearer now.’

‘Poof! It is a two-minute infatuation.’

‘No, Mama, no. I love him.’

Valentina drew in a quick breath. ‘Don’t be absurd. You are too young to know what love is.’

‘You were only seventeen when you ran off and married Papa. You loved him, you know you did. So don’t you dare tell me I don’t love Chang An Lo.’

There was a silence. The darkness grew heavy around them, pressing down on Lydia’s eyes, but she refused to let it into her head. She reached out to Chang An Lo with her mind and found him so easily, it was hard to believe he wasn’t in the room with her. The connection was instant. And she was certain he was lying awake in Mr Theo’s house, seeking her out. She smiled and felt the inside of her head open up into a big bright airy room, full of sunlight, and the sound of Lizard Creek’s water trickled through it. A place where she could breathe.

‘Listen to me, Mama.’

It was easy. At last to talk about him. She told her mother all about Chang An Lo. How he’d saved her in the alleyway and how she’d sewn up his foot at Lizard Creek. She told Valentina everything, the Chinese funeral and the search for him, even the quarrel in the burned-out house and the arguments over some of the savage methods the Communists used to achieve their aims. It all came spilling out. Everything. Well, almost everything. Two things she left out. The ruby necklace and the lovemaking. She managed to hang on to those. She wasn’t that stupid.

When she’d finished, she felt as if she were floating.

‘Oh my sweet daughter.’ Valentina turned and kissed Lydia’s cheek. ‘You are such a fool.’

‘I love him, Mama. And he loves me.’

‘It’s got to stop, dochenka.’

‘No.’

‘Yes.’

‘No.’

Valentina’s hand took hold of Lydia’s under the eiderdown and held it as if in a vice. ‘I’m sorry, darling, your heart will break but there are worse things. You will survive it, believe me, you will. We have come this far, you and I. I am not letting you throw it all away just when I have set it up so that there is money for your education, for university. You could be a doctor or a lawyer or a professor, something great, something important. Something well paid. You’ll be proud of yourself and hold your head high. Never will you have to be dependent on a man to put bread on your table or rings on your fingers. Don’t ruin everything. Not now.’

‘Mama, did you listen when your parents told you the same?’

‘No, but…’

‘So neither will I.’

‘Lydia.’ Valentina sat up abruptly. ‘You will do as I say. And I say this business with the Chinese Bolshevik is over, even if I have to chain you to the bed and feed you bread and water for the rest of your life. You hear me?’

Lydia didn’t mean to say what she said next. But she was angry and hurt. So she struck back.

‘Maybe if I tell Alfred what I saw in the Buick today he would say the same to you.’

She heard Valentina cough. The sound she’d heard a chicken make when its neck is wrung. She wanted to cram the words back into her mouth. Valentina swung her legs to the floor but remained there, seated on the edge of the bed. Her back to Lydia. She said nothing.

‘Why, Mama? Why? You have Alfred.’

Her mother rustled in her dressing gown pocket and Lydia knew she was searching for a cigarette, but it was obviously empty because there was no snick of a lighter.

‘It’s none of your business,’ Valentina said at last in a tight voice.

Lydia rolled nearer and put out a hand. Her mother’s stiff figure was blacker than the surrounding blackness. She touched her mother’s shoulder and for a second had a flashback to reaching out and touching a male shoulder earlier this evening. Alexei Serov’s. He had seen her home and she’d had to admit he’d been quite decent about her mistake. Sweet Christ, she’d made such a fool of herself. Filthy whore-boy. Lying bastard. He had every right to fling her out into the street. But he didn’t. Just became even more arrogant with that conceited smile of his while she danced with him. Only one dance. She couldn’t stand any more.

She could feel the warm silk of her mother’s kimono under her fingers. ‘Why?’ she asked again.

Valentina shrugged, as if it were nothing. ‘A fling.’

‘Mama, I’ve seen you with him. You hate him.’

‘Of course I hate that devil, God rot his stinking soul.’

‘Was it because of the photographs?’

Valentina stopped breathing.

‘I’ve got them.’ Lydia stroked her mother’s back. ‘And the negatives.’

Valentina gave a brief sob. ‘How?’

‘I stole them.’

‘It’s what you are good at.’

‘Yes.’

‘Thank you.’ It was a whisper.

‘So it is my business.’

‘Very well. You asked.’ Her mother took a deep breath. ‘There was no real scholarship to the Willoughby Academy. You’d spent four wasted years in the local charity school here and I knew you would just be smothered and die in that hellhole. So I sought out the best private school, the Willoughby Academy, and the chief officer for education in Junchow. Mr Mason. And I made him an offer. Create a scholarship. Award it to you. In exchange for…’