“So you posted the letter.”
“Yes.”
She stared blankly into space again. After the first sip of coffee she’d put the cup down. She asked if she could smoke. I brought an ashtray from the kitchen and waited for her to go on, but the cigarette only seemed to take her further inside herself, to an obscure corner of her memory.
“You sent the letter…then what happened?”
“He didn’t answer that first letter. I received a receipt: he’d got the letter, he’d read it, but he hadn’t replied. After almost a month my mother phoned the solicitor. “Much better for us,” the woman said. “Either he hasn’t taken us seriously, or he’s been very poorly advised.” Again, I had a sense of foreboding. I’d worked for him for almost a year. You asked me once what he was like. At the time I thought he was the most intelligent man I had ever met-would ever meet. But there was also something just below the surface, something sinister, implacable-he was the last person I’d want to have as an enemy. I feared he’d take my letter as a declaration of war and that I’d have to face the worst of him. I was frightened and started having thoughts that were…paranoid. After all, he had my address, my phone number. We’d become quite friendly; he knew a lot about me. I thought maybe he hadn’t answered the letter because he was planning another kind of response, his own personal revenge. But the solicitor assured me that, as he was married, if he really was an intelligent man he’d do the only thing he could do: pay up. And the longer he took to reply, the higher the sum would get. She dictated a second letter, identical to the first, but demanding an even higher amount, because we were also claiming the wages for the month without a reply. It seemed to have an immediate effect. We received his first response, obviously also written by a solicitor. He rejected everything. It was a list of denials. He denied that I’d ever worked for him and even that he knew me. The solicitor told me not to worry. It was a stock legal reply and simply meant Kloster had realised we were serious and had got himself a lawyer. We now had to wait for the first conciliation meeting and think about how much lower a sum we would accept. I was reassured. In the end it all seemed impersonal, an administrative formality.”
“So you went to the conciliation meeting.”
Luciana nodded. “I asked my mother to come with me because I was scared of facing Kloster again. Ten minutes after the agreed time there was still no sign of him. The solicitor whispered, as if it was just a little bit of mischief, that he was probably busy with another bigger case: his divorce. She said a colleague who was a friend of hers was acting for Kloster’s wife. Apparently his wife had read my letter, with the accusation of sexual harassment, and decided to file for divorce immediately. She’d asked for a settlement running into millions. And her friend was ruthless, the solicitor said: Kloster would be out on the street. I listened, horrified. It had never even occurred to me this might happen.
“Another five minutes passed and at last Kloster’s solicitor appeared. He seemed like a calm, courteous man. He said he had instructions to offer us two months’ pay as compensation. My solicitor rejected this outright, without even consulting me, and the second conciliation meeting was set for a month later. This would give everyone, the mediator said, time to reflect and come closer to an agreement. Outside I asked my mother if we shouldn’t just drop the whole thing. I’d never wanted things to go that far; I never imagined I’d end up destroying his marriage. My mother got annoyed with me: she didn’t understand how I could feel sorry for him. His marriage must have been long over for him to try something with me. So I didn’t say any more. Actually, I felt afraid, rather than sorry. My worst fears were being realised. After all, he’d only tried to kiss me. The consequences seemed excessive, out of control.
“As the days passed I grew more and more anxious. I just wanted to get to the next meeting and for it all to end. I was prepared to stand up to my mother and my own solicitor so that we accepted whatever the other side offered. A day before the date set the mediator telephoned: the meeting was being postponed for a week. I was put out, and asked why. She said it was at the request of the other party. I asked if they were allowed to change the date just like that. She said yes, in extreme circumstances, and lowered her voice: Kloster’s little girl had died. I couldn’t believe it, but at the same time, strangely, I did believe it and accepted it, in all its awfulness, as if it were the logical, ultimate consequence of what my letter had started. I don’t think I said anything for a moment but eventually I managed to ask what had happened. The mediator only knew what Kloster’s solicitor had told her: apparently it was a domestic accident.
“After I hung up I went to my desk, to find the drawings Pauli had given me. She’d drawn her daddy looking huge and me on a tiny chair. The computer was a little square, and at the bottom she’d written her name, which she’d just learned to do. In the second picture, there was an open door, with the daddy in the distance, looking tiny, and she and I were holding hands, almost the same height, as if we were sisters. They were happy, carefree pictures. And now she was dead. I cried all afternoon. I think I was crying for myself too. Although I didn’t yet know when or how, I sensed that it wouldn’t stop there and that something terrible was going to happen to me.”
“But why did you think that? If it was an accident, why would he hold you responsible?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know exactly why. But that was what I felt right from the start and, most of all, I think it was what he felt too. It’s the only explanation I can find for everything that happened afterwards.”
She paused and lit another cigarette with trembling hands.
“So you went to the second conciliation meeting,” I said.
She nodded. “Like before, my mother and I arrived first and we were shown into the mediation room. We waited a few minutes with our solicitor. I thought Kloster would send his lawyer again. But when the door opened it was Kloster who entered. He was alone. His face was shockingly changed, as if he had died with his daughter. He’d lost a huge amount of weight and looked as if he hadn’t slept in days. His eyes were red and his cheeks sunken. He was incredibly pale, as if all the blood had been drawn from his body. But even so, he looked composed and resolute, as if he had a task to accomplish and no time to lose. He was carrying a book that I recognised immediately: it was my father’s annotated Bible which I’d lent him. He crossed the room, straight towards me. My mother made a move as if to protect me. I don’t think he even noticed. He was only looking at me, with a terrible stare that I still see every night. He blamed me, without a doubt. He stopped and held out the Bible without a word. I put it quickly in my bag. He turned to the mediator and asked how much we were claiming in compensation. He listened to the figure and took a chequebook from his pocket, opening it out on the desk. The mediator started to say that he could of course make a counter-offer, but he held up his hand to stop her, as if he didn’t want to hear another word about the matter. He wrote out three cheques: one to me for the total amount we’d claimed, and another two for the mediator’s and my lawyer’s fees. I signed a document stating that the claim was settled. He picked up his copy, turned round without looking at anyone and left. The whole thing took under ten minutes. The mediator could hardly believe it; it was the first time a case had ever ended like this.”
“Then what happened?”
“Then…I went home, took the Bible from my bag and put it on the shelf above my desk, with my university course books. It was a Bible my father no longer used and it was months since I’d lent it to Kloster: I’d forgotten all about it. In fact, when I thought about the meeting again, it occurred to me that it had been an excuse to come up close and stare at me in that way. I couldn’t get that out of my head and I had nightmares for days afterwards. I dreamed that Kloster’s little girl was taking my hand, wanting me to come and play with her, and saying, just as she had when she was alive, that she didn’t want to be on her own in the room next door any more.