The Small Hand Read Online Free PDF Page B

chicken pie. A salad.
    I fell silent. Hugo took a piece of bread. Outside it had grown quite dark. It was warm. It was very still. I remembered the night I had sat out on the terrace at the Merrimans’ house in the gathering dusk, so soon after these strange events had begun.
    ‘And you think you are going mad,’ Hugo said evenly. ‘Like me.’
    ‘No. Of course I don’t.’
    ‘Oh, come on, Adam … If you’re here to get my advice or whatever it is you want, tell me the truth.’
    ‘I’m sorry. But the truth is – well, I don’t know what it is, but you didn’t go mad.’
    ‘Yes, I did. Whatever “mad” is, I went it to some degree. I was in a madhouse, for God’s sake.’
    I had never heard him speak so harshly.
    ‘Sorry,’ I said.
    ‘It’s fine. I hardly think about it now. It’s long gone. Yet there is sometimes the shadow of a shadow, and when that happens I wonder if it could come back. And I don’t know, because I don’t know what caused it in the first place. My psyche was turned inside out and shaken, but they never got to the bottom of why.’
    He looked at me speculatively. ‘So now you.’ Then, seeing my expression, he added quickly, ‘Sorry, Adam. Of course not you. What you had was just a panic attack.’
    ‘But I’ve never had such a thing in my life.’
    He shrugged. A great, soft, pale moth had come in through the open window and was pattering round the lamp. I have never cared for moths.
    ‘Let’s go out for some air,’ I said.
    It was easier, strolling beside my brother down the garden. I could talk without having to see his face.
    ‘Why would I have what you call a panic attack, out of the blue? What would cause it?’
    ‘I’ve no idea. Perhaps you’re not well?’
    ‘I’m perfectly well.’
    ‘Shouldn’t you see your GP all the same, get a check?’
    ‘I suppose I could. When you …’
    ‘No,’ he said, ‘I wasn’t ill either.’
    We stood at the bottom of the path. A few paces away was the dark river.
    ‘I was within a hair’s breadth of throwing myself into that pool. It was terrifying. It was as if I had to do it, something was making me.’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘I’m afraid it will happen again.’
    He put a hand briefly on my shoulder. ‘Go and see someone. But it probably won’t, you know.’
    ‘Did you ever ask if anyone else in the family had had these – attacks, these fears?’
    ‘Yes. So far as anyone knew, they didn’t.’
    ‘Oh.’
    ‘I think that part really is coincidence.’
    ‘I might not be able to resist another time.’
    ‘I’m pretty sure you will.’
    ‘Might you have jumped in front of one of those trains?’
    ‘I think …’ he said carefully, ‘that there was usually something inside me that held me back – something stronger than it, whatever “it” was. But once … once perhaps.’ He shook himself. ‘I’d rather not.’
    ‘The shadow of a shadow.’
    ‘Yes.’
    We heard the sound of Benedicte’s car pulling up and then the bang of the front door. Hugo turned to go back inside. I did not. I walked on, beyond the end of the garden and across the narrow path until I was standing on the riverbank. I could smell the water, and although there was only a half-moon, the surface of it shone faintly. I felt calm now, calm and relieved. Hugo seemed to have come through his own ordeal unscathed. He did not want to dwell on it and I couldn’t blame him. I think I knew that whatever had happened to me was of a different order and with a quite different origin. I also knew that if ever it happened to me again, my brother would not want to help me. Nothing had been said and in all other respects I knew I would always be able to rely on him, as I hoped he would upon me. But in this, I was alone.
    Or perhaps not alone.
    I heard the water lap the side of the bank softly. I felt no fear of it. Why should I?
    I waited for some time there in the darkness. I heard their voices from the house. A door closed. A light went on upstairs.
    I