We walk the small lanes of the graveyard in quiet contemplation.
‘Why did you put the postcard in the book, instead of sending it with your address?’ he asks, when we stop to examine a life-size bronze sculpture. For amoment I can’t answer, my mind awash with the memory . . .
‘Here’s my address,’ says Alistair, handing me a postcard of the Moulin Rouge, the blue ink of his pen still wet. ‘Take it home, then post it to me with your address on it.’
‘Why don’t I give it to you now?’ I ask, thinking we could simply tear the postcard in half.
He smiles, wraps a loose hair round my ear. ‘It’s more romantic to have to wait.’
I take the card from him and removeThe Hunchback of Notre-Damefrom my bag. Squatting next to the train, I scribble an inscription on the title page then deftly, not fully understanding why, slip the postcard behind the dust jacket without him seeing.
‘Take this as a reminder of our time together,’ I say, handing the book to him, and he tucks it into his backpack.
‘Won’t you come with me?’ he asks, his deep chestnut eyes pleading with mine.
‘I can’t, I have to get back to Edinburgh,’ I let slip, though every inch of me is torn between more time with the man I’ve just spent twenty-four blissful hours with in Paris, and returning to Mum.
He places his hand gently on my cheek and kisses me as if to memorise my soul.
‘Go,’ I say, the final whistle blowing, and I watch, doubting my decisions, as he runs down the platform and out of my life.
‘Au revoir, Fran,’ he calls, jumping through the train door just before it slides closed.
I explain about not wanting to complicate Mum’s care with a long-distance relationship, that still to this day Ifeel certain I made the right choice. ‘But I recognised long ago that in doing so I possibly altered the course of both our lives.’
‘Yes, you did,’ he says, his tone shifting. ‘I had no control over that.’
‘I’m sorry,’ I reply, the words sincere, but aware they make little difference.
‘You were everything to me,’ he begins, his voice hardening. ‘For years I thought it was me, that I wasn’t good enough, that I deserved to be rejected. The conflict that’s caused . . .’
He trails off; the faint scent of alcohol on his breath sits like a cloud between us.
‘But maybe it was meant to be,’ he reflects after a while. ‘Maybe life was meant to be difficult without you, so that I’d feel truly alive when I saw you again.’
‘Maybe,’ I say, beginning to feel uncomfortable, aware that Alistair doesn’t sense the crevice I feel opening between us.
‘All my life I’ve wanted to find you. I even relocated the family to Edinburgh, in the hope of finding you,’ he says, looking at me more intensely now, and all the empathy I had for Alistair drains from me. The intensity of his gaze, which thirty years ago was full of passion, now burns in obsession. ‘Can’t we give it a go? Erase the last thirty years. Pretend you sent me your address after all and pick up where we left off. Surely you can see fate brought us to Sacré Coeur earlier, that we’re destined to be together.’
I look away, and we arrive at the exit to the cemetery.‘You know, I promised Carly I’d be back by midnight,’ I fib, a lie Alistair seems to buy.
‘Let’s meet again in the morning, at the hotel, after Chris Rose’s talk.’
‘Yes,’ I say, another fib.
‘I’ll see you to a cab—’
‘No, I’d like to walk.’
‘If you’re certain . . .’
I hurry off, avoiding an embrace, my feet gaining speed as I trip down the pavements, back towards the Moulin Rouge, past strip bars and sex shops and all the squalor I hadn’t noticed before.
Just get back to the hotel, I think, feeling suddenly panicked, as if something or someone is sitting on my chest. I’m mortified that my own daughter could see something I could not.
Uncertain which direction to go, I instinctively turn left and then right, hurrying along narrow streets packed with galleries and cafés and tourists strolling hand in hand, even so late in the day.
Finding myself at a junction, I turn left into a lane that leads to a set of stone stairs and I hurry up them, turning and turning again until I arrive in a cobbled square. In one corner, opposite a large brick church, is a small garden, wrapped in wrought-iron railings.
