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January couldn’t, in Ben’s opinion, come soon enough.
* * *
It only occurred to Ben later that afternoon to ask Nikolas about his travelling identity.
He tracked him down fairly easily by following the sound of piano playing. Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star was being plonked with monotonous repetition, not Nikolas’s preferred performance piece, but the only thing Molly could, as yet, manage. Nikolas couldplaythe piano, but Ben secretly wondered if he was quite as natural a teacher of this skill. Molly didn’t seem to be making much progress, and a great deal of arguing went on between them, as far as he could tell. Even now, it appeared that Nikolas was criticising her technique, as Ben heard an impatient, “No, you have to use this finger.”
“But then this finger will be sad he doesn’t get to do anything.”
“Fingers cannot be sad,MoyaSolnishka; they are inanimate objects.”
“What doesin any muttmean?”
“I said inanimate and it means not moving.”
“You never say anything right, Papa. Uncle Tim says you have ariddy-culousaccent and that your English is not nearly as good as you think it is. Daddy says it’s quite good though. Considering. Better than itusedto be. And all my fingers move a lot. See?”
“You are missing the point. You have to learn to use the right fingers or you will never learn to play well.”
“But it’s more twinkly with this finger. The little star likes to be played withthisfinger. Did you use fingers you didn’t like when you were learning?”
“I did not prefer one finger over another—or if I did, I punished the one I did not like by making him play more. But that is beside the point and—“
“But didn’t granny make you play properly? You told me she made you playfolded up. I asked Daddy, and he said to ignore—“
“I did not tell you—“
“You were blind and folded up in a little box. Yousaidso.”
“What? No.Blindfolded. A scarf. It was a technique she used—“
“Having fun?”
Nikolas looked up, his face pained and harassed, at Ben’s interruption, but before he could reply, Molly piped up happily, “Listen to me play, Daddy. Listen.”
She performed her piece with solemn concentration.
Ben held Nikolas’s gaze over her lowered head and whispered, “Je elsker dig.”
Nikolas chuckled. “And I am accused of having the terrible accent. That was quite good, Molly.”
Her breath caught, and she held her hands very tightly clenched in her lap, as if this rare praise would escape and fly free if not trapped so. Ben ruffled her hair. “It was brilliant, Mol-Mol. Come on, it’s sunny outside. You should be out running around. Go find Sarah.”
He ignored the looks of incredulity he got from them both at the idea of preferring running around to music, and ushered her towards the door. As they were watching Sarah greet her, Ben remarked casually, “I’m not going under a fake name this time, by the way.”
Nikolas rose from the piano bench and began to walk back through the large open-plan rooms towards the kitchen. “That might be awkward.”
“No, it won’t. I’m not pretending anymore. We are who we are, Nik. That means you as well.”
Nikolas gestured towards the kettle, which he apparently didn’t know how to switch on. Ben repressed a sigh and began to make some tea. “You have to travel with your real passport.”
Nikolas made a small noise that could have been amusement. “Thatwouldbe awkward, as I am dead.”
Ben privately hated it when Nikolas said things like this. It was a little too close to the truth, and the reminder ofAlekseymade a familiar shiver of fear prickle Ben’s scalp. “You know what I mean.”
Nikolas didn’t comment on this, he just turned and went over the swim lane and then disappeared into his study.
Ben wasn’t going to give up so lightly. He pursued.
