The Prince Of Mist

7

As they approached the beach house, Max noticed a strange car parked out in front. Roland saw it too and frowned.

‘That’s Dr Roberts’s car.’

Alicia went pale.

‘Something’s wrong,’ she whispered.

Roland raced ahead and Max had trouble catching up with him, even though his friend was also carrying Alicia. When they were just a few metres from the house Alicia jumped off the bicycle and ran towards the porch. Max, panting, followed her while Roland took care of the bicycles. Maximilian Carver, ashen-faced and with a glazed look in his eyes, greeted them at the door.

‘What’s happened?’ Alicia said, her voice trembling.

Her father hugged her. Alicia let him wrap his arms around her – his hands were shaking and when he spoke his voice kept breaking. Max felt something tighten in his throat. He had never seen his father like this.

‘Irina’s had an accident. She’s in a coma. We’re waiting for the ambulance to take her to hospital.’

‘Is Mum all right?’ asked Alicia.

‘She’s inside with Irina and the doctor. There’s nothing else we can do here,’ replied the watchmaker, lowering his eyes.

Roland stood quietly at the foot of the porch.

‘Will she be all right?’ asked Max, immediately realising that the question was stupid, given the circumstances.

‘We don’t know,’ Maximilian Carver muttered. He tried to smile at them before going back into the house. ‘I’ll see if your mother needs anything.’

The three friends stood there, glued to the spot. At first no one said a word but then Roland spoke up.

‘I’m sorry…’

Alicia nodded in response. Shortly afterwards, the ambulance arrived and stopped outside the house and the doctor came out to meet it. It only took a few minutes for the two ambulance men to go inside and then emerge, carrying Irina wrapped in a blanket on a stretcher. Max caught a glimpse of his little sister’s face, which was as white as a sheet, and felt his stomach churn. Andrea Carver, her face tense and her eyes red and swollen, got into the ambulance and peered out despairingly at Alicia and Max. The ambulance crew rushed to their seats. Maximilian Carver walked over to his two children.

‘I don’t like leaving you on your own. There’s a small hotel in the town. Perhaps…’

‘We’ll be fine, Dad. Don’t worry about that now,’ Alicia replied.

‘I’ll call from the hospital and give you the number. I don’t know how long we’ll be there, I don’t know whether there’s anything-’

‘Just go, Dad.’ Alicia hugged her father. ‘Everything will be all right.’

Trying to hold back his tears, Maximilian Carver climbed into the ambulance. The three friends stood quietly, watching the vehicle’s lights disappearing into the distance as the last rays of sun lingered in the violet dusk.

‘Everything will be all right,’ Alicia repeated to herself.

*

Once they’d found some dry clothes (Alicia lent Roland a pair of old trousers and a shirt belonging to her father), the wait for news seemed endless. The smiling moons on Max’s watch showed it was a few minutes to eleven o’clock when the phone finally rang. Alicia, who was sitting between Roland and Max on the porch steps, jumped up and ran into the house. Before the phone had rung a second time she had picked up the receiver.

‘All right,’ she said, nodding at Max and Roland. ‘How’s Mum?’

Max could hear the rumble of his father’s voice down the line.

‘Don’t worry,’ said Alicia. ‘No. There’s no need. Yes, we’ll be fine. Call again tomorrow.’ Alicia paused. ‘I will,’ she assured him. ‘Me too. Goodnight, Dad.’

She hung up and looked at her brother.

‘Irina is being kept under observation,’ she explained. ‘The doctors say she has concussion. She’s still in a coma but they say she’ll recover.’

‘Are you sure that’s what they said?’ Max replied. ‘What about Mum?’

‘You can imagine. They’re going to spend the night there because Mum doesn’t want to go to a hotel. They’ll call us again tomorrow at ten.’

‘What will we do now?’ Roland asked timidly.

Alicia shrugged her shoulders.

‘Is anyone hungry?’ she asked the two boys.

Max felt surprisingly hungry. Alicia stifled a yawn – she looked exhausted.

‘I think it would do us all good to have some dinner,’ she concluded. ‘Anyone disagree?’

It took Max a few minutes to prepare some sandwiches while Alicia made lemonade. They had dinner on the porch, sitting on the bench under the faint glow of the lamp that swayed in the night breeze, wrapped in a dancing cloud of moths. The full moon rose high above the sea transforming the water’s surface into a lake of luminous metal that stretched towards infinity. They ate in silence, gazing at the ocean and listening to the soft swell of the waves.

‘I don’t think I’ll sleep a wink tonight,’ said Alicia, sitting up and scanning the horizon.

‘I don’t think any of us will,’ Max agreed.

‘I have an idea,’ said Roland, a conspiratorial smile on his lips. ‘Have you ever swum at night?’

‘Are you joking?’ Max retorted.

Without saying a word, Alicia gave the two boys a look, her eyes shining and mysterious, then got up and walked off calmly towards the beach. Max watched in astonishment as his sister crossed the sand and, without turning round, slipped off her white cotton dress. She stood at the water’s edge for a moment, her pale skin gleaming under the bluish light of the moon, and then, slowly, she submerged her body into the immense pool of light.

‘Aren’t you coming, Max?’ said Roland, following Alicia’s footsteps on the sand.

Max didn’t reply, but he shook his head and watched as his friend dived in. He could hear his sister’s laughter amid the whispering sounds of the sea.

He sat quietly on the porch, trying to decide whether or not he was saddened by the strong spark between Roland and his sister, a chemistry that escaped all definition and from which he knew he was excluded. While he watched them fooling around in the water Max knew, probably even before they were aware of it, that a lasting bond was growing between them, a bond that would unite them that summer and which seemed as inevitable as destiny.

As he thought about these things, Max’s mind turned to the shadows of a war that was being fought so close and yet so far from that beach, a faceless war that would soon lay claim to his friend Roland and, perhaps, even to him. He also thought about all the events that had happened during that long day, from his sighting of the ghostly Orpheus beneath the sea to Roland’s story in the beach hut and Irina’s accident. Away from the laughter of Alicia and Roland, a deep anxiety took hold of him. For the first time in his life he felt that time was going faster than he wished it to and he could no longer take refuge in his dreams. The wheel of fortune had started to turn, and this time he could not stop it.

*

Later, by the light of a bonfire they had built on the beach, Alicia, Roland and Max spoke about what had been going through their minds over the last few hours. The golden glow of the fire was reflected on the damp, shining faces of Alicia and Roland. Max sat observing them for a long while before deciding to speak.

‘I don’t know how to explain this, but I think something’s going on,’ he began. ‘I don’t know what it is, but there are too many coincidences. The statues, that symbol, the ship…’

Max thought they’d both contradict him, or else reassure him with the sensible words that escaped him, making him see that his anxiety was only the result of a long day in which too many things had happened. But they didn’t. Instead, both Alicia and Roland nodded, their eyes still fixed on the fire.

‘You told me you dreamed about that clown, didn’t you?’ Max asked.

Again Alicia nodded.

‘There’s something I didn’t tell you before,’ Max went on. ‘Last night, when you all went to bed, I had another look at the film Jacob Fleischmann took in the walled garden. I was in that garden yesterday morning. The statues were in a different position. I don’t know… it’s as if they’ve moved. What I saw is not what was in the film.’

Alicia turned her eyes towards Roland, who seemed mesmerised by the dancing flames.

‘Roland, has your grandfather ever talked to you about all this?’

The boy didn’t seem to have heard her question. Alicia put her hand on his and he looked up.

‘I’ve dreamed about that clown every summer since I was five,’ he said in a muted tone.

Max saw the fear in his face.

‘I think we should talk to your grandfather.’

Roland gave a slight nod.

‘Tomorrow,’ he promised, his voice barely audible. ‘Tomorrow.’