The Children’s Home (6 page)

The wall had been built around the estate when Morgan was still a child, at the start of the troubles. He remembered being taken to see it as it rose above his head, and then above the head of his father, and then far, far above, a wall of dark unglazed brick as thick as an arm was long, with a triangular white stone coping and a row of black iron spikes, like arrowheads. They weren’t the only people to take these precautions; other local families constructed similar walls around their properties, while some simply sold up and left the country in planes sequestered by the army and made available to those who could afford one, taking with them whatever was portable of their wealth, leaving the rest behind to be looted and destroyed.

One of Morgan’s first memories after the building of the wall was hearing gunfire and shouting and seeing flames rise from beyond it, while he stood with his hand in his mother’s and listened to her sing a song he had never heard before, in a language he didn’t know. A rebel song, she told him, her dark eyes burning with anger and affront. He didn’t know what
rebel
meant. When he found out the meaning, he wondered if he had heard her right. Weren’t rebels the ones on the outside, he wondered, the ones who shouted and used their guns and murdered; the ones with a grievance. Perhaps what she had wanted to say was
revel
. She was never happier in those days than when she was preparing for a party of some kind.

Then, without reason as far as Morgan could see, the situation seemed to calm. His father took them to the city and they sat in cafés open to the street and watched the people, just as they might have done before. They didn’t seem to be frightened at all as they went about their business, although sometimes children would beg and his mother would give Morgan coppers to reward them with; he would press the coins into their dirty hands with a mingled feeling of distaste and pity, but also a trace of envy as they ran off and giggled together, then turned back to stare at him with a contempt he didn’t, at that time, understand. There was terrible poverty, even he could see that. Old people were left outside houses to die; that was how it looked to him; sat up on hard chairs on the pavement and left there for hours on end, then carried back into dark rooms, cellars, and halls, until the next day. Then his father stopped taking them out because, he told them one evening while they were eating, it was no longer safe to leave the estate, and he loved them all too much to put their lives at risk. Soon after that, he began to travel with a chauffeur, a new man, tall and blond, who spoke a Nordic language and had a gun; the two of them sitting like ghosts behind reinforced glass in his father’s powerful blue car, the car that had been towed home after his father’s death and still stood, covered in green tarpaulin, in one of the garages behind the house, rusting and immense, a home to generations of nesting rats. From the windows at the top of the house Morgan would watch them enter through the main gate, which was guarded by men who were armed and dressed like soldiers, although his father explained that they were not real soldiers but hired men, because hired men were safer. The army could no longer be trusted. There were tales of what the army did to people, tales that were told in the kitchen and beneath the stairs.

And throughout all this, his mother had gardened. And cultivated orchids.

Now, when Crane began to talk about the world outside, Morgan found himself thinking of the stories he had heard in the kitchen all those years before. He hadn’t believed them then and now these new stories seemed equally unlikely. The truth was that, after he had left the clinic and come home, he rarely thought about the world beyond the estate and certainly never regarded it as a threat. The gates had been standing open for months now, because the man who had opened and closed them and kept their hinges oiled was simply not there one morning and had not been replaced. There was no need. Nobody came to the house, or left it. It had a reputation, Morgan was sure of that. Whenever a new kitchen maid was required, one of the staff would persuade a younger sister or cousin to work for the monster they were never allowed to see, but knew might be lurking; the thought of it kept them obedient. Besides, he paid more than anyone else, thanks to Engel, who arranged their hours and his, to make sure they would never overlap. Engel was no fool.

The Doctor told Morgan that his father and mother had also been doctors. Against the wishes of his father, Crane had trained to be a surgeon. His father had said that the only true doctor was the family doctor, that all the rest were mechanics who dealt with body parts. How can you treat a person, he used to say, when you don’t know what his home is like, or the quality of his mother’s cooking. A man is a whole thing or he is nothing. For his father, what made a doctor a doctor was his ability to listen. Let them talk, he said, and they will tell you everything you need to know. If what they say is the seed, then you must learn to be the earth. He was right, said Crane, I realized that the first time I cut into a man whose name I didn’t know. And so I came back to work with them. And then they died, my mother first and then my father, and I stayed here because the practice would have closed and no one else wanted it. And here I am. He paused and smiled to himself. My father used to like to say: None of my patients is ill but thinking makes him so, is that Shakespeare? Morgan nodded.
Hamlet
, he said. More or less. To me it is a prison.

in which Trilby and Pate arrive at the house unannounced

T
he Doctor and Morgan were playing backgammon in the book room one day when Engel rushed in, flustered, gasping for breath after climbing the stairs. She stood at the door, her large hand on the round brass knob. “They’re here,” she panted. “They’re here for the children. The Lord damn their eyes and ears. They say they’re from the government.” Both men ran from the room and crossed to the landing window, from which they could see a small gray car parked in the drive. Two men stood beside it, staring up at the rows of dark uncurtained windows. They were dressed identically in black suits, white shirts, black ties, and brown suede shoes. One man was bald, the other wore a narrow-brimmed trilby. Both men were smoking in the same way, with their hands cupped round the end of the cigarette as if to protect the flame, in unison flicking the ash onto the gravel. If they hadn’t been smoking, they would have looked like civil servants or plainclothes police. Morgan realized as he watched them examining the house and dropping their ash on his drive that he was trembling, and not for fear of his face being seen, although that was also there, that fear was constant, but because these unwanted, uninvited men might take away their children.

“You have to help me,” he said, clutching the Doctor’s sleeve.

“Of course,” said the Doctor. He turned to Engel. “What exactly did they say to you? What were their words?” His tone was stern. Engel cast her eyes to the ceiling.

“I don’t exactly know. I heard them say children, something about our children, and my stomach opened with fright. I thought I would lose my self-respect on the floor in front of them, right there on the floor of the hall. I said I would fetch you at once.” She looked at Morgan, hotly ashamed. “I’m sorry, I know I should never have said that. I wasn’t thinking. I was
so
scared.”

“That isn’t important now,” said Doctor Crane. He squeezed Morgan’s arm. “I’ll talk to them.” Morgan nodded, then said to Engel, “Take them to the green drawing room. But give me enough time to get behind the curtain.” He ran down the stairs, pausing only to assure himself that the front door was properly closed and that he would not be observed. As soon as he was safe behind the curtain, he forced himself to breathe more shallowly. A moment later, Engel opened the door and ushered in the two men, followed by Doctor Crane. Pate took the lead.

“Are you the owner of this house?” he said.

“I am the owner’s doctor,” Crane said.

Trilby had taken a soft black notebook from his inside breast pocket. He uncapped his pen. “Doctor—?”

“Crane.”

“And the owner of the house? Mr.—?”

“Is away at the moment. On business. Perhaps I can help?”

Pate looked suspicious.

“And might I ask what you’re doing here in the house alone, with the owner away? In his house?”

“I would be grateful if you could explain to me first exactly who you are,” said Doctor Crane. “And what your business is. Before I answer any more of your questions.”

“We’re from the ministry,” said Trilby.

“The ministry?”

“Of welfare. The ministry of welfare.”

“So there is still a ministry of welfare?” said Doctor Crane, with a sniff. “I assumed they’d closed it years ago. For all the welfare I see around me. And you have documents to prove this?”

Both men produced from their jacket pockets a metal plate with their photographs and the symbol of a ministry, a portcullis between two towers. Crane took his time examining these, then gave them back.

“And whose welfare is it exactly that brings you here?” said Crane.

Pate thought about this for a moment, then shook his head as if to dislodge a fly.

“As I said, we’d like to speak to the owner of the house.”

“Who is away,” said Crane. “As I said.”

“It’s about certain, well, disturbing rumors that have reached the ministry’s ears,” continued Pate. “Regarding children.”

Morgan’s breath caught in his windpipe; for a moment he thought he was going to choke.

“Children?” Crane said.

“We believe there are children here. In the house. Strays.”

“Children in the house? In this house? Really?” said Crane, in a tone of ascending surprise. “Might I ask on what grounds you believe this?”

“We have our sources,” said Pate in a self-important way, glancing at Trilby, who stood beside him, his pen poised over his notebook. “The ministry, that is to say, has its sources. Which naturally must remain confidential.”

“You said
stray
children,” Doctor Crane said, slowly, as though the word were new to him. “I’m not sure I quite understand what you mean. In what way might children be considered
stray
?”

Pate looked embarrassed. “It’s a ministry term,” he said. But Crane insisted.

“Clearly. Which means?”

Pate looked at Trilby, who indicated what appeared to be his permission with a nod; Pate then said, “Well, otherwise unaccounted for, unparented. What used to be termed
orphans
, you might say.”

“Unwanted, in other words?”

“That’s neither here nor there from the ministry’s point of view,” said Pate. “Nor from ours, come to that, as ministry servants. It isn’t our job to justify the official terminology. These children must be accounted for, that’s all. There are
structures
.”

“And these
stray
children?”

“Are taken care of by the ministry,” said Pate. “Of welfare.”

“I understand,” said Crane. He glanced for a fraction of a second towards the curtain, one eyebrow raised. It might have been a tic. “In
structures
.”

Pate spoke again, with increasing impatience. “Perhaps you would be so good as to answer our questions, Doctor—”

“Crane,” said Trilby, reading from his notebook.

“I really don’t know what else to say,” Crane said. “As you can see for yourselves,” he gestured around him, “there are no children here,
stray
or otherwise. The owner of this fine old house leads a secluded existence, as I’m sure your sources at the ministry will have informed you. He is a man of great culture, a scholar, and appreciates his own company more than any other’s. The last thing he would want is the presence of children. When he travels, he does so to ensure himself that his affairs abroad are in order and to experience other civilizations, other worlds. He would hardly want to leave a houseful of children to their own devices. And if you wish to know why I am here, though of what concern my presence might be to the ministry I fail to understand, then I can tell you that the owner of this house is a friend of mine, a dear old friend, whose door is open to me with or without his presence. I am here today, as it happens, to study in the library, which has an extensive collection of medical texts from the last century. I am here to enrich my knowledge. I am certainly not here to gather children,
strays
or otherwise.”

Pate said, “We have a warrant.”

Crane gestured towards the door. “Indeed? In that case, I’m sure the owner would have no desire to impede you in your ministerial duties. In his absence, I shall be delighted to show you round.” He opened the door and waved them both through, not looking towards the curtain. “Perhaps the main rooms on the ground floor first? The house, as you will have realized, is rather large.”

As he watched them leave the drawing room, Morgan’s heart began to thump against his ribs. His reason told him that his fear was quite unnecessary. Engel, by this time, would certainly have spirited the children away. But perhaps a teddy bear or building brick would have been forgotten, or the small soft shoe of a toddler. Perhaps a cry would escape from the mouth of one of the babies, wherever they were hidden, and be heard by one of these men, these gray-suited jackals with their talk of strays. For one exhilarating second, Morgan entertained the notion that he could spring out from a corner, utter a ghoulish moan, and frighten the men to death; yes, even to death. He could stalk them as they trespassed around his grandfather’s house, because it was clear to him that they were trespassing despite their warrant, until the appropriate moment arrived and the horror of his face would do its work. But that would solve nothing, he knew. Then it occurred to him that he could do what he had done the first time the Doctor came; he could hide in the scullery and watch them as they came into the kitchen. Surely they would never search the scullery, he thought. They were from the ministry; the scullery would be beneath them. He lifted the curtain and was about to step into the room when he heard the engine of a car start up and wheels on gravel. Moments later, Crane burst into the room. He couldn’t speak for laughter.