The Small Hand (14 page)
Authors: Susan Hill
Twenty-two
thought that was an end to it. I thought there would be no more to tell. But there is more, another small piece of knowledge I was given and which I can never give back, can never un-know. Another, far worse thing which I must live with, for there is nothing, nothing at all, I can do with it.
When I got back home, I found a letter. It had been posted on the Saturday morning and it was addressed in my brother’s hand and for a split second as I looked at the writing I forgot that he was dead but was fleetingly puzzled that he should be writing to me, on paper with pen and ink, not telephoning or sending a quick email.
But then, of course, I remembered. I realised. My hand shook as I opened the envelope, sitting at my desk beside the window on that late afternoon of a gathering sky.
Adam,
You need to know this. I have never been able to tell you, though there have been times in these past days and weeks when I have been close to it. But in the end, I could not. Perhaps you knew I had something to say to you. Perhaps not.
Now, having decided I can live with it no longer, I must tell you.
Please remember that we were children. I was a child. At eleven years old one is still a child. I tell myself so.
The boy drowned because I pushed him into that pool. No one else was there for a moment. No one saw what happened. You came to find me and I grabbed your hand and pulled you away, up the steps and through the archway in that high hedge that has loomed so darkly through my nightmares ever since.
No one knew. It was late in the afternoon, people were leaving the gardens. We were last. I pulled you across the grass until we found Mother and then we left too.
Nothing happened for some years. I pushed it down into my unconscious, as people do with such terrible secrets. Nothing happened until my breakdown, which began suddenly and perhaps half by chance, after I read some story in the paper about a child who had drowned in a similar pool.
I had the same urges you suffered, to throw myself into water. The only difference seems to have been that I did not have to endure the grip of the small hand as you did. Not until it abandoned you – perhaps I should say ‘gave up on you’ – and came to me, not many weeks ago. I knew then that I should be unable to resist it, that I would have to do what it wanted, go with it. Of course I have to. It was my fault. I am guilty. You did nothing. You knew nothing.
I am sorry for this, for what I am telling you, for leaving everyone, for putting my family through what I know will be great pain. One thing, please. I beg you never to tell Benedicte or Katerina, however much you may want to unburden yourself. They will have enough to carry. Please keep this last secret between the two of us.
You are reading this in the knowledge that I have paid my debt and please God that is enough. That is an end to it all. The small ghost and I are at peace. The last hand that other small hand will take hold of will be mine.
With my love
Hugo