Agnes was elevated by pillows with the alphabet card on her lap. The drip stood tall, like a hiding guard, its tubes and bags clothed by a flag of linen. She wore a green silk blouse and red cashmere cardigan. The colours threw a faint diaphanous sheen on to the skin around her neck. Illness, resplendent and spoiling, could not take away her radiance. There were two chairs by the bed, with a vase of flowers on the table. Beside the vase lay a small school notebook. A light breeze gently flapped the curtain upon the open French window like bunting on a seaside stall.
Agnes’ blue eyes fixed on Anselm. Emotion pierced his throat and he swallowed hard against a blade. Deathbed scenes, he thought; the last chance to say something sensible, something honest, to wrap it all up. But not here, not now He shuddered: this wasn’t death; that had been and gone, long ago, routed; this was life. He sat down, shaking, and took out a brown, brittle envelope. Lucy sat beside him as he withdrew a single sheet of paper.
‘Agnes,’ he began, ‘I was handed this by Mr Snyman. He told me Jacques had given it to him before he was arrested, hoping it might be brought to you if, by some unimaginable chance, you survived the coming night.’
Through a simple dilating movement of the eyes, Agnes told him to read. Her breathing began to catch hesitantly; fine, curved lashes slowly fell, remaining shut. At the raising of a single, trembling finger, Anselm began reading, in French:
‘April’s tiny hands once captured Paris
As you once captured me: infant Trojan
Fingers gently peeled away my resistance
To your charms. It was an epiphany
I saw waving palms, rising dust, and yes,
I even heard the stones cry out your name, Agnes. ‘
Anselm paused at the end of the first verse. He looked over to Agnes. A faint pulse jerked behind her eyelids. Anselm resumed reading:
‘And then the light fell short.
I made a pact with the Devil when the
“Spring Wind” came, when Priam’s son lay bleeding
On the ground. As morning broke the scattered
Stones whispered ‘God, what have you done?’ and yes,
I betrayed you both. Can you forgive me,
Agnes?’
At the words of confession she opened her eyes. Inflections of shadow seemed to move beneath her skin like passing cloud. Agnes lifted her hand to one side, exposing the white, soft palm. She turned to Anselm, who understood. He placed the letter on the bed and her hand lay tenderly upon it as though it were flesh.
After a long moment Agnes looked to Lucy who walked around Anselm to pick up the second school notebook from the bedside table; then she reached for the alphabet card and placed it in position. Agnes said: