Part XIII
She was glad, and not for the first time, that she'd enlisted Kerry Weaver's help in easing her back. She hadn't been obliged to - this wasn't really anything to do with her employer. She'd never drunk at work, never been hung over at work - but Kerry had been sympathetic without being sentimental, supportive without being patronizing and business like without being uncaring. She'd helped Abby to focus on the day to day reality of coping with her situation and she was grateful. Kerry had scheduled her to work day shifts only for the first two weeks of December, and she'd found her stride with an ease that surprised her.
Both Luka and Carter were watchful, unobtrusively mindful of the stresses to which she might find herself succumbing. They worked a mixed pattern of shifts and she found that she went days without seeing one or other of them. It was OK. She was able to drink coffee with Carter without feeling as though she were stabbing him through the heart. Sometimes she would look at him and wonder who it was that had shared his bed. She found it impossible to imagine that they had ever been lovers, and she had the suspicion that he felt the same. There was a subtle feeling of shared relief between them and she wondered if they'd ever acknowledge it. She thought probably not.
Luka was a different proposition altogether. Him she couldn't sit with in companionable ease and found it almost impossible to forget that they'd once been lovers. She sensed his confusion when, on occasion, she refused his suggestions of lunch or a lift home. They'd been to a movie together and she'd been unable to remember a single thing about it, conscious only of him beside her in the dark. When he'd kissed her cheek after walking her home she'd jerked her head back and laughed uncomfortably, and he'd looked at her as though she'd slapped his face.
And yet she wanted nothing so much as to talk to him, the huge volume of what she didn't know about him was like a reproach to her. She'd never asked him when they were together because she didn't know how, and she still didn't.
Christmas was coming. Not the best of times for her, or for him she knew. She'd wondered about suggesting that they spend the holiday together but felt paralysed by uncertainty. She knew that she was in no position to get involved with anyone yet, but he was her friend and at a time when families should be together he felt his only through their absence. Carter she knew would be in Venice with his Grandmother.
Abby's mother had asked her to spend Christmas in Minnesota; Eric had invited her to Florida. She didn't want to do either. Maybe they could come here and Luka could join them? No, no, no. In the end she brazened it out and asked him.
"Got any plans for the holidays?"
"Work."
"All through?"
"Pretty much." He paused. "I finish at noon on Christmas Eve and that night I'll be taking Rosa to the centre for a party. I was wondering if you'd like to come." He'd been wondering how to ask her and had almost decided not to, despite Rosa's constant nagging.
"Dancing?"
"Certainly."
"Do I have to join in?"
"Oh yes."
"Well, I don't know. I have no sense of rhythm."
"You don't need it. Follow everyone else and try not to get hurt."
"You're not filling me with confidence here."
"You'll be OK. I'm a doctor."
She laughed then, in spite of herself. "I'll think about it."
"Rosa will be very disappointed if you don't come. She'll even brief the Granddaughters to let you leave in one piece." Abby felt herself blush at this.
"Do I need a bodyguard?"
"You have no idea. You'll be the perfect cover."
"How flattering." She was a little panicked by the invitation.
"Come on," he said, "It'll be fun, I promise."
"Well, as long as there'll be no cat fights."
"No, no, we'll leave before then."
"What?"
"The traditional Croation Christmas Eve Cat Fight. Not pretty."
"If you're trying to convince me there are better ways of doing it. OK I'll come, but only if I can sit by Rosa for safety."
"And what are you doing?"
"What? When?"
"Christmas."
"Apart from running the gauntlet of your jealous admirers? Nothing. I have the day shift Christmas Eve, but I'm off Christmas day."
"Would you ." he faltered.
"Would I what?"
"I could come over after my shift. We could watch "It's A Wonderful Life" and feel sorry for ourselves together. Or you could come to me."
"No, no, my place. No egg nog, but I'll cook . something. Maybe a goose." She said, inspired. Luka looked doubtful.
"They're rather big for two, wouldn't you think?"
"Maybe," she conceded. "Pasta?"
"Probably safer."
"OK. You pay for the video rental, right?"
"You mean you don't own it?"
"No, I do not own it."
"I do."
"So what do you pay for?" He considered for a moment.
"The cab home."
"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
3.00 pm Christmas Eve. Abby was beginning to question the wisdom of accompanying Luka tonight. The thought of a couple of hundred Croatians in full drink fuelled cry was making her nervous. And the granddaughters. She smiled to think that she'd be envy of every granddaughter in the place. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad. "Cigarette." She said to herself, pulling her coat on and headed for the ambulance bay. She flattened herself against the wall as a gurney crashed through the doors with a curious lack of urgency and a bored paramedic intoned "Elderly female, 70 -75 years old, probable MI, unresponsive to ." his voice faded as the gurney moved past her and she turned back on her course, running straight into a very tall, very solidly built young man. The cigarette between her fingers was smashed to pieces.
"Hey!"
"I'm sorry. I have to go in there with her." The last time Abby had seen this youth he'd been standing guard over Luka's car outside Rosa's apartment building. Protection.
"You family? Is - is this your grandmother?"
"I have to go in there with her. I have this." He held up a handbag.
"OK, come on, I'll take you."
Abby stood with Protection outside the trauma room as Susan Lewis and Jing Mei Chen worked on the old lady, but it was obvious that they were only going through the motions. She saw Susan glance at her watch, call the time of death. She glanced up at her companion and put a sympathetic had on his arm. "I'm sorry."
"She's dead?"
"I think so. I'll check." Protection held out the handbag to her.
"All over?"
"Yeah. Too little too late. Is that family out there?"
"Her grandson. He seems OK. I have her handbag; ID and stuff might be in it I guess."
"Thanks" Abby made to leave but stopped when she heard Susan speak again.
"Rosa Petrovic. OK, Rosa, let's see if we can tell who to call for -"
"Rosa?" said Abby turning back, almost not daring to look.
"Yeah. Pretty name." Abby looked down at Rosa's face, the lips a grey- blue, her hair newly set. "You know her?"
"No, not really. Excuse me. I have to call Luka."
"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
Her hair smelled of lacquer and had been messed up by the oxygen mask dragged over it. He teased the curls back into place with one finger and stroked her cheek with the back of his hand; she'd had her nails done too he noticed. He slid his hand into hers, wincing a little at the coldness, the waxy feel of her fingers.
"Hey.". He looked down to see Abby standing at his side. "She'd been to the beauty parlour. I guess she wanted to look nice for you." He nodded, mutely. "Protection brought her in." she added.
"I know. I saw him. He's waiting for a lift home." He shook himself a little. "I should call the priest. He'll know what she wants - wanted - done, who to call."
"Do you - do you want company?" He shook his head again. "No. No. I'll be sort of .busy." It seemed the wrong word somehow.
"Luka, I'm so sorry." He just shrugged.
"She was an old woman," he said, almost nonchalantly; "It happens." People die. Danijella, Jasna, Marko.
"Luka, tomorrow -" He shook his head.
"No, I don't think - "
"Just for company." No answer. "OK, I'll call you . You still coming in?"
"Yes. Yes, of course."
"I'll ring." No answer.
"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
She lasted until 8 O'clock on Christmas night before picking up the 'phone. Either he wasn't there or he just wasn't answering. And he wasn't answering his door either she discovered not long afterwards. She had told the cab to wait in case of just such an eventuality and she got them lost twice before finding the right address. She couldn't even find it in herself to be outraged by the cost.
The lift wasn't working now and she stopped at the top of the third flight of stairs to get her breath back. "Damned cigarettes," she said aloud. Rosa's door was ajar and she could hear voices, one she recognised as Luka's the other unknown to her. She pushed open the door. A priest. The two men were sifting through a sheaf of papers on the table before them. "Is it OK for me to be here?"
Luka nodded and managed a smile. She waited while they concluded their business and then her attention was drawn back to them by what seemed to be a disagreement. The priest was holding something out to Luka insisting that he have it; Luka seemed equally insistent that he would not have it. Quite abruptly the priest reached for Luka's hand and a moment later, nodding to Abby, left the apartment.
"You don't mind me coming?"
"Of course not. I - I don't think there's much left to do. The priest called the granddaughter. She'll be here the day after tomorrow. She has a family."
"The same granddaughter?"
"Yes. She's a widow," he replied, shortly. He held up his left hand suddenly. "She wanted me to have this."
"Rosa?"
"She told the priest months ago apparently."
"Her wedding ring." Luka nodded. The ring on his little finger, worn thin with age, gleamed dully in the lamplight. Luka seemed exhausted.
"When's the funeral?"
"30th. Round the corner."
"Can you go?"
"I'll go." He sat down heavily on the couch and threw his head back, eyes closed. "I've said I'll help clear the apartment when her granddaughter has taken what she wants. Not that there's much. I guess she'll mainly want these." He rested his hand on a shoe box on the couch at his side.
"What is it?"
"Photographs - and her few bits of jewellery. Her friends will come and take their pick of her other things and the rest will go to Goodwill I guess." He sat forward, elbows on his knees and head in his hands, and Abby wondered if he might be crying. Moving the shoe box she sat beside him and laid an arm across his back. He wasn't crying she found, just worn out. She picked up a handful of photographs and glanced through them. Some were old, black and white and a young woman, very recognisably Rosa seemed to be in most of them; with her rather stolid looking husband, with their children - the boy she knew to have died in Vukovar. More recent ones showed family weddings, holidays on sunny beaches, ancient skylines and the bluest of skies.
"Is this home?"
He glanced at the photograph briefly. "Looks like Dubrovnik." He'd been right, thought Abby. It was beautiful. She realised that he was twisting Rosa's wedding ring round and round on his finger.
"Luka."
"What?" his voice just a whisper.
"Tell me."
"Tell you what?" He didn't need an answer. He knew what. And, gazing down at a picture of the waters and skies of the Adriatic, he began. His childhood, by the sea, on the farm, happiness taken for granted. Round and round. School, college. Danijella. Danijella, love and absurd happiness. Taken for granted. Round and round Jasna. Marko, who had taken them by surprise and been delivered by his father with a neighbour's help on their kitchen floor. Round and round. Death, the shame of having been there to bury them. The horror that had been the hospital. A camp. She hadn't even suspected that. Release. Round and round. The agony of his father's grief. His escape from everything that spoke to him of happiness. And a vast, featureless period of years when he had felt nothing and been glad of it.
"And then .you."
She felt as though she'd been picked up and dropped from a height. "There was no-one - He shook his head. In that second the full horror their relationship had meant and the damage it had caused hit her with the force of a well aimed punch. She was glad she was sitting down.
"I didn't know."
He laughed, mirthlessly. "Wasn't it obvious?"
"No." That was true. "I'm sorry., Luka. I didn't think."
"It doesn't matter."
"Don't say that."
"Why not? And why are you sorry? It took two of us. I didn't turn you away."
"You tried. I wouldn't let you get away from me."
"You thought you were doing the right thing. I know that. I should have known better."
"And afterwards ."
"Let it go, Abby. It's done." She was shocked at the hopelessness in his voice.
"I wish I'd known."
"Yeah. Nice after dinner conversation."
"And I hid from you too." She said softly.
"What?"
"You didn't really know me at all." He was silent for a long moment. "It seems to be a night for revelations."
She shivered. The apartment was freezing, even in her coat. Luka reached behind her and draped a crocheted rug around her shoulders. She hoped that he'd leave his arm across her. He didn't. But he listened intently to the tragic-comedy of her childhood, her mother, now captivating, now terrifying; the suicide attempts; Richard; the abortion. She looked up at him then and waited.
"And?" he asked.
"I had an abortion."
"I heard. And now you wish you hadn't?" His face was a picture of gentle concern. She looked down then.
"No. It's just I always thought --- I was afraid that you --- you loved your kids and -"
"What has this to do with me? " She didn't reply. "We decided to have our children, Danijela and me, and we loved them. You decided not to. It was right for you then. What should I have to say about it?"
If God had opened up a vat marked "Regret" and sluiced Abby down with its contents. she couldn't have felt any worse. Deep breath. Carry on. Drinking; rehab; divorce. Luka; Carter; her mother's reappearance; her fear.
And at 2.00am he stood up and led her by the hand into Rosa's bedroom where they lay down, in their winter coats and slept.
She was glad, and not for the first time, that she'd enlisted Kerry Weaver's help in easing her back. She hadn't been obliged to - this wasn't really anything to do with her employer. She'd never drunk at work, never been hung over at work - but Kerry had been sympathetic without being sentimental, supportive without being patronizing and business like without being uncaring. She'd helped Abby to focus on the day to day reality of coping with her situation and she was grateful. Kerry had scheduled her to work day shifts only for the first two weeks of December, and she'd found her stride with an ease that surprised her.
Both Luka and Carter were watchful, unobtrusively mindful of the stresses to which she might find herself succumbing. They worked a mixed pattern of shifts and she found that she went days without seeing one or other of them. It was OK. She was able to drink coffee with Carter without feeling as though she were stabbing him through the heart. Sometimes she would look at him and wonder who it was that had shared his bed. She found it impossible to imagine that they had ever been lovers, and she had the suspicion that he felt the same. There was a subtle feeling of shared relief between them and she wondered if they'd ever acknowledge it. She thought probably not.
Luka was a different proposition altogether. Him she couldn't sit with in companionable ease and found it almost impossible to forget that they'd once been lovers. She sensed his confusion when, on occasion, she refused his suggestions of lunch or a lift home. They'd been to a movie together and she'd been unable to remember a single thing about it, conscious only of him beside her in the dark. When he'd kissed her cheek after walking her home she'd jerked her head back and laughed uncomfortably, and he'd looked at her as though she'd slapped his face.
And yet she wanted nothing so much as to talk to him, the huge volume of what she didn't know about him was like a reproach to her. She'd never asked him when they were together because she didn't know how, and she still didn't.
Christmas was coming. Not the best of times for her, or for him she knew. She'd wondered about suggesting that they spend the holiday together but felt paralysed by uncertainty. She knew that she was in no position to get involved with anyone yet, but he was her friend and at a time when families should be together he felt his only through their absence. Carter she knew would be in Venice with his Grandmother.
Abby's mother had asked her to spend Christmas in Minnesota; Eric had invited her to Florida. She didn't want to do either. Maybe they could come here and Luka could join them? No, no, no. In the end she brazened it out and asked him.
"Got any plans for the holidays?"
"Work."
"All through?"
"Pretty much." He paused. "I finish at noon on Christmas Eve and that night I'll be taking Rosa to the centre for a party. I was wondering if you'd like to come." He'd been wondering how to ask her and had almost decided not to, despite Rosa's constant nagging.
"Dancing?"
"Certainly."
"Do I have to join in?"
"Oh yes."
"Well, I don't know. I have no sense of rhythm."
"You don't need it. Follow everyone else and try not to get hurt."
"You're not filling me with confidence here."
"You'll be OK. I'm a doctor."
She laughed then, in spite of herself. "I'll think about it."
"Rosa will be very disappointed if you don't come. She'll even brief the Granddaughters to let you leave in one piece." Abby felt herself blush at this.
"Do I need a bodyguard?"
"You have no idea. You'll be the perfect cover."
"How flattering." She was a little panicked by the invitation.
"Come on," he said, "It'll be fun, I promise."
"Well, as long as there'll be no cat fights."
"No, no, we'll leave before then."
"What?"
"The traditional Croation Christmas Eve Cat Fight. Not pretty."
"If you're trying to convince me there are better ways of doing it. OK I'll come, but only if I can sit by Rosa for safety."
"And what are you doing?"
"What? When?"
"Christmas."
"Apart from running the gauntlet of your jealous admirers? Nothing. I have the day shift Christmas Eve, but I'm off Christmas day."
"Would you ." he faltered.
"Would I what?"
"I could come over after my shift. We could watch "It's A Wonderful Life" and feel sorry for ourselves together. Or you could come to me."
"No, no, my place. No egg nog, but I'll cook . something. Maybe a goose." She said, inspired. Luka looked doubtful.
"They're rather big for two, wouldn't you think?"
"Maybe," she conceded. "Pasta?"
"Probably safer."
"OK. You pay for the video rental, right?"
"You mean you don't own it?"
"No, I do not own it."
"I do."
"So what do you pay for?" He considered for a moment.
"The cab home."
"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
3.00 pm Christmas Eve. Abby was beginning to question the wisdom of accompanying Luka tonight. The thought of a couple of hundred Croatians in full drink fuelled cry was making her nervous. And the granddaughters. She smiled to think that she'd be envy of every granddaughter in the place. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad. "Cigarette." She said to herself, pulling her coat on and headed for the ambulance bay. She flattened herself against the wall as a gurney crashed through the doors with a curious lack of urgency and a bored paramedic intoned "Elderly female, 70 -75 years old, probable MI, unresponsive to ." his voice faded as the gurney moved past her and she turned back on her course, running straight into a very tall, very solidly built young man. The cigarette between her fingers was smashed to pieces.
"Hey!"
"I'm sorry. I have to go in there with her." The last time Abby had seen this youth he'd been standing guard over Luka's car outside Rosa's apartment building. Protection.
"You family? Is - is this your grandmother?"
"I have to go in there with her. I have this." He held up a handbag.
"OK, come on, I'll take you."
Abby stood with Protection outside the trauma room as Susan Lewis and Jing Mei Chen worked on the old lady, but it was obvious that they were only going through the motions. She saw Susan glance at her watch, call the time of death. She glanced up at her companion and put a sympathetic had on his arm. "I'm sorry."
"She's dead?"
"I think so. I'll check." Protection held out the handbag to her.
"All over?"
"Yeah. Too little too late. Is that family out there?"
"Her grandson. He seems OK. I have her handbag; ID and stuff might be in it I guess."
"Thanks" Abby made to leave but stopped when she heard Susan speak again.
"Rosa Petrovic. OK, Rosa, let's see if we can tell who to call for -"
"Rosa?" said Abby turning back, almost not daring to look.
"Yeah. Pretty name." Abby looked down at Rosa's face, the lips a grey- blue, her hair newly set. "You know her?"
"No, not really. Excuse me. I have to call Luka."
"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
Her hair smelled of lacquer and had been messed up by the oxygen mask dragged over it. He teased the curls back into place with one finger and stroked her cheek with the back of his hand; she'd had her nails done too he noticed. He slid his hand into hers, wincing a little at the coldness, the waxy feel of her fingers.
"Hey.". He looked down to see Abby standing at his side. "She'd been to the beauty parlour. I guess she wanted to look nice for you." He nodded, mutely. "Protection brought her in." she added.
"I know. I saw him. He's waiting for a lift home." He shook himself a little. "I should call the priest. He'll know what she wants - wanted - done, who to call."
"Do you - do you want company?" He shook his head again. "No. No. I'll be sort of .busy." It seemed the wrong word somehow.
"Luka, I'm so sorry." He just shrugged.
"She was an old woman," he said, almost nonchalantly; "It happens." People die. Danijella, Jasna, Marko.
"Luka, tomorrow -" He shook his head.
"No, I don't think - "
"Just for company." No answer. "OK, I'll call you . You still coming in?"
"Yes. Yes, of course."
"I'll ring." No answer.
"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""" """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
She lasted until 8 O'clock on Christmas night before picking up the 'phone. Either he wasn't there or he just wasn't answering. And he wasn't answering his door either she discovered not long afterwards. She had told the cab to wait in case of just such an eventuality and she got them lost twice before finding the right address. She couldn't even find it in herself to be outraged by the cost.
The lift wasn't working now and she stopped at the top of the third flight of stairs to get her breath back. "Damned cigarettes," she said aloud. Rosa's door was ajar and she could hear voices, one she recognised as Luka's the other unknown to her. She pushed open the door. A priest. The two men were sifting through a sheaf of papers on the table before them. "Is it OK for me to be here?"
Luka nodded and managed a smile. She waited while they concluded their business and then her attention was drawn back to them by what seemed to be a disagreement. The priest was holding something out to Luka insisting that he have it; Luka seemed equally insistent that he would not have it. Quite abruptly the priest reached for Luka's hand and a moment later, nodding to Abby, left the apartment.
"You don't mind me coming?"
"Of course not. I - I don't think there's much left to do. The priest called the granddaughter. She'll be here the day after tomorrow. She has a family."
"The same granddaughter?"
"Yes. She's a widow," he replied, shortly. He held up his left hand suddenly. "She wanted me to have this."
"Rosa?"
"She told the priest months ago apparently."
"Her wedding ring." Luka nodded. The ring on his little finger, worn thin with age, gleamed dully in the lamplight. Luka seemed exhausted.
"When's the funeral?"
"30th. Round the corner."
"Can you go?"
"I'll go." He sat down heavily on the couch and threw his head back, eyes closed. "I've said I'll help clear the apartment when her granddaughter has taken what she wants. Not that there's much. I guess she'll mainly want these." He rested his hand on a shoe box on the couch at his side.
"What is it?"
"Photographs - and her few bits of jewellery. Her friends will come and take their pick of her other things and the rest will go to Goodwill I guess." He sat forward, elbows on his knees and head in his hands, and Abby wondered if he might be crying. Moving the shoe box she sat beside him and laid an arm across his back. He wasn't crying she found, just worn out. She picked up a handful of photographs and glanced through them. Some were old, black and white and a young woman, very recognisably Rosa seemed to be in most of them; with her rather stolid looking husband, with their children - the boy she knew to have died in Vukovar. More recent ones showed family weddings, holidays on sunny beaches, ancient skylines and the bluest of skies.
"Is this home?"
He glanced at the photograph briefly. "Looks like Dubrovnik." He'd been right, thought Abby. It was beautiful. She realised that he was twisting Rosa's wedding ring round and round on his finger.
"Luka."
"What?" his voice just a whisper.
"Tell me."
"Tell you what?" He didn't need an answer. He knew what. And, gazing down at a picture of the waters and skies of the Adriatic, he began. His childhood, by the sea, on the farm, happiness taken for granted. Round and round. School, college. Danijella. Danijella, love and absurd happiness. Taken for granted. Round and round Jasna. Marko, who had taken them by surprise and been delivered by his father with a neighbour's help on their kitchen floor. Round and round. Death, the shame of having been there to bury them. The horror that had been the hospital. A camp. She hadn't even suspected that. Release. Round and round. The agony of his father's grief. His escape from everything that spoke to him of happiness. And a vast, featureless period of years when he had felt nothing and been glad of it.
"And then .you."
She felt as though she'd been picked up and dropped from a height. "There was no-one - He shook his head. In that second the full horror their relationship had meant and the damage it had caused hit her with the force of a well aimed punch. She was glad she was sitting down.
"I didn't know."
He laughed, mirthlessly. "Wasn't it obvious?"
"No." That was true. "I'm sorry., Luka. I didn't think."
"It doesn't matter."
"Don't say that."
"Why not? And why are you sorry? It took two of us. I didn't turn you away."
"You tried. I wouldn't let you get away from me."
"You thought you were doing the right thing. I know that. I should have known better."
"And afterwards ."
"Let it go, Abby. It's done." She was shocked at the hopelessness in his voice.
"I wish I'd known."
"Yeah. Nice after dinner conversation."
"And I hid from you too." She said softly.
"What?"
"You didn't really know me at all." He was silent for a long moment. "It seems to be a night for revelations."
She shivered. The apartment was freezing, even in her coat. Luka reached behind her and draped a crocheted rug around her shoulders. She hoped that he'd leave his arm across her. He didn't. But he listened intently to the tragic-comedy of her childhood, her mother, now captivating, now terrifying; the suicide attempts; Richard; the abortion. She looked up at him then and waited.
"And?" he asked.
"I had an abortion."
"I heard. And now you wish you hadn't?" His face was a picture of gentle concern. She looked down then.
"No. It's just I always thought --- I was afraid that you --- you loved your kids and -"
"What has this to do with me? " She didn't reply. "We decided to have our children, Danijela and me, and we loved them. You decided not to. It was right for you then. What should I have to say about it?"
If God had opened up a vat marked "Regret" and sluiced Abby down with its contents. she couldn't have felt any worse. Deep breath. Carry on. Drinking; rehab; divorce. Luka; Carter; her mother's reappearance; her fear.
And at 2.00am he stood up and led her by the hand into Rosa's bedroom where they lay down, in their winter coats and slept.