Mazarine Read online

  I didn’t even know Mazarine’s surname, whether it was the same as Joe’s.

  According to Maya, Mazarine had remained in the house after the divorce while the other, the shoe-hurler and beekeeper, who was a university lecturer, had stormed off to some exotic location, Bali perhaps, with a new girlfriend.

  The motorway had narrowed into a highway running along the edge of the Waikato River. Rain drummed on the roof, sluicing down the windscreen as I peered ahead, searching for the church Maya had described. At moments, I could see the broad expanse of the river through the trees, marked by stray gleams of light, reflections from the highway lamps. How ill-judged this was, driving through a storm, at night, with no idea where I was going. I considered turning around and heading home. But Nick. In Maya’s room.

  The scene with Nick had loosened something in my mind; I was assailed by doubts. Were there things I hadn’t seen? Maya had never liked Nick; had I been selfish and wrong to dismiss her objections? Was it my denial, as she’d called it, that had caused her to leave the country, was it my fault she’d now cut off contact? I’d hung onto the idea of Nick for too long, and now, with my family estranged, I had no one left except the dog.

  Estrangement. Recently I was stopped at the lights in my car, and caught sight of Inez heading across the intersection. She walked slowly, owing to problems with her knee, in a kind of slow, effortful march, her fists clenched, thumbs outstretched. She didn’t see me, and I sat as she crossed in front of the car, the figure I had watched and watched for all my childhood, the shape cut out of the universe and etched with precision on my brain. I watched her pass by me, not seeing.

  The tears. Who were they for? What did they signify? Do these mysteries become clear when you discuss them with a friend?

  My daughter, thank god, was as effortlessly sociable as my sister. For years, Maya had a sign above her bed that she’d stolen from somewhere: Assembly Point. Streams of teenagers congregated in her room. My girl was popular. I looked at her photos (hundreds of friends), spent a lot of time ferrying her between dates and parties, and rejoiced that I hadn’t inflicted my being too different on her.

  It puzzled me. I was mostly at ease with men; what I had trouble with was reading women. I knew what I thought about them, but I couldn’t interpret a reaction from them, so I felt blind, and this made me nervous.

  When we were young, after conversations, I used to ask Natasha’s opinion. Did that go well? What do you think was meant by this or that comment? I had no certainty. My role vis-à-vis my mother and sister, come to think of it, came close to that of village idiot.

  Yet memory is a tricky, unreliable thing. How to know what’s truly accurate, what’s being minimised or overstated. Am I crazy, as my family tells me, or am I, after a lifetime of loyalty and holding back, just letting myself go and telling it like it was?

  There was a bond between Inez and Natasha, but between Inez and me there was nothing but trouble. I remembered how Inez wrong-footed me, how she dismissed, or treated with hostility and distaste, the emotions I expressed. I remembered feeling rage and panic at her coldness; instead of comforting or reassuring me she would either slam her bedroom door on me, or call the Judge’s attention to what she called my ‘raving’; in other words, when I registered the abyss of her enmity and was distressed by it, she shamed me by labelling me insane.

  After a while she put it about, without any justification in my view, that she was ‘frightened’ of me. She regarded me as ‘hard-boiled’, as well as ‘too different’. Perhaps it was just that she resented my obvious bond with the Judge. Her thinking was black and white, she divided the world into good and bad, friend and foe. Perhaps she found two daughters a threatening prospect, and sought to divide and rule. Natasha was certainly a golden child.

  I chastise myself for these ruminations. Forget about it, I think. Move on. And yet, on the other hand, can one really go through a whole adult life without considering it? The unexamined life is not worth living, Socrates said (defiantly, before being executed for impiety), and surely it’s legitimate to wonder how one ended up this way? I recalled Inez settling down for a good old laugh about her elder brother’s funeral. She saw herself as small, defenceless, put upon, and she’d always felt dominated by Old Tyson. Did she project Tyson’s image upon me?

  Early childhood is lost to us; formative experiences are stored as data, outside the conscious mind. Our personalities are created when we’re very young, and are stable across a lifetime. Only our parents know what they did to us when we were small.

  No use asking them. Go on, try it.

  ‘It’s quite a power trip having a one-year-old child.’

  The wooden church stood next to a graveyard, the turn-off indicated by a sign that read Old Cement Works, Ruins and Pond. I rallied, with a small feeling of triumph.

  Maya and Joe had paused at the pond and then, I didn’t know. I’d imagined that Mazarine’s house was close to it.

  I had no plan. I couldn’t knock on doors, tramp down the driveways of rural properties asking for a woman named Mazarine.

  ‘Joe’s mother’s very strong,’ Maya said once.

  As in, muscular? In personality more likely, but I didn’t know. Why hadn’t I listened more carefully?

  I didn’t even know if she still lived in the area.

  The cement works turned out to be an actual ruin, amid piles of rubble and jagged remains of walls and darkly gaping doorways, the whole precinct spookily lit by one cobwebby streetlamp. Around it there were no houses; the only landmarks were wire-fenced paddocks and the black expanse of the pond. The dead building made me afraid. I sped up, causing the car to skid, and sending the dog scrabbling for balance.

  Now the road started to wind through hills. In the distance, I saw a car’s headlights needling through the night. I wanted to be back on the highway, out of the dark that grew more oppressive as the hills closed in. There were still no houses, unless they were well back from the road, concealed behind the contours of the land or hidden among trees.

  Then the car hit loose gravel. I slowed to a crawl, grateful for the stoical presence of the dog. The headlights picked out possums’ eyes glittering at the roadside; the stones ground and hissed under the wheels.

  The road reached a ridge and began to descend, and when I got down into the valley I crossed a one-lane bridge and hit smooth asphalt again, and proper street lighting, and houses, rural sections with bungalows set back behind fences, their windows and porches dark. The roads were deserted in the driving rain, the trees tossing in the squalls. I took a turn-off that led away from the houses into more hills, at the summit of which was a picnic area with a lookout where I pulled in and saw, on the plain below, a sprawl of buildings with an unnaturally bright white glow around it: this must be the prison. Further away, at the edge of the plain, the lights of a city were shrouded by the haze of rain. I drove back down.

  My impression was of a finite grid of roads surrounded by farmland at the foot of the hills, properties that would belong to Hamilton commuters and to workers at the prison, a mixture of extensive lifestyle blocks and smaller, more humble bungalows.

  I felt unwell: empty, aching and nauseated. My wrist was painful. The obvious thing to do was to head to the city and find a motel, but I couldn’t face driving back through the hills. I pulled over, cranked the seat back and closed my eyes.

  Dreams came and went, I saw the swans from the dentist’s ceiling, and once I saw Maya, but I was also present in the car with the dog next to me, the rain on the roof, and the sigh of the wind in the overhead wires.

  When the dawn came, I slept heavily then woke up freezing. I turned on the engine and tried to get the heater going. A spray of dust shot out of the vents, followed by frigid air. I inspected my wrist: stiff and sore. The side of my hand and my little finger had turned purple. I opened the door, letting in a blast of cold that took hold of my head and squeezed it.

  Now I was dying for a motel room. I would take the road pas
t the prison to Hamilton and its anonymous commercial strip. I let the dog out, fed him, put him on the leash and walked him along the road, by the edge of the stream.

  Back in the car I got out my phone, checked my emails and saw, oh joy, Maya’s name in the inbox.

  Opening the message, I read: ‘Hallo. I’ve left Istanbul. Warm wishes.’

  ‘Finally,’ I said aloud, my voice cracked and weak. ‘Istanbul. Well. How exciting.’

  The phone screen had gone dark. I touched it, and looked at the email again, the rush of happiness receding as I puzzled over the words.

  Had she been in Istanbul by herself, without Joe? She’d never mentioned a plan to go there.

  ‘Hallo’ was not a greeting Maya had ever used. If she did use the word, which would surprise me, she would spell it with an e.

  ‘Warm wishes’ was completely alien.

  Perhaps she’d picked up new mannerisms; after all she’d been away for months, working in a different country. But it was so impersonal, it wasn’t a message to me and it didn’t sound like her, there was nothing of our easy banter, our mutual affection. She seemed to be deliberately distancing herself, making me a stranger. The lack of even a single x hurt me, when I recalled the extravagant sign-offs I’d usually received: a typical email would end xxxoooo, and be accompanied by emojis and photos, to which I would reply in kind, happily taking my cue.

  Was she telling me she’d grown out of all that? But it seemed unlikely; it cost her nothing to get on well with me. Our exchanges were jokey, often ironic, they weren’t cloying, nor were they controversial; we’d never argued much. And they were always affectionate.

  It was so insultingly brief, after all my messages.

  I couldn’t understand it, and worse, I didn’t entirely trust my own judgement. It was my old problem, being unable to read people, never having an overall certainty about a relationship, but always scanning for evidence with each new communication. I needed a second opinion, someone with whom to discuss this brusque, unsatisfactory message, this brush-off.

  In our previous life, I would have handed the email to Maya and asked ‘What do you think?’, just as I used to ask Natasha when I wasn’t sure how an encounter had gone, or what an exchange really meant. Maya would have had a clear view, straight away.

  I tapped out a quick reply, telling her I missed her, it was lovely to hear from her, I was dying for news, asking her to tell me more. I typed some extra sentences hinting at my bafflement, demanding answers, expressing distress, but hesitated, deleted them and settled for the more neutral tone. I sent the message, then composed an angry one, deleted it unsent. For a time, I sat in the car drafting and deleting messages, unable to decide what to say.

  Further down the inbox I found another email, from Nick. It said, ‘We need to talk.’

  SIX

  Staring down at my phone, I remembered something: Maya had mentioned that Mazarine and her partner owned some kind of novelty letterbox. I couldn’t recall any more than that.

  Now, lights were coming on in the windows, cows were being herded through a sodden paddock, dogs barked, a man jogged by in running gear. The sun was rising behind raincloud, and the eastern sky was all in flames.

  At the top end of the grid I gave up, having driven each road twice, looking for unusual post boxes. I headed for the highway that led to the prison and the city beyond, and then I caught sight of it, almost hidden behind a boat parked on the grass verge, under the trailing fronds of a willow tree: a dark blue letterbox in the shape of a windmill.

  I parked behind the boat and got out to look at the bungalow, with its spacious garden and neatly tended lawns bordered by flowerbeds. I walked partway along the fence of the neighbouring property. The section behind the house was extensive, stretching down through fruit trees to a stream. There was a small swimming pool and, near the stream, against the wooden back fence, two beehives.

  The windmill letterbox was decorated with sails and had two stylised figures painted on it: Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, mounted and carrying spears under an orange sun.

  I unlatched the gate and entered the property, hoping I wouldn’t meet a guard dog. The door was painted navy blue, with a bell that let out a jaunty peel of electronic notes when I pressed.

  Silence. I put my thumb on the bell again. In the distance a rooster was crowing. The door opened and a woman appeared. I jumped, started talking nervously.

  ‘Are you Mazarine? I saw the letterbox, the windmill, Quixote, Sancho Panza. Maya told me about it … I’m Frances Sinclair.’

  She looked at me, expressionless.

  ‘Joe Libard. Is your son?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Sorry it’s so early, but can I come in? I’m so glad I’ve found the right house. The thing is, I want to talk about Maya, my daughter …’

  I offered my hand, repeating my name, and she hesitated, then shook.

  With a show of reluctance, she led me down a hallway to the back of the house, where a kitchen looked over the garden. The morning sun lit up the room, steam curled from a kettle, a black cat with an unusually round face sat on the windowsill, flicking its tail and watching birds on the lawn.

  I began to attempt a proper explanation. She stood with a hand on her hip and the other hand rumpling her hair, looking at me, then broke off her stare and said, ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’

  She was wearing a kimono, and was tall, with large blue-grey eyes, a strong pale face and a mass of shiny, tangled blonde hair. Her voice was soft and pitched low; her expression was severe. She gestured to a chair at the table and went to make the tea. I sat down, and she came towards me holding a mug, the steam curling upwards. She smoothed the folds of the robe around her body.

  Below the window, a heater set the air rippling, and the cat made a staccato chittering sound as it watched a blackbird on the grass. Beyond the fruit trees I could see the beehives, painted red, blue and white.

  I started to talk, but she cut me off.

  ‘Just a moment, I’ll change,’ she said, and left the room, eventually coming back wearing a business-like skirt and jacket, not the butch jailhouse uniform I was expecting. She’d brushed her hair, put on lipstick, and a delicate necklace made of beads and shells.

  I said, ‘You are Mazarine? You’re not the other one?’

  ‘The other one?’

  ‘The other mother. Sorry, I take it you’re Joe’s mother?’

  ‘Yes, I’m Mazarine Libard. So, you found me by my letterbox.’

  She made a face that suggested this was mildly absurd.

  ‘Maya, my daughter, told me about visiting here. I’m sorry we haven’t met before, but I’m so glad I’ve found you. I can’t tell you—’

  ‘You’re a journalist.’

  ‘Well yes, and I write screenplays, a bit of fiction. And you’re a prison officer, right?’

  She smiled without warmth. ‘Did Joe tell you that?’

  ‘Maya said you work at the prison.’

  ‘I go there often; it’s a remand centre. I visit my criminal clients.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘I’m a lawyer.’

  ‘Sorry, Maya was a bit vague about details.’

  She shrugged, folded her arms, planting herself squarely in front of me. ‘You said you want to talk about your daughter?’

  ‘I hadn’t heard from her for ages. Have you? And just now, this morning, I’ve received an email saying she’s been in Istanbul. I not we. Nothing more than that, and it’s a strange message, it doesn’t sound like her at all. Is Joe with her? Tell me you’ve heard from one of them.’

  She gazed off out the window, fiddling with her necklace. ‘I don’t hear from Joe very often. The boys don’t communicate so much.’

  ‘But Maya contacts me all the time, and now suddenly it’s radio silence. When did you last hear? It would be good to compare notes.’

  ‘I have to go to work.’ Her tone was abrupt.

  ‘Okay. I’m sorry, but I’ve been worried. Is there
something you can tell me? When you last heard from them, plans for travel, anything like that? It would be great if you …’

  She curled her hands and looked at her nails. ‘I’m sure Joe is fine. Young people, they like their freedom.’

  I tried to gauge her tone, whether it was approving or not of young people and their fondness for freedom. The cat jumped off the windowsill, ran across the room, pushed through a flap in the back door and streaked across the lawn, sending birds swooping up over the trees.

  Mazarine gave a tight little smile and asked, faintly incredulous, ‘Did you drive all the way from Auckland to ask me? So early?’

  I was struck by her expression, something mocking, almost antagonistic in it.

  ‘I didn’t have your contact details.’

  ‘But you know my name,’ she said softly.

  ‘I didn’t know your surname.’ It sounded feeble, but I wasn’t going to tell her the real reason I’d sped out of Auckland at short notice: my altercation with Nick.

  Although discouraged, I persisted. ‘Are you sure there’s nothing you can tell me? When did you last speak to Joe?’

  She shrugged, smoothed her hair. ‘I’m not sure.’

  ‘Do you not have a very close relationship?’

  She raised her eyebrows, registering my rudeness. ‘He’s visited his father in Paris, I believe.’

  ‘Recently? Did Maya go with him?’

  ‘Possibly.’

  ‘How long ago was he in Paris?’

  ‘I’m not sure. They didn’t tell me.’

  ‘They?’

  ‘His father and brother.’

  ‘Joe has a brother?’

  ‘Yes, I have a son who’s older than Joe. He was living in Brussels, but is now in Paris.’ She fluttered her eyelids and smiled. The effect was playfully hostile.

  ‘So, Maya might be in Paris.’