The Midnight Palace - Carlos Ruiz Zafon [38]
‘Your father hid this secret in the depths of his heart and never wanted your mother to find out about it. Time erased all trace of those events. After the wedding, the first years of married life and your father’s early success, it became just a memory, a remote episode buried in the past.
‘I remember when your mother became pregnant. Your father turned into a different person, a stranger. He bought a puppy and said he was going to train it to become a watchdog, turn it into the best nanny for his future son. And he didn’t stop talking about the house he was going to build, the plans he had for the future, a new book …
‘A month later Lieutenant Michael Peake, one of your mother’s former suitors, knocked on the door with news that would sow terror in their lives: Jawahal had set fire to the secure prison block where he was being held, and had escaped. Before fleeing he’d slit his cellmate’s throat and had used his blood to write a single word on the wall: REVENGE.
‘Peake promised that he would personally look for Jawahal and protect the couple from any possible threat. Two months went by with no sign of the escaped prisoner. Until your father’s birthday.
‘Just before sunrise a parcel was delivered to him by a beggar. It contained a large medallion – the piece that had led Jawahal to commit his first murder – and a note. In it Jawahal explained that after spying on them for a few weeks and discovering that your father was now a successful man with a dazzling wife, he wished them well and would perhaps soon pay them a visit, so that they could “share what belonged to them both, like brothers”.
‘The following days were strewn with panic. One of the sentries Peake had employed to guard the house at night was found dead. Your father’s dog was discovered at the bottom of the well in the courtyard. And every morning the walls of the house were daubed with new threats, written in blood, which Peake and his men were powerless to prevent.
‘Those were difficult days for your father. His finest work had just been built, the Jheeter’s Gate Station on the western bank of the Hooghly. It was an impressive, revolutionary steel structure, the culmination of his project to establish a railway network throughout the entire country, to encourage development of local trade and modernise the provinces so that they could eventually overcome domination by the British. That was always one of his obsessions, and he could spend hours speaking passionately about it, as if it were some divine mission he’d been entrusted with. The official opening of Jheeter’s Gate was taking place at the end of the week, and to mark the occasion it was decided to charter a train that would transport three hundred and sixty-five orphans to their new home in western India. They came from the most deprived backgrounds, and your father’s project would mean a whole new life for them. It was something he had pledged to do from the very start, his life’s dream.
‘Your mother was desperate to attend the ceremony for a few hours, and she assured your father that the protection offered by Lieutenant Peake and his men would be sufficient to keep her safe.
‘When your father climbed into the train and got the engine going that was supposed to take the children to their new home, something unexpected happened. The fire. A terrible blaze spread through the various levels of the station, fanning out along the train’s carriages so that as it entered