Far to Go - By Alison Pick Page 0,77

did she want to miss her chance to say goodbye. In the morning there would be parents and crowds of children and train crew. As much as she didn’t want it to be true, she knew that this might be their last time together, just the two of them, for quite some time. For weeks, most certainly. Possibly for months.

“Show me your Sneezy face,” she said.

Pepik put down his soup spoon, his bowl empty. He made four rapid achoo’s into his elbow. Marta clapped her hands together under her chin. “Well done!” she said. “Goodbye, Sneezy.”

She thought for a minute. “Your Bashful face.”

Pepik fluttered his eyelids shyly. He covered his face with his hands and peeked out at her from between them. She kissed his forehead and both of his ears and said, “Goodbye, Bashful. Travel safely!”

She asked for his Dopey face and his Happy face and his Grumpy face and kissed them all at length.

When the ritual was complete, Pepik lay back on the big feather pillow. He looked pale and sweaty and Marta felt badly for exciting him. She touched his brow: he was still running a fever.

She sat beside him for a while, stroking his hair and wondering what to tell him. It wasn’t clear how much he understood about what was happening, and she didn’t want to upset him further. She looked down at his soft, round face; his little eyelids fluttered shut. She bent down to his level. “I love you very much,” she whispered into the curl of his ear. But somehow this didn’t seem enough. There was something else, she thought, something else she should say. “Open your eyes, miláčku.”

Tears were running down Marta’s face now. She blinked, trying to hide them from Pepik, but they came hot and fast. He looked at her, searching, and lifted a little hand to touch her cheek. “My darling,” she whispered, “may you live to be a wise old man.”

As soon as she’d spoken she wished to take the words back—she would see him very soon, after all, and she’d not meant to alarm him. But he pushed his head into her chest now, clinging to her tightly, and then he lifted his eyes and nodded. He’d understood her wish for him: a long and happy life. And it seemed—although she might have been imagining it—it seemed he was wishing the same for her.

In the car on the way to the station Anneliese looked out the window, hands in her lap, tearing the packing list into smaller and smaller pieces. It was a short drive, but Pepik put his head in Marta’s lap and fell asleep as soon as the car started moving. He woke when they arrived, looked around weakly, and vomited his porridge onto the floor of the automobile. Anneliese pretended she hadn’t seen it. It was left to Marta to wipe up the mess with her handkerchief.

Pavel applied the parking brake and turned the key to turn off the car. He had pulled up beside the Hlavní nádraží with its stained glass windows and the carved faces of women representing Prague as the Mother of Cities. There was already lots of activity on the platform: a long queue of adults in front of a table, and children racing around the entrance to the public toilets. Pavel leaned sideways against the car door so he could see his wife in the seat beside him and Marta behind them. He was grouping them together, corralling them. “Let’s make a plan,” he said to the women.

“What do you mean?” Anneliese asked. She was dressed in a little velvet Greta Garbo hat, a new jacket with shoulder pads, and leather gloves.

“How will we do this?” asked Pavel.

“Oh, it’s revolting.” Anneliese rolled down her window against the smell of vomit.

Pavel nodded towards Pepik, who had fallen immediately back to sleep in Marta’s lap. “Should we carry him?”

“Of course not. If they know he’s sick they’ll never let him on.”

“I’ll get the suitcase.”

“He can walk,” Anneliese said.

Pavel scoffed. “The Crown Prince doesn’t look in great shape for walking.” Marta could feel Pepik breathing against her, the low heat from his head like a flanker.

There was an hour left before departure but already the train had pulled into the station. It stood on the track in the morning sunlight, steaming, a mirage. Pavel got out of the front seat and Marta heard the trunk door slam and the sound of the suitcase falling over on the pavement. Pepik sat up,