An Ark of Light

by Dermot Bolger

  But why am I telling you this? I’m getting as distracted as you are. That night is not the night I want to tell you about…

  Eva placed this third letter beside the first two and looked up at the men seated around the kitchen table in her cottage. Alan sat in silence to her left. A man less attuned to her needs might awkwardly try to comfort her by taking her hand. Perhaps Alan still remembered how she gripped his hand so tightly on the night she found Francis dead that her nails drew blood or he instinctively understood that she was just not ready to be touched by anyone. Francis’s death had been real. In retrospect, it almost seemed foretold so that the only surprise was that Eva had been surprised. This news was different. The more she thought about it the less sense it made.

  She glanced at the mugs and plates she had placed to dry by the sink after breakfast this morning. How long ago those simple actions seemed. Was it really only last night when she and Alan tidied Castle Cottage for new tenants due to arrive on today’s sailing? A lighthouse beam had swept across the rocks to light up that small granite dwelling, built by the Post Office in the last century as a cable station. She remembered extinguishing the gas jet and walking out to stare beyond Lametry Bay at the lights of a ship entering the Bristol Channel, before they companionably strolled towards home along a narrow path and she asked Alan if he was pining for Tangiers.

  Alan had paused to enjoy the silence before admitting that the part of him which secretly enjoyed the thrill of danger did miss that city. Young Moroccan men were lovely, but lethally heart-breaking. He never understood how they could bear to divide their lives in two – being financially kept all summer by infatuated older European men, while maintaining relationships with their girlfriends with whom they shared any money subtly bled from such foreign visitors. He had teased Eva about accompanying him there next summer, saying that Moroccan boys would flutter their eyelids as beautifully for her as for him. Eva had laughingly replied that the only company she wanted in bed was a hot water bottle. When they reached St John’s Well, Alan had suggested visiting the pub but Eva didn’t want to face the smoke and noise.

  She had walked on alone by torchlight to this tiny cottage to light the gas jet. Beside her bed she kept the Buddhist mantra, the Vajracchedika Prajna Paramita Sutra, given to her once by a working-class Glaswegian bricklayer who stayed for months at the Quaker hostel. Despite many long walks and picnics together in the countryside outside London, the earnest young man never converted her to Buddhism, although Eva loved its philosophy. But it was no more the final answer to her quest than the White Eagle Lodge or the Quakers’ contemplative silence. Each belief system was too complex to be true. The truth of the universe was so simple that Eva often thought she had only ever grasped it once: as a child immersed in the joy of running with plucked daisies to share their scent with her nurse sitting with open arms beside the tennis court in her childhood garden in Dunkineely.

  She had put on her nightdress and filled out some Amnesty International clemency appeals for political prisoners in China and Latin America, leaving them by the door to be posted. In bed she had opened her diary – an old ledger intended for her own thoughts, but filled instead with quotations to illuminate the darkness. She had read a verse that she loved from the Vajracchedika Prajna Paramita Sutra, allowing her mind to lose itself in each image:

  ‘Thus, shall ye think of all this fleeting world:

  A star at dawn, a bubble in a stream;

  A flash of lightning in a summer cloud;

  A flickering lamp; a phantom and a dream.’

  Extinguishing the gas jet, she had sat back to look out her window. To her left the Cornish coast stretched to Penzance. To her right the coast of Wales jutted out. She had lowered the wooden window to allow night sounds to enter, the distant waves, a beat of wings, nocturnal movements among the heather. This routine emptied her mind, letting it drift beyond her own concerns and fall into a sleep so peaceful that Alan had needed to knock loudly on her door this morning to wake her to go walking on the cliffs at Stutter Point. Before noon they set off to enjoy their daily ritual of watching the M.V. Lundy Gannet reach its anchorage out in the bay: Eva always amused by Alan’s darkly humorous speculation as to why each new arrival was visiting this remote hideaway.

  Eva looked up again at the men around her kitchen table. Could it really only be an hour ago that the serenity she had striven so hard to achieve was shattered when the two rowing boats set out to ferry the M.V. Lundy Gannet’s passengers to shore? The first three passengers to clamber into a rowing boat were such innocuous looking birdwatchers that not even Alan could invent a dark purpose for them. The next two passengers to board the rowing boat wore police uniforms, though they had removed their hats in the heat. The first boatman began to row for shore while the second rowing boat moved alongside the ship to collect more passengers. Alan had made no comment on the policemen, sensing Eva’s inexplicable alarm as she began to walk quickly towards the beach: Alan struggling to keep up amid the panic seizing Eva. She had imagined herself so well concealed here that ill-fortune could never find her. But instinctively she knew who the police were seeking. As the boatman moored his rowing boat to the makeshift jetty, the policemen asked him a question. By way of replying he glanced towards Eva and nodded. By the time the policemen descended the wooden jetty, Alan stood at Eva’s shoulder, uttering a reassuring remark. Then he went quiet as the officers walked towards her.

  ‘Mrs Eva Fitzgerald?’ the tallest policeman asked. ‘Can we go somewhere private please?’

  ‘Just tell me quickly,’ she had replied. ‘Tell me who’s dead.’

  Those same two policemen were now patiently waiting for her to finish reading these letters as if they expected her to be able to decrypt them. One of them discreetly checked his watch, aware that they had a boat to catch. The busy outside world had pulled Eva back into its nets, and it was a world that could not afford to move at her snail’s pace. Eva picked up the fourth sheet of crumpled notepaper.

  The Argyllshire Farmstead

  Kitale

  Trans-Nzoia County

  Kenya

  7th July, 1970

  Dear Mummy,

  Ask yourself, Mother Dear, what sort of fool races against a train, even in a Bentley. You always say I drive too fast, but even as a child I always noticed how you do everything too slow. There are some things I need to tell you. One is that I can’t do anything too fast anymore, even reply to letters because my right hand is broken in two places. Not that I can use my injuries as an excuse, seeing as numerous attempts to write to you last week got crumpled up in the bin. At least I am alone now. Half an hour ago I heard the door slam, his car rev up with the fall of dusk. Why should a man stay home to count the stitches on his wife’s face? The fact of the matter, Mummy, is that I am not quite looking myself at present…

  Hazel kept trying to tell her something but the words kept spluttering out. Hazel who always cut to the chase, resolute and certain in herself. The policemen needed her to read on. Their eyes were sympathetic but these men had been in this situation numerous times. Eva felt lost, as much bewildered as in shock.

  Alan coughed as a form of subtle interjection. ‘Perhaps Mrs Fitzgerald needs some time … to come to terms. She might be better able to help with your investigations if she could lie down for a while.’

  The second policeman spoke. ‘I know this is a terrible shock, sir, but the thing is that this it’s not our actual investigation, if there is any investigation going on. To be honest, from the curt telex messages I’ve seen from Kenya, I’m not sure if there is one. The problem now with the colonies is that … well … since independence they are not actually colonies anymore. Naturally our High Commissioner in Nairobi can raise any questions that Mrs Fitzgerald has, but our hands are rather tied in that this has nothing to do with Scotland Yard. The Kenyan police would very quickly tell us to mind our own business, so in this matter we’re only…’

  He looked at his colleague for help in
finishing the sentence.

  ‘Messenger boys, unfortunately.’

  ‘Why do you say, unfortunately?’ Alan asked.

  The first policeman shrugged, uncomfortable. ‘I suppose it’s a cultural thing, sir. Different police forces act in different ways, especially in the heat of hot countries. If this occurred in England I am not sure the funeral would have been a mere forty-eight hours later. Obviously they consider it to be an open-and-shut case, but for such a remote location they didn’t leave too much time for an autopsy by a forensic pathologist. Still, I am sure that every procedure was followed and, like I say, we are only messenger boys here, notifying Mrs Fitzgerald on behalf of the Kenyan police. Indeed, normally speaking, we would not be involved at all, but Mrs Fitzgerald’s son-in-law has been unable to contact her directly. The only address he had was the flat in London that we first visited. He also provided an address in some house in Eire which the Garda Síochána assure us is now an uninhabited ruin.’ He looked at Eva. ‘You have a million questions, and I wish we could answer them. But I think it best if you place a long distance call to your son-in-law. He is the person who can properly tell you what happened and I am sure he is desperately trying to reach you.’

  ‘He is not my son-in-law.’ Eva saw the policemen exchange a confused look. ‘I mean he technically is, but I don’t know him. The only person I know in Kenya is my first son-in-law. A good man. They seemed so well matched. Their breakup was acrimonious, like breakups are, but they have a daughter they both love.’

  The first policeman nodded, his work making him undoubtedly familiar with the complex aftermath of fragmented marriages. ‘The Kenyan police took these letters away from your new son-in-law and forwarded them to us in London because they are addressed to you and therefore your property. If they cause you too much distress, please don’t feel obliged to read right now. We merely wanted to give you a chance to ask us any questions about them that might help. However our governor expects us back in London, so we are rather dependent on the tides to get off this island.’

  Eva saw Alan studying her. ‘If you wish to go to Kenya, I’ll fly there with you,’ he said softly. ‘I have some savings. Tomorrow we should probably return to London. All of this is too much for you to take in, Eva.’

  Eva stared at him, baffled. It felt as if her brain had frozen, unable to conceive of any day beyond this one, of having the strength to ever again rise on another morning. It went against the natural order for a mother to endure being present at the funeral of one child, but to have to endure two? But what was she thinking? She had not even been present when – as these policemen kept insisting – Hazel was buried in Kenya two weeks ago. She could not even remember what she was doing on the night of Hazel’s death. The dead needed three days to fully depart this world. During that time their souls were still confused and torn in two, hovering close to those they loved most, desperate to find ways to say goodbye. Had Hazel’s spirit accompanied Alan and her on twilit expeditions to explore remote inlets and listen out for the Manx shearwater’s unearthly cry? Had her daughter’s ghost sat by her bed two weeks ago, invisibly stroking her hair in the moonlight, wanting to say so much but incapable of being heard? If so she must have been like the Hazel who wrote these discarded letters, struggling to find words that refused to come. Eva wanted to ration out each letter, pretending that for so long as she had new words to read it felt as if Hazel were somehow still alive, sitting at a writing desk in Kenya. But Eva’s duty to Hazel was to not only read these words but to read between them. She ran her hand over the next crumpled letter.

  The Argyllshire Farmstead

  Kitale

  Trans-Nzoia County

  Kenya

  7th July, 1970

  Dear Mummy,

  Thank you for yet another letter last week, although really I could do without your rather alarmist concerns. I mean, you don’t need to constantly worry if I take a few months to reply to your latest communiqué from whatever far flung place you have currently decamped to. I mean, why this constant travelling, Mother Dear? What do you expect to find? Or maybe you’re not trying to find something, but running away from the grief you still feel at losing Francis? I know you still feel it acutely because I feel it too. I miss my big brother. I miss everything about him. One thing I wouldn’t miss is your annoying concern. Is it not about time you settled down and stopped pestering me with your anxiety about my welfare? Please don’t add me to all your other causes…

  Eva knew that Hazel only lashed out with such waspish words when trying to cope with stress. Their tone didn’t hurt Eva. The only pain she felt was at sensing the pain her daughter must have been in to write them. If Hazel had played chess, this letter would be the perfect opening defence, deflecting all attention away from Kenya and onto Eva. But this was a tactic Hazel had mastered early. Whenever Francis or Eva were in trouble, Hazel was immediately there for them, the perfect confidant and friend, dispensing advice with such copious generosity that only afterwards did you realise that she had told you nothing about her world, her anxieties and problems locked away from public view, a proud Fitzgerald shielding you for her pain, until – if these policemen were correct – her pain became impossible to bear. This letter was too truncated to reveal anything. Each draft felt like a clue in a crossword puzzle that nobody could ever finish, a labyrinth where all you could do was lose yourself. Alan reached across the kitchen table. This time he did touch her hand, for the briefest second, to remind her that she was not alone, although in truth she was. She passed him the incomplete letters she had already read, hoping that perhaps his logical mind could decode them. Taking a breath she picked up the next crumpled sheet.

  The Argyllshire Farmstead

  Kitale

  Trans-Nzoia County

  Kenya

  7th July, 1970

  Dear Mummy,

  It’s late at night here, with no sound except the hum of the generator. Alex was meant to be staying but she is with friends, which is no bad thing because of what I need to tell you. Before I do I just want to say that I flew off the handle when we last spoke by phone and said hurtful things. But never take those words to mean I don’t love you even when I get so exasperated that I tell you I don’t love you. I was thinking this last night when I woke up, alone as always, and I remembered how you would silently appear in my doorway if I woke as a small child in Glanmire House. Remember how ghastly cold those old rooms always were? The soles of my bare feet were always cold in bed at night there, no matter how many blankets you tucked me in with to try and keep me warm. One miracle of my childhood is that by some sixth sense you always knew when I was awake and needed you. It seemed like I had only to open my eyes and my bedroom door would silently open a moment later: you appearing in the moonlight to sit on the edge of my bed. No need for any words as you lifted my feet out from under the bedclothes to blow on my soles and rub them to make the cold go away and any fears or bad dreams disappear.

  I’m a grown woman now – indeed at fourteen I was more grown up than you’ll ever be. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t nights when I wish that someone like you was here to instinctively know when I wake up, scared and alone. I won’t pretend that in actuality I wish you were here because you’d drive me demented with your crackpot notions. You’re so immersed in compassion for the smallest creature crawling up a stalk of grass that often you’re incapable of seeing the bigger picture of what’s happening before your eyes. So I don’t wish you were here, but I sometimes wish I were a small girl like Alex again, with my whole life before me and with my face as beautiful as her face that it will stop men dead in their tracks in time. Alex has part of your soul inside her – she comforts people. She would comfort me if she were here, she would curl in beside me in the bed and rub my feet if they were cold. But this house is not a happy house and no child should be forced to eavesdrop on rows. I know what rows do to a child because there were nights when I was young that I woke to raised voices and this damaged me, though it
took me years to recognise the damage. I don’t want Alex damaged, no matter what happens to me. Bad things have happened. They came to a head, Mummy, some weeks ago: an accident involving my trying to outdrive the night train to Nairobi. The doctor called my attempt to reach the level crossing before the train a suicidal manoeuvre, but I’d been successful before, doing it once to impress a man who seemed infatuated with me. On this occasion, however, I was alone and ready to show the world – or at least to show that same man – that I was still up to any challenge, still in control, still a fighting Fitzgerald, even if I’m now trapped with a new surname that no longer fits me. I am trapped because what exactly have I got to do back to in Ireland if I leave the red dust of Kenya? Perhaps my latest attempt to outrun the night train was crazy because as I sped along the road which borders the track I could see the driver picking up speed too. He’d been outrun by me several times before and didn’t intend being outrun again by any white woman. It felt like a challenge and I’ve never backed down from any challenge. The doctor was wrong. It was no suicidal gesture, but one of desperation. Suicide is not a word in any lexicon of mine. I’m a fighter, Mummy. You know well that I will never lie down, no matter who that might suit…

  Eva only realised how slow she was in taking every word in when she looked up and realised that Alan had already finished reading the previous five drafts and was awaiting this next one. She sensed that the policemen had read each draft on their way here.