Cupid's Arrow

by Isabelle Merlin

On another shelf, further in from the pantry door, was a row of books. Cookbooks, by the look of them. I pulled one out but pulled too hard and a whole lot of them came tumbling down, scattering book jackets and recipes written on loose bits of paper that had been shoved into their pages. I scrambled around on my hands and knees, feeling guilty, and pulling it all back together when I suddenly saw, pushed at the back of the shelf, a small, thin book with a black plastic cover. An address book, I thought at first: it looked like the type you can carry around with you, in your bag or even your pocket.

  I pulled it out, and opened it. It wasn't an address book, but a small sketch book with stiff white pages. On the first page, in a loose flowing hand that I recognised as Raymond's, was written: Recette pour Gateau Moka. A cake recipe. But there was nothing else written there, so I turned to the next page: but it was stuck down to the next. It wasn't until I'd turned to the next page after that one that I came to the next bit of text. Strangely, it was written in English:

  Last night, I dreamed I was back in the forest. I was on my horse again and the path was dark and narrow but now I was sure it would be different.

  And then the words broke off. There was a picture, a sketch in fact, rather like the one in the library, but a lot less good, if you know what I mean. Better than I can sketch but that's not saying much. Certainly not the work of a real artist.

  I turned to the next page. The words had started again, but were sort of broken up:

  Horse gone ... run run – they are there. Faces. Teeth. Claws. Run. Run!

  And then another sketch of someone running through undergrowth. Long hair. Perhaps a knight wearing a tunic and leggings? Or maybe it was a woman in a dress seen from the back? It was hard to tell. There were trees closing over the person's head. I stared at the sketch. It was much better than the first one. As though someone different had drawn it. The writing was the same, though. Loose, flowing; Raymond's, at least I thought so.

  This page was glued to the next one. I had to turn two to get to the next bit.

  Faces. Faces watching leering grinning waiting. I say I am dreaming but they don't go away.

  Different writing, this time. Spiky, hard. And here was a sketch in that unformed hand again, grinning devilish faces with rolling eyes and sharp teeth, the sorts of faces you see in nightmares, merciless, blank, inhuman, unstoppable. They were badly drawn but I shivered nevertheless. I've seen faces like that before in the dark corridors of the night. I turned over the page and there was another sketch. This one took up two pages (though, once again, underneath it were two other pages stuck together). There was a young man – you could see it was a young man now – in tunic and armour, standing near a wall in which was set a door. His hand was on the door handle, and around and behind him was the dark forest, but in front of him was the wall and over it you could see light and brightness. His face was touched with that bright light. Home at last, read the words under the sketch, and I knew then that the dream – or whatever it was– must have ended happily and that the wicked faces hadn't got him.

  I looked at that picture for quite a long time, then I flipped through the rest of the pages. They were blank, though one or two were glued together, and you could see smudged, faint ink lines through them, as if someone had tried their hand at another sketch but failed. So I closed the notebook and slipped it into my shirt pocket. I can't explain really why I did that, why I didn't leave it where it was, but there was something about that book and the dream it told that touched me very deeply. It reminded me of those pictures in the library but, more than that, also of my own dreams, the good one of the green road and the door in the wall but also the bad one of that hunt through the forest. It also reminded me of what Raymond had said in his letter, the one Mum had read out to me, that we were both dreamers and seekers. Was this book one of the things he'd intended for me? I felt suddenly very close to him, very close to tears, but with a certain sort of weird thrill too.

  Was it Raymond's dream that was being described, or someone else's? Two people had written and drawn this thing, this illustrated dream story. But why had it ended up at the back of the cookbook shelf? Had someone – Raymond, or someone else – deliberately hidden it there, or had it simply been forgotten? There'd been no hint in his letter. Oh well, it was likely I'd never know, and I didn't know who to ask about it anyway. Maybe I'd work it out later.

  I went out into the garden and wandered around a bit, first among the vegies and berries, picking a strawberry and raspberry here and there. Not that I was hungry, but just because they were there! Then I had a squiz at the orchard, picked a couple of peaches and ate those, ambled down further into the park area, finding all kinds of little flowers and things along the way. I sat under a big old oak tree for a little while, watching ants and bees, and was starting to feel a bit sleepy when all of a sudden I turned my head and saw, gliding through the longish grass just metres away, a slim, quick body that moved like a single rippling muscle. I don't know whether it was me or the snake that got the biggest fright, because I jumped up like a jack-in-the-box, shrieking like a lunatic and, even though snakes are supposed to be deaf or something, I reckon that one got its ears cleaned out pretty well. Anyway, the snake took off and so did I, rushing as far away from it as I could, down towards the bottom of the garden, where the ground sloped gently to the river. The water looked so inviting. I took off my sandals and paddled in the shallow water, sending sparkles of drops into the air, just like I used to like doing when I was a little kid and we went for camping holidays by the river in the old goldfields not far from the city. I used to think that I might find gold in the water and I would paddle earnestly about for hours, pouncing on every bit of glitter that winked up at me. I found some fool's gold but never the real stuff. Fool's gold was so pretty and it coated your toes with tinsel, just like you'd emptied tubes of that glittery stuff you buy for craft projects.

  Anyway, there was plenty of glittery stuff in this water too but not fool's gold, just little white river stones that looked like diamonds underwater. Although, when you pulled them out and they dried out, they looked like boring old pebbles. I wandered along the river bed, turning up pebbles and leaves. Once a couple of little silver fish swam past my ankles. Another time, I saw a red squirrel leaping from branch to branch on a tree that overhung the river-bank. I was glad I didn't see any more snakes.

  The sun was beating down now and the water was a lovely temperature and I started thinking that maybe I could take off my shirt and skirt and go for a swim in my bra and undies – well, a bath really, the water was too shallow for swimming. I looked around – I'd wandered a fair way away from the house – it was hidden around a bend in the river – and I had gone in the opposite direction to the village. There was not a person to be seen anywhere. It was all totally quiet.

  A little way up the river, there was a nice sheltered bit, willows overhanging it. I thought it'd be safe there. No-one would see me, even if they walked close by. I waded quickly there, took off my clothes, carefully lay them on the grass near my sandals, making sure Raymond's little notebook was well-protected, and headed gratefully back to the water in my underwear.

  It had been a really good choice of place, because the water was deeper here. It was just heaven getting right into it, putting my head underwater, blowing bubbles, kicking out from the edge, splashing about and generally acting like a kid. I swam round and round my little waterhole, and then lay on my back and watched the blue sky through the willow leaves, and thought how cool it was to be here and how amazing the whole thing was and how when I got back to the house I might even pinch Mum's Blackberry and write an email to a couple of people back home ...

  All at once I heard a rustle. Really close. Someone – or something – was coming! I didn't have time to get out and put my clothes back on. So I just dived down into the water but I couldn't hold my breath for long so just had to crouch in the water up to my neck and hope whoever it was would just pass by. Or maybe it was an animal – not so
mething big and scary like a wild boar or a wolf (were there even any wolves left?) but a squirrel or a rabbit or something. Oh, not a snake. Not a water snake. Did they have water snakes in France? Help.

  All these ridiculous thoughts flashed into my mind like lightning but the main thing was I felt really dumb, crouching in the water trying to protect my semi-nakedness, though really it was similar to me wearing a bikini. Still it feels kind of different when you're in bra and pants though, doesn't it?

  I heard the rustle again, then a soft male voice, calling, Ici, ici, Patou, and then a scratching, scrabbling noise. A moment later, a boy and a dog came down the river path straight towards the willow hole. They hadn't seen me yet, but I could see them. The boy was tall and broad-shouldered, dressed in a grey T-shirt, black jeans and black sneakers. He had long, gleaming, straight brown hair tied back in a ponytail. I couldn't see his face properly, but I thought he looked about my age, maybe a bit older. The dog was one of those thin, elegant, long-nosed grey things, like a greyhound only smaller – whippets, I think they're called. It was nosing along in the bustling, happy way dogs do. In half a mo it would have nosed out my clothes. Then it would nose out me. And then ... no, no, I couldn't wait for that to happen, to be caught cowering like an idiot. So I called out, very loudly, in my bad French, 'Hello. Please, please go away.'

  I actually saw the boy jump. He whirled around and turned towards my hiding place. 'Who is there?' he called, in French.

  'Fleur Griffon. You do not know me. Please go away.'

  But the dog had heard me too. It was excited. It raced off the path, through the willow branches – sniffing at my clothes along the way – and came and stood barking on the riverbank. Then to my horror, it actually jumped in and dog-paddled towards me, splashing as it went. 'Go away,' I said, feebly, hitting the water. The dog took no notice.

  'Patou, Patou, ici, ici!' The boy was scrambling down the riverbank after his dog. He came through the willow branches and said, in English (he had obviously sussed out my accent), 'Mademoiselle, I am sorry. Give Patou a tap on the nose and tell her to come to me. She will leave you alone. Tell her to go to Remy.'

  He was half-turned from me – obviously not wanting to perve, and for that I was really grateful – but it was probably still the most embarrassing situation I have ever been in. I said, weakly, 'Okay, I'll do that,' and I sidled up to the dog and tapped her gently on the nose, and said, Go, go to Remy, before thinking, you dumbo, the dog won't understand English, and repeated it in French, vas, vas à Remy!

  Patou looked at me with a surprised and reproachful air, but she gave a little bark and dog-paddled smartly around back to the riverbank, where she proceeded to shake herself all over my clothes. Remy said, 'Forgive us, we did not know you were there,' and he whistled to Patou and together he and his dog went out of the willow hideout. I could hear them rustling back up the path but it was only after I'd stopped hearing any more noises that I finally snuck out of the water. Racing up to my clothes, I flung them on without even trying to dry myself. They stuck to me, and remembering the notebook just in time, I dried my hands on my skirt and held the book in my hand. I looked cautiously up the path. No sign of Remy and Patou. Shoving my feet back in my sandals, I ran back the way I had come, though not in the water this time, helter-skelter through the grass on the riverbank, no longer even worried about snakes anymore.

  Heart magic

  When I got back to the house, Mum was still busy rummaging about in the library. She had taken lots of books down from the shelves and stacked them in piles on the desk, and was perched on the chair tapping titles into her laptop.

  She lifted a flushed and happy face to me as I came in. 'Fleur, I just can't believe this, it's like heaven, just amazing. He had some real treasures here. Look, take a look at this, for example –' and she thrust a fat book at me, bound in blue leather. I opened it. It was a lovely illustrated collection of fairytales in French, some of which I recognised, like Red Riding Hood and Puss in Boots and Cinderella, and others that I didn't know, like The Yellow Dwarf or The White Cat or Princess Rosette. 'It was published in the 1840s,' said Mum. 'Quite rare, especially in this condition. Or here, look at this.' It was a book, in English, called The Boy's King Arthur, which had beautiful coloured illustrations. 'Imagine! It's a first edition,' said Mum, eyes shining. 'Pictures by NC Wyeth. Raymond had quite a few Wyeth-illustrated books, first editions – he must have ordered them from America. They're worth a mint. Not that I'll ever want to sell them! And look at this .. . and this .. .'

  She was clearly having the best time of her life. She didn't ask me once where I'd been or what I'd been doing. (My hair and skin had pretty much dried off in the sun.)

  'I've also found some of his notebooks,' she said, pointing to a pile on the table near the armchairs. 'Fascinating stuff. Lots of notes on characters and plots and everything. Dreams he had that he thought he could use. All that sort of thing. That's the kind of thing he thought you'd be interested in, isn't it? You should take a look.'

  'Sure,' I said. 'Mum, I –' I was going to tell her about the notebook – I'd put it under my pillow before I went downstairs again – but she didn't let me finish, she was so taken up in the excitement of it all. 'You know, Fleur, I've had a thought. I think we should have a special Raymond Dulac section in the shop back home. Maybe even a room. There's that room next door I could rent. What do you think?'

  'I think it's a great idea,' I said, glancing at the neat pile on the table. 'Mum,' I said, 'there's something I –'

  At that moment, the phone on the desk rang. We looked at each other blankly for a moment, then Mum said, 'I suppose it's for us,' and answered it. 'Oui, bonjour?'

  The phone quacked. I couldn't make out what the other person was saying, but across Mum's face came a surprised expression. 'Yes. This is Anne Griffon. Who am I speaking to?' she said, in English. Then, after they spoke: 'I am sorry. But I do not know –' The other person cut in then, at length. Mum waited, then said, 'It is not for me to say. Oscar Dulac –' The other person interrupted again, and she listened, then said, 'Very well, if it is all right with him. But I have not had time yet to catalogue everything fully. I do not know if –'

  Again another interruption. She sighed. 'Very well. We will expect you. Goodbye, Mr Morgan.'

  'Mr Morgan?' I said as soon as she had put the phone down. 'Who's that?'

  'A guy called Wayne Morgan. An Englishman. He says he was a good friend of Raymond's. He said Raymond promised him the notebooks and he has a letter proving it. He mentioned he's planning to write and publish a study of Raymond's work, which focuses especially on his Arthurian novels, and the notebooks will be invaluable for that. He says he owns a small publishing company in England – I think it's called the Glastonbury Aquarian Press. He seemed to think I'd have heard of it.'

  'And have you?'

  'No. But that doesn't mean it's dodgy. I don't know every imprint there is. Anyway, he told me we could check him out on the internet. Which we will do, of course. And he says he's spoken to Oscar already. He said Oscar told him to come here the day he gets back, which is tomorrow. He says he won't do anything without Oscar's approval. He certainly seems to know everyone here. And he knew I was here and what Raymond had done with his library.'

  'But in his letter to you – that one Nicolas gave you – Raymond said you were to have the notebooks,' I said.

  'No, he didn't,' she said, slowly. 'He only said that I should look at it all, and decide. He didn't say I must have them.'

  'No, but –'

  'Look, we'll have to play it by ear when this Morgan fellow arrives,' said Mum firmly. 'If this man really is who he says, then I think it would be a good idea to have a study written of Raymond's work. He was a very important writer, in that world. Get me my Blackberry, Fleur. Let's check him out right now.'

  She brought up Google and entered 'Morgan Glastonbury Aquarian Press'. Immediately, up came several references. She clicked on the first one, and up came the Press
website. It looked pretty genuine. It said it was owned by Wayne Morgan and was a New Age type of publisher, which seemed to specialise in Arthurian topics. Mum told me that Glastonbury was the place for King Arthur nuts. Lots of people were convinced this was actually the real Avalon, never mind that the name was nothing like it. People went there on pilgrimages from everywhere. All sorts of people, not just New Age types. The place was supposed to be full of magic and atmosphere and it was certainly full of stories. Supposedly, in the Middle Ages someone had found King Arthur's grave here. There was this holy well called Chalice Well where the Grail might be found, and apparently the nearby Tor held many secrets, and the Holy Thorn tree that grew there (and which the Queen herself received a branch of every year at Christmas) had been planted by Joseph of Arimathea, the person who'd paid for Jesus' tomb. Jesus' holy blood was meant to have made those thorn trees grow. Some people said that Mary Magdalene was involved too somehow and I don't know what else. Real way-out Da Vinci Code stuff, but rather confusing. I mean, mixing up all that stuff, it's kind of weird. It doesn't really make sense. I like things to make sense.

  There wasn't much about Wayne Morgan, the owner of Glastonbury Aquarian Press, on the site, just about how he'd loved everything to do with Arthur ever since he was a kid and first began to read the stories, and how he'd moved to Glastonbury to be at the heart of all that Arthurian energy. But on another website, called Glastonbury Heart Magic, we found more information about him. He wasn't just a publisher. He also had a shop in Glastonbury selling all kinds of stuff, you know, candles, incense, chimes, books, tarot cards and various other bits and bobs, all to do with Arthur in some way, and he also had branches of these shops in various other towns in England. On that site there was a picture of him, looking rather like Richard Branson, except dark-haired, with a goatee and an earring and a smart linen suit. And the expression on his face! It reminded me of those characters in Zoolander, you know those male models who try the staring competition, and have names for their posy expressions. Blue Steel, or whatever. Well, it looked just like that, like Wayne Morgan was trying out Blue Steel.