That made him happier, and he grinned at her, hollow-cheeked.
‘I’ll come with you,’ he offered.
‘Oh, why?’ she said. ‘He won’t talk unless there’s no one else there and he has to. Let me go by myself. All right?’
He gave in. ‘All right.’ But he looked dispirited as he trailed after her, through the bare-floored empty dining room and into the droning bar.
‘I warn you,’ she said, as he went behind the bar-counter.
‘Okay,’ he said, ‘you warned me,’ watching her through the doors. Then he reached for a bottle and poured himself a drink.
The flies in the traps irrepressibly sizzled on. The clock, with a view of Windsor Castle on the glass over the pendulum, announced the seconds from a distance of twenty minutes. He leaned on the bar, his forehead on his hand, black-nailed fingers in his stiff black hair.
In time he roused himself, tossing off the contents of the glass; and taking bottle and glass with him he went out, through the bread-smelling kitchen, across the derelict yard, to his monastic room with its sagging iron bed.
Looking out of my window I saw her coming, little puffs of dust rising from her bare feet. So I came out of my house and waited for her at my gate. Oh Lord, I am like a spider nowadays; like a spider that lives on news.
‘Where are you bound?’ I asked her, as she came up. I thought she might be coming to see me; but why should she?
‘To Michael’s place,’ she said. ‘He doesn’t come down, so he never gets any bread.’
‘It’s hot,’ I said.
‘It’s the same every day,’ she replied.
‘Sad to be old in this country; not even the weather to talk about.’
She said, indifferently: ‘I can’t imagine anything else.’
‘I wonder what you’ll talk about when you’re my age. Before, even when nothing happened, there was always the weather—changing—reminding you of the universe. You won’t have that.’
‘I’ll talk about my grandchildren,’ she said.
‘Ah, you’ll have grandchildren?’
‘Why not?’ she asked, with her eyes suddenly wide and questioning. ‘Why shouldn’t I? I must.’
‘Are there any children in Tourmaline?’
‘Yes,’ she said; or hotly affirmed. ‘In the camp. There must be. One or two.’
‘I suppose there must be. I never go there.’
‘You should.’ She sounded annoyed with me. ‘They’re people too.’
‘I get tired. It’s a long walk.’
She stood with the bag dangling in her hand, red dust on her ankles, frowning, thinking. She was looking at my gaol but not seeing it. At last she said: ‘It is hot,’ as if to please me.
‘Shall I come with you?’
‘Everyone wants to come with me,’ she said.
‘Ah well, I won’t, then.’
‘You’re not hurt, are you? Only, he won’t talk if you come.’
‘I don’t mind,’ I said; adding: ‘He’s an interesting boy.’
‘He’s not a boy,’ she objected. ‘He’s been somewhere.’
‘So he has. But where?’
‘He might tell me, if I’m clever.’
‘You’ll find it hard.’
‘Well,’ she murmured, with a shrug. And she looked away, over my gaol, to the hillside where his hut squatted, indistinguishable among the rocks.
‘Will you come in,’ I said, ‘and have some tea or something?’ But she politely refused, swinging the bag in her hand.
So we took leave of one another. And I went back to my kitchen, where the kettle boiled on the rusty stove, and a solitary fly on the window crossed and recrossed her distant figure climbing the hillside.
He was asleep when she got there; sprawled asleep on the iron bed with the grey broad-striped blanket, hiding his eyes in the crook of one arm. She put her flourbag down on the packing case and studied him. In the red light of the hut his skin was like copper. His feet were bare. He showed no sign of waking.
She stood over him, smiling her rather secret smile. Then she reached out and began to tickle the soles of his feet.
He sighed in his sleep. Suddenly there was a halt in his breathing, and he was awake, sitting up in alarm, his strangely coloured eyes staring.
‘Hell, you scared me,’ he said at length, lying back again and breathing out heavily through his nostrils. ‘Excuse me a minute. My heart hasn’t found its way home yet.’
‘You are a nervous man,’ said Deborah.
‘Must have been dreaming. Can’t remember.’
She sat down on the foot of the bed, looking up his body to his red-ochre face. And he, with his hands behind his head, watched her, guardedly.
‘Is your town as lazy as Tourmaline?’ she asked him. ‘Everybody’s asleep this afternoon.’
‘What else is there to do?’
‘Well, there’s your gold.’
‘It can wait.’
‘And the water.’
‘I’m not ready,’ he said, with his sudden rather aggressive curtness.
‘Are you all right now?’
‘All right?’
‘Your head, and so on. D’you still get those headaches?’
‘Now and again,’ he said. ‘I’ll survive.’
‘I think you’ve got one now. Why are you frowning?’
‘It’s nothing. Forget it.’
‘Let me rub your forehead,’ she said, moving to rise. ‘That helps. I do that for Mary.’
But he alerted himself instantly, and sat for a moment on the edge of the bed with his face in his hands, before looking up again with a rather petulant half-laugh and a shake of the head. ‘Are all women like this?’ he wondered. ‘Look, I’m a big boy. Don’t mother me.’
She scrutinized him; intrigued, but still ironical. ‘You are—you’re extraordinary,’ she said at last. ‘I don’t know any people like you.’
He grinned. ‘As you say. But you don’t know many people, do you?’
‘You’re as cold as a fish.’
‘Ah well,’ he said, with his hands on his blue thighs, unfolding himself, and standing, and wandering to the packing case, ‘how many fish have you seen, anyway?’
‘None,’ she admitted. ‘So what? Why do you hate people to touch you?’
‘You’re raving,’ he said; but without any particular discourtesy, or even interest. ‘And if you weren’t it wouldn’t be your business. What’s this?’
‘It’s bread. That I made for you. But if you want to be independent you can always chuck it down the nearest shaft.’
‘There’s no denying it,’ he said (with a certain embarrassment), ‘you’re a kind-hearted girl. And I wish you’d stop doing me favours.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I can’t do any for you.’
‘That’s not the reason.’
‘Now look,’ he said, ‘how well do you think you know me?’
‘You don’t want people to do you favours because you don’t want them near enough to know you. But you can’t get away with it. There’s hardly one person in Tourmaline that hasn’t done something for you.’
He looked at her in astonishment, and remarked, after thinking about it: ‘That’s a cold sort of mind you’ve got. Like a fish.’
‘We’re a pair of fish, then.’
‘Stranded in Tourmaline. A miracle.’
‘I love you,’ she said. With great pain.
Then he was frozen—staring. But not quite frozen. Because he began to tremble.
‘I want to sleep with you,’ she said.
He was frozen.
At last he brought himself to move, thrusting his shaking hands deep into his trouser-pockets, and retreated (trying to make a casual movement of it, but a retreat it was) to the further wall. He propped himself there, looking down. He would not look at her, although she never ceased to watch him, with her eyes bright and sombre, humble and defiant, all at the same time. When at last he would speak she saw that his
lips were trembling, in a very strange way, like the lips of a cat that is stalking an insect, and his voice was deadened as if his vocal chords had been seized up with ice. ‘What are you?’ he demanded, frozen and trembling. ‘A harlot?’
As it happened that was a word she knew. And she cried to him: ‘No, no, I’m not. I’m honest. I love you.’ She was humble and defiant, brilliant and sombre.
‘Ah,’ he said, ‘you’re like an animal, you hot bitch. Go home to your husband.’
‘He’s not my husband.’
‘Of course he is, in the sight of God.’
‘What do you know about the sight of God?’
‘More than you think, maybe.’
She tossed her head, a wild meaningless gesture. She was trying not to cry, perhaps. ‘I can’t love him. He won’t let me. You know him, you can believe that, can’t you?’
‘So you thought you’d come to me?’
She said, quite simply: ‘I want to have your baby.’
He sounded sick, with rage or disgust. ‘What makes you think you can talk this—filth to me? Did you think I was the sort of man who’d listen to it?’
‘I can’t understand you,’ she burst out. ‘I’m honest, that’s all. And why are you frightened?’
‘Frightened?’ he said. ‘Me?’
‘You’re shaking.’
‘I’m cold. That’s all.’
‘But it’s hot, it’s roasting. This hut’s like an oven.’
‘After hell, anywhere’s cold,’ he said. ‘And black.’
‘Always hell, hell, hell. Where is it? Is there such a thing?’
‘Under your feet,’ he said, with cold conviction. ‘And you’ll burn. All Tourmaline.’
‘What have we done?’ she protested. ‘Tom and Mary burn? I don’t believe it.’
‘Forgotten God’s law,’ he said; remote, pontifical. ‘For the sake of some law of their own. And others’ll burn for the sins of the flesh, or for blasphemy, or just for not listening. Or at least, they would have done——’
‘But you came?’
He repeated it, in a dead voice. ‘But I came.’
Slowly she rose from the bed, smoothing her skirt, hoping, perhaps, by her movement to bring him to acknowledge her physical presence and forgive her. But still he would not look at her.
‘What’ll I do?’ she asked, in despair.
‘Take your bread. I don’t want it.’
‘I don’t mean that. I mean, about hell, about sin. How do I know what to believe. Tom says one thing, you say another thing. Kes says: ‘Bull’ to both of you. Maybe nobody’s right.’
‘Yes, somebody is,’ he said. ‘I am.’
She gave a little fretful laugh, reaching for the bag with the bread in. ‘How do you know?’
And at last he looked up. ‘Because God’s spoken to me,’ he told her, with eyes like blue glass.
She came home again; hurt, broken. No one was in the bar. The flies were disturbed, and cried, when she tossed her bag of bread on the bar-counter.
Kestrel heard her footstep, and called out from the bedroom. So she went, stiff and slow, to where he was, lying naked and sweating on the vast bed, his hands behind his head, staring at the flaking ceiling in a kind of trance.
The room was curtained and shadowy. Her tawny skin, his olive skin, glimmered in the dim light. He smelled of clean sweat.
‘Where’ve you been?’ he asked, turning his head on the pillow.
‘Nowhere.’
‘There’s a lot of nowhere round Tourmaline.’
‘You know where I’ve been,’ she said.
‘I don’t know why, yet.’
‘To take him some bread.’
‘Uh-huh,’ he said. ‘And how was he?’
‘He was asleep. Like every other useless bastard in this bloody town.’
‘Hey, hey. Mary never taught you those words.’
‘Oh, leave me alone.’
‘Come here,’ he said, ‘Little Red Riding Hood. The wolf’s got something for you.’
‘You make me sick,’ she burst out, half-weeping; and ran away from him out to the kitchen, where she sat down at the table and hid her face in her arms.
In his own good time he came after her, shirtless, and stood behind her chair. Her neck was cool and smooth as chalcedony, and little hairs that had escaped from her pony tail were straggling on it. He put his lips against her neck, and would have kissed her; but she made an impatient movement, so he blew a raspberry instead.
Then she did weep, in real rage.
‘What’s up?’ he asked. ‘What did you bring the bread back for?’
‘Go away,’ she said.
‘Did he make a pass at you?’
‘No! Go away!’
‘Did you make a pass at him?’
‘You make me sick,’ she cried again.
‘Don’t get off your bike,’ he said. ‘I’ve just got a thirst for knowledge, that’s all.’
‘He doesn’t eat bread. It’s against his religion.’
He couldn’t help himself then. He roared with laughter.
‘Because the wheat’s sick,’ she went on, wildly. ‘Like everything out there. You know what the Law says. D’you think that’s funny? You’re mad.’
‘Is that the only thing that’s against his religion?’
‘For God’s sake,’ she pleaded, lifting her head, and scowling and weeping at him both together. ‘Do you have to keep cackling like an old chook right in my ear?’
‘Ah, she’s a funny girl,’ he said; ‘she’s a humorist.’ He put his hand on her shoulder, affectionately.
And she got up, knocking over the chair, and escaped from him into the yard, running through the dusty bottles.
He strolled after her. She could not go far.
‘Oh look,’ she called, half-laughing, in a shaky way. ‘He’s asleep too. What a dead town. With his damn boots on the quilt. I’ll murder him.’
It was Byrne she meant. The door of his little room was open, but nothing could be seen of him, only the soles of his boots against the iron bed-foot; which was painted white, but flaking, holding pockets of red dust in its bald patches.
‘Let him sleep,’ Kestrel said. ‘Who wants him?’
‘I do,’ she said. ‘I don’t want to talk to you. Byrnie!’
‘You stupid bitch,’ he said, with affection. ‘What’s got into you? All right, if you want him.’ And he stooped to pick up a small stone from the yard, and tossed it through the door to lob on Byrne’s stomach.
The boots didn’t move.
‘I didn’t mean chuck boondies at him,’ Deborah objected. ‘Why do you have to treat him like that?’
‘He didn’t even feel it,’ Kestrel said. Then the dark suspicion came down on him, wiping the grin from his curling mouth. ‘Is he pissed?’
‘How’d I know?’ she demanded. But she hesitated.
‘By Jesus, if he’s been helping himself you won’t murder him, I will.’
‘Leave him alone—please, Kes. Or wait till he’s sober.’
‘Why should I?’ He had grown darker, and his grey eyes paler, uncanny. He started to come towards Byrne’s door.
But she was ahead of him, shaking Byrne, calling: ‘Wake up, Byrnie,’ while Byrne groaned and stirred. ‘Kes is after you. Wake up.’
The black eyes dragged open, under the devilish eyebrows, in the dark spoiled face. He was dazed. He was more than that, he was drunk as a skunk. ‘What? What?’ he was saying, with a rum bottle beside him, under his armpit, and the stinking liquor soaking his shirt and the quilt beneath. ‘What’s Kes want?’
‘Your blood,’ Kestrel said, quietly, studying him from the doorway. ‘Ah Christ, wouldn’t he make you puke? My cousin. You’re a credit to your upbringing, boy.’
‘Get out, Byrnie,’ Deborah was whispering. ‘Quick.’
He dragged himself to his feet, and stood with his head hanging and his eyes closed, swaying a little. Then: ‘No good,’ he said. ‘I’ve had it.’ He
sat down on the edge of the bed.
‘So you helped yourself again,’ Kestrel said, in his stillest and smallest voice.
‘Couldn’t wake you, Kes.’
‘That was a kind thought.’
‘Didn’t want to be a nuisance. Nuisance to too many people.’
‘Come out here,’ Kestrel said.
‘Don’t you,’ Deborah said. ‘You stay here.’
‘You shut up,’ Kestrel said to her. ‘Come here, laddie.’
‘I won’t let you go, Byrnie,’ Deborah said, grabbing him by the belt.
‘Got to go,’ Byrne said, breaking away from her and shambling to the door, from which Kestrel had retreated to wait for him in the yard. ‘What d’you want, Kes?’ he was asking, coming to him, and swaying slightly when he stood.
Then Kestrel hit him across the cheekbone with the back of his hand. And as Byrne simply stood there, shaking his head, he hit him again on the other cheek.
‘Hit him back, Byrnie,’ Deborah cried from the door. ‘Why do you let him do it? Hit him.’
‘’S all right, Deb,’ Byrne said. ‘’S all right. I was asking for it. I deserved it.’
At that point Kestrel gave him a straight right to the head, and he went down, gushing blood from the nostrils.
‘You dingo,’ Deborah said to Kestrel, with extraordinary contempt and conviction. ‘He’s drunk.’
‘Well, now,’ said Kestrel.
And Byrne, on the slate paving of the yard, kept muttering: ‘’S all right, Deb, ’s all right.’
‘Have you done enough now?’ Deborah enquired. ‘Why don’t you go and do something interesting, like pulling the legs off flies?’
And Kestrel, all the time, was standing over Byrne, with those pale eyes of his, and thin bent lips like the seagulls in a child’s drawing.
‘Get up,’ he said.
‘’S over now, Kes,’ Byrne said. ‘Want to sleep now.’
‘Get up.’
‘Can’t, Kes.’
So Kestrel knelt beside him, grabbing him by the shirt collar, and talking very quietly. ‘I’ve had enough,’ he said. ‘It makes me feel pretty proud, seeing you like this—what do you think?’ And his soft anger was terrible, because of the hysteria underneath it. ‘Some day I won’t know when to stop. I’ll kill you, that’s for sure.’
Tourmaline Page 11
