The Stillness the Dancing

by Wendy Perriam

  She stared in disbelief, slowly made out the bald and bloated body, its head shrunken and twisted back. The eye sockets were empty, the teeth yellowed, one small flipper curved helplessly across its chest. A piece of frayed rope was tied around its neck, entangled with necklaces of seaweed; a film of fine sand adhering to the few remaining scraps of fur.

  ‘B … But why should anyone do that? I mean, I thought you said the adult skins weren’t valuable.’

  ‘They’re not.’ David’s voice was low, but taut with anger. ‘Sheer spite, I should imagine. The fishing started just this week. I imagine what happened was that a seal broke a precious net and the fisherman who owned it took revenge.’

  ‘But those … those legends said they married seals …’

  David shrugged. ‘Maybe that’s all part of it. Revenge for other crimes was well—desertion, returning to the sea.’

  Morna backed off. From even a yard or two away, the seal details disappeared and the hulk turned back to rock again, a rock she could have sat on. She shuddered. The mottling on the skin had reminded her of something—Chris’s love-bite—the same purplish-red, blotching into black. She clutched at her stomach. She could make out a whiff of putrifying flesh above the tang of salt and seaweed. She closed her eyes. No. It was David Attwood’s sickly aftershave. She could feel his rubbery flesh against her own, his bloated body beached on orange carpet. The ground was tipping, quicksanding beneath her feet. She lost her balance, stumbled against David’s blurred and shifting form.

  ‘I’m s … sorry,’ she muttered, clutching at his arm. Even her voice sounded faint and indistinct.

  ‘My fault. I shouldn’t have mentioned the seal. You look quite pale. Want to sit down?’

  She didn’t answer, just clung on to the arm. The roar of the sea was still too loud, seemed to have burst inside her skull.

  ‘There’s a ledge of rock back there. Why don’t I take you over and …’

  ‘N … No.’ She couldn’t move. He had to heal her first, remove the bruising on her neck, erase the teeth-marks made by those grinning orange blankets. She had never been so close to him before, slumped against his chest, sheltered by his body. He was standing rigid as a post, obviously embarrassed, but she didn’t pull away, stayed absolutely motionless. The sea was moving for her, crashing on the rocks, thrashing up and down against the steep slope of the beach. All the tension of the last three weeks seemed to have compressed into this moment, screwed so taut she could feel it as a pain constricting in her chest.

  Suddenly, he shifted, withdrew his arm, took a step away. ‘Morna, look, I … I think we ought to …’

  ‘No, please. I’m all right now. I just felt … faint.’ She couldn’t bear to hear his fumbling frigid words—excuses and rejections which might distance him still further. Safer to say nothing, leave things as they were. ‘It was … a dizzy spell, that’s all.’ She shook her hair back, wiped her face with her sleeve.

  ‘I walked you too far, I’m sorry.’

  ‘Not at all.’

  They were back to the stilted phrases, the careful wary distance measured out between them. She kicked at the sand, dislodging pebbles, shells. Two guillemots were shadowing each other, two cormorants preening on a rock, spreading out their ragged wings to dry. Everything in pairs. David moved away, picked up his half-box, poked among the flotsam with his stick for other fuel.

  They climbed back up the rocky steps in silence, trudged on more slowly now, weighted down with wood. David tried to take the largest pieces from her.

  ‘It’s all right, I can manage. You’re loaded down yourself.’

  ‘Sure you’re feeling better, though?’

  Morna muttered something, unsure what she felt. Confused, put-down, rejected. Restless. Even angry. Angry with herself. Why did she have to spoil things, risk a confrontation? She said nothing more until they reached the wreck. They both stopped then, instinctively, walked to the very edge of the cliff. David had told her about the ship, how he had clambered down the steep cliff to explore it, even walked the green and slippery deck. She had no desire to make the climb herself, inspect that grim hulk still clinging to the rocks as if not daring to let go and be submerged. From where they stood, she could see only the mast, looking as small and insubstantial as a straw.

  Morna turned away, dizzied by the plunging drop, her thoughts with the floundering crew. Two only had survived. They had been lodged in David’s cottage until a boat arrived to take them off, had slept in the very bedroom she was sleeping in herself. The day he had told her that, she had lain awake all night, imagining their swarthy limbs crowding the tiny bed, afraid to close her eyes in case she should dream their own pitching tossing nightmares, or touch in sleep the bloated stinking bodies of their mates. It still upset her that in the past the islanders had furnished their homes from wrecks, fed their children on plundered stores, retrieved the spoils from corpses.

  They were nearing the concrete landing slip. Morna dragged her feet as she recalled her first sight of it, her whole impulsive escape from California. Perhaps she should have stayed there, sat out her last week, instead of barging into hermit David’s life. She had been female in America, not neuter, someone men noticed and admired. It wouldn’t hurt to mention a few details.

  ‘I … er … met this guy in Los Angeles,’ she said, staring intently at her wood, trying to sound casual.

  David said nothing, was waiting for her to finish.

  ‘He was called David, actually.’

  ‘Oh, yes.’

  ‘We went for cocktails.’

  Silence. David hated small talk.

  He fucked me. I was drunk. We watched porn movies together. Of course she couldn’t say it. David would be deeply shocked. Yet she wanted him to realise she was woman—flesh and blood, legs and breasts, which other men desired. He was stooping down now, examining the markings on a striated rock, more interested in geology than in her sexual exploits. She really ought to get out of his life, stop torturing herself, leave him to his fossils. She couldn’t stay in any case. For days and days now, she had been saying she must leave, concerned for Chris and Bea, then shrugging off that worry, kidding herself they were both absolutely fine. She had no proof of that at all. Her daughter might have returned from California upset and miserable, missing her father, needing a mother to replace him instead of just a Grandma. Bea herself could be lonely or unwell. It was time she thought of them for a change, stopped being so damned casual.

  She stopped abruptly, put down her stick, her firewood, stared out towards the frail and makeshift quay. ‘David, look, be honest. Would you rather I left—soon, I mean—the minute Cormack’s better?’ She couldn’t see his face; it was hidden by his load. ‘Go on—say. I shan’t mind.’ She minded already that he hadn’t answered, had said nothing yet at all. ‘I mean, I realise I just turned up, without an invitation, when you might well have preferred to be on your own. Anyway, it’s not just that. I ought to get back for Chris and my mother—check that they’re all right. I can’t help worrying. If I could phone or something, it wouldn’t be so bad, but I’ve never been out of touch before. I know I’ve written to my mother, but it‘s not the same. It was a scrappy letter, anyway, and the second one isn’t even posted. She’s used to just picking up the phone and …’

  David put his own wood down, fumbled for her hand, held it so tightly the nails dug into her palm. ‘No,’ he said. ‘No. No. No.’

  She left her hand in his, wincing at the pain, yet feeling a shock of triumph at the vehemence of his ‘noes’. She tried to change tack, convince herself that Chris and Bea were fine, started rambling on again, trying to keep the excitement from her voice.

  David wasn’t listening. ‘No,’ he was still saying, as if she were a dog or stupid child who hadn’t understood the first and second times, had to be told ‘No’ again, again, held on a short constricting lead.

  He seized her other hand, crushed the two together in his own two. ‘No,’ he said once more, looking
anguished, almost desperate, his knuckles white from the fierceness of his grip. ‘You mustn’t go, d’you hear me, Morna? You really mustn’t go.’

  Chapter Twenty Two

  ‘Right, you can come down now,’ David called from the foot of the stairs.

  Morna adjusted her belt, gave a final towelling to her hair. It was the first time she had really missed a mirror, the first time she had clad her legs in tights instead of David’s jeans, replaced his thick sweaters with one of the silky dresses from her suitcase. She had even washed her hair, though it had taken so long and proved such a major task that she had given up halfway. It now felt stiff and soapy, clean, but still not dry, curling in damp tendrils round her shoulders.

  She walked down the stairs, her high-heeled sandals (packed for Los Angeles’ beach restaurants) echoing on the wooden steps, flimsy summer dress fluttering in the draught. She heard David gasp as he caught sight of her, saw him look her up and down, his eyes finally stopping at her neckline which plunged low and was emphasised by a fine gold cross and chain.

  ‘Morna, you look absolutely …’ He flushed, broke off, staring down at the floor now like an awkward teenager who had gone too far.

  Morna laughed. ‘So do you.’

  They were both transformed, as if they had changed not just their clothes but their whole species—no longer coarse and clumping bipeds lumbering about in boots and waterproofs or muffled in pelts and hides, but slimmer, finer creatures with necks and curves and naked flesh. David seemed half a stone lighter without his bulky jerseys and baggy corduroys. He was dressed all in black, as he had been the first day she met him at the retreat, but in tight new jeans which she had never seen before, which clung to his buttocks, revealed slim hips and narrow waist. A heavy leather belt accentuated the waist. He had even trimmed his beard which looked almost rakish, cut to a point like an Elizabethan gallant’s.

  He was holding open the parlour door. It had always been out of bounds before, save for that one brief glimpse of the moon her first morning in the cottage. The room where David slept was somehow inviolate, and always freezing cold. She had tried to persuade him to bed down in the kitchen which was warmed by the range and had become their main living-room—refectory and study, scriptorium and den. But he seemed shy about sleeping in a room so public where she might slip in unexpectedly, late at night or early in the morning, catch him half undressed. They couldn’t waste fuel on two fires, so he slept like Abban in the cold and dark.

  Now, however, the parlour was transformed. A fire was crackling in the black iron fireplace, its blaze augmented by a score of candles ranged all around the room—plain white candles set on plain white saucers, but transfiguring the room with their flickering light. David had pushed back the battered furniture, disguised the threadbare matting with a purple velvet curtain which he had spread as rug and tablecloth and laid with plates and dishes. At one end he had built a throne of pillows, collected from beds and chairs and draped with another curtain in poppied chintz.

  ‘Sit down,’ he urged, gesturing to the throne. She sat unsteadily, almost over-balancing, yet feeling like a queen.

  ‘Presents first,’ he said.

  ‘Presents? Oh, David, I haven’t got you anything.’

  ‘I didn’t want you to. Not until your birthday. They’re only bits and pieces anyway. Flowers …’ He picked up a jamjar which held a single sprig of gorse, one drooping yellow coltsfoot. ‘I reckon that’s the one and only flower on the entire island. And the gorse is the first green shoot I’ve seen since winter. All the rest is dead still and will probably stay that way till April.’ He shook water from the stalks, held them out to her. ‘There you are—a promise of spring.’

  Morna touched a finger to the coltsfoot, still not fully open and with no leaves yet on its stem, but the colour of the sun; admired the glaze of green on the tiny twig of gorse. Back home, there would be sticky buds and catkins, primroses and snowdrops, jasmine, aconites, even the first dog violets. There were two thousand species of native plants in mainland Britain—David had told her that—less than sixty here, and none of them in evidence this early. She hadn’t seen a single bud or flower on their entire morning’s walk around the island. David had ventured out a second time, must have searched every sheltered dip and southern slope.

  He had also scoured the beaches. Arranged in a pattern round her plate were a dazzle of coloured shells—limpets, cowries, periwinkles, one large scallop shell—interspersed with mottled pebbles, stones of curious shapes and markings, a piece of green glass abraded by the sea. She picked them up, admiring, one by one.

  David shrugged. ‘They’re just nonsenses. But here’s something precious—well semi-precious.’ He handed her a package swathed in three or four pink tissues borrowed from her Kleenex box.

  She unwrapped it, revealing a rough piece of stone with some brighter near-transparent mineral embedded in the centre.

  ‘It’s beautiful. Wherever did it come from?’

  ‘It’s a piece of quartz. You find it sometimes in granite cliffs. There’s only one vein I know of on this island—right on the southern tip. You have to climb a hundred feet or so, down a pretty horrendous drop, and hack it out with a chisel.’

  She shuddered. ‘You could have broken your neck.’

  ‘No. I used to do a bit of climbing once, and I took it very carefully. Anyway, with no jeweller’s shop on the island, what else could I do? I wanted to get you something really nice.’

  She held it up to the light, its milky crystals glittering and flashing, contrasting with the brute grey stone. Neil had given her fourteen years-worth of jewellery, for Christmases and birthdays, promotions, anniversaries—showy stones in padded velvet boxes with the name of some Bond Street jeweller swanking on the top—jewels to give her status which then reflected back on him, rings to prove he owned her, gold to show he had made it in the world. She had felt weighted down by stones, padlocked into his necklaces and bracelets. He had spent a lot of money on her presents, but little time. He would dash out in a lunch hour, the day before her birthday, sign a credit card, leave his secretary to do the wrapping and choose a birthday card. Sometimes he bought her things he wanted himself—an Olympus OM 1 when he was going through a camera craze, a top professional racquet when he’d started playing tennis after work. Both gifts ran into three figures. David’s quartz came free—except he had risked his neck for it, given up his precious working time in trekking there and back. It was the same with the shells and flower—all had cost him effort, needed patience.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said, still fingering the quartz. ‘I’ll keep it on my desk at home, use it as paperweight and a sort of inspiration.’

  ‘Just two more crazy things.’ David had got up again. ‘Shut your eyes and hold out your hands. Left one first.’

  She waited like a child, eyes screwed up, palm cupped. A round and scratchy object prickled into it. She opened her eyes, squinted down at a purple sea urchin with a thick halo of spines.

  David touched it gingerly. ‘I tried to find you what they call a heart urchin. I thought it would be appropriate for St Valentine’s. But no luck, I’m afraid. I don’t think they have them on this coast.’

  ‘It’s gorgeous. Such a stunning colour. If it were still alive I’d keep it as a pet.’

  He laughed. ‘Now the other hand. Be careful, though. It’s fragile. Shut your eyes again.’

  Something cool and heavy plopped into her right hand. She knew already what it was, cupped her fingers round the speckled shell.

  ‘Oh, David, you really are a wizard. I grumble about no eggs and the next moment you’ve produced one. Did you lay it yourself?’

  ‘It was almost a case of that. But one of Cormack’s stubborn hens actually did its stuff—the first time in six whole weeks, he said. He’s threatening to wring all fifteen idle necks if they don’t start laying soon.’

  ‘So how did you prise it away from him? I bet he charged a king’s ransom.’

  ‘Only
a princeling’s one. And it was worth it. I was determined to get you an egg. Apart from anything else, it’s important for our ceremony. Eggs represent the universe and new life and resurrection and the union of opposites and creation itself and …’

  Morna let out a mock groan. ‘And I was stupid enough to think I could simply eat it boiled for breakfast.’

  ‘Oh, you can—afterwards. If we ever get round to dinner first, that is. You hungry?’

  She nodded. ‘Starving. It beats me how St Abban managed all those fasts and still worked an eighteen-hour day.’ Though David had done almost as well himself. He had been out again after their lunch break of a glass of water and ten minutes with their feet up, and had then continued his cooking for the remainder of the afternoon and early evening, taken over the kitchen, banished her upstairs for a read and a rest in bed. It was now almost nine o’clock—late for dinner.

  ‘Can I help?’

  ‘No, you sit tight. It’s all ready anyway.’

  He returned with an old and blackened saucepan, set it on the floor, steam rising from the top. ‘Sorry about the pot. You’ll have to imagine the Royal Doulton soup tureen and the solid silver ladle.’

  ‘Soup. Lovely. Dulse soup?’

  ‘Not a single morsel of dulse tonight, I promise. If it tastes fishy, that’s because it is fish. It’s got everything in it I could find.’

  ‘You mean you caught the fish yourself, David?’

  ‘No questions. This meal is a joint effort—Cormack, Mrs Cormack, a bit of begging, borrowing and poaching, the odd miracle thrown in, and a few mountains moved by our ever-obliging Abban. What do you think of it?’

  ‘It’s … good.’ Morna tried a second spoonful. It was salty—saltier than the seaweed. David could hardly help that. Fish were scarce in winter, difficult to catch without a boat. He had probably used salted cod and herring. But she could also taste fresh mussels, other shellfish. He must have gathered those himself, prised them from the rocks, spent long and patient hours shelling and cleaning them. Like the presents, the soup was a labour of love. She cleared her plate.