Star Gazing

by Linda Gillard

  ‘Yes, I know. Which is why I think all this might be harder for you than for me.’

  ‘Oh, that doesn’t matter! Whatever you decide to do, it’s you who have to live with the consequences for the rest of your life. I did think Keir had a right to know, but if he’s going off to Kazakhstan… and God knows where next… Well, it’s nobody’s business but yours now.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Marianne shook some muesli into a bowl and started to peel a banana. Assuming the subject was closed, I turned away and was about to leave the kitchen when she said abruptly, with a strange little catch in her voice, ‘I do love you, you know. I’m such rubbish at telling people how much I care for them. But that doesn’t mean I don’t feel it.’

  ‘Darling, I know! Honestly, I do understand. In any case,’ I said briskly, ‘your bark has always been a lot worse than your bite.’ I saw her lip tremble and threw my arms round her – as much as anything to give her an excuse to cry, poor thing. We stood in the kitchen, hugging each other, weeping and wailing for I don’t know how long. When Garth let himself in, he stopped in his tracks, took one look at us and said, ‘All right, then – ’oo’s died?’

  * * * * *

  Marianne

  Keir and I didn’t discuss what we felt for each other. It was a tacit agreement. Perhaps we couldn’t have discussed it. I doubt we would have known how to describe what we felt, what to make of the mixture of intensity and reserve, a sense that we hardly knew each other at all, and had always known each other.

  Oh, we talked. Talked and talked, but not about us. Not until that last walk on the beach when I learned the geographical whereabouts of Kazakhstan. Instead we made love. And that was overwhelming. Or rather, we were overwhelmed by our need for each other, the sense of urgency, our inexplicable but visceral connection that seemed to lead naturally and often to making love. And in some unlikely places.

  We sheltered in the tree-house on the way back from a woodland walk. Rain was turning to sleet and Keir pulled at my hand and led me to the foot of the rope ladder. I hesitated as the memories flooded back but his voice was at my ear, reassuring. ‘It’ll be OK.’ I climbed up, like an old hand, while he held the ladder.

  Inside the tree-house we stood in silence, listening to a sudden fusillade of hailstones on the wooden roof. Keir laughed, I’ve no idea why. He didn’t laugh very often but when he did, it was somehow infectious. I laughed too, then he kissed me, without any serious intent, I thought. But then he bent his head again and took my face in both his hands and kissed me in a way that was unfamiliar, so raw and needy, I felt shocked. But shock didn’t prevent me from responding. His hands pushed their way inside my fleece, up under my jumper and T-shirt, and tugged at the zip of my jeans.

  We didn’t even undress. I heard him drag something soft out of a box and throw it onto one of the makeshift beds where it settled with a sigh. Then he pushed me down, supporting me in the crook of his arm while his other hand must have been busy with his clothes. As he lowered me on to the makeshift bed, cradled like a baby on his arm, I felt both completely secure and as if annihilation might be imminent. My hands touched an old quilt, soft and damp beneath me. I felt the weight and pressure of Keir above, then the breath was knocked out of me – not just by the violence with which he made love to me, but by the strength of my feeling for him and my absolute need for his body. I was aware of a random, ghoulish wish that this man might procure the abortion of his own baby and with that thought I clung to him, my arms round his neck, my fingers clutching the bones of his skull. I cried out something, I don’t know what.

  It was over in minutes. Afterwards Keir apologised for behaving ‘like a bloody adolescent’. I said there was no need for apology. I’d never felt so desired or desirable in my entire life which, I added, wasn’t bad going for a woman of forty-five, but he apologised again and seemed bothered by what had happened. After a long silence he said, ‘I wish I knew what you wanted, Marianne. What you need. You must tell me. I want things to be good for you.’

  ‘That was good for me. Short and very sweet.’

  I heard him laugh softly. ‘Aye, but did the earth move?’

  ‘No… The tree did.’

  * * * * *

  Louisa

  Marianne kept herself busy. I thought she was engaging in some sort of fitness regime to keep her weight down and build up physical stamina for the later stages of pregnancy and the birth, but when I mentioned this to her she said her long walks, the swimming and the sessions at the gym were intended to give the baby every opportunity to miscarry. As she passed the thirteen week stage at the beginning of May she announced that, ‘It looked as if the little bugger showed every sign of being as strong and healthy as its father.’

  So we went back to see Dr Greig, to talk about adoption and preliminary wheels were set in motion. Marianne asked me to go with her – she had become quite clingy since she’d returned from Skye – and I also attended antenatal appointments with her and sat in on the midwife’s visits. I was down on the forms as Marianne’s official birth partner but I was spared antenatal classes. Marianne said she wasn’t prepared to mix with happy couples half her age, although Dr Greig assured us it was unlikely Marianne would be either the only elderly mother or the only single one. ‘But,’ Marianne replied, with some asperity, ‘I will be the only mother intending to dump her baby the minute it’s born.’

  Garth or I would sometimes accompany Marianne on her walks in the Botanics. I don’t think she relished our company particularly. I suspect she just wanted to avoid being prey to her own thoughts, which must have been pretty gloomy. Dr Greig had explained that mothers sometimes changed their mind about adoption, before and often after the baby was born, so Marianne should perhaps regard her arrangements as provisional. Dr Greig also warned of the possibility of depression. She said pregnancy was something of an endurance test, an ordeal made bearable by the thought of a healthy baby at the end of it. Marianne received all this in silence, her face expressionless as usual, and it was left to me to thank Dr Greig for her concern.

  Well, I don’t know about Marianne feeling depressed, but I could have howled. We walked home arm in arm, saying very little. I suspect she must have sensed my abject mood. When we arrived home it was only 4.30 but she headed straight for the drinks cabinet and declared, ‘Sod the baby – I’m going to have a gin and tonic. Will you join me?’

  I fetched some ice, Marianne poured monster gins, we kicked off our shoes and collapsed into armchairs. I knew things must be bad when she took the unprecedented step of enquiring about the progress of my latest book. I waffled vaguely and Marianne soon lost interest. I didn’t have the heart to tell her I hadn’t lifted finger to keyboard in weeks. I just sat staring at the screen, my mind elsewhere.

  Kazakhstan mostly.

  We’d discussed the scan. We both knew that when the baby was scanned, the radiologist might be able to determine the baby’s gender and offer to tell us. Marianne had told me she didn’t want to know, there was absolutely no point in her knowing, and that it would only make life harder for me because the baby would seem more like a person. (As far as I was concerned it already was. On some days I envisaged a little boy; on others, a little girl. I’m ashamed to admit I’d even given them names, but perhaps as a writer I can be forgiven this lamentable self-indulgence.)

  We had to go to the hospital for a scan when Marianne was fifteen weeks. It was mid-May and Edinburgh was sunny and fragrant with blossom. As we walked through the hospital grounds she stopped suddenly. I thought perhaps she was bottling out, but she said she just wanted to smell the hawthorn blossom. I looked up at the foam of creamy flowers on a May tree and felt pleased she was still able to take pleasure in simple things. My spirits lifted a little but sank again as soon as I saw all the high-tech equipment.

  I tried not to look at the screen. (Marianne, of course, couldn’t.) It must have been written into her notes about adoption because the radiologist didn’t try to describe anything to her or offer
to turn up the volume on the heartbeat, she just informed us that everything appeared to be normal. And then came the moment I’d been dreading. The girl said, ‘Would you like to know the baby’s gender?’ I braced myself and when Marianne didn’t answer I averted my eyes from the screen and launched into an explanation, but Marianne cut me off.

  ‘It’s all right, Lou. There’s no need.’ The radiologist looked at Marianne expectantly and so did I. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I would like to know.’

  ‘It’s a boy. And it looks like he’s going to be a big one.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Marianne. ‘That doesn’t surprise me. Thank you.’

  Stunned, I waited while Marianne got dressed. When she emerged from her cubicle she took my arm, but before we set off she said, ‘I’m sorry, Lou. I suddenly wanted to know. I’ve felt all along that it was a boy and I just wanted to know if I was right. Silly really.’ I wasn’t able to reply. She squeezed my arm and continued, ‘It’s all for the best, you know. Just imagine a boy being brought up by a couple of old spinsters. It wouldn’t be right, would it?’

  ‘No… I suppose not.’

  For what must have been the first time in my life, I thanked God Marianne was blind and couldn’t see my face.

  * * * * *

  Marianne

  Hawthorn blossom. His smell. Life has a way of waiting till you’re down, then giving you a good kicking.

  I’ve always been a martyr to my sense of smell. When I finally agreed to let Louisa help me clear out Harvey’s wardrobe, I insisted on being present. Don’t ask me why. When you’ve had no body to bury, you invent a variety of rituals, partly to show respect for the dead, but mostly in an attempt to achieve some sort of closure. I agreed with Lou there was no point in my actually handling Harvey’s clothes, but I wanted to be present while she sorted, to tell her where I wanted stuff to go. (Some things we gave to the night shelter in Aberdeen, the better quality stuff went to charity shops.)

  I suppose I must have been stupid with grief not to have realised that Louisa handling Harvey’s clothes would bring him back, would bring him into the bedroom, in as vivid a way as if he’d been resurrected from the dead. I stood it for as long as I could. (Another ritual. If I bore the pain, it would begin to cancel out the pain Harvey must have suffered when he died.) Eventually I ran out of the room, overcome.

  That May morning in the hospital grounds, the scent of hawthorn blossom stopped me dead. Keir was beside me. Inside me.

  I didn’t faint, but it was a close call.

  * * * * *

  Louisa

  By the end of May I’d more or less come to terms with the results of the ultrasound scan. I’d abandoned my pretty-in-pink fantasies and was doing my best to quell the blue version. Marianne didn’t relent, she didn’t waver for a moment. She still referred to the baby – when she had to – as ‘it’, which for some reason I found distressing. I suppose it was necessary.

  Although I agreed that raising a son between us would have been even more of challenge than raising a daughter, I couldn’t help wondering if the baby’s gender had actually made life harder for Marianne; if the baby seemed even more a piece of Keir now. She never mentioned it, of course. The baby was discussed only in terms of its health, when she got the results of tests. Occasionally she would mention something to do with the adoption procedure. You would have had no idea we were discussing a person. But I suppose, to Marianne it – I mean, he – wasn’t a person. She couldn’t allow him to be.

  One day I’d hit the gin long before the sun was over the yardarm (well, if you waited for the sun in Edinburgh you’d die of thirst) and I was sitting with my feet up, thumbing mindlessly through a fashion magazine, when Garth put his head round the sitting room door and said in a whisper, ‘Is Marianne in?’

  ‘No. She’s gone for a walk. She should be back soon. Why do you ask?’

  He crooked his finger and beckoned. ‘Come an’ take a look at this.’

  I followed him into the study where he stood beside the PC and indicated the chair. ‘Sit down. It’s probably nothin’ but I thought I’d better show you, just in case Marianne gets wind of it.’

  There were lots of windows open on the screen and Garth leaned over, clicked the mouse and maximised one. It was a news website. I peered at the text. The item was headed BRITISH OIL WORKERS KIDNAPPED IN KAZAKHSTAN.

  ‘Oh, my God! It’s not Keir, is it?’

  ‘Dunno. There’s no way of tellin’. So far it’s just breakin’ news. As they ’aven’t released any names I suppose the families don’t know yet. Do we know ‘oo Keir works for?’

  ‘Well, I don’t. I dare say Marianne does, but we can hardly ask her, can we?’ I looked back at the screen and skimmed through the article. ‘It probably isn’t him… I mean, there must be hundreds of British oil workers in Kazakhstan – mustn’t there?’

  ‘Possibly. An’ I suppose a lot of ’em would be Scots.’

  My stomach turned over. ‘Why do you say that?’

  Garth leaned across and maximised another window. ‘Because this blogger mentions the kidnap an’ ’e describes the oil workers as an American an’ two Scots.’

  ‘Oh, no! Is this a reliable source of information?’

  ‘Couldn’t tell you. It appears to be a blog written by a scientist. A Kazakh livin’ in Aberdeen. This guy thinks the oil workers ’ave been kidnapped by a group of Kazakh conservationists.’

  ‘Conservationists?’

  ‘Yeah. Militants. You know, like Greenpeace. He thinks they’ll be ’oldin’ the guys to ransom.’

  ‘For money?’

  ‘Doubt it. Political leverage, more like. This blogger says a lot of Kazakhs aren’t very ’appy about what’s goin’ on in their country.’ Garth clicked on another window. ‘The scramble for oil an’ gas is causin’ a lot of damage to the environment, apparently. Particularly the Caspian Sea. It’s become a chemical dustbin.’

  I stared blankly at the screen. ‘How can we find out if one of these Scots is Keir?’

  ‘I don’t think we can without their names bein’ released or askin’ Marianne. Does she know any of ’is family?’

  ‘No, I don’t think so. She said he’d talked about them, but she’s never mentioned meeting any of them… Oh, she said he has a sister who lives in Edinburgh!’

  ‘Do you know ’er name?’

  ‘No. She was married anyway, so she probably wouldn’t even be called Harvey.’

  ‘If we knew ’oo Keir worked for we could try an’ contact them without Marianne knowin’.’ Garth shrugged and plunged his hands into his pockets. ‘Maybe we should just tell ’er. Ask if she’s got any contact details for Keir.’

  ‘No, we can’t tell her! There’s no sense in worrying her unnecessarily. I mean, it probably isn’t even him!’ ‘Nah, probably not. But I thought I’d better show you. It’ll turn up on the radio soon. TV an’ all. She could get to ’ear about it.’

  ‘Well, we’ll just have to cross that bridge when we come to it.’ I stood up wearily and kissed Garth on the cheek. ‘Thanks for researching all this. You are an absolute angel. At least we’re prepared now. But it probably isn’t Keir… And if it is, they wouldn’t harm him, would they?’

  ‘Can’t see why they should. This’ll be a political gesture. They’ll want publicity for their cause. Concessions from the oil companies. Compensation. Representation in the decision-makin’ process, that sort of thing. Anyway…’ He smiled at me briefly then, reaching for the mouse, turned back to look at the screen, his pale brow contracted into a frown. ‘It probably isn’t Keir… ’

  Chapter Eighteen

  Louisa

  But it was. It was Keir. They released the names the following day. Garth found them by Googling Keir’s name and ‘Kazakhstan’. In desperation I said, ‘Perhaps there are two Keir Harveys?’ Garth swung round on his chair and looked up at me, his green eyes sad and patient. ‘Both workin’ in oil? In Kazakhstan? Both Scots? Suppose it’s possible, but personally, I wouldn’t pu
t money on it.’ He folded his arms and looked back at the screen. ‘So… do we tell ’er?’

  I sank into an armchair beside my desk, closed my eyes and tried to think. ‘Is it on British news websites yet?’

  ‘Not yet. I’ve set up a Google Alert for ’is name, plus “kidnap” an’ “Kazakhstan”, so that should bring any news straight into your inbox.’

  ‘Do we know why he’s been kidnapped?’

  ‘It’s like I said, they’re militant Greens. They want the oil companies to clean up their act. And the Caspian Sea while they’re about it.’

  ‘So it really isn’t likely they’ll harm him, is it? I mean, people who care about pollution aren’t violent, are they?’

  ‘Depends if they’re fanatics. Animal activists can be a bit dodgy. But this crowd,’ he said, tapping the screen, ‘they sound like environmentalists. Probably young too – they’re thinkin’ about the future. If they speak any English – an’ they probably do – they’ll talk to Keir an’ find out ’e’s a diamond geezer. On the same wavelength.’

  ‘So should we tell Marianne?’

  Garth turned to face me. ‘It’s over between them, right?’

  ‘Well, that’s what she says, but I don’t believe a word of it.’

  ‘The only way she’ll find out is on the radio or TV.’ He picked up a pen and started to tap the desk with it, his eyes fixed on some imaginary point in the distance. ‘We could say one of them wasn’t workin’, but not both. She’d never swallow that.’

  ‘We rarely have the TV news on. She prefers the radio.’

  Garth raised his pen. ‘What if I remove a fuse from the radio plug? Then it’d be dead when she switched it on.’

  ‘She’d just think the fuse had gone and ask me to change it.’

  ‘Yeah, I know. Then you fiddle about with it – or I will if I’m ’ere, that’d be better. She trusts me to be technologically minded. I’ll say I’ve mended the fuse but the thing still isn’t workin’. Then I’ll take it away to get it fixed. An’ that could take a couple of days.’