Ten White Geese (9781101603055)

by Bakker, Gerbrand

  Bradwen topped her up. ‘He’s dreaming,’ he said.

  ‘So what did you think of Dickinson?’ she asked.

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Nothing?’

  ‘I haven’t read it. I don’t get poetry.’

  ‘Another reason you should go.’

  He smiled again, or rather, he continued smiling. ‘Coffee?’

  ‘Have you got a mobile?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Do you ever use it? I haven’t even seen it.’

  ‘No. I don’t know anyone.’

  ‘That’s nonsense, of course.’

  As if the dog had understood, he woke and barked once. He stood up and went over to stand panting where the kitchen joined the living room.

  ‘I’d be careful if I were you,’ the boy said. ‘He bites.’

  ‘Do you have a father and a mother?’

  He hesitated. ‘Of course.’

  ‘You know them, then. Don’t you need to call home sometimes to tell them how you’re doing?’

  ‘I’m here now.’

  She had a tremendous desire to grab her breasts to try to make something clear. She almost did it, but instead – her hands checked in mid-air – she knocked her glass over and began to cry. The boy didn’t do anything, he just stayed where he was. She stood up and walked to the stairs, passing the dog, who licked the back of her hand. She ran the bath, squeezing a long squirt of bubble bath into it, Native Herbs. She left the door – which was the only one inside the house you could lock – unlocked. She took off her clothes and stepped into the water. In the end, this was where she felt best: lying back in hot water, aware of her body, which felt flawless and uncompromised, especially with the storm raging outside. She saw the corridors of Dickson’s Garden Centre before her, rows of rose bushes, and thought of bees in late spring. Come on then, she thought.

  38

  The windowpane clinked. Just when she thought the last gust had been the strongest, the wind roared even louder. She plunged deeper under the duvet, her bedroom door swung ajar, clatter from the landing. She held on tight to her body, hugging her breasts through the thin fabric of her nightie, putting her hands between her legs, raising her knees as if to brace herself, giving off a smell of bottled herbs. The wind roared in from the Irish Sea. She shook her head to dislodge an image of a big ship, pints of beer and fried snacks sliding over a bar, paintings hanging away from the wall, roulette balls bouncing across a red carpet, a clown on a small stage, off to one side, vomiting into the wings. She swallowed and imagined Bradwen on a blue-edged square, moving exclusively in diagonals. Wearing shorts but with his L and R socks on. They’d slipped down a little. He turned circles on his hands, elbows tucked in, the veins in his neck swollen. Sam was sitting on a chair on the edge of the blue square and barked as his master tumbled through the air, almost flying, and landed straight-legged in the dead centre of a corner before raising one outstretched arm, exposing his armpit. Above the raging of the storm something creaked. It was more tearing than creaking: old, living wood coming free of the earth. She realised that she was no longer thinking about before, her mind was clear of all memories of the husband, the student, her uncle, Christmas with the sweetly perfumed Santa-shaped candles. ‘Ah,’ she said, because that candle was in her head now, burnt down to Santa’s waist, a puddle of red wax on the paper Christmas tablecloth, next to a plate of cauliflower cheese and thinly sliced roast beef. Along with her mother, who could never enjoy Christmas dinner because she was too scared to take her eyes off the candles in the Christmas decoration on top of the TV. She considered getting up. Going downstairs to sit next to the cooker and smoke? Maybe make some tea?

  She shot bolt upright, threw the duvet aside and stood up. She held a hand against the window. She could feel the pressure on it. Things went black for a second; she’d got up too fast. The lights in the distance flickered. No, it was the branches swishing back and forth and blocking out the light as the storm rose and fell. She pulled the door further open and groped her way to the stairs, one hand heavy on the rail of the landing. Downstairs in the living room the stove was still smouldering, a vague red light lit the WELCOME mat at the front door and the boy’s hiking boots, next to the mat.

  She lit the two candles on the windowsill and put the kettle on the hottest plate. The bamboo scraped over the side wall and somewhere a door banged, the door to the pigsty, she could hear the metallic clang of the old-fashioned handle. It wasn’t raining, the window was dry. The water started to boil. She filled a mug and dropped in a tea bag. While the tea brewed, she massaged her forehead and temples, her belly. Nothing. On the outside, there was nothing. She took the packet of cigarettes from the table and lit one. The tea was hot. She burnt her tongue and swore under her breath. Immediately after stubbing out the cigarette, she lit another. She sat on a chair between the table and the cooker and turned her head towards the clock. The wind was making such a racket she couldn’t hear the sharp ticking. It was ten past two. She heard another kind of ticking. It was coming from the living room and when the dog appeared in the kitchen she realised it had been his nails on the wooden stairs. ‘Hey,’ she said. The dog hung his head and approached slowly, contrite, though she couldn’t imagine what he had to be contrite about. ‘Couldn’t you sleep either?’ she asked. Sam looked at her attentively, followed the smoke coming out of her mouth, then laid his head on her knees. His sigh made the bottom hem of her nightie tremble. She stubbed out her cigarette and laid a hand on his head. ‘Where’s your master?’ she whispered. The dog started to whimper softly.

  39

  The next morning there was no wind at all. Bradwen stood next to a fallen oak that was lying with its crown over the stream. He pulled on a branch, holding the saw ready in his other hand. He had already rehung the pigsty door, which had blown off its hinges. She watched him with her belly pressed against the cooker. She held the mug she had drunk tea from hours before under the tap and watered the three flowering plants on the windowsill. Sam ran across the lawn with a branch in his mouth. The cows stood at the garden wall and watched, inquisitive and skittish. She brushed some crumbs off the worktop with a flat hand and sniffed. Was it the kitchen that smelt of old woman or was it her? The coffee pot started bubbling gently.

  ‘I think it’s going to snow,’ the boy said when he came in. ‘It’s got cold.’

  ‘Uh-huh,’ she said without turning.

  ‘Then we’ll go to the mountain.’

  ‘Don’t you have to continue with your path?’

  It was quiet behind her for a second. ‘Sure.’

  ‘But not now?’

  ‘Not now.’

  She sighed.

  ‘I’ve got other things to worry about now.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Rose beds. A Christmas tree.’

  She turned round without moving away from the cooker. ‘A Christmas tree?’

  ‘Yep. It’s almost Christmas.’ He stood next to the table with his hat in his hand. His black hair was stuck to his forehead, there were oak chips on the collar of his coat. Today the L and R socks were red and blue.

  ‘Do I need to wash some clothes for you?’

  ‘You don’t need to,’ he said. ‘But I do have dirty clothes.’

  ‘All right, you dig and I’ll wash.’

  He looked at her but didn’t speak.

  ‘And now I suppose you’d like some coffee.’

  ‘Yes, please.’ Finally he sat down.

  ‘Where’s the dog?’

  ‘Running up and down along the fence of the goose field. He’s been doing it a while.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘No idea.’

  ‘Do you know anything about geese?’

  ‘Not really.’

  She poured a coffee and put it on the table in front of him. ‘Biscuit?’

  ‘Yes, please. Aren’t you having one?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Bradwen,’ she said. �
�Stop it.’

  ‘OK,’ he said. ‘But you haven’t said “ach” yet.’

  She smiled and laid a biscuit next to the coffee mug. Then she walked past him to the sideboard and turned on the radio.

  ‘Yes,’ said the boy, just loud enough. ‘That’s another method.’

  *

  She was standing at the front door to ask him what he wanted washed, but the sight of his bent back restrained her. He was digging, she went to do the washing, hauling herself up the stairs with her left hand on the banister. She went into the bathroom first to take a paracetamol, then crossed the landing. It had been a few days since she’d even been in the study. It was cold, the window above the oak table was up a little. The Collected Poems lay as she’d left it, the note she’d written was a little shaky. She rested three fingers on the page and looked down into the garden. The boy was working systematically: he’d already dug up a large part of the bordered rectangle, furrow by furrow. Now he’d stuck the spade in the ground and was standing at the open door of the old pigsty, looking down into the cellar. There was steam rising from his shoulders, his coat was lying on the garden wall. What did he see there? Be its mattress straight. Since Bradwen had come, she’d hardly given Dickinson a thought. She went over to the mantelpiece, where a brown rectangle with four metal clips was leaning against the wall. Apparently there was something about the portrait the boy didn’t like. She turned it round.

  From the mantelpiece, she walked to the divan to straighten the duvet. Behind the divan was a pile of clothes: jeans, L and R socks, a T-shirt, a couple of pairs of underpants. His rucksack was in the corner. She hesitated, then quickly bundled up the clothes. Before leaving the room she looked out through the small back window. The dog was still running back and forth near the geese, nose to the ground, the birds themselves huddled together near the shelter. The sky was a yellowish grey.

  In the kitchen she squatted down next to the washing machine and put his clothes in one garment at a time. Whether it hung in the kitchen or seeped from the washing machine or anywhere else, the old-woman smell didn’t stand a chance against the rancid pong of his blue and grey socks. He has to go, she thought. Better today than tomorrow. To fill the machine, she stripped the bed in her room and added the duvet cover, sheet and pillowcase to the load. Be its pillow round. On the radio Wham! were singing ‘Last Christmas’.

  40

  This time the red-headed boy at Dickson’s Garden Centre had a very different look on his face. He was wandering the car park in a red Santa hat, helping where help was needed. When he saw Bradwen, who had come out of the exit just behind her carrying a Christmas tree, he stopped in his tracks. She saw him wavering: he could hardly pretend he’d been approaching someone else. It was snowing lightly. All of the garden-centre employees were wearing red Santa hats and there were decorated Christmas trees everywhere, even between the tables in the Coffee Corner. A Christmas carol was playing on the PA system. The roses had been moved to make room for racks full of candles and other Christmas paraphernalia; it took her a while to find them. After picking out twelve rose bushes, she asked Bradwen to choose a Christmas tree, but only because she thought they could plonk it in the corner, decorate it and be done. He took one with roots. That was handy, he said, because you could plant it in the garden in January. When she saw him dragging the tree through the aisles, she realised she’d need baubles and tinsel and fairy lights.

  The pots with the rose bushes rattled on the big trolley; she could barely look at them. Her head was aching.

  ‘All right?’ the redhead asked when she walked past him. ‘Yes, I’ve got help today,’ she said, giving him a sideways glance. She heard Bradwen say, ‘Hi, mate,’ in a rather jovial tone of voice, which undoubtedly meant something. The boy looked away, scanning the car park. Sam, who was sitting in the car, began to bark excitedly.

  *

  Bradwen drove very carefully up the drive; the snow was an inch deep. She sat with her hands on her lap and counted the geese. All four were still there and now, because of the whiteness around them, she saw how filthy they were, how bright the orange of their beaks. The sheep were much blacker than usual. It was only when she looked ahead at the house that she saw the tyre tracks.

  ‘Someone’s been here,’ she said.

  This time there was no note on the door.

  How long since I gave those animals something to eat? she thought. Later, taking the geese a few chunks of bread, she saw that the tyre tracks ran over the field and that the sheep were crowded together near the fence.

  41

  In the morning the snow was two inches deep. The leaves of the rose bushes, which the boy had put down next to the freshly turned soil, were white.

  ‘I have to go to Caernarfon,’ she said after breakfast. As usual, Bradwen had eaten a lot. The coffee was just ready.

  ‘What are we doing there?’

  ‘Me.’

  ‘What are you doing there?’

  ‘None of your business.’

  ‘Do I need to drive?’ He tried not to look hurt.

  ‘No.’

  He didn’t say anything else.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said.

  ‘What do I do?’

  ‘Please yourself. Maybe you should call your parents for once.’

  He sniffed and gestured over one shoulder with a thumb at the staircase on the other side of the wall. ‘Thanks for washing my clothes.’

  She lit a cigarette. ‘Light the stove in the living room and make a fire in your bedroom too if you like.’

  ‘There’s not much wood left.’

  ‘When it’s gone, it’s gone.’

  ‘Shall I decorate the Christmas tree?’

  ‘If you like.’

  ‘Where?’

  She glanced around the kitchen. There was an empty corner next to the sideboard. She gestured with the cigarette. ‘There?’

  ‘That’s a good spot. Then we’ll see it from the living room too. What shall I put it in?’

  She didn’t look at him. She couldn’t look at him. What do you put a Christmas tree with roots in? She stubbed out the cigarette. ‘There might be something in the pigsty or out the back. I don’t know.’

  ‘I’ll find something,’ the boy said.

  The dog scrambled to its feet, walked over to her and began to lick her hand. She started to cry.

  The boy didn’t get up. ‘There’s no need to cry,’ he said. ‘I don’t know why you’re crying, and if I asked, you’d only say “ach” and that wouldn’t get us anywhere. But there’s no need to cry.’

  ‘No,’ she said, sniffing.

  ‘When you get back from Caernarfon, from whatever it is you have to do there, the Christmas tree will be done and the stove will be lit in the living room. I’m going to Waunfawr in a bit, so there’ll be fresh bread too. Not that you’re bothered about eating, but it will be here. And I’m not going to ring my parents. I’m not going to ring anyone, because I’m here now. This afternoon at quarter past five, you’ll sit on the sofa and turn the telly on and watch Escape to the Country, and while you’re doing that, I’ll cook. Fish. You’ll eat it and drink two or three glasses of wine to go with it and maybe after tea we’ll plan a garden together or watch a film. The BBC always show great films around Christmas. Afterwards you’ll go to bed. If you like, I’ll light a fire in your bedroom an hour beforehand. I can take the car and trailer and go for new wood any time I like. I can even pay for it. Sam and I will be sleeping two doors along. We’re here. We’re waiting for the lamb that farmer, Rhys Jones, promised you.’

  She sat down. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘The lamb. He was here yesterday.’

  ‘I saw.’

  ‘He brought hay for the sheep.’

  ‘I saw that too.’

  ‘I keep thinking you’re a gymnast.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘The kind that does floor exercises.’

  ‘That’s a first.’

  ‘When you walk, when you sit, when you’re sa
wing or digging.’ She went to light another cigarette, but didn’t, because then she would have had to smoke it and all she wanted to do was have a bath. To have a bath, then leave. She stood up. ‘You say “we” a lot,’ she said.

  ‘That’s because we’re here together.’

  ‘I think that’s what made me cry.’

  ‘Liar.’

  ‘Yes.’ She left the kitchen. In the bathroom she pressed the last three paracetamol out of the strip and took them with a couple of mouthfuls of cold water.

  *

  She drove very slowly; the narrow roads weren’t gritted and she kept a tight grip on the steering wheel going downhill. The dual carriageway to Caernarfon was gritted, but here, too, the few cars she saw were crawling along, as if everyone expected it to start snowing again at any moment. I mustn’t bask in the security, she thought. Curling up by the stove. Allowing him to take charge. Letting the dog lick my hand. She pulled over in a lay-by and got out of the car without putting on her coat. She dragged herself over a fence, walked a good distance through the snow, then turned round. She looked at her footsteps, she looked at the car, she shivered. This is it, she thought. This is the situation. Her shoes were wet, her toes cold. An empty car by the side of the road, bare trees, hills, cold. A badger that no longer appears; standing in a pond with water up to my waist, no heavy objects in my pockets. The smell of an old woman in my body. This is it. This is the situation.

  42

  Once again, there was no one in the waiting room, which was immediately inside the front door. No receptionist; a bell announced that someone had come in. She sat down on one of the four chairs and waited. After about five minutes, when she still hadn’t been called in, she lit a cigarette. She couldn’t hear any voices on the other side of the surgery door. Now and then people walked past the window, looking in inquisitively. There was a clean ashtray and a pile of magazines on a Formica coffee table.