‘Long walk back to Belgium,’ I joked when he finally arrived.
Rufus doesn’t usually bark at people but I had to shush him.
‘Sorry?’
‘I understand you live in Belgium.’
‘No, I’m in London these days. Though I did …’
Rufus barked again so I missed the rest. It was irrelevant anyway. Clearly Belgium was another of Ollie’s fantasies.
‘Did you sort out the confusion?’ I said.
‘Sorry?’
‘About my friend staying here in 1976.’
‘It’s a puzzle,’ Mr Quarles said, reluctant to make Ollie look any more foolish. ‘But I’m happy to take Mr Moore’s word for it.’
When I reconstruct the events of that weekend, I find it hard to be sure what I was thinking or feeling at particular points. But perhaps you’ll believe me when I say that it was then, on the drive, next to the rotting blackberries, with Mr Quarles, that I understood for the first time what a liar Ollie was. I should have seen it years ago. The man was false as water. He lied as easily as he breathed.
I felt sad but vindicated. If he couldn’t be trusted to tell the truth, I owed him nothing.
‘Well, I’d better not keep you,’ I said.
‘It’s all right,’ Mr Quarles said, ‘I’m waiting for Mr Moore.’
‘Really?’
‘We’re going to church together.’
‘Church?’ I said. ‘Since when did Ollie go to church?’
‘He went last week, apparently.’
‘With Daisy?’
‘On his own.’
‘Christ. Has he had a religious conversion?’
‘He said he found it restful there. He wasn’t planning to go today but then he felt sorry for Mr Quarles.’
I’d gone up to our room to undress for a shower and Em had followed. It felt awkward being alone with her after last night, but the bathroom was occupied — by Milo or one of the girls, I presumed — so for now I had no choice.
‘Why sorry?’
‘Weren’t you there when he told us? It’s an awful story. Mr Quarles lost his whole family in an accident. His wife and two boys. It happened up here somewhere.’
‘Recently?’
‘Twenty or thirty years ago. All the same.’
‘A car crash no doubt. That’s what the locals are famous for — bad driving and incest.’
‘They were drowned. Mr Quarles should have been with them but some problem came up so his wife took the boat out without him. She was an experienced sailor, he said. But a storm got up and they capsized.’
Em sat down and rootled in her handbag.
‘Now do you understand why he might want to go to church?’ she said, peering at her mobile phone. ‘Ollie too, given … you know.’
That would explain it, of course: Ollie seeking solace in his hour of need. The thought made me angry, nonetheless. I didn’t like to think of him as weak.
‘Church isn’t going to cure him,’ I said. ‘Or bring back Mr Quarles’s family.’
‘No, but it might help them cope.’
Typical Em. So calm and understanding. Sometimes her halo infuriates me.
‘If God gave me a terminal illness or killed my family,’ I said, ‘I wouldn’t pray to Him, I’d burn His fucking church down.’
‘What’s wrong with you this morning?’ she said, looking up from her phone. ‘Did you lose your little race?’
‘That’s nothing to do with it. I hate people using faith as a comfort blanket.’
‘Why shouldn’t they? Faith’s empowering. You could do with more of it yourself, Ian.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘Faith in yourself, faith in your friends. You’re too suspicious.’
‘There’s a lot to be suspicious of. Trust people and they betray you.’
‘Have I betrayed you?’
‘You’re an exception.’
To my relief, she went back to playing with her mobile. Betrayal was too near the bone.
‘Still no damn signal.’ She held the face of her mobile up. ‘Magda could have been trying to get hold of me.’
My socks were sweaty and hard to roll off. I sat on the edge of the bed to make it easier.
‘Forget Magda,’ I said. ‘Give yourself a break.’
‘If you’d seen the state she was in —’
‘So what? You’re not on duty. You’re supposed to be relaxing.’
‘How can I relax, with all these cobwebs and creaky floorboards and weapons on the wall? It’s spooky here. Don’t you find it spooky?’
‘It’s too hot to be spooky.’
‘Well, it gives me the creeps.’
My socks were finally off. I stood up and dropped my boxer shorts, turning away from Em as I did, in case my nakedness gave me away.
‘ You were late to bed last night,’ she said, more teasing than reproachful.
‘I know,’ I said, wrapping a towel round my waist.
‘What time was it?’
‘Dunno. I lost track. Milo was there. We were talking. Then Archie came in.’
‘And Daisy?’
‘Yes, Daisy was up, too.’ I heard the bolt slide across the hall, just in time. ‘That’s someone coming out of the bathroom.’
‘Are we staying tonight?’ she said, before I could make it out the door.
‘That’s the arrangement.’
‘They’d understand if we left,’ she said. ‘I’ve work to do. Your hearing’s on Wednesday.’ She stood up and put her arms round me. ‘We could beat the traffic and have tomorrow to ourselves.’
‘It would look rude,’ I said, pulling away.
‘No one would miss us. We could drop in on your parents and have tea. I know they’d like it.’
‘On a bank holiday weekend? They’ll be in Blackpool with all the other morons.’
‘When did your parents ever go to Blackpool? You always make out they’re working class, when they’re not. Your dad had that job at —’
‘I don’t want to see them. Anyway, I promised Ollie we’d stay.’
‘Ach, you boys and your stupid bet.’
I opened the door. She let me go. I’d got away with it.
Under the thin, hot spray, I took my punishment. Let me be pricked to death with burning needles. Let me be irradiated. Let me be washed in gulfs of liquid fire.
It was Em who suggested a swim — anything to escape the house. Breakfast had been perfunctory (cereal and fruit) and lunch just sandwiches, the heat killing all appetite. We lolled under the parasol, only Milo’s girls — sealed in factor 80 sunscreen — stirring from the shade. Even Ollie was relaxed for once, as if church had purged his nervous energy. Beyond the orchard, a heat haze trembled over the stubble. It was a day to make you dream of freezer shelves, blizzards, the down draught from helicopters, the spangled fur of huskies.
Archie was asleep or had gone off to his gig. No one seemed to know. We were all far too hot to care.
‘Walk anyone?’ Em said.
Silence.
‘Game of boules?’
Silence.
‘How about a dip?’
‘Now you’re talking.’
It was the prospect of cold that drew us — even the sun at its hottest couldn’t warm the North Sea. Ollie, taking charge, consulted his map to find a beach that ought to be quiet. Milo swept the girls off to get their swimsuits. Em gently berated me in the bedroom, whispering that she’d rather we were driving home. I kissed her on the cheek, like Judas. For me the point of the excursion was to get some time alone with Daisy.
We went in two cars, Milo driving his hosts while Bethany and Natalie came with us. They’d taken a shine to Em, who kept them going with nursery rhymes, riddles, I-spy games and silly jokes. Not knowing the way, I followed Milo, my eyes on Daisy in the back seat. Once or twice she turned and waved but there was no special affection, nothing for me. I was still brooding about her performance at lunch, when Milo said he feared he’
d outstayed his welcome and was wondering about heading back. Good idea, I thought. But Daisy would have none of it, seizing his hand and begging Ollie to ‘make sweet Milo and his lovely girls please, please stay another night'. I ought to have been feeling happy — it was me, not Milo, she’d slept with last night — but I needed some flag or token of her love.
The lanes were narrow and deep, and it was half an hour before we saw the sea.
My idea of a beach comes from childhood holidays in Bridlington: donkeys, ice creams, yellow sand, silent yachts out in the bay. I didn’t expect to find a beach like that near Badingley. But nor was I ready for the bleakness. It’s true that I arrived full of bad feeling, angry at Daisy, irritated with Em, jealous of Milo and dismayed by Ollie. But the melancholy of the coastline owed nothing to my mood.
We drew up near a ruined church, the girls leaping out before I’d killed the engine, frustrated, as we all were, by how long it had taken to arrive. The sea lay straight ahead, beyond the church, like a flat grey mirror, but Ollie said the sand cliffs were too steep at that point and led us off diagonally, round the edge of an open field. From there a path bent seaward through gorse and bracken. The girls ran excitedly ahead, Ollie — self-appointed leader — struggling to keep up. Em took my hand and smiled, grateful for the hint of breeze. Daisy and Milo were lagging behind; after his announcement last night, they had business to discuss. I mustn’t be impatient. Our moment would come.
The sea took its colour from the blue above, but a murky brown showed through, like old paint beneath a new coat.
At a stile, we entered a bird sanctuary or nature reserve, I’m not sure which — all I noticed was the sign: EXTREME FIRE DANGER — NO BARBECUES OR CAMPFIRES. The bracken was tinder under our feet, and I could imagine the whole lot going up in flames. Two sticks rubbed together would be enough. Or a metal heel striking flint. Or a dropped cigarette stub. The known world had turned flimsy and combustible.
Up ahead Ollie and the girls drew to a halt. When we reached them, we saw why. The path petered out in air; from the sheared-off sand cliff, it was a twenty-foot drop to the beach below. Ollie and I were for jumping, but the others overruled us, so back we tracked, curving inland again, till freshly trodden bracken showed a path off right and we descended gently to the shore. We took off our trainers and flip-flops, digging our toes into the pebbly sand and hearing the sea’s repeated slap-and-swish.
‘Great,’ we all said, ‘really great,’ but it was not.
Plastic bottles had washed up on the shoreline. Jellyfish drifted in the shallows like polythene bags. But the real killer was the wooden sign: NO SWIMMING: DANGEROUS CURRENTS. Ollie, shame-faced, was apologetic — he’d been here thirty years ago and ought to have remembered the rip tide. I wandered in up to my knees but no further, the current tugging at my feet. Despite my fear, it was tempting to give in, let go, be carried out past the breakers to the immense, cathartic cold. From the shallows, I threw stones for Rufus, careful not to land them too far out.
Offshore, two white buoys held steadfast against the wash. What was their purpose? I wondered. To provide moorings? Or serve as a warning? And if the latter, a warning of what? I could remember, as a boy, being given a little paperback called I-Spy at the Seaside, which included a description of buoys marking the place of wrecks ('always painted green, with the word WRECK in white letters'). They carried a score of 20 if you spied one, as much as for spotting a lighthouse or a seal. The I-Spy books were hard to get hold of by the time I was born but my mother picked them up at jumble sales and I became a collector, frustrated only by my failure to acquire numbers 29 (People in Uniform) and 35 (Everyday Machines). I carried them round with me constantly, eager to acquire fresh points. I-Spy became my nickname at school — I-Spy Ian, watcher and sleuth.
Getting into the spirit, I invented an I-spy game for Natalie and Bethany: three points for spotting a crab, two for a cuttlefish, one for a minnow. For thirty seconds they were interested, then boredom set in.
‘Hold my hands, girls,’ Em said, taking over. Beyond them, Milo and Ollie stood in the shallows, knee-deep in divorce law by the sound of it; if Ollie resented the intrusion — divorce wasn’t his field — he was too polite to show it. Daisy, meanwhile, had wandered off, beachcombing along the shingle.
With the others distracted, I sidled after her. Beyond the horizon lay Denmark and beyond Denmark the Arctic, its icebergs shrinking in the global stew.
‘Oh, it’s you,’ she said, feigning surprise when I caught her up — she couldn’t have failed to hear me scrunching over the shingle.
A bra strap had fallen from her shoulder and she absent-mindedly pulled it back. Her other hand was full of gleanings.
‘What have you got?’ I said.
‘Amber. Driftwood. Gulls’ feathers. Flotsam and jetsam. What is flotsam and jetsam? You’re the teacher.’
‘Flotsam’s washed-up cargo or wreckage. Jetsam’s stuff the crew throw overboard to lighten the load.’
‘So flotsam’s accidentally lost and jetsam’s deliberately discarded.’
‘Exactly,’ I said.
‘Well, you learn something every day.’
I glanced behind. No one had moved. ‘What else have you learned?’ I said. ‘Dunno,’ she said, not with me. ‘What did you learn last night?’ I said. ‘Last night?’ she said, thinking it a game. ‘Last night I learned … that my husband can be extremely argumentative.’
‘You knew that already,’ I said. ‘You also learned about Milo going to New York.’ ‘I did. Worse luck.’ ‘And later?’ ‘Later?’
‘You know what I mean by later.’ Three waves broke in the silence.
‘I don’t want to talk about it,’ she said, looking nervously towards the others. ‘I was drunk.’ ‘You were wonderful.’ ‘You were rough.’ ‘I wanted you so badly.’ ‘We lost our heads.’ ‘I didn’t lose mine,’ I said. ‘Don’t say that. It makes it worse.’ ‘It’s what I’ve always wanted.’ ‘That doesn’t make it forgivable.’ ‘Don’t go all moral on me.’
She flinched, as though I’d implied she’d been a slut on the sofa. I mumbled and mammered, trying to explain, but she turned away and bent to gather some bladderwrack. ‘It’s like bubble wrap,’ she said, popping a black polyp. ‘I’m being serious,’ I said.
‘And I’m being practical, Ian. We’re with other people. End of story.’
‘It’s not the end, it’s the beginning. We made love.’ ‘That wasn’t love.’
‘It was for me.’
‘We’d been drinking. It wasn’t real.’
‘It’s more real than anything I’ve ever done.’
I reached for her hand but she pulled away, spilling stones and feathers.
‘Don’t,’ she said, kneeling on the shingle to gather them up, ‘the others will see.’
I turned to look. High in the thinning cliffs, martins swooped out of their hatches. Below them — leafless, broken, eerily naked — salt-worn tree trunks lay like corpses in the sand. No one was near. Milo’s girls were coming our way but still fifty yards off.
‘I know you feel bad towards Ollie,’ I said, kneeling to help her.
‘Not just Ollie, Em.’
‘What people don’t know can’t hurt them.’
‘I don’t believe that. Anyway, it’s no excuse.’
‘I’ve stopped wanting Em. There’s no desire any more. You came before her. You still do.’
‘That’s silly, Ian. You two have a life together.’
‘Not after last night.’
‘Stop going on about last night. It didn’t mean anything. Get that in your thick skull, will you?’
As Milo’s girls ran up, she brandished a stone, holding it to the sun. The stone had a hole in it. Lemmel stones we call them in the Pennines.
‘Look,’ she said, performing for them, ‘a stone with no heart.’
I wandered off, down to the tide, letting the surf wash the grit from my toes. Which was worse: to be called thick, or to be tol
d our lovemaking had no meaning? Mr Nobody, that was me — a nothing man who’d had nothing sex with a woman who felt nothing for him. I’d been used then chucked away.
‘You all right?’ Ollie said, catching up.
‘I’m ready to head back,’ I said, wishing we’d never come — not to the coast, not to Badingley, not at all.
‘The quickest route’s along the beach. Daisy’s leading the way, look.’
And so she was, her golden legs striding off, with Milo, Em and the girls close behind.
We headed after them, through the shingle below the sand cliffs. According to Ollie, several feet of land fell in the sea each year. He could remember a house standing on the cliffs when he was last here. Erosion was a natural process.
‘No bollocks about global warming, please.’
‘Certainly not,’ I said. ‘I’ll leave that to Milo.’
Clouds lined the horizon, the first we’d seen in days. Wafts of sage came from the clifftop and ozone from the sea. But the heat felt oppressive, runnels of sweat seeping down my back. Natalie and Bethany had stopped to paddle again. Two stick figures stood beyond them, fuzzy in sea fret — Milo and Daisy it must be. She’d surely not tell him what had happened last night, but I imagined her mocking me, the nerd from Ilkeston, with his clumsy credulity. Or perhaps, since I meant nothing to her, she would tell him, and they’d laugh together at my crassness. Perhaps she’d done it with him, too, and that had meant something. She might have fucked me purely to spite him, after he’d told her he was going to New York. Whatever the truth, they were close now. The mist half obscured them but I could see that they were walking arm in arm.
The Last Weekend Page 18
