Well, it had been more ordinary than that. She ran the film again and saw herself walking down the stairs . . .
Why am I doing this? I should never have worn a dress like this, showing off an expanse of scrawny chest and long skinny arms. And my tattoo shows. She regretted having it done, just as her mother had said she would, but she was too stubborn to admit it. Fortunately, the scar on her wrist was covered by her long black gloves. What shall I do with my hands? A drink. She pushed her way past people towards the bar. There in the distance she glimpsed Johnny Whitaker coming in the opposite direction. Her heart pounded. They drew close. ‘Hello,’ she said. He flicked her a glance. ‘Hello.’ Then he continued on his way without a pause. Disappointment ran cold over her.
She went out into the night. A star gleamed in a gap between the clouds and then was gone. Behind her the music pounded. The whole thing had been a mistake. Why had he looked at her like that? A casual glance, then on with whatever he was doing. He had been looking for someone else. And then, at that point of misery, Mara experienced the sudden shift of perspective which made her think, so what? We are so obsessed with people and things. For a moment she had glimpsed another world where it was the space between things which was real. The realm of angels. Objects were gaps, pools of mere nothingness. She saw the angels passing to and fro across the breadth of the universe, transparent, incorporeal, going about their business. All their works were righteous, and yet true compassion was impossible to them, for what did they know about suffering? She looked up and saw the same star coming and going behind the ragged clouds. That which hath been is now, and that which is to be hath already been. Vanity of vanities. She turned and began to make her way back to the college.
‘Mara, Mara!’ It was Rupert with the Someone-Somethings. Were they the ones he had gone off the rails with at Oxford? At his elbow was an attractive woman, cool and blonde in the dim light of the quad. Cordelia Chauffeured-Bentley. Rupert called her again and beckoned, and she went to join them. This was his sister, Rachel – ‘Hello’ – Mara traced a fleeting resemblance – and her fiancé Marcus; and these were several Oxford friends – ‘Hello, hi’ – whose names vanished into the night as Mara failed to commit them to memory. She was too busy watching them. And this was Cordelia Shefford-Bentley. Rupert had his eyes on Mara, and she was obliged to turn her amusement into a friendly smile. They all smiled back, drawing in closer than she liked. ‘What a wonderful dress! We’ve heard so much about you! Doesn’t she have wonderful hair! Aren’t you studying women prophets or something? It sounds terribly interesting!’
They came from another land, from her mother’s country. They would always bring wine and flowers. They would never forget the thank-you note. I’m only a half-caste. Could I join in if I tried? How wonderful to meet you all! No. But she could at least be pleasant, and not go scything off through them with knives sticking out of her wheels like Boadicea’s chariot. ‘You must stay with us,’ they were urging her. ‘Don’t be silly! Of course you must.’
‘Please please please,’ begged Rupert. She felt his arms go round her waist. A flash went off in the night. The moment of the photograph. ‘Good God, you’ve got a tattoo.’
‘Don’t be rude, Rupert,’ said his sister. ‘I think it’s rather beautiful.’ They all peered and agreed. Really rather beautiful. This was how her mother had consoled herself. At least it wasn’t vulgar.
‘Are you coming with us or not?’ persisted Rupert.
‘Oh, all right.’ An ungracious grinding of gears.
‘You can share him with me,’ said the silvery Cordelia. ‘You’ll have to divide yourself between us, Rupert. Shall you mind that?’
‘Of course he won’t. Come on, let’s go and see this cabaret.’
Rupert hung back. ‘Do you visualize that division as vertical or horizontal?’ he said to Mara with a sort of laboured pedantry which made her wonder.
‘Horizontal,’ she replied, glimpsing the conversation’s next turn.
‘And which half would you prefer?’ He looked into her eyes. ‘Above or below the waist?’
‘Below. Definitely.’
The Someone-Somethings laughed. Rupert was thumped on the back. The group began moving again. Rupert waved them off.
‘We’ll catch you up.’ They glided away with laughter trailing behind them. Rupert turned back to Mara again. ‘What lies behind your preference for my lower half, might I inquire?’ Again that pernickety tone. It occurred to Mara with a flicker of amusement that he might be drunk, drunk in that kind of lucid, coherent way which continues to expound Heidegger whilst sliding slowly down the wall into oblivion.
‘The fact that you wouldn’t be able to boss me around.’
‘Thank you. Thank you, Mara.’ Well, she thought, you ought to be grateful. I waited till the others had gone before saying it. He took her in his arms. ‘And what about my sexual prowess?’ His face was inches from hers.
‘I can’t say I’ve ever thought about it.’
‘I’m painfully aware of that.’ He was definitely drunk. The fumes on his breath touched her face. ‘You think my testosterone has been mystically transubstantiated into holy water. The moment the episcopal hands are laid on – bang! – the male member drops off.’
She stared at him in amazement. Easy does it, Rupert, old thing! said the caption.
‘You’re so pure you believe that we priests are like the angels in heaven: they neither marry nor whatever the hell the other thing is.’
‘ “Nor are they given in marriage.” And you’re not a priest yet.’
‘Was that an invitation?’
Her denial was swallowed up by his mouth. She felt his tongue and his teeth, and his hands – steady on, old chap! – had they not been the hands of a bishop’s son, could almost have been described as groping her. She felt them kneading her skinny backside and pressing her hard into his groin. Bloody hell. The ordaining bishop would have his work cut out. And rather belatedly she thought to struggle free. He released her. They stood looking at one another. Now what happens? she wondered. Was he about to apologize? ‘I’ve been behaving like a dashed brute,’ Rupert blurted. Or: ‘I’ve wanted to do that ever since I first saw you!’
‘You’re supposed to slap my face,’ he reminded her.
‘I’m wearing gloves. It’ll have to be an upper cut instead.’
‘I’ll risk it.’ He tried to kiss her again, but she squirmed away.
Mara smiled at the photograph. She was still surprised how arousing those few seconds had been. Having tried sex once at fifteen and decided it was horrible, and then again at eighteen to check she had been right, this short grapple with Rupert had been a revelation. Even now when she chanced upon the memory unexpectedly, she felt that losing-your-footing-on-a-rockface sensation in the pit of her stomach. Nothing would come of it, of course. Except that she felt she actually liked Rupert, now she had seen him briefly off the rails with his halo crooked. He had appeared in her room the following day making strangely disjointed conversation. It was some time before she realized with a burst of inward amusement that he was angling for information about the previous night.
‘I’m surprised you have the nerve to face me,’ she said, assuming a look of cold outrage.
‘Mea culpa.’ He smote his breast. ‘The fact is, Mara, I only have a very hazy recollection of last night. Charming, but hazy.’
‘And you’re worried about a paternity suit?’
He laughed, then was very still for a moment as he caught sight of her face. This had been too much for her. Her hand went to her mouth and covered her smile.
‘Don’t do that to me, you dreadful woman.’ Then there had been a pause. Embarrassment crept up on them and their eyes wandered around the room. ‘Look, anyway, I’m sorry if I . . . if you . . .’ She looked at him and saw him run his hand through his hair. ‘I wouldn’t like you to think . . .’ His awkwardness infected her and she looked away again. What could she say to reassure him that couldn’t be co
nstrued as further invitation? Her hand was fiddling with her plait as they stood looking anywhere but at one another.
‘Don’t worry,’ she muttered.
‘Right. Well . . . Thanks.’
She glanced at him and saw his relief. There was another pause. They were still stranded in the middle of a swamp of embarrassment.
He recovered before she did, taking her hand and asking gravely, ‘How was it for you?’ She glared at him. Don’t push your luck, Anderson. ‘The earth moved?’
‘Sorry, Rupert. I’m afraid you score negative on the Richter scale.’
‘Thank you, darling. It’s reassuring to know that whatever the situation, I can count on you to say the most wounding thing imaginable.’ But he gave her hand a friendly squeeze and left.
She saw now that this exchange had restored their relationship to its original footing. He need not fear she had been swept away by his prowess. She need not fear he would lunge at her in deserted corridors.
The second photograph was of her and Johnny. She leant it against the books beside the snapshot. The two could not have been more different. They could have been of events over half a century apart, for the second was a portrait in sepia. There had been a photographer posing couples against a background of folding screen and parlour palms. ‘Come on,’ she remembered Johnny saying. She pulled back, not wanting a formal photograph which might whisper ‘Couple.’ But she had given way suddenly at the thought that her reluctance might arouse his suspicions.
She gazed at the result. It was unnerving. She studied the patterned screen, the palm in its brass pot, herself sitting stiffly in the chair with Johnny behind, his hand resting on the chair back like a Victorian patriarch. Had they agreed beforehand not to smile? She thought they had. At any rate, her rigid stare had the authentic look of family portraits of the last century. Johnny’s attempt at a straight face was less convincing. She looked at it closely. This was the expression she had never trusted, that having-just-smiled or just-about-to-smile look. How false photography could be. It posed as reality. This is how it was at that particular moment – she sat like this, he stood like that. The facts were indisputable.
But it had all seemed so different. The two realities could scarcely be reconciled. Some time after she had joined Rupert and the Someone-Somethings the world had taken on that charming, but hazy quality characteristic of a couple of cocktails on an empty stomach. Her recollections from then on were no longer like watching a film. No. When she thought back to those patchy memories, she was not watching herself. She was a single point of awareness, concentrating in an unsteady world like a ship’s steward with a tray of drinks in a storm.
She was outside again and Johnny was there.
‘I saw you earlier,’ she said.
‘I know. I didn’t recognize you. I passed you and thought, ‘There’s someone I know but don’t recognize because she’s dressed up.’
She turned her head slowly away to hide her joy. Her brain seemed to swim round, lagging half a second behind. He had not been ignoring her, then. She tilted her head back and gazed at the sky. The clouds raced on and on, lit up by a hidden moon. Her hair slid over her shoulders and brushed her back, warm as a shawl. She felt his finger touch her upper arm. The tattoo. He laughed.
‘What are you like?’
‘You’ve got one,’ she accused drunkenly. ‘But I suppose that’s different.’
He laughed at her again and rested his hand on her bare shoulder. She looked back up at the sky. If she stood still, he would keep his hand there. The music went on behind them.
‘You know,’ she said, ‘if you look at one star long enough without blinking, it seems to spin.’ I noticed this as a child, lying out on the hillside up above my uncle’s farm.
‘It’s a well-known optical illusion,’ he said. Was it? But it had been her secret discovery. ‘You know what causes it?’ She stared, and he took her hands with a smile. ‘In my case, about six pints of beer. Ha’away, let’s dance.’ They began to move to the music.
He doesn’t believe me. ‘Try it,’ she said, but he only laughed at her. ‘It’s possible to be drunk and right.’ But her words seemed to be wading through deep water.
‘Ah, but the difficulty is convincing people,’ he answered. And they spun slowly like the stars, with her watching his face, while behind him passed trees and buildings and lights, trees, buildings, lights, until they were the only beings in the whole world, with the universe wheeling round them.
Mara paused and drummed her fingers on the desk. She was having trouble with the chronology. There were several other memories, but they were like a handful of holiday snaps that had got out of order, shuffled together in a drawer instead of pasted in the album. Only one stood out like an unmistakable landmark. She felt her scalp crawl at the thought, and she was standing again in the hallway under the skinny cherubs seeing Joanna coming. She was wearing a long blue ‘Queen of Heaven’ type dress, hair flowing and tears on her face, crying, ‘Johnny, Johnny, I’ve got to talk to you!’ and Mara turned and walked away. Snakes hissed and coiled in her head as she went. I will not stay and fight over him. Out under the night sky again, and there was the fishwife still biding her time, magnificent arms gleaming in the moonlight. You’re so bleeding lah-di-dah, she said, walking off like that; while somewhere else there was a six-year-old weeping for a friend, any friend. She hugged her arms round herself as she stood on the edge of the light looking blindly across the dark hollow of the night.
‘You’re bloody useless, you are,’ said a voice behind her. Johnny. She did not turn. ‘You’re supposed to protect me.’ The words stung. So that’s why he wanted my company.
‘I imagine you can take care of yourself.’ She continued to stare into the emptiness. His lips were at her ear.
‘Mmm. I’d much rather you took care of me, though.’ This brought her head round fast. The crude tone had been unmistakable; and yet as she looked at him . . . Of course she was mistaken. He was not Nigel, after all.
‘Well, you managed to escape.’
‘Eventually. Why me, O Lord?’ He made a despairing gesture.
‘Because you’re so good with us lame ducks.’ She bit her lip. It was as though the phrase had been lying there in the undergrowth, tense and sprung, waiting for an unwary foot.
‘Lame duck? Who said that?’ The words had obviously jolted his memory. ‘Did someone call you that, or is that how you see yourself?’
She stood cursing herself and hoped he would not remember and realize she had been eavesdropping. She waited for him to laugh. He laughed.
‘So you think I’m practising my pastoral skills on you?’ She made no reply. ‘You seem to have a very low opinion of yourself. Unless’ – he put a finger under her chin and tilted her face up till he was staring down into her eyes – ‘you have a very high opinion of me. Which would be a big mistake, sweetie.’ She jerked away in scorn. ‘Come on,’ he said, ‘I’ll buy you another drink, and you can tell me about the stars.’
They’re all picking on me! wailed a little voice inside her. She snuffed it out in disgust. I sound like Joanna, she thought, as she let him lead her away.
That’s why I dislike her so much, Mara realized as she stared at the photograph. She uses tactics I don’t allow myself to use. I could cry and say ‘Johnny, Johnny, help me’, except that I never would. The people we hate most are always shadows of our worst selves. She put the photographs back in the drawer and tried once again to concentrate on her work. The others would all be at Rupert’s party by now. Rain pattered on the window and she sighed.
CHAPTER 9
There was a promise of snow in the air. Mara turned her back on the station lights and began to walk the two miles through the dark to her parents’ house. From overhead came the small shiftings and whisperings of the trees that lined the road. The world was holding its breath for the coming snow and for Christmas.
Christmas. Red and gold. Green and white. The holly with its berries in the
vicarage garden. White candles in the dark church, and the gold of chocolate pennies or angels’ wings. With each homeward step a childlike excitement mounted in her, as though she believed it could all be as it once had been. Sitting in bed hugging her knees, Hester in the other bed, her eyes shining as their mother read them The Tailor of Gloucester. The little mice sewing away at Christmas as the tailor lay ill. And in the church tomorrow night the congregation gathering for midnight Mass. She saw the dark-robed figures in the chancel silhouetted against the glowing reredos, moving silently, their hands raised as they lit the candles one by one in the candelabra overhead. One flame and another and another, black figures on gold. And in the vestry her father would be standing in his robes glancing into the mirror, the light sliding over his white cope and the secret gold of the lining gleaming and vanishing as he moved. She had not been home for Christmas for three years, but she knew that the next few days would be full of the old hostilities. They ran like cracks from foundation to rooftop, and her mother with all her skill would never paper over them. There would be silences like loaded weapons or words like biting steel. And worst of all, Hester’s absence, which no one would mention.
I can’t do this, she thought. I can’t bear it. She dropped her bag and pressed her hands over her mouth to stop herself crying out loud. I should have stayed at college. The City loomed in her mind as she had seen it from the departing train, with its buildings rising up out of the freezing fog. The whole of the north had been clenched in a bitter frost, and the fog had worsened until she could see nothing from the window. The train could have been travelling down an endless white tunnel. She stood now under the trees. The branches stirred a little and she remembered the coming snow. Then some words appeared in her mind like a framed sampler. Try To Be Nice. Her mother’s motto. It had hung invisibly on every wall of her childhood, and she had tried. She had been nice enough to burst a blood vessel, only nobody had ever noticed. Hester’s niceness eclipsed hers, just as her prettiness had done, and in the end Mara had been driven to nastiness just so that she would not vanish altogether. But Hester would not be home this Christmas. Is that what I’m trying to do – take Hester’s place? The thought stifled her. It would be like wearing Hester’s clothes – too small, too short. A scream welled up in her. It was pointless. Her father’s study door would remain closed against her. I’ve never been able to please him. I’ve tried and tried. I was never able to displease him, either. He didn’t care enough. He’s never cared about me. It was always Hester. She pressed her hands against her mouth so hard she began to taste blood. Then first flakes began to fall. Well, I’m here now. No point going back. Why not try to be nice? She picked up her bag and began to walk again as the snow floated down.
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