All she said was, ‘Please excuse – I need to sleep.’
‘Of course. You’ve had a rough day.’
‘Goodnight, Odette.’ Harry went across to her. ‘Don’t forget our Tuesday date. I’ll pick you up around seven.’ He reached for her shoulders to kiss her goodbye.
Odette backed away, pallid, then gave a nod, her gaze still turned to the window, as if following the invisible trail of the disappearing owl.
A little later, after Harry had bounced away down the stairs, Mitzi glanced into the study, where Odette, sitting on the camp bed, was combing her hair with slow, meditative gestures. Something about her eyes told Mitzi this was not the time to ask what had frightened her. If she wanted to talk, she would talk; if not tonight, then maybe tomorrow. And Odette would certainly be there tomorrow.
8
In the morning, soon after sunrise, the swan greeted Mitzi with an enthusiastic honk. The air smelled of frost and across the bare branches of the chestnut tree drifted the ringing of diverse, distant chapel bells, tangling together in a gleaming chorus. Mitzi knelt to examine the swan’s wounds, which seemed to be healing well. At least she had no fear now that the bird would lash out at her.
‘You want to go out?’ she asked. ‘I’m off to do an interview, I’ll be back this afternoon.’
The swan clattered her bill and flapped her wings; Mitzi ducked the outstretched snowy power of them. After opening the window, she lifted Odette onto the sill; the swan paused, judging the air, then sprang. Mitzi watched her gain altitude. There was no sign of any owl in the chestnut tree – only Professor Maggie downstairs emerging to untether her bike at that very moment and watching, incredulous, as the swan soared up towards the clear sky. Mitzi dived away from the window, wondering if Professor Maggie had any contact with Robert’s letting agent. And now she had to go and see Robert himself…
Shortly before twelve Mitzi unchained her bicycle, buckled on her helmet and programmed Robert Winter’s address into her phone’s sat-nav app. He had given her detailed instructions about how to find the house, but it seemed so complex that a backup wouldn’t hurt.
The streets were still relatively quiet, though the pavements were well populated with strolling tourists. Mitzi veered to the left, past the front of Duke’s College and its chapel, the grey Grecian colonnade of the art gallery and, soon, the little brown signpost to the station. Her bag jumped about in the basket each time she struck unevenness in the road. She tried to focus on the questions she must ask her landlord, rather than the topics she had to be careful to avoid.
The hospital came into view close by; she navigated the roundabout and pedalled on, out into the countryside. Her legs began to twinge with extra effort: the flat landscape was giving way to undulating hills dappled with woodland. It was somewhere here that Robert Winter lived. Mitzi enjoyed the deepening quiet, the clarity of the air, the still brightness of the morning’s last dusting of frost on hedgerow twigs.
Mitzi knew she was still a country girl at heart. She and Harry grew up in Dorset, in a village that Thomas Hardy was rumoured to have depicted. Although as teenagers the two of them grumbled with their school friends that there was nowhere to go and nothing to do, Mitzi had never wholly adjusted to city life, not even Cygnford, which couldn’t be called a grand-scale metropolis. She visited London only when work demanded it. With Pete, she’d spent more time there, visiting galleries and theatres and talking about whether they might, hypothetically, someday, set up home in one of the more affordable – on Pete’s salary – outer suburbs. Mitzi nevertheless knew that she was not for London, or it for her. She would awake to find she’d been dreaming of open fields, sunken ancient lanes between dappled green hedgerows, the sea in the distance and her father carrying her on his swimming-broadened shoulders towards the beach for an afternoon playing on the sand.
She stopped herself thinking about her father; she had a job to do. She passed the entrance to Anderbury Wood and swept down a wide, curving road into the valley. At the next cluster of houses she found a half-concealed left turn and followed it through a low avenue of beech, oak and hawthorn trees, which in summer would form a green tunnel, but for winter was an elongated basket of tawny twigs, luminous with melting frost. She had never seen this road before. Gradually it was narrowing and growing bumpier. Mitzi jolted in the saddle, but now she could glimpse the terracotta hint of a brick building through the barren trees.
Robert had told her to turn right at the white fence; there she dismounted. The road became a gravel track, then rounded a bend and at last she saw the house: a bungalow covered with a tangle of creeper stems. In front lay a well-kept patch of garden and to one side a building that looked like a garage, though an old red Mini was parked outside rather than inside it. Mitzi gazed at the scene for a moment, then went forward to ring the bell.
‘Mitzi,’ said the same voice she had heard on the telephone, now even warmer and more affable. ‘You found your way perfectly.’
Mitzi fastened the lock onto her bicycle wheel. ‘It’s wonderful out here, I can hardly believe it.’ She turned, flushed from bending, and smiled at Robert Winter.
She’d been expecting a man of fifty, but her landlord appeared to be in his late thirties, dark and big-boned, wearing a chocolate and cream chunky sweater and immaculate, well-pressed trousers. Smile lines webbed the corners of his dark eyes.
‘What can I get you to drink, Mitzi?’
It took Mitzi a moment to utter the words, ‘I’d love a nice cup of tea, please.’
Following him, she stepped across the threshold. The cottage was virtually an extension of her flat. The living room’s longest wall was coated from floor to ceiling with abundant bookshelves; she noticed, at eye level, three more leather-bound volumes of fairy tales, just like the one she had found in the flat. Here they were rubbing shoulders with copies of the Talmud, Sufi poetry and the complete works of Sigmund Freud. The top shelf held a row of large clay pots of various sizes, glazed brown, green and blue. They looked almost alive. She could imagine them bending, twisting, assessing the goings-on in this room like birdwatchers observing the human world instead.
‘How about a herbal tea?’ Robert suggested. ‘Come and choose one. And do call me Rob, by the way – everybody does.’
Mitzi selected lime blossom from his kitchen cupboard, then set up her voice recorder on the coffee table in front of the open fire, where the young flames were stretching out experimental fingers between fresh logs. Woodsmoke, warm and delicious, reached her nostrils; behind the scent, a hint of damp seemed to be hiding. The armchair was saggy and soft, with a blanket draped over it, perhaps to conceal the places where the fabric was wearing thin; piles of paper and towers of books dotted the place like molehills, while plants hunting for air and light took up every windowsill. There was no sign of a television and the computer on the desk was dark and inactive. This house felt unworldly, removed from mainstream life; a feeling, Mitzi remembered, that might indicate someone living there alone.
‘You left your lovely leather chair in the flat,’ she noted.
‘I can take it away if you prefer.’
‘Oh, I love it,’ she said quickly – the last thing she wanted was to lose her comfortable furniture. ‘I’m just surprised you didn’t bring it here.’
‘It’s a bit college-y for this place,’ he mused. ‘And it wouldn’t fit in the Mini. So, what would you like to do? We can eat first, then be professional, we can talk first and then eat, or we can talk over lunch. What do you think?’
‘Maybe we can do the interview first, then eat, and if anything else comes up later then we can record some more.’ Glancing along the nearest shelf, she spotted Jung, Marx and Krishnamurti. Something told her this was going to be a longer interview than she’d expected.
‘I love the pots,’ she remarked as he handed her a mug that matched them.
‘Thanks.’ He settled down opposite, legs extended towards the fireplace. ‘That’s my main subsistence beyond aca
demia – I’m a potter. I teach a bit, I sell a few pieces and I’d like to do more, but I do it because I enjoy it. If it were commercial, it wouldn’t be so much fun. At least I don’t have to make egg-cups shaped like chickens.’
‘How do you fit the teaching in with the lecturing?’
‘I’ve only started since the sabbatical. I have a couple of adult education classes, a few lessons in one of the choir schools and a day a week in the Branswell school that’s doing the fairy tale procession. But actually, I’m testing my wings. I want to see if there’s a living to be made at this. It gets me back to the earth and away from all the infighting and college politics and if it works out, I might stay. We’ll see.’
‘And the building I thought was a garage—?’
‘That’s my studio. Wheel, kiln, the works. Tell me, how are you enjoying the flat?’
‘Oh, it’s great. I love it there. I hope you don’t mind, but I’ve been reading some of the books.’
‘That’s what they’re for. Otherwise, everything working OK? No problems, no issues?’
‘Not a thing,’ Mitzi beamed as hard as she could, an image of the glazier at work and the swan in its box flashing through her mind. ‘So, shall we talk fairy tale festivals?’ She leaned forward to press the red button.
‘Right…’ He turned self-conscious, as people often did in front of the microphone. ‘What can I tell you?’
‘Let’s start at the beginning. How did the idea come to you?’
Rob began to talk, hesitating over his words at first; but as he described the events he’d planned, the excitement of persuading the children to do their research, selecting and voting on the best ideas for the floats, his face became animated with a glow that wrapped around Mitzi like a warm scarf, making her smile, making her relax, making her forget. The fragrance of the golden-coloured lime blossom tea was seeping up her nose and through her lungs, like a flavour long lost and unexpectedly rediscovered. It seemed to be lulling her into a heat haze of pure happiness. Perhaps there was something else in the teabag – chamomile, lavender, turmeric or…
‘Some people have been asking what the big deal is about fairy tales,’ Rob said.
‘Tell me?’ Mitzi forced herself back into journalist mode.
‘A lot of my academic writing has been looking at various theories that fairy tales are good for children’s development, because they address unconscious fears in an indirect way. They help you recognise that you’ll be able to get along with your own qualities, like kindness or ingenuity. There’s an integrity to them, values we forget about – being courageous, being generous – I don’t want to sound pompous, but I think they’re about how to be human. Maybe through rediscovering lost innocence, in some way… Jeez, I’m probably talking crap, but I promise it’s honest crap!’
‘I don’t think it’s crap at all.’
‘Which are your favourites?’
‘Lots. I like “The Little Mermaid”, “Cap of Rushes” and “Hansel and Gretel”.’
‘Have you got a brother?’
‘Yes. Why?’
‘A younger brother? Please forgive me if this sounds arrogant, but do you feel you have to look after him and maybe you think you’ve failed somehow?’
‘What?’ Mitzi was floored for a second. ‘How did you…?’
‘Just a hunch. The two children are lost in the forest, they eat the witch’s house and the witch puts Hansel in the cage to fatten him up for dinner. Gretel has to get him out. You see?’
Mitzi saw. ‘Poor Mum thought she was having a bad time with Harry because he got some tattoos, which she hated – she’s, like, a bit conventional – and he’s always wanted to be an actor. And she expected me to help shunt him back towards some sensible pursuit – which of course I haven’t. He’s a good actor and it makes him happy. But she worries about him and…’
‘Where do you think your mother might be, in the story?’
Mitzi thought. The mother figure disappears, and in her place you get—
‘The witch? Oh no, not our Mum! Is that Freudian or something?’
‘Nothing like that.’ Rob reached out to give Mitzi’s elbow a reassuring pat. ‘I get sick of the way different schools of psychology are always at one another’s throats. None of them can be right all the time. So… that’s one reason I’m here and not in college.’
They caught each other’s eyes and began to laugh.
‘I can’t really put that in an interview for the local paper,’ Mitzi remarked.
‘I’m loving this, whatever you do with it. Let me make you some more tea.’ He started towards the kitchen.
‘I’m interested in the fact that you keep your fairy tale books alongside religious ones,’ Mitzi remarked.
‘That’s where they belong,’ said Rob, opening cupboards. ‘The religious ones, I mean. They’re all fairy tales, aren’t they? The whole world spins on fairy tales. Everything’s about what people choose to believe. You want to fight a war? It’ll be about what you believe to be true, whether political, religious, racial or economic, but it mightn’t be true at all.’
‘By the way… do you know a story…?’ Mitzi hesitated. If anybody could shed light on her Odette problem, it would be Rob. But… not that she could tell anyone and expect to be believed, but if she did, her landlord was the last person who should ever learn what had happened in his flat during this weirdest of weeks. ‘A story,’ she ventured, ‘about a girl turning into a swan and having to be rescued by someone swearing eternal love?’
‘Oh, Swan Lake?’ Rob said, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. ‘Have you not seen the ballet?’
‘Maybe once, when I was tiny…’ The words came out faintly.
‘It’s beautiful. Rather like “The Little Mermaid”… Oh, Mitzi, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to psychoanalyse you, talking about your mother and all that. You’re not upset, are you?’
‘No, no…’ Mitzi realised her face, as usual, must be showing more of her thoughts than she’d hoped to allow. ‘I’m fine. Absolutely fine.’
‘Let’s eat.’ Rob leaned over her shoulder and switched off the voice recorder. Mitzi had forgotten all about it.
‘Remind me – what happens in Swan Lake?’ she asked, while they made their way to the kitchen. A big pot of spice-scented soup was glooping over a low flame, and on the table a wooden salad bowl waited, filled with green leaves, cubes of feta cheese, red and yellow peppers and black olives.
‘OK.’ Rob set out plates and soup bowls, with Mitzi’s fresh tea beside one placemat. ‘The prince is coming of age and his mother wants him to get married. She’s invited some princesses to a ball and he’s supposed to choose a bride from among them. But the last thing our prince wants to do is grow up and face his responsibilities. He goes off hunting and spots a flock of swans. He corners the leader and is about to shoot it – when it turns into a princess called Odette who says she’s been bewitched and can only be rescued by a man who swears to love her forever. The prince says he will, and tells her she must come to the ball so that he can choose her. But Odette is a swan by day and only becomes human after dark, or at midnight, or something. The wizard watches her, I think disguised as an owl, and the prince tries to shoot the owl, but Odette stops him… Mitzi? What is it?’
‘An owl?’
‘This all has some terrific significance, hasn’t it?’
‘I’m sorry.’ She couldn’t meet his gaze. ‘It’s nothing, really nothing.’
‘That’s OK. Don’t worry… Let me give you some soup.’
‘What happens in the end?’
‘Well,’ said Rob, ladling out lentil soup, ‘the wizard disguises his daughter as the swan princess, but wearing black instead of white, and takes her to the ball. The prince is fooled and swears eternal love to the wrong girl in front of everyone. Then he sees the swan outside the window, realises he’s made a terrible mistake and rushes after her. Now the only way for them to be together is death, so they throw themselves into
the lake; and their deaths break the spell and destroy the wizard.’
Mitzi couldn’t look at him. ‘She dies?’
‘Yes?’ He waited.
Mitzi couldn’t face it. It was now or never. She chose… never. ‘The stories are great and I love them, but – aren’t they misleading?’ she heard herself gabble. ‘Isn’t that why some parents won’t read them to their children? Because life isn’t like that?’
‘Oh, but life is exactly like that, at its deepest level, the symbolic level.’ He gave her a giant smile. ‘And magic? People only ever believe whatever they want to believe. As I said, the whole world is based on fairy tales. I believe in magic too, Mitzi, but a different kind. An everyday magic, when people are their best selves and all things become possible. Try this: everything’s symbolic. Think of something. Any ordinary thing you do every day.’
‘Food shopping?’
‘OK, let’s turn shopping symbolic. You go to a supermarket, there’s all that choice, but what you buy is up to you. You can pick up healthy things like fresh fruit and pulses, or you can get what people expect, perhaps bacon and eggs or baked beans, or you can find weird and wonderful combinations of spices and be incredibly inventive. You see?’
‘Yes, but… About Swan Lake, Rob, what do you think a psychologist would say about it?’
‘So…’ Rob, blowing gently on a spoonful of soup to cool it, seemed to be thinking over Mitzi’s question. ‘There’s the prince who’s shirking responsibility and always wants what he can’t have. He can’t have the swan princess because she’s a swan, and he can’t have the magician’s daughter because she’s an evil spirit, so by running after one impossibility after another he destroys his own chance of happiness. Then there’s Odette. Usually the same dancer plays her and the magician’s daughter, Odile – white swan and black swan – so maybe they’re two aspects of the same person, or forces pulling the prince in opposite directions: the unattainable white swan, innocence, purity, goodness, versus the black swan, sex, fascination, temptation, evil. The wizard could be a predatory older man, or even the girl’s father, which is why she won’t let the prince shoot him. His hold on her is so strong that she can’t grow up and have a real relationship. She’s been forced to remain an innocent little girl, instead of becoming a mature, seductive woman like Odile. She has to break his hold.’
Odette Page 9
