by Lucy Wadham
She answered from beneath the sheet, which the little one began to tug: ���Call me Mummy.���
���Alice,��� Dan���s voice whined again. ���Wake up, Mummy.���
���The fish���s gone,��� Samuel said. She heard the sadness in his voice and sat up. He was standing by the window, holding the glass of water in his hand. He had dressed himself.
She climbed out of bed, pulling the sheet around her. As she rose, the little one tugged hard, uncovering her breasts.
���Bosoms,��� he said.
���Let go, Dan,��� she said, retrieving the sheet. She crossed the room and stood behind Samuel, laying her hands on his bony shoulders.
���Look. He���s gone,��� he said, peering into the glass. ���Has he gone to heaven?���
���Yes,��� she said. ���He probably has.���
She could see the fine blond hairs forming a perfect spiral on the back of his neck.
���Look,��� he said, holding the glass up to the light coming through the curtains. ���He���s completely gone.���
���Has it got wings?��� Dan asked her, tugging on the sheet again.
���Probably,��� Alice said, drawing the curtains.
They had a view over the square. It was empty but for a freckled dog lying directly below, panting on the hot, white pavement. She was disappointed to see that the moss-stained fountain in the centre was dry.
���I don���t want to go to heaven,��� Dan said.
���Why not, little one?���
She turned round. Dan was lying on the floor with his feet on her bed.
���I don���t want wings. I don���t want wings; they���ll hurt.���
���You can���t fly if you don���t have wings,��� Samuel said. He was leaning out of the window and slowly emptying the glass of water on to the street below. The dog, who was getting spattered, was blinking tolerantly, apparently too hot to move.
���Don���t do that, Samuel,��� she said, taking the glass from him.
���You can,��� Dan said. ���Peter Pan doesn���t have wings. Nor does Robin Hood.���
���Robin Hood can���t fly,��� Samuel said.
���He can.���
���Mummy. Can Robin Hood fly?���
���No.���
���See?��� Samuel said.
Alice put the glass down and went to pick up Dan���s clothes from the floor. As she straightened up she felt dizzy and sat down again on her bed.
���I don���t want to be an angel,��� Dan whined.
Alice stood up, stepped over Dan and offered him her hand. He let her pull him up and then went limp.
���Oh Dan, please. Let���s get ready and go up to the big house.��� She told herself to watch the high note in her voice.
���I don���t like it there.���
���You���re scared,��� Sam said.
Dan looked up to retaliate.
���Sam!��� he shrieked. ���Not the goggles. It���s my turn.���
���They���re mine,��� Sam said calmly.
���Make him take them off, Mummy!���
But Sam walked past his brother and made for the door. ���It���s my turn!���
���Stay in the square, Sam!��� she called.
He slammed the door.
���Push,��� she told Dan. ���Please.���
She was trying to feed his limp foot into his sandal. He was blowing bubbles with his spit.
���Shall we go and have breakfast now?��� she asked him.
���I haven���t played.���
She touched his forehead. He was still hot.
���You can play for five minutes in the square with Sam. I���ll call you when it���s time.���
They held hands on the way downstairs. On the half-landing a little girl was lolling against the banisters. She stared at Dan as he came towards her. She could not have been more than five but she had dark eyes with heavy lids that gave her a precociously weary look. She wore earrings and a little medallion on a chain around her neck that she passed back and forth across her lips while she stared. A man���s voice echoed in the hall: ���Oph��lie!���
The little girl suddenly stood straight and ran, like a punctilious ballerina, down the stairs in front of them, across the hall, her little gold earrings catching the light. Alice let go of Dan���s hand and watched him pass through the open door of the hotel and disappear into the sunlight. Then she pushed the glass door into the dining room.
Its theme was a Napoleonic encampment: pink, red and gold striped wallpaper hung with sombre prints and an array of military paraphernalia, mostly swords and pistols. The room was empty. A few tables were still strewn with debris from breakfast. She made her way to the only one that was laid and sat down.
She had let Sam into her bed the night before. Dan had stayed asleep on the other side of her and she and Sam had lain awake together, listening to the incongruously urbane percussion of service from the dining room and the shrieks of children in the square. Before he fell asleep he said, ���I know what we���ll call him.��� He had never been able to think of a name for the fish while it was alive. ���We���ll call him Fish Breath.��� She had told him it was a lovely name.
Later she had gathered up his sleeping body and carried him across the room to the camp bed near the window. She had laid him down, never taking her eyes off his face, closed and perfect like a lilac mask in the light from the square. She had leaned over him and felt the breath from his nostrils on her lips and then kissed his cheek, and he had moaned and brushed his face as though he had stumps for hands. Then she had taken the glass from the window sill, flushed the dead fish down the lavatory and refilled the glass.
Alice sat in the room and savoured the moment of peace before the boys returned. Someone was whisking eggs in the next-door room. She saw the summer with the boys stretching before her; she should learn to pace herself better. The man from the checkin desk came to take her order. He had a baker���s livid complexion and he was wearing a dirty white T-shirt with the island���s emblem printed in black across his chest. There was a sound like footsteps on gravel inside her ears and her own voice was muffled to her. He scratched his arm and listened without looking at her, then left.
This refusal of the islanders to behave in any manner approaching servility had always irritated her husband. There were so many things he hated about the island. He even said he had chosen her because she was as far away as he could get from it. Mathieu had spent much of his short life trying to shed all traces the place had left in him. Still, she knew that if she kept returning here with his children, it was because it was here that she felt closest to him.
The little girl with the earrings peeped round the swing door that led to the kitchen. Alice smiled at her, too late: she had vanished. Thinking of Mathieu had become a luxury. She was deeply impressed by this process operating within her by which a source of pain had become a source of pleasure. His death had become intelligible to her; he was a story she told herself and the boys and his absence was as much a part of her life as her children were. Her mother had dug this out in her infallible way: ���You���ve got to stop carrying your dead husband around with you, my love. You���re scaring people off.��� She had meant men, of course. Alice had slept with two men since his death, both friends of his. But now sex made her cry. She realised that she would have done better to sleep with a stranger, if only estrangement were an immutable state.
Dan was standing at her side.
���Can���t find Sam,��� he
said.
Alice studied his face.
���I told him to stay in the square.���
She stood up and followed him through the hall and into the sun. On the threshold of the hotel she shielded her eyes with her hand. No sunlight had ever seemed so white. The dog had gone and the square was empty. ���Shit,��� she said. At the far end was a cluster of trees planted in thick rows. She strode out into the heat cursing Sam. Dan ran at her side.
���Are you cross with him?���
���Yes. Samuel!��� she called.
���Shit,��� Dan said.
The trees were huge chestnuts and her voice spiralled upwards into their heavy leaves. She stood and looked about her, waiting for his answer. There was not a breath of wind.
���Call again,��� Dan said, tugging at her dress.
���Sam!��� Her voice was angry. The tree trunks were perfect for hiding behind, but she knew he was not in earshot. He would not dare push her so far. She turned on Dan. ���Where is he?���
He stared up at her, opened his hands and shrugged his shoulders. Keeping his eyes on her, he shouted his brother���s name in two high-pitched syllables. ���Sa-am!���
���Come with me.��� She pulled Dan roughly by the arm and walked towards the main road that led up to the church. Two old women dressed in black were walking down the hill towards them.
���Have you seen a little boy? Blond.��� She held out her hand to indicate his height. The two women registered Alice���s anxiety and began to try to calm her. They had not seen him. But Alice was already looking up the hill, her eyes scanning the narrow street, and she moved on, pulling Dan behind her, leaving the two women staring after her.
���Sam!��� Her voice echoed against the parched, shuttered houses. She lifted Dan on to her hip and began to run up the hill, the full heat of the day pressing down on her.
She reached the dusty promenade in front of the church. She could not call because she was out of breath. She sat Dan down on a green metal bench and straightened up, heaving for breath. A few paces away three men were playing boules.
���Stay there,��� she said harshly, pointing at Dan. ���Don���t move.���
She walked up to the men and stood before them, hooking her hair behind her ears, still out of breath.
���Have you seen a little boy? About this tall? Blond hair?���
The three men stared at her. Only one answered. He had a purple web of broken capillaries across his cheeks and black eyebrows, comically thick and wiry.
���There haven���t been any children.��� He turned to his companions for confirmation and they both shook their heads. The man with the eyebrows now studied her, ignoring the silent pressure of the other two to resume the game. ���As far as I know, there have been no children in the esplanade since the end of Mass.��� He stood still, defying his friends. On his lips she saw the dark tide mark of red wine.
���Would you mind watching him for a moment?��� she asked, nodding at Dan, who was now trying to cram little pieces of gravel through the perforations in the metal bench. ���I���m going to look in the church.���
The man closed his eyes and slowly inclined his head in assent.
Alice ran up the three broad steps to the church, lost her footing and fell forward on to her hands. She stood up, rubbing her stinging palms together, and stepped into the cool, dark interior. This was the kind of place Sam enjoyed. He would be here, staring into the candles beneath the Virgin. He would be offering a prayer for Fish Breath. As she walked up the side aisle, she heard her anxiety in the sound of her heels striking the flagstones. A figure moved behind the spiral stairs that led up to the pulpit.
���Sam?��� she whispered.
A priest in a pale robe appeared, his face in shadow. He came forward and she saw his dark beard and, above, a forehead and bald pate, shining white. She stood still and tears filled her eyes.
���I can���t find my son.��� Her voice was shrill from the effort not to cry. ���Have you seen a little boy?���
The priest stepped forward and put his arm out, not to touch her but to guide her to some other place, more appropriate, for this young woman was sending a ripple of disquiet around his cool, silent church.
���We can talk in the vestry, madame.���
But she was looking past him to the row of candles blinking in their red glass pots at the Virgin���s feet. Then she turned, so suddenly the priest thought of a bird flying out of a hedge, and ran back down the side aisle to the door.
When she reached Dan her throat was dry and painful. He had covered the bench in gravel. The men had moved off towards the far end of the esplanade. The man with the eyebrows had his back to her.
���Shit,��� Dan said again.
She snatched him off the bench and clasped him to her. She descended the hill towards the square, all the time calling out Sam���s name. People were having lunch and the sounds of kitchens and TV voices came through the closed shutters.
In the hotel she set Dan down in the lobby. She pushed open the door to the dining room. The tables were now laid for lunch, but the place was empty. Each time she called his name, the knowledge of his absence seemed to deepen within her. She could now see herself as though from a distance, running up the stairs, along the corridor, opening the door of their room. She saw herself register the room���s emptiness without even looking. Panic had settled in her voice and a cold, liquid feeling had crept into her chest.
She passed the concierge on her way back downstairs. ���My son���s disappeared. I don���t understand.���
The man stood on the landing, looking at his feet in embarrassment.
Dan was in the lobby, walking round and round in increasingly small circles. She grabbed his hand. ���We���ll try the big house,��� she said, pulling him out into the sun.
She began to run, pulling him after her, past her car and into the narrow alley. This part of Santarosa echoed and seemed always to be empty. She ran between what she thought were blind walls, but the windows were there, high up in the fa��ades. Dan was slowing her down, hanging back. She turned and took him in. His chin was raised and he was panting, his little chest heaving. She picked him up and walked on. Her mouth was dry and her throat was burning.
���Mummy,��� Dan said, burying his face in her neck.
She put him on her back and carried on, walking fast and rhythmically, invoking Sam���s name with each step, making the walking an incantation.
���It���s too far,��� Dan murmured.
The street began to broaden and climb in a steep curve. They passed the last house before the property. A dog on a chain bounded towards them and was gagged into silence. Dan clung to her.
���It���s all right. We���re nearly there.���
When they reached the entrance to the grounds, Alice put Dan down and stopped for a moment to catch her breath. Dan stood there looking at her, plucking nervously at his hands. She picked him up again and passed through the entrance to the property marked by two stone pillars. She began to run along the gravel path that wound through a cluster of pine trees and scrub oaks to a circle of lawn at the front of the house. She put Dan down on the lawn and ran across to the flight of stone steps that led up to the main door. She tugged at the bell but heard no sound. She called out once, but no one came. Gathering Dan into her arms again, she went round to the side and climbed the steps to the broad terrace that ran the full length of the house and overlooked the sea in the distance.
Babette appeared at the far end of the terrace. She was carrying a bunch of orange gladioli with purple stalks that she set down on the stone parapet. She came towards them smiling, her arms open for Dan. Alice handed him to her.
�
����Is Sam here?���
Babette looked fondly at Dan. He was her favourite.
���He���s grown,��� she said.
���I���ve lost Sam,��� Alice said, wiping away her tears. Babette looked up and saw her distress for the first time. ���He was in the square. We can���t find him anywhere.��� Her voice was trembling.
���Have you tried the caf��? They���ve got computer games there now. Kids love that.���
Alice stared at Babette.
���No,��� she said. ���No I haven���t.��� She held out her arms for Dan.
Babette kissed Dan on the cheek.
���I���ll go. You stay here. You���re exhausted.���
���No, no. I���d rather go.���
���We���ll telephone. Come inside.���
Alice followed Babette along the terrace to the back door filled with glass panes that gave on to a narrow passage leading to the kitchen. The telephone was an old black model that hung on the wall beside the cooker. Babette set Dan down on a chair beside a long wooden table covered with empty jam jars, gleaming in the sunlight. Dan kept his eyes on his mother. Alice felt the cold feeling in her chest spreading, settling in.
���Bettie?��� Babette spoke loudly into the phone. Alice could see that Babette was speaking but she could no longer hear her. There was a silence beginning to fill her head. Her mind���s eye was now moving like a breeze in the empty village, around the tree trunks and in the leaves, looking down on to the deserted square. And up the hill, past the church and into the graveyard she knew was there but had never seen. She knew where to go and where to look. All of the places seemed to stare back at her. You see, they said. Empty. No tricks. ���Thanks, Bettie. Call us if you see him.���
Alice turned on Dan.
���Where is he, Dan? Dan, did you see him outside in the square?��� Dan seemed to pull back. ���Dan. Did you see him at all? Answer me!��� She caught sight of his expression and touched her boy���s face. ���Please, Dan.��� Babette stepped forward. ���Did you see Sam?���
