by Joan Lingard
‘I felt I was standing inside his picture,’ said Cathy, surprising him. ‘That one of the pond and the little green wooden bridge over it. It added something to it, at least that’s what I thought,’ she added diffidently.
One of the boys said he could understand that but he couldn’t see what standing in front of 87 rue du Cherche-Midi gazing up at the facade of the fourth floor would do for anyone, especially when you didn’t even know for sure which window it was! His remark was followed by some hilarity and the pink in Clarinda’s cheeks darkened.
Listening to their summing up Cormac, as their teacher, had felt pleased with his students. Their interest and enthusiasm had increased as the week in Paris had advanced. In spite of everything – in spite of the bit of bother with Clarinda, which was how he was choosing to regard it – the trip had been worthwhile and he would be able to say so in all truth when he came to write his report. Some members of staff had been giving him odd looks – Alec McCaffy’s tongue had doubtless been busy – but he felt hopeful that by the following week it would have become old news and something else would have happened to provide fodder for playground and staff room gossip.
Appearing from the shop doorway, Clarinda fell into step beside him. ‘It’s my birthday,’ she said.
‘Clarinda!’
‘You could wish me many happy returns.’
‘Happy birthday to you. Now, listen—’
‘I’m sixteen, Cormac. I’ve come of age.’
‘I’m pleased for you.’
‘Don’t be sarcastic. I don’t like it when you are.’ He lengthened his stride and she broke into a trot to keep up with him.
‘I need to talk to you, Cormac, please! I’m so unhappy I don’t know what to do with myself.’
He did not feel particularly happy himself now and wished he could take a sabbatical, go to the other end of the earth, to Australia, or Bora Bora, and return after a year to find Clarinda laughing about her crush on him.
‘I want to talk to you, Cormac.’ She was becoming tearful. How could they proceed along the road like this with the chance of being seen by dozens of pupils, as well as teachers? ‘If you don’t let me talk to you I’ll do something awful.’ She gulped. ‘I’ll throw myself off the Dean Bridge!’
He slowed his step. ‘Now that’s blackmail, Clarinda, and you know it. You have no intention of throwing yourself off anywhere.’ She wouldn’t, would she? You could never be sure with young girls. It reminded him of Sophie threatening to leave home. All right, they’d told her, go and pack your bag, and she hadn’t of course, and they had known she wouldn’t. But could he know for certain that Clarinda would not throw herself off the Dean Bridge in a moment of derangement? He remembered her going on about Gwen John tempting providence by sitting on rocks close to the sea and being swept off by a huge wave and referring to the sensation afterwards as ‘delicious danger’. Clarinda had said she understood that. But surely danger was only delicious if you had at least a chance of survival? Throwing oneself off the Dean Bridge would not come into that category. He was not totally reassured, however.
Her bottom lip was quivering. ‘You don’t know how miserable I am.’
‘What else can I say? I can only go on repeating myself, saying I’m sorry, and try to persuade you to put all this behind you.’
‘I just want to be with you.’ Her voice was dwindling to a peep. Suddenly she burst into a torrent of weeping.
‘OK,’ he said, ‘let’s go and have a cup of coffee and talk.’
She sniffled her tears away and dried her eyes on a tissue. He took her to a different café from the one they had gone to before.
So, even after your return from Paris, Mr Aherne, you went to a café with her in Edinburgh? Was that not an odd thing to do considering the complications of the situation? Was it wise? You said you wished to discourage her.
He ordered coffee for them both and a pain au chocolat for Clarinda, at her request. She was starving, she hadn’t eaten all day. And no doubt pain au chocolat reminded her of Paris, not that she needed any reminding.
‘I wish we could have stayed there. Why don’t we just go back? We could! Why not?’
‘Now don’t talk daft!’
He noticed that she had blue marks underneath her eyes and wondered if her mother would have noticed them too.
‘I was happy there. You said you were always happy when you returned to Paris. You said it made you feel fully alive and that is how I felt. You said it made the creative juices flow.’
‘I’ve said a lot of things,’ he said. ‘Some of them dubious.’
‘Nothing you said about Paris was dubious.’ She gazed limply at him. ‘Cormac, don’t be angry with me just because I fell in love with you.’
Cormac is watching his daughter fill a hot water bottle. She fills it carefully with water from the steaming kettle, then she holds it against her chest to squeeze out the air, and finally she screws in the top, getting the threads to match, taking her time, showing no sign of the impatience that she sometimes does. She takes a towel and dries the top. He is watching every movement, as if he might learn something about her. He has been so close to her all these years, yet now he feels he has to learn her anew, to try to understand the changes that she is going through.
‘Night, Dad.’ She kisses his cheek.
‘Night, love.’ He wants to hold her tight, to lock her away, so that she cannot come to any harm, but that is not an option.
‘Clarinda—’ He paused and took a deep breath. ‘This cannot go on. You’ll have to talk yourself out of it just as you talked yourself in. I can’t take any more of it. I’m coming to the end of my tether.’
‘But that kiss!’
‘Was a mistake. It should not have happened!’ It had been reprehensible of him to succumb, even for those few seconds. Repent! he could hear the aunts crying in his head.
‘You’re being unkind.’ Clarinda’s voice was on the waver again. ‘And I told my mother that you were the nicest man I have ever met.’
‘You will just have to tell her you were mistaken. Right now I feel I could become downright nasty. And I don’t want to hear about Rodin being nasty to Gwen John, I’ve heard enough of it.’
‘But, Cormac, don’t you see … it didn’t stop her loving him. And he wasn’t nasty to her all the time. Even though he had that other woman, that awful American duchess, he still came to visit her and make love to her. She said that if she had to go through a whole week without him making love to her she froze up like a stream in winter. I understand how that feels, I do. You shouldn’t undervalue my love for you.’
He had his first premonition that she had talked to her mother.
‘And don’t please tell me how much older than me you are. Age has nothing to do with love.’
‘It can often have quite a lot to do with it. You’ve lacked a father figure in your life. Don’t you think you’ve seen me as some kind of substitute?’
‘I don’t feel like a daughter to you. I want to go to bed with you.’
He felt the heat gathering in his face. He glanced sideways at the people at the next table; they seemed very quiet, and not to be talking, which made him wonder if they were listening. Was the whole world listening? He felt there were eyes everywhere.
‘It’s true, Cormac. I do want to.’
He got up abruptly and went to the counter and asked for the bill. The reckoning. Even then he did not think it would turn out to be so high. When he turned round he saw that Clarinda was crying into a paper tissue and the people at the next table were giving him dirty looks. If they had not overheard the conversation they might, with a bit of luck, think he was her father giving her a telling-off for coming home late.
He made for the door and she jumped up and ran after him. Out in the street he said, ‘I’m saying it for the last time, Clarinda. I’m sorry about everything. But now we must draw a line under it. I think you’re a lovely girl but I look on you as a daughter more than anything else.’ S
he was continuing to cry but he did not even feel sorry for her any longer. He felt washed out. Arid. Incapable of feeling anything. His heart sat like a stone in his chest.
Later that evening, up in his studio, he paused from his work to go to the window and look down on the street and saw the silhouette of a girl standing under a tree opposite. He swore softly, over and over again. He did not know what else to do. It was dark and light rain was visible falling under the arc of a street light. She was looking up at his window. She had seen him. He pulled the blind down sharply, catching his finger, drawing blood. He sucked his finger and swore again.
He couldn’t work now. He covered the piece he was working on, the figure of a young boy kneeling, his son kneeling, and went downstairs to pour himself a dram.
‘What’s up?’ asked Rachel. ‘Your hand’s shaking. And have you cut your finger?’
‘It’s nothing. Only a scratch.’ He remembered the angry marks left on Clarinda’s bare arms outside the Métro at Clignancourt.
‘You’re shivering,’ insisted Rachel.
He shook his head. That would have been the moment to tell her, but he didn’t. It will all die down, he told himself; Clarinda will become bored and go away and forget about me and Paris and Gwen John and Rodin and return to her own life, to real life. Did he accept that what she said she felt was real? He did not know. He was too confused to judge the dividing line between fantasy and reality. He didn’t want to think any more. He tossed back the whisky, pleasured by the sting in his throat, and poured himself another now that Rachel had gone upstairs to have a shower.
He went into the hall, quietly opened the front door and peered out into the damp night. His left-hand neighbour opened his door at the same time and called over the hedge, ‘Is that you, Cormac? There’s a girl been standing under that tree across the road all evening. I don’t know what she thinks she’s up to. I was thinking of calling the police. You can never tell with all these burglaries around.’
‘Don’t do that,’ said Cormac hastily. ‘I was just going out to have a word with her. She’s a pupil at my school. She’s a bit, well, disturbed.’
‘Drugs?’
‘Not sure.’
‘Half the teenagers seem to be off the wall these days, one way or another. I don’t envy you your job.’
The neighbour waited on his step while Cormac went down the path, unlatched the dripping gate with fumbling fingers, and crossed the road.
‘I knew you’d come out to me,’ said Clarinda, her cold blue face cracking into a smile. ‘I knew you wouldn’t leave me here.’
‘You have to go home, Clarinda.’ He kept his voice down, conscious of his neighbour’s straining ears. ‘You can’t stay out here and you can’t come into my house.’
‘I suppose your wife is there.’
‘Yes, my wife is there.’
‘We could go somewhere else.’
‘We are going nowhere else.’
‘I’m sixteen now.’
‘I know. You’ve already told me.’
‘But don’t you see, I’m of age?’
‘Need a hand, Cormac?’ called the neighbour, coming down his garden path to the gate.
‘No, no, it’s fine, thanks, John. I’m just going to see her home. Right now, Clarinda,’ he said firmly when John had retreated, ‘we are going!’
He took hold of her arm and pulled her away from the tree. After the first few reluctant steps she allowed him to lead her down the street.
‘We could go up Calton Hill.’
‘I am taking you home. Where do you live? And don’t bother to give me the wrong address and lead me another merry dance for I’m not standing for it!’
‘You’re very angry.’
‘Yes. Very.’
He walked with head down into the wind. Soon the rain came on. Drops of water clogged his eyelashes, blurring the night. The traffic lights wavered and their reflections ran like spilt red, amber and green paint on the road. He could not go through another night like this; something had to be done to jolt her out of her madness. Next time she might bring a sleeping bag and camp out in his garden. He wondered if she had a cat. Mrs Bain looked the type of woman to have half a dozen.
It took twenty minutes hard walking to reach the street of the Bains. They lived in a typical, grey stone tenement block. Clarinda said they were hoping to move sometime – her mother would love a garden – but they would have to wait until they could afford something better.
‘The neighbours think we’re kind of eccentric. Just because we’re different.’ She was in a chatty mood now and appeared to be enjoying this late-night walk.
‘Which number?’ he asked.
‘Are you coming to the door with me?’
‘I’m going to wait till I see you go inside.’
‘That’s it there,’ said Clarinda, indicating a dark greenish-coloured door in need of painting. ‘We’re on the top.’
Letting his eyes travel up Cormac saw that it was easy to pick out the Bains’ dwelling. The windows glowed with a pinkish-orange light; one might almost have thought that the flat was on fire. Presumably Mrs Bain was still up and about and awaiting the return of her daughter.
‘Right then,’ he said, ‘on you go. And don’t do this again or you’ll make me hate you.’
‘Don’t say that!’
‘I’m tired, Clarinda. Very tired.’
‘See you tomorrow,’ she said.
He waited while she crossed the road and opened the door. Before vanishing inside she paused to look back at him. She waved but he did not respond.
As he was about to turn and go he glanced up again and saw a face appear at one of the flaming windows. He wondered if Mrs Bain knew where her daughter had gone and what she had been doing. What exactly did she know? Was she encouraging Clarinda?
He went home.
Davy is in bed asleep and Cormac is restless. He makes a cup of coffee; he drinks a half glass of wine left at the bottom of a bottle and makes a wry face at its sourness; he goes out to stand on the top step with his arms folded across his chest, allowing the night wind to ruffle his hair. He can’t stop thinking about Sophie and wondering what she is up to. The bruise that she has underneath her eye – is her boyfriend violent? Then there’s that mouldy smell that she often gives off when she comes in. He decides to phone Rachel and have a chat with her about it; at least that will be his excuse for he does have another agenda running at the same time. And he misses having her to talk to; she was always able to get things into perspective more easily than he and had a way of defusing a situation. He dials her number and waits. The ringing sound goes on and on; he lets it ring longer than he normally would. He imagines the machine sitting on the hall table beside a vase of flowers – she likes to have fresh cut flowers in the house as well as pot plants, all of which in her care flourish and bloom like the lilies in the field, whereas he tends to forget about his and they end up looking sad and dejected – and he imagines the living room empty of people but warm and inviting with cushions plumped and surfaces dust-free. She is obviously out, as must be Sophie, and they have forgotten to put on the answering machine. He is about to put down the receiver when Rachel answers. He has not been expecting it after the delay and is taken by surprise. She sounds a little breathless, as if she has just run up the outside stair and flung open the door to grab the receiver.
‘Yes?’ Normally she would say, ‘Rachel Aherne here’ in a composed voice.
‘Hi,’ he says. ‘It’s me.’
‘Oh hello, Cormac.’ She sounds guarded. Or is he imagining it?
‘Were you out?’
‘No, no. Just upstairs.’ So she was upstairs? That makes him pause.
Does it take that long to come down such a short flight of stairs? Unless she was having a shower. But she did not say that she was, which would have been the natural thing to say. Is she with someone? Is there a man standing behind her, touching her? Now his imagination has something else to work on. Rachel is w
aiting for him to tell her the reason for his call.
‘I was just wondering about Sophie. If you’d managed to find out anything more about what she’s up to?’
‘No, I haven’t.’ She sounds uninterested. Is the man caressing her, urging her to turn back into his arms?
‘Is she in?’
‘No, she went to Tilda’s. She should be back soon.’
‘Oh, Tilda’s.’ He can think of nothing else to detain her. ‘See you Sunday then, as usual.’
‘As usual,’ she says, and the call is over.
He is even more restless now. He goes upstairs and pushes open the door of Davy’s room. The boy is lying on his back sound asleep with one arm curled round his head. When he sleeps he has seldom been known to wake. Cormac tiptoes back downstairs and puts on a jacket, then he quietly lets himself out of the flat.
He covers the short stretch of road that separates the two streets in seconds. On the corner of Rachel’s street he comes to a halt. Cautiously he peers round the corner. Nothing seems to be happening. Cars are parked, curtains are drawn, not even a dog is barking. The street is too narrow to loiter in, unless one is prepared to crouch behind a car. As he watches he sees a movement halfway down. Someone is coming down an outside staircase. He thinks it might be Rachel’s. He retreats back round the corner and keeps in close to the wall. There are no houses on the opposite side of the road, only the Glenogle swimming baths, and the steep steps called Gabriel’s Road that lead up to the lane behind Saxe Coburg Place. There is no one to observe him acting suspiciously, unless the winged angel Gabriel himself is hovering above. He listens, hears an engine revving up, and after a few seconds a car nudges its rear end out into the main road with its back light indicating that it intends to turn right. Cormac pulls in his stomach and flattens himself as close to the wall as possible. The car looks familiar. Very familiar. Can it be? It is continuing to back out, is reversing now round the corner, towards him; and he can see the dark bulky outline of the driver, half turned in his seat to look out of the back window. For a moment the car and its driver rest there and he wonders if he has been seen, and identified; then they start to move, to gather speed, and they are off, sweeping away in the opposite direction. Cormac steps into the middle of the pavement and watches until the car’s rear lights have dwindled into the gloom. He could swear that the car belongs to Archie Gibson, his former headmaster.
