by Sandra Field
Abruptly she sat down on the boulder. Above their heads there was the scrape of boots and a tiny clatter of stones, and then a couple clambered down the rock-face past them, smiling and nodding. ‘God morgen...god morgen.’
Lars answered them with automatic politeness. Kristine stayed silent; she had said more than enough, she thought, and waited for his reply with a hollow emptiness in her stomach. When the couple was out of sight, he said so quietly she had to strain to hear him, ‘Is that the truth, Kristine?’
‘Yes, Lars, it’s the truth.’ She took a deep breath. ‘I figured if I lied to you and lost your keys you’d be so angry you wouldn’t come after me.’
Her face was framed by ferns growing in a crack in the rock, and the wind played with the soft blonde tendrils of her hair. Her eyes held his steadily. ‘I want to believe you,’ he said. ‘And that also is the truth.’
‘I’m sorry I lied.’ She bit her lip. ‘I didn’t know what else to do.’
The words torn from him, he said, ‘I wish you weren’t so afraid of me.’
‘I can’t help it!’
‘It’s like history repeating itself...’
So he had his own demons, his own ghosts from the past; and her actions had brought him face to face with them. ‘I’ve hurt you,’ she said miserably. ‘I’m sorry for that, too.’
Wishing with all her heart that she could comfort him, she watched him rub the muscles in the back of his neck and give his shoulders a little shake. Then, as if he had made a decision, he took her hand in his, brought it to his lips, and pressed his mouth into her palm. He closed his eyes.
Near to tears, Kristine knew that for her this silent gesture bore an intimacy far greater than their passionate kisses on the beach. She opened her mouth to tell him so. But Lars had dropped her hand as suddenly as he had taken it. Glancing up at the sky, he said, ‘It’s going to rain in the next couple of hours—we should hurry.’ Turning away from her, he began climbing as if a legion of mountain trolls was after him.
Kristine forced herself into motion again. The wind had freshened, so that the grey-edged clouds scudded across the sky. She tramped over scoured rocks and peat-brown earth, trying to keep Lars in sight, and, not for the first time, wishing she could read his mind.
Rounding a corner, she found him waiting for her at the foot of a particularly steep part of the cliff. ‘I’ll give you a hand here,’ he said.
She was glad enough of his help as she found toe-holds in the rocks. He pulled her up the last few feet, and as she scrambled upright, brushing dirt from her jeans, she said wryly, ‘I keep remembering that we have to go back down.’
‘The view’s worth it.’
He took a step back from her. She said unevenly, ‘Lars, are you still angry with me?’
‘No.’
‘I’m truly sorry I deceived you.’
‘It’s past, Kristine. Gone.’ He gave her a faint smile. ‘We’d better keep going.’
But was it gone? she wondered, noticing from the corner of her eye the first gleam of turquoise water far below. Had he really believed how afraid she was of the feelings he aroused in her? And what had he meant by history repeating itself?
The ground had levelled off and the walking was easier. Lars disappeared around a bend ahead of her. She followed him, then stopped dead in her tracks. In front of her, sharp-edged as a knife, loomed Prekestolen, the cliff called Pulpit Rock.
Its horizontal and vertical faces made an almost perfect right angle against the sky; its base was sunk deep into the blue-green waters of Lysefjord. In none of her travels had Kristine seen anything quite so spectacular.
There were two people walking across the flat expanse of rock, their bodies outlined against the clouds. She wanted to be there too, where granite and sky met. Lars said, grinning at the awe-struck expression on her face, ‘Come on.’
It was the first real smile he had given her since she had left him in the restaurant in Mandal. She smiled back. ‘You said the view was worth the climb. Understatement of the year, Lars.’
‘Didn’t want you accusing me of nationalistic hype...how’s your head for heights?’
‘Fine, I guess. I had no trouble hiking in Greece.’
He stepped back so that she could precede him. Leaning against the wind, she walked across the last of the trail and stepped on to the huge square top of Prekestolen.
The sinuous curve of Lysefjord, cupped by rounded grey cliffs, vanished mysteriously into the clouds and the mist. But Prekestolen ended sharply, like the axe-blade of an ancient Viking, a clarion call to violence and to death.
Unable to help herself, Kristine walked across the seamed, split rock, bracing herself against the relentless push of the wind. Dropping to her knees, and then lying flat, she crawled up to that quivering juncture of solidity and space, of matter and nothingness, and looked over the edge.
Like an ambush the water swooped up to meet her; the rough rock beneath her chest and thighs vanished. In pure horror she felt herself being pulled nearer the edge, her fingers losing their hold, her body weightless as a leaf in the wind. The cliffs flung themselves towards her. The sky swirled in front of her like a whirlpool, drawing her inexorably into its embrace.
As though from another planet she felt hands clasp her hips and haul her backwards, strong hands tight around her body. Her fingertips scraped across the jagged granite; from deep within her throat she was whimpering with fear. She closed her eyes, but still the sky whirled and spun and she was falling, falling, falling...
Lars’s voice, deep and resonant, said, ‘Kristine, relax your fingers—it’s OK, you’re safe, I’ve got you.’
Her cheekbone bumped on an outcrop of rock, the pain so sudden and unexpected that she was shocked into some kind of awareness. Her eyes flew open. All she could see was rock, veined and craggy like the face of an old man. Rock. Not sky.
Lars let go of her hips. Kneeling at her side, he slid his arms around her waist and pulled her up against his chest, her body so limp that she seemed boneless. Then he stood up, and from a long way away she heard an unknown voice ask a concerned question and Lars make a reassuring reply. He walked back from the edge as far as he could go, until they were under the overhang of the cliff, sheltered from the wind and from the curious gazes of the other hikers. Then he stooped again, holding her in his lap, chafing her cold hands in his warmer ones.
She was trembling lightly all over. Just as she trembled when Lars kissed her, Kristine thought numbly, and thrust her face into his chest.
He held her close, repeatedly smoothing her shoulders, murmuring to her in Norwegian. She had no need to translate; they were the words of comfort, as far from anger and disillusion as they could be. Clutching at his shirt, wanting nothing but the truth between him and her, she said incoherently, ‘Lars, I’ve never made love with anyone because I’ve always been afraid of physical intimacy...over the years I could see my father and my mother draw further and further apart. With each child that was born they seemed to hate each other more, so by the time I was twelve I was telling myself that I was never going to get pregnant and I was certainly never going to get married—why should I? It was like a cage, a trap. No joy, no laughter...only a man who was angry all the time and a woman who used illness to hide herself from life.’
She rubbed her sore cheek against his collar-bone. ‘And children meant work—always something to do for them, always watching them and worrying that something would happen to them and I’d be blamed because I was the one who was supposed to be looking after them. When all I wanted to do was play with my schoolfriends and have fun...was that so very wrong of me?’
‘It wasn’t wrong at all.’
‘And then you came along.’ She glanced up at him, seeing the tiny black flecks in the smoke-blue of his irises. ‘What you showed me was that I’d managed just fine for twenty-three years because I’d never met a man who made me feel like a woman. A—a sexual woman. I’d never known how the touch of a hand, a kiss—eve
n a look—could make nonsense of all my fears and misgivings, could drive me so strongly towards you so that I forgot caution and only wanted you, the man...’
She drew a long, shuddering breath. ‘But as soon as I was away from you I was terrified of what was happening to me. Scared out of my wits that I’d end up like my parents, trapped and resentful and loveless. So, in Oslo and again in Mandal, I ran away. I didn’t know what else to do.’
She had run out of things to say. Feeling drained yet oddly peaceful, because she knew every word she had spoken had been the truth, she rested her face on his chest.
Lars was silent for a long time, so long that she felt a return of the dizzying terror that had seized her on the edge of the cliff. She had misjudged him, she thought. He didn’t want her honesty. Perhaps all he wanted was to bed her. So her incoherent confession of fears and resentments that went back to childhood was far more than he had bargained for.
He said finally, ‘I didn’t understand how deep it went. Even after you cried at the monolith I didn’t understand.’
‘Perhaps all you want is a summer affair,’ she blurted.
‘I’ve never said that.’
What do you want? The words were on the tip of Kristine’s tongue. But how could she ask them, when she had no idea what she herself wanted?
Lars eased her body away from his. ‘Are you feeling better now?’ he asked.
Knowing nothing had been settled, yet too tired to push for resolution, she said, ‘If that’s what vertigo feels like, no wonder I stay away from Alfred Hitchcock movies.’
Lars’s smile stopped short of his eyes. He helped her to her feet. ‘Why don’t you look around for a while? But stay away from the edge.’
She took his advice, letting the grandeur of the view sink into her senses, wondering if she was being fanciful to imagine that Lars had within him both the uncompromising hardness of the rock-face and the mysterious depths of the fjord so far below. She did know something. In that moment of swirling horror at the edge of the cliff she had made two decisions. She was going to see her grandfather. And, if Lars still wanted to, she would like him to travel with her.
She had been afraid of intimacy for too long.
* * *
Four hours later Lars was driving the Fiat off the ferry in Stavanger. He parked to one side, letting the other cars pass, and said evenly, ‘I’m booked into a hotel just up the street. I’d like to take you to dinner.’
‘All right,’ Kristine said.
Something flashed across his face and was gone. With a lightness that did not quite ring true, he said, ‘What, no arguments about money?’
‘Not tonight, Lars. Tomorrow,’ she said pertly.
‘In that case, we shall have caviare and champagne...where are you staying?’
She gave a witty, more or less accurate description of the guest-house, and finished, ‘So I guess I’ll stay at a campsite.’
‘As your financial scruples are on holiday, I’ll book you a room in my hotel.’
Every muscle in her body ached. ‘Will it have a bathtub? With hot water?’
‘It’s a very good hotel; I don’t think you have to worry.’
She would wear the sea-green jumpsuit that Gianetta had given her, Kristine thought, and remembered how she and Lars had danced together in another restaurant in Oslo. ‘All right,’ she said again.
The hotel was indeed elegant, yet Lars in his dirt-streaked bush trousers and hiking boots looked entirely at home there. Her backpack and haversack were ceremonially loaded on the porter’s trolley, her car was parked for her, and she was given a room on the same floor as Lars’s but four doors down. Lars followed her into it and tipped the porter, who then left, closing the door behind him.
Kristine’s eyes had flown to the queen-sized bed with its very beautiful tapestry bedspread. Lars said forcibly, ‘Let’s get something straight, Kristine. Now, before we go any further. I’m not going to let you disappear again—’
‘I don’t want to disappear,’ she said.
Triumph, happiness and a fugitive relief lit up his face. ‘Good,’ he said laconically, his smile turning her knees to water. ‘But I want to take a break from all the demands I’ve made on you. Physical demands. So let’s just have fun together, do all the tourist things—hike a bit, swim, enjoy ourselves. I don’t know whether you’re going to see your grandfather or not, but even if you don’t you should go to places like Geiranger and Dalsnibba...and I want to be with you when you do.’
She said, feeling as though she was picking her way among the rocks on Prekestolen, ‘You don’t want to make love with me any more?’
‘That’s not what I said. I want to, but I’m not going to—because I can see the conflict that causes you.’ He leaned over and kissed the tip of her nose. ‘I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t wear that turquoise outfit, though—there are limits to my self-control.’
There was something wrong here. Wrinkling her brow, giving him a dubious smile, Kristine said, ‘What if I change my mind? If I want to go to bed with you?’
His body was still; but his eyes, raking her from head to toe, betrayed him. He said huskily, ‘I want you to decide that when we’re nowhere near each other. Not even in the same room. Do you understand what I mean?’
‘To decide with my head and not my hormones,’ she said lightly, and knew as soon as the words were out what she should have said. She should have said, To decide with my head and not my heart. And what did that mean?
Lars moved around her to the door, and for the first time it occurred to Kristine that he was as wary of the bed as she was. ‘I’ll pick you up for dinner in an hour?’ he asked.
‘That’s fine,’ she said, and watched the door close for the second time. Other than a kiss that one of her brothers could have given her, Lars had not touched her at all. Nor would he, she thought. The next move was up to her.
She scowled hideously at the bed, bounced up and down on the mattress a few times, and resolutely squashed any fantasies of her and Lars sharing that bed. Because essentially he was right. They each knew he could sweep her off her feet, that he could seduce her with one kiss. They also each knew how nervous she was of any commitment to physical intimacy, let alone emotional closeness. Oh, yes, he was right.
Which did nothing for the fierce hunger that gnawed at her when she pictured Lars stretched out beside her on the tapestry bedspread.
She unzipped her backpack, shook out her blue dress and left the jumpsuit rolled up in a ball underneath her socks. Then she turned on the bath-taps, cheering up somewhat when she saw the array of complimentary soaps and shampoos—a distinct improvement on last night. And, when all was said and done, Lars wanted to travel with her. Wanted it enough to pursue her from Mandal.
She’d better tell him tonight what she’d done with his keys.
CHAPTER SIX
HAVING laid her monetary scruples to rest for one evening, Kristine thoroughly enjoyed her dinner with Lars. The food was delicious, and the wine made her feel wittier than usual and more penetrating in her judgements, as well as—and here she was brought up short—more desirable as a woman. Luckily there was no dance-floor.
After they had eaten, they strolled down to the harbour, going into a couple of bars and joining a group of singers in the second one, Kristine warbling away happily at Lars’s side. The bar was crowded; he therefore kept very close to her, his shoulder against hers, his arm going around her once or twice to prevent her from being buffeted by the rowdier elements in the bar. She liked this very much, so much so that to distract herself she tried to pick out all the languages she could hear around her. Over the last two years she had decided she wanted to study languages when she went home, and perhaps become an interpreter. In the meantime she must work on her Norwegian with Lars. If—when—she went to Fjaerland, she didn’t want to be totally dependent on a dictionary.
Lars had just ordered a second beer when a red-haired man of about his age started pushing his way through
the throng towards them and came to a stop in front of her companion. He said, grinning from ear to ear, ‘You’re Lars Bronstad, aren’t you? Remember me? Kevin Armstrong, Canadian team, slalom.’ He stuck out his hand.
Lars took it, although not before Kristine sensed through the sudden rigidity of the arm pressed against hers his reluctance to do so. Then Kevin transferred his grin to her, shaking her hand and repeating his name. She liked him right away. After introducing herself, she discovered he had once lived only thirty miles from her, in Welland. ‘Did you say you were on the Canadian ski team?’ she asked.
‘Yeah...got beaten by this guy more than once.’ And he gave Lars a friendly punch on the arm, the beer sloshing in the mug in his other hand.
Lars said, in a not very subtle shift of topic, ‘So what are you doing here, Kevin?’
‘Filming beer commercials for a company back home. Fjords and pretty girls in national costume, you know the sort of thing. Pays well, that’s for sure. What are you up to these days?’
‘Living in Oslo for the moment, looking after some family business.’
Kevin raised his mug. ‘You can’t afford to drink beer in Oslo. Mind you, I’m doing OK...turned pro three years ago. It’s too bad you retired, Lars. You could have gone places.’ His face sobered. ‘I was sorry to hear about your wife. I suppose that’s why you quit, eh? Must have been a bad time for you.’
‘Yes,’ said Lars. ‘Well, it’s been good seeing you again, Kevin—I hope you enjoy the rest of your stay. Kristine and I are planning an early start in the morning, so we’d better head back to the hotel.’
His hand closed around Kristine’s arm in a grip that brooked no arguments. She, the word ‘wife’ still reverberating in her brain, said with a composure that amazed her, ‘Nice meeting you, Kevin. Good luck with the commercials.’
Lars steered her through the crowds, and for once the touch of his hand on her flesh did not arouse her to lust. As they emerged on the pavement, Lars dropped her arm, his face set in grim lines that discouraged any conversation, and began hurrying up the hill towards the hotel. Kristine’s blue sandals were not designed for speed, and she had already climbed Prekestolen that day. She said, ‘Kevin’s not chasing us, Lars.’
