‘My mum reckons he’s a peeping Tom,’ sniffed Liz. ‘She heard something in the front garden once and my dad went out and there he was, that Threadle, on his hands and knees in the bushes. Reckoned that he’d seen somebody climbing our wall. Trying to look into our windows more like it. Dad told him to bugger off and vigilante in somebody else’s garden.’ The bouncing light ahead began to slow. ‘Oh sod it, he’s stopping,’ she sighed.
Bernard halted. The machine almost fell onto its side but he saved it desperately. ‘’Evening, youngsters,’ he said raising his visor. He shone a torch in their faces. ‘Ah, it’s you two. Just checking. Off somewhere?’ He lowered his torch.
‘Just an acid party,’ Liz told him wanly.
‘Where?’ asked Bernard swiftly. His eyes blinked. ‘Where is it? You shouldn’t be going to acid parties. Come on, where is it?’
‘Reading,’ said Toby.
‘Reading? But that’s miles.’ He returned the torch to their faces. ‘Are you having me on?’ he said.
‘No,’ said Liz emphatically. ‘Would we do that? We’re getting a lift from the main road.’
Bernard turned the torch on his own round face. ‘You can see I’m being dead serious,’ he said into his own glare. ‘If you go to this acid party I’ll go straight to your fathers. I know where you both live.’
‘I know you do,’ answered Liz. ‘My dad caught you crawling in our front garden, remember?’ Bernard had lowered the torch from his face but they saw him react in the darkness. ‘That …’ he stumbled. ‘That was a mistake …’
‘It’s not what my dad reckoned. Anyway don’t worry yourself. We’ll be all right.’
They turned from him and walked on. Bernard’s snort was answered by the snort of his motor cycle. He revved it feverishly and started off towards the village. ‘Watch this,’ laughed Liz. She emitted an echoing scream. Cupping her hands she shouted: ‘Help! Help!’
They heard the motor cycle coming back through the dark. They hurried on, laughing wildly.
Bernard skidded to a halt abreast of them. ‘What was that?’ he demanded, balancing dangerously.
‘What was what?’ asked Toby. Liz pretended to search the hedge.
‘Screams,’ Bernard said heavily. He sniffed around as though he might detect something. ‘Somebody calling for help.’
‘We didn’t hear it,’ said Liz blatantly. She looked at Toby. ‘Did we?’
‘Probably a cow,’ suggested Toby. ‘When they moo it sounds like somebody calling for help.’
Bernard put his torch to his face and glared at them again. He transferred it to them once more. They were regarding him innocently. ‘Wasting my time,’ he mumbled helplessly. He pulled down his visor, turned the thin vehicle and crackled down the road towards the village. Toby and Liz clutched at each other in their laughter. They hung and held onto each other. ‘There’s the bus shelter down there,’ she said resourcefully. ‘Let’s go in there.’
Hugged together they stumbled to the bus shelter.
‘Does it pong?’ she inquired sniffing close to the door. ‘People come and pee in here.’
‘Want to go around the back?’ asked Toby. He was desperate not to lose her now.
‘No,’ she whispered. ‘Inside it’ll be safer.’
It was going to happen at last. He knew it. Toby could feel his breath constricting and his heart bumping against his chest. They guided each other into the pungent darkness. He leaned her against the lapped wooden wall and kissed her feverishly on the mouth and all over her neck. ‘I’ll get splinters in my bum,’ she mumbled. But her lips sucked his chin and he began to rub her scarcely detectable breasts. ‘Not too hard,’ she whispered. ‘They might fall off.’
‘I’m bursting out of my flies,’ he groaned.
‘Don’t do that,’ she choked. ‘Don’t burst, darling.’
It was the first time anyone but his mother had called him darling. ‘I can’t stand it any longer,’ he moaned. ‘Can I take it out?’
‘No, I’ll do that for us. I know where to find it.’
Feverishly they kissed again and both wiped their chins. Her eyes were brazen in the dark. She dropped both hands to his fly and unzipped it with a tug of triumph. ‘I can feel it,’ she whispered. Her fingers plunged inside. ‘There!’
‘Christ, so can I,’ he responded, gritting his teeth. ‘Hold it, Liz. But not too tight.’
She manoeuvred his penis over the elastic on his underpants. ‘It’s quite a size,’ she said in a low voice. ‘As they go.’
‘Let me,’ he groaned. He lifted the hem of her dress and grappled with her knickers. Somehow he got them down around her straight thighs before cramming his eager fingers inside them. ‘Lovely soft hair,’ he murmured.
‘What did you expect, bristles?’ she whispered. They sniggered against each other’s faces.
‘Let’s do it, Liz. I can’t stand it like this. I’m going to go bang.’
‘Don’t go bang. They’ll think it’s at the airport.’ She had become composed, enjoying watching him in his excitement. ‘Have you got something to wear?’
‘To wear?’
‘Not like an overcoat. A condom,’ she said. ‘Like they tell you on television.’
‘No. I haven’t.’ Panic made his voice tremble. Oh God, he could not let himself lose her now. He must not fail this time.
‘Why haven’t you?’
‘Well … because I haven’t. I don’t just carry condoms around. This … doesn’t always happen …’ He withdrew his hand from her and put it against her face. ‘But, there’s no need,’ he pleaded. ‘I’ll be really careful and I’m not HIV positive either, I’m positive. Come on, Liz.’ Casually she rubbed his penis tip with her fingers again and he put his hand back inside her elastic waistband. ‘All right,’ she decided. ‘But don’t blame me.’
His desperation was washed away with relief. ‘I love you Liz,’ he groaned. ‘I wouldn’t let you come to any harm.’
They clutched passionately at each other. As they did so a rough male voice outside the bus shelter said: ‘Want to go in or out?’
‘Stay out here,’ said a woman. ‘People go and do their business in there, dirty pigs.’
The boy and girl gripped each other in fright. ‘We’ll do our business out here,’ laughed the man outside.
‘You’re crude sometimes, Curly, you’re really crude,’ the woman said.
‘You love it,’ he told her. ‘Go on, deny you love it.’
‘I love it,’ she confirmed, her voice low. ‘I’d love it now, Curly.’
Liz tried to pull Toby’s zip up and caught his skin. His face creased in the dark and his mouth opened in a silent scream. She tugged it down again. He took his hand out. They remained holding each other and afraid. Regular thuds came from the outside of the bus shelter. They could feel the wooden wall vibrating.
‘I don’t reckon that pub gets any better,’ said the man’s voice conversationally. The thumping continued.
‘They ought to have some music,’ she agreed breathlessly. The wood was sounding like a drum.
‘Have one of them karaoke bars,’ he said. There was a pause. ‘There.’ The thumping and vibrations ceased. Toby and Liz remained locked and motionless.
‘That was all right,’ said the man in the tone of someone finishing fish and chips. ‘Enjoy it?’
‘Lovely, Curly,’ she whispered. ‘You know I always do.’
‘Better get you home. Harold will be wondering where you are.’
‘He’ll be gone up to bed. He always goes straight after Clive James,’ she said.
They moved away and the two young people saw their shadows shuffle by the open door of the bus shelter. ‘I’ve got to go,’ said Liz after a full minute. ‘I feel sick.’
‘Me too,’ whispered Toby. ‘That was horrible.’
Unspeaking, Edward and Adele Richardson walked down the dewy field leaving the knot of people still outlined against the red flush of the barbeque fire. The tent, with its lantern inside, g
lowed like a lantern itself. At the gate Bernard Threadle was fussily preparing to push his motor cycle up the slope.
‘Why don’t you leave it here, Bernard?’ suggested Richardson. ‘You’ll only have to wheel it down again.’
The vigilante’s expression suggested that Richardson had found some flaw in an otherwise perfect plan. ‘Can’t, sir,’ he answered solidly after consideration. ‘Mustn’t be parted from the vehicle.’ He began to manhandle it up the slope. ‘I might ride down,’ he called back at them.
‘He probably thinks somebody will steal the thing,’ said Adele.
‘It’s his persona,’ Edward said. ‘Away from the bike he’s not himself.’
‘That’s an official sort of word,’ she observed. She walked slightly ahead and did not look at him. Her earlier irritation remained. ‘Persona.’ He did not respond. Sometimes he felt it was better to say nothing. Adele pursued it spitefully. ‘Is that the sort of word you use in your reports?’
‘It can be useful,’ he said without emphasis. They walked silently through the village, below the church wall, by the lych-gate, skirting the green. Both inns were now closed but they could see Mrs Mangold’s shadow as she cleared up. The sound of muted television programmes murmured from some houses, the windows still open on the warm night. ‘What did you think of Mrs Collingwood?’ asked Richardson eventually.
‘Mrs Collingwood and her daughter,’ said Adele as if correcting his oversight. ‘I simply cannot think what they came here for. A very odd business.’
‘It is,’ he said. ‘One day they may tell.’
The coughing of Bernard’s motor cycle now trailed them along the street. ‘Oh, damn,’ breathed Adele. ‘The Lone Ranger again.’ Her expression dropped further as the sounds decelerated. The armoured figure wobbled alongside them.
‘I meant to tell you, Mr and Mrs Richardson,’ said Bernard. ‘There’s a big acid party, so watch the youngsters.’
‘An acid party? Where?’ asked Richardson.
‘Reading, according to my informants.’
‘Thanks,’ said Adele almost snapping at him. ‘We might go over there.’ Then, with finality: ‘Goodnight, Bernard.’
‘Yes. Goodnight then,’ said Bernard touching his helmet in a hurt way. ‘I’ll be on my way.’
‘On your bike,’ muttered Adele as she walked to the front door. They were inside by the time he had gone back up the village road.
‘He’s harmless,’ said Richardson. ‘He only thinks he’s doing some public good.’
‘I deal with them all the time,’ she said with weary irritation. ‘So does everybody working in the social services.’
They stood in the close dimness of their hall. He switched on the lights. They looked at each other immediately as if to make a check then both looked away. ‘The damn world,’ she said, ‘is full of potty people who mean well.’
‘Do you want a drink?’ he asked, knowing they were going to quarrel.
‘No thanks. I’m going to bed.’ She remained at the foot of the stairs. ‘I want to know one thing,’ she said firmly.
‘What’s that?’
‘Why didn’t you tell me about this hijack business?’
He shrugged but turned towards the French window. The curtains were open and he could still see the glow of the Burridges’ tent. He felt a touch of envy for them. ‘It was nothing. Some mentally deranged Arab.’
‘Why didn’t you tell me? Everyone else damned well seems to know. Even that Lettie. Bramwell Broad was telling everyone in sight.’
Richardson said: ‘He can’t keep his mouth shut. We prefer it if these things don’t get about. It frightens the passengers.’
‘Oh shit,’ she said bitterly. ‘You and your bloody passengers.’ She mimicked him: ‘It frightens the passengers. I felt a bimbo, believe me, when I didn’t know a damned thing about it.’
‘You’ll never be a bimbo,’ he said quietly. He was tempted to add: ‘Not now.’ She stared at him, then turned and walked sadly and angrily up the stairs. ‘You’ve got an odd set of priorities,’ she said from the landing. He suddenly thought how they had both aged. ‘Any other man would have come home and told his wife,’ she said her voice low. ‘To hell with it being a secret. What’s it a secret for anyway? It’s bloody ridiculous. We are married, you know.’
‘And have been for some years,’ he replied. He felt sorry he had said it. She was looking hard at him as if trying to remember him from a previous time. ‘I did not want to worry you,’ he said shrugging.
‘It worries me more, you not mentioning it,’ she said with finality.
He began to mount the stairs. ‘I’ll go and spend an hour in the observatory,’ he told her.
‘Go on,’ she responded. ‘Stare at the damned stars. Tell them your secrets.’ As he went towards the study she had her last word. ‘Give my love to Venus.’
‘Venus is …’ He halted. He had meant to retaliate but in the end he could not bring himself to do so. He almost said instead: ‘… the evening star.’ It was a moment when, facing each other in their hopelessness and anger, they might have tried to save themselves; either one by just reaching out. But neither did and the moment passed.
Heavily he climbed the steps to the observatory. He heard their bedroom door shut fiercely. A few minutes later he heard the front door open and shut almost as strongly and for an alarming moment he thought that Adele had gone out again. Then he realised that it was Toby coming in. His son trod heavily on the stairs and he heard the door of his room close.
He moved into the articulated seat, adjusted it and settled back in silence and relief. Years away the stars were as unworried as ever. He sometimes liked to imagine he could hear them calling softly to each other. He turned the switch and the music began, the long, eerie, aching music of Walton. It filtered to his ears and he swung the telescope across the breadth of the sky.
Now, despite his growing unhappiness and doubt, he sat back in the chair and swivelled the telescope to the southern horizon. It was his most fruitful hunting ground because to the north the ever-luminous airport diffused even the gleam of the stars.
He knew what he would find to the south. The heroic Hercules, Ophiuchus, the Bearer of the Serpent, and the Serpent itself, Serpens. The Pleiades, with its million stars seen tonight as it was shining 22,000 years ago. He could not believe that they were only beautiful chemicals, somewhere there must be a cool, calm star, or several, or many, where beings peered through their telescopes at the earth and wondered if they would find any sign of life.
He felt himself dozing as he watched. He looked at his watch. It was quarter past two. He disentangled his long body from the telescope with his usual difficulty, turned off the stereo, extinguished the lights in the glass dome, and went with care down the steps to the warm landing. He went into the spare bedroom and only taking off his shoes, stretched himself on the bed and went to fitful sleep.
Seven
Autumn was less than glorious in the threadbare countryside around the airport. Fallen leaves cloaked mud, unkempt trees rattled while the wind shrieked through the strident pylons and their long, looped wires. Skies grew colder. Grey planes arrived and took off from Heathrow with a computerised monotony unaltered by the seasons.
Edward Richardson left Bedmansworth at eight thirty on a September morning while the Reverend Henry Prentice was already sweeping leaves from below the lych-gate of the church. He slowed the car. ‘I’m more of a recumbent than an incumbent,’ said the vicar straightening up. Uncertain sun lay in patches across the old sides of the church and gave the golden ball with its arrow a rich hue. ‘It’s a fixed feast this one. Where are you off to, Edward?’
‘Mombasa, East Africa,’ Richardson called back from the car. ‘All our people there have gone down with beriberi.’
The vicar leaned on his broom. ‘You’ll be there before I’ve finished this lot, I expect,’ he forecast. ‘Then tomorrow there’ll be some more to sweep. God timed the seasons rather inconvenientl
y. The leaves drop when the children, who might be persuaded to sweep them up, are back at school.’ He regarded the wet pile mournfully. ‘And the Scouts don’t want to know. Bob-a-job is history.’
He laughed resignedly and Richardson moved the car on. They all lived in a small world. He thought, not for the first time, how odd, yet how ordinary, it was that on this Monday morning, the villagers, Jim and Dilys Turner and Mrs Durie at the Swan, Mrs Mangold polishing the brass in the Straw Man, the vicar grousing at his leaves, Adele driving to her social services desk, Toby on the bus to Windsor, Bernard Threadle trapped behind his chemist’s shop counter, Anthony Burridge under his bowler, heading for London, and all the others were occupied with their unremarkable concerns, while he was going to a distant continent.
He passed the school, its playground filling, and had rounded the bend onto the old rural road before the motorway, when he saw Rona Train at the bus stop. He slowed and stopped the car.
‘Am I going your way, Rona?’ he asked leaning towards her. ‘I’m going to Heathrow.’
‘Just the place,’ she smiled.
‘You’re not leaving us?’ he asked. ‘I hope not.’
She laughed. ‘No. And especially not by bus.’
She got into the car beside him making him at once aware of her nearness, the brush of her skirt, her arm. ‘I didn’t know whether I was early for the bus or too late,’ she said.
He moved the vehicle forward again and glanced sideways at her. Her deep eyes came around to face him. ‘You can never tell with the bus,’ he said hurriedly.
‘I’d rent a car,’ she said. ‘But it really doesn’t seem justified. We don’t travel far. Mother doesn’t seem to want to move, to go anywhere. She spends her time rummaging around the church. She’s been locked up in the vestry with the parish records. She’s thinking of writing a history of Bedmansworth, so she says. I’m going to try some sketching at Heathrow.’
‘How long have you been drawing?’
‘A few years. Five or six. I only try,’ she said. ‘I don’t think anybody really believes they can draw or paint. I guess even Monet and Matisse were only trying. It’s a comforting thought.’
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