Caedmon’s Song (8 page)

‘Yorkshire? No.’

‘I thought your accent was different. Where you from, then?’

‘Exeter,’ Martha lied.

‘Never been there.’

‘You’ve not missed much. It’s just a city, like all the rest. Tell me about Australia.’

And Keith told her. It seemed to suit both of them. Keith could find suitable expression for his homesickness in talking about Sydney life, and Martha could pretend to be interested. The whole
evening was beginning to seem like a farce to her, and she wondered why she had bothered to agree to meet him at all. It brought back disturbing memories, too, mostly of her years as a teenager,
pretending to be interested in what the boys said as they showed off, and then, later, fending off their wandering hands for as long as it seemed proper to do so. Would Keith turn out to be just
like the rest, too? She put that last thought right out of her head.

‘. . . as flash as a rat with a gold tooth,’ Keith was saying. ‘But that’s just what people from Melbourne say. It’s hardly surprising Sydney’s like a flashy
whore to them. Melbourne’s more like an old maid in surgical stockings . . .’

The place was filling up. Already most of the tables were taken, and three men had just started to play darts. Martha nodded in all the right places. She soon found that she’d finished her
second half-pint.

‘Another?’ Keith asked.

‘Are you trying to get me drunk?’

‘Why would I want to do that?’

‘To take advantage of me.’

Keith blushed. ‘I wasn’t . . . I mean I—’

She waved dismissively. ‘Doesn’t matter. Yes, I’ll have another, if you like.’

It was while he was away at the bar that Martha first heard the voice. It made her hackles rise and her throat constrict. Casually, she looked around. Only two men were playing darts now, and it
was one of them who had spoken. He was small and swarthy and wore a navy-blue fisherman’s jersey. He looked as if he hadn’t shaved for a couple of days, and his eyes seemed to glitter
unnaturally, like the Ancient Mariner’s, under his ragged fringe. He caught Martha looking and returned her gaze. Quickly, she turned away.

Keith came back with the drinks and excused himself to go to the gents.

Martha turned her head slowly again, trying to catch the man in her peripheral vision. Had he recognized her? She didn’t think so. This time he was so absorbed in throwing the dart that he
didn’t notice her looking. Could it really be him?

‘Do you know him?’

Martha almost jumped at the sound of Keith’s voice. She hadn’t seen him come back. ‘No. What makes you ask that?’

Keith shrugged. ‘Just the way you were looking at him, that’s all.’

‘Of course I don’t know him,’ Martha said. ‘This is my first day here.’

‘You just seemed to be staring rather intently, that’s all. Maybe it’s someone you thought you recognized?’

‘I’ve told you, I don’t know what you’re talking about. Just drop it, will you?’

‘Are you sure you’re all right?’

‘Yes, I’m fine,’ Martha said. And it was probably the truest thing she’d said to him all evening. Now she had something concrete to work on, her mind seemed more able to
focus and concentrate. On the other hand, she felt herself drifting further and further away from Keith. It was becoming harder for her to follow his conversation and respond in the appropriate way
at the right time. He began to seem more like an irritating fly that she kept having to swat away. She needed to be alone, but she couldn’t escape just yet. She had to play the game.

‘You a student, then?’ he asked.

‘Yes. I’m doing postgraduate work at Bangor.’

And this book, is it your doctoral thesis?’

‘Sort of.’

It was excruciating, like some awful interview she had to go through. As she answered Keith’s inane questions, Martha was conscious all the time of the darts match going on behind her. Her
skin was burning and her pulse beat way too fast.

Finally, the game drew to a close. The man she had been watching walked over to the bar, where she could see him out of the corner of her eye, and put his empty glass down on the counter.
‘Well, that’s my limit for tonight,’ he said to the barman. ‘See you tomorrow, Bobby.’ The accent was right, the voice hoarse.

‘Night, Jack,’ said the barman.

Martha watched Jack walk towards the exit. He glanced briefly in her direction before he opened the door, but still showed no sign that he recognized her. She looked at her watch. It was a
quarter to ten. For some reason, she got the impression that what had just happened was a kind of nightly ritual: Jack finishing his game, putting his glass on the counter and making some remark
about the lateness of the hour. If he was a fisherman, then he would probably have to be up early in the morning. But shouldn’t he already be out at sea? It was all so confusing. Still, if it
was his habit to do this every night, she could come back tomorrow, when Keith was out of the way, and . . . Well, the next move would take careful planning and a lot of grace, but she had plenty
of time.

‘Want to go?’

With difficulty, like focusing on something from a great distance, Martha turned her attention back to Keith. She nodded and reached for her holdall. Outside, the warm fresh air felt good in her
lungs. A bright half-moon hung high over St Mary’s.

‘Want to go for a walk?’ Keith asked.

‘Okay.’

They walked along East Terrace by the row of tall, white Victorian hotels, towards the Cook statue. As they passed the whale’s jawbone, Keith stopped and said, ‘That must have been
exciting, setting off after whales.’

‘I suppose I’d have been one of the waiting women,’ Martha said, ‘hoping to see the jawbone of a whale nailed to the masts.’

‘What?’

‘It was a sign. It meant everyone was safe. The women used to walk up here along West Cliff and look out for the ships coming home.’ Martha looked at the huge arch of bone. From
where she stood, it framed the floodlit St Mary’s across the harbour as perfectly as if the whole set-up had been contrived by an artist.

‘It’s hard to imagine you doing that,’ Keith said, moving on slowly. ‘Pacing and waiting.’

‘Why do you say that?’

‘Well, I can’t really say I
know
you of course, but you give me the impression that you’re a modern woman, liberated or whatever. You’d have been more likely to be
out there on the ships.’

‘They didn’t take women.’

‘I don’t suppose they did. But you know what I mean.’

Martha didn’t. It had been his first really personal remark and it took her aback. How could someone just sit and talk about inconsequential things for an hour or two and then come out
with a statement like that? She hadn’t even been paying attention to him most of the time. Could he really see into her character? She hoped not. He wouldn’t like what he saw.

By the Cook statue, they sat on a bench and looked out to sea. A cool breeze ruffled her hair and the moon’s reflection seemed to float somewhere far in the distance, yet its eerie white
light spread over all the ripples and billows of the water as far as the eye could see.

Martha thought of the passage from Lawrence’s
Women in Love,
where Birkin threw pebbles at the moon’s reflection in a pond. It was supposed to symbolize something, or so her
English teacher had said, but nobody really knew what. Symbols, to her, had always stood for things you felt but couldn’t explain. And now she felt like throwing pebbles at the rippling white
sea.

‘Do you have a boyfriend?’ Keith asked.

‘What do you think? You seem to know what kind of person I am. What would you say?’

‘I’d be surprised if you didn’t. But if I was him I wouldn’t let you go away by yourself like this.’

‘Why not?’

‘Stands to reason, doesn’t it? A pretty girl like you . . .’

A pretty girl! Martha almost laughed out loud. From where they sat, at the top of the cliff and back a little bit from its fenced edge, she couldn’t see the waves break on the beach below.
She could hear them though, and the deep grumbling hiss as one withdrew filled the silence before Keith spoke again.

‘There’s something disconcerting about you, though,’ he said.

‘Oh? What’s that?’

‘Well, for a start, you’re not easy to get to know.’

Martha looked at her watch. ‘We’ve been together about three hours,’ she said. ‘How much do you expect to get to know about someone in that time?’

‘It’s not time that counts. Some people you can get to know real quickly. Not you, though. There’s hidden depths to you.’

‘Why am I disconcerting?’ Martha asked. Despite herself, she was becoming interested in his perception of her.

‘Oh, I don’t know. You seem so distant. And you don’t get my jokes. It’s like you’ve spent the last few years on another planet. I mean, if I make a little joke,
you don’t laugh, you ask a question.’

‘Like what?’

Keith laughed. ‘Like that!’

Martha felt herself blushing. It wasn’t a feeling she enjoyed. She smiled. ‘I suppose you’re right. It’s just curiosity.’

He shook his head. ‘No, it’s not. It’s more like a form of defence. You’re very evasive. You’ve got a lot of defences, Martha. You’re hiding in there
somewhere, behind all the walls and barbed wire. Why?’

Martha became aware of Keith’s arm slipping around her shoulder. It made her stiffen. Surely he must sense her resistance, she thought, but he didn’t remove it. ‘Why
what?’ she asked.

‘Why do you need to protect yourself so much, to hide away? What’s there to be afraid of?’

‘There’s a lot to be afraid of,’ Martha said slowly. ‘And what makes you think I’m protecting myself from the world? Maybe I’m protecting the world from
me.’

‘Now that really is choice. I’m not sure I understand you, not at all. But I do find you intriguing, and very attractive.’

A ship’s light blinked far out to sea. Keith leaned over and kissed her. Martha managed to contain her boiling rage and let him. It was a soft, tentative kiss, not a violent,
tongue-probing attack. A small price to pay, she told herself amid her anger, for appearing normal. She knew she wasn’t responding with the enthusiasm he expected, but there was absolutely
nothing she could do about that.

‘It’s a shame I have to go tomorrow,’ he said, breaking away gently. Clearly her response, or lack of it, didn’t mean very much to him. ‘I’d like to spend
more time with you, get to know you a bit better.’

Martha said nothing. She just stared out at the rippling moon on the water and watched the ship’s light move across the horizon like a star through the sky. He kissed her again, this time
more passionately, exploring her teeth with his tongue. When she felt his other hand slip up over her side and reach for her breast, she pulled away.

‘No,’ she said, as calmly but firmly as she could. ‘What do you think I am? We’ve only just met.’

‘I’m sorry,’ Keith said, ‘really I am. I didn’t mean to offend you. I just thought . . . I mean I hoped. Oh God, you can’t blame a bloke for trying, can
you?’

Martha could, but she didn’t say so. Instead, she tried to placate him despite the rage she felt. ‘It’s not that I don’t like you,’ she said. ‘It’s just
too soon. I guess I’m not the kind of person for a holiday quickie.’

Now Keith seemed offended. ‘That’s not fair. That’s not what I had in mind.’

But it was, Martha knew. Oh, Keith was a nice enough boy, not too pushy, but all it came down to was that he wanted to go to bed with her. He would make out that he didn’t usually do such
things, and she was supposed to say the same. Then he would tell her how it was different with her, really special. He was a wolf, all right, but a tame one. Getting the brush-off just made him
sulk and become petulant. They weren’t all as easy as him to fight off.

‘Come on,’ Martha said. ‘Let’s go back. It’s getting chilly.’

Hands in pockets, head down, Keith walked beside her back to the guesthouse.

KIRSTEN

‘It’s
my
body. I have a right to know.’

Kirsten leaned back on the pillows. Her eyes were puffed up, and the tear-tracks had dried on her cheeks. The doctor stood by the bottom of the bed, and her parents sat beside her.

‘You were in no state to be alarmed,’ the doctor said. ‘You’ve been suffering from severe trauma. We had to avoid upsetting you.’ For the first time, Kirsten
actually looked at him. He was a short, dark-skinned man with a deeply etched frown that converged in a V between his thick black eyebrows. Somehow, the lines made him look like a short-tempered
person, though Kirsten had seen no evidence of this. If he had tried to keep the full extent of her injuries from her, he had at least been gentle.

‘I’m already alarmed,’ she said. Her nightgown was buttoned up again now, but the memory of what she had seen still frightened her. ‘Look, I’m not a little girl.
Something’s wrong. Tell me.’

‘We didn’t want to upset you, dear.’ Her mother echoed the doctor. ‘There’s plenty of time to go into all the details later, when you’re feeling better. Why
don’t you just rest now? The doctor will give you a sedative.’

Kirsten struggled to sit up. ‘I don’t want a bloody sedative! I want to know now! If you don’t tell me, I’ll only imagine it’s worse than it is. I feel awful, but I
don’t think I’m going to die, am I? What else could be so bad? What could be worse than that?’

‘Lie back and keep calm,’ the doctor said, gently pushing her down. ‘No, you’re not going to die. At least not until you’ve had your three-score and ten. If you
were, you’d have done so before today.’ He moved back to the end of the bed.

‘So tell me what’s wrong.’

The doctor hesitated and looked towards her father. ‘Go on,’ he said quietly. ‘Tell her.’

Kirsten wanted to let him know that his permission wasn’t required. She was twenty-one; she didn’t need his approval. But if this was the only way to find out, so be it.

The doctor sighed and stared at a spot on the wall above the top of her head. ‘What you saw,’ he began, ‘is the result of emergency surgery, the sutures. It looks bad now, but
when they heal, it will be better. Not like new, but better than now.’