New and Collected Stories (94 page)

He sat down and peeled an apple, giving half to her. ‘I'm so glad you feel that way. We'll stay, then. It was only an aberration.'

She hoped so, yet didn't think it could be. He'd heard something she hadn't, or maybe even seen something, therefore she ought to know about it, but had stupidly put him off from explaining, and couldn't now reopen a wound he'd been too glad to close.

With a sink in her bedroom she didn't need to use the bathroom to do her teeth. A light above the glass showed her drawn features: she had certainly lost some pounds in the last few months, which she was pleased about, though not at the scheming yet frightened expression in the eyes that looked back, which also showed the man standing behind her, and she decided to carry on as if he wasn't there, though knowing that it was the request on his face that forced her to keep looking at him and not shout for Stephen, as if her life depended on it even more than did his.

Her cold body thawed and became warm, as a grey wraith hardly visible came around and touched her breast, the sensation as if done by a real but gentle hand which knew exactly the pressure to exert, then withdrew at the same moment as the face disappeared like a light out of her life. A last glance at herself before getting into bed showed flushed cheeks, and an avid glint in the eyes which denied her exhaustion.

A few nights later, when it began, she put a dot with a circle round it in her handbag diary, in pencil and not easy to see. Reading in bed, her habit before going to sleep, she found the pages increasingly difficult to turn, and looked to see if anything was sticking them together, though nothing was apparent. She smiled at taking it for a sign of lights out, no disagreeing about that, put the book down, settled the pillows, and drew the sheet up to her neck, feeling for the switch.

The blackness was complete, also the silence. In London, no matter where you were, there was always the distant roar of traffic, but here, except for a late car going through the village, it was bliss. Blackness and nothingness should have been perfect for being pulled into oblivion, yet it rarely was. Those nights she got to sleep easily provided the weirdest and thickest of dreams.

She was on the way, when someone tugged at her sheet, no mistake, wanting to get into bed, and it could only be Stephen, though she must have been nearer to sleep than she thought because there had been no noise of an opening door. ‘Oh, leave me alone tonight,' she said. ‘I'm too tired.' No one was there, but she was caressed as in a dream come to life, unable to resist until drawn into a sleep without visions.

The awakening was better than for weeks, even months. All day the sensation lasted, and in the evening she suggested as a treat, mainly for Stephen, that they drive five miles to the local town and eat at the Red Lion.

‘I don't know why it is,' he said, ‘But I'm nervous about getting in the car these days. It's as if I've had an accident recently, and scared of being at the wheel again. I can't explain it more than that.'

Well, she thought, you'll damned well have to get used to it, because we're living in the country, and if you don't you're stuck. ‘Then I'll drive,' she said. ‘No problem,' a response which surprised him, because she hadn't really asked what the problem might be. She didn't say it, but he probably intercepted her words. Any such thing was likely in this house.

‘No, it's nonsense,' he said. ‘I'll drive, of course, but I want to go in on my own, and get a very elaborate takeaway from the Indian restaurant. The old Tandoori's supposed to be excellent. You can set out the candles in the dining room while I'm gone. I'll get everything going that looks good.'

‘And all the trimmings?' she said archly.

‘You bet.' The gleam in his eyes showed his distrust of everyone, but especially her, she thought, though he tried to show that she wasn't included in it. She kissed him. ‘I can't wait, so don't be long.'

He was longer than she thought, though half expecting he would be. Whoever or whatever had got into her bed last night had left her so excited it would never do to mention the phenomenon to Stephen. She knew she ought, but if she did maybe the visitations would stop, and not only that but perhaps it would disturb Stephen enough for him to have his dream of country living blasted sufficiently to give the whole experiment up and move back to Town, and she didn't want to do that to him.

Even now, alone in the house, Ralph, as she called him, was with her. She felt the familiar draught as he came to look over her shoulder while she was reading her book, as if taking in the lines slightly quicker and wanting her to turn the pages before she was ready. But she held back, unwilling to let him have it all his own way, thought he was so tangibly present that it became hard to concentrate. Then he left her, so abruptly that it was impossible to know why. For a while she felt bereft, as if betrayed, irritated at the emptiness of the house, for he had gone right away from it she was sure, as if called out on an urgent errand.

She felt sweat on her forehead, and reached for a paper towel, but the skin was dry, and she wondered if she weren't going a shade crazy in wanting him back, the sudden absence of someone she was used to now painful to her. She stood to light a cigarette, which she hadn't done since coming to the place, but luckily Stephen always kept a few packets scattered around, having started again recently.

To the town and back shouldn't take more than an hour, even if he had to wait, which you invariably did at a takeaway. She put plates in the oven on low, then heard the car stop quickly, and a violent bang of the door as he got out. She'd put the porch light on to guide him in, and went to help with his boxes, but he almost knocked her down as he came to the door, took her by the waist, and pulled her back into the kitchen. She had never seen such a look of fright on anybody's face: ‘What is it?'

‘I wish I knew. But I'm sure somebody tried to kill me, and I can't think why. On the way back something dark and grey seemed to sit on the windscreen. I couldn't see a thing, whatever it was, so put on the brakes. I skidded and grazed a bank, then nearly hit another car that came around the bend with lights blazing. Then whatever it was cleared off. At first I thought it was a person, then I wasn't sure.'

‘It could have been a freak mist. You get them sometimes.'

‘I'd like to think so.' He paused, and stared across the room as if seeing it again while – and she couldn't help such a banal thought coming to mind – the boxed food in the car was getting cold. ‘But I don't. I can't,' he added. ‘It came only for me, like a panther, dark grey, jumping across.'

‘It was one of those things,' she said, ‘Accidental. Best not to imagine it was anything else. How could it have been? We live in the real world, after all.'

He looked at her, unbelieving, while she opened the cupboard and took out a bottle of Jameson's, and poured a good measure for him and a smaller one for herself. ‘Let's have a drink. Then we'll get the food and pop it in the oven for a few minutes. I'm starving, so you must be as well.'

‘All right. Nothing else to do.' He gulped the fiery liquid.

‘But I got a fright, let me tell you,' wondering at her divine calmness about the matter, appreciating it all the same, because it wouldn't do for two people to get locked into whatever it was.

Stephen fitted well into the life of the village, and bully for them they made it easy, for he went twice a week to the pub and always came home saying what a good and interesting couple of hours he'd had. They talked gardening, he told her, and sport, agricultural matters, and dispensed local happenings of the past, and any present peculiarities. Someone talked him into exhibiting vegetables at the annual village show, and he got second prize for a huge cabbage, which pleased him in a way she never thought such an accomplishment would. There was even talk about coopting him onto the village council, though since the incident in the car the glamour had gone out of the possibility, in that he had stopped talking about it.

She saw this so clearly that she was sorry for him not being able to fight what was troubling him, or not having the greater courage by somehow giving into it, as she had done, fighting it if he had to, enduring it at least. ‘I want to stay,' she said, when he spoke of leaving. ‘I'm just about getting used to country life. I never thought I would. But it suits me now. I've slowed down. I've forgotten London.'

He went out in the car as rarely as he could get away with, letting her drive when something was needed from the little supermarket in the town. Hitherto not liking to be much at the wheel, she now enjoyed it, exploring the lacework pattern of narrow lanes till getting to know all the short cuts of the area, discovering wayside shops and farms which were good for organic supplies, where to pull in for the best honey, or free-range chickens, the best village for its butcher, or what town had the most elaborate deli. And she was always conscious of her shadowy lover hovering either beside her or on the back seat, giving indications on sharp bends or dangerous corners, and on straight stretches muttering phrases of love and adoration into her ears, and promising to display further expertise during the coming night.

‘You've forgotten London,' Stephen said angrily. ‘But I haven't. All I know is that we were happy there, even though I did agitate to move down here. I only remember how idyllic it was between you and me, looking back on it.'

‘It's amazing how things change,' she said.

‘Or how you do. Or they seem to have. That's what foxes me. I thought you'd jump at the chance of living in London again. It was hard enough getting you out here, God knows.'

‘I'm used to it now.'

‘Yes, but used to what?'

‘I just can't chop and change.'

‘Nor can I. But I have to get away. There's something weird going on in this house.'

The laugh surprised even her, a shock at its tone which seemed to search out every corner of the large living room for refuse, ringing from beam to beam, from inglenook to window seat. The flames in the fireplace danced at the prolonged sound.

He was deep in the armchair, then she was on the floor, the laughter following her from the blow at her head. He was standing over her. ‘Never laugh like that again.' His hands shook, as if he hadn't finished, so close to killing her.

‘Never, you understand?'

He had some justification, but she gloated at his loss of self-control, until the pain began burning in her cheek. He'd never hit her before, and she felt the glowering disapproval of her lover. More than that, a desire for vengeance. ‘That's the last time you hit me,' she called in her rage.

‘You asked for it.' He slumped back into a despair she had no pity for. ‘I'm sorry, though. I don't know what got at me. I couldn't help it. It wasn't me.'

‘It god-damned well was,' she cried. ‘The last time. You understand?'

Close to tears, he went from the room, leaving her to straighten up the small table knocked over in her fall, and set the lamp straight.

During lunch, having again worn himself out in the garden, he told her he was going to London in the morning. He'd seen an advertisement for a large flat that would do for them, in Ealing. ‘I just want to see what it's like. It's in our price range, and we'll have no trouble selling this place, even though it is haunted.'

‘Haunted?' She crushed a laugh. ‘Who told you that?'

‘A bloke in the pub some days ago. He said he was joking afterwards, but it struck a chord in me. So what do you think about a move back to London?'

She didn't, not at all. ‘Well, if you have to, then I suppose that's all right.' The answer was too ready for her to think she would ever go. She liked it here, but let him think not, if he cared to.

He set off at nine, midday-midweek for the best traffic conditions, so she had the day to herself, to enjoy the house, to do what she would, to eat when she liked, to take a bath in the afternoon, sit in the summerhouse and hope for sun, stroll to the end of the village and back – her best day in the house so far, because no one else was there – until she lay in the bath and the water rippled for no good reason that she could see. The indistinct cloud rolled over her, and liked what it saw, then left her to the pleasures of herself. She didn't feel its presence for the rest of the day, as if it too wanted rest, or had something to do elsewhere.

As evening came on she tidied the house, stowed yesterday's newspaper into its place under the staircase, noticing the details of two flats circled with purple felt pen, the large one he said he was going to see, but also a studio flat at Notting Hill Gate, which she supposed he would call at as well, though why? She considered all the possibilities, nothing too outlandish or outrageous to go through her mind. Either he intended someday living alone, or he intended fixing up a place to put a girlfriend in. There was no other explanation.

When he got back she would rail him about it, and though at the moment her thoughts lacked animosity, she would certainly get herself up to it when the time came. Maybe he hadn't even gone to London at all, knowing she would check the newspaper, and accept that reason as an alibi. He said he would be back by dark, but it was dark already. She supposed he had gone carousing with some of his old friends from the finance place, all hugger-mugger at a pub in the city, or he was cavorting with one of his old flames – hard to say what put such thoughts into her mind.

She sat before the living room fire with a plate of biscuits and cheese, and a cup of tea, happy not to have cooked a meal. Stephen always laid a fire on the morning after they had used one, so it was only necessary to hold a long match to the paper and sticks, and bring in a couple more logs to replace those she'd put on. She began to want her love, and wondered where he was, too much to be deprived of both.