The Devil's Music (14 page)

    She steps forward, and the hand with the cigarette hovers over the soles of the woman’s feet. ‘The water source will be here somewhere, in between her toes.’

    The startling effect of pause and motion will be heightened with water flowing over it.

    Still gazing at the diving woman, Sarah picks up an almost empty glass of red wine from a wooden tea chest and drains it with one swig. Then remembers I’m there. ‘Oh – want one?’ She holds fag up in one hand, glass in the other.

    ‘Thanks. Wine’d be good.’

    After a quick search, she finds another glass on a shelf beside a smooth, curving sculpture that makes me think of a lasso. She inspects the glass and wipes the rim on her T-shirt. Wine glugs from the bottle. It’s a very large, blue glass, thick and heavy with air bubbles trapped in the glass. Very cheap or very expensive, it’s hard to say, but I like its weight in my hand.

    ‘The head’s not finished.’ She refills her own glass and turns back to the diving woman.

    Again, I notice the set of Sarah’s shoulders, the muscles in her upper arms, her bare feet. She’s strong, wiry. The joint of her big toe protrudes, giving her feet a gnarled look. There’s a silver band around one middle toe. I knock back half a glass of red. Feel better.

    ‘I want the water to run over her heels, down her legs, over her bum, back and shoulders,’ she swoops with her hand, ‘and then over her head. And I want her to have long hair.’

    The diving woman has Sarah’s feet, but more bony, and larger than life.

    ‘But,’ Sarah continues, ‘the hair’s a real bugger. I want tumbling locks, the water to swirl, not pour or trickle.’ A little red wine sploshes from her glass as she gesticulates. She must’ve had more than one already. ‘Want a towel?’

    I’m startled at her change of tack. She’s staring at my chest. Water from my sodden hair has spread across my T-shirt. Halfway down my back, there’s the cling of wet material. I bend down towards the floor, scooping a mass of dripping hair forwards over my head. ‘I could model for you,’ I joke from between my legs.

    ‘Actually ...’ Her feet, sturdy, wide, come close on the bare boards. The red varnish is chipped. ‘Actually, you know – you could. Your hair’s just about long enough. A photo  ...’

    Her fingertips graze my scalp as she lifts sections of my hair between her hands and lets it fall.

    ‘And thick enough,’ she adds. The bones in her feet flex and ripple as her weight shifts. ‘Sorry, I’ll get that towel.’

    I lift my head. She’s gone. I want to touch the diving woman, run a hand over the curve of her lower back and buttocks, but instead I pull off the wet T-shirt and sit cross-legged on the floorboards facing her. The room is filled with the sound of shingle hauled forward and back.

    I down my wine and help myself to the remains of the bottle. Sarah’s fag rests where she’s left it balanced on the ashtray; smoke wafts in slow curls.

You have made lemonade and shortbread this afternoon, you tell Ian, peeping around the dining-room door. He has his back to you, crouching with the dustpan, and he wipes a hand across his forehead, his face preoccupied and distant for a moment, his mind elsewhere.

    Today has been so hot, you say, opening the door wider, he really should have a cool drink before he leaves – maybe in the garden? His eyes seem to register you standing in the doorway, and he smiles.

    You smile back, prompting him. ‘Yes?’

The jug, as you carry it out to the garden, is slippery with condensation. Ian’s lying on his back, sprawled like a lion on the grass, the vulnerable pale underside of his arms exposed. Ice clinks. He sits up, stretching, takes the glass from you and puts his lips straight to it. His mouth, framed by moustache and beard, is half hidden. You search for his mouth when he speaks, watching for his lower lip. He downs the lemonade in one and runs a hand over his beard.

    ‘I’ll be away hame,’ he says, looking at his wristwatch.

    The tightening of disappointment is fleeting because your watch tells you the same, Ian’s usually gone by now. The children should be home from school. Often they’re back in time for Andy to rush straight upstairs to change out of his uniform and disappear into the dining room. While Ian cleans his brushes, he gives Andy a sheet of sandpaper to use on the skirting board or window frames, or stands behind him at the wallpaper table, guiding Andy’s hand as he spreads the glue in sweeps. As these images pass through your mind, time hovers. You should really be loading Elaine into the pram, walking down to the bus stop to see where the children have got to. Ian should be wheeling his bicycle down the front path. Neither of you moves. A butterfly lands on the buddleia. Then from the kitchen comes a burst of noise as the children arrive, the two of them bundling in through the back door, arguing, and they’re out through the French doors, shedding bags and shoes and blazers across the lawn, stirring up the air.

    Susie is wailing and her hand goes out for a piece of shortbread from the plate as she clambers on to your lap. Her forehead is sticky with heat.

    ‘You’re a bit late today. Where’ve you been?’

    Andy fishes a book out of his satchel. ‘Just down to Grampy’s. Look what he got me!’ Although he’s holding the book up for you to see, he’s sidling up to Ian, who’s still sitting on the grass, arms looped around his knees. ‘There’s even photos. Loads.’

    Andy sits down and wriggles close to Ian, leaning into his arm with a shoulder until he’s snuggled against Ian’s bulk. A fortnight ago, Ian was a stranger. Susie still keeps her distance, round-eyed at his size, his beard, staring at him over the rim of her mug of lemonade. She’s confided to you at night that he might be the giant from the top of the beanstalk.

    ‘That’s Houdini’s Suspended Straitjacket Escape.’ Andy points at a page. His finger is stained with blue Quink.

    ‘Tha’s Houdini?’ Ian says, dipping his head to the glossy black-and-white page.

    From where you’re sitting, you can just make out hats, hundreds of bowler hats and trilbies filling the street between two rows of tall buildings.

    ‘Will ye look at this!’ Ian holds the book up for you.

    There are ropes and pulleys. A bundle hangs from the side of one of the tall buildings, high above the upturned faces. You peer at the bundle. Yes, it’s a human form, upside down, wrists tied behind. The hairs on the back of your neck prickle. You imagine the rush of blood to the head, the grind of wrist and ankle bones. There’s white handwriting across the photograph:
Straight jacket escape
. You laugh, handing the book back to Ian. ‘Someone can’t spell straitjacket.’

    It’s Andy that takes the book from you, smoothing the page with the palm of his hand. ‘Grampy got it from the library for me.’

    ‘Lucky old you! How is he today? Did he give you a drink?’

    ‘Yes.’

    Ian looks at his watch.

    ‘How’s your brother?’ A clumsy attempt to distract him from the time, keep him here in the hot garden with the smell of creosote rising up from the fence.

    ‘I’m awa tae pay him a visit. Take him to the pairk.’

    ‘To see the horses?’ Andy’s face lights up.

    ‘Ay, the horses. Ye cud come. Whit wid ye say tae that?’

    Already Andy is on his feet.

    ‘Andrew, no, you’ve just got in. It’s far too hot.’ Your voice trails off because Susie slides from your lap, stripy summer dress riding up over her bottom.

    ‘And me,’ she says.

    Three expectant faces look at you.

Ian pushes the wheelchair, while you have Elaine in the pushchair with the canopy to give her some shade. Other couples in the park have small babies in perambulators and pushchairs.

    Andy and Susie race in and out of the rhododendron bushes playing hide and seek as Ian explains that he takes his brother out two or three times a week. His mother, who is quite elderly, can have a nap, or just put her feet up.

    Jamie stares at the sky, hands plucking at his trousers, his face still at last. When you first arrived at Ian’s parents’ house and went into the sitting room where he lay on a sofa, you’d been shocked to see Jamie was a man, not the boy you’d imagined. Only sixteen but already broad-shouldered, like Ian, with muscular, hairy arms. His jaw, working furiously as soon as Ian stepped in the room, was dark with a five o’clock shadow. His tongue twisted and toiled, his mouth opening and closing and stretching into a grin, as he grunted and yelped in greeting. Appalled, you’d halted in the doorway with the children, struggling to regain control of your emotions as Ian embraced his brother.

    You stop by the pond and pull out the bread. Ducks appear, flapping and quacking, from all directions. Some stagger out of the water and putter at your feet with their beaks.

    Heat rises from the tarmac path. It won’t be long before Susie and Andy demand a drink or an ice cream. Jamie’s head rolls as if too heavy for his neck, but he rests his chin on his chest and carefully cups his hands together as you give him some torn-up bread. As he flings the bread towards the ducks with both hands, crumbs and chunks scatter on his lap. When the bread is gone, you stroll together around the boating lake, where the boats are bottoms up because it’s getting near to closing time for the day. One or two of the boats need repainting. The ticket hut is already shuttered and bolted. The park is emptying out now, people moving towards the exits. Soon the big iron gates will be locked.

    As you walk on, past the striped bowling green, past the tennis courts where people are zipping racquets into covers and collecting up balls, and past the crowds of damp-haired children smelling of chlorine gathered at the entrance to the open-air swimming pool, Jamie hums and points and rocks his head. Ian bends down to him every now and then. Andy and Susie run around the empty bandstand ahead and duck down, ready to leap out when you walk past. The sky is blue, cloudless.

    ‘Real June weather today.’ You want to break the silence.

    Ian stops, cranes his head backwards, looking up at the sky. Below his beard the hair on his neck grows upwards, like lush grass against the foot of a fencepost. His Adam’s apple slides when he speaks. ‘Gey near noo. One of Jamie’s favourite places.’ He points to the top of a Witch’s Hat roundabout a little further on, just visible above the shrubs. He looks ahead and walks quickly. ‘I hae a commission – weans in a playground, for a charity Christmas card, to go on sale next year.’

    ‘Goodness.’ You do a little skip to keep up with Ian and the wheelchair. ‘How wonderful!’

    ‘Only a commission.’

    ‘Yes, but  ...’

    As you round the bushes, Susie and Andy are already there, fingers and noses through the wire mesh fence, eyes on the two rows of rocking horses. There are about fifteen in the enclosure, their painted flanks gleaming in the sun. These are not traditional rocking horses, legs tidied into symmetrical curves, but individually carved. Every leg has been given a different angle, stretch or lift or flick of a hoof. The horses are assorted sizes, some piebald, some brown or black, some white. They’re beautiful.

    Jamie is gurning again at the sight of the riderless horses, his face contorted with smiles. The playground is empty, no other children anywhere to be seen.

    ‘I’d love to know who made them.’ You gaze through the fence. ‘They’ve been crafted so lovingly.’

    ‘Ay.’ Ian puts the brake on the wheelchair and rattles the gate to the enclosure. ‘Do ye no think we should mebbe try to get in?’

    ‘Oh. Is Jamie all right?’

    ‘He’s no complaining.’

    Jamie’s face moves between grimace to grin, his tongue twisting as he nods vigorously. Elaine stares ahead placidly. You push a damp curl from her face. ‘Look at the lovely horses, sweetheart.’

    ‘Mummy, it’s shut, it’s shut,’ Susie whines. The gate is padlocked. Andy has a toe in the wire mesh ready to attempt to climb the six-foot fence, waiting for a signal from Ian.

    Ian lifts the padlock, twists the metal hoop and it drops open. ‘There we are noo!’

    The children cheer and barge through. Ian manoeuvres Jamie’s wheelchair through the narrow gateway. Jamie’s grin is lopsided, gummy, but the sparkle in his eyes gives you a jolt; it’s the first time you’ve looked him in the eye.