“I can’t go far,” she said. “You have my permission to come and look for me if I’m not back in an hour. But not before.”
She was back within half an hour, and sat in a chair in the front cabin watching Sally cook, while Eve wrote up the log, constraining herself to Anastasia’s laconic style, even though their exuberance had not been mentioned. The boat rocked and Trompette, in a tweed peaked cap and a pair of overalls worn without a shirt, came down the steps into the cabin. She looked, as ever, immaculate.
“Whoa, Anastasia,” she said, scratching Noah behind his ear as he wriggled his coarse-furred little body in delight. “I thought you were in Uxbridge.”
“So I was,” said Anastasia. “And so I will be again. But for now, I am here.”
Trompette went back to the Grimm, moored a few boat lengths behind them, and returned with Billy. He hung about in the doorway, looking unkempt as usual, but unusually sheepish. He had a bottle of wine in each hand and waited for Anastasia to nod before he advanced into the cabin. He fetched the squat Duralex tumblers that were the nearest thing to a wine glass that Anastasia allowed on the Number One and proposed a toast: “To canals!”
Eve could think of plenty of other toasts they might have made, but on balance, this seemed to be the best one available.
* * *
SALLY ADDED MORE RICE, PEAS and ham to her risotto and invited Trompette and Billy to share it. There wasn’t enough room for them all to sit comfortably inside and it was a warm, still, overcast evening, so Anastasia and Sally carried their bowls of food to the front deck, Eve took hers up onto the roof, and Trompette and Billy sat on the towpath. Little was said while the food was eaten and the wine was drunk, but when it was finished, Sally said to Billy, “Arthur told us you had stories about the Blisworth Tunnel.”
Billy wiped his fingers on the grass and rose to his feet, jogged down the towpath toward the Grimm.
“Was that the wrong thing to say?” asked Sally. Trompette shook her head.
“He can’t tell a story without something in his hands to make a noise with,” she said.
Billy came jogging back with a guitar in his hands and resumed his former position on the towpath. He struck a chord, then began to speak:
Imagine, as you listen to my story, imagine you are in darkness so deep you would not know, were you to stretch out your hand, whether you would touch something soft or something hard, something wet or something dry, something hot or cold, living or dead. Or nothing at all. Hear water, in the darkness: water that drips, splashes. Be aware that you are in the presence of water, of walls. Imagine you are in a tunnel. Now, I will begin.
Sally had heard stories being told in the classroom by teachers or volunteers, and she herself had taken a turn. While some children fidgeted or fell asleep, most of them would listen, interested. But occasionally someone with a gift for telling stories would turn up; when that happened, every child, every adult, fell into the place the teller created for them. For as long as the storyteller was speaking, they forgot to do anything except breathe in and out. So she recognized Billy’s skill. As he spoke, she found herself back in Blisworth Tunnel, in the dark, with the roof dripping.
He told them the story of a disaster that occurred as the tunnel was being dug. Fourteen men were killed when the shaft they were digging collapsed and buried them alive:
The lucky ones die at once, killed by a prop falling as the roof comes down. The rest of you—who knows? Who knows how long you lie, suffocating as the earth settles on your bodies, pressing the air from your lungs, filling your eyes and your mouths and pinning your limbs to the ground, robbing you of the small comfort of wiping your face clean as all the life you might have had is reduced to one last desperate effort to draw breath.
Sally studied his face. Under that absurd thatch of wiry hair, he looked angry. There was no anger in his voice, but the words he was using led the listener to understand the buried men had been let down, sacrificed to those people who chose the shortest route through the hill that stood in their way, in order to save money. As he finished, he looked at his audience, which had grown from the four of them to a dozen or more as people passing on the towpath paused, drawn toward Billy, this version of Billy with his guitar and his softly spoken words.
Eve stretched her legs, ready to slide down off the roof to fetch more drink, more food, but Billy struck another chord and started again:
If you think that is all the life the tunnel has taken, you would be wrong.
Sixty years later, he said, one of the first steam-powered boats went through the tunnel when the wind was in the wrong direction, with the boiler pushing out smoke that blinded and then rendered them insensible; killed two of them. Because there was only one ventilation shaft, and that was partially blocked. The chairman of the company responsible for the tunnel, which also employed the victims, assured the inquest jury that more shafts had been sunk, and the families of the poor men who had died (though whether he was using the word “poor” to indicate poverty or misfortune cannot be known) would be provided for. At the end of this story, too, Billy left the audience with the thought that the men had been sacrificed to profit.
There were as many as twenty people on the towpath now, listening to Billy. He stood up, took off his hat and bowed to them before dropping it, upside down on the ground in front of him. He sat down and teased a melancholy tune out of his guitar as the group dispersed, some of them tossing an offering into the hat.
“Was that all true?” asked an earnest young woman.
Billy did not stop strumming. “It is a version of the truth,” he said. “A storyteller’s version.”
Eve watched them all go, listened to the chat—as much about the discomfort of having been sitting on the damp grass as about the story they had heard—and when she next looked over the edge of the roof into the front well, she found both Anastasia and Sally had gone to bed. Trompette, too, had scooped up the hat and returned to the Grimm. The towpath was empty except for her and Billy, who had stopped playing and was smiling up at her.
“What are you doing here, anyway?” he said. “A grown woman like you should have responsibilities, something serious to do, a proper job. So why are you idling away on the canal?”
“As it happens,” said Eve, “I don’t have any responsibilities or a proper job, or indeed anything to do. I don’t think of myself as a ‘grown woman.’ So where better for me to be?”
“Well, one of us has got you wrong,” said Billy, slinging his guitar over his shoulder and heading down the path.
* * *
THE NEXT DAY THEY WORKED twenty locks, close together. Sally and Eve felt as if they’d spent most of the morning turning paddles and opening and closing gates. The locks took two boats, side by side, and Trompette cast off Grimm as soon as she saw the Number One starting to move, entering the first one with them, leaning against the tiller as the water flowed out. Of Billy, there was no sign.
The Grimm went on ahead of them when they stopped at a pub for lunch, Trompette lifting a hand as she cruised on. Anastasia told them as they ate their sandwiches that Billy was only one of a number of entertainers to be found on the canals. Musicians, drama groups and storytellers.
“Is he better or worse than the average?” asked Eve. He had enthralled her, both times he had told a story, and she didn’t know how much of this was the darkness, the atmosphere of the towpath, the unfamiliarity of the experience, and how much was because he was, in fact, good.
“He’s a good showman,” said Anastasia. “And he’s no romantic. I’d always pause to listen.”
They cruised on to the outskirts of Leamington Spa where Anastasia was due to catch a train back to London the next day. Since they would have time in the morning to do the last few locks and find a mooring close to the station, they stopped on a rural stretch and Eve set about making mushroom omelettes. She knew there was supposed to be some magic or mystery about making omelettes, but she had no idea what it was. Sally said her
omelette was fine—and she must be much more practiced in the art of making them than Eve was—and Anastasia said it was an omelette, which was praise of a sort.
“Tell us,” said Sally, after they had eaten, “about the operation.”
It seemed to Sally that Anastasia had come to behave around them as if they weren’t there, and it was this that gave her the courage to ask the question. Anastasia’s former vigilance, her air of being ready to pounce, had softened into what could have been indifference but which Sally interpreted as acceptance.
“It’s something called a lobectomy,” Anastasia said. “There are cancer cells in my lungs. They know this because they knocked me out and put something down my neck and scraped a bit off and tested it. So what they do is, they go in and lop off the part that has these cells in it, then follow up with a bit of chemotherapy in the hope that will see me right for a few more years. I’ve only listened to the parts of all this that seemed to matter, so I may be misunderstanding the detail. I think I have the overall picture right, though.”
No one would know, she said, how good were her chances of survival until they had done the operation. It all depended on what they found.
“My mother died of lung cancer,” Eve said.
“When?” Anastasia asked.
“Twenty years ago.”
“They’re learning all the time,” said Sally. “Finding more successful forms of treatment.”
“I know. I wasn’t actually thinking about outcomes,” Eve said. “I was comparing attitude. My mother was pretty emotional, from the first hint something might be wrong to the last bitter breath.”
“Why wouldn’t you be,” Anastasia said, “if you have a home and a family and you’re relatively young, which I suppose she must have been, twenty years ago. She must have been looking forward to other phases of life yet to come. Hard to think about losing all that. It’s different for me.”
“Yes,” said Eve. “That’s exactly what she felt. But you have a good life, too. Don’t you feel angry at the thought of losing it? Don’t you still hope for good things to come?”
“I’ve never had many hopes or expectations,” said Anastasia. “If good things happen, I enjoy them. If they don’t, I’m not surprised. Anyway, it’s not over yet. Another installment or two to come. Could be ones you’d rather skip, but some sort of experience nevertheless.”
“I know,” Sally said. “My father dropped dead from an aneurysm between putting down his book and picking up his coffee cup, and I remember thinking how furious I would be, not to have had time to contemplate and consider and understand that the end might be coming. Is there anyone you want us to tell—about the operation? Arthur, for instance?”
Anastasia sucked her teeth. Sally used to think this was a phrase used in novels to avoid saying “looked thoughtful.” But Anastasia never did look thoughtful, and was definitely making a sucking sound.
“Perhaps,” she said at length. “And Owen.”
“Who is Owen?” asked Sally.
Anastasia glared at her. “Owen!” she shouted. “Do concentrate. You’re due to deliver the Number One to him in a month or so—or a year or more, the way you two are going—and now you tell me you don’t know who he is! How am I meant to trust you?”
Sally had been thinking of their destination as a place, not a person, but faced with this return to aggressive form by Anastasia, she didn’t like to say so. She glanced at Eve for support.
Eve said: “His name and the address of the boatyard are written in the front of the log. We knew that. I just don’t think we’d bothered to remember them.”
“Well, you should,” said Anastasia. Then she made a sound that might have been the word “flaky” or might have been a cough.
“We can let them know, of course,” said Sally. “Although we don’t have an address for Arthur.”
Anastasia closed her eyes. “Tell Owen to tell Arthur,” she said. “If you must. Just tell them the date of the op. That’s all.”
“And the name of the hospital?”
“I’ve told you already. Fuss. Can’t abide it.”
“Well, they need to know. Then they can ring for a bulletin from the nurses. Set their minds at rest.”
“Very well. Date. Hospital. No detail. Now get out of my way. I’m going to bed.”
* * *
As they cruised toward Leamington the next day, Eve had a text from Jacob.
Arriving in Leamington in 10. Where will I find you?
Not there yet, Eve texted back. Suggest you find the towpath and start walking south toward Stockton and Long Itchington away from Warwick.
She didn’t tell Anastasia. It was obviously too late to stop this possibly unwanted escort from coming and Eve could only hope Anastasia would be pleased to see him, or pretend to be pleased to see him, when he arrived. It would not have occurred to her to suspect Anastasia of pretending, before these last couple of days, but now she wondered if there wasn’t quite a lot of, if not pretense, at least suppression and omission in the way Anastasia behaved.
They met Jacob as they approached a railway bridge. He had paused to contemplate some swans, crouching down to peer at them, fumbling with his phone. He was wearing ripped jeans and his hair was a mass of coarse spikes with yellow tips. He would make a better photo than the swans, Eve thought. A cyclist came past, ringing his bell to alert Jacob, who looked up and saw Eve waving at him. He did a little dance on the towpath, impeding a jogger, who kept jogging on the spot waiting for Jacob to move out of the way.
“Better slow down at the bridge,” Anastasia said to Sally. “I suppose we’ll have to pick him up.”
“Who on earth is it?” asked Sally.
“Someone who doesn’t think I’m capable of traveling from Leamington to London on my own.”
But once Jacob was on board, it was hard to imagine he had made this trip for any reason other than his own pleasure. He loved the way the canal was at once pretty and functional, the way the town was audible but mostly invisible, the way the architecture had molded itself round the needs of the canal, the way it fitted into the landscape. Most of all, he loved the boat. If either of them had squealed and exclaimed as much as Jacob did, Eve was sure Anastasia would have lost patience with them. Perhaps, she thought, keeping an eye on Anastasia’s wrinkles, she was suppressing her impatience with Jacob, allowing him to be the person he was, however irritating that might be. In the end, Anastasia said, “If you’re that excited about it, why don’t you move onto a boat on the Regent’s Canal? There are moorings available.”
“Oh, I would love that!” said Jacob. “But I don’t think I’d ever get Vic to agree. He spends his days cramped up in a little cab and he needs his space when he gets home. And I’d rather live anywhere with Vic than live in a dream house without him.”
“How touching,” said Anastasia.
“You’re very lucky,” said Sally.
“I am, I am, I admit it,” said Jacob.
Then he went through the cupboards and the fridge and put together a salad for lunch. It was a delicious combination of flavors and textures which Eve would never have attempted to try out together unless she had a recipe and had procured all the ingredients in advance.
“How can I learn to cook like you?” she asked. “I want to be able to do what you’ve just done. Throw things together and make it work.”
“You don’t want to talk to me about cooking,” Jacob said. “I’ve served a bit of a painful apprenticeship. You know how some people have eating disorders? Well, I used to have a cooking disorder. It was all my mother’s fault. And she learned from her mother. She believed, because her mother did, that the way to a man’s heart was through his stomach, and because she believed it, I did. I was such a needy little arse, desperate for whoever was the man of the moment to love me and stay with me, so I used to get into the kitchen and try harder and harder to make more and more exciting food until whoever it was left. Then I would go out and find someone else to take me on, me
with my spices and sauces and my mandoline and stick blender. And the next time, I’d try even harder. Until I met Vic. I was an expert by then. Could turn an onion and two potatoes into something delicious at the first hint I might be about to be abandoned. It took me a while to realize that Vic couldn’t give a fart about food—he’d live on pasties and chips if I wasn’t there keeping up his fresh-fruit-and-fiber intake. And since he loves me as much as I love him, it would take more than an underdone steak to drive him away. He couldn’t understand why I felt the need to spend so much time in the kitchen, why I had to be putting all this effort into cooking a meal instead of chilling out with him on the sofa, and do you know what he said when I told him this story? He said: ‘But your dad left when you were eleven. You must have known it didn’t work.’” When Jacob laughed it involved his whole body and was a pleasure to watch. “You need to start with a decent recipe book,” he said, when he’d stopped. “I’ll find you one. And then, when you’re back home, we’ll have a few sessions in the kitchen. That’ll be fun.”
They all walked up to the station, slowly to allow for Anastasia. They took Noah with them for fear he would start howling as soon as they shut the door behind them. He started howling anyway, the moment Anastasia walked through the turnstile and was beyond his reach.
“Is your dog sick?” a passing child asked them.
“No, just forlorn,” said Sally.
“I feel a bit forlorn myself,” said Eve. “I don’t feel as if I’ve got a grip, or a good enough grip.”
“Keep practicing,” Sally said.
* * *
BEFORE THEY LEFT LEAMINGTON, EVE went in search of a charity shop to buy a recipe book. She could have found a bookshop selling new books but was afraid the choice would be too daunting, so she decided to buy one in the first shop she found. It felt like an adventure and she remembered her grandmother, who had lived to a great, idle cantankerous age. She had always insisted that the jigsaws on which she depended to keep herself amused must come from charity shops. It was the thrill of never knowing until the end whether all the pieces were there. Much better to do a puzzle with a picture she loathed, she argued, than to be secure in the knowledge that every time she searched for a certain piece—a certain shape with a bit of green on the left-hand edge—it would always turn out to be there. On occasion, the puzzles were found to have too many pieces. Her grandmother loved it when that happened. As she pushed through the door of an animal charity shop, Eve knew how her grandmother must have felt, anticipating the joy of carrying home something that might be completely marvelous or positively useless. Looking forward to the challenge of making a masterpiece out of faulty materials.
The Narrowboat Summer Page 15