The German Numbers Woman

by Alan Sillitoe

  If he fell in love with a woman on the street, say, and she showed a sudden (though unaccountable) passion for him, both knowing it was forever and that a break must be made with their present lives, say, for instance, that he met Judy and they went away together: Laura would feel the same when he told her he had found someone else. She would have preferred that, as being more understandable according to her views, while he felt the same whatever it was, a liberation from which no one could deter him.

  ‘I understand how you feel, my love.’

  ‘You don’t. You can’t possibly.’ She clattered the chair back and saw herself whitefaced from surprise and chagrin, from a powerlessness which must be caused by more than his announcement. She should smile, indeed she should, and kiss him, arms around his neck; ‘Yes, do go. It’s an opportunity not to be missed. It’ll be so wonderful for you. It’ll do you good to get away from the house and dull old me for a while. I know Richard will take care of you.’

  ‘I do understand,’ he said, ‘but I still can’t think of a valid reason not to go.’

  She couldn’t respond. Wouldn’t anyway. There was every reason for him not to go. He was in the coils of some madness. God knows, she felt close to it herself, but with his obsession pulling her more deeply, words could do nothing, though there was little else to use. No doubt she ought to talk calmly, like a doctor perhaps, or the kind of guru people went to when they were in spiritual trouble. A guru would only confirm him in his determination, tell him to live it through, such people so unscrupulous. ‘I don’t understand.’ She sat down to face him, hands and legs trembling.

  ‘There’s nothing to understand. It’s all very plain and straightforward.’

  ‘No, it’s not,’ she said sharply, ‘and you know it.’ She couldn’t get the right tone into her voice, the effort almost strangling her. The windows shivered in their sockets from the gale, rain smearing the panes. ‘How would you survive, in weather like this?’

  No problem. A lightness of spirit made him a different person, reconnected to his youth, as if that youth had led a conventional life all these years. He wasn’t certain what had done it, only that some kind of magic must have fused him and that other person together, finally mysterious, as if the seed had been there all along and waiting only for certain factors to enrich the soil from which the unity could flower. He felt irresponsible, accountable only to himself. What you can’t see you feel, and when you feel you act, and when you act you see more than if you had stayed still.

  ‘We have a radio to warn us,’ he told her. ‘You go around the worst of the weather. And there’s always a harbour to run for. I’ll get the atlas out soon, and show you where the Azores are.’

  ‘I don’t want to see. It’s the end of the world for me. You’ll never get there. I feel it. Or if you do you won’t get back.’

  ‘I’m sorry to have to tell you, but you’re talking nonsense.’ He sometimes felt he would never see the place, either, but supposed you always did think that before you left for somewhere, confident he would feel differently after the first day at sea.

  ‘I only wish I was. I’m in a bad dream.’

  ‘And I’m in a good one, and wish you could share it.’

  ‘I want to wake up from mine.’ Hard to believe she wasn’t going to. ‘But let’s not talk about it anymore. Not for a while. I can’t think properly while we’re talking.’ She was hungry but unable to eat, farnished but didn’t know for what, in an altered mental state to an hour ago, isolated, floating in uncertainty and misery, everything that was comforting and familiar blown away. She began to cry.

  We’ve woken up, he thought, into the real world, and it took so little, an announcement that I intend setting out on a trip without her. Her crying was muted, made dreadful by her fight to control it. ‘Please, my love, it’s no big thing. I’ll be gone and back before you know it.’

  Not one word of concession, of giving in on a single point. ‘I can’t take any more. I can’t listen to you.’

  ‘Yes, I see that.’

  It must be a practical joke, a test of loyalty and love. Perhaps he had found a way of getting into the locked drawer of her armoire and read the diary account of the times with her uncle, and all the details of the abortion – but how could he, without eyes to see? She had kept a diary as a solace to her distress, written through tears. At the worst of times she recalled the scratching of her pen, the speedy turning of pages, words scribbled so fast that some lines were a jumble impossible to make out whenever she was forced to look at it again, trying to still her mind. She ought to have known that nothing in the past could be buried.

  She had always assumed the book to be safe, because even if she forgot to lock the drawer, and Howard looked inside, the words were braille only to her, though maybe he had secretly taken the diary to Richard, who had read everything to him in his measured uncaring voice. Or Richard, with new-found malevolence, which she supposed every man to have, had tapped out the choicest excerpts in morse and posted the tape back for Howard to run and re-run.

  He was bringing up this detestable stunt of a boat trip by way of revenge for her lifetime’s silence, not knowing that in doing so he was parting them forever. And yet revenge wasn’t part of him – no matter by how much he seemed to have altered – because even if he knew he would understand and forgive. There would be nothing else for him to do.

  Such a fantasy showed how low one could fall in the face of the unexpected. Her mind raced cruelly, not letting her alone. It wouldn’t from now on, a horrifying thought. Even if he suddenly laughed that his plan had been a joke, and he wasn’t going on any such trip, the damage could never be made good. Out of the blue, just like that, he had blasted their lives. ‘I don’t think you’ll ever be able to understand,’ she said.

  Nor would she. He felt young enough to no longer know himself, laughed at his severed connection from whoever he had been a few months ago. The mechanism of how it had come about was clearly part of him. He had been two people most of his life, even before the disaster of going blind, and the dormant person had emerged at last from Sleepy Hollow, the two fusing into himself, not knowing how or why it had taken so long, a transformation impossible to explain.

  ‘I think I do,’ he said. ‘I understand very well. But I would rather go with your blessing than without it.’

  ‘I know.’ She noticed a blackhead on the left side of his forehead, couldn’t think where he had got it in the clean sea air, but decided not to tell him. ‘And you never will.’

  ‘I’m sad about that.’

  ‘Give me time,’ was all she could say. ‘I’d like to lie down’ – being as sleepy as if she had taken a drug.

  ‘We could have some coffee.’

  ‘That won’t do it.’ He had been well looked after for so long that the reason for her being upset was beyond his power to comprehend. How long would they have stayed together if he hadn’t been blind, and if this was what he was really like – making up his mind on such an important issue without any discussion? Not very long. The storm had slackened, birds whistling in the bushes, glad of better weather. ‘I’m your wife,’ she said. ‘I have rights in these matters.’

  If the modern trend of women’s liberation hadn’t passed her by they might not have argued like this, and he would have been on his way with her approval. But any article on women’s lib in the papers, or something mentioned on the radio, had always brought scornful remarks – he would never understand why, though now he did. It was loggerheads, and no mistake, neither of them with any more to say, until:

  ‘I’m going upstairs to sleep, though don’t suppose I shall.’

  But she did, fell off immediately, every corpuscle so weary she didn’t even dream.

  Planes weren’t calling for Vanya’s electronic pinpoints, so no hope of playing ‘Spot the Bomber’. The German Numbers Woman was having her day off, and Portishead told of front after front coming in from the grey Atlantic. On Judy’s wavelength the crackling mush was interrup
ted by a Russian operator sending widdershins in morse.

  He hoped for better weather when the boat set out, wondering how he would take to the turbulent water, since he had never been on a small boat. At moments he had wanted to tell Laura he wouldn’t go, to forget it, he was sorry, I love you, and everything’s all right, so forgive me if I’ve tormented you, and let’s carry on as before.

  No one could say that he would still be going. Things went wrong in any enterprise. He could tell Richard that such a jaunt was out of the question if it meant the end of his marriage. And Richard, knowing he must come on the trip because of all he knew, would make whatever obstacles disappear. Some ingenuity in persuasion could do no harm, even if not really necessary. To cause Richard worry was an exercise in power, and he felt no shame in stating it. Let him also believe nothing was certain. He couldn’t think of anything to prevent him going, but if some factor did arise, there was a pressure moving him forward that couldn’t be resisted.

  When Massachusetts tinkled in he found the sounds banal, couldn’t sit still, paced up and down the familiar room, picked up books and earphones and various pieces of equipment, wanted to go this minute, saying no goodbyes, oblivious to objections or tears, get his stick and walk down the hill with a song on his lips, relishing a madness that was more to him than life itself.

  On Judy’s frequency again he found, as expected, nothing. Emptiness. She was with Carla in Malaga, and he could only hope they were happy. He missed the throaty richness of her voice with an intensity that almost made him faint.

  TWENTY-TWO

  ‘Richard?’

  ‘That’s me.’

  ‘Howard here.’

  ‘I was going to get in touch.’

  ‘Beat you to it. I’m in a phone box on the front. I got a woman to punch in the numbers for me. Could have done it myself, I suppose, but I didn’t want to take any chances, or delay matters.’

  Bloody fool, to let a passer-by have my unlisted number. She might have been following for just such a clue. ‘Why all the urgency?’

  ‘I have to talk to you.’

  ‘Don’t say a word about you know what. Somebody may be listening in. You never can tell.’

  He managed a laugh, to reassure. ‘Who would know better than me?’

  ‘That’s right.’ Who indeed? ‘Me as well, you might say.’

  ‘We’re two of a feather.’

  ‘As long as you like to think so.’ Let him talk, even though time was crucial. He had to be pulled on board, with no argument, otherwise the trip might be called off. It would be like walking into prison if they left him behind. ‘Are you ready for the big sea trip?’

  ‘Well, you see …’

  ‘All I see,’ he monitored the pause with his watch, ‘is that I’ll pick you up at thirteen-hundred hours on Monday the fifteenth, and take you to the boat.’

  ‘I was going to tell you. I can’t go. It’s off.’

  Richard had always known how to be the king of silence. The mouth moved so that only you could see it. The voice box boomed but only you could hear. He looked around the room, naming every gewgaw and object of furniture. When that inventory was finished he glanced at the window, and lit another cigarette at a distance from the telephone to keep the line quiet. He would stand all day if necessary, waiting for Howard to say something further, would drag the bastard out by the short and curlies if it had to be that way.

  Waistcoat had told him to get the potential danger on board or he, as well as his old and upstanding father, would be scuffed off the surface of the world without ever knowing they’d been on it. Waistcoat had a way with words, but one day they would choke him. In the meantime he had to wait for Howard to say something, and though Howard was just as capable of waiting in silence till the end of time he didn’t think more than a decent interval was necessary for what he had to say.

  ‘The reason is, that Laura objects to it.’

  ‘Is that all?’

  ‘Well, it’s something.’

  ‘Amanda used to get like that, all bossy and tearful. I understand how you feel. But she lit off, and a good thing I think now. Women shouldn’t be allowed to interfere without reason with what men want to do.’

  ‘Agreed. All the same, they need to be considered.’

  ‘But not obeyed. I have to tell you I haven’t much time.’

  ‘Neither have I. I’m putting another fifty pee in.’

  ‘Do you want me to hang up, and then I can call you?’

  He saw through that one. ‘I’ve plenty of change. The main question is whether or not you still need me on the boat.’

  ‘You said you wanted to come, didn’t you? Almost insisted on it. So I made arrangements. They’re expecting you. I’d look a right charlie if you didn’t turn up. The idea is that you help out with the radio. I sang your praises so much they’re counting on it.’

  Another pause. ‘All right, I’ll be there. I just wanted final confirmation.’

  Show a little more anger. ‘How much final confirmation do you want, for God’s sake?’

  ‘No more, but Laura’s still got to be dealt with.’

  ‘I have to leave that to you.’

  ‘My problem, is it?’

  ‘Well, it’s not mine.’

  All Howard wanted to know was whether they were definitely going, without him or not. ‘The trip’s on, then, and nothing will stop me.’

  Richard tried a bit of Air-Force slang. ‘Good show. Zero hour’s not far off. You’ll have an interesting time, believe you me.’

  ‘I know I shall. She may contact you, though, come to see you.’

  ‘I don’t mind.’ He’d expected it, hoped for it, knew she’d be on her own. ‘As long as you’re ready on the day.’

  ‘You can depend on it.’

  ‘Bring what you think you’ll need. A kitbag and a hold-all. There’ll be plenty to eat and drink on board.’

  ‘I can’t wait.’

  ‘You won’t have to. I’ll pick you up, and all your worries will be over.’

  ‘I owe you more than I can say. It’s as if I suddenly had a brother. Sounds crazy, but it’s true.’

  More crazy than you think, though Richard shied at a fitting response, felt none of the right emotion. At the same time wondered what sense or truth there was in it. ‘It’s a favour I knew you wanted. Wasn’t easy, but we were friends.’

  Howard had said no more than he felt. He was going on a drug smuggler’s jaunt, inviolable because blind, and assumed he could depend on Richard to get him on board, from which moment he would be at the mercy of so many unknown factors that it didn’t bear thinking about – an adventure not to be refused. ‘I’ll be waiting.’

  ‘And I’ll be there to pick you up.’

  The sign-offs were simultaneous.

  Richard wondered what he had done, but knew he could have done nothing else. He had taken responsibility for another human being so completely that part of himself had been cut away, and he didn’t like it. Nor would Howard, no doubt poking his way back up the hill for another bout with Laura. Not hard to know who would win, though that part of the scheme was no fight of his. He had drawn Howard into his web, and Howard had lured him into an equally tangled snare.

  It was unusual for Richard to be discouraged by success, because he suspected – being no fool – that anything as easy as getting Howard to come with them couldn’t fall out well. Such self-indulgent worry was more intense than the trip deserved, and who had entrapped who, and how it began, was no use going into, must be accepted and forgotten, but he was nagged that something could go wrong. Their laybrinths had met and started to blend, a messy and embarrassing process which set off a twinge of alarm as if, when two such forces collided, control would be lost and all power extinguished.

  He enjoyed walking about the empty house knowing that no one might come back into it at any second. And nobody would. Even so, blessed isolation was little help to his thoughts. A man in a house alone was incomplete because he was more a
t the mercy of himself. He couldn’t tell who or what brought such irrelevancies to mind, but perhaps the world of the house was too small, only seemed big when other people were in it with him. He didn’t like the sensation of being so far off his normally firm centre.

  A car sounded along the unmade track. Maybe Amanda had got tired of sulking at her girlfriend’s, and was coming back to more comfortable accommodation. She wasn’t the sort who would be happy to share the living space of a small flat – if she was ever happy, that is. He had treated her well, but was aware of never having done his proper duty as a husband, such as being there to hear her thoughts and wishes every minute of the day and night.

  He liked to think there was nothing wrong with her in wanting such constant attention, that it was mainly due to him that she disliked being herself, which led her to dislike him even more. On the other hand there were times when she made an effort to love him, or at least endure him without rancour, though perhaps only as a way towards thinking better of herself.

  Whatever it was, it had been too much for him, and now that she had gone he could only think they had been in no way made for each other, which he had said from time to time and which she hated to hear, as if it might be true. Yet if two people weren’t made for each other they weren’t made for anybody else, especially when they ought to feel made for each other, which they did at the best of times, however rare those times were. In any case with him she had a house, and a car, and enough to live on, so what more was needed except patience and tolerance, and a certain regard when they didn’t exactly feel made for each other?

  Going to the window he saw a magpie fly from the trees and skim the top of Laura’s Peugeot, a black and white warning of a hard time as she turned by the derelict barn and parked on the open space of grass before the garden gate. She manoeuvred to face outwards, as if a quick getaway might become necessary, though maybe it was her normal habit. He went to meet her at the door.

  On the way there she had been wondering how to tell him that Howard wasn’t fit to go on a small boat trip out into the Atlantic. He wouldn’t be allowed to, she would say, would only go over her dead body, and if that was the ultimate sacrifice she wouldn’t hesitate to make it. But if she could win Richard to her side such a sacrifice wouldn’t be necessary.