by Guy Burt
My driveway is swathed in shadows when I wave Jamie goodbye. I can see my bedroom window, open six inches, from the side of the house, and it is not too difficult to climb up the trellis at the end of the patio and find my way along the kitchen roof until I’m under it. Fleeting images come to me of lying out here on the still warm tiles and watching the Perseids, some long time ago.
My bed is fresh and cool. I strip my clothes off and get in, remembering at the last minute that I will have to make the bed myself the next morning. Jamie and I have worked it all out walking home – for once, there has been no need to run. The deception has to be carried all the way through; it will be an early start for me, to be up before anyone else, to get dressed again, to make my bed and to get out of the house. And when my parents get up, they will find – as will Jamie’s – that their son’s room is empty, his bed unslept in. Which is how it should be, because he has spent the night at his friend’s house, and will only be back later in the morning.
Where Jamie and I will be during this time we don’t know yet. Perhaps watching the lizards blink their slow, early morning eyes behind the wall, or perhaps deep in the lemon grove waiting for Anna.
Carefully, I set the alarm clock. It is a quarter to three. I remember to check it against my watch, make sure that it shows the right time.
My eyes close and my head nestles against the pillow, the hard shape of the alarm clock hardly softened through the feathers. Still, I am so tired. There has been so much – the hermit, and the journeys up and down the valley. My legs feel like over-cooked spaghetti. And Anna and Jamie, and the case in the belltower …
It takes me a long while to realize what the sound is: a thick, throbbing, angry sound. I blink, and frown, and then I remember. Reaching under the pillow I quickly shut the alarm clock off. It is such an effort to sit up, not to sink back into the warmth and comfort of sleep; but I mustn’t let them down. We have to look out for each other, Anna says. I think to myself, as I struggle out of bed, how I will feel when it is my turn; when I am the one with the torch, staring at my own watch in the candlelight of the chapel, with only the hermit and the sleeping pigeons for company.
I go to the window and look out up the valley. It is difficult to see exactly where the chapel is, so I just fix my eyes in the right direction and gaze vaguely.
Minutes pass, and my eyelids feel very heavy. I wonder if Anna has forgotten. Or maybe she has fallen asleep. If she’s asleep, there’s no point in my waiting; I can go back to bed.
But we have promised each other things, and so I have to wait.
At last – six minutes past the hour, by my watch – it comes. A green light, high up the valley, winks out three times. There is a pause, and then another three. It’s the signal. All my tiredness is gone, and I am full of the excitement of being part of this. I run quickly to the door, and flick my light switch on and off three times. I can’t see from my room, of course, but in his house Jamie must be doing the same thing. I go back to the window, and sure enough, Anna’s response comes a second or two later: three more green winks.
It’s green: she’s safe. I smile to myself, and gradually my limbs start to get heavy again, and my eyes start to want to close. I fumble with the alarm clock, reset it for five o’clock. Jamie is right; we’re none of us going to get much sleep. But we have to look out for each other, too. That’s the most important thing.
I make myself comfortable, and close my eyes. If I listen carefully, I can even hear the ticking of the clock through the pillow.
It is evening. The day has gone, and I have not even known what day it has been.
I find I hardly care.
There is too much to be done; too much to put right again. The whole house is filled with things that need attention, things broken or missing or damaged in some way. There may never be time to make them all right again. And there is a boy standing naked on a rock in the moonlight, and that has to be – finished, too.
I have to work harder. It is not a matter of whether or not there is time; these things have to be done. Time may have to move aside to let them through. I have to rebuild – I have to rebuild. Things have been lost and broken. I have to make them new again.
Chapter Eleven
I break the tab from a new phonecard and dial, waiting while the line clicks and hums gently and the connections are made through exchanges, over landlines, maybe even off satellites, all the way to London.
Halfway through the sixth ring, he picks up.
‘Yes?’
‘Max, it’s me.’
There is a long silence at the other end of the line. Then he says, ‘Tell me you’re at Gatwick right now.’
‘I’m sorry, Max,’ I say. ‘It’s been—’
‘What’s going on, Alex?’ he says. His voice sounds strange; not only far away, but also muted, as if he’s walled in behind glass or something.
‘There’s so much to do here.’
‘No there isn’t. You went to put a house on the market. It doesn’t take more than a day or two.’
‘Well,’ I say, ‘I know it’s been a little longer than that, but there have been—’
‘It’s been nearly three weeks,’ he interrupts. It’s an insane thing to say; we both know I can’t have been here more than – well, not more than a week, maybe ten days? Three weeks is absurd. That would mean the exhibition—
‘Max – what’s the date?’ I say.
‘For God’s sake, Alex!’ he shouts. The line distorts and his voice crackles against my ear. It makes me shiver as if I’ve been stung. ‘You’ve got four days. Four days. Now get on a plane and get back here.’ There’s a slight pause, as if he’s taking a breath; then he says, ‘What do you mean, what’s the date? Don’t you know what day it is?’
‘You don’t understand,’ I say, lamely. ‘I have so much to do—’
‘I have no time for this,’ he says abruptly. ‘This is your exhibition, Alex, not mine. It’s your reputation on the line here. I have better things to do than sponsor your fucking mid-life crisis, OK? Get yourself together, for God’s sake. You need to work out what your priorities are in all this. Chances like this don’t come round twice, you know. This is it. If you fuck this up, it’s thirty years wasted. You understand that? When you get into London, call me. Now get to a fucking airport.’
There’s a click and the line is dead. I stare numbly at the display, still holding the receiver, not able to move or even think much. My finger hovers to call him back, to try and explain all this to him – how important it is. But I know I won’t be able to make him understand. I can picture him in his office, his head in his hands, furious, frustrated, wanting answers. Wanting some kind of understanding that I know I can’t give him.
Has it really been three weeks?
I try to remember the days, one at a time, but I can’t. They shift and come apart and before long they are other days; days when I was seven or thirteen or twenty-two. Not these days. I have hardly been living these days, so perhaps Max is right; perhaps they’ve slid past faster than I have thought.
I keep trying to count them, the phone humming by my cheek, but they elude me, slide away faster than I can get a grip on them.
I feel regret that I am letting people down. If it was just me, it wouldn’t matter, wouldn’t even cross my mind. But there are other people – Max, Julia Connell, the people running the gallery – everyone else. I should be there; I know I should. I should go back.
Carefully I replace the receiver, remove the card. Well. It hurts me to think about it. I feel responsible for them all.
I need food. I have a sense that I may not have been eating as regularly as I should. In the kitchen this morning I have found a half a loaf of bread and some cheese, nothing more. And the bread is very hard, hardly edible unless I dampen it with water. I must try to remember to eat properly, and now that I am in town I will buy food. But materials first; like Max has said, priorities have to be decided upon.
I need wood glue, and v
arnish, and masking tape, for all the things that have to be mended. And I need paint: deep blue and black for the waves, and dusty brown to temper the black bulk of the cliffs, and white and cream and blue again for the figure of the boy who is standing over the water, tensed, waiting to dive.
The sunlight is very warm. The spring is ripening, starting to turn over into summer.
I can’t leave it like this. It has to be done right.
We have crossed through town, past Toni’s and the empty school playground, and are on a little track leading up the far side of the valley. It twists and turns through the cypresses. It is early – only just gone nine – but for us it feels already like half the day has passed. We have been up since six, hiding, maintaining the deception of where we have spent the night. My bed is neatly made; I have struggled over it for some time. I creep out of the house in the twilight of dawn, when the valley is still in the shadow of its own hills, and wait for Jamie. The two of us read comics in the lemon grove until we see Anna coming down the road. She looks tired, but her pace is steady.
We leave it long enough to seem credible, and then announce our return in both households, Jamie’s first, following immediately with the news that we are going to spend the day at the beach. We get money for lunch and ice-creams and are out before anyone can quiz us closely on what we have done since yesterday.
When I go to find my mother to ask her for lunch money, she is talking with my father. The radio is on, the news. My mother is saying, ‘Thank God nothing like that ever happens here.’ I wonder what she’s talking about – something on the radio, presumably – and I hesitate in the doorway. From the little portable set comes the newsreader’s voice: ‘… though his condition remains critical. Police will be seeking to interview him once doctors pronounce him stable enough to undergo questioning. Meanwhile, it was announced early this morning that police will be widening their search—’
My mother reaches for the radio and turns the volume down. ‘What is it, dear?’ she says.
‘Can I have some money for lunch? We’re going to the beach.’
‘All right,’ she says, after a second. ‘Ask Lena for it, will you?’
‘OK,’ I say. A question comes into my head. ‘Thank God nothing like what ever happens here?’
My mother smiles. ‘Don’t worry. It’s just something a long way away, that’s all.’
‘Oh. All right.’
‘Run along now. Have you had breakfast?’
‘Had it at Jamie’s,’ I reply promptly, pleased with myself for keeping our story straight.
‘All right.’
I go to the kitchen to see Lena, and she reaches down into the big jar where she keeps loose change and household money. ‘There you go,’ she says. ‘Now remember to buy some proper food at lunchtime, yes? Not just ice-creams. And don’t go swimming for at least two hours after lunch.’
‘OK,’ I say. ‘Why not?’
‘You know why not. It’s bad for you.’
‘Why?’
‘I don’t know. But it is. Now go on.’
‘Bye!’ I call to her as I run out the kitchen door.
Now, as we trudge up the dusty path higher into the foothills of the valley’s side, Jamie says, ‘How is he?’
Anna says, ‘He’s sleeping. He slept all the time I was there, mostly. Sometimes he sort of moved a bit in his sleep, but not much.’
‘How’s the bandage?’
‘It’s OK,’ Anna says. ‘But we’ll have to change it today.’
The encyclopaedia is very clear on this point: bandages – which it calls ‘dressings’ – have to be changed regularly.
‘We don’t have any more,’ Jamie says.
‘We’ll have to buy some.’
‘How much money do we have?’
I dig in my pockets for what Lena has given me. Anna and Jamie are searching, too. We hand it all to Jamie and he counts it.
‘It’s not much,’ he says, doubtfully. ‘Maybe enough. But not for lunch, too.’
Anna looks from Jamie to me. ‘We can go without,’ she says.
Immediately she says it, I start to feel hungry, and it’s only nine. I can tell from Jamie’s face that he’s thinking the same thing.
‘He might die,’ Anna says.
Jamie shakes his head. ‘All right,’ he says. ‘All right.’
‘And we need cotton wool. And water.’
Jamie looks up the track ahead of us. ‘Hey,’ he says, and his voice is suddenly hushed. ‘Look there.’
We stop, breathing a little hard from the climb. The path curves off to the left, but up ahead through the trees and bushes there is a glimpse of white: a wall.
‘Come on,’ Anna says. She leads the way off the path, scrambling up through the loose earth and scree of the slope, clinging to bits of bushes to give herself a hand up. Jamie and I follow. The wall is further away than it first looks, and when we reach it, we’re tired out from the climb.
‘It’s tall,’ Jamie says breathlessly.
Anna looks back and forth along the length of the wall. ‘It goes on for ever,’ she says.
‘Yeah.’
‘Why does he need a wall, anyway?’
‘I don’t know. Maybe when there were vines and stuff people used to steal them.’
‘Here,’ she says. ‘Give me a hand up.’
‘You can’t go over,’ Jamie says, shocked.
‘I’m not. I just want to see.’
‘Well, be careful. If anyone sees you we’re in big trouble.’
Jamie crouches down and makes a stirrup with his hands for Anna, and a moment later he’s lifted her by one foot. I see her grip the top of the wall and crane her neck over, staring around her. I say, ‘What do you see?’
‘It’s all just land,’ she says. ‘But I can see the house, too. It’s a long way away. There’s a car out front, and – and it’s a really big house. That’s all.’
Jamie lets her down. ‘What now?’ he says.
Anna shrugs. ‘Nothing. I just wanted to see, that’s all.’
Jamie says, slowly, ‘Now that we’re here – I mean, he’s probably up there inside.’
‘He never comes out,’ I point out. ‘So he’s bound to be inside. Well, he hardly ever comes out.’
‘Now that we’re here,’ Jamie repeats, ignoring me, ‘why don’t we go and – you know. Tell him. Like the hermit said.’
He’s been looking at the ground while saying this, but now he looks up at Anna questioningly. I look at her too.
‘No,’ she says.
‘But why not?’ Jamie says, sounding slightly desperate. ‘What’s wrong with telling someone?’
Anna’s eyes have a far-off look in them, as though she’s hardly here at all. She says, ‘We can’t tell anyone. He’s ours. We found him. He’s all we’ve – I mean, we’re all he’s got.’
‘He asked for Signor Ferucci,’ Jamie says. ‘Why did we – why did you lie?’
‘We weren’t the ones that lied,’ Anna says. She’s staring at Jamie now, and her eyes are clear of the distance I’ve seen in them before. She’s staring at him, hard. ‘He lied to us. Remember? About the car crash and everything. And what we found. He’s still lying, I think.’
‘How did you know he was lying?’
The farawayness comes back. ‘I don’t know,’ Anna says. ‘I just thought he was.’
‘Even if he did lie,’ Jamie says, ‘shouldn’t we tell someone now?’
‘No.’ Anna’s voice is calm. Jamie’s voice has had a slight tremble at its edge that I know means he’s upset or angry. Anna says, ‘It’s too late now. We have to look after him. Besides, you swore.’
Before I can stop myself, I say, ‘Yeah, Jamie. We did swear.’
Jamie flashes a look at me that is surprised – hurt. Then he says, ‘I know that. But – what if—’
Anna’s voice is soothing. ‘It’s OK. It’s all going to be all right. He needs us. That’s all. That’s all we need to think about, OK?’
<
br /> Jamie looks at her, hard, and then shrugs reluctantly.
‘Come on,’ she says. ‘We’d better be getting back.’
As we file down the hillside, away from the house where Signor Ferucci may be lurking behind the dark windows and high walls, I keep glancing back; and after a time I notice Jamie doing the same thing. Only Anna keeps her eyes firmly on the path ahead, down into the basin of the town. I know what Jamie’s afraid of, even though I can’t put a name to it myself: a kind of huge, ill-defined awareness of things going beyond our control, and of us letting them slip by. Anna doesn’t seem afraid, though. She seems excited: as though the things that are scaring Jamie and me are lighting her up from inside. I watch her, and I don’t understand her.
We’ve sworn. We’ll tell no-one. That’s all there is to it.
Anna says, out of nowhere, ‘I wonder how the hermit knows this Ferucci man, anyway?’
* * *
‘Everyone grows up, Anna. Me too.’
Somewhere in the darkness is a voice. I know I am sleeping – I can feel the heaviness of sleep all around me, and this is a dream, not a falling back into the past. But the voice is a voice from the past even so. It comes out of the darkness from a great distance, from so far away that to start with I can’t hear what it is saying, only the cadences of the words. The rhythms of the language are strange to me, unfamiliar, as if something has become jumbled across the distance between where the speaker is and where I am. It might be a dream-voice, speaking nonsense; but I know it isn’t.
There is something strange. The sound of the voice is muffled, closed in, as if shut away tight inside something heavy and musty. But it shouldn’t be like that. I should be able to hear a slight echo. The voice should be bouncing off stone and plaster, through empty volumes of air, to reach me.
Someone has shut it away in something and it is trying to get out—
With a struggle and a gasp I am awake.
For a strange, disconcerting moment I am not sure where I am – where this place is – and then I know. This is Florence, a hotel room. It is somewhere in the small hours of the morning.