by Peter Benson
‘It’s your first time, isn’t it?’ she said.
‘No.’
It is private, what we did, but I cannot let it pass without the memory crying back from that past, of her sweetness, and the lust she displayed. How such sweetness could breed that gentle violence, when the field folded us in, and the sheep, anxious for their lives, relaxed at our pleasure.
I could not do it for long, I remember that, but in my remembering, think it went on longer. I pictured each moment, and it’s like I have them framed, so now I cannot lose the pleasure I felt. We didn’t get dressed for a while, she lay in the crook of my arm, the soft hairs on her legs playing in the breeze, the whistle of a herding farmer and the bark of his dog, blowing to us on the air of our love. A swan, flying, a cow, lowing, and the tiny rustles of the hedge, this music, and the music of the river, played at my first loving, and I cannot bear to think now ‘I am alone’ when somewhere someone carries the afterburn of my seed.
We walked to Drove House in the contented silence of our performance, while I counted trees, when I could, to distract my mind from what I’d done. Muriel’s mother was displaying her paintings to nature.
‘My audience!’ she said, spreading her arms, and encouraged us to join in.
We sat down and the meaning of each canvas was explained. I didn’t understand a word, I only remember it as strange pudding to the main course. A painting of Langport was called ‘Langport; a breath of immortality’ and was about the way ancient places store memories and breathe them out again through stone. Muriel laughed. She held her knees tucked up under her chin, and flicked a strand of hair off her shoulder, rubbed the skin there with her chin, and looked at me with fluttering eyes. She lifted her face and licked her lips; I cannot remember a happier time. The words of the dreaming mother, the scents of ripening apples, crushed grass and honeysuckle, the dying warmth of the day. Drove House, friendly and golden in front of us, its windows open and the carpet still hanging from Muriel’s bedroom sill, the rhythmic click click click of a record, turning at its end on the record player.
I walked home, and as the rooks flew under a pink sky, bent to check my trap. It had been sprung by a tiny bird, a dunnock, beaten to death by its own wings. I buried the body, and washed my hands in the river, sad to have killed an innocent bird. It couldn’t have imagined that end: light, air, the trees and green grass, a limitless sky, a thrilling dive towards the ground, an interesting box, then, darkness, a sudden bang as the door flipped shut, a quick but painful death in panic. It dampened my feelings, and clouded my thoughts; I didn’t want to risk this again, I’d have to talk to the old man, I could say the trap had been stolen, anything to avoid the responsibility.
I kicked the box, walked down the bank, found a pile of stones, and filled it with them.
‘You won’t be doing that again,’ I said, ‘you can drown and enjoy it. See what you think about that.’ I tossed the trap into the river, it floated a while, then one corner sank and pulled the rest down. A bubble, the current swilled the spot, and it was gone, good riddance, I had other things on my mind.
Muriel. For all we had done, I remembered the respect she had for the churchyard, and how, when she pulled me from the grass to find a private place, she rounded her shoulders so her neck seemed to disappear, and with coy eyes, invited me to follow. I sat in the workshop at Blackwood, splitting hazel sticks, two magpies scrapping over a bush, the end of the day wishing night welcome. Now I could smell her on my skin, everywhere, like she’d sprayed me. What a golden time.
‘He’s just the same,’ said my mother, ‘had some soup but couldn’t manage the rolls; he’s asleep now.’
‘He’s only done something to his back.’
‘But I think it’s moved on.’
‘Moved on?’
‘He said his chest hurt.’
‘You rung the doctor?’
‘No.’
‘You want me to?’
‘Thank you, Billy.’
Unused to my father being ill enough to lie in bed all day, she worried, her alertness was dulled, she didn’t even talk to the chickens in passing them to go back to the house.
I phoned Doctor Evans.
‘Mother thinks it’s moved to his chest!’
‘What?’
‘His back.’
‘His back’s moved to his chest?’ He laughed, ‘Very interesting.’
‘And he’s not been eating.’
‘I’m not surprised.’
‘Except for a bowl of soup...’
‘A bowl of soup?’
‘It’s all he’s managed.’
There was a serious telephone pause. I fingered a pocketful of change. My father lay at home. The doctor considered.
‘Has he been able to get up at all?’
‘No.’
‘But he wants to?’
‘Of course.’
‘It’s half past six,’ he said. ‘I’ve some things to finish, but I’ll be out to see you later; seven thirty?’
‘Thank you, doctor.’
He came, and said it was all in the mind, and if my father didn’t pull himself together, trouble would become his first cousin. I’d never heard anything like it. He said we should encourage mobility, and help us lift him into a chair. He yelled with pain but, once there, seemed more comfortable.
‘Walk him up and down every now and again. Try to keep him moving.’
‘But I thought you were meant to lie them down, people with backs.’
‘Excuse me. Would you care for some advice on the care of poultry?’
‘No.’
‘Then kindly allow me to continue.’
‘Sorry, doctor.’
‘I’ve some different pills here, blue ones, throw the others away, or give them to me. These are stronger, so he doesn’t have to take so many. And try to get him to eat something.’
Before going to bed, I put my head round the front room door, and watched my mother arrange his blankets.
‘Goodnight,’ I said.
‘Goodnight, Billy.’
Muriel. I lay in bed, trying to sleep but I couldn’t. I watched the moon trace patterns on the ceiling, listened to the call of owls and a dog barking, miles away, across the quiet and sad moor of that memory. I thought about her, lying in bed at Drove House, warm, still. Her hair on another pillow, her body in clean sheets; that memory, a grieving, mysterious thing.
19
I stacked twenty log baskets in the store, washed my hands and made a pot of tea.
‘Billy?’
‘You want a cup?’
‘Yes!’ My father was getting better. His back had moved off his chest, he’d managed the stairs, and walked across the yard.
‘I finished them,’ I said.
Work seemed easier now I was a man, or else I was fooled by the season. July met August, I sucked a honeysuckle flower for its honey, insects came to the hedge to drink at privet and bindweed. Starlings lined up along the ridge of the workshop roof and imitated telephones. I didn’t care. I tossed some bundles of willow into a corner, and sat at the bench, with my tea and a view of the orchard.
I picked at a string of cotton on my shirt, the old man came and sat under the window, with his awful back propped against a sack of potatoes, his face tilted towards the sun.
‘Any better?’
‘You bet,’ he said, ‘skin you alive.’
‘I’m glad.’
‘And you’ve got something to tell me?’
‘Have I?’
‘You tell me.’ He ran his fingers round the rim of his tea cup and gave a long, low whistle.
‘Dad?’ I said, but what I wanted to say didn’t come out. ‘Nothing.’ I didn’t know the words, found a loose button on my trousers instead, pulled at it, agitated the cotton, while he shook his head, slowly to the rhythm of the gentle wind and the heat, rinsing us.
‘You don’t have to say anything,’ he said, ‘just don’t get into trouble.’ He lit a cigarette, we sat in
silence, though the sounds of nature were all around, cockerels, a green woodpecker, shocking the day with its call; sheep, gentle in the grass; the river. After half an hour, mother came, and thought it would be best if he sat in the kitchen, with his back to the stove; he’d be surprised at the difference it would make.
‘By the stove?’
‘Come on!’ she shouted. ‘Lit in summer, it’s a luxury you can’t ignore!’
In the sunny day, the clicks of a thrush smashing snails’ shells, and the scents of wild roses and elder heavy in the air, Muriel walked from Drove House to see me, and sat on the bench, with her legs crossed at the ankles, holding my hand, playing with the petals of a water plaintain. Where the heat had warmed her nose, tiny flakes of skin had peeled away; she rubbed them.
‘Don’t rub,’ I said, ‘you’ll make it worse.’
‘What a summer!’ she said.
We had met since the afternoon at Isle Abbots, and walked to the bridge at Muchelney for a swim. I didn’t feel any terror, I floated, trod water, and crawled against the current to where she dried herself on the bank.
‘Muriel,’ I had said, ‘I love you.’ She’d looked up from her towelling, dabbed a string of water off her stomach, and smiled.
‘You love me,’ she said, ‘I’ll never forget.’
We’d been to Exeter and taken a boat on the river. We went as far as we were allowed, north to the bridge, and as far south as the weir. I told her to sit down when we came to the ferry wire, and stand up when I saw a kingfisher.
‘They make their nests out of fish bones,’ I said.
‘Do they?’
‘And are among the few birds which do not practise nest sanitation.’
‘Quite a little ornithologist, aren’t we?’
‘What?’
‘A bird watcher?’ She fluttered her eye lashes. I steered the boat into the bank, left the motor to idle, and kissed her on the cheek, to show I didn’t have to be eager all the time.
‘You!’ she said, and grabbed me round the neck. The boat rocked, I slipped, but held onto the sides, recovered my balance and sat down.
‘Muriel!’ I said, ‘You’re dangerous!’
‘Dangerous?’
‘Yes.’
‘Ha!’ She laughed. ‘If I was dangerous, I wouldn’t have given you the chance to find out. Dangerous people keep themselves to themselves. They wait. They wait a bit more. They strike.’
‘How do you know?’
‘I just do.’
I steered the boat out of the bank and back to the quay. A shower dampened the pavement, our clothes, but not our spirits. Dangerous people in the rain, and the gentle smell of a wet hedge, swallows, diving for insects, a natural world and a natural place to be.
We’d made love again, in a ditch beneath an old towpath by the Isle, on a muggy day, while grey clouds moved slowly by and we were bitten by mean and vicious bugs. I remembered which parts of her I’d forgotten, and searched for them on her body.
‘Show me your back,’ I said, and she did. Five tiny spots, the colour of chocolate, nestled together halfway down her spine, and a tiny white scar, where she had burnt herself as a child, blemished the skin but added to the moment. Where I had held her were impressed the outlines of my fingers, but she didn’t care, picked a grass and tickled me under the nose.
‘Stop it!’ I said.
‘You’re ticklish.’
‘I’m not.’
‘You are!’
‘I’m not.’ She did it again, I grabbed her waist and took the stalk away. ‘How would you like it?’
I held her down, sat astride her and with my knees on her arms tweeked her nose and brushed the grass over her face, into her armpits and behind her neck.
‘Stop it, you’re hurting.’
‘There!’ I said.
‘You really are! Ouch!’ I kissed her, apologized, sat down and threw the stalk away.
Another day, I drove her to Taunton with some baskets, and she pretended to be my apprentice. She called me by my last name, carried the baskets into the shop, to let me check the invoice and collect the money. She sat in the van while the shop keeper pointed and said, ‘Who’s a lucky boy? You basketmakers; I don’t know.’
I drove slowly, proud of Muriel, while she sat with her feet on the dashboard, curling a five pound note round her fingers, round and round, until it was a tube.
‘I’m hungry,’ she said.
‘You want something to eat?’
‘Well done.’
‘Eh?’
‘I’m hungry, you worked out I want something to eat. Congratulations.’
‘You’re so mean.’
‘Mean?’
‘Playing with me, it’s like you’re playing with me.’
‘Playing?’ She reached over and grabbed me in the waist. ‘You want playing with?’
‘Stop it!’ I shouted. The car swerved into the pavement, some people stepped out of the road, a car hooted. ‘You’ll make us crash!’
She got me talking baskets again. I had to explain how willow was grown, the yearly cycle, and the way they get different coloured rods. Buff: boiled in water, stripped. White: sprouted in water, stripped. Brown: grown that way. There are other willows grown specially for their colours, but these are rare and not seen so much. Some stuff is used boiled with the bark left on, almost a black willow, but buff, white and green; these are the most common.
‘Muriel?’ I said, ‘when are you going back?’
‘Back?’
‘To London. You said you were.’
‘I’m not sure.’
‘But soon?’
‘Maybe.’
‘And Drove House?’
‘What about it?’
‘Your mother?’
‘Yes?’
Another day, we stared at a map, chose a spot, took the ambulance, sandwiches, beer, towels, and drove off the moor, south, towards the coast, where the sea meets the sky at a crescent of pebbles, surf and sun. We parked by an old barn and walked a mile through woods, with high chalk cliffs like fairy castles poking out of the trees, rare birds, the gentle rush of the sea as it broke onto the beach below us, her hand in my pocket.
‘How’d you find this place?’
‘I can read a map.’
‘But you can’t tell from that.’
‘Footpaths, no main roads, no houses, drawings of little trees; look at a map, you can imagine what it’ll look like. Beautiful?’
‘It is.’
‘So we’ll make it our garden, and the sky can be our roof.’
‘An old cliché.’
‘But straight from the heart.’
‘Billy,’ she said, ‘put those things down.’ She put her arms around my neck, ‘Billy, oh dear.’ I felt her eyes, damp on my neck, she rocked herself gently on me, I stroked her hair and kissed it.
We stood on a grassy plateau, set high above the bay, watching a fishing boat. A path led down to the beach, overgrown and shattered in places by broken land, held together in others by clumps of pampas grass. Where streams cascaded out of the crumbling cliffs and ran across the path, planks of wood had been laid, but these were slippery and crooked. Muriel held my shoulders and, in places, the cracks were so bad we were forced to crawl on all fours; she followed me, and pinched my bottom, I didn’t mind.
What heat! We found a place where the beach became a heath; brambles, wild sea grasses, travellers’ joy, twisted and jumbled into forests, but here and there, where rabbits were breeding, were odd lawns of neatly cropped grass, some with old fire patches and piles of half-burnt driftwood, natural rooms, open to the sky, but otherwise secret.
She lay on a towel, I offered her one of my mother’s sandwiches.
‘How’s your dad?’ she said.
‘Getting better. Walking.’
‘Has it happened before?’
‘What?’
‘His back, locking.’
‘No.’
‘Unusual, moving to his front.’
I didn’t know if she was playing with me again.
We swam over the surf and into calmer water, so the towels were like postcards on the beach, and floated, watching some people walk along the tide line, heads down, turning things over, looking for stones.
‘You’ve got weed in your hair!’ she said. I reached up to see, but while I tried to find it, she dived under the water, grabbed my ankles and pulled me down. I came up spluttering, she was swimming back to the beach, kicking up fountains of water, laughing.
‘Billy!’ she shouted. ‘You’re so easy!’
‘Easy!’ I caught up, and straddled across her back. ‘Ride!’ I shouted, ‘Ride, horsey! We’ll see who’s easy!’ I lay down on her in the water, but she turned over and I went under again. As I came back up, she pushed my shoulders, I twisted and grabbed her round the neck. The people on the beach heard us, stopped walking and looked up. They pointed. Muriel waved. They waved back.
‘What you do that for?’
‘Just being friendly.’
‘Friendly?’
‘Yes please.’ I kissed her lips, and treading water, our legs became entwined. We pulled each other down and sideways. I lost my balance, she fell on top of me, the people on the beach laughed.
‘They’re laughing at us!’ I said.
‘Let them. I don’t care.’
‘I never thought you would.’
‘Meaning what?’
‘Nothing.’
‘No. Meaning what?’ She raised her voice.
‘Muriel?’ I pinched her, ‘Catch!’ I splashed away this time, reached the shore, grabbed my towel, and ran over the stones to the heath. I crouched behind a thicket, watching the walkers watch Muriel, and waited, her footsteps on the beach, her padding over the grass, I jumped out.
‘Meaning?’ she said.
‘Meaning I love you.’
We steamed in the heat, and dry, rubbed oil on our bodies; she first, to show me how, then I did her.