by Mary Stewart
‘Well, he’s not,’ said the man briskly, sounding as if he were dragging back the conversation, with an effort, on to a less dramatic and more practical level. ‘He’s here, in France. And there’s nothing to be scared of. He can’t do a thing to you, after all. All you’ve got to do is keep your nerve and hang on to David. We ought to go back, I think. You go first – come down to the corner with me till we see if there’s anyone about.’ He must have turned to go, for his voice grew suddenly fainter.
She stopped him for a moment. Her tone was calmer, and the note of fear was gone, but I could hear the tautness of her nerves through it, for all that.
‘I meant to ask you – that girl, Selborne I think her name is – she offered to take David out in her car tomorrow. I suppose it’s all right?’
There was another pause. I think he took her arm, because I heard them begin to move off together, but I heard his reply, faintly, before they went out of earshot.
‘Quite all right, I imagine. In fact, it might be a good idea …’
The palms of my hands, I found, had been pressed so hard against the stone of the parapet that they were sore. I stood perfectly still for some time after they had gone, slowly rubbing my hands together, and thinking.
It was not a particularly pleasant thought, that somewhere near at hand, possibly even in Avignon at this moment, was a man who was probably a murderer; a man vindictive enough, if I had understood aright what I had heard, to pursue the wife who had divorced him after the trial, and dangerous enough to frighten her as Loraine Bristol was being frightened. She was not, I thought, a woman who would frighten easily.
Why was he apparently following her? Did he want her back, was he hoping for reconciliation … no, that wouldn’t do, she wouldn’t be so afraid if that were all. Then was he angry at her action in divorcing him at such a time, was it revenge he was after? No, that was absurd; people just didn’t behave that way at all, not rational people … that must be it, I thought, and went cold … he was not rational. Mrs. Palmer had said that he was mad, and no sane man, surely, would have struck down his own son …
David.
It wasn’t Loraine he was pursuing at all, it was David.
I pressed my now tingling hands to my cheeks, and thought of David and the dog Rommel, building dams under the Pont St. Bénézet, and as I thought, some of the loneliness of the child’s situation dawned on me, and made me feel chilled. I knew a lot about loneliness. And I knew that, come murderers, come hell, come high water, I should have to do something about it.
I slowly descended the zigzag walk to the level of the Palace square, on the alert in case I should run into Mrs. Bristol, who might be waiting about somewhere to give her companion a start.
Her companion? I had not recognized the lowered voice, the rapid French. But that it was someone at the hotel I felt sure.
Then, in the narrow dark little street that skirts the foot of the rock where the palace is built, I saw someone standing, a man. He did not see me, but stood gazing in the direction of the main square, and, as I paused in the darkness under the palace steps, I saw him slip out of the shadows, and saunter down the street and into the light.
I recognized him all right.
It was Marsden.
4
Old moniments …
(Spenser)
Towards mid-morning the next day I eased the Riley down the narrow main street of Avignon, and out on to the perimeter road. Louise sat beside me, and in the back were David and Rommel, wrangling as usual over the necessity of chasing every cat we passed. We skirted Avignon, following my route of the previous day, but before we reached the old bridge of St. Bénézet, I turned the car over the narrow suspension bridge which crosses the Rhône. We crept across its swaying, resounding metal surface, then swung through Villeneuve-lès-Avignon and headed south for Nîmes.
The heart of Roman France … I thought of the legions, tramping behind their eagles through the pitiless heat and dust, across this barren and hostile country. The road was a white and powdery ribbon that twisted between slopes of rock and scrub. Whin I recongnized, and juniper, but most of the shrubs were unfamiliar – dark green harsh foliage that sucked a precarious life from the cracks among the screes and faces of white rock. Here and there houses crouched under the heat, clinging to the edge of the road as if to a life-line; occasionally a grove of olives hung on the slopes like a silver-green cloud, or a barrier of cypress reared its bravery in the path of the mistral, but for the most part the hot and desert slopes rose, waterless and unclothed by any softer green than that of gorse and scrub.
‘Mustn’t they have felt hot in their helmets?’ said David, breaking into my thoughts as if he had known exactly what I was thinking. ‘Though I suppose Italy’s just as hot.’
‘And they fought all summer,’ I said. ‘In winter they retired—’
‘To winter quarters – I remember that,’ said David, grinning. ‘In my Latin Grammar, if they weren’t going to the city to buy bread, they were always retiring to winter quarters.’
‘I believe they went to the coast. There’s a nice little place east of Marseilles where Caesar made a sort of spa for his veterans.’
‘Aren’t the Michelin guides wonderful?’ murmured Louise. ‘And incidentally, Charity – I hate to interfere, but you have seen that bus, haven’t you?’
‘I could hardly avoid it,’ I said drily. ‘It’s in the middle of the road.’
‘Oh, I just thought – what’s the French for “breakdown”?’
‘Dépannage. Or in this case, just plain accident. Haven’t you got used to the French way of driving yet? You should have.’
We were rapidly overtaking a bus which was indeed thundering along in the very centre of the narrow road. But I knew my stuff by now, after the hundreds of heartbreaking miles before I had discovered that the ‘courtesy of the road’ means very different things in France and England. I swung to the left, bore down on the bus with every appearance of intending to ram it, and put the heel of my hand down hard on the horn. The bus, responding with an ear-splitting klaxon, immediately swerved to the left, too, straight into our path. I didn’t even brake, but put my hand on the horn and kept it there. The bus, with an almost visible shrug, moved over about a foot to the right, and we tore by.
Louise let out a long breath. ‘I’ll never get used to that!’
‘If he’d seen the GB plates we’d never have done it. The British are despicably easy to bully on the roads.’
‘Did you see who was on the bus?’ said David.
‘No, I was busy. Who was it?’
‘That man from the hotel. I think his name’s Marsden. He sits at the table by the big palm.’
‘Oh. Yes, I’ve noticed him.’
I eased my foot off the accelerator, and glanced at the bus in the driving-mirror. It might conceivably turn off at Pont du Gard for Tarascon, but I had the idea that the Avignon-Tarascon buses went another way. In which case, this must be the bus for Nîmes, and Marsden was on it. And after what I had heard last night up at the Rocher des Doms, I was not quite sure what I thought about the possibility of Marsden’s following us to Nîmes.
I slowed down a little more. With a triumphant screech of its klaxon, the bus overtook the Riley, and demanded the road.
I glanced in the mirror as it loomed up behind the car. Yes, unmistakable, even in mirror-image: NIMES.
I put my foot down again, and we drew away. I was trying to think, but I had too little to go on. It was like groping for a window through curtains of spiders’ webs, only to find that it was dark outside the window, and that when the webs were all torn down, the window would be still invisible.
I thrust the problem aside, and passed a small Citroën with concentrated care.
At Pont du Gard we drew in under the shade of the trees, opposite the hotel. Louise began to gather her things together.
‘David,’ I said. ‘Will you do something for me?’
‘Of course. What?’
/>
‘Ask up at the hotel what time the bus gets here. How long it stays. What time it gets to Nîmes. Will your French stand up to that, do you think?’
David gave me a look, and scrambled out of the car with Rommel.
‘Of course,’ he said again; then, with a sudden burst of honesty – ‘It’s not so much asking, because you can practise on the way up, but it’s understanding what they tell you – ’specially when it’s numbers. But I’ll try.’ He gave me his swift engaging grin, and ran off through the gravel terrace of the hotel.
‘Are you sure you don’t want to come on to Nîmes, Louise?’
‘Quite, thanks. I’ll go down by the river and paint the bridge – oh, all right, aqueduct – I’ll have lunch here first. What time are you coming back?’
‘I’m not sure. When d’you want to be picked up?’
Louise looked through the trees towards the river, where could be seen a glowing glimpse of golden stone.
‘I don’t know, honestly. I’ll tell you what, Charity – we won’t tie ourselves down. You go on to Nîmes and look at your remains in your own time. If I’m sitting at one of those tables when you come back, pick me up. If not, I’ll have gone back on the bus, so don’t bother. You won’t want to come back much before dinnertime, anyway, and I’ll have finished painting long before that.’
David came panting across the road to the door of the car.
‘Midi-vingt!’ he announced with triumph. ‘The bus gets here midi-vingt. It waits half an hour, and it gets to Nîmes at half-past one. Is that what you wanted to know?’
‘That’s fine,’ I said, glancing at my watch. ‘It’s barely twelve now, and the bus doesn’t get here till twenty past. We’ll have time to look at the bridge – sorry, Louise, aqueduct – after all.’
I took the ignition key out and dropped it into my bag.
‘What do you mean?’ asked Louise. She was looking at me curiously. ‘I thought that’s one of the things you came for? What’s the bus got to do with it?’
I felt the colour creep into my face. I had been thinking aloud, without realizing how queer it must have sounded.
‘Nothing,’ I said, rather lamely. ‘I was thinking about lunch. We’ll have lunch in Nîmes, so we won’t stay here too long.’
I need not have been afraid that Louise would pursue the subject. She was already rummaging for her pencils, and hardly listened to my reply. But as I turned from the car, I saw David looking at me. A long, unreadable look … and again I sensed that all those impalpable defences were up. Then Rommel gave an impatient tug to his string, and we all went down towards the bank of the river, under tall trees harsh with the shrilling of the cicadas.
5
O bloody Richard!
(Shakespeare)
Whenever I look back now on the strange and terrifying events of that holiday in Southern France, I am conscious of two things which seem to dominate the picture. One is the continuous dry and nerve-rasping noise of the cicadas, invisible in the parched trees, the other is the Roman aqueduct over the Gardon as I first saw it that brilliant day. I suppose the ten or twelve minutes that David and Rommel and I spent gazing at those golden arches spanning the deep green Gardon were like the last brief lull before the thunder.
We stood near the edge of the narrow river, on the water-smooth white rock, and watched Louise settle herself in the shade of some willows, where the aqueduct soared above us, its steep angle cutting the sky. On the under-sides of the arches moved the slow, water-illumined shadows, till the sun-steeped stone glowed like living gold. Except for the lazy sliding silver of reflected light under the striding spans, nothing stirred. Not a leaf quivered; there was no cloud to betray the wind. You would have sworn that the gleaming river never moved …
The sound of an engine on the road above recalled me abruptly. We said goodbye to Louise, who hardly heard us, and climbed the dusty track again to the car.
Not until we had swung out on to the road to Nîmes did either of us speak.
Then David gave a queer little sigh, and said:
‘I’m glad I did come, after all.’ Then he flung a quick glance at me, and flushed. ‘I mean – I didn’t mean—’
‘It doesn’t matter. I’m glad you’re glad you came.’
He glanced at me again, and I could sense, rather than see, a long and curious scrutiny.
‘Mrs. Selborne—’
‘Yes?’
He hesitated. I could feel his body beside me, tense as a runner’s. I kept my eyes on the road and waited. Then he gave another odd, sharp little sigh, and bent his cheek to Rommel’s shoulder.
‘Oh, nothing. How far is it to Nîmes?’
And for the rest of the way we talked about the Romans. I was not to be allowed to help, after all. And I knew better than to force confidence from a boy of his age – a boy, moreover, who had so much the air of knowing exactly what he was up against, and what he was going to do about it. But stealing a look down at the childish curve of the thin cheek laid against the dog’s fur, I wasn’t so sure that he could deal with whatever queer situation he was in. And again, I knew that I wanted most desperately to help. It was irrational, and I can’t explain it, even today. It was just the way David made me feel. I told myself savagely that I was a fool, I said unpleasant things under my breath about a frustrated mother-complex, and I kept my eyes on the road, my voice casual, and I talked about the Romans.
And so we drove into Nîmes, parked the car off the square outside the church, and had lunch in a restaurant in a side street, out of sight of the place where the buses stop.
‘The Arena first!’ said David. ‘I want to see where they keep the bulls!’
‘Bloodthirsty little beast, aren’t you? But there’s no bullfight today, you know. Sunday nights only. The better the day, the better the deed.’
‘Look, there’s a poster – a Corrida, and this Sunday, too!’ He looked at me wistfully. I laughed.
‘No, David. I won’t. And you wouldn’t like it either, really. You’re English – you’d be on the side of the bull. And think of the horses.’
‘I suppose so. Golly, look! Is that it?’
We climbed the sloping street towards the enormous curve of the Arena, and made our way round half its circumference until we found the way in through its massive and terrible arches. I bought tickets, and we went into the barred shadows of the lower corridor. There were a few other tourists there, staring, chattering, fiddling with cameras. We followed a little group of English people up the main steps, out into the sunlight of the Arena until we emerged in what must have been the ringside seats, looking down into the great oval where the beasts and the Christians used to meet in blood and terror under the pitiless sun. I went forward to the edge and looked down at the sheer sides of the Arena, just too high for a man to leap, even if he were in terror of his life. David came to my side. He, at any rate, was not haunted by the things that had been done here. His face was excited and a little flushed and his eyes shining.
‘Golly, Mrs. Selborne, what a place! I saw a door down there labelled TORIL. D’you suppose that’s the bull? Do they use Spanish names here? Where does the bull come out to fight?’
I pointed to the big double doors at the end of the oval, where, in white letters, the word TORIL stood again.
‘Golly!’ said David again. He leaned over the parapet and gazed down with concentration. ‘Do you suppose we could see bloodstains?’
I moved back into the shadow of the stairway. The heat reflected from the stones was almost unbearable. I heard, behind and below me, the monotonous voice of the concierge doling out tickets to a new batch of tourists. Two or three people came up the steps beside me, and another group, I noticed, went through a doorway near the foot of the steps, that apparently led out into the arena itself.
I leaned back against the cool stone in the shadows and watched David idly as he sauntered along the ringside tier, periodically stopping to lean over – looking for bloodstains, I supposed. Well, at
least that disposed of an idea that the boy was a neurotic – a healthy desire for bloodstains was, I knew, part of the normal boy’s equipment.
I closed my eyes. The concierge’s voice rose and fell. There was a murmur of talk in French, in German, in American. Somewhere near me a camera clicked. Some more tourists came up the steps beside me, talking vigorously in German. For once we seemed to be the only English people there. But no sooner had the idle thought crossed my mind than I was proved wrong, for down below, on the arena floor itself, I heard some people talking English. And suddenly, a man’s voice, sharp, distinct, edged with bad temper:
‘This is not the wrong blasted ticket. It was issued at the Maison Carrée.’
Then someone passing on the steps jostled me, and my bag slipped from my lax fingers. I opened startled eyes, and made a grab for it. The culprit – it was a pleasant-looking woman of about forty – stooped for the bag and handed it to me with a soft-voiced apology in a charming American drawl.
‘My own fault, I was half asleep.’
‘It’s this turrible heat,’ she said. ‘You do better in the shade. Come along, Junior.’ As they turned to go, I became aware of David at my elbow. He spoke breathlessly:
‘Mrs. Selborne!’
‘What – why, what on earth’s the matter, David?’
He had hold of my sleeve. His face was flour-white, and in the shadow his eyes looked enormous.
‘Don’t you feel well?’
‘No – I – that is—’ The hand on my arm was shaking. He began to pull me down the steps. ‘May we go now? I don’t want to stay here – do you mind?’
‘Of course not. We’ll go straight away. I was only waiting for you.’
He hardly waited for me to finish; he went down the steps as if his feet were winged, and out through the gate into the hot street, with Rommel close at his heels.
I followed, to find him heading back the way we had come.
‘Why, David, don’t you want to see the other things? This is the way back to the car.’