Scimitar

by Terry Wheeler

  He made an effort to stay cheerful but he felt himself shrivelling up inside. It was all his fault. How could I have done this to her, he asked himself back in Kerry’s room, holding her hand and wiping her forehead yet again.

  This moment had been so long in coming and now he felt cheated. It wasn’t supposed to be like this and he wasn’t enjoying it at all. Indeed, they had almost given up hope that Kerry would ever become pregnant, that they would become parents and have their own family. Now, far from being the culmination of all their hopes, her confinement had become a living nightmare, as far removed from his dreams as he could imagine.

  The doctor came. And went. The midwife looked in and told Robert that Kerry was progressing.

  ‘It’s slow,’ she said, ‘but there’s nothing to worry about. Not yet.’

  Not yet. The words rang in Robert’s ears, going round and round in his head. What were they not telling him? Did they mean that something might be wrong, that after all this time the birth might not go according to plan? Was the baby all right? Would it be normal? Why wouldn’t they tell him what they meant?

  The night wore on slowly and Robert dozed in the chair by Kerry’s bed. Her contractions had eased and she slept fitfully. When they gave her a drip Robert’s heart sank. All his instincts told him that something was wrong.

  First light crept through the window and Kerry’s contractions began again, more strongly than before. If Robert was gripped by panic, the midwife seemed delighted.

  ‘It won’t be long now,’ she told him. ‘Go and get a cup of coffee and when you come back we’ll get this little one born.’

  Robert felt that he was being dismissed. It was as if they wanted him out of the way. What were they going to do while he was gone? He drank his coffee, almost scalding his throat in his haste to get back to Kerry, and when he reached her room it was empty. I knew it, he thought, something’s gone terribly wrong. He rushed down the corridor, back to the nurses station.

  ‘She’s gone to the delivery room,’ they told him. ‘Don’t rush and put a gown and mask on before you go in.’

  He felt foolish, embarrassed.

  It was another hour before their baby was born, a beautiful girl. Kerry was exhausted but cheerful. Robert gazed at his daughter, traumatised by the miracle of birth. Kerry looked at them both. Her life felt complete.

  Back in her room, the sight of his sleeping wife and the snuffle of his daughter’s quick breathing filled his eyes and ears. He had never known such love. It brimmed over and trickled into everything he saw and felt. He needed to go and make telephone calls but he didn’t want the moment to end. Suddenly everything was so clean and so proper; he was loathe to break the spell. The pain and anguish of the last few hours belonged to the past, dirty nappies and sleepless nights belonged to the future; he wanted to stay in the ‘now’ for as long as he could. But although the pain and anguish of the preceding hours might have evaporated, they were not forgotten; the miracle of birth had left an indelible mark on him. It had changed his life.

  Robert had always loved Kerry but now his love for her had found a new, deeper level. When he paused to think, he knew that he was gripped by euphoria, living in a heightened state of mind, and that this would subside and life would return to normal, but for the moment he couldn’t imagine life without Kerry and his daughter. Of all the things I have done in my life, he thought, this has been the most amazing.

  Chapter 10

  Jack needed to find a job. His life had been too full of stops and starts; he was sick of making U-turns and wanted to settle to something; he wanted to find employment that would offer him a secure future, where he could belong and make a difference. He felt no urgent need to earn money and he had coasted through research, obtaining his master’s degree and then a doctorate with ease.

  His parents were surprised at how well he managed to live off the rewards of a research scholarship and the meagre allowance they still gave him but they were content to let him pursue his studies. They were proud of him and revelled in his brief home visits, his mother arranging dinner parties so that he could meet eligible young ladies. Jack was polite but remained single despite their best efforts.

  ‘He’s too absorbed in his studies,’ his mother told her friends. ‘He doesn’t want to be distracted. Not yet.’

  Jack started applying for lectureship posts and had a few interviews but met with little success. He widened his field of applications and finally found a post in the south.

  ‘It’ll mean that I won’t be around so much,’ he told his parents. ‘I’ll still come up from time to time but I’ll have a lot to do. I’ve got to research a slightly different field. Modern European history will be a change for me.’

  They were delighted. At last their only son was going to make his mark.

  ‘Do we call you Professor?’ his mother asked.

  ‘Not yet,’ he replied. ‘It’s only a lecturing post, the bottom rung.’

  ‘But it’s a start,’ his father said.

  Jack found a flat near the university and moved down early in the summer break. He wanted to familiarise himself with the campus before the term started and he needed to do some work.

  After his disastrous entanglement with Jennie he had steered clear of relationships although of late he had found that many of the female students he tutored were happy to pass the odd night or two with him. It gave him a strange satisfaction talking about history in the middle of sex. It seemed to throw them off their guard and he revelled in the way it liberated their libidos.

  He made an effort to take his new post seriously and resolved not to seduce his students. Perhaps he would find another don and they would settle down together. Standing in the open French windows of the living room in his flat he looked out over the river and surveyed the scene in front of him. The water was smooth, unruffled and flowing gently from right to left. It was a scene of tranquil beauty but it did little to quell the feeling of unease that gripped him.

  ‘This is a new start,’ he told himself angrily. ‘It’s time begin again, it's time to put the old me away.’

  Images floated past his mind’s eye, teasing and torturing him. Those far off days when he had cut school should have been long forgotten. He felt flawed and yet hadn’t he made good? Hadn’t he proved that he had brains? He didn’t need to be stuck in the past; he was free to move on. The pull of the past was still on him and he needed to break free. Closing the French windows, he moved into his bedroom, changed and went out for dinner. It was time to take in the local scene, to see what his new life had in store for him.

  The next months became a blur. He prepared and delivered his lectures, took his tutorials, researched his next project and scarcely had time to meet anyone. Faculty meetings were a bore. Little was discussed and the other lecturers were set in their ways. Slowly he came to realise that the exciting life of a university lecturer was a myth. Shut in his study or sitting in the library, Jack was lonely. He had no social life; he had made few friends and too many acquaintances. It was time to make a change.

  He craved female company but, no matter how much he tried to convince himself that he wanted to find a partner and settle down with her for life, he knew that he didn’t want a permanent relationship. He didn’t trust women, or anyone for that matter, and the thought of being committed to one person for the rest of his life was more than he could face.

  He travelled in his holidays, visiting historical sites in Europe and even further afield, exploring the eastern countries that had played such a formative part in Europe’s early history. He brought back mementos of his journeys; fascinating pictures and strange objects began to fill his flat. On one of his trips he had paired up with a fellow traveller and for a while he wondered if this was going to be the relationship that would change his life, but it was a holiday romance, nothing more, and when their trip came to an end they parted.

  Jack missed her for a week but, back at his university post, she was soon forgotten. He started lookin
g for a house in which to live. Returning to his flat after visiting yet another property he had a good feeling. He’d been looking at cottages; quaint, old fashioned houses as far removed from his smart executive flat as he could wish for.

  ‘I’m looking for a quiet place, not too big, where I can come for peace and quiet,’ he told the estate agents.

  The houses they showed him were pleasant but were usually in the centre of villages or in remote hamlets, at best one of a group of two or three houses.

  ‘I’d rather the house was isolated,’ he said. ‘I spend my weeks with hundreds of people and I want to come away at the weekend for some time on my own. I don’t want to be surrounded by other people. I need space to think and write.’

  The cottage he had just viewed was in the country, well away from other houses and yet not far from the local village. Its small garden was overgrown with shrubs and trees and the house nestled amongst them. There was a generous entrance hall and two small front rooms, one of which he mentally earmarked for his study. Two bedrooms at the rear of the property with the usual kitchen and bathroom completed the quota of rooms and there was a garden shed at the rear.

  The more he thought about it, the more ideal it seemed. He’d always dreamt of a country retreat, a bolt hole, and this could be it. The agent knew of an elderly man who would come in and keep the garden tidy and he suggested that there were several women who would be only too happy to earn a little cash for cleaning the house once a week.

  ‘I might take you up on the gardener,’ he told the agent, ‘but I can keep house for myself. I’m used to it and I don’t make much mess.’

  It took two weeks for Jack to make up his mind and put in an offer on the cottage and a further two months before the paper work was completed. Then he took possession. He felt guilty that he hadn’t told his parents about it but he felt very possessive about his new home and he didn’t want to share it with anyone. At least, not yet, he told himself. They knew about his flat and had even visited him once, but that was as far as he was prepared to go.

  It was two years since he had taken up his post and he had grown away from his parents. They were part of his old life, his flawed past, and he wanted to keep his new life clear of all the old encumbrances. He bought new furniture; not quaint, chintzy chairs but clean, comfortable modern leather armchairs and a sofa for his sitting room. He had the kitchen re-fitted and the bathroom modernised. His only indulgence to the age of the cottage was a large, old-fashioned brass bedstead.

  He tried to go down each weekend and sometimes in the week if his lecture programme allowed. His town flat became less of a home and more like an office with sleeping facilities where he did most of his research and lecture preparation. From time to time he held parties there for his students, usually at the end of term, and slowly he gained a reputation for the quality of his work.

  The publication of his first book brought him further recognition and he started to receive letters from people who had read his book and who wished to raise points that he’d made. He was beginning to be noticed in academic circles, too, and received invitations to give lectures at other universities.

  Despite his success, Jack was still lonely. While his work satisfied many of his needs he was still a human being and he needed the companionship of others. He spent a night with another lecturer in her flat and he felt a surge of relief. It was just sex and they’d had a good time. What more did he need? What more did he want?

  It was another step along the path of his new life and he wondered where it might lead. Perhaps this was what he’d been looking for, a mature relationship that would blossom into love. He didn’t invite her to his cottage although they spent nights at his flat. He was debating whether or not to invite her to his cottage for a weekend and had almost reached the point of asking her when she came round early one evening.

  ‘I’m leaving,’ she told him abruptly. ‘At the end of the year. I’m getting married and I’ve got a new post at the university where my fiancé works.’

  Jack was speechless. She’d never mentioned having a relationship with anyone else, let alone a fiancé.

  ‘I hope you’ll both be happy,’ he said, frantically dissembling and trying not to let her see how he felt. ‘We’ve had good times so I know he’s a lucky man.’

  ‘We have two more terms yet,’ she said. ‘We can still see each other.’

  ‘But not tonight,’ he said, ‘I’ve got to go to a meeting.’

  He hoped his lie was convincing. She seemed satisfied.

  ‘Come round to mine tomorrow.’

  But everything had changed. It was the same sex but it no longer felt right. It brought him physical relief but his mind was in torment. Were all women like this? He felt betrayed. And angry. How could he have let himself be fooled yet again? Yet again he vowed never to repeat the same mistake. In the future he would be the one to pick up and put down partners. It was the only way to avoid the pain.

  He turned his energies into making his cottage more of a home and began collecting prints to decorate the walls. With his interest in history he was drawn to old maps and photographs of the past. He took to browsing through antique and second hand shops where he could indulge his imagination by immersing himself in the past. Many objects caught his eye, often artefacts from the Far East, relics of times long past undoubtedly brought back to England in the days of her far flung Empire.

  He found it when he was browsing through a heap of antique maps in a secondhand shop. He looked up and saw it. Framed and hanging on a wall, it drew his eye and he gazed at it, fascinated. He went over to it for a closer look.

  ‘It’s a rare thing,’ the dealer told him.

  ‘Where did it come from?’ Jack asked.

  It looked foreign, Arabic or oriental, perhaps.

  ‘Some say it used to belong to the keeper of a harem,’ the antique dealer said with a twinkle in his eye. ‘It certainly comes from the Far East but I don’t know anything more.’

  ‘Can I see it?’

  ‘By all means.’

  Jack hung it on his study wall and pulled his desk chair back, the better to see it in its new home. It had been an impulse buy. Normally he would not have given it a second glance but it had spoken to him, liberating his mind and carrying his thoughts far away. Images flashed across his mind as he gazed at it.

  Chapter 11

  Kerry and her four year old daughter were making their way home, walking along the path from the swings in the park where her daughter had been playing with her friends. It was late afternoon and the mid-summer heat was just beginning to ease.

  Kerry thought that she had everything; a loving husband, a new house and a child. She did the housework in the mornings and then, if the weather was fine, she took her daughter to the park in the afternoons. She looked forward to this time. Sitting on the benches by the children’s playground she talked to the other mums, exchanging tit-bits of gossip, comparing her daughter’s progress with the other toddlers, swapping the odd recipe; it was her time to relax. Her daughter, too, enjoyed these afternoons, meeting her friends, playing on the swings and the slide and in the sandpit.

  The sun was bright today and the afternoon was still warm. Kerry was wearing a loose, halter neck summer dress and the sun was hot on her shoulders. Holding her mother’s hand, her daughter was pretending that she was still on the roundabout, swinging from side to side, running first one way and then the other. They were happy and carefree. Kerry was looking forward to being back at home and tidying round before Robert, her husband, came back.

  Her daydreams were interrupted when she saw a young man walking towards her. She guessed he was in his late twenties or early thirties; a bit younger than she was. It looked as if he was going to pass them by but then, at the last minute he stopped and moved into the middle of the path, blocking their way. Her daughter turned towards Kerry and buried her face in her mother’s skirt, too shy to look at the young man.

  ‘Can you help me, please?’ he a
sked.

  He sounded agitated and she noticed the way that he was twisting his fingers together. Kerry was surprised that he had stopped to speak to her but he was clearly distressed. Normally people just passed by or nodded. Slender of build, he looked smart and was well dressed in a lightweight, grey business suit. He was looking directly at her, holding her gaze with his eyes.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ she asked, instinctively gripping her daughter’s hand more tightly.

  ‘It’s my dog,’ the young man said. ‘He’s trapped under a fallen branch and I can’t get him out. If I lift up the branch, could you free him so that I can take him to the vet?’

  Kerry felt uneasy. She looked around. The other families at the swings were out of sight now, and the path was deserted where they were: just the man, Kerry and her daughter. Although there was no one else in sight, the sound of the children they had just left, still laughing and shouting at the swings, reassured her. The young man seemed nervous, ill at ease. He rushed on as if he sensed her reluctance, trying to explain about the dog.

  ‘I’m worried about him. I don’t want him to suffer. He's my mother’s dog and she's infirm; she can’t come out so I walk him for her. The lead slipped out of my fingers and he ran off. He means everything to her. She’d be devastated if anything happened to him. You’ve got to help me.’

  His suit was neatly pressed, he was well-spoken and he was clearly anxious; if the dog belonged to his invalid mother surely, Kerry thought, it would be callous to refuse to help.

  ‘Show me,’ she said reluctantly and against her better judgement.

  ‘He’s in here,’ the man said.

  He held aside one of the shrubs and pointed into the undergrowth, towards the thickest part where huge rhododendron bushes had twisted their brown trunks into fantastic shapes; some were lying along the ground while others reached upwards towards the light. Dead leaves carpeted the damp soil giving off a musty smell and it was dark under the rhododendrons. Kerry thought it looked a bit like a tropical forest; she couldn’t see much at all and certainly no dog.