She was driving away from Leeds when the sky ahead began to darken. By the time she reached the last village, the horizon beyond which Stargrave lay was ominously black. She hoped Ben was on his way home if the weather was about to turn nasty. A small cold sun illuminated the moors, so that the slopes shone unnaturally bright against the strip of darkness. The vegetation seemed deadened, as metallic as the sheen of the exposed rock.
Could the height of the moors above Stargrave affect the atmospheric conditions? The blackness appeared to be poised over the town. She felt as if she ought to have found out more about the climate before the family had decided to move from Norwich. She hadn't listened to the car radio since their move, and now she had to assume that the geography interfered with the reception: she could raise nothing but a silence so total she would have thought she had fallen deaf if she hadn't been hearing the sounds of the car.
When she came in sight of the railway bridge, the sky was impenetrably black. She could imagine the sky having given way like ice, leaving a great hole above the town for outer space to show through. It was only a mass of clouds, she told herself firmly, and drove under the arch.
The dark closed over her like icy water so deep that no light could reach it, and she gripped the wheel harder in order not to shiver. For a moment she was nervous of how much darker it might be on the far side of the bridge than it was on the moors. Of course that was nonsense: when she drove up the slope beyond the bridge she saw the houses glaring almost silver; only the forest looked as if it welcomed the blackness overhead. She swung the car onto the track to the house, hoping that Ben would be there.
When she opened the front door she was greeted by a hint of central heating. "Ben," she called, stooping to pick up an envelope from the doormat, but even when she shouted up the stairs there was no response. She switched on the heating and gazed from the kitchen window at the deserted track. She tore off a length of kitchen roll to mop the rings of blackcurrant juice which the children had left like an Olympic emblem on the working surface next to the washing machine. She filled the percolator and turned it on, and then she opened the letter.
It was a form letter from Kerys at Ember. Apart from Dear
Ben and Ellen, only the signature and the lines beneath it were handwritten, and so Ellen read the postscript first. Someone else who's gone to a better place is our publicity director, but the new bod Mark Matthews comes recommended. Give him a call to introduce yourselves or ask Alice to next time you're down. Remind him how good you are. Only wish I could've been around for your success. Heaps of good luck.
The letter itself announced that because of a personnel rationalisation exercise at Firebrand and Ember, Kerys would be leaving at the end of the month, to be replaced by Alice Carroll, the new children's fiction editor with several years experience in juveniles.
Ellen stared out of the window, willing Ben to appear on the track so that she could stop worrying about him, but staring only seemed to make the sky and the forest grow darker. The contents of the letter felt like a dull ache in her mind, an ache she couldn't begin to deal with until she saw Ben. There had been no sign of him when it was time to fetch the children from school. She propped the envelope against the telephone on the fourth stair up and hurried out.
The sun was beyond the forest now. In the streets people were shaking their heads at the sky, blowing on their hands or burying them in their armpits. "Always dark before the silver lining," Mrs Dainty called after the greengrocer as he dashed out of her post office and back into his shop next door, trailing a strip of stamps from one hand and pinching his shirt collar shut above his muddy apron with the other. Two young men from Elgin's were perched on the exposed timbers of the roof of a house near the school, fitting new slates, and Ellen found their shouts to each other oddly reassuring. As she hurried uphill, the sky and the forest and the darkening town felt like aspects of a single darkness.
The sight which met her as she neared the school made her forget the gloom. Ben was leading Margaret and Johnny out of the schoolyard, and his eyes were glittering. "Wait until you hear my story," he said.
TWENTY-TWO
He seemed to be in no hurry to tell her, even when the children eased themselves out of his grasp and ran ahead. He seemed as exhilarated by the blackness of the sky and the possibility of its heralding snow as the children were. When Ellen cried "You're freezing" and rubbed his hands and then his cheeks, he gave her a vague smile. He was so cold that holding his hand made her shiver, but he was here, and what else mattered? She hurried him after the children, back to the warmth of the house.
The white envelope was still propped against the white telephone, both of them glimmering as Ellen closed the front door. Ben picked up the envelope and blinked at it, and eventually said "Good news?"
"Not the best. You'll see better if you put the light on," Ellen said, and headed for the front room to sort out an argument over first choice of television channel. "Let Johnny have the control now, Peg. The programmes you like best are on later."
In the hall Ben was fumbling to unzip his quilted anorak and waving away the heat with his free hand. While she waited patiently he blinked again at the envelope, threw off his anorak, took out the letter. Since he hadn't switched on the hall light, she did so as he peered at the letter. "Well," he said.
"Well?"
"Well, Mark Matthews sounds like two kinds of saint, and can you imagine a better name than Alice Carroll for a children's fiction editor?"
"You don't think it's serious, then."
"Only one v/ay to find out," he said slowly, and unplugged the phone to carry it up to their workroom. "Let's see what Kerys has to say for herself."
When Ellen followed, having told the children not to interrupt them, he was standing at the window of the unlit workroom. The darkness made the forest appear to have closed around the house; as she went into the room the window was full of a mass of black foliage which might almost have been printed on the glass. She switched on the light and crossed the floor to him, and the view of the forest regained some perspective, though it still looked as though the premature night was forming patterns on the hillside. "Will you make the call or shall I?" she said.
He plugged in the phone and dialled, then handed her the receiver. "I'll be your prompter if I think of anything to say."
She wouldn't have minded deciding for herself when she was ready to talk. She was moving to sit on the chair at the desk when a receptionist's voice announced "Firebrand Books."
"Kerys Thorn, please."
"I'll put you through to her secretary."
The receptionist had barely paused, but Ellen had noticed. "I think something may be up," she whispered to Ben, who knelt by her and brought his face alongside hers. Momentarily she felt as if he was kneeling before the dark forest. "Hello, can I help?" Kerys' secretary said.
"It's Gail, isn't it? This is Ellen Sterling."
"Who did you want to speak to?"
"Would you believe Kerys?"
"She isn't here now. Alice Carroll is if you want a word with her."
"I think I should."
Ben was hearing both sides of the conversation as far as she could tell. He'd leaned his face closer to hers and was gazing at the forest. She had never seen trees so still. She felt as if the stillness had invaded the telephone receiver, which was emitting none of the usual restless electrical sounds. When a new voice spoke it seemed such a violation of the silence that she jumped. "Who is this?" the woman's voice said.
Her emphasis on the first word was light but unmistakable. "Ben and Ellen Sterling," Ellen said.
"Of course, the husband and wife team," Alice Carroll said briskly. "What can I do for you?"
"We were wondering what happened to Kerys."
"We decided I should take over now so that Ember can move forward."
Ellen wondered if "we" included Kerys. "When are you next in town?" Alice Carroll wanted to know. "We should meet and talk about directions you might t
ake."
"From whom?"
"Not that kind of direction," Alice Carroll said with a token laugh. "Avenues for exploration. Ideas in keeping with Ember's new image."
"Our books aren't, you mean."
"I like your snowflake book. I think that could point you the way you might want to go."
"Which is?"
"Developing the ecological theme which you were hinting at there. I felt you could have foregrounded that more, made your concern about it plainer. No need to be afraid of alienating your readers, if that was your problem. Today's children want relevance."
"You think so?"
"I wouldn't be here if I didn't. Have you talked to your readers lately?"
"Some of them."
"Let's hope we can make contact with many more. You've the talent. All it should take is an awareness of their needs," Alice Carroll said more briskly than ever. "We'll be putting out the book you delivered to Kerys Thorn, of course, assuming that you don't have second thoughts, but I really think we should get together for a drink and a chat before you start work on your next. How's your diary looking?"
"Kerys said we'd be wanted in London to help promote The Boy Who Caught The Snowflakes."
"That's up to Publicity. I'll have you put through to them and then you can let me know your plans."
The line went dead, which presumably meant she was having the call transferred. Ellen sat up, massaging her arms, which had stiffened with tension, but Ben stayed as he was. "Can you hear?" she said.
"What?" He seemed startled by her question until he glanced at her. "Yes, don't worry. You're doing fine."
She wondered fleetingly if he'd thought she was asking about something other than the conversation, but what else could he have heard? "Publicity," a voice said. "Cynth speaking."
"Could I have a word with Mark Matthews?"
"What's it concerning, please?"
"The Boy Who Caught The Snowflakes. This is Ellen Sterling."
"Who do you review for?"
"Not for anyone. I'm the artist."
"You'll want the art department, then. Hold on."
As Ellen drew breath to protest, Ben jerked his head towards the mouthpiece, so roughly that his cheekbone bruised her cheek. "This is Ben and Ellen Sterling. We wrote and illustrated the book. We want you to connect us with Mark Matthews while you've still got a job. Regard this call as a valuable lesson. One day you may be grateful."
"Don't take it all out on the poor girl," Ellen murmured as he withdrew from the mouthpiece. He blinked at her as if he didn't understand why she was rubbing her cheek, then gave it an apologetic kiss. She was turning her mouth to his when another voice separated them. "Mrs Sterling?"
"I'm here."
"Mark Matthews. Sorry if Cynth got it wrong. She's new here, like me. How can I help you?"
"We were wondering about publicity for our new book."
"Let me just find the publication date." She heard pages turning, and then he said cheerfully "End of November. One of our Christmas books. I'm sure it will sell itself."
Though he wasn't infuriating her as Alice Carroll had, Ellen still felt vulnerable, unsure how important she and Ben and their books were. "Can't we give it a push?" she said.
"What do you feel singles it out from the rest of the season's books?"
"The advertising, I hope."
"Spoken like a true writer. We're holding over most of our advertising budget to relaunch Ember next year. I'm sure we'll have point-of-sale advertising for your next book."
"Aren't we supposed to be helping to promote this one?"
"Will you be free around the publication date?"
"One or both of us."
"I'll make sure our reps and the press know." He cleared his throat. "Sorry if I seem at all vague. I'll be in touch nearer publication, scout's honour."
His pleasantness seemed to have left her no honest response. She handed Ben the receiver in case he had anything to add, but he let it drop onto the cradle. "It sounds to me as if they're going to leave us on our own out there," she said.
"They must know how good we are."
"Are we really, though?"
"Believe it," Ben said, his eyes glittering fiercely. "If they don't know yet, they will when they hear my story. I'd like to see Alice Carroll turn this one into her kind of ideological sermon. The unimaginative always want to reduce imagination to a level they can cope with."
"Are you going to tell me the story?"
He turned back to the window. True night had fallen; it had seemed to spread out from the forest and across the landscape. "I need to spend more time on it," he said. "I don't want to write it until I've got it clear."
"Don't tell me if you aren't ready to."
"No, I want you to hear. Telling it to you and the children may help me see what I'm conjuring up." He gazed ahead as if the dark might show it to him, and said "Suppose that in the coldest places on earth the spirits of the ice age are still there in the snow and ice, waiting to rise again."
"Not much chance of that, the way the climate's going."
"It isn't the climate that keeps them dormant, it's the sun."
"I expect it would."
"The midnight sun, I mean. It shines so many nights each year that they can never build up enough power to leave the ice.
"So how do they, if they do?"
"They do, I promise you. I'm not quite sure how, but I know I've something in here," he said, tapping his forehead. "If I can just bring it out into the open…"
"I know you will. It sounds a wonderful idea. Do you think it might be best to save it until we've done our second book for Alice Carroll? Then we could make sure it goes somewhere it'll be appreciated. Or you could write it and then do something else for her. Your walk in the woods was productive, anyway," she added to cheer him up.
"It's started something. I only wish it would be a bit quicker taking shape."
"Had you just come out of the woods when I met you? How far did you walk?"
"I can't remember." He frowned as if she had distracted him unnecessarily. "I really don't know. I must have been too deep in my story. What does it matter? I came back."
"That's all that matters," she assured him. She gave him a long hug and stood up. "I'd better feed the starving before they realise they are."
She wasn't sure if he heard her. When she reached the door he had shifted onto the chair and was crouched over the desk, his face close to the window. "Turn the light off," he muttered, and she did so, hoping that would help him bring his tale alive. She'd sensed how much it meant to him, and she thought his passion for the idea meant it could be their best book.
When dinner was ready she sent Margaret to fetch him. The girl ran downstairs almost at once, looking unhappy and refusing to say why. Soon Ben appeared, narrowing his eyes at the light, opening them determinedly wide and smiling. "Sorry if 1 made you jump, Peg. I didn't realise you were there until you touched me. I must have been far away."
During the meal he retold the story which had been her favourite when she was little, about the boy lost in the mountains who had to venture to the very edge of what appeared to be a sheer drop in order to be rescued by a girl who turned into a cloud once he was safe, and then he told an ideologically corrected version in which the girl proved to be a member of the local mountain rescue team and lectured the boy on do's and don'ts for climbers. The children laughed so much that Johnny choked and had to be thumped on the back, and Ellen stuck out her tongue at the new version. "Looks as if there are still children whose minds haven't been sewn up by Alice Carroll and her kind," Ben said.
He gave in to pleas for a repeat of the original version once Johnny was in bed. Margaret sat on the end of the mattress where Johnny's feet didn't reach. As soon as the story was over she got into her own bed. Ellen went to bed early too, taking refuge from the chill which seemed to seep into the house whenever the central heating pump clicked off. Ben was in the workroom, and hadn't emerged when she fell
asleep.
In the night a shiver wakened her. She clasped Ben's waist with one arm and pressed herself against his back to warm him up. There was movement at the window, a soft irregular patting on the glass. A white shape which looked tall as the gap between the curtains was dancing in the darkness, fluttering against the window like a bird or a moth. The children would be pleased in the morning, she thought drowsily. For a few seconds the sounds on the panes seemed to grow absolutely regular, in a rhythm too complicated to follow. She was trying to define it when it lulled her to sleep.
TWENTY-THREE
Midnight Sun Page 15