The Best of Fiona Kidman's Short Stories

by Fiona Kidman

  She pushed her gloved hand distractedly through her hair and avoided the feet of the young man sitting facing her, as they threatened to become entangled with hers. The feet were clad in fine soft leather boots.

  10

  She had observed the way people did not stare at each other in England, and the way that they did not make random comments to each other. Even though she had not spoken to anyone except the fruit vendor for several days she knew she should resist the urge to speak.

  11

  The young man pretended to be asleep whenever she looked at him. She knew he pretended by the way he moved his feet. He had started being tidy with them.

  After a while he pretended to wake up and took out a book. She saw that it was a collection of Andrew Marvell’s poems. She felt ashamed that she was only reading a novel, even though it was by Barbara Pym who was now rediscovered.

  The young man wore designer jeans. He picked one of his feet up off the floor and placed it on the seat so that his very long leg was cocked along it, and his shapely crotch exposed towards her.

  It was as good as a smile.

  ‘Are you a student?’ she said, looking at his book, and recalling English I.

  ‘No,’ he said, but he did smile. He had strong white teeth, and his face was lean and tanned. He turned the book a little so that she could appreciate the cover. ‘It’s a good read.’

  ‘Have you been to Paris before?’ she blurted.

  ‘Not since last week,’ he said.

  He pointed to the luggage compartment. She saw then, two tennis racquets in frames. They looked shiny and expensive.

  ‘I’m a tennis player. I play in tournaments. Most weeks I play somewhere in Europe. This week and last, it’s been Paris.’

  ‘How exciting,’ she said, and heard herself breathless and a little tremulous. ‘Are you famous? Should I know you? I’m from New Zealand, you see, we don’t see all the games, well only the finals at Wimbledon, I might not have seen, you understand …?’

  ‘No, not so exciting, no truly. Of course, in New Zealand I can see you might not have … sometimes on television, yes, but in New Zealand, well I can understand that. I do win some.’

  He smiled again. She recognised false modesty when she saw it.

  12

  He was kind though, generous with details. They told each other the story of their lives, listening carefully to one another. He came from Devon. His parents had thought he might do better than be a tennis player but he didn’t understand their problem. It was a good job. It took a long time to tell her this. She, having had a longer life, took even more time.

  They hurtled past fields she could barely see because the mist now hugged the edge of the railway tracks like white fur.

  They discussed the agrarian patterns of Great Britain. In the fifth form, she had been taught about grain production in East Anglia. She could not understand its relevance to her life. She had wondered if, coming here to England for the first time, she would discover why it was important to her to learn about its grainfields when she had only a rough idea of where wheat was grown in New Zealand.

  His tone was almost sharp. ‘Of course it’s important,’ he said. ‘It is a central factor in the British economy’ He paused, frowned. ‘And New Zealand depends on Britain, doesn’t it?’

  How curious, she thought, if, after all, an ear or two of wheat were to come between her and the consummation of what was clearly shaping up to be the most classic interlude in her life. A young man, in Paris, where despite the portents on this side of the Channel, it was officially spring and bound to be fine. A small subterranean voice begged her to remind herself that it was simply fucking in a general sort of way that she had in mind, rather than with this particular young man. She dismissed the voice. For the moment, she thought that if her husband were here, right at this minute, she would probably prefer the tennis player.

  ‘Would you ever play in South Africa?’ she asked him, holding her breath.

  ‘Never,’ he said with fervour. She breathed a long sigh of relief, forgiving him East Anglia. She saw his head on the pillow beside hers, and the index finger of her right hand sitting inside its new glove, purchased in Oxford Street the day before, traced his profile in her mind’s eye. She knew already that she was bound never to forget him.

  ‘In the mornings we eat breakfast outside at the sidewalk cafés. You must do that,’ he was saying. ‘It is the only way to have breakfast in Paris.’

  13

  At Dover she thought the white cliffs were a hill covered with birdshit. They had disappeared behind the hovercraft before she had time to appreciate them.

  ‘Is that all?’ she said to him. ‘Is that all?’

  At the terminal people had turned to look at them. He had bought her coffee and croissants, and refused to allow her to pay. ‘In New Zealand,’ he said. Already it had been decided that he must play the New Zealand circuit some summer soon.

  She felt herself walking with the special pride of someone who has recently become one half of a new couple. It occurred to her that he might be very well known indeed. Look at him, she imagined the eyes that followed them were saying, he has a new woman. Perhaps it would get into the papers. Young tennis player woos mystery woman. Antipodean sweetheart — how long can this romance last? In praise, again, of older women.

  ‘You’ll be speaking French in a minute,’ he said, and too late she realised that the English Channel was behind her.

  She opened her phrase book at Arrivals and Departures. ‘I have two hundred cigarettes, some wine and a bottle of spirits,’ she said, frivolous in her mood.

  ‘The children are on my wife’s passport,’ he said, running his finger down the list.

  She laughed out loud. ‘Non. Je ne suis que de passage.’

  He nodded approvingly. ‘Passing through, eh? Bon.’ He opened his hands, a mock Gallic gesture. ‘Je n’ai rien a declarer aussi.’

  He put his hand on her phrasebook. ‘Don’t worry about it so much.’

  14

  The train stopped often in the French countryside. The small towns all seemed to have rubbish tips for backyards. Their conversation became erratic. It was still raining.

  ‘You must be privileged if you play tennis in England,’ she mused, and aware already that he was. But she had been thinking of Eccleston Square.

  His head was slipping sideways towards her shoulder. She could smell him. He smelled like a new racquet, gutsy and clean.

  ‘Probably. Tell me some more about New Zealand,’ he said drowsily, without minding whether she did or not. She watched him. She thought of something special she would do for him.

  15

  The lock in the bedroom door worked by a number of turns in either direction. She could not work out the sequence. Not only could she not get in, but once in she could not get out either. She had to call reception three times before she had mastered it, and on the last occasion she was near to hysteria. The young man on the desk came upstairs on his own to explain it to her the first two times. His English was bad. The third time he brought another man, who spoke good English. He explained the lock in a slow and patient way as if she were simple. She considered leaving the hotel and going to another, but night had fallen and she did not know where to go.

  When it seemed as if she understood the mechanism of the lock she sat in the room and shook. Several hours had passed since the tennis player had last bought her food, and the hotel had no restaurant. Even if it had, she was afraid to leave the room.

  Still, at least she liked it. After Eccleston Square it was like a return to some other life where ease and comfort were again possible. The king-sized bed was covered with a frilled quilt with a pattern of pink and green peacocks, and there were rose-coloured lights on the wall. There were gold-coloured taps in the bathroom and a deep bath.

  The louvre doors led out on to a wrought iron balcony overlooking Rue Pasquier. The life of the city stretched below her had she chosen to walk out on to the balco
ny, though for the moment the sound of traffic had caused her to close the doors so that she could hear herself think.

  She knew she would not sleep if she did not eat, and maybe drink as well, and that the longer she left it the more difficult it would be to set out.

  Carefully she tried the lock and this time the combination worked to perfection. Emboldened, she left the hotel and walked quickly along the boulevard in the direction of St Augustin. Her handbag was comfortably full of francs. ‘You’ll be all right now, wont you?’ he had said when he left her at the counter of the bureau de change. ‘I’m sorry I can’t see you to a taxi.’ He had become tense and athletic, fretting with his tennis racquets. He had explained on the first train, in England, that his game was on the other side of Paris. As it was, he would be cutting things fine to get there on time.

  Traffic swirled past her. She could not see where the centre line of the road was, or indeed, if there were any true sides to the roads, as a car mounted the pavement and ran its left-hand tyres alongside her ankles. She leapt out of its path and watched it subside into the path of an oncoming car, which swerved in its turn.

  Right up until the last moment she knew that she had been shamefully hoping. Even in the taxi, re-counting her money, which she had been short-changed the first time it was given to her, and she had had to demand in a loud high voice that it be counted again, she wondered if he had heard her tell him the name of the hotel, and regretted that she had not had the courage to repeat it when he was leaving.

  It was after the second time that the lock on the door would not open that she admitted his expression. It was, she remembered, decent and perfectly nice, marred by a slight but growing sense of impatience.

  She found a restaurant. The waiter was young. He did not speak any English at all. She pointed out a phrase in her small blue book. Je ne parle pas bien le français. Je viens de Nouvelle Zélande. He brought her a carafe of wine without being asked. When she drank it thirstily he brought her another, and indicated to her what he had decided it would be best for her to eat.

  Vous êtes très aimable, she wrote on her paper napkin when she left. She felt undone by such simple kindness.

  Like the kindness of the tennis player. They had not talked about his aunts, but she knew without such a conversation taking place, that he was kind to them. He would be good to them if they were ever foolish enough to go to Paris alone. He might even try to dissuade them from going.

  16

  Inside the room she felt free, with a sudden odd delight that she was alone. She leaned against the door with her back to it. It was April, and she was in Paris. She had come from the other side of the world for this. She had transacted money. She knew the combination of her lock. She had bought a meal. In a minute or so she would run a large hot bath.

  She had not drawn the curtains yet, and outside the night sky shone with reflected light.

  Ellen walked to the doors leading out on to the balcony and opened them, breathing deeply and calmly. She stepped outside, and a fine rain was falling. She gripped the edge of the wrought iron balcony, and was happy.

  As she stood there, a curious thing happened. The astonishing traffic began to grind to a halt beneath her. Two cars hit each other with a sickening thud. The drivers leapt out of the cars, and without looking at each other, raised their fists in her direction, as if it was she who was responsible for their misfortune.

  More cars began to stop. Within moments Rue Pasquier was clogged with cars askew where their owners had abandoned them with their motors running. Behind the cars that had stopped, drivers in the oncoming wave who could not see what was happening began to sound their horns.

  Ellen was increasingly bewildered by the commotion. But it was surely a phenomenon which, if studied, must give insight and meaning to the character of the French. She prided herself in a lively curiosity. The men who had first waved their fists at her were now shouting at each other. But other drivers, less hapless, still appeared transfixed by something at the point where she stood. She thought that it must be above her and looked upwards, putting her hand on the wall over her head.

  A man headed towards the balcony then, laughing and shouting at the same time. She drew back, afraid. She was not so far above the street that a man could not scale the wall to where she stood.

  She caught a word. She was sure it was not in her phrase book.

  But she understood.

  17

  When the door to the balcony was double locked behind her she ran her bath. She took off all her clothes. She looked at herself in the steamed-up glass.

  The wife who might pass for a maiden aunt or a missionary who might pass for a whore looked back though it was difficult to say whether she looked any more like one of these than the other.

  Most likely, she thought, she resembled the cello.

  The Sugar Club

  SHE WAS HAVING DINNER at The Sugar Club. The walls were bleak, the tables bare, and the bentwood chairs reminded her of an earlier home than the one she lived in now. The music crunched like gravel underfoot. She was dining with clever women. The food was excellent. They drank expensive wine.

  At the table next to them an actor and an actress who were said to be in love and were both well known stared at each other with stony faces. They ate their meal quickly and left.

  She stood up and walked through the restaurant and out the door marked Toilets. There was a passage beyond painted brick red. At the end of the passage there was the promised lavatory. There was a bowl of daffodils on the cistern. The floor was painted turquoise blue.

  When she came out of the lavatory again she was confused in the brick red passage. She couldn’t see the door through which she had come from the restaurant. The passage ahead ended in an alleyway that opened directly on to the street. A bicycle stood propped against the wall at the end of the alleyway. A gust of stars appeared to pass in the distant sky above the bicycle. She thought of riding the bicycle away into the night but she knew she would fall off it. Not just tonight, but any night. She had been able to freewheel once but it was a long time ago.

  She opened the only door that she could see. It opened into the kitchen. It was completely white and three chefs wearing hats were sitting down talking. They looked frightened and disturbed by her entrance.

  A fourth person stood with her back to the door and did not see her. It was a woman, judging by the voice, for she sang a sweet thin tune.

  ‘… She wears red feathers and a hooley hooley skirt …’ sang the woman.

  She retreated without closing the door. It was banged shut behind her.

  Feeling foolish now, in the alleyway, she looked for a way to escape. Beside her, merging with the brick red paint, she saw the outline of a door. She tried it and it opened to reveal the interior of The Sugar Club.

  She walked through the restaurant with her usual air of assurance. At the table she sat down with the clever women who were pleased to see her return.

  ‘Oh God,’ she said, leaning her head on her hand for a moment. ‘Oh sugar.’

  Bloody sugar.

  ‘Oh bloody sugar,’ she said.

  Pudding

  FROM TIME TO TIME I need to go away in order to write in peace. This is not to say that I am not surrounded by a great deal of peace of other people’s making. People, meaning family and friends, have great respect for my need for peace and quiet these days. ‘Ellen is working,’ they say to each other, ‘she must be left in peace.’ I am grateful and sometimes overwhelmed by this consideration. So overwhelmed that I have to go away.

  I go to a variety of places, but most particularly to a motel a long way from where I live. I think it is best if I do not tell you where the motel is, for the motel-keeper’s wife figures slightly in this story, and I do not think she would appreciate being identified. Her role is not significant, in that it could be filled by another person, and I have thought of cutting her out altogether, but I find that difficult, simply because she was there. Instead, I will t
ell you that the motel is perched on the edge of sand dunes on one of those bays that stretch limitlessly around the eastern coast of the north of New Zealand, the sand so blazingly white by day, that it makes the eyes reel in their sockets when you look at it, and in the moonlight makes you think of Peter O’Toole playing Lawrence of Arabia. Which leads one on to thinking about going to the movies and sitting in the back stalls of picture theatres of which there are, or were, countless replicas of each other, in every little town that anyone has ever lived in in this country of ours, in the days before we all had television. Oh, if you want to be exact, some had television when O’Toole played Lawrence. Like I said, not all of us.

  I was thinking especially along these lines when I went to this motel to write a film script. I had taken a copy of William Goldman’s Adventures in the Screen Trade with me, and my portable electronic typewriter, a tin of lambs’ tongues in jelly, which I find a delicacy of unparalleled delight, a number of avocados, and several bottles of wine cooler. Everything was in its place, and I had already been in residence for three days. On the night of which I write, I had spent a great deal of time walking up and down the beach thinking visually. It was mid-week and the motel was almost empty, even though it was early summer. Sensibly, I had come just before the school holidays. Next week it would be different. For now, I had the motel, built to simulate a Spanish hacienda, more or less to myself. The beach to myself. My splendid panoramic thoughts all to myself. To tell the truth, it could get a little boring; I often long, in these periods of controlled peacefulness, for the phone, to which nobody except my nearest relatives has access to the number, to be rung in case of emergency, to ring (well, hardly anyone, my agent always rings long distance, it pleases him that I have so much discipline) or that it be time to decently call it a day and turn on television.