‘Guest and visitor mean more or less the same thing. Although guest is somehow more special. Anyone can be a visitor. A stranger can be a visitor, somebody uninvited can be a visitor. A guest is somebody who is being treated in a certain way, the way you’d treat somebody you had asked to your home. Hopefully you’d treat a visitor that way too, but not necessarily. But what’s the reason for the name, do you know?’
‘Gost was once an important place, if you can believe it. This was the provincial capital for the district, when we were part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. So people from many different areas visited or settled here. Also we are close to the mountains and they are the highest in these parts, so the crossing is hazardous, especially in the winter. Mountain people have a very strong tradition of hospitality. In such a place a traveller’s survival often depends on it. Also, in those days of wars and bandits, I suppose people thought if they treated a stranger as their guest, then he wouldn’t do them harm. Even today if you go from north to south or east to west you must pass through Gost. That has also brought a lot of strangers here.’
‘My husband said it was easy to get here from the city and the airport or from the coast, and that was one of the advantages.’
‘And as you see, you are my guests.’
‘Thank you. Gost in English sounds like a cross between guest and host.’
‘Or ghost,’ said Grace.
‘In Cro that would be duh.’
Grace repeated the word several times.
‘Correct. Or prikaza, well that would be more like a kind of vision. The last thing you would see before you died, something like that.’
‘Like angels, or somebody who’s already dead and who’s been waiting for you.’
‘That’s how it is in the movies. Who knows what people really see.’
‘I want to learn to speak Croatian. I’m already learning French and German. My teachers say I have a good ear,’ said Grace. ‘Could you teach me?’
I was about to say I would when Matthew, who’d left the room to go to the toilet, reappeared. ‘Are those your guns?’ he asked.
‘Of course. You want to see one?’ I went to the rack at the back door and came back with a .243 rifle I’d owned about ten years.
‘What are they for?’
‘Hunting.’ I slid the bolt to check the carriage and handed it to Matthew.
‘Hunting? No kidding!’ He raised it to his shoulder and swung the barrel around, pointing in different directions. I reached out, took hold of the barrel and pushed it down. ‘Never do that.’ I showed him how to hold it, to press the butt into his shoulder, rest his cheek against the wood and cradle the stock in his left hand. Matthew held the rifle and peered through the sights. ‘Will you take me next time you go hunting?’
‘It’s not the season to hunt. But if you want I will teach you to shoot, hunting we leave for another time.’ I removed the rifle from him.
‘Maybe we should talk about it first, Matthew,’ said Laura.
‘What’s there to talk about?’ said Matthew.
‘This is the country, not the city,’ I told Laura. ‘Here it’s different. You don’t have to worry. Besides Matthew is nearly a man.’
‘It’s not like there’s anything else to do around here. What about this one?’ Matthew had my old 7.62 in his hands and started to raise it, but I stopped him.
‘Not that one,’ I said. ‘That one’s not the right gun for you.’ I took it from him.
‘Then I guess it’s up to you, Matt,’ Laura said.
‘Duro?’ Matthew turned to me.
‘Of course.’
I looked from Matthew to Laura and back – the two were so much alike. Light gold skin and hair, they actually seemed to shimmer in the evening light. The slanting eyes, which in Laura looked feline but made Matthew look sleepy, careless. High forehead, long eyebrows. Matthew wore his hair almost as long as his mother did and his face had a feminine delicacy about it. By contrast Grace’s skin was paler, her hair darker and overall she carried more weight. Her nose was longer and rather sharp, she’d none of Laura’s poise. I don’t think I’d ever met a daughter so different from her mother. At that moment she was bent over kissing Zeka on the nose. She looked up at me, as though she’d felt the touch of my gaze. ‘Can I take them out for a run?’
Laura and I were left alone at the table. Grace was with the dogs, Matthew, outside with an old telescope of mine he’d found, was looking at stars. I fetched more wine, filled both our glasses and took my place opposite. Laura had her elbow on the table and was cradling her chin in her palm, her head angled away from me. For a while neither of us spoke and I was glad that Laura was so relaxed in my company. She sat up straight and sipped her wine.
‘I do worry about Matthew,’ she said. ‘He hasn’t really grown into himself, if you know what I mean. Quite the opposite from Grace who is very easily amused.’ The way she said it, stressing the word easily, made Grace sound defective. ‘What was it like for you growing up here?’
I shrugged. ‘No problem. We had the outdoors. So, freedom.’
‘I grew up in cities. We moved a lot. I changed school four times so I was always the new girl and on the outside of things. By the time I had a group of friends we’d move on.’
‘Your father’s job was the reason you moved?’
‘Yes and no. My father worked overseas, he was an engineer. Before that he had been in the Army, we lived in Germany. After he left the Army we went back to England. He worked for private contractors, he used to go away to consult on projects: Nigeria, Abu Dhabi, those kinds of places. Then he took an overseas posting. We only went out once, to Thailand. My mother didn’t like it and we came back. I was fourteen, I thought it was great and would have stayed but it wasn’t up to me. The idea, I think, was that he would go back and forth, but I think the marriage was on its last legs and so he ended up hardly coming back at all. By all accounts it’s pretty easy for men in Thailand. At first my mother did up houses to keep herself occupied while my father was away, it was more of a hobby. Later, after the divorce, she did it for the money. She’d buy a house, we’d live in it for a couple of years while she got it sorted, and then sell. I always lived in unfinished houses. As soon as the house was ready and I finally had my bedroom the way I wanted it, my mother would put the house on the market and we’d start again. Then we moved to Wales where she started doing up cottages to sell to people as holiday homes, but when the locals started burning English people’s houses the bottom fell out of that market and she had trouble selling the place we were living in. Back to square one. That was the only time I ever lived in the country. Out there it was just the two of us, we never had guests that I can remember, and I never had the sense I could bring my friends home. She refused to eat out, even when we could afford it. So by the time I was in my teens I was off with my friends as much as possible. I dyed my hair and hung out in the town centre. It was hard on her, I guess. I went away to tech in Bristol and while I was away she changed. She had an offer on the house and decided she didn’t want to move after all. She was happy. She’s still there . . . huge vegetable garden. I envy you. I’d love to have grown up in the countryside, you know, properly . . . Did you live here all your life?’
‘For some years I lived on the coast.’
Laura sighed. Her eyes were bright, she was quite drunk. ‘Growing up in the same place, where everyone knows you and you know everyone. In and out of each other’s houses with no locked doors. That’s how it was, I bet.’ She drained her glass.
‘Something like that.’
Grace burst through the door; she was panting and out of breath.
‘What is it?’ asked Laura.
‘It’s Conor!’
‘Has he called?’
‘Conor’s here.’
‘What?’
‘He’s here! Hones
t!’ said Grace. ‘I saw the car parked outside the house when I was on my way back. He’d been off and come back.’
‘Good heavens!’ Laura was on her feet. ‘I’m so sorry, Duro. We have to go. It’s been a lovely evening.’
I didn’t know what to say, so I said, ‘No problem.’
At the door Laura said to Grace, ‘But why didn’t he wait inside?’
‘He didn’t realise the door wasn’t locked.’
And they were gone.
For a few minutes I sat surrounded by the wreckage of the meal. Less than two hours had passed since they’d arrived. I stood up and cleared the table, scraping the leftover food into the dogs’ bowls. On the back of a chair I found Laura’s shawl, forgotten in her hurry. I folded it and put it on the windowsill.
When I’d finished with the table I went to the fridge and opened the door. There was the caramel pudding. It had come out well, perfectly in fact. I upended the dish straight into the bin.
I woke from dreaming of a wooden boat and a crew of men. Salt-dried skin, a vaporous heat, the terrible stillness of the ocean. We were becalmed. Six men marooned in a boat, water all around and lawlessness, the seventh man, huddled together with us in that small space. For a few minutes I lay on my back watching the images and colours of the dream drain away. In the dream, as only in dreams, I was both Patrick Watkins and myself, at times looking at the other men, knowing only what he knew and at other times I was one of them, watching Watkins for his next move. But what was it Watkins knew? What had seemed absolute in the dream had gone. I was left with the taste of salt in my mouth.
A memory creeps into the space vacated by the dream.
Waking to the scent of burning pine needles: Anka and I. We have been dozing in our makeshift home in the pine forest. Up above us a breeze steals over the trees and slips down the valley towards Gost, where it is late afternoon: shops all shut, main road silent. Earlier I’d shown her how to roll a coin across her fingers and sometime later on she’d taken that same hand and put it between her legs, showing me how to do something she already knows. When her back arches and she cries, I take my hand away thinking I’ve done something wrong, but she pushes it back. Then we fall asleep and the coin, a cold spot, lies somewhere beneath our bodies and the quilt. We sleep and something causes us to wake. A crescent of fire perhaps five or six metres long, as though somebody had been drawing a ring of fire around us. Not close enough to be a threat, and the pine needles are damp beneath so the fire burns slowly, only the drama of a cone as it spits and pops. I seize the quilt, run naked towards the flames and beat them out. Back in our shelter, Anka shivers. The quilt is scorched and useless. Above the trees, a blue sky, a sun full of fire: that same furious summer sun which burned now outside my house, slowly reaching through the space between the shutters.
9
Saturday morning after my exercises I walked directly to the blue house. There were the family, sitting at the table at the front of the house over a late breakfast. Grace saw me first. ‘Hi, Duro.’
Laura, who had her back turned to me, looked round, cleared a frown from her face with a smile. ‘Duro. I wasn’t expecting you today. I thought we’d see you on Monday.’
‘There’s a lot to do,’ I said. ‘You left your shawl.’ I handed it to her.
‘Duro, this is Conor, my husband. Conor – Duro. Duro’s the one I’ve been telling you about. He’s come to our rescue. Haven’t you, Duro?’
Laura’s husband extended his hand and we shook. He was taller than me, which isn’t hard, still he wasn’t exactly tall. He was dressed in a T-shirt and a pair of khaki shorts. He looked odd with his white legs. He wore his grey hair short. Pale blue eyes. Ten or more years older than Laura. A heavy-set man, the handshake he gave me was strong. Perhaps it was his natural grip, all the same I tightened my own in response, so that for a few seconds we stood locked together. Conor released his fingers first and let his hand fall to his side. ‘Good to meet you, Truro.’
‘Duro.’
‘Du-ro,’ he repeated. He sat down.
‘Coffee?’ asked Laura.
‘Thank you.’
‘Sit here. I’m finished anyway.’ Grace cleared some plates and went into the house.
Conor said, ‘Thanks for all your work.’
I nodded. Laura poured a coffee for me. We drank in silence, broken by Conor. ‘So, Duro, how much more work is there to be done, d’you reckon?’
‘Still more,’ I replied. ‘The roof is done, the paintwork and outside walls I’m doing now. This dead tree here must come down, before it causes damage. Also depends on what you want inside. One thing, the wall needs repairing. I have fixed the leak in the roof which caused the damage.’
‘But the structure is pretty sound, is it?’
‘The house is good. Built the old way. Will be here one hundred years from today.’
‘Fabulous. Told you, Laura, didn’t I?’ Conor smacked his lips, leaned back and crossed his arms as though he had built the house with his own two hands and just eaten a piece of it.
Laura smiled and laid her hand on his knee. She turned to me. ‘Take today off, Duro. Come on Monday. You’ve worked so hard and we’ll probably stay at home today, so Conor can get a feel of the place.’
‘No problem.’ I finished my coffee, said my thanks and pushed my chair in. As I walked away I heard Matthew’s voice. ‘Hey, Duro, if you’re not too busy today, do you think maybe we could go shooting?’
I thought for a moment. I had plenty I could be doing, nothing urgent. ‘Sure,’ I said.
‘Brilliant!’
‘What do you mean shooting? Shooting what?’ That was Conor.
‘Guns. What do you think?’ replied Matthew.
‘Are you really all right with this, Laura?’
‘Mattie says he wants to.’
‘OK, well, if Matt wants to then it’s certainly none of my business.’ Conor shrugged.
‘It will be perfectly safe,’ I said.
‘I’m sure. Used to shoot myself, actually. Just didn’t think it was your kind of thing, Laura. Or yours, Matt.’
‘How do you know what my kind of thing is?’ Matt looked dangerously at his stepfather who raised his hands in mock surrender.
‘Hey, go ahead. Enjoy. I’ve no doubt you will.’
I needed some time to prepare the guns. Less than an hour later I returned carrying two rifles: my old .22, I’d had it since I was a child, and the .243. The door of the house was open and inside were Laura and Conor, he standing behind her in the middle of the room, arms around her waist, his face in her neck. He raised his head and kissed the top of her head. ‘Man of few words,’ I heard him say as I got closer.
‘Who, Duro?’ replied Laura. ‘He is that. He likes to get on with the job. He’s normally a tiny bit more talkative. Maybe you make him nervous.’
Conor laughed. ‘Nice of him to bring your shawl this morning.’
‘Yes.’
‘I think he’s sweet on you.’
Laura laughed but said nothing.
‘No really,’ Conor went on. ‘And the perfect pocket Romeo. At that size you could take him anywhere.’
‘Oh shut up, twit!’ Laura smiled and pretended to elbow him, pulled herself free and swung round to face him. He reasserted his hold around her waist and she looked up at him; as she did she caught sight of me. ‘Ah, Duro.’ She didn’t miss a beat but widened her smile, as though the smile had been meant for me all along. ‘I think Matthew’s waiting for you at the back.’
I walked away. Behind me I heard a muffled giggle.
I carried the guns, Matthew walked by my side, issuing explosive sounds and shooting at the sky with the fingers of his right hand. He watched me as I set up at the far end of the long field that stretched out from the back of the house. I stapled the target
to a board and leant it against the thick base of an oak tree. Next I dismantled the gun and showed Matthew the component parts, had him repeat each one. ‘Keep the barrel pointed down. With many guns a bullet can travel more than a mile. You miss, you kill somebody in Gost. Understand?’
Matthew nodded.
‘Understand?’ I repeated.
‘I understand.’
‘Face the target always. Don’t swing around. If you have a live round and it goes off maybe it’s me you kill.’ I looked at him. ‘Understand?’
‘I understand.’
Once he was holding the .22 correctly and had taken a few dry shots I loaded the magazine and allowed him to shoot. It’s a light gun, no recoil to speak of. He placed the shots in a good group upon the target, which was all of twenty-five metres away.
‘Nice shooting.’
He grinned, pleased with himself. ‘Yeah, I think I got the hang of that.’
I let him take a few more shots. By the time the magazine was empty he was placing them all pretty much dead centre. He punched the air.
‘Good. Now try this one.’ I passed him the .243, stood back and folded my arms. ‘Make sure you have the butt well into your shoulder.’
Matthew fired. The recoil jerked the barrel upwards and his shot missed the target, the bullet entered the trunk of the tree. ‘Fucking hell!’
I laughed.
Matthew rolled onto his side, shielded his eyes from the sun. ‘You knew that would happen.’
I smiled. Matthew laughed. ‘Duro, you are one ace bastard!’
Matthew took five more shots and began to hit the target. I gave him another five. A tendency to tug at the trigger, otherwise he was pretty good. I moved him back another twenty-five metres, returned him to the .22 for five more rounds. I showed him how to change the magazine. If I hadn’t already heard Conor’s tread behind me I would have guessed who it was by Matthew’s changed expression: his features slackened, except for a faint tightening of the jaw, his eyes hardened and glazed over.
‘How’s it going up here?’
The Hired Man Page 11