I turned back from the open door beyond which the family were piling a chaos of bags into the boot of my Espace. I wanted to be out there with them, in the sunshine, carefree, mucking in, cuddling and reassuring Harry, sharing the heartbreak of farewells.
‘I think you must be a very fine actress, wouldn’t you say so, Madame?’ His gaze was boring into me. In this shadowed, unlit corner, his eyes had an impenetrable yet perspicacious glint to them. ‘You’re quite sure you didn’t know the man?’
‘Y-yes, Capitaine, quite sure.’
He doubted me. I sensed it. Had I betrayed myself, made a slip?
Out on the veranda, the telephone began to ring.
‘I’d better get that. Au revoir, Capitaine. Thank you for your visit. If you are in need of further information, please don’t hesitate to … Good luck.’
1968
24 August
We were peering into the candescence of the bonfire we had built from the bundles of driftwood I had collected from the neighbouring cove earlier that afternoon. I was listening to the wood crackle, listening to Bruce snoring loudly at our feet. Around us the light was beginning to fade and dusk was gathering, yet still everywhere was luminous, as though it had been brushed with fairy dust.
Pierre, head lowered, concentrating, was rolling another joint. He had been missing for most of the day, taken off in his car without a word while Peter and I were eating breakfast. He was absent for so long I thought he must have left us. Peter had spent the day working, studying. He was writing a paper on Prague, recent events, the crushing of the Spring reforms, its impact on Western rebellions. It was about this time that Peter’s interest, later his speciality, had first been drawn to the plight of refugees and those whose rights had been taken from them.
I had been left to my own devices, waiting for Pierre’s return. In his room nothing remained but a few loose cotton garments. They smelt of him. I had spread myself out on his bed and fondled them tight against myself.
The flame of the lit joint was rising high. Blue-tinged from the Rizla paper, it sputtered and sizzled softly, an accompaniment to the fire’s spitting. Pierre dragged hard on his handmade cigarette, then leaned forward to pass it to Peter, who was reticent about taking it but, after a glance in my direction, accepted it. His expression was clear. He disapproved of the illicit opiate between his fingers. He glanced towards me, to Pierre and then, with little relish, he passed the joint back to Pierre.
‘I won’t have any, thanks. Grace, let’s organize some supper.’
My companions’ faces were lit and shadowed by the flames that shimmied between us. The sea and the fire were the shifting forces that surrounded and embraced us. An occasional hooting of a distant owl broke into the tranquillity. Dogs barking. Bruce slept and heaved contentedly, tired out from the long walk he and I had enjoyed and our frolicking in the sea. Drunken screams from a party on a beach some distance towards the town carried on the night air.
‘I’m not hungry, thanks. Anyway, there’s fish.’ I sensed Peter’s irritation as he jogged on the spot. ‘Later, maybe,’ I added, to pacify his impatience.
He dropped back onto his haunches in the sand. Disgruntled.
The sky was turning red, carmine and purple, shot with an aurous glow. It was outstanding. The sea was slicked with gold. The colours were sharp, so vibrant, it was almost unseemly.
We watched the celestial light show while solemnly passing the joint between us, Pierre and I engaged in ritual. I was getting pretty stoned, the rush of dope to my head. My thoughts were slowing, becoming fuzzy, woozy, yet the sounds all about me, the physical sensations and my awareness of them, were expanding, zooming towards undiscovered galaxies. I heard the inhalations, exhalations, of my two silent companions. I heard the lick of waves. The tide was coming in, edging towards us, creeping up the beach. There were bubbles from the curling waves, a foam that was whiter than white even in the descending darkness. I was a part of this universe and I wanted to immerse myself in it.
‘I’m going swimming.’
‘Don’t be silly, Grace.’
‘I want to lose myself in the sea,’ I murmured.
The moon was beginning to rise, slipping up from beyond the horizon. It made flaxen the light.
Peter rested a hand firmly on my arm to discourage me. I brushed him from me. My skin was warm, itchy. It burned slightly but not uncomfortably. I had been spending long hours sun-bathing. Every inch of my body was tanned. My flesh stung, in a pleasant way. I dug my fingernails into the tissue and knew I was alive. I cut into myself for the sheer pleasure of it, for the sharp, indecent thrill. You don’t own me, I wanted to say, but I couldn’t face a scene. I was beginning to care less for him. He was square. Controlling.
I dragged on the joint and the tobacco swirled in my brain, sending me on a giddy bend. I passed it to Pierre. Peter kicked his legs and jumped to his feet again, staring down into the fire. The flames had grown higher because Pierre had just added several cuts of wood. Peter’s mood was edgy, fuming. He disapproved of the drugs. Or so I thought. I was wrong, too lost in my own preoccupations to appreciate the level of pain he was experiencing.
‘The finest Lebanese gold,’ hummed Pierre, as he rolled another spliff, blending the crumbs of it, catching each and every one, pressing them, kneading them into a brown paste, mingled with the lighter flakes of tobacco.
Was that where Pierre had vanished to today? Had he taken off to Marseille to score more dope? Had we, during these last days, smoked the other great chunk?
Peter was neither a smoker nor a drug-taker. He preferred ‘reality and revolution’ as galvanizing forces. Earlier that morning, while making coffee, he had expressed the opinion that Pierre was a dealer, a criminal, and that I’d had no business inviting him into our lives. Into Agnes’s home.
‘One night, you said. He’s overstayed his welcome. I am going to ask him to leave.’
He didn’t, though. Had he worried that I might take off with his rival? Did he suspect that over these last days Pierre and I had become lovers? While Peter had been shut in his room, chronicling his thoughts on the revolution, we had been making out on the beach.
Pierre placed his transistor radio upright on the sand alongside his shoeless feet. ‘You fancy going swimming? A visit to the caves by night?’ he whispered softly.
‘It’s too dangerous. Grace, you mustn’t go.’
‘I will, if I choose to. Yeah, I’m up for that.’
Peter let out a breath. ‘Come and watch the moon-rise from the dunes.’
We had a favourite spot for sunset-watching. It was beautiful, and we had spent several evenings camped out there with a bottle of wine. The days before Pierre had pitched up.
‘Let’s go, Grace.’ Peter held out his hand. Was he offering me a final opportunity, my last chance to heal the wound? I glanced swiftly at Pierre, who had either not heard or wasn’t listening.
I shook my head. ‘I want to visit the caves. Pierre’s got diving gear.’
‘Grace, please listen to me. You mustn’t go swimming now, do you hear? The caves can be dangerous even when you’re sober.’
‘Leave her alone, man. She’s fine. I’ve got all we need. Flippers, snorkels, the full kit. Let her do her own thing. Stop pecking at her as though you own her.’
Peter opened his mouth to speak, then must have thought better of it. He spun on his heels and marched away. I watched him go. Stoned, blinded by my infatuation for Pierre, I watched my friend walk away into the diminishing night. I was impervious to his heartache. Then, with one turn of the head, I dismissed him from my thoughts and returned my concentration to the new lover at my side, who was, almost imperceptibly, swaying to some inner rhythm.
‘Music?’ I whispered. ‘Let’s have some music.’
Pierre pressed the cream switch on his transistor and the machine burst into song. The Lettermen were crooning ‘Goin’ Out Of My Head’. Which was a fair summation of my senseless state.
Stargazin
g from the dunes, swimming through moonbeams: Peter and I had ventured out from this shore on innumerable previous evenings after a few glasses of wine. Bathed by twilight, starlight, moonlight, deliciously liberated. And there had never been a whisper of threat or jeopardy. Because Peter knew those waters. He had swum in them since his childhood. It was his mysterious aquatic world, alien to me, so we had hugged the shore, dipping, splashing, dunking ourselves in the shallows rather than immersing ourselves in the steely blue-black bowels. Never ranging out of our depth.
‘He just fusses,’ I muttered, more under my breath than aloud. I was mad at Peter because he’d treated me like a child.
Had Pierre heard me? Was he defending my position or challenging his male competitor? The quondam partner of the woman – no, the imprudent girl – he was having sex with?
I will never know.
Pierre rose to his feet. Letting fall his lightweight clothing, he stepped purposefully towards the foam, posing there, allowing sufficient time for Peter, disappearing along the shore, and me to notice him. The incoming water swirled about his feet as he waded into the shallows. His broad-shouldered silhouette was ebony in the fading light, a powerful upright figure against the horizon’s deepening purple and grapefruit-yellow moon. My sight was fixed upon him as he plunged forward, the water splashed around him, and he was enveloped.
Phosphorescence lent a mystical hue, a green tinge under the meadow-yellow glow, as he crawled purposefully out to sea. The muscles on his unprotected back rippled like waves. He was a Selkie returning to his natural habitat.
It was a bizarre, mythical image that I was never to forget.
He paused then, I remember, and scanned the littoral. Settling his attention on me, he raised a hand and, with one crooked finger, beckoned me. I jumped up, unsteadily, shook the sand from between my toes and lurched to the spumy fringe. I was flying, not stepping. My body was an apothecary of consumed drugs. Could I remember how to swim in my present condition? I staggered. The water curled itself about my legs, tucking me in. It was invitingly warm even at that hour. I felt it tickle and lick the skin of my legs, the backs of my knees. Somewhere behind me, I heard Bruce whimper, then bark. I tossed my head back and then, arms outstretched, allowed my body to sink low into the turquoise brink. Propelling myself forward, kicking my feet, I began to swim, easy, crawling speedily in the direction of Pierre.
‘Grace! Grace!’ Peter yelling at me from further along the shore. I paid no heed.
As I drew close, Pierre wheeled towards the horizon, crawled forth. Was this a game? Had I to give chase?
‘Wait for me,’ I gurgled. He was too distant to hear me.
His sinewy back, the strength of his arms and shoulders propelling him onwards. In no time he would be a luminous fleck, then swallowed by the watery dead of night.
‘Pierre, wait!’
I was fagged out when I finally caught up with him. I swung myself round to establish the distance to land. Far. Was it still within my reach? I allowed myself to float while I caught my breath. I spied the house, carelessly ablaze with many lights both upstairs and down.
‘We’re miles out,’ I said, or perhaps I only thought it. My thoughts were so loud and clear, echoing from one side of my skull to the other, reverberating in a chamber. It was impossible to differentiate between spoken and imagined. I sensed the depth of the water we were wading in, treading my feet, pumping my legs up and down, as though on a bicycle, because my limbs were beginning to be eaten by cold. This was no longer the warm shallows. I remembered Agnes’s warning about the steeply shelving seabed. I shivered, giggled a frisson of fear. Pierre lifted an arm out of the water, drips ran its length, and plopped it back into the sea. He hooked a hand about me and dragged me towards him. I thought he was going to kiss me. He pulled me tighter. ‘Let’s dive,’ he said. ‘Sex in the sea. Sublime.’
‘No, let’s go back now.’
A cloud passed over the moon and, for a chunk of time, all was pitch. It was scary. Actually, it was terrifying. We were too far from terra firma. ‘I’m getting cold.’ I began to panic, clawed at the water, fighting against it, as though it were swallowing me.
Pierre loosened his grip.
‘I’m sinking,’ I choked.
‘No, you’re not. I’ve got you.’
I felt a rush of water beneath me as he kicked hard to remain afloat. ‘Hey, I thought you were a game chick who wanted thrills.’
There was an edge, a threat, to his voice that made me want to pull away from him, but his hand was locked around my neck.
‘Let go, please.’ I pictured my father, hand at my mother’s throat. I was gulping water. ‘No!’ There was no reason to shout but terror was taking hold. ‘Let go!’
‘Don’t be so scared. Wrap your legs round my midriff. Piggyback on me – I’ll take you on a ride. To the caves, maybe.’
‘We’ve got no diving gear.’
His back was to me now, nudging me, reversing up towards me. He was my amphibious transport. Both his arms were inching me towards the rear of his upper body, his shoulders, wrapping me about him. My feet poised against his slender waist, his skin sticky with salt, yet slippery. My arms clung tight round his shoulders. Sea was getting up my nostrils. I was snorting it. It stung. I shivered. My eyes, the salt, smarting. My balance was precarious.
‘Don’t panic. Trust me.’
We took off, riding the ocean like a pair of dolphins. His power beneath me. I felt safe again. More or less. Thighs beating athletically in the deeper blue. I let out a whoop. He swam in a circle, then circled wider and circled again. I was getting dizzy, losing my grip. I slid to one side and pressed my fingers into the flesh of his shoulder blades, attempting to regain purchase.
‘Shit!’ he cried. ‘Don’t do that!’
It happened all at once. No sequences. One frame layered over another.
I was beating at the water.
‘I’m sinking,’ I yelled. ‘I can’t swim any more.’ Then I felt his hand, pulling, tugging at me. ‘Don’t grab me like that.’ My legs were going numb. Reflexes closing down. My head was ringing. I lurched heavily backwards, capsizing into the water, which was dragging me under.
So many pictures, one on top of another.
I was kicking violently, to save my life, and splashing up a storm. As I did so I must have kicked Pierre in the head. I felt the strike, the sole of my foot knocking against something hard, bone.
Images of Paris. A skull splintering. Images of violence. My dad hitting my mum.
‘Oh, God. Pierre! Are you all right?’
No response. ‘Pierre!’
‘Get back to the shore.’ His voice ordering me.
There was a deep, long groan, a sound that could have emanated from the underworld.
The moon was breaking through the clouds again, a shaft of light restored, but with it, an eerie jaundice hue. A rounded mass of flesh appeared above the water, like a ghostly leprous hump. Had we crashed against a sea creature? Or was it Pierre’s shoulder? Had I struck him?
‘Pierre!’ I screamed, slurred speech.
‘Get back to the shore as fast as you can. Swim. Go.’
‘No, I won’t leave you.’
How deep were we? I called Pierre’s name again. The water was dragging me down. I was going to drown.
‘Start swimming. I’m right behind you.’
I kicked my legs, began to swim. A fury, a virago. Breast-stroking for my life. I was pumping with terror. Was Pierre still behind me? I felt the power of movement, of a current. Fear was crawling all over me, like seaweed embalming me. I was engulfed in blackness, a blanket of night all about me. I feared sharks the most. Sharks trailing me, tuning in to the scent of blood. Was I bleeding? I gulped. Salt water coursed down my throat. I began to cough. My brain was a jamboree of questions, of legs and arms and body parts. I was choking on the blood in my mouth. The wound from the Paris riots, the toothless cavity, had reopened. I would be eaten to a skeleton if I didn’t make the
shore.
Then the shore. In sight. I stopped just short of it, heaving for breath. Crawling, I hauled myself, heavy-limbed, from the sea.
Bruce was there, awaiting my reappearance, barking, barking, jumping up and down. A demented black beast. I heaved myself slowly up onto the sand, panting, and threw myself onto my back. There I lay. Tears were rolling down my cheeks, warm puddles in my ears as I stared skywards, freaking, thinking about my mum and dad, the hand around my throat.
As the fear and emotional jolts subsided, I closed my eyes. What was I doing? Bruce licked my face. His tongue was prickly against my flesh.
Stop that.
He was panting with happiness or relief.
I was done in: cold, wasted and vulnerable. I made my way, half walking, half scrabbling, staggering back to our bonfire. To get warm, to await Pierre’s return. The newspaper Pierre had wrapped around the fish he had caught the day before, our supper, had been ripped to shreds and scattered about the beach. The fish were gone. A few bones remained. Bruce had had his fun. I shrugged on my T-shirt but couldn’t manage my shorts.
I kept my eyes peeled on the water. I was puzzled by the length of time Pierre was taking. I had thought he was right behind me, following me to shore. I couldn’t begin to estimate the number of seconds, minutes I stood there, watching out, shivering and hunched, calling his name. A solitary vigil by our fire, teeth chattering, waiting for Pierre’s return, for his muscular form to surface from the waves. Eventually I pulled on my shorts and ran barefoot the length of the beach, looking out for him, for footprints, signs of his exit from the water. There were none.
Night had fallen. It must have hit midnight. The cries from the beach party west of us, close to the town, had died out. Everyone had fallen into bed, dead drunk. I had sprinted to both ends of the bay and back twice, turned in circles till I was giddy, yelling my lover’s name till I was hoarse.
Where was Peter? Was he sleeping? Had he witnessed my cavorting? Where the hell was Pierre? He was too strong a swimmer for anything to have happened … surely. Should I raise an alarm? Who to call at this late hour? No coast guard available till dawn.
The House on the Edge of the Cliff Page 23