"Do the doctors know, have they said, how," he hesitated, wavered, stumbling over the words. "How much time you might have left; months, years, days? I'm sorry, I shouldn't ask but you appearing like this, after all these years, after so much time being 'out of sight, out of mind'. You know. Forgive me, forget that I ever even asked; blind, unthinking impertinence."
She slid her arm through his and squeezed his arm tight against her side.
"Oh, don't worry about it," she said. "No apology required or forgiveness needed from me. I came to terms with my mortality a while ago. The doctors say it's to be measured in months rather than years now; possibly I'll get to see the summer, possibly not. I just live each day now as it comes. I am on long-term sick leave from the school, I teach English at one of those giant-sized comprehensives; it is one of the few advantages to working for the state, it is generous with its benefits. Some days, I feel well enough to go back to work, days like today for example, but I went on sick leave when I started chemo some time ago and the school seems happy for me to stay away; no sick people cluttering up the staff room and, by their very presence, inviting your attention and sympathy which, after a while, will become tedious and tiresome, for me and for them." She smiled.
"I know, when did I become a teacher? It was about 5 years after....." She paused. "After I left you. I decided that it would be fun and I already had the English degree. I did an MA to get back in practice, back into education, and after that did a post-grad teaching diploma. In general, it's not been a bad career choice and fairly well paid, although spotty adolescents of the male variety, who only have 'World of Warcraft' and girls on their minds, can be, shall we say, challenging. It does, however, have its rewards and its compensations as well."
She still had a firm hold on his arm as they walked alongside the bubbling stream, the fast flowing and shallow water causing gurgling eddies across the stones which littered the bottom. The stream was as clear as his Waterford crystal and the trout lying with heads pointed upstream, gently flicking and waving their tails in gentle, sinusoidal waves to maintain their position against the current, could be clearly seen; their brown backs heavily spotted with black against the pale ochre of the stones and gravel. They walked in silence, save for her occasional question about the identities of the birds that they saw around them, feeding on the meagre pickings which were all that was to be had on a cold winter's day in January across England's farmlands; fieldfares, redwings, a solitary waxwing, winter visitors from Scandinavia; flocks, parliaments of rooks and jackdaws, prising leatherjackets from the hard, almost frozen earth; somewhere a pair of tawny owls were awake and the gentle call and response of the owls, one female, one male, could be heard over the bare fields, 'toowitt', 'toowoo' as each called to the other; some geese, pink-foot or bean geese, he could not tell which, flying high in long and ragged skeins.
After about an hour of tranquil, gentle-paced walking, his arm still tightly held, he stopped suddenly and pointed with his free hand across the field at a low hedge which marked one field's transition to the next; the stitching on the vast patchwork quilt which made up so much of the English countryside.
"Spar!" he shouted. "Sparrowhawk! Some little bird's in for a rough time in the next minute or so!"
"How can you tell?" She asked. "Both what it is and what it's doing; it's so far away."
Almost as if the bird was reading from a cue card, so timely was its action, at the very instant of her question, the sparrowhawk dived over the top of the hedge. Mere seconds later, she, the bird was too large to be 'he', returned to her previous flight path on their side of the hedge, clearly clutching something moving in its talons.
"A rare sight," he said. "You don't see that very often on some idle ramble. To answer your questions: I'd recognise a sparrowhawk anywhere, only a goshawk or a cuckoo even vaguely resemble it and a gos is very much larger and as for cuckoos, well it's not summer; it was a good bet that she was hunting, some birds have learnt to use the hedges as natural cover for an ambush, flying parallel to their prey with the hedge between them. I keep birds of prey for a hobby, you sort of get a feel for when a bird is actively in pursuit of prey, not merely flying from one place to another. Come, that's enough excitement for one day; we really should be heading back before it starts to get dark."
"You are so lucky to be living here," she said. "All this, on your doorstep. No, that's really not correct, is it? It's lucky that you found this particular place at that particular time but it is skill, talent, commitment, those nights when I used to despair of you ever coming to bed, so engrossed as you were in the painting, that have got you to this place. I am glad that I came here today, for all that I despaired of ever finding your house; watching you just now, that same childlike look of wonder and pleasure on your face, I am happy for you. It's good to know, or rather to be more inclined to believe, that a happy ending is possible, whatever I, myself, may have done."
They both turned and set off once more back towards the house, back along the way that they had come.
"You do realise," he said. "That you are still holding my arm." She nodded.
"How did you travel here?" He asked. Car? Train?"
"Car," she replied. "I left it by the locked gate at the entrance to your driveway. I would have thought to ask you for the key, or perhaps to unlock it, but it's not important and I just never seemed to have the opportunity to bring it up. It's parked in a dead end and so I suppose it will be safe enough. Why do you ask?"
"I noticed the overnight bag. Were you thinking of resting up in a hotel or a B & B before the long drive home?"
"Well, I planned on driving home this afternoon but thought it best to pack a bag just in case I became too tired to complete the journey. Besides, I don't much like driving at night or when it's dark, especially on the motorway. I find it hard to judge distances when it is dark and that is just an accident waiting to happen."
"You are welcome to stay at mine," he said. "I have the space, in fact more spare bedrooms than I usually can use. I can offer you clean sheets, a thirteen and a half tog quilt, your own bathroom, I have two, a fine wine with dinner, or a trip to the Boar's Head, if you prefer, for beer-battered fresh cod and some chunky, thick-cut chips. I cannot however guarantee the quality of any conversation nor the quality of my own food but perhaps some Bach or Vivaldi will make up for whatever is lacking; on my mother's life, no funny business, I swear!"
She squeezed his arm and laughed.
"No funny business?" She said. "No, that, at least, is likely. It took you positively months to try it on thirty years ago, I doubt that you have changed so very much in the intervening years. Although I never expected this, I accept your gracious offer, kind Sir; you are indeed most generous." She squeezed his arm against her side once more.
They spent the long walk back engaged in conversation, in catching up on old and more recent news; in remembering old friends, colleagues that they had shared; finally, as they neared the little wooden bridge, 'The plank bridge by a pool' he reminded her, they began to reminisce about holidays on Ithaca, Santorini, the Mediterrenian sun baking his skin dark brown so that they passed themselves off to others as brother and sister, merely to tease with suggestions of incest; 'Biggles', the kitten, the cat, who had ruined numerous curtains with his perpetual desire to be in the highest place possible in a room; the Sunday lunches spent in her family home and the never ending procession of relatives, who came to call to sample the food on offer, whether invited or not. Was it possible to lay to rest a ghost so firmly entrenched, a ghost so reluctant to pass over, a demon that steadfastly refused to get behind him, in but a mere day? To him, it certainly seemed to be, at the very least, a possibility.
No comments:
Post a Comment