The Unsettled Dust Page 12

They rounded a corner with the stone wall on the left, the forest of columns on the right. The two parts of a diptych came into view, of which Trant had before seen only the discoloured reverse.

  ‘The blessed and the lost,’ said the child, indicating, superfluously, which was which.

  Trant thought that the pictures and frescoes were becoming more and more morbid, but supposed that this feeling was probably the result of their cumulative impact. In any case, there could not be much more.

  But there were still many things to be seen. In due course they came to a group of pictures hanging together.

  ‘The sacrifice of three blessed martyrs,’ said the child. Each of the martyrs had died in a different way: by roasting on a very elaborate gridiron; by disembowelling; and by some process involving a huge wheel. The painting, unlike some of the others, was extraordinarily well preserved. The third of the martyrs was a young woman. She had been martyred naked and was of great and still living beauty. Next to her hung a further small picture, showing a saint carrying his own skin. Among the columns to the right was an enormous black cross. At a little distance, the impaled figure looked lifelike in the extreme.

  The child was still skipping in front, making so light of its disability that Trant could not but be touched. They turned another corner. At the end of the ambulatory ahead was the gleaming, flashing object that Trant had noticed from the other side of the crypt. The child almost ran on, ignoring the intervening sights, and stood by the object, waiting for Trant to catch up. The child’s head was sunk, but Trant could see that it was looking at him from under its fair, silky eyelashes.

  This time the child said nothing, and Trant could only stare.

  The object was a very elaborate, jewelled reliquary of the Renaissance. It was presumably the jewels which had seemed to give off the flashing lights, because Trant could see no lights now. At the centre of the reliquary was a transparent vertical tube or cylinder. It was only about an inch high, and probably made of crystal. Just visible inside it was a black thread, almost like the mercury in a minute thermometer; and at the bottom of the tube was, Trant noticed, a marked discoloration.

  The child was still standing in the same odd position; now glancing sideways at Trant, now glancing away. It was perhaps smiling a little more broadly, but its head was sunk so low that Trant could not really see. Its whole posture and behaviour suggested that there was something about the reliquary which Trant should be able to see for himself. It was almost as if the child were timing him, to see how long he took.

  Time, thought Trant, yet again; and now with a start. The reliquary was so fascinating that he had managed somehow almost to forget about time. He looked away and along the final ambulatory, which ran to the foot of the staircase by which he had come down. While he had been examining the reliquary, someone else had appeared in the crypt. A man stood in the centre of the passage, a short distance away from Trant. Or not exactly a man: it was, Trant realised, the acolyte in the red cassock, the boy who had been polishing the brass feet. Trant had no doubt that he had come to hurry him out.

  Trant bustled off, full of unreasonable guilt, without even properly thanking his child guide. But when he reached the boy in the cassock, the boy stretched out his arms to their full length and seemed, on the contrary, to bar his passage.

  It was rather absurd; and especially as one could so readily turn right and weave a way out through the Gothic columns.

  Trant, in fact, turned his head in that direction, simply upon instinct. But in the bay to his right, stood the youth from across the Atlantic in the green wind-cheater. He had the strangest of expressions (unlike the boy in the cassock, who seemed the same dull peasant as before); and as Trant caught his eye, he too raised his arms to their full extent, as the boy had done.

  There was still one more free bay. Trant retreated a step or two, but then saw among the shadows within (which seemed to be deepening) the man in the grey suit with the vague foreign accent. His arms were going up even as Trant sighted him, but when their eyes met (though Trant could not see his face, very well) he did something the others had not done. He laughed.

  And in the entrance to the other ambulatory, through which Trant had just come and down which the child had almost run bravely casting aside its affliction, stood that same child, now gazing upwards again and indeed looking quite radiant, as it spread its arms almost as a bird taking flight.

  Trant heard the great clock of the cathedral strike twelve. In the crypt, the tone of the bell was lost: there was little more to be distinguished than twelve great thuds, almost as if cannon were being discharged. The twelve strokes of the hour took a surprisingly long time to complete.

  In the meantime, and just beside the reliquary, a small door had opened, in the very angle of the crypt. Above it was a small but exquisite and well preserved alabaster keystone showing a soul being dragged away on a hook by a demon. Trant had hardly noticed the door before, as people commonly overlook the working details of a place which is on show, the same details that those who work the place look to first.

  In the door, quite filling it, was the man Trant had believed himself to have seen in the pulpit soon after he had first entered the great building. The man looked much bigger now, but there was the same bald head, the same resigned hands, the same multicoloured garments. It was undoubtedly the very person, but in some way enlarged or magnified; and the curious fringe of hair seemed more luminous than ever.

  ‘The cathedral closes now,’ said the man. ‘Follow me.’

  The fair figures encircling Trant began to shut in on him until their extended finger-tips were almost touching.

  His questions went quite unanswered, his protests quite unheard; especially after everyone started singing.

  THE NEXT GLADE

  ‘I am coming to see you,’ said the man. ‘Tomorrow. Tomorrow afternoon.’

  He looked into her eyes quite steadily, but he certainly didn’t smile.

  Noelle did smile. ‘You don’t know where I live,’ she said.

  ‘I know very well,’ said the man.

  Obviously, it would have been easy enough for him to have found out from Simon and Mut, whose party it was, but it seemed strange that he should have done so before even meeting Noelle, before setting eyes on her, almost certainly before being told about her. Not until that moment had he implied that he already knew anything at all about her. It would have been absurd for Noelle to ask him how he knew.

  ‘We can’t just leave it at this,’ said the man, with some urgency. ‘We can’t.’

  ‘Perhaps we can,’ said Noelle.

  ‘I know the district round Woking pretty well,’ said the man. ‘I’ll call for you about three tomorrow and we’ll go for a walk in the woods.’

  True enough, where Noelle lived there were woods of a kind in almost every direction; but that applied to so much of residential Surrey. Specifically, there was a wood on the other side of the road, opposite her gate.

  ‘I don’t promise to be there,’ said Noelle. ‘I can’t.’

  ‘Then I shall have to take a chance,’ said the man. ‘We mustn’t just leave it, and we’ll get no further here.’

  ‘What’s your name anyway?’ asked Noelle.

  That tone was advancing upon her with the passing years. She deplored it, but one cannot expect to find people en masse who speak one’s private language. It is bound to suffer erosion by the lingua franca.

  But, as if to confirm the man’s point that further communication was impossible, Mut at that instant turned up the record-player and Simon turned on the new strip lighting. Simon and Mut went through a party as if it were a dress rehearsal. As little as possible was left to chance. Noelle always wondered what would happen if there were ever to be an actual performance.

  Still without a smile, the man had dissolved into the glare and the din. Noelle wondered if he were making an assignation with someone else; perhaps proposing the North Downs as background. Alternatively, he might well be going home. For
him, the party might have fulfilled its purpose.

  Only when Melvin, her husband, was on his travels, did Noelle herself go to these parties where almost everyone was younger than she. But that was quite frequently, so she realised how lucky she was that people like Simon and Mut could still be bothered with her. Not that Mut in particular was so enormously much younger. Noelle and Mut had aforetime shared an apartment. The then infant Simon had already been Mut’s lover, been it for years, but Noelle had not yet met Melvin. Indeed, when Mut had been out of the room, Simon could be depended upon for a small-scale agitation, or quick pass. It was a tradition that still lingered.

  As it happened, a surprising number of men seemed still to fall fractionally in love with Noelle, and to prefer dulcet and tender talk with her to such other things as might be on offer elsewhere. Noelle could never decide whether it was merely her appearance or something less primary that drew them. She often reflected upon how little she had to complain of.

  *

  Noelle had been perfectly truthful in saying that she couldn’t, as well as wouldn’t, make a promise. Melvin did sometimes return before his time. As far as she could tell, there was nothing unpleasant or ulterior about this. It seemed natural that Melvin should be blown hither and thither by the trade winds, because everyone else was. Gone are the days of predictable grind in the high-stooled counting house; settled for a lifetime. Business has changed completely, as businessmen always point out.

  Besides, Judith or Agnes might be sent home from school early. That often occurred. And if she was in the house when one or the other of them arrived, she had to give much time either to listening to a tale of grievance and storm, or to anxious effort in trying to discover what this time could ever have happened.

  But, when the moment came, the clock she had inherited from her father (he had been given it by his firm less than a year before his death) struck three, and the doorbell was shimmering before the last dull echo had faded.

  The man was politely extending his hand. ‘My name is John Morley-Wingfield. With a hyphen, I fear I must admit. Let’s get that over to start with.’

  His expression was serious, but not sad. His brown hair curled pleasantly, but not unduly, and was at perhaps its most impressive moment, fading in places, but not yet too seriously grey. His brown eyes were sympathetic without being sentimental. His garb was relaxed without being perfunctory.

  For Noelle, hesitation would have served no purpose.

  ‘Do come in for a little,’ she said. ‘My children return from school in an hour.’

  ‘Are they doing well?’

  ‘Not very.’

  She led him into the room which Melvin called the lounge and she called nothing in particular.

  ‘If you’ll sit down, I’ll bring us a cup of tea.’

  ‘We must keep enough time for our walk.’

  She looked at him. ‘The wood’s not all that big. None of them are round here.’

  He sat on the leathery, cushiony settee, and gazed at his brightly polished brown shoes. ‘I always think a wood is much the same, however big or small it is. Within reason, of course. The impact is the same. At least upon me.’

  ‘You don’t actually get lost in these particular woods,’ said Noelle. ‘You can’t.’

  He glanced up at her. It was plain that he took all this for delay, wanted them to make a start.

  ‘I’ll hurry with the tea,’ said Noelle. ‘Will you be all right? Perhaps you’d care to look at this?’

  She gave him the latest Statist. She did not remark that it was her husband who subscribed to it. The man, who had known her address, probably knew about her husband also.

  ‘Or this might be more cheerful.’

  She held out a back number of the National Geographic magazine. It was Melvin too who subscribed to that, though he complained that he never had time to read it, so that the numbers always lay about unsorted until Noelle gave the children an armful for use as reinforcement in and around the sandpit.

  Noelle went to the kitchen.

  When she came back with the tray, the man was on his feet again, and looking restlessly at the books. They were, yet again, Melvin’s books. Noelle’s were upstairs, not all of them even unpacked, owing to shelf shortage.

  ‘Milk and sugar?’

  ‘A very little milk, please. No sugar.’

  ‘I know we shouldn’t,’ said Noelle.

  He stooped over her so that she could hand him his cup. He had a faint but striking aroma, the smell of a pretty good club.

  ‘Careful,’ said Noelle.

  He drifted, sipping, round the room, as if it had been full of people, or perhaps trees, and every settling place occupied, or, alternatively, gnarled and jagged.

  He spoke. ‘You have the most wonderful hair.’ He was on the far side of the big television.

  Noelle sat up a little, but said nothing.

  ‘And eyes.’

  Noelle could not prevent herself dimpling almost perceptibly.

  ‘And figure. It would not be possible to imagine a shape more beautiful.’

  One trouble was that Noelle simply did not know how true or untrue any of these statements were. She had always found it impossible to make up her mind. More precisely, she sometimes felt one thing, and sometimes almost the complete opposite. One had, if one could, to strike an average among the views expressed or implied by others; and others seemed to spend so much of their time dissimulating.

  ‘Have a chocolate finger?’ she said, extending the plate towards him at the full length of her arm. She was wearing a dress with delicate short sleeves. After all, it was August. Melvin particularly hated August in Pittsburgh, where now he was supposed to be.

  ‘Nothing to eat, thank you.’

  The man was ranging between the Astronaut’s Globe and the pile of skiing journals.

  ‘I like your dress.’

  ‘It’s very simple.’

  ‘You have wonderful taste.’

  ‘Stop being so civil, please.’

  ‘You seem to me quite perfect.’

  ‘Well, I’m not.’ But she made no further reference to any specific defect.

  ‘Have some more tea? Bring me your cup.’

  He traversed the Eskimo-style carpet with measured, springy tread.

  ‘Then we must go,’ he said. ‘We really must. I want to see you in your proper element.’

  She handed up the refilled cup without looking at him. ‘You’re right about one thing,’ she said. ‘I do love our woods. I only wish they were larger.’

  ‘You love all music too,’ said the man, standing over her.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And the last moments before sunset in the countryside?’

  ‘Yes,’

  ‘And being alone in a quiet spot at noon?’

  ‘I usually have the children’s meal to prepare.’

  ‘And wearing real silk next to your skin?’

  ‘I am not sure that I ever have.’

  He dashed the cup back on the tray quite sharply. Noelle could see that it was far from empty.

  ‘Let’s go. Let’s go now.’

  She walked out with him just as she was. He followed her down the crazy concrete path, mildly multi-coloured. The reason why the gate groaned was that the children liked the noise. They swung backwards and forwards on it for hours, and threw fits at the idea of the hinges being oiled.

  She crossed the road with the man, surprised that there was no whizzing traffic. All life had eased off for a moment. They ascended the worn, earth slope into the wood.

  ‘You be guide,’ said the man.

  ‘I keep telling you, it’s not the New Forest.’

  ‘It’s far more attractive.’

  As it happened, Noelle almost agreed with that; or at least knew what the man might have meant. Melvin and she took the children to the New Forest each year, camping at one of the official sites; and each year she found the New Forest a disappointment.

  ‘You fill the wood wi
th wonder,’ said the man.

  ‘We just go straight ahead, you know,’ said Noelle. ‘Really there’s not much else. All the other paths come to nothing. They’re simply beaten down by the kids.’

  ‘And by the wild things,’ said the man.

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  They were walking side by side now, among the silver birches, and it was true that the voice of the world was becoming much drowsier, the voice of nature more express. It was, of course, a Tuesday: probably the best day for such an enterprise.

  ‘Will you permit me to put my arm round your waist?’ asked the man.

  ‘I suppose so,’ said Noelle.

  He did it perfectly; neither limply, nor with adolescent tenacity. Noelle began to fall into sympathetic dissolution. She had a clear thirty-five minutes before her.

  ‘The beeches begin here,’ she said. ‘Some of them are supposed to be very old. Nothing will grow around their roots.’

  ‘That clears the way for us,’ said the man.

  Hitherto, the path had gone gently upwards, but now it had reached the small ridge and begun to descend. Noelle knew that here the wood widened out. None the less, the broad and beaten track led nowhere, because at the far end of the wood lay private property, heavily farmed, and with the right of way long closed and lost, doubtless through insufficient public resistance at the time. Noelle, if asked, would have been very unsure who owned the wood. It seemed to exist in its own right.

  ‘Glorious trees,’ said the man. ‘And you are the spirit of them.’ He was looking up into the high and heavy branches. His grasp of Noelle was growing neither tighter nor looser: admirable. They walked slowly on.

  ‘That’s the end,’ said Noelle, pointing ahead with her free arm.

  Two or three hundred yards before them, the wood ended in a moderate-sized dell or clearing; probably no more than the work of all the people who at this point had rotated and gone back on their tracks, returned up the slope.

  ‘I keep telling you how small the wood is,’ said Noelle. ‘Not much bigger than a tent.’

  ‘Never mind,’ said the man, gently. ‘It doesn’t matter. Nothing like that matters.’