Read Online Saturday by Ian McEwan - Free Book Online Page A

background was less exotic – an unchanging suburban street in Perivale, an only child, with a father he didn’t remember.
    After their love affair finally began months later, past midnight, in the cabin of a ferry on a wintry crossing to Bilbao, she teased him about his ‘long and brilliant campaign of seduction’. A masterpiece of stealth, she also called it. But pace and manner were set by her. Early on, he sensed how easy it would be to scare her away. Her isolation was not confined to the neurology ward. It was always there, a wariness curbing spontaneity, lowering the excitement levels. She kept the lid on her youth. She could be unsettled by a sudden proposal of a picnic in the country, the unannounced arrival of an old friend, some free tickets for the theatre that night. She might end up saying yes to all three, but the first response was always a turning away, a hidden frown. She felt safer in those days with her law books, in the knowable long-closed matter of Donoghue versus Stevenson. Such distrust of life was bound to extend to himself if he made an unusual move. There were two women to consider, and to earn the trust of the daughter he would have to know and like everything about the mother. This ghost would have to be courted too.
    Marianne Grammaticus was not so much grieved for as continually addressed. She was a constant restraining presence, watching over her daughter, and watching with her. This was the secret of Rosalind’s inwardness and caution.The death was too senseless to be believed – a late-night drunk jumping traffic lights near Victoria Station – and three years on, at some level, Rosalind didn’t accept it. She remained in silent contact with an imaginary intimate. She referred everything back to her mother whom she’d always first-named, even as a little girl. She also talked about her freely to Henry, mentioning her often in passing and fantasising about her reactions. Marianne would have loved that, Rosalind might say of a movie they had just seen and liked. Or: Marianne showed me how to make this onion soup, but I can never get it to taste as good as hers. Or referring to the Falklands invasion: the funny thing is, she wouldn’t have been against this war. She simply hated Galtieri. Many weeks into their friendship – affectionate, physically restrained, it was really no more than that – Henry dared ask Rosalind what her mother would have made of him. She answered without hesitation, ‘She would have adored you.’ He took this to be significant, and later that night kissed her with unusual freedom. She was responsive enough, though hardly abandoned, and for almost a week found herself too busy in the evenings to see him. Solitude and work were less threatening to her inner world than kisses. He began to understand that he was in a competition. In the nature of things he was bound to win, but only if he moved at the old-fashioned pace of a slow loris.
    In the ferry’s swaying cabin, on a narrow bunk, the matter was finally settled. It was not easy for Rosalind. To love him she had to begin to relinquish her constant friend, her mother. In the morning, when she woke and remembered the line she had crossed, she cried – for joy as much as for sorrow, she kept trying unconvincingly to tell him. Happiness seemed like a betrayal of principle, but happiness was unavoidable.
    They went on deck to watch the dawn over the port. It was a harsh and alien world. Squalls of rain came flying over low concrete customs buildings and were driven against the grey derricks by a bitter wind which moaned among the steelcables. On the dock, where vast puddles had formed, was the solitary figure of an elderly man manoeuvring a heavy rope onto a bollard. He wore a leather jacket over an open-necked shirt. In his mouth was an extinguished cigar. When he was finished, he walked slowly towards the customs shed, immune to the weather. They retreated from