Read Online The Virgin in the Garden by A.S. Byatt - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: A.S. Byatt
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Potter …”
“Is he?”
He had undone macintosh and cardigan. He turned these back, and started on the skirt.
“Yes, he is. He’s never with anyone. I think there’s something wrong with him. I saw him the other day running up and down like a rabbit, in all directions, for no reason, all alone in Far Field. Then lying down.”
Alexander laid bare her throat and breast. He made a folded frame of her clothing: she sat, still as a statue; he sighed and laid his face on hers. She shivered.
“Alexander – do you
like
boys?”
“Hush.”
“No, but do you?”
“Are you suspecting me of being queer? All wives suspect all unmarried masters of being queer.” He moved his face contentedly against the skin he’d bared. “No, I like them to teach, not to touch. I’ve never wanted to make a grab at one, or anything.”
He thought, his head comfortable on her breast, that he’d never been quite overwhelmed by desire to touch anyone. There had never been an occasion when he couldn’t almost as well
not
have touched. What hewanted, what he really wanted … could not be said. He said instead, “Why am I so happy? When I should feel unbearably frustrated.”
“Yes. You should. Why don’t you?”
“If I had a place – a bed – you don’t think I’d hesitate …”
“I don’t know if you would or not. It doesn’t look as if I’m ever going to find out.”
These expressions of aggression and discontent were also a ritual bent of their dialogue. She sat quite still. Alexander turned his attention to her thighs. He touched the cool and solid flesh between the slippery, straining stocking and the gripping rim of the roll-on. He ran delicate finger-tips over bumps of suspenders, ridges of elastic. He moved spread fingers inside the cutting edge of the pants to the warm creases and wiry hairs, the soft. She sighed, leaned back, put a hand on him. Don’t move, don’t move a muscle, he begged her in his head, fluttering his silent fingers. Bodies in clothes amazed him, the criss-crossing layers, the varieties of smooth, solid, tugging, fluid … There must be as many ways of making love as there are people: what he liked was a slow intensification as close as possible to immobility. It would have been perfectly possible to take her there in the wood. Under a coat or blanket the risks of action, in terms of discovery, were hardly greater than the risks of what they were now doing. He believed his reluctance to be aesthetic. Forcing her, amongst twisted and knotted clothing, smashed twigs, adhesive beech mast, different kinds of damp. So rudely forced. It was odd that although he suspected the lady would be willing he persistently thought in terms of forcing. No doubt he was a little odd. He must live with himself. He continued to flutter her with his hands to keep her still and open, and thought, as he often thought in this position, of T. S. Eliot. The inviolable voice. Philomel by the barbarous king so rudely forced. And still she cried and still the world pursues. The tenses. It was all very well struggling with Shakespeare, but the other voice was nearer and more insidious. He had a moment of panic. He would never have a voice of his own. There was a line he had thought was his, or at least his with a clever modern-Renaissance echo of Ovid, which he must change, he must remember to change, the damned cadence was certainly Eliot’s …
Jennifer spoke a run of words into his thought.
“Darling Alexander, I’ve got to, I simply must, go back to Thomas, and my bottom’s gone numb, too –”
He remarked that his own hip was dead or dying and his supporting wrist very painful. He looked at Jenny. There were large tears in her eyes. Silently he took out his handkerchief and gently wiped them up.
“Is anything wrong?”
“No. Only everything. I love you.”
“I love you.”
He tidied her, shutting away the white breasts, primly buttoning shirt, cardigan, raincoat, twisting a stocking-seam,
“Is he?”
He had undone macintosh and cardigan. He turned these back, and started on the skirt.
“Yes, he is. He’s never with anyone. I think there’s something wrong with him. I saw him the other day running up and down like a rabbit, in all directions, for no reason, all alone in Far Field. Then lying down.”
Alexander laid bare her throat and breast. He made a folded frame of her clothing: she sat, still as a statue; he sighed and laid his face on hers. She shivered.
“Alexander – do you
like
boys?”
“Hush.”
“No, but do you?”
“Are you suspecting me of being queer? All wives suspect all unmarried masters of being queer.” He moved his face contentedly against the skin he’d bared. “No, I like them to teach, not to touch. I’ve never wanted to make a grab at one, or anything.”
He thought, his head comfortable on her breast, that he’d never been quite overwhelmed by desire to touch anyone. There had never been an occasion when he couldn’t almost as well
not
have touched. What hewanted, what he really wanted … could not be said. He said instead, “Why am I so happy? When I should feel unbearably frustrated.”
“Yes. You should. Why don’t you?”
“If I had a place – a bed – you don’t think I’d hesitate …”
“I don’t know if you would or not. It doesn’t look as if I’m ever going to find out.”
These expressions of aggression and discontent were also a ritual bent of their dialogue. She sat quite still. Alexander turned his attention to her thighs. He touched the cool and solid flesh between the slippery, straining stocking and the gripping rim of the roll-on. He ran delicate finger-tips over bumps of suspenders, ridges of elastic. He moved spread fingers inside the cutting edge of the pants to the warm creases and wiry hairs, the soft. She sighed, leaned back, put a hand on him. Don’t move, don’t move a muscle, he begged her in his head, fluttering his silent fingers. Bodies in clothes amazed him, the criss-crossing layers, the varieties of smooth, solid, tugging, fluid … There must be as many ways of making love as there are people: what he liked was a slow intensification as close as possible to immobility. It would have been perfectly possible to take her there in the wood. Under a coat or blanket the risks of action, in terms of discovery, were hardly greater than the risks of what they were now doing. He believed his reluctance to be aesthetic. Forcing her, amongst twisted and knotted clothing, smashed twigs, adhesive beech mast, different kinds of damp. So rudely forced. It was odd that although he suspected the lady would be willing he persistently thought in terms of forcing. No doubt he was a little odd. He must live with himself. He continued to flutter her with his hands to keep her still and open, and thought, as he often thought in this position, of T. S. Eliot. The inviolable voice. Philomel by the barbarous king so rudely forced. And still she cried and still the world pursues. The tenses. It was all very well struggling with Shakespeare, but the other voice was nearer and more insidious. He had a moment of panic. He would never have a voice of his own. There was a line he had thought was his, or at least his with a clever modern-Renaissance echo of Ovid, which he must change, he must remember to change, the damned cadence was certainly Eliot’s …
Jennifer spoke a run of words into his thought.
“Darling Alexander, I’ve got to, I simply must, go back to Thomas, and my bottom’s gone numb, too –”
He remarked that his own hip was dead or dying and his supporting wrist very painful. He looked at Jenny. There were large tears in her eyes. Silently he took out his handkerchief and gently wiped them up.
“Is anything wrong?”
“No. Only everything. I love you.”
“I love you.”
He tidied her, shutting away the white breasts, primly buttoning shirt, cardigan, raincoat, twisting a stocking-seam,
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