Read Online The Wilderness by Samantha Harvey - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Samantha Harvey
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frowzy and disordered decor, bad plasterwork.
Ratty-tatty,
as Sara had said. Woodworm, he thought; joist problems; the lintels are probably shot through with holes; likely it will need reroofing.
“It's absolutely the most perfect and wonderful house I've ever seen,” Helen said, caressing the pictures.
He knew the deal was already done, even before Sara mentioned they could have it for less than two thousand pounds, and even before she went to the kitchen and returned withtwo glasses filled with what she informed them was cherry wine, and even before she declared that the wine was made with fruit from the cherry tree in the garden of the house, and even before she produced a final picture—in case they were interested—of the tree itself, its blossom the colour of mallow (the monochrome image could not subdue that creamy pink-ness), its branches as slender, Sara observed, as a tamarisk tree.
Helen put her hand to her mouth in measured delight. “As I envisaged it,” she said.
“And also,” Sara added, “Rook is coming for dinner.” She rested her cup on her palm and seemed to test him for a response.
He raised his brows. “Rook?”
“He visits me from time to time.” Her eye twitched and she held her fingers to the offending nerve. Long fingers, elegant face—the sort of face he would expect to see in tall women, when in fact Sara was far from tall. “Anyhow he's coming at seven, and already it's four. Will you excuse me in that case? I have a lot of cooking to do—make yourselves welcome.”
“Just as I envisaged it,” Helen repeated, rubbing her hand up and down Henry's back.
Then, if Rook is coming, he must have a bath, he thought urgently, and he must have a piss. It was the coffee machine, the compressed shot of hot water and then the trickle of liquid as it passed into the jug. It always made him need to piss. And the business with this cherry tree and the house they seemed suddenly destined to buy. He excused himself. He hadn't seen Rook for more than a decade.
3
He knows the route to The Sun Rises like the back of his own hand. He knows without any conscious thought when to change gear, when to slow down or speed up, which potholes are deep enough to avoid and which areas flood, specifically which areas, down to a few metres or so. Sometimes the puddles have frog spawn in. He knows to avoid them at certain times of the year and he knows, by light, colours, and instinct, that it is probably that time of year now.
Eleanor has a newspaper on her lap; when he glances across he sees that the headline is something about a plane disaster, there is a photograph of something mangled. He thinks of Helen. Her love of flight always made her morose over crashed planes, because planes belonged to a perfect world of height and freedom that was not supposed to fail. She would havebeen upset now by those pictures in Eleanor's paper and he would have tried to cheer her up with some platitude or other. Maybe she would have been upset by Eleanor herself, wondering how
x
could be put in
y
's place as if
y
had never been. He hopes she would have been upset; he is. He glances back at the newspaper.
“What's the story?” he asks.
Eleanor puts down the pocket mirror she has been frowning into, looks at the paper, sighs, and tells him to hang on a minute. “Something about the Rwandan president being killed,” she says. “In a plane explosion.”
“Will there be a war?”
She folds the paper and picks her mirror up again, rubbing her skin with her fingertips. “I don't know. It doesn't say.”
It worries him, war. It seems like one of those things that, now he is unable to follow the news properly, might just creep up on him. He was always so aware; now not so. There was always some control over the workings of the world when he could see what was coming.
Silence settles between them as Eleanor combs her fingers through her hair.
Memory,
Helen used to say as they drove. He would give her a memory. This
Ratty-tatty,
as Sara had said. Woodworm, he thought; joist problems; the lintels are probably shot through with holes; likely it will need reroofing.
“It's absolutely the most perfect and wonderful house I've ever seen,” Helen said, caressing the pictures.
He knew the deal was already done, even before Sara mentioned they could have it for less than two thousand pounds, and even before she went to the kitchen and returned withtwo glasses filled with what she informed them was cherry wine, and even before she declared that the wine was made with fruit from the cherry tree in the garden of the house, and even before she produced a final picture—in case they were interested—of the tree itself, its blossom the colour of mallow (the monochrome image could not subdue that creamy pink-ness), its branches as slender, Sara observed, as a tamarisk tree.
Helen put her hand to her mouth in measured delight. “As I envisaged it,” she said.
“And also,” Sara added, “Rook is coming for dinner.” She rested her cup on her palm and seemed to test him for a response.
He raised his brows. “Rook?”
“He visits me from time to time.” Her eye twitched and she held her fingers to the offending nerve. Long fingers, elegant face—the sort of face he would expect to see in tall women, when in fact Sara was far from tall. “Anyhow he's coming at seven, and already it's four. Will you excuse me in that case? I have a lot of cooking to do—make yourselves welcome.”
“Just as I envisaged it,” Helen repeated, rubbing her hand up and down Henry's back.
Then, if Rook is coming, he must have a bath, he thought urgently, and he must have a piss. It was the coffee machine, the compressed shot of hot water and then the trickle of liquid as it passed into the jug. It always made him need to piss. And the business with this cherry tree and the house they seemed suddenly destined to buy. He excused himself. He hadn't seen Rook for more than a decade.
3
He knows the route to The Sun Rises like the back of his own hand. He knows without any conscious thought when to change gear, when to slow down or speed up, which potholes are deep enough to avoid and which areas flood, specifically which areas, down to a few metres or so. Sometimes the puddles have frog spawn in. He knows to avoid them at certain times of the year and he knows, by light, colours, and instinct, that it is probably that time of year now.
Eleanor has a newspaper on her lap; when he glances across he sees that the headline is something about a plane disaster, there is a photograph of something mangled. He thinks of Helen. Her love of flight always made her morose over crashed planes, because planes belonged to a perfect world of height and freedom that was not supposed to fail. She would havebeen upset now by those pictures in Eleanor's paper and he would have tried to cheer her up with some platitude or other. Maybe she would have been upset by Eleanor herself, wondering how
x
could be put in
y
's place as if
y
had never been. He hopes she would have been upset; he is. He glances back at the newspaper.
“What's the story?” he asks.
Eleanor puts down the pocket mirror she has been frowning into, looks at the paper, sighs, and tells him to hang on a minute. “Something about the Rwandan president being killed,” she says. “In a plane explosion.”
“Will there be a war?”
She folds the paper and picks her mirror up again, rubbing her skin with her fingertips. “I don't know. It doesn't say.”
It worries him, war. It seems like one of those things that, now he is unable to follow the news properly, might just creep up on him. He was always so aware; now not so. There was always some control over the workings of the world when he could see what was coming.
Silence settles between them as Eleanor combs her fingers through her hair.
Memory,
Helen used to say as they drove. He would give her a memory. This
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