Read Online When Will There Be Good News? by Kate Atkinson - Free Book Online
Authors: Kate Atkinson
Tags: Fiction, General, Thrillers, Mystery & Detective, Missing Persons, Physicians (General practice)
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serve. Snow poles at the side of the road measured up to three metres.
He cast a wary eye at the sky, he wouldn't like to get stuck in a drif t up here, no one would ever find you. He would have to dig in unti l spring, fleece a couple of sheep for blankets. No one knew he wa s here, he hadn't told anyone he was leaving London. If he was lost, i f something happened to him, there was no one who would kno w where to come and look. If someone he loved was lost he woul d stalk the world for ever looking for them but he wasn't entirely sur e that there was anyone who would do the same for him. (J love YOli , she said, but he wasn't sure how tenacious an emotion that was fo r her.)
He passed a fence post that had a bird of prey, a hawk or falcon, perched on top ofit like a finial. Jackson was no good at the naming of birds. He knew buzzards though, there was a pair above him, circling idly in a holding pattern above the moorland, like black paper silhouettes. TY=hen thou from hence away art past, every nighte and aile, to TY=hinnymuir thou com'st at last, and Christe receive thy saule. Jesus, where had that come from? School, that was where. Rote-learning, still in fashion when Jackson was a boy. 'The Lyke Wake Dirge'. His first year at secondary school, before his life went off the rails. He suddenly saw himself, standing in front of the coal fire in their little house, reciting the poem one evening for a test the next day. His sister Niamh listening and correcting as if she was catechizing him. He could smell the coal, feel the heat on his legs, bare in the grey woollen shorts of his uniform. From the kitchen came the scents of the peasant food their mother was cooking for tea. Niamh slapped him on his leg with a ruler when he forgot the words. Looking back, he was astonished at the amount of casual brutality in his family (his sister almost as bad as his brother and father), the punches and slaps, the hair-tweaking, ear-pulling, Chinese burns -a whole vocabulary of violence. It was the nearest they could get to expressing love for each other. Maybe it was something to do with the bad mix ofScots and Irish genes that their parents had brought to the union. Maybe it was lack of money or the harsh life of a mining community. Or maybe they just liked it. Jackson had never hit a woman or a child, he restricted himself entirely to dulling up his own sex. i f hos'nand shoon thou ne'er gav'st nane, every nighte and aile, the whinnes shall prick thee to the bare bane; and Christe receive thy saule.
A whinny was a thorn, he remembered that. Trust his school to set a dirge for its first-year pupils to learn, for God's sake. What did that say about the Yorkshire character? And not just a dirge, but the journey of a corpse. A testing. As you sow so shall you reap. Do as you would be done by. Give away your shoes in this life and you'll be shod for your hike across the thorny moor in the next life. This ae nighte, this ae nighte, every nighte and alleJire and fleet and candle-lighte, and Christe receive thy saule. Jackson shivered and turned the heate r up.
*
It seemed he was not alone on the road to nowhere after all. There was someone else ahead, on foot, walking towards him. It was so unexpected that for a moment he wondered if it was a kind of mirage, brought on by staring for too long at the road, but no, it wasn't a phantom, it was definitely a human being, a woman even. He slowed down as he approached her. Not a walker or a tourist, she was dressed in a longish cardigan, blouse and skirt, moccasin-type shoes. Her only concession to the weather was a hand-knitted scarf twined casually round her neck. Fortyish, he guessed, brown-to-grey hair in a bob, something of the librarian about her. Did librarians live up to their cliche? Or were they indulging in uninhibited sex behind every stack and carrel? Jackson had not set foot inside a library for some years now.
The walking woman had no distinguishing marks. No dog either. Her hands
He cast a wary eye at the sky, he wouldn't like to get stuck in a drif t up here, no one would ever find you. He would have to dig in unti l spring, fleece a couple of sheep for blankets. No one knew he wa s here, he hadn't told anyone he was leaving London. If he was lost, i f something happened to him, there was no one who would kno w where to come and look. If someone he loved was lost he woul d stalk the world for ever looking for them but he wasn't entirely sur e that there was anyone who would do the same for him. (J love YOli , she said, but he wasn't sure how tenacious an emotion that was fo r her.)
He passed a fence post that had a bird of prey, a hawk or falcon, perched on top ofit like a finial. Jackson was no good at the naming of birds. He knew buzzards though, there was a pair above him, circling idly in a holding pattern above the moorland, like black paper silhouettes. TY=hen thou from hence away art past, every nighte and aile, to TY=hinnymuir thou com'st at last, and Christe receive thy saule. Jesus, where had that come from? School, that was where. Rote-learning, still in fashion when Jackson was a boy. 'The Lyke Wake Dirge'. His first year at secondary school, before his life went off the rails. He suddenly saw himself, standing in front of the coal fire in their little house, reciting the poem one evening for a test the next day. His sister Niamh listening and correcting as if she was catechizing him. He could smell the coal, feel the heat on his legs, bare in the grey woollen shorts of his uniform. From the kitchen came the scents of the peasant food their mother was cooking for tea. Niamh slapped him on his leg with a ruler when he forgot the words. Looking back, he was astonished at the amount of casual brutality in his family (his sister almost as bad as his brother and father), the punches and slaps, the hair-tweaking, ear-pulling, Chinese burns -a whole vocabulary of violence. It was the nearest they could get to expressing love for each other. Maybe it was something to do with the bad mix ofScots and Irish genes that their parents had brought to the union. Maybe it was lack of money or the harsh life of a mining community. Or maybe they just liked it. Jackson had never hit a woman or a child, he restricted himself entirely to dulling up his own sex. i f hos'nand shoon thou ne'er gav'st nane, every nighte and aile, the whinnes shall prick thee to the bare bane; and Christe receive thy saule.
A whinny was a thorn, he remembered that. Trust his school to set a dirge for its first-year pupils to learn, for God's sake. What did that say about the Yorkshire character? And not just a dirge, but the journey of a corpse. A testing. As you sow so shall you reap. Do as you would be done by. Give away your shoes in this life and you'll be shod for your hike across the thorny moor in the next life. This ae nighte, this ae nighte, every nighte and alleJire and fleet and candle-lighte, and Christe receive thy saule. Jackson shivered and turned the heate r up.
*
It seemed he was not alone on the road to nowhere after all. There was someone else ahead, on foot, walking towards him. It was so unexpected that for a moment he wondered if it was a kind of mirage, brought on by staring for too long at the road, but no, it wasn't a phantom, it was definitely a human being, a woman even. He slowed down as he approached her. Not a walker or a tourist, she was dressed in a longish cardigan, blouse and skirt, moccasin-type shoes. Her only concession to the weather was a hand-knitted scarf twined casually round her neck. Fortyish, he guessed, brown-to-grey hair in a bob, something of the librarian about her. Did librarians live up to their cliche? Or were they indulging in uninhibited sex behind every stack and carrel? Jackson had not set foot inside a library for some years now.
The walking woman had no distinguishing marks. No dog either. Her hands
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