The Levels (11 page)

I stacked twenty log baskets in the store, washed my hands and made a pot of tea.

‘Billy?'

‘You want a cup?'

‘Yes!' My father was getting better. His back had moved off his chest, he'd managed the stairs, and walked across the yard.

‘I finished them,' I said.

Work seemed easier now I was a man, or else I was fooled by the season. July met August, I sucked a honeysuckle flower for its honey, insects came to the hedge to drink at privet and bindweed. Starlings lined up along the ridge of the workshop roof and imitated telephones. I didn't care. I tossed some bundles of willow into a corner, and sat at the bench, with my tea and a view of the orchard.

I picked at a string of cotton on my shirt, the old man came and sat under the window, with his awful back propped against a sack of potatoes, his face tilted towards the sun.

‘Any better?'

‘You bet,' he said, ‘skin you alive.'

‘I'm glad.'

‘And you've got something to tell me?'

‘Have I?'

‘You tell me.' He ran his fingers round the rim of his tea cup and gave a long, low whistle.

‘Dad?' I said, but what I wanted to say didn't come out. ‘Nothing.' I didn't know the words, found a loose button on my trousers instead, pulled at it, agitated the cotton, while he shook his head, slowly to the rhythm of the gentle wind and the heat, rinsing us.

‘You don't have to say anything,' he said, ‘just don't get into trouble.' He lit a cigarette, we sat in silence, though the sounds of nature were all around, cockerels, a green woodpecker, shocking the day with its call; sheep, gentle in the grass; the river. After half an hour, mother came, and thought it would be best if he sat in the kitchen, with his back to the stove; he'd be surprised at the difference it would make.

‘By the stove?'

‘Come on!' she shouted. ‘Lit in summer, it's a luxury you can't ignore!'

In the sunny day, the clicks of a thrush smashing snails' shells, and the scents of wild roses and elder heavy in the air, Muriel walked from Drove House to see me, and sat on the bench, with her legs crossed at the ankles, holding my hand, playing with the petals of a water plaintain. Where the heat had warmed her nose, tiny flakes of skin had peeled away; she rubbed them.

‘Don't rub,' I said, ‘you'll make it worse.'

‘What a summer!' she said.

We had met since the afternoon at Isle Abbots, and walked to the bridge at Muchelney for a swim. I didn't feel any terror, I floated, trod water, and crawled against the current to where she dried herself on the bank.

‘Muriel,' I had said, ‘I love you.' She'd looked up from her towelling, dabbed a string of water off her stomach, and smiled.

‘You love me,' she said, ‘I'll never forget.'

We'd been to Exeter and taken a boat on the river. We went as far as we were allowed, north to the bridge, and as far south as the weir. I told her to sit down when we came to the ferry wire, and stand up when I saw a kingfisher.

‘They make their nests out of fish bones,' I said.

‘Do they?'

‘And are among the few birds which do not practise nest sanitation.'

‘Quite a little ornithologist, aren't we?'

‘What?'

‘A bird watcher?' She fluttered her eye lashes. I steered the boat into the bank, left the motor to idle, and kissed her on the cheek, to show I didn't have to be eager all the time.

‘You!' she said, and grabbed me round the neck. The boat rocked, I slipped, but held onto the sides, recovered my balance and sat down.

‘Muriel!' I said, ‘You're dangerous!'

‘Dangerous?'

‘Yes.'

‘Ha!' She laughed. ‘If I was dangerous, I wouldn't have given you the chance to find out. Dangerous people keep themselves to themselves. They wait. They wait a bit more. They strike.'

‘How do you know?'

‘I just do.'

I steered the boat out of the bank and back to the quay. A shower dampened the pavement, our clothes, but not our spirits. Dangerous people in the rain, and the gentle smell of a wet hedge, swallows, diving for insects, a natural world and a natural place to be.

We'd made love again, in a ditch beneath an old towpath by the Isle, on a muggy day, while grey clouds moved slowly by and we were bitten by mean and vicious bugs. I remembered which parts of her I'd forgotten, and searched for them on her body.

‘Show me your back,' I said, and she did. Five tiny spots, the colour of chocolate, nestled together halfway down her spine, and a tiny white scar, where she had burnt herself as a child, blemished the skin but added to the moment. Where I had held her were impressed the outlines of my fingers, but she didn't care, picked a grass and tickled me under the nose.

‘Stop it!' I said.

‘You're ticklish.'

‘I'm not.'

‘You are!'

‘I'm not.' She did it again, I grabbed her waist and took the stalk away. ‘How would you like it?'

I held her down, sat astride her and with my knees on her arms tweeked her nose and brushed the grass over her face, into her armpits and behind her neck.

‘Stop it, you're hurting.'

‘There!' I said.

‘You really are! Ouch!' I kissed her, apologized, sat down and threw the stalk away.

Another day, I drove her to Taunton with some baskets, and she pretended to be my apprentice. She called me by my last name, carried the baskets into the shop, to let me check the invoice and collect the money. She sat in the van while the shop keeper pointed and said, ‘Who's a lucky boy? You basketmakers; I don't know.'

I drove slowly, proud of Muriel, while she sat with her feet on the dashboard, curling a five pound note round her fingers, round and round, until it was a tube.

‘I'm hungry,' she said.

‘You want something to eat?'

‘Well done.'

‘Eh?'

‘I'm hungry, you worked out I want something to eat. Congratulations.'

‘You're so mean.'

‘Mean?'

‘Playing with me, it's like you're playing with me.'

‘Playing?' She reached over and grabbed me in the waist. ‘You want playing with?'

‘Stop it!' I shouted. The car swerved into the pavement, some people stepped out of the road, a car hooted. ‘You'll make us crash!'

She got me talking baskets again. I had to explain how willow was grown, the yearly cycle, and the way they get different coloured rods. Buff: boiled in water, stripped. White: sprouted in water, stripped. Brown: grown that way. There are other willows grown specially for their colours, but these are rare and not seen so much. Some stuff is used boiled with the bark left on, almost a black willow, but buff, white and green; these are the most common.

‘Muriel?' I said, ‘when are you going back?'

‘Back?'

‘To London. You said you were.'

‘I'm not sure.'

‘But soon?'

‘Maybe.'

‘And Drove House?'

‘What about it?'

‘Your mother?'

‘Yes?'

Another day, we stared at a map, chose a spot, took the ambulance, sandwiches, beer, towels, and drove off the moor, south, towards the coast, where the sea meets the sky at a crescent of pebbles, surf and sun. We parked by an old barn and walked a mile through woods, with high chalk cliffs like fairy castles poking out of the trees, rare birds, the gentle rush of the sea as it broke onto the beach below us, her hand in my pocket.

‘How'd you find this place?'

‘I can read a map.'

‘But you can't tell from that.'

‘Footpaths, no main roads, no houses, drawings of little trees; look at a map, you can imagine what it'll look like. Beautiful?'

‘It is.'

‘So we'll make it our garden, and the sky can be our roof.'

‘An old cliché.'

‘But straight from the heart.'

‘Billy,' she said, ‘put those things down.' She put her arms around my neck, ‘Billy, oh dear.' I felt her eyes, damp on my neck, she rocked herself gently on me, I stroked her hair and kissed it.

We stood on a grassy plateau, set high above the bay, watching a fishing boat. A path led down to the beach, overgrown and shattered in places by broken land, held together in others by clumps of pampas grass. Where streams cascaded out of the crumbling cliffs and ran across the path, planks of wood had been laid, but these were slippery and crooked. Muriel held my shoulders and, in places, the cracks were so bad we were forced to crawl on all fours; she followed me, and pinched my bottom, I didn't mind.

What heat! We found a place where the beach became a heath; brambles, wild sea grasses, travellers' joy, twisted and jumbled into forests, but here and there, where rabbits were breeding, were odd lawns of neatly cropped grass, some with old fire patches and piles of half-burnt driftwood, natural rooms, open to the sky, but otherwise secret.

She lay on a towel, I offered her one of my mother's sandwiches.

‘How's your dad?' she said.

‘Getting better. Walking.'

‘Has it happened before?'

‘What?'

‘His back, locking.'

‘No.'

‘Unusual, moving to his front.' I didn't know if she was playing with me again.

We swam over the surf and into calmer water, so the towels were like postcards on the beach, and floated, watching some people walk along the tide line, heads down, turning things over, looking for stones.

‘You've got weed in your hair!' she said. I reached up to see, but while I tried to find it, she dived under the water, grabbed my ankles and pulled me down. I came up spluttering, she was swimming back to the beach, kicking up fountains of water, laughing.

‘Billy!' she shouted. ‘You're so easy!'

‘Easy!' I caught up, and straddled across her back. ‘Ride!' I shouted, ‘Ride, horsey! We'll see who's easy!' I lay down on her in the water, but she turned over and I went under again. As I came back up, she pushed my shoulders, I twisted and grabbed her round the neck. The people on the beach heard us, stopped walking and looked up. They pointed. Muriel waved. They waved back.

‘What you do that for?'

‘Just being friendly.'

‘Friendly?'

‘Yes please.' I kissed her lips, and treading water, our legs became entwined. We pulled each other down and sideways. I lost my balance, she fell on top of me, the people on the beach laughed.

‘They're laughing at us!' I said.

‘Let them. I don't care.'

‘I never thought you would.'

‘Meaning what?'

‘Nothing.'

‘No. Meaning what?' She raised her voice.

‘Muriel?' I pinched her, ‘Catch!' I splashed away this time, reached the shore, grabbed my towel, and ran over the stones to the heath. I crouched behind a thicket, watching the walkers watch Muriel, and waited, her footsteps on the beach, her padding over the grass, I jumped out.

‘Meaning?' she said.

‘Meaning I love you.'

We steamed in the heat, and dry, rubbed oil on our bodies; she first, to show me how, then I did her.

‘Seems a shame to waste the opportunity,' she said.

‘To do what?'

She stood up and straightened the towels. ‘Come on, look around! Sun, sea, you, me, towels, all this oil!' I stretched out to her, she pushed me back, our bodies slipped together, it wasn't easy, but we did it again in that green, blue and yellow room, while the evening came. Afterwards, she sent me off to look for driftwood; we lit a fire and cooked sausages. The sea rolled onto the shore, its distance surface shimmered in the moonlight. No one disturbed us. A fishing boat trawled the horizon, a flock of oyster-catchers cried on the beach. The trees and bushes of the undercliff rustled in a breeze so slight it could have been human breath, but the sky, though cloudless, gave away no secrets. The flames on the shore, the girl in the sand; the boy stared at his feet, the sea rolled back time. I could tell; she smiled at me in the fire light, but it was the last time she would, like that, like she meant it a little.

‘Mum's asked you to tea; oh, hello!' Muriel had arrived with the invitation, Dick was there, they hadn't met before.

‘Dick, this is Muriel.'

‘Hello,' he said.

‘You're meant to introduce the lady to the gentleman, not the other way round.' She leant over and kissed me. Dick looked at the ground, but I could see his eyes moving.

‘I've got to get on,' he said, ‘milking to do.'

‘Milking?' said Muriel.

‘Yes.'

‘Could I watch? I wouldn't get in the way.'

Dick didn't know what to do; he mumbled about Chedzoy not liking women in the parlour, shuffled his feet, edged away and put his crash-helmet on.

‘A bit ironic, isn't it? All those females providing your boss with a living but he doesn't like women in his parlour.'

‘What?'

‘You heard.'

‘Billy?' he said. He didn't understand. ‘Any time, remember what I said.'

‘What did he say?' We sat in the workshop, it was a colder day, a stiff wind blew cloud from the west.

‘He wants to take me for a drink.'

‘When?'

‘Anytime.'

‘And tea?'

‘Tea?'

‘Mum's asked you.'

‘Oh, yes.'

We carried the trays into the garden, but it started to rain, so we had to carry them back to the house, and while her mother laid the table, Muriel showed me the latest painting. I thought it was a pig, but she said it was a view of Burrow Hill from Kingsbury.

‘Why's it pink?' I said.

‘She didn't have any green paint.'

‘Then why didn't she do a picture of something pink?'

‘Because she didn't have any green paint.'

‘So she deliberately paints pink things green and green things pink?'

‘I think so.'

‘Why?'

‘Ask her.'

We ate tea in the room I'd seen on that ghostly night, with chairs lined up against one wall, and opposite, a dark cupboard, with a broom hanging on its latch. A half open door had led to the kitchen, it had been gloomy, wet, cold, now I drank tea from a china cup, was passed cakes by a painter, sat next to Muriel. Muriel. She'd never known what this house looked like, it had been changed, a summer of living, two women, they changed Drove House.

‘Have another cake.'

‘Thanks.'

‘More tea?'

‘I'll have some.'

‘This house used to smell of apricots,' I said.

‘Apricots?'

‘Smells of paint now.'

‘I love apricots.'

‘An apricot orchard. Mmm.'

The women liked apricots. Muriel poured herself some more tea, I put my cup on the floor.

‘When I was a girl,' said her mother, ‘we went to the fair; I think back and say to myself, “That was the time, that was the place.'”

‘For what?'

‘For knowing what you wanted to do with your life. All the coloured wagons, swirls and swirls of paint, I knew I'd be a painter. I wanted to run away with them, be a travelling artist.'

‘What happened?'

‘I had my fifth birthday.'

The leaded windows reflected rectangles onto the walls and ceiling. A book on glass-blowing, a bowl of coloured stones, a plate of cakes.

‘Have another.'

Tea at Drove House.

‘Billy's got something to ask you,' said Muriel.

‘Have I?'

‘Have you?'

‘Yes.'

‘What?'

‘About why you paint pink things green?'

‘Oh,' I said, ‘green.' I looked at Anne, she fingered some crumbs from the corner of her mouth.

‘I paint green things pink.'

‘I know.'

‘Not pink things green.'

‘I never said you did. Muriel did.'

‘Muriel, you should know better.'

‘Sorry.'

‘I paint green things pink when I haven't got any green paint and I've plenty of pink.'

‘Then why don't you buy some green?'

‘Because that's too easy. An artist must make life difficult for herself.'

‘I'll buy you some.'

‘No you won't.'

‘Why not?'

‘You don't know what shades I like.'

‘One minute you're doing a hill pink, then you won't let me buy you some paint because you're afraid I'll buy the wrong shade.'

‘Yes.'

I offered to do something I'm good at, the washing up. I washed, Muriel dried. Anne had to go to Taunton. She had to go to the station.

We stood on the porch while the rain blew over, the sun shone for a few moments before setting, and the world became dark very quickly. I could smell autumn, old leaves and fires, a cold sink into winter, but the house was still warm, Muriel took my hand and closed the door.

‘Don't you think we should take advantage of the situation?' she said.

‘What situation?'

‘Billy!'

‘What?'

‘An empty house, an empty bed, two lovers?' She pulled me towards the stairs.

‘But she'll be back soon.'

‘No she won't; anyway, she wouldn't mind, she knows what's going on.'

‘She knows?' I couldn't believe her. I hadn't breathed a word.

‘Of course.'

‘How?'

‘I told her. Like I told her about the others.'

‘The others?'

‘Yes, Billy. Come on; wake up!'

‘Others?'

‘Why not? Where'd you think I learnt the things I showed you? In a book of nursery rhymes?'

‘No. I …'

‘You … ?'

‘I thought it'd just come naturally, I thought you were …'

‘What? A cabbage?'

‘No.'

‘Then take me to bed.'

I'd sat in that room with Dick, felt the smell of apricots stain the floor, and we'd stared out of the window at a winter's night. He'd wanted to come back, but I felt the terror in the place. I knew what climbed the stairs. I had watched the bedroom door close in an empty house, no draughts, just a cold and heavy air. I remember the night came from evening so quickly, the door stopped on its hinges, like it knew I was watching. This room stood guard over my life. Muriel, murmuring in her sleep, her face turned to the window, I ran my hand up her spine, over where her back blended with her shoulders, I took my other hand and stroked her hair. She moved a little, tucked her knees in, sighed, Bang! The piece of tin in the lean-to, banging years ago, the sound echoed to me, sniff; apricots, stewing in the kitchen. I had looked at Dick. He had looked at me. Terror, waiting for what was coming, we waited.

I stroked behind her ear with one hand, while the other picked fluff out of her hair. I played with her earrings, and ran my fingers down the ridge of her jaw bone. The neck. I put one hand either side of it, rubbed gently, easing, pinching little rolls of skin. Her neck. It was so slim, so brown.

‘Billy!' she said. She woke up. ‘You trying to strangle me?'

‘No.'

‘What you doing then?'

‘Remembering it.'

‘My neck.'

‘Yes.'

‘Why?'

‘Because it's the only neck I've got this close to.'

‘The only neck? What about your own?'

‘What about it? I can't see the back of my own neck. I can't kiss it!'

‘No.'

‘So I'm remembering yours.'

The weather got worse. A squall of wind rattled every pane of glass in every window of the place, the clouds blew open a moment to let in a view of higher, racing cloud, screwing across the face of an angry, waning moon, and then the light it gave was gone. I looked at Muriel, she at me.

I felt alone as we lay together. A pair of headlights flooded the room, twisted down the floor, up the wall and across the ceiling. We did not move. Was it the wind, or did I hear a scream? Clunk. Muriel sat up.

‘What was that?' she said.

‘What?'

‘That noise.'

‘The wind.'

‘Never!'

‘It was.'

‘The wind?' She looked at me. ‘Country boy, you can't explain everything with the wind.'

‘I never said I could.'

‘But it's the attitude.'

‘What attitude.'

‘The attitude of your sort.'

I didn't know what she was talking about. Clunk.

‘There!' she said.

‘It's …' Clunk.

‘Yes?'

‘Like I heard before.'

‘Before?'

‘With Dick.'

The orchard trees lashed in the weather, leaves ripped in the wind, apples thrown to the ground. I stood by the window, we heard footsteps on the stairs; I looked at her, pulling a shirt over her head.

‘What are you looking at?'

‘You.'

‘And what do you see?'

‘You.'

It happened again, the odd sounds, the first boom of thunder, a minute later, the room was illuminated by lightning. Muriel's face shone in the light, she wore a shocked expression, reached out and took my hand. It felt cold and clammy in mine, the glass rattled in the window frames, clunk. I wanted to get up and try the door, would it be stuck again? I moved off the bed.

‘Where are you going?'

‘The bathroom.'

‘Wait for me.'

‘Why?'

‘I'm not staying here on my own.'

‘You're scared.'

‘I'm not.'

‘Then stay here.'

‘No.'

Then the knob began to turn. It clicked, a crack of light appeared, and grew as the door opened, and Anne walked in, to say, ‘Half past two, gets in at five — Oh! Sorry.' I looked at her, then at Muriel, who turned her back, stood up, and pulled her trousers on.

‘Thanks,' she said.

Her mother closed the door, Muriel stepped into a pair of shoes, buttoned her shirt, said, ‘See you downstairs', and left me alone, staring at the orchard, the moon appeared again, framed in shattered cloud, illuminating the end of summer.

They offered me a cup of tea, but I said I was late for something I lied about, and left them in the kitchen. I drove home, the rain eased a little, and told my father someone had stolen the rabbit trap.

‘Never mind,' he said. ‘What's stuffing?'

‘Nothing much.'

‘That's what I was beginning to think.'