Rapids (6 page)

All afternoon they keep at this. It’s today’s lesson. Very soon they are in three groups. There are those who take few risks, happy with what they can do; those who seem to have no trouble with anything— the elect— and then those who will keep trying and trying though almost always beaten.

Time and again Vince approaches the top of the eddy. Fascinated, he watches how others— Michela, Amelia and Louise now too— penetrate the current and glide across to the wave apparently without expending energy or taking risks. How is this? There is some hidden place, it seems, between eddy and flow, between the soft grey water milling on shallow stones and the fast dark stream pouring into the wave, some place where the river can be unlocked. A secret entrance. You’re admitted directly to the heart of things. You’re privileged. You can sit on the wave in a miracle of exhilarating speed and reassuring stillness. This mystery is denied to him. The entrance isn’t there when he approaches. The explanations— do this, do that— don’t seem to correspond to the experience.

In the eddy, Michela brings her boat alongside his. She is laughing. She seems happy. She shows Vince exactly the point of entry, the movement of the paddle and hips. Clive will come round, she has decided. It’s so fine to be near him. He is so strong. Those deaths in Milan have brought on a crisis. It will pass. Speaking English makes her feel cheerful. He gives me strength too. Relaxed and determined, she tells the older man to go with the flow. Don’t fight it, she says.

Vince grips his paddle. The rain pours on the rushing water. Unnoticed above, the mountains have dissolved in cloud. And take it easy when you capsize, Michela repeats. You’re hurrying. There’s always more time than you think. Imagine you’re in a swimming pool.

Dad, don’t overdo it, Louise shouted. You’ve got to drive me home, you know.

On the fourth attempt, having once more capsized without reaching the wave, Vince rolls his boat upright in the worst of the turbulence. The paddle is suddenly in the right place. He arches the arm, moves his hips and with no effort at all there he is, tossed out on a boil of water, disorientated, floundering, but up, breathing. Things could still go right.

Last night, Keith was saying later, I asked everybody to introduce themselves. But then, as you know, there have been two late arrivals.

It was raining still, but uncannily warm. They had trailed the boats back to camp. They had strung up lines between the trees to hang the equipment. At least if it doesn’t dry, the rubber won’t stink. They had showered. The Louts had cooked. The three teams are the Louts, the Pigs and the Slobs. This had been young Max’s idea during the trip out. A spirit of healthy emulation, he said in his precocious little lawyer’s voice from beneath the straw hat. Now they were all crowded into the kitchen tent in the light of the gas lamp. Across the site the French boys were drumming under their awning. Occasional thunder rumbled over their heads. The church clock has just chimed eight. It was time for the evening meeting. Sitting in his canvas chair again, Keith wears a permanent smile of self—congratulation.

Louise?

Yeah, I’m Louise, Vince’s daughter said. You all know me anyway. Fifteen. Chatham Grammar. Not cool, I know, but there you are. I’m here because I love the water and the company.

All right, Brian clapped.

That’s all. She was trying to catch Tom’s eye.

Verdict on today? Keith insisted. There was something evangelical about the man.

Great. Really. Learned a lot. Apart from having Phil push in front of me about every two seconds in the eddy by the wave.

Yes, a Wally nomination coming up there, I suspect. Vince?

Sorry?

Could you introduce yourself?

Vince still doesn’t understand. His mind has been captured by the drumming.

Let people know who you are. A few words.

Someone sniggered. It was a beat that seemed to go round and round in rapid circles.

Yes, of course.

He was standing by the entrance of the tent. Michela noticed that his eyes were clouded, his mouth always slightly open.

Well, I work in a bank.

There was an adolescent groan.

Vince smiled. Right, he agreed. Very boring. Anyway, probably some of you will have known my wife, my wife Gloria, since she was an instructor with Waterworld until a year or so ago. He took a breath. Anyway, after … after what happened, well, she had booked a place on this trip, and I just thought I would … He couldn’t go on. The drums pattered.

Vince’s wife, Keith cut in, was national sprint champion in her age group at Henley, when was that, Vince?

Vince was staring at the lamp—lit faces under canvas.

1998, Adam said.

In the night, he opened the fridge and she was crouching there inside. He wasn’t surprised. The fridge was her domain. I can live for ever here, she told him. He was looking for eggs to scramble. What else can I cook? He took them from her hand and closed the door, then went back and opened it again. There was something I should have said. She didn’t seem cramped. She was in her gym kit. No need, she said. Her smile was condescending, like a mother’s. There’s something I want to ask, he insisted. Don’t keep the fridge door open, love, you’ll waste the cold. She smiled. You’re wasting electricity, love. There’s something … It’s precious. Close it. He closed the door. But he was in the flat in London, not at home. Gloria never comes to his London flat. The fridge is tiny. There’s something I have to ask. He rushed across the room to tear the door open. The fridge, as always in his flat, was empty. Gloria! He shouted. Gloria!

Dad, you’re snoring! From her sleeping bag, his daughter woke him. The girl was sitting up. They were unnaturally close in the tent. She seemed eager to turn away.

I’m sorry. He lay still on his back. The ground is uneven and uncomfortable. But it’s not that. The blue canvas flickers from time to time with the torchlight of people heading for the bathrooms. Did I make myself come camping as a punishment? he wondered. Vince put his hands behind his head. His body ached. The day on the river has exhausted him. Then, as always after these nightmares, in the alert, sleepless mood they induce, he played over the sudden last moments of his marriage, the end of life as he had known it. Vince, I’m dying, her voice says. She has called his mobile. He is just climbing the stairs from the Underground at St Paul’s. I’m dying. I’ve phoned nine nine nine. I’m paralysed. It’s a stroke. I’m sure. I know the signs … It must have been at that point of the call that he had shouted, Gloria! He had stopped in the crowd. People were pushing past. It was early morning at St Paul’s. He was standing still, rigid, in the hurrying crowd. Gloria, for God’s sake! My head is filling with blood, she cried. Oh, I’m dying Vince. I’m so, so sorry.

The curious thing, as he let each evening’s tears fill his eyes, was the clarity of her voice in his head. Freed from the crackly quality of the mobile on the stairs outside the Underground, it spoke directly in his head. I’m paralysed. It’s a stroke. The change of tone from her normal matter—of—fact, rather bossy self to something piercingly intimate could not have been more marked. Oh, I’m dying Vince, I’m so so sorry. It was as if right at the end it hadn’t been her, or rather it had been her
at last,
someone he had never known. My wife. His mind was caught there, turning and turning in this unexpected maelstrom. Why had she said she was sorry? Why did he feel so ashamed?Very soon, I must become someone else; Vince knew that. He couldn’t break out of this churn of thought. After six months, it was a wonder he hadn’t already drowned.

A
t breakfast Tom joined the adults, rather than the children. Those bells! The young man seems in turns uncertain of himself and aggressively assured. Vince had been woken ten minutes before the morning ringing by the arrival of a text message on his daughter’s phone. They stood in the mud by the kitchen tent. Who pays the bloke to get up so early every day? Adam was shaking his head. Mandy wanted to know how on earth Michela had learned English so perfectly. She had only been in the UK a few months. She hadn’t even studied at university. With the grass damp, people ate standing up. Tea in the pot! Keith announced. I was born in the wrong country, the young woman laughed. The sun was just touching distant peaks, but the valley lay in shadow. The church tower was topped with a gleaming bronze onion dome, quite new obviously.

Neither of your parents speaks English, though?

I would never have learned if they did. It’s hard to explain, I always knew from as soon as I could think, I should have been English.

Too much of a class act to be a Brit, Tom said earnestly.

Oh thank you so much! Mandy objected.

Michela wasn’t eating. She looked at the young man without seeing him. Too much to do in a world that’s too ugly, Clive had said last night. Once again he had insisted on the sleeping bag on the bare floor. It was a punishment. Again she had walked out after midnight and sat on the roots of the big pine tree above the group’s pitch. In a tent the other side of the track a man and woman were murmuring in a language she didn’t know. She sat with her spine against the damp bark. Why now? Why had he chosen this of all moments?

Again, sometime after one o’clock, she had seen the thin, older Englishman head for the bathroom. He sneezed twice. That was the river in our noses. He is carrying a burden, Michela thought. She drew into the shadow so he wouldn’t see her. She thought in English. She would not use the language of her father and mother. She would not let Clive see her cry. I must be strong, she decided. If you want to go back to your mum, Micky, he said from the darkness as she pulled the door to, I’d understand perfectly. We could sort out the money side. She waited some minutes before answering. She undressed and got into bed. I’d rather kill myself, she told him.

Her man did not watch as she undressed. He knew her body. He knows how avidly she makes love. The room was dimly lit from a lamp outside. It smelled of bare wood and river kit. A good smell. I checked my e—mail this evening, he said finally. He had driven into Sand in Taufers. They’re talking of chartering a plane for Berlin. Will you come?

Of course, she said.

He had not looked as she undressed, but now, over cornflakes, Clive was watching Michela carefully. Vince caught the man’s intense gaze and knew he was in love. For months, he thought, I keep noticing people in love. It was almost the only thing he did notice.

But you have a pretty high position, don’t you? Adam was speaking to him. He named one of Britain’s major clearing banks. The tall instructor was already wearing a wetsuit, the shoulder—straps hanging at his side. I mean, you’re one of the big guns, aren’t you? He seemed extremely respectful of Vince, eager to get to know him. His hair was neatly combed, his receding chin closely shaved. Clipped to his belt, a waterproof case held his mobile.

Well …

I remember your wife saying something.

He only pretty well runs the whole bloody bank! Louise arrived hungry. There was a bag of Chocos she was after, under Tom’s elbow. Move over macho! The girl wore no bra under her T—shirt.

One shouldn’t exaggerate, Vince began.

Oh, come on Dad! You know you run it.

Adam seemed to be expecting a response. I imagine, he insisted, that someone like yourself has to be in touch even while you’re away. I mean at certain levels of responsibility …

But now a new noise captured everybody’s attention. There was a tinny jingle. Oh no! shrieked the young Max, his straw hat tipped back. On the table in the kitchen tent, beside the milk carton, a white hamster, about a foot high on its hind legs, had begun to beat a tin drum. Legs and paws moved with mechanical grace, while the solemn head made slow turns from side to side. A recorded voice in his innards crooned:

I think I love you, but that’s what life is made of.

Amelia and Caroline were bent double with giggles. The big girl grabbed Phil. Was it you? She had to pull off the headphones of his Discman.

And it worries me to say, the voice crooned on, that I’ve never felt this way.

Who stole my hamster? Mandy demanded. The bristly white muzzle was hilariously wise. The voice was that of some twenties vaudeville entertainer. Picked up in a service station, the toy had been a constant joke on the long journey from England. Amal was grinning broadly.

Do you think I have a case, the hamster sang, won’t you tell me to my face?

Who’s been in my tent? Mandy insisted. This is a happy British holiday, Vince told himself. I must participate. Adam smiled sardonically. Who was it? Mandy shrieked. Everybody was running around, giggling. Who stole my hamster? Guilty! Keith peeped a ruddy face from behind Michela’s pine tree. Was it possible, Vince wondered, that the group’s leader and their administrator had something going together? You cheeky bastard, Mandy made a half—hearted dash. Nosing in my stuff! Oh a serious impropriety! Max shouted in his most camp voice. Photograph! someone shrieked. One for the website! When Vince turned he saw Michela was hurrying away to the trailer where the boats were loaded and locked up. How lithe she was. You are under a spell, he told himself. It was an expression he would sometimes use at work to describe this or that commodity or currency. Coffee is under a spell. There’s no other explanation. The dollar is under a spell. But now Tom was saying politely, Mr Marshall, actually I was wondering—

Vince, I’m called Vince.

Sorry, I was wondering if I might pick your brain on money supply at some point? There are a couple of things they’ve been teaching us at university that I really don’t understand.

Listen, don’t talk about my work, Vince told Louise quietly as they gathered their kit together for the day’s outing. His cag was still damp. She couldn’t find her towel. She was sure she’d left it on the line. Please, he said. They fussed about the fly—sheets. It bothers me. What else is there to talk about with you, Dad? she asked. You never do anything but work. He asked if the message she had received this morning had been from her cousins. No, she said. She smiled very brightly. Adam had promised her she could charge her phone on his car charger.