Sheltering Rain (7 page)

The donkey had long gone (“Laminitis. Poor old boy,” said her grandmother, as if she should understand), but the rest of the yard had a strange air of familiarity. It was certainly livelier than inside the house. Along the row of stables, two slight, stooped men moved with bristling brooms and clattering buckets, dividing up a bale of hay into square sections, while behind them horses' hooves scraped on cement floor or thumped against wooden boards in protest. A thin, tinny transistor, balanced on an upturned bucket, spewed fuzzy tunes in the background. Staring at the scene, Sabine suddenly had a vague memory of being lifted up to one of the doors, and of squealing in delighted horror when one of the huge, long faces loomed out of the darkness to see her.

“I assumed you'd be too tired to ride today. But I've hired you a very tidy little gelding from New Ross. He'll do you while you're here.”

Sabine's mouth dropped slightly open. Ride?

“I—I haven't ridden for ages,” she stuttered. “Not since I was a kid. I mean—Mum didn't tell me—”

“Well, we'll take a look in the boot room later. What size are you? Four? Five? Your mother's old ones might fit you.”

“It's been about five years. I gave up.”

“Yes, it's a complete bore trying to ride in London, isn't it? I once went to that stables in Hyde Park. Had to cross a main road even to get to the grass.” Her grandmother strode across the yard, and began berating one of the stablehands for the job he had made of the straw bed.

“But, I don't think I really want to.”

She appeared not to hear. She had taken a broom from one of the men, and was showing him how to sweep, with short, angry strokes.

“Look, I—I'm not really that fond of riding anymore.” Sabine's voice cut across the noise, thin and high-pitched, so that everyone turned at the sound. Her grandmother stopped in her tracks, and wheeled slowly around to face her.

“What?”

“I don't like it. Riding. I—I've sort of grown out of it.”

The two stablehands looked at each other, one with a hint of a raised eyebrow. What she had just said had obviously been Wexford code for “I murder babies,” or “I wear my knickers inside out to save on washing.” Sabine felt herself blushing, and cursed herself for it.

Her grandmother stared at her blankly for a moment, and then turned away, back toward the stables.

“Don't be ridiculous,” she muttered. “Dinner's at eight o'clock sharp. Your grandfather will be joining us, so don't be late.”

S
abine cried for almost an hour, unheard in her damp and distant room. She cursed her bloody mother for sending her to this stupid place, cursed her stiff, unfriendly grandmother and her stupid bloody horses, and cursed Thom for briefly letting her believe it might not be so bad after all. Then she cursed Amanda Gallagher, who she
just knew
would be getting off with Dean Baxter even as she lay there, the Irish ferry system for not shutting down when the weather was crap, and the turquoise shag pile for being so hideous that if anyone ever found out she had stayed in a room that looked like this she would have to emigrate. Forever. Then she sat up and cursed herself for getting purple and blotchy and snotty when she cried, instead of looking sad in the kind of clear-skinned, big-eyed, melancholy way that men found irresistible. “My whole life is a bloody, bloody mess,” she wailed, and then cried some more because it just sounded so much sadder out loud.

S
abine's grandfather was already seated at the dining table when she came slowly down the stairs. She saw his stick before she saw him, jutting underneath the table between his legs. Then as she came around the corner of the dining room, she saw his back, curved as if into a question mark, resting uncomfortably against the tall-backed dining chair, cushioned by a tartan blanket. The table was laid for three, the vast expanse of mahogany glowing between them, but he was just sitting in the candlelight, staring at nothing.

“Ahh,” he said slowly, as she moved into his field of view. “You're late. Dinner is at eight. Eight.”

A bony finger gestured toward the wall clock, which informed Sabine that she was some seven minutes late. Sabine gazed back at him, unsure whether to apologize.

“Well, sit down, sit down,” he said, lowering his hand gently onto his lap.

Sabine looked around her, and then sat opposite him. He was the oldest man she had ever seen. His skin, through which you could almost make out the shape of his skull, was beyond wrinkled; it had divided into hundreds of tiny crevices, like a wetland parched for decades. A thin vein pulsed above his temple, bulging like a worm cast under his skin. Sabine found she could barely look at him; it was somehow too painful.

“So . . .” his voice trailed downward, as if exhausted by its own flight. “You're young Sabine.”

It didn't seem to require an answer. Sabine merely looked accepting.

“And how old are you?” Even his questions trailed downward.

“I'm sixteen,” she said.

“What?”

“I'm sixteen. Sixteen,” she said. Oh, God, he was deaf as well.

“Ahh. Sixteen.” He paused. “Good.”

Her grandmother suddenly appeared from a side door. “Oh, you're here. Right. I'll bring in the soup.” In that “you're here,” she also managed to let Sabine know she was considered late. What was wrong with these people? thought Sabine miserably. It wasn't as if they were being timed.

“The dogs have had one of your slippers,” her grandmother called, from the next room, but her grandfather didn't appear to hear. Sabine, after some internal struggle, decided not to pass the message on. She didn't want to be responsible for the result.

The soup was vegetable. Real stuff, rather than canned, with lots of visible bits of potato and cabbage. Even though she would have refused it at home, she ate it, because the cold house had made her hungry. It was, she had to admit, rather good.

Feeling the need to make some sociable comment, as the three of them sat in silence, she pushed herself slightly upright and announced it. “The soup is nice.”

Her grandfather slowly lifted his face, draining his soup noisily from his spoon. The whites of his eyes, she noticed, were almost completely milky.

“What?”

“The soup,” she said, louder. “It's very nice.”

Some nine minutes late, the clock in the hall announced that it was eight o'clock. An unseen dog let out a shuddering sigh.

The old man turned his face toward his wife. “Is she talking about the soup?”

Her grandmother didn't even look up.

“She says it's nice,” she affirmed loudly.

“Ohhh. What is it?” he said. “I can't taste it.”

“Vegetable.”

Sabine found herself listening to the clock ticking in the hall. It seemed to be getting louder.

“Vegetable? Did you say vegetable?”

“That's right.”

Long pause.

“It doesn't have sweet corn in it, does it?”

Her grandmother looked up and shook her head. She dabbed at her mouth with her linen napkin.

“No, dear. No sweet corn. Mrs. H knows you don't like sweet corn.”

He turned back to his bowl, as if examining the contents.

“I don't like sweet corn,” he announced slowly to Sabine. “Horrid stuff.”

Sabine, by now, was fighting an almost hysterical urge to laugh and cry at the same time. She felt like she was trapped in some terrible third-rate television program, where time froze and no one ever escaped. I've got to go home, she told herself silently. There's no way I can put up with nights and nights of this. I'll wither up and die. They'll find me mummified in a room with turquoise carpet, and they won't be able to work out whether I died from cold or boredom. And I'm missing all the best telly.

“Do you hunt?”

Sabine glanced up at her grandfather, who had finally finished his soup. A thin opaque trail of it was visible at the side of his mouth.

“No,” she said quietly.

“What?”

“No. I don't hunt.”

“She speaks very quietly,” he said loudly to his wife. “She should speak up a bit.”

Her grandmother, having gathered the empty plates, walked diplomatically out of the room.

“You speak very quietly,” he said. “You should speak up. It's very rude.”

“I'm sorry,” said Sabine, loudly, and not a little defiantly. Stupid old sod.

“So who do you hunt with?”

Sabine glanced around her, wishing suddenly for the return of her grandmother.

“I don't,” she half-shouted. “I live in Hackney. It's in London. There's no hunting.”

“No hunting?”

“No.”

“Ohhh,” he looked rather shocked, as if no hunting were an entirely new concept. “So where do you ride?”

Oh, God, but this was impossible.

“I don't,” she said. “There isn't anywhere to ride.”

“So, where do you keep your horse?”

“She doesn't keep a horse, dear,” said her grandmother, reemerging with a large silver tray, covered by the kind of silver dome Sabine had thought was restricted to comedy butlers. “She and Kate live in London.”

“Ohhh. Yes. London, isn't it?”

Oh, Mum, come and get me, Sabine willed. I'm sorry I was so mean about you and Geoff and Justin. Just come and get me. I promise I'll never moan about anything ever again. You can have endless streams of unsuitable boyfriends and I'll never say anything. I'll stay on and do A levels. I'll even stop stealing your perfume.

“Now, Sabine. Do you like it rare or well-done?”

Her grandmother lifted the silver dome, so that the sizzling, brown mound of beef released its aroma into the still air. It was surrounded by a ring of roast potatoes, and squatted in a shallow lake of rich, brown gravy.

“You can have either, dear. I'll carve. Come on, I don't want it to get cold.”

Sabine stared at her in horror.

“Mum didn't tell you, did she?” she said, quietly.

“Tell me what?”

“What?” said her grandfather, irritably. “What are you saying? Do speak up.”

Sabine shook her head, slowly, wishing she did not have to see her grandmother's taut, exasperated expression.

“I'm a vegetarian.”

I
t was really quite simple. Apparently. If one took a bath in the downstairs bathroom (as opposed to the upstairs one, which had obviously been installed when the house was built, and last seen hot water some time then, too), then one removed all evidence of one's visit within five minutes of finishing one's ablutions. That meant all damp towels, shampoo bottles, flannels, even toothbrushes and toothpaste. Or one could expect to find them dumped outside one's bedroom less than half an hour afterward.

If one wanted breakfast, then one made sure one was downstairs in the breakfast room by eight-thirty. Not the dining room. Of course. And not at a quarter past nine, by which stage half the day had apparently gone, and Mrs. H had much better things to do than to wait around while everyone had her breakfast, although she was too nice to say so herself. And one had porridge, followed by toast. With honey, or marmalade. Both of which sat in little silver pots. And no, there was no Alpen. Or Pop-Tarts.

And one didn't complain about the cold. One dressed properly, and didn't wander around wearing next to nothing and then wittering on that it was drafty. That meant thick jumpers. And trousers. And if one didn't have enough of them, then one only had to say so because there were lots of spares sitting in the bottom of the big chest of drawers. And only a rude person would comment on how musty they smelled, or the fact that they looked like they had last been worn by Albanian orphans some time before one was born. And that went for footwear, too. One could not expect to wear expensive training shoes around the place and expect to keep them box fresh. One should go to the boot room and find oneself a sturdy pair of Wellingtons. And if one was going to get hysterical about spiders, then one should shake the things out first.

This was all without the rules one should simply not have to be reminded of. Like not letting the dogs upstairs. Or keeping one's boots on in the drawing room. Or turning over the television so that it wasn't on Grandfather's favorite news channel. Or beginning to eat before everyone had been served. Or using the phone without asking first. Or sitting on the Aga to keep warm. Or having a bath in the evening (or of a depth any greater than six inches).

A week into her stay, Sabine found there were so many rules to remember it was as if the house were a person itself, as seemingly persnickety, and set in its ways as her grandparents. At home, she had grown up with almost no rules; her mother had taken a perverse satisfaction in letting her structure her own life, a kind of Montessori existence, so that, faced with these never-ending and seemingly incomprehensible strictures, Sabine found herself increasingly resentful and depressed.

That was until Thom taught her the most important rule, one that did return some small measure of freedom back into her life—never, ever attempt to traverse any distance within the house or grounds at a pace slower than the Kilcarrion walk. This was a brisk, purposeful gait, to be conducted with chin lifted and eyes focused on the middle distance, which, if carried out at correct speed, served to deflect any of the questions such as, “Where are you going?” or, more commonly, “What are you doing? Come on, you can help me muck out this stable,” or “. . . fetch the horses in,” or “. . . unhook the trailer,” or “. . . hose out the dogs' shed.”

“It's not just you,” said Thom. “She doesn't like to see anyone idle. Gets her anxious. That's why we all do it.”

Now that Sabine thought about it, she realized it was true. She had never seen anyone in the house, with the exception of her grandfather, moving at anything less than a rate of knots. And as she had seen the old man only sitting, she couldn't be sure about him.