Authors: Hugh Fleetwood
The Beast (22 page)
He was aware of nothing more, until he became
conscious
of someone sitting on his chest, breathing into his mouth. It looked like Claudio. And then he was aware of being turned over, and of someone pressing on his back. He vomited. He was aware of being lifted—and he couldn’t help thinking he must be very heavy—and of somehow being carried up the cliff. And then—there was a car, and faces staring at him, and he was being driven very fast somewhere, and there were nuns, and a hospital, and he was being put into bed …
He didn’t know how long he slept for, but when he woke he was feeling, though weak, all right. His first thought, even as he was rising to the surface of his consciousness, was: what happened was just the final, terrible end to a
terrible time. And having survived not just spiritually, as it were, as he had felt yesterday morning (had it been yesterday?), but also physically, now he really could go on. On into the future. And he hadn’t just been cleansed by that last dip; he had been purified. Purified of all falseness, all pettiness, all hatred; purified of the past. And now he no longer needed to play a part anywhere, or feel himself defenceless if he came to Europe. Now he was—oh, he was safe.
Safe
… His second thought, that came to him as he realized there were two nuns in the room talking quietly between themselves—he couldn’t quite make out what they were saying, but it was something about
il
prigioniero,
the prisoner, having escaped—was that he was very, very lucky, and very, very happy to be alive. His third thought, that came to him as he woke fully, and completely regained consciousness—and as just what the nuns might be talking about filled him with a terrible, and absolutely vertiginous dread—was, of course, for Meg.
He said, his voice coming so strongly and unexpectedly from his big motionless body that one of the nuns jumped, ‘My sister. How’s my sister?’
And as the nun who had jumped told him softly and sorrowfully, in a quiet, accented English, that his sister was dead, Benjamin forgot all about his sense of having been purified and having reached safety; he even forgot, for a moment, about the prisoner having escaped. And saying sulkily, almost accusingly, ‘But she can’t be, I was holding her hand,’ he let his head sink back into his pillow; and let tears fall from his eyes.
This ebook edition first published in 2013
by Faber and Faber Ltd
Bloomsbury House
74–77 Great Russell Street
London WC1B 3DA
All rights reserved
© Hugh Fleetwood, 1978
The right of Hugh Fleetwood to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights, and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly
ISBN 978–0–571–30478–3
