The Burning Shore (9 page)

For Michael’s part he was surprised and then delighted to discover that the weapon was a venerable Holland and Holland, only the English gunsmiths could fashion a barrel that would throw a perfectly even pattern of shot no matter how fast the gun was traversed.

He nodded at Anna. Excellent! And she handed him the canvas bag of cartridges.

I will show you a good place. Centaine took his hand to lead him and then saw Anna’s expression and dropped it hurriedly. In the afternoon the pigeons come back to the woods, she explained.

They skirted the edge of the forest, Centaine leading and lifting her skirts over the mud puddles so that Michael had an occasional flash of her smooth white calves, and his pulse accelerated beyond the exertion of keeping up with her. On her short, stubby legs, Anna fell far behind and they ignored her calls to Wait, wait for me. At the corner of the forest, in the angle of the T that the pilots used as the landmark for the return to the airfield, there was a sunken lane with high hedges on each side.

The pigeons come in from there, Centaine pointed across the open fields and vineyards, all of them overgrown and neglected. We should wait here The hedgerow afforded excellent cover, and when Anna came up they all three hid themselves and began to search the sky. Heavy low cloud had begun to roll in again from the north, threatening rain, and forming a perfect backdrop against which the tiny specks of a pigeon flock showed clearly to Michael’s trained eye.

There, he said, coming straight in. I don’t see them. Centaine searched agitatedly. Where - oh yes, now I see them. Although they were quick on the wing, they were flying straight and descending only gently towards the forest.

For a marksman of Michael’s calibre, it was simple shooting. He waited until two birds overlapped each other, and took them both with his first shot. They crumpled in midair and as the rest of the flock flared up and scattered, he knocked down a third pigeon in a burst of feathers with his second barrel.

The two women raced out into the open field to bring in the birds.

Three with two shots. Centaine came back and stood close beside him, stroking the soft warm body of the dead pigeon and looking up at Michael.

It was a fluke, said Anna gruffly. Nobody shoots two A pigeons by intention, not if they are flying. The next flock was a larger one, and the birds were bunched. Michael took three of them with his first barrel and a fourth bird with his second, and Centaine turned triumphantly to Anna.

Another fluke, she gloated. What luck the captain is having today. Two more flocks came within range in the next half hour, and Centaine asked seriously, Do you never miss, Mijnheer? Up there, Michael looked into the sky, if you miss, you are dead. So far I have never missed. Centaine shivered. Death, that word again. Death was all around them, on the ridges over there were for the moment the sound of the guns was just a low rumble, death in the sky above them. She looked at Michael and thought, I don’t want him to die, never! Never! Then she shook herself, driving away the gloom, and she smiled and said, Teach me to shoot. The request was inspired. It allowed Michael to touch her, even under Anna’s jealous gaze. He stood her in front of him, and coached her into the classic stance, with her left foot leading.

This shoulder a little lower. They were both electrically aware of each contact. Just turn your hips this way slightly. He placed his hands upon them and Michael’s voice sounded as though he were choking as she pushed back with her buttocks against him, an untutored but devastating pressure.

Centaine’s first shot drove her back against his chest, and he clasped her protectively while the pigeons headed untouched for the horizon.

You are looking at the muzzle of the gun, not the bird, Michael explained, still holding her. Look at the bird, and the gun will follow of its own At her next shot a fat pigeon tumbled out of the sky, amid shrieks of excitement from both women, but when Anna ran out to pick it up, the rain that had been holding off until that moment fell upon them in a silver curtain.

The barn! cried Centaine, and led them scampering down the lane. The rain slashed the tree-tops and exploded in miniature shell bursts on their skin so that they gasped at its icy sting. Centaine reached the barn first, and her blouse was sticking to her skin, so that Michael could see the exact shape of her breasts. Strands of her dark hair were plastered against her forehead, and she shook the drops off her skirts and laughed at him, making no attempt to avoid his gaze.

The barn fronted on to the lane. It was built of squared attered yellow stone blocks and the thatched roof was t and worn as an old carpet. it was half-filled with bales of straw that rose in tiers to the roof ,This will set in, Anna groused darkly, staring out at the streaming rain and shaking the rain off herself like a water buffalo emerging from the swamp. We will be stuck here. Come, Anna, let’s clean the birds. They found comfortable perches on the straw bales, Centaine and Michael with their shoulders almost touching, they chatted.

and while they plucked the pigeons Tell me about Africa, Centaine demanded. is it really so dark? It’s the sunniest land in the world, too much sun, even, Michael told her.

hate the I love the sun, Centaine shook her head cold and the wet. There could never be too much sun for me. He told her about the deserts where it never rained. Not as much in a year as it does here in a single day.”I thought there were only black savages in Africa.”No, he laughed. There are plenty of white savages too - and black gentlemen, and he told her about the tiny yellow pygmies of the Ituri forests, tall as a man’s waist, and the giant Watusi who considered any man under two metres tall to be a pygmy, and those noble warriors of Zulu who called themselves children of heaven.

You talk as though you love them, she accused.

The Zulu? he asked, and then nodded. Yes, I suppose I do. Some of them, anyway. Mbejane- Mbejane? She did not pronounce the name right.

A Zulu, he has been with my Uncle Sean since they were lads together. He used the Zulu word Umfaan and had to translate for her.

Tell me about the animals. Centaine did not want him to stop talking. She could listen to his voice and his stories for ever. Tell me about the lions and the tigers. No tigers, he smiled at her, but plenty of lions. And Even Anna’s hands, busy with plucking the birds, stilled as she listened while Michael described a camp on the hunting veld where he and his Uncle Sean had been besieged by a pride of lions, and had had to stand by the horses heads all night, protecting and soothing them, while the great pale cats prowled back and forth at the edge of the firelight, roaring and grunting, trying to drive the horses into the darkness where they would have been easy prey.

Tell us about the elephants. And he told her about those sagacious beasts. He described how they moved with that slow somnambulistic gait, huge ears flapping to cool their blood, picking up dirt to dash it over their heads for a dust bath.

He told them about the intricate social structures of the elephant herds, how the old bulls avoided the uproar of breeding herds. Just like your father, said Anna. And how the barren old queens took upon themselves the duties of nanny and midwife: how the great grey beasts formed relationships with each other, almost like human friendships, that lasted their lifetimes; and about their strange preoccupation with death, how if they killed a hunter who had plagued and wounded them they would often cover his body with green leaves, almost as though they were trying to make atonement. He explained how when one of the members of the herd was stricken, the others would try to succour it, holding it on its feet with their trunks, supporting it from each side with their bulks, and when it fell at last, if it was a cow, the herd bull would mount her, as though trying to frustrate death with the act of generation.

This last tale roused Anna from her listening trance and reminded her of her role of chaperone; she glanced sharply at Centaine.

It has stopped raining, she announced primly, and she began to gather up the naked caracasses of the pigeons.

Centaine still watched Michael with huge shining dark eyes.

One day I will go to Africa, she said softly, and he returned her gaze steadily and nodded. Yes, he said. One day. It was as though they had exchanged a vow. It was a thing between them, firm and understood. In that moment she became his woman and he her man.

Come, Anna insisted at the door of the barn. Come on, before it rains again, and it took a vast effort from both of them to rise and follow her out into the wet and dripping world.

They dragged on leaden feet up the lane towards the chateau, side by side, not touching but so acutely aware of each other that they might as well have been locked in each other’s arms.

Then the planes came out of the dusk, low and swift, the thunder of their engines rising to a crescendo as they passed overhead: In the lead was the green Sopwith. From this angle they could not see Andrew’s head, but they could see daylight through the rents in the fabric of his wings, through the lines of bullet holes which the Spandaus had torn.

The five aircraft that followed Andrew had all been shot up as well. There were tears and neatly punched holes in their wings and fuselages.

It’s been a hard day, Michael murmured, with his head thrown back. J Another Sopwith trailed the others, its engine popping and missing, vapour trailing back in a stream behind it, one wing skewed out of line where the struts had been shot through. Centaine, watching them, shuddered, and crept closer to Michael.

Some of them died out there today, she whispered, and he did not have to reply.

Tomorrow you will be with them again. Not tomorrow. Then the next day, or the next Once more it was not necessary to reply.

I Michel, oh Michel! There was physical agony in her i voice. I must see you alone. We might never, we might never have another chance. From now on we must live each precious minute of our lives as though it is the last. The shock of her words was like a blow to his body.

He could not speak, and her own voice dropped.

The barn, she whispered.

When? He found his voice, and it croaked in his own ears.

Tonight, before midnight, I will come as soon as I am able to. it will be cold. She looked directly into his face social conventions had been burned away in the furnace of war. You must bring a blanket She whirled then and ran to catch up with Anna, leaving Michael staring after her in a daze of disbelief and uncertain ecstasy.

Michael washed at the pump outside the kitchen and changed back into his uniform. When he entered the kitchen again, the pigeon pie was rich and redolent of fresh truffles under its crumbly brown crust, and Centaine was filling and refilling her father’s glass without a protest from him. She did the same for Anna, but with a lighter more cunning hand, so that Anna did not seem to notice, though her face became redder and her laughter more raucous.

Centaine placed Michael in charge of the His Master’s Voice gramophone, her most prized possession, and made it his duty to keep it fully wound up and change each of the wax discs as they ended. From the huge brass trumpet of the machine blared the recording of Toscanini conducting the La Scala orchestra in Verdi’s Afda, filling the kitchen with glorious sound. When Centaine brought his plate laden with pigeon pie to where he sat opposite the comte, she touched the nape of Michael’s neck, those dark silky curls, and she purred in his ear as she leaned over him, I love Afda, don’t you, Captain? When the comte questioned him closely on the production of his family estates, Michael found it difficult to concentrate on his replies.

We were growing a great deal of black wattle, but my father and uncle are convinced that after the war the motor car will completely supersede the horse, and therefore there will be a drastic reduction in the need for leather harness, and consequently the demand for wattle tanningWhat a great shame that the horse should have to give way to those noisy, stinking contraptions of the devil, the comte sighed, but they are right, of course. The petrol engine is the future. We are replanting with pines and Australian blue gums. Pit props for the gold mines and raw material for paper. I Quite right. Then, of course, we have the sugar plantations and the I cattle ranches. My uncle believes that soon there will be ships fitted with cold rooms that will carry our beef to the worldThe more the comte listened, the more pleased he became.

Drink up, my boy, he urged Michael, as an earnest of his approval. You have had hardly a drop. Is it not to your taste? Excellent, truly, however, le fbie, my liver. Michael clasped himself under the ribs and the comte made sounds of sympathy and concern. As a Frenchman he understood that most of the ills and woes of the world could be attributed to the malfunctions of that organ.

Not serious. But please don’t let my little indisposition prevent you. Michael made a self-depracating gesture, and obediently the comte recharged his own glass.

Having served the men, the two women brought their own plates to the table to join them. Centaine sat beside her father, and spoke little. Her head turned between the two men as though in dutiful attention, until Michael felt a light pressure on his ankle and with a leap of his nerves realized that she had reached out with her foot beneath the table. He shifted guiltily under the comte’s scrutiny, not daring to look across at Centaine. Instead, he made that nervous gesture of blowing on his fingertips as though he had burned them on the stove, and he blinked his eyes rapidly.

Centaine’s foot withdrew as secretly as it had advanced, and Michael waited two or three minutes before reaching out his own. Then he found her foot and took it between both of his; from the corner of his eye he saw her start and a flush of dark blood spread up her throat to her cheeks and ears. He turned to stare at her, so enchanted that he could not pull his eyes away from her face, until the comte raised his voice.

How many? the comte repeated with mild asperity, and guiltily Michael jerked his foot back. I am sorry. I did not hearThe captain is not well, Centaine cut in quickly and a little breathlessly. His burns are not healed, and he has worked too hard today. We should not keep him unnecessarily, Anna agreed with alacrity, if he has finished his dinner. Yes. Yes. Centaine stood up. We must let him go home to rest. The comte looked truly distressed to be deprived of a drinking companion, until Centaine reassured him. Don’t disturb yourself, Papa, you sit here and finish up your wine. Anna accompanied the couple out into the darkness of the kitchen yard and stood close by, eagle-eyed and arms akimbo, while they said their shy goodbyes. She had taken just enough of the claret to dull the razor-edge of her instincts, or she might have wondered why Centaine was so eager to see Michael on to his motor-cycle.