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Authors: Iain Crichton Smith

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‘A lot. It’s got a lot to do with them.’

He couldn’t understand how her mind worked at all. For two years now he had tried to understand her but couldn’t. His own mind he felt was clear and logical but hers was devious and
odd. It jumped from one thing to another like . . . He could feel no more small animals hitting the car. The moon rose more clearly ahead of him as the air darkened. It was really a lovely moon
like the one they had used to see when they were courting and they could hear the sound of the leaves and the small animals and the water in the ditches.

‘For you,’ she said, ‘the necklace was to be used for getting something else. Don’t you see it was a trap, a rabbit trap? For the little rabbit.’

Her pale throat glowed out of the darkness, he could imagine her small white teeth between the lips. No, he couldn’t cause an accident to her. For God’s sake, she was inside the car.
What was all this nonsense about rabbits anyway? There were hundreds of rabbits. By the laws of average, some rabbits were bound to be killed. After all, he hadn’t set out to kill it.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said feeling the stone in his body. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to kill it.’

‘Of course you didn’t,’ she said in a small voice. ‘Naturally.’

The moon was now a full pale blaze ahead of him. Its majestic aloof beauty awed him. It was so huge and confident rising out of the darkness, more impressive than the sun, a big white stone. It
seemed to swim through the sky.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said again but this time there was a change in his voice. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t understand.’

‘What we do to each other,’ she said again. ‘If we could see it, the torn flesh I mean.’ He thought she was going to be sick again. And this time he did see it. He saw it
quite clearly. He saw the rabbit with its guts hanging out and his wife spewing a thin green bile. He saw it all absolutely clearly by the light of the moon that floated over the undergrowth that
was so fresh and new.

He stopped the car. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, ‘I really am. I see it.’ She looked into his face to see if he had really seen. Her small teeth shone white and her face
seemed to quiver. Good God, he thought, the rabbit. The rabbit in my car sitting beside me. What then did I leave back there? But the moon shone fully and clearly and provided no answer. He stopped
the car and put his arms around her, very gently, without kissing her. He simply held her against him, while she quivered. That damned necklace, he thought, I wish I had never bought it or I wish I
had never said anything. And yet all the same he had wished to surprise her. He had really been happy buying it. He noticed that she wasn’t wearing it, in fact now that he thought of it he
couldn’t remember her wearing it. The moon, white as a pearl, looked in on them through the windscreen with a huge peering power, a complete presence. It was frightening. Why the hell, he
almost shouted, weren’t you shining before, why didn’t you show me the rabbit earlier?

Publication Acknowledgements

from
Survival without Error and other stories
(1970)

first published by Victor Gollancz Ltd, London:

The Ships; Survival without Error; The Exiles; Close of Play; ‘Je t’aime’; Goodbye John Summers; The Black and the White; Sweets to the Sweet; Murder without Pain;
The Adoration of the Mini; Home; On the Island; Joseph; The Idiot and the Professor and Some Others

 

from
The Black and the Red and other stories
(1973)

first published by Victor Gollancz Ltd, London:

The Dying; At the Party; In the Station; An American Sky; After the Dance; The Telegram; The Wedding; Getting Married; The Little People; God’s Own Country; By the Sea; The
Black and the Red; A Day in the Life of; The Crater; The Fight; In Church; Through the Desert; The Return; The End; Journeying Westwards; The Professor and the Comics.

 

from
The Village
(1976)

first published by Club Leabhar Ltd, Inverness:

Easter Sunday; Sunday; The Old Woman and the Rat; The Delicate Threads; The Conversation; I’ll Remember You; The Ghost; The Red Door; The Blot; The Vision; The Phone Call; The
House; The Painter; The Existence of the Hermit; Fable; The Old Man; The Prophecy; The Letter; Jimmy and the Policeman; After the Film; Moments; Old Betsy

 

Uncollected Stories

Mother and Son first published in
Alma Mater
60, no.1, Spring 1949; New Stockings for Young Harold first published in the
Glasgow Herald
, August 1960; The Scream
first published in the
London Magazine
, January 1961; The Angel of Mons first published in
Lines
19, Winter 1963; The General first published in
New Saltire
11, April
1964; Incident in the Classroom first published in the
Glasgow Herald
, July 1964; The Hermit first published in
Sruth
, August 1967; The Long Happy Life of Murdina the Maid first
published in
Ossian
1968; The Injustice to Shylock, In the Maze and The Meeting first published in
Lines
42/43 Sept. 1972–February 1973; Waiting for the Train first
published in the
Glasgow Herald
, July 1974; In the Café and On the Road first published in
Scotia Review
, December 1974

BOOK: The Red Door
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