The Sandcastle (10 page)

‘That doesn’t matter,’ said Miss Carter, ‘no one will know - and we’re not in a
real road anyway. Would you like to?’
‘I might harm your beautiful car,’ said Mor. But he knew that he would like to,
he would like to very much indeed, drive the Riley. Before he could say any
more Miss Carter skipped out of the car and they changed places. She seemed
very elated and watched Mor with delight as he looked doubtfully at the
dashboard. He could remember nothing. ‘How do I start it?’ he asked.
‘There’s the ignition, it’s switched on, there’s the starter, there’s the gear
lever. You remember how the gears go? There’s the clutch, the foot-brake, the
accelerator. The hand-brake’s in front here.’ Miss Carter was perched sideways
in her seat with the gleeful air of a little boy who sees his father about to
make a mess of things.
Mor felt large and awkward. He fiddled a little with the gears. He began to
remember. He started the engine. Then gingerly he put the car into first gear
and released the clutch. With a jolt the Riley leapt forward. Mor immediately
put his foot on the brake and the engine stalled. Miss Carter rocked with
laughter. She had drawn her feet up and clutched her skirt about her ankles.
‘Damn!’ said Mor. He tried again and was more successful. The Riley glided very
slowly forward and Mor navigated her round a turning in the path. A tree
brushed the roof. Almost silently they sailed on through the thickest part of
the wood. Miss Carter was grave now, she was looking ahead. As he felt the big
car purring quietly along under his control Mor felt like a king. He
experienced a deep and intense joy. His body relaxed. He was continuous with
the car, with the slowly moving woodland, with the thick green carpet of the
unrolling bridle path. They drove for a minute without speaking.
Then Mor saw the woodlander. He was lying very close to the path in a little
clearing where the trees receded and left a wide bare space which was covered
with fallen leaves. All round the edge the flowers and brambles were festooned
in a thick palisade, at the farthest point of which a triangular cleft led far
back into the wood and was lost in darkness. The man lay on his side in the dry
leaves and seemed to be playing a game with some brightly coloured cards. Most
of the cards were in his hand, but some half-dozen were laid out upon the
ground. He was a short broad man, dressed in shabby blue cotton trousers and a
blue shirt. The clothes had something of the air of a uniform, without being of
any identifiable kind. Near by, beneath the brambles, could be seen a bundle
and what looked like the handle of some tool. The man’s face was half turned
towards them, his eyes cast down, and the peculiarly dark bronze of his cheek
suggested that he might be a gipsy. His hair was tangled and black.
Involuntarily Mor stopped the car. They were within a few feet of the man. A
moment passed. The reclining figure did not look up. He continued to stare at
the row of cards that lay upturned before him. He paid not the slightest
attention to the watchers in the car. Mor felt Miss Carter touching his arm. He
started the engine again and they drove on. The man was lost to view in the
trees.
Mor turned to look at his companion. Miss Carter was pale and had covered her
mouth with her hand. ‘Don’t be frightened,’ said Mor.
‘I am frightened,’ said Miss Carter. ‘I don’t know why.’
The car bumped quietly along. The path seemed endless. Mor was a bit frightened
too, he didn’t know why. He said, ‘He was probably one of those nomadic
woodcutters that work for the forestry commission. They live in shacks, or
tents in the wood.’
‘He looked to me like a gipsy,’ said Miss Carter, ‘and I’m sure they never work
for anyone. I wonder if we should have given him money? Do you think so?’
Mor cast a quick glance at her. He was unnerved by her agitation. ‘Much better not,’
he said. ‘Sometimes they are very proud, those people.’ He realized as he said
this that he would have felt timid at having to address the man.
‘Did you notice that those weren’t ordinary playing cards?’ said Miss Carter.
At that moment they came round another bend in the bridle path and there before
them was the river. The path turned along the bank, transforming itself into a
wide lawn, and between waving banks of bulrushes, willow herb, and meadow sweet
the river ran strongly, its surface glossy and brilliant. A few late
forget-me-nots still lingered, their stems submerged, at the edge of the
reed-bed. There was a smell of water.
Mor stopped the car and they both got out. They went forward to the edge and
stood for some time in silence. The scene was so like a garden that Mor glanced
about him, half expecting to see a house nearby. But there was nothing to be
seen except the river, which disappeared again on both sides into the thick
wood. He looked at Miss Carter. She was standing deep among the tangle of
leaves and flowers on the river bank. She had a drugged entranced look upon her
face. As if blindly, her hands reached out into the foliage. She plucked a
leaf, and conveyed it to her mouth, and chewed it thoughtfully, her eyes upon
the water.
Mor turned about and walked a little way along the grassy lawn. Here was the
real country where the seasons’ change is marked by minute signs. Blackthorn
gives way to hawthorn and hawthorn to elder. How rarely he came here. He drew
the branches aside, and then saw that the river widened into a pool, hidden
under a low roof of spreading leaves. The bank shelved gently here, and met the
water in a pebbly beach. Beyond it the stream seemed to be deeper, striped upon
one side with lines of white crows’ feet, which lay thickly beneath the far
bank, but clear in the middle. A white swan’s feather scudded lightly upon the
surface. Mor turned to convey this discovery to his companion, but found her
there already beside him.
‘Oh,’ said Miss Carter, ‘I must swim! Do you mind? I must! I must!’
Mor felt a little alarmed and shocked at this suggestion; but he felt too that
his permission was being asked and he could hardly say no. He was silent.
‘Oh, please I
must
swim,’ said Miss Carter again. Mor saw the wild light
in her eye. He was reminded suddenly of the rose garden, of Bledyard’s room.
‘Of course, swim if you want to,’ said Mor. ‘I only hope nobody comes. I’ll
stay well away here on the bank and watch for intruders.’
‘No one will come,’ said Miss Carter, ‘no one will find this place. Yes, you go
down there. I’ll undress here, on the far side of these bushes. I won’t be a
moment. But I
must
get into the river.’
Mor went out again into the sunlight and walked away, his feet dragging through
meadow sweet at the river’s brim. He felt uneasy. The sun was intensely hot.
The perspiration was running steadily like tears down the side of his face. The
river was very inviting indeed. Mor turned his head the other way. He sat down
where a gap in the reeds showed him a small section of water. Here the bank was
high and steep and the river flowed past, three or four feet below him. Gorse
bushes on the far side of the water emitted their strong coconut perfume. A
large dragon-fly hovered for a moment and then whisked into invisibility. No
birds sang. The heat had silenced them.
Mor kept his back turned to the place where the low spreading trees concealed
from view the weedy pool and Miss Carter. In a moment or two he heard a
vigorous splashing sound, and then a triumphant cry. ‘It’s wonderful!’ cried
Miss Carter from behind him. ‘It’s marvellously warm. And the water is so
clear. And do you know, there’s water-cress growing?’
‘Be careful,’ said Mor. ‘Don’t get caught in those weeds.’
The splashing continued.
Mor felt very uneasy indeed. He suddenly began to wish that he had not started
on this silly expedition at all. He began to think about Nan, and his
optimistic ideas of the earlier afternoon now seemed futile. He had thought
that no great harm would be done. But how did he know this? He had no
precedents for episodes of this kind. Mor had never deceived his wife, except
for very occasional social lies, and one or two lies about his health. These
were all of them occasions which Mor never forgot. Never before had he had to offer
to Nan the sort of confession which he would have to present tonight. He had
not the slightest idea how she would take it. Of course, nothing very terrible
could happen. Once the truth was told, they would both just have to digest it
somehow. But he did not know exactly, or even roughly, how it would be, and he
felt a deep anguish.
He wondered if he should tell Nan about Miss Carter’s bathing. Probably he
ought to have told Miss Carter not to bathe. Yet somehow that would have been
cruel. He had better tell everything, Mor thought. If he was to take refuge in
the truth, and indeed that was his only possible refuge, it had better be the
whole truth. Of course, he would call on Tim Burke on the way home, and that
would make at least part of his story true. Or would this be deceitful? Perhaps
he had only decided to see Tim Burke as a sort of device to allow himself to
spend a longer time with Miss Carter? He wasn’t sure. It occurred to him that
after tonight he had better see to it that he did not meet Miss Carter again
except in so far as this was inevitable. Not that it mattered specially. How
foolish that lie had been. It had made something very simple and trivial into
something that appeared important. Mor stared at the river. A water vole swam
slowly across and vanished into the reeds on the far side. Mor did not see it.
He felt a black veil of sadness falling between him and the warm late
afternoon. He looked at his watch.
It was a quarter past five. Mor jumped up. How the time had fled! He must think
about getting back at once. He turned towards the pool and saw Miss Carter’s
blue silk dress spread out on a gorse bush and her very small golden sandals
perched on a tuft of grass. He turned quickly away again. ‘Miss Carter,’ he
called, ‘I think we ought to go fairly soon. I’ll just turn the car round.’
Miss Carter said in a clear voice from somewhere very close to him, ‘Are you
sure you can manage?’
‘I can manage,’ said Mor. He climbed gloomily into the Riley and started the
engine. How could he have been such a fool as to get himself into this idiotic
situation? Tonight all would be plain and clear again. Nan would be hurt and
angry. But at least he would be out of the tangle. He hated deeply the feeling
that at this very moment he was deceiving her. He put the car into reverse and
began to swing it round. He backed it for a little distance along the bank of
the river. The Riley moved fast. Mor put the brake on and engaged the first
gear. He released the clutch slowly. Nothing happened. He tried again, accelerating
slightly. Still nothing happened. The car did not move forward. Mor’s attention
came sharply back to the present scene. He checked the hand-brake and went
through all the movements again, accelerating hard this time. The car remained
where it was, and he could hear a sinister whirring sound as one of the back
wheels turned vainly in the undergrowth of sedge and willow herb.
Miss Carter came towards him across the lawn, taking small steps. She had
resumed her slightly prim appearance, although the silk dress seemed now to
cling even more closely to her body. She was barefoot, carrying her shoes and
stockings. ‘What is it?’ she asked a little anxiously.
‘We seem to be stuck for the moment,’ said Mor. He got out.
‘You’re sure you haven’t got the hand-brake on?’ said Miss Carter.
‘Sure,’ said Mor. He walked round to the back of the car. The back wheels were
extremely close to the edge of the stream and had entered a thick mass of
matted weeds and grasses. The bank fell away here and the undergrowth overhung
it in a deceptive manner. Under the canopy of green the earth was damp and
sticky. The bank then fell steeply to the water, some feet below. Mor stepped
waist deep into the patch of willow herb and saw that the off-side wheel was
almost clear of the ground, protruding into the greenery that hung down from
the bank towards the water. The other wheel appeared to have sunk into a rather
muddy hollow. The front wheels were a foot or two away from the river bank.
‘How’s the situation?’ said Miss Carter. She followed him barefoot, and as he
bent forward he saw her small white feet appear in the grass near to his heavy
shoes.
Mind the nettles,‘ said Mor. ’It’s all right, I think I see what to do. This
wheel is almost at the edge, I’m afraid. But we could move if the other wheel
would bite. That one’s stuck in a patch of mud. If we just put some grass and
branches underneath it, that should do the trick. Look, I’ll rev the engine
again, and you watch the back wheels.‘
No, I’ll rev the engine,‘ said Miss Carter. ’Perhaps the car will move for me.‘
She got in and went through the motions. The same thing happened. The engine
roared in vain. Mor could see the back wheels turning, one in the green
undergrowth above the water, and the other in the patch of mud. Miss Carter
switched off and got out again.
‘Lots of grass and twigs is what we need,’ said Mor. He ran to the edge of the
wood and began to pluck armfuls of bracken and tall grass. Miss Carter went a
little farther into the wood and gathered small twigs and branches. As she
returned Mor saw that her legs were bleeding. They knelt together beside the
wheel. Miss Carter smelt of river water. From the wet ends of her hair, as she
leaned forward, a little water trickled down towards her bosom. She helped Mor
to strew the foliage under the wheel from both sides. With his hand Mor scooped
the mud out from under the tyre, and packed in a compact bunch of twigs and
ferns.
‘There!’ he said. ‘We ought to get away now. Will you take her, or shall I?’
‘I will,’ said Miss Carter. ‘You watch what happens.’
Mor squatted near the wheel while Miss Carter got in again and started the
engine. Breathlessly Mor watched the wheel begin to rotate. It was all right.
It was biting well upon the dry bracken. Mor was about to call out, when
suddenly something happened. There was a violent jolt, and the car stopped
again. Mor saw with surprise that the wheel had risen clear of the ground and
was turning in the air. He jumped up.