The first band played, and the crowd settled down to listen, some talking quite softly amongst themselves as they stood at the bar, most of them drifting to the music. Somebody near the back lit a couple of joints, and soon the room was permeated by the scent. Alice ordered another drink as the group left and Joe’s band took their place; she even took a stroll around the hall to see if she could find Ginny, but without success. She had just returned to her place by the stage when Ginny appeared – a slight, hesitant figure in a pale dress – and Alice beckoned to her to come and sit with her. The girl acknowledged her gesture with a nod, but made no movement to come across.
The lights dimmed, and the band went into the introduction to a slow, traditional song Alice knew well; it was a favourite of Joe’s, ‘The Dalesman’s Litany’. Joe had come to the front to sing, his bass around his neck, a single spotlight on his face. His voice was stronger than Alice remembered it, the northern accent still in evidence, but more mellow. She liked the change.
It’s hard when folks can’t find their work
Where they’ve been bred and born …
She reached the back of the hall, where a few latecomers were standing, holding cans. She scanned the darkness for Ginny. The spotlight was off now, the quiet mood of the music highlighted by soft green and blue filters which lit the faces of the audience with a drowned underwater glow.
When I was young I always thought
I’d bide ’midst roots and corn …
Ginny was waiting at the other side of the crowd; Alice could see her drowned-girl’s face, the livid dress, her hair black in the stage lights, eyes supernaturally huge.
But I’ve been forced to work in town
And here’s my litany …
For an instant Ginny looked at her; and perhaps it was the light, but it seemed to Alice that her tragic mouth curled in a rictus of such complex malevolence that it transfigured her entirely, illuminating her from within with a ghastly radiance, like radioactivity.
From Hull and Halifax and hell
Good Lord deliver me …
Then the expression was gone, and there was only Ginny, with her air of blank and almost simple-minded sweetness as she watched the stage. But whatever Alice had seen or imagined, it was enough to kill any desire to be near her; she lingered at the fringes of the audience, still holding her drink, and was it her imagination again, or had the atmosphere suddenly changed? Had that group of people standing by the door been there all the time? Had there been that subtle charge trembling at the edges of the hall?
The band had gone into a solo instrumental, the violin stretching, almost unbearably, through the registers, groaning and shrieking. It was too much for Alice. She felt stifled, drowning, spread-eagled in the cross-currents coming from the crowd and the stage. Instinctively, she began to move towards the door, where there was some room to breathe and to stand away from the audience. A few others must have had the same idea, for there was a little group of people watching the stage from the doorway: a girl with hair almost to her knees, outlined in neon from the EXIT sign, a youth with dyed red hair and a bird tattoo on his face, a blonde girl, her head laid confidingly on the red-haired lad’s shoulder, a man in a dark greatcoat, face in shadow.
Alice felt the hairs on her bare arms rise. The stance was familiar, arrogant and relaxed … so were the lights reflected from the metal tip of a motorcycle boot.
So what? she thought, half angrily, taking another step towards the door. There were dozens of men who looked like that. There was no reason to be so sure that it was Ginny’s friend of the night before. No reason to remember her dream, to suddenly feel the sting of sweat under her arms, in her throat. Another step … and suddenly their eyes were upon her, and the blonde lifted her head from the shoulder of her red-haired companion. But it wasn’t a girl. It was a young boy, spectrally fair, beautiful, disturbing. The redhead grinned at Alice, showing a gold tooth, beckoned … and Alice suddenly knew without doubt that behind their beauty was something corrupt. She pulled away, rejoined the crowd, and tried to concentrate on the music. But the spell was broken. Only the watchers behind her remained, thrilling the nape of her neck. The spectators around her seemed restless too, like a herd which scents the predator.
She glanced to her left and saw Ginny, closer now, almost by the door. As she watched, the group closed around her, protectively. Ginny lit a cigarette; the sweet smell of cannabis reached Alice across the hall over the hot reek of sweat and lager.
A voice behind her, raised angrily. A ripple ran through the audience, a shiver, like anticipation. She turned, saw an older man approach the little group of watchers at the door. She could not hear what he was saying, but saw his face, briefly, swollen with anger. He did not look strong, not beautiful with the beauty of these strange savage ones; he was balding, hiding the fact beneath a leather hat, long wispy hair trailing out from the back. To Alice he looked oddly vulnerable, half-drowned in the lights and his desperate rage. She heard no words, but saw the tall man smile, speak. Ginny stared, blankly. The man gestured wildly, turned, was engulfed into the crowd. Alice did not see the fight break out, but she saw the repercussions. First, a depression in the rising tide of people; a dimple of bowed heads. It exploded outwards, ripples moving towards the outside. Someone fell. The music faltered but did not stop; a woman screamed, the sound a flight of birds in the dark. A voice from the stage, its message through the PA lost in a squeal of feedback. She looked to the door; they were still there, untouchable, blank, but she could feel the power coming from them, the attraction and the amusement. She moved towards them, irresistibly, the crowd already beginning to push at her back. She saw a man fall in the crowd, shockingly close, saw another strike out, almost aimlessly, at a woman, who stumbled into the wall. The music stopped. Some instrument began to feed back on a high, unbearable frequency.
As if at a signal, the voice of the crowd was raised, ululating in a toneless music of its own. As Alice reached the door someone screamed. Someone threw a full glass at the stage. The glass exploded under the lights like fireworks. Someone shoved her hard in the small of the back and she was sent flying uncontrollably towards the man at the door. She felt his arms around her, holding her upright against the crowd’s undertow. He whispered something in her ear, something low and intimate. He smelt sweet, almost sugary, like candy-floss. His hands were cold, his breath cool against her face. For an interminable second, Alice was absurdly convinced that he was going to kiss her, and that in that moment she would die, but the knowledge was something abstract, someone else’s voice heard from under water. She was aware that she was about to pass out and tried to speak, but could not form words. She tilted helplessly into the rushing silence.
It was only a minute later, when she was safely outside, stretched out on the damp grass, looking up into the concerned face of a medic, that she remembered what the man had whispered in her ear.
The word was chosen.
One
I WAS ILL with fever for a long time; long enough for Rosemary to do her work, and more. For near to a fortnight I was ravaged by fever and by dreams of such potency that they left me gasping for a breath of reality, and while I raved and sweated out my fever I betrayed my friend Robert for the first time, leaving him alone with Rosemary. When I recovered it was too late.
My first inkling of it was when Mrs Brown came to give me my broth. I remembered her doing so at intervals during my illness, but in my mind she became confused with many people, and I had not yet been able to speak lucidly to her. But that day, I was feeling weak but clear-headed, and my first thought was of Rosemary.
‘Where is she?’ I asked Mrs Brown, between two mouthfuls of broth. ‘Is she all right? She hasn’t been ill?’
‘Now, now,’ scolded Mrs Brown. ‘Plenty of time for that later, my lad.’
‘Please!’ I begged. ‘Is she still here? You didn’t send her away?’
‘Mr Robert’s found her somewhere to live, so don’t you fret,’ answered
Mrs Brown.
That was the moment when I began to suspect what had gone on in those two weeks. But she would tell me nothing; all she cared about was to see me well again; as for the rest, that could wait until I was better prepared for it.
Robert did not come to see me; I assumed that Mrs Brown had told him that I must not be disturbed, and did not worry, but I missed Rosemary desperately, and I was anxious that she might attract criticism from Robert for her unwitting part in my illness. And so I continued to fret until the day the doctor told me I could leave my bed, and then I dressed, ignoring all protests from Mrs Brown that it was raining, that I was still not well; with my battered hat on my head and a crumpled woollen cravat around my sore throat I went off in search of my friend. He was not in his usual place; not in any of his usual places, and his lodging was shut. I tried all the coffee-shops, all the bars; I tried his tutors, who told me that they had not seen him for nearly a fortnight, and at last, I began to suspect that there was something wrong. Not that my suspicions were anywhere near the truth, but as I dragged my weariness and my anxiety through the drizzle and the greyness of the unchanging Cambridge streets I began to feel a sense of foreboding.
The mirage of Rosemary followed me everywhere; it was she I saw when a girl in a yellow scarf pushed past me through a gateway, she I saw sheltering under a bridge, she the face looking through a streaming window. And then, I really saw her. Walking with Robert down King’s Parade. Robert had his arm on hers, and was holding his umbrella over her, looking down at her so that I could see his profile; a smile on his aquiline countenance. She was wearing a raincoat several sizes too big, the large cuffs turned over her small hands, her hair tucked into the side of the collar so that I could see the white nape of her neck. I called, but the rain snatched away my words. I ran towards the two of them, splashing clumsily through the puddles, then I stopped. Rosemary turned towards Robert, her hands on the lapels of his coat. Then he kissed her, lightly, with the intimacy of long acquaintance. I froze, then he kissed her again, his arms tight around her, the umbrella slipping from his hand.
The world slipped with it.
I was close enough now to see the drops fall on to Rosemary’s raincoat. I stood there, speechless. Oh, Rosemary.
And then she turned, and looked right at me. I’m sure she did; she looked at me, and for a moment her eyes held me, the colour of rain … and I read humour there, and a cold contempt, and something like triumph. Oh, she knew, she knew all right; she knew I was watching, and all my thoughts and jealousies, all my life, she saw without pity and dismissed. She had Robert, and she had me, and knowing that, she turned away with him into the Cambridge rain, taking my innocence with her.
Two
ALICE WENT HOME feeling sick and exhausted. After the scene in the Corn Exchange, she had found Joe in confrontation with a police officer who was trying to persuade him to come to the station to give evidence. At the far side of a little group of stragglers and police, she could see him in the bright lights, shaking his head, turning away. The policeman tried to catch him by the arm; Joe shook him off abruptly. Another policeman, sensing trouble, took a step towards him, a fairground figure in the revolving lights of the departing ambulance.
Damn.
Alice knew Joe’s relationship with the police of old; he had a habit of picking quarrels at demonstrations, and had been taken in on several occasions, although Alice knew that he had never really meant to cause trouble. She supposed she would have to intervene before Joe hit someone, or got hit himself, and she ran out of the Corn Exchange doorway towards the little knot of people which had gathered around the cars. A dozen or so were standing around, though there was no sign of Ginny’s friends.
Joe turned when he heard her voice.
‘Thank God. Is Ginny with you?’
Alice shook her head.
‘Shit! Where the hell did she go? Where was she standing?’
‘Relax, Joe. She was right at the back of the hall, with some friends. She must have got out right away, and gone off with them. Don’t worry.’
‘What do you mean?’ His anger focused on Alice. ‘What friends? She doesn’t have friends.’
‘She did tonight,’ said Alice, with a glance at the policeman. ‘Look … she’s probably gone home, and I’ll find her waiting for me on the doorstep. There’s really no reason to worry about her. I’m sure she can look after herself.’
Joe didn’t look convinced. His mouth tightened in a stubborn expression.
‘I’ll take you home in the van,’ he said, then, turning to the policeman, continued. ‘So you see, I can’t help you. I didn’t see anything, anyway. I was on stage. The first I knew of it was when someone started throwing bottles. Sorry. OK?’
‘I’ll have to ask you to come with me, sir,’ answered the policeman (politely enough, though his patience seemed to be wearing thin). ‘It won’t be for long, but—’
‘Dammit, what’s with you? I told you …’ Joe took a deep breath and, with an effort, brought himself under control.
‘I’ll phone you to check that Ginny got back,’ he told Alice.
Alice gave him a quick smile.
‘Fine. And keep your temper, hey?’
‘I’m OK.’
She hoped he was.
The first thing she did when she got home was to make a pot of tea. The cats were imperious, demanding their food, and she opened a tin for them and mixed the fish with bread. There were biscuits in the cupboard, and she opened a packet and ate them, without hunger or pleasure, between swallows of tea until she began to feel the aftermath of the night’s events subside. Ginny hadn’t been waiting on the doorstep, but then again, Alice hadn’t for a minute imagined she would. Very likely she was still with her friends, the friends Joe didn’t know about. Alice found that she didn’t care. In fact, she thought as she sipped from her mug, the less she knew about Ginny the better. It was none of her business.
She put down the empty mug, reached out to switch on the gas fire beside her armchair … sat up. Just for a second, she imagined a movement out there in the night – a figure shifting into the darkness. She stood up. Nothing. It was probably her own reflection in the window. She reached up to pull down the blind … and hesitated. There it was again, that movement, part-furtive, part-mocking. Inviting her out to investigate.
Cautiously, Alice looked out, and saw two figures standing under the street-lamp. At once, Alice flinched back towards the kitchen, switching off the overhead light. Fear stapled her tongue to her mouth.
It was the man from the Corn Exchange. He was still wearing his greatcoat, collar turned up so that a wing of it hid part of his face. Alice could see long hair, tied loosely back and spilling over the collar below a pale, angular face with deep shadows at the eyes and cheekbones. He seemed to be looking straight at her, but she knew now that it was only an optical illusion caused by the shadowplay. His companion was the blond boy, and she could see his face clearly. He was thin and bony, with that graceful angularity peculiar to adolescent boys. Alice took him to be no older than sixteen, and his face, beneath a shock of bleached blond hair, was disturbingly feminine. Under a black leather bike jacket, Alice glimpsed a white T-shirt with the slogan DEATH OR GLORY printed on it, and was reminded of Ginny. He turned to the taller man, said something. The tall man shrugged, without taking his eyes from the window. The boy shivered, looked at the sky, pulled his jacket tighter. Maybe they were cold, thought Alice.
On the tail of that thought came another, at the same time compulsive and terrifying: Why not ask them in? That way she would find out who they were and their exact relationship to Ginny. Maybe she would find out what Ginny was hiding. She hesitated for a moment, then flipped on the light and opened the door. Light flooded out, on to the doorstep so that she could hardly see the two figures as they merged into the shadows.
‘Excuse me,’ she said to the darkness, ‘are you waiting for Ginny? I’m fairly sure she’ll be back soon; I thought she might have been
with you. You’re welcome to come in here and wait for her, if you like.’
For a moment, there was no answer, and Alice had the peculiar sensation that she was calling down a tunnel, with only the echoes of her own voice to answer her. Then two faces turned towards her from the dark.
‘We’re friends of Virginia.’ It was the tall man; his voice was quiet and cultured, unexpectedly so, given his bohemian appearance. As he stepped closer to the light, Alice noticed that he was older than she had first thought; the fine-boned face was lined, giving it a hard look, and the long hair was touched with grey.
‘Do come in,’ urged Alice. ‘Wait for her in the warm. I’ll make you coffee if you like.’
The door was wide, but the stranger made no move to go in. The boy stepped through the gate, lingered at the fringes of the light. There was a silence, rather too long for comfort, and Alice began to feel a little embarrassed. A little frightened. She shook herself. What possible harm could come to her here, in the light? In her own house? Cat poked her head through the door to see what was going on, then hissed furiously and fled back in.
Alice smiled, uneasily.
The blond boy grinned, exposing slightly uneven teeth.
‘Do come in,’ said Alice, once more. ‘It’s getting really cold out here.’
At once, as if they had only been waiting to be asked a third time, Ginny’s two friends came through the door into Alice’s living-room, bringing a draught in with them.
‘Pleased to meet you. I’m Alice,’ she said. ‘Are you old friends of Ginny’s?’
‘My name is Java,’ said the tall man with a smile. ‘My young companion is Rafe. Yes, we’re old friends.’ He smiled at the blond boy. ‘Very old friends.’
‘You’re a painter,’ he said. He looked at her. He nodded at the painting she had tacked to the cork noticeboard. ‘She looks like Virginia.’