I saw you for many days before I spoke to you. In those days you were always laughing. I sat at a table with my book, occasionally glancing up at the blue shirts of the vaporetto drivers. This was their café too, after all. They gathered here whenever they came off duty, shouting at the barmen for their ‘cappuccini’ and their ‘cornetti’ as they walked in through the door. You were there every morning; what you did or where you went afterwards was a mystery to me, but I was struck by the blueness of your eyes and your curly blonde hair among all the dark heads. Beyond us lay the lagoon, blue-green, grey, yellow-tinged, depending on the currents. I didn’t know this then, but the currents had different colours that changed several times a day in spring.
It was March when I first saw you; still cold but with a hint of the warmth that would come. I remember your long, slim leg, and your small foot balancing precariously in its red shoe. You were Italian, so of course you had no time for sitting. You simply knocked back your macchiato and then you went away again tossing your hair in the breeze. Across the water the sunlight fell on the island of San Michele, the island of the dead. Had I been the true child of my mother, had I remembered the warnings of my country, I would have taken this to be an omen of what was yet to come. But the East, and my troubled homeland, was a thing of the past. I had shed old habits like a lizard sheds its skin. In those days in Venice, I was full of expectations, thrilled by my own discoveries, like
any romantic foreigner. Only later would I discover how bored you were by all of it! But to start with, in those first weeks, I knew none of this. And so I watched you, day after day. In reality it was probably only a week before you spoke to me, joining me at my table. You, and Gianni, and Sara. All chatting, all laughing, talking to me in Italian.‘
Sei un studente?
’No, I said, I was writing a novel set in the Renaissance. At this you burst out laughing. A tricky subject, you said. After that I saw you every morning, either by chance or deliberately. I hoped it was the latter of course. Sometimes you were with your friends and sometimes you were alone. When you walked in, your eyes searched the bar, looking for me. Then, when you caught my eye, you pretended not to see me, but I knew, you were glad I was there.
I found out that you too were writing a book, on the sculptures of Ulysses. I found out you had lived mostly in Rome but that you were here for the spring. And that Gianni was in fact not your boyfriend. Somehow, in the days that followed, I saw a lot of you. We talked, we walked along the Lido, we ate together and finally, inevitably, I went back to your tiny flat, glowing with its art-nouveau lamps, its threadbare velvets, its warmth. And I knew then, this was serious. Afterwards, even years afterwards, after you died and all the flowers I placed on the pavement had been swept away by the road sweepers, still I could remember that first night with the utmost clarity. How could I have forgotten it now?
And so we continued, you and I. We had both loved others; we had both been disappointed. Maybe that was
the reason we felt so complete, together. Maybe that was why our lovemaking was so candid. At the time it was a revelation to me. You were almost as tall as me and as I peeled off the layers of your clothes, revealing the pale glow of your skin, the small mole on your back, the soft downy blonde hair at the entrance to your secret chamber, I knew that for you too, this time would be different. I lost myself in you after that, in the visceral perfume of our two bodies, and the small murmurings and gasps of our limbs together. Later, we both slept but it was I who woke first to stare at you, delighting in watching the innocence of your sleep. How was I to know that many years later you would look this way as you lay dying? Sleeping, not in my arms but alone on a hospital bed. With the same curl of eyelashes, the same fit of lips against each other. This time your eyes never opened. This time I knew I would never again see that flash of piercing blue. This time there would be no tomorrow.
Theo closed his exercise book. Memory was rushing towards him as though he was parachuting to the ground. He felt his life hung on a thread which at any moment might break. He felt the tension within the house stretch tightly around him. His body seemed to be weeping from an invisible wound. What was love but a memory? How could he have forgotten so much? He was aware that something else, something he could not quite grasp, fluttered vainly within him. But what it was he could not say. What more was there to remember? he wondered fearfully.
The intrusive roar continued for a moment longer and he realised a radio had been turned on in the next room. There had been a tragedy at Mannar, the voice intoned. Hundreds
were left to drown. Villages along the northern coast had been burnt down; women and children hacked to death. A British journalist, some foolish man in search of a human story, having strayed in through the security system, had his eyes plucked out. His captors had released a photograph of him. Appalled, Theo listened.
‘Ah,’ said Gerard, walking in, making him jump. ‘You’re up! Good, good. You’re on the mend. Soon you’ll be well enough to start working.’
‘Why am I here? When can I leave?’
Perhaps it was the unfamiliar sound of a foreign voice speaking English on the radio, but he felt some assertiveness, something he might have possessed in another life, return.
‘I told you, Theo,’ Gerard said easily, watching him, ‘you’re here for your own safety. Have you begun to remember what the Singhalese did to you yet? No? Well, I’m afraid we need to keep you out here for a while. Consider it a bit of a holiday, if you like, a chance for you to do some writing, to rest, get your memory back even. Don’t worry about it. And try to eat a little,’ he added, with all the appearance of friendliness.
W
HEREVER HE LOOKED
, R
OHAN SAW THE SEA.
Every time he thought of beginning to paint again, the sight of it distracted him. But when he looked closer it was the tropical waters of his home that he saw. The perversity of the human mind never failed to amaze him. He remembered the beach, whitewashed, picked clean, pared down and smooth, a strong breeze scuffing the waves. The water had always looked benign enough, but underneath there were shark-toothed currents lurking. He knew those currents well enough to know that they could pull a man under in seconds. He tried to imagine the catamarans, hide-grey and rotten, half buried in the sand. Husks from long ago, withered and crumbling, was how he recalled them from this distance. Like his life, he thought, staring into space. If he were honest, if he allowed himself a moment’s truth, away from Giulia’s anxious eyes, this was what he believed. And the beach that Rohan saw was always empty. No one fished in that sea any more. No fishermen lifted their boats up and along the sands. The small, dark-limbed urchin boys who had played there no longer filled the landscape, and the sea and the sky
belonged only to his dreams. I must paint it, he thought, daily. But he was too apathetic to do anything.
They had been in Venice for several months and had returned to the old routine of crossing and recrossing the bridges every day, on trips to the fish market, to the bar, to an old favourite restaurant. For hadn’t they lived here together, once, long ago? At first the relief on reaching Venice had outweighed everything else. Sorrow was to come slowly. So at first Giulia was glad. She was glad to be back in an ordered world again. Putting the water on to boil for the pasta, making the
sugo
of tomatoes, delighting in the fragrant perfume of basil plants. Yes, she was glad of all these things. But then she saw, something had happened to them both.
On their arrival, desperate to meet up with the girl, they wrote several letters. They had brought her paintings and her notebooks with them and they wrote, giving their new address, telling her they longed to see her again, telling her they had talked about nothing else. At first, they hadn’t worried when there was no reply. Rohan had tried phoning the doctor to find out if he had heard from her. But as usual the line was dead.
Unpacking their luggage, they reread her letters more carefully, now that they had time on their hands. The letters felt old, as though they had been written in another life. They were full of other time zones.
Jim has found me a room in a house. Here is the address. There are five other people living here but I never see them. It is dark and very cold. Next week, Jim’s friend has promised to get me a job. The money you gave me will be enough for the moment but soon I will have to find some work. Jim’s friend says there is a newsagent nearby where I can work. I am very tired all the time. But at least
because I am so exhausted I can sleep and that helps to numb the pain. Only sleep releases me.
Reading the letters from this distance made them uneasy. There were things that had slipped their notice before.
‘Oh God, Rohan, it’s much worse than we realised,’ Giulia said urgently. ‘We
must
find her.’
‘Sure, sure,’ he agreed. ‘She’ll write, don’t worry. We are her only real family now. Her brother is a useless fellow.’
‘She’s young. She should meet someone else,’ said Giulia, ‘make another life.’
And Rohan had agreed again, although he been less certain. He too looked at the letters once more, with fresh eyes.
Yesterday, I was staring out of my window at some yellow flowers in the garden next door. Something, the old habit I suppose, made me want to draw them. Without thinking, I found a pencil and some paper. I began to draw quite fast, not taking my eyes off the flowers, but my mind must have been somewhere else. And then to my horror I saw that I had been drawing his face again. From memory, as I used to. Do you remember?
Months passed and their uneasiness grew. Why had she not responded? In all they had written six letters and all of them remained unanswered. Giulia’s distress had grown, so that, really anxious now, Rohan booked two flights to London.
‘Wait,’ he calmed her, ‘we’ll go over and find her. We’ll be able to speak freely then. Things will become clearer, you’ll see,’ he promised.
So they had packed up Nulani’s paintings and put the notebooks into a small bag and left with a confidence that would
astonish them afterwards. They had no telephone number for her, just an address. Perhaps, reflected Giulia with hindsight, that was when things in their own life began to fall apart.
For London was not as they remembered. And the house where the girl had lived was full of new tenants. Bills and circulars sat together in the letter box, but their own letters were not among them. No, they were told, there’s no one of that name here.
‘Sorry,’ said the lodger shivering at the entrance, ‘I can’t help you, I’m afraid. Never heard of her. Try the next house.’
They took the tube to Kensington and walked the street where the Samarajeevas had once lived. There was a new owner in the top flat. A new name on the bell, curtains at the window. The woman who opened the front door looked at them in surprise. What had they wanted? They could not for the life of them say. Giulia shook her head, confused. Rohan apologised, hurriedly. They must have got the wrong address. What had possessed them to knock on
that
door? After that, they looked in the telephone directory. But what name did they want? Samarajeeva? Mendis? Passing the place where Anna had been murdered, they saw, without comment, the unmarked, flowerless pavement. Time had passed with steady inevitability and they took what comfort they could from this fact. London traffic moved with swift indifference all around. They felt small, angry, gagged. Then, silently, for what else was there to do, they took the plane back to Venice.
Depression enveloped them, and gradually, Giulia saw that this was the price they had paid. Rohan changed. Slowly, like the tide submerging the beach, Rohan began to drown. He became morose and irritable. Giulia did not like to dwell on it, but leaving Sri Lanka had broken him in a way that she had been unprepared for. She feared the worst. She feared he would
never paint again. And she noticed he was for ever cold. Even in that first high summer, when Venice overflowed with humidity, even then, she saw, he hated the climate.
She
had come home but Rohan was somewhere else. Every time she delighted in her native tongue she felt his loss keenly. He had escaped with his life but other things had been lost instead. Something had severed his spirit, broken his determination and cast him adrift. And now a strong current was taking him away from her. Helplessly, unable to follow, she watched as he stared out across the Adriatic Sea. She knew it was some other stretch of water that he longed for. Guilt cemented their relationship where once there had been love. Guilt served to make matters worse. And although the Lido filled with the sound of children’s laughter, still he complained, there was not a single conch shell to be found on the beach. However beautiful it was, still this was not his home. Giulia said nothing.
One day she caught him looking through the girl’s notebooks.
‘Let me see,’ she said eagerly, wanting to break the silence, longing to talk.
They had never mentioned their failed trip to London. It had joined all the other untouchable subjects.
‘Look,’ he said grudgingly. ‘All she had were crude graphite sticks, but look at the line of his hand.’
‘Theo was all she ever wanted to draw,’ said Giulia sadly.
‘She’s a better painter than I could ever be.’
He would not have it otherwise. There was nothing she could do. He simply said he could no longer paint.
‘Perhaps when I’ve settled in this place,’ he said restlessly.
But how can he settle, Giulia worried, if he never paints? All around, the lagoon reflected the milky sky. They were surrounded by light, surrounded by safety. There was no curfew. What more
do I want? thought Rohan impatiently, trying to shake this sickness off.
‘Maybe she lost our address?’ Giulia said. ‘Or maybe she’s busy now and wants to forget.’
It was possible. But they both knew she was not the sort of girl to forget. And the lurking fear, the unspoken horror, that she might have ended her life finally, added to their guilt.
The year turned. Spring tides came and went and the swallows departed, leaving the city to its storms of mosquitoes.
‘Just like home,’ murmured Rohan, knowing it was not.
That spring they gave up hoping for news, waiting for the letter that never came. Nulani Mendis is a thing of the past, Giulia chided herself sternly. We must learn to live with only our memories. And she cooked fresh fish for Rohan in the way she used to, in Colombo, serving it with hot rice and chilli, hoping to bring some small comfort to him. Meanwhile, he began to go for long walks on the Lido. He wanted to listen to the mewing seagulls, he told Giulia. He wanted to be alone, he said, to think. And Giulia took some comfort in this, hoping his solitude might inspire him to paint again.
The weather changed and it began to rain at night. After days of silence, the rain fell in persistent folds, not like tropical rain at all, but gently, lingeringly. Theo lay awake listening to it. Once he slept all the time, but since he had begun to write things down, sleep eluded him. Often he would remain awake until dawn, thinking, or scribbling in his exercise book, and then falling into an uneasy sleep as the light appeared. He felt safer that way. His memory was returning slowly. A few nights previously he had remembered the post-mortem after Anna’s death. She had been pregnant, he remembered.
His memory had come with the rain. Lying on his bed
listening to the house breathe and creak, listening to the heavy drip of water, he longed for some kind of peace. For although his wounds were healing, the tension within him was increasing. He had been here for months. Gerard continued to visit. But the visits had become less friendly. Gerard watched him with open hostility. Instead of asking after his health, instead of bringing him newspapers to read, he had only one question now.
‘You did a good job for the Tamils with
Tiger Lily
. You’re a local hero, you know. So when are you going to start your next book about our plight?’
Yesterday, annoyed at Theo’s continuing silence, Gerard had asked to see his exercise book.
‘There’s nothing in it to interest you,’ Theo had said. ‘Just things about my wife.’
‘Now, you listen to me,’ Gerard had threatened, flinging the book across the room. He advanced towards Theo who’d shrunk. ‘You are trying my patience a little too much. I don’t care about your precious memory loss. I’m not interested in your deceased wife. If you want to leave this place alive, if you have any hope for the future, then you are going to have start working fast. D’you understand?’ He had paused. And lowered his voice.
‘Start with something small.’ he said quietly. ‘Write me an article for a British newspaper. About the things the Singhalese bastards have done to us. Something with your name attached to it. Forget about your damn memory. I’m trying to help you, Theo, but if you refuse to cooperate, I’m afraid you’ll be removed. Understand? Things will be out of my control then.’
Theo had broken out in a sweat. Gerard stared at him.
‘If you can write another book,’ he said at last, reasonably, breathing deeply, ‘if you can contact your publishers we’ll be able to let you go. If not…’ His voice trailed off.
So he knew now. But what could he write about. That night he lay awake, terrified, imagining metal hooks were screwed into the walls above his bed. Finally, Theo slept fitfully. Then towards dawn something woke him. A sentence was repeating itself in his head.
‘
Now that there are no priests or philosophers left, artists are the most important people in the world. That is the only thing that interests me.
’
And then suddenly, as the dawn light filled the sky, he knew. As though he were retrieving a lost language, he saw them. Rohan and Giulia, standing grey-black in the rain. Coffin-rain, made for the dead. Astonished, he thought, But how could I have forgotten them? Unravelling their names from the tangle of forgotten things, he saw Giulia against a waterlogged sky, wintry and far away. Because there was no one to share his new discovery with, he paced the floor of his room. The Tamil woman, hearing his footsteps came in, curious to see what he was doing.
‘I’ve remembered something else,’ he shouted. But his excitement was tempered with fear. ‘What else is there?’ he cried, forgetting the woman did not understand.
Outside, the upcountry rain, which had held off in the night, began falling again. It brought with it the faint smell of tea bushes and blossom. Sharp bird calls stabbed the air, and dark clouds hid the trees.
Giulia had not meant to spy on him. At least that was what she told herself later. She had been on her way to the fish market when she had decided to take a boat out to the Lido instead. The foolishness of it did not strike her until afterwards, but by then it was too late and she had seen Rohan. He was not walking on the beach and he was not alone. She stared mesmerised,
uncaring that he might look up and notice her. Rohan was laughing. At least, it seemed that way to Giulia from where she stood, drinking her coffee. The woman looked vaguely familiar. As her heart constricted with a sharp stab of betrayal, Giulia saw Rohan reach over and light the woman’s cigarette. Then he lit one for himself. But he’s given up smoking, thought Giulia, bewildered. And she flushed with pain. Moving closer, she searched Rohan’s face. It appeared as that of a stranger. What is it? she thought. What is he laughing about? She could not remember the last time she had seen him laugh. And try as she might she could not see happiness in his face.
Back in their flat, she opened the suitcase with Nulani’s things in it and looked at them. All the small, useless tokens they had brought for her lay untouched, along with the letters she had sent. Some bangles, a lime-green skirt, neatly folded, a bottle of cheap perfume. The sum of a life. There were a few photographs of Theo, one of Theo with Anna, and another one of Nulani’s brother Jim. Giulia stared at them. Suddenly she began to weep, thick heavy sobs.