The Ballroom (20 page)

Ella inched her hand towards Clem’s on the glass, till the edges of their little fingers touched. ‘That won’t be you, Clem. That can’t be you.’

‘But it might.’ Clem turned to her now. ‘What about John? Do you think about him? About how you can be with him?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘
Liar
.’ Clem lifted her hand and placed it down, trapping Ella’s own against the glass.
‘
You’re lying. Don’t lie.’

‘Yes. Yes, I do.’

‘I know you do. I know.’ Clem pressed harder. ‘
Listen
, Ella, listen to me. You should go to him. You should meet him.’

‘How?’ She tried to pull away, but Clem was gripping too tight. ‘How can I do that?’

‘You’ll find a way.’ Clem’s eyes were stretched wide, and a bright flush scalded the side of her neck. ‘You have to. It’s the Coronation next week. It’s Midsummer. We’ll be outside. You’ll be able to find a way to him then. Be with him. Taste him. Let him know he’s not alone.’

Ella stared at her hand, pressed in Clem’s, and felt a green wildness pass between them, the current of it loosed and dangerous, and she didn’t know if it was her, or Clem, or the letter, or the summer itself outside the walls that had conjured it first.

T
HE FOOTBALL PITCH
was chalked into long straight lines. John stood on one side of it, he and a thousand other men, penned in like cattle behind ropes, waiting, sweating in the heat. His shirt was plastered to his back, and they hadn’t even started moving yet. Every so often a light drizzle spattered the ground. The sun was only visible as a pale-grey disc behind the clouds.

Beside him, Dan was gripping the rope, practising for the pull. On his head he wore a great swathe of ivy fashioned into a crown, leaves taken from the sentinel oak twisted amongst it. ‘Midsummer’s Day,’ he had winked, as he put it on his head.

John kept his eyes on the baking field, waiting for the moment the women would appear.

A movement on the top of the small hill signalled their coming, then a great straggling line of them poured out of the asylum buildings, down the slope that led to the cricket grounds, and then across that expanse of grass, their attendants yelling, fanning them out so that they took their places behind a rope, on the other side of the football pitch, opposite the men. Their bodies were slightly hunched, their movements jerky and uncertain, as though unused to such things as space and sky. He thought he caught her briefly, walking with the tall, fair girl, until she was swallowed by the roiling crowd and hidden from view. He touched the edge of the letter in his pocket.

There will be many people there.

Perhaps we can meet then?

There was no chance now while the ropes were up, but later, when the games began, perhaps they might.

Beside him, Dan sent up a low whistle. ‘Here we go. Would you look at these jesters then?’

A clutch of the attendants was trooping over the grass in the wake of the women; they were dressed in costume and wearing a forced and jaunty air. Jim Brandt led the pack, dressed as a policeman, a truncheon in his hand. Others had their faces blackened and were wearing frizzy wigs. Clowns with little hats on the sides of their heads had costumes covered in red spots, drummer boys in full uniform beat the instruments that hung about their necks. There were Chinamen in pointed hats, men made to look like monkeys, and near to the back, Dr Fuller, in a strange mixture of a costume, wearing top hat and frock coat, his face made up as a clown’s, but dressed as a horse below, his bottom half clad in brown. Strange little-man legs flapped uselessly either side of the horse’s flanks as he walked.

A chorus of jeers and whistles went up from the men. ‘All right there, Doctor!’ Dan roared. ‘What have you come as then?’

‘Good afternoon, gentlemen!’ Fuller came to a stop before them; his make-up looked greasy already. ‘Happy Coronation Day!’ He lifted his top hat to them, showing hair stuck to his head with sweat. ‘Are we ready for our revels? A little Midsummer madness before our tea? I see you’re already anointed, Mr Riley?’

Dan rolled up his sleeves and threw his big arm out over the rope, hand outstretched in challenge. ‘Those fellas in London aren’t the only ones who get to wear a crown, eh, Doctor?’

Fuller ignored the hand, busying himself instead with his papers. ‘I see you two gentlemen are down for the tug of war. Let’s hope the rain holds off till then, eh?’

‘Aye.’ Dan’s hand curled into a fist. ‘Let’s hope so.’

As Fuller made his way down the line, Dan’s face changed. ‘That’s not a horse,’ he lobbed after him. ‘It’s an ass. The arse end of an ass.’

The men whooped at this. John saw Fuller pause before mustering his dignity and carrying on, making his way over to a high chair facing the grass and calling out names for the egg and spoon.

‘Midsummer.’ Dan turned to John. ‘Did they used to light bonfires in Ireland then,
chavo
? Midsummer’s Eve?’

‘Aye.’

‘He’d make a good Guy, wouldn’t he?’ Dan jerked his shoulder after Fuller. ‘To put on top of those fires?’

A shrill blast sounded on Fuller’s whistle and the games began, the first men picking their way out to take their places on the grass.

John’s gaze slid back over towards the women, and with a jolt he saw her – facing him at the edge of the crowd, her pale face steady and intent. The sky was lightening a little, and she tipped up her chin to receive a shaft of sun. His heart clenched at the sight; looking at her now, her face bright, he could not believe he had ever thought her funny-looking, could not believe he had ever thought her plain. She was beautiful. She blazed with it. He wanted to go to her, to climb over this rope and walk across the grass, while these idiots were prancing about in their costumes. Desire welled within him, a wave powering him forward, and he almost moved, before it broke in his chest and raked back across his belly, and he stayed where he was, shuddering in its wake.

‘All right there,
chavo
?’ A smile creased Dan’s brown face.

John ducked his head, rolling himself a cigarette. ‘Get to fuck, Riley,’ he said, ‘and give me a match.’

The rain did hold off, but barely, spitting sometimes but never falling with much force. There was no wind. It was as though they were all simmering under the great grey lid of the sky, like water almost brought to the boil. The afternoon rumbled on: race after race, and all of them as tame as children’s games. He would not have minded a game of hurley, throwing the ball and running, letting his body take him where it would, but this was nothing like it; this was being pushed and prodded and corralled into lines and whistles and races and no freedom at all.

He concentrated on her instead. Not letting her from his sight. It was not hard, as she stayed in the same place, always just across the grass, but as the afternoon stretched and sagged, he began to wonder if she was real; she seemed insubstantial somehow, in her paleness, as waves of heat rose from the earth and blurred her outline, a changing creature, made of water, not of flesh and blood. If he crossed the grass towards her, if he tried to touch her, would she slide through his fingers and be gone?

When the races had finished and the ground was dusty and the fag end of the afternoon only wanted a heel to put it out, it was time for the tug of war. Dan, who had been dozing on the patchy grass, launched himself up as soon as it was called, the general again now, beckoning the men he had chosen out of the pen, placing them into position on the rope, shuffling them like a deck of cards, muttering to himself.

John was the last to be placed, right at the front, facing Brandt.

‘I knew you’d have wanted to be here,
mio Capitane
,’ said Dan.

John gave a swift nod. Brandt was smirking over at him.

‘I’ll hold us steady,
mio Capitane
.’ Dan clasped John on the shoulder. ‘You at the front, me at the back. We’ll show them. We’ll show the bastards all right.’

Dan trotted back down the line, and once there wrapped the end of the rope three times around his body before taking up his place at the rear. He sent up a loud whistle to say he was ready.

The crowd had come to buzzing, chattering life. Dr Fuller waddled his horse into the middle of the field and held up a hand for silence. ‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he shouted, ‘on my whistle, the men will commence pulling.’

She was watching. He felt the knowledge of it lift his skin.

A memory filled him – playing hurley, or pitching on the crossroads, the women sitting in the fields beside the road, wrapped in their shawls, their red petticoats bright against the green grass, their high chatter like the sound of small birds. Every young man growing a little taller in the gaze of them.

A different sort of heat rose in him as the sinews of hemp grew taut in his hands.

Fuller stepped up to the middle of the rope. His makeup had melted and his mouth was an ugly, smeared gash. ‘The team who are the first to pull the first man from the other team, over
this
line,’ he bent to the ground, drawing a bright chalk mark on the browned grass, ‘will be declared the winner. Are you ready, men?’

Brandt nodded. John nodded. Fuller blew his whistle and stepped away. Immediately, John felt the pull from the other side. He leant backwards, as though into a strong wind.

‘
Allez
,
chavos!
’ Dan’s voice came from the back of the line, tight with the pull.

He dug his heels into the parched earth, the rope’s dry fibres twisting in his hands. His feet stumbled a little, and he was at such a low angle that for an awful second he feared he would fall, but he found his balance and stayed upright. His palms pricked then burnt. Sweat fell from his forehead, stinging and blinding him. He was leaning far, far back now. A stillness came over the pullers, the stillness of great effort, evenly matched. A stillness over the silent, watching crowd. The air taut now too. Little give on either side. Nothing in it.

‘
Allez, chavos!
’ A roar from Dan Riley ripped into the air. ‘
Pull now! Pull!
’

John grunted with effort, felt the rope move towards him, a little, a little further. Brandt’s smile was gone, his face was distorted with the pull, and John had him; he began to walk backwards, slowly, slowly backwards, and he was groaning, all of them were, lowing like cattle with the effort of it, and his forearms were bursting, but he felt the strength of the men behind him, felt Dan, although he could not see him, holding the back steady, and Brandt was coming closer to the line, grimacing, cursing with each step, a filthy black fish flapping its last, ready to be caught.

Something to laugh at.

Brandt was almost up to the white chalk line, and his face was the face of a man who had lost, but then there was a great shrill whistle from Fuller, and in the surprise John felt the rope yank from his hands, watched helplessly as it twitched and loosened like a living thing, and his hands were empty, and he was on the ground.

He scrambled to his feet. Brandt was moving towards the doctor, who had his hands over his head as though to shield himself from a blow. Then, after another quick blast from Fuller’s whistle, the doctor stretched his arm out towards the attendant’s team. ‘The staff are the winners!’

A great bellow came from the back of the line, and Dan barrelled past John, heading straight for Brandt.

John bent, gathering his breath. He cast his eyes towards the women, saw with a start that Ella had moved – that somehow, in the commotion, she had managed to break free of the women’s lines and was waiting by a stand of high fir trees curving close to where he stood. She was alone, not twenty feet from him. As he watched, she disappeared into the trees. His heart battered his chest. He turned from the mayhem, slowly at first, then covering the distance in great, gathering strides.

‘Mulligan!’ A shout came from behind him. ‘Stop! Stop now!’

He ignored the voice, carrying on until a blow halted him, clumsy and splayed across his shoulders.

‘Where do you think you are going?’

He turned, breathing hard. It was Fuller. The doctor was holding his hand to his chest as though it were painful, as though he himself was surprised by what he had done. ‘
Where do you think you are going?
’ The man’s voice was shrill. A vein pounded at his neck.

John stared at him. At his ridiculous make-up, half smudged, his horse’s head, heat sagged, drooping off to one side.

‘I need a piss,’ he said, and his voice was low and hoarse.

Fuller’s eyes bulged. ‘Excuse me?’

‘I need a piss.’ John gestured with his arm towards the clump of trees. ‘Would you want me to do it here on the grass instead?’

‘
No
,’ Fuller barked, his neck crimson. ‘No, I most certainly would not.’

John reached up and wiped his forehead with his cuff. Over by the tug of war, the patients were being rounded up by the attendants. Dan was still shouting. Brandt had his arm twisted up behind him. The afternoon was over. The bastards had cheated and won. Just as they would always cheat and win. The game was rigged from the first.

He glanced over at the trees but could no longer see her. His mouth felt sour, as though the bitter dregs of something were held there. He swallowed. He and Fuller seemed to be alone in the middle of this heat-scoured field. A strangeness hovering in the air between them. He recognized it, though he could not name it. ‘D’ye know what?’ John fumbled with his trousers. ‘It’s a fair way to those trees. I think I’ll do it here after all.’

He heard the shocked intake of the man’s breath. ‘
Mulligan
—’

But his piss cut the man off, ripping on to the thirsty ground, arcing and pooling between their feet.

‘Mulligan! I will not allow this.
Mr Mulligan! It is CORONATION DAY!
’

‘This is what I think of your rules.’ John was enjoying it now. ‘This is what I think of your
coronation.
And this is what I think of your
fucking
king.’ Hot piss splashed over the doctor’s boots.

Fuller stared down, panting, but still he did not move. It was as though some enchantment had rooted him to the spot.