The Green Knight (37 page)

‘So he wouldn't see you? And you even suggested bringing me!'

‘Yes. I still hope to bring you to him.'

‘You forget that I am Jewish.'

‘Peter, what on earth does that matter! All salvation is in some way the same.'

‘I think you mean that all religions are in some way the same, which is far from being the case.'

‘All right, never mind. I just thought you, we, might be helped by a man who has lived for so many years alone with God.'

Bellamy and Peter were once again sitting in The Castle. Bellamy was once again drinking lager. It was the morning after the party. On the previous day, after Lucas had laughingly refused to let Bellamy be his bodyguard, and had sent him away, Bellamy had sat in his room wondering if after all he
would
go to the party, even though it would upset Anax, and even though he didn't like that party with its noise and merriment and masks and dancing (Bellamy couldn't dance) and screams of laughter and the youthful gaiety of children. He had not enjoyed it last year. Of course he did not go, he sat thinking miserably about things which Peter had said. Something must be done. He did not even know where Peter lived, no one seemed to know where he lived. He was not in the telephone book. He ate no lunch but went out in the afternoon and bought some sandwiches. He went round to the house where the young Catholic priest lived but he was not there. When he returned to his room he discovered Father Damien's latest letter. He stood reading it, then stood thinking about it, looking at the dirty window pane and the half-closed curtains. Then he sat on his bed and ate two sandwiches. Then he read it again, together with two previous letters. As it had become dark he pulled the curtains. Roars of laughter came from the Pakistani family in the flat upstairs. The taciturn elderly man on the second floor had moved out. Bellamy felt guilty for not having made serious attempts to befriend him. Where was he now? He ate another sandwich, but it was already stale. A sense of futility and nullity came quietly to him like a mist. He boiled some water and filled his hot-water bottle. He had intended to give up sleeping-pills, but took two pills and went to bed. When he woke in daylight his watch had stopped. He noticed that since he had gone to bed in his clothes he did not have to dress. He fed the electric fire and made some toast but there was no butter. He read the terrible letters again. He decided to go out to get some food and ring up Clement. But instead he sat hunched up on his bed. He found himself saying aloud ‘Spingle-spangle'. Then he decided to go to The Castle just in case.

By daylight, there was even a little mild sunlight, The Castle looked less stark and metallic, less positively weightless and spherical, less like a spaceship. It was certainly small, but Bellamy now noticed, which he had not noticed on the first occasion, that there were little shallow alcoves, saucer-like depressions, in one of which he and Peter were sitting, set in a neat semi-circle. Perhaps it was like a little theatre, or a tiny chapel, where the bar took the place of the stage, or the chancel, and the landlord (for he clearly was the landlord) that of the actor or the priest, as he stood there with his arms stretched out and his large hands gripping the counter, gazing with benign inquisitive satisfaction upon his clientele (or spectators or sinners). There were a few small tables in the central space, but those were empty. The alcoves were different colours, the one occupied (as on the previous occasion) by Peter and Bellamy was green. A few customers were occupying the other alcoves and talking in low tones, thus adding to the ecclesiastical atmosphere. Bellamy and Peter also spoke quietly. Bellamy wondered what time it was.

‘What time is it? How wonderful that you arrived just after I came!'

‘Nearly twelve. No, no. Ascetics are not saints, they are just as likely to be madmen seeking for magic power or miserable remorseful wretches with a spite against the world. It is more likely that
you
could help
him.
That is what he wants to conceal! Why don't you stop playing at destitution?'

‘Please – '

‘I am sorry. You have intruded upon my troubles and must take the consequences. You know that I have lost something. There is something, perhaps the most important thing of all, which I have forgotten.'

‘Is it a good thing or a bad thing?'

‘I don't know! If I knew – anyway it has got to be finished.'

‘You mean about Lucas?'

‘And then there are the women.'

‘Is what you have forgotten something about a woman?'

‘I tell you, I don't know! I mean there are
those
women.'

‘Yes, and surely for their sakes – '

‘You know nothing about hatred. There is an old maxim, let your enemy think he can escape, cornered he will fight to the death, fleeing he may be cut down – let him think he has an alternative to death.'

‘These are evil thoughts. Can you not kill these thoughts?'

‘They say a murderer returns to the place of his crime.'

‘There was no murder.'

‘And where a murder has been committed – something remains.'

‘You mean something evil?'

‘I feel if I returned to the place where I lost my memory I might regain it.'

‘Well, I would go with you.'

‘Let it all happen again.'

‘Perhaps as a sort of rite of purification, like a sort of redemption – perhaps something like this cured some of your patients?'

‘We could re-enact the scene!'

‘You mean by doing it again, miming it, to disperse, to melt away all your anger and your hate? Surely you mean it like that? Oh please let it be like that! Peter, can't you just
forgive
him.
Forgive
him and then everything will be well. And
then
you will find out – '

‘For me, nothing can ever be well again. If he were kneeling in front of me, I'd kick his eyes out.'

‘But it wasn't his fault, it was a mistake, it was an
accident
.'

‘There was no accident. That man was about to kill his brother. He killed me instead. I have given my life for that brother. Justice must be done.'

‘But no one else was there! You had a dream and you wanted to tell it.'

‘Go to your friend the younger brother, go and ask him, ask him to tell you the truth. There must be a final solution. I must damage him as he has damaged me. I want to maim and cripple him as he has maimed and crippled me. All the evil of that blow has entered into me. Now he must pay. I invoke blind justice with her sword and scales. It has got to be finished even if it comes to pistol shots. Wickedness must be punished. Nothing will bring me peace except revenge.'

‘Peter, please be quiet and don't talk in this mad awful way. You are trapped by hideous thoughts and dreams, if you could only put them away and show forgiveness and mercy, you could heal yourself, you could set yourself free, you could set us all free. Perhaps that
could
happen if we returned to that place.
Think
about it. You have this great power. You could enact a miracle.'

‘So you still imagine I am an angel?'

‘I am certain of it. You are a good angel. This is what you
have
to be. And something in your soul knows it.'

‘By the way, did they tell you about Anax?'

‘No, what?'

‘He got lost and I found him. I happened to meet him.'

‘That's
a miracle. I knew you could do them! You sent out a signal and he came to you! He perceived your goodness! There you are! You must believe in your good powers!'

‘I charm only the innocent. That's not much good.'

‘Peter, I'm sorry, but I am terribly hungry.'

‘Well, let us eat. And, if we can, talk about other things. I went to that party.'

‘To the birthday party? So they invited you – that's wonderful!'

‘Yes, after I found the dog they had to!'

‘And did you talk to Clement?'

‘Yes.'

‘I'm so glad!'

 

 

 

 

Breakfast at Clifton was no formal feast, no sitting down together with a blessing implied or otherwise. Moy, waking at six from deep sleep, would dress, descend, let Anax out into the garden, drink some milk and eat some oats, return to her bedroom, make her bed and lie upon it supine open-eyed for half an hour. This was known as Moy's ‘White Time' when she planned her working day or allowed her soul to leave her body; after which, usually, she would set ferociously to work. Sefton rose almost as early, made some tea, ate some toast, and listened to the seven o'clock news; then, except in darkest winter, went into the garden for some brief gardening. Moy fed the birds and stroked the trees, but Sefton tended the plants and mowed the lawn. (There were two small trees, planted after arrival at Clifton, a laburnum and a Japanese maple.) As Sefton was returning to her books Aleph, in dressing-gown, was making her way to her bath. Neither Moy nor Sefton cared much about baths. By this time Louise, who preferred an evening bath, was occupying the kitchen and boiling an egg. Aleph's breakfast came later and lasted until after the eight o'clock news. Louise, when the kitchen was empty again, did the washing up, which Sefton allowed her to do at this time of day only. Sefton did not like the washing-up machine, which was now rarely used. Louise listened anxiously to the movements of the girls, plotting their soft-footed whereabouts. She had come to feel almost in awe of meeting them early in the morning. They had become, year by year, month by month, mysterious to her, her love for them an extended pain, a web or field of force, of which she felt at times the almost breaking tension.

The post, if any, arrived about nine o'clock. On the day in question, which happened to be a Saturday, four days after the birthday party, Louise and Aleph were in the Aviary discussing Aleph's forthcoming holiday with Rosemary Adwarden. Moy, her ‘White Time' over, had washed her very long hair and was drying it beside the electric fire in her bedroom, teasing out the damp strands between her fingers. Her blonde hair had red streaks here and there. Sefton's brown hair also admitted many lines of red. Louise spoke of Teddy's ‘Viking look'. Anax, let in from the garden by Sefton, raced up the stairs, his claws clicking on the linoleum, and scratched at Moy's door. She rose to let him in and received his leaping and pawing ecstasy as if they had not met for days. Has he forgotten, she wondered. No, it was not possible. Sefton, sitting on the floor in her little room beside the kitchen, was wondering what would have happened if, when Isabella and Mortimer had murdered Edward II, they had also had the nerve to murder his young son Edward III. Perhaps the Hundred Years War would not have occurred?

The front doorbell rang, Sefton jumped up and opened the door, it was the postman. He handed over a letter to Aleph from Rosemary Adwarden (Sefton recognised Rosemary's daft writing) and three packets sealed up in brown paper. She took all these into the kitchen and put them on the table. She noticed with surprise that one of the packets was addressed to herself. Sefton did not often receive packages by post. She then noticed that the other two were addressed to Moy and Aleph respectively, and that the writing upon these packages was the same. She hesitated, was about to call out, when curiosity overcame her and, with the help of a kitchen knife, for it was well sealed, she prised open her package. Inside the brown paper there was tissue paper, and inside the tissue paper was a shiny cardboard box, and inside the box was an amber necklace. She drew it out. Sefton possessed no jewellery except for a string of wooden beads which Moy had made for her. She knew at once that the necklace which she held in her hand was no common thing but something grand, composed of glowing faintly transparent light brown amber, with little silver pearl-like beads here and there between the pieces making a pattern, the necklace joining into a single string weighted at the end by a pendent drop of larger even more glowing amber, lightly carved and warm to the touch. She held it up for a moment, then searched the packaging for a note or message. There was none. She carried the necklace into her bedroom and for a moment put it round her neck. There was no mirror, and she hastily took it off again and thrust it into the pocket of her corduroy jacket. Her swift mind had of course at once penetrated the mystery. She ran out to the foot of the stairs and called the others, ‘Post! Presents!'

Aleph and Louise appeared, then Moy, bundling her still damp hair into a thick rope, twisting the rope round and round upon the nape of her neck and securing it with an elastic band. Sefton watched. After interested exclamations about the two packets Louise put the kettle on, Aleph sat down at the table and started reading Rosemary's letter. Moy, deftly using the sharp knife, cut through the thick sealing tape and undid the brown paper. She looked at the writing on it. ‘What odd writing, it looks foreign, who can it be from? Look, Aleph has one too.' She undid the tissue paper, and opened the box, Sefton already standing behind her to view the contents. There was a blue necklace inside. Moy, now silent, drew it out. Louise turned, Aleph looked up. Louise said, ‘What is it?' Moy said, ‘It's lapis lazuli.' ‘Oh, heavens – but who's it from?' Moy said, ‘It's from Peter.' She sat down at the table beside Aleph. ‘Peter – oh you mean – ' ‘Yes.' ‘How do you know, is there a message?' ‘No.' ‘Of course, it's a birthday present, how kind! But it must be very expensive.' ‘Well, he's rich, isn't he,' said Aleph, putting away her letter.

Moy, sitting motionless, stared at the necklace which she had put down, spilling out of its box.

Louise said, ‘Oh – Moy – ' She sat down beside Moy, gazing at her. Moy turned to her and smiled and put her hand affectionately upon her mother's arm, seeking the wrist beyond the cuff.