Long Lankin: Stories

A Death

They lowered the coffin into the grave, and Stephen turned away his face. He watched idly a small, fat man who moved with curious stealth along the perimeter of the dark yew trees. Far in the distance the sea was swollen and rough, and dotted with flecks of white. A cold wind came from the north, carrying with it a few small drops of rain. The little man had halted, and now stood motionless against the restless trees, staring fixedly across the headstones at the bedraggled groups of mourners. Stephen looked back to the grave. They were watching him, he tried to weep, but he had no tears. Beside him Alice sobbed, and that seemed ironic. She had hated the old man. He frightened her, or so she said.

The ceremony ended and they moved away from the grave.

— How do you feel? Alice asked. Are you all right?

— Yes. Fine. I’m glad it’s over now.

He put his arm around her shoulders as she stumbled through the thick damp grass. She had not even yet become accustomed to her pregnancy. The wind blew in the trees and rattled the branches as if they were hung with bones. He shivered, and said:

— Let’s get out of this place.

They began to walk faster, but when they came to the main path Alice’s steps faltered, and she hung back, murmuring:

— O my God …

He looked where she was looking, and saw coming toward them the fat little man who had stood in the trees behind the grave. He wore a dusty black overcoat that reached well past his knees. His head was completely bald, and on the back of it a hat, too small for him, sat crookedly. As he hurried along on his little legs he cast frightened glances to right and left. He stopped before them and leaned close with an air of conspiracy. The rain was releasing from his coat a dull faint smell.

— Stephen, he breathed. My sympathy.

Stephen took the offered hand and glanced uneasily at his wife. She stood with downcast eyes, tightly clutching her gloves.

— Such a wonderful old person, Stephen, the little man said, gazing up at him with intense bright eyes. As you know, I knew him well and it was such a shock to see him go like that so suddenly. Dear me, such a shock. Indeed yes.

— I’m sorry, Stephen said. I don’t seem to remember —

— Come, the little man interrupted him. I’ll walk with you to your car.

He stepped between them with a neat little hop. With protection now on either side of him he lost his furtive air. Stephen looked over the top of the bald pate between them at his wife, signalling frantically with his eyes, but she would not look at him. The little man said:

— You know, sometimes I feel that a whole race is passing. Certainly, Stephen, your father is an example. Not just a generation mind, but, yes, a whole race. Don’t you agree?

Stephen said nothing, and the little man turned to the wife.

— Don’t you agree with me, Alice?

She stared at him in fright and said:

— What? Yes. O yes.

Stephen glanced at her, but she had retreated again, her hand to her mouth.

— Ah yes, a whole race, the little man said with satisfaction. It will be a great loss when they are all gone. What has this new generation to offer the world? Only the fruits of their fear.

After a little silence Stephen said stiffly:

— I don’t see how the world can be made any worse.

The little man looked up at him from under his eyebrows, slyly smiling.

— But there are so many new evils, he said softly.

Stephen coughed.

— Surely there are no new ones.

But the little man was gazing away out at the ugly sea, lost in thought. Suddenly he started.

— What say? Pardon?

— I said — I said surely there are no new evils. You said—

— Ah yes yes yes. We’re told there can be nothing new, yes, but look at the things that have happened these last few years. Terrible. Terrible indeed. Sometimes I think that — that — what was I saying?

He was becoming agitated, and was looking about him again in fear. Stephen watched him with puzzled eyes. He went on:

— There is a new brand of despair in the world. The old ways are dying, and the old religion too. When people turn their backs on God what can they expect? What can they expect, I say?

He looked at them with his bright, troubled eyes.

— I know, he said. I turned my back on God. I wanted to serve him. The call was there, the call to serve, but I told myself it led to death. I was proud and now I have nothing.

They reached the car.

— I have nothing left.

Stephen opened the door for his wife and she got hurriedly inside.

— Without God nothing. Do you hear me?

He put his hand on Stephen’s arm, and Stephen tried to push it away, but the fat little fingers held him.

— Do you know what I’m talking about, do you? Have you seen the terror and felt the angel of death brush your face with his wing? Have you?

His eyes were wide now with a fixed stare, and there were spots of white on his mouth. Stephen said with difficulty, looking anxiously to see if the people in the other cars were watching:

— Look, I don’t know who you are.

— Have you seen it, I say? Have you?

— Listen …

— Admit it. Admit that everywhere you look is desolation. The hand of a spurned god has touched the world and still we ignore it. I tell you, that same hand will touch us with only death unless we —

— Let go of my arm.

— Admit it. Only admit it.

— You’re mad.

Abruptly the little man relaxed, and the brightness went from his eyes. It was as though he had been awaiting this accusation. Quietly he said:

— Mad. Indeed. I saw the horror and the desolation but I would not call it by its name. I had no courage or not enough. If I’m mad it’s that failure that drove me to it. But you. You could if you chose, you could —

— Shut up, Stephen cried. Shut your mouth you old fool and get away from me. Get away.

He pushed the little man off, and his ill-fitting hat slipped from his head and rolled in the gravel. He came back again, his finger outstretched, his lips wet. Stephen got into the car and slammed the door. While he started the engine the little man came near and pressed his face against the window. He stared at them silently with his burning eyes. Stephen forced the gears, and the tyres screamed as the car fled away down the drive.

They came to the road that led to the village. Stephen was shaking and he said between his teeth:

— Madman. Jesus.

Alice said nothing, and he turned and looked at her sharply. He asked:

— Who was he?

She shrugged her shoulders.

— But you knew him, he said.

— What makes you think that?

— You recognized him, he insisted. You stopped on the path when you saw him coming.

— Does that mean I knew him? she asked, regarding him calmly.

Stephen was confused. He looked out at the road and muttered:

— He knew us. He knew our names. Who the hell was he? This is a small place, I grew up here. I should know him.

For a time there was silence, and then he muttered:

— These bloody lunatics should all be locked up.

— He was sad.

— Sad? Sad? He was a lunatic.

— But he was still sad. Why are you so cruel?

— Cruel, you say? Did you hear the things he said to me? Don’t talk rot.

— I’m not talking rot.

— He was a complete head-case and it was obvious to everyone but you. Did you see how no one would come near us when they saw him there? Did you see that? Yes. They bloody well knew, but of course Alice with her gentility and kindness would say nothing but just stand there and let me walk right into it like a fool. Jesus.

— O stop it, for god’s sake. I told you I didn’t know him.

She covered her ears and began to rock back and forth in her seat. He said:

— I’m sorry.

— That’s all you can ever say.

He cast agonized eyes at the roof.

— Jesus, Alice, don’t start. It’s been a rough day and I’ve had all I can take. Please don’t start.

She sat upright and rubbed her eyes. Lighting a cigarette she said:

— We started long ago.

— Alice …

— Leave me alone.

Beside him the evening fields flowed silently, swiftly past. The day was fading now, and the trees were full of darkness.

— Do you want to go home tonight? he asked, and tried to make it sound like an apology.

— I don’t mind.

Her voice was cold, and held a world of weariness. He made a noise with his teeth and said:

— I was going to write a book one time. Did you know that?

She looked at him in surprise.

— No, I didn’t.

He laughed.

— O yes, I was going to write a book. A love story. The story of Stephen and Alice who thought that love would last forever. And when they found that it wouldn’t or at least that it changed so much that they couldn’t recognize it anymore, the blow was too heavy. They retreated into themselves like rabbits into a burrow.

He stopped, and she sighed.

— You’re too cruel, she murmured. Too cruel.

When they came into the kitchen Lilian was by the table, bent over a cup of tea. She did not look at them. Stephen watched her, his only sister, as he took off his scarf and gloves. She was growing old, there were wrinkles at the corners of her eyes, and grey in her hair. The old man’s death had wounded her deeply. Now she would have no one to care for and bully in her ineffectual way.

— Is there any tea? Alice asked, struggling out of her coat. She blew her nose.

— In the pot, Lilian answered, lifting a listless hand.

Stephen left the room and the two women together in their silence. He was washing his hands in the bathroom when Alice tapped on the door.

— Steve, I’m going to lie down for a while. I’m tired.

— Yes. A rest will do you good. You’ll have to take it easy now until the baby comes.

She leaned against the door, pale and drab, running a damp knotted handkerchief through her fingers.

— I think we’ll go back tonight, she said.

— Are you sure you’re up to it?

— Maybe you’re right. It’s been a long day.

— We’ll wait until morning, then.

— Yes.

When she had gone he went down again to the kitchen. Lilian was standing by the sink. She looked at him and opened her mouth to speak, but instead she looked away.

— Alice looks pale, she said after a moment.

— Yes. She’s tired. This has all been a strain on her.

— On all of us.

— Yes.

She stored the cups and saucers in the cupboard, then dried her hands and said:

— I have to feed the hens.

— Lilian, he began, and stopped. She stood with her head bent, waiting. He went on awkwardly:

— You’ll be lonely now.

She shrugged her shoulders, and blushed. He said:

— I was thinking, Lily, that maybe — maybe you’d like to come up and stay with us for a few days. It would take you out of yourself. This place — this is no place for a woman to live on her own.

— I might, she said doubtfully. I suppose I could manage it.

She glanced at him from under her eyebrows and smiled, a nervous, girlish smile. Then in confusion she fled out into the yard.

He wandered restlessly about the room. The strange clarity of vision and thought which follows exhaustion now came over him. The things around him as he looked at them began to seem unreal in their extreme reality. Everything he touched gave to his fingers the very essence of itself. The table seemed to vibrate in the grains of its wood, the steel of the sink was cold and sharp as ice. It was as if he were looking down from a great height through some mysterious spiral. In the corner behind the stove a blackthorn stick leaned against the wall. When he saw it he stepped forward and put out his fingers to touch it, but halted, frowning. He stared at the knots, and they seemed to be whirling in the dark wood, each one a small, closed world. He moved back uncertainly, and dropped his hand. Then he turned and quickly left the room.

He went upstairs to the small bedroom that looked out over the yard to the fields beyond the house. Alice lay on the bed among the shadows, fitfully dozing. Her hands were clasped over her swollen stomach. From the window he looked down into the yard. Lilian stood among the chickens, throwing food to them from her apron. The clucking of the birds came faintly to his ears. The last light was dying, soon it would be night. He stood with his forehead against the glass and gazed out over the darkening fields to the dark hills in the distance.

— Stephen? came Alice’s drowsy, querulous voice. He turned to her, saying:

— Did I wake you? I’m sorry.

— It doesn’t matter.

He sat beside her on the bed. She lifted her arm and touched his cheek with a damp palm. He sighed.

— What is it? she asked.

— I don’t know. I was thinking about father. I don’t seem to … I don’t …

He stopped, and lifted his hands in a helpless gesture.

— All I can remember is his knuckles. They were white, you know, and they used to curl around his stick — like that. Imagine your father being dead two days and all you can remember is a little thing like that. Today at the grave I couldn’t cry. I wanted to, but I couldn’t. I looked at the coffin and it didn’t seem to have anything to do with me.

— It’s the shock, she said.

He stood up with his hands in his pockets and paced the room. Frowning at the floor he said:

— I loved him. I know I did.

— Of course.

— Then what happened to that love is what I want to know? How did it die so easily? I loved him more than anything in the world.

He stopped and looked down at her, asking:

— How does love just die like that, Alice?

She said:

— Things kill it.

He stared at her. She bit her lip, as though she knew she had said too much and was afraid of saying more.

— What things? he asked, apprehension rising through his words.

— I don’t know.

— Look at me, Alice. What things?

But her eyes skittered away from his like frightened animals. She touched her face with agitated fingers.

— I don’t know anything about it, she cried. Why do you ask me? Why? Things just do — terrible things.

He sat beside her again, and stared at his hands clasped before him.

— You’re lying, he said, frowning. You’re talking nonsense. That is all … this … I know this is all wrong.

He stared down at her, but she had shut her eyes.

— It’s all wrong, he said again, shaking his head.

For a time all was still. Faint sounds came to him, the clucking of the chickens in the yard, the small winds singing in the slates. He laid his hand gently on the rise of her stomach. She gave a little moan, and turned her face to the wall, and as she did he felt the strange child move beneath his hand.