Rapids

KEITH’S ROCK

Vince watched Amal. This was the Rienz below Bruneck, a broad brown swirl of summer storm water rushing and bouncing between banks thick with brushwood, overhung with low, grey boughs, snagged in the shallows with broken branches that vibrate, gnarled and dead, trapped by the constant pressure of the passing flood. A hazard.

Amal sits alert and relaxed in his red plastic boat. They are ferry — gliding, crossing the river against the current. The Indian boy waits his turn in the eddy, chatting with the others. The boats rock and bang against each other. Someone is humming the hamster song. Then one firm stroke and the prow thrusts into the flood. The leading edge of the boat is lifted to meet the oncoming water. The current is wild and bouncy, not the steady strong flow of the narrower torrent, but the uneven tumbling of scores of mountain streams gathered together in the lower valley and channelled into a space that seems to resist their impetuous rush. The water piles on top of itself. It comes in waves, fast and slow.

The hull of the boat lifts. Amal has sunk his paddle on the downstream side as brace and rudder. Without a further stroke, the diagonal steady, the trim constantly adjusted, the kayak is squeezed across the flood and, without apparent effort, slides into an eddy against the further bank. The boy sits there steady, helmet wreathed in willow twigs. What is he doing that I can’t?

Vince is familiar with the notion that kayaking is an activity where words, instructions, will take you only so far. In her first bossy excitement at having finally persuaded her husband, two years ago, to take up a sport, Gloria had given Vince a book, the BCU handbook, that taught all the strokes. There were diagrams, photographs, tips. Vince studied them. The stroke that most concerned him then was the Eskimo roll. He hated the embarrassment of having to swim out of his upturned boat and be rescued, perhaps by a twelve — year — old girl or a sixty — year — old man, on the muddy shore of the Thames Estuary.

But text and diagrams were not enough. He who understood the most complex accounting procedures at a glance, who oversaw the foreign activities of one of the world’s top ten financial institutions, could not get his mind around the co — ordinated movement of hands, hips and head that would take you from the upside — down position, face blind and cold in the slimy salt water, to the upright, sitting steady again, paddle braced in the wavelets, the stinging breeze in your eyes. Even when he learned the movement, when he began to come up nine times out of ten, it was still as if some conjuring trick were being performed, something subtracted even from the most attentive gaze, an underwater sleight of hand. Only that now it was being performed through him. Whatever his motives for starting the sport, he knew that this was the reason he had continued, not the health advantages his wife nagged him about for so long, out of love, no doubt (she feared the businessman’s thrombosis), but this stranger business of his body having learned things that his mind would never know, the idea of access to a different kind of knowledge; and, together with that, an edge of anxiety. There was always the tenth time when you didn’t come up and didn’t know why. All at once, he found he needed this excitement.

Vince! It was his turn. He paddled to the top of the eddy and out. Do I have the angle right? The boat was tossed up, thrust sideways. Now he was paddling like mad on the downstream side to keep the angle. The further bank was slipping by. Already he was downstream from Amal. He was working, sweating in the heavy jacket with its double layer of rubber. I’m inefficient. I’m messy. The hull scraped on a thick branch poking out in a swirl of brown water. For a second Vince was unnerved by the sheer volume of the water piling at him, so muddy and broken. Finally, he fought his way into an eddy a good fifty yards down from the Indian boy.

What do you think is wrong with my paddling, he had asked Louise last night in the tent. After the ridiculous argument between Clive and Adam, there had been a long and tedious conversation with Mandy about her divorce and difficult teenagers— she seemed determined to compare notes, as if a separation could be compared with a bereavement— and when at last he had managed to get back to the tent he had lain in his sleeping bag, waiting for his daughter’s return. In the shadows, a glint caught his eye. Something yellow. He switched on the torch. On her copy of The Lord of the Rings, in the corner by her pillow, Louise had lined up the contents of her cosmetics bag. A thin oval bottle was catching the light. There was a yellow liquid inside. Suddenly the idea of femininity was intensely present in the soft curves of the glass, the pale colour of this cheap scent. Beside it lay a puff of pink cotton wool. Vince thought of Michela and Clive. They will be in each other’s arms. My daughter won’t want to share a tent with me next year, he decided.

Crouching to push between the flaps, Louise stumbled. Sorry, Dad. Were you asleep? It was past midnight. He told her about the argument: So then Clive just leans across the table and whacks him one, I mean, really hard! What idiots, the girl said. I’d never go for an older bloke like that, if I was Michela. They’re in love, Vince said. He’s not that old. Sitting on her sleeping bag, the girl had put on a long nightdress and was removing things from underneath. It was something her mother had always done. Love! the girl snorted. She even sounded like her mother. Well, Tom isn’t exactly your age, Vince suggested. Louise giggled. She was brushing out her hair. I’m only doing it to piss off Amelia. Suddenly she was indignant. The way she’s acting, you’d think he was already her property! Vince asked: Now you’ve seen me for a couple of days, what do you think is wrong with my paddling?

Don’t be boring, his daughter said.

No, tell me, I’m getting obsessed.

Probably that’s the problem then. With sports, the more you think about it, the more you screw up. Phil is such a prick, though. She was studying her toenails with the torch. He kept downloading these dirty pictures and trying to get us to look. Honestly. Then there’s the fact that you never wanted to do it in the first place.

What?

Kayak, silly. You only started because Mum forced you. God knows why. And you only came on this trip to be on holiday with me. Probably you’d rather be at the office.

But now I’m here, I want to forget the office, he told her.

God, I’m exhausted. I’ve got a blister on my thumb. She threw herself back on her sleeping bag. This is so bloody uncomfortable.

Lying in the dark— his daughter had started to tell him some news from her cousins, something about her having to change room while they decorated— Vince thought back to that odd period when his wife had absolutely insisted he try this sport. There had been an atmosphere of crisis in the family, but with no substance, as when the market crashes without even a rumour of bad news. Perhaps that was why he had finally agreed. It seemed so much more important to her than he could understand. He began to take lessons Saturday afternoon, out on the estuary. But not long after he started, Gloria had stopped. You don’t want me always telling you what to do, she said. She concentrated on her tennis. In the blue dark of the tent, Vince announced: I’ve been thinking it would be nice to live together again, next term, Lou. Me and you. His daughter didn’t reply. Are you asleep? A patter of rain had begun to fall on the tent.

Vince followed Amal down the river. Whatever it was he was supposed to learn, he thought, had to do with the boy’s calmness. His muscles were perfectly relaxed as a wave smacked into the boat. When he slalomed between stones, the upper body swayed in supple response. This is something more easily observed than emulated. Ahead, Tom was thrashing with determination. He is trapped into being a man to the girls. Amelia, Louise and Caroline were always beside him, pestering, giggling, offering themselves. Mark tagged doggedly after them. Vince rather likes Mark. Adam was precise, steady, executing textbook strokes. Phillip looked for every opportunity to turn his kayak on end, spin it round, force it over a rock and into the stopper behind. The skull and crossbones are visible on his helmet. Max and Brian were splashing each other. But Amal seemed to flow around the obstacles like the water itself. A safe pair of hands, Vince had begun to repeat to himself as he paddled. A safe pair of hands. More and more he would allow his consciousness to be submerged in the rhythm of the repeated phrase. Don’t fight the water, go with it. Don’t fight, don’t fight. Behind him, Michela performed every manoeuvre as if it had been learned, very correctly, only moments before. She is a determined disciple in the wake of her guru. Clive has said not a word today. He is stony, silent, embarrassed by last night’s madness. From bend to bend, eddy to eddy, they descended the river in a plastic line until, shortly before lunch, Keith injured himself.

Let’s learn something new, kids, their leader shouted. Tail dips, Keith proposed. His eyes had their glassy brightness. We’re late for lunch, Adam objected. People are getting tired.

Okay, so what we’re going to do is to use this rock to push the tail under the oncoming current where it pours over.

The rock was about two feet across with the current pressing hard all round. Keith allowed his boat to be drawn up the eddy, then turned it and paddled backwards so that the tail of the boat was pushed under the water pouring over. The effect was immediate. First the stern was sucked down, into the oncoming rush, then quite suddenly the whole boat was forced vigorously upward and forward as if launched from a catapult.

Wey hey! Keith shouted. It was a pantomime of adolescence. With the exception of Mark and Caroline, the kids were enthusiastic. Cool! But Clive was shaking his head, arms folded in resignation on his paddle. Vince was torn between his interest in the manoeuvre itself, and his awareness that both of yesterday’s antagonists disapproved. They don’t want their sport to be a game.

Should be able to go vertical, Keith announced, if you get the entry right. He repeated the performance. His face glowed with a sort of second youth. This time, as the tail was sucked under, Keith let his heavy, paunchy body go right back with it. The boat rose, higher and higher until it seemed to stand still a second, vertical on its tail, then toppled backwards into the rush. Oh yeah! The kids clapped. Ace!

With enviable ease, Keith rolled up at once. He had hardly been under water a second. But he let out a loud cry. Across his wrist was a long deep gash. Swinging the paddle, he had caught a rock edge, or something very sharp. More than two inches of skin had opened up wide, ragged, deep and red. Keith stared. Oh! He was bleeding profusely. Already Adam was beaching his boat in the shallows. He had a first — aid kit under his seat. Blood was pumping out of Keith’s arm. There were squirts of it. Eventually a bandage was found. They tied it tight. But the man must go to hospital. Suddenly the day has a purpose.

The main group was left to eat their lunch while four boats raced down five miles of busy river to the get — off point where the minibus had been parked: Keith, Mandy, Michela, Vince. The two men with coaching qualifications must stay with the kids. Keith had been adamant about that. Those were the BCU rules. He looked the two of them in the eyes. Clive is in charge, he said.

Hurrying down the river, with no plan for playing or learning, just one goal, to get the man stitched up, Vince finally found himself at home on the water. The sudden purposeful — ness made it easier, and the trust they had put in him. The bow swept into the current. He paddled. He reached determinedly for his strokes. The river was swollen, but straightforward. Perhaps I am a canoeist, he decided. They smacked into a wave train. He laughed. His face ran with sweat and spray. But Keith was evidently in pain. The bandage was soaked in blood. The man was gritting his teeth. Mandy was scolding him for always taking risks, showing off to the kids. How could he have known? Michela objected. She was panting. It was one in a million to catch a sharp edge like that.

At last they were paddling across a low lake at the bottom of the run. A storm of ducks rose from the water. Keith and Mandy were already approaching the beach, the get — out point. The air was humming with flies. Vince had waited to let Michela catch up. He was elated by the speed of the descent. Okay? She looked at him, flushed with effort, eyes shaded beneath black helmet. Exhausted, she said.

Course, if I go to hospital, Keith complained, they’ll tell me I can’t paddle for the rest of the week. He was up front in the minibus. You’re bloody well going, Mandy told him. She had a proprietorial manner. You’ll need stitches, I’m afraid, Vince said. Keith blew out his cheeks and sighed. Photo of my war wound, please, he asked.

With Michela to interpret, the injured man was left at the hospital in Bruneck, while Mandy and Vince drove back to the campsite to get a car. It was ten miles up the valley. What Keith was really worried about, the woman explained, was the last day, the stretch of river above Sand in Taufers, the grand finale of the trip; he wouldn’t be able to be there, which meant Clive and Adam running the show together, who hated each other. Keith played the fool, but in the end he only did it for the group. He was totally dedicated.

Vince was driving. Well, the combatants seem to have agreed a truce today, he said. It was the first time he had driven a minibus. Actually, I can’t help thinking Clive is right really. At least in general. I mean, when one of us gets hurt, like now, we immediately rush to help. But we don’t do anything for people we don’t know.

Nor do they for us, the woman said sensibly. She was still wearing wetsuit shorts, and a soaking T — shirt on a stout body. The thing is there’s helping, she said, and there’s shouting about helping.

It was mad to hit him, Vince agreed.

No, but apart from that, don’t you think, it’s all very well him having this cause and so on, we all agree with it, but in the end it’s easy rushing about and chanting at demonstrations. Clive’s never had to deal with things like a divorce, or you losing Gloria like that. He’s always worried about people on the other side of the planet.

Can’t blame him for not having suffered a catastrophe, Vince thought.

All I’m saying is, I judge a bloke by his personal life, what he makes around him, not his ideals.

He looks like he’s got something pretty nice going with Michela, Vince said. He glanced in the mirror.

I’ve seen him the same way with half a dozen others.

Really? Well, good for him, I suppose.

Turning towards her a second as he spoke, he found the woman looking at him quite intently. Her chubby right knee jerked up and down under her hand. I think blokes like yourself, she said quietly, I mean who’ve been husbands all your lives, don’t understand men like Clive. And vice versa. You’re chalk and cheese. But women understand. They have to. Look at Keith, for example, married too young, then has affairs, everybody knows, but won’t leave home, like. He has his responsibilities.

Doesn’t sound like my idea of being a good husband.

He’s stuck at it, Mandy said. While Clive is always talking about universal justice.

And Adam? Vince was aware of a social circle drawing him in. Perhaps, having lost his wife, he should become part of the Waterworld community. He would go to all the club’s events. He could gossip and be gossiped about. Except, of course, that there was nothing to say about him. What have I ever done?

Adam’s wife’s handicapped, Mandy said. MS. No, handi — capped’s the wrong word. She shot Vince an enquiring glance. Actually, I think your Gloria looked after her in hospital.

I’m really sorry, Vince said. I had no idea.

Campsite! Mandy shouted. Don’t miss the turn.

They crossed the bridge, passed the church, trundled down the track between the tents in the bright sunshine. Mandy took over the driving seat of the minibus to head back to the river and pick up the group. Vince went to get his own car to return to the hospital. This was what he’d been brought along for. Fifteen minutes later, on impulse, trapped behind a tourist coach on the narrow, bendy road to Bruneck, he opened the glove compartment of the car, found his mobile and turned it on. There were no messages. Then, driving, he called the office. It was strange. In a matter of seconds he was in touch with London, with reality. His secretary was a small Chinese woman in her fifties. Of course you’re needed, she told him, but everybody’s agreed to wait till you’re back. That would be Monday. So nothing urgent? he asked. It’ll be urgent on Monday, Mr Marshall, but not before. She asked him if he were having a good break. It was blistering in London, she said. She couldn’t remember a year like it. He told her he felt immensely refreshed.

Vince drove past stacks of timber, sawmills. The sun was fierce. There was an open yard full of wooden weathercocks, machine — carved, life — size crucifixes, curious trolls. We come here to play on the river and have no contact with the locals, he thought. A lean old man in a broad — brimmed hat and blue overalls was scything the steep bank above the road to the right. Quite probably he had never been on the water that raced through his valley. Is it really possible I’ll be back in the City on Monday? Vince was conscious of enjoying the drive, of deliberately looking out for everything foreign and unusual: the wide wooden balconies, the gothic script over shops and hotels, the weathercocks, the hay hung on wooden trestles up steep slopes, the little children in leder — hosen, the onion domes of the churches. Did I ever belong to anything aside from the bank? he wondered. Was I part of any community outside the office? Important decisions were being taken without him. I mustn’t miss the turn to the hospital, he worried.

They’re seeing him now, Michela looked up and smiled. The waiting room was a mix of tourists and locals, sitting round the walls, flicking through provincial newspapers, international glamour magazines, nursing wounds and coughs. Two or three men kept glancing at the tall Italian girl in her neoprene shorts and white bikini top. Only since Gloria’s death had Vince become acutely aware that he had never been with any other woman but his wife. He had never ‘picked up’ a woman. They had found themselves, he and Gloria, in adjacent rooms in Durham university dorms. It would have been hard to establish a moment when either deliberately chose the other. By a process of happy osmosis they had married. If you removed that boulder, Keith had been talking to the group yesterday about reading the river, which way do you think the water would go? How many things downstream would that effect? Suddenly Vince is in trouble again. With a determined effort, he asked the girl:

How many of these groups will you be getting then?

Sorry? Michela looked up from a magazine.

Will you be having another group right after ours?

Four altogether. We have a week’s break after this one for a demonstration in Berlin. Then one after another right through to the end of August.

And then?

How do you mean?

I suppose you have some other job.

We’ll go back to England, do courses there through the winter. In England the only real white water is in winter. Here it slows up when the glaciers stop melting. She laughed: We must look crazy dressed like this.

Me more than you, he said. He was wearing a grey thermal top and swimming shorts. She raised an eyebrow.

Being so much older, Vince explained.

You’re younger than Keith.

And you won’t miss anyone in Italy?

No, she grimaced.

There must be someone.

I hate Italy.

All the English love it.

She turned to him. Suddenly she was wry and sophisticated. You want to know? Everybody seems to think I’m such a mystery. I’m not. Just that all the Italian I heard before I was ten was my parents arguing, hating each other and me. Understand?

I’m sorry, Vince said.

But the girl wouldn’t let him off the hook. And when I was in my teens it was my mother on her own telling me she didn’t want to live anymore. She regularly took overdoses. The hospital, the stomach pumps, at least a dozen times. Okay? Got the idea?

Vince sensed the girl was trying to crush him by the completeness of this disaster and the sarcastic lightness with which she spoke of it. There was nothing he could reply. He looked at the young woman, her short glossy hair, tall neck, smooth olive cheeks, lips parted, eyes clouded. She thinks I’m inadequate, bland. Michela smiled rather sourly: I watched Disney films and read comics in English. English was escape for me. It was another world. Does that make sense now? Has the mystery dissolved?

Vince still couldn’t see how to reply.

She eased off: Then just when things are looking promising, Clive goes and makes a scene like that last night.

Did he apologise?

Not yet.

Might be wise, Vince said quietly.

It’s not up to me to tell him what to do. She was sharp again.

Actually, Vince went on, I agreed with him, you know, in a way … with what Clive was saying. In the end, it’s a position you can only respect.

How do you mean?

Well, that as communication speeds up and the countries of the world come closer to each other, it gets harder and harder to avoid the impression that we have a responsibility towards those who are suffering.

If you bloody well agree, why don’t you do something about it?

Like hit Adam?

Oh don’t be funny. She was scathing.

Vince was finding this difficult. To agree with someone, he said, doesn’t mean that you share their passion.

They were sitting side by side on green plastic seats in what might be any waiting room in Western Europe. She was holding a copy of the Italian magazine Gente, leaning forward, feet tucked under the chair, girlish and belligerent. He realised he had adopted the condescending voice he found himself using so often with Louise. He didn’t know how else to speak to someone so young.

Well, it sounds like an excuse to me, she said. I mean, what would it take before someone like you actually did something about the state of the world? Would some huge natural catastrophe be enough? Or would it have to happen right in central London before you woke up? Will people never see what’s going on?

Before he could answer, she started to tell him that she admired Clive so much because of the intensity of this concern he felt. Only he couldn’t find a channel to express it. Do you understand? They went to demonstrations and so on, they had to. But it didn’t achieve anything. Clive really means it, she insisted, when he says we want to use these kayak trips to get people to think differently about the world, to notice that the glaciers are melting, that the planet is being ruined. Obviously we have to make enough money to live, but that’s not why we’re doing it.

Vince listened. As she spoke, the girl grew more and more fervent. She is pleading, he thought. Her whole face was animated. Her urgency was beautiful. Other men in the room were watching. You can’t split up the world, she was telling him now. You can’t care for this and not that, the Third World’s problems, but not global warming or GM foods. Do you see what I’m saying? It’s all part of the same campaign. There’s a right and wrong behind …

Keith emerged from a tiled corridor. His arm was in a sling, his bearded face was pale, but he was smiling. Only eight stitches, he told them, and an order to do absolutely nothing for a month. Great. Now I need a drink.

They found a café in the centre of Bruneck where Vince noticed that Keith flattered the young woman in every possible way, winking, joking, passing remarks, until at last she relaxed and accepted an ice cream laced with rum and Keith said in all his experience he had never heard of anyone getting such a deep wound from doing a simple roll in an apparently innocuous patch of water. It was as if there were an open switchblade just under the surface. Waiting for me! Kismet! he laughed. Or kiss me, as the case may be. His eyes are twinkling.

Michela hadn’t understood. Keith launched into an explanation. Vince’s mind began to wander. The café tables around them spread out over a recently renovated square of fresh porphyry cobbles and clean stone — and — wood façades. A lot of money is being invested here, Vince thought. It was a big collective effort, to capture the tourists, but also to maintain their identity. There were baskets of hanging flowers and, beside the café door, a large wooden troll carved from some gnarled tree trunk with a face at once grotesque and madly benevolent, pipe in warped lips, hat on a knotty head, axe held in crooked fingers. Not unlike the drunk with his shack down by the river bank. Oh Vince! Earth to Vince! Have an ice cream as well, mate, Keith insisted. It’s great with rum. You paddled brilliantly, by the way. Huge improvement. Come on, the others won’t be back yet. Yes, have an ice cream, Michela joined in. She smiled with a long spoon in her lips. Come on, Ageing Mr Banker, enjoy yourself. You look like you don’t enjoy yourself enough.

Where’s Wally? Phil demanded.

Vince couldn’t find the thing. He searched everywhere. He was upset. I can’t believe how seriously you’re taking it, Louise said. It’s only a cheap toy. Mark came to their tent to tell the girl she was supposed to be helping with dinner. The Louts are on. Vince just couldn’t find the stupid puppet. He was sure he had tied it to his cag.

Vincent has lost Wally! Phil shrilled. He ran from tent to tent. Wally missing believed drowned! Re — drowned! Stock market’ll be tumbling, Adam remarked. He was hanging out the wet kit. Wally wasn’t on Vince’s cag, nor in his dry — bag. Enormous fines, the chinless man insisted, shaking his head, smiling wryly, if only to pay the increase in our insurance premium. A grave breach of trust, Max mocked. Unspeakable punishments. There were decades of literature on Wally, Keith said. He was a mythical figure, a patron saint of river communities, the archetypal paddler. Went over Niagara, Mandy joined in. His disappearance presages disaster. Vince looked everywhere. The boat, the minibus, the tent. There’ll have to be a funeral, Amelia announced solemnly. Ask not for whom the bell tolls. Someone who’s lost Wally, Caroline announced, has to buy a substitute and wear it for the rest of his life. She tried to hold a gloomy face, then burst into giggles. It was time to eat spaghetti bolognaise.

We have a new feature on the landscape, Mandy announced as the meal was finishing. Let’s drink to Keith’s Rock, a remarkable underwater geological feature discovered by the Yorkshire man Keith Graham. There was applause, and a toast: To Keith’s Rock! but immediately followed by a chant, from all the children, Where’s Wally, Where’s Wally? They were sitting in a circle on the ground, their plates on their laps. The sun had long since gone behind the mountain beyond the town, but the evening was still bright, the air warm. Then Michela stood up from beside Clive and came round the circle to whisper in Vince’s ear, They’ve stolen it, silly. They’re teasing you.

May I say a word? Vince asked. He cleared his throat. Pigs, Slobs, Louts. He paused. It is with regret that I must inform you that while the eminent discoverer Mr Graham was in hospital after the christening of his remarkable rock, I was unfortunately obliged to go to the police station, to report a, er, serious theft. Indeed a kidnap. Wally, a character, or rather a spirit, a haunting presence, whom we all agree, I think, is the ghostly heart and soul of our commu — nitty, without whom, etc. — Wally, or at least the effigy he is obliged to inhabit following his untimely decease, has been taken from us and is presently being held against his will. Now I must warn you all that the Italian carabinieri, if not the Austrian Polizei, will be arriving in just a few moments to question everyone and search all the tents. The criminals face summary execution. You have just a few seconds to own up.

His daughter, he noticed, was smiling. Then suddenly Wally was flying up in the air in the middle of the circle. The tiny bear wore a small red and white scarf. Who had it? Who stole it? It fell without a bounce beside a stack of dirty plates. Nobody owned up. The creature was awarded then to Max who had forgotten to replace the drain plug in his boat after emptying it at lunchtime and had almost sunk before he realised what the problem was. I shall cherish our patron paddler and protector, he announced, more carefully than has my predecessor. Oh aren’t we affectionate, Brian said. His prede — what? Phil demanded. As on every evening, the boy had returned his food almost untouched.

Serious note now folks, Keith interrupted. Serious announcement to finish the evening. No doubt word has got around that our two illustrious instructors had a bit of a barney yesterday evening. About politics, would you believe? Politics! Brian groaned. What’s that? They’ve made it up, of course, but from now on, the rule is, no discussion of politics for the rest of the trip. Okay? Anyone caught discussing anything that could remotely be considered to be political will be obliged to run round the whole campsite in just their underpants. Yes, please! Max shouted. Oh shut up! What matters here is us, our paddling, learning to help each other, making the group work. Is that clear? Any outside or personal interests, however noble, must be sacrificed to those goals for as long as we’re together. Now, tomorrow will be a half day; we’re going to drive out to a slalom course for the morning and do two or three runs to sort out who will be able to do the tough trip on the last day. Then it’s rest time for the afternoon. You can go into town or take the cable car up to the glacier.

The Pigs were on washing — up duty. Amelia and Tom stood side by side at the big sinks outside the bathrooms. You’ve left a bit, the girl complained. She had tied her hair in a ponytail. It’s a mark on the plate, Tom said. In the plastic, look. They bent their heads over it. No it isn’t. Yes, it is. They nudged elbows and pushed each other and giggled, both clutching the plastic plate. Beneath the inevitable straw hat, Max made faces to Vince. I think I love you, he began to croon, but that’s what life is made of. The boy did an excellent imitation of the hamster’s mechanical movements, imaginary microphone in one hand, drumstick in the other. It’s a manufacturing defect, can’t you see! Tom shouted, but he let the girl hold his wrist. They were tugging, laughing in each other’s eyes. And it worries me to say that I’ve never felt this way. Max dropped his tea towel over their heads. Idiot, Tom yelled, but the economics student seemed perfectly happy with the situation.

Someone tapped Vince on the shoulder. Dad? Louise had put a skirt on, and a short top. She wore earrings. Can I have some money to go to the bar? Just behind her, Mark was hovering nervously, a polite smile on his face. Handing over a note, Vince felt old and disorientated. The Pigs were now occupying three sinks with piles of dirty dishes and the kids doing nothing but fool around. Come on team, he told them, let’s get going and do it properly. Tom. Amelia! Come on now. When Amelia started carrying the plates back to the kitchen tent, Tom suddenly became earnest again and asked Vince how far it was really possible for a government to establish the true volume of the money supply. A professor at LSE had shown them an unbelievably complex calculation. Discovering the exact quantity of the supply was largely irrelevant, Vince said. What mattered was to establish whether it was going up or down, which actually was all too easy. Ooh, I know, Max laughed, I know!

Afterwards, weary of company and conversations, Vince went for a walk around the large campsite on his own. A Jaguar with Dutch plates was parked in front of a luxury caravan. Through the window he glimpsed an elderly couple and, on the table between them, a goldfish in a bowl. He stopped and looked again. Why would anyone drive from Holland with a goldfish? A tiny child on a tricycle circled a waste bin. Somewhere out of view Italian voices were singing to the accompaniment of guitar and accordion, while behind the surface buzz of the site, thunder rolled faintly in the peaks.

Vince looked up. The glacier beyond the castle was obscured by mist. Shining from behind the nearest mountains, a last flare of summer light had turned the vapour to bright milk above the sombre gorge below. It was like some of the skies they had seen in old paintings in Florence, Vince thought: cosmic drama above tortured saints. He stopped. There was no passion between myself and Gloria, he said out loud. To his left was a low tent with a large motorcycle beside it. A haggard woman in early middle age sat cross — legged in black leather pants, smoking, reading a thriller. The thunder came louder. Was that what she meant when she said, I’m so sorry? He began to walk again. The week in London— all work— year in year out; the weekend, full of domestic chores. There was no passion, he repeated. He stepped aside for a car carrying four bicycles on its roof. But does that matter? There’s always something so stupid about passion, Vince told himself. That girl, he thought, is more intelligent than to say those things she said to you. As if the world’s sick could all suddenly be healed. She says those things, he thought, to be in love.

Come on, a voice interrupted: You haven’t got Wally to talk to now, you know. Adam was beside him. Loos are cleaner this side of the campsite, he explained. Want a walk? It’s going to rain, Vince said. So we’ll get wet, Adam smiled. He suggested they climb the hill behind the group of houses at the entrance to the site. There was a church poking out from the woods above, perhaps half a mile away and a few hundred feet higher. There must be a path. But what if there’s a storm? Vince worried. We’ll get drenched, Adam said equably.

They walked quickly, out past the camp shop and bar, the larger church in the valley that rang its bells every morning. Finding a signpost, they struck off up the hill and were soon among thick pine trees. You were talking to yourself, Adam repeated. Getting old, Vince said. The chinless man seemed in good spirits. He said how wonderful the air was here. He worked in insurance, he explained, policy design, risk calculation, dull stuff. What did Vince think about the government’s plans for new banking regulations? Watch it, Vince objected. We’ll be running round the site in our underpants next. He didn’t like the way people kept insisting on his professional life. Oh, I’m not about to whack you round the chops if we don’t agree. Adam stretched the corner of his mouth and touched it gingerly. Bloke’s a primitive. Well — meaning, but primitive.

Vince said nothing. This is an attempt to make me an ally, he thought. The path crossed a meadow, then was back in the wood again. Odd this thunder, he observed, always there but always far away. It’s up on the plateau, Adam said, at seven thousand feet. You know? Different world. After a while they heard the sound of water splashing on stone. It was getting nearer. In the twilight, beneath the dark — green pines, they stood on a small log bridge over a stream that fell towards them down mossy black rock. Adam chose this moment to say how sorry he had been about Gloria. He really should have come to the funeral. We taught a couple of courses together, you know, a few years back. Then we did the Ardêche trip of course. She was really kind to my wife when she was in hospital.

Thanks, Vince said.

Gloria was a wonderful woman, Adam insisted. So full of energy. She gave her time so generously.

Vince had heard this description of his wife from various sources. We’ll get caught walking down in the dark if we don’t hurry, he said. But Adam wanted to press on. They were almost at the church. Your main problem with your paddling, he began to say, is the way you sit too far back in the boat, as if you were afraid. Apart from breaking in and out, you’re usually safer leaning forward, in the attack position, reaching for it.

The path climbed steeply and was stony now and damp. The air had taken on a cool, sweet smell. Vince was wearing sandals and his foot slipped. Eventually they reached a low wall; a gate led into a churchyard with just a few dozen graves. Neat lines of black wrought — iron crosses stood at the head of thin rectangles of shale. In the centre of each cross was a photo of the deceased, a name, some dates. When they both stopped a moment by a fresh grave, smothered in yellow flowers, Adam rather cautiously asked Vince where he had had Gloria buried. She was cremated, he said. I scattered the ashes in the estuary. Oh. Adam seemed taken aback. I really should have gone to the funeral, he repeated.

The church itself was closed. Opposite the door, beyond the graves, a bench looked out across the valley. They leaned on a low parapet. Down below, the road from Bruneck to Sand in Taufers streamed with headlights, but above, the slopes were already colourless and vague with just here and there, high, high up in the forests opposite, an occasional solitary light: some lonely baita,a family with their cattle on the high meadows. Strange being so cut off, Adam murmured. With sudden intuition, Vince announced: You know what the last thing Gloria said to me was? His voice was hard and angry in his throat. I am so, so sorry. He was almost croaking. Those were her last words. She had just a few seconds to speak— she phoned me, you know, she knew she was dying, she recognised the symptoms and managed to phone— and that’s what she said: I’m so sorry. Turning, he found Adam staring at him in alarm.

It had begun to rain. The drops were clattering on the tents when they got back. Vince went to the bathroom then lay on his sleeping bag to wait for Louise’s return. The rain came harder. It drummed on the kayaks roped to the trailer, on the kitchen tent where Phil and Caroline had begun to kiss. Adam was also lying alone, concerned that his son was late, thinking about that moment in the graveyard withVince. I miss you so much when I’m away, he texted his wife. The bedridden woman sent a reassuring reply. Sarah’s baby was doing fine.

The thunder cracked louder now. In the chalet just beyond their pitch, Michela and Clive had been talking round in circles. You just want me to leave, don’t you? she repeated. No, I need you, he said. We’re in this business together. We invested the money together and we’ll have to pay it back together. He began to talk about an e — mail he had received from Diabolik, one of the members in their militants’ news group. There was to be a big demonstration at the American airbase in Vicenza. Some people were going to break in and sit on the runway.

The rain fell harder on the roof. Michela watched her man as he spoke. She had made herself a camomile tea. Her stomach was unsettled. He had insisted on whisky. He was smoking. Come to bed, she said softly. He shook his head. The river will be rising, he said. He picked up the book he’d been reading. The Case Against Nestlé’s. Then the thunder cracked right overhead and the rain fell with loud slaps against the windows.

Towards three a. m. those who had managed to sleep were woken by a wild clanging. The church bell, not a hundred yards away, had begun to ring. In boxer shorts, pulling a plastic waterproof about him, Vince ran squelching from his tent and banged into Mandy. Did it mean there was going to be a flood? There was something gothic about the woman in her white nightdress in the teeming dark. She was fighting with an umbrella. The guy — ropes need tightening, he said. She clutched at him and almost fell. The nightdress was soaked. It was odd to feel the embrace of her body, the heavy breasts.

The church bell rang and rang. Four or five people had already abandoned their sleeping bags for the big kitchen tent. Phil claimed he would be rained out if it went on. Is it a warning or what? He would have to sleep here with

Amelia and Caroline. Then Michela appeared. Above long tanned legs, she wore a heavy mountain oilskin. She was smiling. Listen up, everybody. It’s just a habit here that they ring the bells when it rains really hard. She had come to reassure them. The noise of the bells is supposed to break up the clouds. Certainly breaks up any hope of sleep! Why would it do that? Vince asked. She smiled at him. She had a way, he understood, of seeming seraphic beyond her age. I’ve no idea, she said. It’s a faith they have here, a tradition.

Borrowing an umbrella, Vince made his usual trip to the loo. As always the urinals mysteriously began to flush as he approached. It should be reassuring, this sense of being integrated into the world’s sensible automatisms. Your arrival is foreseen, you are provided for. Faith in what? Louise demanded, when he crawled back between the fly — sheets. She had been reading a text message. The little screen glowed. The bell rang incessantly. The rain was trying the quality of Gloria’s old tent. Gloria loved camping. There were beads of water running along the seams. I know he acts a bit of a loser, but he’s sweet, Louise said of Mark. It’s his dad on at him all the time that makes him shy. Oh, it turns out they knew Mum quite well, by the way. She visited his mum who’s stuck in bed or something. His dad plays in the same tennis club. I know, Vince said. After a moment he asked, Who’s the message from? None of your business, Louise laughed.

They were lying on their beds while the rain drenched the fabric above them and the bell clanged on. Funny, Louise eventually said, her head on her hands, the impression Mum made on people. Mark says he liked her a lot. It was the first time in ten days together that she had spoken to him about her mother. I suppose we all make different impressions on people outside the family, Vince said cautiously. Suddenly, his daughter began to cry. She lay still, crying quietly. Vince leaned across and put his hand on her forehead, stroked her hair. To his surprise, she didn’t push the hand away. It was a pleasure to feel the soft hair under his fingers, the warm skin.

Later, after the rain eased off and the bell stopped, he lay awake, listening to distant voices, the clatter of drops blown off the trees, rustling fly — sheets, zips. He imagined the Italian girl unzipping her waterproof. Clive would be embracing her. Gloria, he whispered. He wasn’t jealous. Many evenings he went to sleep this way. The rehearsal of that final phone conversation, then the quiet mouthing of her name. Gloria. In Excelsis Deo, she liked to add primly. But he couldn’t hear his wife’s wry laugh in the dripping tent with his daughter gently snoring. There was no passion, he whispered. For a moment he imagined getting up again and going to the window of their chalet. You are sick, he thought, Vince Marshall. Sick.