The Invitation(97)

The place is a secluded bay, hidden in trees, where an ancient abbey of pale stone watches over the water. San Fruttuoso. He has decided that the proximity of such holiness will sanctify his actions. And, with the moon shining, the abbey glows with an unearthly light. He chooses to take this too as a sign that the act he is about to commit is something done with divine permission. Only when he comes to tie the rope about her legs does she begin to struggle. She makes quickly for the side of the craft – and he throws himself at her bodily, drags her back by her ankles, uses his weight to pin her down so that she cannot thrash away from him. Now he understands why she has been subdued. She was not resigned to her fate after all: she always intended to escape this way. She has already proven herself to be a strong swimmer. He cannot allow that to happen.

Now she begins to scream – a terrible, animal sound – and when he presses his palm into her mouth she bites the flesh so hard that he feels the skin break. It has become nasty, brutal: this is not how he intended. He must be quick about it. With a blow of his hand, her eyes close, her head falls back. He drags the anchor towards himself, and fastens it tight about her legs. A true man of the sea, he knows the right knot to use in any circumstance.

When it is done he looks back at the shore, suddenly convinced that he has been observed. The beach is deserted – and from that distance very little of what has occurred would be visible. And yet the windows of the abbey have become so many hollow eyes, impassively watching. He can no longer find any validation in its presence. He is struck by the sudden knowledge that he has acted alone, without any form of divine support. His whole body trembles with the horror of it. He steels himself to look down into the black water, certain that he will see her white form, far below. But there is nothing – not a ripple, not a bubble. Instead, in the moonlit surface, he sees his own face. And he looks like a man who has lost everything: his faith, his sanity, himself.

He needs to get away from this place. But he seems to have lost all sense of the way. He gropes in his cloak for his compass: his trusted companion since his first sea voyage. But something is wrong. The needle refuses to still, tracking, instead, in a continuous circle. He watches in horrified fascination until he can’t bear the sight of it any longer, then tosses it to the boards. The stars, then. Any sailor knows how to navigate by the constellations. And yet when he looks heavenward, all he sees is an empty void. The moon, too, has been lost to view. What had been a clear sky has filled suddenly with clouds. The wind has stilled. But on the horizon comes a white streak, blinding in its brilliance.

He understands, now. He is nothing but a piece of jetsam, caught in the calm before the storm.





41


Essaouira, Morocco, 1955


I was only in the cell for a few hours. Several people – including Earl Morgan – could vouch for my having been seen asleep in the library during the hours under scrutiny. I think, more likely, the officers had chosen it for me as a form of punishment, for insulting their integrity.

I was released into the afternoon. The Contessa was waiting for me. She looked, suddenly, every one of her years; older. With all the energy gone from her face, her features had a wrung-out look. When she saw me she came to me, and took my arm in hers. Before I could even ask if there was any news, she shook her head.

As soon as I saw the line of the sea I broke into a run. With the Contessa’s shouts in my ears and the exclamations of the crowd that straggled the shoreline, I ran down to the sand, past the beach umbrellas, shrugging off clothes. I swam straight out in a strong crawl, as though I had a specific destination in mind. At that moment, I felt that I could swim forever, for as long as it took. It was only when I reached the deeper water that I knew my own impotence, a tiny being surrounded by the vast unknowableness of the sea. I shouted her name and the breeze swallowed it almost instantly. I dived beneath the surface and saw only stinging clouds of greenish blue.

I am not stupid. I understood the futility of it. I was hours too late.

Afterward, the Contessa shepherded me into one of the cafés that thronged the Croisette, with the stares of the waiters and other customers upon us. She made me sit down, with all the care of someone looking after the frail or elderly. The irony of this was not lost on me.

‘Hal,’ she said, taking my hand, ‘I’m so sorry.’

‘Truss,’ I said. ‘Where is he? Have they questioned him? It’s him, for God’s sake.’

‘Hal,’ the Contessa said, gently, ‘he has many people who can vouch for him from that night.’

‘Whom he paid, no doubt. The police too – I’m certain of it.’

She touched my shoulder. ‘They think that it was a terrible accident.’

She called the waiter over, had him pour us cups of coffee. She watched over me as I drank mine, attentive as a nursemaid. In the harbour, they were still searching. A flotilla of rescue boats trawled back and forth – a far cry from the pleasure boats of the day before. The crowd still watched, even as a fine rain began to fall, silent and solemn as mourners at a funeral.

‘He drowned her.’

She looked at me sharply. ‘Hal, you can’t say such things. They don’t think—’

‘In the journal,’ I fished it from my pocket. ‘He drowned her, Luna, the girl in the water.’

She frowned. ‘I don’t understand.’