Bridge of Clay(47)

And the last, like a reflex, was this: On a stool, by the easel, was The Quarryman, lying facedown, and he reached for it, he held the book out; and for some strange reason she took it. Maybe it was purely so that a boy and a girl could go after it, many years later….They would keep and read and obsess over it, lying on a mattress, in an old forgotten field, in a whole city of forgotten fields—and all of that coming from here.

She took it.

She held it in her hand.

She kissed her fingers and placed those fingers on the cover, and she was so sad, and somehow gallant, and she took it away, and the door blew shut behind her.



* * *



—

And Michael?

From the garage, he heard the engine.

Someone else.

    He sagged to the paint-spattered stool and said “No” to the girl around him, and the engine grew louder, then ebbed, then disappeared completely.

For a long time, he sat, he kept quiet and shivery, and without a sound he started to cry. He cried his stray silent tears into the passing face of artworks close by—but then he relented, and laid himself down, curled up, on the floor. And Abbey Dunbar, who wasn’t Abbey Dunbar anymore, watched over him, all night, in all her many forms.





For the next four or five days, father and son fell into a routine. It was a careful, side-by-side partnership, maybe like two boxers in the opening rounds. Neither was willing to take too big a risk, for fear of being knocked out. Michael, especially, was playing it safe. He didn’t want any more of those I-didn’t-come-here-for-you moments. They weren’t good for anyone—or maybe just not for him.

On Saturday, the day Clay missed home the most, they walked down the river, instead of up, and he was tempted at times to talk.

At first it was only simple things.

Did the Murderer have a job?

Exactly how long had he lived here?

But then more searchingly, or appealing: What the hell was he waiting for?

When would they start building?

Was this bridge procrastination?

It reminded him of Carey, and old McAndrew—how asking questions would hold her back. In his case, though, there was history.

As a boy who’d once loved stories, he’d been better before at asking.



* * *



—

Most mornings, the Murderer went to the riverbank and stood.

He could do it for hours.

Then he’d come in and read, or write on his loose-leaf papers.

Clay went out on his own.

    Sometimes he went upriver; the great blocks of stone. He sat on them, missing everyone.



* * *



—

On Monday, they went to town, for food supplies.

They walked across the riverbed; its dryness.

They took the red box of a car.

Clay sent a letter to Carey and a collective note home, through Henry. Where the first was a detailed account of much that had happened, the second was typical of brothers.


Hi Henry—

Everything okay here.

You?

Tell the others.



Clay





He remembered Henry suggesting a phone to him, and the thought was somehow fitting; his note was more like a text.

He’d agonized over putting a return address on the envelopes, and chose to put one only on Henry’s. Telling Carey, though? He didn’t know. He didn’t want her to feel she had to write back. Or maybe he was scared she wouldn’t.



* * *



—

On Thursday, everything changed, or at least just slightly, in the evening; Clay sat with him voluntarily.

It was in the lounge room, and Michael said nothing, he just gave him a careful glance, and Clay on the floor, near the window. At first he’d been reading the last of her books—the generous Claudia Kirkby—but now he was onto a bridge almanac; the one he had read most often. The title wasn’t too inspired, but the book itself he loved. The Greatest Bridges of Them All.

For a while it was hard to concentrate, but after a good half hour, the first smile came to his face, when he saw his favorite bridge.

Le Pont du Gard.

    Great wasn’t a great enough word to explain that bridge, which also served as an aqueduct.

Built by the Romans.

Or the devil, if you believed it.

As he looked at its arches—the half dozen huge ones at the bottom, eleven on its midlevel, and thirty-five across the top—he smiled, then felt it broaden.

When he caught himself, he checked.

Close one.

The Murderer nearly saw.



* * *



—

On Sunday evening, Michael found Clay in the riverbed, where the road, each side, was cut off. He stood a way back and spoke. “I have to go, for ten days.”

He did have a job.

In the mines.

Another six hours west, out past the old town, Featherton.

As he spoke, the setting sun looked lazy at first, far away. Trees were in lengthening shade.

“You can either go home for those ten days, or you can stay.”

Clay stood and faced the horizon.

The sky now hard-fought, leaking blood.

“Clay?”