The Book of Strange New Things(30)

As for our old friend Saint Paul, he might not approve of how much I wish I could curl up in bed next to you right now. But yes, let’s quote his wise advice on other matters. My darling, we both know that the effects of your travels will eventually pass and you’ll be rested and then you’ll no longer be able to sit in your cosy quarters writing epistles to me and looking out at the rain. You’ll have to open the door and start work. As Paul says, ‘Walk in wisdom toward them that are without, redeeming the time.’ And remember I’m thinking of you!

Kisses, hugs, and a headbutt from Joshua,

Beatrice

Peter read this letter eight or nine times at least before he could bear to part with it. Then he fetched his bag, the one that the Virgin checkin girl had doubted was enough for a one-way transatlantic flight, dumped it on the bed and zipped it open. It was time to get dressed for work.

Apart from his Bible, notepads, a second pair of jeans, polished black shoes, trainers, sandals, three T-shirts and three pairs of socks and underpants, the bag contained one item of apparel that had seemed uselessly exotic when he’d packed it, an item he’d figured he was about as likely to wear as a tutu or a tuxedo. The USIC interviewers had advised him that there was no particular dress code on Oasis but that if he intended to spend a significant amount of time outdoors, he might wish to invest in some Arabic-style garments. Indeed, they’d dropped strong hints that he might regret it if he didn’t. So, Beatrice had bought him a dishdasha from the local cut-price Muslim outfitters.

‘It was the plainest one I could find,’ she said, showing it to him a couple of nights before his departure. ‘They had ones with gold brocade, spangles, embroidery . . . ’

He’d held it against his body. ‘It’s very long,’ he said.

‘It means you won’t need trousers,’ she said, half-smiling. ‘You can be naked underneath. If you want.’

He thanked her but didn’t try it on.

‘You don’t think it’s too girly, do you?’ she said. ‘I think it’s very masculine.’

‘It’s fine,’ he said, packing it away. It wasn’t effeminacy that worried him; it was that he couldn’t imagine himself swanning about like an actor in an old Bible movie. It seemed vainglorious, and not at all what modern Christianity was about.

One walk in the Oasan atmosphere had changed all that. His denim jacket, still in a crumpled heap on the floor, had dried stiff as tarpaulin. An Arabic smock and pyjama-style pants, such as he’d seen several of the USIC staff wearing, was probably the ideal alternative, but his ankle-length dishdasha would do nicely too. He could wear it with sandals. So what if he looked like a fancy-dress party sheikh? This was about practicality. He pulled the dishdasha out of the bag, let it unfurl.

To his dismay, it was spattered and stained with black ink. The ballpoint pens that had exploded during the flight had splurted their contents directly onto the white fabric. To make matters worse, he’d evidently scrunched the garment further down in the bag when he was preparing to leave the ship, causing the ink stains to reproduce themselves in Rorschach fashion.

And yet . . . and yet . . . He shook the garment straight, held it at arm’s length. Something astonishing had happened. The ink pattern, created randomly, had turned into a cross, a Christian cross, right in the middle of the chest. If it had been red instead of black, it would almost be the insignia on the tunic of a medieval crusader. Almost. The ink stains were untidy, with globs and stray extra lines marring the perfection of the design. Although . . . although . . . those faint lines ghosting under the crossbar could be interpreted as the skeletally thin arms of the crucified Christ . . . and those spiky smudges higher up could be seen as thorns from Jesus’s crown. He shook his head: reading too much into things was a weakness of his. And yet here it was, the cross on his garment where no cross was before. He prodded the ink, to check if it stained his fingers. Apart from a slightly tacky patch in the very centre, it was dry. Ready to wear.

He threw the dishdasha over his head and allowed the cool fabric to slide across his skin, sheathing his nakedness. Turning to appraise his reflection in the window, he confirmed that Bea had chosen well. The thing fitted him, as though a tailor in the Middle East had measured his shoulders, cut the cloth and sewn it for him specially.

The window he’d been using as a mirror became a window again, as lights flared up outside. Two glowing points, like the eyes of some monstrous organism approaching. He stepped closer to the glass and peered through, but the vehicle’s headlights disappeared just as he recognised them for what they were.





6


His whole life had been leading up to this


A rendezvous between a married man and a female stranger, each of them far from home, in the obscure hours before dawn. If there was anything improper or potentially complicated about that, Peter didn’t waste energy worrying over it. He and Grainger both had jobs to do, and God was watching.

Besides, Grainger’s reaction to him, when he opened the door to her knock, was hardly encouraging. She did a double-take: a classic cartoon-style double-take. Her head jerked so hard he thought she might teeter backwards into the corridor, but she just swayed on her feet and stared. The provocation, of course, was the big inky cross on his chest. Seeing it through her eyes, he was suddenly embarrassed.

‘I took your advice,’ he tried to joke, plucking at the sleeves of the dishdasha. ‘About the denim jacket.’