A Dry Spell Read online

  ‘Here, give me that pepper,’ said Martin, who was trying to smoke a limp roll-up in the rain. ‘I think I’ve found a use for it.’ He cut the stalk and seeds out with a knife and made a hole in the rounded end through which he threaded his cigarette so that only the filter protruded. ‘There,’ he said, putting it to his lips like a trumpet. ‘An all-weather smoking shield.’

  The general dissatisfaction with the catering was not entirely the whingeing of pampered youth. On the third night Nina was woken in the early hours by the sound of breaking glass followed by violent retching. Jean, in the next bunk, had wasted crucial seconds hunting for her torch which she had knocked on to the floor and smashed in the search. She had not quite made it to the door before throwing up over herself and the lino.

  Nina, still half-asleep and confused, climbed out of bed and hurried over, fragments of shattered torch embedding themselves in her bare feet. Jean was doubled over by the wall, moaning and spitting. ‘I’m dying,’ she said, clutching her stomach. The sour smell of vomit made Nina gag. ‘Don’t move. I’ll get a cloth,’ she gasped, escaping on to the landing, where she took some gulps of fresh air. By the time she had helped Jean to mop herself up, and supplied her with a clean T-shirt, and a bucket from the kitchen, the rest of the dormitory was awake, several of them complaining of griping guts and nausea. ‘It’s just the smell,’ said Nina, throwing open a window to admit a rush of foggy autumn air. She climbed back into bed, tucking the bristly blanket around her, and glanced at her watch. Three hours till dawn. As her head touched the pillow there came the sound of footsteps thundering down the landing from the men’s dormitory, and the slam of the toilet door, and, as if that was the signal everyone had been waiting for, there was a sudden stampede. The lights were thrown on, and all around Nina people were writhing and groaning on their beds or puking uninhibitedly in the communal bucket.

  By morning the scale of the calamity was apparent and the culprit identified. Only those few, like Nina and Martin, who had had the macaroni cheese the night before were unaffected. The shepherd’s pie was roundly condemned. Several people claimed to have detected a peculiar taste at the time, then backtracked as soon as the others began to rail at them for having said nothing. The invalids spent the day in bed, sipping water and comparing symptoms and degrees of affliction, vomiting intermittently and queuing outside the toilets.

  Nina, with no such excuse to keep her in bed, had planned to return to Malham to finish her study of footpath erosion and to collect some soil samples. But on her way out of the dormitory, where she had been saying goodbye to a wan-faced Jean, she bumped into Martin, who was on the same errand.

  ‘Wait a minute,’ he said. ‘I won’t be long.’ She watched him approach the sickbed where Jean was lying propped up on several of the miserly, underfilled pillows. Nina had just donated her own, and tucked the blankets around her tightly as if, she thought later, to prevent her from getting up. Martin smoothed the hair from Jean’s forehead and squeezed her hand.

  ‘Have fun,’ she said, weakly, closing her eyes and turning her head away.

  ‘Do you want to come and help me with my research?’ Martin asked when they were outside.

  ‘All right,’ said Nina, pleased with this turn of events. ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘I thought I might hitch to Ribblesdale. Do some work on the three peaks. Have you got some decent shoes? We might have to do a bit of walking.’

  Nina lifted a booted foot for his inspection. ‘I don’t mind walking.’ In truth the sight and smell of all those poor sickly wretches in the hostel had made her feel better, fitter, more vigorous than ever. She felt, irrationally, that it wasn’t pure chance that they’d been spared. It was destiny. ‘Do we need any equipment?’ she asked.

  ‘No, no,’ said Martin. ‘Just ourselves.’

  ‘In what sense could this be called research, exactly?’ Nina asked later as they sat outside a pub in Austwick, sipping Guinness and admiring the scenery. It was a crisp October morning, warm in the sun, cold in the shade, with the smell of wet grass and woodsmoke in the air.

  ‘Well,’ said Martin, offering her a peanut. ‘What we’re engaged in here is a bit of environmental perception.’

  ‘Oh? Meaning?’

  ‘We look at the landscape and respond to it. Either positively or negatively, depending on our personal experiences, cultural background, education, etc. etc.’

  ‘Is that all?’

  ‘Yup.’

  ‘It doesn’t sound very scientific.’

  ‘This is the way geography’s going now. The quantitative revolution is over.’

  ‘Is it?’ said Nina, who wasn’t aware it had even begun.

  Martin nodded. ‘It’s no use reducing everything to formulae and devising models and systems any more. That sort of geography is . . . history.’ He gave a sudden burst of laughter at his own joke.

  Nina looked at him through narrowed eyes, wondering whether he was making fun of her.

  ‘Come on, drink up. Another pub, another view, another valuable contribution to my dissertation.’ He emptied his glass and pulled her to her feet. They hitched a ride in the back of a farm truck as far as Ingleton and then walked up to Thornton Force to see the falls, which Nina declared to be ‘very nice’. Martin made a great show of writing this observation down.

  ‘You’re not getting much of a range of opinion here, are you?’ said Nina. As she led the way her boot slipped from under her on a mossy tree root and she stumbled. Martin caught her elbow and held her up until she was steady – and for a few seconds after that.

  ‘It’s not a survey. It’s only your response I’m interested in.’

  ‘You’re making me blush,’ said Nina. ‘And I’m not the blushing type – too thick-skinned.’

  ‘Perhaps it’s all the confidence they dish out at those posh girls’ schools,’ said Martin, squinting at her.

  ‘How do you know I went to a posh girls’ school?’ asked Nina, indignantly. ‘I never said that, did I?’

  Martin laughed. ‘Only every time you open your mouth.’

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ said Nina, her cut-glass accent wavering slightly. This was the first time someone she actually knew had made fun of her voice, though on occasions she had noticed shop assistants and other functionaries sniggering. At school all the girls had spoken properly; so did the sorts of people her parents entertained from the embassy – even the foreigners. Especially the foreigners.

  ‘It’s just an observation, not a criticism,’ said Martin. ‘Please don’t take offence.’

  ‘None taken, I assure you,’ said Nina, listening to her own pronunciation to see what other clues it could possibly be yielding.

  ‘Do you want to walk behind the waterfall?’ Martin asked, looking doubtfully at Nina’s suede coat. ‘Since we’re here.’

  ‘Is it necessary for your research?’ she asked.

  ‘No. But we’re going to get wet either way.’ He pointed back the way they had come at a lowering anvil-shaped cloud which was advancing across the expanse of clear sky towards them. As he spoke a gust of wind blew along the river valley, whipping the dead leaves up off the path in violent copper eddies, and bringing down still more from the branches above. Before the storm cloud was overhead the first flurry of raindrops fell, as if miraculously from the blue; there was a distant, low growl and suddenly it was as if a great black curtain had been drawn across the sun. ‘Quick,’ said Martin, making a dash for the shelter of a broad oak which grew on the bank alongside the path. There was a brilliant flash followed a second later by an explosive thunderclap.

  ‘Not under a tree,’ said Nina, as water started to pelt down with the force of a tropical monsoon. ‘Not in a storm.’

  ‘Where then?’

  ‘Behind the waterfall.’

  By the time they had slithered and scrambled across the rocks to the relative shelter of the overhang the path had become a running channel of mud and the splash of the waterfall had turn
ed into a roar.

  ‘Oh!’ gasped Nina, flicking wet hair from her eyes. ‘Next time I go on a field trip, remind me to choose somewhere hot and dry.’

  At Ingleton they found a pub with a log fire and sat in front of it, steaming, while they waited for their food to arrive. Nina tried to rub her hair dry on the roller towel in the Ladies. The drenching had made her skin look clear and dewy, though the ends of her fingers were shrivelled as if she had spent too long in the bath. She hung her dripping suede coat over the back of a chair where it created a puddle on the floorboards and presently began to give off a smell which Martin identified as ‘beast’.

  They had cowered under the waterfall until it became so swollen by rain that they were in danger of being knocked off the ledge. Wading back along the path had seemed the only option. When they at last reached the pub the rain running down Nina’s neck had met up with the water being drawn up her jeans – the fabric acting as a wick. If she had been in any company but Martin’s this would have prompted energetic complaint, but somehow, today, she could see the funny side of her predicament. Even when he gave her a playful shove and she had stepped up to her knee in a brimming pothole, she had laughed while she was swearing at him.

  ‘I can’t help feeling guilty,’ she said, as their meal was ferried to the table. ‘Enjoying myself while the others are in bed, ill.’ This was not entirely true: it was guilt at what she might go on to do which was troubling her. She broke her roll into little pieces and scattered them on the surface of her soup.

  ‘I don’t,’ said Martin. ‘I’m just glad it’s not me. I hate being sick more than anything else.’

  ‘Perhaps we should take something back for Jean,’ Nina suggested. ‘To show we’ve been thinking of her. Perhaps something that’s made locally.’

  ‘Wensleydale?’ said Martin.

  ‘I meant pottery. Or jewellery.’

  They spent the afternoon browsing around the craft shops in Ingleton, all pretence at fieldwork abandoned. Nina, who liked to spend, and was in any case infected by the holiday spirit, bought a key ring, some argyll socks, a leather bookmark, and an embroidered sleeve patch of the Pennine Way.

  ‘What are you going to do with that?’ Martin inquired. ‘Sew it on to your Girl Guide’s uniform?’

  ‘I always envied other children who had these on their anoraks,’ said Nina. ‘My mother said they were vulgar. They didn’t sell them in the sorts of places I went on holiday anyway.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Oh, Hong Kong, Singapore, Mombasa, you know.’

  ‘Not really, no,’ said Martin, whose family holidays had been spent in a caravan in Shanklin.

  ‘It wasn’t much fun stuck in some embassy compound. There were never any other children to play with,’ said Nina, spinning a carousel of earrings beside the till while the assistant wrapped her purchases in tissue paper. ‘That’s nice,’ she added, pointing to a gold St Christopher beneath the glass top of the counter. ‘My father gave me one the first time I went on an aeroplane on my own. I used to wear it whenever I was travelling, but we had a break-in and it got stolen with all the rest of the valuables. I don’t know whether Jean’s got one, do you?’ she added, conscious that it was, after all, Jean they were supposed to be shopping for.

  Martin shook his head. ‘I can’t even remember whether she’s got pierced ears.’

  Oh really? thought Nina, encouraged by this admission.

  ‘Here we are. This’ll do,’ said Martin, picking up an eightounce bar of Kendal Mint Cake, which didn’t strike Nina as a terribly romantic gift. More the sort of thing you’d buy your granny. Better and better. ‘She’ll need building up when she’s got her appetite back,’ he went on, digging in his pocket for some change.

  Nina left him to pay and continued on up the street, looking in the shop windows and grimacing at her bedraggled reflection. She was looking covetously at an earthenware coffee pot and wondering whether she would be able to get it home in one piece in her suitcase when Martin caught her up, slightly red in the face.

  ‘Here,’ he said, handing her a small box. ‘A souvenir of today.’

  It was the gold St Christopher. ‘Oh, Martin, that’s so kind of you,’ cried Nina, delightedly. ‘But when I said all that just now about losing mine, I didn’t mean you to . . .’

  ‘It was such a tragic story, I couldn’t help myself,’ said Martin, smiling at the effect of his attack of generosity.

  ‘I’m going to put it on right now,’ said Nina, gently disentangling the fragile chain. Martin lifted her hair free of her collar while she fastened the clasp and let the medallion drop down inside her jumper to rest coolly against her skin. ‘I won’t take it off and leave it lying around like the last one,’ she promised. ‘I’ll wear it all the time. Even in the bath.’ Martin raised his eyes at the thought of Nina in the bath. ‘I feel luckier already,’ she went on. ‘Watch me get us a lift,’ and she set off up the street with her thumb up and her arm stuck out into the traffic.

  They walked four miles before someone picked them up. The sun had set suddenly in a blazing reef of pink clouds and the sky was now navy blue. The only light came from the window of a distant farmhouse and the occasional sweep of headlamps.

  ‘Why isn’t anyone stopping?’ Nina demanded, pressing herself into the bramble hedge as another car roared past. She was slightly rattled because she had hoped Martin might try and kiss her once they were away from the town, but it didn’t look as if he was going to, and now a van was pulling up and that was that.

  ‘Kettlewell any good to you?’ the driver said, cranking the window down.

  Martin nodded. ‘Good enough.’ He held the door open for Nina to climb in.

  ‘Shove the dog over the back,’ the man said, indicating the sleeping Jack Russell on the bench seat beside him. Nina put out a tentative hand and the dog began to growl, curling up his black lips. ‘Stop your moaning,’ said the man, scooping the creature up in one hand and dumping him behind the seat on top of some lengths of copper piping and bags of tools.

  Martin explained where they were staying. ‘I can run you to the door no problem,’ said the driver, but as they approached the turn-off to the hostel Martin signalled for him to stop. ‘Just here will do.’

  ‘What did you do that for?’ Nina asked, as they stood on the grass verge watching the van’s red tail lights weaving into the distance. There was still half a mile or so to walk.

  Martin set off. ‘Because I wanted to kiss you,’ he said over his shoulder. ‘And I didn’t want to do it right outside the front door.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Nina, momentarily lost for words. Then, ‘Wanted?’ she called after him.

  He turned and they stood facing each other, twenty paces apart as if in a duel. It was so dark she couldn’t make out the expression on his face, and when they started to walk towards each other it seemed to take a long time before they met in the middle. As Martin kissed her Nina felt something hard pressing against her stomach through the thickness of their coats. ‘Blimey,’ she thought, and when they finally broke apart Martin said, ‘Excuse me,’ rummaged in his pocket, and brought out the gift-wrapped bar of Kendal Mint Cake, crumpled and crushed beyond redemption.

  10

  Jane was in the park again, trying to walk off an ugly row with Harriet – the culmination of a stultifying day of sponge painting, flash cards and Lego. It had started so well, in the kitchen making shortbread, although Harriet would keep sneezing all over the mixing bowl, trying to eat slab margarine straight from the packet, and being generally unhygienic. But the biscuits had been finished, cooked and pretty much eaten by ten-thirty and there was still the rest of the day to be filled.

  In spite of her best intentions to humour the child, play with her, keep her occupied and head off confrontations before they could escalate, a quarrel had blown up from nowhere. Jane had ventured to suggest that Harriet help her to tidy up the Lego before starting a new game. Harriet had refused, and pretty soon unfriendly words wer
e being exchanged. It had ended, as usual, with a smack. Harriet had hit back – not an uncommon occurrence – but made worse this time by the fact that Jane was kneeling and the blow therefore caught her in the face.

  ‘You horrible little child!’ Jane had said at one point.

  ‘You make me horrible!’ Harriet blubbered, before running upstairs. She descended some time later holding a pair of scissors and a bald Barbie, and suffered Jane’s remorseful hugs with her usual frigidity.

  Someone had left a copy of the local paper on the counter at the kiosk. Jane glanced at the front page as she stood waiting to be served. Harriet was tearing around the playground outside, chasing pigeons, and setting the empty swings rattling.

  BOY, 9, KEPT CHAINED LIKE DOG, ran the headline. This was the latest detail in an emerging saga Jane had been following on the regional news. Apparently a woman and her young son had been found living in conditions of unspeakable squalor, in an ordinary suburban house not two miles away, alongside half a dozen feral cats and the decomposing corpse of the woman’s mother. The boy, who was unable to read, write, or speak coherently, had never been to school – a fact which had evaded all the relevant authorities. He had not, it seemed, been out of doors much at all in the preceding three years. The neighbours on either side had noticed nothing amiss.

  Jane shuddered as she read the most recent revelations: the child had been found with a peculiar fungus growing on his skin caused by a chronic lack of sunlight. He had occasionally been let out to play in the back garden – a wilderness, the neighbours conceded, but then horticulture isn’t everyone’s thing – but only at night. The rest of the time he spent chained on a longish leash to the banisters, except when his mother made her fortnightly excursion to the dole office and the local supermarket, during which time he would be shut in the cupboard under the stairs. The matter was now in the hands of the social services, and arrangements were being made to try and rehabilitate mother and son together. Both had demonstrated genuine distress at the possibility of separation.