Simon Beckett - Stone Bruises

There’s movement in the pen behind her. The boar’s snout appears in the cave-like entrance of its shed. Small, mean eyes regard us from under the heavy flaps of its ears.

‘Gretchen, please listen to me!’ Even in the moonlight Mathilde’s face is ashen. ‘I’m sorry—’

‘No, you’re not! You’re lying! Papa didn’t do that! My mother’s dead, you’re not her!’

Behind her, the boar has emerged. It begins to pace, watching us.

‘You’re frightening Michel,’ Mathilde says. ‘Give him to me, and then—’

‘No!’ Gretchen shouts, and with a squeal the boar charges. It thuds into the fencing, and as Gretchen recoils I lunge forward. But she sees me and thrusts Michel towards the enclosure again. ‘Get away !’

I back off. The boar butts against the planks, enraged. The baby is wailing, legs kicking in the air.

‘No!’ Mathilde’s hands have gone to her mouth. ‘Don’t, please! You don’t want to hurt Michel, he’s—’

‘He’s what ? My brother ?’ Gretchen’s face slowly crumples as Mathilde says nothing. ‘It’s not true! I don’t believe you!’

Beginning to sob, she hugs Michel to her. Thank God. Beside me, I can feel the tension ebb from Mathilde.

‘Come up to the house,’ she says as she steps forward. ‘Let me take Michel, and—’

Gretchen’s head snaps up. ‘ Whore! ’

Her face is contorted as she lifts Michel again. The wooden planks buck and creak under the boar’s attack. Oh God, I think, getting ready to launch myself forward, knowing neither Mathilde nor I can reach her in time.

Mathilde stands with her arms out. The moon clears a cloud, illuminating the scene like a floodlight. ‘Please, just let me explain—’

‘Whore! Lying whore !’

‘Gretchen, please—’

‘Shut up! I hate you, I HATE YOU!’

Gretchen pivots towards the pen, and there’s a sound like a whip cracking. She staggers, losing her grip on Michel as her legs buckle. I run towards them as she collapses but Mathilde is there first. She snatches up Michel, quickly checking that he’s unhurt before thrusting him at me and turning to her daughter.

There’s a dark stain spreading on the front of Gretchen’s T-shirt. Even now I don’t understand what’s happened, not until I hear a moan and turn to see Arnaud at the edge of the woods. The rifle stock is still set to his shoulder but as I watch the barrel drops to point harmlessly at the ground.

He stumbles into a run towards us as Mathilde kneels beside Gretchen. She’s lying on her back, limbs moving spastically as she blinks up at the sky.

‘Mathilde…?’ It’s a small girl’s voice, lost and confused. ‘Mathilde, I don’t…’

‘Shh, it’s all right, don’t try to speak.’

Mathilde takes hold of one of her hands as Arnaud reaches us. He pauses to rest a hand on Michel, then drops down beside Gretchen.

‘Oh, Jesus! God, no…!’

My mind seems stalled. I stand there helplessly, awkwardly holding Michel. I tell myself that the rifle is too small bore to do much damage, that it’s only lethal for birds and rabbits. But blood is still soaking into Gretchen’s T-shirt, and now she begins to cough black gouts of it.

‘No,’ Mathilde says, as if she’s reproving her. ‘No!’

Gretchen is staring up at her, eyes wide and scared. With her free hand Mathilde presses at the small hole in her chest. Gretchen tries to speak, but then an arterial gush bursts from her mouth and she starts to choke. Her back arches, feet kicking in the dirt as she spasms. For a moment she’s rigid, straining against it. Then all the tension leaves her body, and it’s over.

A stillness seems to descend, a bubble of quiet that neither Michel’s crying nor the boar’s squeals can break. Mathilde half-sits, half-slumps, so that one leg is pinned under her. She’s still holding Gretchen’s hand. She lowers it as Arnaud weeps and strokes his daughter’s face.

‘I’m sorry. She was going to throw him, I had to,’ he keens. ‘Oh God, no, I’m sorry.’

Mathilde stares at her father across Gretchen’s body, then her hand cracks across his face louder than the rifle shot. He doesn’t seem to notice, rocking backwards and forwards with the bloody print on his cheek.

Behind them, the boar hammers at the fence in a frenzy, goaded by the scent of blood. Mathilde gets unsteadily to her feet. She absently tucks her hair behind her ear, but the gesture is broken and automatic, accomplishing nothing except to leave a dark smear. She walks drunkenly to where Arnaud dropped the rifle.

‘Mathilde,’ I say, my voice a croak.

I might as well not have spoken. She picks up the rifle and comes back, no more steadily than before. Her hands and arms have red gloves to her elbows.

‘Mathilde,’ I repeat, struggling to hold onto Michel. But I’m no more than a spectator now. She stands over her father as he kneels by Gretchen. He doesn’t look up when she chambers a round and raises the rifle to her shoulder.

I flinch away as the rifle fires. The report is followed by a shriek from the boar. When I look back Arnaud is still weeping beside his daughter. Mathilde fires again. This time I hear the bullet slap into the boar’s flesh. It roars and spins around, then charges the fence once more. Mathilde calmly works the rifle bolt to reload. She walks closer until she’s firing right down onto the animal’s back. Each shot is accompanied by a frenzied squeal as the boar continues to attack the planking. Its dark-grey hide is black with blood as it shrieks its pain and rage.

Then Mathilde puts the barrel to its ear and pulls the trigger, and the screams are abruptly cut off.

Silence settles, shroud-like, around the pens. Only the soft weeping from Arnaud disturbs it, but gradually other sounds begin to filter in. The pigs’ frightened squeals, Michel’s cries, the rustle of the trees. As the land comes back to life around us, Mathilde lets the rifle drop from her hands. She stares off at nothing while her father kneels over Gretchen’s body, and I stand apart from them both, convinced that this moment will go on for ever.

A MIST-LIKE DRIZZLE, too light to call rain, blurs the distinction between ground and low grey clouds. The trees by the roadside are displaying their skeletal nature, stark branches showing through the sparse leaves, while what were fields of wheat are now furrows of bare stubble waiting to be ploughed under.

I walk the last kilometre to the farm. After the car has pulled away it occurs to me that, by a vagary of the last few lifts, I’m following the same route as when I first arrived. I stop when I reach the barbed-wire-topped gate, looking past it at the familiar track disappearing into the trees. The mailbox stencilled with Arnaud is still nailed to the post. But the white lettering is more faded than I remember, and the rusty padlock that used to bar entry has been replaced by a severe construction of brass and steel. Pinned to the centre of the gate is a subtler form of warning: a printed notice announcing that this is now bank property.

I rub my hand along the gate’s weathered grain, but make no attempt to climb over. Now I’m here I’m reluctant to go any further. I wait for a lone car to flash past before throwing my rucksack onto the other side and clambering across the corroded wire. The once-dusty track is puddled and muddy, and without the cover of leaves I can soon make out the farmhouse through the trees. Then the track emerges in the courtyard, revealing the changes a few months have made.

The place is abandoned. No hens scurry about as I cross the cobbles, and the van and trailer have been removed. But the stable block’s dead clock still stands at twenty to nothing, and the ancient tractor remains; too broken and decrepit to move from its long-time home. The house is closed and shuttered, more dilapidated than ever under its rusting scaffold. The section of wall I repaired looks smaller than I remember, a cosmetic repair that doesn’t conceal the fundamental rot.