Pat Barker - Border Crossing

‘Did they fight? I mean, did he hit her?’

‘No, he hit me. He hit me to get at her.’

‘So Angus was pressing on some raw spots.’

‘Oh, it was dynamite. I mean, I’d totally blocked off the past. I didn’t have any explanation for why I was in the secure unit. I was just there. I wasn’t there because I’d done anything wrong. I believed my own story.’

‘So why did you go on writing about the past? You could’ve stopped.’

Danny shifted in his chair. ‘I think…’ A sigh. ‘I think I got addicted to the… intensity of it.’

‘Did you feel it was dangerous?’

‘God, yes. What the fuck did he think he was doing? Because you look at what he did, he took somebody with hypothermia, and put them next to a blazing hot fire. As soon as the feeling starts to come back, they scream their bloody heads off.’

‘Yeah, I can see that. But then, the other thing you don’t do with hypothermia is to leave people in the Snow.’

‘No, I know. No, I know it had to be done. And then he fell in love with me, and that didn’t help.’

‘When did you realize he was in love with you?’

‘Quite late. I’m not sure I knew at-all till after I’d left. If you mean when did I realize he wanted to fuck me, about five minutes after we met.’

‘And he made love to you?’

‘Yes.’

‘How on earth did you manage that? You were supervised every minute of the day, locked in at night…

‘Well, he was doing the supervising, wasn’t he?’

‘And how long did this go on?’

‘Two months? Not long.’

‘Do you remember how it started?’

‘I was walking past the window of his room, the room where he taught, and I tapped on the glass. He was sitting at the desk, marking books, and he waved to me to come in. And we talked. And that was all we did. But we were alone, and it was an absolute rule that we shouldn’t be, and we both knew that. So there was this casual conversation going on, totally innocent, and at the same time… And then he had to go to a meeting, and that was that. Except he knew I’d tap on the window again, and I knew that when I did he’d wave to me to come in.’ Danny smiled. ‘It was all so bloody repressed you wouldn’t believe. Talk about Jane Austen. And it went on like that for quite a long time. And then one day I brushed against him, deliberately of course…’ He shrugged.

‘But then the headmaster found out?’

Danny looked surprised, almost as if he’d forgotten how the affair ended. ‘Yes, that’s right.’

‘And Angus lost his job.’

‘Yes.’

‘Did you tell the headmaster?’

‘No, I told another teacher. She told him.’

‘And there was no inquiry?’

‘Nobody wanted one. Angus certainly didn’t.’

‘And that meant no more digging into the past?’

‘Yes. Till now.’

Tom took the hint. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘Your father had just left home and you were searching for the present you thought he must’ve left for you, and you found his binoculars.’

‘And more or less went to bed with them for the next three months.’

‘You also said you looked at your mother through the wrong end and she was tiny like a beetle and you didn’t have to feel sorry for her. Did you feel sorry? It implies there was a problem.’

‘Well, yes. It would’ve been a hard life for a woman, at the best of times, but she’d had a mastectomy. She’d lost her hair. She’d lost her husband. For Christ’s sake. That Christmas she got one of the neighbours to kill the geese, and she sat in the shed till midnight plucking them. I went in, and the draught from the door made all the feathers rise up, and they take ages to settle. And when you looked at them every one of them had a little plug of blood at the end of the spine. I tried pulling some of them out, but of course I got bored, and she says, “It’s all right, son. You go to bed.” It was freezing in the shed. And the skin was this horrible dingy yellow, pimply, cold.’ He pulled a face. ‘I hated her because I couldn’t help her.’

The word ‘hate’ seemed to liberate him. 1 hated her because she couldn’t keep him. I hated her for being ill and miserable and bald and ugly and old. I hated the way her nose went red when she cried. And at the same time I was frightened she was going to die. Only even that was mixed because at the back of my mind there was a fantasy: if she dies he’ll have to come and get me.’

‘And it was just the two of you?’

‘Yes, till the cancer came back and she had to have another mastectomy. And then my grandparents came and lived with us. I don’t know how she’d have managed otherwise.’

‘And then your grandfather died.’

‘Yeah, babbling on about rabbits, poor old sod. Gran went back home. She couldn’t do anything — she was ill herself. I think — I’m not sure — I think there was a bit of a breach. I think she blamed my mother for Granddad dying like that. He was doing too much, trying to help, and he couldn’t, his heart was too bad.’

‘It sounds as if there was a lot of blaming going on.’

‘Oh, a tremendous amount.’

‘How did you react to all this?’

‘Went off the rails. Let me see, what was I doing? Starting fires. Once in my bedroom, I think that was the worst time.’

‘How did it feel?’

‘Marvellous. Fantastic. My mother said when she came into the room I was staring at the fire, not doing anything, not trying to put it out. And that was awful for her, because then she felt she couldn’t leave me, and she had to leave me. She’d got a job cleaning, by this time. The farm was up for sale, but it wasn’t selling. She sold all the stock and lived on social security, Dad never sent a penny. And she got this little job, cash in hand, and she used to run all the way there and all the way back, and every time she turned the corner she fully expected to see the place on fire. Then I burnt the barn down. And there was one other little fire in the shed. The rest of it was all outside. But that was with other kids. We lit a fire once that took four fire engines hours to put out.’

‘Did you watch?’

‘Yes.’

‘How did you feel?’

‘Powerful’

‘The opposite of being hung up on a peg.’

A sour smile. ‘Yeah.’

‘And what did you do the rest of the time?’

‘Moped about. Nicked off school. Stole.’

‘On your own?’

‘No, there was a gang of us. Except I think… I don’t know.’

‘No, go on.’

‘I think they were more normal than me. I mean, we used to play at being the S AS behind enemy lines, and we’d be completely lost in it, the way kids are, but then the game would stop for them, and they’d go and do something else. I was inside the game all the time. And then I’d go to call for somebody and he’d come to the door, and say, “I can’t play out today. Me nanna’s coming to tea.” And I’m like, What does he mean his nanna’s coming to tea? We’re the fucking SAS. I was inside the game all the time. I’d be lying in bed at night listening to Mum and Gran downstairs and they were enemy civilians.’

‘And the fire-setting and the stealing?’

‘Part of the game. Setting fire to enemy buildings. Living off the land.’

Any moment now he was going to claim that Lizzie’s death was collateral damage. ‘Who did you steal from?’

‘My mother. Shops. Eventually houses.’

‘With the gang?’

‘Sometimes. Everybody nicked sweets from shops.’

‘And stealing from houses?’

He hesitated. ‘No, that was just me. It wasn’t about money, though I did need it. I don’t know… I liked being in the houses. Being there, breathing the air, leaving all these invisible traces all over the carpet. I liked the idea that when they came back they wouldn’t know.’ He shrugged. ‘It’s hard to explain. Nothing in the house could do anything.’