Hilary Mantel - Beyond Black

At Whitton, Colette opened the wardrobe. “Where are Zoë’s things? Surely she doesn’t take everything with her when she travels?”

A pity. She had been looking forward to trying her clothes on, when Gavin went to work. She wished he would clear off, really, and let her go through all the drawers and cupboards, instead of hanging about in a sheepish way at the back of her and sighing like that.

Back and back. There is an interval of darkness, dwindling, suspension of the senses. She neither hears nor sees. The world has no scent or savour. She is a cell, a dot. She diminishes, to vanishing point. She is back beyond a dot. She is back where the dots come from. And still she goes back.

It is close of day, and Al is plodding home. The light is low and greyish. She must make it before dark. Clay is encrusted on her feet, and beneath them the track is worn into deep ruts. Her garments, which appear to be made of sacking—which may, indeed, be sacks—are stiffening with the day’s sweat, and chafing the knotty scars on her body. Her breath is coming hard. There is a stitch in her side. She stops and drinks from the ditch, scooping up the water with her fingers. She squats there, until the moon rises.

In the kitchen Colette was opening cupboards, staring critically at the scanty stocks. Zoë, she thought, is one of those people who lives on air, and has no intention of putting herself out to cook for Gavin; which is a mistake, because left to himself he reverts to fried chicken, and before you know where you are he’s bursting out of his shirts.

She opened the fridge, she pushed the contents about. What she found was unappealing: a half-used carton of full-fat long-life milk, some Scotch eggs, a lump of orange cheese which had gone hard, and three small blackened bananas.

“Didn’t anyone ever tell Zoë,” she said, “not to keep bananas in the fridge?”

“Feel free,” Gavin said.

“What?”

“Look in all the cupboards, why don’t you? Look in the dishwasher. Don’t mind me. Look in the washing machine.”

“Well, if it’s empty,” she said, “I’ll just pop in one or two things of mine that I brought with me. I didn’t like to leave my dirty laundry behind.”

He followed her into the sitting room as she went to pick up her bag. “You’re not going back then?”

“No chance. Gavin, excuse me, don’t stand in my way.”

“Sorry.” He sidestepped. “So won’t you miss her? Your friend?”

“I’ll miss my income. But don’t worry. I’ll get it sorted. I’ll ring up some agencies later.”

“It’s quiet,” Gavin warned.

“Anything at your place?”

“My place? Dunno.”

She stared at him, her pale eyes bulging slightly. “Gavin—correct me if I’m wrong.” She squatted and opened her bag. “Would I be near the truth if I said you’re still out of a job?”

He nodded.

She plucked out her dirty washing. “And would I be near the truth if I said you made Zoë up?”

He turned away.

“And that rustbucket out there, it really is your own car?” Damn, she thought, isn’t that just typical, he’s more embarrassed about the car than everything else put together. Gavin stood rubbing his head. She passed him, went into the kitchen with her bundle.

“It’s temporary,” he said. “I traded down. But now you’re back—”

“Back?” she said coldly. She bent down and retrieved a grey sock from the washing machine. It was a woolly sock, the kind you darn; the heel had gone into holes. “How long were you intending to leave it before you told me Zoë didn’t exist?”

“I thought you’d work it out for yourself. Which you did, didn’t you? I had to say something! You went on about this Dean guy, and the rest. Dean this and Donnie that. I had to say something.”

“To make me jealous?”

“Yes. I suppose.”

“I only mentioned Dean once, as far as I remember.”

“He going to come after you, is he?”

“No,” she said. “He’s dead.”

“Christ! Really? You’re not winding me up?”

She shook her head.

“Accident, was it?”

“I believe so.”

“You’d lost touch? I’m glad he’s dead. Suppose I shouldn’t say it, but I am.”

She sniffed. “He was nothing to me.”

“I mean, I hope he didn’t suffer. Kind of thing.”

“Gavin, is this sock yours?”

“What?” he said. “That? No. Never seen it before. So what about this psychic stuff, have you given it up?”

“Oh, yes. That’s all finished now.” She held up the sock to examine it. “It’s not like you usually wear. Horrible grey thing. Looks like roadkill.” She frowned at it; she thought she’d seen the other half of the pair, but couldn’t think where.

“Colette … listen … I shouldn’t have told you lies.”

“That’s all right.” She thought, I told you some. Then, in case she seemed to be excusing him too readily, she said, “It’s what I expect.”

“Doesn’t seem like seven years. Since we split.”

“Must be. Must be about that. It was the summer that Diana died.” She walked around the kitchen, her finger dabbing at sticky surfaces. “Looks like six years and three hundred and sixty-four days since you gave these tiles a wipe-down.”

“I’m glad now we didn’t sell up.”

“Are you? Why?”

“It makes it like before.”

“Time doesn’t go backwards.”

“No, but I can’t remember why we split.” She frowned. Neither could she, really. Gavin looked down at his feet. “Colette, we’ve been a couple of plonkers, haven’t we?”

She picked up the woolly sock, and threw it in the kitchen bin. “I don’t think women can be,” she said. “Plonkers. Not really.”

Gavin said humbly, “I think you could do anything, Colette.”

She looked at him; his head hanging like some dog that’s been out in the rain. She looked at him and her heart was touched: where her heart would be.

Admiral Drive: Al hears the neighbours, muttering outside. They are carrying placards, she expects. Sergeant Delingbole is speaking to them through a megaphone. You can’t scare Al. When you’ve been strangled as often as she has, when you’ve been drowned, when you’ve died so many times and found yourself still earthside, what are the neighbours going to do to you that’s so bloody novel?

There are several ways forward, she thinks, several ways I can go from here. She accepts that Colette won’t be back. Repentance is not out of the question; she imagines Colette saying, I was hasty, can we start again, and herself saying, I don’t think so, Colette: that was then and now it’s now.

Time for a shake-up. I’ll never settle here after all the name-calling and disruption. Even if, when all this dies down, the neighbours start to cosy up to me and bake me cakes. They may forget but I won’t. Besides, by now they know what I do for a living. That it’s not weather forecasting; and anyway, the Met Office has moved to Exeter.

I could ring an estate agent, she thinks, and ask for a valuation. (Colette’s voice in her ear says, you ought to ring three.) “Miss Hart, what about your shed, which is of local historic interest? And what about the black cloud of evil that hovers over your premises. Will you be leaving that?” Memories are short, she thinks, in house sales. She will be forgotten, just like the worms and voles who used to live here, and the foetus dug in under the hedge.

She calls Mandy.

“Natasha, Psychic to the Stars?”

“Mandy, Colette’s walked out.”

“Oh, it’s you, Alison. Oh dear. I foresaw as much, frankly. When we were at Irene’s, looking for the will, I said to Silvana, trouble there, mark my words.”

“And I’m on my own.”