Iris Murdoch - The Sandcastle

‘What’s the matter,’ said Miss Carter. ‘You look very strange. Are you all right?’

‘Yes, fine,’ said Mor. ‘I’m just feeling the heat a bit. I’ll be better when the car’s started.’

Miss Carter gave him an anxious glance and they set off.

Here I am telling another lie, said Mor to himself. Suddenly he said to Miss Carter, ‘I’m sorry, that’s not true. The fact is that, I don’t know why, I didn’t tell my wife that I was with you in the car — which was very foolish of me.’

Miss Carter turned to look at him. Her eyes were hidden behind the dark, glasses. Now she’ll despise me, thought Mor. She’ll despise me for telling the lie, and she’ll despise me for telling her that I told it.

‘Oh dear,’ said Miss Carter. ‘You’ll have to tell her when you get back. She won’t mind much, will she? But I expect she’ll be cross with me.’

Mor felt a sudden relief and an enormous liking for Miss Carter. Of course, it was straightforward enough, and not much harm would be done. He would have a nasty half-hour with Nan, that was all. He was grateful to Miss Carter for the simple way in which she had dealt with it, and he was glad now that he had told her.

‘You’re perfectly right, of course,’ said Mor, ‘and naturally I shall tell her when I get back. She’ll be cross with me, quite rightly, but she won’t be cross with you - I’ll see that she isn’t. I’m so sorry about this. I really am a fool.’

The car had been speeding along as they talked. ‘Where are we now?’ said Miss Carter.

Mor wasn’t quite sure. ‘Drive on a bit,’ he said. ‘We may have missed the turning. I’ll recognize something in a moment.’ He felt that this last exchange had broken some barrier between himself and Miss Carter, and he found himself now more at ease in her presence. For a moment he was almost glad of his foolishness.

Miss Carter slowed the car down and Mor began to study the countryside.‘ By this time they were deep in the ragged coniferous Surrey landscape which lies between the fanned-out lines of the great main roads out of London: the region where the escaping Londoner, alone of city-dwellers to use the word in quite this way, says a little doubtfully, ’Now at last we are really in the country.‘

Mor decided that they must have passed the turning he had in mind, but he felt sure that if they continued they would find their way to the river all the same. He was determined, after that unpleasantness, not to fail Miss Carter in the matter of the river. He owed her a service. Meanwhile the afternoon was growing hotter and the woodlands thicker, more immobile, and more heavily perfumed. They drove on.

With a simultaneous cry they greeted what now appeared quite suddenly upon the road before them. Miss Carter braked violently, and approached at a walking pace. She said, ‘How strange, I thought at first it was a mirage.’ She stopped the Riley within a few feet of the ford.

The water ran twinkling across the road in a wide steady sheet. They could hear it running. For a while they sat in an entranced silence listening to its noise. Then Miss Carter let the car come very slowly forward until the front wheels were dipping into the water. She turned to Mor with a look of triumph.

Mor was glad at her joy. He looked about him to each side. The water emerged from the wood under concrete shelves, the tops of which were covered with earth and grasses. Beyond this the trees were thick and it was impossible to see what happened to the little river. Mor looked across the water. A short way beyond the ford there was a turning to the left. ‘Let’s just go down there,’ said Mor, pointing to it. ‘We might be able to reach the bank of the river farther along.’

Miss Carter looked at him a little anxiously. ‘Are you sure you have time?’ she said. ‘I don’t want to keep you. My pranks have caused you some trouble already.’

‘Nonsense!’ said Mor. ‘Nothing was your fault, my dear child. I’ve still got some time in hand. If you’d like to go -? We won’t spend more than a moment looking.’

‘I’d love to!’ said Miss Carter promptly, and the car went through the ford with a gentle swish and sailed round the corner. Here once more the trees met overhead and there was a diffused green light. Miss Carter took off her glasses.

After about a hundred yards they saw that the little road was bearing to the right, away from the direction where the river must lie. The wood was still far too thick for them to see what was there, although when the car stopped and Miss Carter switched off the engine a murmuring sound of water was distantly audible. Straight in front of them, however, was a white gate, and beyond it was a gentle green bridle path which curved away to the left between ferns and brambles under a close continuous archway of oaks, birches, and conifers. It was tempting. They looked at each other.

‘Let’s leave the car,’ said Mor. ‘We could walk down there in a moment and find the river.’

‘No,’ she said, ‘why walk? We can ride.’ And she had leapt out of the car and was unfastening the gate. A minute or two later the Riley was lurching gently along the bridle path.

‘To drive a car along a path like this,’ said Miss Carter almost in a whisper, ‘is like sailing a boat along a street. It is an enchantment.’

Mor was silent. It was so. The engine was almost noiseless now and above it rose the massed hum of the woodland on a summer afternoon, a dazing sound that confounded itself with silence. It was as if since they had passed the white gate they had entered another world. The spirit of the wood pressed upon them, and Mor found himself looking from side to side expecting to see something strange. The path was well kept and closely covered with fine grass, and someone had cut the bracken back on either side. All the same, the ferns and the wild flowers were close enough to the wheels of the car to touch them as they passed, and Mor saw gorse and ragged robin and ladies’ lace banked and swaying slightly on either side of the path ahead. Here and there came a deep vista into the wood, down leaf-strewn alleys lighted by a brown light. There was still no sign of the river. Miss Carter stopped the car suddenly. She still spoke in a low voice. ‘Would you like to drive?’

Mor was startled. It was nearly fifteen years since he had driven a car, and he had never possessed one of his own. ‘I haven’t driven for a long time,’ he said, ‘and I don’t know whether I could now. Anyway, I haven’t got a driving licence.’

‘That doesn’t matter,’ said Miss Carter, ‘no one will know - and we’re not in a real road anyway. Would you like to?’

‘I might harm your beautiful car,’ said Mor. But he knew that he would like to, he would like to very much indeed, drive the Riley. Before he could say any more Miss Carter skipped out of the car and they changed places. She seemed very elated and watched Mor with delight as he looked doubtfully at the dashboard. He could remember nothing. ‘How do I start it?’ he asked.

‘There’s the ignition, it’s switched on, there’s the starter, there’s the gear lever. You remember how the gears go? There’s the clutch, the foot-brake, the accelerator. The hand-brake’s in front here.’ Miss Carter was perched sideways in her seat with the gleeful air of a little boy who sees his father about to make a mess of things.

Mor felt large and awkward. He fiddled a little with the gears. He began to remember. He started the engine. Then gingerly he put the car into first gear and released the clutch. With a jolt the Riley leapt forward. Mor immediately put his foot on the brake and the engine stalled. Miss Carter rocked with laughter. She had drawn her feet up and clutched her skirt about her ankles.