One, two, three, and miss the next one. Anna, in a white cotton nightgown, came down the small flight of stairs from her bedroom, counted steps and listened for the creak of a warped board. The darkness was large and mobile and she could feel its different textures – the way it hung like silk curtaining over the stairs, the way it was fine and furred over the carpet on the landing. She felt delicately for the fifth step with a bare foot and heard her own breathing, soft, regular, too quick. Everyone was withdrawn, half human, in their sleep behind the closed doors. Anna was glad of it; they left the house and herself to her.
When they had come home, that evening, no one had been very happy or wanted to talk very much. Margaret had complained of sunburn, Caroline had been sharp, even with Jeremy. Henry had said, ‘Hush, I am thinking,’ whenever he was addressed. There had been something antagonistic between them all, as there so often is between those who have been expected to enjoy themselves in each other’s company. They had all gone to bed early. Anna licked her lips, and put her whole weight very carefully onto the last step. They were negligible now they were asleep. She imagined them all with delight, inert and solid under their sheets, their hair tangled over the hot faces pressed into the pillows. Their sleep gave her power over them, just because she was awake, and moving.
The weather was about to break, and Anna was waiting for it. She had been sitting up, watching the window, listening for the slightest sound, the slightest tremor, to mark the beginning of the storm. So far there had been nothing; the night was evenly black and undisturbed; but she knew it must come. It prickled on her skin, she had scented it already, it was a question of time only. Anna liked storms. They excited her always, but this time it was worse than usual. It had been too long coming. In the end she could not sit still, and had come downstairs for a glass of water, needing movement and a change of place. She crept along corridors, feeling a prick of electricity even in the carpet under her feet, and came to the white closed door of the bathroom.
Inside, it was beautiful; so beautiful, that she made a little noise of excitement and had to look hurriedly behind her in case she had disturbed one of the sleepers. An earlier owner of the house had been wildly and uncharacteristically extravagant over the bathroom, had stripped and remade it along the glass and chromium lines of the chic furniture magazines of the late twenties. The old iron bath, on its lion’s paws, which Caroline would much rather have had, now stood in one corner of the garden and Henry grew hydrangeas in it. Caroline felt that it would be somehow too much to put it back and decorate round it. She was nevertheless ashamed of the ostentatious costliness of what she had and annoyed because the bathroom made it, she had to hope, painfully obvious that their house was not the family heritage she liked to pretend to herself that it was.
But tonight, with the soft light from the summer moon leaning gently on the corner of the bath, propped triangularly like another pane of paler glass between the window and the floor, there was nothing garish about the bathroom at all; it was a drowned world, a sunken secret world, with pillars and planes of light shining gently in its corners and the odd brightness of a tap, or the sliver of light along the edge of the basin, winking like living creatures, strange fish suspended and swaying in the darkness. The shelves were a miracle of green and silver, shadow of transparent shadow, reflected and admitted, block geometry made ideal in light, under the brittle circular shadows of the glasses, which rested on them and through them. Shadows of light, Anna thought, thickness on thickness, all these textures of light, caught and held in glass, spirals and cones and pencil trellises, where the shadow of one shelf overlapped another. She crossed quietly to the basin; the water came out of the tap in little silver spearheads that danced in the glass like quicksilver and settled into a faintly swaying lucidity. Anna drank quickly – she was no longer, if she had ever been, really thirsty – and refilled the glass for the pleasure of watching the water. She carried it across to the window and held it so that light was directed and split through the water onto the floor of the bath. The circle of brightness opened like a flower, with crisp, spinning petals. She curled up in the wide windowsill and turned the glass lovingly, with outstretched arms. Nothing she had ever seen had been more exquisite, or more unreal. She felt balanced and complete, between all this trapped, plotted light and the approaching storm; she said to herself, turning the glass round and round, over and over again, not knowing herself quite what she meant, ‘I can do something with this. Oh, I can do something with this, that matters.’ It was all so extremely important and she would, any moment now, know clearly why.
Outside the trees sighed, and air ran across the garden. Now, she thought, now it is coming.
Oliver came in and had reached the washbasin before he saw her. He was very solid and woollen, in a black dressing-gown, and his feet were neat in pointed black leather slippers. He had carried his glass half-way to the tap when he caught sight of her, and Anna watched his face as he turned, in the mirror behind him, sharp and drained of colour.
‘What are you doing here?’ He did not start; only his hand, with the glass in it, was arrested.
‘I came down for a drink. I’m waiting for the storm.’
There was a silence. Anna spun her glass and waited.
‘Aren’t you cold, in that thin dress?’
‘No.’
Oliver finished pouring his water, in a matter of fact way, and came over to the windowsill. Anna moved into the corner, making room for him, and he sat beside her, sipping silently, looking intently across at her. He said, in the end, ‘Do you intend to sit there all night?’
‘Possibly. I can’t sleep. It’s more exciting down here.’ Unthinkable to tell Oliver about the light.
‘You seem remote, all white, amongst all this glass.’ Anna crossed her arms over her breasts, and shivered.
‘I thought I should see you, before I left. It seemed necessary. It’s been a very inconclusive time we’ve had together.’
Anna, hunched into herself, said nothing.
‘Are you afraid of me, Anna?’
‘I don’t think so. Why should I be?’
‘You are still so uneasy with me. I should like to go away feeling that we were friends. I don’t like to think I’ve handled things wrongly.’
‘Things?’
‘I should like to feel I’ve brought you a bit nearer reality.’
‘Reality?’
‘Reality. A combination of one’s own limitations and, in some form or other, the eternal kitchen sink.’ He laughed, shortly.
‘It sounds grim,’ said Anna. She twirled her glass, rocking the light in it. ‘Sometimes,’ she said carefully, ‘I think perhaps I have no limitations.’
‘And that is when you are most limited,’ Oliver said.
‘Don’t, don’t start again.’
‘No, I wish I could have brought you to trust me more. It’s odd, I have had a feeling, in spite of everything, that you’re like me. You remind me of myself.’
‘That’s frightening,’ Anna said, without rudeness. ‘That’s really frightening.’
There was another silence. Oliver cleared his throat, and smoothed his dressing-gown, whilst Anna, her eyes half closed, rocked backwards and forwards over her knees. The thunder poured into the silence like the tumbling of high towers, the crack of heavy stones and the dull rumbling of dust afterwards. The window behind them trembled, and Anna’s hand tightened on her glass.
‘It’s come,’ she said, whilst the sky shook. Oliver nodded, dryly. ‘There ought to have been lightning.’
‘There will be.’
They both turned to the window and watched. After a moment the lightning came, sheet after sheet, bright and metallic, splayed across the lawn and the orchard, so that the trees stood out against it sharp and black. After it, the darkness was thicker, softer and less loaded.
‘Shift the lightning a little,’ Anna said, ‘and you don’t recognize the world at all.’
‘It’s the same world,’ Oliver said imperturbably. The lightning cracked again, a steady persistent flickering this time, and Anna, turning back from the sudden glare of its intrusion into her drowned world, found herself looking into Oliver’s face, levelled by it into a white mask, with holes for eyes and blue slit mouth.
‘Oh,’ she said, ‘I can’t bear it.’
And then, as the thunder bore down upon them again, Oliver reached out for her and held her back by the hair, as he had done in the water, and she, after her first involuntary stiffening, clutched at his shoulders with sharp fingers and held out her mouth to him. No one had ever kissed her so thinly or so angrily before. Indeed the only other who had kissed her had been Michael, who was warm and comfortable, however exciting. Oliver’s love-making was painful. Anna managed to draw a breath, and twisted away from him.
‘Please –’ she said, rather loudly.
‘Hush,’ said Oliver. He said stiffly, ‘I’m sorry, of course, I didn’t mean to do that.’ He looked at her sideways and fiddled with the end of his dressing-gown cord.
Anna felt suddenly very grown up and began to laugh.
‘What’s funny?’
‘You – and me – being so serious. Of course you meant to do that. You couldn’t have gone home without. It’s been coming all the time.’
‘Anna –’ said Oliver seriously. ‘That’s not why –’
‘Oh, I know, that’s not why. Don’t look so worried. It doesn’t matter, does it, it’s just one of those things. It doesn’t make any difference. You must be very careful, Oliver, kissing strange girls. Anyone less sensible than me might get very upset, or think you meant – something. That’s what’s supposed to happen. But I don’t seem to mind.’
Oliver looked as though he found her hilarity in rather bad taste, and also as though he was a little hurt.
‘It isn’t important,’ Anna said decisively. She stood up and reached for his hand. ‘Let’s go out. Into the garden, before it rains.’
‘You’ll catch cold.’
‘No I shan’t, I never do. I’ve got to get out, I shall suffocate in this house if I stay here any longer. Don’t you feel it?’
‘And with the lightning about, it may be very dangerous,’ Oliver said. He followed her, nevertheless, down the stairs, through the kitchen, and out of the house.
‘Do go in if you want to,’ Anna said indifferently, tapping her bare toes on the cold grass. ‘I just had to get out, don’t you see? I mean, if I can be silly enough, I might get out, yet –’
‘Out of what?’
‘I don’t know.’ She paused, and giggled. ‘You look so solid, standing there with your feet together. Pyjamas are so flappy.’
‘How silly do you have to be?’ Oliver demanded, with exaggerated impatience.
‘I don’t know. I don’t know at all. I’ll race you to the orchard.’ She began to run, still laughing, across the dried grass.
‘You little fool!’ said Oliver. ‘Come back.’
Anna went on running. After a moment, Oliver gathered up the skirts of his dressing-gown and ran after her, somewhat untidily. As they reached the orchard, the first rain rustled in the air.
‘Listen,’ said Anna. ‘Now it’ll all be clean –’ Oliver caught her up; she saw that he was shaking with anger and her assurance deserted her. Drops of rain sounded around them on the leaves, like snapped fingers. ‘Come here,’ he said. ‘Come here, listen to me.’ He made a grab at her and missed; she stood for a moment, breathing heavily, looking at him, half pleading with him, and then walked back towards him. ‘Come here,’ he repeated again and put a heavy arm across her shoulders. He began to kiss her, over and over again. Anna did not precisely like it. She was still curious, remained pliable, and kept still. She made no attempt to encourage or repel Oliver’s one attempt at a more intimate embrace; he did not repeat it. She was clever enough to see that he was proving something to himself which he needed to prove, and she was not quite sure what it was. The rain at last seeped through the leaves and collected in a beaded mat on the shoulders of Oliver’s dressing-gown and plastered Anna’s hair to the back of her head until water ran down her neck. Anna thought, in a minute this will be over and I shall be able to work out what I think about it, and then, suddenly she was very cold and wet and shivering uncontrollably.
‘Oliver,’ she said. ‘I’m cold. Please, can we go in now.’
Oliver shook the rain out of his hair and seemed to gather himself together. He said, ‘I forgot myself, I’m sorry.’
‘No, don’t be, I’ve told you it doesn’t matter, I don’t mind. Only, I’m cold, I’ve got to go in.’
‘You ought to mind, I think.’
‘No,’ said Anna. ‘Neither of us minds really. There was nothing to do all summer. Let’s not pretend. And anyway, I’m no good at minding things. I don’t care if you make love to me, I – I like it, but I can’t bear it if you try to make me think about it.’
Oliver wrinkled his brow, at a loss. He said, ‘I don’t like this not minding things –’
Anna said impatiently, ‘You want your cake and eat it. Think yourself, for a change, where would you be if I did mind?’
‘I’d manage. It’d work out.’
‘Oh, yes, I expect, more talk. But I don’t mind. So everything’s all right.’
‘I don’t –’
‘Please, Oliver, let me go in. Let me go in. I’m cold. I shall miss you, tomorrow.’
Oliver hesitated still, then took her hand and walked her into the house. At the foot of her stairs she leaned over and kissed him on the cheek.
‘Goodbye, Oliver.’
‘Goodbye.’
‘It’s all right, isn’t it?’
‘Yes,’ said Oliver heavily. ‘It’s all right.’ He looked suddenly very tired.
Margaret sat up and said, ‘Oliver, darling, where have you been? It must be four o’clock, it’s gone horribly cold and there you are, soaked to the skin. What have you been doing?’
‘I’ve been out,’ Oliver said, dropping his wet clothes one after the other on the floor. ‘In the weather.’ He climbed, cold and naked, into the bed. ‘Let’s pull up another blanket, for God’s sake.’
‘But, darling, why?’
‘Just don’t talk, please,’ he said. He turned to her and studied her. ‘You’ve never wanted to damage anyone, have you? Not consciously –’
‘Damage?’
‘It doesn’t matter. I’m a Puritan at heart, did you know that?’ Margaret looked puzzled. ‘Never mind,’ he said. ‘Come close and warm me.’ Margaret took him into her arms and put out the light. Almost immediately, she heard him snore.
Anna congratulated herself on her own sophistication in being quite unperturbed over having been passionately embraced by a married man and wrung her wet nightdress out of the window. Men are funny about sex, she told herself, as she climbed into bed. It doesn’t matter to them as it does to women (everything one read told one this), it’s just something they have to do, it doesn’t matter to them. But they spend much more time having to do it and for some reason doing it means they have to prove they can make women mind and they are terrified one will mind and be a nuisance to them, and they are hurt and disappointed in one if one takes it as casually as they do. It’s a funny pride they have, nothing one can recognize, quite mysterious, really. One has to learn about it, by experience. I’m learning all sorts, she told herself, I ought to be grateful to Oliver, really. She smiled to herself. ‘Poor, old Oliver.’ The sound of the rain on the roof accompanied her, comfortably, to sleep.
When they left in the morning, the drive was a slow river of yellow mud and loose gravel. Henry drove them to the station, with water slopping round the axles, and Caroline stood with the children, both of them, on the steps to wave.
‘Come again,’ she called, cordially, to the back of the car. ‘Come again. We so enjoyed having you.’
They waved, misted, through the back window. Anna had dark rings round her eyes and the beginning of a cold. Caroline sent her to bed and told her that she must look after herself if she was to pass her exams.
Henry came back from the station and said, ‘We got them off, just in time.’
‘Oh, Henry,’ Caroline said reproachfully. Then she smiled.
‘I can get on, now,’ Henry said, making for his study. ‘People can be an awful nuisance, don’t you think?’
The house closed around them, again, and the rain continued for five days. When it stopped, it was suddenly autumn.