THE next morning Jane Sheppard had gone. When Mait-land woke the basement room was silent. A shaft of sunlight down the narrow staircase illuminated the shabby bed on which he lay. The faces of Guevara and Charles Manson hung from the walls, presiding over him like the custodians of a nightmare.
Maitland reached out his hand, feeling the imprint of the young woman's body. Still lying there, he looked around the room, taking in the open suitcase, the gaudy dresses on their hangers, the cosmetics on the card-table. Jane had straightened everything before leaving.
His fever had subsided. Maitland picked up the plastic cup on the packing-case, lifted himself on to one elbow and drank the tepid water. He pulled back the blankets and examined his leg. Some wayward healing process had locked the hip joint into its socket, but the swelling and pain had eased. For the first time he was able to touch the bruised flesh.
Maitland sat quietly on the edge of the bed, staring at the Astaire and Rogers poster. He tried to remember if he had ever seen the film, casting his mind back to his adolescence. For several successive years he had devoured almost the whole of Hollywood's output, sitting alone in the empty circles of huge suburban Odeons. He massaged his bruised chest, realizing that his body was more and more beginning to resemble that of his younger self – the combination of hunger and fever had made him lose at least ten pounds in weight. His broad chest and heavy legs had shed half their muscle.
Maitland slid the injured leg on to the floor and listened to the traffic sounds from the motorway. The certainty that he would soon be leaving the island revived him. He had now been marooned on this triangle of waste ground for almost four days. He knew that he had begun to forget his wife and son, Helen Fairfax and his partners – together they had moved back into the dimmer light at the rear of his mind, their places taken by the urgencies of food, shelter, his injured leg and, above all, the need to dominate the patch of ground immediately around him. His effective horizon had shrunk to little more than ten feet away. Even though he would escape in under an hour – however reluctantly, the young woman and Proctor would help him up the embankment – the prospect obsessed him like some decade-long quest.
‘Damned leg … ’
Inside the packing-case were a primus stove and an unwashed saucepan. Maitland scraped the brown crust of dry rice from the pan, hungrily forcing the hard grains into his bruised mouth. A thick beard covered his face -he looked down at the grimy dress-shirt, the blackened trousers slit from the right knee to the waistband. Yet this collection of tatters less and less resembled an eccentric costume.
Leaning against the wall, Maitland swung himself around the room. The Guevara poster tore in his hands and hung swaying from a corner pin. He reached the doorway, turned himself on his good leg and sat on the lid of a fifty-gallon drum that served as a water butt.
A dozen steps led up to the bright sunlight. From the steep angle of the sun Maitland guessed that it was about eleven thirty. The quiet Sunday-morning traffic moved along the motorway – within half an hour or so some good-humoured family out for a day's drive would be startled by a haggard man in ragged evening dress staggering across the road in front of them. The longest hangover in the world.
Maitland moved up the steps towards the sunlight. When he reached the top he lifted his head cautiously, peering through the grass and nettles that surrounded the stairwell.
He was about to step on to the island when he heard a familiar phlegmy breathing. Maitland crouched down, and eased himself across the ground to the derelict paybox. Lying on his side, he reached out and parted a bank of nettles with his arms.
Twenty feet away, in a small hollow surrounded by the nettles and high grass, Proctor was performing a set of gymnastic exercises. Blowing hard through his mouth, he stood with his bare feet together, strong shoulders braced as he raised his arms in front of himself. A skipping rope and the steel-capped boots were parked on the well-worn ground of this private recreation yard. He was dressed in the ragged remains of the circus leotard which Maitland had seen hanging from a chair in the air-raid shelter. The silver strips showed off his powerful shoulders, and revealed the livid scar that ran like a lightning bolt from the back of his right ear down his neck to his shoulder, the residue of some appalling act of violence.
After preparing himself, an elaborate ritual of puffing and panting like the start-up of an old gas engine, Proctor took a short step forward and leapt into a somersault. His powerful body whirled in the air. He struck the ground heavily, barely holding his balance, legs bent and arms wavering at his sides. Delighted by this triumph, he stamped happily in his bare feet.
Maitland waited as Proctor prepared for his next feat. From the careful build-up, the repeated pacing about and measuring of himself against the air, it was clear that this next acrobatic turn represented his real test. Proctor concentrated all his energies. He marked out the ground, kicking away the loose stones like a large animal searching for the kindest terrain. When he finally leaped again into the air, attempting a backward somersault, Maitland already knew that he would fail. He lowered his head as the tramp sprawled across the ground, scattering his boots.
Stunned, Proctor lay on his back. He picked himself up, looking dejectedly at his clumsy body. He made a half-hearted attempt to prepare himself for a second attempt, but gave up and brushed the dust from his grazed arms. He had cut his right wrist. He sucked at the wound, and tried a hand-stand, following it with a crude knee fall. His co-ordination was clearly at fault, and the forward somersault had come off by chance alone. Even skipping was too much for him. Within seconds the rope was tangled around his neck.
Nevertheless, as Maitland realized, the tramp was not dismayed. He licked the cut on his wrist and panted happily to himself, more than satisfied with his progress. Embarrassed by the display, Maitland edged away.
Hearing Maitland move behind the pay-box, Proctor turned suspiciously. Before Maitland could reach the staircase he had disappeared from sight, vanishing like a startled animal into the deep grass.
There was a faint movement in the nettle bank behind Maitland. He waited, certain that Proctor was watching him and that if he stepped out the tramp would seize him and hurl him back down the step”. Maitland listened to the traffic, thinking of the tramp's unconcealed strain of violence, a long-borne hostility to the intelligent world on which he would happily revenge himself.
Maitland eased himself down the steps. From the bottom of the stairwell he looked up at the sky and the waving grass. He stepped back into the room and swung himself around the walls. As his eyes cleared in the dim light he gazed round at the underground posters, the dingy bed and leather suitcase filled with cheap clothes. Who were these two tenants of the island? What uneasy alliance existed between the old circus hand and this sharp-witted young woman? She appeared to be a classic drop-out, exiting from a well-to-do family with her head full of half-baked ideals, on the run from the police for a drug or probation offence.
Maitland heard her voice call out across the deep grass. Proctor answered in his gruff simpleton's tones. Maitland moved back to the bed and lay down, covering himself with die blanket as Jane came down the steps into the room.
In one hand was a supermarket bag filled with groceries. She was wearing her jeans and combat jacket. For once, Maitland reflected as he noticed the mud on her shoes, the camouflage was not merely a youthful fad. Presumably she knew some private route up the embank ment and across the feeder road.
She peered at Maitland, her sharp eyes taking it. everything in a one-second glance. Her red hair was brushed back tightly against her head like a hard-working mill-girl's, exposing her high, bony forehead.
‘How are you? Not too strong, I imagine. Anyway, you slept well.’
Maitland gestured weakly with one hand. Something warned him to disguise his recovery. ‘I feel a little better.’
‘I see you've been wandering around in here,’ she remarked without any criticism. She straightened the Guevara poster, re-pinning the torn corner. ‘You can't be too bad. There's nothing to find here, by the way.’
She put her strong hand to Maitland's forehead and held it there, then briskly pulled out the primus stove and carried it into the sunlight at the bottom of the stairwell.
‘Your fever's gone. We were worried about you last night. You're the sort of man who has to test himself all the time. Do you think you crashed on to this traffic island deliberately?’ When Maitland regarded her patiently she went on, ‘I'm not joking – believe me, self-destruction is something I know all about. My mother pumped herself so full of barbiturates before she died that she turned blue.’
She lit the primus and set three eggs boiling in the pan. ‘You must be hungry – I bought some things for you at the supermarket.’
Maitland sat up. ‘What day is it?’
‘Sunday – the Indian places around here are open every day. They exploit themselves and their staffs more than the white owners do. But that's something you know all about.’
‘What's that?’
‘Exploitation. You're a rich businessman, aren't you? That's what you claimed to be last night.’
‘Jane, you've being naive – I’m not rich and I'm not a businessman. I’m an architect.’ Maitland paused, well aware of the way in which she was reducing their relationship to the level of this aimless domestic banter. Yet there was something not entirely calculated about this.
‘Did you call for help?’ he asked firmly.
Jane ignored the question, setting out the modest meal. The brightly coloured paper cups and plates, and the paper table cloth she spread carefully across the packing case, made it resemble a miniature children's tea party.
‘I … didn't have time. I thought you needed some food first.’
‘As a matter of fact, I’m starving.’ Maitland unwrapped the packet of rusks she handed to him. ‘But I've got to get to a hospital. My leg needs looking at. There's the office, and my wife – they must wonder where I am.’
‘But they think you're away on a business trip,’ Jane retorted quickly. ‘They probably aren't missing you at all.’
Maitland let this pass. ‘You told me you'd called the police last night.’
Jane laughed at Maitland as he hunched in his ragged clothes on the edge of the bed, his blackened hands tearing apart the packet of rusks. ‘Not the police – we're not very fond of them here. Proctor isn't, anyway – he has rather unhappy memories of the police. They've always kicked him around. Do you know that a sergeant from Notting Hill Station urinated on him? You don't forget that kind of thing.’
She waited for a reply. The sulphurous smell of the cracked eggs intoxicated Maitland. She steered a steaming egg on to his paper plate, leaning across him long enough for him to register the weight and body of her left breast. ‘Look, you weren't well last night. You couldn't have been moved. That terrible leg, the fever, you were completely exhausted, raving away about your wife. Can you imagine us stumbling about in the dark, trying to carry you up that slope? I just wanted to keep you alive.’
Maitland broke the boiled egg. The hot shell stung the oil-filled cuts in his fingers. The young woman squatted on the floor at his feet, shaking out her red hair. The contrived way in which she used her body confused him.
‘You'll help me afterwards to get away from here,’ he told her. ‘I understand your not wanting the police involved. If Proctor–’
‘Exactly. He's terrified of the police, he'll do anything to avoid bringing them here. It's not that he's ever done anything, but this place is all he's got. When they built the motorway they sealed him in – he never leaves here, you know. It's pretty remarkable how he's survived.’
Maitland crammed the dripping fragments of the egg into his mouth. ‘He nearly killed me,’ he commented, licking his fingers.
‘He thought you were trying to take over his den. It was lucky I came along. He's very strong. When he was sixteen or seventeen he used to be a trapeze artist with some fly-by-night circus. That was before they had any safety legislation. He fell off the high wire and damaged his brain. They just threw him out. Mental defectives and subnormals are treated appallingly – unless they're prepared to go into institutions they have absolutely no protection.’
Maitland nodded, concentrating on the food. ‘How long have you been in this old cinema?’
‘I don't really live here,’ she answered with a flourish. ‘I'm staying with some … friends, near the Harrow Road. I used to have my own study as a child, I don't like too many people around me —you probably understand.’
‘Jane–’ Maitland cleared his throat. Eating the hard rusks and scalding egg had opened a dozen sore places in his mouth. His gums and lips, the soft palate, stung from the unaccustomed bite. He looked down unsteadily at the young woman, realizing the extent of his dependence on her. Seventy yards away the traffic moved along the motorway, carrying people to their family lunches. Sitting over a primus stove with her in this shabby room for some reason reminded him of the first months of his marriage to Catherine, and their formal meals. Although Catherine had furnished the apartment herself, virtually without consulting Maitland, he had felt the same dependence on her, the same satisfaction at being surrounded by strange furniture. Even their present house had been designed to avoid the hazards of over-familiarity.
He realized that Jane had spoken the truth about saving his life, and felt a sudden debt to her. He was puzzled by her mixture of warmth and aggression, her swerves from blunt speaking to outright deviousness. More and more, he found himself looking at her body, and was irritated by his own sexual response to the offhand way in which she exploited herself.
‘Jane, I want you to call Proctor now. You and he can carry me up the embankment and leave me there. FU be able to stop a driver.’
‘Of course.’ She looked frankly into his eyes, giving him a small smile. A hand stroked the hair behind her neck. ‘Proctor won't help you, but I'll try – you're awfully heavy, even if you have been starving. Too many expense-account lunches, terrible tax evasion goes on. Still, you're supposed to get some kind of emotional security from over-eating…’
‘Jane!’ Exasperated, Maitland drummed with his blackened fist on the packing case, scattering the paper plates on to the floor. ‘I'm not going to call the police. I won't report either you or Proctor. I'm grateful to you – if you hadn't found me I would probably have died here. No one will find out.’
Jane shrugged, already losing interest in what Maitland was saying. ‘People will come …’
‘They won't! The breakdown men who tow my car away won't give a damn about anything here. The last three days have proved that to me a hundred times over.’
‘Is your car worth a lot of money?’
‘No – it's a write-off. I set fire to it.’
‘I know. We watched that. Why not leave it here?’
‘The insurance people will want to see it.’ Maitland looked at her sharply. ‘You saw the fire? Good God, why didn't you help me then?’
‘We didn't know who you were. How much did the car cost?’
Maitland gazed into her open and childlike face, with its expression of naive corruption.
‘Is that it? Is that why you're in no hurry to see me go?’ He put a hand reassuringly on her shoulder, holding it there when she tried to push it away. ‘Jane, listen to me. If you want money I'll give it to you. Now, how much do you want?’
Her question was as matter-of-fact as a bored cashier's. ‘Have you got any money?’
‘Yes, I have – in the bank. There's my wallet in the car, with about thirty pounds in it. You've got the keys, get there before Proctor does. You look fast enough on your feet.’
Ignoring his hostility, she reached into her handbag. After a pause she took out the oil-stained wallet. She tossed it on to the bed beside Maitland.
‘It's all there – count it. Go on! Count it!’
Maitland opened the wallet and glanced at the bundle of damp notes. Calming himself, he started again.
‘Jane, I can help you. What do you want?’
‘Nothing from you.’ She had found a piece of gum and was chewing on it aggressively. ‘You're the one who needs help. You were screwed up by being on your own too much. Let's face it, you're not really unhappy with your wife. You like that cool scene.’
Maitland waited for her to finish. ‘All right, maybe I do. Then help me get away from here.’
She stood in front of him, blocking his path to the door, eyes furious.
‘You're making these assumptions all the time! No one owes you anything, so stop all this want, want, want! You crashed your car because you drove too fast, now you're complaining about it like a child. We only found you last night…’
Maitland avoided her fierce gaze, and pulled himself along the wall to the doorway. This deranged young woman needed someone to be angry with – the old tramp was too dim, but he himself, starving and half-crippled by a broken leg, made the perfect target. The first show of gratitude was enough to set her going…
As he passed her she stepped forward and took his arm. She slipped it around her small shoulders. Like a dance-hall instructress leading a helpless novice, she steered him towards the stairs.
Maitland stepped into the bright sunlight. The long grass seethed around his legs, greeting him like an affectionate dog. Fed by the spring rain, the grass was over four feet deep, reaching to Maitland's chest. He leaned unsteadily aginst the young woman. The high causeway of the overpass spanned the air a hundred yards to the east, and he could see the concrete caisson on which he had scrawled his messages. The island seemed larger and more contoured, a labyrinth of dips and hollows. The vegetation was wild and lush, as if the island was moving back in time to an earlier and more violent period.
‘The messages I wrote – did you wipe them off?’
‘Proctor did. He never learned to read and write. He hates words of any kind.’
‘And the wooden trestles?’ Maitland felt no resentment towards either Proctor or the young woman.
‘He straightened them – right after the crash, while you were still stunned in the car.’
She supported him, standing against his shoulder, one hand pressed against his stomach. The scent of her warm body contrasted with the smell of the grass and the automobile exhaust gases. Maitland sat down on a truck tyre lying on the ground. He gazed at the high wall of the motorway embankment. The newly seeded grass was growing more densely on the surface. Soon it would hide all traces of his accident, the deep ruts left by the tyres of his car, the confused marks of his first struggles to climb the embankment. Maitland felt a brief moment of regret that he was leaving the island. He would have liked to preserve it for ever, so that he could bring Catherine and his friends to see this place of ordeal.
‘Jane … ’
The young woman had gone. Twenty yards away, her strong head and shoulders moved above the grass as she strode towards the air raid shelters.