threw a leg over one of the bikes; she slithered across the saddle and rode it in seesaw movements, in a mimicry of copulation.
Another girl stood slightly apart from the group. She was with them, but didn’t seem to belong to them at all. She had a shaggy head of thick, dark red hair; he could hardly see her face or shape, and it was the oddity of her that made him give her a second look. She wore a black-and-white tweed jacket that was several sizes too big; it was well-worn, and the kind of thing that a settled Norfolk matron of fifty might call “my old gardening coat.” No pretence at fashion in it, or even anti-fashion. She had lace-up school shoes: also not a rebel’s possessions. Someone spoke to her, and she shook her red head violently, and started across the road, cantering off, like an animal, in the direction of the church.
Julian turned and put the car keys in his pocket. He crossed the road too, followed her into the church grounds. She stood beneath the broken, collapsed tower, whose craggy top overbore the streets, the Market Cross, the bike boys. Seeing him, she seemed to shake herself inside the vast stiff jacket, and trotted further off, to the far side of the churchyard. There she sat down on a bench (put there by the Old Folks’ Welfare Committee) and waited for him to catch her up.
At first he hardly dared sit down beside her, in case she took fright and hurtled off again. Her animal quality seemed pronounced, and he wished he had something to offer, a sugar lump or even a piece of bread, to show that he meant well. As if reading his mind, she reached into the jacket and took out an apple, then a second. She offered one to him, holding it out at arm’s length, without a smile.
“Do you always carry your supplies with you?” he asked.
She said, “Yes, certainly.”
He tossed his head back toward the marketplace. “Do you know that lot?”
“Not really.”
“I thought you were with them.”
“I picked up with them this morning. I’d nothing else to do. I went to Cromer with them. Nobody had any money. We came on here. They fetched me.”
He took the apple and sat down on the bench beside her. She wiped the fruit on the sleeve of her jacket and bit into it. She chewed gloomily, reflectively, eyes on gravestones and the church’s ancient walls.
“Are you going back with them?”
“No.” She was angry. “They’re senseless.”
“Where do you live?”
“In the Burnhams. You know it round there?”
“You’re a fair way from home.”
“You can get a fair way when you go on the motor bikes, that’s one thing about them. Still, I don’t care for it. I ought to be getting back.” She threw her apple core on the ground, but didn’t move, just huddled into her jacket. It began to drizzle. “I’ll take shelter in the church,” she said.
Later, it seemed to him that Sandra knew all the county’s churches, great and small. She treated them as other people treated bus shelters and waiting rooms. He had to stride to keep up with her, as she bolted for the porch. “If you’re not going to eat your apple,” she said, “I’ll have it back, I might need it later.”
He said, “I could take you home.”
“Have you got a car?”
“Yes.”
“You’re young to have a car.”
“It’s my mother’s car. I don’t mind taking you. You’ll never get back any other way, and this rain’s setting in.”
“All right,” she said. They stood in the church porch for a minute and watched the rain fall. “Sanctuary,” she said, unexpectedly.
“Do you know about this church?” Julian looked sideways at her, into her face. Such pale eyes. “When they were building it, it was the Peasants’ Revolt. There was a battle near here. It was the last battle, I think. Some of the rebels came in here begging sanctuary, but the church wasn’t finished, so it didn’t count. The Bishop of Norwich came after them and killed them all.”
The girl blinked at him. “I never heard that,” she said.
He loathed himself, spouting semifacts. Why had he done it? He laughed and said, “Didn’t they tell you about it at school?” He loathed himself more. What had made him go on about the Peasants’ Revolt, for God’s sake? She unnerved him, that was it. She had not told him her name. Her sandy-gilt lashes drooped onto her cheek.
“I don’t recall anything about it,” she said. But then, very kindly, “I’m always glad to know anything about old places, so if you’ve anything to tell me you needn’t be afraid I won’t like it.”
It seemed she expected a long acquaintance. The rain slackened a little. Julian took her jacket by its bulky sleeve and hurried her to the car. The bike boys had scattered. She was his responsibility.
A fine drizzle hit the windscreen. The sea, on their right as they drove, was obliterated by a rising mist. The Sheringham caravan sites loomed out of it, and the wind plucked at the blossom on the cherry trees in the bungalow gardens. The trees looked as if they had been left outside by mistake, or transported from some softer country.
Between Cley and Weybourne, the heathland melted invisibly into the marshes. Bird-watchers, hung about like pedlars with the tools of their trade, strode toward the invisible sea. There were sheep in the fields; among their ambling forms they saw the necks of resting swans, as hard and clear as marble, startlingly white in the thick air. By the roadside, signs—crudely chalked blackboards, or painted boards—advertised FRESH SEA BAIT, SHRIMPS, COCKLES, FRESH CRABS, DRESSED CRABS, KIPPERS. The tourist season was beginning.
They drove in what seemed to be a companionable silence. At Blakeney—the salt marshes a nebulous blend of earth, sea, air— Sandra turned in her seat. “I’m sorry if I was angry back there. I’m not usually angry.”
