She had made no attempt to conceal it for her dark hair was drawn back
to the nape of her neck and secured there with a leather thong. She
wore no make-up, and her skin looked clean and glowing, tanned and
smooth.
Despite the bulky fisherman's jersey and woollen slacks her body
appeared firm and slim for she swam each day, even when the snow winds
came down from the north.
Ella left the doorway and moved silently closer to the desk, studying
Debra's eyes as she so often did. One day she would paint that
expression. There was no hint of the damage that lay behind, no hint
that the eyes could not see. Rather their calm level gaze seemed to
penetrate deeper, to see all. They had a serenity that was almost
mystic, a depth and understanding that Ella found strangely disquieting.
Debra pressed the switch of the microphone, ending the recording, and
then she spoke again without turning her head. Is that you, Ella? How
do you do it? Ella demanded with astonishment.
I felt the air move when you walked in, and then I smelt you. I'm big
enough to blow up a storm, but do I smell so bad? Ella protested,
chuckling.
You smell of turpentine, and garlic and beer, Debra sniffed, and laughed
with her.
I've been painting, and I was chopping garlic fox the roast, and I was
drinking beer with a friend. Ella dropped into one of the chairs. How
does it go with the book? 'Nearly finished.
It can go to the typist tomorrow. Do you want some coffee? Debra stood
up and crossed to the gas stove. Ella knew better than to offer her
help, even though she gritted her teeth every time she watched Debra
working with fire and boiling water. The girl was fiercely independent,
utterly determined to live her life without other people's pity or
assistance.
The room was laid out precisely, each item in its place where Debra
could put her hand to it without hesitation.
She could move confidently through her little world, doing her own
housework, preparing her own food and drink, working steadily, and
paying her own way.
Once a week, a driver came up from her publisher's office in Jerusalem
to collect her tapes and her writing was typed out along with her other
correspondence.
Weekly also she would go with Ella in the speedboat up the lake to
Tiberias to do their shopping together, and each day she swam for an
hour from the stone jetty.
Often an old fisherman with whom she had become friendly would row down
the lake to fetch her and she would go out with him, baiting her own
lines and taking her turn at the oars.
Across the lawns from the jetty, in the crusader castle, there was
always Ella's companionship and intelligent conversation, and here in
her little cottage there was quietness and safety and work to fill the
long hours.
And in the night there was the chill of terrible aloneness and silent
bitter tears into her solitary pillow, tears which only she knew about.
