She wasn’t sure whether the spell had been cast by him or his bowl. ‘I want to buy it.’
Instead of looking pleased, his expression clouded. ‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes, I’m sure.’ It was expensive – she had glanced at the price on the little sticker – but not that expensive. Anyway, what price that kind of magic?
‘What did it do for you?’ He still seemed doubtful.
‘It transported me. I could see oceans and mountains. Snows. Skies. Towering clouds.’ She paused, embarrassed, wondering why she had said all that, and then realised it was true. For several long minutes the noisy, stuffy hall with its crowds of people and mingled smells of incense and vegetarian hot dogs and talking and laughter and music and Tannoy announcements had faded into non-existence. She shrugged. ‘It would be coming to a good home.’ Why did she feel she had to justify wanting to buy it?
He had put out his hands for the bowl but she didn’t want to let it go. She cradled it against her chest possessively.
He laughed. ‘It’s all right. I was only going to wrap it for you. Look, they come in their own special bag.’ He glanced up and their eyes met again.
That was all. He put the special striped bag inside a white carrier bag. She signed the credit card slip, filled in her name and address for his mailing list and at last, with no excuse to stay longer, fled the exhibition, exhausted but strangely triumphant.
The bowl was alive. She stood it on the chest in the corner of her living-room and looked at it in awe, then, gently, tapped it with the wooden stick. The note rang on and on, vibrating down through the wood of the chest, up into the air, into the very walls of the cottage. She sat looking at the card which had come with it, describing its history in Tibet and how it was made of a secret amalgam of seven metals, then she picked up the bowl, held it on her hand and made it sing. Later she put on her new dress, ruffled her hair, kicked off her shoes and danced alone in the vibrating silence of the room.
It was almost no surprise when he knocked on the front door. ‘I’m sorry to call round. My daughter forgot to give you back your credit card. I thought you’d like it back at once.’
He paused, eyeing her, and she realised he had been expecting to see the demure ex-housewife who had bought his bowl. She laughed in delight. The woman he was seeing instead was barefoot, beautiful, exotic, a confident goddess with eyes that shone and skin that glowed.
There was a moment of silence. He couldn’t see the bowl but he could feel the vibrations in the air. It had been singing to her. Ten years before, when his wife died and he had made his first trip to Nepal, he had felt that excitement himself for the first time and he had been hooked.
He held out his hand with the credit card. As she took it their fingers touched.
‘You looked so…’ He floundered. ‘So unlikely a person to own a bowl. But now…’
She laughed. ‘But now you’ve caught me as my real self. Thank you for bringing me my card. It was silly of me to forget it.’ She couldn’t leave it at that. Not now. ‘Can I offer you a drink to say thank you?’
He hesitated. For a moment she thought he was going to say yes, then, regretfully, he shook his head. ‘Perhaps another time. There’s so much packing up to do.’ He stepped towards the door, then stopped and turned round. ‘May I say something?’ His smile was gentle. ‘You should dress like that all the time. It suits you.’ He smiled again and was gone.
She stared after him, then slowly pushed the door shut. Picking up the bowl, she carried it to the mirror and, her eyes fixed on her image, began to make it sing.
She was seeing herself as he had seen her. Confident. Attractive. A complete whole. Slowly, sensuously, she began to dance again.
When the doorbell rang she knew that she had called him back. That was how it would be in the future. She had liberated something in her soul. She liked men. She might even like this one very much indeed. But her destiny was in her own hands now. And from now on she would call the tune.
Between Times
Heat fell across the garden like a blanket. Sighing with relief Helen turned her back on the now spotlessly tidy chalet and carrying her cup of tea, a fat paperback novel and a rug she stepped out of the French doors onto the grass. Tim had taken the children to the beach. Ahead of her lay two or three hours of perfect peace.
‘Come too, Hen.’ Tim had dropped a kiss on the top of her head. He tried bribery. ‘I’ll buy you an ice cream?’
No contest. Two hours alone – completely alone – versus thousands of people, shouting children and, the final turn-off, runny ice creams dripping stickily down sun-sore skin. No thanks!
She spread out the rug in the shade under the small cherry tree, kicked off her flip-flops and sat down cross- legged, the mug on one side of her, the book on the other. The silence was total.
She adored the children – there were three of them, Jack, Felix and Polly – and she adored her husband, but they were all so noisy, so demanding, so overwhelmingly
This was their first real holiday all together and Tim was being marvellous. Putting thoughts of the office for once behind him and ordering her to do the same, he had marshalled the children; they had tidied their toys, helped wash up, each found towel and bathing costume, and then suddenly there was silence and there was nothing – blessed nothing – to do!
She took another sip of tea and gazed lazily around her, unwilling even to make the effort to pick up the book. Each of these chalets had their own garden and they had been there long enough to have established hedges and flower borders, ornate trees, neat handkerchief -sized lawns. Nearby she heard the sharp alarm call of a small bird and she screwed up her eyes, trying to see it. The neighbouring gardens were totally silent too – no doubt the other families also on the beach. And then she saw it, the tiny brown bird with its ridiculous pert tail and bright eyes watching her from its hiding place in some ivy clinging to the fence near by. She smiled. Finishing her tea she lay back on the rug with a sigh of blissful contentment.
Did she fall asleep then? Afterwards she always wondered. But of course she had. How else was it all possible?
As she lay looking sleepily up through the lacework of the leaves, feeling the sun dappling her face, she realised there was someone in the garden with her.
‘Tim? Have you forgotten something?’ Her initial reaction was extreme irritation. Could they not allow her just this one small window of peace?
There was no answer and she turned her head, her arm shading her eyes against the glare of the sun.
From where she lay she realised suddenly that she could see through a gap in the hedge into the next door garden. A man was standing there watching her. She sat up hastily, knocking over her mug as she did so.
‘Sorry. Did I startle you?’ He stepped forward between the laurels and she saw that he was a man of middle height, handsome, tanned, his hair bleached almost white by the sun. ‘The children are on the beach and Mary is asleep. How are you?’ He sat down opposite her on the grass and leaned across to lay his hand for a moment over hers. It was a curiously intimate gesture. Not in any way threatening. He smiled at her and she found herself smiling back. Her initial indignation at his presence had disappeared. He wasn’t a stranger. She knew him well.
‘It’s blessedly peaceful without them for a while, isn’t it?’ she said quietly. Her eyes were, she realised, still staring into his; she was drowning in his gaze. Drowning. She had read that expression in one of her novels, and not quite understood what the cliche meant. Now suddenly she knew. She could see into the depths of his soul and she could see that he loved her. He loved her with tormented, agonising, passion.
‘My dear.’ She turned her hands upwards to meet his and their palms touched, their fingers intertwined. ‘How long will they be away?’ She couldn’t remember his name, this man whom she had loved forever and to whom she realised suddenly she was going to make love, here in the back garden of a rented holiday chalet in a place she had never been to before.
