We stood.
‘More wood,’ she said. ‘We need wood. Not much left. Bradley did the wood. There was always a huge pile in the garage. I have no idea how to buy wood.’ She turned, shrugged. ‘First winter alone in this house. It’s much too big for one person but I can’t bear the idea of sharing with strangers. That part of life is over. If I didn’t love it so much, I’d find something smaller.’
‘Let’s see what’s left.’
She put on shoes. I followed her down the passage, through the kitchen, across the courtyard into the garage. Half a dozen logs were in the corner just in front of Stuart Wardle’s BMW. I squeezed in, just managed to get them all into my arms.
On the way back, Lyall said, ‘Bringing in the firewood. Essentially a male preserve.’
I said, ‘And we want to hang onto it. Not a lot of preserves left.’
‘I want you to hang onto it,’ Lyall said. ‘I want you to feel ownership of the firewood preserve.’
‘Empathy. Essentially a female preserve.’
She had a good deep chuckling laugh.
In the sitting room, I said, ‘Would you be offended if I reconstructed this fire?’
Our eyes met. Lyall tilted her head, looked thoughtful. ‘No,’ she said, ‘I think that falls into the firewood preserve. What kind of idiot objects when someone else volunteers to get dirty and burnt?’
‘They’re out there, I’m told,’ I said, picking up the tongs to start the messy work of unpacking the heap of charred wood. ‘A dangerous strain of idiot.’
‘None around here,’ she said. ‘When you’ve got it inflamed, would you like some red? White? There’s beer. I’m over beer now, may never drink beer again. The red’s a bit special.’
I said, ‘Once inflamed, red would be nice.’
She went away while I had a go at resuscitating the fire. When I came back from washing my hands in the down- stairs bathroom, she handed me a glass. ‘It’s called Hill of Grace.’
‘I know the bounteous hill. From the time when I was a responsible social drinker. And non-millionaires could afford it.’
‘This is the bounteous 1988. Courtesy of Bradley Joffrin. Two unopened cases in the pantry. It was the day you were here. I was looking for dried food. Bit unsteady. The room’s so big, bodies could be in there. Shelves about a metre deep. They were in the corner under all sorts of things. I sent Bradley an e-mail in Los Angeles. “Two cases expensive, unobtainable wine found in pantry. Await instructions.’’ He sent an e-mail back. “Listen, bitch, you pass this way but once. Drink.’’’
‘You’d like a person for that.’
The crooked smile. ‘Like him, love him. Love him’s fine. In love with him’s the problem. I was in love with him for years. Never mentioned it. No point. He’s gay. Huge loss to womankind.’ She raised her glass. ‘Straight womankind. Cheers.’
The Hill of Grace was like drinking a liquidised alcoholic plum tart. We sat down on sofas opposite each other in front of the fire, now in aggressive form.
‘Talent for reconstructing fires, Mr Irish,’ she said, looking at the blaze through her glass. ‘To be honest, I’ve got to confess to vaguely false pretences. I don’t think that what I remembered will be of much use to you. Thought it would be nice to see you again.’
I said, ‘Well. That’s cheeky. Think you can get away with wasting a high-powered suburban solicitor’s time. Make nuisance calls.’
She turned her head, half-profile. I remembered thinking that she had a judgmental face. ‘I rather hoped so.’
‘If it’s show and tell,’ I said, ‘I considered phoning you the other night. Imagined getting the busy-this-year- feel-free-to-call-thereafter.’
We looked at each other.
‘So,’ she said, the smile. ‘Shown you mine, got a glimpse of yours.’
We both looked into the fire, uncertainty about the next step in the air.
‘I didn’t think about eating,’ she said. ‘You forget that other people don’t have lunch at 4 p.m. Are you before or after eating?’
‘Possibly beyond,’ I said. ‘I had a pie mid-afternoon. The local pie tends to steer the mind away from food for a while. Days. Weeks sometimes.’
‘I’ll get the other half then,’ she said. ‘Needs to breathe a bit. That’s what they say.’
‘No arguing with they,’ I said. ‘They know everything.’
I watched her leave the room, admired her lean buttocks. At the door, she turned her head, caught me looking. The smile. I got up and stood beside the fireplace.
She came back with a large plate, wedges of cheese and a packet of water biscuits. Under her arm, another Hill of Grace. She put the plate on the coffee table, found a waiter’s friend on the mantelpiece and removed the cork like a professional.
Then she walked around the sofas, came right up to me. We looked at each other. She wasn’t wearing lipstick. I swallowed. ‘Very professional with a corkscrew,’ I said, hearing the awkwardness in my voice.
‘Very handy with a poker,’ she replied. She put up a hand, ran it over my shoulder quickly, a ghost touch, a phantom touch, felt down my body, in the groin.
I put fingertips to her mouth, brushed her full lower lip. There was a flush on her cheekbones.
Her hand went behind my head, long, strong fingers, pulled me down, kissed me on the lips, a full kiss, mouth slightly open, hard, then soft.
I put my hands on her hips, pronounced hipbones, pulled her to me, felt her pubic bone against my erection, frisson of pleasure down the spine into the pelvis. When my hands went under her cotton sweater, touched the skin of her waist, she shuddered.
‘My learned friend,’ she said, breath against my face, voice even deeper than usual. ‘Let’s just do it.’
We came back downstairs in time to save the fire.
‘Try the uncompromising goatsmilk something,’ she said. ‘The one with the ash on it. A cheese bore at that place in Richmond sold it to me.’ She cut off a wedge, chewed reflectively. ‘I’ve never understood the ash,’ she said. ‘Must be religious.’
‘Ash Wednesday. Penitent cheeses. Sprinkling ash on foreheads. You could be right.’ I tried a crumbly portion with a sip of the Hill. The combination of tastes forced me to close my eyes. ‘In this case, the religious connection is clear,’ I said. ‘I think I’ve been forgiven.’
She sliced cheese, pushed the plate across. ‘This other stuff’s not bad either. Made by a woman in Tasmania.’
We ate cheese, drank wine, talked, all strangeness gone. She didn’t know anything about football but seemed to know an alarming amount about many other things, laughed a lot.
I got up to put some more wood on the fire. The wind had risen, hollow sound in the chimney. I leant against the mantelpiece.
Lyall had her back against the sofa arm, legs on the seat, firelight on her face, handsome features, once thought plain. She held up her glass. ‘Sexy evening,’ she said. ‘Much nicer than getting pissed alone and making phone calls that wake up people in other time zones.’
‘Clear improvement on house cleaning, too.’
‘I inquired about you,’ Lyall said, eyes on mine. ‘You’re described as a person of dubious reputation who escaped prosecution for shooting and killing two ex-policemen.’
I said, ‘Well, there’s a perfectly simple explanation.’
‘Tell me when I’m lying down in case I faint at the gruesome detail.’
In the morning, I woke early, sat upright, no idea where I was. Lyall put a hand on my arm, drew me down.
Later, at the front door, I said, ‘Good drop that Hill of Grace.’
She came up close, turned her palms outward, put them on my thighs, high up, little fingers in my groin. She offered her mouth. I kissed it, a lingering, delicious contact, unwillingly terminated.
‘Beard rash is the danger,’ I said, short of breath.
She stood back, put two fingers on my chin, rubbed. ‘Beard rash. Taking on plague proportions says the World
