Trespass. Part 22

Later, in the autumn gales, in the drenching rains falling under Mont Aigoual, berries and seeds would fall onto the lichen and take root. Box and bracken would begin to sprout there, and in time, in not much time... wild pear, hawthorn, pine and beech would spread their branches...

About all this, she was not wrong.

She knew her beloved land. What would begin to grow all around her, as the seasons pa.s.sed, was virgin forest.

Spring came slowly, reluctantly, with cold squalls of rain and morning frost and nights when the wind seemed bent upon hurling the roof off the bungalow.

And then everything quietened. The sun was suddenly warm. In Audrun's wood, aconites and dog's-tooth violets pushed up in the new gra.s.s. The sound of the cuckoo was heard.

She drove her car down to Rua.s.se and parked in the square and walked up through the old town to the prison. She hadn't known she was going to do this. But some sudden feeling of... what could she call it? Kindness? Some sudden calm in her prompted her to dress herself in her Sunday clothes and drive down to Rua.s.se, and then to walk up the steep cobbled road to the prison and ask at the gate to see her brother, Aramon Lunel. She was there almost before she realised it. After she'd said his name, clouds gathered above the town and a light rain began to fall.

She went in and the stone walls of the old Foreign Legion barracks closed around her. The guards looked at her with interest. She was Lunel's first and only visitor, aside from his lawyer. She was told to wait. She'd brought an awkward package with her, wrapped in newspaper, but this was taken away.

She sat on a hard bench and listened to the sounds of the prison. After a while, the newspaper package was returned to her and she was shown into the long empty s.p.a.ce reserved for prison visits, set out with tables and chairs, as though for some school examination. The room was deserted except for Audrun and an elderly prison warder, on whose features was etched a melancholy of the most profound kind.

'Do you know my brother?' Audrun asked.

The warder nodded.

'Is he... is he able to endure endure?' she asked.

The warder shrugged. 'He'll never be well,' he said. 'His ulcers were treated, but they still bleed...'

'And... in his mind... how is he in his mind?'

As Audrun said this, a lock turned, then the door opened and Aramon came into the room. He wore his prison uniform: grey trousers, blue s.h.i.+rt, grey pullover. And in these clothes, thought Audrun, he looked better dressed than he'd been for a long time. His face was freshly shaved, his hair cut and washed. Prison had cleaned him up.

A second warder led him to the table where Audrun sat, then withdrew. He and the elderly prison officer walked away and kept guard by the door.

Aramon stood with his hands by his sides, looking at Audrun. Behind her, she heard the rain fretting against the narrow windows. Aramon sat down. He put his hands flat on the scarred wooden table that separated them.

'Normally,' he said, 'I don't get any visitors.'

'No?' said Audrun. 'Well, you're used to being alone, aren't you?'

She noticed that the soreness in his eyes had gone and he smelled of strong soap, not alcohol. His look was hectic and bright, as though some recent news had excited him.

'You don't have to feel sorry for me,' he said.

'I don't feel sorry for you,' said Audrun.

'I have a room of my own,' he said. 'Painted white. Well, it's a cell, not a room, but I think of it as my little room. I have my own toilet and washbasin.'

'Good. That's nice.'

'And a picture of Niagara Falls on the wall.'

'Yes?'

'I like waterfalls. There used to be falls in the Gardon, high up near Mont Aigoual, in the winter-time, after the snows. Remember?'

'Yes.'

'They won't let me frame my picture of Niagara. Stupid idiots. They don't let me have gla.s.s in case I cut my wrists, pardi pardi! But I don't feel like cutting my wrists. I'm all right.'

'I'm glad you are.'

'I told you, you don't need to pity me. I take pride in my cell. I keep it tidy. Not like up at the mas. Uhn? I couldn't keep track of things up there. Even on the land, I couldn't keep pace with the work. I'm better off here.'

'Are you?'

'I tell you I am. Like you're better off in your bungalow, Audrun. I told you that when Father died: a little small place you can keep clean...'

She cut him off by reaching down and lifting up the bulky package she'd brought and placing it in front of him on the table.

'I brought you this,' she said.

'What is it?' he asked. 'I'm not allowed to have my own things.'

'It's not a "thing",' she said.

His labourer's hands began unfolding the newspaper wrapping. They worked slowly, tentatively. But eventually what lay revealed on the table in front of him was a branch of white cherry blossom.

Audrun watched him. Aramon lifted his hands, as though afraid to touch the branch, but his eyes, so strangely bright, stared down at it in wonder. He seemed with his whole expression to drink in the scent and sweetness of the flowers. Then, he gathered it up and buried his face in it and began to cry.

Audrun stayed very still on her chair. She glanced over at the warders and took in some expression of alarm on their faces, but it wasn't Aramon's weeping that was agitating them. Indeed, they didn't seem to have noticed this, but were instead staring at the rain, which was now beating harshly on the windows. She heard one of them comment that it was getting dark in the room, even though it was only mid-afternoon.

She stayed still, letting Aramon cry like a boy, letting the storm-darkness gather round them from moment to moment. She saw Aramon's shallow chest moving up and down as the weeping caught at his breath. Then he looked at her and said: 'Why did you bring this? Why?'

'Well,' she said, 'I suppose, when I saw it, I thought... I thought about you and me as we once were. In the days when we were kind to each other.'

He laid the branch down and put his head in his hands. His crying gathered in intensity and now the two warders approached, both looking anxious, and the older man laid a hand on Aramon's shoulder.

'Allez, Lunel,' he said. 'Don't make yourself sick. Let's take you back to your cell now.'

'Madame,' said the other officer, 'I regret your visit is at an end.'

Audrun stood up obediently, but Aramon suddenly reached out and grabbed hold of her hand. 'I'm sorry!' he stammered. 'I've been wanting to say it! I'm sorry! I'm sorry! You were my princess... that's all. You were my princess and I couldn't find any other. You were my princess for all time!' You were my princess... that's all. You were my princess and I couldn't find any other. You were my princess for all time!'

There was a silence in the room, disturbed only by the sound of the rain on the gla.s.s. Audrun said nothing, but nevertheless gently covered Aramon's hand with hers and held it in a tender grip for a moment before it was torn from her, as the warders led her brother away.

The door opened and closed and Audrun heard the lock turn and she knew she was alone. She looked down at the branch from the cherry tree, left where it was on the table, and she saw how the white blossoms remained luminous and bright, when everything around them was becoming indistinct.

BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

Novels

Sadler's Birthday

Letter to Sister Benedicta

The Cupboard

The Swimming Pool Season

Restoration

Sacred Country

The Way I Found Her

Music and Silence

The Colour

The Road Home

Short Story Collections

The Colonel's Daughter

The Garden of the Villa Mollini

Evangelista's Fan

The Darkness of Wallis Simpson

For Children

Journey to the Volcano