The Adulteress Page 3

  ‘I have a surprise for you.’

  ‘Oh,’ Robert raises his eyebrows, a smile forming on his lips, as I pour him an extremely weak cup of tea from the pot. ‘A surprise, you say?’

  I nod, so excited I can hardly wait for him to put down his cup.

  ‘I can smell something baking.’ He sniffs dramatically.

  I kneel down by the hearth and reveal the pie, steaming and fragrant. I pick it up and bear it in my arms as if it is treasure from the pharaohs. Robert’s brow furrows.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Apple pie,’ I announce, ‘made with apples from our orchard. There are so many of them, Robert, I spent the whole afternoon picking.’

  He looks at me, none too happy, and I think, Gosh, he doesn’t want those apples picked. But of course he knows what an unreasonable thing that is, especially the way things are with shortages. So all he says is, ‘I don’t like apples. You know this, June.’

  I feel as if he has slapped me, and tears prick my eyes as I set the pie down on the table.

  ‘Will you not have a slice?’ My voice wobbles. ‘I made it specially for you.’

  ‘I am sorry, dear,’ he says icily, ‘but apples make me quite sick.’

  He gets up, saying he wants to try to tune into the wireless in the back bedroom, find out what is happening with the war. He walks out of the kitchen.

  There is my pie steaming on the table, but I have such a lump in my throat that my appetite is completely gone. I stare at my creation, and I cry for all the things I am missing, my sister and the old Robert.

  My husband has become so solemn. The war. He is obsessed with news of the war. Why is he concerned with events so far away from us, when I am here, in front of him, needing him? Each day I feel he is becoming more distant. Is he disappointed in me?

  Then it dawns on me. If I had placed that hot apple pie in front of him, and then sat down by the fire to nurse his child, he would have eaten it all. Robert would have watched the baby feeding, and cleared his plate, his eyes on mine, full of pride and joy. He would have made himself sick for love of me, the mother of his child.

  I clench my fists and sit back in the chair. I push the hair off my face; my cheeks are burning, and not just from cooking. I look at my beautiful pie, and then I pick up the knife and dig it in, watching the apple heat spurt out. I slide a huge slice onto my plate.

  I eat slowly, a quarter, and then another quarter of the pie, but I am not tasting it. The light pastry, the soft sweet innards of the pie are lost on me. I still keep eating, all the while staring out of the window. It is quite dark now, and a single candle flickers on the table, while the lamp remains unlit. I sit in a pool of moonlight, watching a giant harvest moon ripen. I do not notice when I am full because my anger makes me want to go on and on. As if I am somehow being defiant.

  I eat that whole pie. I eat the whole damn thing. And when I am finished I sit as still as one of those ghostly apple trees lit up by the moon, my stomach groaning, and bloated, as if I really am pregnant.

  NICHOLAS

  He is lucid in his nightmare when he sees the Adulteress look at him, her legs wrapped around her lover. Her honey eyes turn as cold and grey as clay, for he is the husband who is no longer a lover like this man can be for this wife. Nicholas watches her with her lover, sees the changing landscape of her face, open skies, gentle rain, loving waters, nature itself, expecting no more than what can be given in each moment. The wind rattles the window, branches claw at the glass, and all the dark spirits of jealousy clamour to enter the bedroom.

  Nicholas wakes wet, sweltering, sobbing, and feels as if he is dying. He sits up in bed, trying to slow down his breath, pressing his hand to his chest. He listens to the wind’s lamentation outside the house, shaking the blossom off the apple trees in the orchard. He remembers his mother telling him that a storm always heralds a new death. Could lost love kill him?

  In his murky bedroom Nicholas feels the depths of his anger, and it frightens him. He presses his arms against his body, holding his elbows with his hands, trying to stop himself from shaking. Gradually he sees a light, a fragile radiance emerging from the shadowy corner by the window. He lies back against the pillow, and it comes towards him, gleams above him, a translucent haze. He shivers, and yet this light is a comfort. He imagines he can feel a hand brush his cheek, tiny fingertips like a child’s following the contours of his face. The fingertips press down on his eyelids and he drifts back into a dream-filled sleep.

  When he wakes in the morning Nicholas doesn’t feel so lonely. The duvet is not wound around him tightly like usual, but spread across the whole width of the bed as if he had a partner sharing it with him. He remembers his dreams and they were strange. The ghostly woman he had seen outside the window was lying next to him and speaking softly in his ear. I miss, I miss, I miss, she whispered, and he cried back. ‘What? What is it that you’ve lost?’ But she shook her head dolefully and faded away.

  Nicholas is hungry. He gets up and goes into the kitchen. The fridge is empty apart from milk and eggs, so he makes a huge omelette with all four of them. He sits down at the table, chewing his golden eggs and looking out the window. The sun is shining and pink blossom is out on two cherry trees in the front of the house. He picks up his plate and steps out the front door, sitting on an old rickety chair he was going to chop up for firewood. In Dublin he had never really noticed the seasons changing, but here summer is bursting all around him. The air smells good, and he feels optimistic about his renovation project. Yes, it will take a while, but when he is finished his home will be perfect. Just how he wants it. He imagines keeping bees and making honey, and then he starts to think about the apples. He gets up and walks through the little gate into the orchard.

  The trees haven’t been pruned in years. Some branches are bowed so far over they appear to be growing back into the ground. But some of the younger trees look healthier. He wonders if he will get many apples this year, enough to make cider even. He could travel around to those farmers’ markets with his cider and sell it.

  He picks some white blossom up off the ground and fingers it. He thinks again of the strange woman of his dreams. The phantom spirit from the past. Maybe he should get the place exorcised or something, but in truth he doesn’t mind. Is he so pathetically lonely that he enjoys the company of a ghost? This makes him laugh. He realizes it is the first time he has laughed out loud since he came here. He stops laughing and kicks the ground. Charlie took away his happiness. Why would he ever want to laugh again?

  Nicholas strides back into his house, banishing his ex-wife from his mind and instead filling his head with plans. He could make this place work for him: honey, cider, piano lessons. He likes the idea of living simply. He turns the kettle on to make coffee. He can smell something baking. He opens the oven, but it isn’t on and it’s empty. He opens all the cupboards. They’re empty, but still he can smell it. He steps into the yard, but it’s not coming from outside. He goes back into the kitchen and the smell is stronger than ever. He feels a wave of astonishment. Either he is going mad or his ghost has been cooking. He sniffs again, and the aroma makes his tummy rumble. It is his favourite pudding. She has baked him an apple pie.

  He taps the kitchen table with his fingers, playing ‘Clair de lune’ on the mottled wood. The aroma of baked apples swells around him and again he is pulled towards his piano in the back room. He tries to remain in the real world, but something else seizes him, an urge to be part of a story, even if it isn’t his own.

  He sits down at his piano and he can feel her arms about his chest, squeezing him, as if his heart is an accordion and she demands music from his pain. His hands are shaking, but slowly he places his fingers on the piano keys. He plays her ‘Clair de lune’ like he used to do for Charlie, and yet he has never played it like this before. Each note is torn from him as if he made them himself from his very own lost love. As Nicholas plays, he decides he will find out who she is, and what happened to her. He wants to know the
tale of the Adulteress because he wants to understand.

  JUNE

  Today when I wake I feel quite terrible. Not surprising, since I ate a whole apple pie before I went to bed. My head is pounding, and I only just make it across the yard to the lavatory in time to be sick. I am as weak as a puppy. I manage to clamber back into bed, and lie quite still in an attempt to quell the nausea swirling around my stomach. It is only just beginning to get light, but Robert is awake. He will soon be up and gone for the day. The thought of this makes me feel even worse. He always goes out to work early and it never bothered me before, but this particular day I do not want to be alone, with all my chores laid out in front of me, stretching endlessly into dusk.

  ‘Are you all right, darling?’ Robert is looking at me.

  ‘I do feel rather peaky.’

  ‘Have you been sick?’

  I nod, tears pricking my eyes.

  ‘Now don’t be such a silly old thing.’ Smiling softly he adds, ‘I am sure it is only all that pie you ate.’

  I cast my eyes down, ashamed of my greed, when I could have given the pie to the Tobins.

  He makes to get up, and pull on his trousers. I lean over and tug at his hand.

  ‘Robert, please stay with me today.’

  ‘What on earth is the matter?’

  His eyes scrutinize me. In the morning light they look almost ginger, and striped, like the coat of a marmalade cat.

  ‘Please, darling, can we spend the day together?’

  I feel such a deep need, like a child every time your mother leaves you after blowing out the candle and you are left lying in the dark. You pray she will return, and hold you until you fall asleep, but she never does.

  Robert surprises me. Bending down and pushing the hair out of my eyes, he speaks so very politely, the way he used to do in London when we first met.

  ‘It was very selfish of me to marry you.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ My cheeks colour in confusion.

  He cups my face with his hands, and kisses me on the lips. ‘I suppose I can get up a little later for once,’ he says, ignoring my question, turning his eyes away from mine and, climbing back under the covers, he takes me into his arms. I nuzzle up to him and let him cradle me, his long legs tucking me up next to him. Immediately I no longer feel sick, and with his hands on my belly I drift off to sleep.

  When I wake the room is cascading with golden light, the walls dappled with reflections from leaves outside. I can hear the wind washing through the trees. Robert is kissing me. I turn, and he holds me by the shoulders.

  ‘Can we try to make a baby?’

  He asks me so sweetly. In his eyes I can see the boy he once was. I nod.

  He kisses me again, all the while undoing his underclothes and helping me take off mine. I close my eyes, and my husband puts himself inside me. He is so quiet, and gentle, and steady. It is like being lapped by the ocean.

  Afterwards is always the best. Robert holds me in his arms and closes his eyes, dreaming of goodness knows what. I look at him, trace each line on his face, count the grey hairs in his thick black hair, and wonder what our child would look like if we were to have one. But it is a fantasy, because it is so long since we have been trying that I cannot imagine actually having a baby now.

  ‘I love you,’ I whisper into his ear, which is surprisingly small and dainty for such a big man.

  He mumbles softly and goes back to sleep.

  By the time we rise it is terribly late, and Robert hurries out to milk the cows. I prepare the dinner. I am glad Oonagh isn’t here today. It is just the two of us. For once I feel contented to be in my Cavan home. I look at a miracle rainbow arching the wet land in the distance, and smell the scent of turf fire spinning out of the top of the chimney. Robert returns to the house for dinner, but after we have finished eating, instead of going back out to the animals, he leans across the table and takes my hand.

  ‘Let’s pick the rest of those apples,’ he says, pressing his thumb into the soft flesh of my palm.

  ‘Are you sure you want to?’ I glance nervously out of the window, across the yard, towards the tangled orchard.

  ‘Absolutely.’

  As we approach the apple trees, I feel his body stiffen next to mine. I know he doesn’t want to pick those apples, but he is forcing himself to make me happy. That is enough for me and, taking his hand in mine, I turn to him.

  ‘There are plums, over there,’ I point. ‘Will we pick those instead?’

  ‘Yes, that’s a wonderful idea,’ he says gratefully. ‘You can make jam.’

  I close my eyes now and all I can see is purple. It is a sea of regal, promiscuous, empress purple, wound around my hand, bandaging my eyes, enfolding me in its rich, sensuous shades.

  We eat and we pick, and while we do all this, we stroke each other, on the backs of our hands, our shoulders, the smalls of each other’s back, making lovers’ imprints with our palms. Our lips are magenta, and our fingers stained indigo from our labours, but we are happy about this. Our markings make us one, united, together in the work our marriage makes. I think of Mother and Father and how I never saw them do anything together, not once. I am determined Robert and I will succeed.

  When I was a little girl I was frightened of my mother, and I adored my father. I did not understand how he could love my mother, for she was often angry and cruel to my sister and I. I remember one time in particular. Min and I had gone down to look at the sea, just look, but of course we had got carried away as usual. Mother was there waiting for us on the front lawn as we came scampering back up the garden.

  ‘Look at the pair of you,’ she cried out, the perfect mirage of her face cracking with anger.

  I spoke quickly, ‘Mother, I’m sorry . . .’

  But Min interrupted me, ‘We were racing on the beach.’

  There was no apology in her tone, no explanation, and now it was too late for me to tell the neat lie I had created in my head. We had slipped down a dune, while looking for shells, to make a necklace for her – for her, our beautiful, imperious mother.

  Mother’s lips twitched and she hissed, ‘You are not boys, you are girls, and girls don’t race.’

  I remember the fear, the pain of this dreadful anticipation. Who will she choose? But I knew deep down that I would not be the victim. I never was. It felt like the most awful treachery, never to be chosen.

  ‘Why not?’ Min’s voice rang out clear as the sparkling sunlight, insolent and challenging. Immediately afterwards there was the sharp sound of Mother’s hand, slapping my sister’s cheek. I winced, although my sister stood rigid, with heat in her bones. I could feel her ire.

  ‘Miss Sinclair, you are a dreadful creature.’

  Mother always adopted this formal tone when she was angry with us, and always spoke to my sister directly, never to me. It was as if I was invisible.

  ‘And a liar too,’ Mother added. ‘A simple race on the sand would not reduce you to that state. It looks to me as if you were in a rugby scrum! For goodness’ sake, we have people coming to tea!’

  Min was shaking beside me, but she was not crying, she was laughing. Mother slapped her again, but it only made Min worse.

  ‘Stop it!’ Mother shouted, ‘stop it!’

  My mouth was dry with fear.

  ‘Mummy, please, we’re sorry,’ I begged, beginning to cry, as if it was I who was being hit, not my sister, so fearless, her eyes dark with pride and rage. But Mother ignored me.

  ‘Stop laughing at me this instant.’

  She raised her arm high, as if she was about to serve in a game of tennis, but there was no racquet in her hand, just her rings on her spread fingers, glittering in the afternoon sun. She was wearing a printed chiffon afternoon dress in shades of pink, its waist dropped to the hips and detailed with a black satin bow, collar, cuffs and hem. The skirt rose to just above the knees to reveal her slim legs in flesh-coloured stockings, and tiny ankles and feet in a pair of black patent-leather pointed shoes. Her dark, glossy h
air was cut short, as was the current fashion, and her fine face was framed by a black silk hat, with a red velvet ribbon.

  When I compare my mother to other mothers, I realize how very different she was. She had the perfect form, and was still able to wear the clothes she wore as a young bride (although she never would, of course). Mother’s knowledge of fashion was encyclopaedic. Her desire to be in the latest season’s clothes was her only passion – that and the attention of other people’s husbands. But even if Mother had worn an old sackcloth, and was twice the size, she would still be stunning, for it was her charming visage that stopped most people, men and women alike, in their tracks. Arched brows, long lashes and crystal-blue eyes, a small fine nose and rosebud lips. Her skin was pale and creamy, and her hair was jet-black. She was created for adoration.

  At that time it was as if she always despised us. Her daughters were reminders of her age and the frailty of all her desires. As we got older it got worse, for our breasts were beginning to bud, and it was apparent that one of us had inherited her looks, although one of us had not.

  The hand came down, and later Min claimed it had not hurt, not one bit. But there was still a red mark on her face even then, and surely it had, because even though Mother was small, she was strong and had sent my sister flying across the grass.

  Mother took a step back, shocked at her own actions. I could hear the bell ring inside the house and knew the guests had arrived. It was another world, all neat and clean, and nice manners. Out here on the sunny lawn was high drama.

  Mother walked over to Min, her tiny ankles and slim legs mesmerizing, and I marvelled at how gracefully she bent down so that you might feel sorry for her, not my hurt sister, flung to the ground.