and is only to be attained through suffering. Privation and suffering are the only things that can open the mind of man to those things which are hidden from others.’
Across Arctic America: Narrative of the Fifth Thule Expedition (1927)
Knud Rasmussen
Sean once knew the sequence of lights so well that he never got caught on red. Now the route had become as alien as his old home and he misjudged every stretch. To keep his mind away from thoughts of Tom, he focused on driving impeccably and not as if he had gulped three fingers of vodka in the last hour – but the morning rush-hour traffic was infuriatingly slow and he suddenly felt self-conscious in his car.
It was a beautiful Aston Martin Vanquish in a custom missile-bronze colour, and part of its appeal three years ago – the longest he had ever kept a car – were the looks he caught as he flashed past other drivers. But today, passing slowly made him uncomfortable. Perhaps he should change it for a Tesla to show what a good, upright, ecologically concerned citizen he was, as well as a flash bastard.
Perhaps the lights were stuck. The white van alongside him made little feints forward, and he glanced over. Two schoolboys in green uniforms clambered over each other like puppies, waving at him and pointing in admiration of his car. They tugged at their driver dad, a tough-looking young man with a shaven head, who stared straight ahead.
Red-and-amber – the white van surged ahead the very instant the lights changed to green, and Sean saw the boys cheering and goading their father faster.
He drew alongside then fell back a couple of times, pulling faces as if he were striving and failing to overtake, so that the boys screeched with joy and bounced up and down on the bench seat. As he saw the filter lane for his exit, Sean pretended he was giving up, and the boys pumped their fists in triumph as he let the white van surge past him. The tough young dad flashed him a grin and he felt a wave of good feeling. Then he indicated, tipped the wheel and the feeling frayed like a thread as he wound back on the roads of his old life.
He drove slowly for the last few miles, surprised to see it had rained heavily. There was no sign of the red dust of London and the fields were green. The track to the house was badly potholed and he felt irritated – it wasn’t as if Gail couldn’t afford to get it graded. The thought of the settlement still pricked him. He would have been generous had she let him, instead of taking out her anger against Martine in financial terms. He had not thought her capable of being so petty. But put that aside: he was here to deliver a terrible blow.
Gail, I’ve got some bad news. Gail—
Something on the track ground against the undercarriage and he cursed and slowed down. He would go out the other way. The grading of the lane was not his business and this would be the last time he would come here, so it didn’t matter. But still, his eye ran over the orchards in some dismay. The fruit was retarded and the leaves too heavy. All the rain without the sun.
Instead of the old blue Saab in the garage, there was a new silver BMW four-wheel drive. Only now did he consider the possibility that Gail might not have been home, or not been alone. He pulled up, blocking the garage, the way that always made them look out. And there she was, coming to the kitchen window. To his surprise, she waved. He walked down the path, hoping she had not got the wrong idea. No flowers, no bottle, a bad time of day to visit. He brought bad tidings of great pain. Gail, I’ve got some bad news …
She opened the door before he knocked. One year younger than Sean, the glaze of youth had cracked into a filigree of lines around her eyes. Her face was softening and dropping and she wore her clothes sexlessly loose. But she was still wearing perfume.
‘Sean, I’m so sorry,’ she said. ‘Are you OK?’
‘You know?’ He stared at his ex-wife. ‘How? I only just found out.’
‘Ruth called me.’ She stood back to let him in. ‘Crack of dawn.’
‘They told her first?’ Sean was assaulted by the smell of home. The old oak floors and stairs, the extortionate beeswax polish. He noticed a bowl of orange roses on the table. ‘You cut the Whisky Macs.’ They always left them blooming on the path, for visitors to enjoy their scent.
‘Saves them from the rain. Someone called her from Svalbard: Tom named her next of kin, apparently. But you already knew that.’
Sean touched a rose and its petals dropped. ‘I don’t remember every single detail of that time.’
‘I do … But they saw each other, didn’t they? That one last time.’
‘Yes, but I didn’t realise she was officially … next of kin.’
Sean winced at the idea of Ruth Mott relating her version of that last night. But that was the only way Gail could know, because at the time they were in the final throes of nisi to absolute, and only their lawyers were speaking. He looked up the stairs. Someone else was in the house, he could feel it.
‘Whose silver car is that out there?’
‘The colour’s called mineral white. And it’s mine.’
‘You said you wanted to keep the Saab forever.’
‘Out with the old. Apparently this new one’s attached to a satellite, so I’m tracked from space if I want and even if I don’t, unless I sit down online for hours and work out how to switch it off. It’s got this inbuilt—’
‘I’m glad you’ve got yourself a good car.’
She’d moved the pictures around. There was a new light on a table. Tom was dead, that was why he’d come. So that Gail could express his grief. She wasn’t doing that properly.
‘You and Ruth have made up then.’
‘I was unfair to her.’
‘She shouldn’t have meddled.’
‘I should have listened.’
Alarmed by the tremble in her voice, he went into the kitchen. A muscle memory prompted him: dump the coat, dump the bag – he looked down at the settle. The newspapers and the big tabby cat that slept there were gone.
‘Where’s Harold?’ He looked around, making the sound that called him.
‘He died too. Last year. Tea? Coffee?’ Gail filled the kettle, her back to him.
‘You didn’t tell me.’ He couldn’t help himself, he looked around. Each thing he recognised was like an accusation. ‘Isn’t this place too big for you now?’
Gail turned. ‘Sean, why did you come? You could have phoned.’
‘That’s what Martine said.’
‘Ah. She’s so thoughtful.’
‘You
