Her tears had stopped, though felt close to breaking out again. ‘There’s a lesson,’ he said. ‘We must never fight against ourselves. The two tribes in biblical days did, until the First Exile. Then it stopped, because there were other forces to contend with. After the so-called Emancipation, the European Jews served their countries as good soldiers, and as good everything else. But now we have a greater force against which to unite, and still for the sake of those countries that as often as not despise us.’
He placed his flowers under the Star of David. She kissed his cold face, and when he looked into her eyes he noticed her tears.
5
‘Where to now?’ They were back on the main road.
‘Boulogne. Navigate us via St Pol and Fruges,’ he said.
When the route became straight, he turned out behind a car to overtake. A horn screamed from close by, sending him in again. The driver of a yellow Ford pointed angrily to his side mirror to tell him he should be more careful.
‘He’s right,’ Tom said. ‘I must get a wing mirror to make it safer.’
‘When you want to overtake,’ she said, ‘let me know. I can look.’
Near Boulogne he followed signs for the port, and she wondered whether he had forgotten something in England that was important enough to go back for. If they made the crossing, she would feel Judy’s warm kiss, and tell her how full of uncertainty she was, how far afloat in spaces she did not understand, how lost among forces still incomprehensible. She would find comfort, even if only in talking for a few hours about things that didn’t much matter. It had taken her a long time to learn that one woman could mother another and call it friendship, and at the moment that’s all she wanted.
They were not going to England, but joined a queue by a railway line set apart from the quai. ‘We put our car on the train,’ he said, ‘and in the morning wake up in Italy!’
The heat burned into the car. They stood outside, and there was no breeze. She strolled to the end of the queue, wondering how to get a ticket and go back on the next ship whether he came or not. She could be with Judy by evening. She could be in London by tomorrow, and in Nottingham the day after that. She opened her bag. There was enough English money. But there was nowhere for her to go, nowhere she wanted to go to, only someone she needed without knowing why. It had become unthinkable not to be with him.
As if knowing what she thought, he left her alone. He would think the same. He stood, smoking a cigar, looking at long wagons on to which he would drive the car before they took their seats in the carriage. Their tickets were checked. The train was half an hour late in leaving, and he cursed the heat. A man in front cooled himself with a folded newspaper. Cars began to move. She watched him drive up the ramp. She had made her choice. On the way down, carrying their overnight suitcase, he didn’t get low enough under a girder, and bumped his head. When he swore she laughed.
6
He held her hand. ‘Let’s get on board.’
They leaned back in their seats and dozed, taken smoothly from the coast. By half-past five the train was east of Paris, stopped under a sunny sky among green fields, woods and orchards, with low hills in the distance. A halted train opposite was full of Spaniards, one of whom called out that they had come from Belgium and were going home on holiday. The heat was uncomfortable. A young Englishman understood Spanish, and translated what was said. There was a lot of unemployment in Belgium, they told him.
Pam was thirsty, and they went to the restaurant car. Tea and cakes cost five pounds, and she called it extravagance. ‘Blame the exchange rate,’ he said. The train rolled south and south-east. He took out a cloth map to show where they were. His grandfather’s signature was on the hardboard cover: ‘But the railway lines are the same.’
Window glass reflected their faces when it got dark. Inactivity made her sleepy. The noise and rattle was soporific. With darkness outside it seemed like travelling through an endless tunnel. They would never hit daylight again and see landscape. She would doze for ever, while Tom assiduously studied a multilingual phrase-book.
On her way from the toilet she opened the window of an outside door and heard the rush of wheels. If she unlatched the door and slipped she would be sucked underneath. The difference between life and death was a thrusting forward of the body, a twist of the foot. Even if there was nothing else to do she would never do it. Such impulses made life seem valuable.
‘I thought you’d got lost,’ he said.
‘I was standing by myself. One has to now and again. I might not be able to for much longer.’
He closed his book, wondering what she meant.
‘It sounds idiotic,’ she said, ‘and impossible perhaps, but I think I’m pregnant. I haven’t had a period for two months. Either that, or it’s something worse. But I don’t think so. I’ve been as sick as a dog the last few mornings.’
He hadn’t noticed. He should have done, he said. She’d mentioned it, but neither had made the connection. They hadn’t cared to. Neither had she – until now. So what else could the poor bloke do but smile? Pull the communication cord? He asked if she were sure. Who would be till it popped out? But the signs were there. It’s incredible, she said. I’m forty-one. She had lived in a dream and taken no pills. Maybe she was mistaken, but it had been impossible not to mention in this timeless train driving through nowhere. He was happy, she supposed, and certainly wouldn’t mind. She wondered whether there was any occurrence he would be disturbed at. If not, it was just as well.
He hoped it was true, he said. He could think of nothing better, leaned across to hold her and say he was sorry there was no one else in the compartment to hear the good news. He loved her, he said.
‘At least we can kiss in peace.’ If I’m pregnant, she thought, you should take me home. Ought that not to be his first consideration? If he could not get himself to take her home, at least he might say that he would like to. Was he daft, dead, or made of iron? He was unaware of the problem. They were light years apart. She had invented a reason for returning to England, but he hadn’t fallen for it. All the same, it seemed she was pregnant, and she was glad they couldn’t turn round and go back the way they had come.
At dinner they shared a table with the fair-haired young man who had translated the Spaniards’ talk. His name was Aubrey, and he was going to Italy on a three months’ tour, he said. In the autumn he would work in his father’s car insurance firm. Next year he’d marry, get a house in Boreham Wood, and travel to town every day. Yes, he was looking forward to it. Whatever happened, however trivial, was an adventure. He was philosophicaclass="underline" there was no such thing as an ordinary life. Dullness was in the heart of the beholder. England was a wonderful country, but he liked being on the Continent, as well. When he had a family he would buy a caravan and go touring. He ordered his dinner in excellent French, and called for a bottle of wine, saying he couldn’t sleep on a train unless he was half sloshed. Tom, agreeing it was the best thing, asked for champagne.
‘Celebration?’ He looked at Pam.
‘Not particularly,’ Tom said. ‘I have a liking for it.’
Pam was surprised at her appetite. Something to throw up in the morning. For a train meal it was good. Tom insisted that Aubrey share their bottle. They drank to themselves and to each other, to every letter in the alphabet, never to meet again. Tom was, Pam thought, used to such encounters, which is why he’ll never let me go. The idea frightened her, but it was a fear that came out of love. There was no firmer treaty. With both parties willing, what hope of parting?