Girl in the Dark Page 14

  Nevertheless, I am thrilled to have a way to track my progress. I note down in my diary each evening the f-number at which I went out. When people ask me how I am, I reply at first with incomprehensible technical blather, describing how I “managed f8 yesterday and hope to try f16 at the weekend.” Only photographers understand.

  My diary has a useful page showing sunrise and sunset times for each week of the year. This is very helpful for me, as I can work out at around what time I should start preparing for my walk. I have become a dusk-tracker, an adherent of planetary rather than human time, following the swing of the earth as it loops around its star. My slice of dusk moves through the day, its contents changing with the seasons as the days contract and dilate like the slow pupil of an eye. In winter I coincide with children in scarves and hats walking home from school; at equinoxes, with the return of car-borne commuters to suburban driveways; in April and August, with the hour of soap, when there are few people abroad and giant TV screens effloresce from the walls or corners of front rooms. Around midsummer I must wait and wait for hours, far into the evening, as a fiery teardrop slides down the blue cheek of the sky.

  Encounter

  One day I go out for my evening walk at f8, according to my light meter. I wander for a while among the houses, then cut down a path which leads to open ground. A stream in a concrete culvert runs through the estate, and the developers have left a broad area of grass along either side, with occasional trees and hawthorn bushes, so that the whole forms a sort of miniature valley where people stroll or walk their dogs, and children ride their bikes.

  I turn on to the path beside the stream—and stop in my tracks.

  There, just above the horizon, oozing dark crimson into flesh-coloured cloud—a giant inflamed eye.

  For the first time since the darkness, I have come face to face with the sun.

  I look at the sun. The sun looks at me. Something indescribable passes between us.

  It is a first parley between old, old enemies. It is coming across a former lover suddenly, in the street, years after they broke your heart. It is sitting down to negotiate with terrorists, looking across the table into the eyes of a killer, knowing that the two of you are locked in this thing together, and some modus vivendi must be found.

  I stand on the path by the stream. I extend my hand to the horizon.

  “Hello, sun,” I say.

  Puppy Cage

  What I would like to do is find a way to travel for a while before dusk to a scenic spot so that when my time comes I can burst forth and enjoy my walk somewhere new.

  But how is this to be done? Dracula travelled from Transylvania to Whitby in one of a consignment of coffins; he came out each night to prowl about the ship and feast upon the crew.

  A coffin, however, is not practicable. There could be difficulties breathing, and it would not fit in the car. Instead, Pete and I devise a contraption that can be installed and uninstalled in the back seat. It consists of a large piece of industrial felt, black, half a centimetre thick, and two long wires. According to the photobiology department at the hospital I once attended, high-quality black felt is the most light-protective material. The wires are strung between the grab handles which sit above each of the back doors. They pass in and out of holes in the felt, so that they hold it up. The forward part of the felt hangs over the back of the front passenger seat.

  The result is a sort of small tent in which I can sit while being driven about the countryside. My friend Pam christens it the Puppy Cage.

  Now my horizons expand. I consult my table of dusks and dawns, subtract the amount of time before sunset that I can currently manage, and estimate the length of the journey to the common or woods I have in mind. This tells me when we’ll need to leave the house. Then I subtract a further ten minutes to allow for wrestling with the puppy cage. Unfortunately this is something Pete has to do on his own. The felt is heavy and unwieldy, and the green wires stick out of it like tentacles. A person watching him manoeuvre it towards and then into the car would conclude he was fighting to the death with a slightly home-made-looking monster, perhaps from an early series of Doctor Who.

  Once the damn thing is in place, Pete gives a signal to me. In my hat, coat and boots I charge out of the house and nosedive into the open back door of the car, burrowing under the folds of the felt. I flail about for a while finding my seatbelt and disentangling my handbag straps, then, finally, we’re off. I am sitting diagonally behind Pete, and encased in heavy material, so conversation is muffled. It is difficult to pass casual remarks without having to roar them at a volume out of proportion to their significance:

  “Highland cows coming up on the right.”

  “What sort of nice house?”

  “What?”

  “What sort of house?”

  “Not house, COWS.”

  “What?”

  “Oh, never mind, we’ve gone past them.”

  “Gone past what?”

  “HIGHLAND COWS.”

  “Oh, right.”

  Pause.

  “I wonder what Highland cows are doing in Hampshire, anyway.”

  “Being hairy, I suppose.”

  “What?”

  “BEING HAIRY.”

  And so on.

  But it’s all worth it when we get to the woods. I leap from my puppy cage, my nose glorying in a thousand different outdoor smells, and bound towards the freedom of the trees.

  Word

  crepuscular a. of twilight; (Zool.) appearing or active before sunrise or at dusk [f. L crepusculum twilight].

  I discover that I have become crepuscular, and that I share this characteristic with various creatures, including deer, rabbits and short-eared owls.

  Also wombats, apparently.

  Honeypot

  Growing up in London, I never went to the New Forest. It isn’t very hilly, and my upbringing taught me to associate holidays and days out with strenuous ascents followed by contemplation of the world from a high vantage point, rather than the more tenebrous pleasures of trees.

  Emerging from my darkness in Hampshire, however, I find the New Forest is a good place for expeditions. It is easy to get to, and the shade of the trees stretches the time I can be outside. I can start my dusk walk earlier than I could in open country, and stay out later after dawn.

  I am impressed by the rugged girth of the ancient trees, their intense individuality, their fabulous lived-in look. Lattices of ivy stems cross-garter their lower trunks, mistletoe springs from out-flung limbs, holly bushes sprout between long gnarled toes. Lichens in understated greys and beige, and designer mosses, smooth as moleskin, or hairy like fake fur, patch their corrugated skins. Supersized fungi stud them, like jewels.

  They stand at intervals, these huge bedecked trees. Smaller, younger trees grow between them, but it is clear that these are mere underlings assisting at the council of their elders, and do not really count. Pete and I wander past the ankles of the great, of no more moment than a cat that, during a conclave of cardinals, pads across the room.

  Trees may well have matters to discuss. I have heard of a mysterious occurrence that suggests co-operation between oak trees. Mice eat the acorns of oaks; a few fruitful years cause the mouse population to explode, and the chances of acorns eluding their attentions become small. But then there comes a year in which the oaks produce no acorns at all. Many mice die because they can find no food. In the years after the cull, acorns reappear. It works, of course, only if all oaks act together.

  A CREPUSCULAR LIFE can lead to strange misapprehensions. Visiting the New Forest at dusk and dawn, Pete and I rarely see other people, coming across mainly ponies and deer. I comment on the absence of humans, which serves to render more striking the powerful presence of the trees.

  “You do realise,” says Pete, “that if we went in the daytime like normal people, the whole place would be jumping?”

  “Really?” I say.

  “Yes. It’s a honeypot. Loads of people go there. Honestly, y
ou are a nitwit. What did you think all those empty car parks were for?”

  “Ah,” I say. “I suppose there were a lot of car parks, actually, now one comes to think of it.”

  Mottisfont

  I am always on the lookout for different things to do at dusk—new woods and paths within a reasonable distance of our home, outdoor concerts and theatre, if they do not start too early, and the audience is not overlit. Much research is needed, and often the idea does not come off.

  “You should look into Mottisfont,” says Pete. “They have a walled rose garden, and they open late for two weeks around midsummer, when the roses are at their peak, because so many people want to see them.”

  Eagerly I page through the National Trust handbook. Mottisfont is a property in the valley of the River Test, not too far away. Its rose garden is internationally famous, specialising in traditional old-fashioned varieties that have not had the smell bred out of them in pursuit of the structure or longevity of the blooms.

  I run my finger down the table of opening times—and indeed, for two weeks, the gardens stay open until 8:30 p.m. But, consulting my diary for sunset times, I find that this is no good—because around the summer solstice the sun is at the peak of its glorious career and, diva-like, does not quit the stage until at least twenty past nine. Currently, I can manage half an hour before sunset—but that would mean starting any visit at 8:50 p.m., twenty minutes after the gardens have closed.

  So near and yet so far, I think sadly, imagining roses that I will never see. I mind even more for Pete than for myself; I want to give him treats that we can enjoy together, as there is still so much he has to do alone.

  So I decide that I have nothing to lose. I write a letter to Mottisfont explaining my situation and asking if there is any possibility that we could visit the garden later. I offer to pay for the inconvenience, or extra hours for staff.

  It is early May when I write, and I fully expect to receive nothing but a polite refusal. But then, in mid-June, a lady phones me up. “I’m sorry we haven’t got back to you,” she says. “It is extremely busy here during the rose season. But yes—you can come. We can open the gardens for you between nine and ten, and there’s no need to pay.”

  “That’s wonderful,” I say, overwhelmed. “Thank you so much.”

  So on the date agreed, I climb out of my puppy cage into a car park from which the last vehicles are dispersing after a long and sultry day. The air is warm and close, but the first cool tendrils of evening are beginning to lace their way through. Soon a young woman appears, with keys, and lets us into the main grounds. Together, we cross a stone bridge over the burbling river, then pass along the north front of the house, and past the stable block, and through an avenue of enormous stately trees, before we reach the walled garden itself.

  The wall is high, and made of old bricks in an incredible variety of colours—russet, violet, peach and cream, the descending sun brushing all of them with gold. The young woman unlocks a door in the wall, and holds it back for us with her outstretched arm.

  We go inside.

  The smell wallops us in the face.

  It is as though we have passed from air to some new substance, formed of a thousand interlocking scents that twist languorously about each other, like invisible smoke. We feel resistance on our skin as we push further in, as if the garden within the wall were at a higher pressure than the world outside. The temperature itself grows warmer. “There you are,” says the young woman. “Enjoy! I’ll meet you back at the front gate at around ten.” She closes the door on us, and we are left alone in this magical, rainbow garden, trespassers in its silent, oozing profusion. To strike a match would probably be dangerous; the whole thing might explode.

  We look slowly about us. A wide border runs all the way around the walls, backed by climbing plants spread-eagled across the brick. The main part of the garden is laid out in geometric beds, with long straight paths running between them. Some of these walks lead under arches, thick with climbing roses. At one crossroads is a circular stone pool, with a little fountain at its centre. Apart from the discreet bubbling of the water and the drone of late bees zigzagging between blooms, everything is still.

  There are roses here—but many other flowers as well: lilies that thrust upwards on long slender spikes, tufted carpets of pinks, neat humps of lavender like green-and-purple porcupines; plants that fork and furl and splay, plants of which I do not know the names, plants with ordered, structured heads, plants with trailing, pendulous sprays.

  I run my fingers gently along smooth and furry leaves, put my nose into velvet and silken depths. I want to get bodily into the beds, and roll; I have to hold myself back.

  Slowly the light alters, from yellow to purple to blue. The colours in the garden grow softer and less distinct. Pete, who has been taking pictures, puts away his camera and comes to join me. We sit on a bench beside an enormous flesh-coloured rose, its blossoms blowsy and collapsing, revealing indecently hairy yellow centres. Petals spread over the earth and grass like a layer of delicate ears. The fragrance wraps us in a private cloud.

  “We are very lucky to see this on our own,” says Pete. “During the rose season there are usually hordes of visitors, and the whole place is packed.”

  There is evidence of hordes passing through: some of the paths are made of turf, which has been ground down into bare earth by hundreds of feet. And there is a sandwich on one of the seats, in a plastic triangular case.

  “Yes—it’s wonderful,” I say, leaning back on the bench and looking at the sky, where a moon has appeared, like a suddenly opened eye. “Complete, decadent luxury.” But I still feel a small pang. I would quite like to be part of a horde now and again, to rub up against my own species in the mass. It does not happen any more.

  We wander back to the door in the wall, and slip through into the real world, closing it carefully behind us. We make our way through the shadowy grounds to the entrance, passing an elderly lady exercising a snuffling dog among the stately trees.

  “She must live here, lucky person,” I whisper to Pete.

  “Yes,” he replies, “I think there are apartments in the house.”

  The young woman with the keys is waiting at the gate. When we thank her, she tells us that it has not been any trouble, as she does not live far away. We drive back in the not-quite-dark midsummer night, and on the inside of my eyelids I carry with me the imprint of glorious flowers, and in my nostrils, the ghosts of their perfume.

  Hats

  I have always been a hat person, and now I have the perfect excuse for building a truly fine collection. The exercise bike in the corner of the living room, bought years ago by Pete in a keep-fit paroxysm but used only periodically by either of us since, has found its true vocation as a hatstand. Hats are piled up on the handlebars, hooked over the LCD display, and one sits proudly on the uncomfortable, buttock-slicing seat.

  In my acquisition of hats I face one main obstacle, apart from the obvious difficulty of not being able to visit shops. I have a very large head, and thick hair; many hats do not fit, perching on top in a ridiculous manner, and resembling, as my mother puts it, “a pimple on a cheese.”

  I fall constantly for hats in catalogues that claim “one size fits all,” and find, invariably, that it does not. Sadly, I package up the hat for Pete to take to the post office. He has to do this on Saturday mornings, when there is a long queue, and the whole process makes him grumpy.

  “If you must purchase unsuitable hats,” he says, as he pulls on his anorak, “can you at least try to do it from companies that offer a courier collection service?”

  “But it was such a beautiful hat,” I wail.

  “Face it, darling, you haven’t got a normal head.” He stomps to the front door. “Now is this proof of posting or have I got to pay?”

  Pete’s goddaughter Sophie, who is six, comes to visit, accompanied by her parents, and by Hannah, her smaller, fiercer, faster-moving sister. We sit about chatting, drinking tea and ea
ting cake. Slowly, as though drawn by an invisible magnetic field, the two little girls sidle towards the exercise bike. When they get close to it, Hannah, looking back to see if anyone is noticing, lifts off a hat and puts it on.

  It is a large-brimmed hat in a brown woollen material, and it entirely envelops her head. She stands stock still, suddenly transformed into an oversized mushroom. Meanwhile, Sophie has selected a straw hat with a pink scarf round it, and is examining herself in the long mirror on the wall. Hannah, recovering from her surprise, throws off the brown hat and finds a black waterproof one decorated with a small flower, which she reaches up and places on her father.

  Soon everybody is wearing hats.

  Even the silly hat comes into play. It is a greyish-brown toque-like creation in stretchy fake fur, with a stripy Davy Crockett tail hanging down the back. Pete brought it back from a trip to the States—the hat is entirely useless in terms of light protection, but an excellent source of entertainment.

  Sophie comes up to me and asks shyly, “What is your favourite hat?”

  “That’s a very good question,” I say, and consider the matter. Finally I pick out an oversized cap with a big peak, made of rich brown plush the colour of ginger cake. “This one. This is the one I like best.”

  Sophie nods approvingly. “That is a good hat,” she says.

  Despite their popularity with visiting children, my hats, worn on walks, have an unfortunate disadvantage. Dogs in general become excited by my presence; a sub-set of dogs, it turns out, have a particular susceptibility to hats.

  Pete and I are getting out of the car one winter evening towards sunset, preparing to go for a walk in some snowy woods. We come across a man returning to his vehicle accompanied by a small, yappy dog. The dog takes one look at me, in my woollen, broad-brimmed hat, and launches itself at my throat.