The Circle Read Online Free Page B

rising wind and wanted to deny it.
    Yes, she had travelled away to give lectures, she worked very hard at that, at every chance to do that she could take and it was money for them; Gertrud looked after the children when she was away. She did that well. Nevertheless, Lena hated her for it. It was partly because she was the inarticulate witness to those arguments between herself and Ben, as she sat at the window, her long red hair just washed down over her eyes; and partly it was her very placidity, the very quality that made her essential. The small, fat face, which offended her; she never went out, had no boy-friends . And knew she was needed, loved. The children loved her. And this in itself was confusing, it left Lena feeling safe away from home, and yet in some deep and damaging way it made her feel: replaceable.
    One night Lena prepared to go off into the coldwinter rain, into the strange black schizophrenic world of away from home. Hurrying to put the children to bed, to catch the train, sloppily herding them about a bit brutally, because of the pressure of time, worrying them out of the bath, Michael said, thoughtfully. You know, in a way things are. Somehow calmer when you’re away.
    And she’d slapped at him furiously: Think that, little bugger, do you.
    He’d tried, without crying, and alarmed at her misery to explain: how nice it was to find breakfast ready laid on the table, but crossly she’d involved herself in a piece of nastiness.
    –You little fool, she said. Gertrud does what I ask her for money. She’s paid to put your breakfast on the table.
    –No, Michael shook his head. Rubbing his arm and preoccupied as he thought it through. And suddenly even then, back then, Lena thought, he’s right. And when the girl came down to eat with them, she watched her a bit guiltily. Waiting to have Michael repeat the question.
    –It’s not true is it? You wouldn’t go if Mummy didn’t pay you.
    –Of course not, the girl said softly. And she seemed pleased.
    And Lena had thought, now what is this alarm. It’s true, she wouldn’t. Is she. Waiting? To take over from me? Is that what she wants? And behaved badly. Weeping on Michael’s bed, so that he had to comfort her, a serious puzzled child, comforting his mother, and when Ben came back at the last moment to take her to the station, she’d said: in that funny bodiless state which always came over her in the stink of the station, the clang and the wheel rollings in her ears saying goodbye.
    –If I die. Don’t marry Gertrud will you?
    –Gertrud. He didn’t say anything for a moment. Then: No. Except. Supposing she wouldn’t look after us otherwise? The words were said lightly, as if to tease her.
    –Marry. Marry. Anyone else. She said hysterically. And he kissed her, the calm soft kiss of those days without passion.
    –Don’t worry, you aren’t going to die.
    And the next day it was all forgotten. Away from Ben changes of weather were an exhilaration, the next day she remembered the cold sunlight entering her like alcohol. Yes, she walked about the town she taught in, alone taking the signs of morning cold still there with joy, the rucks in the grass hard, ice on the smaller puddles brittle and cracking. Alive in her own head.
    –Nun, she remembered Ben accusing her. You should never have married.
    *
    And driving home in the car, she thought: perhaps she would sleep with someone else. Just that, just the fact of sex she thought, no connections, nothing to touch her affections and needs. Yes, to sail out like the prostitute Ben had once called her, blatantly unknowing whoever came, because what she needed was some lust that could be honestly that and untainted. With the terrible continuous burden of relationship. Remembering . The lithe Moroccan on the boat out from Marseilles, thin-hipped and beautiful in the steaming wash house, his penis between her open legs as they pressed back on a table, and so easily they came together.
    –Ça y est, he’d