Transit

EIGHTEEN

For no reason that he could consciously appreciate, as time went by the desire to explore grew into an obsession with Avery. It started a few days after he and Tom had found the golden woman at ‘their’ bird-cage tree. Oddly —and inexplicably—at first he tried to ignore it. But as the days added themselves up into uneventful weeks, so the pressure grew, until it could be contained no longer. He wanted suddenly and impossibly to explore in all directions, to find out as much as he could about the world they were living on.

At night the two moons and the strange pattern of stars tantalized him. By day, he stared at the seaward horizon, or along the shore, or at the long green phal anxes of trees and bush as if he would force them to yield their secrets by sheer will-power.

There were plenty of ways in which he could rationalize the urge to explore. He told himself that he and Tom, Barbara and Mary were slowly sinking into an insidious and primitive lethargy, they were becoming too content with the simple (and infuriatingly satisfying) routines of existence. They had been thrust into a strange situation and they had adapted too readily. Camp Two represented security. Unless they made a conscious effort to extend their knowledge and their dominion, both would ultimately, inevitably, shrink. If they continued to exist in the same old way, they would get to know intimately the small area of territory in which they now operated. By contrast, the unknown tracts of land would be regarded as dangerous. In the end, they might even become tabu….

There were many arguments for exploration—all of them good ones, some of them even dramatic ones. But they were still rationalizations. The plain fact, he told himself moodily, was that he was getting bored with the so-called idyllic life. He was still infected with all the restlessness and discontent of an allegedly civilized mind.

He did not say anything to the others. They seemed happy enough and contented enough with what they already had. In the few months that they had been thrown together, there had been enough excitement, danger and minor crises to make them feel thankful for what they had managed to achieve. And it was certainly no mean achievement for four strangers to mould themselves into a fairly harmonious group.

Because he was busy repressing the thoughts that had begun to dominate him, Avery became taciturn and took to indulging in long solitary strolls when the others were bathing or just spending a lazy afternoon on the seashore. He always went armed on these expeditions, but fear of wild animals and the golden people had diminished. He was no longer the same person whom They had picked up, ill and flabby, one cold and dismal afternoon in another world of space and time. He was lean, weathered, muscular—and, he thought complacently, a fairly reasonable kind of hunting/fishing machine. He had despatched many animals that would formerly have sent him running; and had even wounded then ultimately finished off a small rhinotype by getting it groggy from a distance, then rushing in to tomahawk its head to a bloody pulp. Even Tom had not managed a rhinotype so far. Avery was proud of the distinction.

A solitary stroll, then, no longer seemed an abnormally hazardous venture. Being alone was a bitter-sweet pleasure for which his taste seemed to be growing.

Barbara was more aware of his inner turmoil than he suspected. She said little enough when he took himself off for long periods; but she charted the change in his moods and habits anxiously, trying vainly to persuade herself that his moodiness was an obscure variation on the theme of homesickness. They all suffered from it occasionally—but not nearly as much as they would have expected. There were times when they felt they would give anything to experience once again the sights and sounds of London. But the sensation would pass, and they would contrast the freedom of their new lives with the restrictions and frustrations of the old. And suddenly, the sunlight would seem brighter, and the sea utterly wonderful.

When she was not trying to cheat herself, Barbara knew that it was not homesickness that Avery was suffering from. And, in turn, she herself became subject to moods—fits of despondency, feelings of guilt and inadequacy.

There was a further complication to consider. Recently, she and Avery had begun to make love. Or at least they began to have sexual intercourse. Avery, inspired by the altogether beneficial change in Tom and Mary, and at the same time feeling that he was denying Barbara something that was hers by hereditary right, had made tentative—and awkward—overtures in the darkness of their tent. Barbara had responded with enthusiasm— perhaps too much enthusiasm—for though the mechanics of the operation were perfect, it proved sadly to be no more than that: a mechanical operation. Physical passion received its quietus, for a time. The body was fulfilled, but the soul remained strangely empty.

They had made ‘love’ not more than half a dozen times. It, too, had become a formula…

The storm broke one night when Avery felt impelled to ‘do his duty’ once again. He placed a hand on Barbara’s breast—the same hand, the same breast—and slipped an arm round her shoulder, thoughtfully taking care, as usual, not to entangle it with her hair. Next would come the first kiss, a hard empty kiss, then a fondling and a stroking of her arms and neck; and then….

Barbara could stand it no longer. She pushed him away. ‘Not tonight—please….’

He was surprised. ‘Is anything wrong?’ Even the gentleness of his voice was mechanical.

‘Yes, there’s a hell of a lot wrong,’ she sobbed bitterly. ‘Where are you? There’s a part of you that’s gone away, and I don’t know where it is. I only know that it isn’t here All that wants to make love to me is a body with a bloody, built-in, automatic, self-regulating social conscience.’

Her body shook with the intensity of her frustration. She hated Avery, she hated herself, she hated the words she had spoken; and, above all, she hated the treacherous, scalding tears.

Avery was appalled. ‘Barbara…. Dear Barbara,’ he said lamely. ‘I’m so sorry.’

Having started the scene, and loathing herself for it, Barbara was determined to fight it out to a finish.

‘What do you want?’ she demanded angrily. ‘What in God’s name do you want? If you want me to act like a harlot, I’ll do it. If you want me to pretend I’m a shy, cowering virgin, I’ll do my best. I’ll even crawl on all fours if it will make you happy But if I don’t know what you want, how—how can I ever hope to give it?’ Avery felt like a swine. Hell, he told himself savagely, I am a bloody swine—with megalomaniac tendencies….

‘What I want,’ he began, ‘it’s not what you can give me, Barbara.’

That made matters worse.

‘Goddammit, what do you want?’ she cried.

‘I want to find out,’ he said desperately. ‘I want to find out what sort of world we’ve been dumped on, why we’re here, what we can do about it I want to know.

I want to know something more….’

‘Is that all?’ She seemed to find it amusing. ‘You’re a liar! That’s only a diversion! You want Christine’s breast and Christine’s lips. You don’t want to find out anything at all. You just want to make love to a sad little ghost…. You’re only looking for excuses.’

That was when he struck her. It was the first time he had ever hit a woman in anger. As soon as he had done it, he hoped—he hoped with all his heart—it would be the last.

‘Tomorrow,’ he said coldly, trying to hide his shame, ‘tomorrow, I’m setting off to do a bit of exploration. I may be away two or three days. Perhaps by the time I get back ’

‘You’re not going alone,’ she said savagely. ‘That’s a standing order—delivered by the illustrious leader of the expedition. I’m going with you…. Now hit me again, and try to change my mind.’

‘Please yourself,’ snapped Avery. ‘I doubt whether I shall be much company.’

‘When were you ever?’ sighed Barbara. She felt empty. The anger had drained out of her. Only the frustration remained.