The Woman who Loved an Octopus and other Saint's Tales Read online

  After I was captured, I saw an electric drill being put through a man’s hands. I heard his shrieks even over the screaming of the drill. He wasn’t killed. It wouldn’t have been so bad if he had been. It would have been over. But he wasn’t killed.

  I had to sit next to the man in the interrogation room and watch. When I tried to close my eyes they hit me, and then they hit the man. I had to watch. I kept my eyes fixed on the drill, I studied the drill until I could have drawn it with my eyes closed. It was dark green and orange and on the side of it were the words Made in Germany, and while I sat there, a part of my mind detached itself from that room and made plans for how I would get away, and swore that I would never go to that country Germany, never, never, no matter what. And that’s why, when I finally got away, I didn’t stop there although the other refugees said it was a good place, with good medical care for my son, and that I should stay. But I couldn’t stay. I went on, north and west until I came to the Channel, and the train and London. I know it’s arbitrary. It could have said Made in Britain on the drill and I’d be in Munich or Berlin now instead. I don’t expect anybody would accept it as a reason, even if I told them, and I won’t. But that’s why I’m here, because I had to watch an electric drill put through a man’s hands.

  After they had finished with the man they said they would start on the baby. They had someone carry my son in, and a man stood over him with the drill that was still smeared with blood from the other prisoner, and they said it was either the drill in my son’s belly or I would talk and tell them the truth. They said they were tired of my games.

  They started the drill.

  * * *

  I killed my father, I tell the doctor. I watch her face. I want to see if she will understand.

  She watches me back. I can see what she’s thinking: Patient blames herself for father’s death. Survivor’s guilt.

  I say nothing.

  She says nothing.

  Finally she asks, how did you kill him?

  My mouth opens and I say, I pushed him. I pushed him and he stumbled and he fell into the fire. That’s how I killed him.

  And then I say nothing at all after that. I have made sure that she won’t believe me when I tell her what really happened.

  * * *

  How is your baby? the doctor asks.

  Another operation yesterday, I say.

  The skin of my face feels like paper. My eyes burn. I was up all night, sitting by the bandages and tubes and beeping machines that are as close as I can get to my son. The nurses didn’t send me away. They only said that the operation had gone better than they’d dared hope, and that they would keep him sedated for a while longer, and not to be disappointed if he didn’t come round. I think what they meant was that there was no point in me staying, but I stayed anyway, and they didn’t send me away.

  Maybe the last operation, I say.

  But I’m too tired to hope. I’m too afraid to hope. I don’t tell her that.

  But when she smiles and says, I’m glad for you, that’s really good news; I don’t contradict her.

  * * *

  No, I said. I had to scream it over the noise the drill made. No no no please no please please.

  They switched the drill off. Looked at me.

  So the bitch has decided to talk, has she? Maybe she has a heart after all.

  I’ll tell you what you want, I said. My eyes burned. The inside of my mouth felt like paper. I wanted to say: I will tell you nothing, I will not betray the things I believe in, the people I care about. But instead I said: I’ll tell you what you want. Everything. Only don’t hurt my child.

  I betrayed my father in exchange for the life of my son. I told the men in the interrogation room about the place where my father was hiding, and how to get inside. I hoped the password had been changed in the time since my capture.

  They were gone three days.

  They tied me up and left me alone in my dark cell, no food, no water. I could only just feed the baby. I couldn’t clean him, or myself. I couldn’t stop him screaming. I was terribly afraid that the men had left, that the baby would starve, that I would starve, alone in the dark.

  I thought of my father. The last time I’d seen him we’d quarrelled. I had seen the whole mess coming. I’d even told him that if he thought getting in one lot of bandits to fight another was a smart idea, then he was probably more senile than he appeared and it was time to hand over the reins of power to someone else. He said the only reason he wasn’t going to throw me out was that my son might one day follow him on the throne. I told him he could keep his throne. But he hadn’t been able to. The coup happened two days later, and we’d been on the run since then.

  I prayed that the men wouldn’t find him.

  They came back after three days, stinking of smoke, and told me what they had done. They told me that they had beaten my father and lit the building around him. They told me how he had cursed me with his dying breath, in the flames.

  Then they poured petrol over everything and set fire to the prison too, and then they left.

  I don’t know how I got out. All I can remember thinking is that I had sacrificed my father for the life of my son, and that the sacrifice must not have been for nothing. If the baby died, my betrayal would have been for nothing.

  I never told anybody. When I got to London and claimed asylum and they asked me what had happened, I said that my father had died in the fire and that I ran away with the baby.

  Now I owe my father a life. I owe my father my son’s life.

  In my dreams under the red sky, my father comes tottering, a human torch, faceless, his hands stretched out like claws. I know what he wants. He wants his grandson’s life. That’s why I have to watch the baby as he sleeps, because I am afraid his grandfather’s spirit is going to come and take him.

  * * *

  I killed my father, I tell the doctor.

  She watches my face. I think she tries to understand.

  I say nothing.

  She says nothing.

  Finally she asks, do you want to tell me how you killed him?

  With words, I say.

  I tell her how.

  And now he will...

  I hadn’t meant to say that.

  And now he will? she asks.

  I look at her. He will come back and fetch my son, I say. A life for a life.

  Is that what you were so afraid of? she asks.

  I say nothing.

  He won’t come back, she says. Your father is dead because he was killed by war criminals. You are traumatised, and your little boy is in hospital, because you were tortured and nearly killed by the same war criminals. Your father’s ghost won’t come back to steal your little boy’s soul. Can you believe that? Can you try?

  I look back at her.

  I don’t say no.

  Annon

  Fifth century

  anhun [m] – (n) sleeplessness

  Annon, or Anhun, was the handmaid of Queen Madryn of Gwent (herself a saint). It is said that, together with her mistress, Annon founded a church at Trawsfynydd.

  She and Queen Madryn were returning from a pilgrimage to Bardsey Island when night fell and they stopped at the place that is today the town of Trawsfynydd. There they both had the same dream in which they heard a voice telling them: ‘Adeiladwch eglwys yma’ – ‘Build a church here’.

  I’d like to be able to say that she came in the night, like a thief, to steal me away. In fact she arrived on the boat from Pwllheli like everybody else. I saw her get off as it lay moored in the island harbour on Saturday morning.

  I wasn’t actually at the harbour when the boat came in. I do not mix much with people. They call me the Hermit Nun, although I am not a nun. I don’t belong to any order.

  I am on a retreat. I’m retreating from the world and its people. I try to live close to God’s creation; air and sea and silence and the huge blue question mark of the sky.

  Most of the visitors who come for the week only don’t ev
en know that I am here. Some may catch a glimpse of me on my way to chapel early mornings or evenings, and ask who I am. But I never talk to them. I never talk to anybody. I keep my distance, my silence.

  When the boat came into the harbour that morning I was standing on a little hill that overlooks the sea and the harbour.

  I saw the boat come in around the side of the mountain, nosing past the rocks where seals will lie sunning themselves at low tide. There was a little knot of departing visitors at the landing stage; and some of the people who spend all summer on the island, come to look at the fresh intake of weekly visitors.

  And there they were, clambering off the rocking boat onto the landing stage, one after the other. There she was, although I didn’t know her then. I just saw a middle-aged woman, short and thick-set, wearing brightly coloured clothes. One of the visitors. They’d all be gone soon enough, and another lot would come next Saturday to replace them.

  Few of them stay longer than the week. The silence and the emptiness get to them, the absence of amusements, electricity, television. There is nothing here to take your mind off things. You find that very soon your self and your life loom large, echoing like sound in a cathedral because nothing gets in the way. There is nothing else here.

  You are alone with God.

  It is a chance but most see it as a threat. So much emptiness, they say, looking at the sky full of blues and greys and clouds and birds, at the endlessness of the sea and all the shades of green and grey of the island. So much emptiness they say; looking, not seeing.

  They fill up the silence with their noise, with the things they bring to remind them of home. They find me unnatural, think it uncanny that I don’t talk. They do not understand that it is only by avoiding the noise of their lives, their voices, that I can strain to hear the voice of God.

  Don’t misunderstand me – there is no big voice booming down from heaven, no miracle shafts of light, no seagulls speaking in tongues. But to hear the voice of God in prayer, there needs to be silence; a silence of the spirit as well as an absence of noise. I empty myself to be ready for God.

  ‘Is that your sister who arrived yesterday?’ the shepherd asked when I met him early next morning on my way back from chapel.

  I looked at him, not understanding.

  ‘One of the new lot. She got here on the boat yesterday morning. You must have seen her. She’s the spitting image of you.’

  I shook my head. Frowned. I do not have a sister. As far as I could remember there had not been anybody on the boat who looked like me.

  ‘Ah, well,’ he said, moving on. ‘You’ll meet her sometime, I expect. Can see for yourself then.’

  I nodded good morning and walked on up the mountain to the Saint’s cave. A millennium and a half ago, it was home to a holy man. He lived on this island, existing on water and the fish that God sent for his food. I sat down by the cave entrance, closing my eyes; hands folded in my lap to keep them still.

  I do not see visions when I pray. I’m not given to visions.

  I hear.

  I listen, and I hear.

  This is the music of the spheres: a great rushing and humming, black and silver and blue, greater than anything we can imagine.

  I prayed, and I listened, and I was filled with joy.

  ‘There she is,’ the shepherd said the next morning. It was very early, the air sharp and cold, not long after sunrise, the grass still wet with dew. I was on my way to chapel. He whistled to his dog, then moved his head to indicate a figure walking towards the chapel. ‘Another believer, by the look of it. You’re going to meet her now. I would have thought it was you, if it hadn’t been for the clothes!’

  I looked.

  There was a woman; not young, and stockily built, her grey hair pulled back into a plait. She wore a long skirt of brightly coloured material, red and orange and purple; some ethnic jacket. She walked, head bowed, with measured strides. The thought came to me that she was trying to look like her idea of a devout person.

  Another believer, indeed. A tree-hugger, more likely.

  I gave her a nod when I entered the chapel, and was relieved when she just returned my greeting without attempting to talk.

  ‘I hear you’re spending all summer here,’ she said after the service, when we were walking away from the chapel. Her earrings jingled as she walked.

  I nodded.

  ‘I’d love to go on a real retreat.’ Her voice sounded wistful. ‘I went for a week last year, a Buddhist retreat near St David’s; only a week is not the same, is it? I just haven’t got the time. Or the money.’

  ‘Then make time,’ I said, breaking my silence. ‘For God. What could be more important?’

  ‘The Goddess is in all of us,’ she replied. It sounded like something she had learnt by heart. ‘Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. She is there for us.’

  I said nothing.

  She sighed. ‘And some of us have to earn a living.’

  I inclined my head; the gesture saying as well as any words could, that the birds of the air neither sow nor reap, and yet God feeds them.

  We arrived at the fork in the road. I gave her a nod and went on my way, towards the house for breakfast and then the mountain and the hermit’s cave.

  The sky arched over the island, its brilliance singing in my eyes. The sunlight dazzled me. I took a breath and tasted beauty on my tongue. I was wrapped in the blue of the Virgin’s mantle. Even when I closed my eyes I saw nothing but blue. I gave praise to God. I closed my eyes and I opened my ears, and I prayed.

  I prayed, and I listened. But my ears were not opened. I sat and I prayed and I felt like a vessel stoppered up, so that nothing will go in and nothing come out. I sat with my eyes closed and my hands folded in my lap, and I called upon God to open up my ears, but He did not answer. I sat and I prayed, and when I opened my eyes the air was flooded with gold and copper and the sky streaked with green and blue and yellow, and it was evening.

  A road of light stretched from where I was sitting: it went across the waters of the Sound to the mountains of the mainland, wound itself round the hills. I closed my eyes and opened them again, but not before I had seen two figures walking on the road of light, walking away towards the mainland.

  I shook my head like a dog just out of the water.

  Now all I could see was the sunset.

  There was a chill in the air. I got up. Time for evening service.

  She was there again, but this time she did not try to talk to me. We prayed together, and afterwards walked home in silence. She smiled good night as we reached the fork in the road; nodded, and was gone.

  The waves breathed in and out, in and out, in and out. I blew out my candle and went to bed.

  There was a voice in the dark, and it spoke to me. Follow the road I have laid down for you. I stood on a hill overlooking a valley and steeply rising mountains beyond. Ragged grey clouds moved swiftly across the sky. The air was cool and damp. Build my church here, the voice said.

  With that I woke up. The room was pitch dark. There wasn’t a sound except for the whispering of the sea outside.

  My ears were ringing with words.

  The sky next morning as I walked to chapel was the palest shade of aquamarine. The morning was cold and clear and exquisite.

  As soon as she saw me, her eyes became round as marbles and she opened her mouth and drew breath to talk.

  I nodded a greeting, sat down and lowered my head in prayer.

  After the service, there was no holding her.

  ‘I had the strangest dream last night,’ she said. ‘I saw the two of us walking away from here together, on to the mainland. And then I heard a voice...’ She looked at me. ‘Do you ever have... you know, visions?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘I do,’ she said. ‘The Goddess shows me things, sometimes.’ She stopped and looked at me. ‘She has got plans for us. I’m so glad! I was hoping something would happen. That’s why I came here to the island. It’s supposed to be
a holy place. I was hoping for a miracle.’ She gave me a radiant smile. ‘And now I’ve got one.’

  All day long I sat on the mountain by the Saint’s cave, praying and straining to listen, but in vain. My ears were closed to the music of the spheres.

  That night in my dreams, I saw myself being led away; not on a path of light this time, but an ordinary tarmac road in the drizzle. There were hills on both sides and mountains rising before us; and no sign of the sea anywhere.

  Follow the road I have laid down for you.

  The mountains drew closer together. A valley opened up in front of us.

  Build my church here.

  I awoke. It was dark.

  I got up, pulled on my clothes. I found my torch by touch and let myself out.

  The air was dark and cold, the sky brilliant with stars. The chapel windows glowed golden. When I pushed the door open, there was warmth and light. Somebody had lit the candles.

  She was kneeling by the altar, head bowed, lost in prayer. She did not look up when I came in and pulled the door closed after me.

  I knelt down, attempted to empty my mind of all thought. There was a great rushing in my ears like a waterfall. It was not the music of the spheres. It was the noise made by my fear.

  Lord, into Your hands I commend my spirit.

  ‘You saw it too,’ she said as we walked away from the chapel after morning service. Her smile shone. Her earrings tinkled.

  I raised my eyebrows. Her display of joy struck me as almost unseemly.

  ‘I know you did. Aren’t you delighted? I’m so happy.’

  I said nothing.

  ‘It was the same as last night, like a dream; but it wasn’t a dream. The two of us, walking towards this place in the mountains. It’s drizzling and cloudy, and then we come to a valley and the voice says, Build my temple here.’ She turned to me. ‘She’s calling us. She has chosen us.’