Night Street by Kristel Thornell Page A

stunningly attractive, not even particularly comely, however she doubted her own perception. There had to be rare loveliness in a woman with such a lucky name and destiny. Perhaps it lay in a detail not immediately obvious. The sinuous volumes of her thighs. Her warm, private smell. Or—painful to consider—some quality of her heart.
    Clarice was wretched from wrong, incessant thinking and under its spell. She was often cruel to herself in those days, vindictive, punishing herself in little, secret ways, pinching the flesh of her own arm or biting her tongue that threatened to speak. She was brutally exacting with her art, hating most of her paintings, once they were complete. But she was still too self-indulgent and undisciplined to rein in her truant mind. She was really only tranquil when properly in a painting; that was her respite.
    She settled into a spot on the beach, separating her feet the right distance, stretching her toes inside her shoes. Mercifully, extraneous thoughts were dispersing, dropping away. The dawn began and she lifted the cart’s lid, entering the usual strange meditation. She emptied so she could fill, or was it feel — differently, calmly? She rubbed her hands together, getting the blood flowing. Looking. Impressions travelled towards her like wave fronts through a kind of ether. Her brush in a loose grip, she was part of a design larger than her own, deeply scientific or inscrutably holy.
    Afterwards, slightly cold, she stood in her bathing suit close to the sea. When pictures of Arthur returned to surround her, a dense fog, she jogged into the water.
    Swimming, she followed for a while the cool, majestic progress of an ocean liner, vaguely curious about the intrigues and inner lives of its passengers. The mindless gliding of gulls held her attention longer, as did her astonishment at how a lone body, hers, could disturb and alter a wave, so subtly. Time was soft and the universe fecund. She discovered, putting her chin to it, a strand of seaweed on her shoulder, verdant and fishily alive. It stayed where it was, amiably claiming her. And there was more of the plant floating about, like her own marine hair. Those were her long, luxuriant tresses: she had intermingled with the watery element. She was anaesthetised.
    But here was Arthur again, bringing back the new ignited Clarice. Coming in, chilled and shaking, she found Herb on the beach. He waved and she approached. He was sitting drinking tea and smoking, pleased with himself, carefree, irreverent. ‘I’ve been round at Sandringham,’ he said. ‘What a day for it. I drew the fishermen with their nets. Magical thing. You’ll have a cup? I’ve got a fresh pot brewing.’
    The morning was getting on and there was not long left, the minutes shrinking quickly. ‘Lovely,’ she said.
    He looked her up and down. ‘You’d better get some clothes on.’
    In the caravan, her damp nakedness was preternaturally white. She dressed, and forced her hand through her tangled hair. There was a sketchbook on the cot. She thought of the airiness of fishing nets, which Herb—with that weightless quality of his—would know how to convey, but she did not open it. He sometimes asked for her opinion on something and she was always reluctant, thinking it better not to look at a friend’s work that way; she might be hard on it, as she could be on her own. But she had seen a few of his paintings, and liked the pioneer hunger they had in them. Where would this take him? Back in the expanding light, she was shivery, jerky.
    â€˜I must be coming down with something.’ She watched the swirl of milk on the surface of her tea, a white spiral staircase slowly undoing itself.
    They sat for a few minutes, the sun hot but not quite easing her chill.
    As if apprehending the drift of her thoughts, Herb said, ‘You should get yourself a boyfriend. It would do you good.’ He glanced away. ‘I hear