The Magdalena Curse by F.G. Cottam Page A

a crank or anything,’ Hunter said. ‘I like poetry. I can even quote it, should the need for proof arise.’
    She appraised him some more. He could not read her expression at all. She wore a red wool coat, unbuttoned. It was early spring outside on the street but very hot in the crowded space they shared. The heat seemed of no concern to her. She cocked her head and looked at the book in his hands and then plucked it from his grip. ‘ Beowulf ,’ she said. ‘This isn’t Heaney’s poetry.’
    ‘It’s his translation.’
    ‘It’s the story of a monster. My name is Lillian.’
    ‘It’s the story of the quest to kill a monster. Three monsters. I’m Mark.’ An incredulous thought occurred to him. ‘Are you chatting me up?’
    She handed him back his copy of Beowulf and sipped more wine. ‘You are the most attractive man in the room. You might be the most attractive man I’ve ever met. That will depend. Tell me about yourself, Mark. Don’t lie. I will know straight away if you do.’
    Afterwards they went for a drink in Covent Garden, where she had a flat. She worked in publishing. But she had been at the Heaney reading purely as a fan. Her book had been signed also. It was the Collected Poems . It had been safely tucked back in her shoulder bag by the time of their Hatchard’s confrontation.
    ‘What kind of poetry do you like?’
    ‘Modern,’ he said. ‘Anything I really like is from Manley Hopkins on.’
    She laughed. ‘You seem entirely too good to be true.’
    ‘I can assure you I’m not.’
    ‘You must think me very brazen. I’m not usually like that. I’ve wasted the past two years on a relationship that wasn’t worth my time. This was a discovery made only a few days ago. It’s left me feeling somewhat angry and aggressive.
I’m not usually quite so forthright. And I’m not so pathetic as to think relationships with men define a woman. But I saw you and I saw that you were alone and I didn’t want you just to slip away.’
    ‘I’m glad.’
    ‘What do you do?’
    Their table in the pub seated only two and they occupied an isolated corner. Mindful of her earlier warning, he told her. She listened. Once again, he found that he could not read her expression. He thought that she was very beautiful. She was the more so the more he studied her. It was not an effect of make-up or of style. It was uncontrived and she seemed hardly conscious of it, though he knew she must be. When he had finished telling her about his life, she smiled and finished her drink and asked him to walk her home. On her doorstep, he kissed her. She dropped a hand on to his shoulder and the touch of her thrilled through him with a force that was almost convulsive.
    ‘What would you like to do now?’
    ‘Take you to bed?’
    ‘I mean, would you like us to see one another again?’
    ‘Oh, God. That was so crass. I’m so sorry, Lillian.’
    She fished for her keys in her bag. ‘Don’t be,’ she said. ‘There’s no harm in optimism. The glass half full and all that.’
    He laughed with relief. ‘What would you like me to do?’
    She had found her keys. She lifted her eyes from them to him. She flicked the veils of heavy hair away from her face, revealing her expression fully. ‘I’d like you to court me, Mark. I would like that very much.’
    He walked down Catherine Street to the north side of Waterloo Bridge and took the turn of descending steps to the Embankment. He looked along the gentle sweep to the right of the Thames towards the Houses of Parliament.
He would walk the route back to the barracks and his hard mattress and coarse woollen blanket and sleep. There was a light spring fog over the river and the lamps strung along the Embankment were pearly in the rising mist. He was billeted at Chelsea Barracks for a two-day session of seminars. He had seen the details of the Heaney reading in a London free-sheet left by someone on the table he chose at random for lunch in the officers’ canteen. He had set