Blaming (Virago Modern Classics) Read Online Free PDF Page B

– that demure, little-girl attitude, with hands clasped and ankles crossed, the gaily patterned dress (for on holiday one would not have suitable clothes for such an occasion). And the gloves. Oh, why the gloves?
    The steward with the gong was now going his rounds. Martha made a brief attempt at smoothing her hair and went in to lunch, sat down at the table next to the empty one, ate ravioli, drank a little wine.
    Towards the end of the meal, the purser and the ship’s doctor came in and took their places at the captain’s table. They ate in silence. They have disposed of her, Martha thought, have left her alone in some hotel, perhaps; awaiting a plane, perhaps; for the
Galatea
must leave that afternoon. She supposed they had taken Nick’s body ashore, while the passengers were miles away, looking at mosques. Not finishing her cheese, she went to her cabin. In two hours, the ship would sail for Izmir. There was so much that Martha wanted to know, so much that she would wonder about for the rest of her life, she supposed.
    The hotel bedroom was draped with dark red. There was a huge, muslin-covered bed with a chandelier above it and a velvet armchair in which Amy sometimes sat down and wept. But for most of thetime, she walked up and down this strange room, too panicky to sit still; or would stand looking with alarm at a view from the window across the water.
    Somewhere below her was the
Galatea.
At any minute now it might come away from its berth and make its way to the open sea. Thinking of that, she drew the curtains across the windows and went to sit down once more in the now darkened room, overwhelmed. It is for ever, she thought. For ever now. She was filled with the icy horror of travelling back in the same plane, and she cried aloud like a frightened child.
    Later on that afternoon, Martha, having packed, settled her affairs on board, got from the purser the name of Amy’s hotel, disembarked. The German couple, leaning over the ship’s rails, watched in amazement as she got into a taxi. Here was something they had not been told about, something they could not explain to others in their excellent English or French, or their fast-improving Italian.
    Martha stopped the cab and bought a bag of figs from a barrow. She felt that she should take something, and flowers – perhaps inappropriate in any case – seemed not to be about.
    They drove away from the thronged Galata Bridge, and came through narrow streets at last to the hotel. She felt distinctly nervous. She left her suitcase in the hotel foyer and, carrying the figs, whose thin paper bag was by now damp and disintegrating, she slowly and resolutely climbed the staircase. When she knocked on the door of room two, there came no sound from the other side, so she opened the door onto the darkroom, and saw Amy standing there, looking scared, her hat and the white gloves lying on a table beside her.
    “Throw me out if you will,” Martha said, “but the ship will have left by now.”
    Amy sat down, and the chair seemed to absorb her. She whispered something inaudible.
    Martha went over to the basin and washed the figs. Amy watched her, and when Martha came back to her, she obediently took one from the dripping hand, as if it were part of ritual.
    “Do we need the curtains drawn?” Martha asked.
    “I didn’t want to see the ship leaving.”
    “Well, then, better leave them for a little longer.”
    “Why did you come?” asked Amy, repeating what she had whispered.
    “I thought I might be better than no one. In a strange place.”
    “A hateful place,” said Amy bitterly, finding something at last to blame.
    She is not a touchable person, Martha decided. She had wondered for a moment, if she should take this near-stranger in her arms, and by holding her fast, try to steady her. But no. Instead, she took a peep through the curtains and, across the water, she recognised the striped funnel of the
Galatea.
She was leaving, going down the busy stretch of water in