Some Rain Must Fall Read Online Free PDF Page B

again, but handing the burden on to someone else – in fact, allowing it to be lifted off your shoulders, by God. Yes: by God, who stands at your side at this very moment, as near to you, and as real, as I, but a million times more powerful … !
SISTER JENNIFER
    waved at the couple through her side window. They were going already. Perhaps they had seen everything they’d come to see; captured it inside their camera and binocular lenses, souvenired it on a strip of undeveloped film. Perhaps they were simply disappointed to find another human being here, at this spot which was so renowned for its desolation. Perhaps they were especially discomfited that this other human being should be a nun. They might think she was about to interrogate them on their marital status, or ask them to donate money to a leprosy mission in Indonesia. That was the sort of thing her fellow nuns might have had on their minds, she supposed. It was difficult to recall. It was so long since she’d been in the company of her sisters in Christ.
SISTER JENNIFER
    watched the camper-van reverse, turn, and drive away. When it was quite out of sight, she swung open the door of her own car and lowered herself out. She squatted right next to the car’s body, its padded door shielding her from the buffeting wind as if it were a wing trembling to enfold her. Shekept her habit rucked well above her hips until she was finished, then shut herself back into the car, shivering. She considered putting her parka on again, had a drink from her thermos instead. Hours went by. The sun described its arc across the sky, aloof and beyond temptation. No one else came to the cliff edge.
SISTER JENNIFER
    slumped back in her seat, the adrenalin long since ebbed away, the reasons for living no longer rehearsing themselves in her head. In time, she dozed. Waking, she prayed a little. Then she listened to the radio some more, this time finding out what time it was mercifully quickly. It occurred to her that she might be well advised to drive back into the town before the shops shut. She wasn’t sure how her provisions were going.
SISTER JENNIFER
    alighted again, walked around her vehicle, lifted the hatch of the boot. As she did so, a massive bird – some sort of giant heron or egret – flew over her car, its spear-like beak and dazzling white wingspan perfectly aligned with the vehicle. Involuntarily, Sister Jennifer’s head snapped back as the great bird passed over, and she almost overbalanced, blinded by the sun. It was such an extraordinary moment that she was struck with fear, as if something would simply have to happen next, something which would surely rip her open like a paper bag. But nothing else happened. Dazed, she looked down into the boot of her car, seeing nothing there but the luminescing after-image of the sun.

SISTER JENNIFER
    realised soon enough the true significance of the epiphany. God had given her yet another reason for living which she could pass on to others: the miracle of a bird in flight, the privilege of seeing a creature essentially different from oneself display its inhuman mastery, a display which one needed to be human and alive to witness and appreciate. It was necessary to keep living, if only to love the beauty of a bird, for birds themselves were incapable of loving it.
SISTER JENNIFER
    waited until the flare on her retinas had faded and normal vision resumed. She rummaged through the supplies in the boot, verified that there was very little food left except more tins of spaghetti which, though she was hungry, she didn’t feel like eating just now. She checked the drink situation. There was half a bottle of white wine left, which she carefully poured into the thermos despite the fact that it was no longer the least bit chilled. She tried to calculate whether it would last her until tomorrow, sipped it as if to force the issue one way or the other. She remained unsure, and wondered to what extent she was merely being cowardly about