Read Engleby for Free Online Page B

and Amit from King’s, and Hannah and Holly from Newnham, and Hannah’s boyfriend Steve, and Stewart, of course, and Jennifer, who was sitting next to him, and all the others and the ones who did the lights and the sound and the runners and so on. I hadn’t seen the script myself, but there was a feeling of relaxation and people seemed happy to go wherever it took them. The night was warm and someone had a guitar. Sitting there, they looked like Jesus and his disciples. They gave me a feeling I’d seldom had before, like sometimes when I’d watch Julie and one of her friends from school when she was five or six. I used to sit on the other side of the room and just observe them playing.
    Most nights in Ireland were similar, but the night I cooked the chicken was the best. After I’d cleared up the plates and stuff, some of the people went off to their tents or their rooms, but most of us, about twenty, stayed round the fire.
    Steve had a steel-string guitar, and he began to strum it gently, sitting with his legs crossed, pausing to suck on a joint and pass it on. He then began to pick at the strings instead of strumming. He didn’t make a big thing of it; he played quietly, so if you wanted to listen you could, but it didn’t matter if you carried on talking. In fact everyone did stop what they were doing, and edged into the circle, looking over to where Steve sat. They held their paper cups and cigarettes and waited in the darkness.
    The notes picked by Steve’s right hand began to form a melody. He played a Bob Dylan song, ‘Girl From the North Country’, which is like ‘scarborough Fair’, but somehow full of concern. He wants a girl he once loved to be all right. He’s worried that she’s cold. ‘Please see she has a coat so warm/To keep her from the howlin’ winds.’ (He’s already spoken of the snow and ice, where ‘the winds hit heavy on the borderline’.) I used to wonder if this was the border of Canada and America, maybe near the Great Lakes, but now I don’t think it matters. It could be any North Country. He isn’t worried for his own loss or his own feelings – only for the girl he loved. He wants her still to have her hair long, and to be warm. I don’t know why this is so sad.
    We sat out there for hours and drank cider and wine and smoked more and listened to Steve’s guitar. Then Holly played a little, but she wasn’t such a good singer as Steve and she gave him the guitar back and he ended with a song called ‘Fire and Rain’. As he was singing, I noticed Jennifer get up and stretch in the night and she walked right past me and laid a hand on my shoulder as she passed and said, ‘Thanks for the dinner.’
    I let myself in through the Clohessys’ kitchen and went quietly up the stairs and pushed my window open and wondered if I could still hear any music, just faintly on a breeze. It was a very still night, though.
    The boy in charge of the camera was called Nick, and they called him the DoP, which means director of photography, or chief cameraman. ‘Ask the DoP,’ Stewart said ten times a day. I think it was Nick’s camera. It was quite large and could be mounted on a tripod, though for some shots Stewart used to put it under his arm and insist on walking around with it himself to give what he called a ‘New Wave texture’ (which is that thing where you feel seasick). Nick never seemed that keen on Stewart holding the camera and looked relieved to get it back on its tripod.
    The other main female part was played by Hannah, who’d done a lot of stage plays earlier in the year, including Hedda Gabler , I think. She was confident and difficult to deal with; she often said things were ‘getting too heavy’ and she’d stop for a cigarette and Stewart had to be very gentle with her. Steve, her boyfriend, watched carefully.
    There are lots of ways you can make yourself useful on a film set if you’re good with your hands and if you’re patient. When the sound man wants to go