Read Lighthousekeeping for Free Online Page B

eyes opened sleepily, and she smiled at him.
    She always smiled at him. He loved that.
    And then he would take her in his arms, burying his face in her neck, and trying to identify all the different smells of her. She was clean but she smelled of herself, something like new hay with the flowers still in it, and something greener, sharper; nettles in the cut hay.
    And apples, he thought, the white flesh and its faint pinkness.
    When they had first met, he had taken her apple picking in his father’s garden. They had propped the ladder, spread the cloth on the ground, and he had been in shirt-sleeves, showing off by climbing higher and higher to get the ones she pointed at, the ones most out of reach.
    They had picked nearly the whole tree, and in the afternoon, under the branches of the tree, they sat side by side sorting the best eaters, the best keepers, the apples for jelly, and those apples to be stewed rightaway, their brown parts cut out with a sharp knife.
    He was so aware of her next to him that his hands shook slightly as he pared and slit. She noticed this, because she liked his hands – the long fingers and squared nails.
    Then the knife slipped, and he cut his ring finger, and straight away she had taken the knife from him, and chopped a ribbon from her dress to staunch the bleeding.
    They had gone inside to find cold water. The kitchen was empty. She knew what to do, and soon she had him clean and bandaged.
    ‘Kiss it better,’ she said, bending her head like a bird drinking.
    They looked at each other and didn’t move at all. Dark was conscious of the sunlight in stencilled squares on the stone floor, and the brightness of the sun through the thick glass, and the sun in her eyes, flecking the pupils, and shining on her as though the sun were showing him a secret door.
    He put out his hand and touched her face.
    Two days later they made love.
    She had asked that it should be dark.
    ‘Like a bed trick,’ she had said, though this made him feel uneasy.
    Measure for measure, he made his way to her house, showing no light at any window. He used his fingertips and the moon to find the door latch, and as he went in, he saw a lighted candle, in a holder, waiting for him on the bottom step of the wide wooden staircase. He took the candle and went slowly upstairs. He had no idea where he was going. He had never been to this house before.
    His footsteps creaked on the landing. He startled a mouse on wainscot business. There were two oil paintings of a man and a woman in blue clothes, and a chest at the end of the corridor. By the chest, he thought he saw an open door. He went towards it.
    ‘Babel?’
    ‘Yes.’
    His heart was beating. He was sweating. His groin was tight.
    ‘Put the candle on the chest.’
    He did as he was told, and stepped into the dark room, lit only by a few low-burnt coals in the grate. The room was warm. The fire must have been lit for a long time and allowed to burn down.
    He could see the bed.
    ‘Molly?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Shall I take off my clothes?’
    ‘Yes.’
    His top coat and waistcoat were easy enough. He pulled at his stock and tore it on the pin. His fingers had grown thick and clumsy, and he couldn’t undo the flap on his breeches. He didn’t curse or speak. He fought in silence with his reluctant outer skin, until he was in his stockings and shirt. Then he went to the bed.
    He stood, hesitating, smiling, terrified. Molly sat up, her hair round her shoulders, and falling onto her breasts. Suddenly he was glad it was dark.
    She took his shirt and helped him pull it over his head, and then she stared, frankly, at where he stood, raised, ready, unable to hide himself now.
    She touched his sides with both hands, running her hands down over his buttocks and thighs, liking his firmness, and kissing his abdomen with her lips. She was confident and certain, while he sweated with desire and fear. Why was she so sure? He wondered, just for a second, if he was the first man who had come