Of course, they did not know they were going to become lovers. It seemed to come off quite naturally, without inhibition, one day when they were on their way to the beach…
They drove along the coast road, past villas and restaurants on the outskirts of the town. At length they came to a barrier. They parked the car, got their beach bags from the boot and climbed over the barrier. Here, the road was cracked in places and in danger of falling into the sea. Back from the road, on the slight incline of a hill, was an abandoned property comprising a turreted villa and several outhouses. At the bottom of the slope, by a broken fence, was the tired-looking skull of a swimming pool.
The villa, he said, was the property of a famous recluse… a rich lady, who also kept dogs and let local children swim in the pool. The lady would never appear.
“Did you swim in her pool?”
“Only once. I got frightened off by the dogs.”
“Poor boy.”
As it was full of plastic bags and beer bottles, they did not care to stop in the first cove. Instead, they carried on walking along the cliff path where they met a teenage boy who nearly fell off his scooter when he hit a rock and started cursing in that way teenage boys do. As if it was the fault of the rock and not the boy’s impatient revving of his scooter. “Be quiet,” he said, “he’ll hear you!” – “Well,” she said, stifling her giggles, “it serves him right for being such a show off!”
At length they came to a wall with barbed wire running along the top, and they could walk no further along the cliff. The woman was curious to know what was behind it. She clambered over the rocks trying to see around the side of the wall. Then she said as a dare they should try and climb over the wall. But the man said it was not a good idea.
“Why on earth not?”
“Well, for a start that barbed wire is very old and rusty.”
She laughed and called her lover chicken. “Why chicken?” – Chicken, she explained, was what English children said to each other when they didn’t want to dare. “To us,” he said, “it was forbidden. We were not allowed to go beyond the wall.”
“So,” she said, “all you children were chickens.”
Against her protests, he led her by the hand back along the cliff to the cove they had just passed.
There was an old iron ladder down onto the beach. The final steps were so rotten they had to jump with their beach bags onto the sand.
The seaweed had come up onto the beach, and they had to make a little path with their feet so they could sit without being disturbed by sand flies.
Happily, she wriggled out of her jeans and walked down to the edge of the shore. The water was cold when she put in her toes.
She stood in the water enjoying the sensation. Then she put her hands in, scooped some water and washed her face.
She walked back to where he was sitting smoking a cigarette. She took off her top and lay back.
The man leaned over and kissed her breasts. Then he got up and took off his shorts. He went down to the shore and waded out up to the bottom of his black trunks; then he came back to the beach to take off his T-shirt. Venturing out again, he took the plunge and dived under water. She watched as his head rose and then dipped again.
He swam out to a rock at the edge of the cove. The rock was about a hundred metres away. She watched him moving away from her in the water. He disappeared around the rock. For a while she could not see him…. She began, foolishly, to worry until she saw his head rising again in the water on the far side of the rock. When he reached the beach, he was out of breath. Then he came and sat down on the sand, next to her.
“Anyway,” he said, “if we never did climb the wall, I knew someone who did. He was not from around here.”
“What was his name?”
“We didn’t know his name. To us he was just an outsider.”
“Because he was different?”
He made no attempt to answer her question; instead he began to tell her this apocryphal story.
‘In those days the Queen’s House was surrounded by a perimeter. The perimeter was at times characterised by a wall, at times by a fence with barbed wire with guards positioned along its length. No outsider could enter the perimeter. If captured, they were taken prisoner and locked away in the palace.
One day, the protagonist of my story was guarding the top of the perimeter where you could see the woods and the hills about. If it was lonely at the top of the perimeter, the young guard held her spear tighter and thought of her duty to protect the Queen.
The young guard returned from her watch to find the guardroom in an uproar. “What is all the fuss about?” She asked.
“Didn’t you hear?” Some said. “We have taken a prisoner.”
Most of the guards were too young to know an outsider. They asked one of the older guards what they were like.
The old guard shrugged. “They are different from us,” she said. “They behave differently, both in their movements and their manners, although of course we are the same species.”
The young guards were confused by the old guard’s explanation. “You are talking in riddles,” they said. “Why don’t you say something more intelligent?”
The old guard took time to consider her answer. “They are like strangers. They may talk like us, but they lie and insinuate. You can’t trust them.”
The younger guards were puzzled. “What did the outsiders do to make them so untrustworthy?”
The old guard smiled.
They realised the old guard was teasing them… “In truth,” she said, “I have never met an outsider, although I heard a rumour once. – An outsider came to talk to our Queen. He made her an offer she could not refuse.”
“Well,” said one of the young guards, “I cannot imagine that.”
“In fact,” said the old guard, “the Queen was a wily campaigner, but the outsider was very persistent.
“What did he want?” She asked.
“He said that he would give her many fine wares if she would marry him. The Queen replied she did not need fine wares. The outsider said he would give her many diamonds. This scene of diplomacy continued for a while. The court could see the outsider was getting frustrated; he threw up his hands in a gesture of despair. Finally, he said he had something important to tell our Queen but he would not reveal it unless her guard was removed from the hall.”
The young guards were shocked. “What! No guards around the Queen! Who did he think he was?”
They conferred amongst themselves about this unusual precedent. The old guard remained silent.
The young guards wanted to know what happened.
“It is said the outsider spent the night with the Queen. In the morning he disappeared.”
Over the following days, the young guard heard little more of the outsider. She was on a guard duty in the palace – first in the queen’s vault and then in her bedchambers. When she came back to the guardroom, she had little time for rumour and gossip. She fell fast asleep.
When, in the morning, she went to look at the duty roster, she saw it was her turn to guard the prisoner. She went to the outsider’s cell. She looked in the cell, but the outsider was lying on his bed with his face to the wall. Over him was a blanket. She could not satisfy her curiosity. She took up her position before the cell and waited. As she stood there, she could hear him moving around behind her. She did not dare turn round. Her heart began to beat faster; she felt she was going to faint. Every time she did she tried to pull herself together and remember her duty. It was then that she felt his breath on the back of her neck – his voice in her ear. She jumped and turned round – putting up her sword and shield. “Avast!” She cried. “Stand back!”
The outsider was looking at her; there was laughter in his eyes.’