The Crocodile Bird Read Free Page B

me.”
    “Liza?”
    Only amazed, only incredulous. He had the door open very quickly. He was naked, a blanket from the bed tied around him. Blinking at the light, he stared at her. If she saw a sign of dismay in his eyes, if he asked her what she was doing there, she would die, it would kill her.
    He said nothing. He took hold of her and pulled her inside, into the stuffy warm interior that smelled of man, and put his arms around her. It wasn’t an ordinary hug but an all-enveloping embrace. He folded himself around her and held her inside himself as a hand might enfold a fruit or a cone, softly but intensely, sensuously appreciating.
    She had been going to explain everything and had foreseen herself telling her long tale, culminating in what had happened yesterday. It was a justification she had had in mind and a defense. But he gave her no chance to speak. Somehow, without words, he had made plain to her his great happiness at her untoward unexpected arrival and that he wanted her without explanation. As his arms relaxed their hold she lifted up her face to him, to look at his beautiful face, the eyes that changed his whole appearance when they grew soft with desire. But she was deprived of that too by his kiss, by his bringing his mouth to hers, so sweet-tasting and warm, blinding and silencing her.
    When the bed was pulled down out of the wall the caravan was all bed. Her face still joined to his, she wriggled out of her clothes, dropped them garment by garment onto the floor, stepped out of the tracksuit pants, kicked off her trainers. She put her arms up again to hold him as he had held her. He let her pull him down onto the bed. It was warm where he had left it. They lay side by side, her breasts soft and full against his chest, hip to hip, their legs entwined. He began to kiss her with the tip of his tongue, lightly, quickly. She laughed, turned her face.
    “I’ve run away! I’ve come to you for good.”
    “You’re a marvel,” he said. “You’re the greatest,” and then, “What about her?”
    “I don’t know. The police came, they came in two cars, they’ll have taken her away.” She appreciated his look of amazement, his interest. “I’d gone by then. Are you pleased?”
    “Am I pleased? I’m over the moon. But what d’you mean, the police? What police?”
    “I don’t know. The police from the town.”
    “What’s she done?”
    She put her lips close to his ear. “Shall I tell you about it?”
    “Tell me the lot, but not now.”
    He ran his hands down her body, down her back in a long slow sweep, and drew it close to him in a delicate arch. Without looking, she sensed him viewing her, appreciating her smoothness, her whiteness, her warmth. His hip touched hers, his thigh pressed against hers, warmth to warmth and skin to skin.
    “Don’t talk now, sweetheart,” he said. “Let’s have this now.”

TWO
    S HE slept for a long time. She was very tired. Relief had come too and a reprieve. When she woke up, Sean was sitting on the bed, looking down at her. She put out her hand and took hold of his, clutching it tightly.
    Sean was wonderful to look at. She hadn’t much to judge by, the painted man at Shrove, grainy monochrome images of actors in old movies, the postman, the oilman, Jonathan and Bruno, Matt, and a few others. His face was pale, the shape of the features sharply cut, his nose straight, his mouth red and full for a man’s, dark eyes where she fancied she saw dreams and hopes, and eyebrows like the strokes of a Chinese painter’s brush. She had seen a painting in the drawing room at Shrove with willow leaves and pink-breasted birds, a strange flower Eve said was a lotus, and letters made up of black curves like Sean’s eyebrows. His hair was black as coal. Liza had read that, for as far as she knew she had never seen coal.
    “You’ve been asleep for six hours.” He said it admiringly, as one acclaiming another for some particular prowess.
    “For a minute, when I woke up, I