The Watchers on the Shore Read Free Page A

watch. 'Well, it's twenty to twelve now, but at three o'clock it'll be twenty to eleven.'
    'What on earth are you talking about?*
    'Summertime. It ends at three o'clock.'
    'I'd like to spend the extra hour in here, but I don't think there's any more hot water. I just love warm baths.'
    'I just love warm beds, and that's where I'm going now.'
    'Pass me the towel, will you? ?
    I unfold the big blue bath towel and hold it up as she cleans the tidemark off the sides of the bath, pulls the plug out and stands up. She steps out into the towel and I wrap it right round her, keeping her trapped against me in my arms.
    'Thank you, James. That will be all.'
    'Will it?'I plant a kiss on the damp curve of her neck and shoulder.
    'Yes, it will,'she says; 'On your way, lover-boy. I want to get dry.'
    'I'll dry you.'
    'I can manage, thanks, I don't want covering with bruises.'
    'Would you rather have kisses?'
    'I'd rather you went away and let me get dry.'
    'I can take a hint.'
    I leave her and go into the bedroom. I open a new book but I've hardly got into my stride with it when I hear Ingrid coming out of the bathroom, so I put the book away, switch off the bedside light and lie in the dark. She comes into bed and lies quietly beside me for a while. Then she says:
    'Do you wish Bobby was ours?'
    'What? No. Why should I?'
    'You seem to make such a fuss of him.'
    'I think he's a grand little lad; but there's a difference between playing with a kid for half an hour and having to cope with him all day and every day.'
    'You would like to have children, wouldn't you?'
    "Course I would. But there's no hurry yet.'
    This isn't a new conversation with us. Every now and again Ingrid's got to be reassured that I do want kids and at the same time that I'm not over-worried that in her case it's going to be a bit trickier than normal to produce them. But when I say there's no hurry it's not the real reason I give her. The real reason is that a baby would put another chain round us, tie us a bit more firmly, and try as I might I can't help resisting this. There's a part of me under the daily routine, the settled surface of our marriage, that never accepts, that's always holding out against a final surrender to the facts.
    And it's a bit later, when we've made love, that the feeling hits me strongest; and I lie in the dark with nothing now between me and the thought that comes to me time and time again; the question that's always hanging round waiting for an answer I can't give: Is this all?

    2

    'What I want to know,'Henry Thomas says,'is where's the catch.'
    'You would, Henry,'I tell him. 'Everybody else is taking their first easy breath for a week and you're nattering about catches.'
    'Oh, I'm relieved,'Henry says, taking a dog-end from behind his ear and lighting up. 'But perhaps I'm a bit more far-sighted than some people. I don't take things on face value as easy as most.'
    It's Monday morning, first thing, a grey October morning out in the streets, and we're in the shop together. I'm looking through the post and Henry's leaning on the other side of the counter, having a chat like he often does before organizing his day's work.
    'You see,'Henry says, pulling his great thinker's face, 'I can't understand why the Russians should build missile bases in Cuba without trying to camouflage them, and then agree to dismantle them when the Americans cut up rough.'
    'Perhaps they didn't expect the Yanks to get as tough as all that.'
    'Aye, and perhaps they did expect just that. I don't know. It's a mystery.'
    'It is to me an'all. But I'm not trying to analyse it; I'm just bloody glad it's all over ... Here, listen to this: "Dear Sir, That television I bought from your shop two months ago is very good on the BBC but there is too much advertisements on the other side which keeps breaking into the programmes and spoiling them. Would you please send your assistant to adjust and oblige yours faithfully..."'
    'Do you fancy a bit of adjusting and obliging mine