You can see perfectly. Don’t worry, I’m not going to fling back the curtains. It’ll be a full day before you can see freely. I’ll give you a set of filters to wear. Anyway, these dressings let through more light than you imagine.’
At eleven o’clock the next morning, his eyes shielded only by a pair of sunglasses, Maitland walked out on to the lawn. Judith stood on the terrace, and watched him make his way around the wheelchair. When he reached the willows she called: ‘All right, darling? Can you see me?’
Without replying, Maitland looked back at the house. He removed the sunglasses and threw them aside on to the grass. He gazed through the trees at the estuary, at the blue surface of the water stretching to the opposite bank. Hundreds of the gulls stood by the water, their heads turned in profile to reveal the full curve of their beaks. He looked over his shoulder at the high-gabled house, recognizing the one he had seen in his dream. Everything about it, like the bright river which slid past him, seemed dead.
Suddenly the gulls rose into the air, their cries drowning the sounds of Judith’s voice as she called again from the terrace. In a dense spiral, gathering itself off the ground like an immense scythe, the gulls wheeled into the air over his head and swirled over the house.
Quickly Maitland pushed back the branches of the willows and walked down on to the bank.
A moment later, Judith heard his shout above the cries of the gulls. The sound came half in pain and half in triumph, and she ran down to the trees uncertain whether he had injured himself or discovered something pleasing.
Then she saw him standing on the bank, his head raised to the sunlight, the bright carmine on his cheeks and hands, an eager, unrepentant Oedipus.
1964
They lived in a house on the mountain Tlaxihuatl half a mile below the summit. The house was built on a lava flow like the hide of an elephant. In the afternoon and evening the man, Charles Vandervell, sat by the window in the lounge, watching the fire displays that came from the crater. The noise rolled down the mountainside like a series of avalanches. At intervals a falling cinder hissed as it extinguished itself in the water tank on the roof. The woman slept most of the time in the bedroom overlooking the valley or, when she wished to be close to Vandervell, on the settee in the lounge.
In the afternoon she woke briefly when the ‘devil-sticks’ man performed his dance by the road a quarter of a mile from the house. This mendicant had come to the mountain for the benefit of the people in the village below the summit, but his dance had failed to subdue the volcano and prevent the villagers from leaving. As they passed him pushing their carts he would rattle his spears and dance, but they walked on without looking up. When he became discouraged and seemed likely to leave Vandervell sent the house-boy out to him with an American dollar. From then on the stick-dancer came every day.
‘Is he still here?’ the woman asked. She walked into the lounge, folding her robe around her waist. ‘What’s he supposed to be doing?’
‘He’s fighting a duel with the spirit of the volcano,’ Vandervell said. ‘He’s putting a lot of thought and energy into it, but he hasn’t a chance.’
‘I thought you were on his side,’ the woman said. ‘Aren’t you paying him a retainer?’
‘That’s only to formalize the relationship. To show him that I understand what’s going on. Strictly speaking, I’m on the volcano’s side.’
A shower of cinders rose a hundred feet above the crater, illuminating the jumping stick-man.
‘Are you sure it’s safe here?’
Vandervell waved her away. ‘Of course. Go back to bed and rest. This thin air is bad for the complexion.’
‘I feel all right. I heard the ground move.’
‘It’s been moving for weeks.’ He watched the stick-man conclude his performance with a series of hops, as if leap-frogging over a partner. ‘On his diet that’s not bad.’
‘You should take him back to Mexico City and put him in one of the cabarets. He’d make more than a dollar.’
‘He wouldn’t be interested. He’s a serious artist, this Nijinsky of the mountainside. Can’t you see that?’
The woman half-filled a tumbler from the decanter on the table. ‘How long are you going to keep him out there?’
‘As long as he’ll stay.’ He turned to face the woman. ‘Remember that. When he leaves it will be time to go.’
The stick-man, a collection of tatters when not in motion, disappeared into his lair, one of the holes in the lava beside the road.
‘I wonder if he met Springman?’ Vandervell said. ‘On balance it’s possible. Springman would have come up the south face. This is the only road to the village.’
‘Ask him. Offer him another dollar.’
‘Pointless – he’d say he had seen him just to keep me happy.’
‘What makes you so sure Springman is here?’
‘He was here,’ Vandervell corrected. ‘He won’t be here any longer. I was with Springman in Acapulco when he looked at the map. He came here.’
The woman carried her tumbler into the bedroom.
‘We’ll have dinner at nine,’ Vandervell called to her. ‘I’ll let you know if he dances again.’
Left alone, Vandervell watched the fire displays. The glow shone through the windows of the houses in the village so that they seemed to glow like charcoal. At night the collection of hovels was deserted, but a few of the men returned during the day.
In the morning two men came from the garage in Ecuatan to reclaim the car which Vandervell had hired. He offered to pay a month’s rent in advance, but they rejected this and pointed at the clinkers that had fallen on to the car from the sky. None of them was hot enough to burn the paintwork. Vandervell gave them each fifty dollars and promised to cover the car with a tarpaulin. Satisfied, the men drove away.
After breakfast Vandervell walked out across the lava seams to the road. The stick-dancer stood by his hole above the bank, resting his hands on the two spears. The cone of the volcano, partly hidden by the dust, trembled behind his back. He watched Vandervell when he shouted across the road. Vandervell took a dollar bill from his wallet and placed it under a stone. The stick-man began to hum and rock on the balls of his feet.
As Vandervell walked back along the road two of the villagers approached.
‘Guide,’ he said to them. ‘Ten dollars. One hour.’ He pointed to the lip of the crater but the men ignored him and continued along the road.
The surface of the house had once been white, but was now covered with grey dust. Two hours later, when the manager of the estate below the house rode up on a grey horse Vandervell asked: ‘Is your horse white or black?’
‘That’s a good question, señor.’
‘I want to hire a guide,’ Vandervell said. ‘To take me into the volcano.’
‘There’s nothing there, señor.’
‘I want to look around the crater. I need someone who knows the pathways.’
‘It’s full of smoke, Señor Vandervell. Hot sulphur. Burns the eyes. You wouldn’t like it.’
‘Do you remember seeing someone called Springman?’ Vandervell said. ‘About three months ago.’
‘You asked me that before. I remember two Americans with a scientific truck. Then a Dutchman with white hair.’
‘That could be him.’
‘Or