Atonement by Ian McEwan Page B

the small mouth—if he had ever thought about her at
all, he might have said she was a little horsey in appearance. Now he saw it
was a strange beauty—something carved and still about the face,
especially around the inclined planes of her cheekbones, with a wild flare to
the nostrils, and a full, glistening rosebud mouth. Her eyes were dark and
contemplative. It was a statuesque look, but her movements were quick and
impatient—that vase would still be in one piece if she had not jerked it
so suddenly from his hands. She was restless, that was clear, bored and
confined by the Tallis household, and soon she would be gone.
    He would have
to speak to her soon. He stood up at last from his bath, shivering, in no doubt
that a great change was coming over him. He walked naked through his study into
the bedroom. The unmade bed, the mess of discarded clothes, a towel on the
floor, the room’s equatorial warmth were disablingly sensual. He
stretched out on the bed, facedown into his pillow, and groaned. The sweetness
of her, the delicacy, his childhood friend, and now in danger of becoming
unreachable. To strip off like that—yes, her endearing attempt to seem
eccentric, her stab at being bold had an exaggerated, homemade quality. Now she
would be in agonies of regret, and could not know what she had done to him. And
all of this would be very well, it would be rescuable, if she was not so angry
with him over a broken vase that had come apart in his hands. But he loved her
fury too. He rolled onto his side, eyes fixed and unseeing, and indulged a
cinema fantasy: she pounded against his lapels before yielding with a little
sob to the safe enclosure of his arms and letting herself be kissed; she
didn’t forgive him, she simply gave up. He watched this several times
before he returned to what was real: she was angry with him, and she would be
angrier still when she knew he was to be one of the dinner guests. Out there,
in the fierce light, he hadn’t thought quickly enough to refuse
Leon
’s invitation.
Automatically, he had bleated out his yes, and now he would face her
irritation. He groaned again, and didn’t care if he were heard
downstairs, at the memory of how she had taken off her clothes in front of
him—so indifferently, as though he were an infant. Of course. He saw it
clearly now. The idea was to humiliate him. There it stood, the undeniable
fact. Humiliation. She wanted it for him. She was not mere sweetness, and he
could not afford to condescend to her, for she was a force, she could drive him
out of his depth and push him under.
    But
perhaps—he had rolled onto his back—he should not believe in her
outrage. Wasn’t it too theatrical? Surely she must have meant something
better, even in her anger. Even in her anger, she had wanted to show him just
how beautiful she was and bind him to her. How could he trust such a
self-serving idea derived from hope and desire? He had to. He crossed his legs,
clasped his hands behind his head, feeling his skin cool as it dried. What
might Freud say? How about: she hid the unconscious desire to expose herself to
him behind a show of temper. Pathetic hope! It was an emasculation, a sentence,
and this—what he was feeling now—this torture was his punishment
for breaking her ridiculous vase. He should never see her again. He had to see
her tonight. He had no choice anyway—he was going. She would despise him
for coming. He should have refused
Leon
’s invitation,
but the moment it was made his pulse had leaped and his bleated yes had left
his mouth. He’d be in a room with her tonight, and the body he had seen,
the moles, the pallor, the strawberry mark, would be concealed inside her
clothes. He alone would know, and Emily of course. But only he would be
thinking of them. And Cecilia would not speak to him or look at him. Even that
would be better than lying here groaning. No, it wouldn’t. It would be
worse, but he still wanted it. He had to have it. He wanted it to be