then sank through the surface, transformed into the players of an underwater pageant, a school of angel fish ruffed with translucent gills and plumed with delicate tendrils.
A few people still hesitated on the bank. I leapt through the crowded waves, urging them to leave the suffocating air. The party of tennis players threw aside their rackets and dived into the water, whipped away as handsome white sharks. The butcher and his attractive wife tottered down the grassy slope, immersed themselves and sailed off as immense sea-turtles with rolling carapaces.
Almost all Shepperton had joined me in this new realm. I cruised along the bank, past the discarded kite and tennis rackets, the still playing radios and forgotten picnic hampers. Only one group remained, watching me from their familiar positions, Miriam St Cloud and her mother, Father Wingate on the beach, Stark and the three children. But their faces were without expression, veiled by the spray as if in a deep dream from which I was excluded.
At that moment I knew that they were not yet ready to join me, and that it was they who were the sleepers.
Leaving them, I drifted downwards into the sunlit water. Led by the swordfish, a huge congregation surrounded me, shoals of porpoise and salmon, groupers and rainbow trout, dolphins and manatees. Drawing the sun’s rays with me, I sank towards the river bed. Together we would lift the aircraft and carry it downstream to the estuary of the Thames and the open sea, a coronation coach in which I would leadthe inhabitants of this small town to the great deeps of their real lives.
The sunlight faded. A few inches from me, through the water-dimmed windshield, a once-human face grimaced at me. A drowned man wearing an aviator’s helmet, his mouth fixed in a death-gape, lay across the controls, arms swaying towards me in the current that flowed through the cabin door.
Terrified by this wavering embrace, I turned and swam blindly into the tail of the aircraft. The air rushed from my lungs in the violent water. No longer a whale, I struck out for the surface through the hundreds of scattering fish. Torn from the aircraft, a fragment of white fabric sailed upwards through the water. Following it, I fought my way to the surface. In a last exhausted race for the sun I seized the air.
I woke in the insect-filled meadow, lying on the wet flowers that filled the grave. A few steps away the three handicapped children watched me from among the poppies. I was drenched in the sweat that soaked my jacket and trousers, and too tired to speak to them. A strange headache was leaving me. I breathed unevenly, as if for the first time, and tried to focus my eyes on the vivid birds and flowers within the meadow. I was aware again of my bruised mouth and chest, as if the dead occupant of the aircraft I had glimpsed in my dream had tried to drown me.
But for all the reality of the meadow, I knew that this warm grass, these dragon-flies and poppies belonged to another dream, and that my fever-vision of swimming as a right whale had been another window into my real life.
I rose to my feet and brushed the petals from my suit. The children moved away through the grass, subdued by whatever they had seen. The strangled starling lay among the dead daisies. Jamie turned on his shackles, avoiding my eyes, but his small face was puckered with concern, as if he wantedto guide me through the ordeal of my vision. In his hands he held a dead sparrow, another purse to be hidden in the grave.
When they had gone I walked alone through the late afternoon, my damp suit covered with a coat of rainbows, a confetti of petals, celebrating my marriage with the meadow.
People were leaving the river on their way home, the tennis players and young parents with their children, the old women and their husbands. Their faces were lit by an energy I had never seen before. As they passed me I noticed that all their clothes were damp, as if they had been caught in a sudden
A few people still hesitated on the bank. I leapt through the crowded waves, urging them to leave the suffocating air. The party of tennis players threw aside their rackets and dived into the water, whipped away as handsome white sharks. The butcher and his attractive wife tottered down the grassy slope, immersed themselves and sailed off as immense sea-turtles with rolling carapaces.
Almost all Shepperton had joined me in this new realm. I cruised along the bank, past the discarded kite and tennis rackets, the still playing radios and forgotten picnic hampers. Only one group remained, watching me from their familiar positions, Miriam St Cloud and her mother, Father Wingate on the beach, Stark and the three children. But their faces were without expression, veiled by the spray as if in a deep dream from which I was excluded.
At that moment I knew that they were not yet ready to join me, and that it was they who were the sleepers.
Leaving them, I drifted downwards into the sunlit water. Led by the swordfish, a huge congregation surrounded me, shoals of porpoise and salmon, groupers and rainbow trout, dolphins and manatees. Drawing the sun’s rays with me, I sank towards the river bed. Together we would lift the aircraft and carry it downstream to the estuary of the Thames and the open sea, a coronation coach in which I would leadthe inhabitants of this small town to the great deeps of their real lives.
The sunlight faded. A few inches from me, through the water-dimmed windshield, a once-human face grimaced at me. A drowned man wearing an aviator’s helmet, his mouth fixed in a death-gape, lay across the controls, arms swaying towards me in the current that flowed through the cabin door.
Terrified by this wavering embrace, I turned and swam blindly into the tail of the aircraft. The air rushed from my lungs in the violent water. No longer a whale, I struck out for the surface through the hundreds of scattering fish. Torn from the aircraft, a fragment of white fabric sailed upwards through the water. Following it, I fought my way to the surface. In a last exhausted race for the sun I seized the air.
I woke in the insect-filled meadow, lying on the wet flowers that filled the grave. A few steps away the three handicapped children watched me from among the poppies. I was drenched in the sweat that soaked my jacket and trousers, and too tired to speak to them. A strange headache was leaving me. I breathed unevenly, as if for the first time, and tried to focus my eyes on the vivid birds and flowers within the meadow. I was aware again of my bruised mouth and chest, as if the dead occupant of the aircraft I had glimpsed in my dream had tried to drown me.
But for all the reality of the meadow, I knew that this warm grass, these dragon-flies and poppies belonged to another dream, and that my fever-vision of swimming as a right whale had been another window into my real life.
I rose to my feet and brushed the petals from my suit. The children moved away through the grass, subdued by whatever they had seen. The strangled starling lay among the dead daisies. Jamie turned on his shackles, avoiding my eyes, but his small face was puckered with concern, as if he wantedto guide me through the ordeal of my vision. In his hands he held a dead sparrow, another purse to be hidden in the grave.
When they had gone I walked alone through the late afternoon, my damp suit covered with a coat of rainbows, a confetti of petals, celebrating my marriage with the meadow.
People were leaving the river on their way home, the tennis players and young parents with their children, the old women and their husbands. Their faces were lit by an energy I had never seen before. As they passed me I noticed that all their clothes were damp, as if they had been caught in a sudden
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