A Division of the Light (3 page)

A small group of visitors waited near the home of the girl who had seen the vision. Most were silent, but some prayed quietly and continuously. Others knelt on the stony soil with their hands clasped. Some were evidently poor, but one woman had brought a plush velvet cushion to kneel on; another wore clothes for a skiing holiday, the manufacturer's logo bold across her back. Carla asked if they minded having their photographs taken. No one objected. One woman even asked which newspaper Gregory worked for. He lied and said the English
Sunday Times
.

“They all want to be part of this,” Carla said as they walked away.

“They always do,” the journalist said.

A few chickens scratched around their feet and a goat ate a sparse shrub at the end of its tether.

“You must have covered other stories like this,” Gregory said.

“I've read the files on dozens of cases,” the journalist answered. “They're all similar. You'll see what I mean when you meet the family. Miraculous visitations are the product of marginal communities with deep religious beliefs, and the person who sees the vision is always a lonely pubescent girl. Mostly the visions fade when she grows up.”

“You think that will happen here?”

“Maybe, but there's a force behind this. You can feel the pressure. This girl fascinates believers, but the rest of the world is
fascinated too. If she didn't have that quality then you and I wouldn't be here, and neither would anyone else. There's another TV crew arriving tomorrow because the world wants to know about Little Maria. And a few weeks ago she wasn't ever called that; she was Anamaria until a newspaper rechristened her. Now even the villagers call her by her new name. Her family does, too.”

“Everyone believes it is better to call her that,” Carla told them.

“And do you?” Gregory asked.

“Perhaps. If she saw what she tells us she saw.”

“What she saw,” the journalist said, “was what these disturbed young women always see—an apparition that resembled a naïve painting. Little Maria saw a Virgin Mary who was just like an illustration in an instructional book for children. Adults in advanced societies don't ever see visions like that.”

“A vision can come to anyone,” Carla said.

“We don't have visions; we hallucinate,” the journalist answered. “We hear voices inside our heads, or get blinded by non-existent lights, or lose ourselves in the numinous. We don't get visited by images from picture books. Look around us: we're at the very edge of subsistence here. It's like stepping back into feudal Europe. People see what they've been taught they will see at the moment of death.”

The family was what Gregory expected. A few weeks ago the parents might have been credulous, but now they had become used to media attention. He photographed them against a scabbed and whitewashed wall to show off their frayed clothing and lined faces. He asked them to make sure their hands were on display so that readers would be able to study the stumpy fingers and broken nails.

An ambitious local priest asked to be photographed, too; after all, he was the only one able to provide spiritual guidance to these people. They were, he confided, simple, goodhearted, and unable to understand why their daughter should be so honored by Our Lady. Why, Little Maria herself was perplexed that she had been chosen. Although he doubted if the photographs would be required, Gregory allowed the priest to pose alongside the crucifix that hung above the deeply recessed window.

The girl he photographed standing outside the broken-roofed cowshed where the Virgin Mary had appeared and promised to return. Her brothers and sisters looked on with a mixture of puzzlement and envy.

Gregory was certain that the priest had advised the family that Little Maria should be dressed as if for a communion. Probably he had also supplied the dress: it was slightly too large and its frills were out of place in such bleak surroundings. Little Maria's face was bony and pale, as if she had lost blood, and she stared into the lens with a stubborn unearthly superiority. Throughout the short session she said nothing. There was animal shit on her boots and the hem of her white dress was spotted with mud.

As soon as Gregory indicated that he had finished she spoke. It was a sentence of only a few words, delivered in a monotone. Her expression did not change. Then she walked back into the house and the door was closed behind her.

“What did she say?” he asked.

“She said,” Carla began, and then seemed to consider her translation for a moment before she continued in a quieter voice. “She said that you do not need to live your life like this.”

Gregory smiled. “If I'd known that, I would have asked you to tell her that I live the kind of life that I want, and that I'm happy with it.”

Carla nodded, but said nothing else.

The priest had remained outside the house, his face expectant. The journalist suggested an amount of cash Gregory should hand over. “For the upkeep of the church,” he explained drily. Gregory paid up and received a cursory blessing. The priest made a little speech that Carla translated.

“He said that we are all instruments of God. He said that we do not understand what is really happening to us, just as musical instruments are not conscious of the tune that is played on them.”

“Right,” Gregory said. They thanked the priest and walked away.

“You'll not have got as much as that from the famous Little Maria,” the journalist said wryly. “She's laconic at the best of times.”

“She told me that I needn't live in the way that I do. Not that she knows anything at all about how I live. But that's what they call faith, I suppose.”

“The girl only says what you expect her to say. None of it is thought-provoking. She doesn't know why she was chosen and she has no idea what will happen next. But the Virgin says that one of these days she will pass on a great secret. That kind of thing.”

“These people believe it is certain that the Virgin will return,” Carla added.

“When she does I bet she won't be visible on film,” Gregory told her.

“But the visual isn't everything,” Carla responded. “Neither are words. Some things are beyond photography just as they are beyond description.”

The journalist shrugged. He had seen so much of the world that he could no longer be bothered to argue such points. When Carla turned away he raised his eyebrows at Gregory, who gave a wry complicit smile in return.

By early evening Gregory had uploaded the photographs to his laptop, judged and selected them, and then transmitted his choice to the picture desk. Later, he ate with Carla from a hotel menu that exhibited only the faintest trace of national cuisine, and immediately afterward they went to bed together.

Gregory felt no guilt about this. He was merely choosing to take something that was being made available. He was neither excited nor intrigued by Carla, and he viewed their sexual union as a purely technical exercise, one that he would perform and then forget. It had happened often enough before. And even though he obtained a certain amount of pleasure from it, a part of his mind remained aloof. For Carla, it was different. Like a castaway, she strove for something that seemed to have drifted forever out of her grasp.

In the morning their farewells were perfunctory and slightly embarrassed. They both knew the night had been a failure. Gregory was certain that he would never return to that part of the world. Why, he had not even bothered to take a photograph of Carla.

As he walked to the plane across the windy tarmac, and as he unexpectedly began to examine the way in which he had lived his life, he became convinced that a change was about to come. But he shook the feeling off because he knew it was irrational. Gregory prided himself on a clear-eyed perspective of the world. He thought that perhaps tiredness, or the rarefied air of the village, or its barely suppressed hysteria, had begun to seep unwanted into his dreams.

Even before he opened the envelope he guessed the sender. Inside was a twenty-pound note fastened to a postcard by a red paperclip. The picture on the card was an Edward Weston photograph of a seashell. Silver and pearl-gray, the shell folded in on itself like a swan asleep.

Knowing that Cassie was watching, Gregory looked across the room to where she sat at the desk with her papers and computer screen. She inclined her head in a wry, questioning manner that always reminded him of his wife. His daughter had inherited her strong features and yet she, too, disliked being photographed.

“They say you should never send cash through the post.”

“So they do,” Gregory said drily, unclipping the note to find the message written on the card's reverse. The first thing he did was look at the signature, even though he was certain whose it would be. He was unable to suppress a tiny smile of pleasure even though Cassie kept watching.

“You're keen to find out about this, aren't you?” he asked.

“It looked personal so I didn't open it. You know I never—”

“Yes, I know. You're very discreet for a daughter. Or so you often tell me.”

“I'm discreet about all kinds of things. You should know—you've tested me several times. Officially
and
without my knowing.”

The note was short and to the point.

Dear Mr. Pharaoh

Thank you so much for looking after me and for being so

trusting. Here is the money that you kindly lent me.

Disappointingly, the police tell me it is unlikely that anyone will

be charged with the theft. Best wishes and thanks again. Alice Fell.

Beneath the message she had written the number of a mobile phone.

Gregory looked across to his daughter.

“I lent her twenty pounds. It was for a taxi.”

“The woman who had her bag stolen? You didn't say you'd given her money.”

“It must have slipped my mind.”

“I see. Maybe you're lucky that you got it back.”

“Maybe. But if it had happened to you I would have wanted a good Samaritan to give you the taxi fare back home.”

“Dad, I've been surviving on my own for a long time now. And do you know what? I've never been robbed. You needn't worry about me.”

Gregory thought about confessing that in some ways he had never stopped worrying, and that it would be comforting if his daughter could find someone to live with. Cassie had had a few casual relationships and then an extended but unsatisfactory one,
after which she had given up on matters of the heart. She remained determinedly alone, unattached, and, as far as Gregory knew, celibate. His behavior and his needs were utterly different to hers. And yet, paradoxically, he envied his daughter's resolve, and could understand her contentment at being free of the tightening coils of intimacy and romance.

“There's a phone number,” he said.

“Ah.”

“Do you think she wants me to call?”

Gregory wondered why he should ask Cassie for approval. When she was not present he did not need her opinion. Often he did not even consider what she might think, however sensible her advice. It was only when they were together in the same room, or talking on the phone, that he felt compelled to ask his daughter what she thought. He had continued to do this despite his intermittent decisions to stop. Gregory was sure this had something to do with Ruth's early death. His wife had left guilt behind her as well as memories; it colored her wake like a dark stain.

“You must realize that it's an invitation,” Cassie answered, reaching up to touch the beads on the necklace that she had inherited from her mother.

Gregory looked again at the message and then reversed the card to study the Weston photograph. It had been taken almost ninety years ago. The curved shell chambers looked like barriers engineered to protect an invisible center.

“Why not ring her now, and get it over with?”

Gregory nodded but faltered.

“Dad, would you rather make that call when I wasn't here?”

“Of course not.”

For the moment, at least, he had nothing to hide.

Alice answered after a few rings. Usually Gregory began speaking as soon as he could, but for an unexpected moment, no more than a second or two, he was silent. He could hear a background of amorphous murmur, as if a hand had been cupped to his ear.

“It's Gregory Pharaoh.”

After a pause, Alice spoke. “Yes.”

“I just thought I'd let you know that the money arrived safely. Thanks.”

This time the pause was slightly longer. “It seemed easier to send cash and not a check. Was that all right?”

“Yes. Yes, of course. How are you feeling? I mean, after what happened?”

“Not bad. You saw how shaken up I was.”

“Right. Maybe there are people with you. Can you tell me anything else?”

“I'm still bruised but I'll get over it. It was upsetting and embarrassing but it wasn't a disaster.”

“The credit cards?”

“The bank people blocked them before they could be used, so things could have been worse. Now I have replacements. And a new mobile that I'm talking on now. There were store cards as well. I'd forgotten about those.”

“I didn't think about them, either.”

For a few moments Alice did not speak. Silence vibrated between them.

“Are you at work?” Gregory asked.

“Yes, I'm here now.”

“Good,” he said lamely.

“I know why you rang.”

“I told you why.”

“That was just an excuse.”

“You think so?”

“Yes. You rang because you want to see me again.”

As if by reflex Gregory looked across at Cassie, but she was pretending not to listen. Her face was pallid in the glow from the computer screen.

“You were badly shaken up,” Gregory said. “I'd be interested to find out what you remember.” He cleared his throat and went on. “Maybe we could meet up sometime?”