by Sue Morris
‘The tree which moves some to tears of joy is in the eyes of others only a green thing which stands in the way.’ William Blake, from his communications with the Reverend John Trusler, 1799
Early mornings the couple leave their home, walk the four-hundred yards or so to the edge of a meadow – tread the gravel of a narrow path, dust swept to either side. Mist rising. The sun dreams and the wind, depending on the season, gentle or wild. Samuel holds an old duffle bag that he refuses to part with. Its once maroon-black leather handle has softened, the leather cracked and the zip held together with two large safety pins. Only the side pocket has some purpose, and this is where he keeps his penknife. The wife breathes heavily, nostrils flared, her mouth wrinkled closed, the muscles of her neck constrict, her shoulders rise slightly, up and down, He widens his step when the meadow is within sight.
He sits cross-legged on a small patch of flattened, hardened ground under the branches of a four-hundred-year-old beech tree. His wife stands before him, her linen bag swinging from her shoulder, ready to leave before he does. He too faces the splintered trunk of the tree and touches each of the small seven markings – scratches its surface with his fingernails, blisters of blood leaving their trace. Then strokes each horizontal line and re-counts the years. Indents that are barely visible, in one practiced motion. He moves slowly and any words that are spoken are spoken with a hush. How many times will you touch them? She speaks methodically. How many more times will we need to come back to this spot? She speaks not in anger or irritation. More out of a tired love. Words that have been repeated over one-hundred times.
Samuel says nothing. Once, he might have said, when it feels right. And Ellen would have shrugged, how will you be able to tell, Samuel? The saying of his name blunt on her tongue.
Then that moment of pushed silence.
Samuel believes distance is like a maze that promises an exit but always lies. Samuel is an art historian. He has written four chunky books. He believes in the spirit of natural things, believes that the Beech (with a capital B) holds unrivalled mystery, believes in fairies, myth and magic even, believes that out of grey comes colour. Beliefs that have become a life-time’s obsession. Ellen knows this and is sick of it. His work has led him to a lot of lonely questioning – why, for example, do some objects lose their clarity, their colour, their detail, the further away the observer is. He questions why small objects appear weaker, are easily ignored. And why for some, those objects on closer inspection grow larger and more important. Which is weaker, the large or the small, he continually asks himself?
Ellen will not say more. She just waits, then turns away from Samuel. That time she recalls, when they had first seen the tree had been by chance – they were teenagers just having fun. Samuel would climb its branches and she’d call out to him, Hey Tarzan, how ya doin’, with a coy-made-up-sentimental-twang. He had giggled. Back then, they thought a tree was just a tree. What had she said, oh yes, there are millions of beech trees around the world, aren’t there, Samuel, that from a distance all look identical?
But time is a great changer. It provokes and dismantles.
Samuel does not move, allows the tree’s dense umbrella to envelop him. He watches the silvery light that escapes the autumn sky in dribs and drabs, gradually changing the colour of the leaves – lighter for him, darker for her.
They’d fallen in love under this tree on the edge of a meadow. Samuel used to embellish their love story to friends, romanticise the tale just a little more each time, change the white shirt he had been wearing to a rosy pink one, the colour of his yet-to-be-wife’s eyes as blue rather than grey and her having worn dangly earrings with little angels rather than plain nickel studs. He’d talked of a painting he’d once seen. He described every inch of it to her – the broken branch that lay horizontal in the foreground, the woman to the left, how small she was, waiting, the wondering of that woman and the silvery-grey cloud touching the horizon beyond her. They’d first made love under the beech. They’d been noisy then. They were young and clumsy. But they had laughed at their mistakes and promised to try harder next time. Afterwards they’d laid spread-eagled on the soft grass, drunk with imperfect sex, turned on their sides, their noses touching, breathing in the salty and the sweet. They’d leaned with their backs against its great whittled trunk the evening they’d become husband and wife. They’d held hands. She’d announced she was pregnant there six months later and he had lifted her high off the ground and smothered her with kisses; she’d said be careful and he’d worried that their growing baby might be harmed. They’d marked the trunk with their initials, the ‘S’ above the ‘E’ and in-between, she had drawn a silly-looking angel with an arrow through its middle.
They’d brought Mary here, new-born she was, all bundled up in a fluffy white blanket, rested her on the then green grass and she had pulled funny faces and studied her hands as if she was watching a miracle. And on her first birthday, Samuel marked her height, the penknife-line falling way below the arrowed angel. Back then, there had been wild daisies scattered across the meadow and Ellen made bracelet chains of different sizes for Mary, her fingers moving fast in crochet lightening. And she kept each one in a tin box, waiting for Mary’s wrist to widen. And then there had been clusters of purple flowers neither one of them knew the name of. Like poppies, without that papery feel, the crimson of Bougainvillea. During the winter months from the bay of their living room, they’d lifted Mary and together watched the mist rise; she’d pointed to the mystery of the flickering white lying on the bed of the meadow beyond, and they’d waited for the farmer to ready himself for the day’s harvesting, the call of the red-breasted robins. She’d sat untroubled on the carpet surrounded by play-things, practised the art of picking things up, putting them down, throwing them about, pulling down her favourite picture book from the shelf – a red ribbon opened to page eight. And she’d point to the picture of an old beech tree, its bent branches looked like water, she’d said, falling. And smile to the most beautiful lady ever, the tiny treehouse on the highest branch, the golden-handled teacups, the handsome man upon the white mare. At lunchtime, they’d sit around the kitchen table and talk of the wonders of the world. Magical things.
* * *
Ellen stiffens, rubs her left hip hard with her wedding hand, leans on the other leg and waits for feeling to return.
Samuel sees only the painting, sees the artist pensive in his mind’s eye; the size of it always returns to him in his sleep and imaginations – the proportions sometimes change, go skew-whiff, grow larger. He can wear the painting like a cloak or a wedding veil that flows effortlessly behind him with the image of the waiting woman walking with him. Who is she? What will be her next movement? Is she frowning? Are those tiny wrinkles under her eyes? Is she happy or sad? And sometimes, he imagines the tree so tiny he could place it comfortably in a matchbox.
Ellen reads his mind. Because it’s so easy. It’s just a painting, Samuel. She wants to scream out but holds it in with everything else: my eyes aren’t blue, they are grey, Samuel, magic isn’t real. His tree is light and warms your hand as though in flame, its fine lines held together by silvery leaves which merge with the storm cloud above then dissipate. The broken branch that has fallen is set up for sitting. In distant houses parents wait patiently for their children to return.
Suddenly he speaks. She jumps, turns to face him.
‘It’s an odd thing.’
She risks saying something, with the tiniest of hope he seems to have found.
‘What is, Samuel?’ Slow and rigid.
‘I don’t know—the real and the unreal.’ She knows what’s coming next but for a second, a hope did return. And then the long silence grabs it. Samuel had said this so many times before. When Mary turned five; the eve of her sixth birthday; the morning of her seventh – trying to explain something to her – how a picture can seem so real. Imagination, he kept repeating, is believing, and Mary had nodded with him. as she always did
Ellen’s forehead beads sweat – and the day is not hot – that drips down her face slowly, to the tips of her fine eyebrows, drops as water-bubbles, hits the lower tips of her eyelids, tastes like sour milk. She blinks to brush away the blurry image. She turns her back to Samuel and clasps her fingers around her linen bag. Her knuckles whiten, as though crushing a hard nut, in the bare palms of her hands, and her back arches with the force. Samuel circles the tree and hugs it. Ellen moves to the other side of the meadow, to where their kissing gate used to be. She sees a man claw at bits of rubbish, grasp what other people have left behind. She leans back on the last splintered bit of post standing.
* * *
That first time she kissed Samuel was the week she announced to her mother that she had become a real woman and her mother, bless her soul, said, well, don’t you go kissin’ any fella. She was sixteen. Samuel a year younger. She had taken an age to decide what to wear that day. Her mother was of no help, said she always looked lovely. But Mother, Ellen had said, this needs to be special. Finally, she chose the loose-belted dress, trimmed in white lace right down to her ankles to hide their thickness, although Samuel always remarked how he had loved them. Chosen the brand-new sandals, put a few plasters in her handbag, just in case. Samuel wore slacks and a blue-grey jacket which he knew she loved. His shirt open to the second button because she liked to watch his Adam’s apple move as he talked.
Now the wood of the post feels cold and wet against Ellen’s back and when she stands away from it, she imagines it’s still there, an image stuck. She waits for a sound. Any sound. A signal. Where have the nesting red-breasted robins gone? Why can’t I hear the humming of the harvest tractor or see the wonder of the spreading of seeds for next year’s crop from the farm on the other side of the gate? She tries to calm herself – what had the counsellor said, breathe in slowly, out again, but she can’t. She shouts, ‘Where’s the fucking noise?’ but Samuel can’t hear her. She can see him from the distance still hugging the tree. She needs the sound of something new. She’s simply had enough. She walks as though she’s taking a Sunday stroll, saunters around the perimeter of the meadow. She doesn’t speak or look at Samuel as she passes him, just walks on by.
* * *
‘Am I taller?’ Mary always asked Samuel. She stood against the beech, clinging to her picture-book, as he marked her height with the penknife from his duffle bag. She loved to stroke the shine of the maroon-black leather handle. Smell its earthy sweetness. She loved to pick it up and pretend she had important business to attend to, swagger her hips, walk tall. Just a touch taller, Samuel said, although he knew that not to be true. But he also knew that look of hers – her lower lip turned outwards, pouting pink. Her left dimple, hidden somewhere inside the flesh of her cheek. Her eyebrows drawn inwards with quizzical disappointment. Her little hand stroking her chin as though she was bearded, like an old man.
Tell me again Daddy, pl-ease, would come next. He couldn’t help it. He sat his five-year-old daughter down on the knobbly root-seat of the four-hundred-year-old tree. A seat that reminded her of the claws of some huge bird, poking up from beneath the earth. She knew the names Samuel had taught her – toucan, parrot and eagle. She picked up two stray leaves that had fallen of their own accord, which seemed like magic to her, their motion slowing and swaying as they made their way down. And had looked deep into her daddy’s eyes whilst stroking the fine hairs on the surface of the lime-green leaves. Look Daddy – her excitement melted him – this one is the lady one and this, placing the other leaf in the palm of his hands, cupped his fingers closed, the gentleman. Shake them, she would demand of him, showed him how to do it. And then they had waited for a few beechnuts to fall, like little golden nuggets, she said. Tell me again Daddy, the story of the beautiful lady, pulling on the red ribbon to page eight.
Well, a long time ago, in a land far from here, where the sorcerers and elves did rule, there lived a beautiful lady with eyes the colour of a raven, curls that reached her ankles, who lived in a treehouse, high, high up in the branches. The floors were carpeted with thick-piled rugs, the colours of the rainbow, and lanterns that lit as soon as dusk fell. She was never lonely because she was surrounded by everything she needed and loved. Don’t forget the cups and saucers Daddy. They were decorated with pictures of silver-breasted robins with waistcoats that flickered in the moonlight, buttoned with sapphires, their wee handles painted in gold. One day she heard the clopping of hoofs. She saw a fine-looking gentleman, astride a winged white mare. Could it fly Daddy! Oh, yes! She rustled the branches and he looked up, saw her there, dangling her pretty slender legs from the top branch. She called down and politely asked him if he was lost. Oh, no, he said, we are just taking a rest. Can I stroke your white mare? Samuel paused, looked to his daughter – how she twiddled the ends of her hair, her eyes squeezed shut, knowing she wouldn’t open them until the story ended. Then the beautiful lady jumped from the great height of the beech, landed surprisingly softly on the ground. Mary’s eyes then opened wide, wet and glassy. Tell me again, how was she able to jump like that and not hurt herself? Sometimes if you concentrate hard enough, you can make anything happen. Like magic? A little. Will you teach me to jump just like the lady in the story? Samuel hesitated. Well—perhaps—one day – Promise me Daddy.
On Mary’s seventh birthday, they packed a picnic. The day was perfect. No wind or rain. The open bay window filled the house with all that was perfumed and soft. Samuel filled his duffle bag with plastic containers of sandwiches, sweet treats, packets of crisps, syrupy tarts. He rolled two tablecloths, secured them with twine and placed them on top. Ellen wrapped the miniature set of cups and saucers in fine tissue paper of gold, a red braid around its centre tied into a bow, and stowed it in her linen bag, wedged between a couple of pullovers. They swung Mary all the way to the four-hundred-year-old beech. She wore her new cotton frock. Her hair in ringlets. They heard the call of the red-breasted robin. They circled the trunk of the beech with arms outstretched, fingers touching, hugged it, not quite able to hold hands. Mary helped her mummy lay out one of the tablecloths on a patch of spongy grass. It bellowed like a half-opened parasol. There was a moment, almost imperceptible,that temporarily delayed time. There would be no treehouse. Just a little girl who wanted to climb to the highest branch and pretend she was a beautiful lady. Mary sat cross-legged under the tree, holding the gift to her chest, poked at it, guessing. She frowned, trying to figure out what it was – what could it be? She untied the bow ever so slowly and the fine gold tissue came away, uncovered the set of cups and saucers. A pattern she imagined to be of silver-breasted robins. Samuel covered the picnic with the other tablecloth, stood at the foot of the tree. He knelt, palms to the ground. She gave a laugh – you look like a dog, climbed onto his back, her arms clasped around his neck.
They were already climbing up when Mary called down, it’s fine Mummy, we are playing at magic. They climbed high to the first sturdy branch. He felt the hem of her frock tickle him on a bare part of skin. He smiled, and she giggled. Samuel climbed a little higher with surprising ease, stopped suddenly when her weight lightened – shards of cotton-candy caught between branches, and all sound stopped. As Ellen watched her daughter fall, only the distant stutter of heavy machinery broke the silence.
Samuel removes his penknife from the side pocket of his old duffle bag. He stands straight, ready to measure his height, faces the trunk, feels its etched surface. With penknife in hand, he raises his right arm, bends it slightly and makes his mark. He steps back and looks at the small indent and notices he has grown smaller.
Sue Morris is a prolific writer of literary fiction. She lives and works in London – the city she grew up in. She first qualified in Fine Art and practiced as a painter for ten years. She then moved into teaching English and creative writing, a career that spanned over thirty years. When she’s not writing, she can usually be spotted at Curzon Bloomsbury, her self-adopted home, and always avidly reading!
