‘OK. I understand. Let me show you out.’
They walked down the long flight of stairs together in silence. Mouse went first, breathing heavily, slowing as they descended. Finally, they stood by the turnstiles in the yellowish glow of the library lights. Mouse’s eyes were red.
‘Goodbye, sport,’ he said. ‘Give my love to Abby.’
Marcus reached out to hug his friend again, but Mouse pulled away.
‘Tell her I hope the birth. . that everything goes well for her.’
Marcus felt in his pocket.
‘I have something for you.’
He dropped the pair of earrings, one turquoise, one blue, into his friend’s hand. Mouse’s eyes filled with tears.
‘Thank you,’ he said, his voice breaking.
Marcus stepped into the lift.
‘I’m sorry.’
Mouse shook his head, tears streaming from his bright, buoyant eyes.
‘Bye, Mouse.’
Mouse stood at the lift doors until they closed, then Marcus rode downwards in the wheezing, clanging contraption. Outside, the snow had begun to drift in Russell Square. Marcus hailed a taxi and made his way back to the flat.
When he got inside, Abby was sitting cross-legged on the bed reading a book about child-rearing, one of a large pile that sat on the dresser in their room. Marcus brushed his teeth and lay alongside her. She closed the book and took his head in her lap, bending down to kiss him.
‘You found Mouse,’ she said.
‘Mmm. He was at the library.’ Marcus stared up at her.
‘How is he?’
‘He’s OK. He’ll be fine.’
‘D’you think he’ll come back to the Course?’
‘I don’t know. I think maybe he will. But I’m so tired. Can we go to sleep?’
‘Of course. We can talk tomorrow.’
She reached over, turned out the light and stretched out with her back to him. Soon she was snoring. Marcus lay in the darkness and heard, echoing through his mind, the wail of a baby, the howling of the wind in the library and the sound of Lee picking out the ‘Promenade’ from Pictures at an Exhibition on her piano. Above all the other sounds, and yet somehow containing them, he heard the high wailing beauty of the tongues.
Epilogue Spring
Abby walked down the main street of the quiet university town. Students were streaming out of classrooms and heading back to their dorms. Some made their way through the gates and across the main road to the shops. It was a balmy March day. The winter had been a cruel one, much colder than she was used to at home, but the past few weeks had been mild. She was growing to like these North-Eastern university towns: Princeton, New Haven, Cambridge, Ithaca. They were manageable, even to a foreigner. She smiled as a man stood aside to let her pass along the narrow pavement. She wondered if he could tell she was pregnant. She was at the annoying stage where she might be mistaken for merely fat.
She stepped into a bar on the main street. It was across the road from the town’s famous record exchange, a white brick building that managed to attract a constant stream of pale, acne-scarred students despite the increasing obsolescence of its wares. The bar was almost empty. She bought herself a glass of wine and then sat at the table in the window, overlooking the university’s main quadrangle. A huge Henry Moore sculpture stood, bright with verdigris, in the centre. The bartender looked over at her. She put her handbag in her lap to hide her bump. She knew what Americans thought about drinking during pregnancy. But she deserved a little celebration. The past few weeks had been marvellous.
She had called her mother the night before and told her that she would be staying for the rest of the year, would be having the baby in New York. Her mother, unusually emotional, had started to cry. Abby’s middle sister Susie had moved back home, after finally divorcing the maths teacher. Abby could hear her shouting at the children in the background.
‘And you really think this is what you went to that wonderful university for,’ her mother was saying. ‘To run a cult thousands of miles away from your family?’
Abby had made vague, soothing sounds and hung up. She rarely spoke to her mother any more. Sally and David were her new parents. And she knew that they were very proud of her. She took a gulp of wine.
A group of students came in. She realised that they had been at the meeting earlier. The girls were exquisite-looking: shimmering with health, their hair bounced as they walked. The young men were tall and wore pastel-coloured shirts tucked into their chinos. They sat at a table at the other end of the bar and Abby had to strain her ears to make out what they were saying.
‘It’s exactly what I’ve been waiting for. Almost all my life, it feels like.’
‘The whole thing was so chic. Because that’s what I always hated about going to church with my family. All the unattractive people there.’
‘And the music is so great. I’ve already downloaded some of the podcasts. A bit of talking, some music. I listen to it on the way to class. Oh, hey, look, there’s Abby. Come and join us, Abby.’
Abby left her half-drunk glass of wine on the table and walked over to the group. She smiled down at them.
‘Can I get you guys a drink?’
‘No. Let us get you one. It’s Ben’s turn to buy. What would you like?’
‘Um. . Could I have a Diet Coke?’
They sat and talked for an hour. A huge bowl of nachos appeared in the centre of the table. Abby pulled out long strings of cheese, negotiating them carefully into her mouth. She enjoyed spending time with these young, burnished Americans. They had none of the scepticism of their English peers.
‘I’m going out to California next week,’ Abby told them. ‘I’ve never been before. I’m terribly excited.’
‘Oh, you’ll love it. Where are you going?’
‘San Francisco and LA. We’re doing a thing in LA with a bunch of Hollywood actors. The founder of the Course was out there last month and there seemed to be such excitement about it. I suppose a drive to make religion stylish was bound to go down well out there.’
‘I’ve got some friends at Berkeley who’d love to come along. Should I let them know about it?’
‘Sure. Please do tell as many people as you can about the Course. This is just the beginning. It’s really marvellous to be there at the beginning of something. David Nightingale, the founder of the Course, is making a huge speech in London today. Some terribly powerful church leaders from over here have flown out to watch him. With their support, the Course is going to simply explode in the US.’ She looked at her watch. ‘I’m afraid I must go and catch my train. I have to be in New York tonight. But here’s my card. Send me an email if you’d like to become campus representatives for the Course. We need as many people to spread the word as possible.’
She strolled downhill towards the train station. The university buildings were the colour of toast. Ivy grew up the wall beside her. On the other side of the road was a vast chapel built by a private-equity billionaire. It was here that she had spoken to the students earlier. Each time she came to one of these events she expected to be greeted by an empty hall, by spiky atheists intent on disrupting the meeting. But the rooms were always full. To see so many hopeful, upturned young faces, it gave her hope herself.
On the train back to New York she slipped her shoes off and tucked her legs beneath her on the seat. She was reading The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Mouse had sent it to her. It was the edition they had given to him for his nineteenth birthday. He had crossed out their message and written underneath it. The new inscription read: For Mummy and Baby Glass. She smiled. The sun was going down as the train moved out of the leafy New Jersey countryside and into the vast urban sprawl that surrounded New York. She liked to listen to the strange place names as they edged towards the city: Rahway, South Amboy, Secaucus. There was something terribly exotic about it all, even though the towns themselves were ugly smears of industrialised wasteland.