Ice - Anna Kavan [29]
I went up and opened the solitary door. The sound-proof room was in darkness, but a little of the faint light from the landing came in behind me. I saw the girl lying on the bed, fully dressed, with a book beside her; she had fallen asleep while reading. I spoke her name softly. She started up, her hair glinting. 'Who's that?' There was fear in her voice. I moved, let the dim light touch my face; she knew me at once, said: 'What are you doing here?' I said: 'You're in danger; I've come to take you away.' 'Why should I go with you?' She sounded astonished. 'There's no difference...' We both heard a sound at the same moment; footsteps were starting to mount the stairs. I stepped back, froze, held my breath. The feeble light outside the door was extinguished. I stood in black shadow, I was pretty safe; unless she gave me away.
The man's ungentle hands gripped her. 'Put on your outdoor things quickly. We're leaving at once.' His voice was low and peremptory. 'Leaving?' She stared, saw him as a blacker shadow against the black, her cold lips murmuring: 'Why?' 'Don't talk. Do as I tell you.' Obediently she stood up, the draught from the door made her shiver. 'How am I supposed to find anything in the dark? Can't we have a light?' 'No. Somebody might see.' He flashed a torch briefly, saw her pick up a comb and start pulling it through her hair, snatched it away from her. 'Leave that! Get your coat on—hurry!' The irritable impatience radiating from him made her movements slower, more awkward. Feeling about the dark room, she found her coat but could not find the way into it; she held it the wrong way round. He seized it angrily, turned it, forced her arms through the sleeves. 'And now come on! Don't make a sound. Nobody must know we've gone.' 'Where are we going? Why do we have to go at this time of night?' She expected no answer, doubted whether she heard correctly when he muttered, 'It's the one chance,' adding something about the approaching ice. He grasped her arm then, pulled her across the landing and on to the stairs. The beam of the torch, intermittently stabbing pitch blackness, showed his looming repressive shadow, which she followed as if sleepwalking through all the ramifications of the huge building, out into the icy snowfilled night.
Although snow was falling heavily, there was none on the black car; it had just been cleared away: yet no one had passed them, nobody was in sight. She shivered as she got in, sat in silence while he quickly inspected the chains. Yellow oblongs stained the pure white in front of the windows. In the air, the snow was transformed into showering gold as it passed the lights. A confused noise from the dining hall, voices, clattering plates, drowned the noise of the car starting up, and impelled her to ask: 'What about all those people who are expecting you? Aren't you going to see them?'
Already in a state of irritable nervous tension, he was exasperated by the question, lifted one hand from the wheel in a threatening gesture. 'I told you not to talk!' His voice was frightening, his eyes flashed in the dark interior of the car. She moved fast to avoid the blow, but could not get out of reach, crouched down, shielding herself with her raised arm, made no sound when the glancing blow struck her shoulder and crushed her against the door; afterwards huddled there in silence, shrinking away from his silent rage.
Snow-muffled silence outside; silence filling the car. He drove without lights, his eyes like cats' eyes, able to see through the snowy darkness. A ghost-car, invisible, silent, fled from the ruined town. The ancient snow-covered fortifications fell back and vanished in snow, the broken wall vanished behind. In front loomed the black living wall of the forest, ghostly whiteness