The Art of Standing Still Read online

  ‘It’s made the rush hour easier,’ Josh said brightly.

  Alistair glared at him. Ruth placed her hand gently on Alistair’s arm.

  ‘We’re here to read through the play. Alistair, if you’d like to try improving on my efforts, you’re very welcome. I mean it.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Alistair placed his hand over hers. ‘I think you’ve done an admirable job. I’ll try my utmost to do it justice.’

  The two actors read their parts before walking through their moves, their voices echoing around the church hall. A chill went through Ruth as Alistair said the words; ‘The man that I kiss is the one you should kill.’ And once again she wanted to weep at the injustice of the betrayal of one man by another, one to whom he had been so close.

  MUCH AS RUTH LOATHED THE IDEA, SHE KNEW SHE WAS OBLIGED TO VISIT THE other rehearsals. She would have to sit there while Ronnie or Harlan mangled her text and directed the cast in a way guaranteed to set her teeth on edge.

  Ruth arrived early at the Edwardian grammar school to watch the choir rehearse. She followed the chatter and giggles of teenage girls – the angelic choir, she assumed – to the classroom on the second floor. The hallways smelt of disinfectant. It reminded Ruth of her own schooldays.

  ‘Ah, Reverend Wells, come in.’ Harlan beckoned to her.

  In an effort to keep Ronnie and Harlan separate as far as possible, Ruth had allocated the music in the Old Testament section to Ronnie and the New Testament to Harlan.

  ‘How’s it going?’ Ruth asked.

  ‘Very well indeed. We’re about to start, so you can hear for yourself.’ She clapped her hands.

  Most of the girls continued their conversations. There were plump girls, black girls and Asian girls, short girls and tall brunettes. There was even a redhead with glasses. Unfortunately, there were no boy angels.

  She made her way to the back of the classroom and sat at a desk facing the whiteboard. Harlan asked a couple of girls to push the small upright piano away from the wall and angle it so she could peer round at the girls. She positioned herself, perched on the piano stool like a bird, and commenced the warmup exercises.

  Ruth lamented that none of the original music had survived from the Middle Ages.

  ‘Ah,’ Harlan had once said, defending herself, ‘I heard about a musician connected with the York Mysteries who studied ancient paintings and managed to construct a piece by examining the sheet music held by a choir of angels in an ancient painting. How’s that for resourcefulness?’

  As the choir began, it was obvious Harlan had not gone to the same trouble. At first Ruth thought the choir was carrying on with warmup scales and arpeggios; then she recognised some of the words.

  ‘Glory to God in the highest and peace to men on whom his favour rests.’

  But the melody! It would have made Schoenberg sound positively conventional. She tried not to let the pain show on her face as the beautiful words had the life squeezed out of them by the appalling tune. Ruth could honestly say she would rather have listened to amorous tomcats than Harlan’s choir.

  Now Ruth’s discomfort shifted focus. She needed to tell Harlan what she thought of it – and she needed to be honest. Harlan ran through a couple of passages, singing out the notes and demonstrating high and low notes to the girls by making horizontal chopping movements with her hands, as if she was a rather indecisive lumberjack in the process of felling a sapling, unsure of how high up the trunk to make the first cut.

  When the seemingly interminable song at last ended, Harlan sidled over to Ruth. Behind her, the girls chatted loudly about their boyfriends and the latest episode of their favourite soap.

  ‘Well, what do you think?’ Harlan’s eyes shone and her pendulous earrings almost brushed her shoulders as they swung.

  Ruth paused to take a deep breath. Before she could get the words out, a crash distracted them both. One of the girls who had been perched on a desk fell to the floor with a shriek. Her giggling friends tried to pull her to her feet. Harlan hurried over to check on the girl and re-establish discipline. That done, she returned to Ruth.

  ‘So glad you liked it,’ she said. ‘That awful man – ’ Ruth assumed she meant Ronnie – ‘maintained that you couldn’t have a contemporary setting for ancient words. “Nonsense,” I told him.’ She shook her head vigorously, entangling her earrings with her hair. ‘It’s been such a fantastic opportunity, not only for me as a composer, but also for the girls to get away from all those trite pseudomedieval ditties.’

  A scuffle broke out among some young ladies in the front row. Harlan again propelled herself out of her chair and homed in on the debacle. Ruth took the opportunity to slide out of the room, closing the door quietly behind her.

  Back in her car, she tried to think logically. From the start she felt a sense of connection with the plays, yet the whole project had now taken on a life of its own. She could no more claim ownership of the plays than she could the sea or the wind or God himself. She had a choice. She could let the plays have their head, or she could attempt to rein them in and make them behave.

  A choice? Why then did she feel so helpless, as if she could not stop the plays from running amok.

  Scene Ten

  JEMMA COULDN’T DECIDE WHETHER TO TAKE A COPY OF HER ARTICLE IN THE Gazette to the rehearsal to show Josh or whether to play it low-key and modest, assuming he had already seen it. Finally she peeled the front page off the current issue, folded it neatly, and tucked it into her handbag. That way all eventualities were covered.

  When she arrived at the hall, Ruth looked flustered, sitting in her director’s chair, speaking urgently into her mobile phone. Jemma sidled up to Ronnie to find out what was going on.

  ‘John the Apostle has been seconded to the Frankfurt office for three months; St Peter is on holiday for a week, and Lazarus has the flu. Says he is at death’s door!’

  That would be handy, Jemma thought. Then the part wouldn’t tax his acting skills too much. Still, it might be a bit of a tall order for Josh to resurrect him . . .

  ‘Thanks, Alistair,’ Ruth said into the phone, ‘I knew I could rely on you . . . yes, we will just be reading in . . . by half past seven; yes, that would be wonderful. Thanks so much. You’ve saved my life.’ Ruth flipped the cover of the phone closed.

  Jemma assumed Ruth had to drum up replacements and stand-ins at short notice, but Alistair! There was something about the illustrious Councillor Fry that made Jemma’s hackles rise. It wasn’t that she didn’t like him; it was just that . . . Jemma couldn’t put her finger on what was bothering her. Perhaps it was that ‘reporter’s nose’ again.

  The door swung open and Josh entered. The bulky bandages were gone, and his palms were covered in flat white dressings. Some of the sore, reddened skin on his fingers showed. Jemma felt relieved; he was obviously on the mend. She wanted to rush to him and cradle those hands and kiss his fingers. But before she could walk across the room to make polite conversation with him, Ruth intercepted him, presumably to explain the lack of disciples. Josh glanced at Jemma and she smiled at him. He quickly looked away.

  The door clattered open again and Alistair rushed in. He was still wearing his navy three-piece pinstriped suit, but his maroon tie with the Monksford town crest was askew and his top shirt button was open. Ruth’s face brightened when she saw him and she quickly abandoned Josh to welcome Alistair.

  Josh stood alone. Jemma wanted to go to him, but she felt herself blush as shyness overwhelmed her. This was not an emotion she usually experienced, not since she was a little child. But here it was, keeping her feet cemented to the floor. She half wanted to walk over and show him the article. Her other half wanted to run and hide in the toilet. She didn’t have the opportunity to do either.

  ‘Right!’ Ruth clapped her hands. ‘Let’s get started. In your positions, please. Jesus over here and Woman Caught in Adultery over here.’

  Jemma and Josh climbed onto the stage along with her four accusers.

  ‘Of course the
re’s no biblical or historical precedent to think that the woman caught in adultery and Mary Magdalene are one and the same. But from a production standpoint, it’s just such a small role it’s hardly worth getting anyone else in.’

  Jemma nodded. She knew this. Why does she have to go through this every time? Her irritation rose as she prepared to be dragged on by her accusers. It’s as if she feels the need to justify everything. To me, perhaps? Or to her God? What does it matter?

  Rough hands took hold of her arms and dragged her across the stage. They threw her at Josh’s feet. She glanced up and looked pleadingly at him. Josh was staring down at her. There was something cold in his eyes. He wasn’t acting.

  ‘ “Lord, no man has condemned me,” ’ Jemma said.

  ‘ “And because of me, be ashamed no longer. Of all your sins I make you free. Look no more to sin’s assent,” ’ Josh said.

  For all the forgiving words, Jemma sensed a barrier between them that had nothing to do with either of their roles.

  Even so, this was one of the scenes she found the most difficult to understand. So the girl had had a few boyfriends; she had been about a bit. Why would they want to kill her?

  They played through the scene again and again until Ruth was satisfied; then they moved on to the raising of Lazarus with Alistair standing in for the indisposed corpse. Jemma played Mary, this time with a different coloured scarf on her head, to signify, as Ruth was at pains to point out – again – that Mary Magdalene and Mary the sister of Lazarus were not the same person.

  Part of the middle of the play text had been lost, giving the whole scene a jumpy feel, like a badly edited movie. Jemma wondered why Ruth had included this fragment. Then she realised that it was almost certainly for her benefit. They spent a little while talking about how to fill the gaps in the play.

  ‘Well, I know it’s not completely authentic, but I’ve taken the Bible story, tweaked it a bit here and there, and slotted it into the original play.’ The inconsistencies irked Jemma’s writer’s sense. If only she could get her editing pen to that script . . .

  Finally they stopped for a break. She smiled over at Josh, who turned his back to her and left the building, letting in a blast of cold, damp air before the door slammed close. Jemma pulled on her coat and followed him out.

  ‘Hi,’ she said, placing her hand on his arm. ‘Are you okay?’

  He shrugged out of her grasp. ‘Why did you do it?’

  ‘Do what?’ She frowned.

  ‘Write that article. What do you think you were playing at?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ She tried to stay calm, to not raise her voice.

  ‘All that hero stuff! Why did you do it?’

  ‘I thought you’d be pleased!’ Jemma was shouting now.

  ‘Why? Why would I be pleased? I just can’t believe your nerve. You took my comments and splashed them all over the front page of the local paper. I thought you wanted factual information. Instead you’ve turned me into a . . . I don’t know . . . a celebrity.’

  ‘I didn’t misquote you, did I?’

  It was Josh’s turn to shout now. ‘That is not the point!’

  ‘Then what is?’

  ‘I’m not a hero; I didn’t do it for publicity . . .’

  ‘Then why did you do it? Pure altruism? Or did the DIY store pay you a bonus?’

  Josh turned, red faced, and headed back towards the hall.

  Jemma followed. She wasn’t going to let this rest. She had done nothing wrong. In fact, she had done him a favour.

  ‘Josh – don’t you walk away from me.’ She caught him by the arm and pulled him outside. ‘What is your problem?’

  ‘Firstly, it was not heroics. I just did what anyone with a scrap of compassion would do. Secondly, you have used things I told you privately, and thirdly . . .’ He looked down at his feet. ‘I thought you cared enough about me, I thought you’d got to know me well enough to realize that I wouldn’t want all this attention, all this glory.’

  He looked up and Jemma searched his brown eyes. Her anger was diminishing but she still needed to make her point.

  ‘I understand what you’re saying,’ a phrase she used when she didn’t understand what someone was saying, ‘but, this was news. Best of all, this was good news – ’

  ‘Good news!’ His voice rose an octave with incredulity. ‘My workplace almost burns down, a man nearly dies, and I get my hands burnt – superficial and deep dermal burns the hospital said. There may be some permanent scarring they said. Great news, let everyone rejoice!’

  ‘The fire got put out and nobody died. All right, you got hurt, but you’ll heal.’

  ‘Thanks very much!’

  ‘No, hear me out. If you had any idea of what comes in to newspaper offices, if it’s not boring or trivial, it’s the most heartbreaking stories of suicides, lives ended in horrific road accidents, or murders. Some days I wonder what kind of world we live in. Sometimes what I hear and see, and what I have to investigate and write about makes my heart sick. Sometimes I have to go home and shower, just to get the feeling of degradation off me. Then we get a story like this, a story of . . . well, hope. You did a good thing, Josh, and the public need to know about it. People need hope. I managed to persuade my boss to run that story as the front page. Do you know what the alternative was?’

  Josh shook his head.

  ‘It was the story of a woman of ninety-eight who was attacked in her own home. She was robbed of sixty pounds, her pension and savings, and left shocked and bleeding. A neighbour found her later that day but she died in hospital from her injuries and from shock. That’s what happens in Monksford.’

  ‘Isn’t it important that people know about the old lady too?’

  ‘Of course, and the story did go into the paper, along with information from the police about how to keep safe. It just wasn’t the first thing they saw when the paper dropped through their letterbox. You did something special, Josh, and no, I don’t think just “anyone” would have done what you did. You rescued someone. You saved their life. And you put your own life at risk to do it. To my mind, that’s no small thing.’

  She took him by the shoulders. ‘Please, Josh, don’t be angry with me.’

  ‘I’m not angry. It’s just that there are more important things.’

  ‘More important than saving a man’s life?’

  ‘ “For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for him will find it.” ’

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘Look it up.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘In the Bible – Matthew 16. You have got a Bible, haven’t you?’

  Jemma growled in frustration. ‘Don’t you dare throw Bible verses at me. If you want to talk to me, you can explain properly in words I can understand.’

  ‘How’s this? I am not a hero. Jesus is. I don’t want to be on the front of the Monksford Gazette. I want him to be. I don’t want people talking about me. I want them talking about him. What I did was nothing. Zero. Compared with what he did. I prolonged one man’s earthly life for possibly a few years. Jesus forfeited his life so we could live forever. Do you understand?’

  ‘No.’ said Jemma. She was getting cold, standing out here discussing metaphysics with this man. ‘Besides he’s been dead for two thousand years!’

  ‘No, he hasn’t!’

  ‘Of course he has! It’s there in the play. You should know. Christ’s death on the cross.’

  ‘No, you should know. What about his resurrection and appearance to Mary Magdalene.’

  ‘This is all real to you, isn’t it?’ Jemma studied Josh’s face. He wasn’t just acting in a play; he was living another man’s life.

  ‘Yes,’ he said softly.

  ‘Look, I’m sorry I used your story like that. I should have asked first.’

  ‘Yes, you should have.’

  ‘I’ve apologised. I meant it.’

  ‘Okay, just don’t do it again.’

 
‘Well don’t go rescuing anyone else from burning buildings.’

  Josh shook his head. ‘I meant I don’t want to see anything else about me emblazoned across the local press.’

  ‘I promise.’ Before he could stop her, she gave him a peck on the cheek. He looked startled and put his hand to his face, as if she had slapped him. She turned and walked into the church hall. She didn’t look back, because she didn’t want him to see the smirk on her face.

  The second half of the rehearsal went better than the first. Josh had relaxed, and there was more warmth between them. Ruth had grabbed a Bible, and they blocked out the scene where Martha and Mary took Jesus to Lazarus’s tomb. Some mourners were cast in role, and the company performed the shortest yet most profound verse in the Bible: ‘Jesus wept.’

  At the end of the rehearsal everyone looked happier. Alistair and Ruth seemed deep in conversation, the woman playing Martha had flown off to relieve babysitters, and the disciples and Jewish leaders had disappeared to the Blue Bell.

  ‘Do you want to join them at the pub, or do you want a lift home?’ Jemma asked Josh.

  ‘Home, I think.’ He sighed. ‘I’m back to work tomorrow. Not that I can do much with these.’ He looked at his hands with the white dressings covering both palms.

  Jemma drove down the High Street, but instead of continuing to the bypass she turned left into the Todbourne Road.

  ‘I think you’ve taken the wrong turn,’ Josh said.

  ‘I don’t think I have,’ said Jemma.

  ‘You were supposed to be taking me home.’

  ‘I am, you just didn’t specify whose home.’

  ‘Stop the car!’

  ‘Josh, what’s the matter?’ She pulled up to the kerb, flicked the key to silence the engine, clicked the catch on her seatbelt, and turned to face him.

  ‘You know exactly what the matter is.’ He swivelled in his seat to face her.

  ‘My home is very nice,’ she wheedled.

  ‘Jemma, what are you playing at?’

  As if he didn’t know, thought Jemma. ‘Well, I like you and I think you like me . . . and I thought we could go back to my place for a coffee and . . .’