In Another Country (28 page)

The after-lingerings of a midsummer sunset last forever. Infinitely slowly pallor passes towards blackness. The vanishing light edges north, smoulders on earth long after the source of it has gone below. But with an utter abruptness the light went out in the old couple's downstairs room. They're going to bed, the young woman at the barrier said. Mr. Carlton shuddered. The bedroom light came on. The old woman in her floral dress stood at the window illumined and looking out. Perhaps she stood there every night, every soft summer night at least, and looked down on the close and the kitchen garden for a minute or two, taking it in. She drew the curtains. You're crying, said the young woman holding Mr. Carlton's arm. What is it? You're crying? What's the matter? No, no, Mr. Carlton replied. I have two grown-up daughters, older than you, with children, a great joy, as yours will be. No, no, all is well. The light in the bedroom went out. They're going to sleep, the young woman said. Is it that? Is that why you're crying? Yes, said Mr. Carlton. It's that.

The southbound carriageway opened. Down it in a flickering torrent of blue lights the police cars and the ambulances screamed. After them, bulkier but quietly, came the fire engines. Carnage, said Mr. Carlton. A few minutes later the normal traffic followed, three lanes of it, headlong, heedless. Now we'll be moving soon, said Mr. Carlton. Do you want to go back to your car? I'll stay here, if you don't mind, until it starts, said the young woman still gripping Mr. Carlton's arm.
 

 

David Constantine is an award-winning short story writer, poet, and translator. He has published four collections of short stories in the UK:
Back at the Spike
,
Under the Dam
,
The Shieling
, and the winner of the 2013 Frank O'Connor Award,
Tea at the Midland and Other Stories
. Constantine is also the author of the novel
Davies
, and a work of biography,
Fields of Fire: A Life of Sir William Hamilton
. His collections of poetry include
Caspar Hauser
,
The Pelt of Wasps
,
Collected Poems
,
Nine Fathom Deep
,
Elder
, and
Something for the Ghosts
, which was shortlisted for the Whitbread Poetry Prize. He has translated Hölderlin, Goethe, and Kleist, as well as Bertolt Brecht's
Love Poems
(with Tom Kuhn; Liveright, 2014). In 2003, his translation of Hans Magnus Enzensberger's
Lighter Than Air
won the Corneliu M Popescu Prize for European Poetry Translation. He lives in Oxford and on Bryher, Isles of Scilly. Until 2012 he edited
Modern Poetry in Translation
with his wife Helen.