MORNING SERIAL
HE re-entered his house noisily, so as to make sure of being audible. The young couple were sitting in opposite easy chairs when he entered the living room. The room seemed to be charged with the aftermath of their tenderness. The lovers had obviously bolted for their seats as soon as they heard him enter. He watched Isolde’s full skirts subside. The sensation of their blissful intimacy crawled on the surface of his body, and he felt as if they were surreptitiously winking at one another behind his back, though he knew they were not. ‘May I offer you coffee, Miss Dahl?’ Saying her name seemed a way of threatening her; offering a naked blade to the blind. ‘No, really, thank you, I should be getting back. Wolfi is going to teach me the cello.’ ‘That’s nice. I met an old acquaintance in the village. He invited me to the Blutehof,’ he taunted her, perversely, since she was blind to the blade. ‘It seems they are having a naval reunion. A big do.’ Wolfi yawned. He traditionally yawned at any mention of the Navy. U-boat anecdotes prostrated him. The destroyer Dresden brought on suicidal boredom. Nostalgia for the sea made him itch. It had always worked out very neatly until now: Wolfi never wanting to know what Michael had never wanted to tell. AN hour later Isolde was on the telephone, her low voice shaking. ‘Mr Quantz, the little girl I was telling you about — that I was worried about – she’s missing. Would you come over? They want everyone out searching. I feel so awful. I knew there was something badly wrong, I should have spoken. Rachel, we were talking about her, your pupil, Rachel Goldman?’ ‘Hang on there. I’ll be right over.’ > The Element of Water by Stevie Davies is published by Parthian in the Library of Wales series www.parthianbooks.com