The Crystal World. Robert MacFarlane

surrounded by a circle of onlookers, holding in his upraised hands a large native carving of a crucifix. Brandishing it like a sword over his head, he waved it from left to right as if semaphoring to some distant peak. Every few seconds he stopped and lowered the carving to inspect it, his thin face perspiring.

      The statuette, a cruder cousin of the jewelled orchid Sanders had seen, was carved from a pale-yellow gem-stone similar to chrysolite, the outstretched figure of the Christ embedded in a sheath of prism-like quartz. As the priest waved the statuette in the air, shaking it in a paroxysm of anger, the crystals seemed to deliquesce, the light pouring from them as from a burning taper.

      ‘Balthus—!’

      Dr. Sanders pushed through the crowd watching the priest. The faces were half averted, keeping an eye open for the police, as if the people were aware of their own complicity in whatever act of lèse-majesté Father Balthus was now punishing. The priest ignored them and continued to shake the carving, then lowered it from the air and felt the crystalline surface.

      ‘Balthus, what on earth—?’ Sanders began, but the priest shouldered him aside. Whirling the crucifix like a propeller, he watched its light flashing away, intent only on exorcizing whatever powers it held for him.

      There was a shout from one of the stall-holders, and Dr. Sanders saw a native police-sergeant approaching cautiously in the distance. Immediately the crowd began to scatter. Panting from his efforts, Father Balthus let one end of the crucifix fall to the ground. Still holding it like a blunted sword, he looked down at its dull surface. The crystalline sheath had vanished into the air.

      ‘Obscene, obscene …!’ he muttered to Dr. Sanders, as the latter took his arm and propelled him through the stalls. Sanders paused to toss the carving on to the blue sheet covering the owner’s stall. The shaft, fashioned from some kind of polished wood, felt like a stick of ice. He pulled a five-franc note from his wallet and stuffed it into the stall-owner’s hands, then pushed Father Balthus in front of him. The priest was staring up at the sky and at the distant forest beyond the market. Deep within the great boughs the leaves flickered with the same hard light that had flared from the cross.

      ‘Balthus, can’t you see …?’ Sanders took the priest’s hand in a firm grip when they reached the wharf. The pale hand was as cold as the crucifix. ‘It was meant as a compliment. There was nothing obscene there – you’ve seen a thousand jewelled crosses.’

      The priest at last seemed to recognize him. His narrow face stared sharply at the doctor. He pulled his hand away. ‘You obviously don’t understand, Doctor! That cross was not jewelled!’

      Dr. Sanders watched him stride off, head and shoulders held stiffly with a fierce self-sufficient pride, the slim hands behind his back twisting and fretting like nervous serpents.

      Later that day, as he and Louise Peret had dinner together in the deserted hotel, Dr. Sanders said: ‘I don’t know what the good Father’s motives are, but I’m certain his bishop wouldn’t approve of them.’

      ‘You think he may have … changed sides?’ Louise asked.

      Laughing at this, Sanders replied: ‘That may be putting it too strongly, but I suspect that, professionally speaking, he was trying to confirm his doubts rather than allay them. That cross in the market drove him into a frenzy – he was literally trying to shake it to death.’

      ‘But why? I’ve seen those native carvings, they’re beautiful but just ordinary pieces of jewellery.’

      ‘No, Louise. That’s the point. As Balthus knew, they’re not ordinary by any means. There’s something about the light they give out – I didn’t get a chance to examine one closely – but it seems to come from inside them, not from the sun. A hard, intense light, you can see it all over Port Matarre.’

      ‘I know.’ Louise’s hand strayed to the sun-glasses that lay beside her plate, safely within reach like some potent talisman. At intervals she automatically opened and closed them. ‘When you first arrive here everything seems dark, but then you look at the forest and see the stars burning in the leaves.’ She tapped the glasses. ‘That’s why I wear these, Doctor.’

      ‘Is it?’ Sanders picked up the glasses and held them in the air. One of the largest pairs he had seen, their frames were almost three inches deep. ‘Where did you get them? They’re huge, Louise, they divide your face into two halves.’

      Louise shrugged. She lit a cigarette with a nervous flourish. ‘It’s March 21st, Doctor, the day of the equinox.’

      ‘The equinox? Yes, of course … when the sun crosses the equator, and day and night are the same length …’ Sanders pondered this. These divisions into dark and light seemed everywhere around them in Port Matarre, in the contrasts between Ventress’s white suit and Balthus’s dark soutane, in the white arcades with their shadowed in-fills, and even in his thoughts of Suzanne Clair, the sombre twin of the young woman watching him across the table with her frank eyes.

      ‘At least you can choose, Doctor, that’s one thing. Nothing is blurred or grey now.’ She leaned forward. ‘Why did you come to Port Matarre? These friends, are you really looking for them?’

      Sanders turned away from her level gaze. ‘It’s too difficult to explain, I …’ He debated whether to confide in her, and then with an effort pulled himself together. Sitting up, he touched her hand. ‘Look, tomorrow we must try to hire a car or a boat. If we share expenses it will give us longer in Mont Royal.’

      ‘I’ll gladly come with you. But do you think it’s safe?’

      ‘For the time being. Whatever the police think, I’m sure it’s not a virus growth.’ He felt the emerald in the gilt ring on Louise’s finger, and added: ‘In a small way I’m something of an expert in these matters.’

      Without moving her hand from his touch, Louise said quietly: ‘I’m sure you are, Doctor. I spoke this afternoon to the steward on the steamer.’ She added: ‘My aunt’s cook is now a patient at your leproserie.’

      Sanders hesitated. ‘Louise, it’s not my leproserie. Don’t think I’m committed to it. As you say, perhaps we have a firm choice now.’

      They had finished their coffee. Sanders stood up and took Louise’s arm. Perhaps because of her resemblance to Suzanne, he seemed to understand her movements as her hips and shoulders touched his own, as if familiar intimacies were already beginning to repeat themselves. Louise avoided his eyes, but her body remained close to him as they moved between the tables.

      They walked out into the empty lobby. The desk-clerk sat asleep with his head leaning against the small switchboard. To their left the brass rails of the staircase shone in the damp light, the limp fronds of the potted palms trailing on to the worn marble steps. Still holding Louise’s arm, and feeling her fingers take his hand, Sanders glanced out through the entrance. In the shadows of the arcade he caught a glimpse of the shoes and trousers of a man leaning against a column.

      ‘It’s too late to go out,’ Louise said.

      Sanders looked down at her, aware that for once all the inertia of sexual conventions, and his own reluctance to involve himself intimately with others, had slipped away. In addition, he felt that the past day at Port Matarre, the ambivalent atmosphere of the deserted town, in some way placed them at a pivotal point below the dark and white shadows of the equinox. At these moments of balance any act was possible.

      As they reached his door Louise drew her hand away and stepped forward into the darkened room. Sanders followed her and closed the door. Louise turned towards him, the pale light from the neon sign below illuminating one side of her face and mouth. Knocking her glasses to the floor as their hands brushed, Sanders held her in his arms, freeing himself for the moment from Suzanne Clair and the dark image of her face that floated like a dim lantern before his eyes.

      Shortly after midnight, as Sanders lay asleep across the pillow on his bed, he woke to feel Louise touch his shoulder.

      ‘Louise …?’ He reached up and put his arm around her waist,