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The Sandpit

Nicholas Shakespeare
Chapters (55)
  1. Cover
  2. About the Author
  3. Also by Nicholas Shakespeare
  4. Dedication
  5. Epigraph
  6. Prologue
  7. PART ONE
  8. Chapter One
  9. Chapter Two
  10. Chapter Three
  11. Chapter Four
  12. Chapter Five
  13. Chapter Six
  14. Chapter Seven
  15. Chapter Eight
  16. Chapter Nine
  17. Chapter Ten
  18. Chapter Eleven
  19. Chapter Twelve
  20. Chapter Thirteen
  21. Chapter Fourteen
  22. Chapter Fifteen
  23. Chapter Sixteen
  24. Chapter Seventeen
  25. Chapter Eighteen
  26. Chapter Nineteen
  27. Chapter Twenty
  28. PART TWO
  29. Chapter Twenty-one
  30. Chapter Twenty-two
  31. Chapter Twenty-three
  32. Chapter Twenty-four
  33. Chapter Twenty-five
  34. Chapter Twenty-six
  35. Chapter Twenty-seven
  36. Chapter Twenty-eight
  37. Chapter Twenty-nine
  38. Chapter Thirty
  39. PART THREE
  40. Chapter Thirty-one
  41. Chapter Thirty-two
  42. Chapter Thirty-three
  43. Chapter Thirty-four
  44. Chapter Thirty-five
  45. Chapter Thirty-six
  46. PART FOUR
  47. Chapter Thirty-seven
  48. Chapter Thirty-eight
  49. Chapter Thirty-nine
  50. Chapter Forty
  51. Chapter Forty-one
  52. Chapter Forty-two
  53. Chapter Forty-three
  54. Chapter Forty-four
  55. Acknowledgements

Cover

Vintage Books

About the Author

Nicholas Shakespeare was born in 1957. The son of a diplomat, much of his youth was spent in the Far East and South America. His books have been translated into twenty-two languages. They include The Vision of Elena Silves (winner of the Somerset Maugham Award), Snowleg, The Dancer Upstairs, Inheritance, Priscilla and Six Minutes in May. He has been longlisted for the Booker Prize twice and is a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

Also by Nicholas Shakespeare

ALSO BY NICHOLAS SHAKESPEARE

FICTION

The Vision of Elena Silves

The High Flyer

The Dancer Upstairs

Snowleg

Secrets of the Sea

Inheritance

Stories from Other Places

NON-FICTION

Bruce Chatwin

In Tasmania

Priscilla

Six Minutes in May

Dedication

To Roger and Ian Kellas

Epigraph

The essential self is innocent, and when it tastes its own innocence knows that it lives forever.

JOHN UPDIKE, AFTER WILLIAM BLAKE

Prologue

Shula read his text message, and the air thinned around her. Why was he sending her this? It was exactly what they had agreed he must never do.

Her instinct was to call him. In that void between dialling his number and the distinctive British ringtone, she caught herself. Foolish. Foolish. Abruptly, she rang off. Her need to hear Rustum’s voice ran deeper than her common sense.

The baby was still asleep, no one else in the bedroom, yet she had the sensation that eyes were tracking her.

She turned off the phone and slapped it, face down, on the small chest of drawers. Her movements were self-conscious, disembodied even, the actions of a young woman who had just woken up and was watching herself being watched. She knew implicitly that even the most neutral gesture, like unpinning her hair, would become data.

It was early Saturday morning and he was supposed to have telephoned last night. She had dozed off, waiting. This reckless text of his, so out of character, added to her foreboding.

She picked up her brush and pulled it through her hair. She hadn’t had time to wash it, although the baby took pleasure in the smell and in grabbing hold and hiding in the black weight of it. Her son Samir, too, had loved to tangle himself like that. With his departure, she had had to cut herself off from the physicality that she had shared with her first-born, as well as rechannel the longing which prickled her skin whenever she thought of her husband. It was an acute missing, and she had struggled. But that was the deal.

And now this text.