The Bridge Builder Of Arta Page 2

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  While eating his lunch up at Headley View, Benjamin often contemplated the meaning of the two statues that stood either side of the two benches. What was the significance of the bridge plans, the box of food, the wall which the wife was standing in? Or even the fact that the wife looked blankly at her husband while he seemed only interested in what the North Sea had to offer. It is true that he went to Headley View to relax, to eat the lunch that Marie had prepared for him, and to read The Yorkshire Post. But he would more often than not find his mind wandering to the bridge builder and his wife, so much so that after some little time, he made his way to the small county library in Scarborough. There, among the creaking wooden floors and towering shelves, he read in a small Victoria-era guidebook that the statues had been unveiled in 1879, two years after the staircase up to Headley View had been constructed.

  At the beginning of August, Scarborough was fortunate enough to be bathed in a week of unusually strong summer sun. The trains arriving at the Westborough Road railway station would spill forth squealing crowds of day-trippers from Leeds and Harrogate who would pour down the steps and head straight for the sands or the pier. Benjamin climbed up to Headley View and found, as always, his two statue friends, the two empty benches, the shack of a shelter and the overgrown lawns awaiting him. And then there was the silence. The unworldly silence of Headley View. Even on days of high summer when the long sands of the bays would echo to squeals of delight, barely a whisper reached him up high.

  Benjamin approached the iron railings and lay his hands upon the cool iron where black paint flaked away at his touch. Born in the urban maze of Leeds, the corrosive power of the sea air still staggered him. Just behind Benjamin, his shadow in fact darkening Benjamin's shoes, was the statue of the bridge builder. As he watched the tiny figures racing about on the beach below, Benjamin heard something behind him, just for a split second - a sound he couldn't place but felt instinctively was something scraping on the hard ground. He turned to greet the person who'd presumably made this sound, but there was no-one there. Looking up at the bridge builder's face, Benjamin saw his eyes looking directly at him, that peculiar sensation you also get with pictures. He collected his lunchbox from the bench and returned below to Parnell Road.