For a moment Rice doubted; perhaps the figure would laugh and stride into the mist. Ice sliced through his toes; he tottered and then plunged. "How did you make sure there was n.o.body about?" he forced through swollen lips. "When you got rid of him?"
The eyes flickered; the scar shifted. "Who, Phillips? G.o.d, man, I never did know what you meant half the time. He"ll be wondering where I am--I"ll have to think up a story to satisfy him."
"I think you"ll be able to do that." Cold with fear as he was, Rice was still warmed by fulfilment as he sensed that he had the upper hand, that he was able to taunt as had the man on the cliff-top before the plunge. He plunged into the fog, knowing that now he would be followed.
The grey fields were abruptly blocked by a more solid anonymity, the streets of Lower Brichester, suffocating individuality, erasing it through generations. Whenever he"d walked through these streets with Jack on the short route to the pub each glance of Jack"s had reminded him that he was part of this anonymity, this inertia. But no longer, he told himself. Signs of life were spa.r.s.e: a postman cycled creaking by; beyond a window a radio announcer laughed; a cat curled among milk-bottles. The door was rolled down on a pinball arcade, and a girl in a cheap fur coat was leaping about in the doorway of a boutique to keep herself warm until the keys arrived. Rice felt eyes finger the girl, then revert to him; they had watched him since the beginning of the journey, although the figure seemed to face always forward. Rice glanced at the other; he was gazing in the direction of his stride, and a block of ice grew in Rice"s stomach while the glazing of the pavement cracked beneath his feet.
They pa.s.sed a square foundation enshrining a rusty pram; here a bomb had blown a house asunder. The next street, Rice realised, and dug his nails into the rubber of the torch in his pocket. The blitz had almost bypa.s.sed Brichester; here and there one pa.s.sed from curtained windows to a gaping house, eventually rebuilt if in the town, neglected in Lower Brichester. Was this the key? Had someone been driven underground by blitz conditions, or had something been released by bombing? In either case, what form of camouflage would they have had to adopt to live? Rice thought he knew, but he ------------------------------------com71 didn"t want to think it through; he wanted to put an end to it. And round a corner the abandoned house focused into view.
A car purred somewhere; the pavement was faintly numbered for hopscotch. Rice gazed about covertly; there must be n.o.body in sight. And at his side the figure did the same. Terrified, Rice yet had to repress a nervous giggle. "There"s the house," he said. "I suppose you"ll want to go in."
"If you"ve got something to show me." The scar wrinkled again.
Bricks were heaped in what had been the garden; ice glistened in their pores. Rice could see nothing through the windows, which were shuttered with tin. A grey corrugated sheet had been peeled back from the doorway; it sc.r.a.ped at Rice"s ankle as he entered.
The light was dim; he gripped his torch. Above him a shattered skylight illuminated a staircase full of holes through which moist dust fell. To his right a door, one panel gouged out, still hung from a hinge. He hurried into the room, kicking a stray brick.
The fireplace gaped, half curtained by a hanging strip of wallpaper. Otherwise the room was bare, deserted probably for years. Of course the people of the neighbourhood didn"t have to know exactly what was here to avoid it. In the hall tin rasped.
Rice ran into the kitchen, ahead on the left. Fog had penetrated a broken window; it filled his mouth as he panted. Opposite the cloven sink he saw a door. He wrenched it open, and in the other room the brick clattered.
Rice"s hands were gloved in frozen iron; his nails were shards of ice thrust into the fingertips, melting into his blood. One hand clutched towards the back door. He tottered forward and heard the children scream, thought once of Harriet, saw the figures on the cliff. I"m not a hero! he mouthed. How in G.o.d"s name did I get here? And the answer came: because he"d never really believed what he"d suspected. But the torch was shining, and he swung it down the steps beyond the open door.
They led into a cellar; bricks were scattered on the floor, bent knives and forks, soiled plates leading the torch-beam to tattered blankets huddled against the walls, hints of others in the shadows. And in one corner lay a man, surrounded by tins and a strip of corrugated metal.
The body glistened. Trembling, his mouth gaping at the stench which thickened the air, Rice descended, and the torch"s circle shrank. The man in the corner was dressed in red. Rice moved nearer. With a shock he realised that the man was naked, shining with red paint which also marked the tins and strip of metal. Suddenly he wrenched away and retched.
For a moment he was engulfed by nausea; then he heard footsteps in the ------------------------------------com72 kitchen. His fingers burned like wax and blushed at their clumsiness, but he caught up a brick. "You"ve found what you expected, have you?" the voice called.
Rice reached the steps, and a figure loomed above him, blotting out the light. With studied calm it felt about in the kitchen and produced a strip of corrugated tin. "Fancy," it said, "I thought I"d have to bring you here to see Harriet. Now it"ll have to be the other way round." Rice had no time to think; focusing his horror, fear and disgust with his lifetime of inaction, he threw the brick.
Rice was shaking by the time he had finished. He picked up the torch from the bottom step and as if compelled turned its beam on the two corpses. Yes, they were of the same stature--they would have been identical, except that the face of the first was an abstract crimson oval. Rice shuddered away from his fascination. He must see Harriet--it didn"t matter what excuse he gave, illness or anything, so long as he saw her. He shone the beam towards the steps to light his way, and the torch was wrested from his hand.
He didn"t think; he threw himself up the steps and into the kitchen. The bolts and lock on the back door had been rusted shut for years. Footsteps padded up the steps. He fell into the other room. Outside an ambulance howled its way to hospital. Almost tripping on the brick, he reached the hall. The ambulance"s blue light flashed in the doorway and pa.s.sed, and a figure with a grey sock covering its face blocked the doorway.
Rice backed away. No, he thought in despair, he couldn"t fail now; the fall from the cliff had ended the menace. But already he knew. He backed into something soft, and a hand closed over his mouth. The figure plodded towards him; the grey wool sucked in and out. The figure was his height, his build. He heard himself saying "I can always help to look after the children." And as the figure grasped a brick he knew what face waited beneath the wool. ------------------------------------com73
The Interloper
When Scott entered the cla.s.sroom it was as if a vacuum-jar had been clamped over the cla.s.s. Thirteen conversations were truncated; thirty boys stood, thirty folding seats slammed back; a geometry set crashed, scattered; John Norris coughed nervously, falsely, wondering if Scott had heard him saying seconds before to Dave Pierce "The Catacombs at lunchtime, then?" Scott"s gaze froze about him. "All right, sit down," said Scott. "I don"t want this period wasted." He sat. The congregation sat. Homework books were flurried open. John sensed Scott"s haste, and pin-cushions grew in his palms; he thought of the solution on which everyone else agreed; he lived for the arrival of the Inspector in the afternoon, when Scott surely couldn"t take it out of him. clamped over the cla.s.s. Thirteen conversations were truncated; thirty boys stood, thirty folding seats slammed back; a geometry set crashed, scattered; John Norris coughed nervously, falsely, wondering if Scott had heard him saying seconds before to Dave Pierce "The Catacombs at lunchtime, then?" Scott"s gaze froze about him. "All right, sit down," said Scott. "I don"t want this period wasted." He sat. The congregation sat. Homework books were flurried open. John sensed Scott"s haste, and pin-cushions grew in his palms; he thought of the solution on which everyone else agreed; he lived for the arrival of the Inspector in the afternoon, when Scott surely couldn"t take it out of him.
"Answer to the first one. Robbins?" On the bus that morning, during breaks in the dawn game of musical window-seats, they"d compared solutions. ("What"d you get, Norris?" "34.5." "You sure? I had 17.31." "So did I." "Yes, I did too") The pins stung. "Correct, x knowledge knowledge 2.03 or com3.7. Anybody not get that? Any questions?" But n.o.body dared stand unless so ordered. "Next. Thomas?" Thomas stood, adjusted his homework, gave vent to a spurious sigh of desperate concentration. Scott drummed a stick of chalk, swept down in dusty robes on Thomas. "Come on, lad, you can"t dither in an exam. 27.5 is the answer, isn"t it?" Thomas beamed. "That"s right, sir, of course." "No, it isn"t, you blockhead!" Scott strode behind Thomas to peer at his homework, drove his knuckles into Thomas"s kidney with an accuracy born of years of practice. "Wake your ideas up, lad! Fuller, can you show Thomas how to think?" 2.03 or com3.7. Anybody not get that? Any questions?" But n.o.body dared stand unless so ordered. "Next. Thomas?" Thomas stood, adjusted his homework, gave vent to a spurious sigh of desperate concentration. Scott drummed a stick of chalk, swept down in dusty robes on Thomas. "Come on, lad, you can"t dither in an exam. 27.5 is the answer, isn"t it?" Thomas beamed. "That"s right, sir, of course." "No, it isn"t, you blockhead!" Scott strode behind Thomas to peer at his homework, drove his knuckles into Thomas"s kidney with an accuracy born of years of practice. "Wake your ideas up, lad! Fuller, can you show Thomas how to think?"
The exam in six months, possessing Scott with terrifying force. The Inspector"s visit, driving Scott to fury at being subdued in the afternoon. Oh, G.o.d, John prayed, don"t let him ask me question five. "That"s it, Fuller. Go on, sit down, Thomas, we don"t need you as cla.s.s figurehead. Hawks, what have you got for the next one?" The cla.s.s next door roared with laughter, Foghorn Ford must be taking them, the English master, John"s favourite, ------------------------------------com74 who let him write poetry in cla.s.s sometimes when he"d turned in particularly good homework. Silence. Laughter. John was jealous. Scott was behind him somewhere, pacing closer: "Come on, come on, on, Hawks!" Further down the corridor cracked the flat sound of a strap. Some of the masters you could come to terms with, like the art master; you had only to emulate the skunk to get rid of him. But Strutt, the gym master--he"d have your gym-shoe off for that. And you couldn"t do much about Collins"s geography cla.s.s--"Spit" they called him, because sitting on his front row was like standing on a stormy promenade. Yet no cla.s.s was so suffocated by fear as Scott"s. One lunch-hour when John had been writing poetry Thomas had s.n.a.t.c.hed his notebook and Scott had come in and confiscated it; when John had protested Scott had slapped his face. Dave Pierce had told John to protest to Foghorn Ford, but he hadn"t had the courage. Next door Ford"s cla.s.s laughed. Further off the strap came down: Hawks!" Further down the corridor cracked the flat sound of a strap. Some of the masters you could come to terms with, like the art master; you had only to emulate the skunk to get rid of him. But Strutt, the gym master--he"d have your gym-shoe off for that. And you couldn"t do much about Collins"s geography cla.s.s--"Spit" they called him, because sitting on his front row was like standing on a stormy promenade. Yet no cla.s.s was so suffocated by fear as Scott"s. One lunch-hour when John had been writing poetry Thomas had s.n.a.t.c.hed his notebook and Scott had come in and confiscated it; when John had protested Scott had slapped his face. Dave Pierce had told John to protest to Foghorn Ford, but he hadn"t had the courage. Next door Ford"s cla.s.s laughed. Further off the strap came down: Whap! Whap! Silence. Laughter. Silence. Laughter. Whap! Whap! Whap! Whap! WHAP! WHAP! John felt Dave"s eyes on him, deploring. He turned to nod and Scott said "Norris!" John felt Dave"s eyes on him, deploring. He turned to nod and Scott said "Norris!"
He stood. More moist pins stabbed. On the still air hung chalk and Scott"s aftershave. "Yes, sir," he stammered.
"Yes, sir. The first time I repeat myself it has to be to you. Question five, Norris, question five!"
The Inspector. The Catacombs at lunchtime. Foghorn Ford always called him "Mr Norris." None of these could comfort him; fear twinged up from his bowels like wind. "34.5, sir?" he pleaded.
"Norris--Thomas I can understand, because he"s an idiot, but you--I showed you how to do this one on the board yesterday. Don"t tell me you weren"t here."
"I was here, sir. I didn"t understand, sir."
"You didn"t understand, sir. You didn"t ask, sir, did you? You were writing poetry about it, were you? Come out here." Scott cast his robes back; chalk whirled into the air.
John wanted to shut his eyes, but that wasn"t permitted; the cla.s.s was watching, willing him to represent them in the ritual without shaming them. Scott pulled John"s left hand straight, adjusted it to correct height with the strap. He aimed. John"s thumb closed inadvertently. Scott flicked it aside with the strap. The crowd was hushed, tense. The strap came down. John"s hand swelled with hectic blood.
"Now, Pierce," said Scott. "I"m sure you can enlighten your friend."
A bell shrilled. Ford"s cla.s.s pelted to the playground, flattening against the wall to file as Scott approached. "Time for a drink, Ford?" he called. John ------------------------------------com75 averted his face as he pa.s.sed, swollen with fear and hatred. "Scott"s not too bad really," Dave Pierce said. "Better than that swine Ford, anyway, keeping me in last week."
Disloyal to his throbbing puffed-up palm, thought John bitterly. "Glad you think so," he muttered.
"Never mind, John. Did you hear this one? Two men go to a doctor, see--was John could guess the sort of thing: he didn"t like to hear it, couldn"t join in the secret sn.i.g.g.e.r at "Edgar Allan Poe," Poe," "oui-oui," and so on. "We"d better hurry," he interrupted. "You get past the gate and I"ll be under the wall." "oui-oui," and so on. "We"d better hurry," he interrupted. "You get past the gate and I"ll be under the wall."
He strolled past the playground; boys walking, talking, shivering in the pale February light which might have been shed by the gnawed slice of moon on the horizon; a group in one corner huddled round photographs, another conferring over homework for the afternoon; beyond, on the misty playingfield, a few of Strutt"s favourites running in gym-suits. On the bus that morning a man cradling a briefcase had offered to help John with his homework, but he was obscurely scared of strange men. He stood against the wall beyond the playground. When Dave"s lunch pa.s.s flew over, he caught it and made for the gate.
A prefect leaned against the railings; he straightened himself, frowning, as befitted his position--one day a week for the school spirit, he"d rather be at the pub. Above his head words were scratched on the king george v grammar sign through the caretaker"s third coat of paint, in defiance of the headmaster"s regular threats. John flashed the pa.s.s from his good hand and escaped.
Down the road Dave was waiting by fragments of a new school: a lone shining coffee-urn on a counter, pyramids of chairs, skulls drawn in whitewash on the one plate-gla.s.s pane; a plane had left a fading slash of whitewash on the sky. "How do we get to The Catacombs?" Dave asked.
"I don"t know," John answered, feeling comfort drain, emptying the hour. "I thought you did."
Heels clicked by in unison. "Let"s follow these girls, then. They"re a bit of all right," Dave said. "They may be going."
John drew into himself; if they turned they"d laugh at his school blazer. Their pink coats swung, luring Dave; their perfume trailed behind them-- The Catacombs would be thick with that and smoke. He followed Dave. The girls leapt across the road, running as if to jettison their legs, and were lost in a pillared pub between a shuttered betting-shop and the Co-operative Social Club. Dave was set to follow, but John heard drumming somewhere beneath the side street to their left. "It"s up here," he said. "Come on, we"ve lost ten minutes already." ------------------------------------com76 Cars on the main road swept past almost silently; in the side street they could hear beneath their feet a pounding drum, a blurred electric guitar. Somewhere down there were The Catacombs--but the walls betrayed no entrance to this converted cellar, reclaimed by the city in its blind subterranean search for s.p.a.ce. Menace throbbed into the drum from the rhythm of John"s hot hand. Spiders shifted somnolently in a white web wall within a crevice. A figure approached down the alley, a newspaper-seller with an armful of Brichester Brichester Heralds, Heralds, his coat furred and patched as the walls. John drew back. The man pa.s.sed in silence, one hand on the bricks. As he leaned on the wall opposite the boys it gave slightly; a door disguised as uneven stone swung inwards from its socket. The man levered himself onward. his coat furred and patched as the walls. John drew back. The man pa.s.sed in silence, one hand on the bricks. As he leaned on the wall opposite the boys it gave slightly; a door disguised as uneven stone swung inwards from its socket. The man levered himself onward.
"That must be it," Dave said, stepping forward.
"I"m not so sure." The man had reached the main road and was croaking "Brichester Herald!" Herald!" John glanced back and saw the pub door open. Scott appeared and strode towards him. John glanced back and saw the pub door open. Scott appeared and strode towards him.
"No," John said. He thrust Dave through the opening; his last glimpse was of Scott buying a Brichester Brichester Herald. Herald. "That was your friend Scott," he snarled at Dave. "That was your friend Scott," he snarled at Dave.
"Well, it"s not my fault." Dave pointed ahead, down a stone corridor leading to a faint blue light around a turn. "That must be The Catacombs."
"Are you sure?" John asked, walking. "The music"s getting fainter. In fact, I can"t hear it anymore."
"I couldn"t really hear it anymore when we came in," Dave admitted. "Come on, it"s got to be here." They rounded a turn.
A wan blue glow narrowed away into dimness. Slowly a perspective formed; a long stone pa.s.sage, faintly glistening, too narrow to admit them abreast, perhaps turning in the distance--somehow lit by its own stones, luminously blue. It lured curiosity, yet John grasped Dave"s arm. "This can"t be it," he said. "We"d better not go on."
"I am, anyway. I want to see where it leads."
"Wait a minute," John said. "I just want to go back and see--was But he couldn"t p.r.o.nounce his inner turmoil. He was already frightened; they might get lost and not be back for Scott"s cla.s.s this afternoon. If Dave wanted to go on, let him. He was going back.
He turned the corner of the stagnant blue light and plunged into darkness. The moistness of the air hinted of lightless underground pools; the only sound was the sliding of his heels on slimy stone. He reached the wall ahead, the door. There was no door.
One fingernail, exploring, broke. He bit it off. His left hand, still sore, ------------------------------------com77 flinched from the wet unbroken stone. Suddenly alone and threatened, John fled back into the blue twilight, slipping in his own tracks. Dave was not waiting.
"Oh, G.o.d," John moaned. His eyes adjusted. Far down the perspective he made out a vague shape vanishing, its shadows suppressed by the unwavering light. He hurled himself into the corridor, arms sc.r.a.ping the stone, the archway hurling by above him, a turquoise spider plummeting on an azure thread, winding itself back. Globules beaded the brick; still plunging headlong, John brushed his forehead with his hand. Ahead the figure halted, waiting. "The door"s shut. We can"t get out," John panted, sobbing for breath.
"Then you"ll have to come with me," Dave said. "There must be another way out of this place, whatever it is."
"But we"re going downwards," John discovered.
"I know that. So we"ll have to go up again somewhere. Maybe-- Look!"
They were still walking; they had turned another bend. The pa.s.sage twisted onward, glowing. John tried not to look at Dave; the light had drained his face of blood, and doubt glinted faintly in his eyes. On the stone floor wisps of cobweb, tinted blue, led to another turn. And in the left-hand wall Dave had seen an opening, foreshortened. He ran to it; John followed, robbed of The Catacombs, seeking a way back to Scott"s next cla.s.s, to the Inspector. Dave faced the opening, and the doubt in his eyes brightened.
It was an opening, but a dead end: an archway six feet high, a foot deep, empty except for filaments of cobweb which their breath sucked out to float and fall back. Dave peered in, and a spider as large as a thumb ran from a matted corner. He threw himself aside; but the spider was empty, rattling on the stone.
John had pressed past to the next bend. Another downward twist; another alcove. He waited for Dave to join him. The second alcove was thick with cobwebs; they filled it, shining dully, shifting as Dave again took the lead. The boys were running; the light congealed about them, the ceiling descended, threads of cobweb drifted down. A turn, an alcove, webs. Another. Glancing sideways, John was chilled by a formless horror; the cobwebs in the alcove suggested a shape which he should be able to distinguish. But another fear burned this away like acid: returning late for Scott"s cla.s.s. "Look, it"s widening!" Dave shouted. Before John could see beyond him, they had toppled out into an open s.p.a.ce.
It was a circular vaulted chamber; above their heads a dome shone blue through webs like clouds. In the walls gaped other archways, radiating from the circular pool in the centre of the chamber. The pool was still. Its surface ------------------------------------com78 was a beaded mat of cobwebs like a rotting jewelled veil. "I don"t get it," Dave whispered; his voice settled through the air, disturbing shining airborne wisps. John said nothing. Then Dave touched his arm and pointed.
Beyond the pool, between two archways, stood a rack of clothes: hats, caps, a black overcoat, a tweed suit, a pinstripe with an incongruous orange handkerchief like a flag, a grey. They filled John with nightmare horror. "It must be a tramp," he said desperately.
"With all these things? I"m going to have a closer look." Dave moved round the pool.
"No, Dave, wait!" John skidded round the pool in pursuit; one foot slipped on the pool"s rim. He looked down, and his reflection was caught by cobwebs, jewelled with droplets, swallowed up. His voice vanished into corridors. "It"s past one now! You try one pa.s.sage and I"ll try another. One of them must lead out." Immediately he realised that he would be alone in his corridor among the matted alcoves; but at least he"d diverted Dave from the suits.
"That"s the best idea, yes. Just wait till I have a look at these. It won"t take a minute."
"You do that if you want to!" cried John. "I"m getting back!" He fell into the pa.s.sage next to that through which they had entered; the first alcove was less than a minute ahead. He looked back miserably. Dave was peering at the suits. John forced himself over the harsh blue stone. Then Dave screamed.
John knew he had to run--but to Dave or away? He was too old for blind heroism, too young for conscious selflessness. His legs trembled; he felt sick. He turned.
Dave hadn"t moved, but one suit lay crumpled at his feet. He was staring at what it had hung upon, too far for John to see in the blue haze. John"s hand pulsed and perspired. He stretched out his fingers towards Dave as if to draw him forward; Dave"s hands were warding off whatever was before him. John tore his feet free of the urge to flee. As he began to trudge forward, a figure moved between him and Dave. Cobwebs held to its shape like an aura. John recognised the profile and the patched coat. It was the newspaper seller.
John struggled to shriek a warning to Dave--but of what? His lips were gummed shut as if by cobwebs. His legs were tied to the stone. The man moved round the pool, beyond John"s vision. John"s lips worked, and Dave turned. His mouth opened, but this time no scream came. He backed around the pool, past the suits. And something appeared, hopping towards him inside the patched overcoat: long arms with claws reaching far beyond the ------------------------------------com79 sleeves, a head protruding far above the collar, and from what must have been a mouth a pouring stream of white which drifted into the air and sank towards Dave"s face as he fell, finally screaming. John clapped his hands over his ears as he ran towards the outside world, but Dave"s screams had already been m.u.f.fled.
As he fled past the first alcove, the web moaned feebly and opened a glazed eye. No more, he prayed, no more. Each turning was the last; each stretch was cruelly telescoped by the unrelenting light. His lungs were burning; each sucked breath drew a wisp of cobweb into his throat. In one alcove a girl"s eyes pleaded; her hand stretched a wedding-ring towards him. He screamed to blot out her stifled cries. In answer came a sound of something hopping round a bend behind him, of something wet slapping the walls. A web-wisp brushed his cheek. He blundered onward. Another bend. He heaved around it hoa.r.s.ely, and saw daylight.
The door was propped with an empty milk-bottle; someone had found and blocked it, perhaps meaning to return. He staggered out onto a patch of waste ground: a broken bed, a disembowelled car, a baby"s rattle encrusted with mud. Reaching behind him, he wrenched out the bottle. The door became one with the earth. Then he fell face downwards on the bed.
Dave! He was down there in an alcove! John jerked to his feet, shivering. Through the slight drizzle he saw people pa.s.sing, eyeing him oddly. He couldn"t tell them; they might be from the pool. Someone had to know. Dave was in The Catacombs--no, in the catacombs. Someone. Where was he? He sidled to the pavement, watching them all, ready to scream if one came near. Up the road from the school, in the opposite direction to that they"d taken so long ago. Even further from home than he"d thought. Ford. He"d tell Ford that Dave was in The Catacombs. He made for the school; the tangled lines of rain on the pavement looked like something he"d forgotten.
Scott was waiting at the gate. He folded his arms as John appeared. John"s terror kicked him in the stomach. Scott"s lips opened, waiting; then his gaze slipped from John to someone behind him, and his expression altered. "All right, Norris, you"d better get to cla.s.s," he said.
It was the Inspector! John thought as he hurried up the stairs to the familiar faces. He didn"t know where Ford was--perhaps he could tell the Inspector that Dave was in The Catacombs. If Scott would let him. He"d have to--he was scared of the Inspector. "He"s scared of the Inspector," he said to Dave. "What?" said Hawks behind him.
Scott and the Inspector entered; Scott held the door politely. The cla.s.s stood, raising chalk-dust and a cobweb from John"s blazer, which was grey ------------------------------------com80 with wisps, he saw. But then so was the Inspector"s pinstripe suit: even the orange handkerchief in his top pocket. "Dave, sir--Mr. Ford--was cried John, and vomited into his open desk. "My G.o.d!" shouted Scott. "Please, Mr. Scott," said the Inspector in a voice light yet clinging as cobwebs, "the boy"s ill. He looks frightened. I"ll take him downstairs and arrange something for him."
"Shall I wait?" hissed Scott.
"Better start your cla.s.s, Mr. Scott. I"ll have time to find out all I want to know about them."
Bare corridors. Leaping tiles smelling of polish. A strap cracking. Somewhere, laughter. A headlong latecomer who gaped at John and the figure leading him by the wrist. The tuning of the school orchestra. The dining-room, bare tables, metal plates. The cloakroom, racks of coats stirring in a draught. "I don"t think we can entrust you to anyone else"s care," said the Inspector.
The gates, deserted. They turned towards the pillared pub, the side street. There was still time. The fingers on his wrist were no longer fingers. The eyes were veiled as the pool. Two women with wheel-baskets were approaching. But his mouth was already choked closed by fear. They pa.s.sed on towards the side street. Yet his ears were clear, and he heard the comment one woman made.
"Did you see that? I"ll wager another case of "unwillingly to school"!" ------------------------------------com81
The Guy
You can can "that hide from Guy Fawkes Night. This year as usual I played Beethoven"s Fifth to blot out sound and memory, turned it loud and tried to read, fought back faces from the past as they appeared. In September and October the echoes of lone fireworks, the protests of distant startled dogs, the flopping faceless figures propped at bus-stops or wheeled in prams by children, had jarred into focus scenes I"d thought I had erased. Finally, as always, I stood up and succ.u.mbed. Walking, I saw memories, fading like the exploding molten claws upon the sky. On waste ground at the edge of Lower Brichester a gutted bonfire smouldered. Children stood about it, shaking sparklers as a dog shakes a rat. Then wood spat fire and flared; a man dragged off his boy to bed. Defined by flame, the child"s face fell in upon itself like a pumpkin wizening from last week"s Hallowe"en. He sobbed and gasped, but no words came. And I remembered. "that hide from Guy Fawkes Night. This year as usual I played Beethoven"s Fifth to blot out sound and memory, turned it loud and tried to read, fought back faces from the past as they appeared. In September and October the echoes of lone fireworks, the protests of distant startled dogs, the flopping faceless figures propped at bus-stops or wheeled in prams by children, had jarred into focus scenes I"d thought I had erased. Finally, as always, I stood up and succ.u.mbed. Walking, I saw memories, fading like the exploding molten claws upon the sky. On waste ground at the edge of Lower Brichester a gutted bonfire smouldered. Children stood about it, shaking sparklers as a dog shakes a rat. Then wood spat fire and flared; a man dragged off his boy to bed. Defined by flame, the child"s face fell in upon itself like a pumpkin wizening from last week"s Hallowe"en. He sobbed and gasped, but no words came. And I remembered.
A papier-mache hand, a burning fuse, a scream that never came-- But the memory was framed by the day"s events; the houses of the past, my own and Joe Turner"s, were overlaid by the picture I"d built up from behind my desk that morning, the imagined home of the boy who"d stood before me accused of setting fireworks in a car"s exhaust pipe: drunken father, weak wife, backgarden lavatory, all the tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs--I could see it clearly without having seen it. My parents hadn"t liked my change of ambition from banker to probation officer; faced with the choice, I"d left them. "Don"t you know they all carry razors these days?" my father had protested round his pipe. "Get yourself a little security. Then you can help them if you must. Look at your mother--don"t you think the clothes she gives away mean anything?" Referred to, my mother had joined in. "If you deal with such people all day, Denis, you"ll become like them." The same prejudices at which I"d squirmed when I was at school: when the Turners moved into our road.
Joe Turner was in the cla.s.s next door to me; he"d started there that term when the Turners had come up from Lower Brichester. Sometimes, walking past their house, I"d heard arguments, the crash of china, a man"s voice ------------------------------------com82 shouting "Just because we"ve moved in with the toffs, don"t go turning my house into Buckingham Palace!" That was Mr Turner. One night I"d seen him staggering home, leaning on our gate and swearing; my father had been ready to go out to him, but my mother had restrained him. "Stay in, don"t lower yourself." She was disgusted because Mr Turner was drunk; I"d realised that but couldn"t see how this was different from the parties at our house, the Martini bottles, the man who"d fallen into my bedroom one night and apologised, then been loudly sick on the landing. I was sorry for Mr Turner because my parents had instantly disliked him. "I don"t object to them as people. I don"t know them, not that I want to," my father had said. "It"s simply that they"ll bring down the property values for the entire street if they"re not watched." "Have you seen their back garden?" my mother responded. "Already they"ve dumped an old dresser out there." "Perhaps they"re getting ready for a bonfire," I suggested. "Well, remember you"re to stay away," my mother warned. "You"re not to mix with such people." I was fourteen, ready to resent such prohibitions. And of course I was to have no bonfire; it might dull the house"s paint or raze the garden. Instead, a Beethoven symphony for the collection I didn"t then appreciate. "Why not?" I complained. "I go to school with him." "You may," my father agreed, "but just because the school sees fit to lower its standards doesn"t mean we have to fall in with the crowd." "I don"t see what"s wrong with Joe," I said. A look spoke between my parents. "Someday," said my mother, "when you"re older--was There was always something about Joe they wouldn"t specify. I thought I knew what they found objectionable; the acts schoolboys admire are usually deplored by their parents. Joe Turner"s exploits had taken on the stature of legend for us. For example, the day he"d sworn at a teacher who"d caned him, paying interest on his words. "Some night I"ll get him," Joe told me walking home, spitting further than I ever could. Or the magazines he showed us, stolen from his father as he said: he told terrifying stories of his father"s buckled belt. "I Kept the U.S. Army Going," by a Fraulein; my vocabulary grew enormously in two months, until the only time my father ever hit me. I felt enriched by Joe; soon it was him and me against the teachers, running from the lavatories, hiding sticks of chalk. Joe knew things; the tales of Lower Brichester he told me as we walked home were real, not like the jokes the others told, sn.i.g.g.e.ring in corners; Joe didn"t have to creep into a corner to talk. In the two months since he"d run after me and parodied my suburban accent until we"d fought and become inseparable, he showed me sides of life I never knew existed. All of which helped me to understand the people who ------------------------------------com83 appear before my desk. Even the seat behind my desk belongs to Joe as much as to me; it was Joe who showed me injustice.
It was late October, two weeks before the bonfire, that fragments of the picture began to fit together. From my window, writing homework, I"d watched early rockets spit a last star and fall far off; once I"d found a cardboard cylinder trodden into the pavement. That was magic: not the Beethoven. So that when Joe said "I bet you won"t be coming to my bonfire," I flared up readily. "Why shouldn"t I?" I attacked him, throwing a stone into someone"s garden.
"Because your parents don"t like us." He threw a stone and cracked mine open.
"We "re us," I said loyally. "I"ll be coming. What"s the matter, don"t you like it up here in Brichester?" "re us," I said loyally. "I"ll be coming. What"s the matter, don"t you like it up here in Brichester?"
"It"s all right. My father didn"t want to move. I couldn"t care less, really. It was my mother. She was scared."
I imagined I knew what he meant: stones through the front windows, boys backing girls into alleys, knives and bottles outside the pubs; I"d probably have been as scared. But he continued "She didn"t want to live where my brother was."
We ran from a stretched rain and stood beneath an inscribed bus-shelter; two housewives disapproved of us and brought umbrellas down like shields. "Where"s your brother now? In the Army?" In those days that was my idea of heroism.
"He was younger than me. He"s dead." The umbrellas lifted a little, then determinedly came down.
"h.e.l.l." I wasn"t equipped to deal with such things. "What happened?" I asked, curiosity intermixed with sympathy.
"Of course only ill-brought-up boys try to impress with made-up stories," came from beneath the umbrellas.
Joe made a sign at them in which I hurriedly joined. We went out into the thinning lines of drizzle. I didn"t like to ask again; I waited for Joe to take me into his trust. But he was silent until he reached our road, suburban villas p.r.o.nged with TV aerials, curtains drawn back to display front-room riches. "You won"t really come to my bonfire," he repeated suddenly: his eyes gleamed like the murderer"s in the film we"d surrept.i.tiously seen last Sat.u.r.day, luring the girl towards his camera with its built-in spike.
"See if I don"t."
"Well, I"d better say good-bye now. You won"t want to be seen near your house with me." ------------------------------------com84 "You watch this!" I shouted angrily, and strode with him arm in arm to his door. Joe beat on the knocker, which hung by a screw. "You"re not coming in, are you?" he asked.