Red Shift Page 11

  Margery heard Thomas cry out. His voice echoed in the stair. She left the cooking and ran to him. She was in darkness, and pulled herself up the steps, her feet slipping on the narrow tread. When she came out into the light on the tower she was dazzled. Mow Cop was sharp behind the battlement, and then she saw Thomas. He was swearing, sobbing, trying to hit John Fowler: but John’s long arm held him away by the head. His young, parson’s face was twisted. She saw scorn, and play. She hit the face with all the force of her body. The arm drew back. Thomas stumbled, and she held him safe.

  John Fowler stared at her, trying to smile, not to lose.

  “How very interesting.”

  His sneer went directly to her.

  “I hope I live to see your coffin walk,” she said.

  John ran for the dark of the tower.

  “There,” said Margery. “Give over skriking. He’s gone. I’m here.”

  Thomas clung to her, and wept. “Oh, Madge. Madge. Madge.”

  “He’s gone.”

  “I love you. I love you so much.”

  “I know. What’s he been saying?”

  “He’s not kind.”

  “He’s not.”

  “Madge, he’s always looked after me—”

  “He’s clever.”

  “—learned me. All my life—”

  “Clever.”

  “I can’t plunder what he’s at. What’s he want?”

  “What he can’t get.”

  Magoo sat at his post, liming the hair of the heads he had brought in at dawn. Logan went the rounds.

  “Why more?”

  “Tribal. They expect it of Mothers. And I go in my own time, off duty. I like it.”

  “They know we’re not Mothers.”

  “Speak for yourself.”

  “It’s not jannock for the Ninth. The risk.”

  “ ‘Jannock’?” said Magoo. “That’s right military-manual dialect, that is. Jannock! You’d not last an hour off this mountain.”

  “How do you know so much? What was your tribe?”

  Magoo smiled. “Don’t worry about me. It’s that Cat-humper we’re landed with who’ll break first.”

  “Face?”

  “Look at him. He’s never away from the slag. She’s got him scared. He knows so much he believes it.”

  “What about?”

  “Happen you’d best ask him yourself.”

  She sat with Macey, grinding rye. He offered to feed the stone, but she pushed his hand aside, and used only the grain from the jar that was by her.

  Face was restless. He patrolled, watching her more than the boundary, scratching himself, frowning.

  “What’s wrong?” said Logan.

  “She sent me away,” said Face.

  “You’re under orders.”

  “Not that. She won’t have my company today. She’s singing.”

  “She often does.”

  “Listen. The tone. It’s religious.”

  “I can’t hear her words.”

  “She’s doing something: different.”

  “Is it a festival?”

  “Any day could be. It’s not one of the big ones.”

  “Come on, then.”

  “No.” Face held Logan. “We mustn’t go near.”

  “Look, Mack,” said Logan under his breath. “Pull out. You’re the Ninth, not a gook.”

  “She’s doing something differently. Differently.”

  “Maintain watch.”

  “Yessir.”

  “Leave baking to the catering corps. And you were right about Magoo. He’s all Mother. We’ve problems.”

  She sang. The stone belled her voice.

  “—You looked at me, you saw my face:

  “You asked no question of my being—”

  She fed the stone at each pause. Macey listened, happy.

  “—Nor the hard stone from the earth,

  “The goddess would not be grinding,

  “If the girl knew nothing of the mill—”

  The words were from the Big Words, he recognised them, but their meaning had to be left with her.

  “—And I will tell you, gentle boy,

  “It is with me the High Kings sleep.

  “Bonded am I. My hands grind cold.

  “The mill I turn. Hard for Logan.”

  “Are your hands cold? I’ll warm them,” said Macey.

  “You mustn’t touch me,” she said. “Get the baking hot.” She mixed the flour with water into flat loaves and made the bread. “Take it to them before it cools. They’ll want it warm, against the wind. They’re still nesh.”

  “She was doing something different,” said Face. “I can’t put a name by it—”

  “I hope that bread’s hot, lad,” said Logan.

  “It is,” said Macey. “I hurried special.”

  “Take Magoo his.”

  “Right.”

  “Eh—is she up to any tricks, do you think?”

  “I’ve been with her all day.”

  “And night,” said Face. “But he wouldn’t know.”

  Macey went back to the fire after delivering the loaf to Magoo.

  “Where’s mine?”

  “We’re finishing yesterday’s,” she said.

  He grinned. “You think I’m nesh, really. Don’t you? I’m not.”

  “Then get them crusts down you,” she said. Her eyes were exhausted.

  Magoo filled his mouth and ate. Face and Logan broke the bread. Steam came from it. They drank beer.

  “Bit tacky,” said Logan. “Grain’s going off. Still, we’ve not done bad, considering.”

  “It stinks.” Face washed his down. “Oily.”

  Logan sniffed his hands. “It’s the flour. More like— fish?”

  Face moaned, and grabbed the beer jar. He drank until he retched. He dropped the jar. It shattered on the stones and he clawed grass and heather and tried to swallow them, but choked. “Be sick! Be sick!” Logan acted: nothing came up. He gulped at sand. “What?” he shouted. “What’s done?”

  “I knew. Something. Different.” Face took his hand out of his throat. “I couldn’t see. It was different. The stone. She turned it the other way. Flour. She ground it. Sun-setting.”

  Tom waited until his parents were in bed and all movement of the caravan had stopped. He made himself listen to “Cross Track.” He left a note, saying, “Gone early, back late.” He hid his bicycle under a hedge, and went over the fields to climb into the M6 service area. At that time it was not hard to find a lonely driver, and the night converged, M6 to M1, and he crossed the forecourt of Euston station while London was still quiet and the first birds were restless.

  Inside the great hall, cleaners echoed. The departure and arrival boards ticked, rattled. The tempo was idle, but increased with the light. The place was warm, and the seats were not hard. But he could not settle. He patrolled, excited, his mouth dry, hands and feet tingling. Railway police stood at the top of the escalators of the Underground.

  He went into the booking area and found the window she would use. He had a good hiding place behind the pillar in front of the First Class window. People came from all directions, but they channelled themselves along the same routes to buy their tickets. He would not be seen.

  She would come up the escalator, round the policemen, to the queue. At the moment she asked for a day-return he would put his hand on hers and say, “Going somewhere?” Meanwhile, the chatter of the boards increased, footsteps built a rhythm and he counted the tesserae on the column. Forty, by forty-two, by seventy-five high. She would be early, to make sure of a seat.

  She came along the forecourt, by the war memorial. He did not recognise her easily. It was her walk that was the same, and her hair. But her coat, her shoes, her dress: they were not for Mow Cop. He had never seen them, nor the overnight case.

  The man with her carried his coat. They must have come by taxi. His suit fitted him. The handkerchief in the pocket matched the tie and the shirt. His briefcase was new,
and he did not have the time to remove airline labels. His hair was good, his shoes bright and he walked with his arm through Jan’s.

  He walked with her, past the booking office, towards the First Class window, towards Tom. Tom managed to go slowly about the pillar and not be seen. They passed him. The man bought a ticket and gave it to Jan. She took it, she accepted it, and then he gave her money and folded her hands over it. She put the money away and went with the man towards the platform barrier.

  Tom bought his own ticket, single to Crewe, and followed. Jan was in the window of a First Class coach. The man stood on the platform, looking up, his hand on her sleeve.

  Tom worked his way along inside the train until he could see them. They talked: his hand was on her arm, untroubled: the whistle blew. The man kissed her cheek, and the train moved gently away. Tom watched him. Their faces passed, a slow crossing, close, separated only by glass. The man waved, his eyes fixed ahead of Tom, and he was smiling.

  At Basford sidings, Tom went to be near the exit steps when the train reached the platform. He ran up the steps, and waited outside the barrier for Jan. She came to him in her usual anorak and jeans, the walk and the hair the same.

  “Where’s the bike?”

  “I’ve not got it today,” said Tom.

  “Never mind.”

  “Yes.”

  “Somewhere fresh.”

  “Right.”

  “Or do you want the Secret Path to Basford?”

  “I want nothing secret.”

  “Oh. That’s the mood, is it?”

  “There’s no mood.”

  “Have they been at you again?”

  “Not enough for me to notice.”

  “Let’s try this road,” said Jan. “It’s quite the vilest, even for Crewe.” It was straight, enclosed, and where the houses showed, they were mean. “You’ll be radiant, by comparison.”

  They walked. “It’s odd,” said Jan. “There’s always been something like this at some time when we meet, hasn’t there?”

  “Something what?”

  “Not this acute: but something. As if we have to absorb the shock of meeting.”

  “The surprise?”

  “Even resentment, for a few minutes. Almost, ‘Why aren’t you the same as your letters?’ I think I’ve worked it out. The longer I’m away from you, the more certain my love for you becomes. Because we don’t have each other, we have memories, and these memories simplify themselves. We forget our flaws and create ideals of each other. Then, when we meet, the difference shows. Instead of purity, we’re people, the flaws seem criticisms, but the good part reasserts itself, and we balance. But it takes a while.”

  “Have you finished?”

  “Yes.”

  “I was waiting for the bibliography.”

  “You’ve proved my point,” said Jan.

  “Impeccably.”

  “You wouldn’t be so brutal in half an hour from now, would you?”

  “Ah.”

  “Don’t you agree?”

  “Of course.”

  “I’m not allowed to get off so lightly after one of your intellectual safaris! You might discuss what I’ve said.”

  “There’s no point. You’re right.”

  “I love you,” said Jan.

  “We’ve not defined ‘love.’ ”

  “Why are you so cold?”

  “My bladder’s full.”

  “O, you who have suffered worse than this, even to this shall God appoint an end.”

  “Aeneid, Book One.”

  “I can quote, can’t I? You don’t have the monopoly.”

  “But is the quotation applicable?”

  “Use your eyes,” said Jan. “This park was given by the London and North Western Railway Company A.D. 1887 to commemorate the Jubilee of Her Most Gracious Majesty Queen Victoria and the fiftieth anniversary of the opening of the Grand Junction Railway. There’s bound to be somewhere to pee.”

  They walked down a long avenue towards a memorial. Every seat had a plaque.

  “ ‘To the memory of Arthur Holland and the happy hours we spent in this beautiful park,’ ” said Tom. “Honesty. Simple.”

  “I was only trying to think like you’ve told me,” said Jan.

  “Every seat. A wife. A friend. Golden Wedding, look, and a son killed in action: two for the price of one. Why not? It usually is.”

  “There’s the lavatory,” said Jan.

  “Simple, honest graffiti people,” said Tom when he came out.

  “In there?”

  “Here.” He began to walk across the grass. “The trees, too. One for Edward the Seventh. One guaranteed from the Mount of Olives. They look after you here. The loving and the dead. Even that soldier on top of the war memorial has a lightning conductor up his jacksie.”

  “A beautiful park, at the end of a vile road?” said Jan. “You’re seeing more, aren’t you? You’re not just being wet?”

  “So many people have made the effort to commemorate, to mark the flux. We’ve not.”

  “We’re still living it.”

  “We’ve not tried.”

  “You’re maudlin,” said Jan.

  “I tried so hard.”

  “How does this square with your new social conscience?” said Jan. They were at a derelict bandstand. ” ‘The Verdun Plot,’ ” she read. ” ‘These trees were grown from seeds brought from Verdun, France, 1918.’ ”

  “Shit!”

  “A few honest trees?”

  “I’m thirsty.”

  “For nearly a million men?”

  “I’m thirsty.” He put his face against the wet bark. “One of the iron crosses in our caravan came from Verdun. These trees should bleed. Something should.”

  “Can I help?”

  “I doubt it.”

  “I’m not that furniture salesman.”

  “No.”

  “Tell me.”

  His face was still against the tree. He banged his head gently with one fist and held Jan close to him.

  “There’s something very wrong inside here, I’m afraid.”

  “Tell me.”

  He left the tree. “That was pathetic,” he said. “You were right: maudlin self-indulgence. Like my father on the beer.”

  “Tell me.”

  “You’ve not come all this way to be miserable. You said so.”

  “I know desperation when I see it.”

  “Do you?”

  “We mustn’t live unreal. It can’t be sweetness and light every time.”

  “But we can try,” said Tom. “Main gate in ten minutes.” He ran along the avenue.

  “Why?”

  But he could not hear.

  Tom was waiting when Jan arrived. “What are you doing?” she said.

  “You’ll find out.”

  A taxi stopped by them, and Tom opened the door. Jan looked.

  “What?”

  “In you get.”

  “But—”

  “Shopping precinct,” Tom said to the driver. He sat back in the comfort.

  “I rang from a call box.”

  “Why?”

  “Today, we commemorate.”

  “How?”

  “You’ll see.”

  At the precinct Tom gave the driver a pound note and walked away, linking his arm through Jan’s. He went into the warm, smoke-filled room, stepped over the children and sat before two lighted panels. An attendant gave him change, and he divided it into two equal columns.

  “Play,” he said to Jan.

  “I—I’ve never—”

  “Then watch. You’ll pick it up.”

  The coloured balls danced, the voice called and the numbers clicked in the panels. Jan sat, and did not move. Tom fed her machine with money and controlled her panel by using her hand as a twig to mark the numbers. She cried, making no noise, and the concentration of the room was untouched.

  “They can’t be dim,” said Tom. “It takes a bit of effort to run both games simultaneously, and that
’s how most of them play—although sustained repetition would off-set the inferior intelligence. I must reassess my attitude towards plebeian culture.”

  Jan cried herself out.

  “We’ll lose one pound fifty an hour each, at this rate,” said Tom.

  They did. Tom thanked the attendant, and left.

  Jan was white. She had to run to stay with him. “What was that for?” she said.

  “I object to cosmic Bingo. The Crewe variety is less damaging.”

  “Have you gone crazy?”

  “Not at all. My appetite is ready to do justice to the meal I’ve booked. It’s a pity we’re not more suitably dressed, but they’ll let us in.”

  The waiter held Jan’s chair. The tablecloth was stiff, clean linen. Tom ordered flawlessly and asked for the wine list.

  “What the hell’s going on?” said Jan.

  “ ‘I don’t know’ is the answer to your question.”

  “Are you sick?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “If you won’t give me a straight answer, I’ll stand on this table and scream.”

  He looked directly at her. His calm eyes were steady and their violence hurt.

  “Which would be a silly thing to do.”

  “I shall.”

  “I believe you,” said Tom. “Some time ago I put up the hypothesis that it would be beneficial to let rip, to forget money, to commemorate us. The park showed it could be done. We’re doing it. Right?”

  “We don’t need to commemorate,” said Jan. “We’ve so much already. You’ve spent a train fare. We’ve spent a weekend.”

  “That’s just what we haven’t. A bottle of number seventeen, please,” he said to the wine waiter. “Do you love me?”

  “Yes,” said Jan.

  “Then think about it, and don’t spoil today.”

  “I’ll try.”

  “You look more shocked than amused.”

  “That’s it,” said Jan. “Your eyes. Shock. Has anything happened at home?”

  “Something’s always happening at home: lots and lots of nothing.” He tasted the wine. “Thank you,” he said to the waiter. The waiter nodded, and filled Jan’s glass.

  “It’s Moselle,” she said.

  “Excellent with veal.”

  “You know it makes me sick.”

  “It was the lobster, not the wine. Wasn’t it?”

  “Sorry. I’ve not got used: I’m trying to catch up: sorry.”