The Wanderer (24 page)

While the tribeswoman and I havered, another fiery missile struck the bulwarks, not far from us, burst apart, spraying the
deck with flaring tar. As if my memory had been kindled by a burning smut, I recalled where I’d seen the sigils scratched into the container’s floor before – they matched those on some of the buttons of the companion hatch’s keypad. I knew, of course, the graving was far more likely to be some reckoning or random phrase, a gambling debt toted up or a crass insult, than the scuttle’s code, but anything was worth hazarding. Having gone back into the container and scored the sigils on my brain, I went back outside again, signalled the tribeswoman to follow me, and dashed for the foredeck, typescript and typewriter in my arms. As we ran, a third missile struck. Then I heard one of the tribe cry out in anguish and turned to see a seagull, perhaps the same I’d descried a few times before, stooping on those gathered about the catapult, stabbing with its keen beak, hindering them, gaining us some time. We flung ourselves down by the trapdoor. I, letting drop my things without a thought for the mechanisms of the typewriter, too afraid, too frantic, crouched, tapped the sequence of symbols I’d memorized into the keypad. But nothing happened. I cursed, thumped the hatch, bloodied my hands. The tribeswoman, who knelt beside me, bit her lip, shook her head.

Looking over at those huddled about the catapult again, I saw one stood jabbing aloft at the bird with his sword. Then the blade grazed the gull’s wing and, squawking, it wheeled away, rising into the blue of the sky. The bird driven off, the tribesfolk turned back to loading the weapon. They’d their range and loft, even scurrying hither and yon we’d soon be struck, and the rest of the tribe had the hulk encircled – we were not simply able to run as before. I groaned. But then the tribeswoman grabbed my shoulder, shook me, jerked me round to look at the scuttle. It was revolving slowly, lifting, the filth clogging its seal was shed in strips, like peeled orange rind. Once above the level of the deck, there was a crunch of gears meshing, and it began to move to one side. Metal shrieked. Taking out my torch, I shone it into the gloom through the widening aperture. Steps descended into
darkness. Dust motes, agitated by the air soughing in through the opening, gyred in the beam of light. I stared. Then the end of the gangway began to jounce, and I heard the noise of drubbing feet. I thrust the tribeswoman towards the hatch, followed her inside.

There, I hewed at the murk with the beam of my torch. Sighting a button on the underside of the deck, I reached up, pressed it. The hatch began to eclipse the opening once more. Dazed, relieved, it wasn’t till only a sliver of sky remained that I recalled my document and typewriter. Thrusting out my hands in a panic, I grabbed those things, dragged them through the fast-waning crescent.

Had my stupor lasted a moment longer, the gap would have been too narrow and this document, this typewriter would have been lost.

As soon as the hatch had settled into place once more, a roar from above told of a missile striking the foredeck over our heads. Searing heat forced us down the stairs. We soon reached their foot, found ourselves at one end of a long narrow corridor.

I’ll write, in time, of the horrors of the hold. But, for now, I feel I’d best press on with that strand of my tale, the crucial one in truth, which concerns the evening I and the others learnt of our curse, the night we spent drinking and relating our stories in the Nightingale. Before I do, though, I must, lest my narrative be too confused, tortuous, briefly explain how the tribeswoman and I came to be in the straits I told of at the beginning of this chapter: confined to a cabin, far below decks. It’s not that there’s any gross clog preventing our leaving this place, the doorway’s not blocked outside by crates fallen from a precarious pile we knocked against on entering, the door is not plate steel, did not swing shut behind us and seal us in, is but flimsy plywood, locked only with a bolt we pushed home ourselves, and obstructed only on the inside, by the filing cabinet I’ve pushed up against it as a barricade. It’s simply that the batteries of my
torch have given out. We’ve illumination in here, as we found, in one corner of the room, an oil-burning generator, with a full reservoir of fuel. By the flickering light of the fading torch, the tribeswoman managed to get it working, hook it up to the bare bulb dangling by a long cable from the ceiling. It runs with a slight whirring noise. It’s fixed down, cannot be moved, and, therefore, we’re stuck here, in this office; were we to attempt to find our way back to the companion or set out to search the hold for provisions, for anything of use, we’d soon become lost in the dark, mazy, horror-ridden ways and rave.

I don’t understand why my dread foe, who I believe now has the tribe under his dominion, hasn’t sent them in to capture or bolt us yet. Perhaps he means to rack me by leaving me to moulder here. And it does distress me sorely to see the tribeswoman wasting. But he doesn’t know of the light source, without which we’d have been crazed long ago, nor that I am, in some ways, glad of the reprieve, glad of time to write, to set down as much as possible of what remains of my tale. With this task to inspirit me, my dire situation, and looming agonizing death, harry me less than they might.

VIII

While Jane told her story, the rest of us sat appalled, but in thrall, hardly aware of the Nightingale’s saloon, of the pub’s other patrons. Then, after her tale was done, she slumped, elbows on the table, head cradled in hands, and we others sat staring, morose, into our drinks. So none of us saw the pint, the pint I’d set before the empty chair, fall, hit the floor, shatter. Lager splashed across the boards, a dark spatter; we all blenched.

‘Fuck!’ William winced, rubbed his eyes. He’d paled.

‘Strange,’ I said. ‘It wasn’t anywhere near the edge.’

Duncan pointed to a pool of beer on the table.

‘It must just’ve skited on that. Aye, that’ll be it.’

Jane shook her head, eyes wide with terror.

I went up to the bar. The publican had heard the glass smash, offered to help clear up, but I thanked him, said it was fine, really. So he gave me a cloth, a bucket, a dustpan and brush, and I returned to the table, hunkered down, swept up the shards, mopped up the spill, wringing the cloth out into the bucket. My hands shook. The others sat in fraught silence the while.

After returning the cleaning things to the bar, I sat back down at the table, made a vain attempt to rouse the others from their stupors with a witticism I don’t now recall, but received no response, well none bar a grimace from Rashmi. Elliot tugged on each of his fingers in turn, till the knuckles cracked, making William cringe. Then Jane began to sob, quietly, into the sleeve of her jumper, while the rest of us looked on, awkward.

And so we remained for a time. Rashmi was the first to offer Jane consolation. Getting to her feet, she crossed over, and put an arm around the older woman’s shoulders.

‘There, there,’ she said, as if she were comforting a child.

Jane stopped crying, looked up at her, grateful, but perplexed. I was also baffled. Clearly I’d been awry about Rashmi; I’d
thought her obtuse, callous, judged her for misguided opinions, rudeness. This impression of her was confounded by the sensitivity and consideration now shown. I thought myself acute, but I’d been dull this time, dull for thinking I could so swiftly grasp someone’s whole nature.

Reaching into her pocket, Jane brought out a handkerchief, dried her eyes, blew her nose.

‘Why did you give up writing?’ I asked, gently.

‘How did you know about that?’

‘It was in the papers.’

‘Of course. Well, I just couldn’t bear to make things up any more.’

William sighed, rubbed his eyes, smiled wan, lit a cigarette.

‘What about your sons?’ he asked. ‘Are they alright?’

‘I don’t know. I’ve only once brought up what happened that afternoon. It wasn’t long after. They were reluctant to talk, but when pressed said we’d played a game, I’d pretended to be a monster, chased them, that was all.’

She paused, fished for the wedge of lime in her drink, squeezed it.

William peered at her.

In response to his unspoken question, she nodded.

‘They have changed though. Jeremy’s been shy, nervous ever since, Peter, taciturn, sullen. Sometimes I catch them whispering together, maybe scared, maybe plotting. They won’t talk to me, won’t open up to me.’

She began again to weep. The rest of us tried to solace her, save Elliot, who seemed tired and a little distant, but she waved aside our feeble, if sincere, words of comfort. Then, stemming her tears, looked round at us, forcing a grin.

‘I lost more than just my faith in the appearance of things, back then. A lot more.’

‘Jane, listen…’ I began.

But she interrupted me. ‘Sorry, I don’t want to talk about it
anymore, at least not for now.’

Rashmi then suggested that someone else go ahead and tell their tale.

Duncan spoke up, ‘I’ll go next.’

Then, slightly shamefaced, added, looking to Rashmi and Elliot, ‘That is, if the two of you don’t mind, like.’

Rashmi shook her head, ‘Sure, go on.’

Elliot was staring up at an oak beam overhead, solid, age-stained, worm-eaten, seemed lost in his thoughts. Duncan reached out, waved a hand in front of his face.

‘What is it?’ Elliot asked, turning to the Glaswegian, scowling.

Duncan frowned, then said, ‘I was just wondering if it was alright if I told my tale next.’

‘Oh right. Yes, go on, fine by me.’

‘Well, if you’re sure.’

‘Duncan,’ I broke in. ‘Do you mind waiting a moment? I’m just…’

I gestured at the men’s toilet.

‘Go ahead.’

I got to my feet, a whit unsteady, drunker than I’d thought. There was a dull ache behind my eyes, and I knuckled them. Rashmi also excused herself, got up, headed for the women’s toilet. Walking over to the ‘Gents’, stark outline of a man’s form on the door, a sigil or fetish, I passed a couple sitting with hands clasped across the table, recalled Rachel with a pang. Going into the lavatory, I was dazzled by the harsh light of a fluorescent tube glaring from white tiles and mirrors, narrowed my eyes. I walked over to the metal urinal. The acrid perfume of bilious disinfectant cakes failed to mask the sour stench of stale urine. I unzipped my fly, began pissing.

‘Oi!’

I startled, almost sprayed my shoes, and, looking over my shoulder, saw, at the toilet’s small window, open just a crack, the red bloated face of the crazed drunk. He took off his wig, pushed
it through the small gap, and dangled it from forefinger and thumb, made it dance, herky jerky. His bald scalp was scabrous, lumpy.

‘Do you know the parallax poetry of piss?’

I stared.

‘No? It’s simple enough. Look down at your stream, close first one eye, then the other, and…That’s it. Simple. But truly magical.’

‘What? What the…’

But he was gone, snatching his wig back through the opening.

After, as I was washing my hands in the sink, I heard a bolt being drawn back, and, turning, saw an old man, lank moustache, lined face, coming out of the cubicle. My heart scrabbled against my ribs; he was one of the elderly fiends, the man I’d seen staving the skull of another of the mob. Yet now there was no scent of blood on him. He held my gaze, but there was no sign he knew me. I fled the toilet, crossed the saloon, sat back down. My hands trembled, my breathing was ragged. I turned to Duncan, and said, fighting for calm, ‘Sorry to keep you waiting. Go ahead.’

‘Nae bother,’ he said. ‘Still holding on for Rashmi.’

Then he peered at me.

‘What’s wrong?’

The others also looked concerned. Just then Rashmi returned, sat down.

‘Hey,’ she said to me. ‘You look white as a sheet.’

I explained about the old man.

Duncan nodded, sage, patted his stump.

‘This missing limb of mine is a constant reminder of what happened to me. Long ago, I learnt to see the good in it. It’s proof, don’t you see, that what I underwent was no delusion. Wouldn’t you rather know yourself sane, but afflicted, than mad? There are other things that tell me that too, as you’ll hear. Still, it’s a dreadful thing to have to face horrors again. You’re sure you’re
alright?’

‘Yes, I’m fine. Another strange thing though…’ And I told about the bewigged drunk, how he’d appeared at the window, what he’d said.

‘Oh shite. Oh fucking hell.’

Duncan went white, whiter than his already pale complexion, white as tripe.

‘What?’

‘Well…Look I’m just going to tell my tale. You’ll see.’

He had several swigs of his porter, then tapped the ash from his pipe, refilled it from his pouch. Once he had it lit, he sat back in his chair, cleared his throat.

‘There’s something I want to ask of everyone before I begin. The experiences we’ve all undergone have been strange…unco, like. But though you’re prepared for the bizarre, what I’m going to tell you will be hard to believe. There’s one aspect, in particular, you’ll find tough to credit. I’ll explain all at the end, but, please, I’d like you not to ask me anything till I’m finished. I just want to tell it as it happened, get it straight in my head, tell it true. Understand?’

He looked round the group, plumes of pungent pipe smoke seeping from between his clenched teeth.

Everyone gave their assent.

‘Thanks. Well, I’d better start. I was born in Glasgow, spent my early childhood in a tenement flat in the Gorbals. My family was right poor, real kirk mice. My father worked in the shipyards, shipbuilding, you know, down on the Clyde, but what he earned wasn’t really enough to keep life and limb together…’

A Treatise on Dust

Therefore, to keep his family fed and warm, Duncan’s father had to take stale bread from bins behind bakeries and fill his pockets with lumps of clinkered coke from the heaps by the smelting furnaces down at the yards. Then, when Duncan was five, his mother found work as a maidservant, worn-out clothes and shoes were replaced, and, while the work lasted, the larder was well stocked, and coals crackled and spat cheerily in the grate each evening. But it didn’t last long; one evening, only five months after she’d got the job, her employer, a lawyer, came across her alone, below stairs. He’d been drinking, was lusty, used her roughly. The next day, when serving breakfast, a long rent in the skirts of her maid’s clothes, hastily, badly sewn up, fired the suspicions of the lady of the house, and she was sacked. Duncan’s father said he’d kill the lawyer, but he never did anything about it.