Matlock's System

by Reginald Hill

  The fourth time, the man had not returned. His wife and son were executed.

  Painlessly, quickly, but killed by law for all that.

  Matlock had finger-stamped the execution order.

  “Christ, I was certain in those days!”

  He had spoken aloud. The sound of the words cut through the turmoil in his mind. He was standing in front of the open lift. Turning away from it, he set off up the corridor to his left.

  About fifteen yards along, he hesitated in front of a plain unnumbered door. He glanced back up the corridor and counted the doors he had passed. Three.

  This was it. This had been his room for those powerful years.

  He turned to move on. But something (not sentiment, he thought) made him press the handle. The door slid silently open.

  A man turned from the ebony-inlaid kidney-shaped desk which dominated the room. He wore uniform.

  “Good-morning, Mr. Matlock, Sir. It’s nice to see you again.”

  “Hello, Jody,” said Matlock with relief. “It’s nice to see you too.”

  The grey-haired figure came towards

  him with a pleased smile. A Messenger of the House, already old when Matlock had occupied this room, he must be in his nineties now. He was a peculiar case, a man outside the Age Law. He had a very rare blood disease, one of the few conditions beyond the reach of modem medicine. His doctors had certified that an operation would kill him. They were doubtless right. They had also certified that he had at the outside a couple of years to live.

  Matlock, with a single finger stamp (life and death in my finger! he thought) had put him outside the Age Law. But the doctors this time had been wrong. Jody thirty-five years later was as hale as ever. He rarely left the House now, partly because his advanced years were not so noticeable in the one place in the country where old men abounded. Partly because in the straight, smoothly padded corridors of the House which he knew like the back of his hand there was less chance of his meeting with the accident which could mean his death.

  “Visiting the Minister, are you, sir?” asked Jody.

  “Not really, Jody. Just looking around.”

  “Oh,” said the old man.

  “I’ve been with the P.M.,” added Matlock, sensing the Messenger’s uneasiness.

  “Oh, that’s all right then,” said Jody brightly. “And you’re just having a look-see for old time’s sake, eh? Changed a bit since you was here, Mr. Matlock.”

  Matlock looked at the huge desk, the white nylon-tread carpet, the lazer-cut sculptures welded to the wall.

  “Yes, it has. My desk was a bit smaller, eh Jody? And we didn’t have these works of art in those days.”

  “No indeed, sir. We did not. The Minister says they represent the sexual rhythms, sir. I know I’m getting on, but they ain’t like what I recall of it, sir. Not a bit. Eh?”

  He cackled away to himself. Matlock joined in.

  “You’re not that old, Jody. And with some of the new drugs, you could go on for ever.”

  Jody winked wisely.

  “So you’ve heard about them, sir? Are you coming back to join us then? They said you would.”

  Matlock, who had been preparing to disengage himself from the conversation, now gave his full attention.

  “Did they? Who was that, then, Jody?”

  He was as casual as possible. Jody was like the Vicar of Bray. Old acquaintance was old acquaintance, but he belonged to the man in power.

  “Why, the P.M. was just telling my Minister the other day.”

  Something in Matlock’s expression must have warned the old man for he suddenly became very alert.

  “You did say you was coming back, sir?”

  “I’m not sure, Jody.”

  Jody tried to move him to the door, talking quickly and genially, but Matlock stood fast.

  “It won’t do, Jody. Tell me more. If you won’t, I’ll go back and ask Browning. Quoting you as my informant.”

  It was cruel; Jody could not risk official disfavour, but even then for a moment he did not seem able to make up his mind.

  Give him another reason, thought Matlock. It’s worked with better men for worse deeds.

  “Remember, Jody, you’re alive because of me. You owe me something.”

  It worked.

  “Look, Mr. Matlock, I’ve got nothing to tell really. Nothing at all.”

  “What did you hear, Jody?”

  “Nothing really. It was just that I was clearing up some things of mine in the store-cupboard yonder when I caught a few words between my Minister and the P.M. Well, my Minister …”

  “Sedgwick.”

  “Yes. Mr. Sedgwick. Well, my Minister said, ‘If you don’t get Matlock you’re in trouble,’ or something like that. And the P.M. said, ‘Don’t you worry about that. I’ll get Matlock back. He’ll be with us within a fortnight’.”

  “What were they talking about before they mentioned me?”

  “I don’t know. Really I don’t. I didn’t hear that. You’ll not say anything will you, sir? Not to Mr. Sedgwick or Mr. Browning.”

  There was a pathetic fear in the old man’s eyes which made Matlock turn away.

  Will I cling on to life with such little dignity? he wondered. Or am I clinging on already?

  But there were more important things to occupy his mind than the pleasures of self-analysis.

  Budget Day was just under a fortnight away, so this seemed the obvious timelimit referred to.

  But his own importance in all this was still a mystery. The official attitude to him for twenty-five years now had been quiet suppression. Nothing dramatic enough to bring him into the public eye. He was never allowed to become a hero — or a martyr. The storm surrounding his resignation was allowed to subside. But his efforts to rejoin Parliament in opposition were efficiently and unobtrusively thwarted. And thereafter he found himself continually and inevitably channelled into obscurity.

  Now suddenly power had been handed back to him. He was worth bribing, worth threatening. And he had no idea of the reason why.

  “You’d best be on your way then, sir.”

  The old man’s unease showed clearly through his deference.

  “I’II call the lift for you.”

  “No, don’t do that, Jody. I’d rather leave nice and quietly. I could probably find my own way out without being seen, but it’s been a long time since I was here and I shouldn’t like to give the impression of prowling about. But I’m sure you can find me a nice side exit if you try.”

  Jody obviously did not like the idea of Matlock ‘prowling about’. He stood uncertainly for a moment, then said with stiff formality, “Come this way please, sir.”

  Five minutes later Matlock was walking across Westminster Bridge.

  He paused to peer down at the Thames. The crystal clear water was dotted with hover-taxis and sight-seer craft, though there were fewer of these than had once been the case before travel restrictions had become more stringent. The purification of the Thames had taken place during Matlock’s own lifetime. Now it was worth fishing off Westminster Pier.

  We have done something worth while. We have made an open sewer into a waterway fit for the barge of a queen.

  The romantic thought amused him. The visionary in him had been left a long way behind.

  But there is a poem I once knew. About Westminster Bridge. ‘Earth has not anything to show more fair.’ That’s it.

  Something of comfort began to steal over him as the lines came back.

  Something about ‘a calm so deep. The river glideth at his own sweet will. Dear God! The very houses seem asleep. And all that mighty heart is lying still.’

  That mighty heart.

  What shall I do? rose the great cry in his mind. How shall it all end?

  He turned in anguish to continue his walk. Coming towards him from the south, unhurrying, his loose robe flapping in the slight east wind, was the bearded man he had seen outside his flat the night before.

  Matlock turned quickly.
He wanted no conversation at the moment. His mind was confused, in turmoil. He had to have time to work out the full implications of the morning. This seemed the day for old quotations for now another rose into his mind.

  He who hath wife and children hath given hostages to fortune.

  To Browning. Hostages to Browning.

  He set off at a brisk pace back the way he had come. Once off the bridge he glanced back. The bearded man had fallen further behind. But as he turned into Victoria Embankment his sense of being pursued suddenly doubled and his legs seemed to lose their strength. They felt old, wasted.

  Like dry sticks. Sticks with expensive cloth flapping around them. How shall I escape?

  He glanced round again. There was no sign of the bearded man. Just ahead was a building he knew well. The Globe Slow-Theatre. He and Lizzie often went there. He did not even pause to look at the posters but strode quickly across the foyer to the ticket machines. Clutching the metallic disc he headed for the escalator. He stepped on and was sucked up into the green-lit dimness above.

  Having no idea which dance was being performed today, Matlock had no logical preference for any level. He got off at the third for no better reason than that this had been Lizzie’s choice on their last visit, though he had argued in favour of the fourth as giving a more aesthetically pleasing angle for that particular dance.

  At this time of day there was little difficulty in finding an empty box. He pressed the button which opened the door.

  He entered an ovoid cubicle, soundproofed to prevent disturbance from or to the neighbouring boxes. The glass shell before him was so clear that, as always he had to touch it to make certain it was there. He leaned back in the ergonomically designed chair and brought his attention to bear on the stage.

  The Slow-Dance was the artistic product of an aesthetic theory which had its roots in the orientalization of Western philosophy in the last three decades of the twentieth century. Meditational processes, flower symbolism, the new Hermetism and a myriad of other elements had combined to produce the simple proposition that all art should mirror the great imperceptible movements of life, invisible yet inevitable — the blossoming of a flower, the growth of a tree, the cycle of the seasons.

  The ageing of man, thought Matlock.

  But his mind was already beginning to react to the scene on the stage below.

  Five dancers knelt in a circle. They faced inwards but their bodies were arched back till their heads almost rested between their ankles. Their eyes were closed, the lids painted a matt white so they stared dully, blankly, sightlessly from the circular stage.

  In the centre of the circle stood another dancer. He stood upright, heels slightly raised, arms by sides, hands with their palms facing forward. All the dancers looked as if they were resting in perfect stillness but Matlock knew that slowly, inexorably, they were moving. This was one of the classical rising movements and would take at least another three hours to complete. They must have been at it for over an hour already.

  He settled back in his seat to enjoy the performance. It was one of the most relaxing experiences he knew. It was the awareness of movement without the perception of movement that drew out time into long valleys of peace, he had decided. Like watching a clock, which moved though you could never see it moving.

  How much of the hour had gone, he did not know. But suddenly the performance was horribly, violently disrupted. From the side of the auditorium appeared a man. He staggered across to the circular stage and tried to climb it, but collapsed with his legs trailing over the edge. He was hardly a yard from one of the choral dancers, and the sight of that body heaving with the effort of breathing so close to the exquisite stillness of the dance was an obscenity in itself.

  But worse followed. From all sides of the auditorium came the police. Tall dark-uniformed men, about a dozen of them, guns at the ready, moving without haste (though relatively their movements seemed violent, outrageous) towards the stage.

  The fugitive looked round wildly, made a final effort and dragged himself wholly on to the stage. He was shouting now, opening his mouth into a cavern of terror and despair. But the whole scene was made even more horrible to Matlock because the glass shell before him kept all sound out.

  The police reached the side of the stage. Ten of them stopped there. Two vaulted lightly on to the platform.

  The fugitive backed away, crashing into one of the choral dancers and sending him flying. He was old, Matlock saw. Old and terrified. This was no escaped criminal, he knew. This was one who had fled the moment of death. This was a man whose time had come and who had broken under the knowledge.

  The police had reached him. They bent down and took him gently by the arms. He screamed silently. Shook them off and flung his arms around the central dancer. The police pulled, the dancer toppled. For a few vile moments they all thrashed around in orgiastic violence. Then Matlock saw one of the police press an anaesthetic disc on the back of the old man’s neck and within seconds he was as still as the remaining choral dancers who had held their position throughout the confusion.

  The policemen picked up the still body and carried it to the edge of the stage where they passed it down to two others. Quickly the little procession disappeared into the darkness of the auditorium.

  Matlock sat back, his mind filled again with turbulence and horror. He could guess what had led to the scene below. When a man’s E.O.L. was up, he was invited to visit a terminal hospital (the Death House as they were usually called) where the stopping of the heart clock would take place with the minimum fuss and distress to friends and relatives. Most people went. But some preferred to remain at home to the end, either through love, or fear. Others (a troublesome few) insisted on pretending that the time had not come and went about their normal business — till they fell dead in the street, or at work.

  But in addition to these, there were always those who broke under the strain. Sometimes they went quietly mad; sometimes they went berserk. In the early days of the Age Law there had been a great upsurge of sexual and other crime among these soon to die. But this had eased off as it became generally realized that the laws of the land still applied and that any sentence passed on a man (or woman) but unable to be carried out on him because his E.O.L. was up, could be transferred to his immediate relatives. And as the most common form of punishment in the courts nowadays was the time-fine — that is, the curtailing of the guilty man’s E.O.L. by a period ranging from a month to several years according to the seriousness of the offence — family supervision was usually enough to keep the old man on the rails.

  But always some broke loose and were a terror and a danger to the public as they ran wild in search of an escape that was impossible.

  “Not a pleasant sight, Brother Matthew,” said a voice behind him.

  He turned. Standing in the doorway was the bearded man.

  Matlock almost welcomed this diversion from the troubled maze of his own thoughts. In any case, the bearded man was a problem that needed solving. The easiest solution was that he was one of Browning’s men. But he had not acted like one the night before. And it seemed unlikely that Browning would have him followed by someone whose appearance cried out for attention.

  “Yes?” he said interrogatively.

  “Ah. The Abbot said that you were a great statesman. You invite me to speak without promising to reply.”

  “You read a great deal into a single word.”

  “Very little, Brother. The whole universe is comprehended in a single word. Would that we could comprehend the word!” Gradually it was beginning to dawn upon Matlock who, or rather what, this man was. The Age Laws had thrown up many odd minority groups. Some had been banned. Like the Birthday Unions whose members shared the same birthday — and therefore the same E.O.L. Their activities became so wild towards the end that the Government had stepped in.

  But there were others, several religious in origin. And the largest of these was the Brotherhood of the Meek. Matlock knew little about them though
he did recall a magazine article a few months earlier. They had re-established a community in the ruins of one of the great Yorkshire abbeys. Fountains it was, he thought. There had been rich and powerful connections from the start. Now about a thousand of them lived there under vows of obedience, chastity, and poverty. Their attitude to the Age Law was simple. The Meek would inherit the Earth. The Age Laws did not apply to them. Their heart clocks were fitted and worked all the same. They accepted this, smilingly.

  There had been photographs with the article and this, Matlock realized, was where the memory of the bearded man’s strange clothes came from.

  “What’s your name?” he asked.

  “They call me Brother Francis.”

  “What did they call you before they called you that?”

  The bearded man lifted his hands as if in awed acknowledgement of Matlock’s intelligence.

  Matlock thought he detected a touch of mockery and was glad. That at least hinted at an underlying sanity.

  “What do you want?”

  “What all men want, Brother. Peace and the Will of God.”

  “Then I’ll leave you to it.”

  Matlock made towards the door, but the man’s bulk, magnified by his loose garments, blocked it completely.

  “I have been sent to fetch you, Brother.”

  “Then you’d better go and pray that I will come. Brother.”

  Matlock reached determinedly forward to thrust the man out of his way, but his hand stopped before it touched the rough woollen garments. From somewhere in its maze of folds, Brother Francis had produced a gun. It was pointing steadily at Matlock’s stomach.

  “Oh, I have prayed, Brother, and you will come.”

  Matlock shrugged.

  “If God wants me that much,” he said.

  Outside in the street, he stopped and the bearded man closed right up behind him.

  “Do we go by foot, Brother,” asked Matlock, “Or is there a chariot of fire?”

  Francis did not seem offended, but he did not laugh either.

  “Walk a little way, Brother. Just a little way.”

  In fact he told the truth. A hundred yards away round the comer a car was waiting. Behind the wheel in ordinary clothes was a little wizened man who, had it not been for the law, Matlock would have said was nearer ninety than eighty.