Voyages in the Underworld of Orpheus Black

by Marcus Sedgwick

  Agatha, I said, as calmly as I could, have you any idea where we are?

  A frown on her face. Why?

  Me, forcing a smile: I think I’ve lost my way.

  This is near where I was living, she said quietly, pointing at the blast-damaged block in front of us, hazy in the dust and smoke and half-light. I think I recognize that building.

  You’re sure? I asked. So do you think your parents might be close by?

  And then it all got stranger. She frowned again. No, Harry. Now I do not think they are here, she said. I do not think they make the journey in the end.

  I asked her what she meant by that, but she just gave me the saddest smile I have ever seen and shook her head. Looked away.

  I told her that I didn’t understand, that I must have got myself in a muddle.

  It is my fault, she said bravely. It is very hard to explain.

  When we find someone around here, I’ll ask. Head’s feeling really odd again and knees a bit weak. Perhaps I’ll rest awhile and get Agatha to scout ahead and find someone to ask exactly where we are. Need to calm myself, but I keep feeling the urgency of that falling water and the staircase, the drop into the cellar or whatever darkness lay below.

  Rock roller

  push boulder

  timeless torture

  under ground.

  Back breaker

  inch stealer

  take your punishment

  make no sound.

  Roll your rock to the top of the ridge

  inch by inch

  hour by hour

  day by day

  year by year.

  Roll your rock to the top and then,

  watch it roll back down again.

  This is not the place to speak of your crimes, Sisyphus.

  This is the place to speak of your punishment.

  Staggering step after staggering step

  up that hill, eternally

  pushing that boulder before you;

  figure of futility.

  I remember I saw you when I was in Hell.

  How you shuffled and lumbered, your back to the rock.

  I asked who you were, and when they told me,

  I watched for a while, to see if you’d stop.

  O Sisyphus, how you keep on fighting

  against your endless pointless pursuit;

  you keep on making meaning from nothing,

  then see that meaning be nothing again.

  How do you do it?

  How, and why?

  What makes a man continue to try?

  Is there a secret to your infinite toiling?

  And do you know what it means to feel joy?

  Only philosophers can offer us answers;

  the rest of us try just trudging on.

  Some aren’t even aware of the question,

  and I?

  Well, I have my song.

  Sisyphus.

  Do you remember when I came before Hades;

  did you stop for a moment to look?

  Not for a second, no, not one:

  you kept on working as I started to sing.

  Kept on pushing, and pushing, but then

  I sang to Hades and Persephone;

  decanted my song, fluid and free;

  let each word take them,

  let each note make them,

  wrap them and trap them and fill up their hearts,

  till they started to sob as they sat on their thrones.

  And as I finished, then I saw

  another miracle,

  one of your own:

  you sitting still upon your stone.

  Sisyphus, I thought of you today.

  Here, in the wasteland of London.

  This man called Harry, this Orpheus Black,

  and Agatha;

  these wanderers amongst the rocks

  came to a patch of open ground,

  where in huddled ones and twos

  hunched-up figures bent to a task

  that reminded me

  of you.

  Scratching and scraping,

  sifting through rubble,

  hunting for things of worth.

  Endlessly searching,

  rolling and lifting,

  clearing the ruins of last night’s attack.

  Making only the smallest difference

  till the bombs of tonight bring it back.

  What are they looking for?

  Why do they do it?

  Broken and bent and beaten down,

  scavenging for nothing,

  for nothing seems to be found,

  just the endless toil of clearing the ground.

  Harry approached them,

  asking aloud,

  Who’s in charge here,

  and what are you doing,

  and can you help us find a way down?

  Their leader,

  a man of uncountable years,

  straightened his back and came face-to-face;

  stubbed his finger on Harry’s coat,

  and spoke.

  Leave us alone. You’ve no business here;

  nothing we’re doing is wrong.

  And then: something else I hadn’t predicted;

  Harry gave them a song.

  In the face of that anger, he took a step back,

  he opened his mouth and music came out.

  This man from the Marches, who claims not to sing,

  tipped up his head and let it ring.

  I stood in wonder, I listened with awe,

  as the girl joined in and helped with the tune.

  I stood and stared as if at the moon.

  I, whose life was created through song,

  I, who tamed the wildest of beasts,

  had never seen it in quite the same way;

  as someone else wove wondrous sounds,

  it was all I could do to stay on my feet,

  and laugh as the hunched-up ones and twos

  stopped their work and crowded around,

  and listened to Harry and clapped their hands,

  laughing and smiling; and so for a time

  they forgot their punishment,

  forgot their crime.

  And when it was over,

  with flickering smile,

  their leader took Harry in hand

  and said, D’you understand,

  you’ve given us a wonderful gift,

  a song from nowhere to lighten our load.

  So I must give you a gift in return,

  something to take on your road.

  Harry pointed at the ground.

  That, he said. A way down.

  That’s what I want;

  and the man said, Sir,

  why don’t you look around?

  Can’t you tell?

  To me it seems we’re already in Hell;

  to go only deeper is madness itself,

  so what can I give you to take on your way?

  He thought for a moment.

  He looked at the girl.

  Put dusty finger to grimy curl.

  Here, he said, this is the thing.

  This is who we’re fighting for,

  and understand this:

  when I say fighting,

  I don’t mean war.

  I’m speaking here of greater things

  than Nazi leaders and British kings.

  She’s not your daughter, I can tell,

  but I can see you love her well,

  and so you should, for she is life:

  she is deliverance from eternal strife;

  she is pacifism; she is peace;

  she’s goodwill before the armistice.

  Above all else, you know, it’s true:

  she is the feminine in you.

  So spoke the man.

  When he was done, he turned to the others, turned back to their toil, of shifting through the broken soil, left Harry to stare at his retreating back, who felt Agatha tug his hand and say,

  Harry, I didn’t understa
nd.

  His English was funny, don’t you think?

  Shall we sit by their fire before we go on?

  Why are you crying?

  Did I do something wrong?

  No, said Harry, not you.

  It’s we who’ve done something terribly bad.

  Not you. Not you.

  Not you.

  I’ve been asleep. Head full of the fog. Dogs barking in the distance. All around us the towering mounds of broken buildings like Gothic ruins.

  The sun for once is a perfect disk. Orange and dulled by the dust in the air, the smoke from fires, the sun is setting for the first time this year. And next year? Does it go on like this? Suppose we win the war like Ellis says is inevitable. Then what? A respite and then just more of the same? No, it will keep changing, developing. Who expected the V-1s a year ago? And who could have dreamed up the rockets that come hurtling at us from the upper edges of the atmosphere? We are taking our machines to the edge of space, and when we look down, the world is going to seem very small. Very conquerable. Maybe we won’t win it. Maybe the supersonic ray will wipe us clear off the Earth. Or maybe the humming sound, or whatever our boys are working on, will beat them to it and unleash something terrifying the other way.

  Agatha is sitting, looking at the figures gathered round the fire a few yards away. I search the entry above this one, scour my memory, but can produce nothing but a blank. Nothing but the sketch of a man with a barrow full of rock, and the refrain of a song echoing around my vacant head.

  More information, not that it helps, furnished by A. She found these people who told us they were working to clear this mountain of rubble by hand. Apparently they’ve been at it for simply ages; never seems like there’ll be an end to it, one of them said to her. And this is where it gets even stranger still.

  Agatha tells me I asked them where we were, if we were near the site of the White Horse, but they said they weren’t sure. They just had to keep going. Told us to clear off in no uncertain terms.

  Are people trapped? I asked, and their leader, an old man with a roughed-up face, told us there was a staircase down into the Underground here somewhere, and they felt they had to clear this place up. Nobody else seemed bothered.

  Everyone seems to have forgotten about us, the man said. Every time the hole is almost clear, the excavated rubble slips and falls back in.

  But you were amazing, Harry! Agatha said to me, her face lifting as she told the story. You began to help them and then started singing — that lovely tune — and after a while they all joined in, and everyone was singing together and working. Where did you learn to sing like that?

  Bewildered, I told her I can’t sing for toffee. Never could. Ellis was the chorister, the singer.

  I think you sing very well, she said earnestly, looking puzzled and a bit concerned, and then trying to hide it. Can’t you remember it, Harry?

  I told her I didn’t.

  Agatha shrugged. Well. It happened. It was sehr schön. You looked so well and full of life, my Harry, my Orpheus.

  I told her I didn’t feel at all well. That I didn’t want to let her down, that I didn’t want to let Ellis down, but I was feeling useless.

  You are not useless, she said. Not at all. I looked in your notebook again. It was beautiful. I hope you don’t mind.

  No, I said. But it’s just a journal — me scribbling down stuff that seems to matter, first for my new project, then to try and keep my resolution. Now it’s to gather my ideas together in case I forget stuff. I asked her if that made any sense and she nodded.

  But it is more than that, she said. It is a very lovely diary. I liked reading about you finding me. You are writing very well.

  I told her that was Ellis’s department, but she just gave me that flash of a smile again and patted the back of my hand.

  You must keep writing, she said. As much as you can. I think it is important. What is Warriors of the Machine?

  It’s just an idea I’ve been working on, I said. I told her that when I get back to the Slade Art School, I want to do a big illustrated book, with words and images combined; make a kind of warning. About how we’re just going to become more efficient at killing each other unless we work out how to develop our better selves. Rambled on for a bit about killer robots and helmets that could control people from a long way away with radio waves or whatever.

  It sounds very scary, Agatha said.

  It is, I said.

  Now the exhausted rubble heapers sit to one side, brewing tea in a blackened can over the bruised flame of a Primus stove, passing cigarettes, talking quietly amongst themselves. Words that don’t convey anything but a shared burden, a brief respite. They look timeless as behind them the sun keeps slipping, darkening, going under.

  Those dogs are getting louder. Angry-sounding things.

  Time for an eyeball. I slip it into the dust that these people are making with their unceasing effort, and it catches that last bit of coppery light.

  Harry, you’re fading.

  Fading, fast.

  Any of your scribblings could now be your last.

  But I can help you tell your tale.

  When your words fail, I can help you speak.

  I can walk inside you, when your legs are weak.

  Can’t you remember . . . ?

  Those dogs?

  Those wild, hunger-maddened dogs.

  They come across the wasted ground.

  Agatha: running, shouting.

  One of the rubble sifters takes a burning firebrand;

  throws it at the pack;

  they scatter, but come back.

  Snapping, snarling, biting, clawing,

  and then another metamorphosis:

  the dogs stop.

  Raise their forepaws from the ground,

  hips cracking, straightening backs,

  joints twisting, muzzles receding,

  fur falling, ears shortening,

  as they become:

  men.

  Not just any men, Harry,

  but the warriors of the machine.

  X-Dogs of war. You looked into the future, Harry:

  is this what you saw?

  Men who don’t know they’re men anymore?

  I, who can sense the smallest vibration

  (for vibration is all that music is),

  can hear that something is amiss:

  the X-Dogs have helmets upon their heads,

  helmets so cunning as can scarce be believed.

  Trans-cranial subsonic manipulation:

  sound waves control every thought and deed.

  Direct stimulation of synapse and nerve

  by subsonic waves crossing into the brain:

  no more fear, no more dread, no more pain.

  No more tiredness during a battle;

  no more panic when danger’s near:

  fatigue removed and consciences cleared.

  Man as machine, warrior dog:

  who could have dreamed of such a horror,

  who could have sat down and sold this to someone

  and who could have placed it on another man’s head?

  Only the warriors, the warriors of the machine.

  The dogs come closer; Harry steps back.

  I can see in his eyes that he hasn’t the strength,

  and so I step inside him,

  and sing.

  We sing of things too lovely for words,

  like children laughing and music dancing,

  of apples and honey and grapes on the vine,

  of the darkest red wine,

  of the delight at the approach of spring,

  of all the joy that love can bring,

  of magical moments that happen in life:

  like how, having climbed a hill,

  you would still climb higher

  and how eyes shine bright when we sit by the fire.

  We sing of the pleasure of finding a word

  for something unnamed before.

  We sing of a th
ousand wonderful things,

  then sing of a thousand more.

  And then, Harry, look! Harry!

  The dogs are removing their metal hats.

  They stand as if they’ve just been born,

  shaking their heads,

  brushing webs of deceit from their minds,

  and turn to each other,

  smiling at first,

  then laughing and joking

  they turn towards the nearest man

  and starting to dance, hand in hand,

  shout, Orpheus! Orpheus!

  You gave us your song,

  stronger than anything nursing our brains;

  found us and saved us and showed us a way

  to stop. Just to stop and say,

  I don’t know you, but I love you like no other;

  I love you like a brother.

  One of the dogs is curled at my feet. Her ferocity gone. The wolf has become a household faithful.

  Agatha was really worried about me, but I feel better again now. In the gaps between whatever’s happening to my head, I don’t feel too bad. It’s like listening to a faulty radio — the voice suddenly gone and drowned by static, but when it comes back, it’s talking away as if nothing has happened and everything’s fine.

  The diggers are clearing the top of a flight of steps and have told me they think I’m close to where I need to be.

  We’re getting nearer, A said. I can feel it.

  And I think I can too. I can sense we’re on the right track again.

  I push my hand into the fur at the dog’s neck, outer layer trapping cold air, warm deeper down. She looks up at me now as I write. A different color, different size, of dog, but those eyes! She reminds me again so much of dear old Lottie, our childhood dog, one of the three pointers that Father had bought for shooting but became the family pet instead, so bad was she at finding and retrieving wounded or dead game. No interest at all in chasing falling, shot-filled ducks as they thumped down, feathers shredded. Just a joy in being alive — and keeping us all company. In the end she even warmed Father’s heart after his initial frustration and disgust at her complete disinterest in training. Softened his grief a bit over Mutti when the rest of us couldn’t do a thing to help him.

  Lottie would roll over at the drop of a hat, tail wagging like anything, soft belly ready to be stroked. Or would beg Ellis and me to walk her on the wild tops of the hills. And we did. Miles and miles and miles of windy November days; clear mornings in May when you could look one way and see the flatlands of England stretched out in a haphazard green checkerboard, then look the other and see the sleeping mountains of Wales, summer evenings of slanting warm light. And always Lottie with us, snuffling, running rings around us, disappearing, returning. Quietly, secretly, we each thought of her as our own. And as she and we aged, I began to dread her passing more and more.