The Clockwork Tartan: Quest of the Five Clans

by Raymond St. Elmo

  So I leaned forwards, took the next grape, placed it to her lips. Teeth less white than once. Lips still full. Her eyes went wide with surprise. Then the mouth opened, accepting the offering. I moved hand to cheek, caressed it as I would a cat. The wide eyes closed, she shivered exact as virgin on wedding bed.

  Of a sudden she pushed away basket, cup and plate. Pulled off bonnet, threw it aside. Then stood, looked about. Went to candle, snuffed its busybody light. Returned, stood before me. Waiting. Offering me choice. I chose, and rose. Moved behind her, reached arms around to unfasten the robe. Knotted at the waist. I cursed, she laughed, both of us recalling the locks of her wedding dress. When the robe came free, a chemise fell easily after. Now she trembled naked. I trembled dressed.

  The hair atop her head: bound strands, painted ash. I studied the nape of her neck. A fine place to begin. I did so, gave kiss just there. She sighed happy. I grasped her shoulders, turned her slow about so we faced one another. The last of the evening light revealing the matron before me.

  She put arm across breasts, hand shielding crotch, exact as when we met upon a burning roof. Lines across the rounded tummy narrating children carried, a history writ clear as any letter. Nipples darker, breasts longer, heavier.

  “What a shy thing you are, always,” I declared. “’Tis a wonder you ever gave up maidenhood for a proper bed.”

  “Me shy?” she declared. “You stand the one still clothed, man.” And her fingers set about to correct this injustice. And to other good works as well. When we stood naked together, I pressed her close, began another kiss. Her tongue darted away surprised to meet mine. She pulled head back. Whispering something in her dream language of a fantasy north.

  “None of that,” I declared.

  She turned head aside. “I said this feels wrong,” she declared. “Is it breaking faith for me to lie with you? For all we’re married. Yet you are scarce half my age. What would the father of my children say?”

  It made an interesting question. But I’d had a surfeit of interesting questions. Hell with them all, and their answers too. I ran my hands down her sides, up along the back. The bones of hip and spine were shyer than once; I had to press lightly with fingers to find them. Here, and there. Did skin feel less warm? No. For sure there were wrinkles in unexpected places. I explored more. Till she growled, in desire or annoyance. In solution to either I took her hand, led her to the couch. She sat down, lay back. I knelt on the floor beside her, touching here, kissing there.

  When she hissed at me in sign to cease play, I knelt upon the couch, joined her on the couch. She gave a deep groan of a laugh, and wrapped legs round my waist for a welcome home.

  * * *

  I napped atop her. Till couch became uncomfortable. We rose, put the pillows upon the floor, lay side by side. Again I slept, till she shivered, I rose, lit a fire. Returned with the blanket. We lay silent, embracing, listening to the fire; listening to the tale the house told in its silence, it’s settling to the years.

  “I knew you were to wander here, tired and hungered,” she said at last. “Just wasn’t sure of the day. Been preparing baskets and blanket, coming to this room each evening for a fortnight.” She shook head. “Peeking in, finding naught but books. Lonely thing, a picnic by oneself.”

  She considered that, then shook away sad vapors, cocked practical eye at me. “Now best ask what you need to know, man. You don’t have overmuch time, and I’ve forgot half the tale of what comes next.”

  What to ask? Where was the Espada bell that Chatterton had to ring, so his insane cousins would cease their murderous hunt? What became of the Glocken? The Charter? I considered this tomb of books, the silence it bespoke. Considered how she looked at me in hunger. No, not for blood; but for touch, for word, for the sight of my charming face.

  I reached to her own charming face, touched finger-tip to a tear. Asked what had best be asked and done with.

  “How long have I been dead?”

  Chapter 25

  The Mirror is a Harsh Mistress

  Lalena shook. A long moment passed before she made answer.

  “By clock and calendar’s accounting? Not so long. By heart’s measure, a thousand years.”

  “Ah.” I said. Couldn’t think of a thing to say. I might ask how I died. Probably I’d want to know. Or maybe not. I hugged her tight. She returned embrace. That’s most of a marriage there.

  “Don’t be alarmed,” whispered Lalena into my ear. “But I am about to scream.”

  “What?” I asked, alarmed. I abandoned the hug. “You did so already. This morning.”

  “Did I?” she asked, curious. “Whatever for?”

  “Well, I was dead.”

  “Ach. I recall now. How you did keep dying! Why you ever took up arms is a mystery.”

  I sat up. “Woman, you once praised me for leaping atop a giant wolf.”

  She sat up. “And a mad brave thing it was, dear heart. But a habit of mad bravery is hard on a marriage.”

  Was this about the dragon? Of course it was about the dragon. I prepared to argue the dragon. Didn’t. A scream rang through the house. I leaped up naked, scrambling for rapier. Lalena sighed. The door burst open. In came a very angry… Lalena.

  She stood before us, firelight on her face, her opened mouth a forge of rage. White teeth sharp and bared. Hands clenching. Looked up and down my naked self, then to the naked woman at my feet.

  “I thought to find you with your slut of a whore of a house maid,” she hissed. “Who is this?”

  * * *

  The clans of my in-laws are descended from one legendary tribe. That primeval source called (with confounded shrug, oft as not) ‘the old ones’. What title can they be given, when they took no name? For their joy was to live free of name, of definition, of binding by words. They wandered the earth pocketless, homeless, infinitely proud of their freedom and mastery, delighting in the love between their excellent kind. ‘Hearts like to their hearts’, they sang, and what they meant by that is any sane man’s guess. They ran across the earth free as the shadows of clouds passing across fields. All the lesser, later clans such as Sanglair and Mac Tier, Decoursey and Glocken, Mac Mur and Espada descend from that ancient source. ‘Wind’s children, Flame’s brethren’, they declared. And who or what these apocryphal creatures were, they never said.

  But those of the family who wearied of wandering, gave themselves names, founded homes, put things into pocket. But still their delight lay in meeting together. ‘Revels’, they called such gatherings. And when road and sea and time made too great a barrier? Why, they met in dreams. A Mac Tier might greet a Mac Muir upon the road with a kiss, recalling a dance between them a thousand sea fathoms down, and twice as many years passed. All the family lived in a tangle of lives and loves, a dance of endless quarrel, endless laughter, infinite delight.

  * * *

  The woman upon the blanket rose in no hurry, in no worry for dignity. Giving an ‘oof’ of breath as she unfolded to a stand. She did no covering of herself, not a whit more shy than when she’d first stood before me whispering of broken hearts. She stood proud, grey head jutting forwards, hands on widened hips to display stern attitude and flattened breasts. She cocked eye at her younger self, glance critical.

  “Girl, blue silk with yellow hair makes you a flower painted on a vase. You but need a shepherd’s crook to complete the porcelain picture.”

  Lalena at the door stared. Slapped by the words. Struck more by this mocking lack of shame. She tried another hiss. No reaction but a smile. Lalena the Younger stamped into the room, thrust head forwards, set face to face with Lalena the Elder.

  “How dare you, you old worn thing?”

  “You chit of an innocent,” sighed the other. “You only know of being feared. You’ve yet to dare to begin being loved. It frights you, does it not? And so you rushed in hoping to find the love false. Admit it so.”

  Lalena Younger stepped backed, shocked as lion when lamb draws first blood. She could find nothing t
o say but what she’d already said.

  “How, how dare you?” Then turned to me. Easier prey for sure. “And you!”

  I backed away, not a bit in fear, just in search of my pants. I didn’t want another angel stealing them. They would, you know.

  “Lilly-Ann Elena Mac Sanglair,” I waved to one, then the other. “I have the pleasure of introducing you to Lilly-Ann Elena Mac Sanglair.”

  Dressed Lalena scowled, hissed, sputtered… and stopped. Eyes shot wide. Slow and unwilling did she turn gaze upon the other. Her face revealing all a garden of flowering emotions. Anger. Puzzlement. Fear. And last came dread comprehension.

  “No,” she whispered. “No, no, no.” She turned to me as if I could yet rectify this wrong done unto her by the miles of Time’s Hall. I held out empty hands. There was naught here to rectify, by my measure. She stamped foot, waved arms in the air in defiance of years and mirrors.

  “Her?” she waved hand. “You lay with her? ‘Tis betrayal worse than you fornicating with your red-haired whore! How could you prefer this creature to me?”

  I shook head for lack of answer. Should I declare I’d kissed and caressed her, not another? But to Younger Lalena I’d joined in lust with a mocking stranger. And perhaps she had the right of it. Touch and taste and fit of the Elder Lalena had differed. Even our after-love banter followed a different tempo. How not? If time did not lead us to change, there would be no hall to wander.

  Easy bit of philosophy, till tested out upon oneself. Suppose I were to walk into my bedroom, see my wife’s legs tight about the waist of my sixteen year old self? I’d howl she befouled our marriage bed with a damned dirty churl of a dog cock. And God dead and Devil on the Throne… if I were to find her in the embrace of Old Rayne, paunched and yellow-toothed? I’d kill the wrinkled reprobate dead, and pack her off to a nunnery.

  And yet… why should she or I see it so? Let my wife love me all my years, else declare marriage a thing for brief fashion, same as style of hat. Hellfire, I’d track Lalena up and down the Hall of Time at every age and stage of womanhood, did I not risk madness in the doing. And I would go mad, I knew it now.

  I considered the two women before me. Elder Lalena waited, refusing least retreat. Young Lalena’s face shone flushed by fire shine. Unmarked by time… or scratch. Of a sudden I perceived what would come. I hurried to find words to prevent destiny. Pointless. Lalena Naked, slapped Lalena Dressed. The ring upon the older woman’s hand tracing a bright red line across the cheek.

  Lalena Dressed shrieked, raised fist to smite Lalena Naked. Then stopped. They both considered that fist. Till Lalena Naked shook head, spoke.

  “I’ve daughters older than you. And wiser. Your man loves you when you aren’t a girl but a woman shaped by life, by years. You think that betrayal?”

  Dressed Lalena stepped back, defeated. “So old,” she whispered. Turned to me. “No. No. No,” she repeated. Then turned and fled the room. I thought to pursue. But that’d be leaving my other wife. I’d done over much of that. So I sighed, finished dressing. While Lalena the Elder stood naked and thoughtful. I filled a cup with wine, drank half. Then brought the chalice to my widow. Yes, I know the word I used.

  “I fear I treated her cruel,” sighed Lalena, taking the wine. “Does that hold sense?”

  I felt the same. I’d seen the next part of the play, not understanding. Younger Lalena would now rush through the Hall of Time, returning to the dawn of my obituary. Her head angry, her heart heavy, she’d encounter me in the vestibule. She’d seize me for a picnic all of our own, in our own private place, in our own green years. Thinking to halt right there all the adventure to come.

  Naught to do but give an embrace to the Lalena at hand, knowing it would one day reach the one that fled. This wife grinned, lifted face to mine, returned kiss as giving as when she’d stood before priest, white veil raised. Till at last the kiss ended, the wine cup emptied. Then she dressed.

  We walked through an empty house, hand in hand, candelabra raised high. My rebuilt home had succumbed not to flame, but dust. We passed doors closed and sealed. Sheets upon furnishings. Cobwebs aplenty, and a hint of mold. Did Lalena live in this ruin alone? Whatever passed with Mistress Grumble, and Edward the groom? Where now the gay throng of in-laws that once haunted our house, tiptoeing behind us, spying and prying?

  I didn’t ask. If the oracle means you well, they will say what is best you know. All else? Mere theatre of misdirection, Macbeth’s witches on the heath grinning for their clever cheats.

  “Were I you, I’d seek the Espada bell first,” advised Lalena. “The Glocken has sunk it fathoms deep beneath the years. You’ll need aid of some of the Clockmaker clan to find it.”

  “There is a key twisted in all this tangle,” I observed. “But I keep losing it.”

  “Ach,” she laughed. “There’s no keeping those keys. That key, I suppose. They say there’s only the one, bouncing forwards and back through time. Seize it when it tumbles by. Else never find your way out the maze. Some never do. Here we are.”

  We stood in the vestibule before the front door. I gazed up at the crystal centering the chandelier. Still there. And yet also in my pocket? Lalena set the candelabra upon the letter table. No flowers in vase, no last fallen petal remained. She opened the closet to the side, same where I had emerged this morning decades ago. The black of Time’s hall filled the frame, yielding no least view of what waited beyond.

  “Here’s your path, boyo,” she said, smiling at me. Dark house, pale face, bright tears.

  What to say? What to ask? What to vow? What to explain? Nothing. Nothing. And nothing. Long words at such partings were cruel. Useless as those battle field letters found on the fallen. The things of meaning are said all the days before ‘farewell’. Ah, but my wife’s tears shone bright. So also mine, I suppose.

  “I’ll take good care of the poor thing,” I promised.

  She puzzled a moment, then scowled amazed. “You’ll take care of… Bah and ha, man, you’d best mend proud ways, end glorious airs. You won’t always have this fine head of hair.” She gave my fine head of hair fond pat.

  Of course I would, I thought. Why would I rid myself of it? But best not argue. I reached to embrace, she did same. We stood long so. Prouder than I, she stepped away first.

  “Majesty of the Oak,” she said. “Good fortune in your path, your heart, your hearth.” She made graceful curtsy, defying Time’s touch upon knee and back. For a second I puzzled. What of the what? Ah, the fool title of oak-king I’d declared at our first meeting. Near two years passed. So very long ago.

  “My lady,” I returned. Considered another last embrace. No. Enough. I nodded, turned, strode into the dark doorway. Time being a japester, I feared I’d clatter into a wall. But no; I walked on into the dark, leaving her behind.

  Chapter 26

  And if He left off Dreaming

  Far and deep in the Hall of Time, one lonely lamp shone. I marched towards it, sword drawn. Feeling no great interest in what I’d find. My heart and mind remained behind. So I trudged along, expecting clockwork monstrosities, highland lunatics. Else a dragon or three. At length the single lamp revealed a tableau of harmless things. A chair. A girl. A cat.

  The chair: same in which the dragon sat as man. Carved wood or stone, it looked a heavy thing, suitable to eternity’s furnishings. No dragon within it now. The Lamp Maiden rested upon the throne, legs draped across a chair arm. She held a string, dangled it towards the floor.

  A kitten darted out from beneath, tumbling and twisting at the yarn. The girl laughed. The flame of the lamp laughed. I smiled, not yet up to laughter. I felt wrung and twisted as if I’d just said last farewell to a long life’s love. Still, here was a peaceful scene. I leaned against the wall, watching kitten, girl, string.

  She looked a mix of Vixen’s foxy chin and mouth, and Lalena’s straight hair, with the Porcelain Doll’s unnaturally smooth skin and doll-like motion. Yet the total reminded me of the three nameless girls. Wherefore n
ot? All were cousins, kindred of close age. This girl might sit alone in an empty hall, but she mirrored all a secret nation like unto her. A wonder of a thought, that we held bits and pieces of one another within our beings, like tiny portraits in a locket capturing the face of our beloved.

  The string dangled. The kitten leaped. The girl laughed. I watched, feeling my heart’s pain ease, the anguish cease to weigh. Here the world was warm and still and sleepy. Yet not lonely. Whatever partings come, in the Hall of Time is a door for every reunion. At length I sheathed sword, walked onwards into the lamp light. The girl looked up at my steps. Greeted me with smile, returned to teasing the kitten, dangling the string. The kitten lay on its back, thrashing paws at its dread foe, eyes wide and mad for battle.

  One lamp cast all this island of flickering warmth. I stopped, considered the infinite steps beyond the light. What did going on offer? A long march of hours, days, years. Better to stay here for eternity. Let wars and sorrows enact themselves beyond the endless doors. I’d lean against this wall in peace, watching a girl laugh, a kitten chase a string.

  Someone lay on the floor in the shadow of the throne… Behold the Glocken himself, head resting in arms. Tattered black cloak wrapped about for a blanket. Battered top hat and cane beside him. He snored, puffs of air setting wisps of mustache drifting. I studied him awhile. Had this creature done me harm? He’d meant me harm, I felt. But he was old, he was mad. Let him live, let him sleep.

  The girl dangled the string. The kitten whirled and pounced, astonished at the magic of this thin creature to confound its mighty paws. And at last I too laughed, with the girl, with the light. The Lamp Maiden smiled kindly, as though it were past time I did laugh.

  “I seek a door to the Espada bell,” I whispered to the girl. “Can you help?”