Defend or Die

by Tom Marcus

  I got up and started carefully inching my way around the walls, planting each foot neatly after the other. Let’s say each foot is ten inches long, just to make things a bit more interesting, then when it comes to the height of the walls, we’d do the width of a hand – say, four inches? I nodded to myself: sounds good.

  I plodded on, round and round, totting it all up in my head and storing it away. I had no real sense of time, but it felt as if I must have been going for two hours at least – maybe three? – before my concentration started to waver. I felt my way over to the bucket and gulped down another scoop of water. I could have had more but I needed to ration myself: I’d used up at least half in cleaning myself up and I didn’t know when Martindale would be back. I was getting hungry now, too, beginning to feel a bit woozy as my blood sugar hovered around zero. Soon I’d be running on empty, and that would bring its own problems. But for the moment I was OK, as long as I didn’t get too dehydrated. Stevie chucking his guts up hadn’t helped.

  I decided to have a rest. I went back to my corner, almost stubbing my toe on the legs of the stool, then remembering where it was just in time. I wedged myself between the walls, pulling the blanket over my knees. I felt the darkness and the silence closing over me as my mind went quiet. It was like going under when you were exhausted from treading water. I felt a hand grasping my ankle, pulling me down. For a second I let go, surrendering to the familiar touch. No! I shook myself alert and got my head above water again.

  Come on, focus. What next? OK, got it: you’re going on the tube from Uxbridge to Epping. Which lines? How many stops? Count them: Hillingdon, Ickenham, Ruislip, Eastcote – no – Ruislip Manor, then Eastcote, then . . . is it North Harrow or West Harrow? Or Harrow-on-the-Hill? Shit, go back to the beginning, see the map in your head. OK – Uxbridge, Hillingdon . . .

  39

  I heard the soft scrape of shoes on stone and suddenly became alert. Had I been asleep? My sense of time was totally gone. Martindale could have been away for an hour or a whole day. I stopped and listened. Nothing. Was it my imagination? Maybe it was just rats. There must be plenty down here, after all. What did Martindale say this room used to be: an ossuary? Full of bones, at any rate. They’d be hundreds of years old, though. Not much left to gnaw on. There could always be a new lot, of course, if things went wrong. I could end up propped up in the corner just like Daisy. Would anyone ever find me? Maybe not for another few hundred years. That would give the rats plenty of time to pick me clean.

  Fuck. Stop that.

  I heard the clunk of the lock and then the creak of the door opening. A gust of chilly air blew into the room as the light from Martindale’s lamp swept round the walls. He stood for a moment, looking down at me, without speaking, then sat down on the stool, placing the lamp on the floor beside him. I shut my eyes, the sudden brightness making me dizzy.

  ‘It’s probably a bit bright for you, isn’t it? You’re getting used to the dark.’ He reached into a pocket of his combats and pulled out a candle and a box of matches. ‘This will be a bit less uncomfortable.’ He struck a match and held it to the wick until it spluttered alight, then set the candle down carefully on the floor, before turning off the lamp. I opened my eyes. Martindale’s face seemed to be floating in the gloom, just visible in the candlelight. Somewhere deep inside, I could feel Stevie trying to worm his way further into the dark.

  ‘I hope you’re feeling rested, because it’s time for another little trip down memory lane.’

  I nodded, slowly, but Martindale seemed to sense that Stevie wasn’t entirely present. I couldn’t see his eyes clearly but I knew he was looking at me, waiting patiently. Slowly, reluctantly, Stevie uncurled, like a kid playing sardines whose hiding place had just been discovered.

  ‘OK,’ Martindale said. ‘You’re probably feeling a little hungry. If you concentrate hard and do what I ask, maybe I’ll bring you something.’

  ‘OK, yeah,’ I said, my voice barely a whisper.

  ‘Your mother,’ he said.

  ‘I don’t—’

  ‘Yes, you do.’ His voice was firm. ‘You do. You’ve just chosen not to remember. I can’t think why you’d do that – a boy deliberately forgetting his own mother? That’s not very nice, is it?’

  I felt a flutter of panic. Stevie was fully present now. ‘But she – I don’t know – got rid of me, when I was a baby. So I can’t remember her, can I?’

  Martindale sighed heavily. ‘That’s the story you’ve told yourself, but we both know it’s not true. You’ve just tried to block her out. But that’s going to stop, right now.’

  My breathing quickened. ‘OK.’

  ‘Good. Let’s start with your first summer holiday.’

  Nothing. My mind was a blank.

  ‘Come on – Bournemouth. You went to the beach. What was the weather like?’

  I paused. Stevie had never been to Bournemouth. He didn’t even know where it was. But it was no use him saying that. Martindale was like an irresistible force. Stevie was just too weak to resist. I closed my eyes and tried to think. At first there was nothing. Then suddenly I could picture it.

  ‘It . . . rained,’ I said.

  ‘Yes! It poured down, didn’t it! What did you do?’

  ‘Made sandcastles on the beach, I suppose.’

  ‘In the rain?’

  A pause.

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘What was your mother doing?’

  It was miraculous, as if Martindale had conjured her out of thin air. There she was, the mother he’d never seen. He could have reached out and touched her. ‘She . . . had an umbrella. She stood and watched. She was smoking a cigarette. She was . . . always smoking cigarettes.’

  Martindale was nodding. ‘Did it make her clothes smell? Could you smell it when she held you?’

  I found myself grinning. ‘Yeah. I liked it.’

  ‘When you smell cigarette smoke, do you think of her?’

  ‘Yeah. Always.’

  ‘Was she pretty? She had dark hair, didn’t she?’

  ‘Yeah. And long. Really long. All the way down her back.’

  Martindale didn’t say anything for a while, letting the smell and the look and the feel of her fill Stevie’s mind.

  ‘She really loved you, didn’t she? What was that? I can’t hear you.’

  I opened my mouth but no words came out. A dam-burst of emotions was filling me up and I felt myself starting to choke.

  ‘She . . . she . . .’

  ‘Come on, say it.’

  I toppled over, retching, but my stomach was empty and nothing came out.

  ‘Say it!’

  ‘Yes! She loved me.’

  ‘Good. Good. And how did she show that she loved you?’

  I shook my head. ‘No . . . please.’

  ‘Come on, don’t be shy!’ He was leaning forward eagerly on his stool now. I thought of a fisherman watching his float bobbing, waiting for the moment to strike.

  I was rocking from side to side now, moaning. I felt Stevie slipping away.

  Martindale could sense it, too. ‘You can smell the cigarettes in her hair,’ he said, raising his voice. ‘Your face is in her hair, that lovely long hair. You liked to put your face in it. You put your arms round her neck, didn’t you? Holding on tight. And then she turned her face to you and looked at you, and she smiled, didn’t she? And you smiled back, because you were so happy she was there, and you loved her so much, and then she . . .’

  He stood up, a faceless, shadowy figure towering over me. I cringed back, like a dog waiting to be kicked.

  ‘Say it!’ he shouted.

  Stevie was on the verge of blacking out. I took a huge breath, trying to fill my lungs . . .

  ‘She kissed me!’ I screamed, then sank back, like a puppet with all its strings suddenly cut, my head bumping against the wall.

  Martindale stood for a moment, looking down at me, then sat back down on the stool. The candle had fallen over, and he picked it up carefully and stood it uprig
ht. He lit another match and the flame flickered back into life.

  ‘Very good,’ he said. ‘I’m glad you can remember that. You’re still remembering it, aren’t you?’

  I made a sound.

  ‘I’ll take that as a yes. A mother’s love: we all need that, don’t we? Without it we’d be . . . nothing. Nothing at all.’

  I felt sick, knowing what was about to happen.

  Time stretched out. Martindale didn’t seem to be in any hurry to deliver the final blow. Just fucking get on with it, I thought.

  ‘I said I’d get you some food, didn’t I? What would you like?’ He waited. ‘That’s all right, I’ll just grab what I can find. Oh, before I go, just one thing you should know.’

  He came and squatted down beside me. I couldn’t see him properly, but I could feel his breath on my face.

  ‘Your mother,’ he said in a soft voice. ‘She died soon after you were born. So I’m not sure who the woman on the beach was. Or the little boy for that matter. Strange, isn’t it? Because you remember her so clearly.’

  He waited to see if he’d get a response. But there was nothing. Then he turned and walked to the door.

  40

  It was the gnawing hunger pains that eventually brought me back to my senses. I was lying on my side, clutching the blanket, my face against the cold floor. Far off, very faintly, I could hear a child crying. It felt as if I’d been listening to it for a long time. Could there be a child down here, somewhere in another cell? I didn’t understand. What would Martindale want with a child? Then I realized: it was Stevie. I listened. It was getting fainter. Soon it would stop. And then Stevie would be ready for the next stage, the next phase of the cleansing process. I could feel him already, beginning to loosen and fall apart, like an overdone chicken. I wondered what Martindale was going to do next, what bone he was going to pull.

  I got onto my hands and knees and crawled towards the buckets. I wasn’t thirsty, but I was desperate to put something in my mouth. Martindale had said something about bringing food. When had that been? I felt along the floor with my fingers. A bowl. A metal bowl. I put my finger inside. There was a smear of something; it felt like porridge, but thinner. Some kind of gruel. I scraped it up and shovelled it into my mouth. It was barely a mouthful and tasted of nothing, but I started salivating, just the same. I worked my fingers around the sides, trying to get every last scrap, desperately licking and sucking my fingers until there was nothing left.

  So he had left food. Had I already eaten the rest of the bowl? Why didn’t I remember? Or maybe the rats had been at it. Or had he left the bowl with just a spoonful of food in it just to fuck with me? More mind games. Maybe he’d calculated that it was just enough to keep me going, just enough to keep me alert and receptive without actually making me feel any less hungry. I put the bowl down and methodically searched the floor in case there was anything else, even sticking my fingers hopefully into the half-dried patch of vomit, but that seemed to be it. For a moment I had the thought that Stevie had eaten the rest of the bowl without telling me and felt a flash of anger.

  I shook my head. Steady, Logan.

  I drank a scoop of water, splashed another scoop onto my face, and went back to my corner, wrapping the blanket round my shoulders. Stevie’s close to breaking point, I told myself. You just have to hold your shit together until he cracks, and remember not to go crazy along with him.

  You can do that, right?

  I nodded to myself. Yeah. Piece of piss.

  OK, what next?

  How about some exercise? Fifty circuits of the cell, maybe? Just to get the circulation going and keep everything from seizing up?

  I wasn’t sure I had the energy. I would need what little I had left to try and stay alert, focused. Silly to waste it on doing press-ups.

  Concentrating on the body, on physical sensations, was good, though. It was a way of keeping yourself grounded. I decided to do a full inventory, starting at the bottom with my feet and working my way upwards, focusing on what I could feel. I spread the blanket and laid myself out flat. An uncontrollable wave of shivering went through me.

  OK, that’s a good place to start. Cold, you’re unbelievably fucking cold. Good. It’s when you stop feeling cold you have to worry. OK, let’s get back to the feet: apart from the cold, what can you feel? Those broken toes from two years ago: still aching a bit, or is that just imagination? And what about your dodgy Achilles? Still a bit sore?

  I worked my way up, willing sensation into my muscles and tendons, trying to bring the map of my body to life, remembering old injuries – along with the stories that went with them – and tracing long-healed scars, until I could feel a faint buzzing going all the way through me from head to toe.

  Right. Next.

  Where had I got to with the cup finals? For a moment I was confused: had I already started or had I just been thinking about it? I had a feeling I’d got to 1974 but I couldn’t be sure. Never mind; let’s start there, anyway. I could always go back to the beginning.

  Right. 1974. Liverpool and Newcastle. Three–nil Liverpool. Bill Shankly still in charge. Was it his last game? Can’t remember – come back to that. Scorers: Keegan, Heighway . . . Shit, who scored the third? Keegan, Heighway . . . Toshack? No. Let me think. Let’s go through the team.

  ‘Keegan.’

  I looked up. Daisy was sitting on the stool.

  I blinked and looked again.

  ‘Still here,’ she said with a giggle. ‘Not pleased to see me? Anyway, it was Keegan. He scored two.’ She shook her head. ‘You call yourself a football fan?’

  Her hair was very blonde, almost dazzling. I didn’t remember it being frizzy. I also wondered how I was able to see her, since there was no light.

  ‘It’s my inner glow, in case you’re wondering,’ she said with another laugh.

  I felt if I said anything, if I acknowledged her presence, it would only make her more real.

  ‘You’re welcome,’ she said. ‘Any time. A bottomless treasure trove of useless information, that’s me.’

  I couldn’t help staring at her, even though I desperately wanted her not to be there. She seemed pleased.

  ‘Don’t you think I’m looking well?’

  I opened my mouth, then quickly shut it again. She was looking lovely.

  ‘Better than you, anyway. Aren’t they feeding you down here? You look a bit pale, to be honest. It’s not really meant for regular people down here. You should be dead, strictly speaking.’ She looked at me curiously. ‘You’re not dead, are you?’

  ‘No,’ I whispered.

  She laughed delightedly, clapping her hands. ‘He speaks! Not dead, then. Very good. Being dead’s no fun, I can tell you. Not at first, anyway. You get used to it after a while, though. Then it can have its moments, I suppose.’ She looked around. ‘Where’s the other one?’

  I concentrated on keeping my lips shut tight.

  ‘Hiding. Silly boy.’ She shook her head. ‘I don’t know, the pair of you.’

  The longer this went on, the more real she seemed to be getting. I felt torn in half. There were so many things I wanted to ask her. Plus it was company. But I also desperately wanted her to go away. How could I make her go away? I was sure she’d go if Martindale came back, but I didn’t want that. Anything was preferable to that.

  ‘You feeling peckish?’

  My stomach clenched.

  ‘I’ve got a little something here, if you are. Don’t show your friend, though, or he’ll want one, too.’

  She was holding something in her fist. Her fingers were very pale. Her fingernails were blood-red.

  ‘Do you want to see?’ Her eyes sparkled and she was grinning. ‘If you don’t say anything, that means yes!’

  I bit my lip, tasting blood.

  ‘Ta da!’ She opened her fist, revealing what looked like a purple golf ball in her palm. ‘Look at that! It’s almost as big as I am!’ she squealed.

  She held it closer and I could see that it was a gobstop
per.

  ‘They’re not so easy to get hold of these days, you know,’ she said. ‘Not great big ones like this. Well, do you want it?’

  I couldn’t help staring at it. It seemed to be slowly growing bigger as I watched, glistening in the glow of her bone-white fingers. At first it had looked purple, but now it seemed darker, almost black. I wondered what would happen if I put it in my mouth. It wasn’t real, after all. The sugary, artificial taste of it was making my mouth water. Surely it couldn’t do me any harm?

  ‘Go on,’ she said. She seemed to have got closer without moving. I licked my lips. I was trying to keep as still as possible, but my hand seemed to be moving of its own accord, slowly reaching out. ‘Go on! That’s it!’ I looked up and saw she was grinning, her tiny pearl-white teeth clenched together.

  I heard the sudden rattle of a key in the lock. Her head snapped round, and she snatched her hand back, closing her fingers over the gobstopper.

  The door began to open and the light from Martindale’s hurricane lamp swept round the room. As it touched her, she started to fade.

  ‘Saved by the bell,’ she said in an annoyed voice, before vanishing.

  41

  Martindale stood in the middle of the room with the lamp in his hand, looking at me curiously. I realized I still had my hand out. I pulled it back and hid it in the folds of the blanket, keeping my eyes on the floor while I shuffled back further into my corner. He shone the lamp over the buckets and the tin bowl. I saw the glint of a metal spoon in the far corner. ‘We’d better empty that,’ he said. I assumed he meant the bucket I was supposed to piss and shit in. ‘And get you some more water. It looks like you were hungry.’ He put the lamp down so it was pointed almost directly at me, moved the stool nearer and sat down.