Foulsham

by Edward Carey

  ‘He doesn’t like to be made so small,’ said the Tailor. ‘How he struggles and twists himself over it. We’ve so stretched and pulled and hurt the shape of each other, we’ve corrupted and deformed ourselves. We’re bent out of all order and shall not come back right again.’

  ‘Poor Cousin Rippit!’

  ‘You see how we have changed over these five years, how I have stretched and tugged and how he has shrunk and dented and rusted. How we have hurt one another. I am not as strong as once I was and sometimes, particularly of late, I fear he may get the better of me. But he has not yet, though he pulls me so hard!’ The Tailor wrapped and returned the flask to his pocket. ‘Back at Heap House, your cousin had a certain way with objects. He summoned up people every now and then, pulled them briefly from the objects they had become. He stalked the house upsetting things, bullying them, bringing them for the briefest moments back to themselves, only for them to be drowned once more back into object form. There was pain all over the House, the things were hurting.’

  ‘Yes, there is truth in this. The objects do hurt so!’

  ‘One day your cousin called upon the object nearest him, to bring it out, just for a moment he hoped, and then to close it back in the form of a letter opener knife. Thus did I stretch and stand once more, and thus did I pounce and keep him there, that twisted metal soul: your cousin the hip flask!’

  ‘Poor Cousin, though he was never kind to me, still I say it, poor Cousin.’

  ‘Rippit Iremonger,’ said the abused metal from deep within the pocket.

  ‘Begging your pardon, sir,’ I said, ‘but what shall you do to me? Shall you tailor me?’

  ‘I have been tracking you, Clod Iremonger. I have read the bill posters, seen the policing doubled, seen the Iremongers come out from their gates because of you. That’s not normal, that’s not like them. They keep their distance in general, from all the filth. I’ve been after you since I understood how much they wanted you. I told myself, if they want you so much, then I should be the one to have you. Why are they after you, Clod Iremonger, why do they want you so?’

  ‘I cannot say, sir.’

  ‘Well they shall have you again, true enough, once I have emptied you out. Once you shall cause no harm.’

  ‘I do no harm, sir. I do not indeed.’

  ‘Listen to me, Clod Iremonger, listen well – ever since I stole to Foulsham I’ve had but one purpose in my life, one solid purpose that never have I stirred from though it stretch me and pull me so I snap. I do not waver, it gives me reason. My life: to go about me in these foul streets and to poke at Iremongers with something sharp, to find me some lonely Iremonger down a lonely street and to send him off, as his kind has to so many others. But rarely, no I shall admit it, never have I had a full Iremonger in my reaching. I am Revenge, Clod Iremonger. That is my title!’

  ‘You won’t hurt me, shall you, sir, Mr Erkmann?’

  ‘Shan’t I? I think I might.’

  ‘Please not to. I never hurt anyone so much as ever I was aware of.’

  ‘Your name is enough hurt right there, your name’s done a thousand, thousand murderings!’

  ‘I cannot help my name!’

  ‘No more can I,’ said he, lifting the scissors above his head. ‘Say your prayers now.’

  I closed my eyes. I waited for the sharpness to come.

  In the hovel I heard the sounds of things calling out in darkness. I had not heard them before, but now as I concentrated the voices declared themselves loudly.

  ‘Elsa Howard, now a nail.’

  ‘Horace Bentley, wooden plank.’

  ‘Wilfred Pilcher, under the straw, a child’s left glove long forgot.’

  ‘Mr Sandford, a pillow cover, rag now.’

  ‘Hello, hello to you all, I hear you,’ I whispered.

  ‘What’s that?’ cried the Tailor. ‘Who do you talk to? Be quiet, shall you!’

  ‘He hears us!’ the things cried.’He hears us well!’

  ‘Goodbye, dear things, goodbye to you all,’ I whispered.

  ‘Who are you talking to, Clod Iremonger? There’s no one there. You and your family were ever such mad ones. But not for long I do swear it!’

  ‘He says goodbye,’ said the pillow case. ‘Do you hark at that? He thinks of us before he dies. Shall we let it happen, shall we allow it?’

  Their voices were a comfort to me.

  ‘I seem to hear you all,’ I said, ‘in the darkness there. Can you, do you think, can you come forward perhaps? I should so like to see you now.’

  It was the pain of it, the horror of my place. It must surely have been that that did it, because as I stood there now so close to my own ending, I saw Grandfather in all his high misery, moving the things about. If only I could do that, I thought, if only ever I could.

  Why not? I thought. Why not, after all you’re an Iremonger, you are.

  ‘I should like, I should so like you, Wilfred,’ I whispered, ‘if you may, should you jump into a mouth for me?’

  ‘Yes, sir, I think I shall, if you wish it true.’

  ‘Elsa? Elsa, are you there still?’

  ‘Oh, he calls my name! He calls it!’

  ‘Elsa!’ I whispered in my mounting excitement. ‘Elsa, have at a hand now, shall you strike a hand that holds some scissors?’

  ‘Stop this!’ said the Tailor. ‘Enough of your talking! Keep still shall you?’

  ‘Oh, for the life of it, I shall!’ called Elsa.

  ‘And Horace, Horace, shall you strike a back?’

  ‘I shall, with all my love!’

  ‘Mr Sandford, I shall need you. I shall be wanting you most particular!’

  ‘Here, I am! What service? Give the word!’

  ‘Mr Sandford, cover a head shall you?’

  ‘Sir, sir! Sandford’s the man!’

  ‘Now, all,’ I said, ‘now should be best. He comes on so close to me!’

  ‘Now, Clod Iremonger,’ called the Tailor.

  Movement in the hay, sudden rustling and shifting, things with life and purpose, all at the rush. The Tailor turned around in a terror himself now, his scissors snapping uselessly in the dark. The nail rushed up and cut at the hand that held the scissors and the scissors dropped to the floor, the Tailor made a yelp. The plank lifted up then and struck the back, the Tailor cried out. The moment his mouth opened the glove filled the mouth, then came the pillow case over the head. And so! And so the Tailor was on the floor! In the dirt. And I stood over him.

  How had I? How had I done it? I’d knocked the Tailor down, unscissored him and had him in the dirt.

  ‘I’m Clod Iremonger,’ I said.

  The Tailor made a muffled cry from beneath Mr Sandford.

  ‘I’m Clod Iremonger,’ I said, ‘and I can do such things. I am Clod Iremonger, the friend of things!’

  11

  IN FOULSHAM STREETS

  Continuing the narrative of Lucy Pennant

  We scrambled down the hill into town. It felt different to me, how to say exactly? It felt darker and damper. There was black smoke around the town that I couldn’t remember being there before. It seemed to stick, that dark smoke, like it was permanent weather. The walls too, was it my imagination or did they seem to drip now? Everything was dank. Yes, it dripped, Filching Town did, never stopped dripping though there was no rain. The streets were thick with mud and waste, that was always true, but it was harder going than I recall, like we was wading back in that river again. Benedict shook a little, he trembled to be out there among the old houses, at each distant figure moving through the filthy streets he stiffened and seemed about to flee, and had often to be encouraged on.

  Round a corner we surprised two men moving a great barrel. Their faces covered by rags, they were tying the barrel hard to a building. Seeing us they ran off. Something wrong about that. What was that about? But I soon enough forgot them, because there before us was clothes for the picking, clothes to warm and change us.

  People as often kept their heap leathe
rs outside as in, on account of the stench of them, especially if the weather had been rough. I grabbed at some sorry looking forms, they were hanging up on a line, trying to run away with the wind it looked like, the smoke and wind of Filching getting up the trouser legs and down the arms so that the abused leathers seemed to live by the weather. I caught up a couple and tugged them down. Someone tomorrow should howl for my thieving, but I couldn’t help that. Trying to get Benedict into leathers was no easy business and he cried to have himself so constricted, he split them a bit, but at least was mostly covered now.

  A march of Iremonger police came rushing by, men in brass helmets, all in a worry. We’d go the other way to them, shouldn’t like to find them face to face.

  ‘If anyone asks you anything, Benedict,’ I said, ‘say you’ve just come in from the sorting and your leathers have been that ripped up. It’s not too far now, the boarding house is the far edge of town, close to Bayleaf House.’

  We passed into another street. Police whistles were going off in the distance, not for us though, nothing for us to worry over.

  ‘Go home,’ Benedict said.

  ‘I’m trying,’ I said. ‘I am so turned around.’

  ‘Go home,’ he said again.

  ‘Hold on a while, Benedict, everything shall come right, I think it shall.’

  ‘No, no. Go home!’

  I turned to him then, looked hard at him. He wasn’t talking about me or even himself, he was talking to a trail of rubbish that seemed to be following him.

  ‘Go home!’ he cried and kicked out at it, and the things seemed to disperse, only to gather up again a small while later, to do it on the sly, when Benedict had turned around.

  ‘Is following me,’ he said.

  ‘What is?’ I asked.

  ‘It misses me. It calls me back.’

  ‘What is, Benedict?’

  ‘The Heap is, is crying for me.’

  ‘It’s just rats, isn’t it? They will follow a person if they get a fancy.’

  ‘No, it’s rubbish,’ he said sadly. ‘Likes me, always has.’

  ‘Bits from the heaps you mean?’

  ‘Yes, yes, Heaps bits.’

  ‘Tell them to go away.’

  ‘Am trying! Go home!’ he called and for a moment the trail dispersed, only to begin forming itself, and to grow larger this time, just around the corner.

  ‘Let us move faster, Benedict, let us run a little.’

  ‘Is begging me,’ he said.

  We began to pick up our pace but the trail of rubbish followed after, growing, but always, for now, some little way behind us, but growing in size and, I suppose, in confidence. What a welcome home this is, I thought.

  We were back near the Corn Exchange then, the old place where the heaps bits used to be weighed and counted up, long disused that was, even when I was a girl. There was a wheelbarrow in front of it. Someone had just left a wheelbarrow there. As we came a little closer I saw that something was in the wheelbarrow. Some pile of clothing, I thought at first, only then that pile moved, slumped forward a bit, and then I understood it was a person, leaning forward, a person with a balding head who seemed to be in communication with a seagull. Yes, a fat seagull padded around the wheelbarrow, cawing and screeching. At last the man in the wheelbarrow waved his hand and the seagull ran down the street and heaved itself into the air.

  The man sat up, looked about him, east and west, what a shiny moon face it was, grinning it was, then I saw the eyes. I’d know him any day. I’d know him by his eyes. He was a cruel one from the House, nearly had me before, on account of the doorknob I took a shine to. Didn’t have anything with me much then did I? Oh no, nothing much to speak of, just some pilfered leathers and some man with half the dirt heaps stuck to him and the other half in pursuit. Nothing to declare, no, sir, no, nothing at all.

  How he sat up, the blind one in his wheelbarrow.

  ‘Who’s there?’

  I came no further forwards, pushed Benedict back a bit. But behind him the heaps came on, through the street we’d just quit, tumbling on in after us.

  ‘Who’s there? Who’s new there?’ He put his head out at an angle so the ear could hear the better. ‘Such Foulsham calling. Can’t hear right, but was there, a moment, did I catch: Iremonger?’

  He sat still amongst all the clattering, all that smashing. ‘Dunnult?’ he cried. ‘Where are you, Dunnult?’

  There was an officer come running.

  ‘Where’ve you been?’

  ‘Just patrolling, sir, as you said, giving you some space.’

  ‘There’s something wrong here, something very unnatural. Something disturbed and hurt. I never like being out in these streets, would much rather stay indoors. I couldn’t catch its name, but there’s something very wrong with it, terrible pain and anger. No, no, come, come Dunnult, wheel me on, this town’s gone all to hell!’

  The wheelbarrow squeaked off into the night, and we could on ourselves. The pursuing dirt had reached our feet by then, was tangling around them, was over us, was lapping there, we only just kicked it off, I reckon, and ran on before it grew any bolder.

  Our feet too noisy down the streets. And after it the tumble-crash of objects.

  A small blue-glass bottle dislodged itself from the pile and flew at my head.

  ‘Ow!’ I cried, picking up the bottle, an old poison one it was, it had marked upon its side NOT TO BE TAKEN. I threw it down again, it rolled away with a greater speed than it should have. ‘That hurt!’

  ‘It don’t like you,’ said Benedict.

  ‘I don’t like it,’ I said.

  ‘It hates you,’ he said.

  ‘Thanks, thanks a lot.’

  ‘Is jealous.’

  ‘What on earth for?’

  ‘It blames you.’

  ‘Blames me for what?’

  ‘For stealing me.’

  ‘I didn’t steal you.’

  ‘It thinks you did, maybe you did.’

  Round the corner there was noise in the street, such a different sound, the noise of people all bunched up together. How I cheered to hear it! Yes! We might try that, I thought, some company to hide in. I grabbed hold of one of Benedict’s arms and quickly pulled him along the way and then ducked quick inside a building, slamming the door behind me, instantly there was a thumping on the door. But it could not break through. We were in a public house. I’d been inside this place when I was a child, sitting with my father: THE HEAP’S REST.

  12

  IN WHICH A PROMISE IS MADE AND SOMETHING COMES UNDONE

  Continuing the narrative of Clod Iremonger

  The Tailor Strikes a Bargain

  How he was crumpled upon the floor, the Tailor of Foulsham, his scissors kicked far from his hands.

  ‘Wilfred Pilcher,’ I said to the glove that had thrown itself into the Tailor’s mouth, ‘Wilfred, you may come out now, I thank you. Let the fellow breathe.’

  A small and dirty glove fell down, crawled out from under the pillow case and scuttled back into the straw.

  ‘Devil! You very devil!’ called the Tailor from underneath Mr Sandford, the old pillow cover.

  ‘I am a friend of things,’ I said. ‘I do thank you Mr Sandford, Horace, Elsa, Wilfred, I thank you most awfully!’

  ‘You are that welcome, sir.’

  ‘Glad to be of service.’

  ‘Most gratifying.’

  ‘Please,’ called the Tailor, ‘call them off, call off your things, get them from me!’

  ‘They’ve never done that before,’ I said. ‘I’ve heard them, I’ve always heard them, but I’ve never had them move before, not on my account. The truth is, Mr Erkmann, I’m that astounded. I’m quite impressed!’

  ‘Take them off, call them off!’

  ‘You did provoke me, sir, you must admit to it.’

  ‘You’re an Iremonger!’

  ‘I am, sir, it seems even more certain now. In truth, sir, I run from my family. I do not love them very much.’

&nbs
p; ‘Get them off!’

  ‘You must promise, Mr Erkmann, to behave, then they may stand down.’

  ‘I promise,’ came his cracked voice.

  ‘Very well then, Mr Sandford, if you wouldn’t mind overly.’

  ‘I like to do it,’ said Mr Sandford. ‘I could quite take his breath from him.’

  ‘Better not, I think, Mr Sandford, on the whole. Do come away now.’

  The pillow case blew upwards of a sudden as if by a sharp wind and floated down upon the floor, quiet and still again, a pillow case. The Tailor sat up then, coughed and heaved, his very body rattling. Looking about him much disturbed, ‘Indeed,’ he said at last, ‘you are an Iremonger. I know your family and their business. There are of you ones that can move glass, and them that have a way with metal, or porcelain, and some that can only summon newspaper. I have seen one of your family walk the grounds within the railings of Bayleaf House with ten and more footstools lapping at her feet, and one solemn man who seemed to go a-wandering with a hatstand. You are not a proper people, I think. You oughtn’t to be let alone. You should be done away with.’

  ‘We are not all of us, I think,’ I said, ‘not all so bad. My Cousin Tummis was a very decent fellow, only he was drowned, you see. Ormily, she’s a good sort … ’

  ‘Listen hard, use those precious ears of yours,’ said Alexander Erkmann. ‘I’ll tell you a family story. One to warm your illbred heart.’

  ‘Oh dear, I do not think I shall like it much.’

  ‘Those people that I kill, Clod Iremonger, they are not real people. Your family made them in Bayleaf House. They put them together out of rubbish, they made them from the heaps, to do their bidding. They are among us, these non-people, walking among us, everywhere about us. Slowly, slowly they have been populating Foulsham. They are very like us, indeed they are very clever now, at first they were not, at first they might catch a part of themselves upon a nail, for example, sticking unseen out of a wall and that nail should snag their shirt and then the thing should simply come apart, their insides should pool out of them, sawdust or stones or old cracks of glass, all that they are comes out and spews upon the floor and there is their clothing before us, quite deflated, a person who only a moment ago was sitting beside you. But he has grown better since then, your grandfather. He has found another way. Listen now, Clod Iremonger, harken to this.’