The Dumb House

by John Burnside

  As I drove home, it began to snow, slowly at first, then heavy and quick, filling the windscreen till I could barely see the road ahead. By the time I reached the edge of town, it had begun to settle, fledging the trees and the empty fields on either side, augmenting the distance between one familiar object and the next, till the landscape seemed wider and emptier than before. I was tired now; I could hardly see the road, and I found it difficult to drive after I had left the streetlamps of Weston behind me. At one point, I pulled into a lay-by and sat in the car with the engine running. My watch had stopped. More than an hour had passed since the episode in the churchyard – maybe two hours – but it felt like minutes. I was surprised at how much it had affected me. Not long before I had been elated, filled with energy, convinced that what I had done was a logical necessity. Now I was exhausted, and the whole thing seemed arbitrary and absurd. I got out of the car and walked a few yards in the thick snow: I wanted to be out in the open, to breathe the cold air and think. I was parked on the highest point of the road, on a ridge looking down over the partly wooded valley. I could see the lights of a farmhouse at the foot of the slope and it occurred to me that this was the house that had once belonged to a friend of my parents. I had even visited there as a small boy, one Sunday afternoon in winter. All of a sudden I had a vivid memory of standing in the hall in a bow tie and flannel trousers, waiting for someone to take my coat. It must have been Christmas: I could smell mince pies and my fingers were tingling with frost. The memory was instantaneous and clear: a long hallway led to the kitchen, at the back of the house, a large painting of a horse hung on the wall to the right of the door, a wooden staircase rose into the darkness. I was trying to remember the name of my host, a man about my father’s age, whose wife had died young – Thompson, Thomason – when, in my mind’s eye, a light came on above me and a girl slowly descended the stairs. Helen Thompsett. She was carrying something. I couldn’t see what it was, but I knew there was an object in her hand. For some reason, I had the idea that it was a candle.

  Now the house belonged to someone else. I had no idea where Helen was. It was the first time I had thought about her in twenty years, but now I could see her clearly: her hair was dark-brown, tied back with a pale blue ribbon; she would have been two or three years older than me then; she was dressed for a party, in blue satin. I could see her eyes, they were the same deep-blue colour as her dress. I had been in love with her for a while; perhaps it had even begun that evening, though I hardly ever saw her, she attended a girls’ school on the other side of the county, and only ever came home in the holidays. I had probably only seen her three or four times, once for that evening around Christmas and on the rare visits she and her father made to our house, but I could see her clearly in my mind’s eye: radiant, mysterious, unbelievably beautiful. For one absurd moment, a wave of regret passed through my body, a truly physical sensation, like sudden blood loss, or vertigo. I wanted desperately to go back to that moment, to see her descending those stairs again, to have power over time. Once, in childhood, I had read a story where a boy has the ability to move through time, because of a magic word he has learned from an ancient Persian scholar. For several months, I really believed this word existed.

  In the farm below, someone was out in the yard, moving about with a torch or a lamp. The house was lit too: these were the only lights I could see across the whole valley, though I knew there were two or three cottages further along the single-track lane that ran down from the main road to the farm. Above the lights, the woods were filling quickly with snow. I stood a while, watching it fall, and I tried to imagine that I was looking back into the past. I imagined, if I drove on to the junction and found that narrow road, I could drive down into the yard where Mother was leaving the house, laughing softly, calling goodnight to the people behind her and I was turning back for a last glance at Helen, too shy to speak, or even wave.

  Things were falling apart. My sense of elation had completely disappeared, and I was beginning to be afraid, wondering if the body had been found, if I had left any clues. Maybe the Stanley knife had fallen out of my pocket during the scuffle, and now it was lying there in the dark, covered with my fingerprints, a few feet from the body. For a moment, I even considered the absurd idea of going back and checking to see if I had left it behind, but I managed to put that notion out of my mind. I got back into the car and drove on, peering over the wheel to see my way in the snow. I had to move slowly: the snow on the road was thick and fresh, and I could hear it crunching under the tyres. I repeated a list of words I had memorised years before, a list of place names from Canada. I was surprised I still remembered so many. I had liked the Indian words, because they seemed old and rounded, like stones smoothed in a riverbed, but some of the new names were beautiful too, with their suggestion of a new life, and the promises the settlers had made to themselves as they wandered in handfuls across the country: Vermilion Bay; Fort Hope; Fort Resolution. I was tired now, and it was hard work concentrating. At one point, an animal – a dog, or a fox – ran across the beam of my headlamps and I hit the brakes, skidding slightly, though there was no danger of hitting the creature, I was moving so slowly and it was so far ahead it had been and gone before I could even tell what it was.

  That night I hid my bloodstained clothes in the shed and bathed thoroughly as soon as I got home. Lillian was still asleep when I slipped in beside her. I remember thinking how lucky it was that she slept so deeply. The next day I checked the car and washed away some traces of blood, then I drove back to Weston. I parked in the usual place and began walking slowly in the direction of the library. When I reached the churchyard entrance, I found it closed. There were four policemen in uniform, and several other men in civilian clothes; they were searching the grounds, wandering up and down between the headstones in the early afternoon sunlight. Much of the snow had thawed here, but patches remained in places, in the shadow of the hedge and around some of the shrubs by the graves. A small crowd had gathered by the gate to watch, casual shoppers and office workers on their lunch breaks, hoping to catch a glimpse of the murder weapon. There was a small tent pitched near the steps, where I assumed the body was concealed. I was a little surprised, as I thought Jimmy had fallen a little further away.

  I stopped and joined the other watchers. I was surprised that nobody tried to move us on, the way they do in the films. I half-expected a gruff, good-natured constable to wander across and wave his arms, telling us all to go home, that there was nothing to see, that it was all over. Instead, the men in the churchyard ignored us: they were going about their business, a little bored, perhaps, yet suitably thorough, systematic in their approach, as any professional will be when he is being observed at work, treading a fine line between complacency and interest, maintaining the appropriate gravity of the position. One man, who seemed to be charged with watching the crowd for any potential interloper, stood next to the thin plastic tape that was stretched across the entrance to the churchyard. From time to time he glanced at a young woman by the gatepost, and gave her small, shy smiles, which she returned brightly. He was younger than the other men, and had grown a moustache to seem older, but this only had the effect of exaggerating his youth. It amused me, I must admit, despite my anxiety about the knife, to imagine these two people flirting at the scene of my crime. I lingered for a few minutes, half-hoping the policeman would speak; perhaps he was too conscious of his position, perhaps he was just shy, but he did no more than smile for a few minutes longer, and after a while the girl moved off with her friends, presumably to get back to work. I glanced at my watch. It was one thirty. I considered whether it was correct to ask the young policeman what had happened, or whether this was expressing too much of an interest. I didn’t want to draw unnecessary attention to myself, yet it seemed a harmless enough question. Suddenly, I heard a voice at my shoulder, and I turned to find the librarian, Miss Patterson, standing beside me.

  ‘Hello,’ she said, smiling brightly. ‘We haven’t seen you for a whi
le.’

  From the slight sharpness in her tone, I assumed she had not yet forgiven me for deserting her library.

  ‘Hello,’ I replied, innocently. ‘How nice to see you. Is the library closed?’

  ‘Not at all,’ she said, laughing a little too readily. ‘I don’t actually live there, you know, though it sometimes seems that way.’

  I smiled to show appreciation of her dedication, and her self-deprecating sense of humour.

  ‘What’s going on?’ I asked, with obvious, and slightly impolite curiosity.

  ‘Ah.’ Miss Patterson came reluctantly to the matter at hand. ‘They seem to have found a corpse.’

  She pronounced the word with some relish, like someone who has been allowed, after a lifetime of abstinence, to enjoy some dark pleasure.

  I reacted appropriately.

  ‘A corpse? Here? I’m sorry, I—’

  ‘A body,’ she interrupted. ‘Everyone seems to think it’s a murder.’

  ‘I see.’ I allowed a moment for thought. ‘Do you know who it is?’

  ‘The murderer?’

  ‘The body.’

  ‘Ah.’ She smiled with grim satisfaction. ‘They think it was one of the vagrants. You know the ones. They came into the library once, when you were there.’

  ‘Oh.’ I nodded. It didn’t seem appropriate to show concern or sympathy with the victim. Miss Patterson obviously had none.

  ‘What’s happening now?’ I asked her.

  ‘They’re searching the grounds,’ she said.

  ‘What for?’

  ‘The weapon, I suppose.’

  ‘Have they found anything.’

  She shook her head.

  ‘Not while I’ve been here. It’s not really very interesting, as a matter of fact. Just some tramp. Maybe he wasn’t murdered at all. You know how people are.’

  She gave me a sidelong glance.

  ‘I don’t suppose you’re much interested in the affairs of some dead tramp, anyway,’ she said.

  I nodded agreement.

  ‘Not much. Still, it’s a little inconvenient.’

  ‘Well, I look at it this way.’ Miss Patterson replied, ‘As far as I’m concerned, these people are mostly just a nuisance. They come into the library to get warm and they frighten people. They sit around begging. It’s just one less disturbance to worry about.’

  ‘Quite,’ I said, curtly. I noticed that the young policeman had overheard Miss Patterson’s last remark and was watching her out of the corner of his eye. I think he had something he wanted to say, but again, he stuck to his duties.

  I loitered a few moments longer, then excused myself. Miss Patterson offered to walk with me to the library, but I told her I had to go back for something. As soon as I reached the car park, I got into the car and drove away. I was already regretting my weakness. Even if the police did find the Stanley knife, there was no possibility of their tracing it to me. The only obvious danger was of my losing my nerve and attracting attention to myself. In any investigation, the real detective is the suspect. He is the one who provides the clues, he is the one who gives himself away. As long as I remained calm, and treated the problem as a question of logic, I would be quite safe.

  I kept an eye on the papers for a while, but the news was thin. The police had found the body of a homeless man in the church grounds, they did suspect foul play, but they had no clue as to the murderer’s identity or motive. They questioned Jimmy’s former associates; for a while, it looked as if they were going to charge one of the men I had seen him with, that day in the pub, but nothing further emerged and eventually the story dried up. I kept the papers out of Lillian’s sight, even though I knew she couldn’t read them, and there were no photographs of the murder victim. I didn’t want to take any risks of upsetting her now.

  As the weeks and months passed, she grew strange and awkward, as if she were some creature I had fished from the sea. The swelling on her belly looked alien and uncomfortable in a body as thin as hers, it was too local, it did not seem to belong to her body, and her skin changed colour suddenly, from its usual rose-white to a shade of vellum. She was tired all the time. I have always been suspicious of the phrase, the glow of pregnancy, and my suspicions were only confirmed by Lillian’s appearance. Instead of a glow, her whole body seemed to become more and more dull, sallow and sickly-sweet and vague, like a candle burning out or a line of smudged writing. Nevertheless, she remained cheerful. She tried to continue with her work around the house, even when I assured her that I could look after things. Sometimes she spent whole days in bed, watching television. It appeared that her happiness was too large, too strong to be affected by a temporary physical setback. I think I was more affected by the change in her appearance than she was. I found a book in Mother’s library which described what happened during pregnancy; I found another that showed how a child was delivered, by conventional methods and by Caesarean. This was invaluable. When it came time, I would be obliged to manage the delivery myself.

  I did all I could to make Lillian comfortable over those last few months. I had no idea, of course, that I was about to lose her, but I am glad I treated her so well, looking after her when she was sick, finding the kinds of food she could bear to eat, tending to her when she was too tired to get up. I feel better now, when I think how happy she was for that little time. And there were moments, even towards the end of the pregnancy, when she seemed beautiful to me, in spite of everything, moments when she seemed perfectly balanced, immersed in a cool white light, almost incandescent. Whenever I remember her, I will see her like that, just as she was before the twins were born.

  The day came. I had been waiting for the moment with a mixture of dread and anticipation. On the one hand, I was afraid for Lillian, and for the child; on the other, I wanted to observe this bizarre process, I wanted to see how a body worked when giving birth. To be honest, I was mystified by everything I had read, how sometimes the head is too large for the birth canal; how, sometimes, small incisions must be made between the anus and the vagina, to allow it to pass through; how the child will sometimes turn around and come feet first; how the birth can be so difficult that a section of the woman’s belly must be lifted, in order to free it. Even the easier births might demand the use of forceps to pull the child free, with the risk of damage to the head, or even the brain, if too much force were applied. It seemed to me that the whole process was too complicated, too unnatural, as if humans had not been intended to give birth at all.

  I was apprehensive, naturally, about the possibility of having to cut Lillian when the time came; obviously a Caesarean, or any other complex surgical procedure was out of the question. Yet, as it happened, the birth was relatively easy. She seemed to suffer some pain, but she was patient, stoical, even brave – especially when, after the first child emerged, I felt something else was there, inside her, and I realised the child I had just prised loose had a twin.

  In spite of her bravery, the process of giving birth to twins damaged Lillian badly. Afterwards, she would not stop bleeding: the blood was thick and dark, and I was worried that she would lose too much and become ill, or die. After several hours, however, the bleeding stopped and, though Lillian was too weak and tired to feed the twins, I managed to keep her and them well through their ordeal. Or so I imagined. I have no idea, now, what would have happened if Lillian had survived. The experiment would have taken quite a different course, naturally; perhaps the outcome would have been different, under different circumstances. Not that there is any profit, ever, in speculation. There is only one possible course through life, and that is the course one takes. No other decisions could have been taken, no other circumstances could have arisen.

  The next morning, Lillian developed a fever. The children were unaffected, but she was still unable to feed them, and I had to continue with a compound feed. Fortunately, I had stocked up on feeding material, in case such difficulties arose. I had also set up a temporary crib arrangement in the spare room, which was fortunately large
enough to take both children, so that, while I was involved with tending to Lillian, they were never left alone. They had one another for company. Perhaps that was where their extreme attachment began. Perhaps it was not nature after all, that made them as they were. It might just have been the circumstances of those first few days, when they lay as close together in the world as they had done in the womb. Strangely, for new-born children, I don’t remember their crying very much. They seemed hushed, awed, as if they were aware, with some residue of womb-knowledge, of their mother’s condition. I was certain Lillian had contracted a serious infection, and I considered taking her to a hospital. Her condition seemed to worsen by the hour, and she began to bleed again. Needless to say, it was a difficult time. For the first time, I considered the possibility that Lillian might die, and it was a delicate process, getting the twins established on the feed compound. I am surprised, now, that they survived that stage.

  I watched Lillian closely. Her symptoms were dramatic: extreme pain, fever, tenderness in her stomach and belly. I soon realised that my first guess had been correct; she was suffering from an infection of some kind, worsened no doubt by the dramatic loss of blood over the first few hours. Once again, I considered calling a doctor, but I convinced myself that it was too dangerous. To call a doctor in would not only jeopardise the future of our experiment, it would also link me, through Lillian, to Jimmy. It wasn’t just one life that was in danger, it was everything: my life, Lillian’s new-found happiness, our whole enterprise. If I had brought in medical help, I might have saved Lillian’s life, but that would have been all. She would have been taken away from me, and placed in an institution, where she would, most certainly, have been unhappy, perhaps even subject to the kind of abuse she had suffered before she met me. She was a girl who had probably been abused all her life. Without me, she would be helpless. Wherever she went, a Jimmy would appear and take over. There were thousands of Jimmys.