Watson, Ian - Black Current 02

by The Book Of The Stars (v1. 1)

  I didn't consider that I was the daughter of either Mum or Dad in quite the same repetitive fashion. Except that by now I was their daughter twice over. Which was certainly a repetition!

  In a surprise reversal of times past, Dad now took me several times to his place of employ. This, during a war! Yet here perhaps lay the key to this change of heart—rather than in any suspicion of his that he had lost his other children through a lack of workaday connexions. I'm sure Dad wanted to prove that he too was doing something significant, and that soldiers weren't the only ones who served. He wanted to show me this (as though I would understand, or even remember, at such a tender age!), and by so doing persuade himself that he was proud of what he did, and hadn't wasted his life.

  Mum demurred at these trips to work, but Dad insisted. Now was a time when men were putting their feet down. Tramp, tramp. Quick march. About turn!

  Since Dad was senior in his job these days, there was no bother about my turning up at work. He always chose routes to and fro which kept us away from the waterfront, but once at the counting house I had the run of the place and of the adjacent warehouses and processing sheds, some of which were seductively close to the river.

  Generally the janitor, old one-eyed Ballow, kept his eye on me. Well, he wasn't really one-eyed; a milky cataract eclipsed his left pupil, and he wore a grey patch to cover it. Early on in our acquaintance he revealed his disfiguration, to warn me about the pair of ginger cats which slunk around the buildings (keeping these clear of shrew-bugs and of any intruding Golden Spritsail flutterbyes which would lay their eggs on spice sacks). Years ago Ballow found a hurt cat. Foolishly he picked it up, increasing its pain so that the animal struck out, puncturing his eyeball, letting in a disease. So he said.

  "I often dream," he told me confidentially, "that I'm a cat—with the eyes of a cat. It's as though they owe me an eye, and repay me. When I'm awake, like now, I see everything flat. When I'm asleep, I see things deep as can be, the way they used to look. That's why I'm kind to the cats here, since it wasn't that sick one's fault. But don't you ever put your lovely little peepers anywhere near a pussy's claws, or your Dad would never forgive me."

  He pointed at one of our hunters, which had actually spotted a shrew-bug clinging on to a coriander sack—a fairly rare encounter. Ginger was arse-squirming towards its prey, taking his time, teasing the tip of his tail to twitches of delicious frustration. Eventually he launched, patted the shrew-bug to the floor, played with it till it was broken, then ate it.

  "There's an old tale, you know," observed Ballow, "concerning three friends who only had one eye between them to see with. And one tooth between them to eat with. And one long fingernail to scratch with, and stir the porridge and pick your nose. When it came time to swap the eye and the tooth and the fingernail around, you might suppose as you couldn't trust the friend with the eye since he could see where the tooth and the nail were, so he might grab them and run off. But no. All three friends could see through that one eye at the same time, no matter whose head it was in, no matter if the three were leagues apart. Not that they ever were leagues apart, since without a tooth you can't eat, and without a nail you can't scratch; and they were always awful itchy, these friends, and they often had colds as blocked their noses up. But finally one day the friend who had the eye at the time—let's call him Inkum—he did seize the tooth and the nail by guile. He stuck the tooth in his gob, and the nail on his finger's end, and he took off at a run. His friends —whom we'll call Binkum and Bod—could see where he was running to, from his point of view, so they raced after him to keep up."

  Ballow sat himself down on the coriander sack. He slapped his hands on his knees and squinted at me. "So what do you suppose happened next?" And he waited.

  Now, I wasn't in the habit of answering anyone; and Ballow was really being quite a disgusting old buffer at the moment, though maybe he thought he was entertaining me or even educating me.

  But he just carried on sitting there on the sack, and every now and then he asked me again, "So what happened?"

  I could of course have walked away, and maybe I should have done, but I was thinking that Yaleen was my absent eye and I wouldn't be able to see or do anything effective till she turned up and surrendered her viewpoint to me,

  I had an inspiration, and stuck my tongue out at Ballow.

  He chortled and slapped his knees again.

  "So you'd trade a tongue for an eye, would you, little girl? You'd trade a tongue for an eye! But it's you as needs a tongue, eh? Tell you what: if you'll give Ballow one of your eyes, Ballow'll give you his tongue to talk with. How's that?"

  I revised my opinion sharply. Ballow wasn't daft or disgusting at all. What a perceptive old codger he was, to be sure. I wondered whether my Dad had put him up to this, having known Ballow for years; whether this was the real why and wherefore of my outing. But no, no, I doubted that. Dad, who had clapped a hand over precious Narya's eyes so that she wouldn't behold a wounded ear, would have clapped his hands over her ears if he had heard half of Ballow's banter.

  I had to play this just right.

  I flexed my fingers like claws. Said, "Miaow!"—and hissed.

  "Okay, okay," said Ballow. "So you're hurting inside, like that pussy I mentioned. No need to scratch my other peeper out. What I see in you—with one peeper, which is better than most folks with two—I won't say to a soul. There, that's a bargain, eh? We're friends now."

  He stuck his hand out. It was big and tough as a cow's hoof and dirty. I wrinkled up my nose, but laid my little hand in his.

  And we were friends from then on. Firm friends. One of us halfblind, the other one mostly dumb.

  "I'll show you a game you can play with peppercorns," he said. "You have to build a pyramid. . . ."

  These excursions turned out to be the pleasantest hours of my phony infancy. What with the war and so many boats being used as a navy, the export trade was at a virtual standstill; though the clerks still had work enough on hand, analysing and accounting. Nevertheless, Dad always spared some time to walk me round the warehouses and processing sheds. I showed my appreciation by smiling and crowing, and touching and sniffing: the spices, and Dad. Connecting, connecting the two.

  He too made a connexion one day—between time past and time present. I was in his little office, boxed off by a bamboo trellis from the rest of the spice-musty counting house. I was hanging on to the edge of his desk which was piled with open ledgers, crammed with figures in his neat hand, some fresh, some old and faded.

  "Now supposing we'd fled to Halba's for refuge," he remarked, more to his ledgers than to me, "we'd have had to rely on her for charity, and repay her with labour, hoeing and pruning and hauling, wouldn't we? As our Yaleen had to, once, at harvest time. Instead of relying on ourselves alone. But maybe if you rely on yourself entirely, that's what you become: alone. Then one day you break your leg, and who's there to help? Who's there?"

  I drummed my fingertips on the desk top, as much as to say, "I'm here."

  Dad laughed, and drummed his fingers too.

  "Ah, what would we do without you, Narya? And what would we do without those brave 'jacks?"

  Even after the war was won Dad continued, jauntily, with these treats. Yes, jauntily. For men of the east had marched far from their homes and gained a victory; and he was a man. So his heart quickened to the distant drumbeat. Thus maybe the Sons, in defeat, had gained one small, nasty victory; for what woman in her right mind would ever thrill to the clash of swords and the excitement of busting heads? To the looseness, violence and anarchy of it all? Oh yes, Dad had groaned when that 'jack lost his ear to the axe; but he groaned because his little girl might have noticed—and perhaps, perhaps, because that was the real outcome of wielding weapons, and he didn't wish to know.

  Long ago, Yaleen had told that brother of Dario's that she sympathized with the frustrations of men. That was before she had been tortured in Cherubland by frustrated Sons who bated women. True, those Sons were exc
eptions . . . mad dogs. Nor had the 'jacks who fought in our campaign exactly changed into crowing cockerels as a result. But there did seem to be an insidious equation between violence and the sporters of penises, when men were able to rule the roost. It had been so on the Moon, whatever Jean-Paul's secret intentions to preserve and protect his flock. (Though who had murdered umpteen Paxmen with a bomb? None other but the cherub Yaleen. . . .)

  And yet, and yet, men were diminished by our way of life. That was true, too.

  Or had been true, till now. The war had loosened certain inveterate restraints. Should those be bound up again tightly—or not? Maybe no debate was needed. The black current already stretched as far as Aladalia. Restless men could always walk to beyond Aladalia—where indeed they might be useful as soldiers, guardians of our freedom.

  Meanwhile relations between man and woman were subject to a degree of flux, and Dad stepped out defiantly, perhaps unaware why there was a different spring in his step.

  Then one day as he was bearing me along dusty crowded Zanzyba Road, just as we were drawing close to the Cafe of the Seasons, a voice cried, "Dad!"

  I saw Yaleen sitting there.

  Dad broke into a gallop. I giggled with relief and nerves.

  It was like a reverse of that time when I returned to war-wrecked Verrino and hastened up to the top of the Spire, only to find emptiness and nobody there (until Hasso turned up). Here was Yaleen at last, in exactly the right place. I felt hysterical. Hilarity welled up in me. The charade would soon be over. I could start being myself again, just as soon as there wasn't another self bumming around in competition. I could stop being Narya—and become . . . Narya- leen?

  A tricky moment, this! Trickiest of all when I winked at Yaleen. She gave me such a peculiar look; but I couldn't resist the wink. Besides, I had already seen myself wink at me, a few years earlier at this very moment. I was grinning stupidly when I todded over to the table, but I composed myself.

  "Hallo, Narya," said Yaleen. "My name's Yaleen. I'm your sister."

  Supposing I said: "Oh no you aren't"? Supposing I said: "You and me are the same person"?

  I didn't. I wasn't going to throw away two years' drudge on a wild whim. Would you?

  Since I merely stood there mute. Dad and Yaleen got on discussing my supposed problems, over my head.

  "Ah, she's my big darling, aren't you?" said Dad after a bit. He hoisted me aloft. "Let's step on home, Yaleen."

  I steered Dad home by tufts of hair as though I were steering worlds. Or suns around the galaxy; keeping reality from colliding with itself by a hairsbreadth.

  You already know the events of the next two weeks. During that time I was an arrow notched on a taut string, ready to fly to its target: namely that night when my parents would be away at Chataly's; and when I would lock Doctor Edrick and Yaleen in the bedroom together. But beyond that point I would be shooting blind.

  Do you know, I'd been passive for so long that it even seemed possible to me during those last days that I might simply continue thereafter in the same vein? That this might be preferable?

  I could start to talk more freely. I could grow up ordinarily. I could make believe that I was just like any other child. Ultimately I might even persuade myself that during my infancy I had been insane. Them, having duly grown up, I could steer well clear of Worms and rivers for the rest of my days, and nobody would be any the wiser. . . .

  During that same fortnight, Yaleen too had been going through similar mood shifts. She also had been thinking about opting out. She had nursed fantasies of marriage, or of becoming a hermit or a poet; now hadn't she?

  Taut as I was—stretched like a banjo string—was I resonating in tune with Yaleen? Was I echoing her? Or had she perhaps been echoing me unawares? Had vibrations been passing up and down the same Ka-tree, on which we both were leaves, travelling through the ever-never?

  It's odd: I only grasped this aspect of that last fortnight just now when I set it down on paper. Obviously there's some use in writing books; you discover things you didn't know before! Or do you perhaps invent them? Then convince yourself that they are and always were the truth, because they explain events more neatly than the confusion—the shooting in the dark—of the actual time?

  To act or not to act? If I didn't act, I would forever just be the kid sister of Yaleen of Pecawar, author of The Book of the River. That wouldn't do at all, now would it?

  So was my pride more of a spur to action than the threat posed by the Godmind and its burning lens? Perhaps! The Godmind and its concerns seemed far away from our little family home in Pecawar; from the smell of cinnamon coffee, from the gaudy barrel-gourds in the garden. My universe had diminished drastically, but at least I had my pride to see me through.

  * * *

  Chataly choked to death. Mum and Dad departed. Yaleen cooked a pudding, brewed cocoa, read to me and saw me off to bed with a kiss.

  Before story-time I sneaked into the kitchen and unbolted the back door. Yaleen never did get round to wondering how Doctor Edrick had managed to enter the house without smashing and crashing. When he popped up, that was that. Busy! And after she was murdered, Yaleen had other things on her mind. Unbolting the door may seem a somewhat shitty thing for me to do. Hardly fair exchange for a pudding, a bedtime tale and a kiss? Well, if I can put it this way, it seemed a likely thing for me to do. When I locked the bedroom door upstairs I would close a trap; so presumably it was up to me to open the trap in the first place. It balanced out.

  As soon as I estimated that Yaleen had settled down with the poems of Gimmo the Tramper, downstairs from my bed I crept. Yaleen would doze off before Edrick arrived, and I didn't know how long she would snooze. Hunkering down in the dark outside the door, I waited.

  Not long, as I discovered.

  Then everything happened very suddenly—just as it had happened once already. (Though this was the first, and only time.)

  When Yaleen noticed me skulking there, I scrammed. I hid behind the urn in our entry hall. No sooner was I concealed than Yaleen came crashing through the door and scrambled upstairs pursued by Edrick. I counted slowly to ten and followed them. Opened the bedroom door, got the key, closed and locked it.

  When I turned that key I locked another door as well: the door of foreknowledge. Suddenly the future was a blank, unwritten. Now the burden was gone; I was free. I felt as though I'd spent these last two years gaga in a trance. . . .

  Action, now! I hastened into my own room, to drag a chair against the open window. I climbed on to the sill. That was when I heard the bang of the pistol, muffled by Yaleen's mattress and a couple of intervening doors. (Bye, Yaleen! Fly away!) On the wall outside was a rickety trellis supporting a creeper which bore hosts of tiny flame- blooms every spring. The creeper pretty well hid the spars of the trellis, as well as holding them together. If the trellis had been easier to spot—and bear in mind—Dad would probably have tom it down to prevent precisely such an escapade as followed.

  I edged out, latched on, and climbed slowly, feeling my way up to the flat of the roof. It was a good thing it was night. Apart from some escaping lamplight, the only light came from the stars. Just enough illumination, not too much. Any brighter, and I might have been scared—what with the cliff of wall above me and the gulf below and me only being little. One rotten spar snapped but I didn't lose my grip. The trellis sagged but didn't collapse. I soon humped myself over the guttering and lay a while, panting. Then I stood up on the roof and screamed my lungs out to the neighbourhood.

  It's amazing how much noise a small child can make. And I made it all. I didn't bother with words at first, just noise. Then I decided to switch to some words in case the neighbours thought I was merely a tom-cat with its dander up.

  "Help! Murder! Enemy! Enemy! Help!" I shrieked.

  By now Edrick had probably discovered that the door was locked, and kicked it loose. He'd be able to hear my shrieks, though since the noise was coming from overhead maybe this would confuse him. If he did da
sh into my bedroom and try to climb the trellis I was sure the structure would collapse; though come to think of it, Edrick only needed to stand on the windowsill to chin himself up to the roof. But why should he bother? Why should Yaleen's little sister matter to him now? He'd be best advised to cut and run.

  Lanterns and lamps lit up in the nearby houses.

  "Help! Help!" Raggedly; my throat was giving out.

  People soon came pounding along the lane to our front door. I heard cries of "Stop!" and half of the people rushed on by; so Edrick must have decamped. Pursuit receded into the distance. Very public- spirited, but hardly sensible! Why run after a killer?

  Lantern light spilled into our garden from downstairs, supplementing the faint glow cast by Yaleen's reading lamp, so neighbours were inside the house by now; Edrick must have left the front door open in his haste.

  In the distance I heard the crack of a shot.

  I squatted on the edge of the roof to await rescue, while above me blinked the stars. My stars.

  Death never makes things simpler. Oh what a fuss there was with Yaleen found dead! And Doctor Edrick also dead, as it transpired.

  Needless to say, in the eyes of my saviours I was simply a shocked little child, so I had a bit of difficulty working out exactly what had happened to Edrick. By and by I pieced it together. I gathered that his pursuers caught up with him in a blind alley, where Edrick fired his pistol, smashing someone's shoulder. Then the pistol must have jammed, or maybe it could only fire two shots before reloading; so our local heroes rushed him, and Doctor Edrick collected a knife in the guts.

  No doubt this was a sign of the times in once peaceful Pecawar. Our local newssheet had published details of "war atrocities" in Verrino. My parents had discussed these hushedly, other people not so hushedly, it seemed. Though the people of Pecawar hadn't themselves been injured by the war, this seemed to make them the more virtuously incensed on behalf of Verrino and its victims. It was noteworthy to me that the people of Verrino itself hadn't flooded out en masse to the prison-pens to try to massacre their former tormenters. They were numb with their sufferings. But Pecawar people had the energy to feel aggrieved. Thus a presumed absconding murderous Son armed with a gun and an offbeat accent deserved a quick reprisal, rather than citizen's arrest and investigation. (An investigation, just in case he was indeed a junglejack deserter, some poor wretch desperate to get home to Jangali.) When our citizens knifed Edrick, they didn't even know he had murdered anyone; not for sure. Such a thing wouldn't have happened before the war; but at least nobody openly boasted of planting the knife.