by Mervyn Peake
Adventure had begun again. He had awakened to a new life.
6
Awakening Is Sweet Sorrow
The door was wide open. Whiteness had given place to the brilliant green that presages the torrent of living. Sounds of humans: a horn, unlike the haunting alarms at sea, echoed around the mountains, sweet, deep and eloquent. Through the open door poured sunlight of such intensity that Titus was impelled to shriek, as a baby new born hails its own entrance into the world.
He saw a movement across the room – everything was awakening. He heard birdsong – he heard sounds that he could not place – muscular, masculine sounds. A saw cutting through logs – a double-edged saw – voices shouting to each other with the glory of sunshine.
He wished to be at one with those voices and his determination took him stumbling, crawling, undignified to the open door.
He gazed, as one who had been blinded, at the stupendous beauty of nature. His eyes could only take in so small a part of what there was to be seen.
He might have toppled over the mountains that surrounded him, as he drank in the air, the sky, the deep green of the trees, but for arms that held him and laid him gently on a bench, roughly hewn, and placed in his hand a mug that was lifted to his lips and, as he drank, his body and his mind were suffused with gratitude.
At his feet lay the warmth that had nestled him and nursed him through the months of cold fatigue. He glanced down and a paw, gentle and huge, laid itself upon his knee. He turned his head to the right and a thrill like a shriek of lightning coursed through his body, as he saw beside him those dark eyes devouring him.
Titus knew now that speech was no longer efficacious. He put down the mug, and found a hand, ready to take his own – a gentle, frail and blue-veined hand, which clung to his as though it had been stitched by a surgeon on to his.
All thoughts had flown. Only occasionally does human beauty so transcend all that one knows.
7
Living Refound
As the sun entered the lives of his unknown benefactors, and of himself, Titus longed to renew the grasp, so long subdued, that he held on life.
He no longer felt it necessary to assert ‘I am me – I am Titus’.
The old woman, who was a part of his life now, nodded her head with pleasure at every new gesture he made, as he found his way from his bed to the door unaided, as he sang, as he twirled her gently and slowly in his arms, round and round the stone floor in a dance that brought back to her, inevitably, echoes of a long-distant youth.
The silent woman, with her huge eyes, sat still as an Eastern goddess on a bench by the open door, and when his newfound vigour expended itself her hand moved imperceptibly to take his, as he seated himself beside her.
‘Is it love?’ he wondered. But the need to make recompense was uppermost now; in a practical way to repay the care given to him so generously by people to whom poverty was as much a part of living as being born and dying. The two pallet beds had been the only resting place for the tired limbs of the old woman, and the shepherds and huntsmen whose voices he had heard. The generosity of the poor knew no bounds. And now, at last, Titus knew to whom he was beholden – the faceless and the generous ones who had given, with no expectancy of return.
He forced himself outside for the first morning. The lit world nearly annihilated him, but he slid down the grass slopes longing to give of all that was within him; to thank in a physical way.
He ploughed into life, as though it was water, diving and coming up again into the air, breathing life, new and rare. He sought sounds. He traced them down a small path, hedge-lined, where small birds nested, until he came to an open space where he saw men with two-handed saws, working through, rhythmically, huge boles of trees. They were surrounded by the neat, stacked results, like intricate piles of matches, but these would not fall at a touch.
Titus joined the men. They clapped as they saw him, and he indicated by a gesture, so learned was he in mime, that he also wished to take one of the saws.
An elderly man, stained by the elements and wrinkled, stood aside, and also by a gesture indicated to Titus that he could take his place.
Everything that is mastered appears to the spectator to be easy in execution and Titus, with the ebullience of an amateur, took hold of the saw that had been given up to him. At a word, quite incomprehensible to Titus, from the man at the other end of the saw, he started to move his arms. He had seen the rhythm and the ease, and he thought that he, too, would slip into the same movements, but he was clumsy to the point of self-embarrassment, and the saw wriggled like a worm under his inexpert guidance. He felt an arm take hold of him, rather as a mother might guide her child in the use of a pencil, and with immense patience his arm was gently moved, backwards and forwards, in duet with the man at the other end, who urged Titus on.
Very gradually the rhythm came to him, but at the same time the physical exertion overwhelmed him. As he sank to the carpet of mossy grass in exhaustion he felt the strong arm that had held his behind the saw slowly change to a soft loving arm. He turned to see the two black pools enveloping him and a dew of pride overflowing down the pale cheeks.
He was ashamed of his weakness and almost roughly edged his hand away as he strove to rise again from beside the girl. His arms ached with the new-forced exertion. His body was weak and his brain angry with frustration.
He knew that he had exerted himself as much as his tired body was capable of, and he crept back to his bed, humbled, and lay with his arms over his face to shut out what he thought of as his defeat.
8
Life Can Be a Miracle
As the elements became more clement, Titus’s growing strength engendered in him an awakening of all his senses. He became aware of the awe-inspiring beauty of the mountains that surrounded him, snow-laden at their tips and brilliant green as they gently swam downwards to deep fir-lined valleys. Everything around him was a miracle. The small mountain flowers, the sounds of water, birds and human voices and the mild sun overhead generated not only warmth, but also a sense of renewal in the act of living.
Titus went every day to the clearing and each day he became a little more expert at manipulating the double-handed saw. There was no verbal communication, just the rareness of being one with the men with whom he worked. His muscles became hard and his face lost its pallor.
Inside the hut the girl’s beauty grew no less haunted, but it had the recognition of love in it. She had taken it upon herself to relieve the old woman of the harder household tasks. When there was a rabbit to be skinned, she would seat herself at the bare scrubbed table and skin it. No one knew what feelings she may have had in undertaking this macabre task. Chickens and birds of many varieties she plucked, with knowledge gained from her old mentor, and she took the task of cooking upon herself.
When the weather was mild enough the food was brought outside. Home-made bread was dipped in the stews and the wooden plates wiped clean with it. Each meal was received with the graceful acknowledgements of hand-clapping, and sometimes one of the men would sing, melancholy and haunting, or a man and a woman would dance with slow, intricate steps, their bodies hardly moving, while the watchers moved their hands like sighs.
A man with a musical instrument, made by himself during the long and dark winter, jumped into the circle like a jack-in-the-box, and as he played, a round of girls and boys, and men and women, danced with primitive pleasure.
Titus realised that it was also for him to contribute. He felt untalented. He could not sing, play an instrument or even dance. With a quick jump he entered the circle, and the cream-coloured dog who had attached itself to him followed him like a shadow.
He held it upright on its hind legs, and to the bizarre music of the old musician he danced round and round and round, like a top spinning, until he was so dizzy that he lost all sense of balance and fell with little grace on to the moss, and his canine friend lay panting beside him.
The applause that greeted him echoed down the mounta
ins, and he rose and bowed with a clown-like foolishness, and led his canine partner, and stood it on its hind legs once more, and bowed its head so deep that it almost lost its dignity.
Titus bowed again and, with the humour he had for so long forgotten to be a part of his life, waddled out of the circus, his feet forming one straight line holding the right paw of his cream-furry friend who sped like a startled willow warbler.
The days followed each other in the wonderment of spring and inevitably to a young man this wonderment of nature could not contain itself in looking alone. In Titus, also, the sap rose, and the pangs of desire led him to the girl with whom he could hold no communication. He wanted more.
In the beauty of these spring evenings he led her to a small clearing he had discovered, surrounded by blackthorn in which there were nests woven as though by a master craftsman. All around them the newborn rabbits scuffled and darted about. There, on the moss, he made love to her and those eyes that still devoured him. Was it love or the physical necessity that impelled him almost to desecrate a body? Her body was compliant, yet seemed to have known a suffering to which Titus shut his eyes.
As spring gave way to summer, her emaciated body became fuller and carried within it his child. He realised he had no wish to spend his life with this woman, but he knew that what little decency he had should wait its term.
Titus threw himself into all the work that surrounded him, the planting and the sowing, the weeding, and all the preparations made by humans to stave off the winter ahead, when they live in a world dependent on their own skill and their own labour.
He had long since returned the pallet bed to the old woman, and slept where and when he could.
The dark eyes became more painful to watch, as the months proceeded and, as he acknowledged within himself his own infidelity, he wished to hide from them, and from her, more and more. He knew that she realised her burden was hers to face alone. He would leave her, but when she didn’t know. He made love to her still, but he felt less and less urgency. He had not wished to propagate and the very fact that he had done so lessened his desire for her.
He detected a cooling of the friendship he had made with his fellow men, as the woman grew. Any tenderness he felt for her turned to an aggrieved sense that he was trapped. If he had had any feeling for her, perhaps he would have had the empathy to realise that she was trapped too, far more than he.
The surrounding mountains now made him claustrophobic and in his cowardice he worked out how he might escape when the time was appropriate.
The seasons were never so slow in passing from one to another. The spring that had brought about his newfound liberation took aeons in giving way to summer. He longed for his freedom. No longer did his companions clap his existence. He felt an outcast. It was as though everyone was waiting for him to go, and the eyes most of all.
9
Autumn and Winter, the Pain of Both
Darkness came earlier now. The leaves were piled into mounds and the smell of autumn twisted high into the sky, coiling with the wind. The evenings were empty of activity and potent with unease. The skies were laden, and as the body grew more full, Titus could think only of Fuchsia. Over and over again he called to the girl, pointing to her stomach, ‘Fuchsia – Fuchsia.’
The only being that still clung to Titus was the cream-coloured dog. It followed him and sat at his feet as the evenings grew cold, portending winter. The logs, sawn in the days when he was learning to live again, fuelled the fire in the small room and conjured up magical warmth.
Expectation smothered him. He knew he was vile, but he did not know how to combat it. He felt that if he could speak and be understood, perhaps he could make a case for himself, yet at the same time he knew that he had no case to make. He would leave the eyes, as he had left one after the other of the people who could have loved him, but echoing always in his mind and body was the one who would continue to haunt him throughout his life – the ‘Thing’, loveless, heartless, cunning and cruel.
The days and nights were interminable. If he could have found the courage within himself, Titus would have torn himself free and rushed down the mountains and away. But his fate was sealed, as was that of the girl who had given him everything that a woman can give and asked nothing in return, except to await the advent of his child.
The days were still spent in physical labour and, as they shortened, Titus felt surrounded by a steadily growing animosity. He spoke only to himself. He heard the voices calling to each other and he was not of them. There was nothing to do any more but wait, and the waiting was hard to bear. Mist covered the mountains and clouded his brain. By his inexpert calculation and the slowing of the woman’s movements, there would be two more months to wait. If Titus had been able to feel concern for anyone but himself, he would have known how much his tenderness was needed. She craved affection and found it in the old woman and the others in this little mountain home.
The snow began to fall once more and he was awoken one night by the soft moaning of pain. The old woman, knowledgeable in childbirth, moved deftly out of her bed and across the room at a speed surprising in one so old.
His child was making an early entrance to a bitter world. Titus left the two women inside, and he and the dog walked round the impoverished hut. As the whiteness fell around them his child was born. The dog whimpered, then let out a howl, which coincided with the scream of the baby released from its mother’s womb. The scream subsided into unholy silence.
Titus entered the hut, and looked at the mother on the bed. She knew now the years of emptiness that lay ahead of her, as tears chased each other down her pale cheeks. She held out her frail arms and murmured the only words that had ever passed between them, ‘Fuchsia, Titus,’ then turned away.
Titus’s heart was as cold as the infant on the bed, as he made his way out of the hut.
10
Away from the Mountains
As he left the hut he heard breathing behind him – it was a mixture of the dog, and the hiss of hatred from the men and women with whom he had lived for nearly a year.
Knowing he would leave when the time was ready, he had concealed a little way down the mountain provisions that would go some way to relieve his hunger pangs. He had not anticipated having a companion, so he would have to ration the supplies, but to think of another winter like the last one was anathema to him.
It was dusk as he made his way down the path to the clearing where his child had been conceived. He put all feelings of conscience behind him. His life lay ahead. He now knew that any permanent relationship was not for him. His desires would be peremptorily fulfilled and he would hide consciousness of the pain he might inflict deep in the well of his mind.
With the provisions he had hidden a skin that would not be missed. They were buried in the earth so that the weather could not touch them. As the snow fell, he was glad of his secret precautions. Now, after a year hemmed in by the mountains, he longed for the sight and the sound of water. His objective was to reach a sea and the mysterious outline of islands, whether inhabited or not. He yearned to see those porpoise-shaped islands emerging from the sea mist. His youth urged him on to conquest. He knew himself to be selfish, to have turned his back on the people who cried to him for help. He lived only for himself. He thought back to his other worlds, where he had cared, and been cared for, and given his strength to kill the most heinous of villains – Steerpike – and the man from the Under River.
‘I am not wholly despicable,’ he said out loud to himself and to the dog who warmed his freezing body. ‘Perhaps one day I may prove again that I am not wholly selfish – where and when will it be?’
The dog opened its jaws and howled in sympathy.
As the day broke, they nursed their frozen limbs, and saw through the mist the pale pink path Titus knew would lead him to a sea. They broke the sullen bread and scooped the frozen snow for sustenance before they left the hollow and began to make their way. Titus followed the unworn path through thorn bushes, h
earing the frightened screeches of birds. On the ground a grass snake twisted, curving away from him like a femme fatale.
‘You beast, you are alone, with a man who is searching, but I don’t know for what I am searching. I have forsaken love, companionship, community. And you, faithful beast, you are alone and, when the time comes, I will forsake you too. Why so pitiless?’
His words echoed up and down the mountains, as he and the dog were scourged by icy wind. ‘I was not always selfish. I loved Fuchsia. I loved Dr Prune – I loved Bellgrove. I revered but feared my mother. But I was only at one with the ‘‘Thing’’, who was nothing but a dream, appearing and disappearing, and then gone for ever, and the man who wore faithfulness like a garment, alone like me, in the woods of Gormenghast. What was his name . . . ?’
Titus pulled at brambles, pushing aside overhanging bushes. ‘What was his name? May? Day? Clay? Hay? Say? Jay? Pray – pray, pray – oh, Mr Flay – yes, Mr Flay with the creaking knee-joints. How you would despise me. Titus the traitor – but also a traitor to himself. And now I want to live, as I have never lived before. I want to see everything this new world has to offer me.’
Titus relished the freedom that was his – not looking further ahead than the next step. As he rounded a corner in the downward path he spied a hut, built from hacked-down trees, primitive but inviting. He sang and he ran. The dog bounded joyfully beside him.
The signs of a human activity hung outside the hut. Animal skins stretched pathetically, their lives stripped from them. Small flowers clung to life as the winter advanced.