Decay Inevitable

by Conrad Williams

  “I wouldn’t know him anyway,” Emma said, reasonably.

  “Well, you won’t ever forget him when you do clap eyes on him. Come on.”

  They hurried to the other side of the bridge in time to see the barge dock and the harbour master secure the boat with rope as thick as an arm. Goat-swift, Tim was off the boat and scurrying into a warren of backstreets, his arm clasping to his chest a package wrapped in cream-coloured paper. A red bloom was spreading across the bottom. For a moment, Sean supposed that the other was not Tim – how would such a physical wreck be able to move like that? – but then Sean himself was finding that he was able to move much more quickly over here. Over Here was how he preferred to call this place. Over Here and Back There. It tickled Emma to hear him talk in this fashion. She had christened it Tantamount.

  As he cut into Tim’s lead, Emma began to drop back. He called to her to wait by the river and she pulled up, her hands on her waist, as he dived into the alleyway that had borne Tim’s feet not twenty seconds before. He kept to claws of shade as a filthy shower of sleet began, moving from pillar to post, pylon to pergola as Tim flitted through the heavily peopled alleys, his hair flapping around his tiny head like an anemone. At a covered market, he slowed to walking pace and took some time to inspect the produce, all the while rubbing at his booty (his lunch, was it?) as if it were a cat in need of succour. The stalls here were thick with game, vegetables, and pulses. Spice jars emphasised the lack of colour all around. Dogs and ferrets chased each other through the forests of legs while customers argued the toss over a couple of coppers to pay for their cockles and bully beef. A basket of chickens tumbled across Sean’s path, causing him to veer into a scrum of elderly men drinking tarry wine from a huge moonshine jug. Their curses followed him deeper into the gloom. A sticky smell of hemp hung here, like fragranced steam in a sauna. Tim was dawdling now, stopping to chat to a woman selling beads and to take a small cup of strong, thick coffee with the neighbouring café owner. Tim had a swagger here that seemed ridiculous in such a reedy frame. When he pushed on into the bazaar, Sean hurried over to the bead seller and pretended to browse her wares for all of two seconds before:

  “That man, just now. That man you were talking to. Who is he?”

  The woman looked up at him from beneath a pair of eyelashes that must have been three inches long. A rat squirmed in and out of the folds of her clothes. Her breasts sometimes jiggled into view, small and brown as nuts. She smiled at him and showed off teeth that had been ground and patterned like tiny tablets of sculpted ivory.

  “That was Mr Edge,” she said. “Alderley Edge. He’s very popular round these parts.” She rubbed her finger and thumb together. “He has big pockets.”

  “Does he live near here?” Sean was getting anxious. He would lose Tim if he wasn’t careful.

  “Yes. He has an apartment in the clipper.”

  “The clipper?”

  “Yes. A grounded boat in Frenzy Square. You won’t miss it, I promise you.”

  “Nice rat,” Sean said, as the animal slid luxuriously into the woman’s cleavage and lounged there, twitching at him.

  The market stalls thinned out. He emerged in a tunnel filled with fresh air but scant lighting. At the other end, a courtyard floored with large, terracotta tiles boasted a ship at its heart, listing heavily to the port side without any water to support it. Huge wooden stanchions supported its bulk and prevented it from tipping over any further. He saw a figure against one of the portholes, observing his approach. He wondered if Tim would recognise him as he clambered aboard, a wave of vertigo almost tipping him over as the freshly canted decks of the boat, the Flat Earth if the nameplate above the wheel were to be believed, spread out around him.

  “Tim?” Sean called gently, thinking, Alderley Edge?

  The door to one of the cabins had not been closed properly. Sean let himself in and found Tim sitting on a chair by the porthole, trying to get the cork out of a bottle of rum.

  “Do you want a hand with that, Tim?”

  Tim tossed the bottle to him. “I’d rather you called me Alderley. Or Mr. Edge. Yes, Mr. Edge would be best.”

  He took two glasses from a leggy cupboard that had been customised to deal with the absurd angles and set them down on the table. Sean poured. “So what are you doing here?” he asked, taking one of the glasses and drinking deeply.

  “Any question you ask, I could ask of you,” Tim parried.

  “I’m here because a girl died. If we’re playing quid pro quo, then I believe it’s your turn.”

  He was still the gawky, ponderous Tim when you got up close. But cleaner somehow. Sharper. None of the serous fluids that wept from his cavities, or rumbled in his chest were in evidence here. The boy was almost good-looking. He realised that this would be answer enough for his question, but Tim led him in a different direction.

  “There’s gold in these hills,” he said. “Why should I tell you about it?”

  “Smuggling?” Sean guessed.

  The curl went from Tim’s lip. “How would you know about that?”

  “Oh come on, it’s obvious. I’ve been with Vernon on his little trips around the Northwest. I’ve seen his hand-overs. The little parcels. What’s in them?”

  “You don’t know?” The curl returned.

  “I could make you tell me.”

  “You have no power over me here,” he purred.

  Sean reached out to grab Tim’s arm, but his fist squeezed the meat out of both ends until he was holding on to nothing. It was like trying to grasp water. Tim’s arm reattached itself as he watched.

  “Quod erat demonstrandum,” Tim said. “See, you’re not the only one who knows Latin.”

  “Pallida Mors aequo pulsat pede pauperum tabernas regumque turres,” Sean said, enjoying the crease in Tim’s forehead.

  “Fuck off, Sean,” he said. “I’m strong here.”

  “And you, such a spaz back in Warrington.”

  “You’re dead, you know that, if you go back. Pig.”

  “You been reading up on me, have you? Doing a bit of research?”

  “Vernon is disappointed in you. He thought you were good stuff. He thought you were going to help him for years to come. He’s mostly disappointed in his own judgement though. He’s a harsh critic, is Vernon.”

  “Which one of you was it?” Sean said. “Killed Naomi?”

  “The name means nothing to me.”

  “Do you at least know why she died? You were, after all, at her funeral.”

  “In the bird’s nest, I am a quail’s egg, matey. If you’re looking for ostrich produce, you’re in the wrong place. I was at the funeral to keep a look out–”

  “With your eyes?”

  “–for somebody who wanted to disrupt the ceremony before she was put into that quiet earth. Anybody who wanted to make contact. She was still useful to some people even when dead. In the ground it was game over. We were there to protect our interests.”

  “Well you didn’t see me, did you?”

  “Maybe we did, but you wouldn’t have been classed as dangerous. Sorry to disappoint you. No, the danger would have come from someone a little less obvious. Someone using this place as a shield from which to attack us.”

  Sean refilled their glasses. The paper parcel had been hidden somewhere. Sean sat back in his chair and sipped his drink. The walls of the room were festooned with sea-faring equipment: photographs of sailing boats, a barometer, portraits of salty old Jack Tars, a sextant hanging from a hook. Tim sat on the other side of the table, his head tilted, hands clasped softly together like those of a priest taking confession.

  Sean heard a bell tolling in the distance, and a voice bellowing “Seven o’clock and all’s well!”

  “That’s the sentinel,” Tim informed him. “The watch has started.”

  “The watch?”

  “Every night, from seven till dawn. This is the time of day when all the fun starts.”

  “I’d like to see some of this fun.” />
  “You might. But then you’ll definitely see some if you go home too.”

  “Are the others in on this?”

  Tim blinked at him. “The others?”

  “Yeah. Lutz, Robbie. That lot.”

  “Foot soldiers. Cannon fodder. They’re helping us out. They don’t know a thing.”

  “Helping you try to find the Negstream at the de Fleche building.”

  “Why did you leave the flatfoot club if you’re so clever?”

  “That’s nothing to do with you.”

  Tim leaned across the desk, his hands splaying on the wood. “And, my friend, this place has nothing to do with you. Stay clear, or you will be harmed. I promise you that.”

  “I won’t stop until I find out who killed Naomi.”

  “I can’t protect you, Sean. I won’t protect you.”

  “I don’t need protection from you, muppet-boy. Who’s going to look after you, at the end of the day?”

  Tim smiled. “I am a king here, Sean. I’m better off here than I am back home. I don’t need protection. I’m well looked after. I’m untouchable.”

  “I suppose it was you who burned the buildings down, once you were sure of where the Negstreams were.”

  “Of course. Just following orders.”

  “There are others. You haven’t got a stranglehold on this place, you know.”

  “That’s not our concern.”

  “Then what is?”

  “Work it out yourself, you so-called Peeler.”

  Sean stood up. “I’ll see you again, Mr. Edge.” He walked over to the door. “Thanks for the rum.”

  EMMA WAS SITTING by the bridge when he returned. She was kicking out at a flock of shabby sea-birds that were circling her, shrieking for food.

  “Have fun in the market?” she asked, but the cockiness in her voice cracked as soon as she spoke. She went to him and hugged him tightly.

  “I was worried,” she said.

  “It’s nice to know that.”

  “Don’t leave me alone here ever again.”

  He buried his face into her neck and breathed her smell deep into him. “I won’t. I promise. I’m sorry.”

  “Where to now?”

  Sean lifted his head to look at the river. “I suppose we should try to find the hill. I expect we’ll find answers there.”

  Emma scanned the horizon, a daunting panorama filled with black glass and towers made from steel and neon signs that burned like little suns. Packed into the interstices were suffocating markets like the one Sean had explored, great scaffolds in which tents and bivouacs fluttered, hundreds of metres off the ground. The roads were jammed with dead cars that were either improvised homes for some or materials to be cannibalised for skeletal scooters that putt-putted along pavements thronged with tramps or thieves, and dead bodies that could not be buried for lack of space. They were salted, these corpses, and left to desiccate. Emma saw some of their mummified flesh used for storm shutters on crude windows. She saw others floating on the surface of the river.

  “Do you think this is the kind of place where you might find a hill? A pond? A wood?”

  “No,” Sean said. “But it must be here. It must.”

  “De Fleche came here to stay. There must be more to it than this. Why would he want to stay here?”

  “You’re right. We’ll find it. But let’s go back first. I want to talk to somebody.”

  Emma held his hand. “What if we can’t get back the way we got in?”

  He smiled. “Well, at least it will be fun trying, won’t it?”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE: THRESHOLD

  WHEN HE WENT back to confront George about the marks on his arm, and to ask if he knew of anybody who might help treat his complaint, he saw that George had skin problems of his own. The yards of skin that contained the man had been stuffed into the toilet, as if it was a peel-off costume made of paper that could be flushed away. No other trace of him remained.

  He found a cab with a horse attached, but nobody to drive him. As he had no map to show him the way to Sud or Howling Mile or the other place, Mash This, it seemed he was stymied. He needed to find a train station if he was to make any exploration of the countryside count. To understand this landscape might help him go some distance to understanding how he might find Cat. Nothing else mattered to him any more. Sean and Emma were too wrapped up in their own needs to consider the simple urge that now governed his life.

  He got into the driver’s seat of the cab and took up the reins. He tried a few encouraging noises, and with a jolt that threw him back in his seat the horse began to trot along the lane. A couple of minutes and the village was behind him. One road lay ahead, bisecting the scorched fields and the crippled, denuded woods. The black sun burnt without heat, and after an hour of their journey it began to snow. Black flakes landed on Will’s skin and burnt into it. He had to draw the sleeves of his jumper over his fingers and hunch his head into his neck to shield himself from the acid flurry. The horse didn’t seem to mind, jogging along gamely, its white mane seething in the wind. No houses were visible on the roadside; no traffic passed him on its way to Gloat Market. He was alone. The fear of that speared him and he wept into his jumper for a while, but knowing that he was in the same place as Cat revived him. He would find her. Imagining how she would look, how she sounded, filled his heart to a point where he thought it must burst. The baby too, might be here, with its mother. All he had wanted was a quiet life. The three of them together, happy.

  The horse drew to a standstill. Will shook the reins and made more chivvying noises but to no avail.

  “Are you hungry, nag? Is that it?” He felt in his pockets for food but found nothing edible. Under the cushions on his seat was a carrot but when he offered it to the horse, it wasn’t interested.

  “What’s wrong? Do you smell something?”

  The road stretched ahead of them, seemingly no different from the road they had traversed so far. The same razed fields and stunted trees. The stench of dead things. The bones sticking out of the earth.

  He tried tugging on the reins to lead the horse forwards but it strained against him. Will gave up and left the horse where it stood. The road led on for another half-mile or so before it petered out.

  “Super,” Will sighed. The terrain grew rockier and the trees disappeared altogether, replaced by spiny bushes. It continued to snow, the large black flakes like wafers of ash from a burning house. Their burn was bearable, once you got used to it. Will clambered over the rocks and saw the house immediately. It was still a way off, but smoke was whipping from its chimney and a single window was a square of pale orange. The sea was here once more, fizzing against the shore, its skin vibrating with reflected crescents of black. Spume made quivering sculptures that the wind tossed into the air. Will reckoned it would take him twenty minutes or so to reach the house, but before he had crossed half the distance, he came across the woman.

  She was lying on a ledge on one of the bigger rocks. She looked to be asleep; her limbs were not twisted to indicate a bad fall. Will got down beside her and patted her gently on the shoulder.

  “Hello? Are you okay?” His voice, after a long silence, sounded alien to him. It buzzed in his ears, atonal and waspish. But it did the trick. The woman woke, frowning, her mouth moving as she tried to make words come.

  “It’s okay. Here, let me help you stand.” Will gently pulled her upright. The woman was flapping her hands around as though batting away flies. Her eyes twitched and then flew open. She regarded Will with shock, as though she had never seen a fellow human being before. And then she screamed. The sound distorted as it came from her lips, glissading into a metallic, digitised howl, something that might be happened upon on a short-wave radio. Flakes of snow found their way into her mouth and she choked and spat them out. Her breath was coming in tight, short blasts.

  “It’s okay,” Will soothed, trying to squeeze her hands together so she could do neither him nor herself any harm. “Try to relax. You’re o
kay now.”

  Okay, he thought. Nobody here is okay.

  Slowly the woman found some poise. She looked around her, taking in the surroundings with the wonderment of a child at the zoo. Will was ready for her first question, the inevitable, when it came.

  “I don’t really know where we are,” he said. “But I just came from a small village a couple of miles back that way. There don’t seem to be very many people around.”

  “Who are you?”

  “Will.” He stuck out his hand and she shook it. The frown had yet to leave her brow. She appeared to be in her mid-twenties, with a long, sleek pony tail and grey eyes. She didn’t have any of the characteristics of Alice or George. He was glad about that.

  “Joanna,” she said. “My voice sounds funny. It’s like talking through a kazoo.”

  “Yeah, I don’t know why. But there’s tonnes of strange stuff here. You won’t believe some of it.”

  “I don’t know how I got here.”

  “Me neither.”

  “I remember...” Joanna faded out, looking away in the direction of the road Will had just travelled along. Her eyes seemed to be searching for visual clues as to what had gone before. “I remember two brilliant lights, and a roar. And falling, like you know, in a dream.”

  Will had pricked up his ears at the lights. He mentioned his own hazy recollections. “I was just on my way down to that house. To see if they could help me find a train that went to somewhere with a bit more life.”

  “Can I come?”

  Will felt like hugging her. “Of course. I’d have been disappointed if you didn’t.”

  They made their way over the rocks to a narrower path, hampered by offcuts from boulders and muddy puddles. The black sun had sunk behind the edifice they had left behind. The snow too had lifted; only a few flakes fell now. Will checked his hands. They were chapped and sore, but the skin had not broken.

  “This place seems to me,” Joanna was saying, “the most familiar place in the world. But at the same time, I feel as though I have never been here before.”