Tower of Silence

by Sarah Rayne

  Selina had tilted her head right back, into the position people called craning your neck, in order to see what the men were doing. As they began to lift the bodies onto the wide ledge there was a movement deep inside the night sky that made her shiver all over. It was exactly as if something that had been crouching in the dark had stirred and was creeping forward. The ogre-birds, stretching their claws, spreading out their wing-cloaks, getting ready to pounce on their prey? Selina had not known that word ‘prey’ until Douglas had used it. It was a bit worrying that the word sounded the same as when you talked to God in church every Sunday. Selina had been asking God to let them escape ever since the men had snatched them all up in the garden, and she had thought that was praying. But then Douglas had said about the tower and the vultures and the prey, and Selina had had a sudden doubt. Supposing she had been talking not to God, but to the ogre-birds all along? It was difficult when one sound had two quite different meanings; it meant you could not tell if things got mixed up. Selina could not be sure, now, if she had been praying to God, or if she had been telling the ogre-birds that there was prey waiting for them in the tower.

  Whichever it was, the birds were up there. Two of them were already on the ledge, their round-shouldered outlines grimly black against the night sky. Three more were hovering: in the crimson torchlight their wings looked wet and ragged at the edges. It looked as if they had been dabbled in blood.

  Even down here, Selina could hear the sound of the beating wings on the air. There was a rhythm about it. Dreadful. Like somebody tapping on a drum. Like a rude man banging impatiently on a table for food…

  She was shivering violently, and she was so cold she thought she might die from it. She was huddled into a tiny dark space as far from the iron stair as possible, her knees drawn up to her chest, both arms wrapped around them.

  She thought Christy was a little way along the wall–she could not see her, but she could feel that she was quite near. I’d probably be able to reach her hand if I dared move, thought Selina. But she dared not move.

  The plotters were lifting the two wrapped shapes onto the ledge: the birds moved again then, swooping up into the air and hovering over the tower, almost as if they might be saying, We must give these humans room to arrange our food. It did not take very long; the plotters did it quickly, looking up at the birds as they laid the two bodies out. Selina supposed she ought to be thinking that that was her father and mother up there, but she could not. The pale bundles were simply sacks; they were nothing. There was a word–anonymous. It meant no name and no face. Even when the men twitched aside the wrappings, they were only arms and legs and hair, vaguely embarrassing because they had no clothes on.

  The iron staircase shuddered as the men came back down: they descended very fast indeed, glancing uneasily upwards all the while, and for the first time Selina wondered if the ogre-birds could actually come inside the tower. But no, they were perched on the ledge–there were at least eight of them by now, and they were hunching over the two bodies. The plotters had reached the ground and they were about to go out of the tower. They’ll slam the door, thought Selina, in panic. And then we’ll be trapped all over again, with those things eating my father and mother up there, and I don’t think I can bear it—

  It was then that two things happened, not absolutely together, but so close that Selina was afterwards to almost believe that one had set off the other.

  The first thing was the sound of several vehicles, being driven very fast, coming towards the tower. The glare of headlights swept across the dark interior, and there was the sound of car doors being opened and slammed, and of people shouting. The gun-men began to scatter, dropping their weapons as they did so. It’s the rescue! thought Selina. They’ve found us! I can see Christy’s father, and Douglas’s! And lots of other people in uniforms! But she stayed where she was, until she was sure that there were enough people out there to grab the plotters and their guns, and then she stood up, brushed down her frock which was filthy, and walked a bit unsteadily out into the glaring headlights and the people.

  It was then that the second thing happened. As Douglas’s father lifted her in his arms, and said, ‘My poor child, you’re safe now,’ Selina heard–they all heard–the most terrible scream coming from the very top of the tower.

  For a while everything was blurred. The night seemed to suddenly fill up with terror, and people began to run into the tower. The iron stairs clanged as they raced up them, shouting as they went.

  Selina was carried to one of the jeeps, and wrapped in a blanket and given something hot to drink. Everyone was saying, ‘You’re quite safe, Selina; it’s all over,’ but there was horror in their voices when they said it, and Selina knew it was not over: there was something in the darkness that was screaming, over and over, dreadful terrified screams, so that you wanted to clap both hands over your ears and shut out the screaming and the panic and the red-streaked night.

  Two shots rang out, and something screeched in anger. One of the ogre-birds? And then somebody said, ‘Sod it, I missed the bloody thing! It’s too dark and it’s too far up–I can’t even see the damned creatures!’ and somebody else–Selina thought it was Douglas’s father–said, ‘For Christ’s sake, try for it again–she’s still alive up there—’

  ‘Up there’ meant the tower, of course. Selina tried to sit up to see what was happening, and she tried to see where Christy was as well, but people kept coming in between her and her view of the tower, and voices were saying something about ‘Keep the child away’ and, ‘Get her back to Alwar–there’s a British hospital there’. Somebody else told her to stay where she was; everything was all right.

  One of the men had managed to tilt the other jeep so that its headlights shone onto the terrible ledge, and Selina could see the tower’s top pretty well. She could see that something was moving up there, on the ledge. It was something that had pale arms and legs and body, and hair that streamed untidily in the wind. It was crouching over, its arms coming up to cover its head, but the ogre-birds were all round it–they were flying at it over and over again, their great wings beating on the air, their hunched-over bodies leaning down.

  The screaming went on and on, but by the time the men reached the top of the iron staircase it had stopped.

  Great-uncle Matthew did not approve of fires in children’s bedrooms. He said it was a ridiculous waste of money: children were notoriously hardy creatures and they were better for not being pampered and cosseted. He demanded to know whether Flora thought money for coal and coke grew in the garden, because he was not a millionaire, said Great-uncle Matthew testily, dear goodness he was not, and there was already enough wanton extravagance to contend with as it was, what with Rosa’s funeral to arrange, and very likely half of Inchcape coming to Teind after the service, expecting to be fed.

  But Aunt Flora, who was puffy-faced from crying, had insisted that Selina had a fire in her bedroom on the night Rosa’s body was found. She said fires were comforting, and they must remember that it had been Selina who had found poor Rosa’s body, and the poor child was bound to be suffering from shock. They were all of them suffering from shock, said Aunt Flora, and oh dear, what were they going to do without Rosa? She sat down on one of the over-stuffed chairs in the dining room and gave way to another noisy bout of weeping, and had to be given a teaspoonful of brandy in a small glass as a restorative by Great-uncle Matthew, who did not approve of females drinking spirits but did not like it when Aunt Flora cried, because it upset his digestion.

  Selina went to the funeral, of course. In church she sat in between Aunt Flora who smelt of the mothballs she used to preserve her good black coat, and Great-uncle Matthew, who smelt of pipe tobacco and unwashed feet because in all the upset nobody had remembered to light the boiler for hot water. Aunt Flora had said that she would heat up some water for washing, but Great-uncle Matthew said he would not dream of allowing Flora to struggle up two flights of stairs with heavy kettles of boiling water.

  S
elina had washed in cold water, and she wore her school uniform which Aunt Flora thought would be the most suitable thing. Everybody was very solemn and a few people shed tears at the graveside, but Selina did not, partly because Great-uncle Matthew had said she must not make a scene.

  It was nothing like a funeral in India would have been. Selina had not been allowed to go to the funeral they had held for Douglas and Christy and the others, because it had been thought too upsetting for her. But she knew about funerals in India, because her ayah had told her about them.

  In India, the dying person had to chant the patet along with all the family, or, if that could not be managed, the ashem vohu. ‘Very good, the prayer for ashem vohu,’ Selina’s ayah had said. ‘It make for a happier time beyond death.’

  And then, after the death, wherever possible there was the visit of the sagdid to the body–the four-eyed dog. ‘Not truly four eyes,’ the ayah had said. ‘But a dog with two spots over its eyes.’ The sagdid had to be brought into the house to see the dead person, ‘For the forces of evil retreat at the sight of a dog,’ said the ayah. ‘And there must also be fire, because the burning of fragrant sandalwood and frankincense destroys all ills. And after all is over, the family must eat only vegetable and fish for three days as a sign of mourning.’

  Selina thought this all sounded very reasonable. You would want to drive away all the bad things when somebody died–the forces of evil, the ayah had called them–whether you did it by introducing a spot-eyed dog or burning nice-smelling things. Sandalwood was very nice indeed: mother had had a bottle of perfume called Sandalwood. And if you were upset at the death of somebody you loved, you would not feel like eating anyway.

  The children in Alwar had not been able to chant the repentance-prayer, but Selina thought it might not matter so much for children. They had not had the sagdid either, but Selina thought that they would have crossed the old and holy Bridge all right, because they would have been together. Sometimes she could see them all, holding hands together, walking across the Bridge, Douglas and Christy helping the younger ones, all of them fearful but a bit excited, because to die was an awfully big adventure. Douglas had said that, right at the end. At times Selina wished very hard that she had gone with them to share the adventure.

  There was no spotty-eyed sagdid dog at Great-aunt Rosa’s funeral, of course–Great-uncle Matthew could not abide dogs or cats and would not have one in the house–and there was no frankincense or sandalwood, either. Selina had rather timidly asked about this, and both Great-uncle Matthew and Aunt Flora had been shocked. ‘Popish practices,’ said Great-uncle Matthew, and then, to Aunt Flora, ‘If you ask me, it’s as well that child was got out of India when she was. Frankincense, of all things! I could hardly believe my ears.’

  There was no vegetables-and-fish mourning, either; in fact it almost seemed to Selina as if Aunt Flora was preparing for a party after the service. A ham had to be ordered from Stornforth’s best butcher, because Mr McGibb in Inchcape could certainly not provide what was wanted, and two large pork pies were delivered as well. Jeannie from the village who came in to do the laundry and what was called ‘the rough’ was summoned, and the morning of the funeral was spent in cutting ham sandwiches and arranging wedges of pork pie on large plates.

  ‘Cake?’ Selina asked, hopefully. Aunt Flora baked the most delicious cakes, especially when the vicar was coming. But it seemed that refreshments after a funeral must be decent and restrained, and that to be seen eating cake would be disrespectful. Great Uncle Matthew said afterwards that he did not know about restraint; four bottles of his best sherry had been drunk, and a good three-quarters of the whisky. He shut himself in his study to calculate how much everything had cost, and told Aunt Flora to be sure to have the ham bone boiled up for soup. A good ham soup made a filling and nourishing dish.

  Once Aunt Rosa was safely dead the shrine could be put back in place because nobody else was likely to go out to the Round Tower. Selina waited until after the funeral, and then scurried out to the stone room. The photographs, the books that father used to read to her–including her very favourite Heidi–and the silk stole mother had liked to wear in the evenings. It still smelt faintly of Sandalwood.

  Nobody saw her do any of this, and she whispered to father and mother that she was sorry about what had happened–she thought they would know it was not her fault that the shrine had been taken away. It was to be hoped that it had not disturbed their journey across the old and holy Bridge, because Selina was not sure if she could bear the sight of those poor tattered ghosts in her bedroom all over again.

  She wondered about Aunt Rosa’s ghost. It would be just like the horrid witchy old thing to come into her room when it was dark, but Selina thought she would not mind it very much, because of not liking Aunt Rosa, and certainly not loving Aunt Rosa in the way she had loved her parents.

  When she thought about it again, Selina was very glad she had stretched the black string across the top of the stairs that night. She had tied one end onto a nail in the skirting board and then wound the other end round the banisters, doing it carefully and quietly after everyone was in bed, creeping out in her dressing gown and slippers. Nobody had heard her and nobody had seen, although she had had the spookiest feeling that Christy had been with her. This was such a strong feeling that she had to keep looking over her shoulder, in case Christy might be crouching in the shadows watching her. But she was not, of course, because she was dead; she had died on the night the men took them to the Tower of Silence, and if anything had held Selina’s hand and talked to her in the darkness, it had been Christy’s ghost. Selina thought it would be like Christy to come back, just for that short time, so that her friend would not be alone in the scary Tower of Silence. And Christy would approve of what Selina was doing tonight, because she would understand about the shrine; she would understand that Aunt Rosa could not be allowed to destroy the shrine.

  The string across the stairs was about six inches from the ground–just the height of a person’s ankles–but because it was black it would not be seen. Aunt Rosa had not seen it when she got up next morning, which was why it had tripped her up and sent her tumbling headlong down the stairs. The police doctor had said that the fall had broken her neck. Her legs had been broken as well, and one wrist, but it had been breaking her neck that had killed her.

  After the funeral Aunt Flora had been worried that Selina, poor motherless scrap, might find it difficult to go to sleep, what with it being hardly a year since her parents had died, but the fire in the little hearth had burned up bright and warm and the bedroom was cosy and snug. Selina went to sleep without any trouble at all.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Mary had slept very deeply on the night after Ingrid died. The doctors at Broadacre had forced some kind of tranquilliser into her, but she thought she would have slept deeply anyway, on account of having been revenged on that bitch Ingrid. It was strange that after all these years it still hurt to remember how much she had trusted Ingrid and how Ingrid had betrayed her trust. It taught you a lesson, that kind of thing; it taught you never to trust anyone, except for that secret strong voice inside your own mind. It taught you to not even trust people who seemed genuine and kind, and said that their sole purpose in life was to help you.

  Ingrid had said that at the start. ‘I want to help you, Mary,’ she had said on that first night, the night of the rape attempt. She had sat on the edge of the bath while Mary got undressed, and she had talked soothingly, her hand on Mary’s thigh. Mary did not really want anyone in the bathroom with her–she wanted to be on her own to scrub away the smell of the man’s body from her skin–but they would not let her, because she had to be examined to see exactly what the man had done and how far he had got. Ingrid had probably been told that Mary must not be left alone in case she washed away the evidence.

  But at least she had been able to wash her face and hands, and shampoo her hair, which helped a bit. Ingrid helped her to dry her hair. ‘Pretty,’ she said
. ‘You ought to let it grow a bit.’ Pretty…That word again.

  When Ingrid hugged her Mary could feel Ingrid’s body through the thin pyjamas she had put on; she could feel Ingrid’s breasts pressing against her own breasts. It felt peculiar. When she said, ‘I shouldn’t have done that,’ a little pulse of excitement started up at the pit of Mary’s stomach. She felt her nipples harden, and she stared at Ingrid, feeling her face grow hot with embarrassment and apprehension. Ingrid was breathing a bit faster and there was a faint line of sweat on her upper lip. Will she do anything else? thought Mary. I’ll hate it if she does; I’ll hit her, hard, and then I’ll run back to the dormitory–there’ll be people around by now.

  But when Ingrid bent over and kissed Mary, full on the lips, her mouth open so that Mary tasted her breath, she did not run away and she did not try to hit Ingrid. She kissed her back, at first fumbling because she was so inexperienced, but then with more confidence. She gasped when she felt Ingrid’s tongue, and when Ingrid stepped back, and said with unmistakable regret, ‘I mustn’t and I daren’t. Go along to the dormitory, Mary. Goodnight,’ Mary felt a sharp pang of disappointment. She had expected Ingrid to do more than just kiss her. She had not expected this incomplete love-making.

  ‘Incomplete,’ Broadacre’s duty doctor had said, making his brief humiliating examination. ‘No penetration.’

  ‘We didn’t think there had been,’ said the slab-faced nurse smugly.

  ‘No, nor did I. Oh, and for the record, she’s virgo intacta.’ The doctor had straightened up and peeled off the thin surgical gloves and dropped them into a bin, and then said, apparently as an afterthought, that Mary could have a bath now if she wanted.