The Everlasting Sunday

by Robert Lukins

  By three o’clock the jollification had burnt itself out. All the boys but Radford and Rich had retreated to their rooms. Of the elder class just Manny and Teddy remained and, clearly, Manny had been building the courage to retire for at least the previous hour. Teddy had him explaining magnetic tape and the workings of his machine.

  ‘You’re putting on a lesson tomorrow?’ Radford asked, letting the bait drift out to Manny.

  ‘Oh … yes. I was thinking of it.’

  ‘Looking forward to it. In the morning. Early.’

  Manny looked apologetically to Teddy.

  ‘Of course,’ came the reply. Teddy slapped his shoulders. ‘Get away, promptly. Early start.’

  Manny gave Radford an expression like appreciation and bustled to the stairs. Teddy was rubbing his hands, adjusting his coat sleeves, busying every limb.

  ‘Still awake?’ he asked.

  ‘No, Teddy,’ Rich said without lifting his head from the tabletop. ‘I’m toasty in a room of my own. Grander than anything you’ve imagined. Gold trim, satin, the works. And I do not, in any sense, share it with a score of stinking chickens.’

  ‘What is he talking about?’

  ‘The coop, Teddy.’

  ‘You’re not keeping yourself out there?’

  Rich lifted his chin.

  ‘You’re making a joke.’

  ‘No, Teddy. Not a joke, not at all.’

  ‘It would be absolutely impossible. Suicidal. What possessed you?’

  ‘I can come in?’ Rich was straining forward, hovering above the chair.

  ‘Of course, don’t be so daft. I know for a fact there’s a second mattress in Rabbit’s room. Bunk in there for a start.’

  Rich leapt to the man, planting an outlandish kiss on the point of his head.

  ‘Get away.’ Teddy swished at Rich, who had already spun and fled. ‘Very silly.’

  So the last pair. Radford had his chin propped in his hands while Teddy shifted from elbow to elbow. In a plea for attention the fire let out a feeble pop.

  ‘Shall I put another log on?’

  ‘Maybe,’ Radford said. ‘I should go to bed. I feel awful.’

  ‘How so?’

  ‘Nothing really. Tired.’

  ‘Oh, right.’

  They stared at the same knot of wood in the table’s surface.

  ‘A bit that way myself,’ Teddy said. His eyelids seemed made of paper, like they might peel away.

  ‘Which way’s that?’

  ‘Awful.’

  Radford had first imagined the Manor to be a poisonous place, tough and maybe impossible. Now he didn’t know the shape of things. Any time the edges seemed to be becoming clear they would retreat into steam, with this man the least distinct edge of all.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ Radford asked.

  ‘I suppose I’m tired too.’

  More nodding.

  ‘The Royal Oak,’ Radford said. ‘I was wondering if that was supposed to be a lesson.’

  ‘How would it be?’

  ‘Is it something you do with all the new boys – take them to the end of the grounds and tell them a story about a tree?’

  Teddy’s eyes narrowed.

  ‘That’s fine,’ Radford went on. ‘If that’s what you do. If there’s a message, about an ordinary tree that could be great. I supposed I was meant to find a lesson in it. To consider my place in history or what can come from small beginnings.’

  ‘An inspiring tale?’

  ‘Something like that.’

  ‘You have me wrong.’ Teddy smiled and it brought hidden years to his face. ‘I have dominion over a very few tasks here. They are to pay the bills and speak with whoever it is from the government that I am required to on any given day. I am to create and file a great quantity of paperwork – that is my most pressing purpose.’

  Radford accepted this and turned to the dying fire.

  ‘Do not take that as a measure of my concern. For you all. I am interested in nothing but the fate of you gruesome animals. But I am not the one who will give you what you need.’

  ‘Yes, I’ve heard this. I’m answerable to myself. I’m the only one who can take responsibility, I know.’

  ‘My god, no.’ Teddy took Radford’s hands in his. ‘Who told you that? What a pile of arse. How are you supposed to look after yourself? You’re a sad little ant. A child. Do you not see? You’re to look after each other.’

  Water was pooling in the corners of Teddy’s eyes and Radford could not measure if it was only from the smoke and late hour. The fire let forth with another pop, this time much louder, impersonating its younger self, and he was released from Teddy’s hold.

  ‘Off to bed,’ Teddy said. ‘You have a lesson first thing, if you haven’t forgotten. Our dreams run ahead of us, do your best to catch them up. I’ll put on a last log.’

  So Radford did run, to bed and to sleep, and that night was met by a nightmare that had not found him in years. The one that posed as flying but ended in falling, and left his bed damp and his hollow sarcasm reduced to a filthy sweat across his skin. This dream, the last time, had been a warning.

  THREE

  It earnt a name: The Big Freeze. What had for a time been a decent cold snap, a playful white Childermass for the romantic, had grown to be a national wreck. The news of it made its way to the Manor by radio and newspaper, though the state of things could be guessed through any window.

  Travel to the village became near impossible with the boys’ few bicycles rendered useless. The hike was such an unattractive prospect that whisky and tobacco supplies dried to nothing. The house was tense with sober need. Farmer Gall would give lend of his cart and two horses or his rusted Humber Snipe when it would agree to turn over. This saved the house from true isolation as the snow worsened daily.

  They would wait for breaks in the wind, every second or third day as need for food arose, with Teddy and Manny up front and two short-strawed boys backwards in the wagon or sat in the car’s rear clinging to shovels. When these foraging parties returned it was to relief and hot drinks and much hurrying to the fireside. They would bring bread and milk and whatever quantity of meat the butcher would ration. There were times they returned abundant, others where they scurried inside with a single miserable loaf and a stack of outdated newspapers.

  West became town crier. He would teeter on an apple box atop the long table nearest the dining-room fire and read aloud the headlines and columns. Weeks went on and even the harder, affectionless boys would gather.

  WORST FOR 82 YEARS – MORE TO COME!

  He told stories of trains freezing solid and refusing to regain motion. Vegetables and fuel ran low all over and hamlets were being cut off. Rock salt for the roads ran out after the first week. An old woman gone to walk her dog was found dead. Five others, younger, discovered lost after a whiteout. Two more were suffocated taking shelter in a van. Rubbish mounted in the streets as garbage men were rebranded as snow-clearing teams and sent to make a way through prioritised towns and junctions.

  BIGGEST BLACKOUT YET HITS BRITAIN

  Power was being cut and afternoons lit by oil lamp. Some were building fires inside, without fireplaces, without chimneys. Houses were burning and people were discovered choked to silence by their desperation.

  IT’S CHAOS!

  The sea had frozen off Essex. This was the news that hit Teddy hardest. After four weeks of West reporting the abandoned families, the army rescues, the starving horses, the ice turning villagers into inhabitants of fearful islands, it was this news of the ocean turning solid that forced muteness on the man. Until then Teddy had been the house commodore, marshalling and resourceful, but as feet walked out onto the sea his face drained of adventure.

  They didn’t see him for three days after that.

  Manny and one of the stranded teachers took
charge as well as they could, directing what limited actions were available and settling disputes. The boys assumed Teddy to have gone to the city but there was talk that he had been seen drifting between the kitchen and his rooms in the very early hours. He returned one day at breakfast, giving no excuse or comment, and by the end of that morning’s oats things had resumed an anxious normality. Teddy announced that a little glum weather was no excuse for a fruitless day and that lessons were to continue unfettered. After wash-up he would be giving a tutorial on the subject of leg-before-wicket.

  ‘These bats and ball separate us from barbarism,’ he said, rising. ‘Lewis, fetch what we need and meet in the hall.’

  Even Teddy’s eyes were unconvinced by his warming tone. Radford saw this but followed like the others. More of this toxic sport. Even those who didn’t play, or shouldn’t, seemed compelled to develop philosophical interests in the thing. Perhaps it was a way of coping: team as family, opposition as enemy.

  Cricket was war and so he would be Switzerland.

  *

  West made all the actions of opening the door yet it would not shift. ‘Give us a hand.’

  Radford stepped up and they synchronised their attack. And a-one – two. The door broke away at one of its hinges and bared the source of resistance. Snow was piled against the outside, scraps of it crumbling into the hall as they squeezed through the gap. The belfry had been unvisited for weeks, since the Freeze had set in and the store of cigarette material had dutifully turned to atmosphere.

  This fading afternoon West had stuck his head into Radford’s room and mimed the lighting of a pipe. He held a spade and used this to direct Radford to gather blankets. Outside, West pushed the door back into a closed position as well as it could manage, booting ice against its base. They looked to the sky through the missing ceiling: it was not quite frightening, though cruelly cold and dim. They battled to stay upright, but knowing what it could be they fell into a pact of silent gratitude, content to be venturing out at all. Radford wrapped West in a blanket and took one for himself, scraping with his heel to find floor. ‘Where’d you get tobacco?’

  ‘Volunteered for the village. Nearly ended belly-up, truly. Got stuck in a dip and it took an hour to dig the cart back onto the road. I slipped away while Teddy was pleading our case to the greengrocer. Had to get pre-rolled, hope that’s acceptable, m’lud?’

  Radford showed both palms for the packet and the matchbook.

  ‘The occasion calls for some level of dignity.’ West raised the shovel. ‘A couple of kingly blood like us. We’re short a couple of thrones.’

  He laid wildly into the banks of snow. Radford stood back as West cleared the centre, heaping ice rubble against the walls until it spilt from each of the four arch window spaces. West turned the tool and began to beat into opposing stacks. The snow compacted into hard seats with high backs, the corners square against the cutting edge. In a final flourish West folded his blanket into a neat cushion, finishing the grand chair. Radford copied and they found their places facing one another, a princes’ caucus.

  ‘As it should be.’

  They smoked their cigarettes. Radford slid one out, an exquisite, faultless thing with the strong smell of vanilla and peat. Senior Service, the packet read, its logo a navy ship under sail, laurelled and capped with the crown and a pair of gliding seagulls. For the life of those first cigarettes he and West relaxed into quiet meditation, and smoke replaced the dust and lifeless air of the house corridors. It was a rough kind of glory and for a time the cold ceased to be.

  ‘Radford, I need you to enlighten me. If we came from apes, when was it that we evolved shame? I mean, when did we stop licking ourselves clean and begin to shower apart, do you know?’

  He attempted no answer and left West to continue pondering. The Freeze and its headlines could not be heard. Winter, he was sure, loved them. It cradled and adored them and they lit fresh with the embers of the last.

  ‘You’re looking thin,’ Radford said, surprising them both. ‘You’ve lost weight, since I got here.’

  Upon saying the words he knew it was true – West had lost pounds, and he’d been lean to begin with – but until then this had been mouthless speculation on Radford’s part. West laughed. He took hold of his smoke, bowing in thought, peering with deep curiosity.

  ‘I can’t picture what got you here,’ West said.

  ‘No?’

  ‘As far as I can tell it takes two things to end up at the Manor: a reason and a final straw. A feller’s reason, well, that can be anything. That’s the thing way down in a person that means you can’t get along with the regulars. How they diagnose you. You’re fundamentally disturbed. You’re of a violent disposition. Can’t bear to be away from Mummy or you’re interested in other boys.’

  ‘Truly?’ Radford rubbed his neck. ‘So what’s my reason?’

  ‘No idea, none whatsoever. Reasons can be buried deep, that’s what I’m told. You can’t tell by just looking at a person. Also, I don’t care a bean. I don’t want to know your business, you keep that all wrapped up and warm, but I figure there’s got to be a second thing. The final straw. Some thing that happens that means your dumb life can’t keep going the way it was. Some big old rock that you chuck off the cliff that means the people around you can’t be around you anymore. With drips like Lewis and Brass it’s not hard to imagine. Lewis is top shelf, and there’s little I wouldn’t do for him, but he’s also a great old moose and it’s easy to see him sending his mother through a plate-glass window.’

  As West spoke the air around his face grew thick and pale with his warmth. He had his chin in his palm and looked, Radford thought, very much the child king delivered by fate and battles lost.

  ‘But you,’ West went on. ‘I can’t see your final straw.’ He raised his hands in peace. ‘And I don’t want to know – as I said, that’s your business. But I must say, I’m intrigued. I am entirely intrigued.’

  Radford stretched and a sense of ease shot through him, like Rich’s whisky. It felt like a natural and good thing to be under the consideration of another and he thought of telling all to West, if only because he didn’t want to let go of this pleasure. Of being in any way fascinating. A series of corrupt, bulky words assembled themselves at the base of his tongue but West drew on his cigarette, released the weakest of coughs, and this was enough to disturb the spell.

  ‘And what about you?’ Radford asked.

  ‘Yes, sir?’

  ‘Your final straw. You say you can’t imagine mine.’

  As he watched West smile and flex his thin arms in the style of a circus strongman, he considered again the weight this boy had so clearly parted with. Pickings from the village were slim but his loss had a more sickly character.

  ‘I might surprise you,’ West said.

  ‘You burnt down your school.’

  West’s laughter was so urgent it sent his cigarette spiralling into the snow. ‘Why would you think that?’

  ‘I can picture it,’ Radford said.

  ‘Me, burning down a school?’

  ‘Or a church. Did you burn down your church? I can see it. I will confess, I’m intrigued. I am entirely intrigued.’

  West clapped and drew two fresh Senior Service, offering one. They returned to their smouldering reverie as the cloud above made its presence known. In the preceding minutes the sky had nudged closer to night and storm. The boys had their heads tilted back and Radford imagined they were breathing in the scent of change, blowing out a fog of human exhaust in retaliation. These two elements would meet in the air above and new would fight old, like it made any difference. Like it would not all become old regardless.

  Radford thought of his last straw and dreamt of West’s. If it all became the past in the end then what did it matter? All the same, West had been intrigued. Radford tried to remember the sweetness. He closed his eyes and faced the darkening sky, sp
iting it.

  *

  ‘He’s back. Snuff, he’s back!’

  It was Rich ricocheting down the hall. No other’s voice could have been so crudely joyous at that hour of the morning. The clock at Radford’s bedside showed both hands pointing near six: he hoped that Rich had justifiable cause. The voice trailed away and was replaced by cursing and footsteps. Radford dressed quickly and joined them, seeing Brass and West.

  ‘What was he saying?’

  ‘Snuffy.’

  ‘What’s Snuffy?’

  The crowd swelled against their backs and pushed to the stairs. They reached the ground floor sounding as flamingos and Rich could be only faintly heard as the colony assembled by the dining-hall fire. Boys competed to attend to the fledgling flames. They prodded and fanned. They bickered over which was the most suitable of the split logs drying against the hearth.

  Still no explanation. Still all this inside knowledge.

  West pushed through and launched himself at someone sitting in the fireside armchair. Radford moved in and saw an embarrassed West gathering himself from the floor, the chair occupied by a bedraggled pair, a young woman in a young man’s lap. She was shivering with purple lips. Beneath her the other figure was equally pale and somewhat more soaked.

  Brass made way. ‘Snuff,’ he declared, initiating a handshake that became a rough hug. ‘What state are you in?’ He pushed his hands through the other’s sopping hair and seemed to first notice his partner.

  She gave him a vinegared look and said, ‘Victoria,’ at the encircling faces, of which a few confessed recognition.

  There was much shuffling and half-nodded greeting. West had recovered and he now took Victoria’s hand, shaking it firmly enough that water sprang from her sleeves. As he was wiping droplets from his brow and forgetting to release her hand, Rich arrived laden with towels.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said and wrapped her hair, then Snuffy’s, while hugging another.