The Sphere

by Martha Faë

  The three of us look around in silence, each of us willing one of the others to answer. Beatrice sighs, makes a face, and grudgingly sits down with her tea. I can see it’s taking a huge effort for her not to get angry, not to curse at us in her mind, but those are her Creator’s precepts.

  Morgan gulps down her tea and goes over to open the windows.

  “Girl,” she says to Beatrice, “even your windows are narrow.”

  Beatrice looks at her scornfully as Morgan takes flight. We watch her disappear, slicing through the airspace of the Sphere.

  “I see you took advantage of my absence to come up with another misguided scheme,” Beatrice says, her brow furrowed. “I have no intention of aiding you in your heretical investigations.”

  She gestures at Sherlock and me with her cup without paying any attention to the way she’s sloshing tea everywhere. Her movements are radically different from the way she was when I met her. I’m convinced the Sphere is mixing with my world at top speed—these mood swings in Beatrice aren’t normal. Sherlock ignores Beatrice’s remark. He hasn’t called her lovely lady in quite a while.

  Less than twenty minutes later Morgan flies back into the living room.

  “The flight has borne fruit,” she says. “Everything seemed in order; there was nothing unusual about the private gardens. But—of course—I found something suspicious near St Nicholas.”

  “I’m warning you, Morgan!” says Beatrice, looking her right in the eye.

  “St Nicholas is where the orphanage is; Wuthering Heights is just a bit north of it,” Sherlock explains.

  “Heathcliff’s home,” I say.

  “If you can even call it a home,” says Beatrice angrily. “My poor little one, how different his life would be down here, in our streets...”

  “Sure, in your house,” murmurs Morgan.

  Beatrice smashes her cup on the ground.

  “That’s enough!” Sherlock shouts. “If you cannot control yourself you can leave the investigation right now.”

  Beatrice keeps looking contemptuously at Morgan. I don’t think she even heard Sherlock’s words.

  “What did you see, Morgan?” I ask.

  “Heathcliff. Everything was calm, and then I saw him appear at one end of the orphanage garden like he’d risen out of the ground. He just came out of nowhere.”

  “Don’t accuse him without any proof. It could have been any other Spherean,” Beatrice says to Sherlock and me. “Do you think you could identify someone from that height? No. The Creator knows you couldn’t. All you can see from above is a head, nothing more. So Morgan saw Heathcliff, or any other Spherean.”

  “It was Heathcliff.” Morgan takes a deep breath, trying to hold onto what little patience she has. “It’s like I was telling you. Heathcliff appeared out of nowhere in the orphanage garden. As if he’d come out of the adjacent garden. It was his way of walking, his clothing, his messy black hair. It was him.”

  “Sure, out of nowhere...” Beatrice giggles. “It must have been an optical illusion. Surely he was just under a tree and you didn’t see him.”

  “We’ll comb the area,” says Sherlock, getting ready to go.

  “But...” Beatrice stammers. I can see with my own eyes how her expression shifts from aggression to the gentleness that belongs to her role. Her features relax; even her skin tone changes a little. Once again she’s the sweet, helpless Spherean we all know. “Isn’t walking in the orphanage gardens forbidden? Why go look right there? Why assume Heathcliff is up to no good?”

  “We’ll inspect the orphanage and its surroundings. If Heathcliff has nothing to hide, you should have nothing to worry about. You may come with us or stay, as you prefer.”

  Beatrice lowers her gaze and follows us to the street as we set off on our mission. To her great pleasure, we spend hours watching buildings, peering over stone walls, and hitting cobblestones and drains to see if any of them move, but find nothing out of the ordinary.

  “I think we can count Heathcliff out,” she says with a triumphant smile.

  We’re on the terrace outside St Leonard’s chapel, next to the college with the same name.

  “If you don’t mind,” Beatrice continues, “I’d like to go into the chapel to thank our Creator for smoothing over this rough patch, and to ask him to protect Heathcliff from future rumors... and to grant you”—she coughs and corrects herself—“to grant us the light to see things more clearly.”

  “Very well, go on,” says Sherlock, his brow furrowed. He’s thinking hard, going round and round the ways Heathcliff might have gotten away, just like Morgan and I are. “I can feel the prickling that comes before a real discovery,” he says.

  “I’m absolutely sure I saw him,” Morgan says.

  “I know.”

  I look around the small yard. It’s surrounded by old buildings: to my left the chapel, some small houses in front of me, and the college on the other two sides. In the few days before the accident I didn’t get the chance to see this part of St Andrews. There are some really lovely buildings, made of stone, like everything else around here. The college has a wing at the back with big picture windows, and a clock tower with a rounded cupola that comes to a point. I wonder how many children live here. It looks like a boarding school. How many of them must be going through their roles as students without any idea that very near, maybe right here, there are Sphereans being held against their will? The leaves on the trees sing as the wind blows through them. I walk around a little while Morgan and Sherlock wait near the chapel. When I reach the end of the open yard a shiver runs down my spine. I feel the same unpleasant sensation I did at the library, and when we were all together in the church. Someone is watching us. I can feel the weight of someone’s malevolent gaze on me. Very slowly, and with all the discretion I can manage, I look at each of the big windows in turn. It doesn’t seem like there’s anyone behind the bowed, old glass. Suddenly black shadows soar overhead, swoop down, and fly through me like ghosts, letting out a shrill whistle. It feels like a cloud of ice just passed straight through my body. I let out a terrified shriek and Morgan and Sherlock come running.

  “What happened?” asks Morgan, agitated.

  “I’m not sure. Something went right through me.”

  I’m shaking from head to toe. I can barely stand upright.

  “But what—what went through you?” asks Sherlock.

  “Something black, I couldn’t see it well. It was several beings. I don’t know. They went that way,” I point at the corner between the main college building and the low houses.

  When we get closer we discover a very narrow passage between the two walls.

  “Let’s go,” orders Sherlock.

  Beatrice comes out of the chapel just in time to catch up with us. The passage between the two walls is so narrow that the sunlight doesn’t even reach the ground. A damp chill creeps under our clothing, and I can feel my bones trembling. The passage opens up into a garden, a large, well-maintained space with some trees, and flowers of all different colors. There are poppies bigger than my hand, and tiny yellow butterflies fluttering around. It seems impossible that anything bad could ever happen here. Under one of the large trees sits an inviting bench.

  “This is private,” says Beatrice. “We can’t be here.”

  Sherlock gestures in silence for us to split up and explore different parts of the garden. In less than a minute Morgan shouts:

  “Come here!”

  Behind a thicket she’s found a staircase of mildewed stone. At the entrance is a battered gate that someone has just opened—it’s still creaking slowly on its hinges.

  “Careful,” warns Sherlock. “The stones may be quite slippery.”

  The stairs lead to a dark, dank passageway. We move cautiously; the ground is covered not only with mildew, but also a thick layer of mud. Right before we reach the end we hear the metallic crash of the gate slamming shut. Morgan, Beatrice, and I clutch at each other.

  “We’re trapped,” whimpers B
eatrice in horror.

  “Stay calm,” says Sherlock’s voice, still neutral. “There must be another exit on this side.”

  I want to trust him, to believe blindly that this time—like all the others—he’s right. But the truth is there’s no light coming from the direction we’re going. The tunnel just gets darker and darker.

  “There’s no way out,” says Beatrice in a trembling voice.

  “There must be,” says Morgan, “I’m sure it was right around here where I saw Heathcliff appear.”

  “We have to go back. There’s no way out,” says Sherlock.

  Some kind of power takes hold of me. I will not stay trapped in here. Maybe this is the kind of situation I have to face up to if I ever want to get out of the Sphere and back to my world. I run my hands over the wall that stands in our way. A thousand insects scurry over my fingers. I can feel their tiny, tickling legs, but my hands keep on searching. I am going to find the way out.

  “It can’t be!” I shout, enraged, and give the wall a good kick.

  The door we were searching for opens. Finally a little bit of air comes in, along with the noise of a heated argument. We go out into the part of the orphanage garden where Morgan saw Heathcliff appear.

  “I knew it!” she exclaims in triumph.

  We walk over and find ourselves right in the middle of the fight.

  “You’re an animal!” shrieks a little girl wearing a patched dress. “Go away, I never want to see you again!”

  Another little girl is crying inconsolably next to the door of the orphanage. Tears have left tracks down her dusty cheeks.

  “Go away!” the first girl yells again.

  Heathcliff is standing in front of them, watching with a cruel smile. It’s clear that he enjoys seeing them like this. The little girl who was yelling picks up a handful of rocks and starts throwing them at him. Some miss; some don’t.

  “Enough!” Beatrice runs to get in between Heathcliff and the girl. “Enough, Jane, you’re going to hurt him.” The girl looks around but there are no more stones to be found. Her small fists scrape up some grit and she hurls it at him with all her strength.

  “Enough, Jane Eyre!”

  Heathcliff shoves Beatrice away with a grunt. Jane’s eyes are shining and her cheeks are burning with anger. Her reddened hands tremble, still clasping the grit.

  “That’s where little girls like you go,” says Heathcliff, pointing at some small gravestones to his left. “That’s where I bury them so I can eat up their tiny bones later, bit by bit.”

  Heathcliff gnashes his teeth, pretending to savor shreds of meat left on a bone. The crying girl runs to hide behind Jane.

  “Don’t pay him any mind, Helen,” says Jane Eyre. “Everything he says is lies. There’s nothing under those stones.”

  “No? So then why are they there? Just for decoration?” Heathcliff moves closer to the girls and they clasp each other more tightly. He winds his rough fingers into the hair of the little girl who won’t stop crying. “You can read, right?”

  “Unlike you, yes, we can both read,” Jane Eyre says through clenched teeth.

  Heathcliff spits on the ground without letting go of the girl.

  “Tell me, what does it say on that headstone?”

  “Daisy,” says the girl between sobs.

  “How many years did Daisy live?”

  “Six.”

  “And the next, how many years did she live?”

  “Ten...”

  “What was her name?”

  The girl can’t speak; her sobs are battering her body, coming in waves.

  “Perhaps I will put Helen there very soon,” mutters Heathcliff, letting her go with a rough shove.

  “You’re a liar,” shouts Jane. “There’s nobody there, and there never will be!”

  “Well, of course there isn’t,” says Beatrice, coming over to the two girls to embrace them gently. “They’re the graves of the orphanage’s pets, that’s why the stones are so small. They are empty, like all the graves of the Sphere. There is nothing to worry about. The Creator...”

  “Don’t stick your nose in, you useless prig! You’ve got no business here.”

  “Heathcliff...” Beatrice can’t believe what that dark man just said to her, his eyes burning like coals, can’t believe the way he has his hand raised to threaten her. “Will you really be able to strike me again?”

  “Begone!” bawls Heathcliff. “You, and all of you, too. Leave before I give you a thrashing.”

  Heathcliff rips a bare branch from a nearby tree and moves toward us, brandishing it. Little Jane Eyre scoops up the stones she threw before and resumes her attack, but he doesn’t seem to feel the blows. One of the stones hits Beatrice in the forehead and she staggers backward, trying to keep her balance.

  “Bice, are you all right?” I say, holding onto her. Heathcliff doubles over with raucous laughter.

  “Evil beast!” shouts Morgan. “I ought to turn you into a donkey right now. I ought to reduce you to a—a...”

  “All of you, go, once and for all!”

  Letting out a bellow from somewhere deep inside, Heathcliff charges at Sherlock, who has been watching the whole time. Just as he’s about to hit him with the branch the two little girls throw themselves at Heathcliff, biting his legs, but he shakes them off like they were insects.

  “Put down that stick this instant!” A deafening shout saves Sherlock from a real beating. “Go home right now.”

  “It’s Nelly, Cathy’s nurse and confidant. The only one with the strength of character to stand up to Heathcliff with any success,” Morgan explains to me quietly.

  “As if they were to blame for Cathy abandoning you!”

  “Cathy has gone?” asks Sherlock, finally startled out of his stillness.

  “That’s right. And if she’s smart, I hope she never comes back,” says the woman.

  “But she’s gone to marry Edgar Linton, right?” says Beatrice. “You oughtn’t worry, Heathcliff. She’ll come back soon, like always.”

  “No, she hasn’t gone for that,” answers Nelly. “It’s none of your concern, but Edgar is at home crying, too. This time she left as soon as she married him. She left without saying a word to anyone—she just disappeared.”

  “Poor Heathcliff!” exclaims Beatrice. “Heathcliff, wait!”

  He goes off grumbling to himself, his footsteps heavy as an elephant’s. Nelly stays for a few more seconds in the garden to make sure the girls are all right.

  “How long ago did Cathy leave?” asks Sherlock.

  “Several days ago now. You might think I’m being foolish, but something tells me she won’t be coming back this time.”

  “I always knew she was a wicked woman, abandoning poor Heathcliff like that, with that good soul’s need for affection...” says Beatrice through tears.

  “For once in her life my girl has done the right thing,” says Nelly.

  “It’s hard for me to believe that she’s abandoned Heathcliff,” Sherlock says, more to himself than the rest of us.

  “Well, yes,” answers Nelly, “it is hard to believe, just as it’s hard to believe that Heathcliff spends his nights crying over her. He should have loved her properly when she was here instead of pitying himself now.”

  The nurse shakes her head in disapproval.

  “Heathcliff—crying?” I’m so surprised I accidentally say it out loud.

  Nelly looks me up and down. “Yes, he cries. He doesn’t know how to live without her... If you were from around here, you’d know.”

  She turns on her heel without saying goodbye and walks off with determined steps, toward the hill where the house called Wuthering Heights stands.

  “It must be the winds up in those hills that makes them all so harsh,” says Morgan. “No one in that house has the least manners. Cathy’s nurse’s kindness is wasted on the rest of them up there. By the way, Holmes—what are we doing with these graves?”

  Holmes is inspecting the little headstones with his
magnifying glass.

  “I didn’t know they were here,” he says, “but I imagine they’ll be empty, too.”

  “I suppose so,” agrees Morgan. “And besides, they’re too small. Not much could fit in them.”

  Jane and her friend Helen run about the garden.

  “I think we should inspect them, at any rate.”

  “You’re right, Dissie. We shouldn’t leave them out.”

  Sherlock tells Morgan to open them.

  “Why do I have to use my magic? It’s just a question of digging up the dirt; you all can do it, can’t you?”

  These tombs, unlike the ones at the cemetery, are buried. Only the little stones with the names on them are showing. Sherlock gives Morgan a dirty look and goes over to the graves to start inspecting them. I look around to make sure that neither the little girls nor anyone related to the orphanage can see what we’re about to do. That’s when I see Beatrice sitting on the grass, her dress lost among the tall grasses and daisies. She hasn’t stopped crying since Heathcliff threatened her.

  “Don’t cry,” I say, coming over to embrace her. I can feel her slender body trembling like a leaf in my arms. “I’m sorry Heathcliff tried to hit you again.”

  “I’m not crying for me, but for him. I can’t stand other people’s pain.”

  “Other people’s pain, or Heathcliff’s pain?” asks Morgan, but she realizes immediately that the question wasn’t very appropriate. “I’m sorry, Beatrice. I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings.”

  “The Creator wanted for me to feel the pain of every Spherean as if it were my own.”

  I look at Morgan, who nods. What Beatrice says is true.

  “Let’s go,” says Sherlock.

  It took him hardly any time at all to uncover the small coffins, their wood rotting from the damp earth. He takes out a handkerchief from his pocket to clean his hands, puts it away again, and puts his pipe in his mouth. Our eyes meet for a few moments and I immediately know three things: first, there was nothing in the coffins. Second, he had assumed that would be the case. And third, he deeply admires my meticulousness, the fact that even though it was likely they would be empty, I still didn’t want to leave anything unexamined. A warm feeling spreads through my chest. My time in the Sphere, and all the thinking I’ve done about Axel and my other loved ones has helped me finally put a name to it. It’s familiarity, that pleasant feeling of knowing someone, knowing that they know you, that you can relax, let down your guard—like being at home. I surprise myself by wondering if Sherlock could be my home someday. The idea doesn’t seem totally preposterous. But it would mean staying in the Sphere, and the thought of that turns my heart to ice.