Whit

by Iain Banks

  He gave a single scoffing laugh.

  'You are the one who needs forgiveness, not me,' I told him, sniffing back my tears and wiping my cheeks with my knickers.

  He waved one hand dismissively, still not looking at me. 'You stupid, selfish… foolish child,' he said, shaking his head. 'Get out of my sight. When I look on you again it will be to accept your confession and apology.'

  I sucked in my breath. 'Grandfather!' I cried, despairing. 'What is wrong with you? What has changed you? Why are you being like this?'

  'Isis, child, if you can accept your guilt and answer it in front of me, before the Festival, you may yet be able to take your proper part in that celebration,' he said, still studying his glass. He finished his whisky and then walked across the bed to the bathroom door; he opened it - golden lamp-light spilled from the open door - and closed it behind him. I stood there for a moment, then wept a little more. I stuffed the knickers in my pocket and left the room.

  The sitting room beyond was unoccupied; one lamp shone on a desk by the drinks cabinet. I took my boots and ran out, sitting to do up my laces on the top step of the stairs, by the light of a wall candle. Sniffing and blinking, I walked down the stairs and out of the silent mansion house.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  The sky over the courtyard was deep, deep blue, scattered with the brighter stars and enthroning a near-full moon. The monthly Service to mark the full moon would be only a few days away now.

  Voices came from the lit windows of the farmhouse and the sound of muffled hammering from the workshop by the forge. Woodsmoke and cooking smells tugged at my attention, comforting and banal. I walked across the courtyard cobbles in a daze. My steps led to the archway facing the path that led to the river and the bridge. I stood beneath the archway, with the Community around and above and behind me, gazing out across the lawn and the curving path that sloped down towards the trees that marked the line of the river. Moonlight cast a faint shadow of the orchard wall across the path and reflected off the glass of the greenhouse on the other side. I looked up at the dark swell of the hills to the south, piled against the indigo of the sky like a huge wave.

  I could hear singing and the sound of a guitar coming from behind me, and childish laughter, far away, quickly gone.

  A wind rustled the tops of the trees. I walked down the path, not sure where I was really going or what I was meaning to do. The path was dark under the rustling trees; over the river it was a little lighter again, and the old bridge looked deceptively solid and whole, bowed over the dark waters. Beyond, a sliver of yellow electric light came from a curtained window of the Woodbeans' little turreted house.

  I made my way to the middle of the bridge and then stepped gingerly across the holed timbers to its downstream edge. I stood at the centre there, just behind the rusted iron shield that held the indecipherable coat of arms, facing east. I put up my arms and held onto the rough, gritty-feeling surfaces of two girders, and watched the river. It seemed solid and unmoving in the darkness, only the occasional muffled gurgle betraying its slow, untroubled current. After a while I thought I could make out the faintest of watery shadows on the waters, as the moon shone through the bridge in the increasing gloom. I could see it only when I looked away, and when I tried to see myself in that shadow - waving one arm slowly over my head - could not.

  An owl hooted in the trees around the driveway and a car's engine sounded in the distance, the note faintly rising and falling as it passed unseen on the road. A couple of tiny, quick shapes flitted under the bridge, barely glimpsed, and must have been bats.

  'Oh God,' I whispered. 'Help me.'

  I closed my eyes and stood there in the darkness, listening with my soul, trying to call up the clear, calm voice of the Creator, abandoning myself to the silence so that I might hear Them. I heard: the river, like darkness liquefied, beneath me as it flowed; the owl, soft and distant and mysterious, a cry of hunting that sounded like longing; the susurrus of air shivering the branches, twigs and leaves; the far-away grumble of engine noise, dying on the wind. I heard my own heart beat, twin-pulsed: Is-is, Is-is, Is-is…

  Images came, snatches of conversation, crowding, jostling their way to the front of my mind; Grandfather's body, Grandfather's voice. I shook my head slowly, heavily. My thoughts were still too noisy, drowning out anything else; I felt that God was there, that They were listening to me, but I could not hear Them. For all that there was quietness and peace around me - the slow river, the hushing breeze - there was a furious torrent and a shrieking gale in my mind, and I would hear no word of God until they abated.

  I stepped carefully back to the wooden pathway that zig-zagged over the bridge's corrupted timbers and walked on to the drive in front of the Woodbeans' house. I looked up at the thin, toy-like house with its single small, cone-roofed turret. The light I had seen earlier came from the sitting room downstairs. I walked up to the door and knocked. I still didn't know whether I was going to try to contact Grandmother Yolanda or not.

  Sophi opened the door, surrounded by light, holding a book, her long fawn hair spilling over her shoulders.

  'Is!' she said, smiling. 'Hi. I heard you were… Are you all right?'

  I could not speak; I tried to but I could not. Instead I started to cry again; soundlessly, hopelessly, helplessly. She pulled me to her, across that threshold, dropping the book from her hand and taking me in her arms.

  'Isis, Isis, Isis!' she whispered.

  * * *

  Bonny, braw and big-boned, Sophi is my comfort and has been so for almost four years. One day, I know, she will find the good, kind man she yearns for and go off with him to be wifely and have babies. We shall be no more after that, and I hope that I am wise enough to accept this and make the most of the friendship we do have, for as long as we have it. I have asked myself if I love Sophi and I think the answer is yes, though it is genuinely the love of a sister, not a lover. I have asked her if she loves me and she has said she does, with all her heart, but it is a big heart, I think, and there will always be a place for others within it. Perhaps I'll never entirely vanish from that place, but I know that my position there will one day be overwhelmed by that good, kind man. I hope not to be jealous. I hope she finds him, but I hope she finds him later rather than sooner.

  Mr Woodbean was out that night. I lay in Sophi's arms, on the couch in the sitting room, her blouse wet from my tears, her long hair curled across her breast, her blue-jeaned legs entwined with mine. Sophi has hair the colour of fresh straw. Her eyes are blue with brown flecks, like ocean worlds with islands scattered. She stroked my head, calmly and slowly, the way I imagined a mother would.

  I had sobbed into her shoulder for a while after she had brought me into the sitting room, then she had sat me down on the couch and I had pulled myself together enough to tell her about my trip and my adventures - that alone had calmed me, and we even laughed a few times - then I'd come to the events of this evening, and I had broken down once more, throwing the story up as if it was sickness, spitting and hacking it out between great coughing sobs, until all that bile was finally out of me and I could wash it all away with tears.

  'Oh, Isis,' she breathed when I was done. 'Are you sure you're all right?'

  'Oh, far from it,' I said, sniffing. She handed me another tissue from the box she'd fetched when she'd realised that my tale would involve a lot of blubbing. 'But I'm unharmed, if you mean that.'

  'He didn't hurt you?'

  'No.' I coughed, then cleared my throat. I dried my eyes with the tissue. 'Except I feel like I've been… eviscerated, like everything's been pulled out of me, like there's just a huge space inside me where there used to be…' I shook my head. 'Everything. My life, my Faith, my family; the Community.'

  'What are you going to do now?'

  'I don't know. Part of me wants to go back right now and make my case before all of them; another part just wants to run away.'

  'Stay here tonight, eh?' she said, raising my face to hers. She has a broad, tan
ned face, graced with soft brown freckles she pretends to hate.

  'Is that all right?'

  ''Course it is,' she said, hugging me.

  I laid my head on her breast again. 'He said he wouldn't see me again unless it was to confess and apologise. But I can't.'

  'You better not,' she growled, with mock severity, squeezing me.

  'I don't know what he'll say to the others, what he'll tell them. I want to believe he'll come to his senses, realise that whatever he thought he heard was a false signal, that he will repent, and ask my forgiveness; that… Oh, Sophi; I don't know,' I said, lifting my head and staring into her eyes. 'Could he have put the vial in my bag, meaning to lead to this? Was that his purpose all along? I can't believe that, but what else is there? Is there a Devil, after all, and it's in him?'

  'You're the theologian,' she said. 'Don't ask me. I think he's just a dirty old man.'

  'But he's our Founder!' I protested, sitting up and taking her hands in mine. 'He's done everything for us; revealed so much truth, brought us the light. I still believe that. I still believe in our Faith. I still believe in him. I just can't believe this is really him; it is like he's possessed.'

  'He's old though, Isis,' Sophi said softly. 'Maybe he's frightened of dying.'

  'What?' I exclaimed. 'But he will be in Glory! An adventure awaits him on the other side that will make all this life look a small, insipid, selfish thing. Death holds no fear for us!'

  'Even holy people have doubts,' Sophi said, squeezing my hand. 'Don't you ever wonder if you've got it wrong?'

  'No!' I said. 'Well, yes, but only because we are told to think of such things by the Orthography; we must have faith, but not blind faith. But such theoretical doubt only strengthens our belief. How can Salvador himself really doubt what he's created?'

  'Well,' Sophi said, crinkling her nose as she looked thoughtful, 'maybe that's it; you all have him to turn to but he only has God. You know; tough at the top, and all that. Buck stops with him, sort of thing.'

  'He has all of us to turn to,' I said, though I saw what she meant.

  'Anyway, holy men are still men. Perhaps he's just got used to having any of the women in the Order he wants.'

  'But it's not like that!' I protested.

  'Oh, come on, Isis. It's not far off it.'

  'But there's never been any coercion. It's just natural; ours is a faith of love, in all its forms. We're not ashamed of that. And he is - has been… still is, I suppose - an attractive man; charismatic. Everybody finds him so; women have always been attracted to him. I mean, they still are,' I said. I ran my fingers through my hair. 'Lordy, he has no need of me.'

  'Forbidden fruit, maybe?' Sophi suggested.

  'Oh, I don't know!' I wailed, and fell upon her breast once more, clutching at her perfumed warmth. 'Morag avoiding me, Grandfather pursuing me; somebody traducing me…'

  'Introducing you?' she said, sounding confused.

  'Traducing me; defaming me. The whole thing with the zhlonjiz.'

  'Oh.'

  'What's happening to my life?' I said. 'What's going on?'

  Sophi shrugged, and I could feel her shaking her head.

  The telephone rang then, out in the hall. We listened to it. 'Not one of yours, then,' she said after the seventh ring. She patted my back. 'Better get it; might be Dad wanting a lift back…'

  She went out to the hall.

  'Hi?' Then a pause. 'Hello?… Hello?'

  She put her head round the edge of the door, looking in at me and grinning, the telephone handset to one ear.

  'Don't know what…' she said, then frowned. She shook her head, long hair making a sine wave in the air. 'I can hear music… Sounds like something sort of… something scrabbling around; clunking…' She made an odd expression, raising her eyebrows, turning down the corners of her mouth, the tendons on her neck standing out.

  She held the phone out to me, and just as she did so I heard something clatter metallically from the handset and a tiny voice shout something. Sophi's expression changed to one of bemusement. She held the handset away from her and looked dubiously at it, then carefully brought it to her ear.

  I got up from the couch. There had been something about the tone and cadence of that voice… Sophi held the phone away from her ear a little so that I could listen in, my cheek against hers.

  '… dropping the damned thing,' said a miniaturised, mechanised voice. It sounded very odd, and both thick and slurred. 'I think this is right number… are you there?'

  Sophi put her finger to her lips, looking amused.

  'Ach; is the answer machine thing. I just…' There was some more clattering. 'That is…' The voice deteriorated into mumbling. 'That is right number, isn't it? Yes; yes, looks famil… familia… familiar… I'm sorry, very very, but bit… but bit… bit worse for wearing, you know. I am just call to say, I have got your message. And I am to be there tomorrow, is this all right? Well, be there, I will. I mean. You know this now. I… I am hoping… this will-' Silence, a muffled curse and another clatter.

  Sophi put her hand over the mouthpiece. 'God,' she whispered, 'he sounds drunk, doesn't he?'

  'Hmm,' I said. I was sure I recognised the man's voice.

  We listened in again. There was a scuffling sort of noise; something redolent of fabric and friction. Then: '… bounced… under the flippink… sideboard this time; most vexing. I… I think I go now… Are you still… ? Well, I mean… oh… well, anyway. Tomorrow.' There was heavy breathing for a moment. 'Tomorrow. I come for her. Goodnight.' Then a clunk, and nothing.

  Sophi and I looked into each others eyes.

  'Weird, eh?' she said, laughing a little nervously.

  I nodded. She leaned out into the hall, replacing the phone. 'Wrong number, I suppose,' she said.

  I bit my lip, standing with my back to the edge of the doorway, arms crossed. Sophi put a hand on my shoulder. 'You all right?'

  'I'm fine,' I said. 'But I think I know who that was.'

  'You do?' Sophi laughed. 'Oh; should I have said something?'

  'I don't know,' I admitted. And indeed I didn't. 'I think it was my uncle Mo,' I said to her.

  'What, the one in Bradford, the actor?'

  'Well, Spayedthwaite. But yes. Yes, that's the one.'

  Sophi looked thoughtful. 'So who was he calling?'

  'Who indeed?' I nodded. 'Who did he think he was calling, and who's this "her" he's coming for?'

  Sophi leaned against the other edge of the doorway, also folding her arms and drawing one leg up under her backside. We looked at each other for a moment.

  'You?' she said quietly, eyebrows flexing.

  'Me,' I said, wondering.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  I stayed with Sophi that night, lying chastely in her generous arms while she breathed slowly and made little shiftings and mutterings in her sleep. Her father returned about one in the morning; she stirred when she heard the door, woke and rose, padding downstairs. I heard their muffled voices and then she returned, giggling quietly as she took off her dressing-gown. 'Drunk as a monkey,' she whispered, slipping back in beside me. 'These golf club meetings…' she snuggled up to me. 'At least he gets a lift home…'

  I stroked her hair as she fitted her chin into the angle of my neck and shoulder. She jerked a couple of times, apologised once, then went quiet again. I think she was asleep within the minute. I heard Mr Woodbean come up the stairs, and experienced the fluttering trepidation I'd always felt when I'd stayed over at Sophi's, frightened that he would burst in and discover us together, however innocently. As ever, his heavy tread creaked on past Sophi's door and along the landing to his own room, and I breathed easily again.

  Sophi dreamed beside me, her hand clenching around mine, her breath hesitating, then speeding up a little, then dropping back.

  I lay there, unable to sleep despite being deathly tired. I had been late to bed the previous night, had not so much slept then as fallen into an alcoholic stupor, and had subsequently undergone all the tri
als and tribulations that had overtaken me.

  It already seemed like a week must have passed between sitting in the Jaguar car as it glided past Harrods department store in London and standing on the dark bridge watching the bats fly and hearing the owl call while I listened in vain for the Voice of my God.

  Still, I could not sleep, but kept turning over and over in my head all the oddnesses of my recent life: Morag's apparent avoidance of me, the zhlonjiz business, my Grandfather's lecherous attention, and now Uncle Mo, calling on the telephone, implicated and implicating, filthy drunk, seemingly thinking he was talking to a telephone answering machine when the Woodbeans had never had such a thing, and now presumably on his way, coming for somebody - me?

  What was going on? What was happening to my life?

  There had been enough untowardness and nonsense without Uncle Mo getting involved. Uncle Mohammed is the brother of Calli and Astar; a darkly handsome but prematurely aged early-forties actor who left the Community on his sixteenth birthday to seek fame and fortune in - where else? - London, and achieved a degree of fame before I was born when he landed a part in a Mancunian television soap opera. An unkind metropolitan newspaper critic, not remotely as impressed with Mo's talent as Mo was, once accused my uncle of putting the ham in Mohammed, which caused something of a fuss in the Moslem community - of which Mo, apostate, was now a part - and eventually required an apology and retraction. Mo was written out of the television story almost a decade ago and now exists in Spayedthwaite, near the northern city of Bradford, finding acting work very occasionally and - rumour has it - waiting on tables in an Indian restaurant the rest of the time, to make ends meet.