Whit

by Iain Banks

  The match! I thought. The match I'd used to light the candle; he could detect its treacherous, sulphurous smell! Ice water seemed to run in my veins. Allan sniffed the air again, glancing down at the fire, then the frown disappeared and he shook his head. He went into the storeroom, closing the door after him. I breathed out, half delirious with relief. And I'd even thought to close the window in the storeroom, too, though I hadn't locked it after me. I waited, wiping sweat off my brow. My heart seemed to shake my whole torso. It felt like it was trying to escape from my chest. I wondered if nineteen was too young to die from a heart attack.

  Several minutes passed; my heart slowed. I picked the solidified wax off my hand and put the bits in my pocket. I licked the smarting skin underneath, waving my hand about to cool the moistened area. Then I thought I heard a voice coming from the storeroom. Allan's voice. As though he was talking to somebody.

  I hesitated. It would be madness to go and listen; I could never get back here in time when he returned to the study. It was obviously insane, and it would be tempting fate; I had only just managed to set the desk by the door back in order before Allan came into the room; I'd already used up all my luck. I ought to stay here, keep quiet, let Allan do whatever he was doing, let him leave and then continue with my search. I turned and looked away from the room, out into the darkness where the courtyard and the farm buildings were, invisible in the night. Of course it would be stupid - idiotic - to go over to the storeroom door.

  I don't know what made me do just that, but I did; I left the comparative safety of the curtains and - with a clear image in my mind of how the room had looked while illuminated with the glow from Allan's paraffin lamp - stepped smartly across the floor and through the darkness to listen at the door to the storeroom.

  '… told you, she's obsessed,' I heard Allan say. Then, 'I know, I know … Why, have you had any more letters? … No, no, she doesn't, ah… didn't find out. No, you're all right there… Well, I don't know how, but she, ah, she didn't… well, she didn't say anything. No, wouldn't be like her… I don't know… You did? Yes, so did that old bat Yolanda… Yes, she brought her back.'

  He was talking on a telephone! It took me that long to work it out; it was such an unthinkable thing, to have a telephone in the Community, and here, right at its heart! He had one of those portable wireless telephones; that was what he had taken out of the drawer in the desk! He was talking to somebody on it! The deception of the man! And to think I had felt bad, felt like a sinner, dammit, for making a couple of calls from a telephone box in Gittering! For shame, brother! I had half a mind to burst in on him and denounce him to his face, but luckily that particular rush of blood to the head didn't last very long.

  '… Well, not for long,' Allan said. 'I asked Uncle Mo to come up here; looks like we've persuaded her to take a holiday with him.'

  So Mo had been calling Allan. My uncle must have dialled the wrong number in his cups, having the vague idea that he was ringing the Community but getting the Woodbeans' number, not Allan's. So, did wireless phones have answering machines too? I supposed they must have, or could link into one somewhere else. Perhaps that accounted for the few minutes of silence when Allan had first entered the storeroom; he had been taking his messages. Well, of course; he couldn't be seen with the phone, couldn't carry it around and have it ringing while he was amongst us.

  '… Spayedthwaite; oop north,' Allan said, putting on a funny accent. '… Tomorrow, with any luck. Why, what were you…?… Really?… Flumes?… Well, it's not Spain, I suppose, but…'

  Spain? Hadn't Morag been due to go there with Mr Leopold, her agent/manager? Good grief! Was he talking to Morag? Then why -? I abandoned speculation to continue listening.

  '… Oh, I see. Really. Well, everybody should have a hobby, they say…. So we might see you yet for the Festival?… It was a joke. I dare say she will, too…. Oh, getting crazier; latest thing was she had a private audience with the old man and offered herself to him; tried to get him to screw her. Can you believe that?'

  What? I felt my mouth fall open as I stared at the door, black in front of my face, unable to believe what I was hearing. What was I being accused of now? Attempting to seduce my Grandfather when in fact he had practically tried to rape me? If I had felt there was ice in my veins a few minutes earlier, I could believe it was superheated steam now. The treachery of it! The calumny! The mendacity! This was… this was evil.

  '… I know, I know,' Allan said. '… Well, of course nobody else was there, Morag, but I believe Grandfather, don't you?… Well, quite…. Yes…. I don't…… No. No idea…. Yes, me too. Sorry about the lateness of the hour…. What?… No, I don't suppose it is, really, not for you, but it is for us. Well, I'll say…'

  I'd heard enough. I wasn't quite so sure of my route back to the curtains as I had been from them to the door but I got there without bumping into anything. I slipped back behind them again and adjusted the gap until it was the same as it had been before.

  The storeroom door opened and Allan reappeared with the paraffin lamp and the little portable telephone; different centuries in each hand. He put the phone back in the drawer of the main desk, locked it and - apart from one sniff at the air, which seemed to satisfy him - left the office without further ado. I heard the key turn in the lock and listened to his footsteps fade as he climbed the stairs back to his room.

  I stood for a while, trembling as though cold.

  So, my brother was spreading lies about me to Morag. I had the distinct impression that they were not the first, either. And how long had he been able to call her? Why had I been sent to find her at all? Why had he made no mention of her apostasy? The world seem to tip around me again, out of kilter, out of joint, out of its head.

  I stepped out from the curtains with a strange feeling of numbness. I made faces of disbelief into the darkness. Had I really heard what I had just heard? I shook my head. Here, now, was no place to stand wondering what was going on.

  I pulled myself together as best I could and relit my candle - waving the match's cloud of smoke away with one hand - then returned to the typing desk by the door.

  The piece of paper I was looking for was in a folder in the deepest drawer. I noted down the numbers for Morag in a kind of insensible daze, my mind still reeling with shock at what I'd heard. I almost put the sheet of paper back in its folder straight away, and on such a trifle, at that moment, did the whole fate and future course of our Faith potentially hang.

  Instead of putting the paper away, then, I looked at the other names and addresses.

  And saw that there was an entry for Great-aunt Zhobelia, whom we had always been told had gone off to find - and perhaps effect a reconciliation with - her original family and then effectively disappeared. Great-aunt Zhobelia whom Grandmother Yolanda was convinced had once hinted at… something. Something for sure, she'd said. By God, I would welcome anything sure in my world, just now. There was no actual address for Zhobelia, just a note that said she was 'Care of Unc. Mo'.

  I looked at it, transfixed. Now what?

  I half expected to find full addresses and telephone numbers for Aunt Rhea,. or even Salvador's original family, but there were no more surprises. I looked through a few other folders and riffled through all the loose papers, in case there were any more revelations, but I think my courage was running out at that point; my hands were shaking. I put the desk back as I'd found it and lifted the candle carefully this time.

  I stopped at Allan's desk and tried its drawers, but they were all locked, and I couldn't find a key anywhere; I strongly suspected that the only key was the one hanging round his neck. My teeth were starting to chatter, though I wasn't cold. The mantelpiece clock said the time was half past midnight. I decided it was time to retreat. I considered keeping the candle aflame when I went back through the storeroom, but I really did feel I had entirely used up my quota of good fortune for the night, and it would be just my luck for there to be a Luskentyrian or two wandering around out there in the formal g
arden or beyond, so I blew out the candle.

  I forgot to walk backwards through the storeroom and banged a shin so hard I swear I actually saw lights -1 think it was because I closed my eyes so hard; it was that or cry out. Doubled-up, limping and rubbing my shin, I got to the window, muttering quiet but vehement curses under my breath. It was only as I was climbing out of the opened window and saw starlight reflected in the pond on the ground below that it occurred to me that this was probably the window I had been thrown out of by my father on the night of the fire, sixteen years earlier.

  Suddenly realising that, I experienced a second of dizziness as I straddled the opened sash-window, and for a moment I was terrified that I was about to totter and fall; certainly I was quite far enough above the ground to break my neck if I did. The moment passed, but my tattered nerves, already stretched to their limit, could have done without the scare. I started to tremble again.

  Perhaps because I was shaking so much, getting down to the ground proved more difficult than climbing up had been, and I hung on my fingertips for a good half-minute desperately trying to fit the welt of my boots into a crack, but I made my way down eventually and got back as far as the orchard wall before I came up with an idea.

  I looked down the road towards the river.

  * * *

  'Is! What's wrong? Are you -?' Sophi said, looking out from the hall with an expression of concern on her sweet face. She wore pyjamas and a dressing-gown.

  'I'm fine,' I said, in a whisper. 'Sorry it's so late. Can I come in?'

  'Of course.' She stood aside. 'Dad's in bed,' she said.

  'Good.' I kissed her cheek. She closed the door and hugged me.

  'Can I use your phone?'

  'Of course. I might not wait up till you're finished, though,' she said, smiling.

  I shook my head. 'This will be a proper call; voice.'

  She looked pretend-shocked. 'Are you allowed to do that?' she asked, lifting the telephone off its table and pulling it through to the sitting room.

  'Not really,' I said. 'But these are desperate times.'

  'God, they must be.' She pulled the telephone's wire under the door and then closed it. 'Quieter in here,' she said, putting the phone on the sideboard. 'Need a chair?'

  'No thanks,' I said, pulling from my pocket the sheet of paper I'd written Morag's numbers on.

  I explained to Sophi what I'd done.

  'Is!' she squealed in delight. 'You're a cat burglar!'

  'There's worse,' I said, and watched her expression change to horror and then anger when I told her what Allan had said to Morag.

  'That slimy bastard,' she said, her jaw set in a firm line. 'Is that who you're going to call? Morag?'

  'Yes. She might hang up on me; if she does, will you call her back; be a sort of character witness?'

  'Certainly. I'll go make us some tea, eh?'

  'I'd rather you stayed here; she might want somebody to put a good word in for me anyway.'

  'My pleasure, Is.' She sat on the arm of the sofa.

  I dialled the first number, and got a voice telling me I'd got through to La Mancha; I thought the voice sounded particularly distorted, and so narrowly avoided the embarrassment of trying to hold a conversation with an answering machine. I left no message after the beeps. I dialled the next number.

  'Hello?' It was her. It was Morag. I knew that voice - I had heard it going, 'Yes, yes, oh yes!' just a week ago - well enough to tell from just that one word.

  I swallowed. 'Morag,' I said, gulping. 'Please don't put down the phone, but… it's Isis.'

  There was a pause. Then, coldly, 'What?'

  I glanced at Sophi for some moral support, which arrived in the shape of a wink. 'Did Allan just phone you?'

  Another pause. 'What's it to you?'

  'Morag, please; I think he's been lying to you. I just heard him lying to you.'

  'How?'

  'What?'

  'How did you hear?'

  'Well, overheard.'

  'How?'

  I took a deep breath, then shook my head. 'Oh, it's a long story, but the point is I did. I heard him say that I had tried to… seduce Grandfather.'

  'Something like that,' said the cold, distant voice. 'It didn't surprise me, not considering what you've been doing to me.'

  'What? What have I done?' I asked, hurt and confused. Sophi was biting her bottom lip, face creased into a frown.

  '… Oh for God's sake, Isis!' Morag yelled, making me jump. I jerked the handset away from my ear, startled. 'Following me; stalking me all round the country, for a start!'

  'But I was told to!' I protested. 'I was on a mission!'

  'Oh, yeah. I suppose you heard voices.'

  'No! I was told to; I was sent on the mission to find you… sent by Grandfather, by the Community; everybody.'

  'Don't lie, Isis. God, this is so pathetic.'

  'I'm not lying. Ask anybody in the Community; they all came to see me off. We had a meeting; two meetings, sub-committees-'

  'I've just been talking somebody from the Community, Isis: Allan.'

  'Well, apart from him-'

  'I mean, he's even spoken up for you in the past; when all this crazy obsessive stalking stuff started.'

  'What crazy obsessive stalking stuff?' I cried. 'What are you talking about?' I was feeling terribly emotional; there was a prickling behind my eyes. Sophi, sitting on the couch in her dressing-gown, looked concerned and slightly alarmed too.

  'For God's sake, Isis; all the letters; asking me for-'

  'What letters?'

  'Isis, are you having black-outs or something? All the letters you've sent me, pledging undying love; sending me your knickers; asking me for my used knickers, for God's sake-'

  'What?' I screeched. Sophi flinched and glanced upwards. She put her finger to her lips.

  'Morag,' I said. 'You have to… Look, I mean, I… I like you; I always have… I'm, that is… we're friends, as… as well as cousins… but I don't have a crush on you or anything; I'm not obsessive about you. Please believe me; I haven't sent any sort of letter for about four years, soon after you started sending the open letters, to everybody, when you got busy, with; well, at the time we thought it was playing the baryton, but I suppose it was, um, actually the, ah, films really, but-'

  'Don't lie, Isis,' she began, then broke off. '… Wait a minute,' she said. 'What do you mean, "films"?'

  I grimaced. Sophi returned the look as though reflecting my feeling of embarrassment. I cleared my throat. 'As, ah, Fusillada; you know.'

  There was a long pause. 'Ah, Morag?' I said, thinking she had somehow rung off silently.

  'You do know about that,' she said, sounding wary.

  'Yes,' I said. 'I… Well, it's another long story, I suppose, but-'

  'Allan just told me you hadn't found out,' she said flatly.

  I caught a sniff of victory. 'That's what I'm telling you; Allan's a liar!' I said.

  'How many people know about the films?'

  'Well… everybody,' I confessed.

  'Oh, shit.'

  'Look, Morag, I don't think there's anything wrong in what you're doing. It's your body and you can do what you want with it, and the act of love is holy under any circumstances unless there is coercion involved; commercial exploitation is irrelevant in that respect and the reaction of Unsaved society is largely a result of its deep-seated fear of the power of sexuality and the repressed-'

  'Is, Is… yeah, right; got all that. Jeez, you're sounding like some girl on the game who's just got an Open University degree.'

  'Sorry.'

  'It's all right. But none of this explains why you were chasing me round the fucking country in the first place.'

  'I told you; I was on a mission!'

  'For what?'

  'To talk you back into the fold of the Saved and restore your faith in the Order.'

  'Eh?'

  I repeated what I'd just said.

  'What are you talking about?'

  'Morag; I
saw the letter you sent.'

  'What letter?'

  'The one you wrote two weeks ago where you said you didn't want to be part of the Order or take part in the Festival; the one where you said you had found another faith.'

  Morag laughed. 'Hold on, hold on. I wrote ages ago saying I wasn't coming to the Festival, after I started getting the weird letters from you. But I haven't written in a couple of months. As for finding some new faith, I know I'm not the best Luskentyrian in the world, but I'm not lapsed or anything.'

  I stared at Sophi. She looked back, her expression half trepidatious, half hopeful.

  'So,' I said into the telephone. 'Somebody's been sending both of us faked - forged - letters.'

  'Yeah, if all this isn't you being a really clever stalker,' she said, but didn't sound serious. 'Oops; I'm getting battery low showing here. You got any other bombshells you want to drop?'

  'I don't think so,' I said. 'But look, can I meet you? Can we talk some more about this? Wherever you want.'

  'Well, I don't know. I heard from Allan you were going to stay with Uncle Mo…'

  'What's that got to do with anything? Look, I'll come to Essex, or London; anywhere. But I'm not stalking you, for goodness' sake…'

  'Well, the thing is, as you were going to be heading south - well, the north of England - but you know what I mean, and as we're stalled here with Frank's… ah, business dealings-'

  'Ah yes. The VAT problems,' I nodded.

  'How do you- ? Oh, never mind.' I heard her take a breath. 'Okay, look; yes, we'll meet, but I'm going to bring Ricky - the cute guy you saw at the house?'

  'With Tyson.'

  That's right. And it'll be a public place, okay?'

  'Fine by me.'

  'Right. Well, the thing is, we're going to be in Edinburgh tomorrow.'

  'Edinburgh!' I exclaimed.