by Iain Banks
The train started off. An announcement informed us the buffet car was open for the sale of light refreshments, soft drinks and alcoholic beverages.
'I think that means the bar's open, Uncle Mo,' I said brightly. 'Would you like me to go and get us something?'
'What a good idea, niece!' Uncle Mo said, and took out his wallet.
CHAPTER TWENTY - ONE
'Dreams,' Uncle Mo repeated sadly, obviously getting into his stride with this theme. 'Dreams can destroy you, you see, Isis.'
'Really?'
'Oh, yes,' he said, and sounded bitter. 'I had my dreams, Isis. I dreamed of fame and success and being an admirable person, a person people would recognise without ever having met me. Do you see, Isis?' He reached across the table and grasped my arm. 'I wanted all this for myself you see. I was young and foolish and I had this idea that it would be wonderful to be loved without reason, just because people knew oneself from stage or film or the dreaded goggle-box; the television. But I was too young to see that it is not really you that they love; it is your part, your role, your persona, and in that much you are at the mercy of writers,' he grimaced, as though he had just bitten into something sour, 'producers, directors, editors and the like. Liars, egotists; all of them! They control the character you play, and they can destroy you with a few sentences typed on the typewriter, a few lines scribbled on a memo, a few words over a coffee break.'
He sat back, shaking his head. 'But I was young and foolish, then. I thought everyone would love me; I could not understand that there is so much cynicism and selfishness in the world, especially in certain professions of a so-called artistic bending. The world is a wicked place, Isis,' he said sombrely, fixing his watery gaze on me and lifting his plastic tumbler. 'A wicked, wicked place.' He drank deeply.
'I am starting to find that out, Uncle,' I said. 'I am finding wickedness and selfishness even in the heart of our-'
'It was ever thus, niece,' Uncle Mo said with a wave of his hand, that sour expression on his face again. 'You are the innocent now; you have your dreams and I hope they are not the source of bitterness that mine were for me, but now is your time and you are finding what we all find, no matter where we go. There-is much that is good in our Faith - well, your Faith - but it is still part of the world, the wicked, wicked world. I know more than you know; I have been around longer, I have kept in touch even though I was not there, you see?'
'Ah.'
'So I have heard much; perhaps more than if I had stayed in the Community.' He leaned forward, chin almost on the table again, and tapped his nose. I leaned forward too, but this time I led with my other arm; the one he'd been grabbing until now felt bruised and sore. 'I know things, Isis,' he told me.
'You do?' I said, in my most breathless-ingénue manner, and widened my eyes.
'Oh yes,' Uncle Mo said, and sat back again, nodding his head. He straightened his jacket, patting the bulge over where his wallet was. 'Oh yes. Mysteries. Rumours.' He appeared to think for a moment. '… Things.'
'Golly.'
'Not all sweetness and light, Isis,' he said, finger wagging. 'Not all sweetness and light. There have been… darknesses along the way.'
I nodded, looking thoughtful as the train swung briefly away from the coast to enter the town of Berwick-upon-Tweed. It slowed but did not stop as it passed through the station; we both watched the view unfold as the train curved out along a long arched stone viaduct across the river, revealing the jumbled old town on the steep north bank, the later, more uniform houses on the flatter south side, and the sloping road bridges between the two, outlined against the distant sea and clouds.
'Our Faith has had,' I said eventually, 'our share of sadness, I suppose.'
Uncle Mo watched the view, nodding. I refilled his glass with the last of the four miniatures.
'The loss of Luskentyre,' I said, 'my parents' death and Grandmother's death, and one might even say the loss of your mother, my Great-aunt Zhobelia, who is supposed still to be alive, but is lost to us all the same. All these thi-'
'Ah, you see!' Uncle Mo sat forward, taking my arm in his hand again. 'I know things there; things I am sworn to secrecy on.'
'You are?'
'Indeed. For the good of all…' He sneered. 'So I am told. Then I hear what is supposed to have happened…' He looked as though he had thought the better of saying any more, and took a long swallow from his tumbler instead. He finished his drink and looked around the bottle-strewn table.
'Shall I get us some more refreshments, Uncle?' I asked, quickly draining my beer.
'Well,' he said. 'I suppose… but I am drinking rather quickly today. I don't know. Perhaps I should have a sandwich or something. Maybe…'
'Well,' I said, holding up my empty plastic tumbler. 'I think I'll go and get another beer anyway, so if you…'
'Oh, very well. But I must slow down and have a sandwich or something. Here,' he said, digging inside his jacket for his wallet. He felt around inside, then had to open out his jacket with his other hand and look within to guide his seeking fingers, before finally taking out the wallet and carefully extracting a twenty-pound note from it. 'Here.'
'Thank you, Uncle. How many would you like- ?'
'Oh, well, I shall slow down, but best to stock up in case they run out. Say…' He waved his hand weakly and shook his head. 'Whatever that will buy. And whatever you wish, of course.'
'Right you are!' I said perkily. I tidied the table, shoving some of our debris into the little brown paper bag. I included my beer can, which was still half-full. I lifted out the can when I deposited the rest in a litter bin on my way to the buffet car.
I had kept a little of the change from the last order. I kept all the change from this one, wolfed down a sandwich at the bar, and came back swigging beer from the same can I'd taken away.
'Here we are!' I said, plonking down another rattling brown paper bag onto the table.
'Ah! There, now. I see. Well, there we are. Ah, you fine child,' Uncle Mo said, his hands waving like tendrils towards the bag's little folded paper handles.
'Allow me,' I said.
Outside, Lindisfarne, the Holy Isle, slid past beyond undulating meadows and long shallow dunes of golden sand and gently waving grass. Between the land and the island were empty acres of sandy tidal flats which in places were already inundated by the rising tide. A car was risking the crossing on the causeway across the sands, waves lapping at the roadway. A small castle rose dramatically in the distance on the island's only piece of high ground, a smooth, linear swell of rounded rock towards the isle's southern limit. Beyond, on the land facing the island, two huge obelisks rose before the miles of low dunes, and visible on the seaward horizon bulked a hazy prominence that - if I remembered my maps correctly - ought to be Bamburgh Castle.
'Did you get any sandwiches?' Uncle Mo asked plaintively, as I emptied the bag and poured him a drink.
'Oh, did you actually want a sandwich? I'm sorry, Uncle Mo; shall I-' I started to rise from my seat again.
'No, no,' he said, motioning me to sit down. 'Never mind. It's not necessary,' he slurred.
'Look; I got some ice in a separate glass,' I said, putting a couple of lumps into his drink.
'You are a good child,' he said, raising his tumbler and slurping at his drink. Dribbles ran down his chin. 'Oh, my goodness.' I passed him a napkin and he dabbed at his chin. He put down the glass, spilling a little, but did not seem to notice. He fixed me with his bleary, diluted, dilated gaze. 'You are a very good child, Isis. Very good.'
Not that good, I thought to myself, and had what I hope was the decency to feel guilty for my mendacity, and for my cynical use of Uncle Mo's weakness for the drink.
I sighed. 'I often think of Great-aunt Zhobelia,' I said, innocently. 'I hardly ever think of my mother and father, because I was so young when they died, I suppose, but I often think of Zhobelia, even though I can't remember her very clearly. Isn't that strange?'
Uncle Mo looked like he was going to cry.
'Zhobelia,' he said, sniffing, head bowed, looking into his drink. 'She is my mother and I love her as a dutiful son should, but it must be said she has grown… cantankerous with age, Isis. Difficult, too. Very difficult. And hurtful. Most hurtful, also. You wouldn't… No. But there you are. Terribly hurtful. Terribly. I think now she likes especially to hurt those who love her most. I have tried to do my best for her and been the good steward for her charge…' He sniffed sonorously and dabbed at his nose with the napkin I'd given him. 'There is some… I don't know. I think they were always… I think those two knew more than they let on, Isis. I know they did.'
'What two, Uncle?'
'Zhobelia and Aasni; my mother and my aunt. Yes. There you are. They knew things about… things; I don't know. I would catch things they said to each other when they weren't talking in the old country's language, or the island language, which they also knew something of, you know, oh yes. Indeed. I would catch a look or a start of a sentence or phrase and then they would switch into Khalmakistani or Gaelic or that mixture of those and English they used which nobody else could understand and I would be lost, but… Oh,' he waved a hand at me. 'I am ramp… I am rambling now, I know… I… I'm sure you think… I'm just an old man but I'm not, Isis. You know, at the last Festival, when I asked, well; didn't really, but thought of asking… well; did ask, I suppose, but not such that… that… but… you…' He shook his head, his eyes full of tears and his lips working in a strange, fluidly disconnected way. 'Flippink dreams, eh, Isis?' he said, sniffing hard again and looking at me. He shook his head, looked into his tumbler again and drank.
I gave him a while to compose himself, then I got up and - taking my Sitting Board - went round to sit next to him, putting an arm round his shoulder and holding his other hand.
'Life can seem cruel sometimes, Uncle Mo,' I said. 'I know this now, though you have known it longer. You are older and wiser than I am and you have suffered more, but you must know in your heart, in your soul, that God loves you and that They - or He, your prophet's God, if you will - that God can be your comfort, just as your family and friends can comfort you, too. You do know that, don't you, Uncle Mo?'
He put down his drink and turned to me in the seat, putting out his arm; I leaned forward so that he could put his arm between me and the seat. We hugged each other. He still smelled of cologne. I hadn't realised how slight he was; shorter than me, and somehow packaged, bulked out with his fine clothes to look more substantial than he actually was. I was aware of his wallet pressing into my breast and, with my left hand, could feel what was probably the hardness of a portable telephone in another jacket pocket.
'You are such a good child, Isis!' he assured me again. 'Such a good, good child!'
I patted him on the back, quite as though it was he who was the child, not I.
'And you are a good uncle,' I said. 'And I am sure you are a good son as well. I'm sure Zhobelia must love you and must love to see you.'
'Ah,' he said, shaking his head against my shoulder. 'She has little time for me. I cannot get to see her as often as I would like anyway, Isis; they keep her up there, away from me; ha! I have to pay; my savings, you'll notice; mine. My money from my savings and the few parts I get and the restaurant money. It is a fine, good restaurant, Isis; I don't actually own it, you probably guessed that, if I ever gave that impression I didn't mean… didn't mean deceiving, but it is the best in the city, a most estimable place where one might lavish oneself and I am the maître de you see, Isis; I am the first public face of the establishment and so most highly important and influential with the minds and hearts of the diners, you see. We have a most extensive wine list and I was a fine wine waiter, a fine wine waiter I tell you as well and still can fill in… in the most exemplary manner.'
'Your mother should be proud of you.'
'She is not. She calls me a liqueur Moslem; innocent and sweet on the outside - even chocolate coloured - but open me up and I am full of alcohol. It is her family. Her other family.'
'Her other family?' I said, shifting my hand to stroke Uncle Mo's head.
'The Asis family. She says she wants to be in that home but she was happy in Spayedthwaite; they persuaded her, turned her against me, made her say she wanted to be nearer to them. And yet I still pay. I get some help from them and a little from your people but I pay most; I. Me. Mr Muggins McMuggins here. They talked about responsibility and blood ties and they wanted her near them and they made her say that she wanted the same thing too and so she away went, most unfairly. It isn't fair, Isis.' He squeezed my hand. 'You are a good child. You would have been good to your poor mother and father. I don't know I should be doing this for your brother, really. He holds the wallet strings, you know that, but I don't know that I should be taking you away like this. It is so hard to do the right things. I try, but I don't know. You must forgive me, Isis. I am not so strong a man. Not so strong as I should like to be. Then, who is? You are a woman, Isis, you would not understand. Such strength. Please understand…'
He put his head down upon my breast and sobbed then, and after a moment or two I could feel my shirt getting wet.
I looked out of the window. Trees whizzed past. The train rocked us. The trees parted dramatically, like a great green curtain upon a stage, revealing a small steep valley with a river curving through beneath. A flock of birds burst from somewhere underneath us and turned as one, a grey-black cloud of fluttering movement sweeping through the air between the banked walls of the trees. The trees rushed back up in a green blur. I looked upwards to the creamy layers of cloud.
'Where did they take Zhobelia, Uncle Mo?' I asked quietly.
Mo sobbed, then sniffed hard, so that I felt his whole body shake and vibrate. 'I'm not supposed… Oh, what does… ? You're not supposed…'
'I'd love to know, Uncle Mo. I might be able to help, you know.'
'Slanashire,' he said.
'Where's that?'
'It's Lanca… Lanarkshire; a horrid little town in… Lanarkshire,' he said.
That was a relief. I'd thought he was going to name somewhere in the Hebrides, or even back in the sub-continent.
'I'd so much like to write to her,' I said softly. 'What's her address?'
'Oh… The… what is that word again? Gloaming. Indeed. There. The Gloamings. The Gloamings Nursing Home, Wishaw Road, Mauchtie, Lancashire. Lanarkshire,' he said.
I got him to repeat the town's name, too.
'Near Glasgow,' he went on. 'Just outside. Well; near. Bloody horrid little place it is. Oh, excuse me. Don't go…. Miserable…. Write. She would love to hear you… hear from you. She would love to see you, perhaps. Well, maybe. She seems not to want to see us very much… Her own son… but… Well. Who knows? Who ever knows, Isis? Nobody ever knows. Nobody ever… knows nothing… at all. All dreams. Just… dreams. Terrible……dreams.' He gave a single great, ragged sigh, and settled closer into me.
I held him for a while. He seemed very small.
After a while, I shifted one of my hands to Uncle Mo's head and gently placed my palm over his hair, cupping his head like some delicate goblet. I closed my eyes. I settled into the steady rhythm of the rushing, rocking train, letting its hurtling movement become stillness and its shimmering, steely racket become silence, so that I found - in that stillness and that silence - a place to prepare myself and gather my powers and await the awakening sensations that were the presentiment of my Gift.
It came eventually, tingling in my head and in my hand, and I became a conduit, a filter, a heart, an entire system. I felt my uncle's pain and sadness and broken dreams, felt their spare, bleak, numbing terror, felt the choking fullness of his emptiness, and felt it all flowing into me, circulating through me and being cleaned and neutralised and made good through me and then flowing back out through my hand and into him again as something made wholesome from poison, something made positive that had been negative, giving him peace, giving him hope, giving him faith.
I opened my eyes again and flexed my hand.
The trees outside the window gave way to farmland, then houses.
I watched the houses for a while. Uncle Mo breathed on, easily now, and nestled against me like a child.
The guard announced we would soon be arriving at Newcastle upon Tyne. Uncle Mo didn't stir. I thought for a moment, then looked at my hand, the hand that I had touched Uncle Mo's thoughts with.
'Oh, Uncle Mo,' I breathed, too quiet for him to hear, 'I'm sorry.'
I did some quick mental arithmetic and a bit of estimating, then I looked around to make sure nobody could see and shifted Uncle Mo a little in my arms. Then - asking God for Their forgiveness as I did it, and feeling quite wretched and triumphantly predatory in equal measure, yet excited as well - I took Uncle Mo's wallet from his inside jacket pocket.
He had eighty pounds. I took half, then gave him change for twenty-nine from the funds I already held, most of which, admittedly, Uncle Mo himself had unwittingly provided. I pocketed the notes, replaced his wallet and shifted him again, pushing him gently away from me so that he rested with his head partly against the side of the seat and partly against the window. I thought a little more, then reached into his other inside pocket and took his portable telephone. He muttered something, but seemed otherwise oblivious. I scribbled a quick note on a napkin and put it under his tumbler on the table in front of him.
The note said, Dear Uncle Mohammed. I'm sorry. By the time you read this I will be on a train to London. Thank you for all your kindness; all will be explained. Forgive me. Love, Isis.
P.S. Posting phone back.
I got up as the train was slowing, took my travelling hat down from the overhead luggage rack, lifted my Sitting Board and walked up the carriage to collect my kit-bag. I passed an elderly couple sitting in seats whose reservations labels read from Aberdeen to York, and pointed Uncle Mo out to them, asking them to wake him before York and make sure he got off. They agreed and I thanked them.