Whit

by Iain Banks

  There was still time to kill; the Full Moon Service would not take place until the evening. Ricky went off to check out the flumes at Stirling swimming pool. We four took tea. Great-aunt Zhobelia reminisced, rambling through her memories like a gracious lady through a flourishing but overgrown and unkempt garden. Morag sat poised in jeans and a silk top, twisting a gold chain on her wrist. Sophi chatted. I dissembled, nervous. Zhobelia said nothing to the others of the secrets she had revealed to me at the nursing home, though whether this was because she was being discreet or just absent-minded it was hard to say; either seemed plausible.

  Ricky reappeared. We had a late lunch in the restaurant. Great-aunt Zhobelia yawned and Morag offered her the use of her and Ricky's room for a lie-down, which she accepted.

  Morag and Ricky went off to the flumes. Sophi and I strolled through the town, doing a bit of window-shopping and just taking the air, walking round the base of the castle and through the strange old cemetery nearby under breezy blue skies and a damp wind. Looking west across the broad flood-plain of the Forth, we could make out the trees surrounding the bend in the river where the Woodbeans' house and the Community lay. I tried not to feel too sick with nervousness.

  We thought we'd lost Great-aunt Zhobelia for a few minutes, arriving back at the hotel to find Morag and Ricky on the brink of telephoning the police because Zhobelia was not in their room, and nowhere else to be seen, either. Then she appeared from the hotel kitchens, accompanied by the chef, chatting.

  We took more tea. I kept asking Sophi the time. The afternoon wore on. Zhobelia went back up to the room to watch a soap opera, but returned a few minutes later, saying it wasn't the same watching it without the old dears there. And then it was time to go, and we went; Great-aunt Zhobelia and I in Sophi's car, Morag and Ricky in the white convertible Ford Escort.

  It took less than ten minutes to arrive at the entrance to the High Easter Offerance estate.

  CHAPTER TWENTY - EIGHT

  We left the cars at the gates and walked down the shady drive. My stomach felt huge and hollow, resounding to the beat of my thudding heart.

  'Want me to come along?' Sophi asked, just before we got to her house.

  'Please,' I said.

  'Okay, then,' she said, winking at me.

  We helped Great-aunt Zhobelia over the bridge across the Forth. She chuckled to see how dilapidated the bridge had become. 'Oh yes. I think we're safe from tigers here!' she laughed.

  We walked slowly up the curving track to the buildings. Zhobelia nodded approvingly at the re-pointed orchard wall, but tutted over the state of the grass on the lawn in front of the greenhouses and verbally scolded the two goats concerned, which lay on the grass, chewing the cud and looking at us with insolent unconcern.

  The gate had been drawn across the arched gateway that led into the courtyard. This was not uncommon when there was a big Service taking place. It occurred to me we might be better going round the long way anyway, so we opened the door to the greenhouse and walked through.

  Zhobelia sniffed a few blooms on the way through and prodded the earth in the flower pots. I got the impression she was looking for faults. I rubbed my sweaty hands on my trousers.

  A terrible thought occurred to me. I let the others walk on a little way while I stopped with Zhobelia, who was looking at a complicated arrangement of hydroponic pipe work.

  'Great-aunt,' I said quietly.

  'Yes, dear?'

  'I just thought; did you ever mention that little book and the money and so on… to anybody else?'

  She looked puzzled for a moment, then shook her head. 'Oh no; never.' She brought her head closer to mine and lowered her voice. 'Glad I mentioned it to you though, oh yes. Been a burden off my back, I'll tell you. Best forgotten now, if you ask me.'

  I sighed. Fine, but my confidence was shaken. If I hadn't thought of that until now, what else might have escaped me? Well, it was a little late to turn back now. Sophi, Ricky and Cousin Morag waited at the far end of the greenhouse. I smiled at them, then took Zhobelia's elbow gently in my hand. 'Come on, Great-aunt.'

  'Yes. Lot of pipes, aren't there? All very complicated.'

  'Yes,' I said. 'All very complicated.'

  We exited the greenhouse's humid, mustily perfumed warmth beside the door I had crept out of on my way to burgle the office a few days earlier. We continued round, past the outhouses and some of the old buses and vans which had been converted into dormitories and extra greenhouses. Zhobelia tapped the bodywork of an old coach with her knuckles.

  'Bit rusty,' she said, sniffing.

  'Yes, Great-aunt,' I said, choosing not to point out that the bodywork was aluminium.

  We entered the courtyard from the north. The sound of distant singing-in-tongues was sweet, and brought a lump to my throat. I took a deep breath and looked in through the windows of the schoolroom as we headed for the main doors of the mansion house. Somebody was standing at the far end of the room, drawing on the blackboard with coloured chalk. It looked like Sister Angela. The children were sat at their desks watching Sister Angela; some had their hands up. Little Flora, Sister Gay's eldest, turned round and looked at me. I waved. She smiled broadly and waved, then put up her hand and waved it urgently. I heard her shouting out. Other small heads turned to look at us.

  I walked to the main doors and held them open for Great-aunt Zhobelia, Sophi, Ricky and Cousin Morag.

  'Okay?' I asked Morag.

  She patted my arm. 'Fine. You?'

  'Nervous,' I admitted.

  The singing was very loud in the front hall, swelling out of the meeting room's closed double doors to our left. Sister Angela opened the door on the other side of the hall. She looked surprised. She looked at Ricky and Morag, then Zhobelia. Her mouth opened.

  'Sister Angela,' I said. 'Ricky. Sister Zhobelia. I believe you know Sister Morag. Shall we?' I nodded into the classroom.

  'Little Angela, eh?' said Zhobelia as we trooped into the classroom. 'I don't suppose you remember me, do you?'

  'Ah… not that… well, yes, but… ah; children? Children!' Angela shouted, clapping her hands. She introduced the others to them en masse, and the dozen or so little ones dutifully said Good Evening. Across the hallway, the sound of singing-in-tongues gradually subsided and then ceased.

  'Would you tell my Grandfather that Sister Zhobelia would like to see him?' I asked Angela. She nodded, then left the room.

  Zhobelia sat in the teacher's chair. 'Have you all been good?' she asked the children. A chorus of Yeses came in return. I took a piece of scrap paper from the pile on the teacher's desk and wrote a number on it.

  Sister Angela came back. 'Ahm,' she said, seemingly uncertain whether to address me or Zhobelia. 'He'll-'

  She was interrupted by Grandfather coming into the room.

  'Are you sure- ?' he said as he entered the room. He was dressed in his best creamy-white robes. He saw me and stopped, looking more surprised than angry. I nodded to him and pressed the little sheet of paper into his hand. 'Good day, Grandfather.'

  'What… ?' he said, looking round, glancing down at the bit of paper, and then staring at Zhobelia.

  She waved. 'Hello, my dear.'

  Grandfather started over to her. 'Zhobelia…' he said. He looked at Sophi and Ricky and then stared at Morag, who was half sitting on the teacher's desk, arms folded.

  I kept near Grandfather's shoulder. 'I think you should look at that bit of paper, Grandfather,' I said quietly.

  'What?' He looked back at me. His face reddened as his expression turned from shock to anger. 'I thought you'd been told-'

  I put my hand on his arm. 'No, Grandfather,' I said quietly and evenly. 'Everything has changed. Just look at the paper.'

  He scowled, then did as I asked.

  I'd written a number on the scrap of paper.

  954024.

  For a while I was worried that it was too subtle a way of getting through to him, that too much time had passed and he'd simply forgotten. He stared d
own in silence at the number on the paper, looking mystified.

  Damn, I thought. It's just a string of numbers. Meaningless to him now. What had I been thinking of? He probably hadn't thought of that number in forty-five years; he certainly wouldn't have seen it. Is, Is; you idiot.

  The number my Grandfather was looking at was his old army serial number.

  Eventually, after what seemed like a long time to me, and while I was still cursing myself for a damned fool and wondering how else I might get through to him, his face changed, and slowly lost that look of anger. For a moment he visibly sagged, as though deflated, but then seemed to drag himself back upright. Even so, his face seemed crumpled, and he looked suddenly five years older. I swallowed down a feeling of sickness and tried to ignore the tears pricking behind my eyes.

  He stared at me with big, bright eyes. His face looked as white as his hair. The sheet of paper dropped from his fingers. I stooped and caught it, then - as he swayed - took him by one arm and guided him back towards the desk. Morag moved away as he sat down on the edge, staring at the floor, breathing quickly and shallowly.

  Zhobelia patted Grandfather on his other arm.

  'Are you all right, dear? You don't look that well, you know. My, we've got old, haven't we?'

  Grandfather took her hand and squeezed it, then looked up at me. 'Will you… ?' he said quietly, then looked round at Morag, Sophi and Angela. 'Would you excuse me… ?'

  He stood. He did not seem to notice my hand, still supporting him. He looked into my eyes for a moment, a small frown on his face, for all the world as though he had forgotten who I was, and for another moment 1 was terrified that he was going to have a heart attack or a stroke or something awful. Then he said, 'Would you come… ?' and pushed himself away from the desk.

  I followed him. He stopped at the door and looked back at the others. 'Ah, excuse us, please.'

  In the hall he stopped again, and again seemed to pull himself upright. 'Perhaps we could take a turn round the garden, Isis,' he said.

  The garden;' I said. 'Yes, that's a good idea…'

  * * *

  And so we walked in the garden, in the late-evening sun, my Grandfather and I, and I told him what I knew of his background and where I had found it, though not what and who had led me there. I showed him a copy I'd taken of the newspaper report and said that I had sent another one in a sealed envelope to Yolanda, to be kept by her lawyers. He nodded once or twice, a slightly distracted look on his face.

  I told him, too, that Allan had been deceiving all of us, and that his lies would have to be dealt with. Grandfather did not seem very surprised or shocked by that.

  At the far end of the formal garden there is a stone bench which looks down a steep grassy slope to the weeds, rushes and mud of the river bank. Beyond, the fields stretched to a distant line of trees, with the hills and escarpment beyond under a sky patched with cloud.

  My Grandfather put his head in his hands for a moment, and I thought he might be about to weep, but he merely gave a single long sigh, then sat there, hands hanging over his knees, head bowed, staring at the path beneath us. I let him do this for a while, then - tentatively - put my arm over his shoulders. I more than half expected him to flinch at my touch and throw off my arm and shout at me, but he did not.

  'I did a bad thing once,' he said quietly, flatly. 'I did one bad thing, Isis; one stupid thing… I was a different man then; a different man. I've spent the rest of the time trying to… trying to make up for it… and I have. I think I have.'

  He went on like this for a while. I patted his back and made encouraging noises now and again. I still worried in a distant kind of way that he might suffer some attack or seizure, but mostly I was simply surprised at how unaffected I felt by all this, and how cynical my attitude seemed to have become. I did not comment on his claim that everything he had done since his crime had been to atone for it. Instead, I let him talk on while I turned over in my mind again my choice between the destructive truth and the protective lie.

  I felt like Samson in the temple, able to tear it down. I thought of the children in the classroom with Sister Angela, and wondered what right I had to bring the stones of our Faith tumbling down on those innocent little heads. Well, I supposed, no more than I had the right to decide for them they should be brought up within a Faith founded on a great lie.

  Perhaps I should just behave as everybody else seemed to behave, here as elsewhere, and settle the matter according to my own selfish interests… except I could not even decide in which direction that would take me either; part of me still wanted to take my revenge on the Faith by shaking it to its very foundations, to exercise the power - the real power - I knew I now possessed just by having discovered what I had, and bring as much as possible of it crashing down about those who had wronged me, leaving me to look on from outside, from above, at the resulting chaos, ready to pick up the resulting pieces and rearrange them however I saw fit.

  Another part of me shrank from such apocalyptic dreams and just wanted everything to go back - as much as was possible - to the way it had been before all this had started, though with a feeling of personal security based this time on knowledge and hidden authority, not ignorance and blithe naivety.

  Another part of me just wanted to walk away from all of it.

  But which to choose?

  Eventually, my Grandfather sat upright. 'So,' he said, gazing at the mansion house, not me. 'What is it you want, Isis?'

  I sat there on the cool stone, feeling calm and clear and detached; cold and still, as though my heart was made of stone.

  'Guess,' I said, speaking from that coldness in my soul.

  He glanced at me with hurt eyes, and for a moment I felt both cruel and petty.

  'I'm not leaving,' he said quickly, looking down at the gravel path at our feet. 'It wouldn't be fair to everybody else: They rely on me. On my strength. On my word. We can't abandon them.' He glanced back, to see how I was taking all this.

  I didn't react.

  He looked up at the sky now. 'I can share. You and I; we can share the responsibility. I've had to live with this,' he told me. 'All these years; had to live with it. Now it's your turn to share that burden. If you can.'

  'I think I could cope,' I told him.

  He glanced at me again. 'Well, then; that's settled. We don't tell them.' He coughed. 'For their own good.'

  'Of course.'

  'And Allan?' he asked, still not looking at me. The breeze brought the noise of bird-song across the lawn, flower beds and gravel paths to us, then took it away again.

  'I think it was he who put the vial of zhlonjiz in my bag,' I told him. 'Though he may have got somebody else to carry out the actual physical act. It was certainly he who forged the letter from Cousin Morag.'

  He glanced at me. 'Forged?'

  'She hasn't written for two months. It's true she wasn't going to come to the Festival, but the rest was all a fabrication.'

  I explained about the holiday Morag and her manager had arranged, which had only been postponed at the last minute. I told him about Allan lying about me to Morag, so that she would avoid both me and the Community.

  'He has a portable phone, does he?' Grandfather asked when I got to that part. He shook his head. 'I knew he crept down there most nights,' he said, sighing and wiping his nose with his handkerchief. 'I thought it was a woman, or maybe drugs or something…' He sat forward, hunching over, elbows on his knees. He wound the handkerchief round and round in his hands.

  'I hear since I've been away he's been… helping you with the revisions to the Orthography,' I said.

  He looked round at me, but then could not hold my gaze, and had to look away again.

  'Tell me, what changes has he inspired, Grandfather?'

  Grandfather seemed physically to grope for words, his hands waving in the air. 'He…' he began. 'We…'

  'Let me guess,' I said, trying to keep the bitterness out of my voice. 'You have heard God tell you that primogeniture is back,
that Allan and not I should inherit the control of the Order when you die.' I gave him time to answer, but he did not choose to do so. 'Is that right?' I asked.

  'Yes,' he said quietly. 'Something like that.'

  'And Leapyearians… what of us? Where do we figure in this new regime?'

  'To be respected,' he said, still not looking back at me. I heard him swallow. 'But…'

  'But without power.'

  He didn't speak, but I saw him nod.

  I sat there, looking at his back for a while. He was looking down at the handkerchief, still winding it round and round in his hands.

  'I think that all has to be changed back, don't you?' I said softly.

  'So that's your price, is it?' he asked bitterly.

  'If you want to put it like that, yes,' I said. 'Restoration, Grandfather. My restoration. That's what I want.'

  He looked back, angry again. 'I can't just…' he began, his voice raised. But again he could not maintain his gaze, and looked away from me, his words dying on his lips.

  'I think, Grandfather,' I said, slowly and softly, 'if you listen hard enough for the Voice of God you may well hear it tell you something which could have the desired effect. Don't you?'

  He sat for a while, then looked round, his eyes moist. 'I am not a charlatan,' he said, and indeed sounded genuinely hurt. 'I know what I felt, what I heard… back then, back at the start. It's just since then…'

  I nodded slowly for a few moments, wondering what to say about Zhobelia's visions. Eventually I said, 'I didn't accuse you of being a charlatan.'

  He looked away again, went back to winding the handkerchief round his fingers for a moment, then stopped, made an angry noise and stuffed the hanky back in a pocket. 'What do you want of Allan?'

  I told him what I wanted.

  He nodded. 'Well,' he said, and sounded relieved. 'We'll have to put that to him, won't we?'

  'I think we ought to,' I agreed.

  'Your brother has… ideas, you know,' he said, sounding regretful.