Literally so? I wonder about this. Has there really been time and opportunity to programme me?
Or …
Or could it in fact be something else? Could it be merely that it makes good sense to try to escape the dogs? For if I don’t what happens? They either savage me or else bring me to bay. Whichever, I’m back in the hands of my captors, from there to be passed on for punishment. If savaged of course I’m subject to yet further quantities of pain … which might well augment my daily menu but otherwise won’t alter anything. Similarly it makes good sense to escape the fliers, since my failure to do so—there, too—will mean a swift return to jail.
Yet if I really have some element of choice … then couldn’t I force myself to remain inside the canyon? Now that I know what lies ahead, it would be idiotic—lunacy—not to focus every last billionth atom on avoidance. That canyon might even serve as a bolt hole: one among whose rocks I could maybe eke out some Robinson-Crusoe-type existence for the rest of time—apart that is from the hours spent getting there and the hours spent sleeping in the barn? Need such an existence be altogether joyless? Couldn’t I try to profit from my own unstated advice to Mr Tibbotson: sing, dance, attempt to think positively? Even humorously.
More—I could sunbathe, do physical jerks, find makeshift weights to keep me healthy. (For what?)
I could invent and improvise in ways at present unimaginable. But Robinson Crusoe himself would have wanted to take stock before deciding what might or mightn’t be imaginable. And if I could indeed manage to stay, possibly my days in the canyon would be sufficiently varied to stave off at least some of that hellish dreaded boredom. (Oh Lord! Was boredom already something to be dreaded once more?)
However if by that sheer expenditure of will I can remain won’t the helicopters then try to flush me out—the helicopters or the hounds? All right; I shall refuse to budge! Whatever the unpleasantness which may result from this there’ll still have been the pushing back of boundaries. I can hardly believe it. There is hope.
Or am I getting wildly—that is, groundlessly—optimistic?
No.
I am simply stepping out in faith. That is what I am doing.
And for the second time, sweating profusely, intermittently blinded and feeling that my lungs have reached the bursting point, I tear into the canyon.
Eventually I pause again and double over whilst gradually the pumping slows and the breathing grows less laboured. From now on I shall simply walk.
And as I say I’ll try to stop. I’ve even planned where I shall try to stop. There’s a place where—against the right-hand wall of the ravine—two boulders, set roughly four or five feet apart, obtrude onto the track. Yesterday it crossed my mind they might conceivably form a narrow room: a tiny three-walled refuge. Ideally I’d have liked them more centrally positioned since they’re only a very short distance from that terrifying exit point. But, ultimately, even such proximity could prove beneficial. The noise of war will serve as grim reminder if ever I feel tempted to bemoan the tedium of sanctuary. And anyway why should I need to remain in that particular spot once my independence is established? For one day at least I’ll have the run of the terrain.
What confidence—though perhaps only due to the fact I’d slept so well! A further restless night and my buoyancy might all have been destroyed?
Naturally the sky seen from the canyon is once more blue. Even at this depth shafts of sunlight still fall across my path. Birdsong returns: each chirrup corresponding to its counterpart of yesterday? Drawing closer to those two boulders (and maybe growing paranoid again) I suddenly wonder about the possibility of some force field I shouldn’t be able to cross; then in a panic start to pray, totally forgetting that God apparently has no dominion over the devil—and that anyhow there was a lengthy portion of the previous day when I’d been telling him explicitly how much I hated him. But old habit dies hard; especially in emergency. And despite all the horrors of the world, I now remember the God who cured my brother Simon’s meningitis and assisted me to win the long-jump championship, the God whom I felt performed any number of small things throughout my boyhood and early adolescence to convince me that he really did exist; a helpmate and a friend who truly cared. Events like my meeting with Brad had consolidated a slightly wavering belief: five seconds later he’d have left the pub and I’d have lost him. (If I had lost him of course I shouldn’t be in my present pitiful position. But that doesn’t change my thankfulness—not basically, no way—despite what I might say, or rather yell, under extreme duress.)
As usual I try to incorporate into my prayer all feelings of gratitude; which unfailingly include both Brad and my family. And my friends.
But now I’ve reached the stones.
So this’ll be it.
Of course you can.
Oh Brad I can’t.
Bullshit. Take hold of yourself. Don’t even think. Just do.
For a moment I listen to the sounds of slaughter. But I do think. I think about the battlefields; I think about the torture chair. I turn into my refuge, whip round so as to be facing outwards, brace myself between the pair of stones—and wait.
A side step executed in a second. I may have taken them by surprise. No force field.
But I suspect that if they pull me out a force field can be set there in an instant. And it occurs to me that to pull me out they may resort to some kind of suction device: a mini-whirlwind for example. Or in default of suction a mountain lion—a cobra—a tarantula? Again, though, I feel I should hardly be envisaging such way-out possibilities; and for the time being simply continue to brace myself between those rocks … as if for all the world I were Samson and about to push down the pillars of the temple.
25
However there was one way-out possibility which I had not envisaged. They say the devil can quote scripture. What they don’t mention is that he’s also pretty expert at impersonation. I heard my name being called. I had been there less than three minutes and I heard my name being called. I had expected force of some kind. I had not expected sweetness. I hadn’t thought I might be listening to the voice of Brad.
“Danny? Can you hear me? Don’t be scared. It’s me.”
I said nothing. My heart did all sorts of stopping, beat-skipping, soaring, sinking things; it must have run the full gamut. But even so I said nothing.
The counterfeit called: “You see, I didn’t want to give you too much of a shock.” (What the devil was he talking about?) The tone was tentative even though it next attempted humour. “Bring on a heart attack or something.”
Brad wouldn’t have said ‘shock’; he would have said ‘surprise’.
So I decided I wasn’t going to provide the satisfaction of an answer; any answer. Did they really think I could be fooled as easily as this? To some extent I might have got the better of them but they must still consider me a very poor kind of opponent.
Good! Well that could work to my advantage.
“Darling it’s me it truly is. I know what you’re thinking. Since you died I’ve known everything you’ve been thinking. Every single thing. I’ve been with you every step of the way. Literally.”
This was diabolical; and I wasn’t the type who could keep quiet indefinitely, no matter how wonderfully frustrating I thought it would prove for the enemy. “You’re wasting your breath!” I shouted back coldly.
And think now. What sort of sense would it ever make for Brad to be in hell? He had neither taken his own life nor was he remotely evil.
“Those aren’t the sole requirements.” God this was insidious. The person or the thing out there had even caught the underlying chuckle so heart-piercingly familiar. “There’s another one: running in pursuit of somebody you love—somebody you always did love, deeply, but whom all the same you’ve come to love inexpressibly more with every passing moment. I told you I’d come back for you. I know you haven’t forgotten it so I’m almost forced to conclude that you didn’t take me for a man of my word. Despite tautology.”
“I can’t come in,” he said. “This is your final test. You need to trust in God and simply to step out in faith. Which we both know is a phrase you yourself have lately had in mind—and a precept you’ve been straining to put into practice right from the beginning. So come on. Show you’re ready now to lean back on him entirely. You’ve shown love; you’ve shown hope; you’ve shown charity. Only one thing remains and then you’re through.”
I smiled very slowly. He shouldn’t have said that. The counterfeit shouldn’t have said that. I mean certainly not those first few words … which had rendered all the rest of it fallacious. And just at that very moment when I might actually have been weakening! Thank you God oh thank you God.
This slip suggested that—very poor kind of opponent or not—I was at least a little more alert than he was.
For had he forgotten? Scarcely three minutes ago? You see, I didn’t want to give you too much of a shock. His exact words.
And the inference to be drawn? The obvious, indeed the only possible inference? That otherwise he wouldn’t merely have called out from a distance in order to give me warning; he’d have charged straight in and thrown his arms about me; impatiently dispensing with preliminaries.
Besides the counterfeit was very nearly pleading. (What did that remind me of?) The counterfeit was almost holding out a bribe. This surely shouldn’t be the way that good things happened.
No. I was steadied by the cool smoothness of the stone against my palms. I couldn’t go back to Scotland. I couldn’t go back to France. I couldn’t go back to the Gestapo. There were those no doubt who’d been through similar experiences and had managed to retain their faith—their belief in the ultimate victory of good. I envied them this strength and was totally amazed by it, made to feel indescribably humble and undeserving, but I was not and never could be of such calibre. There were certain places in this world where faith just wasn’t viable. There were certain places in this world where God had never been.
The counterfeit said: “Danny you’re wrong. You know the Creed better than I do. ‘And he descended into hell and on the third day …’”
For some reason I felt the tears begin to well. “Then what did he do while he was there? Pop out for an ice-cream sundae? If so I hope it gave him indigestion.”
“It may well have done—what he did while he was there. Chronic indigestion. He comforted the suffering. He stood beside the torture chair and entered in and instilled that incredible strength you’ve just been wondering at.”
Plausible. Oh, glib.
“Well in that case why has he broken me?”
“And is that how you truly see yourself my love? But just look at you! Fighting every single bloody inch of the way!”
Oh Brad. I am broken. What shall I do? Wherever you are—you the real you the bona fide Brad Overton—just tell me what I ought to do.
I hadn’t asked this out aloud.
But of course that didn’t make much difference.
“Listen Danny. Please listen. This is the real bona fide me. And when I said that stuff about not wanting to bring on a heart attack I agree it was just plain stupid. But there are three points you’ve got to let me make. Firstly we don’t stop expressing ourselves badly just because we’re dead. Not all at once. Secondly I think that even good things—if they happen too abruptly—can sometimes come as something of a shock. But I was nervous and I know I paved the way quite clumsily.”
“Nervous of me? The man you claim to have lived with for over the past two years? Oh yes. Naturally. I can fully understand that.”
“Nervous you idiot that I might say the wrong thing. Make a total cock-up. (As in fact I have.) But surely you must know: one always does get nervous with somebody one loves. Before the future’s all tied up that is—while things could still go either way.”
“And the third point?” I inquired. Dry. Deadpan. Conceding nothing. “You did say there were three points?”
“And the third point: we’re on the devil’s ground, remember. He’s frightened you’re about to get away and he’s contesting it like mad. There’s nothing he’d like better than to see me make that total cock-up.”
“Which you said was already made.”
“I’m hoping it’s retrievable. That so far it’s only partial.”
“Anyhow. He’s frightened that I’m about to get away then is he? So what about yourself?”
I’d kind of thought this was in the nature of a trick question. But I wasn’t too sure how. In any case it was supposed to be ironic.
“I’m sorry?”
“I mean—isn’t he frightened you’re going to get away as well?”
“But no that doesn’t enter into it. So far as he’s concerned I’m just visiting. A free agent.”
“Although he knows you’ve come to take me back?” I realized then that I had indeed set a trap even without being fully aware of what it was. And now I could really hear the note of triumph in my voice—was ever any note of triumph more completely and pathetically specious? “I assume then they never told you a person can only be released from hell when somebody cares for him enough to take his place?”
“Oh Danny do you think I don’t care for you enough to take your place?”
“And would you even know what it involves to take my place?”
“Yes I would. As I mentioned, I’ve been with you every step of the way. Every solitary step of the way. In fact my own testing has been wholly tied up with yours, from the very first moment of the crash and even before you took your life—because it was known of course you were about to do that. Not by me though. I was dumbfounded, staggered, literally can’t express the gratitude I felt, even if at the same time I would have given anything not to have you do it. But that’s why I had to leave the Halfway House before you yourself arrived. Again I would have given anything to be allowed to stay but …” There was a pause. “So yes. Oh God yes. To answer your question—I do know what it involves.”
“To answer it in brief.”
“Yes. Always admirably succinct.”
It seemed the two of us were enjoying a small joke.
“So in that case how could you ever have thought that you would get away?”
He replied very gently: “I didn’t commit suicide.”
“Throwing God’s most precious gift back in his face? The ultimate sin? Even less forgivable than murder?” Again, though, my tone had aimed at irony. The counterfeit made no response.
But was he that? Was he? Oh Brad … Wherever you are please don’t give up on me. If I have ever needed to know you’re there I need to know you’re there right now.
“That isn’t the point,” I said. “You’re here in hell; apparently you’re here in hell. That’s what matters. So I need to have an answer. If you release me what makes you think that you can get away as well?”
“Oh my love my love. You ask one heck of a lot of questions! But then of course you always did. People used to comment.”
Which clearly meant he hadn’t anything to say to that last and truly all-important one.
“Oh why don’t you just go home?” I cried. “Go home! Back to wherever you’ve come from! I really can’t be arsed to listen to any more of your stupid damned lies. And besides.” I felt less angry now than plain dispirited. “Even if you had been the real Brad this ploy of yours could never have worked. Do you honestly believe I’d have let the real Brad take over from me here? I know the likes of you won’t ever understand this but you’d still have been wasting your time. Perhaps a crumb of consolation?”
He started crying. The counterfeit started crying for God’s sake. I could hear it distinctly.
“Yes, shame,” I said. “It sure is a hard world out there! Is Daddy going to be most frightfully cross with you? You’ll have to make him see it was an absolutely no-win situation—even he couldn’t have done better. Either that or else you�
��ve just got to take your medicine like a proper man.”
I had reckoned this was the last weapon in his arsenal. Perhaps it wasn’t, quite. “I love you so much,” he said. “I love you so very very much.”
Yes crocodile tears and crocodile sentiments but the thing was—he sounded so unbelievably like Brad. “Stop it,” I whispered, “stop it, please stop!” I took my hands away from the boulders and tried to block my ears. I started to hum as loudly as I could. After a few seconds I realized what I was humming. ‘Diamonds are a girl’s best friend.’ (Brad had often told me that gentlemen prefer blonds.) I went on for at least another half-minute.
Then I finished humming and also unblocked my ears. “And do we still find you there Mr Telepathy?” Unexpectedly, almost unaccountably, I realized I’d have been disappointed if no answer had come back. Relieved—yes probably—yet weirdly disappointed too.
He said: “‘The only thing you have to do is brush up on your telepathic skills.’ That’s a quote—from not so very long ago. Do you remember?”
That hadn’t been in my mind. It hadn’t been in my mind at all. I hadn’t thought of it even once since that moment he’d first spoken it. (Well, maybe once but only that.) There was more than mere telepathy involved in all of this.
“Of course I do. It was the night on which you died. Correction; forgive me. It was the night on which Brad died.”
“That’s right. We each thought the other had arranged for John to come to pick us up.”
“I will say this for you: you’ve definitely done your homework.” I almost added—with a devotion beyond the call of duty. It was quite true people used to comment on the fact I asked a lot of questions; Brad used to say it was because I was a writer. But this of course was what made the present lies so scarily persuasive: the way they adhered so closely to the truth.
For so much of the time. For so very much of the time.
“By the way, I never knew you sometimes read a Mills & Boon. I’m sorry you felt you couldn’t tell me. Did you really think I might have minded? (Though I agree I would probably have teased you quite a bit. But in that department you always gave back as good as you got—at least as good as you got. Just as in every other.) And also … while we’re vaguely on the subject … thank you my love for leaving a message at the airport for Suzanne.”
On Chasing Brad Through Purgatory Page 18