Christopher Uptake

by Susan Price

  I dressed, and left the house and its dark corners as soon as there was some light in the sky. I walked out to the fields, where the light poured down, white, clear and cold, and the grass was white with mist and rain. I looked back at the houses, and they seemed shrunken. I looked out over the white, shining sky. The pictures that had appeared before my eyes in a darkened room could not survive so much light, but my thoughts were brilliantly illuminated. It was my fault. I would not watch a cock-fight, but I had sold people. But what could I do? How could I go back and untangle myself from the tangle of accidents and coincidences that had led to the arrests?

  People began to leave the houses behind me. Some of them had to cross the fields. and they stared at me curiously as they passed. It started to rain. I remained where I was until the water had soaked through to my shirt and was trickling down my back: then I was suddenly angry with myself. Could my being wet atone for what I had done? I left the fields. and went to the Bear.

  I spent all day there, listening to anyone who wanted to talk. By the late afternoon, when the theatre emptied, I was dull-headed from the beery air in the tavern, and my head ached, and I was very tired. I dared not go back to my lodgings, where the horrible thoughts and pictures would come again. As the afternoon went on into evening, the tavern filled, and I became so tired that I left off propping up my head, and laid it down on my folded arms. I went to sleep.

  I was woken, at some later time, by a noise near me, and lifted my head and looked about. The tavern was just as crowded as earlier. I laid down my head again, and was half-asleep, when someone touched my shoulder and spoke. I started up in dread, confused by the colour, movement and smell of a tavern I had not expected to see.

  "I am sorry," someone said. "I meant to wake you, but not to alarm you."

  I turned my head to see the man who had spoken. He was sitting beside me on the bench. He had a large- featured, square face, its squareness emphasized by his thick, dark beard, and the moustache which had been trimmed to outline his wide mouth. His nose was large and hooked; his eyes, large and round-lidded, were dark, and set deeply under thick brows.

  "Who are you?" I asked.

  He smiled, with a slight tilt of his head, and said, in a way that was almost shy, "Brentwood.''

  "Brentwood?'' I rubbed at my eyes and remembered the letter and the money. "Oh - I have to thank you - ''

  "No.'' He held up a broad hand. "I want no thanks. Anything I may have given you was in deserved and earned payment. Are you well, Christopher?''

  "I am very well, thank you, sir. And how are you?"

  He shook his head slightly, and smiled. "I am not sleeping in a tavern. Are you in difficulties? - Forgive me, but - you have had to leave your lodgings, perhaps?''

  "Oh - no. I'm tired," I said. "Tired, sir, that's all." He nodded again, questioning. "I have been up all night, sir."

  "Are you working night and day on a new play for us?"

  "No," I said "It's those Catholics."

  He smiled. "You will need to explain a little more.''

  Again, I looked at him. Why did he want explanations? But that I was an informer did not mean everyone else was. In a mixture of irritation, defiance, and a desire to tell someone, I said, "Haven't you heard of the twenty Catholics who were arrested - just recently?'' I looked away from him and watched the people at the other tables.

  The pause before Brentwood's answer was very long this time. I let my head slip down against my hand so that, looking sideways, I could see him, and guess why he had not answered. He was watching me, a small, brilliant point of light caught in each of his eyes.

  "I had heard of it," he said. "That is what has been keeping you awake? Had you a relative among them, or a friend?"

  "No."

  "You had no personal connection with these people, and yet, a week after their arrest, concern for them keeps you awake at night?"

  "I heard of their arrest only yesterday. I have been out of town. I went home with the money you gave me."

  Another pause. "Not many people would feel so strongly for criminals who were neither relations nor friends."

  I did not answer him. I tilted my head toward the table, leaning on my hand, and closed my eyes.

  Brentwood asked, "Are you a Catholic sympathizer?''

  I opened my eyes, alarmed. Having said what I had, it would seem suspicious if I did not answer, but if I gave him an answer, to whom might he report it? "I am," I said, carefully, eventually. "To some extent. They should not be persecuted for believing in something that - " I stopped, realizing that denying the existence of God was an even worse offence than being a Catholic. "That - that all of us believe in, each in his own way." I drew a deep breath of relief and thankfulness for platitudes. "Even pagans have their Gods and - " I looked up at his quiet eyes as I heard myself expressing yet another heresy.

  "You are not writing anything now?" I shook my head. "I am sorry. I hope that you find inspiration soon - I think that you would sleep more comfortably in your bed at home, do not you?"

  "Thank you, sir," I said. "I am going home now.”

  I shook hands with him and he said, "God be with you," and went away.

  I remained at my table, leaning my head in my hands. But I could not spend the night in the Bear, so, eventually, I started back to my lodgings.

  The cold, wet streets woke me, but then the thicker air of my lodgings made me wearier than before. I have no memory of climbing the stairs, undressing, or getting into bed, although I must have done all these things. I slept, because I was so tired. I had no bad dreams, and I didn't wake, and in the morning I was capable of reason.

  It was quite possible, I argued to myself - indeed, it was probable - that the information I had sold had not helped toward the arrest of the Catholics in any way. How could a lying description of an old man help anyone to find a secret chapel? And so I passed the day in comparative peace - but when it grew dark, I grew nervous once more. I had told them in which district to look. I had described a man for them to follow.

  It was my fault. Again I could not sleep; the same horrific sights and sounds followed me round my room and pushed in front of my eyes when I tried to read; and when I covered my eyes, I saw these sights more clearly.

  It was a haunting. By day I thought about my own problems and worried about myself, just as usual, only occasionally - with a sudden, sick feeling of shame remembering the catholics. But darkness changed my thinking.

  At night I could not forget the catholics or what they were suffering, and I came to hate myself even for pitying them, because I thought: You are more sorry for your own loss of sleep than for the people you have injured.

  During my fourth sleepless night, I discovered that the only way to rid myself of these night-visions was to call them up deliberately, to watch them, to repeat them. When they were invited, half their power to frighten was gone, and, when they were examined and explored, though still repellent, they were dead and harmless. They could be ignored.

  Having prevented these thoughts from keeping me awake, the memory of what I had done began to fade, and, when I did remember, I was able to put it out of my mind quickly. Perhaps Bagthorpe was sent to make me remember.

  I was standing outside a book-shop, looking through the books which were displayed on trestle-tables near the door, when a man came and stood beside me, turning over the pages as I was doing, and occasionally glancing at me as if he was waiting for me to go so that he could reach those books which were in front of me. I was about to move aside for him, when he said, "Christopher Uptake?''

  I was surprised, and looked at his face. I had never seen this man before, and I should have remembered him if I had, because he had curling hair of a very bright, harsh red. "Yes?'' I said. "Should I know you?"

  He grinned. All his teeth were very square and small. "No. You are the Christopher Uptake who sells Catholics?"

  I started back from him even before I fully realized what he had said. I stared at him; then turned an
d hurried away along the street.

  He followed me, and caught at my arm. "I have something to say to you - There is money in it."

  I jerked my arm away from him and walked on with such long strides that I was almost running.

  He kept pace with me, and actually took hold of my arm again. I saw that he was as tall as I, and his way of standing suggested youth, but his face, which was brown and red, deeply creased, and of a rough, cracked texture, almost like the cracking of dried mud, showed him to be many years older. He smiled at me, amused by my anger and speechlessness, and said, "The pay is better than free-lancing."

  I pulled away from him again, and ran back to my lodgings, where I spent the evening in reading and trying to behave as if I had no worries - but I was afraid. I had not told anyone of how I had sold the information about the Catholics, so how had this man known? I was afraid that this proved that I had been the cause of the Catholics' arrest.

  But I was not going to let guilt get such a hold as it had before. I was always ready to think of the play I was reading, or to plan how much cheese I should buy when my present stock ran out. I sat up late, but told myself that there was nothing unusual in that, I often sat up late. At two in the morning, I went to bed, having forgotten the Catholics completely.

  I woke from a nightmare. I had dreamed of a giant hacking, with a cleaver or an axe, at a man who lay at his feet. Blood had flowed everywhere, in streamers, as it does at cockfights, but the terror of this dream had not lain so much in what was done as in the words which the giant yelled as he chopped: terrifying threats, things too horrible for any person to think of doing to another; horrible words - my words. It was my dream.

  The picture and the shouting vanished the instant I woke, and I could recall only the sense of the words. Even that made me afraid, in a cold, dreading way that I had not experienced before. I was afraid to leave my room, but I went out anyway, because I could see no sense in giving way to the fear. I went to the Bear, as usual, and the red-headed man was there. I recognized him at once by the perfect round of tight, red curls which made his head, as it rose above the slumped shoulders of those round him, seem so neat and small.

  Dick was sitting at a table near the door. I edged over to him. "That man over there," I said. "Curling hair, carroty, stands very straight - do you know who he is?"

  Dick looked. "Him. I don't know him, no - but he's been asking about you."

  "Asking - ? Asking what?"

  "Oh - asked did we know you, what were you like . . . Said he was looking for somebody who he'd heard had been seen with you. His brother, I think he said."

  "Oh,'' I said, and left, intending not to return to the Bear until I was sure this man, whoever he was, and whatever he wanted, had stopped looking for me.

  I kept away from all the places where I might usually be found. I crossed the river and walked beyond the few houses there into the open fields, and wandered there all day, only returning to the town at dusk. I had much to think about. Was this red-headed man some friend of the Catholics who had been arrested? Had he somehow heard that I had sold information concerning them? If so, I did not deny his right to revenge, but I did not intend to let him have it if I could prevent him.

  But he had offered me money, and he had said that 'the pay' was better than 'free-lancing'. The only sense I could make of that was that he was offering me money for more information, which made me more determined than ever to avoid him. Even if I had possessed more information, I would not have sold it. I did not want another such four sleepless nights. I did not want to hurt anyone else.

  I reached my lodgings after dark, sneaked up to my room, thankfully locked myself in, and set about making myself a supper of bread and my last bit of cheese. I was eating when there was a loud knock on the door a few feet away from me. The noise boomed, and I started, almost choking on breadcrumbs as my breath drew in. I sat very still, holding my breath, and hoping that whoever was outside would go away.

  The knocking came again and a voice shouted, "A message for Mr. Uptake!'' But I knew who it was outside the door. No one would send a message at that time - but - perhaps George - or perhaps Dick, for some reason - I could not think of any reason, but - I took up my candle, unbolted the door, drew it back just far enough for me to look out, and peered round it.

  On the landing, his face lit by my candle, then receding into shadow as the flame flickered, stood the man I had expected to see, his tight round of curls standing neatly away from his neck, his ill-kept little beard hanging from his chin and, below that his shabby, scuffed, and wrinkled leather jacket. When I opened the door he moved quickly, putting his hand on the door-jamb, so I couldn’t slam the door without slamming it on his fingers. He pushed his face into the small space between door and jamb; his tiny, square teeth were all neatly defined by a faint, grey line. "Can we talk now?" he said.

  I drew back and made as if to slam the door, but he moved his hand from the jamb and grabbed my collar. "You could make more money - "

  I tilted the candle I held and put its flame to his hand. He cried out in pain and stepped back, and I slammed the door. I pushed the top bolt across, and kicked across the lower one; then put my ear to the door and listened. There was no sound for a moment, but eventually he said, "Right, my lad." I heard him go away down the stairs. I turned back into the room and packed up all my things in my blanket.

  The next morning, early, I paid what I owed to my landlord - which left me almost penniless - and then went straight to George, whom I found in bed again, and ill. I decided to pool the little money I had with the little that he had, and not to go and see Dick, or even go to the market, until I had no choice.

  There was some food in George's cupboard. The meat had gone bad, and I threw it out of the window, but there were some eggs and some cheese, which I divided between a dish and a cup, and then baked near the fire.

  George wouldn't eat his share because he didn't recognize the dish, and when I offered him the cup, he insisted that he had never seen that before either. They belonged to that somebody else. I spent over an hour trying to persuade him otherwise, but he would not believe me, and he would not eat from a dish or a cup that belonged to someone else. So the food was wasted because I would not eat his share.

  After three days George felt better and went out for the afternoon. I stayed in because I had a play in mind which was beginning to form itself into something more substantial than a mere idea, and I was trying out passages of dialogue. When I grew bored with this, it was almost dark, and, since George had not returned, I went out to look for him.

  He wasn't in the Bear, so I went from one to another of the taverns where he might be, thinking that by spending the evening with him and making sure that he got home safely, I would be saving myself the trouble of searching for him later.

  I took a short cut, which led me along a muddy alley and past the yard of the Talbot inn, a large establishment where George certainly would not be found. I had reached the end of the alley when someone behind me called out, "Hey!''

  I turned and saw, standing in the gateway to the Talbot's yard, a man - a blocky, dark shape, rather. "What?'' I asked.

  "There's somebody hurt here," he said. "Come and help, will you?'' He gestured toward the yard.

  George, I thought. He could have come this way to the Crown, as I had. He might have been attacked and robbed, as I had often feared he would be - but I hesitated and half-decided to walk away. It has always been a trick of thieves to steal your sympathy as well as your money; begging for your help, but giving you none once they have beaten you to the ground.

  "He's hurt badly,'' the dark shape of a man said. "Help me get him into the Talbot."

  It might be George; it was probable that it was George - and the yard would be lit from the windows of the Inn. I started back along the alley.

  "Hurry," said the man, and I hardly noticed how he stepped aside for me at the gateway. I passed through it, and he gave me a swinging blow with his arm which kn
ocked me sideways, off balance. I fell hard against the wall beside the gate, and, before I could straighten, the darkness thickened alarmingly in front of me. Something sharp and cold touched my neck, where my collar was open. The beat of my heart became, in a moment, so fast, so heavy, that I felt dizzy, and every pulse-beat made the knife-point prick me. I braced my knees, in case they should give way and impale me on the point.

  "I have no money," I said. "None."

  "Is this him?"' one of the men asked, and the other muttered and shuffled aside, letting the light from the kitchen windows of the Inn reach my face. They peered at me, evidently being able to see me, even though I could see nothing but two black shapes. "That's him," one said.

  Their voices were almost comforting, as all quiet voices heard in darkness are comforting, and it was strange to hear them while I stood against a wall with a knife at my windpipe.

  "Right then," said one of the voices, and both my arms were gripped tightly above the elbow, and I was pulled away from the wall.