Ventriloquists

by David Mathew

  The boat (or ship) was being lobbed, port to starboard. Juggled.

  Connors’s brain protested: This doesn’t make sense.

  The old seadog shuffled his way back to Connors, skating the frothing wooden boards for part of the journey with the professionalism of one who has ridden many a tempest. Maybe one who had even enjoyed the rides, if the smile beneath his white beard was anything to go by.

  ‘This is where the largan’s buried, boy! Just below our boots, on the ocean floor!’

  ‘The what?’ Connors shouted back.

  The seadog provided an expression that suggested that the question was among the top two or three most stupid questions ever posed.

  `‘The largan,’ the seadog repeated. ‘The reason why we’re in this skirmish!’

  Connors felt abruptly and acutely more conscious of his ignorance.

  I must be dreaming. It’s just a dream…

  ‘Are you dreaming, boy?’ the seadog demanded at the top of his voice (perhaps not the captain after all, Connors considered). ‘Or are you gonna grab a rope and tug – tug like it’s between you and the Devil! For who falls in the Pit, boy!’

  Then the seadog slapped Connors across his chops.

  Connors jumped. The slap, and the cold wet air that nursed it, lent a sting disproportionately sharp to any that he might have considered possible within the gluey confines of a dream. It was almost as though he could feel the colour red that he was sure his left cheek must have turned.

  The sting was bad. But accepting reality was worse.

  Just at this moment the boat lurched sideways and downwards; it had slid down the slope of a sudden colossal wave… and now everything was shifting – towards the starboard side.

  Connors could not hold onto his rope. With a stomach-tugging drop, he was at the barrier within the space of a few seconds – the barrier that separated him from the water. The impact – chest on wood – was more than enough to wind him, and air left his body with the force of a bullet from a nozzle. Then the pain launched. It was like he’d been struck across the chest with a bat. It was all he could do to hold on to the balustrade – and meanwhile the boat rolled and listed itself, a giant being bullied among other giants.

  His knuckles were pinched white: the cold, the fear, the chilling spray…

  I’m going to drown.

  This was what Connors both thought and dreaded at this moment.

  As the waves climbed again, he emptied his body of piss and vomit.

  Show and Tell

  1.

  The road must be closed, Branston deduced: nothing else would explain the queue. An accident up ahead, perhaps; an unexploded bomb…

  Sod it!

  The one day in the last month that he’d chosen to avoid the bypass! The one day he’d fancied a change of journey on his way to work!

  Fade in…

  Middle-aged man at the wheel of a small car. Anger on his face. Late somewhere. Shaking the wheel.

  Pullback.

  Car is one of a hundred pearls on a five-mile necklace of traffic out of Leighton Buzzard.

  Sod it!

  Branston chose this moment to shake the wheel for real; scripts in his head notwithstanding, he had a job to get to, and if the cars in front didn’t start moving soon he was going to be late for his class. And apart from the work ethic and the stratospheric level of professionalism at which he pitched his lessons, one of the things he took pride in was his punctuality. Those learners needed him! One of them, after all, might make it big in the film business in the future; and Branston had long since believed that in the void left by his own failures to direct an arthouse classic, the best he might hope for was a mention in an awards ceremony acceptance speech.

  Closeup.

  The starlet’s face basted in tears.

  STARLET: But most of all I’d like to thank Tim Branston. He was the one who saw something…

  No.

  …saw a spark of potential in my work, filming Samurai swordfights in Morrison’s car park.

  Branston laughed. Then behind him a horn squawked. ‘Oh wait your pissing turn,’ he shouted, his eyes locked on his rearview mirror. With a brass pair of balls he’d be out of his car…

  Longshot.

  Man exits vehicle and strides back down the road he’s traversed. Points a finger at each driver in turn, expression quizzical.

  MAN: Was it you with the horn, prick? Was it you?

  Four cars back, a sweaty man at the controls. Honks the horn again. MAN bunches a fist and punches the driver’s side window to buggery –

  Branston shook his head.

  – to smithereens… to splinters. MAN reaches through the space and pulls the driver’s fucking head off…

  Another honking at the horn from a car behind, and Branston said, ‘Keep your hair on, squire’ – this time under his breath.

  A policeman was approaching, following the white dotted line in the middle of the road.

  Branston dabbed the switch and the window rolled down.

  ‘Officer? What’s going on?’

  ‘House explosion, sir, in Edlesborough. The road’s jammed. Where are you heading?’

  ‘Luton. Barnfield College. I’ve got a class to deliver at nine o’clock.’

  ‘Well, you won’t get there this way. If I were you I’d do a U-turn. Go up the bypass.’

  Branston nodded and shifted into first. ‘It’s the story of my live,’ he told the constable.

  2.

  He arrived at seven minutes to nine by the dashboard readout, and the possibility that this was not to be his day was swiftly validated: there was nowhere to park. Branston followed lane after lane, sharking for the unlikely chance of someone reversing out of a space. But the universe was not feeling kind this morning. In the end Branston parked half a mile away, at the very periphery of the premises, and halfway up a drainage verge – not a bona fide parking spot anyway, but sod it.

  In a dash he crossed the lot and entered the building. Given everything that had happened so far, he was of a mind that his swipecard would not allow him access; in this respect at least the universe was with him. He slipped through the barrier, strode along the corridor past clumps of students, and ascended the rear stairs. It was nearly a quarter past when he pushed into the classroom, saying ‘Hi – sorry, everyone! Are we all here? Hands up if you’re not here!’

  The class of seven students did not so much as groan: they had heard the hands-up joke on a number of occasions, and term was only a few weeks old.

  Branston typed in his password and took the register. ‘Now. Today’s the day, as you all know: we all get to see each other’s masterpieces.’

  A few of the class tittered. Experiencing relief at the sound, Branston sensed the accumulated anger at his late arrival dissipate. Some of the kids – kids is a forbidden term, he heard his head of department wag – shifted places to accommodate this new understanding. Not seat to seat (no; no one moved to a different chair) but in themselves, a straightening of the backbone, a cleared throat, a readiness. We’re ready.

  ‘I can either flip a coin,’ said Branston, ‘or you can decide among yourselves. Screen’s up.’

  A student named Sammy said, ‘I’ll go first,’ and rose from her seat. The room had been designed for a maximum of twenty, and the front was achieved in a matter of four or five steps. She said, ‘I’m nervous.’

  Branston told her, ‘Don’t forget, I said draft quality. No one’s really expecting a completed meisterwork.’

  ‘That’s lucky,’ Sammy told him, her throat clicking slightly with snapped-off humour. Into the laptop port she slotted her memory-wand (for backup, just in case the internet connection failed her), then she typed the address for her film.

  ‘What’s the piece called?’ Branston asked, partly by way of setting the young woman
’s nerves; partly by way of asserting seniority and a semblance of control.

  ‘”Chuck the Ripper.” It was almost “Chuck the Impaler” but I preferred “Ripper” in the end.’

  Branston said, ‘Good. It’s witty, Sammy.’

  ‘I hope so.’

  The homework assignment brief had been to film and dub something of the students’ own concoction, the guidelines being three to ten minutes, strict. Sammy had chosen a scene close to home – indeed, one inside her own home – in which Chuck the cockerpoo went on his canine rampage around the front room, chewing and snuffling and swinging his head right to left with a broadsheet supplement in the glossy grip of his front teeth.

  The film ended at three minutes and two seconds.

  Feeling otherwise from how he was about to react, Branston said, ‘A noble effort, Sammy.’

  ‘Thanks!’

  Wait for the but…

  ‘But not much, I’m sure you’ll agree, in the way of narrative.’ Branston perched on the edge of his front desk. ‘I mean this: what gives the dog his motivation – why chew that cushion? – and have you presented his story fairly?’

  Sammy paused before responding.

  ‘…He’s a dog,’ she said.

  ‘Precisely. Could we not have cause to learn more about dogs in general from a similar film?’

  ‘I have no idea.’

  ‘My question is rhetorical, Sammy. Chuck the Impaler loves tearing things to shreds: fine. Motion pictures have been built on lesser material; but I wouldn’t want you to go away from today’s lesson believing that a You’ve Been Framed extended mix constitutes the basis of a short film. It didn’t. And if…’ Branston smiled. ‘…I’ve learned anything from you and the rest of this group over the past couple of weeks, it’s the fact that I didn’t believe you’d be so naïve. It needs a good deal of work, Sammy.’

  Having grown increasingly defensive throughout the critique, Sammy told Branston: ‘As you say: a first draft.’

  ‘A first draft,’ Branston replied. ‘No doubt about that – and no problem with that… Who was next?’

  Shabreel said, ‘Me, Tim.’

  ‘Up you come, Yasser.’

  Yasser sashayed to the front of the class. He was as nervous a mouse in Owltown. ‘It’s just called “Market,”’ he said. ‘I hope it speaks for itself.’

  ‘It should!’

  ‘Shall I…’

  ‘Go!’ said Tim Branston.

  3.

  Voiceover (in Yasser’s accent):

  The market has been a staple of Luton High Town for at least thirty years. Nearly everything you could want is for sale.

  In an age in which everyone goes to the shopping centre, it’s nice that the market does all right, though, week in and week out.

  Longshot.

  The market in full swing. Customers and vendors in a graceful ballet. Some of the stalls are not interesting, so people stroll on.

  Cut.

  Closeup on Yasser.

  The Asian youth hands out change to an elderly Oriental gentleman, who walks out of the shot carrying a rake with a large plastic bag sellotaped over its tines.

  Voiceover.

  Some days are fun and the hours roll round like minutes. Other times it’s the other way around, when it’s slow or it’s raining and no one wants to spend any money – and even Snow White in his snacks van’s gone home.

  But today is not going to be either of those typical days. Today is going to be something out of the ordinary for everyone involved. For the entire market community, indeed.

  Cut.

  Midshot.

  A man in his early thirties and a woman in her late twenties wave at the camera. They are white, dressed casually; they are smiling. The man is wearing a black Ramones t-shirt with HEY HO! LET’S GO! on the front in big white letters.

  Voiceover.

  This is John and Eve. They’re friends of mine and my uncle’s. John works in a hardware shop that he’s asked me not to name, and he sells stuff that he gets with his staff discount – and my uncle and I sell it on. Eve works at JB Sports. When I’ve saved up enough I like to buy my trainers and sweats from her because they have a commission system to supplement their peanut wages. And this…

  Camera dips. Closeup on a pushchair. A little girl in a pink bonnet sleeps inside, swaddled in a red blanket.

  Voiceover.

  …this is lovely Eloise. Only eight months old, and already starring in her first film, with no idea she’s about to be going on the ride of her life.

  ‘Good, Yasser, good,’ Branston muttered. ‘Suspense: I like it.’

  ‘Thank you, Tim,’ Yasser replied, glancing now at his classmates for a sign of their thoughts on the matter. All eyes were on the screen mounted on the wall. This was sign enough of their involvement. Yasser felt protective and pleased. Then he said, on the film:

  If you keep your eyes on the top left corner of the screen, you are about to witness a crime, ladies and gentlemen.

  In the foreground of the shot, a man scoops chestnuts into a brown paper bag and is given a banknote, which he deposits in the wren-coloured bumbag he wears over his groin. His fingers dicker with coins until he has the right amount of change to hand over to the stooped Asian lady in her puce yashmak… In the midground, Snow White leans out of the side of his van to hand a parcel of food to the young Polish boy who sells paperbacks. Uncle Wafiq’s head, on this day topped with a pigeon-fancier’s flatcap, slides past; Wafiq does not grant the lens so much as a cheeky grin; but his failure to acknowledge his moment in the spotlight is not noted by the class. After all, they have been instructed to watch the upper left corner of the screen.

  This is where John and Eve are mulling over the possibility of a purchase, at the stall selling ladies’ fashion. The pushchair containing Eloise is three or four metres away.

  Voiceover.

  Eloise is asleep, in the Land of Dreams, no doubt. And her parents have taken leave of their joint responsibility. You can see them going into the cave of dresses – Eve wants a new frock for a wedding they’re going to in November…

  The woman that Yasser now knew as Maggie strolled into the shot, no larger than a matchstick on the big screen. She was wearing black: the hem of her greatcoat descended over her trousers or jeans, possibly leggings; it was difficult to judge, given the distance.

  She hesitated: a pulse, a beat. Then in one unbroken movement, she stepped across the pavement and plucked the child from the pushchair. She straightened up; she moved away quickly; she slipped out of shot.

  Voiceover.

  And this is all it takes: an instant of distraction, and the little girl is taken from her parents.

  Yasser heard a gasp from one of the class members; he was pretty sure it was Sammy – he’d made her gasp. Not entirely in the way he’d like to make her gasp, but hey! Beggars couldn’t be choosers. The way to a girl’s heart being via her brain, all that; and the way to her whoopsadaisy being her heart.

  Zoom and closeup.

  The miniloader – by this point as familiar to Yasser as snow on a mountain top – was the getaway vehicle: Tommy the Brazilian’s miniloader. With the girl in her arms, Maggie slipped in and could not have secured her charge. She was away and off: like shit off a shovel, as slick as grease on a doorknob (both of these similes that Yasser had edited out of the final draft). The perfect crime.

  Voiceover.

  The perfect crime? (Yasser concluded). The police will tell you that this beast does not exist. There is no such thing. There is no such thing as the perfect crime.

  The film stopped. Centred and frozen on the screen was the miniloader’s registration plate. A second; two seconds.

  Because the camera never lies. All it took was a call to the police. The vehicle was registered and the child was returned to her rightful
parents, leaving us with the big question. What made her do it? What compels some people to steal a human being?

  The screen darkened; then white letters showed the class the film had been ‘A Yasser Shabreel Production’.

  After a few seconds, Branston said, ‘Wow. Is that all true, Yasser?’

  ‘Every frame.’

  One of the other guys said, ‘What happened?’

  Yasser raised his hands. ‘The film says it all. The girl’s in safe hands, back with John and Eve. Unharmed. And all because I left the camera running while I served a customer! It was sitting on top of a pile of boxes or garden hoses, on the stall. Sheer good fortune.’

  ‘Nice one, Yasser,’ said Sammy.

  ‘Yes, a good piece of work, Yasser,’ Branston added. ‘Who’s next?’

  4.

  At the end of the lesson Branston asked Yasser to stay behind for a minute; the other class members filed out, chatting.

  ‘It was just a query really; I didn’t want to raise it in front of the others.’

  ‘What is it, Tim?’

  ‘…Your uncle is a policeman, isn’t he?’

  ‘One of em is,’ Yasser replied. ‘Big family.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘…You seem unsure about something, Tim.’

  Branston plunged.

  ‘What I’m about to say to you – it might mean nothing or it might mean a lot. But here it is.

  ‘For nearly a year now I’ve been seeing a psychotherapist, three times a week, in the evening after I finish here. And… if only to avoid any confusion in the future, I’ll spell it out properly: when I say seeing I mean paying for a service – I don’t mean… dating, or anything like that.’

  ‘I appreciate your candour,’ Yasser replied (somewhat prissily).

  ‘You don’t look surprised.’

  ‘If it was intended to be kept a secret, Tim, someone’s blabbed – someone’s snitched on you. That was last month’s news.’

  ‘Good.’ Branston hid with a smile an emotion that he found hard to define. It took him a beat to realise that it was disappointment: he had wanted to confess. ‘And no, I’ve never tried to keep it a secret – it’s nothing to be ashamed of, you see: therapy. It’s no different from going to a doctor when your sniffle’s gone on for a bit longer than you think it should and you’re starting to worry.’