‘– But she doesn’t know how much has been done!’ said Mac. He was getting excited. ‘She talked about Eyes Right too calmly! It’s like those people who are hypnotized on a show and made to do ridiculous things – you know, pretend they’re monkeys and scratch themselves, that sort of thing – and when they come out of it, they just look around modestly and smile politely. Even when they’re told what stupid things they did, they still can’t believe –’
‘It’s the only thing we’ve got,’ I said.
‘It’s not good enough! I wish we could kill her, I wish we could do something to her!’ Beth shouted.
I said, ‘Shut up, Beth. Unless someone can come up with something better, a new idea, we’ll take a vote. Let’s all sit still and think for three minutes by my watch. Beginning now.’
I looked at my watch and we started thinking. At least, Mac and Beth probably did, but I couldn’t. I was thinking of Beth and wondering if she was really such a bloodthirsty horror as she seemed, or whether it was just Grinny acting on her instinctively female responses – to put it less grandly, her built-in bitchiness. Just once, I’ve seen my own mother turn into a screaming tearing wildcat. It was when a couple of teenage yobbos got hold of Beth behind the big tree in the playground. They didn’t do anything much but when Mum caught them a day or two later in the village street, she just screeched and smashed and flailed. No man could have acted like that, let alone sounded like it. You’d have thought she was mad, but she was right. I thought Beth mad, but she’d been right.
Before the three minutes was up, Mac said, ‘It’s obvious. Eyes Right, emotions, electricity. They’re our weapons. Any argument?’
‘No,’ I said.
‘No, but soon,’ said Beth. ‘Tonight!’
We talked some more, deciding just what to do, then broke up.
‘Tonight, remember,’ said Beth. ‘Not later!’
April 24
Grinny again in the big chair, holding court. Telling us about the new order. Another instalment of the same nightmare.
We gave her the Eyes Right treatment.
She said, ‘Yes, well, this is very amusing but rather naughty of you. I have endured a lot of teasing from you children, all kinds of mischief and tricks. I don’t know if it has occurred to you that I have one or two tricks of my own!’
She pulled something out of her handbag. It looked like a large, smooth pocket torch. She held it in her hand.
I think it was this torch thing that started Beth off. We had agreed to push emotions at Grinny as hard as we could go, as well as giving her the Eyes Right. We had even agreed, in a silly sort of way, what emotions each of us would try to project (Beth simply said, ‘Hate!’). The trouble was that, apart from Beth, we were beyond emotion. Mac and I agreed that we both felt merely – sick. Sick with fear, sick with worry, sick with tiredness (neither of us could sleep properly and when we did sleep we had dreams). Perhaps it would have been different if we had known just when the thing was going to happen – just when the spaceship would land, just what the invaders would look like. But we knew nothing and Grinny wouldn’t tell.
All we knew was that sooner or later, it would happen. Adults over here, children over there. Get marching. If you didn’t march, something to tickle you up and make you. No time for goodbyes – no reason for them, even: the parents would talk about all the usual home affairs – Marjorie’s O levels, how expensive good beef is, let’s have coffee at eleven on Tuesday … And some of the little children would shriek and cry and tug at their mothers’ skirts, but mother would just turn round and say, ‘Oh, you are being naughty today – run and join the other children over there like a good girl. Mummy will be with you in just one moment.’ And there they would be, the hypnotized and the un-hypnotized, the grown-ups chattering away politely as they were herded away together to be wiped out and the children, alone, screaming and yelling and begging in an agony of fear as the world came to an end.
At least, that is how it is in one of my dreams. There are several variations, some of them highly spectacular and bloody. It is just the same for Mac, of course.
Meanwhile, we go to school and do our prep and eat our dinners and lie awake in bed. When you have done this for a week or so, emotions are hard to come by. You just feel sick and rotten and hopeless.
Anyhow, Grinny pulled out the torch thing and Beth tautened like a cat. But she must have still kept on with the Eyes Right. I know I did. I suppose the emotion I put out was fear and anger. The same for Mac. But with Beth it was spitting, violent, killing hate.
It reached Grinny. She went under.
‘I have one or two tricks of my own,’ she had said. Immediately Beth got at her, Grinny’s voice changed. ‘Useless!’ she grated (she really did grate the word out, right from her throat: you can hear it on the tape, I had the recorder running). ‘Useless – how dare you – most certainly not … Will not permit … most severe and painful punishment … painful, terribly … I warn you, here in my hand …’
She lapsed into Grinnish. The torch thing had fallen into her lap but her hand was still clenched as if she were holding it. We kept up the Eyes Right pressure and I heard Beth muttering. She was saying, ‘I hate you, I hate you, I hate you, I want you to die and die and die.’
Then Grinny was talking again. She said, ‘A temporary embarrassment. Bring them to order, to heel, discipline … in good time, merely temporary difficulty … once we are overwhelming superiority will change and subdue, all in charge no further trouble, could not possibly allow … (Grinnish) … very powerful she is for such a small animal, oh how very powerful she is for such a small animal oh how powerful, oh how uncomfortable it is but still one must endure, merely a temporary situation …’
She was talking of Beth and I think Beth knew what was happening. Beth was leaning right forward, glaring at a space one foot to the right of Grinny’s eyes, mouthing at her. I glimpsed this out of the corner of my eye – but I could have felt it without seeing it, almost, her hatred was so intense. A solid stream blasting from her mind into Grinny.
I tried to stop my brain from just watching and concentrate instead on projecting emotion at Grinny. I would go back to projecting Muddle. This is as close as I can get to naming my emotion. Confusion, muddle, worry, doubt, all made into a mixture to confuse and weaken Grinny. I suppose I was mouthing away too, saying things like, ‘You’re wrong, you’re failing, you’re losing, you’re done for, you’re frightened!’
Mac had chosen Determination (he is very determined anyway). He was simply getting across the thought, ‘You won’t, we will. You’ll lose, we’ll win. We’re strong, you’re weak.’
Grinny was deep into Grinnish for quite a long time. She must have been greatly weakened. Her eyes were wide open as if she were in a trance. Her mouth was open too. Her fingers were twisted and knotted in shapes I can’t imagine in human hands. They were writhing.
I thought it a good time to go and get the camera. Part of the plan was to get together as much evidence as possible of the behaviour and nature of Grinny in case we were ever lucky enough to reach some adult who would listen to us and be convinced and even take action.
So, still Eyes Righting, I got to my feet and slowly went to the door. The Pentax was there, fixed up with the electronic flash gear. I came back step by step, being careful not to step across the sightlines of Mac and Beth. I knew the camera was already correctly set for speed and aperture.
I was afraid that the flash would spoil everything, but had to risk it. I took one of Grinny from about six feet, when her hands got into an extraordinary position and her dry open mouth was gaping at me through the viewfinder. The flash went off and she stopped speaking Grinnish immediately.
But she didn’t come right out of her trance as I had feared, she just started talking English again. She said, ‘Special circumstances … not likely to be encountered when we have established our general, overall superiority and ascendancy. Admittedly most uncomfortable, most, most, most, most �
� thrice blessed is he who gets his blow in first, a quotation.’
I felt something touch my leg. It was Mac’s finger. He was leaning forward still Eyes Righting Grinny, but he wanted my attention. He flicked his eyes towards the French windows for a split second. I looked out of the window.
The spaceship was in the sky, closer than I had ever seen it before. So close that you could guess its height, only a few thousand feet. Its shape was crisscrossed by the branches of the lime tree in our garden.
I was shaken badly. Mac was too for he began to talk his emotions. He began muttering, ‘We’re not suitable, not suitable.’ He was doing this to make himself concentrate.
Grinny changed position in her chair like someone uneasily asleep. Her hands began to writhe again and I thought of photographing them because they were so strange and inhuman but I was afraid she might wake up. Then I thought (it was difficult to think and at the same time keep up the Emotion and Eyes Right) I should photograph the torch thing, which might be valuable evidence. I couldn’t look at it myself as I had to concentrate on Eyes Right. The spacecraft was still there. I could see it without looking at it as something bright at the edge of my vision. Mac was getting confused too by everything that was going on at the same time. Only Beth was really keeping going.
I suppose it was our weakening that made a change in Grinny. She began talking again, this time much more clearly and with expression in her voice. She said, ‘Most severe and painful discipline unless. I have only to give the order and the torch thing the torch thing you called it the torch thing will punish most severe and painful. Your silly tricks. I saw a flash, a flash of light. Your silly tricks.’ But the torch thing was no longer there! It had disappeared – gone – vanished.
Beth was saying, ‘Die, die, die!’ Mac said, ‘No you won’t, no you won’t, we are not suitable, not suitable!’ And I was saying (or thinking, or both) the same thing as Mac – ‘not suitable, not suitable!’ It was the reappearance of the spacecraft that had brought this phrase back, of course.
Then Mac changed his tune. He began to tell Grinny that the ‘torch thing’ was no good, useless, she couldn’t use it, couldn’t touch it, couldn’t reach it, etc. I thought this was a good idea of his. It turned out not to be.
Grinny suddenly woke some more. She said, ‘Emotion! Emotion! The mind!’ Then she looked round about her, just as someone does when they wake up, and said, ‘You children are behaving very stupidly. I shall punish you if you continue, with the “Torch thing”.’
Mac then said, ‘You can’t! It’s gone!’ and Beth screamed, ‘Gone! It’s gone!’ and started screeching with laughter. She was getting hysterical.
Grinny said, ‘Don’t be so absurd, of course it has not gone!’ She spoke as if she was not quite with the situation.
Mac said, ‘It’s gone. It’s out of reach so it’s no good to you.’
Grinny looked surprised and puzzled and replied, ‘But, you stupid child, I do not have to touch it, it is worked by the mind!’
There was a sort of gulf or vacuum for a second or two while the same thought hit all three of us: somewhere, Grinny’s punishment machine was crawling round the room waiting for her instruction. When she gave it – when she flicked it on with her mind! –
I yelled, ‘Eyes Right!’
We all glared until our eyes were bursting and it worked. She shrunk down again in her big chair and said, ‘Triggered by the mind, the mind.’ She was quiet for a moment. Then she said, very sharply and clearly, ‘Oh dear! I should not have said that! If the nasty children should hear …!’
But we had heard.
At last, Beth’s voice said, hoarsely and softly, ‘Punish her.’
We stared at the space one foot to the right of Grinny’s eyes. Only Mac and I were in the right position to see the dull glint that appeared under the skirt of the sofa. The torch thing! The glint moved, slid across the carpet like a small rat and silently went towards Grinny.
Beth saw it and I heard her gasp. Then she said, ‘Punish her!’
Grinny said, ‘Most certainly not, most certainly …! I forbid. I am the master and you will obey me …’
The glinting rat stopped.
I hissed, ‘Emotions!’ We all clutched our minds together and beamed them at Grinny.
The torch thing slid onwards towards Grinny.
‘More!’ I said. We gritted our teeth and poured the stuff at her. The torch thing slid smoothly up the side of Grinny’s chair. She was wrestling with herself now, jumping and jerking in her chair. Streams of Grinnish came from her lips.
The torch thing paused – swayed – then dived into the sleeve of her dress. It went up her arm. It made a rippling hump under the fabric, right the way up her arm.
She made a horrible noise, a horrible noise, not a scream at all, it was like machinery tearing itself to pieces, like metal cutting metal. It went on and on and on until we couldn’t stand it. She was flailing and whipping about with her arms in the chair.
I screamed out, ‘Stop it! – Stop it!’ and everything stopped.
She was still again. Her chair is the wing chair. One of the wings was broken and the cloth on the arms of the chair had been beaten through by her arms. Her sleeves were split and torn. So was the skin on her arms, it was torn. The metal bones showed through.
Yet her face was just the same as ever. The slight grin was still playing round her mouth. Her eyes were steady, her skin was neither pale nor red.
She said, ‘Please. Don’t do it again. Please don’t do it again. You know how afraid I am of electricity.’
Mac said, ‘Electricity?’
‘Blood,’ she said. ‘Some humans are afraid of blood, are they not? The life fluid. I am like them … afraid of the life fluid …’
Her voice sounded so ordinary and old-ladyish and unstrained.
‘You would not be so cruel!’ she said. Then she repeated it, giving her voice human stresses and emotions. ‘You would not be so cruel!’
Mac said, ‘What do you mean, electricity?’
I said, ‘The torch thing punished her with electricity and she’s afraid of electricity like some people – human people – are afraid of blood. Electricity is their life fluid just like blood. Is that right?’
She said, ‘Yes. Please, please don’t do it again.’
Mac said, ‘You admit that we win?’
Grinny replied, ‘Yes, yes, anything you like. Just don’t do it again.’
‘You admit our minds – our emotions – beat yours?’ I said.
‘Oh yes, yes.’ She was grinning politely.
Beth said, ‘I hate her! Don’t trust her!’
I started to remove the flash head from the electronic flash. When you do this you expose a three-pin socket. You can put a variety of flash leads into the body. I took the extension lead and threw it to Mac. He always carries a penknife. I said, ‘Strip off the ends, Mac.’
He began to bare the wires. Grinny said, ‘What are you doing?’
‘We’re not suitable, Grinny,’ I told her. ‘Not suitable at all. We are not going to be invaded.’
‘No, of course not!’ she said. ‘What are you doing?’
‘Do you know what Grinnish is, Grinny?’
‘No. What are you doing?’
‘Grinnish is the language you speak when you talk to the thing out there.’ I pointed out of the French windows. The spacecraft was no longer visible, but that made no difference. She knew what I meant.
‘You’re going to speak Grinnish, Aunt Emma. Now. You are going to tell your people that we’re not suitable. Now or ever.’
She began to knot her fingers and shift in her chair.
Mac said, ‘Catch.’ He threw the lead to me. I pushed the plug in. The three wires coming from it had shiny, raw ends. I opened my hand and held it, palm out, towards Grinny. Then I put the three raw ends in my palm and closed my fingers over them.
‘If I pressed the button now, I’d get a shock,’ I told her. ‘Lot of volts. I
don’t know how much voltage that thing puts out –’ I pointed to the torch thing – ‘but I’ll bet this compares quite well. And it isn’t controlled by the mind, it’s controlled by a little red button.’ I showed her the button.
She said, ‘No. Please!’
‘So if I put these wires in your hand, Grinny,’ I went on, ‘and if I tell Mac to press the red button, you’ll get a shock of electricity. And there is nothing you can do to stop it. If you try to hypnotize us, you’ll be too slow. If you get the torch thing going, you’ll be too slow. If you blow the whole world up, you’ll be too slow. Mac will still press the red button.’
She said, ‘You mustn’t, you mustn’t.’
‘Say something in Grinnish, Aunt Emma,’ I said.
‘I can’t. I can’t think of anything.’
‘Say “the rain in Spain stays mainly in the plain”. It’s a quotation.’
‘I can’t. There is no word for “Spain”.’
I went over to her and said, ‘Give me your hand.’ She held it out. I looped the wires over her middle fingers and twisted them tight. ‘Say it,’ I told her. ‘And when you come to “Spain”, say that in English.’ I caught Mac’s eye and nodded towards the tape recorder. He went over to it. She looked at me with her emotionless eyes and said, ‘All right.’
Then there was a split-second burst of Grinnish.
‘Again.’
Another burst.
‘Again.’
A third burst.
‘Play it back on the slowest speed, Mac.’
He played it back. Even on the slow speed, it was impossible to catch the syllables. But one thing was certain. The three bursts of sound were identical; and in each, there was the spitting sound that could have meant ‘Spain’.
‘We’re not suitable!’ said Beth. ‘Make her say that! Make her! Make her say it!’
‘But I cannot possibly say it!’ said Grinny. Her voice was loud and passionate. She must have concentrated hard to get so much human feeling into it. ‘They will be angry, very angry …’
‘Make her!’ said Beth. She jumped up and gave the wire a little tug so that Grinny’s finger jerked. ‘Make her!’
Grinny Page 8