His Last Fire

by Alix Nathan

  ‘Ohh. That . . . is me.’

  The hand raised to feel the beard.

  Powyss told him to write each day. He bites off tobacco, chews rapidly. Opens the journal, grasps a pen. His nails dig into his palm. He tears at them with his teeth. Dips the pen, writes his name.

  John Warlow

  Tries to remember what they used to write in school: I am 7. Writes:

  I am 4 3 yers old I live in Moram Moream Morham Moreham

  Febry 1793

  He knows the year, but days have passed, weeks. He crosses out Febry and writes March. Crosses that out, puts Aperl. He has no idea of the date though he hasn’t yet smelled summer. That’s enough for one go. His fingers are covered in ink; he’s spilled sand all over the book.

  He plunges his hand in the cistern and a frog jumps out, hops away into the dark. He bawls at it, spits, dries his fingers on his breeches, warms his arse before the fire.

  Remembers what he said to Powyss. He’d be glad to be shut of human faces.

  ‘For seven years, Warlow. To see nobody for seven years?’

  ‘Yes.’ Yes. Yes. He’d had no doubts.

  It was the money. £50 wouldn’t make him rich. But every year for the rest of his life! That was it. It’d keep the lot of them. He wouldn’t work if he didn’t feel like it. And if he did he’d keep his wages for himself. Drink as long as he wanted. Liberty. That was the word, wasn’t it? Or was it freedom?

  ‘For the rest of my life,’ he murmurs over and over.

  The others were envious you could see, though they said he was a fool.

  But it was true about the faces. He’d rather look a horse in the face than see old Martin day after day, grimy dewlaps wobbling each time he took a swig. Dick grinning. Wind blew, they said, his mouth stuck. Sucking soaked crusts between his gums.

  ‘No woman for seven year.’

  He’ll get by. There’s no joy in Hannah. So scared of another child she’ll do anything to avoid him. Scraping damned pans into the night, mending, scrubbing again and again. In the morning asleep at the table head on arms. She’s had that many, eight living, five buried. Thin as a skeleton herself. He could kill her easy rolling on top. Her coughing, struggling for breath. The last time he hit her her arm broke. He hadn’t done it since the girl was born.

  Polly. He’ll miss her. Her sweet look. But the rest. Good for nothing. Hungry all the time, fighting each other, he had to knock them about. Roars out loud at the thought of them. Can’t tell one from the other. Sometimes calls them by the names of the ones who died. Dick says children are punishment.

  *

  Each day he goes to the grating to sniff the outside world. Soil, damp or dry. Knows when it’s been raining; when spring begins to warm. When leaves on the other side, piling up in the brick-lined shaft are dusty with summer; when scores more gust in; rattle of ash-keys. Smoke-smell of fog; hears hail, soundless snowfall. And hooves on gravel, wheels, boys shouting, bells. Cocks, pigeons, rooks. All sounds shrunken, as from a tiny country.

  It’s through the rusting grating the frogs get in. He came across that first one, a flat, dried-out frog shape on the ground near the bed. Now he catches them, drops them in the cistern. Scatters crumbs, fragments of food on the surface.

  It’s when he smells hot earth that he longs to get out and shit among the leaves at the edge of the wood, chew bread with the others while sweating horses rest.

  *

  There’s tapping. He’s had his third meal so it must be evening. Strong dark meat he didn’t recognise, boiled celery, plum dumpling. Pint of porter.

  He scratches his scalp, the beard now down to his chest. Thinks he imagined it, but it’s there all right. Other side of the nailed up door. He doesn’t move. Mustn’t reply. To get his reward he must speak to no one. Then it stops.

  Is it Hannah? No. Powyss said he’d take care of them while he’s below. And she’ll not have anything to say. She’ll be glad, very glad he isn’t there.

  Days later it happens again. He pushes hair from his eyes, presses his ear against the door. A woman’s voice.

  ‘Mr Warlow? John? I know you’re there. Just the other side of the door.’

  He presses harder, accidentally scratches the door with long nails.

  ‘I can hear you’re there.’ He thrusts his fingers into his mouth, gnaws off the nails.

  ‘I know you’re there, John. You poor man.’

  He’s breathing hard. Mustn’t reply. For so long now he’s been saying his thoughts aloud, taking comfort from the sound of himself. Perhaps it’s a trap. To make him speak, lose the money.

  ‘John?’

  A young voice. Who is she?

  ‘It’s Annie. I work in the kitchen.’ He doesn’t know her. But he never had to do with the house until all this. ‘I know what you look like, John. What you looked like. You look different now, I reckon. I could tell you things, John.’

  He groans to himself. Maybe it’s the voice of the devil. Isn’t that what they say? He speaks in the voice of an angel to tempt you. He moves away from the door. Behind the table as if to protect himself. Says the name of Jesus three times. Tiptoes back.

  Then there’s scuffling, a man’s voice.

  ‘Come away! Stupid girl!’ He recognises Stephens. ‘What are you thinking of? He’s not allowed to speak.’

  ‘It’s cruel. Poor man! And his wife …‘ Her words suddenly muffled as by a hand.

  ‘He agreed to it. Didn’t need to. He must abide there.’ Shouted for his hearing. More scuffling. Silence.

  For some time he is buoyed by this episode. The girl is thinking about him! She’s kind. Young. Pretty no doubt. Ample. She’d need to be strong in the kitchen. He pictures her reddened by steam, meeting him in Horseshoe Copse. Eager. Greedy. He imagines.

  For he’ll be famous when he comes out. Powyss said so. He’ll be a wonder. They’ll all want him. And Hannah? Hannah will probably be dead by then. Yes, these thoughts buoy him up for days.

  *

  He can sense daylight. Knows he’s right when he hears the first meal begin its downward journey. Gets up, greedy for bread. Or doesn’t. They’ll not wind the dishes up till he rings the bell. Can lie as long as he likes. Imagining Annie’s breasts, buttocks. Eventually bladder compels.

  Kidneys, lamb chops, white bread, butter, jam, the beer he asked for. Sits on the close-stool scratching back, groin, behind the knees, digging into the skin until it bleeds. Buttons himself, lifts the pot, rings for its shaky journey up to where he cannot go. Clean one descends.

  At the grating he breathes heat or dripping cold. Confirms the world still exists. Grips the flaking iron, shakes it. If he loosened it what then? Too small to get through. Not think about getting out.

  Checks traps. He has several, sent down when he wrote:

  I ned rat trapps pleas 5

  Builds a new fire, burns the corpses.

  Tends to frogs. He tried putting them back between the curls of rusting iron but they can’t jump high enough to get out of the chute. Once fallen they’re stuck. Drawn to the cistern, lured to its lifeless water.

  The futility of their life troubles him. When he finds one floating on its back he’s depressed for days. Then he thinks to catch them, put them under a dish-cover, send them upstairs. He laughs to think of the women shrieking as frogs spring off the dish. But he won’t have them killed.

  pt froggs in pon pleas

  Now the long gap of morning. Once in a while he opens a book and flicks its pages as if this time it will make sense. Writes only when there’s something to ask for. Chews. Spits. Sits. Stands by the nailed door. Distant kitchen sounds. Annie hasn’t come back. Sits again. Scratches the webs of his fingers. Kicks off clogs, scratches the webs of his toes. If Annie’s left she’ll have no option. He thinks of Moreham men enjoying her.

  His sight grows used to d
imness, smell and hearing sharpen. As seasons pass he labours in his mind: mud, seed, weeds, grain. Herding, thwacking flanks, tugging warm udders. Plods up a furrow, down the next. But this occupies minutes only. Mind grinds down like a windless mill with no corn. Great stones, weighted, waiting.

  He scratches his lice-thick hairiness. Curses. Thinks how to burn off some hair. That’s not cutting, is it? But how can he do it without setting his head alight?

  Feet hurt. He saws the nails with a knife. Powyss won’t know: they’ll grow again. But they’re like horn. Tries forcing a foot up into his mouth but his body is thick and stiff with inactivity. Topples off the chair; lies on the patterned rug bemused. Why move? For what? Until he gets cold.

  And when the meal comes creaking down it disgusts him. Pieces of soft fish hidden in thick, winey sauce. Unknown vegetables. Freezing ice-cream. Powyss somewhere above, eating the same. He scrapes it into the traps.

  More blank hours. Fear runs across his mind like black beetles. He closes his eyes, dozes. Dreams prompt memory. They thought he was a fool. Are they right? Fifty pound. Fifty pound. He wants someone to tell him he was right to agree.

  Mother was always old, working, never still until the end. Had no time for any of them. Hannah is already like her. His father was trampled, crushed by a bolting horse and cart. Then he and the rest scared crows, dug ditches, hauled branches for their keep until old enough to plough.

  Only Mary looked at him without loathing or annoyance. With sweetness. His sister Mary. He refuses to think of her end. She, now. She’d tell him what’s right.

  *

  One day he hears sounds above. Close. Realises they’ve always been there. All the years. John Warlow 4 7 yers old. Listens. Moves away from flames cracking in the grate. Listens. Silence for minutes. Someone, he’s sure of it. Someone way above, listening. Listening to him listening.

  Scraping sound. Then he knows they’ve gone.

  Came from the ceiling. He takes the lamp, chair. Reaches up, feels with big hands, black now from no washing, dried scabs. Planks, beams. Cries out as a splinter jabs into his flesh.

  Knot-hole. No. He puts two fingers in it. Feels metal. Sticks a broom handle into it. Way up.

  Powyss listens through this hole! He made it to listen. Damned Powyss. Never said, did he! Listening all this time! Can he see? Is he watching him, too? Shove the broomstick in his eye!

  Everything changes with this knowledge. Powyss could be listening at any time. So he fills the day with tasks. Clears out the ash, sweeps the hearth, brushes mats, writes in the journal, cleans out the traps, takes the books off the shelf, puts them in a pile, replaces them, opens one, holds the illustrations under the lamp to fathom the story. Raises the organ lid, pumps with his feet, plays a note, another, closes the lid.

  Screws a piece of foolscap into a ball, rams it in the hole.

  Later he finds it on the ground. Searches through the box of kindling. Finds thin sticks to jam in the hole, but they, too, are on the ground the next day.

  Does Powyss know he knows or doesn’t he? He dips the pen:

  Mr Powis I no yor lisnin

  Sends it up with his soil pot.

  No reply.

  ‘Damn Powyss! Damn! Shut me down here. Yes, I said yes. How did I know? It’s prison! For science, he said. What’s science? It mean no Freedom. No Freedom for likes of us.’

  Remembered phrases bubble like gas.

  ‘Them as has money does what they likes. Puts people in prison for science. Damn to Powyss! Damn to the government! Damn to the King!’

  He paces about, shouting, relieved it all makes sense. Men painting on the market cross ‘Liberty’. And that other word. He, here, is part of the great stirring that began before he came below. The great grumbling that grew in the taverns. Men shooting an effigy of somebody. He hopes Powyss can hear him.

  He tires of bawling. But can’t stop thinking of Powyss in his fine black velvet coat. Listening through the hole at every moment. Easy smiles. Proud. Of all this! Picks up, flings shovel and tongs down onto the hearth. What he’d do if only he could get upstairs! Give me an axe!

  But wait. He’s got fire. Can fire the house. Tonight when Powyss has gone to bed, no longer above him. Stuff more paper through the hole. No, strips of linen. He’s already ripped a shirt for a length to tie back his hair. Smear them thick with butter. Push all the way up. Light a taper. Blow bellows! It’ll soon catch fire, then boards, carpets, furniture.

  He knows men do it these days, pull down houses, fire them. He’s heard. Bands of men; but he’ll do it on his own. Praise in the village. Not the fool they said he was.

  Flames, big flames, tall as houses, licking chimneys. He’s seen it. Houses that burned in Moreham when he was a boy. Burning ember began it, they said. People and animals jumping out, screaming. Streams of rats and mice. Stood and watched in huddles. People counted. Only the end house when all had burned to nothing. Two bodies in the cellar.

  ‘Aah. Aah!’ Bangs the table with huge fists, head. ‘Ah, how can I do it? Cannot get out. Must get out.’ Howls. Overturns table. Glass shatters from pictures hurled. Howls. Ripped books shower their shreds.

  ‘Pump with your feet!’ Howls. Presses both arms hard on the keyboard: howling crowd of sounds, takes the chair to it, poker to the case, pulls out wood shards with his hands, bloody with cuts, crumples, falls exhausted. Sleeps.

  *

  Wakes to the creak of the dumb-waiter. A meal descends. Half a roast fowl, bacon, peas. A salad. Redcurrant tart. Pint of porter.

  He kicks paths through the debris. From bed to close-stool to dumb-waiter. Most days he lies in bed wrapped in the smell of himself. Cares not for the outside world. Listens to mice back and forth beneath his bed, infernal buzzing of flies. Another summer passes. He is defeated.

  Lying on his back in the dark he hears a distant shout above. A high cry. Open window in the house.

  Sleeping, waking, there is little difference. Dreaming of Mary. Mary coming towards him arms wide open, calling his name. In the dark after he’d scared crows all day from first light.

  Is it morning? He lights the stump. Plates on the table. Congealed lamb’s fry. Empty beer jug. His full pot on the dumb-waiter. He’d returned to bed, not rung the bell.

  Suddenly he knows he wasn’t asleep. Drags the table over, gasping for breath, places the chair on top of it under the hole. Kneels on the seat. Ear to the hole. Nothing. Something blocking. Climbs off. Smashes broom on the flags to break off the head. Climbs up again. Breathless. Pushes it in with another broom beneath to make it go further. Up, up. Something light shifts away. He stops panting. Slides the handles down. Listens.

  ‘See to it, Stephens.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  A door closes. Silence.

  He smiles, smiles at the reversal. Laughs. He will listen to Powyss.

  He does it with diligence. No sound for ages. Powyss is solitary. Reads books for hours. He may wait for days. Sits contorted next to the ceiling. Hair sticky with cobweb. Sleeps at night with neck and shoulder aching. Returns to his cramped post each morning.

  ‘Here we are again, Polly! Which flowers did you look at in the garden on your way here?’

  ‘Big red daisy flowers, Mr Powyss. I likes them.’

  The voices move away down the room. He hears tones not words. Still he listens, immobile. Polly his child. Baptised in remembrance of his sister Mary. Sweet face. His beard is wet with tears.

  NO APPLAUSE

  Hogweed heads stand dry in late September fields; a spring-tide of goosegrass shrivels to crisp cobwebs. On the hot stone terrace cats bask. Prowl half-heartedly. Fitz stretches out, dozes, nose between huge forelegs.

  She watches them. Stands at the window watching them and the sky: the subtle shift into a new season; the day’s magnificent protest.

  Here’s Mitchell.

&nb
sp; ‘Will you take your tea at the little table, your ladyship?’

  ‘Yes of course I shall. You know perfectly well I shall want to see the sunset, Mitchell.’

  Mitchell’s as old as me. Looks dreadful, but she will frown so when she speaks. I know exactly what the woman’s thinking, but I’m not changing now.

  ‘Mitchell, when did Mrs Dent say she’d come next? She is supposed to bring me one of those new German songs. For Haydn is dead of course. And Handel a thing of the past.’ She sighs.

  When it’s dusk she’ll read. The new gaslight is a wonder. She’s kept up with the times. Mrs Dent brings the latest novels. She, too, looks at me as though to say ‘if only you’d . . .’

  Here’s Gerald.

  ‘Lady Gatcombe, the carriage, your ladyship.’

  ‘Yes, what of it?’

  ‘It have dropped all to pieces. Will you not come and see with your own eyes, your ladyship?’

  ‘Dropped to pieces? Why would it do that?’

  ‘It have not been used these twenty year, your ladyship. It is eaten away.’

  ‘Clear it out then, Gerald. Build a huge fire for the poor children in the village. There are still poor children in the village? I’ll look out for the blaze from the upstairs drawing room. Col. Corbett can buy fireworks when next he goes to London. That will cheer everyone.’

  A small disagreement with a servant is nothing. Servant resentment was a familiar at my birth. And Mrs Dent and Col. Corbett will never say what they think to my face. They live off the dregs of my reputation.

  She drums the window frame in mild annoyance. The dog’s ears prick up, he looks round. She smiles at him and he sleeps again.

  Snubs. Rebuffs. Animals never snub you. Backbite. Vilify.

  Fireworks make her think of violent death. Mrs Clitherow and her family in Half-Moon Alley, up all night stuffing paper tubes with fuses and gunpowder for November 5th. Burned to death, the whole lot of them, running in and out trying to save each other amid dazzling explosions and showers of brick.