The Ecliptic

by Benjamin Wood

  [. . .] SHE LEAVES HAVING DEDICTATED HER LONG TENURE TO PERFECTING A WORK OF RESONANCE AND PROFUNDITY. THAT SHE OVERCAME A DEVASTATING CRISIS OF FAITH TO ACHIEVE THIS IS A TESTAMENT TO HER RESOLVE AND INDUSTRY. IF, AS RUSKIN SAID, ‘ALL GREAT AND BEAUTIFUL WORK HAS COME OF FIRST GAZING WITHOUT SHRINKING INTO THE DARKNESS,’ THEN SHE HAS GAZED LONG ENOUGH AND NEED GAZE NO MORE. A FIREWORKS DISPLAY WILL FOLLOW THIS EVENING’S DINNER.

  —PROVOST

  We held these dreamed-up notices in our minds, tinkered with the phrasing daily, sharing them in moments of self-doubt. Like our jetons, they were gestures to the future. They kept us striving, grafting, exploring, when no end was in sight. We worked hard every day to ensure that the truth would reflect our fantasies by the time we came to leave. So finding MacKinney’s actual notice on the bulletin board that morning felt like sabotage.

  DEPARTURE OF MACKINNEY

  IT IS WITH GREAT JOY THAT I ANNOUNCE THE DEPARTURE OF A TRUE FRIEND OF PORTMANTLE: THE PLAYWRIGHT MACKINNEY. SHE LEAVES US FOR THE MAINLAND TOMORROW, HAVING BROUGHT TO TERM HER NEW STAGE PLAY: ‘ALL THINGS AT ONCE’. MACKINNEY HAS OPTED TO FORGO HER READING IN THE LOUNGE THIS EVENING, BUT I LOOK FORWARD TO SEEING YOU ALL AT DINNER TO WISH HER BON VOYAGE. ‘SINCE FATE INSISTS ON SECRECY, I HAVE NO ARGUMENTS TO BRING — I QUARREL NOT WITH DESTINY . . .’ CONGRATULATIONS, MACKINNEY!

  —PROVOST

  A few of the short-termers were huddled around it, in discussion. I nudged them aside to get a closer look. I read it four times, stunned by the phrasing of it at first, then nauseated by it. I thought of the provost in his study, winding the paper into his typewriter, arching his fingers to punch out every last untruthful letter. There was no mention of Mac’s sponsor, no hint of anything irregular.

  ‘Is it Matthew Arnold?’ said Gluck, behind me.

  ‘What?’

  ‘The quote. I think it’s Matthew Arnold.’

  ‘Great. That makes everything so much better. Excuse me—’ I pushed past him.

  ‘It’s going to be strange for you,’ he said as I went by. ‘You’re the only woman left. There’s Gülcan, I suppose, but she doesn’t really count. And Nazar.’ He tried to grab my arm, or I thought he did—I swung round to glare at him, but he was only reaching inside his sleeve for a handkerchief. ‘What’s the matter?’ he said, wiping his nose.

  ‘Gülcan’s been here longer than most of us. Watch your tone.’

  ‘Yes, of course. I didn’t mean any disrespect.’

  ‘Then you should try speaking less.’

  He blenched, mopping his brow.

  Everything was normal about the mess hall except for the fact that MacKinney was not there. Our table by the window was empty. The foil was still wrapped around the milk jug spout. The cutlery lay unmoved. Ender was preparing the juices near the serving pass. I asked if he had seen her but he stroked his moustache and shook his head. ‘I don’t think she has come yet. See, nobody touches the muesli.’

  I went back out to the landing. Gluck was still there, studying the provost’s note. He did not apologise for his earlier remark. ‘I’ve been thinking more about this quote. Not Matthew Arnold. I think it’s part of an old villanelle, but I can’t recall the author. I’ll look it up for you.’

  ‘Don’t bother,’ I said.

  ‘It’s no trouble.’

  ‘If you really want to help me, tear it down.’ I could not stand the thought of Quickman and Pettifer discovering the news on a bulletin board—no warning, no context. The shock of it would play hell with Tif’s old heart. And the more I was forced to stare at it, the more it had the look of some crass letter of eviction.

  ‘I can’t,’ said Gluck. ‘That wouldn’t be right.’

  ‘Then get out of the way.’

  I ripped the message from the board and hurried off along the corridor.

  ‘But how will I check the quote!’ Gluck called after me. ‘I haven’t written it down!’

  Mac’s door was either stuck or locked when I got to her room. At first, she did not respond to my knocking, but soon her voice came through, muffled by the oak: ‘Who is it?’

  ‘It’s Knell. Open up.’

  ‘I’m sleeping. Come back tomorrow.’

  ‘You’ll be gone by then. Let me in.’ I slid the provost’s notice under the door and waited.

  Footsteps approached. I heard the locks turn and the door hinged back. MacKinney peered out at me. Without her glasses, her face seemed flatter, older, and there was an abraded quality to the skin about her eyes and cheeks, a dull red tension. There was a cigarette fuming in her mouth, and the ashy scent of it was wondrous. It belonged to faraway places: the front steps of buildings in Paddington, the grandstand at Kempton, the snug at The State Bar, my parents’ bedroom—everywhere I had known in my life beyond Portmantle. She blew the smoke brazenly through the doorway. ‘I know what you’re thinking,’ she said. ‘Did I save any for Quickman, right? Well, let’s just see how well he behaves today.’ She moved her hair to show a couple more tucked behind her ears on each side. ‘He’s going to wet himself.’

  ‘How long’ve you been sitting on those?’

  ‘Ages,’ she said, dragging, exhaling. ‘I was waiting for a special occasion, but there’s not much point in that now, is there? They’re a bit stale.’ She bent to pick up the notice, scanned it for an instant, then stepped aside, holding the door open. ‘I wish he hadn’t mentioned the title of the play. I’m still undecided. What do you think of it? All Things at Once.’

  ‘It’s fine.’

  ‘No, really—be honest.’ She locked us in.

  ‘I said it was fine.’

  Her room was shadowed and airless. The curtains were shut, the bed unmade. Her wardrobe was gutted and her suitcase packed. On the bureau, her typewriter was stowed in its brown leather box with the label: PROPERTY OF PORTMANTLE. ‘Oh, I get it,’ she said. ‘You’re mad at me for not being mad.’ She perched tiredly on the foot of the bed. ‘Well, I thought it was quite sweet, what he wrote about me.’

  ‘Even if it isn’t true.’

  ‘There are some true bits. And what did you expect? A ten-page explanation?’ She drew on her cigarette, rubbing her fingertips. ‘At least he’s sending me off with some poetry. I quarrel not with destiny. Rather poignant, I’d say.’

  I could not understand her cheerfulness. ‘We can fight this, you know. The four of us.’

  ‘Oh, sure. A few cartons of ayran to the face ought to do it. You go for Ender, I’ll take out the provost. Q and Tif can dig our foxholes.’

  ‘I’m serious.’

  She laughed and wagged her hand dismissively. As she got up, a line of ash fell onto the front of her gown and she just smudged it into the fabric. ‘It’s funny to think I’m not going to be MacKinney any longer. I’ve been sorting out her last will and testament. Would you like your inheritance now, or do you want to wait until I’m out of here?’

  ‘I’m not letting you talk that way. You might’ve given up on this place but I don’t have to be happy about it.’

  She ignored me. At the bureau, she dumped her cigarette in a cup and reorganised a stack of books, choosing one from near the bottom. ‘No, I think I’d better give it to you now . . . Chances are, you’ve read it, but you definitely won’t have this edition—it’s as rare as they come.’

  It was a clothbound copy of Captains Courageous by Rudyard Kipling. The fading blue cover was wrapped in polythene. ‘Sadly for you, I inscribed it,’ she said. ‘That might knock a few quid off the value when you come to sell it.’ On the inside cover, she had written:

  To Knell, who was someone else before I knew her, and will be when I’m gone. Your great friend, MacKinney xx

  I felt the urge to cry. It rose through my whole body, starting at my toes. ‘I can’t accept this,’ I said.

  ‘Just say thank you. That’s all you have to do. And think of me when you look at it.’

  ‘There has to be a way out of this mess.’

  She came towards me, shaking her head. �
�I’m afraid our time is up, old girl. It’s really happening.’

  ‘We just need to lean on the provost, that’s all, put the pressure on.’

  ‘Accept it, Knell. I’ve been expelled.’ She tried to make me smile with this, but I could not. The provost’s note was in her hand, and she pushed it into mine, closing my fist over it. ‘Look, do you know how many plays I’ve written in my life? Thirty-six. Know how many of those were actually any good? One. One! If I had a market stall, I’d be in penury by now. But it’s amazing how far one decent effort can carry you, if you let it—it’s taken me further than I had any right to go. I’m tired of retracing my own footsteps for a hint of who I used to be. It’s undignified.’

  She released my hand and went back to the bed, neatening the covers. ‘Fact is, I just can’t stick around here any more, pretending that number thirty-seven is going to magically surpass what I’ve achieved before, because, deep down, I know it won’t. How could it? I’ve already written the best play I’ll ever write. I was twenty-three years old and utterly miserable when I wrote it, but that was easily my brightest moment. You never saw it, did you? I wish you had—that production was the most exciting thing I’ve ever been involved in.’ She stopped for a moment, tightening the cord on her gown. ‘It wasn’t even about anything, not really. Just a family going about their days. A few flawed people in a household, making mistakes with each other. No grand ideas, just ordinary life. My childhood, I suppose. It was quite a special thing. But that’s the problem, isn’t it? Once your best story’s told, it can’t be told again. It makes you, then it ruins you.’

  The bedclothes were now smooth as a tabletop. She started on the pillows, plumping them, one at a time. ‘Well, at least now I can stop trying to be original. And I can see my girls again. That’ll be nice. I’ve neglected them horribly.’

  ‘You weren’t meant to be a housewife, Mac,’ I said.

  ‘Maybe not. But if I had thirty-six children instead, I’d be a whole lot happier.’ She dropped her gown and hooked it on the bedpost. The skin about her clavicle was freckled and pinched, but her body was so slender under her nightdress, and she stood there with the easy poise of a much younger woman, confident of her beauty, or at least oblivious to it. ‘Go and put that thing back on the board, would you? If you’re worried about Q and Tif, don’t be. It’s better they think I’m going off with a finished play—for their own sake.’ She went into her bathroom and I heard the taps running.

  ‘Then why aren’t you giving a reading?’

  ‘I don’t want to humiliate myself,’ she called.

  ‘You could just do a few scenes. I could play Willa. Q could be Christopher.’ The idea made me uncomfortable, but I would have done anything for MacKinney at that time. And I thought it would give the four of us a chance to spend her final day rehearsing together, instead of being stuck alone in our lodgings, contending with our projects. ‘You deserve a proper send-off like the others. I’m not letting you leave without one.’

  She came to the threshold, a towel around her middle. ‘I’d prefer to just go quietly into the night, if it’s all the same to you.’

  ‘Definitely not.’

  The shower continued to run. Rafts of steam began to flood the space behind her. ‘Q would never do it, anyway,’ she said.

  ‘Of course he would. You’ve got cigarettes, remember. We could even give Tif a role.’

  ‘But I’ve already told the provost no.’

  I looked at the rumpled notice in my hand. ‘I’ll amend it. Or write an appendix. See, you’re thinking about it. That means you want to.’

  ‘I suppose it wouldn’t be too awful.’ She went off again into the bathroom. ‘There are one or two scenes we could make something out of, with a bit of rehearsing.’ Craning her head around the door, she said, ‘Tif’s got the wrong kind of voice for it, though. He’ll only ham it up, and I don’t want to look stupid.’ She closed the door. I heard the shower curtain skittering on its rail.

  ‘What about Fullerton?’ I shouted, but she did not receive me. ‘Mac?’

  Once the notion was in my mind, I could not get rid of it. I put the Kipling on the bed and went to the bureau to unpack the typewriter. But I could find no blank paper in the drawers. The room was so dingy, in fact, that the innards of the desk seemed cavernous.

  When I turned on the lamp, the bulb popped, startled me. I went to open the curtains. They were the same heavy velvet drapes that adorned the windows all over the mansion, hung on brass loops that were difficult to shift—there was a knack to it, a sideways whipping action. As they parted, the teeming of the rain became louder, more encompassing. And perhaps it was something about this noise and the splatter of Mac’s shower, along with the sudden adjustment to the light, that made me lose my senses for an instant; but as I looked out through the misted panes, I saw an enormous stretch of open water where the grounds of Portmantle should have been, a swaying sea that reached up to the sides of the mansion, as though the house itself were an island and MacKinney’s windows were the coastline.

  It was only there for a blink and then it was gone. Everything returned at once: the lawns, the trees, the lodgings, the surrounding sights of Heybeliada. I rubbed my temples, scrutinised the pattern on the wallpaper. Black spots waned in my vision. I had not eaten breakfast yet and felt a little faint. It was tiredness, a touch of vertigo—nothing more.

  There was just enough daylight to help me find what I needed in Mac’s bureau. A box of goldenrod paper was buried in the bottom drawer, beneath a heap of manila folders. I spooled one sheet into the typewriter. It was not difficult to replicate the provost’s formal tone, though my typing was very unpractised. I was so slow that the page was still scrolled in the machine when Mac came out of the bathroom, towelling her hair. ‘What are you writing?’ she said.

  ‘An advertisement.’ I hit the last full stop and lifted out the paper, handing it to her. ‘Leave it to me. We’ll start rehearsals after lunch.’

  ADDENDUM TO PREVIOUS

  I AM PLEASED TO CONFIRM THAT, SUBSEQUENT TO FURTHER DISCUSSION WITH MACKINNEY, A STAGED READING FROM HER NEW PLAY WILL NOW FOLLOW THIS EVENING’S DINNER. PLEASE ASSEMBLE QUIETLY IN THE LOUNGE. FRESH SALEP WILL BE SERVED.

  —PROVOST

  Quickman had a very particular way of eating a pomegranate. He would slice an opening into its base with a sharp knife, score its rind into eight simple sections, then wrestle the whole fruit over a bowl, working out every wine-dark seed with his fingers, until all that remained was a limp carcass. The complete procedure took less time than it took the rest of us to peel an orange. And when pomegranate season came round each summer, I would sit and watch him honing this technique every morning, aware that I was gleaning something of the workings of his brain. It occurred to me that he approached conversations the same way: nimbly separating all the vital pips and casting aside the worthless dregs while you were speaking.

  He took in the news of MacKinney’s departure with an attitude of calm, leaning on his fists as he read the provost’s notice. The mess hall was nearly full, the rain’s attack upon the windows like the crackle of a phonograph. He did not question the facts of the message, just thanked me for showing it to him. Then he said, ‘She kept that pretty quiet. I had no idea she was so close to finishing.’ I told him that I had known about it for a few days; I was not sure that he believed me. ‘The provost’s quote is a bit puzzling, though,’ he said. ‘Not his usual syrupy fare, is it?’ He gave the note back to me. ‘Still, it accounts for her gruffness lately. All that bud-dying up to the Spaniard. Hah. The whole thing’s starting to make sense.’ He grazed his fingernails across his cheeks. ‘Well, no point feeling sorry for ourselves, I suppose. I’m proud of her. She’s bloody well earned it.’

  ‘This place without Mac, though,’ I said. ‘Doesn’t seem right.’

  ‘Best to focus on the positives.’

  ‘I’m trying. It’s not easy.’

  ‘Does Tif know yet?’

  ‘He
’s still in his studio.’

  ‘We ought to wake him up. He won’t want to hear this from someone else. Let me finish eating and we’ll go.’

  I decided I should have something in my stomach, too, given my odd vision in Mac’s room. I sat and drank two glasses of whole milk while Q ate the last of his eggs. When I explained my plan to stage a reading, he was surprisingly enthusiastic; I did not even have to tell him about the cigarettes. ‘Count me in,’ he said, ‘provided I can stay in my chair for the duration. Proper acting is beyond me, but I think I can handle reading aloud.’

  ‘I thought I’d have to bully you into it.’

  ‘You know I’d give Mac a kidney if I had to. And besides, I’m dying to see what she’s been working on. Are we going to give Tif a part?’

  ‘I think she had someone quieter in mind.’

  ‘Shame. He’ll be keen.’

  ‘That’s sort of the problem.’

  ‘Oh, let him try at least. Exuberance is no bad thing. It’s Mac’s farewell—he’ll want to be involved.’

  ‘I suppose.’

  ‘Come on then. Drink up.’

  We borrowed the provost’s umbrella. Quickman and I were of similar height, and although the lime-green canopy covered us evenly, the puddles on the path were almost ankle-deep and our trousers were soon drenched.

  Pettifer’s lodging stood some fifty or sixty yards from mine, behind the southernmost face of the mansion, in a clutch of slightly larger studio huts the provost reserved for architects and print-makers. Only two of these studios were presently occupied (Crozier had the other), and Pettifer’s was on the downward slope towards the boundary fence, which made for a slippery descent. The jutting roots of lindens nearly tripped us twice. The waist-high scrub nicked our hands as we brushed through it. By the time we reached Pettifer’s walkway, we were in the foulest mood.