Gog

by Andrew Sinclair

  On the facing hill at the end of North Street, Durham Cathedral sends up its square central spire, pointed in position by the pediment of Bethel Chapel; the Methodists have gone classical now and they proclaim their respectability from pillared doorways; the fire of Wesley and Whitefield is snuffed out under pseudo-porticos. Gog sees a canopy of glass and wrought-iron project from the line of the shop-fronts; its solid delicacy makes it worthy to be the roof of the stable of the horses of the sun, but underneath its shadow, double-decker buses now squat in heavy oblongs, waiting to box the people together for their necessary journeys. For the signs are everywhere, insisting – IS YOUR JOURNEY REALLY NECESSARY? until Gog feels like shouting, No, no, no. I walk because my feet move, I wander because I wish to, I voyage towards uncertainty, I tramp in service to myself, I am of necessity a man and of necessity I travel because all men must on their slow trudge from light to dark. IS YOUR JOURNEY REALLY NECESSARY? Yes, but I don’t use your transport, I go on my own way.

  The old stone terraces plunge down the side-streets until checked by the corner houses in mid-topple before they crush Gog, descending past the Durham Miners’ Hall, proudly stamped 1875, when the men-moles had decided that digging and delving was not enough and had organized to build their temple under the props of heaven; but the depression had made them poorer and the coal seams had grown narrower, and now their temple has golden letters tacked onto its tower that spell out ESSOLDO and the wooden chairs of the protesting pit-workers have become the cushioned seats of the liquorice-suckers, who stop their gobs on sweet glue while they watch the jerry bombers in flaring explosions on the newsreels and cosily dream of daring-do from their dark cockpits only two feet off the ground.

  Gog keeps to the left side of the street, under the dangling floors of old window-seats on the second storey of the shops, until he reaches the bottle-necked bridge over the River Wear, where the convoys pant endlessly on the slow trail down to Catterick. On his left, Gog sees the weir over the river making a scimitar of sunken stone under the shallows and carding the slow green water into white threads falling transverse down. Green weed lines the edges of the river, houses and factories hem the banks with red brick and square windows, all powdery with the rot of time. Dark trees screen the far view at the bend of the Wear, as though a forest stretches up two fingers to nip off the stream between them. Above the end of the bridge ahead of Gog, Durham castle is jetty-long, with great windows in the shape of perpendicular arches cut into its yellow stone sides in a vain effort to disguise the fortress as a university.

  Gog now crosses the road between the lorries of stalled con­voys, past soldiers staring glumly down over green tailboards. The men seem dazed at still being ferried about, although the fighting in Europe is over; they are waiting for the demobiliza­tion that does not begin, but is always promised for this year, next year, sometime, never, as the army authorities count heads mysteriously and pick the lucky few for civvy street by some arcane principle that is no more just than the eeny-meeny-miny-mo of children. On the right side of the bridge, the trees continue to clothe the small hills on either bank of the Wear; the branches near the river make drab-olive shadows on the wan waters in a zig-zag of camouflage more perfect than on the hoods of the trucks. Half a mile upstream lies another low weir and a bridge between so much sloping greenery that Gog might have imagined himself in a glen, fringed with a few stray roofs. Yet the convoy starting behind in a grind of gears recalls Gog to the world of the incessant machine and his eyes rise upwards over the trees on the left bank towards the great crown of the west end of the cathedral, which raises its two flanking spires sheer into the sky for the armrests of the throne of Magog, whose giant and invisible spirit squats between the pinnacles and broods over Durham on the roof of the west nave.

  Gog takes the narrow path through the trees up the hill toward the cathedral; the gravel is dappled in sudden sun all the way to the peaked roof of the old prebend’s house that hats the top of the path. When Gog reaches the garden wall of the build­ing, he turns left down a shadowed narrow street. Someone is playing a piano within the prebendary; he plays two shrill notes over and over again, with the shriller voices of choirboys imitating the notes a little flat, a little late, a little false, until the piano notes stop and are succeeded by a shrill shriek, “No, no, no.”

  Then Gog emerges out of the street and, as he wheels, the full glory of the cathedral close bursts upon his eyes, so he senses that he has been kicking upwards out of a trough of dark water and he has broken the surface into bright air and he is gulping down life again into his lungs and his blood is pulsing and his mouth gasping with joy. The sun strikes out the gravestones in white squares and rounds and barrows and slabs of light against the cropped green luxury of the grass. Occasional trees spawn other dark trees on the turf; the shadow leaves in the wind become shaking black garlands over the graves. Three of the tombs are lying men, weathered by the centuries until their smooth stone flesh is pale as a girl’s body. The choirboys sing again on two high notes to the nagging piano and Gog’s eyes swim in the glare of sudden light and the standing gravestones shake and shimmy like bleached robes, they whirl about the maypole trees as if in magic circles to woo the summer sun, and the lying stones are white couples writhing in the smooth interweavings of love, and the very grass quakes in an ecstasy of earth, yes, the skin of green and stone and flesh is all aquiver on the film of Gog’s eyes so that his whole body shakes in the shifting spurt of delight that sometimes pierces and fuses all creation in one shudder of sudden joy.

  Then the shrill voice shrieks crescendo, “No, no, no, no, no,” and Gog blinks his eyes clear and he sees the great holy place of Magog threatening the close from above. The whole shape of the cathedral is the one distorted initial of Magog, with the square central spire jumped up in authority between the end spires, which are themselves built as smaller M’s, as is the cathedral doorway over the main entrance, where wooden slabs hide away the interior of power.

  And Gog walks down the gravel path to the cathedral door, on which is fixed a brass lion’s head with a ring in its nose, a sanctuary knocker where the fugitives from the king’s justice could once cling and beg the bishop for refuge inside the cathedral safe from the king’s men. But the lion’s head is bodiless and without strength; the ring in its nose is to lead the beast, not to proclaim its might. The knocker only saves the outlaw from the king’s men at the price of making him a slave to God’s priest; the ring is the gyve about his neck. Magog in his holy place grants sanctuary for the condemned to prove his power over kings and to enslave those men weak enough to try and evade the justice of other men. The mercy of the most high is no mercy; it is the mere proof of power over the less high. The arch-priest of God absolves in order to bind men to himself and to spite their laws; he never forgives a man still proud enough to stand on his own. Magog rules because he denies both men’s justice and their injustice, in the name of the Almighty; and in the name of the Almighty, men bow down before him to receive the heavenly hope of the opposite to their fate on earth.

  Gog passes the sanctuary knocker into the black hole of the cathedral doorway. A velvet pad is laid over his eyes and ears as he reaches the massy aisle of Magog’s house.

  The organ sounds in the darkness; it is being tuned and one pipe is blown and held and stopped, a small pipe that does not shrill as the choirboys, but hums high and intermittent, until Gog’s very brain becomes untuned. Gog rams his fingers in his ears, but the hum skewers through his plugs of flesh and unhinges his thoughts, so that he can feel his eyelids pucker back and his eyeballs begin to roll and his fears start out in cold sweat on his skin. He sidles against one of the great ridged pillars that fence off the north aisle from the nave and he supports himself with his spine pressed to the stone and his arms braced back­wards against his feeling of falling to the rear.

  Sweet Jesu, the cracks over the paving stones . . .

  Wisps of cloth . . . shreds of dresses rising . . .

 
Women in kirtles and hoods grovelling . . . beating their shaven foreheads on the stone . . . clawing the nails off their fingers on the pillars . . . tufts of hair pulled free, blood at the roots . . .

  Women stretching at the raised font . . . making a pyramid of praying, of writhing hands . . . beggar women, poor women, cook women, peasant women, market women . . . screeching like roasting cats . . . gaping up, teeth bare . . .

  The fanged round arches thirty feet overhead yawn back in silent howl . . .

  Above these under the second tier of arches . . . more women weeping, scratching the satin off their breasts . . . scourging their bare backs, screaming for mercy . . . Mary, mother of God, have mercy . . . Magog, master over man, have mercy . . . milky ladies and gentlewomen, shrieking repentance . . . squalling their submission in their soiled finery . . .

  Above these, gargoyles sneering, stone-lipped in frozen spite . . .

  Higher, higher, half-way to heaven . . . under the top arches, by the small far windows . . . abbesses in ripped purple, stained with their own blood more purple . . . scoring their cheeks to let out their sins . . . peeresses in sackcloth, flogging each other with gold chains . . .

  All women, all keening, all begging mercy . . . all women, all this side of the black boundary cross . . . black stone cross set in the paving . . . Cross that grants no crossing, no ford for Jezebel . . . no bridge into the main body of the church for Lilith . . . yes, no way past, not even for Ruth nor Judith . . . back, at the back, you too, Queen of Sheba . . . Women may not cross my black stone, boundary marker at the rear of Magog’s holy house . . . Women are evil, are sinful, are slow death to men . . . Back with you, skulk lucky to be let into the byways of grace at all.

  On the forward arches towards the altar . . . the arches high as towers, keeping up the roof of plaited cloud . . . gouged deep round the arches, the dread initial of Magog . . . hidden in mouldings or patterned squares, squeezed out in waves . . . Magog’s initial, to terrify the faithful . . .

  And in the nave proper, a great bellowing . . . a sobbing and moaning and sighing . . . varlets and tumblers, quacks and glee-men, minstrels and chapmen, palmers and gypsies, bakers and butchers, smiths and shoemakers, farmers and labourers, all of low estate lowly and weeping . . . trampling one another down, prostrate three deep . . . a heaving brush, a moving bush of flesh . . . fingers shaking as twigs in a mighty wind of beseeching . . . the packed, stinking, common people, herded to seek mercy . . .

  In the second row of arches overhead, level with the ladies . . . fat burghers and merchants, gentlemen of quality, traders and lenders . . . meaty and milch lush, yet scrabbling loose their purses . . . spilling out coins for charity, any price for absolution . . . stripping off their doublets and hose, their rich slashed stuffs and silken linings . . . standing bare-legged and round-thighed in shirts with ropes round their puffy necks . . . muling and puking . . . Magog, Master Magog, mercy, mercy . . .

  Above these, on the top tier, lords lying prone . . . naked and despairing, their jewels heaped before them . . . gashing their ribs with swords, lacerating their shaven polls . . . not daring to ask absolution, so great their sinfulness . . .

  And high, high, high, all praise to the highest . . . in the great square hollow of the central spire, a red swing . . . redder than whale’s gore, finer than damask, rich as the morning . . . back­ward and forward swinging, a crimson-clad boy at each corner . . . a boy to north, south, east and west . . . on their wrists are bolted burning censers . . . the censers burn wormwood, acrid and stinging . . . between them, two naked stooped men, man­acled to act as armrests to the throne . . . on their heads, crowns; round their ribs and limbs, chains . . . as the seat of the throne, two naked queens . . . their flesh as an eight-legged stool, the backs of queens bearing the burden . . . the burden of seated Magog, dressed in flame and crimson . . . on his head an eagle’s mask of burnished copper . . . from its beak, a trumpet flares open its brazen mouth . . .

  Magog raises high both bronze gloves . . . the right one clutches an iron cross . . . an iron cross that is a three-pronged trident, with a barb at tip and two sides . . . the left bronze glove holds a steel orb, burning with light, so that the people are blinded by the orb and grovel, weeping . . . begging Magog on high for mercy, have mercy, Magog, Master Magog, set over men . . .

  And Magog sounds his trumpet from the red swing and makes a single unceasing note of brazen breath that topples reason and sends all sense reeling to worship the majesty of Magog . . .

  Before the cataracts . . . of the stone-falling fountain of the screen behind the High Altar, monks and priests lie on their faces . . . their heels towards Christ’s mystery . . . each tonsure turning its bald eye upwards at the blinding orb of Magog . . .

  Bishops in the choir stalls rend their mitres and chasubles . . . tears are slimy on their soft jowls, as they intone their peccavis to Magog . . .

  Lofty in the embrasures of the upper windows . . . cardinals vomit into their scarlet hats . . . throwing up their pomp and pride in fear of Magog . . .

  Even the Archbishop of Canterbury on the wooden throne of red and gold over the choir stalls . . . even the Archbishop cries out . . . Mea culpa, mighty Magog . . . even the Archbishop hems and haws for mercy . . . even the Archbishop havers his old noddle forwards to rub his nose on the wooden floor in abase­ment . . . Mea culpa, mighty Magog, mea culpa . . .

  And Magog still sounds the brazen note of his horn.

  Then the note stops.

  And all is still.

  And there is peace, dropping slow.

  And Gog looks about himself and finds that he is at the east end of the cathedral in front of a placard on a wall, which tells him that he is standing in the transept of the nine altars, the altar to Saint Michael, the altar to Saint Aidan and Saint Helen, the altar to Saint Peter and Saint Paul, the altar to Saint Martin, the altar to Saint Cuthbert and Saint Bede, the altar to Saint Oswald and Saint Lawrence, the altar to Saint Thomas of Canterbury and Saint Katherine, the altar to Saint John the Baptist and Saint Margaret, the altar to Saint Andrew and Saint Mary Magdalene, the nine altars of the favourite saints of the North, a medley of missionaries and warriors, of men and women, of Hebrews and British, a fit stew for any Northerner with faith in his heart. And Gog knows that the truly meek can find an altar there to venerate, showing their backs to Magog while all the rest of the people scrape beneath him. And Magog will let them turn away to the true God. For the strong shall inherit the earth and the meek shall work it. The humble at heart shall have their peace, if they sweat for it. The mild in mouth shall find their quiet, if they do not protest. The charitable shall lay up their treasure in heaven, if they are taxed on earth. The gentle shall bind up the wounds that others inflict upon them. The compassionate shall be given more than they can sorrow for, yea, even their own plight. The forgiving shall be judged for what they have not done. The generous shall be deprived of that which they do not wish to give. And the good, ah the good, it were better that they are not born. And if they are born, it were better that they die at birth. And if they live to the natural end of their days, they shall live to curse their life and they shall go into the grave gladly, as no one else goes among men.

  “Can I help you, sir?”

  Gog looks down to see a small verger, staring at him with sharp green eyes under the white fuzz of his brows. Gog is about to tell him that helping is the short way to hell on earth, when he realizes that the verger only wants an excuse to show the giant madman out of the cathedral, before telephoning the police to take care of such a suspicious character. “I help myself,” Gog mutters and strides down the nave out of Magog’s holy house, leaving the verger nervously checking the locks on the offer­tories, just in case Gog has helped himself too much.

  XIV

  As Gog walks down the hill from the cathedral on its loop of land overlooking the Wear, he meets a familiar, wizened, waxy goblin of a man, Miniver alias Cluckitt, looking even more aged than before. Miniver
now wears a black academic gown that billows about him and wraps him in blackout, if not in learning. He smiles to see Gog, his face withering with his grin like a balloon losing air.

  “My dear Doctor Griffin,” Miniver says. “We have not had the pleasure of your company for an age. Have they let you out of His Majesty’s Forces, now you’ve won the war for us? I see from your clothes, you must have been issued with a demobiliza­tion suit.”

  “You haven’t seen me recently?” Gog demands in a threaten­ing voice.

  “Not since the war, my dear fellow. You know that.”

  “Cluckitt.”

  “Who?” Miniver says.

  “You don’t remember being dressed up in a red bonnet and answering to the name of Cluckitt? Just two days ago?”

  “Two days ago?” Miniver says in astonishment. “I was here, of course. A red cap, did you say? Cluckitt?” Miniver scratches the few remaining hairs that are slicked down against his pate, then suddenly laughs. “Why, yes! That was seven years ago. Or more. Before the war. When I dressed up like a peasant from Lady Chatterley. I had a bet with Maire I could take you in. And I did. Except she wouldn’t pay. Maire never pays if she loses a bet. She just refuses to admit she’s lost it. How is she, by the way? Darling Maire.”

  “You haven’t seen me for years?” Gog says. “Do you swear?”

  “My dear Gog Griffin,” Miniver says, “I never swear on principle. But you know perfectly well you haven’t set eyes on me since ’39.” Miniver’s own eyes narrow to black pips between his cheeks of withered appleskin. “You’re all right, old chap, aren’t you? Nothing the matter? Shell-shock? Anything like that?”