by Jeff Noon
None came. None at all.
Alone, alone, alone.
He screamed again, and heard himself screaming again down the empty street.
echo, echo
echo
He was standing outside the community center. After a long day’s wandering around so many domestic interiors, this building seemed to be the true center of the village, a neutral place. No attachments, no memories. He went inside, for warmth and comfort more than anything else, for he had already explored it earlier in the day. There was a small foyer with the receptionist’s desk and the notice board, and an open door leading to the administrator’s office. Nyquist looked around. Here was the hall where he had watched Professor Bryars’s slide show: the screen was still in place. And here was the table where he had enjoyed tea and biscuits. He climbed onto the stage. There was a handwritten notice pinned to the screen, reading, “Tonight’s lecture on basket weaving has been cancelled due to non-attendance.” He tore this down and then turned to look out at the rows of empty chairs, at the invisible audience. He took a breath.
“Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. My name is John Nyquist. The elders of the village have kindly asked me to say a few words about myself, and my purpose here.”
No one listened to him. He felt lightheaded as though a part of his mind had become displaced from the rest.
“I have also been known as Edmund Grey. And also as Mr Written in Blood.”
He knew he wasn’t supposed to say the new name out loud, but nobody seemed to mind, not one member of the audience.
“I was born in a city called Dayzone, a place of intense light and heat, of loud noise and teeming crowds. And of a region called Dusk, where mist reigns over all who venture there.” He took a moment, to let his message sink in. “I have come to your village seeking the whereabouts of my father, who ran off into the dusklands when I was but a boy, eight years old. Here are some slides.” And he gestured to the empty screen. “The house where I was born, under a glow of neon signs. My mother, Dorothy, who died when I was young. My father, George. I will pause here.” The invisible image flickered on the screen. “Please, good people of Hoxley-on-the-Hale, please study this man’s face. Has anybody seen him?”
No one answered.
“Please look carefully. I believe he came to the village in September of this year, but he may have been reclusive. I am trying to find his current whereabouts.”
Silence, from all the seats.
He stared out at them, all the missing people.
“Please, I beg of you. Will you not give help to a stranger in need?”
They would not.
Nyquist’s eyes scanned the empty hall and then finally settled on one particular chair, slightly off-center on the left, three rows from the front. This he knew was the seat his father would choose, if he ever came to a public event. He spoke to this chair alone.
“Eschewing modesty for the moment, I would like to think that I have made something of my life. I am a private eye. I have witnessed events so strange they have brought me to the edge of madness, and yet I have survived these hardships, often by accident more than skill. I have made my way to this point in time, despite all. I am alive!”
Anger broke free of his words.
But his audience made not a murmur: they really didn’t care. He brought himself under control and carried on with his speech in a calmer tone, speaking once more to his father’s empty chair.
“Father, whatever you think you have done wrong… I have done the same, or worse.”
He paused, suddenly unable to formulate his words.
“And yet… and yet…”
His audience waited, or didn’t wait. He imagined a chair scraping; someone at the back was leaving. Another person followed.
“And yet, in recompense, through my work, I have… I would like to believe… that I have helped… that I have eased a few troubles here and there… and that I have, almost by chance, discovered…”
One by one the invisible audience was leaving.
“… That I have uncovered hidden mysteries.”
Now the empty chairs were doubly empty. The hall was deserted, twice over. Or not quite, for Nyquist saw that one seat was still invisibly occupied, his father’s chair. And seeing this, he felt possessed, taken over by the twin spirits of seeking, and finding. Those twin spirits who really, secretly, hated each other.
“I know that you killed your wife, Dorothy… my mother… I know it was an accident… I know that you were drunk at the time.”
His thoughts could never quite complete themselves.
“In consequence of which… speaking freely… if I ever did find you… father… I don’t know if I would love you madly… or kill you.”
Here he paused again, for there seemed little more to say. And he had a sudden insight, that he was talking to an empty room, and that he might as well talk to an empty mirror, for all the response he would get: an empty broken mirror.
And yet he had one last thing to say: “Are there any… are there any questions?”
Silence, utter silence.
Until at last…
Until at last someone got up the courage to speak.
There was a question from the floor.
Nyquist stood very still, all his soul fixed on the act of listening.
But it wasn’t asked in words, this question, more in sound, in the sound of a small bell chiming. A shiver of silver in the air. He tried to locate the source, but every turn of his head seemed to move the bell away from his direct hearing. And then he bent down on his hands and knees and lowered the side of his face to the wooden floor. Yes, it was coming from there, from beneath the stage!
He searched in vain for a trap door. He walked down the steps and saw the little door in the side of the stage. It was ajar by half an inch. Nyquist ducked down low and entered a dark space filled with theatrical properties, costumes, hats, make-up kits, and rolled-up backdrops. Bent over double at the waist he made his way to a set of stairs, leading downwards.
The bell called him on.
It was getting louder, just slightly. He was closing in.
He was now in a cellar area. Here he could stand upright, although the top of his head brushed the plaster ceiling and a cloud of dust gathered about his hair. The space was tiny, with a single door offering progress. It too was partway open. A painted sign announced in a decorative script, HOXLEY MUSEUM & ART GALLERY. Below that a printed notice said, “Closed for refurbishment.” It was doubtful that any repairs had been done in a while, and he remembered Professor Bryars’s comments about the museum, and its lack of funds.
Nyquist pulled the door fully open. Immediately the sound of the bell was hushed.
He stood where he was, not daring to move.
He breathed deeply, preparing himself. And the bell took up again, even louder now, in response to his body’s expression. Spurred on by this, he stepped into a wide corridor lined on both sides with display cases. His hand found a light switch but it only turned on a single nearby bulb, leaving the further reaches in darkness. The cases were the same style as the one shown in the photograph. The woman must’ve stood in this place, somewhere, posing herself, or being posed. The photographer would have used a flashbulb.
Nyquist moved forward cautiously. His first step set the cobwebs trembling around his head; his second caused a small creature to scurry away into the shadows.
Each display case held a dusty item. Stuffed hares and weasels posed in panoramas of rocks and dried heather; a single white glove decorated with pearls; the face of an old clock, one yard across; a book of spells open at a certain page, the text and diagrams on view; the empty flattened skin of an adder positioned next to the bones of its jaw. A turn in the corridor led to an area given over to painted portraits and landscapes. He read a few of the labels: the paintings depicted local people, and local scenes, some of which he recognized. There was also a portrait of King Edward VII in pasty oils, all the royal colors dulle
d to brown and cream. Another turning led to more display cases. Contained within were early examples of the saintly icons, carved by hand, sculpted from mud and leaves, cast in tin or copper, glued or strung together, chiseled, broken, partway repaired, with hands and faces missing, iron figures wearing gowns of rust, the mummified head of a chicken stuck on a child’s doll. One horrible face was pasted over with insect wings, hundreds of them.
A notice informed the visitor that the first saint to be revered by the people of Hoxley was Saint Algreave, in the year 1666. There was that date again, with its trio of sixes. So the first saint and the first wearing of the Tolly mask both happened in the same year: perhaps one was a result of the other, the saints as holy protection against the devil? And almost three centuries later, the cycle was still being played out.
The next room housed a collection of human blood, held in storage, all three hundred and sixty examples displayed on shelves in cabinets. Arranged by date, the containers varied through time: thick colored glass, clear glass, test-tubes, Petri dishes and so on. Each was labeled with the saint’s name. A few from the Victorian and Edwardian periods had their prices marked on them: a farthing, a halfpenny, one penny, a shilling, and so on. And despite the differing prices, the one name had stuck. Penny bloods. A handwritten card, very old and crinkly, displayed a poem or spell.
A guinea for her Ladyship
Two bob for Creeping Jenny.
Mr Brown likes half a crown,
But the devil takes a penny.
It was the kind of rhyme whose meaning, and characters, had been lost over time. And although it was described as an “18th Century charm to ward off evil”, it could easily mean the opposite. Nyquist didn’t know what to make of it all. The corridor was dark, lit by a few hidden bulbs, giving the bottles, flasks and tubes an eerie half-shadowed glow. Were they genuine blood relics, drawn from wounds in holy flesh? And if the people believed it so, then didn’t that make it true, as Professor Bryars had insisted? Symbols held just as much power as reality.
One last turning led to an enclosed room. He no longer knew which direction he was facing, or where he was in relation to the community hall above. Perhaps he was under a different building by now? Time and distance slithered against each other. He felt sick inside, and dizzy. Only the sound of the bell drew him forward.
The Tolly Man stared out at him from a cabinet.
Another step; another mask, arriving out of the gloom. Six of them altogether. Each was dated – 1799, 1824, 1859, 1899, 1912, 1937. The earliest looked more like a pile of dead twigs bound together with rotten vines. Nyquist studied each mask in turn. Branches of the myre tree, and wires and string or rope or fishing twine if no wire was available, and thorns and the ragged holes where once a person’s eyes would have peered out, and the tiny stalks where the moonsilver berries had been torn off, and the tangle of darkness at each mask’s center. He paused at the exhibit marked 1859, and shivered inside, knowing that one of his ancestors had worn this very mask. And he remembered for the first time the event in the night – dream, or otherwise – of the Tolly Man or Woman standing over his bed, and touching his face with sharp prickly fingers. He broke away from the troubling thought and moved on and then paused once more at the final display cabinet. There should have been a seventh mask held here, constructed in 1947 according to its card, but the cabinet had been broken into. Shards of glass lay on the floor. The mask had been stolen. A hollow inside a hollow. It made him uneasy. He was hardly aware that the bell had fallen silent.
The silence pooled in the room, mixing with the shadows.
He could make out another door on the far side of the room. It was labeled Exhibit 149. It was open, of course, but only darkness could be seen within, a rich tempting darkness. But instead of exploring this next chamber, he stood where he was, unmoving, suddenly fearful.
He wasn’t alone.
For every breath that he took, another person took a breath. And when he held his breath, the other person did the same, in tandem.
The room was deathly quiet.
Nyquist turned.
And there in the shadows, her face half in darkness, a woman was waiting for him. She raised her arm to show him what she held in her fingers. It was a silver bell. And in that one precise moment, every single detail of the seventh photograph was brought to life.
Slowly, quietly, softly lulling, hardly heard – the bell started to ring.
THE FLOOD
The light shifted, or else the woman moved, and now her face was fully encased in shadow. Yet even in the dark, her presence was palpable, a weight to the air that pressed on his skin: the room was a drugged space. The hand bell sounded again. It made a far quieter noise than it should, given its size. It appeared to be muffled, or to be ringing from a distance. The chimes merged with silence… and then found silence.
“Who are you?” Without realizing, he was speaking quietly.
He could hear her breathing, nothing more.
He thought of repeating his question.
But then she spoke, saying, “I’ve been watching you.”
Her voice was steady, almost too much so, as though she were holding the words in place, carefully, one by one as they were uttered. “I have been watching you, off and on, whenever by chance our pathways crossed, and whenever I took a break from my work.”
“Today?”
“Yes. Only today. Didn’t you hear my bell, calling to you?”
“I did. But you didn’t show yourself.”
“I couldn’t.” There was a hint of regret. “I had to wait… and you had to find me. As the rulings decree.”
Nyquist thought carefully on what to say, for he knew that this woman held secrets that were important to him, and he also knew, or rather he sensed, that she would fall silent, or even hide herself away, if pushed too far. So, he kept his voice as level as hers: “Haven’t I seen you before, around the village?”
“No. That isn’t possible, I’m afraid. It brings me sadness. But there it is.”
“Why not? Why can I only see you today?”
“Because…”
“I’m listening.”
He could hear her clothing rustle. “They won’t let me out, except for Saint Leander’s Day.”
“I see. And what’s your name?”
“I know only the name given to me by the villagers. They had a competition, and a vote was made for the best entry.”
“And which name won?”
“Madelyn. Madelyn Arkwright.”
“There can’t be much cause for those, around here.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Arks. And the building of them.”
She took his remark entirely seriously. “Your assumption is correct.”
“Unless it rains for forty days and nights.”
“That has never happened, not for that precise duration, not in my lifetime.”
It was a bizarre undertaking, to engage with her in this way. There wasn’t a trace of guile, or humor, in her tone and subject matter. It was a kind of innocence, and yet not one born of inexperience or even ignorance, but rather one arriving fully formed in life, and remaining so forever. What kind of person was she? How had she come to this position in her society? Why on earth wouldn’t the villagers let her out on other days?
Now she said, “But you do know that the name Madelyn means woman from the high tower? And why on earth would a woman in a high tower need an ark? It doesn’t make any kind of sense. Let it rain and rain, she is safe in her tower from all fear of flooding.”
Nyquist nodded at this, in the hope that she could see him.
And she added, “And yet I have to live with the contradictions. Happily, over the years I have come to terms with all such ambiguities.”
“Madelyn, won’t you let me see your face?”
She answered with a small step forward. The bell was still in her hand, but lowered to her waist. With her other hand she reached out for a wall switch and turned on the light
. It was a dull and dusty bulb, enough to give her face a glow, nothing more, but under its light she smiled at him. Or at least tried to; emotion was a curse on her face, something to be struggled with.
“How do I look?”
It was a difficult question to answer, for she held no distinguishing features. Or rather, too many features at once. It was, for instance, almost impossible to guess her age: at first glance he would have said his own age or thereabouts, mid-thirties, perhaps; but a second and a third look caused him to doubt that. She might be anywhere from twenty-one to forty-five, depending on how the light hit her face, and her mood. Even as he watched, her face seemed to age for a moment, to crease up, to wither, and then to settle back into a clearer, younger expression. And now that he saw her clearly for the first time, her gender was not quite so obviously stated. Despite the name given to her, Madelyn was an androgynous figure, from her cat-like eyes – one blue, one green – to her short-tufted hair, and her slim, shapeless body draped by a simple gray tunic, and trousers. Not a speck of color or adornment was seen. Her hair was halfway between blonde and brown, and even showed flecks of gray at the temples. Her voice shifted from guttural to singsong halfway through a sentence. Looking at her, Nyquist got an inkling of why some of the staid residents of Hoxley might not like her too much.
He asked. “Where do you live when it’s not Saint Leander’s Day?”
“In the dark.”
“Are they keeping you prisoner?”
The question worried her, bringing her older expression into view once more.
“I shouldn’t really be talking to you,” she said. “It’s dangerous. If the villagers return, and if they find us together…”
“What can they do?”
Madelyn shook her head at this, dismissing the notion. “I will keep us safe,” she said, “for as long as I can.”
For a moment the two of them stood there, staring at each other. And then Madelyn said, “You haven’t answered my question.”
“Which one? You’ll have to remind me.”