by Jeff Noon
“So it…”
“Seems.”
“It seems…”
“Seems so.”
It was hopeless. He stood up, breaking the bond completely, and he walked away until his hand touched the wall in front of him. From here there was no hope of communication. And he waited. He waited until he heard Bryars stand up, her chair scraping on the floor. He heard her footsteps approaching. He listened to her voice, faltering.
“You know… you know I want to…”
“To… to talk?”
“Yes… John, yes! For I am… I am…”
“What is…”
“Help me… help me to…”
Nyquist turned to look at her. “To finish? Yes? Your… words?”
“Yes. On this… this day.” She took a deep breath. “We help…”
“Help each other to…”
“To speak?”
“Yes.”
“To complete…”
“Yes.” She looked at him. “I am… I am… help me… I am…”
“Lonely?”
“Yes. Just so… and scared.”
“Talk then.” Nyquist held her close to him, too close, face to face. “Talk to me.”
It was simple enough, this instruction, and it set the professor going, knowing that only so many minutes might remain in which speech, true speech, was possible. She pushed it all out in one long gasp of air.
“Guinevere Clud was known as a witch, or a wise woman, depending on your point of view. She was a practitioner of plant magic, of poisons and charms made from bloodwort and wolfsbane and moonsilver, and so on. A number of people fell ill, all at the same time, and two of them died. It was in all probability an outbreak of a disease, for the plague was rife that year. It was 1666. But Guinevere was a natural scapegoat and she was punished for her sins. They drowned her in Birdbeck tarn, in full sight of her husband, Adam. I told you the story of Adam Clud being the first Tolly Man?”
“You did.”
“Guinevere died shortly after that. Adam must have loved his wife dearly, for her death set him off on a campaign of torment against the villagers. He was caught, and plastered with tar and feathers and locked up for three days in the mocking gate, without food or water.”
Nyquist looked at the professor’s face, as she looked at him, mere inches apart. He saw every mark and line, every pockmark, and no doubt she could do the same with him: the friction of life, never-ending, eating away.
Bryars narrowed her eyes. “In truth, Adam Clud was a broken man. He killed himself a few weeks later. But not before he had cursed the village of Hoxley and all who lived in it, and all who would live in it, all the generations down.”
“What was the curse?”
“That all the dead of the village would join with his beloved Guinevere, in the weeds of Birdbeck. All would be entangled in her clutches, and all their stories would bind themselves with hers. The villagers took to calling her Creeping Jenny, and saw her as a plant that grows only on the borderline between life and death. Once a victim becomes entangled, the vines would drag you to your doom.” The professor moved away slightly. “The legend of Creeping Jenny was born… born… from this…” And the further she moved away, the more broken was her speech. “This act of…”
“Of punishment… of murder?”
“Yes. Yes! Both. And now… now she can… can be summoned… yes… and so, by her charms… one story might be changed into another… from bad, to good… yes… by means of… of sacrifice.”
This last word was barely spoken at all. Professor Bryars looked exhausted, but she made a great effort.
“I think the elders have tried… each year… and failed. But this year… this year…”
“It worked?”
Bryars nodded. She kept rubbing at her forearm, pressing hard on the sleeve of her cardigan. Nyquist wondered if she’d been injured in some way. “You do know,” he said, “that Doctor Higgs is involved in this?”
“I don’t wish to know.”
“She’s ill. Very ill. She’s looking for a cure.”
Tenderness came to the professor’s eyes. “I wish… I wish I could help her…” She sat at the table and her body slumped forward until her head was resting on her arms. Nyquist watched her a moment. He went to the stove and checked the kettle for water. He put a match to the gas ring and spooned tea into the pot. He wanted to put in three spoonsful (one for each person, one for the pot) but Saint Hetta held him by the hand and he could only put in one and a half spoons. He waited in silence for the kettle’s whistle to sound. It seemed to take much longer than it should, and he gave up. He poured the half-boiled water into the teapot and gave it a stir. He set cups and saucers and sugar and milk out on the table, and placed the teapot on its stand. And then he sat with Bryars and they waited together for the tea to brew. He poured it into her cup, and then his, and added sugar and milk, as desired. They drank. But the tea was weak, the milk was sour, the sugar was nowhere sweet enough. And the usual feeling a cup of tea might give, that for a moment all things might be well, was not there.
All was not well.
Nothing could be well, not on this day.
But the professor was grateful. She thanked Nyquist for the tea and then she leaned forward across the table, not too close, but close enough for a sentence to make more than halfway sense. Nyquist moved in as well, and between them they tried to find an exact border, where words might find completion.
“John. This is not the day to…”
“Not the day to find my…”
“This is not the day to find your father.”
Bryars leaned in further. He copied her. Their teacups clinked.
“Saint Hetta does not allow things to be…”
“To be finished…”
At last their fingers touched on the tabletop, and Bryars could speak freely.
“She does not allow things to blossom, for she could never fully commit to her chosen god or goddess, and was buried while still alive. As the day progresses, her power increases. By nightfall you will be reduced to a word or two at the most, and every action will be curtailed. All your plans will fail, before completion. This is how Hetta feeds. Nothing will work, everything will be in pieces. And it will get worse and worse until midnight chimes.”
“I will try, nonetheless. I have to.”
“Most villagers will be in bed by eight. This is one of the worst saints to deal with.”
His face set into a harsh pattern. There was no peace in it.
Bryars pleaded with him: “Wait, at least. At least wait until tomorrow, John.” But her voice grew too loud and the words faltered.
Nyquist answered simply: “It happens today.” He stood up, but Bryars reached out and grabbed his arm and held him there tightly, as close as she could manage.
“Let me go!”
“Has she visited you?”
He was confused by the question. “How do you mean?”
“Guinevere?”
He nodded. “I think so. She left a different object behind each time.”
“Tell them to me, please.”
“A teacup, a book, a gun, and a coin. But they were stolen from me, all four–”
Her nails dug into his forearm. “There is a fifth, a fifth object.” Her whisper sounded like a scream of pain. “A fifth object calling to you.”
“You’ve seen it?”
“More than that. Much more…”
“You possess it?”
“I am…” Worry took her over. “I am the…” She started to tremble.
Nyquist moved to her. He whispered, “Show me, where is it?”
Her eyes never left his as she rolled up the sleeve of her cardigan, revealing her bare forearm and the green tendril that grew from the flesh. Bryars looked terrified. She made a croaking sound, and leaned in close, close enough that she managed to say, “I found it this morning, when I woke up. John, what shall I do? I don’t know what to do!”
The tendril reached out for
Nyquist, wanting one thing only: to bind with him, one story inside another, inside another, inside another…
THE NAMING TREE
At twelve noon that day they buried Ian Bainbridge. About twenty mourners turned up at the church. Nyquist stood at the back of the pews, with Professor Bryars at his side. The villagers were sitting in ones and twos, or small family groups, the women’s faces half made-up, the men with loosely knotted ties or with one or two buttons undone. The few children present all had one shoe laced, the other unlaced. The vicar made a valiant attempt at a eulogy, but never quite managed to say who it was that had died, and what he left behind, nor why he should be loved and remembered. Then they all trooped outside to attend the lowering of the coffin into the hard ground. The gravediggers had a task of it, or Saint Hetta had governed their actions, for the grave was a foot short of the required depth. The sky was a low roof of mottled slate. Hilda stood alone, wringing a white handkerchief in her hands, a flag of surrender against her black dress and overcoat. Somehow, against the day’s rulings, she had managed to make herself look immaculate. It was bitter cold. Nyquist took up position below the canopy of a tree. He scanned each face in turn, wondering if the fifth member of the committee was present. The one person he really wanted to talk to, Irene Higgs, was conspicuous by her absence. At last the ceremony came to an end and the first clods of earth hit the lid of the coffin. Hilda Bainbridge stood there in silence, perfectly still, her lips trembling.
Nyquist turned to see a lone woman walking along the path.
It was Agnes Dunne.
She made her way toward the grave. By now everyone was looking at her, but she seemed oblivious to this; she simply walked on, keeping her eyes straight ahead. Her face could not be read. She stopped at the graveside and threw an object down into the hole. The sight of this set Hilda to wailing. She was trying to speak, to shout, to cry out, but her curses were trapped inside, expressed only though the lines on her face, and the bitter hatred in her eyes. Len Sadler had to grab hold of her, to stop her from making a physical attack. Agnes flinched a little and then straightened herself, and turned and walked away again. Len took Hilda by the hand and took her to one side. This was a sign for the other villagers to make their own way to the church gate. One alone took a different path, towards Nyquist and Bryars. It as Becca Fairclough. She stepped as close as convention would allow and said to him, “I’m worried.”
“Why?”
“It’s Teddy.”
“Yes?”
“He’s… he didn’t…” She was struggling, and took another step to make it easier for her to speak. “He didn’t come home…”
“Last night?”
“This morning. No sign.”
Nyquist frowned. “I don’t know…”
“Where is he?”
“I don’t know.” He leaned in close and took a breath and he pushed on to the end of his thoughts. “I don’t know where he is, I swear to you, Becca.”
She stared at him in disbelieve. But nothing more was said. Nyquist watched her as she walked away across the bridge.
He stepped forward to the grave. There was a twig of the myre tree lying on the coffin lid, complete with its bunch of white berries, the very thing that had killed Ian Bainbridge. This looked like pure provocation on Agnes Dunne’s part. No wonder Hilda had reacted as she did, howling in pain. But Nyquist gave it another meaning: an act of confession.
The gravediggers started on their job, hoping to get it half finished before the rain come down. Saint Hetta deemed it fit that only a few feet of soil should be added; tomorrow the men would return to complete the task, the new day’s saint permitting. Nyquist watched them at their work. He couldn’t help worrying a little about Teddy, wondering what the young man was up to now: hoping it wasn’t anything too stupid. Was he in trouble, in danger?
Was he the fifth person?
No. No, it couldn’t be…
Bryars tugged at Nyquist’s sleeve, breaking his mood, and he followed her gesture over to the cemetery wall. There was a gnarled and twisted tree there, almost tied in a knot by the pressure of years and the code in the seed. At first he could see nothing of interest, but then a slim dark figure dropped down from the lower branches and started to hurry away. It was Sylvia Keepsake. Moving quickly, he went over to the tree, but Sylvia had already vanished through a side gate and when he tried to follow, he could only see a curving pathway, deserted in both directions. He went back to the tree, where Bryars was standing. Something in the branches had caught her attention. About a dozen naming labels had been attached to twigs. Nyquist read one of them: Sister Silence. He reached up to examine each in turn, but they all said the same thing: Sister Silence, Sister Silence, Sister Silence. Perhaps Sylvia of the Woods had left the messages here as offerings for the dead and the grieving. He looked at one last label: Sister Silence. He pulled it from the twig and handed it to Professor Bryars.
“Who is Sister Silence?”
Bryars explained, or tried to explain: “Hilda’s maiden name…”
“Yes… What was it?”
“Keepsake.”
“She is Sylvia’s…
“Yes.”
He stepped close and asked clearly, “Sylvia is Hilda’s sister?”
“Yes.”
Nyquist looked away, back across the graves of centuries past; and he thought about the case as it lay before him, set out over the last six days, one clue leading to another, or leading away from each other.
Hilda Keepsake. Sylvia Keepsake.
Bryars stepped even closer and said, “On the same day Hilda lost her voice, Sylvia started on her labeling. Words are taken from one person, while the other has a surplus of them, and must expel them into the world, by the renaming of objects. I believe both afflictions are part of the same curse.”
“The curse being?”
“Perhaps a first attempt at summoning Creeping Jenny. Now Sylvia is trying to cure her sister, to place words in her mouth, this time asking the demon for forgiveness.”
“Of course! Of course…”
“What is it?”
“Something Nigel Coombes said to me before, about the person to blame taking charge of the spell. He was talking about Sylvia.”
“Right. Sylvia, who gave his wife a new name, and this led…”
“It led to Gladys Coombes killing herself. Or at least, that’s what everyone around here believes!” Now he had it, and his mind turned over and over, as a simple truth struck him. “Because Sylvia started this, Nigel really thinks she can finish it. That she can reverse the spell in some way.”
They set off across the bridge to the high street. The funeral party had retired to the pub for the wake. Nyquist looked into the lounge bar. It was a quiet and desolate affair; all words held back by grief and embarrassment and Saint Hetta, combined. He couldn’t imagine it would last for very long.
Bryars followed as he went upstairs to his room. He would gather together his few things, his clothes, his suitcase, and transfer them to the professor’s house. The two of them would hole up there until this day was done. But his room had been taken over: he saw hundreds of labels hanging down from the ceiling, the lamps, the mirror, the sink, the bed frame. The floor was littered under his feet with the same white cards. They fluttered from the window frame, and they covered his bed, and they were tagged to his shirt and trousers in the wardrobe. His suitcase was filled with them, to the brim. And every label said the same thing.
Exhibit 149. Exhibit 149. Exhibit 149. Exhibit 149. Exhibit 149. Exhibit 149. Exhibit 149. Exhibit 149. Exhibit 149. Exhibit 149. Exhibit 149.
Here was the final proof. Sylvia Keepsake was the fifth member of the committee, perhaps the leader of it. And she was drawing him on, needing Nyquist’s involvement – willing or otherwise – to bring the ritual to its culmination.
They walked downstairs. Once they were safely at Bryars’s house, it became obvious that the professor was suffering from tiredness or something more. They
huddled together at the table. Her eyes were closed, her thoughts far away. He could not reach her. These two people, this room – he felt he was sitting in a dugout in a war, a kitchen battlefield. And then Bryars leaned over, even closer than before, and she brushed his ear with her lips and spoke in a voice that was almost all breath.
“The people involved in this will want to complete their task quickly, I think.”
He whispered back, “I agree. The time draws near.”
“But today belongs to Saint Hetta. Nothing can be completed.”
“Not until midnight.”
“And then…”
“And then they will take their chances.”
Bryars agreed with him. But her face turned away from his.
He asked her, “What is it?”
She looked back. Her eyes were dark and glistening as she spoke.
“I have seen Creeping Jenny.” Whispering, whispering. “Ever since this thing planted itself in me, I have seen her face in my mind, and felt her breath on my skin.”
Bryars rubbed at her forearm, where the tendril was attached.
“She’s creeping up on me, just like in the fables I was told, as a child. I am meant to be a part of your story, John, yet I don’t want to be. I want only to be alone.”
She stopped, and blinked, and wet her lips with her tongue. And then she rolled up her sleeve and revealed the growth on her arm.
“John, will you cut this thing out of me?”
Nyquist didn’t reply. There were arguments to be made against the act, but none ruled over the woman’s distress and pain. And most of all he didn’t want her involved in this, or hurt by it. He found a bottle of whiskey in a cupboard and ordered her to drink, and to drink again, as quickly as she could. It was an easy task for her. Meanwhile, he turned on the gas stove and held a steak knife in the flame for a few minutes. Nothing was said; nothing could be said. He could hear Bryars slurping at her glass. He took the bottle of whiskey off her and poured a generous amount over the tendril and the patch of skin from which it emerged. At the last moment Saint Hetta came into his mind and tried her best to make him only half complete the task. But he dismissed her with the last of his resolve. And then without any warning, he dug the blade into the flesh. The alcohol burned away with a hiss.