by Alan Garner
He punched the door code and went into the control room.
‘Afternoon, Owen.’
‘Hi, Colin.’ The duty controller turned in his chair away from the encompassing desk, the monitors and computers and the clocks of other time. ‘What are you doing?’
‘I want to check the data.’
‘You’re a liability. You know that?’
‘Have you got the printouts?’
‘And R.T.’s after your head.’
‘Wellaway.’
‘He’s found you’re spending time on M45. Says you’re wasting the budget.’
‘Am I, now?’
‘Don’t push it. He thinks you’re not here.’
‘I can change that.’
‘Colin. You’re off sick.’
‘So I don’t feel sick.’
‘Listen. We worry about you. You’re irrational.’
‘Perhaps.’
‘M45 is not a priority.’
‘Not for you.’
‘Listen, Colin. I don’t give a corkscrew chuff box for the budget. It’s you I’m bothered about, my friend.’
‘Thanks, Owen. I appreciate that. Is R.T. in?’
‘Yes.’
‘Right. I’ll see whether he wants my head on a charger or as it comes.’
Colin left the control room and went to the Director’s office. He knocked on the door.
‘R.T.?’
‘Whisterfield. Come in; you already have. Take a seat. Aren’t you on sick leave?’
The Director was his calm self. He turned a stone paperweight under his hand: the only sign; and the blue of his eyes.
‘You’re not happy,’ said Colin.
‘Correct.’
‘M45.’
‘Precisely.’
‘Why?’
‘Look here, Whisterfield. You are an able fellow. You have the potential to expand our understanding of the cosmos. Yet you fritter the budget on a cluster of adjacent stellar trinkets that is more the stuff of students.’
‘And if it isn’t?’
‘What are you saying?’
‘The fact that M45 is a local phenomenon may be irrelevant.’
‘But it is science that others less creative could do.’
‘“Creative”? R.T. You built your contraption outside to look for something you never have found. Now it finds what wasn’t even guessed at and wouldn’t have been discovered without you. Was that only science?’
The Director’s hand on the paperweight was still.
‘All I ask is a chance,’ said Colin.
‘I hear you, my boy,’ said the Director. ‘Watch your back.’
‘Thanks,’ said Colin, and closed the door behind him.
‘And?’ said Owen.
‘He’s fine,’ said Colin. ‘He understood when I explained what I was doing.’
‘Well, I’d not have put money on it, choose what you say,’ said Owen. ‘Here are the printouts. And you’re still sick, lad. Go home.’
‘I shall. Oh, and by the bye. The chough, Pyrrhocorux pyrrhocorux, builds its nest of twigs, roots and plant stems, lined with grass on cliffs or in old buildings; Slater, Williams and Whisterfield page 102. It would not, and could not, use a box.’
Colin wheeled his bicycle across the grass to the security fence and looked up at the white dish. It was parked in the zenith. He heard the wind among the struts. A klaxon sounded. The hum of the drive motors started, and the amber warning lights on the bogies flashed. The three thousand tonnes of steel began to move in azimuth and elevation and the red eye of the central focus mast tilted into view. The two towers that held the dish crept along their rails. The note of the wind changed, the stresses of the girders and of the dish made their own music as the telescope tracked, slowed to the measure of the Earth’s turning, and the motors died near to silence.
Colin checked. 15.15. He squinted. Azimuth 157·6°; Elevation 58° 20´; Right Ascension 3h. 46´; Declination +24° 11´. Good old Owen.
So the day shrank and night stretched. The clonter of the cobbles in the river was silent, and the river fell to sleep.
Then was the time when day and night were the same, and the sun tipped towards death. He went to the stack. The bones were clean and the wind had taken the hair to be found when birds built nests again; and the woman and the child were gone into life.
He brought the bones to Ludcruck. He eased them through the grit so they would not break. He reached to the nooks of the dead and lifted aside the old to make way for the new. And when they were quiet he left them.
The sun was dying, but hope would come. He counted as the cold gripped. If hope did not come, the sun would not turn, and there would be nothing but the wanderers, the curving of the stars, winter, and the moon.
At each clear dark he went above Ludcruck to the Bearstone and watched as the Stone Spirit, riding on the Bull’s back, the Bull that he had made new with the blade and with his hand, climbed the wall of the night cave. He watched the ring of stars that sat upon the Spirit’s brow, and watched until the Bull dropped below the hills.
And at the next dark he watched; and the next. If the Stone Spirit should see there was no one to care that the sun was weak it would not give the fire of its brow and the stars would end. Then where would be beasts to hunt? Where the hunters? Where the Hunter in the sky?
Once, when the world was full, the Hunter walked the sky. Above him was the Bull, and through the nights of winter it went before him with lowered horns. But when the world grew empty the Hunter left to follow the herds; yet the Bull stayed. And every night he rose above the hills. He hooked his red eye over, watching to see that there was life, and the Stone Spirit looked to send out eagles from its head to feed the stars. Then, when they had seen that the world was well and the stars were fed, the Bull and the Stone Spirit rested until night came again.
And each dancer in Ludcruck made new the Bull and the beasts on the wall of the cave sky for the time when all would be again, with the Hunter striding. But if the dancer did not dance and sing and make new the Bull on the sky wall, the Stone Spirit would not send eagles.
Yet there was a greater than the Bull, a greater than the Stone Spirit; for they kept the world and the stars through winter, but Crane kept through all Time.
Crane flew never resting along the River above the sky. It flew the highmost heavens and drove down upon the night. At deepest winter, when the sun could die, it thrust its beak to the dark above the Tor of Ghosts that lay under the star that did not turn. Then, when it seemed that it must strike the Tor, at the midpoint of the night, Crane skimmed the crest and rose to dive again in everlasting life. So the Bull cared for the world, the Stone Spirit for the stars, Crane for world, stars and the round of Time.
With the woman and the child gone into Ludcruck, he made a snow hole at the Bearstone and sat as the Bull lifted, to show that he kept watch and worked that the world would not be lost. And, as he sat, hope came.
Above the Bull’s back the Stone Spirit put up its hand and plucked eagles from the ring about its brow and sent them out. They flew as sparks across the night, gliding on their feathered fire about the cave, and the stars were fed. Every night he watched, until every eagle had flown and the sky was new though the sun sank.
Each year the sun went to die; and each year the Stone Spirit and the eagles fetched it back, though it had its trick to play.
With every setting, the sun drew nearer to death, the point of Moel, the Hill of Night, the hill from which there was no return. And at last it sank, big, into Moel and was gone. Then, if the Stone Spirit had not fed the stars, the sun had died. But now it crept behind the ridge of Moel until it came to the Nick in the hill, and blinked.
For five nights the sun played with the world, dying into Moel, and blinking at the Nick. Then it stopped its play, and climbed from Moel and death, so that night shrank and day stretched once more.
Colin locked his bicycle at the Health Centre and spun the combination. He rubbed disinfec
tant gel into his hands from the dispenser before tapping his details on the screen. He saw that he was expected and was invited to the waiting area.
He sat and watched the red LED dots cycle their information: welcome, statistics, chiding of appointments missed, a clinic for infant eczema, monitoring of blood pressure, electronic beeps of the summoning of patients to their doctors, please ask a member of staff if you need help.
A woman was reading a book to a child on her knee.
‘“So the little boy went into the wood, and he met a witch.” Don’t pick your nose. “And the witch said, ‘You come home with me and I’ll give you a good dinner.’” Now you wouldn’t go home with a witch, would you?’
‘I wouldn’t, Nan.’
‘But this little boy does. “The witch’s house stood on hens’ legs.” Isn’t that daft?’
He nodded.
‘“And the witch said, ‘Come in, and I’ll give you some dinner.”’ Would you go in?’
He shook his head.
‘Well, the little boy, see, he’s going in. “The witch said, ‘Come upstairs.’” Would you go upstairs with a witch?’
‘Don’t go,’ said Colin.
The woman looked at him.
‘“So the boy went upstairs.” If you went upstairs in a witch’s house, what would you do?’
‘I’d wee.’
Colin stood. ‘Young man. Do not go into the witch’s house. Do not. And whatever you do, do not go upstairs. You must not go upstairs. Do not go! You are not to go!’
The woman put her arm around the child.
‘You must not go upstairs!’
A receptionist came from her desk.
‘Professor Whisterfield.’
‘You must not go!’
‘Professor Whisterfield.’
‘He must not go upstairs! I have been upstairs! They are not hens’ legs! They are not the legs of hens!’
‘Professor Whisterfield. Please.’
‘He must not.’
Beep. The LEDs flashed. Colin Whisterfield. Room 5.
‘You mustn’t. They are not Gallus gallus domesticus,’ said Colin as he left the waiting area.
‘That man’s funny,’ said the boy. ‘He makes me laugh.’
Colin knocked on the open door.
‘Hi,’ said the doctor. ‘How was the hospital?’
‘Farce.’
‘Do you want to continue?’
‘If you like. Don’t let that boy go in.’
‘Boy?’ said the doctor.
‘The one outside.’
‘Go in where?’
‘The witch’s house.’
The doctor linked his hands behind his neck, pushed his chair backwards, and spun until it came to rest.
Colin leaned forward and turned the computer screen. ‘So what have we here? Well, these cocktails didn’t work, did they? That. And that. And that. Oh, I remember that. How I remember that. And that. And that. And as for that! I didn’t care. Chemically poleaxed. I’d rather be mad. Give me a healthy psychosis any day.’
‘All I can do is offer advice,’ said the doctor. ‘It’s up to you whether you take it. We’ve exhausted the pharmacopoeia. ECT isn’t ideal, but that’s where we’re at.’
Colin held the screen frame at arm’s length and shut his eyes against the facts. He swung his head one way, then the other, and began to shake. The doctor loosened the fingers from the computer. Colin clapped his palms to his face and slouched on the desk.
‘Help me.’
The doctor waited.
‘There’s nowhere. Nowhere to go. I’ve nowhere. Else.’
‘You had to admit it yourself, Colin. It had to come from you. If people get too close you act the goat; and you’re so damned clever and devious you run rings round any argument you don’t want to hear. You’d run rings round me, if I let you.’
‘I can’t manage any more.’
‘If you mean that, there is somebody you wouldn’t con.’
‘Alone. Inside. I am so alone.’
‘Did you hear what I said?’
‘Yes. All right. Yes. Anything. Whatever you want.’
‘She’s not to everyone’s taste; but she gets results.’
Colin looked up. ‘“She”?’
‘Is that a problem for you?’
‘Is she a witch?’
‘What on earth do you mean? Don’t talk such rubbish, man. Of course she isn’t a witch. She’s a highly qualified psychiatrist and, in my opinion, if you’re the least bit concerned, an even better psychotherapist. Colin, sometimes you say the strangest things.’
‘She could still be a witch,’ said Colin. ‘Does she like crows? Carrion crows? Corvus corone corone?’
‘I’ve no idea. I haven’t asked her.’
‘OK,’ said Colin. ‘OK.’
‘What are you talking about?’ said the doctor. ‘What’s bothering you?’
‘Nothing. Nothing. It’s all right.’
‘It clearly is not all right. You’ve got a tremor.’
‘It’s nothing. I concur. Just let’s stop. This. Please.’
‘Leave it with me, then. I’ll cancel the hospital.’
‘As you wish. Whatever you want.’
‘It’ll be rough.’
‘I understand the implication.’
Colin got up to go.
‘Eric.’
‘Yes?’
‘You were spinning the chair anti-clockwise. That’s unlucky. Always turn with the sun.’
The sun worked, and the cold gripped more; but it would pass. He had to travel the White Rocks before the clonter of spring began and the waters blocked his return.
The time came when day and night moved the world from winter. He took a bag of skin and went in the dark to the Bearstone and smelt the wind. It was in the Flatlands, where the sun now set. He watched Crane climb the sky, pulling the day up from below the hills, and as it reached above his head, night became empty of black, Crane faded into the light, and the coming sun hardened the edges of the hills as it rose behind him.
He took the leg bone of a crane from the bag and he went down into Ludcruck and faced the wall of the bird spirits. He danced the day and put the bone to his lips and played. He played the cranes from their sleep. The bone made their cry, and the cry answered from the spirit wall and joined with the sound, growing, back and to, back and to, so that his playing was lost in the greater cry. He stopped, but the sound went on, until all Ludcruck was a waking of cranes.
Over the Flatlands black lines and dabs rose in the sky cave, swirling, bulls, shifting, hinds, horses, antlers, horns, haunches as the cranes rose, wheeled and firmed into heads of spears.
He danced in the sound, and the sound of Ludcruck was loud and louder as the cranes flew above. He danced and he danced. He danced to join them. The spear shadows darkened. He danced. He danced his spirit wings, and lifted out of the rock into the company of the birds.
The cranes flew beyond the Bearstone, and he with them. His legs lay behind, his head stretched before, and his throat called. He flew in the spearheads over the Black Peaks towards the White Rocks, and across the White Rocks, by ridges and ice and down to the Lower Lands where the pines grew; on and on, calling, calling in the gale of feathers, through the day, until the Valley of Life showed.
Strength left him. The Valley was his journey. The cranes flew above, but he sank beneath, and his voice lost the music of the greater cry; and with the last beat of his wings he came to the edge of a crag and was a man.
Colin built momentum to above Beacon Lodge so that he freewheeled from there. The gradient as far as the lay-by at Castle Rock could be cancelled by the wind. It depended on the camber, and cars blared at him as he wobbled to the crest of the Front Hill; but he made it and began the drop past Armstrong Farm.
‘Down in Pennsyltucky where the pencils grow
There’s a little spot I think you ought to know.
’Tis a place, no doubt, you’ve never heard about;
It’s a spot they call the Imazaz,
Nestling itself among the hills.
’Twas there I learnt my prayer.
’Twas there I learnt to swear.
’Twas there I took my first two Beecham’s pills,
Ta-rah-rah!’
He passed the notice at Whinsbrow. THIS HILL IS STILL DANGEROUS. Straight down from Rockside to the five-lane-ends and the roundabout.
‘There’s a cottage so sweet
At the end of the street,
And it’s Number Ninety-Four.
Oh, I’m going back to Imazaz:
Imazaz a pub next door!’
At the bottom he braked to lessen momentum, so that by leaning hard over and trailing his foot he cleared the roundabout and veered right into London Road and the traffic. He worked among the flocks of cars. They all had black glass in the windows. Then the station approach made him pedal. Two point zero four kilometres; approximately.
After the station he went by Brook Lane and Row-of-Trees, urging past Lindow Moss, along Seven Sisters Lane to Toft. The house stood at the end of a drive, among rhododendrons. He lodged his bicycle and rang the doorbell.
‘Whisterfield. Colin Whisterfield.’
‘Do come in, Professor Whisterfield. Doctor Massey is expecting you.’
The entrance corridor had a side room.
‘Please wait here.’
Colin waited.
He waited.
‘Doctor Massey is ready now, Professor.’
He was led into a bigger room, lined with books. French windows opened to lawns. A woman lay on a chaise longue, reading a file. She wore a suit of dark silk. ‘Hi,’ she said, without looking up.
‘You’re quite young,’ said Colin.
‘“Quite”.’
‘Your hair’s black.’
‘That’s this week, darling. Tomorrow may be a different story.’
There was a diamond-paned cabinet. The tumblers and decanter inside were of crystal.