Fire in the Abyss

by Stuart Gordon

  Rather, they were arguing.

  “…and so you claim that your band KRONONUTZ—which I assume refers to this cult—met these two ‘DTIs’ hitchhiking on…”

  “It’s not a cult,” insisted Sylvia, “and not my band.”

  “Will you let me ask my question, please?”

  “Sure. I just don’t like you making it so plain you think I’m a nut. You could at least try to be…”

  Oh God.

  The phone’s started again.

  RING RING RING RING!!! No, I will not speak to you. It’s nearly five o’clock, dawn soon, not much more night, and maybe I should go, now, yes, but I must finish this, or I know I’ll be left undone, I know it. Just stop ringing, damn you! If I take fright now and go, I won’t finish this—and I must, it must be done, I’ll complete the circle, it’s nearly there, and all in my mind so strong I can ignore that device, yes, I can! Stopped. It stopped.

  Do it, fool. Get this done.

  Yes.

  “You could at least try to be polite!” said Sylvia. God, I have perfect memory of it, burned in, so now burn it out!

  “You say you met these two,” the unseen interviewer went on, “in Kentucky, and took them with you to a rally in St. Louis, where one of them got up onstage and took the microphone and claimed to be the Elizabethan sailor-explorer Sir Humphrey Gilbert. Is that correct? You say it’s his face and voice on the tape, and that the woman is—or was—an Egyptian priestess of Isis, no less? And you believed them and knew them for some six months until the group protecting them in Chicago was infiltrated by the CIA and…”

  “No, not the CIA. Some branch of the Feds.”

  “…and then they went on the run and vanished mysteriously”

  “No. Tari was murdered. Humf was shot in the head, but recovered. People looked after him. Then he went off on his own. We don’t know where he is, or if he’s alive or dead.”

  “‘Tari’? ‘Humf? It sounds as if you were on remarkably familiar terms with these…”

  “Come on! People are people, wherever or whenever!”

  “Do you really expect people to believe all this?”

  “I don’t care. Who believed in space-travel a hundred years ago? I just say what I know. Of course I don’t have sure proof. But I’m sure in my heart. Totally.”

  “Why? What was it about them?”

  “A thousand little things. I could go on all night.”

  “We don’t want you doing that. I hear you’re playing a big show tonight. Good luck with your band. Thanks for talking to us.”

  Sylvia shrugged and grimaced at someone off screen. Chris? Vic? Dan? Johan? I sat there in a chill sweat of apprehension, in a sort of spell, my wounded shoulder throbbing. “And now let us see and hear this… remarkable tape,” continued the commentator. “The donor has taken great care to treat it so that the faces of people in the room you’ll see have been blacked out, except for the two alleged DTIs. Ms. Kasaboulis appears to be sincere in fearing danger from her own government, while apparently willing to risk her own safety.

  “But the subjects of the tape—said to be Sir Humphrey Gilbert, a half-brother of Sir Walter Raleigh; and Nefertari Mery-Isis, from the Eighteenth Dynasty in Egypt, a century before King Tut—can clearly be seen and heard.”

  Oh, Michael. You and Ursula both stared at me, sitting there in your living-room; and then you turned and stared at my face, and at Tari’s face, there on the screen of your television set.

  Neither of you said a word. Both of you just looked back and forth and back and forth and back and forth, sang-froid quite gone, and I cannot tell who was more shocked, yourselves or I.

  I was clearly recognisable as the same man. On the TV my hair was not so long and shaggy, but my beard and face were the same, and my voice. The two of you stared, and listened, and so did I, and not a word was said while Tari (it hurt, it hurt to see her lovely face and hear the calm of her voice again!) spoke of the cycles of History; of the Marriage of Ancient and Modern…

  Then we listened to myself as I spoke of the prophecy the cunning man once made to me at Eton Fair in April of 1550.

  “…He told it all to me when I was but eleven,” I heard and saw my image say. “He said from the sea you’d be taken by a power not…”

  Then suddenly, with an oath, Ursula frozen beside you, you jumped up and turned off the TV set with a snap, and your face was contorted with fury and disbelief as you turned on my shivering self.

  “HOW… DARE… YOU?” you demanded. “You come bleeding into our house and at great risk we help you and you… DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM? How could you play a trick like this on…”

  Then, and I admire you greatly for it, you realised the illogicality of your rage, and controlled yourself with great effort while I stared at the flowered carpet and Ursula breathed in gasps.

  At length you grunted in amazement, and shook your head, and went to a bookcase. You pulled out a fat volume and tossed it over the room into my lap, where it arrived with force. With difficulty I read the title.

  Cunning Men and the Occult Tradition in Elizabethan England. It was published by Heinemann, and the author was Michael Greene.

  The Hawk, yes, the Hawk. Why not? Either way, it happened. And who knows what will come of all this? With your book in my lap I gazed at you. I was stupefied and unable to move. “I realise,” you said slowly, with utmost self-control, “the stupidity of my first suspicion, that you chose deliberately to be shot outside our house just two nights before the broadcast of this programme. But understand—whoever you are—that we are both extremely shocked!”

  Ursula muttered assent. I too strove for self-control.

  “You may think me mad!” My voice still trembled. “Doubtless I am! Yes, and I understand if you think me but a lunatic playing a low trick on you! But I would never have told you who I am if not for this! I stopped doing that after Tari died, save in two cases.”

  Clumsily, with difficulty, I stood. “I have no wish to bring harm to you. I will go, now, if you want.”

  “Michael,” said Ursula in a thin voice, “I think… I don’t know… that maybe we should… perhaps…?”

  “I’ll not blame you if you do,” I said grimly. “Only give me a few minutes, that’s all I ask.”

  Then I saw you shaking your head, Michael. There was an odd, almost hungry gleam in your eye as you regarded me. “No,” you said, and you sounded puzzled at yourself. “No need to rush anything. I think we should at least… sleep on it.”

  And that’s how all this began.

  32. Aquarius: Vision of the Dancers

  And how it ends.

  I got away by the skin of my teeth.

  Tonight we’re camped outside Wrexham, Michael. Tomorrow we go on to Liverpool. There are many of us, more than last year, more with each convoy that arrives, and here tonight half-a-dozen convoys stand grouped together for strength. I don’t know how many of us there are, but I can see fires twinkling away into the night in all directions. The time has come, the police and soldiers are too busy to pay us the sort of attention they’d like. They’re distracted; we should be able to get into Liverpool without too much difficulty. Archie and Lorraine tell me there has been a lot of argument in recent weeks. Some say we should have nothing to do with the fight in the cities, but involve ourselves only where and when it touches us in the country. The majority view (which seems sound to me) is that to sit passively now is to court destruction and waste of much good effort. Most agree we must take what we have into the fight, and breed our spirit into whatever may come of all this. “If we stay out now,” Archie said to me just an hour ago, “we’ll never find common ground with those folk in the streets. We have to show them we’re with them all the way. You’ve been a soldier, haven’t you, Humf?”

  “We.”

  “Our.”

  Yes. I’ve chosen where and with whom and for what I’ll stand, and for more than one good reason! Michael, you know I was once a soldier, and not such a bad sold
ier at that. The times may change, but not human affairs. Things go in spiraling cycles. Peace and war, peace and war, and Humf knows where he stands now, an it’s neither Marx nor Capital, Michael. In my view what’s at stake goes far beyond that weary mechanical duality.

  Yes, I made it by the skin of my teeth.

  It was already after dawn yesterday morning when I wrote those last words (only a page ago, but universes ago, too!) on how you and I met, and how this all began. “That’s it!” I told myself, “It’s done, let’s go!” Yet very nearly I went on writing for a few more minutes after that, wanting to round the whole thing off with some well-chosen fine-sounding words; such as declamatory description of how Gylberte is now dead so that Humf may live and love and fight again, and making my final judgments on England and America, perhaps with a quotation or two in Latin—all that—but suddenly, with sun near to rising, I had such a strong prickly feeling of imminent interruption, of disaster, that I put down my pen and wrote not another word. In short, I was in a blue funk, with the sense of not a second to be wasted. I bundled up all these pages into the pack with the rest of my necessary gear, pulled on my boots, made sure of the map to Betws-y-Coed, and in ten minutes I was out of that house with dishes unwashed and fire still burning.

  Foolish, nervous Humf! Can’t answer telephones and flees because of prickles up the spine! So I was scolding myself as I climbed quickly up the pastures, aiming north, up to the standing stone—and was almost up to the top of the hill when from below I heard cars, and quite without thinking threw myself flat behind a bush. When I looked I saw two cars with turret-lights and black-and-white chequer-pattems on their sides come bumping along to the house I’d just quit. Police! Yes, so I scolded myself no more, but got on as quick as I could, stopping just a few seconds at the stone to touch it and give the Hawk my thanks for alerting me. Call it what you like, Michael. And the rest of yesterday I stayed to the land. No roads, and those I crossed I crossed with great care. It’s wild land as you know, and I met nobody, but I got caught in a nasty storm. Eventually I knew I wouldn’t reach Betws-y-Coed before night. So I stayed in a wood on a lee slope, quite comfortable, really, once I found stuff dry enough to make a fire. I made a shelter and wrapped up tight and was quick asleep.

  It’s not clear to me why the law came at such a time—early in the day yet late in the month. But I don’t have to worry about that.

  I slept as sound as a babe, until midway through the night I woke up. You can call it one of these terrifically real dreams I get, if you prefer. For high up the slope above me, through the trees, there was a dancing light.

  The rain had stopped. The sky was clear, moon waxing bright, stars like petals, very soft through the wet clean atmosphere; and the land about was layers of dark woody hilly watery presence, all intermingled and vibrant with tremendous sense of lovemaking. The trees rustled soft all about, an owl hooted far away, away a mile or more. And the light—Michael, it was like a will-o’-the-wisp, sometimes two, dancing all over the high pasture, and of course I got up and put on my boots and climbed after it. And so on a high field under the moon I came to them.

  Do I have to tell you who they were?

  Well, she had her raven hair again, and he as massive as I remembered, magnificent-headed, and I felt those wings that beat above, beating the whole earth, to the beat of which they danced.

  They danced the dance of what we do now.

  Do you understand me?

  When they were gone—or when I awoke—I found myself alone on that slope with dawn. Yes, I had my boots on. I struck camp and made my way the last few miles to Betws-y-Coed.

  Once again I found them on the point of departure.

  Police were patrolling not-so-casually in the not-so-immediate vicinity of the heath where the convoy was camped. I made my way through them easily enough. I came in, and found a welcome.

  Archie took me to Lorraine and when we came to her she turned round unsurprised, as if expecting me, and she was not unhappy about it at all! Neither was I! And she had not one surprise, but two!”

  “Oh, hullo,” she exclaimed, “your colours look so much better, Humf! Hey, I tried to call you twice, a couple of nights ago, pretty late, but there was no answer. Maybe I got given the wrong number.”

  Michael, I tell you I was taken aback, and chagrined.

  But I can live with it.

  It seems that Joe Thomas (Grace mentioned him to me: the local lad who knows these terrible people my friends) told them about the eccentric Englishman staying at Griffith of Gwernacca’s old house, so Lorraine knew immediately who it was, and she found the number and rang, late, to be sure I’d be there to answer if there at all. But I wouldn’t answer, being so full of bugaboos about the thing.

  I told her about it, though not without a cough or two.

  She laughed and said she feels the same about telephones.

  Colum and Deirdre are well, and were glad to see me. It wasn’t until I’d greeted them that she produced her other surprise.

  Well! And he has my looks too, the lucky young pup!

  She says she knew before I went but decided not to tell me because if she had I wouldn’t have gone, which would only have ended up with my blaming her for keeping me. Or something like that.

  Michael, this day has been rather remarkable for me. Somehow it completes the whole business. I am no longer a stranger. I have a child in this age. I am a father, and related to others.

  I’m still overwhelmed, and perhaps I’m prattling foolishly, but it all seems to me as if… how can I put it?—

  No. Let’s not even try. There are things to do.

  As for Liverpool, I had my doubts whether children should go in with us, but discussion has decided that we all go in.

  Michael, this is a joyous day for me. As soon as I can I’ll mail this, to the other address, just in case; also the printed card you gave me to tip you off that it’s delivered there.

  Be careful, Michael. Godspeed, my friend. Farewell.

  Afterword: Michael Greene Laughs at Last

  After his diet-controlled breakfast, still in his dressing-gown, the pale man slowly climbed the stairs to his study. He looked and moved like one for whom the spirit has gone out of life. At his desk he shuffled papers and scribbled a few notes, but it was only habit, his mind was not on it. Outside birds chattered in newly budded trees; he heard them no more than he noticed or took heart from the sunlight spilling through the windows. Soon, with a sigh, he dropped the papers and took up a dogeared snapshot of a tall, slim, choleric-looking middleaged man. No observable expression occupied his face as he studied it.

  Some minutes later his wife came in with mail and folded newspaper fresh from the doorstep. “Mail, dear,” she said, but frowned to see the photograph on the desk before him. “You’re not still worrying about him, are you? He’s gone, you know. That man Griffith says he must have left just before the police came to take him in for raping that poor girl. Dreadful business! How you were fooled by him in the first place I’ll never know!” She plumped mail and folded paper down over the snapshot. “There’s a letter from the Chancellor’s office. It must be your formal reinstatement. They’ve been very understanding, don’t you think?”

  “Um,” he said, not looking up. “Um.”

  She left, still frowning. After the door shut he picked the bundle of mail up listlessly, and began to slit open the Chancellor’s note with a penknife—then tossed it aside.

  For the first time that day light came to his eyes.

  Under the university letter was a postcard, a printed item.

  PHILIP OGILVEE, ANTIQUARIAN BOOKS, said the black Gothic script. Address and telephone number followed, then, WE ARE PLEASED TO ANNOUNCE AN AUCTION OF RARE & VALUABLE ITEMS AT OUR…

  He looked for the mark he’d made. It was there.

  His heart began to beat rapidly. Careful, he thought, don’t overdo it. But he felt glad. He felt hope again. His mind, so long sluggish with fear and confusion, began to m
ove. He picked up the local paper automatically. Have to get to the boathouse somehow, he was thinking as he opened up the news, It’ll be there now! I’ll say I need an afternoon alone at the river to think things out. Tomorrow? Drive me there and pick me up later. I’ll get it back here, and…

  The headline. The headline caught his eye.

  MYSTERY MADMAN CHARGES LIVERPOOL TROOPS!

  There was a photograph. Something familiar…

  “Oh my God!” he uttered, “Humf! No! Surely not!”

  His heart. He took a pill. Then he read the story:

  Liverpool,

  23rd April. By Our Correspondent.

  Soldiers of the Lancashire Fusiliers were driven back from their positions in the Hoxton suburb of Liverpool today following a bizarre assault on their barricades.

  At dawn, only hours after the weary troops had driven mobs armed with bricks and Molotov Cocktails out of the disputed area, the men of C Company were awakened by a trumpet fanfare.

  “Scared the s**t out of me!” a private soldier later told our man. “We’re used to hearing that coloured reggae stuff, but this sounded straight out of bleedin’ John Wayne!”

  In the immediate wake of the trumpet call, a rider mounted on a black horse burst out of a side-street fifty yards from the barricades. The rider charged, apparently singlehanded, waving a sword in one hand, and in the other carrying a crude banner with the emblem of what seemed to be a hawk painted on it.

  “Our men were confused,” our man was told by an officer who requested anonymity, “their training in street-tactics includes no provision for dealing with this sort of thing.”

  Bellowing a warcry variously described as “Agelbert,” “Agincourt,” or “A Gilbert,” the rider, dressed in pseudo-medieval garb, thundered straight at the army barricade without a shot being fired at him.

  “So what would you do?” a disgruntled NCO later demanded of our man. “We know how to deal with blokes throwing rocks and that, but this was like a loony dream! I mean what’s things coming to? This f*****r just rode right over us. Then the rest of the b******s hit us while we was all watching him doing his Charge of the Light Brigade bit. We didn’t have a chance.”