Deep Sleep

by Frances Fyfield

  So. A chemist’s wife may die, sadly alone, like any other wife (Helen was alternately happy and sad not to be a wife), without the faintest suggestion of crime since tragedy and crime do not always go hand in hand, and if there was no sufficient suggestion of crime, then Helen had no business to linger over this or any file, because she was not paid for idle curiosity, only for the prosecution of those who were criminal by accident or design in some incident already established.

  All the same, she dived into the in-tray, searching for the addendum or any additions to this scrappy and preliminary report which somehow held the imagination. Ahh. Page two emerged from the internal memos, notes on Christmas leave, law reports, other reports and letters which she allowed to fall to the floor, one way of forcing herself to examine them. An in-tray was a magnet for the meaningless, but full of hazards.

  ‘Mrs Perry, the pharmacist’s assistant, was questioned about the death, she being apparently well acquainted with the deceased and the person who found the body. She could contribute no information to explain the cause. However, Mr Carlton volunteered the fact that his wife was in the occasional habit of sniffing chloroform to induce sleep and/or well-being. Small bottle of same found in bathroom, but the dose found in the body was not enough to kill, being only half that necessary (see Pathologist’s report). There were no other drugs on the premises at all, no chemicals, apart from the usual domestic range, bleach, dry-cleaning fluid, etcetera. Same have been kept. There were no stimulants. I seek your guidance on how much further this matter should be investigated … The family would like the body released for burial …’

  Well, I can see his point, Helen thought. No murder suspect, no misadventure but the simple and unacceptable fact of death. Chloroform, self-administered, well, well. Twelve milligrammes, she read, not lethal. How did anyone know, since no modern doctor used the stuff any more? The arrogance of all this infuriated her. Why sniff chloroform when you live upstairs from a stockpile of pills you could drink in your tea? She rummaged in the top right-hand drawer of her desk, looking for the familiar store of apples kept to impose limits on her cigarette consumption, forgot there would be none, and found instead a packet of cough sweets which she ate, absently. She jotted on the blotter, phone … retest blood – for what? Chloroform in bathroom, body in bed. How? I hate facts, she complained to herself. I hate facts and smells.

  Smells, obnoxious scents. She lived by visual images, second to words heard and things smelled, all of these senses acute and long-remembered. The cough sweet tasted of eucalyptus, but alongside that was another smell, reminiscent of a dentist, the mask coming down over the face, a sickly smell inhaled in mute protest. A little like the smell of the dry-cleaning she had placed over the spare chair on the other side of the desk, the polythene covering disturbed to release that waft of cutting scent, so suggestive of aggressive cleanliness. The smells in a pharmacy, as clear as a notice saying we have cleaned everything twice. She jotted on the pad again, ‘Dry cleaning fluid: test …’ How weird was the association of smells, worse, oh far worse than the association of words.

  No, she did not believe. No one willingly dumped such cloying smells over their faces simply to sleep. Not if they had ever been to a dentist. Somewhere this report contained a lie.

  Helen stirred, felt the still swollen abdomen, wished someone would come in to talk. She felt lazy, resented the prospect of effort; wanted back her hospital bed, tea and sympathy, but not this faint and dangerous scent of anaesthesia.

  Tombo hated the smell for a start, nearly as much as he hated the whole occasion. Rotten fruit, not rotten but overripe, suppurating somewhere, ready to burst from boxes and dribble to the floor, fruit worse than the kind his mother packed for him every day and which he threw, extravagantly, towards the playground wall, like they all did. He joined in, afraid, as he always was, that some kid from Herringbone Parade would hit him. A party like this, full of these kids who tormented him whenever they saw him for reasons none of them could have defined, was the worst possible thing about living in Herringbone Parade. Life was better with Daddy – or maybe not. Daddy was better to think about and shout about, as in, You leave me alone, my daddy’s a copper, between class, scuffling shouts repeated and rehearsed to perfection, losing their potency now. Boasting about Daddy was better than the actual experience of him every other Saturday when he didn’t really know what to do and didn’t really know where to go, apart from the pictures where he fell asleep and Tombo sat on, eating popcorn until he felt as sick as he was bored by the characters on the screen. Or playing inept football with Dad, even worse, since Dad was always so disappointed in him. Dad? Can we go and see Omen Three? Jimmy’s dad took him to that and he said it was great. No, you can’t. Here, catch. Got to make a man of you. Can’t have you turning out a cissy, but no nightmare films either.

  What a joke. As if anything was more of a nightmare than this party. Tombo had not been given the choice of refusing the party organised by Mrs Bum from the grocer’s on her premises, but sponsored and bossed by Mrs Bosom from the clothes shop, names he had coined for the satisfaction of giggling himself silly. But while he was there, knew very well what a nightmare was. He felt the symptoms: a flush in the chest, a little sweat on the forehead, a feeling of hot and urgent panic, and only because he was strictly, if imperfectly, tutored about his manners, did he stay, suffering like a soul in torment.

  They did this every year, Mrs Bum and Mrs Bosom, whatever they were really called, both in competition with one another, which ensured the continuation of this time-battered ritual. Mrs Bosom could not let Mrs Bum take the accolades for what had once been a philanthropic idea in harder times; nor could Mrs Bum stop donating her larger shop one afternoon a year for a ritual she privately loathed (although she always said otherwise, in case anyone should consider her mean and a person who did not like little kiddies, which she emphatically did not). So far, only the little kiddies could tell, and the compromise she had managed to make was to insist that this party, for all the children in Herringbone Parade, as well as all the children of the Parade’s customers, be held at the very beginning of December, to inaugurate the whole festive season and at least not waste as much trading time as it might if she held it during Christmas week when everyone else had a party anyhow and their own efforts would not be noticed. She cleared the front of the shop as well as one of the large rooms at the back where they kept the new stock along with the old, now all piled against the wall, awaiting trimming and rejuvenation before sale. Her husband did not hump the sacks of sprouts because of his ulcer: Daniel did that. Daniel was useful, tolerantly despised. Never mind him being an addict; he was nice enough, not always reliable, but cheap at the price, without ever being comfortable. There were several cartons of melons he had carried indoors, a mistake, those melons, but the fairy lights were sound, tested here before Mrs Beale moved them to the window the week after next. Sod the little bastards, get them organised. Tombo heard her voice, but all he was really registering, by deliberately removing himself from all the other children around him, was the smell of the rotting melons, the dankness of the room, the unaccustomed sweat of his own terror.

  ‘We’re all going to play pass the parcel,’ shrieked Mrs Bosom, who despite the alarming nature of her appearance, all shiny stuff and so big on top, entered fully into the spirit of this gathering. Mrs Bosom did not have children and still preserved the body beautiful, as well as a belief in childish fun. Currently, her voice was hoarse. ‘And after that, boys and girls, hide and seek! With prizes!’

  Tombo was quite beyond wanting a prize, the only carrot to be found in a grocer’s shop: the disgrace of not getting one of the many prizes progressively less important, and besides, they had all been given a bar of chocolate already. They were ushered into a circle while a huge, light parcel was produced. Crackly music blared from the stereo in the corner. As the parcel passed into his hands, he threw it on with great violence as if his fingers were burning, then sat back, bathed in relief,
his arms crossed over his chest, resisting the next contact or the touching of anyone else. Then the parcel lurched into his lap again as the sound of the carol faded. He looked down in furious disbelief, kicked it on savagely, survived for five terrible minutes. He fixed a smile while the chocolate he gripped changed shape in his sticky fingers and he did not know where to put it down.

  But hide and seek was a fate worse than death, a sort of slow torture recalled from previous horrors, unavoidable despite pretending to go to the lavatory, finding whispering girls in the path up the stairs, retreating, holding himself, his need frozen in the greater desire simply to pass the time before he escaped, remembering to smile when he came back. Sent first to hide, he hid obviously enough to be found in seconds, then was grabbed and hauled back, only to understand that this was a trial and he had to do the same again. ‘Make it harder, Tom, there’s a good boy,’ yelled one voice, but he could not imagine anything harder than hiding away to be found, pushed, shoved, squashed with the enemy in a dark smelly corner where someone would pinch. He hid behind the melon boxes, gagging on the smell, but his nerve was gone. They were counting up to one hundred, going slowly to give him time, all of them with their hands over their eyes, and the chanting ‘…twenty-seven, twenty-eight, twenty-nine, thirty!’ ending in a shout at the end of each ten, sounded like the barking of a malevolent pack of dogs set to tear him to pieces. Vomit was in his throat: shame at his heels.

  Tombo stumbled through the back room, not really looking at all. There were two back rooms to this, the largest of all the shops: one where they had partaken of the tea which lay so heavily on his stomach, the other no more than an ante-room to the little yard which led out to the service road behind, a cold, draughty annexe. Tombo heard the counting grow louder, speeding out of control before someone would turn out the light for them to come creeping after him, less like dogs now than rats hissing in the dark. The terror of humiliation became uncontrollable, lending him strength. He pushed against the back door, knowing the pushing was loud enough to be heard, not caring, kicking it shut behind him, running through the yard before stopping, suddenly brave enough to turn back and yell, ‘Yer, yer yer!’ very loudly, frightening himself further by the echo into the silence. His fist was raised, shaking defiance.

  The greengrocer’s was at the far end of the Parade, once a house, and the first of all the shops which seemed to stream out like a series of additions to an original idea. At the back, everything was featureless. Tombo knew exactly where he was since he had explored this service road, poked into the little yards and delivery bays, but never in the dark which made this unlit backwater endless. Half-day closing today, the party starting straight after school and himself not expected home before seven, Mummy probably taking advantage to be out. Tombo breathed deeply, puffing out his chest as he looked round on the off chance for Daniel. Daniel often hung round here, no real fun, but big and company of sorts. At least you could sit with him. Tom looked hopefully at the building site. Empty. There was no sound in the wintery blackness apart from his breath on the cold air, a rasping noise which made clouds in front of his eyes. He remembered the coat left behind, hugged his arms to his chest, and then heard dim thumps coming from inside the shop. Like dogs and rats released, they would realise soon, follow him, hissing and barking, taunt him, put him inside one of the tall bins flanking the road. He began to trot bravely, going faster and faster past the back of the newsagent’s, the off-licence, the butcher’s, the takeaway, each with its own terrible smell, trying not to break into a run, pretending he was in control; not knowing what to do until he was level with the back of Carlton’s Caring Chemist, no light shining out of his own upstairs home, and nowhere to go. Sometimes he had a key to let himself into the flat, a practice which made his mother so ashamed for all it signified, but not today. Any other day he could have waited inside the shop, but today they shut at five. Tombo stood, irresolute, becoming cold, then crept forward. Salvation. There was a light at the back of the shop where Mr Carlton’s back room, his own, tiny dispensary, led on to a patch of ground below the stairs to the flats. Light shone from the window, so welcome he wanted to touch it. Better than nothing: he was cold.

  Tombo had never quite brought himself to like Philip Carlton, whom he always addressed as plain Mister, nor could he rely on Mister to understand his predicament because Mister was clearly a person who liked parties, and because Mister always tried to be nice (call me Uncle Pip), but he did not believe he would be sent away. Formulating excuses and reasons, he crept to the window, which was, he had forgotten, the top half of the door. The light was the only sign of life. Thinking how sick he was of pushing unfamiliar doors either to get out or get in, he tried the door, which yielded suddenly to his touch, sending his light body into the chemist’s back dispensary with all the grace of a jack-in-the-box.

  ‘What the hell …’

  Philip Carlton whirled round from the laboratory shelf which occupied half of the room, with the sink in the middle surrounded with what looked like medicine bottles, and a few very old and mouldy-looking books. It was the ante-room to the back room rather like the arrangement in Mrs Bum’s but without stairs connecting with the upper landing. Philip’s voice was thick with fury. He had seized a jemmy used for prising open cardboard crates and held it aloft in one hand, the arm lowering as he squinted, identifying his visitor.

  ‘What on earth do you think you’re doing in here, young Master Perry? I thought you might be one of those bad boys I know, come to steal drugs. You know bl …’ he choked on a swear word, tried to stand up straighter, ‘… very well you’re never supposed to come in here. Now what do you want?’

  ‘Nothing, Mr Carlton, honest. I’m sort of locked out upstairs and I saw the light. I thought Mum would be back, but she isn’t, you see not yet …’ the fury in Philip’s usually unctuous voice made Tombo gabble, come to a dead halt and stand there, hugging his chest. Then Mister smiled, very broadly, and Tombo felt another kind of doubt as he heard a complete change of tone, the voice becoming manically friendly, even a little dreamy.

  ‘Oh, I see, I see, I see. Well that’s fine then, absolutely fine. You’d better stay here until your lovely mummy gets back. Play with Uncle Pip, eh? Such a lot of fun we’re having here, such a lot of fun.’

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Me? You must mean me, ha, ha, no one else here, is there? Me? I’m making mixtures. For putting in bottles, keeping poisons safe and fit to use. Such fun, you see.’

  He always repeats himself, Tombo thought, says the same things again and again and everything twice. Reassured, but unaccountably anxious, he couldn’t help but notice there was something strange about Mister tonight: he was grinning so wide and his eyes were all sparkly, his movements expansive, so that when he waved an arm to usher Tom further forward into the room towards a chair, he knocked some books to the floor. Tombo was used to Mister being delicate and precise in all his movements, irritatingly, sometimes comically so: the big waves and big voice were more often the surprising hallmark of little Mrs Carlton. Remembering she who was dead, this one-time friend of his, made Tombo even more uncomfortable. Death was not something he understood, except to know it was discussed in low voices.

  ‘Seen these books, eh, Tombo?’ Mister was pointing at the old volumes on the shelf which appeared to have been the object of his study before the interruption, although the whole bench was littered. The books contrasted oddly with the modern, laminated manuals his mother used for reference, but Tom was not curious.

  ‘No,’ he said.

  ‘Well, you can look at the pictures, but not if you don’t want nightmares, ha, ha. Mares in the night, don’t you know. Why call ’em mares? Why not nightfillies?’

  ‘What’s in the books?’ Tom asked out of politeness. He was beginning to get used to the glittering eyes and the strange smell in there. Nothing like the faintly dirty smell in Mrs Bum’s. This was at least clean. As his father had noted with disgust, Tom had become a fasti
dious little boy.

  ‘Shows you how they used to do operations, Master Perry, in the olden days. I got all those books when I was a lad your age, wanted to be a doctor, but not to be, not to be. Not enough money. A humble chemist, never an anaesthetist. My mean old dad, no ambition. Dead, of course, my dad.’

  That word, dead; a signal to change the subject.

  ‘What sort of doctor is a neethtist?’ Tombo enquired, looking dutifully at the books, which were dull indeed, containing pictures certainly, but nothing in colour and only of things which looked like masks, strange contraptions, old nurses’ uniforms.

  ‘An an-aes-thet-ist is the one who puts you to sleep before you have an operation, silly.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Tombo, turning the pages. The atmosphere was oppressive: between the cleanness of the smells, the party tea rebelled inside him and he was developing a headache.

  ‘What time is it, Mr Carlton, please?’

  A watch was consulted with elaborate care. Mister seemed to have some difficulty in reading it although the light was extremely bright.