The Girl with the Peacock Harp

by Michael Eisele

  The town itself stands on a hill overlooking the promontory which extends into the sea like the tail of some fabulous dragon of old turned to stone, and at the very tip I could see the lighthouse itself, the whitewashed walls of which stood like a beacon in the low sunlight. This was well intended, I could see, for round about in the sea I could see the waves breaking in tiny white caps over submerged rocks waiting to tear a ship’s bottom out, should it venture too close.

  I had myself never sailed in these waters, having served man and boy on a merchantman plying the route between Dover and Calais. I suppose you could say that I lacked an adventurous spirit, but from my fellow seamen I had heard tales, some of them frankly fabulous, of the perils that lurked around these parts, and it was easy to imagine a storm at night and the towering waves breaking over the rocky cliffs with the beacon of the lighthouse shining out over the restless waters. I must have stood thus in a reverie for some moments when I felt a touch on my arm and turned to find a little bewhiskered fellow in a sea cap looking up at me uncertainly.

  ‘Be yew th’ new keeper?’ he inquired in the local accent. I confessed that I hoped this was the case, if the authority should see fit to award me the position. At this he broke into a wheezing laugh.

  ‘They’m be so clemmed if but sobe’t that tha’ hast but two legs an’ two arms an’ can strike a flame t’candle,’ he managed to get out in his almost incomprehensible dialect, ‘Tha s’all’t have th’ post sartan as eggs be eggs!’ From this I gathered that could I but fulfil the requirements of a living, breathing human person, the post of lighthouse keeper should be mine for the asking.

  This took me somewhat aback, for I had imagined the job to be one requiring not only due diligence in the maintaining of the light, but some competence in managing mechanisms such as the bell which took the place of the light on nights of heavy fog. However I soon perceived that my interlocutor was ‘making game’ of me according to some local protocol, and accordingly not responding to his jibes I made inquiry as to the location of the local authority. In answer he pointed a gnarled forefinger up the street to the most imposing edifice in view, not a difficult distinction to make, in truth, the majority of the dwellings in evidence being single storey with low stone roofs the better it seemed to withstand the storms on this exposed coast. The lighthouse authority by contrast had solid walls made of dressed stone blocks with a roof of heavy pantiles which added to its imposing appearance.

  As I made my way thither I noticed a bank of clouds building to the southwest, and wished that my business would be concluded before the threatened storm should break. Indeed, a breeze was rising ominously as I reached the doorway and prepared to announce myself, and the hollow boom of the knocker was seconded by a purely fortuitous roll of thunder echoing over the distant whitecaps.

  Inside I was conducted to a barely furnished room where behind a long deal table sat three men dressed in sober black, with the letter I had sent detailing my experience lying before them. The individual seated in the centre professed himself eminently satisfied that I was of sober and industrious habits, and saw no bar to my assuming the post of resident lighthouse keeper, provided I could set their minds at rest concerning a few additional matters.

  Betraying by his form of address that he, at least, was a member of the sect called ‘the Friends’, or ‘Quakers’ by the vulgar, he proceeded to ask me these extremely odd questions:

  ‘Dost believe in piskies?’ I thought this must be akin to ‘pixies’ and answered that I did not.

  ‘Dost believe in knockers, then?’ I answered that insofar as I had any idea to what the name referred, I ventured to assert to the contrary. At this point one of the other men, seemingly overcome with impatience, contributed the following:

  ‘What of mermaids, friend? Dost believe or disbelieve?’

  It was all I could do to repress a smile, owing to the fierce solemnity with which this last question was uttered. When I could command my voice, I answered that in forty years’ service upon the sea I had never seen anything resembling a woman with the tail of a fish, although I had seen aplenty on land who might be mistaken for the other end.

  This attempt at levity met with a stony silence, whereupon the three bent their heads together, with a muttered, ‘Tha’rt agreed then?’ ‘Aye, and thee?’ ‘Aye.’

  Finally the man in the centre addressed me cordially, telling me that the post was mine, that my term of service might start immediately if I were agreeable, and offered to conduct me to the lighthouse itself this very night, the rooms there being all prepared.

  Not wishing to be ungrateful at the speed with which the appointment had been made, I mumbled something to the effect that I was proud and thankful to have been chosen, and that I would of course be eager to see my new quarters without delay, in spite of the fact that I had not eaten since that morning’s meagre breakfast. This produced consternation out of all proportion, I thought, until the gentleman in the centre beckoned to a young lad who had been seated by the hearthside, and bid him hurry to the tavern and order some stew and bread be sent down to the lighthouse without delay. ‘And a bottle of his best ale,’ the lad was told as he left the room with commendable haste.

  Thus it was that not an hour had passed before I found myself seated at a table in the tiny kitchen in the base of the lighthouse tower with a basket containing my hastily contrived dinner before me, the steam still rising from a can containing what was certainly a very fragrant stew. I had been shown the method of lighting the main beacon, and how to operate the extremely simple mechanism that should ring a great bell at regular intervals if the fog proved too thick.

  I could at first hardly believe my good fortune. The post of lighthouse keeper, while hardly a sinecure, was sufficiently simple in essence to prove no strain either physical or mental to the sort of able bodied man I prided myself in being. Then too, the enforced seclusion should be balm to a soul such as mine, having been shut up for months at a time in what amounted to a steel box with men whose personalities had come to excite feelings ranging from dislike to an excruciating boredom.

  The stew was still a bit too warm for my taste, and I found myself possessed of a strange restlessness, as if like some animal in a new den I must sniff into every corner to make the place mine. Accordingly I made my way up the winding stair to where the great argand beacon awaited its nightly lighting. I had been shown in a cursory way how to work the valve on the oil reservoir mounted above the lamp chamber, and terse instruction as to the fragility of the spidery white mantle that carried the flame, but the other appointments of the chamber were passed over as if they did not exist.

  I spent some moments admiring the view from the huge windows that were arranged in polygonal formation around the perimeter. Out to the west the sun was nearing the horizon in a flood of crimson that dyed the surface of the waves and edged the cloud bank rising there. Silhouetted against the purple clouds I could make out the lights of a ship heading on a southerly course, and I thought to myself that my copy of Lloyd’s Register would soon be worn and dogeared if I attempted to keep a log of what shipping was passing.

  The glimmer of a metal fitting caught the fading light and I went to investigate. The source proved to be a brass tube, arising from the sill of one window for all the world like the speaking tube of a ship’s bridge which is used to communicate with the engine room when underway. I examined it more closely and found that it was capped in exactly the same way, by a wooden plug, without, however, incorporating the whistle signal used aboard ship. I puzzled for some moments over what function it could possibly serve in a lighthouse, ending by hypothesising a crew of two or more manning the station at some time in the past, however unusual such an arrangement might be. I tried to remove the plug and found it beyond my best efforts, and indeed looking more closely I saw that it had been secured in place by a number of large screws; which judging by the bright scratches disfiguring the screw heads showed the work was of quite recent vintage.

&nb
sp; A sudden decrease in the light as the sun was swallowed up in the cloud bank on the horizon prompted me to abandon my speculations in favour of lighting the beacon for the first time. As the glow of the clear flame met the mantle a strengthening illumination was produced so that in minutes I could barely look at it directly. With a certain complacent pride I imagined the light, my light, streaming out over the restless waves, greeting that distant freighter with its bright warning. Then, hunger won over further exploration for the moment and I descended the stairs once more, thinking to myself that I should bring tools and discover the mystery of why the speaking pipe, if such it was, should have been so resolutely sealed up.

  As I was finishing my simple meal it occurred to me to look for the termination of the speaking tube at this level. I first opened a large press near to the room’s single window, finding only a stout holdall containing a miscellaneous collection of tools, from which I extracted a large screwdriver. I examined several other cabinets, but try as I might I could discover no sign of a corresponding glint of brass, until rummaging in a cupboard under the tiny sink I unearthed two significant finds. One was a tattered log book which I put aside for later perusal; the next was a dully shining length of tubing which indeed seemed to be a continuation of that which I had discovered above, but here, as with the logbook when opened, more mysteries were created than were solved. For there was no terminus into a stopped speaking tube; on the contrary the brass pipe thus revealed continued unbroken into what seemed to be the solid rock upon which the tower had been erected!

  I remember I sat back, my mind whirling with speculation. I could imagine no use to which such an arrangement could be put; if to conduct water into the light chamber for whatever purpose why not terminate in a stopcock instead of a wooden bung? Plus as far as I could tell the water supply of the kitchen had no connection with the mysterious length of brass.

  The single note of a bell ringing overhead broke in upon my reverie at this point, and after a moment I realised that it must signal, as I had been warned, that the clockweight which drove the simple mechanism which rotated the lens of the beacon had reached its terminus and necessitated rewinding. When I had attended to this I returned to the table where lay the old logbook, and with renewed curiosity opened the heavy cover, hoping to find therein some indication of a solution to the mystery. Imagine if you will my chagrin when I found that an entire section comprising the first forty or fifty pages had been roughly removed, literally torn from the binding, and that the remaining leaves were totally blank!

  All this time the wind outside had been rising, as indicated by a steady increase in the vibration caused by the waves breaking over the rocks. Now a rumble of thunder made itself heard, and with a certain trepidation I put the mutilated book to one side and made my way up the stairs to the light room, not forgetting to pocket the heavy screwdriver I had found.

  Outside the great windows the storm indeed raged, and the view from the windward side was obscured by the explosion of the lashing rain. The wind moaned on a rising note through the ventilator overhead, and the whole enclosure was lit as if by daylight by repeated flashes of lightning. Yet in the intervals of Stygian darkness, the mechanism rotating the lens sent its warning beam out over the maelstrom of tossing waves, and I felt a complacent pride that any vessel abroad on the sea tonight could take comfort in the steadily blinking light.

  There was a simple straight-backed chair set below the level of the beam which rotated at head height, evidently for the use of the keeper in the performance of his duties, and I pulled it over to where the brass speaking tube emerged to try the screws that secured the bung, for I had resolved to end the mystery of the purpose for which it had been installed.

  After some moments of effort, for the screws seemed to have been driven in with some force, I managed to loosen first one, and then the rest. The last screw proved the most stubborn of the lot however, and it was only after applying both hands to the greasy haft of the tool that it came forth, grinding and squeaking as if in protest.

  Did the thunder crash ominously as I drew forth the wooden plug? Or is that merely my fancy after so many years? The storm was now at its height and I suppose the chances are even; in any case nothing dramatic ensued, no strange sound, no noxious vapour was emitted by the blandly gaping pipe. I even put my ear to it, hearing nothing but the sort of sea sound one imagines one hears coming from the depths of a seashell, and which is nothing more than the pulse of the blood in one’s ears magnified.

  I had to leave off my investigations, somewhat disappointed to have so little result from my labours, for the bell rang again signalling the necessity of cranking up the weight that drove the searchlight mechanism.

  If I had conjured up a vision of myself relaxing of an evening with a book, it became all too evident as the night wore on that the task of lighthouse keeper was no mere sinecure, for not only had I to attend to cranking the weight up every hour, but the wick of the lamp needed trimming occasionally to keep it at maximum brightness, a task requiring precise timing as the lens turned in its slow revolutions. The storm abated just before dawn, by which time I was near to dropping from tiredness, not having slept then for above eighteen hours or so. Wearily I stumbled down the winding stair and making a hasty toilet fell into my bunk.

  I was roused by a regular knocking on the downstairs door as the morning sun poured in through the single window. Opening the heavy door I discovered the young lad from the night before who had brought my dinner down from the tavern. He looked indecently fresh faced, and indeed the whole world seemed as if newly washed, the colours heightened, the sea a crisp deep blue, and the sun sparkling on lichen-encrusted rocks around the base of the tower, still wet from the rain.

  The lad proffered an enormous covered basket, and informed me that ‘Squire fra’ th’ authority’ had sent me some necessary supplies so that I might in future fend for myself in the evenings when I was on duty—which meant effectively all of them, I realised ruefully. Thanking the lad and begging that he convey my gratitude to the ‘Squire’, I then inquired if he knew for what purpose the brass tube had been installed, but he shrugged and professed ignorance, only saying, if I understood his patois aright, that it was ‘sommat a’ th’ Pr’fess’rs’.

  Whilst unpacking the generous supply of groceries and other necessaries, I mulled over this terse reply. A professor? Had my late predecessor been a man of letters, then? My weary brain could pursue the matter no further, and after firing the tiny oil stove I made an attempt at breakfast, after which I sought my bunk again for some much needed slumber.

  I must have slept the day through, near enough, and only wakened when the quality of the light told me it must be late afternoon. I resolved, as I washed and shaved in the kitchen basin, to make a more regular schedule from now on, with meals and sleep at set times. I was newly enough from life aboard ship to distrust any habit of life that did not contain schedules strictly adhered to.

  Staring into my little shaving mirror an idea came to me regarding the mysterious brass tube. Now that I had time to consider, there had been something odd about the quality of sound I had heard by applying my ear to the opening. A tube more than ten leagues long by my estimate should at the least have had a pronounced echoing quality, whatever its actual terminus. Accordingly I climbed to the lamp room and angling the little mirror in such a way as to convey sunlight into its interior, I perceived a short way along the crumpled end of a wad of paper; moreover, even in that brief glimpse I could see the paper was covered with handwriting! Had I discovered what had become of the missing logbook pages? But then, how to extract them?

  I remembered seeing a tangle of fishing line stored where I had found the tool box, and returned to the main room to rummage further. In a few moments I had found the line, a heavy gauge variety such as is used for large fish such as tarpon or tuna, and at one end what I had sought, a large barbed hook on a wire leader.

  With a pair of stout grippers, I managed to straighten th
e cruel hook into a sort of miniature fish spear, hoping by this means to snag the paper and withdraw it. Back upstairs with the aid of the shaving mirror I probed carefully, turning the extended barb until I felt it catch in the main body of the paper, then slowly, slowly, I drew the mass of crumpled foolscap out. I put it aside for later examination and again applied my ear to the opening.

  The next instant I was bolt upright staring at the opening with disbelief. Even at a distance of a few feet I could still hear the sounds being emitted now that the dampening effect of the wadded paper had been removed.

  Once when I was newly employed by the shipping line, I had been making an inspection of the lower deck cargo hold, when suddenly the cavernous space was filled by an eerie moaning coupled with a shrill whistling. After the usual sailors’ jokes at my expense, the Mate condescended to explain that we were passing by a pod of whales, the voices of which were being transmitted by the water to the steel hull. The indescribable cacophony now pouring out of the brass tube had something of the nature of those eerie cries, coupled with a slow, bass booming noise as of great rocks being ground together, and strangest of all, a mingled ringing as of bells being struck with an enormous padded hammer.

  Moved by I know not what fancy, I approached nearer and shouted into the tube, ‘Hallo! Can you hear me? Is anyone there?’ My voice was swallowed up and for a few moments it was as if I had been speaking into a well. Then a perfect storm of howls, groans, whistles, and I know not what else poured out of the tube, so that I hastily applied the bung to stop it. Even with the solid wood in place, I fancied I could still hear what sounded like a whole tribe of whales, until suddenly it ceased. I removed the bung cautiously but heard now only random noises; still, taking no chances I jammed the bung home firmly and carried on with my duties.

  After my evening meal it was time to light the beacon again. Once more the clear welcoming and warning beam poured out of the wide windows, sweeping over a sea now calm and untroubled, where on the horizon the running lights of distant freighters passed on their journeys. For a little while I consulted my Lloyd’s manual, trying to identify this or that distant light with reference to what I could determine of compass headings, but the results were inconclusive and after a time of attending to the clock-weight my gaze was drawn again to the gleaming brass speaking tube, and the mysterious written pages which still lay on the shelf where I had placed them.