Heap House for Hotkeys

by Edward Carey

  ‘We should get out of here,’ I said. ‘It isn’t safe for us down here.’

  Some lids, pan lids, tops of pots, bottle caps, about its person snapped up and down, like many mouths opening. Was it hungry?

  ‘I don’t have anything,’ I said, ‘nothing on me. I had a door handle once but that’s gone.’

  It came closer, there were knives, I saw now, small dirty knives where its hair should have been were it human, and these were striking against each other, making a slashing, scraping sound. I thought, it’s hungry, it’s hungry and it doesn’t understand. It held out a hand to me, a hand wriggling with old piping and handles and bits of old brush, a comb or three, a finger made of an old ointment bottle, another of a teapot spout, one was a bit of pipe stem, its neighbour most of a penny whistle, the thumb was the brass lens of a magic lantern and the little finger the shell of a shotgun cartridge.

  ‘What do you want?’

  More scraping, more whining, more lids snapping, knives snipping. I’ve got to go, I thought, it’ll keep me here too long and then we’ll be found. How to get rid of it, such a sad, longing collection as that? I pulled open a drawer. Nothing much there but a few napkins. A napkin flew out, a saucepan lid opened and the napkin rushed inside. I opened more drawers, I opened drawers all along the dining room wall, and soon the air was thick with things rushing towards the staggering person-thing, and that thing was growing larger. And it seemed to me to be clacking in approval, as if it was laughing. That’s it then, I thought, now’s your moment, if it follows you they’ll have you in an instant, get out now while it’s growing, run, run. Uphouse. Clod.

  Footsteps. People coming. I ran. Downstairs then. Downstairs away from them. I could still hear them, getting closer – down I went and down. Where was I, I couldn’t say – deep down, deeper than I’d been before, under the station for sure. Down away from the footsteps. And calling, there was calling too.

  ‘Closing up! Closing up! Hatches down! Hatches down! Shall be flooded, come up! Come up!’

  I ran further along, deeper, deeper into the back rooms.

  ‘Out! Out!’ I heard. ‘This side! Come up! Hatches down! Hatches down! Come up! Come up!’

  On I went, on and on, away from the words.

  Everywhere I ran was just me, only me. No one else there. So. So. So at last I stopped. I was alone, quite alone. In the long distance I heard one last, ‘Closing up!’

  And then the noise of doors being shut, of hatches being slammed down, and then hammering, and then nothing, just a distant rumble. I understood it then. The first double doors, where I’d gone out to the courtyard, had broken through, bits of the cellar were being shut up now, they were blocking off the whole stairwell and if you were the wrong side well then, bad luck for you, wasn’t it. I was the wrong side.

  That’s why I hadn’t been found. These rooms were empty now, empty of Iremongers who were all thinking themselves safe, barricading all the doors. I couldn’t get out. There was no way to get out. These rooms would be flooded by the heaps any moment. I could hear banging and pelting and smashing and rumbling, and I knew then that those sounds were not the Iremongers battening down the doors. Those were the sounds of the heaps, of the heaps coming in.

  Think, Pennant, think you, Lucy, there must be a way.

  Loads of them. Loads of them actually. All over the downstairs darkrooms. Fireplaces. Must have been ten of them at least down there. I’d climb up a chimney flue, that’s how I’d get out and get up.

  There was a lonely, cold fireplace made of slate, a dismallooking thing, it was in the Prussian Blue Room, where old boots and shoes of London taken from heaps were brought and there cooked up to make the pigment called Prussian Blue. It was a dark, sticky room, all slip and shine and stink, as if the whole place had been lacquered and quite japanned over.

  The Prussian Blue Room had such a sharp stench, like swimming in vinegar. I stood by the miserable fireplace. Its big mouth was wide open. Well then I let it swallow me, eat me up. In I went, in and up, between the walls, within the house.

  Not much to see. Not much to breathe. No light, none at all. Slow progress. Cut all over. But shunting upwards, small ledges in the brick to scratch onwards with bleeding fingers. Storm noise whistling down from above, trying to spook me. A long wail, very human sounding, as if there were a broken woman stuck and screeching above me, wedged in the chimney.

  ‘Shut it,’ I said.

  ‘Whoooooowheeeeeeeee!’ came the answer.

  ‘Don’t scare me.’

  ‘Whooooowheeeeeeeee!’

  It did.

  I slipped a good deal and lost my progress, sticking out my knees to stop me from falling all the way back down. Bloody knees, bloody arms, bloody elbows, bloody fingers. But up I went, up and up. Moving up the house. Way back down where I started there was banging now and swooshing and I knew that the heaps must have broken in and that if I slipped I’d likely go under, I’d be tugged under by the heaps. And those heaps, I thought, those heaps will be climbing up the chimney too, climbing up from down below, and from up above me I felt some rain falling down, but not just rain, the plip and plop of nails and screws of small heapbits making it down from the sky, a bullseye into the stack and onto my head. Cutting me, little slits. Heap below me coming up, heap above me dripping down, and somewhere in between: me, bloodied and sooted.

  Then something else. Some other black thing upon me, pouring onto me. A new black in that other blackness. Black smoke. Someone had lit a fire to warm themselves on this howling night and that fire was beginning to cook me. How the Grooms should love that, to find me tumbled down the flue ready cooked. They’d pick off my crisp skin then, no doubt, have themselves some Lucy crackling, some smoked Pennant. The smoke wanted to fill the black passage, it wanted to be there all on its self, it was a thick fat thing crowding me, dressing me, covering me, taking me over. Only smoke to breathe now, nothing but black inside me, turning me black. I kept going up, coughing and steaming. I felt a sudden draught and went for it, and clambered into the cooler air, I was horizontal now not vertical, I was in a different chimney tunnel, away from the central flue, a branch of it. I crawled along it, cutting myself again, but I didn’t care. The flue went down suddenly, but I wasn’t ready for it and was rushing, tumbling, falling downwards and could not stop myself. There was light, light coming forward in a great rush, or me hurtling towards the light. I landed in a firegrate. Ironic that.

  I was in someone’s bedroom.

  Someone, some full-blooded Iremonger, was asleep in bed just a few feet in front of me. My tumbling in had not woken the sleeping mound. An adult I presumed by the size of it. And wearing a nightcap. I couldn’t see the face. Couldn’t tell man or woman. Sleeping away, despite the storm rattling the windows and house. I went into the room very carefully.

  She had called me ‘the red rat’ and that surely was what I looked like then. Red of blood and hair, dirt and soot all about me, very ripped for certain, but still going on, still breathing, a bit of life.

  It was a woman I think. Some sleeping Iremonger lady. There was a night light on, dimly lit, giving me a little show of what was about. Neat place. Nothing out of order. Only strange thing was a small skillet on her bedside table. A small skillet beside a silver hairbrush and mirror, and a photograph of some fellow in a top hat holding a brass bedpan; the frame was silver. So what’s a cast iron skillet doing there then, ruining the display? Then I had it. It was her birth object, must be. This old woman under her covers kept her skillet with her day and night, she slept right by it, to feel that it was safe. What an Iremonger.

  Well, I don’t love the Iremongers do I, I thought, can’t say that they’ve done right by me, can I? And I said to myself, I’ll have that. I’ll take that, thank you very much. I can hit with that, it’s a weapon of sorts, and it’s your bloody birth object, you snoring Iremonger, you dumb lump you; yes, by God, I’ll have it. I picked it off the night stand. It was quite heavy for a thing that size. I like
d the weight of it. It felt like I’d got something. I possessed something right enough. Mine. And I left the woman fast asleep, what a chicken screech she’d give in the morning. If there was a morning, couldn’t be certain of that any more. Right then, Clod. Where are you, Clod, where are you this night? Which door shall I find you behind? Sitting room? Sitting room.

  Sitting Room. Just as it always was. Up the staircase. Easy to find. Victory, I thought. No one there though. Just the red seat, nothing else. Well, wait then. Just wait. Wait for a while. He’ll come. Sure to come.

  I found my place behind the sofa. On the floor. Put my skillet down. On the floor. Under the sofa. And now to keep a look out, look out from under the sofa.

  The storm smashed on. Bringing noises everywhere. House shaking. And me just waiting, waiting in the Sitting Room, behind the red sofa, on the floor. Come on. Come on.

  Door opened then. Here he is! Up I get! No, no, Lucy, you fool, make sure it’s him. Let him show himself. You, Clod? Is it you?

  Steps closer. Coming in. Clod? Is it? No, isn’t. Not Clod. Someone in grey trousers. Standing in the room, just by the sofa. Walking up and down now. Waiting. Go on. Go away. But the trousers didn’t. They stopped there, even sat down on the seat. Got up again. Knelt down. Trousers put his hands under the sofa, he’s got me, he’s found me! Only not. He pulled out my skillet, he took my skillet. Trousers sat down again, my skillet on his lap. Trousers got up again, paced the room again. Once even kicked the door. Scuff on shoe from that. Sat down again. Patted the sofa. But then, at last, one more pacing and then out. Gone. Door closed again. I got up. I’m not staying here. Clod, where are you? The door opened again. I ducked down. Looked out from under the sofa. Clod? The same shoes, the same trousers. As if the trousers were watching the room. Isn’t safe here, isn’t.

  Then trousers were gone again. I waited. Nothing but the storm. I got up around to the door and opened the door and went out of that trap. Footsteps behind me? Thought so. On! On! Another door. Which one? This one. Get in. In I was. Footsteps going past, someone running. Safe. Close. Very. Must find Clod. Where is he? Find him. Room to room if necessary. Well then, first this one.

  I hadn’t meant to do it at first, it wasn’t my purpose, I think the skillet would have been enough, but I didn’t have it any more, someone had taken it from me. I was looking for Clod but then there I was in a room with a different sleeping Iremonger, so I took, didn’t I, I just took, shoved it into my uniform pocket. When I opened those doors after, so quietly, so carefully, and seeing those heads that could not possibly belong to Clod, all sleeping, there beside the sleeping figures, upon all those nightstands, were things. Objects. Birth objects. I did not exactly mean to do it, not at first. Something incredible. Lucy Pennant, I said to myself, you’re a very bad one. Yes, so what? I went from bed to bed, collecting. I had four before I loved the idea, a tiepin, an eggcup, a noose, a darning mushroom. Then I had a passion for it. I stuffed them deep in my pockets, what a feeling, what a weight. They do things to you, these objects. I moved from room to room so quietly, so carefully, and I took the objects, one by one. All those sleeping Iremongers, so vulnerable in the night. One boy’s object I couldn’t find until I saw that he was wearing it, a woman’s shoe, that must be it, I thought, and it slipped off well enough. The storm was furious busy outside. Every now and again I should have to stop my lifting and wait in the darkness as something fell down one of the flues into a firegrate, just like I had, or outside the shutters rattled so much that the Iremonger in bed suddenly sat up and called out, ‘Who’s there?’

  And I, so very close, my hand upon the night stand touching a particular thing, would see that Iremonger’s dozy hand come up, pat the object once or twice, seeking solace, finding solace, and go to sleep once more.

  I was bitten as I worked, there were bugs all about, sometimes as I took hold of an object some roach should flee from it. I’m very brave, I said. And the storm kept on. Pipes rattled about, it seemed to me the more I went on in my game the more the house shook and gurgled. Once I heard an enormous crash and saw a couple of servants run along the landing, a great banging and thumping. Some shutters had come unfastened and smacked against the walls. The window lasted only a very little time, there was a huge crashing as it broke and then as the poor servants battled on, seagulls, a whole flock of them, came careering in, yelling and cursing and shitting, and objects flew in after them. At first just some papers, some newspapers and a few books whose covers seemed to be flapping in the tempest, but then larger things, great bowls and bricks and hats, shoes, bits of other houses, a broken window frame came in through the window, rubble, a saucepan, a seat that looked as if it belonged in a music hall, all came crashing through, and the servants retreated then, they could not stop it, hiding behind a curtain, peeking out, I saw them barricading the door with an upturned table.

  ‘The house has been breached!’ one of the servants screamed. ‘Get help! I shan’t be able to hold this for long!’

  The other ran off, seagulls hopping and flying all about. One gull, a large one, with a red tip to its beak, stood in front of the poor servant as he pressed himself and the table against the door, which had begun to thump now as if there were a person, not a thousand objects, trying to smash through from the other side. The seagull waddled up to the man in an appallingly good-humoured, slightly lazy way; it put its head to one side, and then it leaned forward slightly and began to peck at his shoe, then it waddled forward a little bit more and its beak snapped at the man’s shoelace.

  ‘Shoo!’ the man called.

  With the next peck the seagull had undone the shoelace and was now tugging on it, trying to haul the man with his foot with all its might.

  ‘Get away! Get away!’

  But the gull pulled all the harder and now other gulls came to watch this sport and one, cawing and screeching, waddled over to the other foot and began to peck at the neighbouring lace.

  ‘I can’t hold it! Help! Help ho!’

  The other servant came back and I shuddered to see Sturridge who heaved all his colossal weight against the door and kicked one of the seagulls so hard that it burst against the wall.

  ‘Awaken everyone on the corridor,’ thundered the butler, ‘get them safely beyond. This landing must be sealed off! Move! Move!’

  In all the commotion I slipped away then and to a lower floor.

  I crept down the main staircase. There was a man in official Iremonger uniform, with gold-braided bay leaves, fast asleep at a desk. He’ll drown in his sleep if the heaps have anything to do with it. I heard footsteps on the marble stairs. I ducked down behind the man’s chair, behind him at his desk. Someone ran past, stopped for a moment before the desk, and I saw the trousers again with the same scuffed shoe. Trousers stopped a moment then hurried on. Official uniform still sleeping, I entered his corridor. This must be an important place, I thought, let’s see what’s within. The door handles were porcelain with pretty flowers on them, I turned a handle, stepped in. Treasure room! Paintings in gold frames, polished tables and all manner of stuff on top of them. A huge marble fireplace with marble women, naked nearly, holding up the shelf. What place is this? I hadn’t gone two steps before an old voice called out to me, ‘Who is it, who’s there?’

  An old woman was inside a great four-poster; she was awake but her bed curtains were drawn. I couldn’t see her and she couldn’t see me. I hid behind a great ugly seat; after a bit looked out above it.

  ‘Someone’s here, I know it.’

  A head came from the curtain, an awful withered face, old and lean.

  ‘Who’s there? Show yourself.’

  No, no I shan’t. Can’t make me.

  ‘Who is it?’ called the old woman. ‘Is it you, Iremonger, have you come to check upon me? If it’s you I shan’t be angry. Declare yourself. Has the train come in yet? Who is there? I shall not be angry, only show yourself this instant. Piggott! Is it you again, Piggott? Have you found it? It’s not good enough just to d
isperse a Gathering, that won’t win you any medals. Is it you, Piggott, come to tell me how useless you are? No, no, you wouldn’t do that, would you? You wouldn’t come up again until you’ve found it. It’s not you then. Someone else? But who? Is it, could it possibly be . . .’ Her voice was quieter, then, ‘Is it . . . the it? It’s got lost, hasn’t it? Somehow stumbled its way in here. That’s it. The it.’

  The old woman was silent a while and then the emaciated figure came out from her bed. On her night stand, I saw, but a glass of water, no birth object at all.

  ‘Who is it please,’ said the old woman, in a very different voice, weak and frightened, ‘there’s only me, me and my memories. What have you come in here for, who are you in my room? I can hear you breathing. Why do you not answer me? I don’t see well but I can smell you and hear you, come closer, come to me, visit me. Won’t you please? No one comes to visit me. Only the Iremonger with the food, it’s so nice to have someone new, someone young. Can I touch you, may I feel your skin? The Iremonger who comes does not have nice skin, do you?’

  As she said this, very slowly she crept towards me, and I just as slowly crept away. I moved to the side of the seat, and then, that no longer being safe, crawled out until I was behind a great black armchair.

  ‘Was that you moving? Did I just hear you? You’re very shy, aren’t you? Don’t be shy. There’s just me here, an old, old woman. Have you seen my fireplace? It is a magnificent thing. There’s nothing so fine in all Heap House. Would you like to see it properly, why not step close to it? I was given it when I was born. We have stayed here together, my marble fireplace and I, in this room. When I was a child I should dart out of the corridor, even go down a stairway a little before running home, but that was long ago now, I haven’t seen the staircase for so many years. I used to open the door every once in a while and look at the different weather of the landing, but now, generally, I just lie here, in my bed, facing the fireplace.’