Dogchild

by Kevin Brooks

  Is there a point to all this? I said. I mean, why did you ask me if I knew where Starry was when you knew the answer anyway?

  We need to know if anyone else knew where he was, Kite said. Look, Ime just trying to tell you what happened, thats all. I assumed youd want to know. Ime quite happy to stop if you dont.

  I looked at her, not sure what to say. I knew she was lying, and part of me didnt want to hear anymore. It was the same part of me that didnt want to be here anymore either, the part that wanted to go home and go to bed and stay there forever. But there was another part of me, the vengeful part, that wanted to know what Pilgrim and Kite were up to, and the only way to do that was by staying here and listening to their lies. Thats where Ide find the truth – in the nature of their lies.

  Tell me what happened, I said to Kite.

  Starry left my house at the usual time, she told me. About an hour before dawn. As you know, he always went fishing first thing in the morning, and thats why he kept a few fishing rods at my house, so he could go straight to the beach when he left---

  She frowned for a moment, pretending to think.

  Were you aware that he didnt come home last night?

  No, I said, not knowing why I was lying. I went to bed around midnight and didnt wake up til I heard the gunshots.

  Was Chola Se with you?

  Does it matter?

  I wouldnt ask if it didnt.

  Yeh, she was with me.

  All night?

  Yeh.

  You just said you were asleep from midnight onwards.

  So?

  So how do you know she was there all night?

  What are you trying to say? You think she had something to do with Starrys death?

  Do you?

  I sighed. This is ridiculous.

  Kite stared at me for a few seconds, then turned to Pilgrim. Shede said her piece, it seemed, and now it was his turn.

  The way it looks, he told me, is that Starry was fishing from the old sea wall, and at some point, for some reason, he climbed down onto the beach. We dont know why. Maybe he dropped something and was picking it up---his crutch perhaps, or maybe his shotgun. Pilgrim shrugged. It could have been anything. But whatever it was, there must have been an eel waiting in the mud, and when Starry climbed down onto the beach, it either saw him or felt the vibrations of his movement---and it must have moved so fast that Starry didnt have time to get back up onto the wall. He obviously managed to get off a couple of shots, but its impossible to tell if any of the blood on the beach is the eels, so we dont know if he hit it or not. But even if he did, he could only have wounded it, otherwise it wouldnt have been able to take him down and drag him back to the mud.

  Pilgrim paused, idly rubbing the back of his neck.

  And thats about it really, he said, not bothering to hide his lack of concern. As I said, wele probably never know exactly what happened, but everything points to it being nothing more than a tragic accident. Starry either made a mistake or he simply ran out of luck.

  I looked at Kite. Is that what you think happened?

  She nodded.

  Nothing to do with Chola Se then?

  I didnt say it was. All I meant was —

  Why do you think the eel left his hand behind? I said, turning back to Pilgrim.

  What?

  Why would it bite off Starrys hand but not eat it? Why leave it there?

  Pilgrim just shrugged.

  I stared at him. Its a good job it did leave it behind really.

  Whyse that?

  Its the only thing that proves beyond doubt it was Starry.

  The last time I saw Starry at the old sea wall, I told Chola Se, was the day after Gun Sur asked me to write the account. I had no idea how to do it, and I wasnt even sure I was capable of doing it. So I did what I always did when I didnt know what to do – I went to see Starry.

  I closed my eyes for a moment, picturing the scene at the beach that day – the early-morning light, the air already thick with heat, the smell of the ocean drifting across the beach.

  Caught anything yet? Ide asked Starry.

  And hede shaken his head and said, Its getting harder every day, Jeet. Everything out there is dying.

  I opened my eyes.

  It seems like a lifetime ago, I said. A different world, a different me---a different everything.

  Every days a different everything, Jeet.

  It was early afternoon now, some 7 or 8 hours after Starrys death, and we were talking quietly in our room. I was lying on my back on the bed – my eyes half closed, my hands behind my head – and Chola Se was sitting crosslegged at the foot of the bed with her back to me, facing the closed door. In the half-seen haze of the afternoon light she looked like a creature of dreams--- a shimmering vision in a long white dress – her breast crossed with a leather bandolier, Starrys shotgun resting in her lap, her black hair edged red in the light, her head silhouetted against a galaxy of sunlit dust---

  It was hard to believe she was real.

  A door slammed downstairs---

  That was real.

  Now that the house was officially uninhabited – and there was no longer a Scrapkeeper on the premises – wede been ordered to leave the front door unlocked at all times so that everyone still had access to Starrys bits and pieces. Wede appealed against the order – how could we keep ourselves safe if we couldnt lock the door? – but Gun Sur himself had upheld it, leaving us with only 2 options.

  Move somewhere else.

  Or stay here – unofficially – and spend most of our time locked in our room.

  We werent going anywhere else.

  Not yet anyway. This was where we lived now, officially or not. Until we left for the Deathlands, this was our home.

  We werent going anywhere else.

  Chola Se had taken hold of the shotgun at the sound of the door slamming, but thered been no more noises since then – no sound of anyone coming up the stairs – so shede lowered the gun, and now it was resting in her lap again. When Ide given her the shotgun – assuring her that Starry would have wanted her to have it – Ide told her that if she looked in the little storeroom at the end of the landing shede probably find some ammunition for it. When shede come back from the storeroom, she not only had 4 boxes of homemade shotgun shells, shede also found an old bandolier – a leather shoulder belt with loops for carrying cartridges – which she was wearing with the cautious delight of a child whose just found a brand-new toy but isnt sure if theyre allowed to keep it or not.

  I just thought Ide try it on, shede said awkwardly. I know its not mine —

  Yeh, it is, I told her. Its as much yours as anyone elses. It looks good on you. You should keep it.

  Shede adjusted it to make it fit better, then contentedly loaded it up with shotgun cartridges, and shese been wearing it ever since.

  I glanced at her now – sitting upright, straightbacked, alert, cradling the shotgun in her lap – and I didnt know what Ide do without her.

  She made me feel like living.

  I wasnt purely sad anymore. My eyes were tired and bloodshot from crying, my chest ached – it felt as if my ribs had been crushed in a vise – and there was a desolation inside me that seemed to come from everywhere, as if the world itself was in mourning – the blue light of day, the heat, the air, the sounds of the town drifting in through the open shutters---it all seemed hushed and funereal. It was a strange feeling – neither good nor bad, just there. It was a feeling that told of the missingness in my heart.

  When I was at the beach with Starry that day, I told Chola Se, he taught me how to take everything in – how to see things and hear things – and then how to put those things into words.

  Chola nodded silently.

  I closed my eyes then, remembering Starrys words.

  Close your eyes, hede said. Now tell me everything you can hear and feel and smell and taste.

  He told me not to think about anything, I said, my eyes still closed. He told me that all I had to do was
take all the feelings from my heart and mind and put them into words.

  Did it work?

  I nodded, opening my eyes. And thats why I have to do it again now.

  I dont understand.

  I need to take myself back to the beach this morning and live it all again. I need to see and hear it all again, smell and taste it all again, then put it all into words. Its the only way Ime going to find out what really happened to Starry.

  I could see the concern in Chola Ses eyes, and I knew she was worried about my state of mind. Ide been a mess when Ide come back from the beach – crying, shaking, freezing cold, violently sick – and she didnt want me to go through all that again. But at the same time, she knew that I had to. I could see that in her eyes too. She knew that I had to go back and live it all again.

  Close your eyes, she said. Tell me everything.

  I closed my eyes and saw it all again.

  I saw the shattered fragments of fishing pole scattered all around like windstripped branches after a storm. I saw the cork handle, the handle that Starry would never use, and the singlehandled reel that hede never use either, crushed and buckled into a misshapen glob of metal---and I heard Kites flat and empty voice again – Starry was with me last night---he kept a few fishing rods at my house, so he could go straight to the beach when he left – and I still didnt believe a word of it.

  And I told Chola Se everything.

  Why would Kite lie? she said.

  Because shese with Pilgrim.

  What do you mean? With him how?

  Shese with him in whatever hese doing, whatever he did. She was with him when he arrived at the beach. And they were the first to get there too. They turned up just a couple of minutes after me.

  So?

  So how did they get there so quickly?

  Chola Se thought about that for a while, then said, Are you absolutely sure that Starry wasnt seeing Kite?

  He wouldnt be with someone like her.

  Why not?

  He just wouldnt. Shese everything he wasnt---everything he despised.

  You dont have to like someone to desire them, Jeet. Sometimes people cant help themselves. And we dont know what Kites really like anyway, do we? We only know what we see of her. Maybe she was different with Starry---its not impossible, is it?

  I thought back to the time when Starry had made Kite smile with the talking fish, and as I was thinking about it, wondering if it meant anything, I suddenly remembered him telling me how hede found out about Pilgrims obsession with Cowboys – an old friend of mine knows a woman who stayed with Pilgrim one night – and that made me wonder even more---

  But then something dawned on me.

  Even if Starry was seeing Kite, I said to Chola Se, she was still lying about the fishing pole. And I know that for a fact. He didnt use poles with cork handles. So why would he keep a corkhandled pole at Kites house when he never used them? I shook my head. She was lying. And if she was lying about that---

  I closed my eyes again, and this time I saw Starrys severed hand – the deadwhite skin crawling with flies---the sand beneath it soaked black with blood – and I saw again the thing about it that had bothered me, the thing that wasnt as it should have been---the thing that Glorian had stopped me from seeing close up. But now – in the darkness of my closed eyes – I could see it quite clearly. It was the open wound that was wrong – that pink and white sand-dusted slice of flesh and bone where the giant eels jaws of needlelike teeth had hacked through the hand at the wrist---

  My mind flashed back to another memory – a memory as vivid as the bluest of skies – the remembered vision of the remains of a little girls body lying in the sand---2 little legs and 2 little feet, perfectly unharmed, attached to a bottom and waist that had been severed from the torso with such massive power that it looked as if it had been sheared off with a giant sword---

  Starrys hand didnt look like that.

  Thats what was wrong.

  Starrys hand had been hacked off, the wound ragged and imprecise. There were little nicks all round the edge, little cuts – sharp, angular, jagged – like tooth marks. Or like someones idea of how toothmarks should look.

  I told Chola Se everything.

  This time her face visibly paled.

  If an eel didnt take off his hand, what did? she said quietly.

  A heavy knife, machete---maybe an axe.

  And the little nicks?

  I think whoever did it was worried that the hand was cut off too cleanly for an eel attack, so they messed it up a bit, tried to make it seem more natural-looking.

  Chola Se went quiet, staring blankly at the floor, and I guessed she was trying to comprehend how anyone could do such a thing. I felt like telling her she was wasting her time, that these kinds of things are beyond understanding, but I didnt have the will or the energy.

  I closed my eyes again.

  I was seeing things with an unnatural clarity now, things Ide only half-seen before, things Ide seen but hadnt consciously registered, like the unmistakable bootprint halfway up the old sea wall. Ide seen it that morning, but hadnt recognized it for what it was. It had almost come back to me when Ide been staring at Pilgrims Cowboy boot, when Ide heard that faint and faraway click from somewhere deep in the back of my mind, but then Ide lost it again. But now it was back. And I could see it quite clearly – half a bootprint, just a heelprint really, in a small patch of hardpacked sand in a gap between 2 rocks in the wall. The rocks in this part of the wall jutted out slightly from the rest, forming steps that led up to the top, and the bootprint was at least halfway up, nowhere near the ground, so whoever it belonged to had been climbing to the top of the wall for some reason.

  And it belonged to Pilgrim.

  There was no question about it. It was a print from the heel of his Cowboy boot. Ide recognize it even if I hadnt seen it before, but I had. Ide seen it the day after Chola Se and the babies were abducted, when Ide followed the trodden-down path of the trackers from Chola Ses house across to the West Tower. Ide been looking out for any prints that were deeper than usual, indicating the extra weight of a man carrying someone, and the only one Ide found with any great depth to it was an imprint of Pilgrims left boot heel. It was about 20 yards from the tower, right at the point where the ground changes from packed dirt to black glassrock, and Ide assumed its depth was probably caused by Pilgrim missing his step and slipping off the edge of the glassrock, his left foot taking all his weight.

  But Ide been wrong.

  I told Chola Se everything.

  Youre sure its the same bootprint? she said.

  I nodded. And he definitely didnt climb up the sea wall when I was there. So he must have been there before.

  Why would he need to climb the wall?

  I dont know.

  And what about this other bootprint, the one by the glassrock at the tower---?

  She hesitated, lowering her eyes and looking away from me, as if she couldnt quite bring herself to finish the question for fear of hearing the answer. I waited, not saying anything, and after a few moments I saw her shoulders rise and her back straighten as she took a deep breath to compose herself, then she breathed out slowly, turned her head, and looked me in the eyes.

  Yael didnt abduct me that night, did he? she said quietly.

  No.

  It was Pilgrim.

  I closed my eyes again, and this time I didnt plan on opening them until Ide seen everything there was to see – every act, every word, every movement, every memory---every piece of the picture. There were so many pieces still missing that I knew Ide never find the answers to everything, but I didnt stop looking. I didnt give up on the black silence of my closed eyes. I couldnt. It was all I had. I knew it was a kind of madness – a madness of grief – but I also knew that it was keeping me from a greater madness, and if thats how it had to be, so be it. So I just kept going, searching for everything I could see, and bit by exhausted bit, the picture kept growing, until eventually I realized that something had clicked
into place and all of a sudden the entire picture made sense.

  I opened my eyes, got up off the bed, and crossed over to the corner of the room where Starrys crutch was leaning against the wall. I picked it up and went back over to the bed, then sat down beside Chola Se and began removing the padded leather covering that Starry had fixed to the top part of the crutch, the part that went under his arm.

  It stopped the wood rubbing against his skin so much, I explained to Chola Se.

  Right---she said, looking bemused. Are you going to tell me what youre doing, Jeet?

  Youle see in a minute.

  The hollowed-out compartment was so well made that even when Ide removed the leather covering it was still virtually invisible. I could only just about make out the telltale join myself. But if you didnt know it was there, youd never see it. So unless Pilgrim and Kite had made Starry tell them---

  I couldnt think about that.

  I was sitting on the edge of the bed holding the main part of the crutch between my knees now. Ide never opened the compartment myself before, but Ide seen Starry do it, and I was just trying to copy his technique. Knees gripping the crutch, holding it still---hand gripping the top, pressing down and simultaneously twisting to the right---

  The top turned, I felt a dull clack of wood on wood, and when I gave it a quick firm tug, the top section came away in my hand, revealing the hollowed-out compartment in the main part of the crutch.

  I glanced at Chola Se.

  She wasnt bemused anymore, just totally engrossed, staring wide-eyed at Starrys secret hideaway.

  I placed the top section of the crutch on the bed and brought the other part closer, angling it towards us for a better look. There was definitely something in there, but whatever it was, it was wrapped up tightly in a piece of black cloth. I reached in carefully, got hold of the package with my finger and thumb, and gently pulled it out. I could feel something solid beneath the cloth – some kind of cylinder, maybe. Not that big, about 4 inches long, and not that heavy.

  What is it? Chola Se whispered.

  I think its what got Starry killed.

  I put the crutch down, then shuffled along a bit to make enough room to unwrap the package on the bed between us. It didnt take long, and even before it was fully unwrapped I knew I was right, and as I peeled away the last layer of cloth to reveal a small cylindrical blueglass bottle, I knew it was the answer to Chola Ses question.