Heaven Eyes

by David Almond

  “See?” said Jan.

  “Yes.”

  I dug around the hand with my own hand. I exposed a forearm, an elbow, all covered in the smooth, delicate, leatherlike skin. It glistened in the sunlight. I stared, and saw how beautiful it was, so lifelike, but like a copy of life, left here in the Black Middens waiting for someone like January and me to find it. I scraped away more mud. An upper arm, a shoulder, a chest, a beautifully formed rib cage with the strange skin draped over it. Jan watched and gasped. I turned to him.

  “What did Grampa mean?” I whispered. “What did he mean by saying it was a saint?”

  His eyes were wide. I saw that he too was entranced by this beautiful thing emerging from the Middens.

  “Dunno, Erin.”

  I pushed more mud away. There were fragments of some fabric resting on the body. They broke up and came away with the mud. A fragment of metal, a catch or something. I held it in my fingers, held it up to the sun, passed it up to Jan. I found little coins in the mud. I wiped them and passed them up to Jan. I found another catch resting on his chest and passed it up to Jan.

  “What is it?” he said. “What have we found, Erin?”

  I kept on lifting away the mud. I paused. I prayed. I whispered to Mum. Then I lifted the mud from where the face should be.

  His head rested in the black mud. The cheeks were sunken, the eyes were closed. The lips formed a calm straight line. Black hair was tangled on his brow. The face shone, reflecting the light. It was still as still, still as still, but it rested there in the mud facing the sun like it was waiting, like at any moment the eyes might simply open and gaze into mine. I ran my fingertips across the beautiful face. I knew now that it wasn’t a model or a statue. It was a dead man who had been lost for many years in the Black Middens, who had been preserved by the silt and oil. It was a beautiful young man from a long time past.

  I climbed up to January.

  “It is a man,” I whispered. “It’s just that he hasn’t rotted away.”

  We looked down.

  “We should be terrified,” I said.

  “I know.”

  “But he’s lovely, isn’t he?”

  Jan smiled, shook his head.

  “Lovely as lovely, eh?”

  “What should we do?”

  “God knows, Erin.”

  We rubbed the clasps and the coins and looked at them.

  “Not ages past,” said January. “Maybe a hundred years, something like that.”

  “Not murdered by Grampa.”

  “Not murdered by Grampa.”

  He stared at the empty river running past.

  “Probably the time when the river was full,” he said. “Loads of ships. Loads of men working on the quays and in the shipyards. Maybe he just fell into the water and nobody knew until it was too late.”

  “Maybe they searched for weeks and couldn’t find him. They thought he was at the bottom of the river or washed out to sea.”

  January stared at the clasps.

  “They’re from overalls,” he said. “That’s what they are. They were to fasten his overalls.”

  “A working man,” I said.

  “A working man.”

  We looked at the banks of the river, the places where the warehouses and workplaces had gone. The banks opposite were landscaped and turfed. There were footpaths and cycle tracks. Upriver there were wastelands, dilapidated quays, all waiting to be cleared, too. There were new pubs and clubs where there used to be great cranes and loading bays. Behind us were more ruined workplaces, the printing works, all waiting to be demolished and swept away. We looked down again at the beautiful young man in the mud, the man from an age that had been wiped away.

  “He’d have children,” I said. “He’d have a wife. They’d be waiting for him to come home again, and he wouldn’t come.”

  “Who was he?”

  “No way of knowing.”

  “A mystery.”

  “What should we do?”

  “We could leave him. We could cover him again. We could bring him out.”

  We said nothing else. We slithered down together and carefully uncovered him. We worked slowly, gently. We eased our hands under his body and loosened him from the Middens. We smiled to see that his leather boots, preserved like his body, still clung to his feet. We lifted him, carried and dragged him up to the dry land. We thought he would be stiff and awkward, but his body arched as we raised him. There was still a looseness in his joints. We laid him on the raft, facing the sky. We crouched beside him and ran our hands across his skin. We touched his face, stroked his brow. We arranged his hair tidily on his head. We scooped handfuls of water from the river and washed the mud from him. Moment by moment he became more lifelike, more beautiful. Then we lifted him between us and carried him up the ancient ladder to the quay.

  WE TOOK HIM TO THE OUSEBURN and washed him clean. We washed the Middens from ourselves. We cleared a space of litter and laid him on the printing floor, close to the office, beneath the outstretched wings of an angel. We arranged the coins and clasps beside his head. We laid out his name in metal letters at his side:

  As we worked, the sun rose higher. It streamed down onto him through the ruined rafters and the dancing dust. A hidden bird began singing somewhere in the works. The man lay there like he was sleeping, like at any moment he might open his eyes, stretch his arms and legs, sit up and take his place in the world again.

  It was afternoon before we went back into the office. Heaven Eyes and Mouse still gazed at Heaven’s treasures. Grampa sat above them at his desk, turning back the pages of his great book.

  “Come and see,” we said.

  We led Mouse and Heaven through the alleyways between the ancient machines and showed him lying there.

  “Who is he?” they whispered.

  “A mystery,” we said. “A working man.”

  They stared, in dread and fascination.

  Then Grampa came. He walked slowly, with the filth of the Middens still clinging to him. He eased himself to the floor and he knelt there, looking at the dead man.

  “Great joy,” he said. “Great joy, Little Helper. You has truly found a saint.”

  “A saint?” said Mouse.

  “There is secrets and there is treasures and there is saints waiting to be found. These saints is them from way back, way way way back in the past, afore Grampa, afore Heaven Eyes, afore us all.”

  He looked at Mouse. He reached out and touched his cheek.

  “One day way back I did hear that such saints was waiting to be discovered in these Middens. But it did take one like you, with great goodness in his heart, to find one. I must thank you, Little Helper, for finding this saint in the deep deep dark and bringing him to me.”

  He closed his eyes. Perhaps he prayed. My head reeled as I looked at this strange circle around this figure on the printing floor below the ruined roof. I told myself that I was dreaming, hallucinating. “This is impossible,” I whispered to myself. Then I remembered Wilson Cairns’ words just before we ran away: It’s possible. It’s possible. I thought of the way his eyes stared through us to a stunning place beyond. I thought of his last words: Keep watching. I watched. And then from somewhere outside us there came a great roaring and clanking, like some huge machine was coming near.

  Grampa reached out to Heaven Eyes.

  “I has been a good grampa?” he whispered.

  She clung to him.

  “You is a lovely grampa,” she said.

  “You has seen your treasures now.”

  “Yes, Grampa.”

  “I has hidden many things from you.”

  “Yes, Grampa. Many many things.”

  “And there is still many things waiting to be shown.”

  He turned his eyes to me.

  “Your friend does understand,” he said.

  “Yes,” I said. “I understand, Grampa.”

  He sighed and lowered his head.

  “Heaven Eyes?” he whispered.

&nb
sp; “Yes, Grampa?”

  “Is there great wrongness in this hiding things?”

  “There is no wrongness, Grampa. You is Caretaker. You is been only trying to take care.”

  He sighed.

  “Yes, little one. I is Caretaker. I has been only trying to take care.”

  He sighed again, deeply. He looked old, so old. He looked at me, at January, at Mouse.

  “These is your brothers and sister, Heaven Eyes? These is your brothers and sister come back to you again?”

  Heaven Eyes whispered.

  “Will you be my brother, Mouse Gullane?”

  “Yes,” said Mouse.

  “Will you be my brother, Janry Carr?”

  “Yes,” said January.

  “Yes,” said Heaven Eyes. “These is my sister and my brothers come back to me, Grampa.”

  “Lovely,” he said. “Lovely as lovely.”

  He focused on my eyes.

  “You will now take care of Heaven Eyes?”

  “Yes. We will now take care of Heaven Eyes.”

  “And will you tell her the things that needs to be telt?”

  “Yes.”

  Tears trickled down the black mud on his cheeks.

  “There is also truth,” he said. “There is truth that I did find you lying on the black Black Middens in the moony night, my little one. There is truth that I did bring you out and care for you.” He lowered his eyes. “I did find your little treasures with you, wrapped inside your pocket, and I did keep them hid from you, my Heaven Eyes. I did think that this would keep you happy in your heart.”

  “And I always has been happy, Grampa. Happy as happy.”

  He stroked her cheek. He reached down and stroked the saint’s cheek.

  He whispered, quiet as quiet.

  “Mebbe now the time is come when you must cross the runny water to the world of ghosts, my little one.”

  “Oh Grampa,” she said. “Oh my Grampa.”

  They held each other tight.

  I lifted my head and listened. Not too far away, the great clanking and roaring intensified.

  I WENT BY MYSELF through the ancient alleyways. I walked away from the river, went beyond the printing works, through the ruins of warehouses and sheds and factories and offices. I scrambled across collapsed walls, beneath teetering roofs. I leapt across great cracks and potholes. I read faded signs telling of metalworkers, shipwrights, ropemakers, bootmakers, coal merchants, ship’s suppliers, nail and screw and wire manufacturers, tea importers, spice importers. Rats scuttled here. Mangy dogs watched timidly from the shadows. Skinny cats hissed and arched their backs and bared their teeth. Pigeons flapped and cooed. Crows scavenged. Outside it all was the city’s low deep endless din, and nearby the roaring, the clanking. And then I saw it, the huge crane making its way toward this place from the city’s edge. I sheltered in a doorway and watched it come. It moved slowly, gracelessly. The ground cracked beneath its great metal tread. A huge metal ball dangled from its jib. It squealed to a halt fifty yards away from me. A young man in jeans and T-shirt and a red helmet jumped down from the cab onto the metal tread. He lit a cigarette, pulled a newspaper from his pocket, sprawled there in the sunshine and waited. I watched. I waited too. And then the next crane loomed out from the city’s edge and ground its way toward us.

  I hurried back to the printing works. In the office, Grampa was in his uniform. He scribbled in his great book. He murmured about the saint, about the great treasure found by Mouse Gullane in the black Black Middens. Heaven Eyes and Mouse were feasting on Milk Tray and Hob Nobs. January knelt on the floor. He had a heap of Grampa’s notebooks, a little pile of newspapers. He was placing them in one of the boxes from the high shelves.

  “Where you been?” he said.

  “It’s all going to be cleared away,” I said.

  I told him what I’d seen, what I expected.

  “Can’t be today,” he said. “Too late to start today.”

  “No. But tomorrow.”

  We looked at Heaven Eyes and Grampa.

  “What can we do?” he whispered.

  I shook my head. We shared a packet of Hob Nobs. We listened. We watched the door. We expected workmen to come in at any moment, wearing hard helmets. They didn’t come. The afternoon wore on.

  “And Heaven’s brothers and sister is come back to her at last,” Grampa murmured as he wrote. “And they will take her cross the runny water to the world of ghosts.” He scribbled on, he murmured on. Soon his hand began to slow. “And Grampa’s taking care is done,” he whispered. “Love. Grampa an Heaven Eyes. Love, love, love …”

  The pencil fell from his fingers to the book.

  He looked down at Heaven Eyes.

  “Lovely,” he whispered. “Lovely as lovely.”

  Then he closed his eyes and lowered his head to the book.

  “Grampa,” said Heaven Eyes, turning suddenly to him. “Grampa. My Grampa!”

  And she leapt to him.

  But Grampa was still. Still as still.

  EVERYTHING WOULD GO. The printing works, the warehouses, the factories, the offices and sheds. The great printing machines bearing eagles and angels would be put into a museum. The rubble would be hauled away. The ground would be broken up and bulldozed. Shining new offices would appear. There’d be pubs and clubs and restaurants. There’d be lawns and little hills with plaques showing how things had been. There’d be cycle tracks and walkways. There’d be jetties where little sailing boats would be tethered. The sun would shine down and this beautiful new place would glisten beneath it, beside a glistening blue river, and people would wander at ease on broad pathways. We saw it all, January, Mouse and I, late that afternoon, when we left Heaven Eyes alone with Grampa for a time. We saw it on the great billboards that had been put up beside the waiting cranes. We stood there and wondered, lost in the mystery of Grampa and his death, the mystery of the saint, the mystery of this new world that would soon appear.

  When we went back to her, she sat on the floor beside her box of treasures. She was calm and smiling.

  “He did tell me this,” she said. “He did tell me that one day he would be still as still and I must cross the runny water.”

  She held my hand.

  “How did you know that this was the time to come for me?” she asked.

  “I don’t know how we knew,” I said. “It was January who made his raft and made us come.”

  “Janry Carr,” she said. “Janry Carr, my brother.”

  We didn’t know what to do with Grampa. He lay there on his book. We laid his pencils beside him. We tidied his shovels and buckets. As evening came on, we lit candles and placed them near him. We said prayers. We said that he was a good grampa, that he had truly taken care.

  I sat with Heaven Eyes with my arm around her.

  “Grampa is gone,” she said.

  “Yes, Heaven Eyes.”

  “He is gone but he will keep staying in my heart.”

  “Yes, Heaven Eyes.”

  “And I will cry much for him, but I will be happy for him in my heart.”

  We looked at her photographs, her family.

  “You must whisper ‘Mum. Mum,’” I told her.

  “Why is this?” she asked.

  “Just try,” I said. “Mum. Mum.”

  She took a deep breath.

  “Mum,” she whispered. “Mum. Mum.”

  She bit her lip.

  “Does feel that funny in my mouth,” she said. “Mum. Mum.”

  “Just whisper it,” I said. “Just try it, Anna.”

  Her mum smiled out of the photograph at us.

  “Is a lovely mum,” said Heaven Eyes.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “Mum. Mum.”

  “Say it gentle as gentle,” I said.

  “Mum. Mum.”

  I felt her spirit relaxing, and I felt the new excitement entering her.

  “What is this new funniness in mine head?” she said.

  “Funniness?”


  “Funniness when I whisper, ‘Mum. Mum.’”

  I smiled at her.

  “Mebbe this is your mum,” I said. “Mebbe she’s finding a way back into your heart and into your head.”

  “Oh, Erin. She is whispering to me.”

  “She whispers ‘Anna. Anna.’”

  “Yes, Erin. She does whisper ‘Anna. Anna,’ just like in my sleep thoughts.”

  “But these are not sleep thoughts.”

  “No, Erin. These is waking thoughts and thoughts as bright as day.”

  DEEP INTO THE NIGHT. Deep into the dark. The moon poured down through the broken rafters. No one slept, but our minds trembled, drifting through truth and dreams and imagination. Jan and I nibbled Hob Nobs and orange creams and wandered over the printing floor. We talked about the raft and about tomorrow.

  “We’ll have to leave Grampa and the saint here,” he said. “We’ll have to leave them for the workmen to find.”

  “No room on the raft,” I said.

  “No room on the raft.”

  We put candles around the man we’d dug out from the Middens and we sat with him.

  “What will they say,” I said, “when they find them here?”

  He smiled.

  “All kinds of weird tales’ll be told, eh?”

  “Can’t wait to read them,” I said.

  I picked at the metal letters on the floor. I laid out the name:

  “That’s the story they won’t be able to tell,” I said.

  “It’s our story,” said Jan.

  “That’s right. Even the bits that we don’t know and the bits we’ll never get to know.”

  “Truth and dreams and bits made up.”

  We laughed.

  “Wonder what Heaven’ll put in her Life Story book,” said Jan.

  He told me about the newspapers.

  “There are names for all of them,” he said. “The mother, the father, the sister, the brothers. Their boat was washed up on a beach. No bodies were ever found. The whole family was lost at sea.”