The World House, page 18
"There are great chunks of my life they were welcome to," said Miles. "Can't say I would have missed them. One thing, though, who's he?" He pointed to a prone figure, lying quite still behind one of the tents. "I'm sure you'll laugh but I can't remember him for the life of me."
interlude
The renegade has fallen deeply in love with Constantinople. The city has such scope for excess. Where else can one drink a few beers and watch 60,000 people slaughtered?
The Byzantines have finally lost all patience with the Latin Europeans, and are routing them out with the sort of vigour only a deranged mob can achieve. He has lent a hand, naturally, stoked the flames a little. Now he is happy to sit back, enjoy the feel of the sun on his face and the screams in his ears. A small group of people gathers a few feet away and he wonders what new piece of street theatre is to be offered. They separate with a cheer, setting a dog to run through the streets, the head of Cardinal John – representative to the Pope here in the city – tied to its tail. It bounces behind the animal, its mouth popping open as if the holy man wishes to take a bite out of the hound's rump.
The renegade laughs along with the crowd. You can't beat a little light comedy to break up an afternoon's massacre; it's tiring work casting the bodies into the sea and everyone needs their spirits lifting. He drinks his beer and watches the reef of dead bodies building off shore.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Sophie doesn't like any of this. In fact Sophie hates it. Everywhere Sophie looks there is something that makes her head shout. Her thoughts are like her father's car alarm, they go on and on and on and on. She wishes she could turn it off but she doesn't have the key. She has tried to empty herself but Alan will not let her. Alan needs her to stay still. Alan needs her to run. Alan needs her. Alan does need her. Alan does not look good. He is old – though more father old than grandfather old – and old people often do not look good. This is because they are nearly dead. Sophie hopes Alan does not die just yet, she would not like to be here without him, it is too Wrong. It is a place that needs company.
She had hoped for three but one of the three was not a good man. Now he is lying on the carpet and that serves him right. He can just stay there. He is pink and he shouts and he says the word that means "I have just hit my hammer with a thumb" or "You are not a very good driver" or "You shouldn't have left that toy on the stairs as now I've fallen over it". She knows this because her father has used the word too and she has figured out what it means. She looks at Alan. He is bent over and finding it hard to breathe. Perhaps, like her, he is finding this very wrong and it is making him sick. They have just stepped out of a mirror and that is wrong. Mirrors are for practicing your "I Understand" smile. They are not for walking through. Also, you do not break them. If you do then father will say that word again and he will say it Very Loudly.
Sophie decides she must be strong for Alan. She takes hold of his hand (she does not like holding hands but he does it a lot so he must like it so she does it to make him feel better). "Come with me, Alan," she tells him, "we will find a quiet place."
She leads him down the corridor. They should not be in a corridor. They should be in a jungle. She tries not to think about that as she has to be strong for Alan. She opens the first door they come to and walks him inside. She closes the door. The walls of this room have a lot of tiles. This means it must be a kitchen or it must be a bathroom. The tiles are blue so this is probably a bathroom. It is very big for a bathroom. Though it has a lot of water so that is good. There are towels in very tall stacks. There are benches on which to sit. This is not a bathroom, she understands. This is a swimming pool. That is why it has the sea in it. You can swim in the sea, it's allowed.
She locks the door. Which is confusing as bathrooms have locks but swimming pools do not have locks.She knows bathrooms have locks as sometimes she locks herself in them to stop other people being with her. This lock will stop the pink man from being with her. This is good. But Alan can stay. She likes Alan.
Alan sits down on one of the benches. Then he lies down. Something in his shoulder makes him yell. Sophie yells too even though there is nothing wrong with her shoulder. Sometimes she cannot help copying people when they do things she doesn't understand. Sometimes it helps her understand. Alan looks worried because she has yelled like him. She shows him her "I Understand" smile. He still looks worried but his eyes close and his face stops being worried and starts being about pain. Alan does not understand and it hurts him. He needs to go quiet for a while so she leaves him to do so.
She goes to look at the sea. It is the sea. She wasn't sure because she knows you don't have a sea in a house. It fills the world as far as she can see. It makes waves that push the long fluffy rugs up and down that lie at the edge of it. The rugs do not float out. The rugs stay. This is also wrong.
Sophie has an idea. Everything here is wrong. If everything is always wrong then perhaps it is right for here. This feels like a fact. This is good. She does not feel so bad now she knows that wrong can be right as long as it is always wrong.
She sits down on a dry part of the rug and watches the sea go in and out. She wonders if it would be good to swim. Sometimes she likes to swim. The water feels good. It holds her and bounces her like it is pleased with her. Sometimes she does not like to swim. The water feels bad. It pushes and shoves her like it is angry with her. Sophie wonders what mood the sea is in today.
Sophie thinks about the sea she nearly fell in when she found the box. That did not look like a happy sea. Its waves were bigger than this sea. This sea looks like it might be happy. She will try it.
She goes to get a towel and looks at Alan. She thinks Alan is now sleeping. This is not unusual. Sometimes when she is very upset she falls asleep too. Sleep is easy, nothing happens there.
She gets a towel. It is very big and very white and very nice. She holds it to her face and hopes the sea will be as happy as this towel.
She walks back to the edge of the water. She takes off some of her clothes. You do not take off all your clothes when you swim as it is Not Allowed. You keep your pants and bra on. It is a rule. And a fact. Sophie thinks all rules are facts. Unless you break them but Sophie would never do that. Sophie makes her clothes neat. Clothes are nice when they are neat. Socks next to each other, facing the same way, tidy feet waiting to walk.
Sophie steps into the water. It is not cold. This is good. If the water had been cold Sophie would not have gone in, cold water is angry water. Sophie goes a little further. The water is as far as Sophie's knees and it has not been angry. She thinks that if the water was going to be angry it would have done it by now. The water is happy with her so she gets in completely and starts to swim. Swimming is easy as long as you remember you can do it. Sometimes it is easy to forget. Especially when the sea is angry. When it throws a big wave that hits your face and steals your air. Then you can forget and you start sinking. Thinking about this, Sophie nearly forgets how to swim but she stands up in the water and remembers again. She wonders if any fish live in this sea. There should be fish. The sea is where fish live. She cannot see any fish and the water is clear. The water is clear like those pictures of the sea you see that ask you to go on holiday. The water is as clear as it is in the swimming pool. Underneath the water are tiles like in a swimming pool. This is wrong. This is good. Sophie is so glad she now knows that wrong can be right, it makes things much easier.
Sophie swims some more. Sophie wonders if France lives on the other side of the sea. It does where she lives but this is probably not the same sea. She looks back at Alan. He is still sleeping on the bench. Sophie decides she will look for France while she waits for him to wake up.
The throbbing in Alan's shoulder woke him up. He hoped he hadn't dislocated it. He'd seen people in movies pop a dislocated shoulder back into place but he didn't fancy trying it. He sat up and looked around. They had swapped one impossible room for another, jungles in the greenhouse and oceans in the bathroom. Where was Sophie? He looked around but couldn't see her anywhere. Then he spotted the clothes and looked out across the water. Dear Lord… please don't say she had…?
He pulled off his shoes, shirt and trousers and limped into the water. What had he been thinking? Leaving her on her own like that, it was obvious she couldn't fend for herself…
He swam as fast as he could, shouting her name above the gentle sound of the surf. He noticed the ground beneath the water was tiled; not the sea at all then, just a pool big enough to form waves. He dived beneath the surface, dreading catching sight of her sunken body. Surely she wouldn't have swum so far out? Though he had to admit it was easy going. He took a taste of the water; there was no salt, yet it seemed to carry him forward. It felt as if this was water you could never drown in, water to embrace you, to relax you, water that made you feel a part of it.
"Sophie!" he shouted again, catching sight of a shape bobbing nearby. "Sophie?" He swam towards it, overcome with relief when he drew close enough to tell it was her, flat on her back in the rippling water. "You had me worried, honey," he said as he drew up next to her.
"Not honey," she said, "plain, no butter or jam or marmalade or Marmite or honey or anything, plain."
"Er… OK. We should swim back now though, OK?"
"No. The sea is happy. Lie back and see."
Alan made to argue but stopped himself. What the
hell was the harm, hadn't they earned a moment's peace?
He flipped on to his back and tried to relax. He always struggled to float, too damn tense… Not in this water, in this water he could float just fine. Slowly he let himself go. He was no longer floating on the water, he was the water, rising up and down with the tide. He imagined himself dissolving, breaking up, fizzing, losing the cohesion that weighed him down with every moment. Not just the time in the house, all of it: the hot Florida sun, the students, the sweat, the ignorance, the apathy, the therapy sessions.
All of it.
Gone.
Nothing but the water.
"This is wonderful," he whispered.
"Shush," said Sophie, "they are coming."
And they came. Great shoals of fish, swirling around them, their little mouths puckering against his body, tickling, stroking, kissing.
Alan had never known a peace like it.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
"He looks like someone from my era," said Penelope as they carried the stranger to a mattress. "It's all right," she shouted, leaning over him, "you'll be able to move soon!"
"My dearest Miss Simons, I am quite sure deafness wasn't part of the transference process," said Carruthers.
"Oh, yes, sorry…"
The man was incredibly old, his skin a mess of soft wrinkles and liver spots. Miles picked up a fedora hat from where it had fallen from the stranger's head. He dropped it on to his own at a rakish angle. "The name's…erm…"
"Caulfield," said Penelope, rolling her eyes.
"Sorry, still a bit shaky on that one. Ahem… the name's Caulfield… Miles Caulfield. What's a goodlooking dame like you doing in this joint?"
"Socialising with mad limeys," she replied, "and that has to be the worst American accent I've ever heard."
"Fair enough," Miles replied, taking the hat off and placing it next to the man. "Think we should take his coat off too?"
"We don't have to strip the poor man," she replied, straightening the tails of his gaberdine across his legs, "just keep an eye on him while he comes around… Oh…" She held up a large handgun. "It was in his pocket." She looked down at the old man. "I wasn't checking your pockets, it slipped out when I was straightening your coat, sorry!"
"If you wouldn't mind, my dear?" Carruthers held his hand out for the gun. "A little more advanced than a revolver in my day," he said, taking it off her. He pulled the barrel pin and emptied the cartridges into his palm. "Though the principle is much the same." He handed the gun back to Penelope. "Return the man's property to his pocket with my apologies for making it redundant."
"Wise move," said Miles, "he could be a raging nutter for all we know."
"I haven't the faintest notion what one of those is," admitted Carruthers, "but on the assumption that it's the sort of cove one would dislike to see running around with a weapon then we're in agreement."
"Exactly one of those sorts of coves, yes," Miles replied.
"He can hear you, remember?" said Penelope. "As you just kindly reminded me, there's nothing wrong with his ears."
"I'm sure no reasonable gentlemen would begrudge us a degree of caution," Carruthers assured her. "I will, of course, return the gentleman's property to him once we are utterly reassured that it is safe to do so. Now, rather than crowd the poor chap might I suggest that we get on with our preparations and allow him to come around in his own good time."
Penelope nodded. "You're quite right, of course." She noticed a book on the floor. "In all things it would seem," she said, holding it up. "Chester's biography, now with great chunks of it missing. It seems I was never meant to know."
Carruthers smiled. "Abandon it, my dear. The past is too weighty a burden to carry with us for ever."
Penelope tossed it to the floor and returned to the piles of spare clothing Carruthers had gathered (after all, she couldn't travel without a small selection of outfits – a lady had to have some principles).
Miles walked over to Carruthers. "Do you think he'll want to come with us?" he whispered, gesturing towards the old man.
"Who can say?" Carruthers replied. "He doesn't look sprightly enough to get far. Not that we can really leave him here…"
"I don't see why not, it's not like you plan on returning to the camp."
"That is neither here nor there. As last night proved, he is no safer here than anywhere in this godforsaken building. If we leave him our consciences must accept the consequences."
"You never know, he may be stronger than he looks."
"In that case he will be more of a benefit travelling alongside us than not. Anyway, it's all immaterial, it must be his choice."
"I suppose." Miles noticed the old man's fingers beginning to twitch. "Won't be long before we can ask him."
"How many bags are we taking?" Penelope shouted. "Just so I know how many shirts to take."
"Dear God," Carruthers muttered under his breath, "perhaps it's Penelope we should leave behind?"
Miles smiled. "One bag each, I'd say." He looked at Carruthers. "Agreed, o seasoned explorer?"
"Agreed." Carruthers nodded. "And maybe you might like to bear in mind some of the essentials we'll have to split between us before you fill yours?"
"How is a shirt not essential?" Penelope asked. "It's not as if I'm suggesting cocktail gowns, is it? What could be more essential than a shirt?"
"Food?" asked Miles.
"Ah." Penelope looked at the pile of shirts draped over her arm. "There is that. Maybe only five or six then, you'd say?"
"Or less?" Carruthers suggested.
"How many less?"
"Five or six less?" Miles replied.
Penelope scowled at him. "Very funny."
"You really won't be able to carry more than one change of clothes, my dear," Carruthers explained. "A lack of crisp, laundered cotton will not kill us, whereas a lack of tinned beef may."
"What a wretched and beastly excuse."
"But true."
The old man exhaled a rasp of breath, one arm twisting and turning spastically as he tried to lift it.
"It's all right," Penelope said, dashing over and taking hold of his hand, "just relax, let it come." The man's face was twisted in either pain or terror, she couldn't tell which. "I don't think I was this bad," she said.
"I was," said Miles, "but then I did have the added stress of animated taxidermy trying to kill me."
"I say," Carruthers said, all ears, "you didn't tell me about that."
"Well, didn't want to bore you, savaged by a tigerskin rug, we've all been there."
"This house…" Carruthers shook his head in disbelief.
Penelope brushed his thin fringe from the old man's eyes. "Don't get too close," Miles said, passing her on his way to their supply of tinned foods.
Men! she thought, so suspicious, seeing danger in everyone. They didn't possess the intuition women had in such things, too busy trying to look bigger and stronger than everyone else. There was no danger in this man, Penelope simply knew it. She could tell from his watery, powder-blue eyes and his full lips. They were lips that were born to smile, not scowl.
He mumbled something but she couldn't hear. "What was that?" she asked.
"Who is it?" he whispered.
