HebrewPunk, page 8
“I did,” I said. “I think someone wants you dead.”
Manning turned his head: a man appeared behind us, and Manning shot him clean through the head.
“Or you,” he said. “Which is the answer I find more likely.”
I had thought of that, and the thought gave me no pleasure. Manning, on the other hand, seemed buoyant.
He led me through the glistening tunnels; there were no more followers. Our passage made the pipes reverberate and produce odd echoing sounds, and our feet splashed in the waste water.
“You don’t want to be caught down here when they flood the sewers,” Manning said, and moved his index finger along his neck with emphasis.
“I don’t want to be caught down here at all,” I said.
I followed him, but a feeling of foreboding began to steal over me. I was used to feeling the connection with the ground, with the skies, and now I felt that connection disappearing, barred to me behind the lead piping and the layers of earth. Down here elementals ruled, in a simpler and more dangerous world, a world closer to the Old World, a buffer zone between this world of Assiah and the outer Sephirot.
“Chang told me you dug up Billie Carleton’s coffin.”
He stopped and pushed me against the wall of the tunnel, his breath hot against mine. I didn’t fight him. His face was hard, like iron that was smelt and remade in the furnace. “Then he lied.”
“Did he?” I said. “It seems to me you both have an unhealthy interest in the dead.”
He lifted his hand to hit me. I shook my head. After a moment he lowered his hand and continued walking.
“I could say the same for you,” he said over his shoulder.
I trudged after him without an answer.
We were walking, it seemed to me, for too long. We had descended in Soho; surely there would be a manhole cover somewhere nearby? Instead, I felt our path was leading us further down, into the bowels of the city, and I was growing disturbed. I looked at Manning’s back: he seemed to walk with a purpose in his step, leading me…leading me where?
“Stop,” I said. The tunnels were getting darker and darker, and it was difficult to see. The air turned humid and hot, and deformed rodents ran in the murky water at our feet. “I said stop.”
He didn’t seem to hear me.
“Manning!”
I watched him disappear into the shadows ahead.
I looked at my surroundings, sighed, and moved on to follow him. From a coat pocket I removed a small packet of snow and snorted it. I thought of Manning: he’d seemed scared when he came to see me, and scared again in the basement, and yet the fighting seemed to have revived him. And now he was leading me through the sewers like a Dybbuk, a man possessed. I thought of simply knocking him out, but then where would I go? I didn’t want to leave him down here, and I had no idea how to get out. I was, literally, out of my depth.
Somehow, the thought made me giggle. I felt happier now, as if decisions and their making were no longer important. I followed behind Manning as we walked further and further into the bowels of the earth.
* * *
We walked in silence, the only noise produced by the treading of our feet in water.
I followed Manning through turnings in the sewer system, into tunnels that were made of stone; clumps of moss grouped together for comfort on the cold walls providing a faint luminosity. There were writings on the walls, letters and drawings that I felt I should recognise and yet didn’t.
The quality of light changed: as we journeyed I began to notice strange crystal globes set in the walls, emitting a clear, bright light.
After more time had passed, the tunnel we were in began to widen and at last came to an end in a cavern of white stone. Here the light was brilliant and yet comfortable. Crystal globes were set at regular intervals along the walls, turning the cavern into the semblance of a ballroom, or a temple.
On the floor of the cavern was a giant drawing, and when I saw it my mind returned to me. It was the Tree of Life.
A dark snake was coiled around the Sephirot. Its tail was touching Malchut and its head was by Keter.
Beside me, Manning’s face slackened, then closed. Without a sound the big man fell to his knees and then to the floor, where he lay with a look of peace on his face.
As he’d fallen, the lights had dimmed. I kneeled down and took his pulse. Manning’s heart was beating a strong, steady beat. He looked like a man in the throes of a deep, drugged sleep.
Nothing stirred amidst the newly formed shadows. I opened my mind and let it encompass the cavern. Slowly it expanded, and yet I encountered the presence of no living being, only a kind of ancient, drowsy solitude that seemed to emanate from the stones themselves.
“Tzaddik.”
I turned, my mind shrinking back to one focal point from which I tried to see the speaker. The voice was feminine, and somewhat familiar, like the taste of vintage Judean wine sampled a long time ago and never entirely forgotten.
She stood in the drawing of the Tree, in the heart of the Pillar of Equilibrium, over the sphere called Tiph’eret, Beauty. Her hair was short, where I remembered long; white, where I remembered the blackness of strong coffee.
“Amat…”
She laughed. I remembered her laughter, but it was buried deep, under the layers of memories that recorded every detail of her death, the screams as she fought the Leviathan in the old Egyptian kingdom and was pinned by the dying god into the mud of the Nile, her body broken and the magic whispering as it ebbed away…Amat al-Qadir, Servant of the Almighty.
Under her feet the dark snake came alive. It crawled from the Tree of Life and wrapped itself around her like a scarf. Reptilian eyes regarded me; a forked tongue hissed as it tasted the air.
“It hardly seems credible that you are alive,” I said.
She nodded. A small smile caught at the corners of her mouth like a butterfly threatening to escape. “Hardly,” she said, and we both laughed.
“Come here, fallen guardian,” she said. I walked to her. She held her hands to me, but when I touched her I felt nothing, only whispering air. I looked into her face, no longer smiling. “You died.”
She inclined her head in agreement.
“The paths between the spheres are disturbed,” Amat said. “The passage of those seeking an end to death has unbalanced the twenty-two ways.”
I stood back and looked at her, feeling both sad and annoyed. “Don’t you think I know that?”
She shook her head. “It isn’t a question of what you know, it is a question of what you do.”
“Amat,” I said. “You can drop the sphinx act. I’m too old for riddles, and I am no longer bound by the code of the Thirty-Six.”
She smiled at that, and it brought back memories of her and Ma’ani and Sarwa—the three golden girls of the hidden temple—in days long gone, when the sun seemed never to set and the waning and waxing of the moon were reflected in the Nile and in the lives of our people. Still, I felt the old bitterness rise in me again.
“You were always a rake,” she said gently, and I felt the anger pass as swiftly as it had materialised.
“I’ve come to deliver a message,” she said. Her hands stroked the snake, and its tongue hissed against her skin, scenting her. “There is a thing let free on Assiah which is not meant to be so.” She looked into my eyes and said, “And it is your problem.”
“Strictly speaking,” I said, “It’s the Thirty-Six’s problem.”
Her eyes betrayed amusement. “Oh, they will probably move in if you can’t solve it,” she said. “But of course, you’d be dead by then.”
“And wouldn’t that be just dandy,” I said. But I thought about her words, realised they had hidden a warning. There was something on Assiah that could kill a Tzaddik. No wonder the Thirty-Six were sitting it out, hoping I could do the job for them or, even better, finally die in the process. I thought about my old comrades and decided I’d rather stick around, if only to give them a two-fingered salute.
“Is that it?” I said, feigning a confidence I didn’t quite feel.
That smile again, returning with its parasitic host of unwanted memories.
“That’s it,” she said. “No more ’sphinx act’, all right? You know the consequences of failure or success.”
“Fine,” I said. I had always found it difficult to argue with Amat. I reached out with my hand, wanting to touch her one last time, to feel her hair between my fingers, to say good-bye. But again there was nothing there, like a mirage painted on air.
I looked around me, at the cavern and the painting on the floor. “What is this place?” I said.
“A hiding place,” Amat said. “During the riots and blood libels of Richard the First’s rule, a group of rabbis—with an understanding some say has never been surpassed since—built this place as a refuge for our people, deep under the king’s city.”
“It couldn’t have done them much good,” I said, thinking of the expulsion of the Jews from England in 1290. I had never heard of a secret dwelling underneath London, or of the mysterious rabbis Amat talked about.
“Their understanding of the Zohar was unparalleled,” Amat continued. “They utilised…”
I let her speak as I opened my mind again to my surroundings. In life, Amat loved to show off her knowledge, and it seemed she had retained the tendency in death. Still, I could not detect her presence. My mind moved over the curious crystals and their cold light, sensing nothing. Beyond one of the walls I felt space, and within it giant, hushed figures. My mind moved over them, sensing enormous bodies made of clay: statues, perhaps? My mind moved around them, then shrank back as I detected a slow, regular beat coming from them. Were they alive?
I looked at them in my mind’s eye. They were enormous, each easily the size of ten men, and the clay they were made of seemed ancient. Their faces had no features, and their hands were closed into fists. Hard diamonds were strewn in a pattern throughout their body, a pattern I had just recognised.
They were imbued with the Tree of Life.
“Enough,” Amat said. I returned to myself and stood facing her. On the floor beside me, Manning snored loudly. “Time is running out, and the angel is growing stronger. It will come looking for you. Be prepared.”
“I thought you were going to quit the Sibyl role,” I said, but her eyes mesmerised me. I was lost in them, seeing the faraway shapes of curious mountains and rivers, clouds that seemed like faces, and giant creatures gliding on the winds… I reached for her, a third and futile time, and felt pain explode in my hand like a grenade.
“Remember me…” she whispered, as the snake’s venom coursed through my blood. I felt a hot, searing pain as if my brain were exploding.
Then I passed out.
* * *
I came to on the floor of my living room. My hand throbbed. Two puncture marks were visible on the flesh between my thumb and forefinger. I stood up. Underneath my feet was my chalked Star of David. Around me, furniture and belongings lay in broken heaps.
I moved through the house, feeling weary: room after room had been smashed up and its contents scattered. There were pools of piss in the bedroom and human excrement left on the kitchen’s floor.
I didn’t care about any of that. I went down to the basement, not surprised to find it had also been ransacked. The false brick in the southern wall, however, was undisturbed. I slid it out and helped myself to its mysteries: a bottle of Scottish whisky, a small bag of opium, and a curved wooden pipe, the shape of a wingless bird. There were also some vials I had left there for a day of need, and these I pocketed carefully.
Then I proceeded to have a party.
It went well as far as solitary parties go, and when there was no more whisky and only a little cocaine I curled up into a ball on the floor and went to sleep, figuring a house that had already been broken into might just be the best place to lie low for a little while.
I slept, and in my sleep Amat’s face returned to haunt me, uttering more nonsensical warnings; I saw the dark figure of the Feng-Huang stalking shadows, moving through my dreams, but he never turned back, never turned to look at me. I followed him through dreamscapes of torn memories, returning at last to the boarding-house in Paris, to a self centuries in the past, lying on the floor, choking on vomit, body wracked by drugs.
It occurred to me, then, that my life had not, perhaps, changed as much as I thought it had.
In my dream, the Feng-Huang loomed over me and laughed. Its eyes were burning emeralds, poisonous green, and its laughter was that of the hyena, a mad, deep sound that hurt my skull.
I tried to turn away from it, and in the way of dreams the scene was somehow gone, and I was dancing in the Albert Hall, Billie Carleton in my arms, the band playing music that made us soar together like two birds tied by a string. I could see Manning sitting at a table by the bar, Brilliant Chang opposite him. They were playing cards, their faces grim, and the pot was Billie’s golden snuff box.
Their cards, I noticed, were Tarot cards, and I strained my neck to see who would win the game, but the swirl of dancing partners passed between us and when I looked again they were gone.
“You smell lovely tonight,” I said to Billie, and she smiled at me and held me tight, and so we danced until the ballroom was gone and only the two of us remained, dancing in a perfect darkness, our lips touching in one blossoming, perfect kiss.
As I tasted her I felt her move away, become lighter. “Billie, no!” I cried, but her form began to melt in my hands, to ebb away, and I cried and tried to hold her, to keep her, all to myself.
Then somebody kicked me hard in the ribs and I woke up shivering on the basement floor.
* * *
“You son of a bitch,” I said. Motty put out his hand and helped me to my feet.
“Sorry, boss,” he said. “We tried waking you up but you were gone. And time is something we don’t have an abundance of right now.”
He motioned for the boys, who were leaning against the walls of the basement. Aviel brought forward a flask of hot tea and a bag full of sandwiches, then retreated and lit himself a cigarette.
“Thanks.”
The hot tea washed away memories and dreams alike; I ate quickly, while Motty and the boys waited. Then, “What’s going on?”
“We’ve been trying to find you since yesterday,” Motty said. ”Zenovia came to the shop screaming murder. Said that you and Manning had been attacked by tongs, then disappeared. We came to your house, but it was already broken into. I left Daniel outside to watch if you came back, but being the useless boy that he is it took him until now to let me know.”
The boy foremost left shook his head. “It wasn’t my fault, boss. This whole area is crawling with police.”
“Why police?” I said. I had a feeling I would not like the answer.
Motty coughed. It wasn’t a gentle cough, but the cough of a smoker who had pursued tobacco with a passion. “You’re wanted for the murder of Saturday Beauregard.”
I opened my mouth. Then I closed it. Then I said, “Fuck.”
The boys all nodded.
“According to the papers,” Motty said, ploughing on as if determined to unburden himself of the bad news as quickly as he could, “Beauregard escaped prison the night after Manning was released. And according to eyewitnesses, he was seen in Limehouse, and later again he was seen having a fight with a man matching your description. Also—” the cough stopped him again, but only briefly “–his body was found last night, downriver from the place we saw him. You’re wanted for questioning.”
“Very convenient,” I said. I thought about the situation. The Metropolitan Police were not known for moving very fast, so their quick mobilisation must have had an external agent of some sort. It didn’t take long to work out who—or what—was behind it.
“Any word of Manning?”
“No,” Motty said, a faint note of surprise in his voice. “We thought he was with you.”
“Clearly,” I said, “He isn’t.”
There was a noise from upstairs, and Alfy Benjamin came rushing down the stairs.
“Looks like we were spotted,” he announced. “There’re pigs and tongs all over this area and they seem to be heading this way. Separately, of course, but this looks like trouble.”
I motioned the boys, and they followed me as I climbed back up to street level. The time for running around and being pursued was over, or so I tried to tell myself.
Through the window a dull afternoon light cast a tired haze over Smithfields market. I had lost twenty-four hours according to Motty, though I suspected my time in the sewers and my time in the dream were somehow longer than that. There were plainclothes policemen milling about in the street, trying unsuccessfully not to look like policemen. There was also a large contingent of Chinese men, sticking to the shadows in the entryways of buildings. It almost made me want to find a way back to the sewers. But not quite.
“Where one sees only a problem,” I said, “another sees opportunity.”
“What are you going to do?” Motty asked.
I turned to him and grinned. “I’m going to magic us away,” I said.
“Oh. Good,” he said. He didn’t look reassured.
We left through the front door. Me in the middle, surrounded closely by the boys. Alfy and Motty strode ahead, shouting for the crowd to make way, that a dangerous criminal was caught. The policemen were close, and were approaching us now, but we continued to move, directly toward the tongs.
It was a dangerous game to play, with me as bait and the boys with the very real chance of getting hurt. But it was a game worth playing.
I could almost see it in their eyes, the moment the decision was made. The tongs wanted me. And they hated cops. On the other hand, the cops wanted me. And they really hated the tongs.
I heard the shot go off as planned. Motty, soon followed by another, this one from a policeman. The tongs returned fire.
I watched the riot begin.
“Since when do the police have firearms?” I shouted and felt exhilaration grip me like a vice. “Watch out, boys—it’s magic time!”
