Imajica

It had already been a day and a half since he’d made such a show of taking Dowd’s life: a performance of which he was justly proud. But the casualty that lay before him was a real loss. Dowd had been passed down the line of Godolphin for two centuries, bound to them until the end of time or Joshua’s line, whichever came first. And he had been a fine manservant. Who else could mix a whisky and soda so well? Who else knew to dry and powder between Oscar’s toes with especial care, because he was prone to fungal infections there? Dowd was irreplaceable, and it had pained Oscar considerably to take the brutal measures circumstance had demanded. But he’d done so knowing that while there was a slim possibility that he would lose his servant forever, an entity such as Dowd could survive a disembowelling as long as the rituals of Resurrection were readily and precisely followed. Oscar was not in ignorance of those rituals. He’d spent many lazy Yzordderrexian evenings on the roof of Peccable’s house, watching the tail of the Comet disappear behind the towers of the Autarch’s palace, talking about the theory and practice of Imajical feits, writs, pneumas, uredos and the rest. He knew the oils to pour into Dowd’s carcass, and what blossoms to burn around the body. He even had in his treasure room a phonetic version of the ritual, set down by Peccable himself, in case Dowd was ever harmed. He had no idea how long the process would take, but he knew better than to peer beneath the sheet to see if the bread of life was rising. He could only bide his time, and hope he’d done all that was necessary.

At four minutes past four, he had proof of his precision. A choking breath was drawn beneath the sheet, and a second later Dowd sat up. The motion was so sudden, and - after such a time - so unexpected, Oscar panicked, his chair tipping over as he rose, the almanac flying from his hand. He’d seen much in his time that the people of the Fifth would call miraculous, but not in a dismal room like this, with the commonplace world grinding on its way outside the door. Composing himself, he searched for a word of welcome, but his mouth was so dry he could have blotted a letter with his tongue. He simply stared, gaping and amazed. Dowd had pulled the sheet off his face and was studying the hand with which he’d done so, his face as empty as the eyes of the voiders sitting against the opposite wall.

I’ve made a terrible error, Oscar thought. I’ve brought back the body, but the soul’s gone out of him; oh Christ, what now?

Dowd stared on, blankly. Then, like a puppet into which a hand had been inserted, bringing the illusion of life and independent purpose to senseless stuff, he raised his head, and his face filled with expression. It was all anger. He narrowed his eyes, and bared his teeth as he spoke.

‘You did me a great wrong,’ he said. ‘A terrible wrong.’

Oscar worked up some spittle, thick as mud. ‘I did what I deemed necessary,’ he replied, determined not to be cowed by the creature. It had been bound by Joshua never to do a Godolphin harm, much as it might presently wish to.

‘What have I ever done to you that you humiliate me that way?’ Dowd said.

‘I had to prove my allegiance to the Tabula Rasa. You understand why.’

‘And must I continue to be humiliated?’ he said. ‘Can I not at least have something to wear?’

‘Your suit’s stained.’

‘It’s better than nothing,’ Dowd replied.

The garments lay on the floor a few feet from where Dowd sat, but he made no move to pick them up. Aware that Dowd was testing the limits of his master’s remorse, but willing to play the game for a while at least, Oscar picked up the clothes and lay them within Dowd’s reach.

‘I knew a knife wasn’t going to kill you,’ he said.

‘It’s more than I did,’ Dowd replied. ‘But that’s not the point. I would have entered the game with you if that’s what you’d wanted. Happily; slavishly. Entered and died for you.’ His tone was that of a man deeply and inconsolably affronted. ‘Instead you conspire against me. You make me suffer like a common criminal.’

‘I couldn’t afford for it to look like a charade. If they’d suspected it was stage-managed - ‘

‘Oh I see,’ Dowd replied. Unwittingly Oscar had caused even greater offence with this justification. ‘You didn’t trust my actorly instincts. I’ve played every lead Quexos wrote. Comedy, tragedy, farce. And you didn’t trust me to carry off a petty little death-scene!’

‘All right, I was mistaken.’

‘I thought the knife stung badly enough. But this

‘Please, accept my apologies. It was crude and hurtful. What can I do to heal the harm, eh? Name it, Dowdy. I feel I’ve violated the trust between us and I have to make good. Whatever you want, just name it.’

Dowd shook his head. ‘It’s not as easy as that.’

‘I know. But it’s a start. Name it.’

Dowd considered the offer for a full minute, staring not at Oscar but the blank wall. Finally, he said:

‘I’ll start with the assassin, Pie’oh’pah.’

‘What do you want with a mystif?’

‘I want to torment it. I want to humiliate it. And finally, I want to kill it.’

‘Why?’

‘You offered me whatever I wanted. Name it, you said. I’ve named it.’

‘Then you have carte blanche to do whatever you wish,’ Oscar said. ‘Is that all?’

‘For now,’ Dowd said. ‘I’m sure something more will occur. Death’s put some strange ideas in my head. But I’ll name them, as time goes by.’

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

1

While it was to prove difficult for Gentle to prise from Estabrook the details of the night-journey that had taken him to Pie’oh’pah, it was not as difficult as getting in to see the man in the first place. He went to the house around noon, to find the curtains at all the windows meticulously drawn. He knocked and rang the bell for several minutes, but there was no reply. Assuming Estabrook had gone out for a constitutional, he left off his attempt and went to find something to put into his stomach, which after being so thoroughly scorned the night before was echoing with its own emptiness. It was Boxing Day, of course, and there was no café or restaurant open, but he located a small supermarket managed by a family of Pakistanis, who were doing a fine trade supplying Christians with stale bread to break. Though the stock had disappeared from many of the shelves the store still had a tempting parade of toothdecayers, and Gentle left with chocolate, biscuits and cake to satisfy his sweet tooth. He found a bench, and sat down to subdue his hunger. The cake was too moist and heavy for his taste, so he broke it up into pieces and threw it to the pigeons his meal had attracted. The news soon spread that there was sustenance to be had, and what had been an intimate picnic quickly turned into a squabbling match. In lieu of loaves and fishes to subdue the mob, Gentle tossed the rest of his biscuits into the midst of the feasters, and returned to Estabrook’s house content with his chocolate. As he approached he saw a motion at one of the upper windows. He didn’t bother to ring and knock this time, but simply called up at the window.

‘I want a word, Charlie! I know you’re in there. Open up!’

When there was no sign of Estabrook obliging, he let his voice ring out a little louder. There was very little competition from traffic, this being a holiday. His call was a clarion.

‘Come on, Charlie, open up, unless you want me to tell the neighbours about our little deal.’

The curtain was drawn aside this time, and Gentle had his first sight of Estabrook. A glimpse only, for the curtain was dropped back into place a moment later. Gentle waited, and just as he was about to start his haranguing afresh heard the front door being unbolted. Estabrook appeared, barefoot and bald. The latter was a shock. Gentle hadn’t known the man wore a toupée. Without it his face was as round and as white as a plate, his features set upon it like a child’s breakfast. Eggs for eyes, a tomato nose, sausage lips; all swimming in a grease of fear.

‘It’s time we talked,’ Gentle said, and without waiting for an invitation, stepped inside.

He pulled no punches in his interrogation, making it plain from the outset that this was no social call. He needed to know where to find Pie’oh’pah, and he wasn’t going to be fobbed off with excuses. To aid Estabrook’s memory he’d brought a battered street map of London. He set it down on the table between them.

‘Now,’ he said. ‘We sit here until you’ve told where you went that night. And if you lie to me I swear I’m going to come back and break your neck.’

Estabrook didn’t attempt any obfuscation. His manner was that of a man who had passed many days in terror of a sound upon his step, and was relieved now that it had come, that his caller was merely human. His egg eyes were perpetually on the verge of breaking, and his hands trembled as he flipped the pages of the gazetteer, murmuring as he did so that he was sure of nothing, but he would try to remember. Gentle didn’t press too hard, but let the man make the journey again in memory, running his finger back and forth over the map as he did so.

They’d driven through Lambeth, he said, then Kennington and Stockwell. He didn’t remember grazing Clap-ham Common, so he assumed they’d driven to the east of it, towards Streatham Hill. He remembered a church, and sought out a cross on the map that would mark the place. There were several, but only one close to the other landmark he remembered, the railway line. At this point, he said he could offer nothing more by way of directions, only a description of the place itself: the corrugated iron perimeter, the trailers, the fires.

‘You’ll find it,’ he said.

‘I’d better,’ Gentle replied.

He’d so far told Estabrook nothing about the circumstances that had brought him back here, though the man had several times asked if Judith was alive and well. Now he asked again.

‘Please tell me,’ he said. ‘I’ve been straight with you, I swear I have. Won’t you please tell me how she is?’

‘She’s alive and kicking,’ Gentle said.

‘Has she mentioned me at all? She must have done. What did she say? Did you tell her I still love her?’

‘I’m not your pimp,’ Gentle said. ‘Tell her yourself. If you can get her to talk to you.’

‘What am I going to do?’ Estabrook said. He took hold of Gentle’s arm. ‘You’re an expert with women, aren’t you? Everybody says so. What can I do to make amends?’

‘She’d probably be satisfied if you sent her your balls,’ Gentle said. ‘Anything less wouldn’t be appropriate.’

‘You think it’s funny.’

Trying to have your wife killed? No, I don’t think that’s very amusing. Changing your mind, and wanting everything lovey-dovey again: that’s hysterical.’

‘You wait till you love somebody the way I love Judith. If you’re capable of that, which I doubt. You wait until you want somebody so badly your sanity hangs on it. You’ll learn.’

Gentle didn’t rise to the remark. It was too close to his present state to be fully confessed, even to himself. But once out of the house, map in hand, he couldn’t suppress a smile of pleasure that he had a way forward. It was already getting gloomy, as the midwinter afternoon closed its fist on the city. But darkness loved lovers, even if the world no longer did.

2

At midday, with his unease of the previous night allayed not one jot, Pie’oh’pah had suggested to Theresa that they should leave the encampment. The suggestion wasn’t met with enthusiasm. The baby was sick with sniffles, and had not stopped wailing since she’d woken; the other child was feverish too. This was no time to be going away, Theresa said, even if they had somewhere to go, which they didn’t. We’ll take the trailer with us, Pie replied; we’ll just drive out of the city. To the coast, maybe, where the children would benefit from the cleaner air. Theresa liked that idea. Tomorrow, she said, or the day after, but not now.

Pie pressed the case, however, until she asked him what he was so nervous about. He had no answer to give; at least none that she’d care to hear. She understood nothing of his nature, nor questioned him about his past. He was simply a provider. Someone who put food in the mouths of her children, and his arms around her at night. But her question still hung in the air, so he answered it as best he could.

‘I’m afraid for us,’ he said.

‘It’s that old man, isn’t it?’ Theresa replied. ‘The one who came to see you? Who was he?’

‘He wanted a job doing.’

‘And you did it?’

‘No.’

‘So you think he’s going to come back?’ she said. ‘We’ll set the dogs on him.’

It was healthy to hear such plain solutions, even if -as now - they didn’t answer the problem at hand. His mystif soul was sometimes too readily drawn to the ambiguities that mirrored his true self. But she chastened him; reminded him that he’d taken a face and a function, and in this human sphere, a sex; that as far as she was concerned he belonged in the fixed world of children, dogs and orange peel. There was no room for poetry in such straitened circumstances; no time between hard dawn and uneasy dusk for the luxury of doubt or speculation.

Now another of those dusks had fallen, and Theresa was putting her cherished ones to bed in the trailer. They slept well. He had a spell that he’d kept polished from the days of his power: a way of speaking prayers into a pillow so that they’d sweeten the sleeper’s dreams. His Maestro had asked for its comfort often, and Pie used it still, two hundred years later. Even now Theresa was laying her children’s heads upon down suffused with cradlesongs, secreted there to guide them from the dark world into the bright.

The mongrel he’d met at the perimeter in the pre-dawn gloom was barking furiously, and he went out to calm it. Seeing him approach it pulled on its chain, scrabbling at the dirt to be closer to him. Its owner was a man Pie had little contact with; a short-tempered Scot who brutalized the dog when he could catch it. Pie went down on his haunches to hush the creature, for fear its din would bring its owner out from his supping. The dog obeyed, but continued to paw at Pie fretfully, clearly wanting to be loosed from its leash.

‘What’s wrong, buster?’ he said to it, scratching behind its war-torn ears. ‘Have you got a lady out there?’

He looked up towards the perimeter as he spoke, and caught the fleeting glimpse of a figure stepping into shadow behind one of the trailers. The dog had seen the interloper too. It set up a new round of barking. Pie stood up again.

‘Who’s there?’ he demanded.

A sound at the other end of the encampment claimed his attention momentarily; water splashing on the ground. No, not water. The stench that reached his nostrils was that of petrol. He looked back towards his own trailer. Theresa’s shadow was on the blind, her head bared as she turned off the night-light beside the children’s bed. The stench was coming from that direction too. He reached down and released the dog.

‘Go, boy! Go! Go!’

It ran barking at a figure slipping out through a gap in the fence. As it went Pie started towards his trailer, yelling Theresa’s name.

Behind him, somebody shouted for him to shut up out there, but the curses were unfinished, erased by the boom and bloom of fire, twin eruptions that lit the encampment from end to end. He heard Theresa scream; saw flame surge up and around his trailer. The spilled fuel was only a fuse. Before he’d covered ten yards the motherlode exploded directly under the vehicle, the force sufficient to lift it off the ground and pitch it on its side.

Pie was blown over by a solid wave of heat. By the time he’d scrabbled to his feet the trailer was a solid sheet of flame. As he pitched himself through the baking air towards the pyre he heard another sobbing cry, and realized it was his own; a sound he’d forgotten his throat could make, but which was always the same, grief on grief.

Gentle had just sighted the church which had been Esta-brook’s last landmark when a sudden day broke on the street ahead, as though the sun had come to burn the night away. The car in front of his veered sharply, and he was only able to prevent a collision by mounting the pavement, bringing his own car to a juddering halt inches short of the church wall.

He got out, and headed towards the fire on foot, turning a corner to head directly into the smoke, which veered and veered again as he ran, allowing him only glimpses of his destination. He saw a corrugated iron fence, and beyond it a host of caravans, most of which were already ablaze. Even if he’d not had Estabrook’s description to confirm that this was indeed Pie’oh’pah’s home, the fact of its destruction would have marked it out. Death had preceded him here, like his shadow, thrown forward by a blaze at his back that was even brighter than the one that lay ahead. His knowledge of this other cataclysm, the one behind, had been a part of the business between himself and the assassin from the beginning. It had flickered in their first exchanges on Fifth Avenue; it had lit the fury that had sent him to debate with the canvas; and it had burned brightest in his dreams, in that room he’d invented (or remembered) where he’d begged Pie for forgetfulness. What had they experienced together that had been so terrible he’d wanted to forget his whole life rather than live with the fact? Whatever it was, it was somehow echoed in this new calamity, and he wished to God he could have his forgetfulness undone, and know what crime he’d committed that brought upon innocents such punishment as this.

The encampment was an inferno, wind fanning flames that in turn inspired new wind, with flesh the toy of both. He had only piss and spittle against this conflagration -useless! - but he ran on towards it anyway, his eyes streaming as the smoke bit at them, not knowing what hope of survival he had, only certain that Pie was somewhere in this firestorm and to lose him now would be tantamount to losing himself.

There were some escapees; but a pitiful few. He ran past them towards the gap in the fence through which they’d escaped. His route was by turns clear and confounded, as the wind brought choking smoke in his direction then carried it away again. He pulled off his leather jacket and threw it over his head as primitive protection against the heat, then ducked through the fence. There was solid flame in front of him, making the way forward impassable. He tried to his left, and found a gap between two blazing vehicles. Dodging between them, the smell of singeing leather already sharp in his nostrils, he found himself in the middle of the compound, a space relatively free of combustible material, and thus of fire. But on every side, the flames had hold. Only three of the caravans weren’t blazing, and the veering wind would soon carry the flame in their direction. How many of the inhabitants had fled before the flames took hold he couldn’t know, but it was certain there’d be no further escapees. The heat was nearly unbearable. It beat upon him from every side, cooking his thoughts to incoherence. But he held on to the image of the creature he’d come to find, determined not to desert the pyre until he had that face in his hands, or knew beyond doubt it was ash.

A dog appeared from the smoke, barking hysterically. As it ran past him a fresh eruption of fire drove it back the way it had come, its panic escalating. Having no better route, he chased its tail through the chaos, calling Pie’s name as he ran, though each breath he took was hotter than the last, and after a few such shouts the name was a rasp. He’d lost the dog in the smoke, and all sense of direction at the same time. Even if the way was still clear he no longer knew where it lay. The world was fire on every side.

Somewhere up ahead he heard the dog again, and thinking now that maybe the only life he’d claim from this horror was the hound’s, he ran in search of it. Tears were pouring from his smoke-stung eyes; he could barely focus on the ground he was stumbling across. The barking had stopped again, leaving him without a beacon. There was no way to go but forward, hoping the silence didn’t mean the dog had succumbed. It hadn’t. He spotted it ahead of him now, cowering in terror.

As he drew a breath to call it to him he saw the figure beyond it, stepping from the smoke. The fire had taken its toll on Pie’oh’pah, but he was at least alive. His eyes, like Gentle’s, streamed. There was blood at his mouth, and neck, and in his arms, a forlorn bundle. A child.

‘Are there more?’ Gentle yelled.

Pie’s reply was to glance back over his shoulder, towards a heap of debris that had once been a trailer. Rather than draw another lung-cooking breath to reply, Gentle started towards this bonfire, but was intercepted by Pie, who passed over the child in his arms.

Take her,’ he said.

Gentle threw aside his jacket, and took the child.

‘Now get out!’ Pie said. ‘I’ll follow.’

He didn’t wait to see his instruction obeyed, but turned back towards the debris.

Gentle looked down at the child he was carrying. She was bloody and blackened; surely dead. But perhaps life could be pumped back into her if he was quick. What was the fastest route to safety? The way he’d come was blocked now, and the ground ahead littered with burning wreckage. Between left and right, he chose left, because he heard the incongruous sound of somebody whistling somewhere in the smoke: at least proof that breath could be drawn in that direction.

The dog came with him, but only for a few steps. Then it retreated again, despite the fact that the air was cooler by the step, and a gap in the flames was visible ahead. Visible, but not empty. As Gentle headed for the place a figure stepped out from behind one of the bonfires. It was the whistler, still practising his craft, though his hair was burning and his hands, raised in front of him, were smoking ruins. He turned his head as he walked, and looked at Gentle.

The tune he whistled was charmless, but it was sweet beside the stare he had. His eyes were like mirrors, reflecting the fires: they flared and smoked. This was the fire-setter, he realized; or one of them. That was why it whistled as it burned, because this was its paradise. It didn’t attempt to lay its carbonized hands on either Gentle or the child, but walked on into the smoke, turning its stare back towards the blaze as it did so, leaving Gentle’s route to the perimeter clear. The cooler air was heady; it dizzied him, made him stumble. He held on tight to the child, his only thought now to get it out into the street, in which endeavour he was aided by two masked firemen who’d seen his approach and came to meet him now, arms outstretched. One took the child from him, the other bore him up as his legs gave way beneath him.

There’s people alive in there!’ he said, looking back towards the fire. ‘You’ve got to get them out!’

His rescuer didn’t leave his side till he’d got Gentle through the fence and into the street. Then there were other hands to take charge. Ambulance attendants with stretchers and blankets, telling him that he was safe now and everything would be all right. But it wasn’t, not as long as Pie was in the fire. He shrugged off the blanket and refused the oxygen mask they were ready to clamp to his face, insisting that he wanted no help. With so many others in need they didn’t waste time attempting to persuade him, but went to aid those who were sobbing and shrieking on all sides. They were the lucky ones, who had voices to raise. He saw others being carried past who were too far gone to complain, and still others lying beneath makeshift shrouds on the pavement, blackened limbs jutting out here and there. He turned his back on this horror and began to make his way around the edge of the encampment.

The fence was being torn down to allow the hoses, which thronged the street like mating snakes, access to the fire. The engines pumped and roared, their reeling blue lights no competition for the fierce brightness of the fire itself. By that blaze he saw that a substantial crowd had gathered to watch. They raised a cheer as the fence was toppled, sending plagues of fire-flies up as it fell. He moved on as the firefighters advanced into the conflagration, bringing their hoses to bear on the heart of the fire. By the time he’d made a half circuit of the site, and was standing opposite the breach they’d made, the flames were already in retreat in several places, smoke and steam replacing their fury. He watched them gain ground from his new vantage point, hoping for some glimpse of life, until the appearance of another two machines and a further group of firefighters drove him on around the perimeter, back to the place from which he’d emerged.