The Palace of Curiosities

They smell it on the road. Keeping their heads low: not sniffing for grass to chew, but getting a sniff of those who passed before, the excruciating spoor of that last drive, the screaming muscle, the aching bones. Most of all they smell the fear.

And if they are bad on the road in, that is nothing to how they are when they get to the yard and are left standing, listening to the sharpening of blades. They smell death before it happens; hear the thump of the stunning blow before it cracks the first skull of the day; taste the blood of their brothers misting the air from the day before, when their guts spilled out of the bag of their bellies.

The fear of beasts. It is a fire that runs between them dry as tinder. When they get it in them the worst things happen. So I strive to make it quick. Today, we are unlucky.

Alfred raises his hammer with a good will, but when it falls some agency turns it awry and it falls to one side, a feather’s width only, but enough to inflict pain without release. The bullock rears up, its skull caved in. How can a dead animal leap up? When they are hammered, that should be an end to it. But I’ve seen what I’ve seen. Slaughter-men know these things.

It pauses, hanging in the air. We are fixed also, though we must clear out of its way for the plunge that will follow: it wants to take us into that animal darkness, and Heaven help anyone in the way when it comes crashing down. I have seen a man lose an arm, torn off at the shoulder by those fiendish hooves, and heard the beast give a last moan of delight to hear its murderer scream.

It falls, staggering. Alfred tries a second blow, but it swings its head despite our attempts to hold it steady, and this blow is worse than the first, breaking the bone beneath the eyes. The screaming starts: a sound no-one would believe who had not heard it. Women have it when they push a child out of them; beasts have it when we push the life out of them, and do it badly.

It is dead enough to fall to its knees, undead enough to thrash out when the hooks dig through its tendons and the hauling starts, so it takes four men to get it up there, the four who should be mopping the floor, so now we are slipping in the bile it has spewed up. I cut its throat right across, more than is needed, to sever the windpipe as well as the vein, and air whistles out, but at least it is a hiss and not the awful keening.

Finally, we tie it off: heels up, head down, tongue licking the floor; and still struggling. The blade is in my hand. My fellows are getting angrier, and I am the only one who can do a thing about it. I lift my hand; the blade falls and I have some comfort that this stroke at least is deep and true. I lose myself in the sight of its guts, gushing out in a smooth clean tumble. I do not let myself see its juddering terror as I kill it for the last time. I will not let myself think of that at all.

The hauliers are bringing up the next beast, shouting, ‘Get a move on, you fuckers. How long does it take to kill a bullock, for Christ’s sake?’ Their charge is restless: it can smell and hear and taste and see what is before it, and knows its share. Then it is in, stamping out its complaint, and we must continue. I look at Alfred: he is sweating, his hand unsteady. The haulers hate him, the winch-men hate him, the sweepers hate him, the animals hate him. His day is already bad, and the only direction it can go is to the worse.

‘Alfred,’ I say.

I hold out my hand and he places the hammer into my grasp. The bullock looks at me with wet brown eyes, and I look back; I lay my hand on its flank until it grows still. Then it happens: it stumbles forwards, as though kneeling in prayer. I am to be its killer, but I am kind, each blow struck by me being on the mark. It knows it will be fully dead when it is split open. I am the only one it can be certain of. Other men try but I succeed, every time. It closes its eyes, knowing I will be quick and sure. It is my nature.

I do not disappoint: neither the beast nor my companions. They see my kindness, and each of them pauses, even the most brutish of the hauliers, and breathe out their relief.

‘You’re a good man,’ says Alfred, and rubs my shoulder, swabbing it with blood.

His voice snaps in the middle, dry and thin. I return the hammer to him.

The day swims past, and I drift upon its languorous current. My arm continues to rise and fall and I am drawn into a drowse by the movement, by the length and silkiness of black hair flowing in a stream from wrist to elbow, the veins standing out along the length.

With each fall of the blade the muscles of my hand and thumb stiffen and relax, and I find myself thinking how simple a thing it would be to make a vertical incision upwards from the wrist; how soft the curtains of skin as I part them, warm as the inside of a mouth, revealing the workings of the body within.

I see myself slip a flat-bladed knife beneath the musculus coracobrachialis and biceps brachii – for these notations are suddenly known to me – and raise them slightly from their accustomed bed against the bone of my upper arm. I do not want to fix my gaze anywhere but on this work, which terrifies me yet is familiar, and comforting in its familiarity.

I am opened up, and am possessed of a knowledge that sparkles through me. My heart soars: I know this. For what are men but hills, swamps, sinkholes, deep abysses, flat plains? I understand now. This is no gazetteer of any country; it is the terrain of man’s interior geography, and I am a geographer of that body for I know the mountains and rivers, the highways and cities. I gaze at my flesh, opened up so beautifully. It prickles, quickens. I behold the mappa mundi. All I need to know is here.

I feel wetness on my cheeks, hear a cough and the softness flies away, as though I have been roughly shaken from sleep. My heart beats fast, and I am filled with a fear that I shall find everyone looking at me, somehow knowing my strange imaginings, but the sound is one of the sweepers. I examine my arm: it is untouched. My body is quiet again.

I shake my head and empty it of what I have just witnessed. I do not know whence it came. I have been affected by the terrified beast earlier, that is all. I am a plain man and do not know such long words, nor such an overwhelming philosophy. It is nothing. I press my knowledge into a deep well.

At mid-morning my companions lay down their tools and go out for a mug of tea and piece of bread.

‘I shall stay,’ I say, for I desire a peaceful spot in which to gather up my ragged thoughts.

‘Come now, Abel. You’ve earned a breather.’ Alfred grins.

‘You more than any of us bastards,’ adds William, and they laugh.

‘One-Blow Abel, that’s you!’

I make my mouth smile also.

‘There is but one carcase needs finishing off,’ I say, lightening my voice to make it careless.

Alfred dawdles.

‘I shall stay also. We shall follow presently.’

He grins at me as they depart.

‘Just the two of us, eh? Best company a man could have.’

I set myself back to work, striking the carcase before me; but my hand trembles and I only split it halfway. I try again and strike untrue, jarring the bone so hard my shoulder numbs, and I drop the axe. The steel rings against stone, and Alfred calls out.

‘Abel?’

‘Yes,’ I reply.

‘What is it?’

‘I have dropped my blade.’

‘Dropped it?’ His voice sounds with shock, and he pushes through the curtain of cadavers to my side. ‘What ails you, Abel?’

His eyes search mine.

I shrug. ‘It is nothing.’

‘Well, then,’ he says. ‘Very well.’

He coughs, busying himself in picking up my blade and placing it into my hand.

‘See,’ I say. ‘I am steady again.’

I make another stroke to prove my words, but it is a poor effort, shearing away and striking my forearm, and I am sliced to the bone. For an instant, all is peaceful as we stare at my arm, the dark crimson of muscle within. He speaks first.

‘Christ, your arm.’

‘Yes,’ I say.

It is true. It is my arm. He, like me, can see the sick whiteness showing at the heart of the slit. I should be afraid, but I am not; I feel no panic as I watch the wound fill with sluggish blood. I wait for it to commence pumping, in the way that kine do when I cut their throats, but it does not. The liquid rises partway to the brim and then pauses, small bubbles winking on the surface. As I watch, I am aware of another sensation: my soul begins to beat sluggish wings, unfolding them after a long sleep. My body tingles, stirs.

‘Christ,’ says Alfred. ‘Dear, sweet Christ.’

He sits upon the floor, not caring about the stickiness and filth.

‘Sit down, man,’ he croaks.

‘Yes,’ I say, lowering myself to sit next to him.

He is trembling.

‘You are dying. You will die. What am I to do?’ he stutters. ‘You will bleed to death. You are slain. What can we do?’ His hands patter all over his apron, wringing the corners. ‘I must get help,’ he says, but does not move.

‘Yes,’ I agree, and do not move either, for my eyes will not leave the sight of my inner workings revealed in this impossible fashion.

I am surprised, but not in that way of a new thing, a never-before-seen thing. It is the stillness of curiosity. I ache to dip my thumb into the dish of the wound to see if I am warm or cool; indeed, I lift my hand to do so, and only hesitate because Alfred is shaking violently, small sobs coming from deep within his chest.

‘I must go. I must go and find a doctor,’ he says, over and over, not stirring. ‘I should not have spoken to you. I distracted you. This is my fault.’

I want to say, It is not, but I am lost in contemplation of this phenomenon.

‘I am not bleeding,’ I muse, and find I have spoken aloud.

Alfred is sitting quite still. ‘Dear Christ,’ he breathes. ‘You are not.’

It is the truth. The injury is full of blood, but is not spilling over.

‘I wonder why,’ I say, for it holds me in a fascination.

I am a slaughter-man: I know well the fountaining of heart’s-blood when an artery is severed.

‘Sweet Jesus,’ repeats Alfred. ‘Look.’

I look. The blood is sinking, and as it subsides the edges of the wound begin to close together very slowly, but fast enough that it is possible to observe the motion. I am held in the grip of a terrific stillness, so entrancing is the sight of my body re-sealing itself. After minutes I forget to count all that can be seen is a red seam along my forearm. I flex my fingers, and they move: I can bend easily at the elbow. Nothing is damaged. Alfred gets to his feet, staggering backwards.

‘You …’ he says, his eyes wild. ‘When a man is cut, he should stay open. You close up. It is not right. You should be dead.’

His gaze darts up and down and from side to side; everywhere but at me.

‘I am not,’ I say simply.

His breathing is rough. ‘I do not—’ he begins, and stops. ‘I do not know you.’

He walks away. I inspect my miraculous arm, twisting it about and watching the line where I cut myself grow smooth and pink. After a while I pick up my axe and continue with my labours. I am determined to concentrate, for I do not wish to slip into another bout of this dangerous half-sleep. The others come back in; Alfred also, but he says nothing, and will not look at me.

I set my teeth and apply myself to my labour. I am a slaughter-man, I say to myself. I cut open the bodies of beasts. They stay open. I was cut, and I closed up. I did not bleed. I shake the troubling thoughts away. I must have been mistaken: I cannot have cut myself so deeply. These things are not possible.

The remainder of the day is simpler. Each beast waits patiently in line, and the greatest noise we hear is the sigh of each giving up its spirit gladly. At the end of the day, I walk out of the gate to find Alfred waiting.

‘Let’s be walking home, then,’ he says grudgingly.

He keeps half a pace ahead of me, and looks back every now and then, as though expecting something, eyes sliding to my forearm. I wince with the knowledge of my body and how it healed; and how he witnessed it happening.

‘Alfred?’

‘What?’ he growls.

‘You are my friend,’ I mumble.

‘Yes, yes,’ he mutters. ‘So you keep saying. Give it a rest.’

He thrusts his eyes ahead, walking faster so that I have to quicken my step to keep up with him. I chew the inside of my mouth until I taste iron. I hold out the package I have been given as my day’s perk: I bear the prize of an entire head, brains and all, for the way I turned things round, the gaffer said.

‘I like brains,’ I say. ‘Brains are tasty.’

He breathes out, slowing down so that I do not have to rush so.

‘They are,’ he agrees, and we fall back into step.

The evening is chilly: he is wrapped up in his coat like a boatman, breath standing before him, humming some tune I do not recognise. I try not to interrupt him. It is difficult. At last I speak.

‘About today—’ I start.

‘It is of no consequence,’ he snaps, picking up the pace again.

‘But it was—’

‘It was nothing!’ he cries. ‘It was a difficult day. That bullock! God, how it wouldn’t die! Enough to make any man see things.’

‘But, Alfred, at the slaughter-house—’

‘I do not want to talk about it. In fact, I remember nothing.’

‘Alfred—’

‘I said, I do not want to talk about it. Get a move on,’ he grunts. ‘It is time to get some food inside us.’

‘Oh.’

My mouth fills with water.

‘That’s the job. Think of that. Nothing else.’

‘Yes. You are right.’

He breathes out heavily, clouding the air around his head.

‘Of course I am. No more rambling. I’m freezing. Let’s get back and get this lot cooked. Of a sudden I have a powerful hunger upon me. Think how good it’ll taste. Any meat you’ve had a hand in is a clean and cheerful dish.’

He slaps my shoulder. I know that the events of today have brought me close to grasping something, but it is already beginning to slip away. If he would talk to me, maybe I could fix my understanding. But he will not.

We walk in silence to our lodging house, a narrow squeeze of a building caught between the muscular shoulders of the tenements to each side. Ours is little different, except the bricks are perhaps grimier, the steps to our cellar a little more slippery with spilt beer and bacon fat, the straw in our palliasses a little older. But there are just as many folk squeezed into the upper floors – three families to a room as I hear it. Their babies squall as lustily; their men and women argue just as cantankerously. It is our crowded ark, one of an armada of vessels crammed thick with humanity. I have no desire to move from my cellar, where everything is cosy and peaceful by comparison.

A woman from one of the upstairs rooms cooks the meat, and there is plenty to share. All the cellar-men fill up the kitchen, joining in the feast of my good fortune. One man brings beer, another, bread; for this is our way of a night. We eat until Alfred’s bad humour is quite taken away, and we are friendly once again. When we have finished, we return to the cellar and Alfred finds our pallets as sure as a seagull finds its nest from the hundreds on a cliff. I stretch out, cradled in the comfort of my companions patting their stomachs, smacking their lips and wiping gravy off their chins.

Alfred lolls on his elbow, picking at his buckled teeth with a straw. His rough sandy hair stands up in surprised tufts. He shifts his thin hips, cracks out a fart and laughs at the sound. His mouth is soft, for all his endeavours to hide it beneath a broad moustache.

‘You know what, Abel?’ he muses. ‘When we strike it rich, we’ll be out of here. Get a nicer room.’

‘Why would we want that? There are so many friends here.’

He scowls. ‘So I’m just one of many, am I?’

‘Not at all, Alfred. You are my dearest friend.’

‘Ah, get away with you.’

He is pleased, and I do not know why he demurs. It is true: I would not find my way through each day without his guidance. The thought is alarming, so I push it away. He clears his throat.

‘Time to reckon up, Abel.’ He rubs his palms together in pleasure. ‘Our little ritual.’

And I remember: every night before we turn in, I count out our wages.

‘This is for lodging,’ I say. ‘This for breakfast. And midday food. This for drink. And this left over.’

‘More drink?’ says Alfred.

‘Hmm. No. I need better boots.’

‘That will not buy you boots.’

‘Then I shall save each day until I have enough.’ I hand the money to him. ‘Will you keep it safe for me? I lose things, you know. I will forget where I have put it.’

Alfred laughs. ‘You’d forget your head!’

‘Yes, you’re a wooden-head, and no mistake!’ calls a man further down the row of sacks.

‘Old dozy!’ another man takes up the cry.

‘It is true,’ I say, for so it is.

‘Come on, lads,’ mutters Alfred.

‘Oh, we like him, Alfred; even if he is tuppence missing.’

‘You know there’s no harm in it.’

One of them punches my upper arm. ‘You’re our lucky charm.’

‘Not one of us has got hurt since you joined us.’

‘So we’re not going to chase you off, eh?’

‘Not our Abel.’

‘You’re a bit of a miracle, as I hear it.’

‘Fished you out of the mud, they did.’

‘You were mostly mud yourself.’

‘You should of been a goner. By all accounts.’

‘No-one as goes in the river comes out. Save you.’

‘Got a bit of luck you’d like to rub off on me?’

‘Come on, Abel, how about a good rub-down!’

They roar with laughter and I decide it is best to join in. I ache for them to say more. To paint in the blank picture of my forgetting.

‘You were in the papers and everything. Come on, Alf, show us.’

Alfred unbuttons the neck of his shirt to a scatter of playful whistles and draws out a much-folded sheet of newspaper. He lays it across his knee, smoothing out the folds carefully.

‘There you are,’ says one, leaning over Alfred’s shoulder and jabbing at the page.

‘Watch it, Pete. You’ll tear a bloody hole in it.’

‘Look, Abel. That’s you, that is.’

I squint at the small engraving: a man’s head; nose prominent, eyes dark and deep-set, a shadow of hair on the chin. Below, a cluster of uniformed men around a prone figure. They look very pleased with themselves. Mysterious Gentleman Rescued, reads the headline. Startling Discovery, of Particular Interest.

‘You can read it?’

I realise I have been speaking out loud.

‘Didn’t know you were educated.’

‘Neither did I,’ I say.

They laugh, and are easy with me again.

‘You can see why they thought you were that Italian.’

‘Go on, say something wop. You know you can.’

I do not have to think: the words fly easily to my tongue. ‘Piacere di conoscerla.’

‘He’s a living marvel!’

‘Yes, but not that posh one, as went missing.’

‘They found him with his throat cut.’

‘And his trousers down!’

‘So you’re common as muck, like the rest of us.’

‘Better off with us lot, eh, Abel?’

‘I am,’ I agree, and it pleases them greatly.

‘Why did you jump?’ says one, more thoughtfully.

‘I do not remember,’ I say. ‘Maybe I fell in.’

‘Lot of drunks fall in. No offence.’

‘I am not offended.’

‘You don’t seem like a drunk.’

‘Well, you weren’t in the pudding club. That’s why the ladies tend to take a late swim.’

They chuckle again, and after a while Alfred shoos them away.

‘Don’t chase them off.’

‘Only trying to help out a pal.’ He sulks. ‘Give you a bit of peace.’

‘I know. But I like to hear them talk. Truly, I don’t remember.’

‘Remember what?’

‘Any of it. Falling in the river. Being pulled out. Anything before this cellar.’

‘Now you’re pulling my leg.’

‘Alfred, I am not.’

‘Abel, I know you’re a wooden-head at the best of times …’ He stops. ‘You mean it?’

‘I want to remember. I can’t. I look into myself and find nothing. Each morning I wake up …’

He looks worried. I decide to stop. The look changes to thoughtful, and then he smiles.

‘It’ll come back,’ he declares, with a certainty I do not share. ‘Big shock, that’s what it is. Thing like that’d scare any man out of his wits. Make him imagine all kinds of nonsense.’

‘You are sure?’

‘Course I am. Wouldn’t lie to you, would I?’

‘No. You are my friend.’

‘You keep me straight, Abel, you do.’ He smiles, and grasps my shoulder.

‘Right, listen up!’ bawls one of the cellar-men. All heads turn. ‘I am chief bully for the evening, and I have a treat for us all.’

He flourishes his hand towards a woman at his elbow. There are a few whistles and rumbles of approval.

‘Some of you know her, some of you don’t. Not a tooth in her head. Eh, May?’

The woman grins, demonstrating the truth of his statement.

‘So, steady up, lads, finish your idle chatter,’ he says. ‘A gobble for sixpence; a helping hand for three.’

They gather into a knot and lay out their coins. She seems unconcerned by the number of acts they are negotiating, eyes brightening only when the take is firmly stowed in her bodice. She leads the first into the corner. The rest turn their backs and share a pipe, acting as though they cannot hear his shallowing gasps.

‘You’ve got a bit left over, haven’t you, Abel?’ says Alfred casually.

‘I have,’ I say.

He waves towards the female, who is already taking her next customer in hand. I consider her fingers working at my body in a similar fashion.

‘It’s there for the taking.’

‘No,’ I decide.

He smiles. ‘Me neither.’

Although I do not wish to participate, I find it difficult to take my attention from the hunched bodies in the darkness. One of the men, satisfied now and lounging on his mattress, notices the direction of my gaze.

‘Come on, cold-fish,’ he shouts. ‘You can have one on me if you like.’ He tosses a few coins in the air. ‘It’ll make a man of you.’

He laughs, not unpleasantly, and those men who are not distracted by the woman turn to regard me.

‘You have got one, haven’t you?’

‘Maybe it’s a tiddler,’ chaffs one, waggling his little finger.

‘She doesn’t mind small fry, do you, May?’

The woman hoots, washing down her most recent bout with a mouthful of beer and scratching at her skirts.

‘Maybe it’s as lifeless as he is. That soaking in the river has made it as much good as a herring.’

‘The river’ll do that to a man. Turn his every part to mud.’

‘Don’t plague him so,’ says Alfred, and their eyes turn from me to him. He is examining the laces of his boots as though they are fascinating objects worthy of deep study.

‘Only our bit of fun, Alf.’

‘He doesn’t mind, do you, mate?’

‘No,’ I say truthfully.

One of them thumps me on the back.

‘See? We’re only jesting.’

‘You’re all right, Abel, even if you can’t get it up. Anytime you change your mind, though, first one’s on us. Right, lads?’

They murmur assent, raising their smokes and cups in a toast. Then, finished with their companionable teasing, they settle to the more stimulating activities of the evening. After some time, the woman completes her labours and departs.

It occurs to me that I have heard taunts like theirs before, and I scrabble in my head for when it might have been. Last night? Last year? The harder I search, the more elusive the answer. I close my eyes, and it comes to me: I stand encircled, hands bound. My mind stirs unpleasantly and I shake my head. Perhaps I do not want to remember, after all. But now I have called them up, they will not leave me.