Incarnate (42 page)

The sight of her made him cringe inside. Her raw face disgusted him. He would have fled into the foyer, except that she was already too close; he hadn’t room to open the door. He couldn’t touch her, he could only dodge around the projector.

She was stumbling, hands outstretched, toward where he had just been. He knew what to do without even thinking. He braced his back against the wall and shoved the heels of his shoes against the projector.

When it began to rock, it felt so heavy that he was afraid it would topple toward him. He could feel his shoes beginning to stick to the metal. He shoved with all his strength as it rocked away from him, as Dr. Kent turned what was left of her face toward him to see what he was doing. She hadn’t time even to throw up her hands before the projector fell, pinning her to the floor.

Though there was room for him to escape, he had to see what happened. Her face and most of her torso were under the projector. Her hands kept trying to claw at it then recoiling, bruising their knuckles against the floor, clawing wildly at the air. The cramped room began to stink of burning plastic and then of something worse. Eventually her legs gave a shove, so violent that her heels tore the carpet, and fell apart limply. After that she didn’t move. Nevertheless Danny watched for a while to make sure that she wasn’t playing another of her tricks.

The way the metal burned deeper into her fascinated him, but when she or her coat began to bubble like a slug, he clapped his hand over his mouth and hurried into the foyer. When at last he took his hand away he found he was grinning. He had never expected to get rid of her so completely. He dug out his keys and jingled them like bells, and was unlocking the foyer doors before he wondered what he was going to do with her body. He wanted desperately to flee while there was nobody to see him, but he couldn’t just leave her for Mr. Pettigrew to find. It wasn’t even her that bothered him so much, it was his magazines that were under her and the carpet.

He crept back to the projection box and stood outside the door. Perhaps Dr. Kent hadn’t really been here after all, perhaps she had just been one of the things they put into his mind. When he pushed open the door he was hoping the projector would still be upright, the box would be empty. But her arms and legs were protruding from beneath the metal, the room was full of smoke and an abominable smell.

He slammed the door and thought of the smoke. All at once he knew what to do. He ran into the auditorium to one of the rickety rows of seats. It took him a few minutes to tear a dozen loose.

He couldn’t bear the thought of going near whatever was left of Dr. Kent until he had to. He climbed on a pile of seats and used one to smash his window. He was retching with the smell before he’d cleared the frame of broken glass. At least the seats would go through diagonally. He posted them all through the window and pulled a few more loose to follow them, then he ran into the foyer, to the counter.

Two columns of the plastic display case were full of matchboxes; the rest held packets of cigarettes. He took one pile of matchboxes to the steps outside the projection box. By now his arms were trembling. He pushed the door open, to see what he needed to do.

The smoke was thicker. Most of the seats that had fallen on or against the projector were smoldering, and so was the carpet; he thought he heard the crackle of wood. The heat made him nervous about going in. He began to throw boxes of matches onto the projector, and he’d thrown about a dozen when the first exploded. Flames sprouted from the nearest seats and raced toward the others, and he flung the remaining boxes into the flames and slammed the door.

He ran into the auditorium. Flames were snaking out of his window, reaching toward the roof like ivy in a gale; the wall above the window was already black. As he watched, the projector’s window shattered, releasing flames that clawed at the roof. The fire needed no more help from him. Mr. Pettigrew would have to open a video library now. He locked the doors behind him, and grinned with astonishment at how much he’d achieved in one night. He welcomed back his sense of power. He’d dealt with Dr. Kent, and soon there would be nobody to confuse him. He only had to deal with Molly Wolfe.

42

T
HE SOUND
of Joyce’s voice woke Geoffrey. When he realized she had been saying good-bye, he struggled out of bed and groped his way into his dressing gown, then he stumbled dozily toward the landing. He shook his head irritably, but nothing seemed to move in there, neither his blood nor his thoughts.

Joyce was emerging from the old lady’s room. She gave his arm a squeeze and kissed his cheek. “I’m in a rush to get started on the painting. You’ll be all right if I go now, won’t you?”

“I’ll cope.” But he clung to the banister and hobbled downstairs after her as quickly as he could. “How long will it be now?”

“Are you getting fed up, poor old thing? Not long, I promise. They’ve put the new floor in, and we were only waiting for the plasterers to finish. I won’t be any longer painting than I have to be. I want it to look nice and bright for my old folk.” As she opened the front door, she gave him a sympathetic almost guilty look. “I know you’re missing auctions. You won’t miss many more.”

His doubts must have shown on his face, for she came back along the hall. “I’m not hurting your business, am I, Geoffrey? You mustn’t ever let me do that. You’re more important to me than my old folk are, you’re the only one who is.”

“We’re doing all right. It’s just that I’m selling more than I’m buying. I don’t like to do that for too long.”

“I can understand that, Geoffrey. I’ll be as quick as I can.” She leaned toward him to whisper, “You won’t be looking after her much longer. Sometimes I feel we’ve no time to ourselves anymore, don’t you? I tell you what,” she said more normally, “when I’ve got things running smoothly we’ll go away somewhere, shall we? Go somewhere we’ve never been before.”

“I’d like that. Let’s do it soon.” He watched from the front door as she hurried away. A few scraps of snow lay here and there in gardens, and made him think of his dream of the pats of flesh. He shivered and stepped back into the house.

He stumbled blinking to the kitchen. He could bathe and dress later, when the unpleasant part of the morning was over. When he opened the refrigerator, at first he couldn’t see the old lady’s bowl of mush. Leftover vegetables, a plateful of steak which, as he squinted at it, looked dusty and unreal; for a moment he thought it was the plastic steak from the day center that had previously been a butcher’s. He shook his head as if he could shake out the thought; he was imagining too much these days. He found the old lady’s bowl, put it with a spoon on a tray, and carried them upstairs.

He had been feeding her most days since Christmas. When she had refused to come downstairs, they’d taken Christmas to her, first the dinner and then the games. They’d played alphabet games and rhyming games, and when they’d played opposites she’d said the opposite of “dream” was “brain.” “That’s clever, isn’t it, Geoffrey?” Joyce had said, kicking him surreptitiously when he failed to respond.

It was surprising how quickly he’d grown used to the task, which was almost part of his day now. He knocked at her door, though she couldn’t be out of bed. “Who’s there?” she piped nervously. When he went in she said “Oh, it’s Geoffrey” as if she were telling someone else, and he wondered if she were growing worse.

Her head lolled back on the pillow as he set the tray down by the bed, lolled so heavily that he saw the ends of the pillow draw in. As soon as he picked up the spoon her mouth opened wide, displaying her almost white gums and tongue. Apart from “thank you” after each mouthful of mush, she said nothing—had said nothing else to him for days. It seemed her personality was vanishing beneath her fat, which he was sure was growing. He stared into her colorless eyes to avoid looking into her mouth, and wondered what color her eyes had once been. Every time she said “thank you,” he filled her mouth again at once, for gazing into her eyes while he listened to her breathing kept making him feel sleepier, in danger of nodding forward, too close to her face.

The scrape of the spoon on the empty bowl made him start. Her lips and eyes were sagging closed. Her brows were so fat now they overhung her eyes; no wonder it was a strain for her to raise her furrowed lids. He laid the spoon in the bowl and held the tray on his lap, and stared at her as her breathing grew deeper. He didn’t know how long he sat there, thinking of nothing at all, before the phone rang.

He dumped the tray on the landing and hurried into his office. Once he’d picked up the receiver, he held it while he thought of what to say. “Geoffrey Churchill,” he said.

At first he thought it was a fault on the line. “M-m-m—”

Eventually he realized. “Mr. Pelham. What can I do for you?”

“Are you all r—” Mr. Pelham said, and after a few attempts, began again. “Are you a-a-a—”

“I’m fine, thank you, Mr. Pelham. I know I should have visited the lady whose address you gave me before, now. Do tell her I’ll price her collection soon.”

“I was calling to t-t
-tell
you that the collection has been s-s-s—” It seemed minutes before he managed to pronounce “sold.”

“Oh, I see. Well, thank you for letting me know, Mr. Pelham. I expect I’ll see you at an auction soon.” Geoffrey replaced the receiver and wondered why he should feel so relieved that he needn’t go to Canterbury, needn’t go out at all. Whenever he thought of leaving the old lady on her own he felt the stirring of panic. He could only hope that was all it was, hope that the habit of staying at home hadn’t somehow made him nervous of going out, Joyce had enough problems without him.

He unlocked his desk and lifted out the sheets of the new issue she’d brought home yesterday for him from the post office. He ran his ruler down the sheets to help him spot imperfections, but he hadn’t examined three sheets before he found his eyes were blurring. He closed them and opened them, gazed at the paintings on the stamps, miniature English landscapes above which the queen’s obligatory head was floating in eyeless profile, but that didn’t help him rest his eyes; if anything, it seemed to strain them, for he felt as if he were gazing not at the stamps but into them, into tiny windows or screens. Suddenly the landscapes seemed to have too much depth.

When he found he was moving his head back and forth as if he might see around the edges of the paintings, he stood up quickly. Apart from anything else, he needed a bath. He would be letting himself go unless he was careful. He mustn’t be a burden on Joyce.

The old lady’s breathing followed him into the bathroom. He was so used to its presence everywhere in the house that noticing it came as a shock. He shaved before he ran his bath, so that steam wouldn’t fog the mirror, but still the mirror didn’t seem clear; he couldn’t recall the last time it had. He brushed his hair and went into his office, and then he stood staring.

The old lady must have begun to snore. That was what the squeaking was. It wasn’t the sound of a chorus of tiny voices, it couldn’t be, yet he could see the heads moving. He made himself go to his desk to prove that nothing was. But all the queen’s heads on the topmost sheet of stamps were mouthing and squeaking as they began to float across the tiny landscapes. Though they were all in profile, they were turning toward him.

He grabbed the sheet of stamps and crumpled it between his hands. Something struggled in his fists while the sheet he had exposed began to move. Clouds drifted over the tiny landscapes, the floating heads were chattering excitedly in mousy voices. He gasped and swept all the sheets off the desk, flinging the crumpled sheet after them, and ran downstairs.

At the front door he faltered. It wasn’t just the thought of leaving the old lady that stopped him, it was a sudden terrible fear that if he fled he might not be able to find his way back home. Everything stable seemed to be crumbling all at once. He must control himself, mustn’t let Joyce see what was wrong with him; he simply hadn’t realized how much stress he was suffering, what with being unable to leave the house and caring for the old lady and his fears for Joyce. Surely he was too young to be senile. He had managed to calm down and was making his way upstairs for the tray he had left on the landing when someone knocked at the front door.

Geoffrey had to search his mind before he recognized the bony, sensitive face and the single earring. It was Mark, the young poet who’d helped Joyce at her old day center. “Joyce is out, I’m afraid,” Geoffrey said. “I know. Can I talk to you?”

“Of course you may,” Geoffrey said automatically. “Please do come in.” At least Mark would be company of a kind, though he glanced up nervously at the old lady’s breathing. Geoffrey closed the door of the living room after them, but that didn’t help much. “Sit yourself down,” he said. “Can I offer you a cup of something?”

“No thanks, I’d better not.” He seemed prepared to sit and clasp his bony hands and stare at them.

“Are you still in the same line of work?” Geoffrey prompted.

“Old people, you mean? Yes.”

“Joyce found a new center, you know,” Geoffrey said.

“Did she?” His face brightened, looked relieved. “When?”

“Before Christmas. She’s been refurbishing it ever since.” Geoffrey faltered. “What on earth is wrong?”

“Mr. Churchill, I don’t quite know how to say this, but—have you been to see her new place?”

“Not yet, no. I’ve been looking after one of her old people, as a matter of fact. Why?”

“Please don’t be angry, Mr. Churchill.” Mark pulled at his cheeks with his knuckly fingers, peeling the flesh of his cheeks from his eyes. “I work in the West End now,” he said as if this were an answer. “I take the bus past Hyde Park every morning, and the same way home at night—I like the trees.” He gazed harder at his clasped hands. “What I’m trying to say is, most days I see Mrs. Churchill. Joyce.”

“What, near Hyde Park?”

“On Bayswater Road.”

Geoffrey shook his head. “You must be mistaken. That isn’t where she’s working.”

I thought I was mistaken too. I got off the bus the day before yesterday to make sure. It really was Mrs. Churchill. Yesterday I tried to talk to her, but she didn’t know me. Mr. Churchill, she hasn’t found a new center at all. She just wanders up and down Bayswater Road as if she’s waiting for someone.”