Mountains of the Moon (15 page)

“That was probably Heath on the phone,” I say. “You didn’t recognize his voice?”

Pete doesn’t know what I’m talking about.

“The phone—the phone box—it was a phone box a minute ago but.”

There’s a dawning as Pete remembers the demolition outside.

“Heath—how is he?” Pete says. “I haven’t seen him for years—nine, ten, eleven, twelve years?”

I remember introducing Peter and Heath, in the kitchen at Park Lane. They recognized each other from the night in Davros’ Cellar; they stood there in the kitchen gleefully insulting each other. That first time Pete came to the house, Gwen didn’t quite stress the “t” of his name, her elocution lessons dropped off with an afternoon bottle of Scotch. It’s PeTer, actually, he said. I loved him, I loved him then. While the kettle was boiling I went in my room and rolled around with a lion skin, didn’t know
he had followed me in and was leaning against the door, watching. I try to remove the memory like a sticky thing from my eyebrow.

“Heath’s back doing haulage.” I say. “I phoned him yesterday, to tell him I was going away.”

“Is Heath still married to Gwen?”

“On paper.”

“You didn’t ever get in touch with her again, you don’t still see her?”

“I see her almost every day, Pete. She’s parked in the side street just up the hill.”

He’s charmed and delighted by the notion;
poison dwarf
he used to call her. He’s smiling at a candle flame dancing in the floor shine. I reach for two flat nylon pouches, pencil cases really with zips. He watches me put them side by side on the floor in front of me.

“Two pouches,” I say. “One red. One black.”

He’s rolling a matchstick between his fingers and lips.

“One pouch contains two thousand pounds in US dollars; the other contains a wad of airmail paper. Red or black?”

“Black.”

He’s smiling at me, that slightly open-mouthed smile. I twist a matchstick lazily in my lips. He tips his head the other way. I slip two new batteries into the flashlight; Pete’s eyes follow the beam to the wall. I turn the focus tight, to a sharp particular point of light. On the wall I write
Q
, in two clean sweeps. I turn the flashlight off but the letter remains, glowing like a ghost of itself.

“I got a letter from Quentin’s mother,” I say and count to ten. Then decide to count to twenty. “She wrote to tell me that he’d woken up.”

Pete doesn’t flinch. He looks up into the dark corner as though something magical is occurring there. When his gaze returns, I’m not sitting where I was. He finds me in the mirror. Waves me over.

I pretend I’m asleep. He gets dressed, loose change spills out of his pockets onto the painted tile floor. A sparrow in the tree outside mistakes the sound for song and repeats it back. He takes ages putting on the layers: it’s cold on a market stall all day. I hear his shoe leather go into the
lounge. His heavy set of keys jingle-jangle. And there it is, the sound: the short “zip” of a pencil case, opening.

Closing.

Twice.

There isn’t any money in either of the pencil cases, just two wads of paper, one says
bye
, the other says
bye
. Friends and Family parade as favorites but you get better odds with strangers, I find. The front door opens.

He’s gone.

No.

His shoes come back in, creak in my bedroom doorway. I feel the body of his heat above me.

“Be careful,” he says.

And he lets himself out, closing the door with a click behind him. I stand up straight away. Relearn gravity. Stuff everything into the backpack. There’s a tap-tap on the door. It’s Pete, jumper half off over his head. He’s getting undressed again. Off comes the sheepskin waistcoat, the sweatshirt, the moss-colored velvet shirt. He holds it all between his knees. Off comes the vest. It’s bright white, like a new one out of a packet. He hands it to me and then he’s gone, in a garment struggle, out of sight and down the stairs. I bury my face in the soft hot vest. Then get to the window just in time. He drives slowly down the hill, dragging a payphone on a curly cable behind him in the road. Fucking bastard. I’d like to see it ring now.

I’ve got twenty minutes. I move from room to room with a laundry bag, gathering my remaining possessions: the shoebox of paperwork; a few clothes, the dictionary, bits of tat. I stuff it all in the airing cupboard, out of Danny Fish’s way. I copy Heath’s address in Manchester from a notebook onto a scrap of paper and tuck it into my shirt pocket.

This is it. I put the backpack on my shoulder. My booming heart. I close the door behind me and bump down the stairs. Danny Fish has the postbox key; I drop the apartment keys into it, for him to pick up later. Don’t care if there is post, don’t care what it says. It’s a filthy,
cold, horrible day. I turn left up the hill, past a heap of warped metal and shattered glass. Panda starts her pedigree yapping. There’s an empty bottle of Scotch on the passenger seat.

“Shut-up, Panda!” Her eyes are closed. “Enough now! For pity’s sake, be quiet!”

The quilt over her legs is filthy. I tap on the car window. Yes, wake up, Gwen. Her hand flies to the door-lock button. It’s locked already. Green piggy eyes set close together. Dirty-colored skin. A raptor’s nose. She winds the window down a fraction.

“What the hell do you think you’re playing at?” she says.

“I thought I’d save you the wait.” I slip Heath’s address in through the gap in the window. She lifts a grubby hand to take it. I pull it away slightly, make her reach, make her overreach for it.

“For God’s sake,” she says. “You look ridiculous—where the hell do you think you’re going?”

“Africa,” I say.

She laughs with her little stained, pointy teeth. I could never see her beauty.

“I’m off to visit Quentin, actually. You remember Quentin, Gwen?”

She sits back. Panda starts yapping at me.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she says. “Quentin is dead and buried.”

I slowly shake my head, lean down to thread the words in through the window.

“Apparently, he gestured for a pen and, after a little bit of practice, wrote
Hello, Mum—Can I have a cup of tea?
I’ve got to go, Gwen, plane to catch.”

I don’t look back.

I sit at the front of the coach, with a high view of the filthy motorway. I look sideways out of the window. See the cows in black and white, lying down. The fields in fallowed brown. Sheep all facing in one direction, as though strategically placed. A stubble field. A black pine wood. Rain clouds raging overhead. Window wipers doing their thing. I think about
Danny Fish, feel a pang of guilt about the apartment, the noise; the rats. His parting words were so nice, regret that I was disappearing when we’d only just met.

“I’ll write to you, Danny Fish,” I said. “I know where you live.”

He’s someone to look forward to, when I get back. If I get back.

Lorries buffer past the coach, chucking up sheets of grease. I shift sideways. I lie back. I wipe sweat from my forehead with the back of my hand. I think about Gwen and where that began, in counties all over England. I’m on the coach, so cold. We pass Swindon. I close my eyes. Wake up passing bloody Reading. I close my eyes. I wake up still passing Reading. I close my eyes. Wake up as a plane goes over the coach, coming in to land at Heathrow. The drumming is so loud and so clear. I see the slip road and the signs; all roads bring me back to here.

Y
ou asked to see me, sir.

I’m sorry to delay you, Sergeant, I appreciate your holiday should have started yesterday.

That’s all right, sir.

Dave, is it?

Yes, sir.

DC Bryant has been taken sick.

I heard, sir, trouble with his ticker.

I’m picking up his threads.

Have they found her, sir?

They’re still looking. Where did she go?

Well, sir, we just lost her, she was there and then she wasn’t.

Who’s we?

Sergeant Coot and I, sir, and one of the witnesses, do you mind if I consult my notes?

Go ahead.

Mr. Richard Draper, he lives around the back from the girl, he joined us in the chase.

Chase?

Well, a running search if you will, sir, it was almost dark.

What was happening when you and Sergeant Coot arrived?

Well, the brigade and the ambulance team were doing their best, as you’d imagine. A large crowd had gathered and were blocking the lane.

Where was she when you and Coot arrived?

Still up in the tree, sir, way up above the road. The brigade were using their hydraulic platform, sir. She was clearly visible in a red cloth. Mr. Draper—

The neighbor from around the back?

Yes, sir. Mr. Draper, he said she dressed all the time like an African warrior, red cloth, spear and everything, sir.

Where was the mother?

On her knees in the road: several bystanders had been sick, sir; it appeared that she was playing to the crowd.

Playing? What was she saying?

Demon seed, sir, bear with me, sir—it’s in here somewhere. She said,
demon seed
, sir,
She couldn’t stand it, I loved him, she’s killed him, poison
, something about a
vixen
, sir, I couldn’t catch it, sir: it sounded to me like Shakespeare. She yelled at the crowd and then at us and turned to scream up at the trees, threatening to kill the girl.

Did the girl respond?

No, sir, she seemed terrified rigid. The wind was fierce, the treetops were swaying. It was almost dark; the street lights hadn’t been adjusted for the changing of the clocks, with the search teams returning and the headlights in the lane and the blue lights flashing and spark flying: the brigade had to use an angle grinder, sir; it must have been very confusing.

Why didn’t the brigade get her down?

They were about to, the platform was on its way back up to get her. I was distracted, sir, a fracas broke out when a man in the crowd stepped forward and slapped the mother, a Mr. Baldwin, sir, the next-door neighbor, he made the initial call. The girl’s aunt, who was visiting at the time, slapped Mr. Baldwin; he’s a retired gentleman, sir. When I looked back up the girl had gone. The brigade hadn’t seen her go either; they were searching through the treetops with their spotlights. There were planks, sir, running from tree to tree.

What happened next?

Well, sir, while Coot moved the crowd back and redirected traffic, I walked to the end of the lane following the line of trees. I thought the girl might be hiding or fallen and hurt, sir. Mr. Draper searched on the other side, in the waste ground. He must have flushed her out; I thought I saw something run across the lane.

So you went after it?

No, sir, not straight away. I ran back for assistance—Sergeants Prichard and Pine had arrived by then so Coot came with me, sir, and Mr. Draper, he showed us where to get into the field, a ditch, sir, and barbed wire. Like I said, sir, we couldn’t really even see her.

It had got dark?

The sun was sitting on the horizon; I saw a jumping silhouette, fleeing, well, like an antelope, sir. Then I wasn’t sure if I’d seen it all, it was more like chasing an idea. Mr. Draper seemed to know where the girl would run, we followed him, sir, not being familiar with the landscape.

How far did you chase the
idea
? What sort of distance are we talking here?

I should say half a mile, sir, of waist-high grass.

But you couldn’t see her for sure? Not even in a red cloth?

No, sir, everything was black and red. It surprised me, sir, because the field just ended suddenly, there’s a low fence with wire and Keep Out signs.

She went over the edge, down into the motorway works?

No, sir, it was a sheer drop, a hundred foot or so. One of the Smithers boys was there, sir, smoking a cigarette, and he pointed left, in the direction she went.

She went
left
?

Sorry, sir—toward Weybridge.

Junction 12. Clockwise.

Where is the search now, sir?

Watford, Junction 19. Which Smithers boy was it that sent you
left
—Digger or Jake?

No, sir, one of the smaller ones. Whichever one’s got his arm in a plaster cast.

How long did you pursue that line, Sergeant?

It became clear within minutes, sir, that there wasn’t enough light to find her.

You all went back to Leafy Lane?

Yes, sir, DC Bryant had arrived by then and we reported back to him. Coot and I took all of the witness details and then we were replaced by Sergeant Rawlings and Sergeant Lake. Sergeant Rawlings is familiar with the girl; there’s a record of domestic violence. I hope they find her soon, sir—they’ve forecast snow.

Thank you, Sergeant, for your help; be sure to write the details as you’ve described to me—they found the other girl’s shoe this morning.

I will, sir.

Have a good holiday. When you go past the desk tell Rawlings I want to see him.

Yes, sir.

What is it, Sarah?

Mrs. King is at the front desk again. Sorry, sir. Says she’s got evidence that proves intent.

I
think about falling.

I think about the plane and flying. We were so above ourselves. I wasn’t scared. I didn’t care if we crashed. I was looking forward to it.
We haven’t come all this way to die out in the ordinary.
I was invincible. The hostess brought me a glass of water. I rolled up my sleeves. At twenty thousand feet I was closer to the gods.

“Come on then, you fuckers,” I said and felt the drumming.

The beat was so loud and so clear.

The white cotton is fine and soft. I tug at the knees, settle the long white drape over my hands and feet. I don’t like clothes, I never have. I bought these pajamas yesterday from an Indian stall in the market. Feel cool and monumental in them.

“Lawrence of Arabia?” says the woman in the broken mirror.

“Trust me.” I shake out the bright African cloths; tie a tangerine swag around my waist and hips like a sash. Well, it will save the arse of the white tunic every time I sit down. I drape the finer brick-red cloth over my head and around my face, with the long ends twisted over my shoulder.