Songs From Spider Street (12 page)

Finally, she
forced her eyes away from the building, staring instead at the turmoil of the
river, which seemed comforting in comparison.

She choked
back her tears, feeling her father had been betrayed somehow. Maybe she had,
too. Now that she’d come here, where was there left to go?

Walking out
on to the remains of the bridge, the wood complaining beneath her feet, she
stared down into the water as it hurried past, eager to be gone. The sun
reflected painfully off the surface. She stood for several minutes as the
silver and grey bounced around inside her overcrowded skull, carving new
pathways for her fear and loss.

Then the
sunlight shattered on the water, dividing into a million tiny reflections. She
stretched out her hand towards the apparition of the hospital, not knowing if
she was warding it off or pleading for help.

She took a
step forward. Oblivion welcomed her like a long-lost child.

I dreamt that I slept through my death and awoke when the trees were proclaiming
theirs.

Moscow, 1899

My, but it is windy today. The sort of wind that carries snow. I will
delay going out into that wind for as long as possible.

In front of
the grey fence a small boy struggles with his hat and his dog. First one is
more troublesome and then the other.

Each nail in
the fence that he passes marks a day of the misery in which I and my little
Anna have become caged. There are many of them.

I have to
look away. Oh God, my eyes! The pain is too much. So often now the world disappears
behind a series of indistinct veils, one falling in front of the other. The
room dissolves before my gaze. I know my sight will go. The doctors have told
me this. It is part of the price I have to pay for the coarse excesses of my
youth; a price that Anna must also pay.

I can only
pray that it will not be too soon. I need to keep the darkness at bay. I need
time to help Anna. There must be money to care for her when I am gone. There
has to be.

I have no
confidence that this other one will have honour enough to take her as his wife,
to support her and care for her with all the responsibilities and duties that
entails. My strength ebbs and flows and I feel helpless; like a child.

My wife seeks to escape me in the most obvious way.

Yet how can I
deny her even this most hurtful of betrayals after what I have brought into her
life?

I no longer
know what she thinks but I understand why she does what she does.

Although at
the still heart of my self I do not think I deserve what she is doing to me,
for it is as though she had erased our love and counts it as worthless.

We have not made love – for it was love, once – for nearly two years. My
doctor forbids it and I forbid myself. Anna says she understands. Her own fear
may play a part in that understanding.

Our elderly,
thick-waisted maid, Katya, navigates around me at a distance as if the space
surrounding me is irredeemably polluted. A fixed smile is my only weapon
against her.

Only Anna’s
constant companion is unafraid to confront me directly. It snuffles aggressively
against my shoe, scuffing away the shine. It only desists when pushed away
sharply. This scuffs my shoe even further and raises a yelp of protest from the
animal. Even this display of petty anger exhausts me.

Something has leached out of me, infecting the whole household.

Sometimes
there is a burning rush inside my head and I want to run to her, to scream at
her and put my hands about her pale neck and shake her. Shake her very hard.
She refuses to understand that I still love her and that I need to stop her.
There is little time left.

For appearance’s sake, we attend the theatre together, speak to the right
people.

And for her
sake we have kept it from her family. I don’t know for how much longer my
fading strength will allow me to fend off her father’s and her brothers’
persistent suspicions. Then things will be very bad for her. I couldn’t bear
that.

My cigars, which Anna hates, are one of my few consolations now. My wife
has the maid assiduously air the rooms after I have been smoking. I’m sure that
is the reason.

I stumble on
the stairs and the sudden scent of clean carpet unearths a memory of our first
day in this house. Anna, proud of her role as mistress of her own home at last,
queen of her own parlour, bustled about in a carousel of ceaseless activity. I
laughed to see her so endlessly animated. She grew angry and I grew contrite,
for a little while.

I stand above her. Her hair fans out across the pillow like a huge sail,
catching the wind to steer her dreams far away from me; towards him.

Her lower lip
twitches in sleep. Her soft shadow on the pillow is a mimic.

A lonely
ivory Christ nestles in the pale hollow of her throat, constantly falling then
rising.

Her bedtime
perfume barely masks the stale smell of her sweat. I am tempted by her
fragility to put an end to all this.

I close the
door softly as I leave her room.

Up here in the attic I feel more at ease. I am sure everyone else does as
well.

I have lain
here for most of the day.

A thick,
gellid ooze has begun to seep from me, gathering in puddles on the bare
floorboards. So it has begun.

Soon it must
flow between the cracks and seep through the ceiling below. Into the maid’s
room. She will be horrified. I do not mean to cause her distress but am now
unable to move.

The pain begins again behind my eyes.

Everything
fails, everything ends; perhaps I will be gone by the time Anna tires of her
game.

In the frozen, broken room he sits alone.

“… hope it reaches you. I don’t know if you can hear this. There’s no way
to be certain. Not sure if there’s enough power left but I want to try.

“I needed to
… Ruth. The things I needed to say can’t wait. There may be nothing to wait for
– nobody can tell me; there’s nobody left now...

“Everyone
else is gone … dead or presumed dead. It started when Gureyvich thought … found
something out on the eastern shelf. ‘A huge mineral trace’, he said … picked up
a fault on the automatic survey rig out there, so no more data came in.

“… in the
excitement … went out there … late that evening we heard the explosion. Davies
and Kemal went out next morning … all killed, all eight of them … terrible blow
…

“… for all
the next week … couldn’t even bury them …

“Wilkes
started saying he thought there was something ‘down in the ice’ … could ‘feel’
it. Bloody nonsense … nothing showed up … and three of the others, out towards
the … where drilling had stopped …

“… seemed
like some sort of pseudo-religious crap … ‘gods’ buried in the ice. He’d
obviously cracked up … pity he took Davies, Hiram and Kemal with him … nearly a
month ago.

“… haven’t
seen Andersson since last week … only one left … alive at least …

“The wind’s
coming hard off the high cliffs today … across the ice at us … me … But you’d
know about that … no better since your time here …

“It was good
to have you here. It really was … so sorry about what happened …

“I remember
being young when we … Now an old-ish man looks back at me from the mirror; no
hair … own teeth. I was young … vigorous back then, it … much lost – memories,
bone mass, muscle …

“And I wonder
what I’ve achieved … entire project achieved anything...

“… certainly
hasn’t lived up to its promise. Since we landed … Now … cannibalized the ship
for … But something … working against us. Resisting our …

“But there’s
nothing out there in the white. I know that … because it’s … no air, just
something that would cut your lungs to pieces in seconds. Sometimes I feel
there is no air in here … Maybe someday, whenever, they will find … suffocated.

“Sorry. I
shouldn’t have said that.

“Listen, I
just wanted … you’re the only one I’ve ever loved. There’s never been anyone …
since … to know that, Ruth.

“… kept your
photograph with me. You and Lor. It’s the one of you together … just after we’d
moved out … away from the city and the institute … inconvenient but better for
us all, you …

“You look
really happy. Lor … bit distracted … practically had to twist her head around
to look at the camera … kept looking behind her at the horses in the … see one
of them behind …

“It was later
that summer that … well … I don’t need to …

“I know you
blamed me, Ruth. I know that. I tried to tell you. It wasn’t my fault … wasn’t
…

“The ice was
so thin … she didn’t know …

“I remember
her face, her eyes … screaming to me as she slipped beneath the ice … couldn’t
save her. She was gone too fast, too       deep … no chance of …

“Her frozen
scream … eyes of frost melt into my dreams and even my empty, long waking hours
… what more … I’d like you to …

“Two of the
horses came up to the pond to watch … breath making huge clouds in the chilly …
probably wanted a drink … threw clods of earth at them … drove them off …

“I felt
ashamed … Lor used to love those horses. She once told … sit at her window
every … watching them in the field across … and listening to them sing.

“I never told
you … said she could hear them singing. I listened every morning after …
listened for months and months … only heard them twice … thought I heard …

“… course I
understood why you had to go. You … with me any longer. I understood … never
understand why you came to work here … must have known I was here … joy to see
you but I knew … only three years since …

“And I’m glad
you left here when … it was my fault but in light of what’s happened since …

“I dreamed
last night (or perhaps … morning) – I don’t sleep now – we were holding …
embracing out there on the ice. Our skins, together … covered in snow. Our
limbs … embrace, had turned a pure white … heat of our kisses was … that warmed
us, kept us alive in that place, so cold … desert of ice.

“… couldn’t
have been a dream. It must have been a memory,   or … in a dream. We’re not
like that now; not for a long …

“… first time
I saw you … thought you’d go away again … With your red hair … pale skin; yours
was a white love, an icy love … remember that beautiful, departed day … seemed
perfect.

“… on the
observation deck yesterday. Don’t know why – nothing to see … there was
something … thought I saw horses – white and perfect – galloping out of the
blankness, emerging proud … four of them. Pure white … ran off again, almost at
once, into the nothingness and I … afterwards that they couldn’t have … Couldn’t.
… hope I’m not going the way of Wilkes.

“Since …
taking stock … no way out … won’t be able to pick me up for months … off the
freighter routes … payload to spare their fuel … too late … eaten in three days
… hardly feel the fingers … my right leg’s useless. Can’t get warm.

“… monitoring
equipment’s automatic. It’s so far from home … too far … heard things aren’t so
good there, anyway.

“… wind
sounds very strange … tugs at the buildings, sounds as though … some sort of
singing …

“Wait! Wait!
I can hear a voice … coming from outside … it’s not the wind. Definitely a
voice … shouting across the …

“It’s her! It’s
Lor … she’s calling me. She’s out …

“But she can’t
be. It can’t be her … she’s not … she died, so far away … far away …

“No, I know …
how she’s done it. I know …

“The ice. The
ice! She’s used it … she’s come back through the ice. That’s it! Good girl!
Clever … You see, Ruth, just like her mother … just like you, even …

“… a viewing
port in the door. I’ve got to try and see …

“Yes. She’s …
Standing in the snow … looks just the same. Just like when …

“Oh, it’s
cruel that you’re such a distance from us … only you were here … all together
again … we …

“I wish you
could see her, Ruth. I really wish …

“Listen … my
love, can you hear her …? If only you had some way to reach …

“… voice is
different. Must be the cold. Ice crystals forming on her tongue, making her …
breath freezing by now …

“She’ll
freeze out there … I can save her this time. Save her!

“I’ve got to
go now … outside. She’s calling. I’ve got to go to … She’s outside. She’s
calling … outside …”

The grey September sky swept by slowly overhead and a fine mist lay on my
clothes from the thin, weak rain.

I was alone
on the street as the lights came on, beaming down on the shining grim
pavements. Stuffing my hands into my coat pockets I wished I was home already.
The new job was acceptable but the district in which the office lay was not.

There seemed
to be hardly any facilities in this area of the city and the narrow streets
were endless. When a corner presented itself, along with the possibility of a
fresh vista, an opening out of the closed landscape, my hopes were always
raised slightly. Inevitably they were dashed when more long grey streets,
stretching away in every direction, presented themselves to my gaze.

The one break
in the monotony as I made my way to the nearest bus stop was a small shop that
was always closed and had heavy curtains drawn across its windows. Nothing was
visible within, of course, and there was no name above the door. The only
identification was a wooden sign over the entrance that showed a painting of a
pig done in thick oils. In this light – which was the only light I ever saw it
in – it was impossible to tell whether it was an old and venerable firm
specialising in farming law or a chic new media firm that made a virtue of
performing nebulous tasks.

I often
stopped on my long journey to the bus stop, which was still a good 10 minutes
away, to gaze up at the sign. I also often made myself a promise to return here
on my day off and see the sign in daylight. Inevitably I always had something
better to do when the time came to keep my promise.

As I resumed
my journey home another unexpected break in the monotony presented itself. On
the other side of the road two figures had appeared, presumably from one of the
many doors as there was no cross street or turning for a good few hundred
yards.

The two were
both male and dressed in a similarly shabby fashion with dark coats and
threadbare trousers. They seemed pathetic, sinister and comic all at the same
time. The pair made me feel very glad that I was heading to my own home and able
to get in off the streets.

The air of
oddity that the two gave off was added to when the shorter man, who had been
talking away indistinctly but animatedly to his taller companion, lurched
suddenly sideways. His movement was accompanied by the teeth-jarring crack of
old bones as one of his knees gave way; his progress groundwards was halted by
the other man, who literally dragged him back onto his feet by hauling at his
coat. For some seconds the man dangled in the other’s grip like an old
marionette waiting to be put back in its box, the rain glistening on his
hairless head in the lamplight. His companion’s sour look made the man regain
his tattered composure as quickly as possible.

Having
witnessed the impromptu show I felt too troubled to laugh inwardly or even
smile as I hurried on. The pair were almost level with me now and showed signs
of crossing the road. I looked away quickly before turning my head back almost
at once; one of them had looked at the shop and was fumbling in his pocket.
Perhaps they were the owners … or the caretakers. It was entirely possible that
if I hung around I might learn something about the mysterious emporium. I have
rarely found anything as gratifying as having my curiosity satisfied.

I halted my
progress, shuffled and coughed, then bent to tie my already perfectly well tied
shoelace. The men had now crossed the road and were without doubt headed
towards the shop. The shorter kept up his stream of words as the taller of the
two busied himself with finding the key. If the shop was theirs, trade was
obviously poor, judging by their clothes; the shorter man had a tear in the
obviously ripe cloth at the back of his coat where the other had rescued him
from his fall.

The few
snatches of the conversation that I could catch without turning my head and
making my eavesdropping obvious seemed to refer to better days and a popular
relative’s colourful life. The man was insistent in his remarks, as if
demanding that his companion confirm his views and opinions, validating his
memories of his youth.

There was a
faint air of menace as I saw, from the very corner of my eye, the taller man
turn from the door and draw himself up to his full, considerable height as he
shuffled closer to his companion.

The shorter
man kept up his torrent of recollections and demands, never seeming to run dry
of words. There was something vaguely unpleasant about his reminiscences.

It wasn’t
until the second figure finally spoke that I scrambled to my feet, breaking
into a run.

The man’s
high, grating voice contradicted his companion: “No, no, Craven. Your memory is
playing tricks on you. It was his
eyes
that Uncle Anouilh used to keep
in that glass overnight.”