The Map of the Sky (57 page)

“And then I realized that if I was going to scare away the ferret, I needed to find the rake, but that was no easy feat, for as I already explained, I was trouserless,” Harold was saying.

Howls of laughter followed, from which I deduced that the coachman was telling his story to an audience as numerous as it was attentive, probably the rest of the domestic servants and the guests. And I was not mistaken, as I discovered when I pushed open the door behind which the gale of laughter had erupted. I stepped into what must have been the servants’ parlor. The chairs had been placed in a semicircle, at the center of which was the coachman, hands raised like a magician surprised in the middle of a conjuring trick. I was relieved to see my wife Victoria, her sister Madeleine and her husband, my cousin Andrew, sitting amongst the servants. They were the only members of the family in the house at the time, as my uncle and aunt were vacationing in Greece with my parents when the invasion began. But I also spotted their esteemed guests, who
were none other than my wife’s and her sister’s two best friends: the former Misses Lucy Nelson and Claire Haggerty. Lucy’s husband, an inspector at Scotland Yard by the name of Garrett, was not there (it was reasonable to assume he was on duty, bringing order to the streets, if such a thing was possible), but Claire had brought her husband, John Peachey, whom I had yet to have the pleasure of meeting. I noticed they all had a brandy in their hands, and the faraway smiles on some of their faces suggested they were on their second glass. In order to enliven proceedings, a gramophone in the corner was filling the room with a merry tune, muffling the explosions. Victoria seemed happy that I was still alive, although her irritation prevented her from responding with anything more than a triumphant smile: my lamentable appearance was proof of the fact that the invasion was indeed making inroads, regardless of what the future held, as she had reasoned during our discussion. For my part, despite what I had witnessed, I continued to believe this meant nothing, that before long in some way or another the Martians would be defeated. Adamant in our opposing views, neither of us made the slightest move to embrace each other, as we would have liked, for, as everyone knows, wounded pride is a great destroyer of affection. It was my cousin Andrew who rose to greet me, breaking the harmonious tableau they formed.

“Thank God you’re here, Charles!” he exclaimed, delighted to see I was unscathed. “We didn’t know what was going on out there, and we feared for your safety.”

“I’m fine, Andrew, don’t worry,” I replied, noticing with dismay that a couple of the maids were remarking to each other on the sorry state of my clothes.

“All we heard were explosions, and it was making us terribly nervous, so we came down here,” my cousin explained, raising his brandy glass to indicate the room. “Harold had even begun telling us a funny story to take our minds off what’s happening outside.”

The coachman played down my interruption with a brief wave of his hand.

“Nothing I can’t finish some other time, sir,” he said.

With an obsequious gesture, the butler hurriedly passed me a glass of brandy from a tray on a small table.

“Here, sir. You look as if you could do with a pick-me-up.”

I thanked him absentmindedly, trying to reconcile this cheerful atmosphere with the terrifying scenes I had witnessed outside.

“What’s going on, Charles?” Andrew asked, as soon as I had taken a sip of brandy. “Is this . . . an invasion?”

Everyone gazed at me expectantly.

“I’m afraid so. The Martians have marched into London and . . .” I paused, unsure how best to describe the devastation I had seen, but there was no way of telling them gently. “Well . . . they’re destroying the city. Our army has been routed, and there’s no one left to protect us, we are entirely at their mercy.”

There was a murmur of consternation all round the room. A couple of the maids began to weep. My wife and her sister clutched each other, while Mr. Peachey put his arm around his wife, who nestled her head on his chest like a scared child. Next to me, my cousin gave a sudden sigh.

Apparently, until then, Andrew had refused to believe there was an invasion, despite the series of blasts resounding in the distance, which could still be heard downstairs despite the cheery music. Seeing my cousin’s unease, I realized that deep down he wanted me to be right in thinking the invasion wouldn’t happen; he seemed more let down than afraid, as if I had somehow failed him by being mistaken in my predictions. I contemplated the others in the room; my words seemed to be the command they had been waiting for to begin trembling. “My God,” several of the servants murmured in tremulous unison, exchanging looks of despair.

“There’s nothing to fear,” I reassured them, even though I, too,
had difficulty believing this after what I’d seen aboveground. “Everything will be all right, I’m sure of it.”

Victoria shook her head, and her lips set in a fold of sorrow and ridicule. When would I admit defeat?

“What makes you say that, Mr. Winslow?” Claire asked expectantly, raising her head from her husband’s chest.

I took a deep breath before replying. I knew I’d have difficulty convincing my impromptu audience, and indeed, after the latest events, even I was beginning to consider the possibility that my logic was flawed. Still, I tried to put my argument across as clearly as I could, ignoring my wife’s disapproving looks.

“As you know, Mrs. Peachey, some of those here, including yourself, have traveled to the year 2000 and have taken a stroll through a future where the only threat to the human race was the automatons. Clearly that means the invasion to which we are being subjected cannot flourish. I’m convinced something will happen soon to put an end to it, although I still don’t know what. The future tells us this.”

“I wouldn’t take much notice of the future if I were you, for as the word suggests, it’s something that hasn’t happened yet,” her husband interjected.

Annoyed by his interruption, I looked at him with curiosity, raising my eyebrows exaggeratedly, and Claire hastily introduced us.

“Charles, this is my husband, John Peachey,” she said.

Hearing my name, the man promptly offered his hand, as though fearing he might break some rule of etiquette were he to delay for a few seconds. But that didn’t prevent me from shaking it with a bored expression. I must confess that my first impressions of this Peachey fellow were less than favorable, and not only because he had the nerve to contradict me. I’ve always felt an uncontrollable dislike of men who underestimate their own potential, and who squander it as a result, and Peachey was most definitely one of those men. He was a strapping youth, whose perfectly proportioned face
was endowed with a pair of fiery eyes and a noble chin, and yet he appeared to devote his morning ablutions to sabotaging these attributes, obtaining through his meticulous efforts a dull, pusillanimous individual whose lacquered hair was combed down over his brow, and who wore a pair of enormous spectacles. It was as if he lacked the personality to go with his physique, the determination needed to make full use of his formidable appearance. Everything about him was insipid, self-effacing, contrary to his nature. Although I had never met him, I knew Peachey was an honorary director of Barclay & Company, where Claire’s father was a major shareholder. One look at the man told me it was not due to his assiduous, aggressive business acumen that he was occupying that coveted office in Lombard Street.

“Good, now that we have finally been introduced, Mr. Peachey, may I ask what you were insinuating just now with your naïve comment?” I said with thinly veiled rudeness.

“I was saying that the future hasn’t happened yet, Mr. Winslow,” he hastened to reply. “It doesn’t exist yet, it isn’t tangible. And so, basing one’s suppositions on something that hasn’t happened yet would seem to me very—”

“Ah, you appear to know a great deal about the future, Mr. Peachey!” I interjected, with that perfect mixture of sarcasm and civility that only a man of breeding knows how to carry off. “Have you ever visited the year 2000? I have, and I assure you it all seemed very tangible to me. But I don’t recall seeing you there. Which expedition did you go on?”

Peachey looked at me for a few moments in silence, as though unsure how to respond to my exquisite ambiguity.

“No . . . I’ve never visited the future . . . ,” he confessed awkwardly.

“Never? Oh, what a shame, my dear Mr. Peachey. Then I suppose you’ll agree with me when I say that he who pronounces on what he has not seen runs the risk, far too costly in my view, of
making a blunder and looking foolish in front of others,” I said, smiling amiably at him. “Consequently, before you continue down that path, allow me to inform you, and Claire will doubtless back me up, that the future does exist. Yes, somewhere in time that future is happening at this very moment, and it is no less real than this instant in which we are conversing. And, unlike you, I can vouch for this, for I
have
been to the year 2000. A year in which the human race finds itself on the verge of extinction due to the evil automatons, not the Martians, even if thanks to a man named Derek Shackleton we will succeed in defeating them.”

“I wish Captain Shackleton were here now,” Harold murmured behind me.

Peachey glanced at him with sudden interest.

“I don’t think one man could do much,” he said dryly, shrugging his shoulders.

The banker’s second comment nettled me even more than his first. Not only did this man appear impervious to my disdain, choosing to ignore my last remark and responding to that of the vulgar coachman instead, he also dared to comment on what Shackleton could or could not do.

“Captain Shackleton isn’t just anyone, Mr. Peachey,” I said, trying not to show my annoyance. “Captain Shackleton is a hero. A hero, do you understand?”

“Even so, I doubt very much whether in this situation he could—”

“I’m afraid, Mr. Peachey, I couldn’t disagree with you more,” I interrupted him once again, with deliberate contempt. “However, this is no time to become embroiled in what has the makings of a fascinating discussion, and which under other circumstances would have given me great pleasure, for there is nothing I like more than an exchange of opinions as clever as they are frivolous. I shall simply point out to you that if you had traveled to the future, you would know what a true hero is and what he can achieve.” After smiling at
him politely, I could not help offering a final barbed remark: “How rude of me, Mr. Peachey; why, I’ve only just realized that, not having enjoyed as comfortable a position two years ago as you do now, the price of a ticket was doubtless beyond your means.”

I watched Peachey purse his lips to stop himself from saying something that might have spoiled his outward show of refinement. Then, having stifled this urge, he tilted his head to one side, searching his mind for a more appropriate but equally stinging retort, and I realized that without meaning to we had entered into a verbal sparring match. While the banker was busy trying to think up a reply, I took the opportunity to glance quickly about the room. Everyone had stopped talking and was looking at us: the servants had taken a backseat, no doubt incapable of following the discussion, excepting Harold, who was sitting closer to Lucy, Madeleine, and my wife. They had risen from their chairs, alarmed by the dangerous direction our conversation was taking, while a step away from us, tense as the strings on a violin, stood Claire and Andrew. I grinned at Peachey, my excitement doubled by having such a large audience. The gramophone’s lively melody cut through the silence.

“What do you know about my life two years ago?” my adversary said at last, barely able to contain his agitation.

I shook my head slowly, disappointed at Peachey’s response. He had made the classic beginner’s error: even a child knows that answering with a question forcibly exposes one to the wit of the person who must respond to it.

“As much as I need to know, Mr. Peachey,” I retorted calmly, swirling my glass. “That you appeared quite literally out of nowhere, with no name and no money, only to marry the daughter of one of the wealthiest men in London.”

“What are you insinuating, Charles?” Claire chimed in.

I turned toward her with a movement as theatrical as it was graceful.

“Insinuating? Oh, God forbid I should insinuate anything,
Claire!” I said, giving her my most dazzling smile. “Insinuations rarely satisfy the one who makes them, for they force those who are blameless to defend themselves, whilst the guilty can simply ignore them without arousing anyone’s suspicions. That’s why I have always preferred being labeled impudent rather than a hypocrite, my dear, not because I care about other people’s opinion of me, but because I like everyone to know mine.”

“Oh we all know perfectly well how you love giving your opinion, Charles. But allow me to remind you that in this instance you are referring to someone about whom you know nothing,” Claire retorted, visibly upset. “And as you yourself warned John a few moments ago, he who pronounces on things he knows nothing about runs the risk, far too costly in your view, of looking foolish in front of others.”

I positively beamed.

“But I’m the first to admit my ignorance, Claire!” I exclaimed, spreading my arms and glancing around me with a look of innocence. “And I’d like nothing more than to remedy it. My dear Claire, speculating about where your mysterious husband sprang from has been the favorite pastime of all London for the past two years! I’m not exaggerating when I say that since the tragic death of Mr. Murray it has been the most popular topic of discussion in the clubs and salons.”

“Charles, I think everyone here will agree that there is a fine line between impudence and downright ill manners, and tonight you seem intent on stepping over that line,” I heard my wife say. Clearly, whilst considering our argument too important to dispel with a tender embrace, she did not mind breaking our silence with a reproach.

“My dear, it is impossible not to take an interest in another person’s life without being ill-mannered. If not, one risks falling into mendacity,” I said, turning to her. “You better than anyone ought to know that, or do you intend to put me in the awkward position of reminding you in front of everyone that yours was one of the
sharpest tongues when commenting on the matter behind your dear friend’s back?”