Cryptozoic! (16 page)

Which led him to understand that he must do what he could to upset the
Action regime, for
how far was a feeling genuine if it did not find
expression in an external act?
He used this question to stiffen his good resolutions, so overcome by
the beauty and universality of it, for it embodied truths, he felt,
which he had come on in Breedale, that it was some while before he
recognized it as kin to an old Biblical saying his art master had often
jocularly applied to his pupils' still-life studies of apples and pears,
"By their fruits ye shall know them." All the same, he had worked round
to the perception for himself, which was a promising sign.
Bush's soul had broken away from its little mud hut. It moved now in a
mighty crystal palace. He felt the godlike qualities in himself.
This merciful interlude in Breedale, away from the real world, had given
him the opportunity to find himself. It was his forty days in the wilderness.
Much of the days when he discovered this transformation of soul he spent
praying; but the prayers changed shape and tone, and came winging back
to him. It was the god-quality in
himself
he needed to reveal --
and to reveal to others as well as to himself.
During that long day in another garden, when his mother had proved how
she had turned against him, he had become aware of a flaw in the moral
structure of the universe. Now he felt strong enough to take a patch to
that flaw, to rise upon a course of positive action, to make over the
world again!
He starved, himself. He had visions. Away from the world, he could see
it glinting at his fingertips, ready to be fashioned. It was a complex
work of art, on which he had the largest -- purest! -- ambitions. He would
show his mother that he could be a god, quite beyond her petty scheme
of rewards and punishments.
He got ready to mind-travel again. He knew what he had to do. The lesser
things before the greater, material before transcendental. There was
one more hesitation first of all, easily dismissed: he wondered if
he should remain in 1930, not in Breedale, but in some other place --
notably in London, for it was common knowledge (he seemed to remember),
and something of a joke, that intellectuals who mind-traveled made
for Buckingham Palace, enjoying its snob appeal, its comforts, its
discomforts, and its convenience as a rendezvous. But this close to
the present, the palace would be deserted by all but the royal House of
Windsor and their entourage.
No, his quarry might well be there . . . but farther back in time,
at a time more easily available to all except mavericks like Bush.
He thought he could divine the exact date, and prepared to mind there.
Before he left the mining community, a surprise presented itself. The new
manager of the little grocer's, who had been there no more than ten days,
rolled down the blind over the door at eight o'clock one evening, bolted
the door, and turned to propose marriage to Joan. So Bush interpreted it
by her modest looks, her smiles, her moment of fear, his way of clasping
her hand formally and tenderly. Next day, the fellow cycled to work as
usual and presented Joan with a ring from his neat waistcoat pocket;
as he slipped it on her finger, she smiled with misty eyes and suddenly
put an arm about his neck, resting a cheek against his head.
Bush wondered at her, this ordinary girl! Was she just an opportunist?
Did she care for the young man? Was she hardhearted or indifferent?
Her external acts were capable of being read in conflicting ways.
"This is my story, being acted for me," he told himself. "When I have
sorted out my affairs, I can return here and see what happens to her,
if I so wish." They would always be here, perched on the edge of the
great moor. For that matter, her father would always be running out
dying into the cow parsley. Perhaps Bush would come back and change it
all through his new divinity.
When he had folded up his tent, collected up his chattels, and was about
to give himself a jab of CSD, he went to take leave of Joan. She was
in the back room, checking over invoices, with the old granny sitting
behind her, chewing her teeth with the horrid geniality of a medieval
memento mori.
Bush raised his hand in salutation to all bitter-sweet things; he was
already half delirious from the effects of the drug; he wondered that he
had frequently felt so much more alone in his own epoch, among people he
could touch and talk with, and presumably "understand" better than he
"understood" this little faded underfed virgin. But understanding was
a poor thing beside wonder.
Reluctant to disappear before her unseeing eyes, he moved outside.
Overhead, a cuckoo hurtled in a parabola towards the bare line of moor
as if fired from a great feathered gun. Bush vanished from the scene
like a ghost.
Chapter 2
THE GREAT VICTORIAN PALACE
He stood under great elms and knew this was the place -- his Dark Woman
was nearby, very shadowy, her form erased a thousand times by the passers-by.
At the end of the line of elms stood a great crystal fountain, its waters
pouring into a circular pool. Fountain, pool, and elms were enclosed in
a mighty glass arcade and flanked by bizarre statuary.
Bush knew this place and time; the Victorian mania in his childhood
ensured that. This was 1851, when the Great Exhibition was held to
testify to the upsurge of British wealth and power. He went over and
stood by one gigantic statue that caught his fancy almost as much as it
did the crowd's. It was a German statue, fashioned out of zinc, depicting
a mighty Amazon woman riding a stallion bare-back and bare-breasted. She
was about to plunge her lance into a tigress which, prompted by reasons
of its own, was climbing up and over the horse's shoulder.
The Victorians, in sculpture and painting, had been masters of 'What will
happen next?,' freezing one second of time into a question; their skill
had been both lost and derided with the onset of photography and cinema
and television and lasoids -- all of which insisted on answering the
question, rather than remaining content to pose it. Now he was faced with
the same question in his own life, and must solve it with action. The Dark
Woman was watching him. From her vantage point in time, she might well
know what-happened-next-to-Eddie-Bush. It was not a comforting thought;
he was pleased to think that she knew no more than he whether the Amazon
or the tigress won their battle.
There were other what-wouId-happen-nexts involved with his personal
equation; hanging about beneath the great zinc figure, he decided that
the first one concerned Silverstone, alias Stein. He had been trained
to assassinate Silverstone; clearly, the man had something that was
dangerous to the Gleason regime -- which Bush in his new mood saw was
something to cherish. It was his duty to get to Silverstone and warn
him -- if Silverstone were still alive, for although Bush had personal
reasons to know that Silverstone was well able to protect himself,
he would probably have several of Gleason's agents on his trail by now.
Popular Action mind-travelers would be stretching throughout time,
searching for Silverstone and any other potential trouble-makers they
could find: probably including Bush himself by now.
By such reasoning, his godlike Breedale thoughts came back to earth.
The obvious place to begin looking for Silverstone was Buckingham Palace.
He pushed invisibly through the crowds, even in this moment of pre-occupation
finding space to delight in their diversity, eccentricity, and flamboyance,
so different from the leveled-down masses of his own day. Outside, the people
were even less subdued. Carriages stood here, both private and for public
hire, together with leathery men holding horses, or gentlemen riding them,
singly or in groups. Bush thought that the Victorians seemed most themselves
when these dark ambiguous animals were about. He wished he could ride one,
and save himself time.
The splendid glass and iron front of the Crystal Palace, flags flying on
all tiers, fell away behind him as he crossed Hyde Park and made his way
down Rotten Row. There were smart gigs dashing about here; he kept out of
their way, although they could do him no harm.
Somewhere in this wilderness of humanity, Turner went about his business,
the great Turner whose thoughts were all yellow and raw-red vortices of
fire, an artist who was all Bush would be: consumer of himself and his
age, and transcending both. Somewhere here, Turner was in his boozy old
age -- this was the year of his death -- interesting himself in such
traitorous new techniques as photography and, if he visited the Great
Exhibition, no doubt smiling at the horse-riding lady in zinc.
Bush closed his thoughts down. One day, he promised himself, he would be
wholly an artist; first, a few historical necessities had to be cleared
out of the way.
His senses were alert to danger now. As he approached the palace, he was
on the watch for anyone from his own time, knowing they would be noticeable
even from some distance by their duller, dustier aspect, as if it were they
rather than the scene about them that lacked a sufficient degree of reality.
Horse guards paraded before the ornate building; the animals on which
they were mounted looked haughtily through Bush. He slipped past them,
moving into the grounds of the palace, working his way cautiously to
the rear, where a group of vans and carts were drawn up, with porters
and menservants busy unloading them and carrying their contents into
the palace kitchens. From one van, Bush noticed, game birds were being
taken -- grouse, pheasant, partridge, and another bird he presumed to
be ptarmigan. They came out on stretchers, huge blocks of ice melting at
each end, the water from which stained the already impoverished plumes of
the fowls. From another van, a pile of turkeys was being unloaded. Bush
looked away; he was still in his innocent mood, and the sight of all
this petty death disturbed him.
Buckingham Palace had stood for a long time. Even to mind-travelers,
its walls were so substantial that they had to pass through the doors
like ordinary mortals imprisoned in time. So the doors would be watched
by the Action party, if it were here.
He ran his gaze over the men in livery and in aprons. As a stretcher
piled with dead pheasants was carried inside, he saw another man go
with it, carrying nothing, a man wearing a blue apron and sporting a
curly moustache. He showed slightly grey against the background. Even
as Bush looked, he disappeared into the building. Bush could tell from
the man's tone that this was someone from within a year or two of his
own present -- one of Gleason's agents, for certain.
Or one of Silverstone's? Bush had yet to find out how well organized
Silverstone was. But he realized that whether he ran into Gleason's or
Silverstone's men, they were not going to be friendly to Bush.
His best hope lay in hiding in the palace before the opposition was alert
to his arrival.
Moving rapidly past the lackeys, Bush strode into the great building.
He found himself in a maze of servants' quarters and sculleries --
the little woman who lived at the heart of this great warren and ruled it
and the lands far beyond it probably visited India more frequently than
she visited this region -- or was that right? Were airships in use at
this time? He believed not, but his history was shaky on the point.
He came to servants' stairs, bare of carpet, and climbed awkwardly --
stairs were never easy in mind-travel. On the first floor, he emerged
onto a rather spartan landing, stepping back hurriedly into an alcove as
a party of women approached. Three maids were positively marching along in
their stiff morning uniforms; beside them -- Bush remembered Sergeant Pond
-- was a formidable woman, perhaps an under-housekeeper, resplendent in a
severe purple dress that swirled about her feet. The maids stopped outside
the doors along the corridor; at each door one of them detached herself
from the file and opened the door for her superior, whereupon the two
would enter the room, presumably to inspect its cleanliness. In the dull
light, it was difficult to tell if the figures were of their own times.
Bush took a chance on it. He could not wait about while the bedrooms
were inspected. He walked boldly out past them. They never looked in
his direction; he was less than a ghost.
There were doors at the far end of the corridor. He went through them
and found himself in a wider and grander corridor. The hour was still
sufficiently early for the floor to be deserted except for servants.
He recalled that the grand Victorian habit was to breakfast on until
ten-thirty and after.
As he walked down the corridor, he saw great rooms of state on one side,
heavy curtains at the windows, sumptuous carpets underfoot, heavily carved
tables and chairs, immense potted plants. He moved through corridor after
corridor, losing his way. He thought that the intellectuals pitched their
tents in Albert's smoking lounge, but could not remember on which floor
the room was.
By now, he was growing confused and anxious. Gleason's agents would have
marked him down, surely. It was up to him to be as prepared as possible
for any trouble, yet his gun was still in his pack. He turned back into
a side passage, where the light was poor.
A maid was coming towards him. Nervous, he moved into the nearest open
doorway. The maid followed. She took his arm.
"Eddie! Don't be surprised! It's me!"
How long since he had heard any voice but his own? How long since he
had felt a woman against him? How many hundreds of years?
He saw her air-leaker was camouflaged as a brooch pinned to her stiff
dress-front. He saw her hair tucked under the maid's cap, her face as
smeared as ever.
"Ann! Ann! Is it really you? You left me at The Amniote Egg, ages ago!"
He clutched her, uncertain how he felt about her; that would depend on
how she felt about him. There was a glassy feel about her, her voice
came to him with a slight thinness through the entropy barrier, but she
had minded close enough from his time for her to seem completely real.
"What are you doing here?" she asked.