Gormenghast (34 page)

       Bellgrove paused and wiped his forearm across his wet forehead and tossed back his white mane. He had spoken with his eyes shut. A sense of dreamlike strength had filled him. He knew in the self-imposed darkness that Irma's eyes were upon him; he could feel the intensity of her close presence. He could hear the feet of his staff, as his words continued, shuffling away in tactful pairs, and he could even hear himself talking as though the voice was another's.

       What a deep and resonant organ the man has, he thought to himself, pretending for the moment that it was not his own voice he was hearing, for there was something humble in his nature which, every once in a while, found outlet.

       But such thoughts were no more than momentary. What was paramount in him was the realization that here he was again, within a few inches of the lady whom he now intended to pursue with all the cunning of old age and all the steeple-swarming, torrent-leaping, barn-storming impetus of recaptured youth.

       'By the Lord!' he cried, voicelessly, and to himself yet very loud it sounded, in his own brains - 'by the Lord, if I don't show 'em how it's done! Two arms, two legs, two eyes, one mouth, ears, trunk and buttocks, belly and skeleton, lungs, tripes and backbone, feet and hands, brains, eyes and testicles. I've got 'em all- so help me, rightside up.'

       His eyes had remained closed, but now he lifted the heavy lids and, peering between his pale eyelashes, he found in the eyes of his hostess so hot and wet a succubus of love as threatened to undermine her marble temple and send its structure toppling.

       He glanced about him. His staff, tactful to the point of tactlessness, were gathered in groups and were talking together like those gentlemen of the stage who, in an effort to appear normal, yet with nothing to say, repeat in simulated languor or animation - 'one... two... three... four' and so on. But in the case of the professors they mouthed their fatuities with all the overemphasis of un-rehearsal. In a far corner of the room a scrum of gownsmen were becoming restive.

       'Talk about a wax giraffe, Cor slice me edgeways!' muttered Mulefire between his teeth.

       'Certainly not, you hulk of flesh unhallowed,' said Perch-Prism. 'I'm ashamed of you!'

       'And so indeed, la! Am I a beetroot? What it is, la, to have known better days and better ways, Heaven shrive me - Am I a beetroot?' It was the gay Cutflower talking, but there was something ruffled about his tone.

       'As Theoreticus says in his diatribe against the use of the vernacular,' whispered Flannelcat, who had waited for a long while for the moment when by coincidence he would both have the courage to say something and have something to say.

       'Well, what did the old bleeder say?' said Opus Fluke.

       But no one was interested and Flannelcat knew that his opportunity was gone, for several voices broke in and cut across his nervous reply.

       'Tell me, Cutflower, is the Head still staring at her and why can't you pass the wine, by the day of which we're made, it's given me the thirst of cactusland,' said Perch-Prism, his flat nose turned to the ceiling. 'But for my breeding I'd turn round and see for myself.'

       'Not a twitch,' said Cutflower. 'Statues, la! Most uncanny.'

       'Once upon a time,' broke in the mournful voice of Flannelcat, 'I used to collect butterflies. It was long ago - in a swallow country full of dry river-beds. Well, one damp afternoon when...'

       'Another time, Flannelcat,' said Cutflower. 'You may sit down.'

       Flannelcat, saddened, moved away from the group in search of a chair. Meanwhile Bellgrove had been savouring love's rare aperitif, the ageless language of the eyes.

       Pulling himself together with the air of one who is master of every situation, he swept his gown across one shoulder as though it were a toga and stepping back, surveyed the spread-eagled figure at their feet.

       In stepping back, however, he had all but trodden upon Doctor Prunesquallor's feet and would have done so but for the agile side-step of his host.

       The Doctor had been out of the room for a few minutes and had only just been told of the immobile figure on the floor. He was about to have examined the body when Bellgrove had taken his backward step, and now he was delayed still further by the sound of Bellgrove's voice.

       'My dearest lady,' said the old lion-headed man, who had begun to repeat himself, 'warmth is everything. Yet no... not everything... but a good deal. That you should be caused embarrassment by one of my staff, shall I say one of my colleagues, yea, for so he is, shall always be to me like coals of fire. And why? Because, dearest lady, it was for me to have groomed him, to have schooled him in the niceties or more simply, dammit, to have left him behind. And that is what I must do now. I must have him removed,' and he lifted his voice.

       'Gentlemen,' he cried. 'I shall be glad if two of you would remove your colleague and return with him to his quarters. Perhaps Professors... Flannelcat...'

       'But no! but no! I will not have it!'

       It was Irma's voice. She took a step forward and brought her hands up to her long chin where she interlocked her fingers.

       'Mr Headmaster,' she whispered, 'I have heard what you have had to say.

       And it was splendid. I said splendid. When you spoke of "warmth", I understood. I, a mere woman, I said a 'mere' woman.' She glared about her, darkly, nervously, as though she had gone too far.

       'But when, Mr Headmaster, I found you were, in spite of your belief, determined to have this gentleman removed' (she glanced down at the spread-eagled figure at her feet) 'then I knew it was for me, as your hostess, to ask you, as my guest, to think again. I would not have it said, sir, that one of your staff was shamed in my salon - that he was taken away. Let him be put in a chair in a dim corner. Let him be given wine and pasties, whatever he chooses, and when he is well enough, let him join his friends. He has honoured me, I say he has honoured me...'

       It was then that she saw her brother. In a moment she was at his side. 'O Alfred, I am right, aren't I? Warmth is everything, isn't it?'

       Prunesquallor gazed at his sister's twitching face. It was naked with anxiety, naked with excitement and also, to make her expression almost too subtle for credulity, it was naked with the lucence of love's dawn. Pray God it is not a false one, thought Prunesquallor. It would kill her. For a moment, the conception of how much simpler life would be 'without' her, flashed through his mind, but he pushed the ugly notion away and rising on his toes he clasped his hands so firmly behind his back that his narrow and immaculate chest came forward like a pigeon's.

       'Whether warmth is everything or not, my very dear sister, it is nevertheless a comforting and a cosy thing to have about - although mark you, it can be very stuffy, by all that's oxidized, so it can, but Irma, my sweet one -let that be as it may - for as a physician it has struck me that it is about time that something were done for the warrior at your feet; we must see to him, mustn't we, we must see to him, eh, Mr Bellgrove? By all that's sacred to my weird profession, we most certainly must...'

       'But he's not to leave the room, Alfred - he's not to leave the room. He's our 'guest', Alfred, remember that.'

       Bellgrove broke in before the Doctor could reply.

       'You have humbled me, lady,' he said simply, and bowed his lion's head.

       'And you,' whispered Irma, a deep blush raddling her neck, 'have elevated me.'

       'No, madam... ah no!' muttered Bellgrove. 'You are over-kind' and then, taking a plunge, 'who can hope to elevate a heart, madam, a heart that is already dancing in the milky way?'

       'Why 'milky'?' said Irma, who, with no desire to drop the level of conversation, had a habit of breaking out with forthright queries. However engulfed she might be in the major mysteries, yet her brain, detached as it were from the business of the soul, took little flights on its own, like a gnat, asked little questions, played little tricks, only to be jerked back into place and subdued for a while as the voices of her deeper self took over.

       Luckily for Bellgrove there was no need for him to reply, for the Doctor had signalled a couple of gownsmen over and the seemingly prostrate suppliant was lifted from the carpet, and carried, like a wooden effigy, to a candle-lit corner, where a comfortable chair with plump green cushions stood ready.

       'Seat him in the chair, gentlemen, if you will be so good, and I will have a look at him.'

       The two gownsmen lowered the rigid body. It lay straight as a board, supported by no more than its head on the chair-back, and its heels on the ground. Between these extremities were thrust the plump green cushions so that they might, as it were, prop the plank - to take the little man's weight, but no weight descended and the cushions remained as plump as ever.

       There was something frightful about it all and this frightfulness was in no way, mitigated by the radiant smile that was frozen on the face.

       With a magnificent gesture, the Doctor stripped himself of his beautiful velvet jacket and flung it away as though he had no further use for it.

       Then he began to roll up his silk sleeves like a conjurer.

       Irma and Bellgrove were close behind him. By this time the reservoirs of tact on which the professors had been drawing were wellnigh dry and a horde stood watching in absolute silence.

       The Doctor was fully conscious of this, but by not so much as a flicker did he reveal his awareness, let alone his delight in being watched.

       The incident had changed the whole mood of the party. The hilarity and sense of freedom that had been so spontaneous had received an all but mortal blow. For some while, although certain jests were made, and glasses were filled and emptied, there was a darkness on the spirit of the room, and the jests were forced and the wine was swallowed mechanically.

       But now that the first red blush of communal shame had died out of the staff; now that the embarrassment was merely cerebral and now that there was something to absorb them (for there was no resisting such an occasion as was now presented by Prunesquallor as he stood upright in his silken shirt sleeves, as slender as a stork, his skin as pink as a girl's, his glasses gleaming in the light of the candles) - now that there was all this, their equipoise began to return and with it a sense of hope; hope that the evening had not been ruined, that it held in store, once the Doctor had dealt with their seemingly paralysed colleague, a modicum at least of that rare abandon which had begun to set their tongues on fire, and their blood a-jigging - for it was once in a score of years, they told themselves that they could break the endless rhythm of Gormenghast, the rhythm that steered their feet each evening westward westward to their quadrangle.

       They were absolutely silent as they watched the Doctor's every movement.

       Prunesquallor spoke. It seemed that he was talking to himself, although his voice, in reaching those gownsmen who were at the rear of the audience, was certainly a little louder than one would have thought necessary. He took a pace forwards and at the same time raised his hands before him to the height of his shoulders where he worked his fingers to and fro in the air with the speed of a professional pianist.

       Then he brought his hands together and began to draw them to and fro one across the other, palm to palm. His eyes were closed.

       'Rarer than Bluggs Disease,' he mused, 'or the spiral spine! No doubt of it... by all that's convulsive... no doubt of it at all. There was a case, quite fascinating - now where was it and when was it very similar - a man if I remember rightly had seen a ghost... yes, yes and the shock had all but finished him...'

       Irma shifted her feet...

       'Now 'shock' is the operative word,' went on the Doctor rocking himself gently on his heels, his eyes still closed - 'and shock must be answered with shock. But how, and where... how and where... Let me see... let me see...'

       Irma could wait no longer. 'Alfred,' she cried, ''do' something! Do something!' The Doctor did not seem to hear her, so deep was he in his reverie.

       'Now, perhaps, if one knew the nature of the shock, its scale, the area of the brain that received it - the 'kind' of unpleasantness...'

       'Unpleasantness!' came Irma's voice again. 'Unpleasantness! How dare you, Alfred! You 'know' that it was I who turned his head, poor creature, that it was for me he fell headlong, for me that he is rigid and dreadful.'

       'Aha!' cried the Doctor. It was obvious he had not heard a word that his sister had said. 'Aha!' If he had appeared animated and vital before, he was trebly so now. His every gesture was as rapid and fluid as mercury. He took a prancing step towards his patient.

       'By all that's pragmatical, it's this or nothing,' He slid his hand into one of his waistcoat pockets and withdrew a small silver hammer. This he swivelled between his thumb and index finger for a few moments, his eyebrows raised.

       In the meanwhile Bellgrove had begun to grow impatient. The situation had taken a queer turn. It was not in circumstances like these that he had hoped to present himself to Irma nor was this the kind of atmosphere in which his tenderness could flourish. For one thing he was no longer the centre of attraction. His immediate desire was to be alone with her. The very words 'alone with her' made him blush. His hair shone more whitely than ever against his dark red brow. He glanced at her and immediately knew what to do. It was crystal clear that she was uncomfortable. The figure on the chair was not a pleasant sight for anyone, let alone a lady of distinction, a lady of delicate tastes.

       He tossed the shaggy splendour of his mane. 'Madam,' he said. 'This is no place for you.' He drew himself up to his full height, forcing back his shoulders and drawing his long chin into his throat. 'No place at all, madam,' and then apprehensive that Irma might interpret him wrongly and find in his remark some slight upon her party, he shot a glance at her through his eyelashes. But she had found nothing amiss. On the contrary, there was gratitude in her small weak eyes; gratitude in the gleaming incline of her bosom, and in the nervous clasping of her hands.