Grimus (21 page)

L

F
LAPPING EAGLE SAT
at Virgil Jones’ feet, or, more precisely, sat beside him on the low bed in Jocasta’s room as Virgil spoke. There was a satisfaction on Virgil’s face and an excitement in his voice, but of a faintly morbid kind, the satisfaction and excitement of a man who senses events are running his way once more, but is highly uncertain of his power to direct them. A spider wove its webs on the ceiling.

—More cases of fever, said Virgil Jones. Certainly there will be more. I’m afraid K is vulnerable now. The Achilles heel exposed. An object lesson in the fragility of the best defences. And make no mistake, the Way of K was a very expert defence. They practised their eyes-to-the-ground life for so long, it became second nature. Hence the confusing illusion of normality you succumbed to, and that entrancing, ethereal quality. They lived here, but they lived
for
their preoccupations, and thus seemed detached, intoxicating, complete. The expertise grew with the power of the Effect, keeping pace, and they might well have resisted it forever. Gribb’s death changed all that. Now there are many who find it an effort to keep their minds off Grimus. And they need to, whereas before the deaths they could even joke about him. Hence the determination of the lynch-mob. Hence the attitude of Mrs Gribb. I’m not sure she is so much in love with you. She needs to love, that’s more important. It will get worse; for now, the instant they relax, they will be open to the Dimensions. Some of them will die. Which will make the rest even more manic. A gloomy prospect, I’m sure You’ll agree.

—Jocasta and her girls don’t seem to suffer, said Flapping Eagle.

—Ah, said Virgil. There you have the extraordinary nature of this House in a nutshell. A refuge, you see, from the Effect as well as the mob. Because, as you hazarded earlier, it has become, for them, an end in itself. The only thing that matters to them. Though I fear you may be unsettling dear Media, you know. You do have almost as powerful an effect on women as, as Grimus, ha ha.

—I’m sorry, said Flapping Eagle stupidly.

—The simple fact, said Virgil Jones, is that Grimus is in possession of a stupendous piece of knowledge: that we live in one of an infinity of Dimensions. To accept the nature of the Dimensions involves changing, entirely, our ideas of what we are and what our world is like. Thus rewriting the book of morality and priorities from the beginning. What you must ask yourself is this: is there such a thing as too much knowledge? If a marvellous discovery is made whose effects one cannot control, should one attempt to destroy one’s find? Or do the interests of science override even those of society, and, indeed, survival? Is it better to have known, and die, than not to have known at all? A fair number of questions, I’m afraid.

—And you’ve decided, said Flapping Eagle, that science must yield.

—At this time, in this place, this piece of knowledge is an untenably dangerous thing, said Virgil Jones sadly.

Virgil Jones examined his corns, wiggling his toes. Flapping Eagle sat in silence, watching the spider. Eventually, Virgil spoke again.

—They treat me like an idiot here, he said, because I went through a phase of behaving like one. Just after my … disagreement … with the Inner Dimensions. And Liv. I ran around town once with my sex hanging out. I dyed my nose blue. I farted into women’s faces with my trousers down. Poor forked creature that I was. Am. I had something to prove, then. That they didn’t matter to me. That the island didn’t matter. That nothing mattered. Trouble was, I didn’t believe any of it myself. So the gestures lacked a certain conviction. In the end I went down the mountain and discovered dignity instead. The clothing of impotence. Until you arrived.

Flapping Eagle burst out: —Virgil, what shall I do? What is there to do?

—Ah, said Virgil, licking frantically around his lips. That’s what I’ve been getting round to. You can choose between withdrawal, inaction and action. No shame in any of them.

—I don’t understand, said Flapping Eagle.

—Withdrawal involves walking out there and getting lynched. Not pleasant. Or sneaking out somehow and going back down the mountain to let events take their course. The blinks, the fever, all of it. Leave it behind. Inaction involves staying put right here and waiting to see if Jocasta throws you to the wolves. Action, however, does rather involve doing what I say.

—You chose inaction, said Flapping Eagle. You haven’t done much recently.

—Naturally, said Virgil. I can’t do anything. You can.

—It’s not that the Inner Dimensions burnt my mind out, said Virgil. Or I couldn’t have danced the Strongdance successfully. Call it a kind of paralysis. A seized-up gearbox. It worked in extreme need, in the forest. But my little flutter with the Gorf undid that. And now, because I know it would be much easier for you, the need isn’t there. I’m not sure the will is either.

—But you said you’d made up your mind?

—Decisions are easy, said Virgil Jones. They’re the easy part.

—The field of what I’ll call Dimension-Chaos in which we find ourselves, said Virgil, tutorially, and indeed all Grimus’ powers, spring from an object called the Stone Rose. As you’ve probably guessed. This is what must be destroyed.

There is, actually, a considerable risk. It is possible that this Dimension cannot survive without the Rose. What is certain is that no-one will survive here, except for spiders, flies and animals, unless the Rose is broken. So it is a risk we must take.

—Kill or cure, said Flapping Eagle.

—Precisely, said Virgil. How well put.

—Deggle, you know, said Virgil Jones, unintentionally did the only thing that could have turned me against the Rose. When he broke that piece off the Stem, I mean. One has to ascribe both blinks and probably even the Grimus Effect to malfunctions of the mutilated Rose. It was only a small piece, so it went unnoticed. But it has, ah, damaged the dimension.

—If a small piece can create so much havoc, asked Flapping Eagle, wouldn’t we inevitably be destroyed if the whole Rose were broken up?

—Not necessarily, said Virgil. Half a loaf is not always better than no bread.

The weight of his guilt and the feeling of futility within him inclined Flapping Eagle towards agreeing to perform the task. His morale had been steadily declining ever since the death of Ignatius Gribb. Now, faced with the grim alternatives Virgil had offered, it was at its nadir. But something held him back from acquiescing, a fragment, perhaps, of the relatively innocent self he had brought to Calf Island; and, thinking about that self, he found a last glimmering of hope.

—I want your word on two scores, he said to Virgil. First, that Grimus possesses some means of undoing my immortality. There’s nothing for me on Calf Mountain, and I know eternity palls in my own world.

—So you’re back to that, said Virgil.

—Also, Flapping Eagle forged on, I must know that a way back exists: a way back to the place, world, dimension, whatever, that I came from.

—If we’re spared, you’d like to return.

—Yes.

—And if I give you my word, You’ll go to Grimus.

—If I can.

Virgil Jones smiled sadly.

—As far as I know, he said, the answer to both your questions is that there are no such certain ways and means of achieving either of your aims.

It was like a sentence of death, confirmed, with no appeal. No way back. The aim of centuries, to return to normal life, dashed; his recent aim, to live contentedly here in K, in ruins. Flapping Eagle was an empty man, a Shell without a Form.

—O hell, he said. I’ll do it anyway. Why not?

Virgil Jones smiled his sad smile again. It was tinged with triumph.

The time of action obliterates the process of evaluation. Virgil Jones, champion of doubt, had no time for it now. He was planning Flapping Eagle’s ascent to Grimus.

—The Gate to Grimus is similar in type to the one through which you entered the Sea of Calf. Though less crude. Impossible to find it unless you know where it is. Which, as it happens, I do. That’s where your conquest of the Inner Dimensions will come in handy. They cannot harm you now, so you can concentrate on moving through the Outer ones. It may not be pleasant, though. Grimus will certainly know you’re coming; he may well try and close the Gate. In which case you will have quite a battle to break through. He will also resist any attempt to tamper with the Rose. You’ll just have to do what you can, wait for the opportunity, you know, strike when the time is ripe and so forth. Remember this: he’s only a man.

—The odds do seem to be just slightly against me, said Flapping Eagle.

—About a hundred to one, said Virgil. And even if you get through … Grimus can be a very persuasive man.

—Where’s the Gate? asked Flapping Eagle mechanically.

—Ah yes, the Gate. Now that will involve escaping the mob. And climbing a little further. As far as, as far as, Liv. The black house, you know.

His voice trailed away lamely.

—I know, said Flapping Eagle. I met her. She sends you her regards.

Virgil jerked himself out of an incipient reverie.

—Met her? he said. Are you quite sure?

—No, said Flapping Eagle. She wore a black veil. From head to foot.

—That’s her, said Virgil. That’s Liv.

Flapping Eagle looked around the room. Creeping plants on the wall. Creeping spider on the ceiling. It was probably one of the last rooms he would ever see. Facing this, he discovered he didn’t particularly mind. He was a spent force now, Virgil’s tool, no more. Before coming to Calf Island, he had felt a suicidal urge born of desperation. He was not desperate now; he simply saw no particular value in remaining alive.

—Ah well, said Virgil Jones. It will be, ah, pleasant to see Liv again.

LI

—B
Y ALL MEANS
, said Jocasta. Go, by all means.

Virgil stood before her like an errant schoolboy, wringing his hands, opening and shutting his mouth as though eternally on the verge of producing an acceptable explanation of his misdeeds.

—Go, repeated Jocasta. If the things we have done for you, the things I have done, mean so little, then please go at once. Go back to her. She’ll shred you into tiny pieces, that one. This time there will be nothing left for me to patch up. She sits up there and spins her webs and of course you walk right in. Go, go, be done with it, if you have the urge to wound yourself, I will not stop you any more. Perhaps you are a fool. Perhaps you are mad. It is mad, to go back, after the shame she brought upon you, but go. I will not stand in your way.

—I have to, Jocasta, said Virgil, distressed. I must show Flapping Eagle the Gate.

—Flapping Eagle! she cried. Who returned your kindness with betrayal. Who returned my kindness by intoxicating Media. Who has brought nothing but trouble to all who took him in. You’ll do anything for
him
.

Virgil Jones said in a very quiet voice:

—It is Flapping Eagle who is doing this for me.

—All of you, burst Jocasta. Go, all of you. Leave me to my House again.

Elfrida Gribb in white lace, her face veiled, a fly crawling unhindered across the veil, standing at the window, carvings to her right, mountain at her back, Flapping Eagle at her left, disaster staring her in the face.

—You will not go, she said. You cannot, after what I did. I love you, Flapping Eagle. My place is at your side.

He closed his eyes and hardened his voice as much as he could.

—I loved you, he said.

Her eyes turned to stone, green marbles of blindness.

—Loved. The word was not a question. It was a bleak statement.

—Everything has changed, he said miserably. I must go.

—A whore, she said. You think I’m a whore.
I do not talk to whores
. You and her. You planned this, to make me love you, to make me jealous, to ruin me.

—No, he said.

—Whore. Elfrida the whore. Yes, why not. Yes, why not. If my love thinks me a whore, I must live up to his idea of me. Yes, why not. I shall be a whore and earn my keep. Yes, why not, why not.

Why not
, thought Flapping Eagle, was the phrase of the moment.

Media, eavesdropping, heard the interchange; and was delighted.

In the kitchen of the House of the Rising Son, amid the desolate pots and pans, the man called Stone ate, the only guest of the night, the one who could not be turned away. Virgil Jones saw him, and the escape was planned.

Flapping Eagle left the house by the side door and crawled out on to the Cobble-way, decrepit as his borrowed clothes, stained as the houses, dusty as the streets, and began to count the cobblestones. He greeted them like old friends. Slowly, tattered hat pulled low over stooping face, he made his way down the night road, pail in one hand, cloth in the other, on his knees, mumbling, polishing.

Madame Jocasta lay in her bed, shut into her room, refusing to know what was happening in her house. Media had volunteered to keep the pebble-cleaner occupied, even though it was a breach of House rules; and while Jocasta turned her face to the wall, Media used every scrap of experience at her command to ensnare Stone, her first man in an eternity, long enough for Flapping Eagle to make good his slow, painfully deliberate escape.

Just before dawn, Virgil Jones left the brothel, bowler hat on head, watchless chain around his waist, humming innocently to himself. The mob had dispersed to its bed, for the most part; but the implacable Peckenpaw sat bearlike on the front doorstep. He looked at Virgil angrily, but let him pass. Virgil went humming up the street, and was interested to notice that it bore no crawling figure. Flapping Eagle had either been discovered or had reached his goal.

At the far end of the Cobble-way, at the point where the town of K yielded to the resurgent slopes of Calf Mountain, the forest regained its supremacy. Thick vegetation concealed the narrow path, more suited to donkeys than men, which led up to the last habitable point, the rock on which Liv’s house stood and looked down on K. Here, in the forest, Virgil and Flapping Eagle made their rendezvous.

—Just like old times, said Virgil Jones.

Media, gone. Flapping Eagle’s absence was a relief. Virgil’s absence she had fortified herself to expect. But to find a man, and a wretched man at that, in Media’s bed, and her nowhere to be seen, was almost more than Jocasta could bear. Media, poor, infatuated Media, Media of all her girls.

Gone, but where? To follow Virgil and Eagle, but how far? And had they asked her, and did they want her, and would she come back cowed and crawling and beg forgiveness? Jocasta wanted to think so but she, too, remembered Liv; and she knew Media would not return, not if she could help it, not if she could…

Jocasta walked out into the corridor, silent as it was, and was hit by the third blink there, alone.

She gasped when it passed and leant against a wall. Elfrida Gribb came out of her room, tight-faced, controlled.

And put an arm around her.

—Madame, she said. I should like to stay. To stay … and work.

Jocasta looked at her vacantly. Anything was possible now.

—Since we have a sudden vacancy, she said, you’re hired.

The two bereaved women stayed there a moment, clutching each other; and then Jocasta, eyes red-rimmed, went down to the front door. Peckenpaw stood as she opened it.

—The House of the Rising Son is open for business, said Madame Jocasta.

It was morning.