The Matrix (13 page)

I opened my mouth, eager to explain, to apologize, but he silenced me.

‘Leave now,’ he said. ‘Quickly. I cannot be responsible if you stay.’

There was a note of fear in his voice that chimed perfectly with what I felt inside, with what the silence and the shadows and the still figure on the divan were already shouting at me. I ran from the chamber and did not stop until I was in my own room, shaking and praying for dawn.

I must have fallen asleep. A hand on my shoulder woke me, causing me to jump. It was Duncan, come for me at the usual time.

‘The sheikh is expecting you, Andrew. You should not be late.’ I looked at him, not understanding.

‘The sheikh? But . . .’

Duncan put his fingers to his lips and shook his head gently.

‘Say nothing of what you saw last night. I will explain it all to you in time. But for the moment, you must behave as though you know nothing. It is for the best.’

I dressed and breakfasted on black coffee, as had become my custom in that house, and when it was time, I made my way to the sheikh’s room.

He was waiting for me as always, a stiff figure held erect more by willpower than muscle, his thin legs crossed beneath his robes, his head balanced on his neck like a shell on a wooden stalk. On his lap lay a sheet of white paper, covered by his long, bird-like hands. I had never felt so afraid of anyone before.

‘You look tired,’ were his first words after I had greeted him and seated myself on the floor at his feet.

‘There was a wedding last night,’ I said. ‘The music kept me awake.’

He stared past me into the room.

‘They marry,’ he murmured, ‘they give birth, they die. I have heard the music of more weddings in this city than you can possibly imagine. And the weeping of funeral processions just as often.’

His eyes turned to me.

‘What would you give to escape all that?’ he asked. ‘Marriage, birth, decay, the grave.’

I hesitated. Every word mattered here, there could be no carelessness.

‘Surely,’ I stammered, ‘surely no one can escape the grave.’

He looked hard at me without answering. I felt the slow heartbeat in my chest quicken its tempo. This was dangerous territory. A word or phrase out of place . . .

‘On the contrary,’ he said, ‘that has been the object of our brief study here. The means of escape.’

‘In theory, yes, I understand that. But . . . surely no one could really achieve it.’ As I spoke, however, I thought of what I had witnessed the night before. Had Sheikh Ahmad cheated the grave? Had he really been an old man one hundred years earlier? And a century before that?

‘You are very young,’ he said, ‘and your studies of these matters have scarcely begun. Do not leap to conclusions. In time you will understand.’

He paused. His withered hands moved like leaves across his lap, disturbing the sheet of paper.

‘You have not yet answered my question,’ he said. ‘What would you give to live even one year beyond your allotted span?’

‘I have no desire to live a long life,’ I replied. ‘There would be no point in it.’

‘Really? Why is that?’

‘Because the point of everything for me was someone I loved. She died, and I can no longer see a point to anything.’

‘I understand. You said it when you first came, that you do not seek longevity, but mastery. But what if I were to say to you that this woman whom you loved might be brought back to life again?’

He did not take his eyes off me as he said it.

‘That would be very cruel,’ I said. ‘Catriona is dead. Her body is in a grave, rotting.’

‘Nevertheless.’ His voice was hard, unyielding. ‘If it were said, “What would you give?” I ask you merely to suppose.’

‘To have her back?’ I thought it safest to play his game. ‘Everything,’ I said. ‘I would give everything.’

‘Your own life? Your soul?’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘If it would bring her back. Anything at all.’

He smiled for the first time.

‘You have started to learn,’ he said.

He lifted his hands from his lap. The paper that lay on his knee had inscribed on it a circular talisman of the style known in Arabic as
da’ira.
In the centre, prominent among a host of invocations, I could see Catriona’s name, written in red ink in Arabic characters.

*   *   *

We left Fez the following day. Of what followed I retain but the haziest memory. Our first destination was Marrakesh, where we took a small house of our own in the medina, and where Duncan was visited daily by a succession of holy men and seers. This far south, the summer heat was oppressive. The long days passed in a sort of narcoleptic state in which I was more asleep than awake. I longed for a cool breeze or an ice-filled stream. Everything wilted. My dreams were filled with memories of Sheikh Ahmad. His withered face and feverish eyes harried me down long, dusty streets. Sometimes he was dead, sometimes alive, sometimes something that was neither the one thing nor the other. Several times I dreamed that Iain and Catriona were looking for me and could not find me.

Duncan grew morose and withdrawn, his bonhomie worn down by the constant heat, and the long hours he sat incarcerated with his holy men, reciting spells or reading grimoires their fathers had passed down to them. He would introduce me to those among them he thought suitable for me to meet. And we went together at night to visit the ceremonies of their brotherhoods, or to recite prayers at the tombs of their sheikhs.

From Marrakesh we travelled into the deep south, to the Tafilalt and beyond. The few towns through which we passed were stranger than any dream, labyrinthine warrens built to shut out the desert sun. Here, I would sit for hours in darkness while Duncan whispered in the corner with men in veils and old women, their hands and feet painted with henna. I would fall asleep only to find myself crawling through the door of that dark cathedral in Stornoway, or hurrying on all fours down the streets of Fez, pursued by something that slithered and sang.

We passed through an unchanging waste of desert in which the tiny huddled towns were mere growths of sand-coloured brick, the monotony broken only by the occasional white dome of a saint’s
koubba
, or a human figure etched against the skyline. Everywhere we went, they spoke of the dead, the
amwat.
They wore amulets to guard against unseen evil, they carried talismans to ward off the attentions of the undead. In cemeteries set hard against the desert, they would whisper to us the secrets of the next world. I shivered, thinking of the old man in Fez, for I knew he had been dead that night.

One day towards the end of September, Duncan told me it was time to return home.

‘We’re finished here for this year,’ he said. ‘I know it hasn’t been easy for you, but when you get back and sort it all out, you’ll see how valuable it’s been. You’ve learned more in these few months than you could have learned in years at home.’

We journeyed back to Marrakesh, where we were to take a plane back to London. Duncan had booked us into a hotel, and allowed two days in which to rest before the flight. We were both tired and in need of sleep, and much of the time was spent in bed.

On the last evening, we returned to the hotel after an early meal. We both had some packing to do. The streets were filled with people heading for the
moussem
of Sidi Musa, a local saint, a festival that would continue for several days. The sound of music floated across the roofs. In a small square next to our hotel, men were preparing to slaughter sheep in honour of the holy man. Some had been despatched already. There was a tang of blood on the air. The night was hot, but with a touch of damp that heralded the coming rains.

Indoors, we went to our rooms to finish packing. I had about a dozen books that had been given to me in the course of the journey, and I found that the last five would not fit into the suitcase I had planned to use. Taking them with me, I went to Duncan’s room.

He was standing by an open window, watching the celebrants pass along the street. I could hear the frightened voices of sheep mingling with the shouts of the passers-by.

‘I can’t get all my books in,’ I said. ‘Should I try to find another bag?’

‘The shops are all closed,’ he answered. He did not turn from the window. ‘But there’s still some room in my case. You’ll find it in the bedroom. Do what you can with them.’

I thanked him and went into the bedroom. Duncan’s case was lying open on the bed; he had left a few shirts ready to place on top. I lifted some items out in order to make room for the books. They fitted with room to spare.

As I made to straighten the clothes, something drew my attention, I do not know why. Perhaps I had unconsciously been looking for it. A length of striped cloth, quite unmistakable. A New College scarf – Iain’s scarf, the one he had left in my flat, the one that had disappeared shortly after Duncan’s arrival. I pulled it out. There was no mistake: Iain’s name was written quite clearly on the label. I remembered the conversation I had once had with Duncan about good and evil, and his remark concerning the method by which one might cause a man to fall ill or die.
The most that is needed is a lock of the victim
’
s hair or an article of his clothing to be his representative.

I returned the scarf carefully to the place it had occupied, tidied the clothes, and left the case as it had been. I went back to Duncan’s living room. He was still standing at the window.

Outside, they were still slaughtering sheep. I heard them bleating as they were led to the knife. Bleating and stamping their feet on the hard ground. It was the longest night of my life.

I got back to Edinburgh as the year turned. The leaves had fallen early, and by the middle of October autumn was showing the first signs of hardening into winter. After that interminable summer, I came without warning into a cold and unwelcoming world full of sharp winds, and rain, and mists from the sea. Every- where I went, people were wrapped against the foul weather. My old rooms were still waiting for me, and I sat in them shivering, loath to go outside.

The summer had unsettled and confused me, bringing with its fresh knowledge a swarm of unanswered questions. My discovery of Iain’s scarf in Duncan’s luggage had awakened the darkest suspicions, but I felt powerless to pursue them, even in the safety of my own mind. I convinced myself that there must be an innocent explanation, that Duncan had mistaken the scarf for one of his own of similar design. College scarves are easily confused with one another. But I also knew what use could be made of a scrap of clothing by a man like Duncan.

My job at the university had been irrevocably terminated; there was no immediate prospect of part-time work there or at Heriot-Watt, the city’s other university, so I signed on for unemployment benefit. I would be worse off, but I reasoned that I would gain by having the freedom to spend my days as I pleased, and to channel my research in the directions I wanted.

I explained my situation to Duncan as best I could, without revealing the true circumstances. I had completed my doctorate, I said, but wanted to stay in Edinburgh if possible in order to pursue what I now regarded as my real studies. He did not ask when the degree ceremony was to be held, and I think he had guessed the truth by then, but decided to go along with my little subterfuge. To be honest, I was tempted to make a clean breast of things: it hardly mattered what sort of research I had been doing, since that was no longer the motivation for my continued involvement with Duncan and his activities. Only embarrassment kept me from admitting what I had been up to earlier.

Duncan immediately offered to pay the rent on my flat, for I could barely afford to stay there on the little money I had from the state. I said I could not possibly accept.

‘You’ve already paid a small fortune to take me to Morocco and keep me there,’ I said. ‘I can’t let you spend another penny on me.’

‘Hardly a fortune, Andrew. Morocco is a cheap place to live, and we were guests in friends’ houses most of the time. I’d prefer to help you. Frankly, I’ve invested a great deal in you and your arcane education. I’m not prepared to let you go just like that. If you end up in some miserable tenement you’ll soon start thinking twice and three times about staying on to study with me. You’re fully qualified now, and I don’t think you’ll have much trouble finding a job of some sort. Once you do that, we’ll see less and less of one another. You may even find an academic post in another city.’ He paused. ‘You can repay me later.’

‘How can I do that unless I take a job?’

He smiled.

‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘I’m sure I’ll think of a way.’

The smile did not leave his face. It was warm and winning and curiously knowing, not a pleasant smile at all. I still admired Duncan then, in spite of my fear. And what he was offering was unquestionably attractive.

My experiences in Morocco had disturbed me, but paradoxically whetted my appetite for a more comprehensive grasp of the mysteries I had been investigating. Edinburgh, with its familiar streets and raw winds, quickly drove all images of the summer out of my mind. Confused as they had already been, my memories of North Africa grew increasingly hazy, and before many weeks had passed I had come to regard much of what had happened to me there as little more than the work of an already unsettled imagination, stimulated by new sights and sounds.

I returned to my books and my rituals. Winter settled hard as steel. There was rain most days, and frost when there was not. I woke late and read through the long nights. I had made a prison for myself, a tightly spun cocoon from which I hoped one day to re-emerge, resplendent. But whether I would wake into light or darkness it was impossible to say.

Early in November, Duncan took me to his home for the first time. Penshiel House was a sombre dwelling in the Scottish baronial style, situated to the east of the city, at the foot of the Lammermuir Hills. It was a cold, bleak day, with a sky that threatened sleet or even snow. As we drew near the house, rolling down a long, twisting drive in Duncan’s Jaguar, it seemed to me that the air grew darker still. Penshiel House lay hidden behind a wall of high trees, their branches already leafless. There were shadows everywhere: the shadows of trees, the shadows of tall rocks, the long shadows of the house itself, thrown crookedly across a short lawn lined with cypresses.