Under the Skin

by Michel Faber

  The bodies were laid in a row on the concrete in the middle of the barn. The legs of the most complete one were still seeping grume; the heads of the shot ones had more or less stopped bleeding. Pale and glistening with frost, the foursome looked like massive effigies made of candlefat, unevenly melted from their hairy wicks.

  Isserley looked at them, then at Amlis Vess, then at the bodies again, as if drawing a direct line for his attention.

  ‘Well?’ she challenged. ‘Proud of yourself?’

  Amlis Vess stared at her, his teeth bared in pity and disgust.

  ‘You know, it’s very strange,’ he said. ‘I don’t recall shooting these poor animals’ heads off.’

  ‘You might as well have done,’ snapped Isserley, mortified to hear Yns snorting inappropriately behind her.

  ‘If you say so,’ Amlis Vess said, in a tone (if not an accent) she herself might have used to humour an alarmingly deranged hitcher.

  Isserley was rigid with fury. Fucking elite bastard! He was behaving as if his actions didn’t need defending. Typical rich kid, typical pampered little tycoon. None of their actions ever needed defending, did they?

  ‘Why did you do it?’ she demanded bluntly.

  ‘I don’t believe in killing animals,’ he replied without raising his voice. ‘That’s all.’

  Isserley gaped at him for a moment in disbelief; then, incensed, she drew his attention to the toes of the dead vodsels, an untidy row of approximately forty swollen digits splayed on the concrete before them.

  ‘You see these parts here?’ she fumed, singling out the worst affected ones with her pointing finger. ‘See the way the toes are grey and mushy? It’s called frostbite. The cold does it. These bits are dead, Mr Vess. This creature would certainly have died, just from being outside.’

  Amlis Vess fidgeted uncomfortably, his first sign of weakness.

  ‘I find that hard to believe,’ he frowned, ‘It’s their world out there, after all.’

  ‘Out there?’ Isserley yelled. ‘Are you kidding? Does this’ – she jabbed her finger at the frostbitten toes, unintentionally slashing an additional perforation in one of them – ‘look like they’ve been running around in their natural element to you? Does it look like they’ve been having a little … frolic?’

  Amlis Vess opened his mouth to speak, then apparently thought better of it. He sighed. And when he sighed, the white fur on his chest expanded.

  ‘It looks like I’ve made you angry,’ he said gravely. ‘Very angry. And the strange thing is, I don’t think it’s because I caused these animals to come to harm. I mean, you were just about to kill them yourself, were you not?’

  With unconscious cruelty, all the men joined Vess in looking to Isserley for an answer. Isserley went quiet, her fists clenched. She was aware all of a sudden of why she should never clench her fists: the ineradicable pain in each hand where her sixth finger had been removed. And this, in turn, reminded her of all her other differences from the men who stood in a semicircle before her, across a divide of corpses. She cringed instinctively, dropping her posture as if to brace herself for all fours, then folded her arms across her breasts.

  ‘I suggest you keep Mr Vess out of trouble until he can be shipped back where he came from,’ she said icily, directing the instruction to no-one in particular. Then, one slow and painfully dignified step at a time, she walked out of the steading.

  Those left behind stood in silence for a while.

  ‘She likes you,’ said Yns to Amlis Vess at last. ‘I can tell.’

  6

  ON THE WINDSWEPT A9 an hour later and forty miles away, a bleary-eyed Isserley squinted up at a vast electronic traffic sign that said TIREDNESS CAN KILL: TAKE A BREAK. It was a self-confessedly ‘experimental’ sign, inviting comment from motorists by means of a telephone number on its bottom rim.

  Isserley had passed under this sign hundreds of times on her way to Inverness, always wondering if it might one day display important traffic information: news of an accident or tailback up ahead, perhaps, or of severe weather conditions on the Kessock Bridge. There was never any message of that kind. Only generic homilies about speed, courtesy and tiredness.

  Today, she smiled ruefully at the sign’s advice. It was true: she was tired, and she ought to take a break. To be reminded of this by a soulless machine was funny, in a way – but easier to obey. She’d never been very good at listening to advice when it came from her fellow human beings.

  She pulled the car in at a layby and switched off its engine. A belligerent sun was staring her right in the eyes and she considered darkening the windows, but thought better of it, in case she fell asleep and was wakened by police banging on her opaquely amber windows. That had never happened yet, but if it did, it would be the end of her. There were quite a few things police might ask to see which she didn’t have – including a pair of vodsel-sized eyes behind those big thick glasses of hers.

  Isserley’s eyes were sore right now, irritated by lack of sleep and the strain of looking through two layers of glass. She blinked, then blinked again, slower and slower, until the lids stayed shut. She would rest her eyes for just a little while, then drive back north for a proper sleep. Not on the farm, somewhere else. The farm might well be in an uproar again, with that idiot Amlis Vess at large.

  There was a spot she knew off the main road, on the B9166 to Balintore, where she sometimes pulled in at the ruins of a medieval abbey to doze. Nobody ever went there, despite it being an official tourist attraction; its far-flung web of promotional signs was too sparse to draw motorists in. It was just the place for Isserley when she’d had almost no sleep and been forced to chase lost vodsels for hours before dawn.

  Imagining herself in Fearn Abbey already, Isserley fell asleep, her head and one arm cradled inside the padded steering wheel.

  She dreamed, at first, of the abbey’s roofless ruins as if she were sleeping inside them, with the ocean of sky above, azure and cirrus-striped. But then, as so often happened, she slipped down into a deeper level of dream, as if through a treacherous crust of pulverulent earth, and landed in the subterranean hell of the Estates.

  ‘This is a mistake,’ she told the overseer as he led her deeper into labyrinths of compacted bauxite. ‘I have powerful friends in high places. They’re absolutely shocked that I was sent here. Even now they’re working on my reclassification.’

  ‘Good, good,’ murmured the overseer as he pulled her deeper. ‘Now, I’ll show you what your job will be.’

  They had arrived at the dark centre of the factory, the smooth cervix of a giant concrete crater filled with a luminous stew of decomposing plant matter. Huge roots and tubers turned lazily in the albumescent gleet, obese leaves convulsed on its silvery surface like beached manta rays, and billows of blueish gas ejaculated from sudden interruptions in the surface tension. All around and above this great churning cavity, the stifling air swirled with green vapour and particles of sphagnum.

  Peering closer despite her revulsion, Isserley noticed the hundreds of tubes, thick as industrial hose, draped over the rim all round, disappearing into the glutinous murk at intervals of a few metres. One of these tubes was being reeled in by an indistinct mechanical agent, the sheer glistening length of it a clue to how deep the crater really was. After some time, at the very end of the tube, attached to it by an artificial umbilicus, emerged a baggy diver’s suit enslimed in black muck. Still clutching a spade-like implement in its gloves, the diver’s suit slithered clumsily onto the concrete rim and struggled to raise itself to its knees.

  ‘This,’ the overseer explained, ‘is where we make oxygen for those above.’

  Isserley screamed herself awake.

  She found herself sitting inside a vehicle by the side of a road stretching from eternity to eternity, in a strange and far-off land. Outside, the sky was blue, transparent and without upper limits. Millions, billions, maybe trillions of trees were making oxygen without human intervention. A newly mature sun was shining, and only a few m
inutes had passed since she had fallen asleep.

  Isserley stretched, rotating her thin arms through 360 degrees with a grunt of discomfort. She was still exhausted, but the dream had put her off sleep for the time being, and she felt she was no longer in immediate danger of dozing off at the wheel. She would do some work, then assess how she was feeling by sundown. Obviously, the pressure she’d felt herself under yesterday to deliver the goods for the boss’s son, the distinguished visitor, to admire, had vanished now. Bringing home a vodsel for Amlis Vess was plainly not the way to his heart, or whatever part of him she’d been hoping to impress. However, visiting crackpots aside, she did have her own expectations to live up to.

  Still driving south, just beyond Inverness, she spotted a big hitcher holding up a cardboard sign saying GLASGOW.

  She drove past him out of habit, out of adherence to procedure, but she had no doubt that she would pick him up on the second approach: he was powerfully built and in the prime of life. It would be criminal to leave a specimen like that standing there.

  Despite his bulk, he ran quite nimbly to meet her when she stopped the car near him; always a good sign, since drunk or disabled vodsels could only stumble.

  ‘Pitlochry all right?’ she offered, judging from his open, eager-to-please expression that this would be more than enough.

  ‘Brilliant!’ he enthused, jumping in.

  He had a big meaty face, a bit like a monthling already, with tight blond curls at the top. The curls were sparse, though, and the skin rough and blotchy, as if the vodsel’s head had been lost at sea at some stage in its life, then cast ashore and weathered for years in the sun before finally being reunited with the body.

  ‘Mah name’s Dave.’ He reached one hand over to her, and she awkwardly allowed one of hers to be grasped, trying not to wince as he pressed on the place where her sixth finger had been. It was so unusual for a hitcher to introduce himself, she was slow to think of a reply.

  ‘Louise,’ she said, after a few moments.

  ‘Pleased tae meet you,’ he beamed, busily buckling himself in as if they were about to embark on a professional adventure together, like breaking the sound barrier in a racing vehicle, or test-driving a jeep in rocky terrain.

  ‘You seem to be in a good mood,’ observed Isserley as she pulled away from the kerb.

  ‘Too right, hen, Ah’m well pleased,’ affirmed Dave.

  ‘Is it something to do with what’s waiting for you in Glasgow?’ she pursued.

  ‘Right again, hen,’ he grinned. ‘Ah goat tickets tae see John Martyn.’

  Isserley mentally scrolled through the entertainers she’d seen on television during her morning exercises, or who’d figured in the evening news for some reason. John Martyn was not a name she remembered, so quite possibly he did not bend spoons by psychic power or break laws against inhaling vegetable smoke.

  ‘I don’t know him,’ she said.

  ‘You’ll ken some ae his songs for sure,’ promised Dave, his brow crinkled with incredulity. ‘“May You Never” is a big yin.’ All of a sudden, without warning, he began singing loudly. ‘Ah-M-A-A-AY YOU never lay your head down, without a hand to hold … No?’

  Isserley was hastily correcting the startled swerve her car had taken towards the middle of the road.

  ‘Whit aboot “Over the Hill”?’ Dave persisted. Strumming one beefy hand against his ribcage, the other fingering the neck of an invisible guitar, he sang, ‘Been worried about my babies, I been worried about my wife; there’s just one place for a man to be when he’s worried about his life; I’m goin’ home, HEY HEY HEY over the hill!’

  ‘Are you worried about your wife, Dave?’ enquired Isserley evenly, keeping her eyes on the road.

  ‘Yeah, Ah’m worrit she might find oot whir Ah stay, hyuh hyuh.’

  ‘Any babies?’ She was being audacious, she knew, but she felt in no mood to waste time today.

  ‘Nae babies, hen,’ said Dave, sobering his tone abruptly and bringing his hands to rest in his lap.

  Isserley wondered if she’d overstepped the mark. She shut up, pushed her breasts out, and drove.

  It was a pity, Dave reflected, that this Louise was only taking him as far as Pitlochry. At this rate he’d get to Glasgow about four hours earlier than he needed to, and this girl wouldn’t be a bad way to spend that time. Not that he was a sexist, mind, but she had that upfront way of speaking that easy girls had, and she’d picked him up, him a big beefy guy, which let’s face it females almost never did. She had fantastic bosoms, and bigger eyes than Sinéad O’Connor even, and nice hair too, although it was a bit of a mess really, sticking out like a mop so he couldn’t see her face from the side. Maybe this was what women meant when they talked about having a bad hair day. Maybe he should mention something about bad hair days, to show her he had some idea about these things. Women liked to think there wasn’t a hopeless divide between the sexes; it was a real leg-opener, he’d found.

  Maybe something would happen between them on the way to Pitlochry! Beds weren’t essential, after all. Louise could pull in at a layby and show him what she was made of.

  Dream on, dream on, Dave. This is what would really happen: at Pitlochry she’d set him down at the roadside and drive off with a wink of her tail-lights. End of story.

  But he’d get to see John Martyn, just remember that. Trying to get off with a woman was always a bit of an embarrassment when you looked back on it later, but a great musical performance was a warm buzz forever.

  Thinking of which: what did this girl have in the way of music? There was a car cassette player just above his knee: plenty of time for a C-90 before Pitlochry!

  ‘Goat any tapes, hen?’ he said, pointing at the machine. Isserley glanced at the metal slit, trying to recall what had or had not been inside it when she’d first acquired this car, years ago.

  ‘Yes, I think there’s one in there,’ she replied, vaguely remembering being startled by unwelcome music when she’d been familiarizing herself with the dashboard controls.

  ‘Brilliant: put it oan then,’ he urged, smacking the thighs of his jeans as if to kick-start the drums.

  ‘Feel free to do it yourself,’ Isserley said. ‘I’m driving.’

  She felt his gaze on her, incredulous at her carefulness, but there were cars overtaking hers constantly and she was too nervous to look down. Being driven around at high speeds by that maniac Esswis had rattled her and she was in no mood to exceed forty-five.

  Dave switched on the tape player and sound issued forth obediently. At first Isserley was relieved that he’d got what he wanted, but she soon sensed that all was not well, and made herself focus on the music. It seemed to be submerging itself every few seconds, as if passing through watery obstacles.

  ‘Oh dear,’ she fretted. ‘Perhaps my machine is malfunctioning?’

  ‘Nah, it’s yir tape, hen,’ he said. ‘It’s loast its tension.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ repeated Isserley, frowning in concentration as a car behind her hooted its horn in apparent chagrin at her refusal to pass a tourist coach. ‘Does it need … uh … disposing of?’

  ‘Nah!’ Dave assured her, happily fiddling with the cassette controls while she endured the sound of beeping. ‘It’s just needin’ windin’ backwards an’ forwards a few times. Daes wonders. You’ll see. Folk throw tapes oot thinkin’ they’re deid. Nae need for it.’

  For a few minutes more he busied himself with the tape player, then switched it on afresh. The song rang out of the speakers, clear and harsh as television. A twangy male voice was singing about driving a truck all night long, to put a hundred miles between him and a town called Heartache. The tone was one of jovial dolefulness.

  Isserley trusted that Dave would be satisfied now, but instead he radiated puzzlement.

  ‘Ah goat tae say, Louise,’ he said after a while. ‘It’s funny you huvin’ Coontry and Western music’

  ‘Funny?’

  ‘Well … unusual, fur a wumman. At least a young wumman, y’ken.
You’d be the furst young wumman Ah’ve met that’s goat a Coontry and Western tape in her motor.’

  ‘What kind of music would you have expected?’ Isserley enquired. (Some of the larger service stations sold cassettes; perhaps she could buy the correct ones there.)

  ‘Oh, dance stuff,’ he shrugged, beating the air rhythmically with his fist. ‘Eternal. Dubstar. M Pipple. Or mebbe Björk, Pulp, Portishead …’ These last three names sounded to Isserley like varieties of animal feed.

  ‘I suppose I have strange tastes,’ she conceded. ‘Do you think I’d like John Martyn? What does his music sound like? Can you describe it to me perhaps?’

  Her question lit up the hitcher’s face with a glow of serene and yet intense concentration, as if his whole life had been leading up to this moment and he knew he was equal to the challenge.

  ‘He daes a loaty stuff wi’ echoplex – foot pedals, y’ken? It’s acoustic, but it soonds electric – spacey, even.’

  ‘Mm,’ said Isserley.

  ‘One second he’ll be playin’ this ril soaft acoustic guitar, next second it’s like WHAAANG! WAKKA WAKKA WAKKA WAKKA, birlin’ all roond yir heid.’

  ‘Mm,’ said Isserley. ‘Sounds … effective.’

  ‘An’ his singin’! That manny sings like naebody oan earth! It’s like …’ Dave began to sing again, in a melismatic convulsion of slurring and growling which made him sound alarmingly drunk. For years now it had been Isserley’s policy never to allow a very drunk hitcher into her car, in case he fell asleep before she could make an informed decision about the icpathua. Had Dave greeted her with this extraordinary performance, she would definitely not have taken him. But, he assured her: ‘It’s deliberate. Like jazz, y’ken?’

  ‘Mm,’ she said. ‘So, have you seen John Martyn many times?’

  ‘Oh, six or seven, over the yirs. But he’s well intae the drink, y’ken. Y’canny be sure someboady like that isnae gauny pop off any day noo. Then you’d be tellin’ y’self, Ah couldy went and seen John Martyn, an’ now he’s deid! An’ whit did Ah dae instead, eh? Watched telly mebbe!’