The Fetch

by Robert Holdstock

  ‘You’re a living poltergeist. You throw stones at yourself, not at others. You drown yourself in earth, drawing it down on to yourself through that strange and frightening grey matter between your ears. There must be such a rage in you …’

  Swirling, circling.

  ‘But if that’s true, where did it come from? That rage. I wish you could talk to me, Michael. I wish I could pick beyond that ginger hair, right down to the grey stuff. Where did it come from? Who was your mother?’

  And he added as an afterthought, frowning slightly, ‘Or father. Who was your father, I wonder?’

  Susan came down, dressed in a bathrobe, her hair soaking. She looked suspiciously at Richard as she entered the kitchen. ‘What’s all the talking?’

  ‘Talking to my son. Having a chat about dogs and temples.’

  ‘Dogs and temples?’

  ‘Sue, I think you’re right. It’s time we both went to London and got some co-operation from your Dr Wilson.’

  Unexpectedly, Susan was uncomfortable. She shook her head, towelling her hair quickly to start drying it. ‘No. No, I don’t think so. I’ll go alone. He won’t want us both.’

  ‘We need to talk to Michael’s mother. We need to know something more about her. Maybe she was on drugs. Maybe she …’

  ‘Maybe she what?’

  He looked up, not happy with the thought. ‘Maybe she tampered with black magic. Maybe she did something to herself, something that damaged her during an experiment, something like that. A psychic experiment …’

  Susan’s uneasiness increased. Again she disagreed. ‘I’ll talk to Wilson on my own. I’ll call him. But he’s still very discreet. He won’t give me the address. I know he won’t. He won’t tell me a damn thing.’

  ‘But you can try.’

  ‘I’ll try.’

  She left the kitchen. When Richard looked down he was startled to see Michael leaning back, his gaze fixed on his father. The boy’s mouth worked, as if he was biting the skin on the inside. His hands hung limply beside his body. He seemed, suddenly, exhausted.

  Richard had the uncanny feeling that the work of art was complete, that Michael’s swirls and blobs had reached their final form.

  And the artist was now empty and at peace with himself.

  PART TWO

  The Mocking Cross

  NINE

  Michael ran across the field towards the house, but stopped at the gate, solemn-faced as he listened to the distant sound of his sister’s laughter. He looked back over his shoulder, back to the woods, then down at the small object he was bringing home. The air was hot and he was still damp inside his loose shirt. The shock of what had happened a few minutes ago had brought him out in a feverish sweat.

  From the house came the sound of his mother’s voice, and Carol laughed again. They were playing the counting game; it was Carol’s favourite. They played it all the time, while Michael drew pictures, or explored his camps in the garden.

  He felt sad. At the same time he felt angry. Again, he looked back to the woods across the field, then brushed at his trousers and sleeves, knowing that he might be in trouble. He tried to pick the leaf litter from his ginger hair and smoothed the wild locks down with a smear of spit.

  There was blood on his fingers, he noticed, and he wiped them carefully on the ground, then tore up some grass to use as a handkerchief, scrubbing at his face, at the stinging cut just below his cheek.

  He pushed open the gate and stepped into the garden, darting up through the maze, peering cautiously over the top of the low hedge as he moved towards the house.

  His mother’s voice resolved, and he could hear her telling Carol a story. He ran from the maze to the apple tree and stood behind it, listening to the happiness in the house, holding the heavy little statue tightly. His body burned with anguish and his hands were wet. The cut on his face hurt him and he knew he should go in and have it washed.

  His mother was in the sitting room, by the open doors. The back door was open too and he began to walk towards it, but heard his mother come into the kitchen and run water from the tap. So he changed direction.

  Carol was sitting at the small desk she always used for her own writing and drawing. Michael stood in the doorway and watched her, then edged slowly over to her and peered down at what she was sketching.

  It was a drawing of a house, their house. She showed smoke coming from the chimney. Three little stick figures, two large, one small, suggested their parents and Carol.

  On impulse Michael snatched her pencil and drew the stick figure that was himself, complete with its shadow correctly orientated from the spiky sun she had drawn. The girl looked up at him sharply, but said nothing. He glared at her. She bit her lip, then looked down at the paper again and used her yellow crayon to sketch in Michael’s hair. Michael felt suddenly pleased, but didn’t show it.

  ‘You look dirty,’ Carol said. ‘Mummy’ll be angry. You’ve been in the quarry.’

  He said nothing. He held his hand behind his back and twisted slightly to look at the heavy, glinting object he’d found.

  Carol kept drawing, and now she sang in her oddly tuneless singing voice. She was aware of Michael standing there, but determinedly ignored him. He knew she wanted him to go away, but he wasn’t sure what to do. He wanted to show his mother what he’d found, but he knew he’d be in trouble as well.

  He wanted Susan to tell him a story, too. He loved stories, but he usually had to sit and listen to Carol’s. Maybe if he washed his face and changed into another pair of jeans, his mother wouldn’t be angry with him, and would tell him the story of the Fisher King. He liked that adventure especially. He’d got it in a book, and read it often, but he would like it to be read to him. The old king in his castle, living in a barren land, where famous and glorious knights rode on quests and the golden chalice of the Holy Grail glittered somewhere, hidden in a deep and frightening cave, guarded by terrible creatures.

  Glittering.

  He peered again at the gold gleam of the tiny figure from the pit.

  His mother came into the room with two glasses of orange squash. She was wearing slacks and her hair was tied into a top-knot. She was humming to herself, but stopped, horrified, when she saw Michael.

  He cringed.

  ‘Where have you been? You’re filthy!’

  She put the glasses down and stormed over to him, her face a hard mask of irritation. ‘You’re covered with chalk! And you’re bleeding. What have you been doing?’

  He backed away from her, but she grabbed him, turned him round and brushed at his clothes.

  ‘Have you been playing in that quarry? Have you?’

  He stared at her silently.

  ‘How many times have I told you not to go there? You’re not to play there. It’s dangerous! There’s all sorts of rubbish down there, and muddy pools. I don’t want you playing there. Is that understood?’

  She shook him by the shoulders, her face red, her eyes blazing. Carol had stopped drawing and was listening. Michael turned his head to look at his sister and as if she was aware of his eyes on her she started to draw fiercely.

  ‘Go and wash!’ his mother said sharply. She propelled him hard by the shoulder and he nearly stumbled as he took several paces across the sitting-room carpet. ‘Go and clean yourself …’

  She had turned away from him. She glanced at Carol’s drawing, smiled, then walked to the table where she had placed the orange squash. Catching him standing, looking at her, she pointed sharply to the door. ‘Go and wash, Michael. Go and do it now. I haven’t got time to be chasing you. I’ve got a lesson to prepare.’

  He took his arm from behind his back and held out his hand. He opened his fingers and sunlight caught the tiny figure. Gold gleamed. The figure seemed to dance, but it was only because he was shaking with nerves.

  ‘Pretty,’ he said. ‘Pretty.’

  ‘Stop talking in that baby way,’ Susan snapped. ‘How many times must you be told? You’re seven years old, for heaven’s sake.
’

  He started to shake uncontrollably, but stood his ground. Then his mother saw what he was holding and came slowly over to him, her eyes wide, her face now puzzled rather than cold. Michael smiled, watching her apprehensively.

  She reached for the figurine and he let her fingers take it from his trembling palm.

  ‘Pretty,’ he said for the third time, but now there was a question in his voice.

  Pretty?

  ‘It’s very pretty,’ his mother said slowly, softly. ‘It’s made of gold. It’s … yes, it’s very pretty.’ She looked into his eyes, frowning. ‘Where did you find this, Michael … ? Where did you get it?’

  ‘In my castle?’ he said quietly.

  ‘In your castle?’

  He nodded, his teeth clenched together, his face grim. He wasn’t supposed to talk about the castle. Chalk Boy wouldn’t like it. He looked nervously at the French windows, at the distant woods by the pit.

  ‘Where’s your castle? Michael? Tell me where your castle is.’

  ‘By the sea,’ he whispered. He hoped Chalk Boy couldn’t hear him.

  ‘But you’ve just been in the quarry. There’s no sea in the quarry. Michael, where did you find this? You must tell me. It’s very pretty. But it’s not ours. It’s very valuable. It might belong to someone.’

  Michael stood his ground, resolute in his silence now, not willing to betray his secret.

  Susan stood up and stared again at the gold figurine of a girl with the head of a wolf. Then she touched Michael’s shoulder.

  ‘Go and wash,’ she whispered softly. ‘There’s a good boy …’

  Richard was in the British Museum’s bookshop, leafing through a newly published volume on Celtic archaeology, when Jack Goodman came looking for him, to give him the bad news. Goodman needn’t have acted so awkward and concerned. Richard had known for over an hour that the job had been denied him.

  He put the volume back on the shelf, turned and beamed at the younger man. Goodman wore a black leather jacket and sharp trousers. His spectacles were gold-rimmed, a round, designer look for the mid-eighties. He was one of the new breed of historians who worked their way ruthlessly through the system.

  But he clearly felt embarrassed that Richard had fallen yet again at the hurdle called ‘a permanent position’.

  The reason Richard had known that his application had failed was because he could read the face of the main interviewer, Professor Edward Simpson, like a book. While the rest of the panel had talked about ideas, asked his thoughts on the set-up for photography at the BM, showed genuine interest, Simpson had remained silent, staring at the interviewee over his half-rims, a report sitting open at one page in front of him. In the hour of the interview that page was never turned.

  It had become an intimidating, intrusive insult.

  One page.

  One fact.

  One mistake.

  Since that one fact, that one mistake, was all that interested Simpson, it meant he had no interest whatsoever in entertaining the idea of Dr Richard Whitlock as candidate for a permanent post on the staff of the museum’s documentation section.

  ‘I’m sorry, Richard,’ Goodman said.

  ‘What for? I knew I’d failed.’

  Goodman grinned half-heartedly. ‘How about lunch? We could go to The Plough, just down Museum Street. There are a couple of things we need to talk through …’

  ‘Sounds good to me.’

  They walked stiffly and uncomfortably out of the building and into the sunshine. The steps were swarming with visitors and pigeons. Goodman put sunglasses on. He said, ‘I did my best. I want you to know that.’

  ‘Of course you did. But Doctor Death wasn’t going to have anything to do with me …’

  ‘I should have tackled him on the chalk artefacts thing …’

  ‘Why? It was my job to tackle him. I just couldn’t be bothered. He only did it to embarrass me, to challenge me. No matter what I’d said, he wouldn’t have believed me.’

  It had been towards the end of the interview. Simpson, after the period of silent staring, picked up the photographs of the two ball-shaped chalk artefacts from the earthfall and settled back in his chair, looking hard at the images. He had thrown them on to the desk with an almost contemptuous dismissing motion.

  ‘They’re splendid photographs I’m sure, Dr Whitlock, but they don’t illuminate much.’

  ‘The patterns are unusual. I didn’t notice them for several years. You’ve seen the first photographs, the balls appear to be perfectly smooth …’

  ‘And then, as if by magic, the patterns appear …’

  Message received by Richard, clearly understood. He said, ‘I’ve developed a better chalk wash. It uses a fine oil. In angled light, heavy on the blue, the minutest traces can be seen. These photographs are really just to illustrate the developments in technique. There’s much in the museum that should be re-photographed, and I think I’m the man for the job.’

  He smiled half-heartedly, and Goodman grinned and nodded supportively, but the room was tense, and he had probably made a tactical error.

  Simpson said, ‘I don’t think we’d welcome too many patterns emerging suddenly on our exhibits.’

  Goodman slumped back in his chair. The other interviewers kept watching Richard, but all looked embarrassed.

  It was the moment at which he should have attacked. It was an appalling slur on his character.

  But the page. The open page … that fact. That open, terrible fact!

  He answered very coolly, ‘Until we look carefully we won’t know. My camera techniques are the best around. They can reveal more than just decoration, and I hope you’ll all welcome the opportunity – with or without me – to re-examine some of your exhibits.’

  ‘Absolutely,’ said Goodman.

  But the interview was over. His face was burning. Infuriatingly, Simpson stood, beamed a smile and extended a hand. Infuriatingly, Richard found himself taking that hand and listening to the words from the director’s mouth.

  ‘Thank you for giving us this opportunity to consider you, Dr Whitlock. It’s been quite revealing.’

  They walked through the doors of the pub and hit the steamy, smoky crowd of late lunch-time. There was bench space in a corner and Richard occupied it while Goodman set up the drinks. They squeezed in between two enormous American tourists, who smiled and tried to make conversation, and a group of students who were smoking heavily and talking in the loud, assertive way that was a sure sign of their ignorance and competitiveness.

  ‘We could go somewhere else … The Royal George?’

  ‘This is fine. I haven’t got long. I have to get back to Ruckinghurst this afternoon.’

  ‘Another job?’

  ‘A freelance job. Yes. Ten photographs of a local church for the local council.’ Richard smiled bitterly. ‘Oh, I tell you, Jack, my life is one wild round of excitement and discovery!’

  They drank in silence until Richard’s frustration had passed.

  Goodman said eventually, ‘I don’t know if this is consolation or not, but Simpson will be gone in three or four years. Then the New Wave takes over. You won’t be an outsider for long.’

  Richard chose to ignore the element of patronization in Goodman’s attempt to reassure him.

  ‘I made a mistake. I didn’t commit a crime by law. But I committed a crime within the hallowed Institute. People like Simpson can’t stomach that. Simpson’s followers will be groomed in the same school.’

  ‘Not necessarily—’

  ‘Oh, come on!’ Richard turned sharply towards the younger man. ‘If you’d thought your job depended on it, would you have sided with Simpson today, if asked?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Yes, you would. I know that much about you, Jack. And that’s good. Because that’s what I would have done too.’

  Stung, and looking distinctly irritable, Goodman sipped his lager and said quietly, ‘And you think that makes it OK?’

  ‘OK? No. Of course not.
I didn’t mean that. I meant it makes it not necessary for you to bullshit to me. I know exactly where I stand, and how difficult it is to ask for support. And I appreciate yours. But ten years ago I stole from an archaeological site, not for pleasure but for profit. I’m in Limbo for the rest of my career. Freelance work, yes, but never to be invited to the permanence of a job where I could be really effective.’

  ‘Things will change. You’ll see …’

  ‘No they won’t. Because I walked away from a Neolithic grave site with a flint arrowhead!’

  ‘We’ve all done it, Richard. There’s not an archaeologist I know who could put his hand on his heart and say that he’d never taken a “souvenir” …’

  ‘I don’t believe that.’

  ‘Believe it. A stone, a handful of soil, a twig: a souvenir. Just a memento? But maybe that twig was part of a doll. Maybe the stone was part of a shrine.

  Maybe the soil contained bone fragments of a ritual burnt offering. It’s all stealing.’

  ‘I know. I know …’

  ‘And maybe the stone we nick as a souvenir had been used to kill someone. And in that stone, someone like our new psychic archaeologist can hear vibrations …’ He sneered the word, adding, ‘And it makes me sick. They’ll fund a medium to investigate stones and statues, but not employ the best bloody photographer in the business!’

  For a moment Richard couldn’t speak. He watched Goodman, letting the man’s words get clear in his head.

  ‘A psychic archaeologist?’

  ‘Apparently. It’s a part-time position, more of a consultancy, really. It’s called ES Past Object Associativity. For ES read Extra Sensory. Do you believe in that sort of crap?’

  Richard smiled and sipped his drink. A psychic? At the British Museum? It seemed too unreal to be true. And yet, violently stranger things had happened in his own life!

  Goodman was puzzled. ‘What’s on your mind? You’ve gone very solemn.’

  Feeling the need to change the subject, Richard simply said, ‘What did you take from a site?’

  Goodman stared uncomfortably at the glass in his hand. In a soft, edgy voice he said, ‘Like you, an arrowhead. Only I didn’t get seen doing it.’