by Simon Raven
He directed the party to the sundial.
‘I adore sundial mottoes,’ he said.
‘This one,’ said the Provost, ‘was chosen by Monty James.’
‘The writer of ghost stories?’ said Milo, remembering Conyngham’s reference to these some days before.
‘Also a very distinguished scholar. Read his chosen motto to us, Milo.’
‘“Tu pias laetis animas reponis sedibus,”’ read Milo, who had examined the dial the previous day and looked it all up overnight. ‘Horace: tenth ode of the first book.’
‘Good boy. Now translate.’
‘“You”, referring to Mercury, “bring the souls of the righteous to the abodes of bliss.”’
‘Monty James wasn’t thinking much of Mercury when he chose this,’ said Tom Llewyllyn. ‘He was thinking of Time.’
‘There are others that take on the office,’ said Milo, ‘apart from Mercury and Time. It is, I think, an honourable function. For it is often necessary or desirable that souls should be transferred from this world to the next rather more swiftly than would normally be the case. The series of moral or social mathematics about which I have been talking, Provost, often have this end in view.’
‘Murder?’
‘No. Setting up an entirely natural and normal sequence of events which may lead, without drama or distress, to a decease devoutly to be wished for any number of sound reasons.’
‘Oh,’ said Tom, looking rather hurt. ‘Isn’t that rather overdoing it? I feel a little tired, dear boy. Would you bring me to my bedroom, where I shall rest until dinner?’
The thing is now much clearer, thought Len, as the Provost slowly departed on Milo’s arm. These theories that that boy is spouting derive from an adult who has influenced him, probably that schoolmaster of whom we have heard talk, Raisley Conyngham. Not content with airing the theories, young Milo is itching to apply them. He loves talking of the matter, so he talks of it to his new friend, the Provost, who does not properly understand what he is saying. He also enjoys danger (welcomes the idea of a new and fiendish sexual disease); so he hints, without committing himself at all plainly, that he is interested in, and may become involved in, the formulation of some series in what he calls human engineering or socio-moral mathematics that may result in somebody’s death. He likes throwing out hints because of the small but piquant danger that he may be caught out. The Provost will not catch him out; I might. What does he think I should do if I did? He thinks I should do nothing, because I should be able to do nothing: on his view of the theory – a view no doubt inculcated by Conyngham – these ‘series’ of events are so cleverly initiated and manipulated to resemble absolutely normal and unremarkable occurrences that, however horrible the result, no one can be accused of contriving it.
This boy Milo, thought Len, is of course the friend of Marius Stern, who introduced him to our notice. Is Marius to be part of Milo’s machinations? If so, should I warn Marius’ friends? Carmilla? Theodosia? The Provost, for that matter, who is Marius’ uncle? No, thought Len. I do not know enough to start being officious. I shall just sit still and watch the thing go on. It promises rich entertainment; the theory is an amusing one, and it will be very enjoyable to see whether it is sustained by its practice.
Marius Stern and Raisley Conyngham were spending their half-Quarter exeat at the Regina Hotel (one star, no credit cards accepted) in the hamlet of Holkham.
‘A hostelry distinguished by a plain yet savoury cuisine and wonderful surroundings,’ Raisley said as they arrived. ‘Do not make the mistake common among rich young men, my dear Marius, of despising the economic family hotel. Many of them retain the dignity and reticence that has now entirely deserted the great ones, even the Ritz itself.’
For the most part Marius and Raisley drove to cathedrals, churches, castles, abbeys and fine houses; but on two occasions they walked by the sea – or as near as one can get to it at Holkham, where it is seldom much less than a mile away over a treacherous beach. They would leave the Regina, walk down the old road over the level crossing of the coastal railway (long since dismantled) and on towards the dunes and the pine forest that overlook the sands. From here the sea could just be glimpsed, a thin band of turquoise beyond steep ridges and sudden depressions, the latter often of quicksand. One now had a choice between a rough path that led along the line where the dunes meet the beach and another, rather more commodious, path behind the dunes and the ranks of pines, between the forest and an inland saltmarsh. Raisley preferred the path by the beach; he loved, he said, to look at the faraway and so, in this instance, ‘never sounding’ sea. So this path they took, going south towards Wells, because if one went north the pines became fewer and fewer until they vanished, leaving one on a twisting and ill-marked track between distressful clumps of thorn, thistle, burr and briar.
‘Ah, these pines,’ Raisley said on their second walk that way. ‘Very M R Jamesy, my dear. You know his stories? The ones set in this part of the world?’
‘Only The Three Crowns of East Anglia.’
‘By no means the best. You must have read Whistle and I’ll Come to Thee, My Lad?’
‘No, sir. I was just going to, once, only my father borrowed my copy to take away with him to Trieste – whence, as you may know, he did not return. We’d had a very funny afternoon – the last afternoon I ever saw him. But I’m sorry, sir, I’m interrupting you…’
‘Fascination,’ said Raisley. ‘Your last afternoon with your father. Go on, Marius.’
‘He and my mother came and took me out from my School at Sandwich. We went to see a very creepy Norman Chapel, hidden away in a large wood, just off the road between Deal and Dover. My mother told me the legend about it – there’d been some Abbess from a nearby Convent who met her lover there. But now it was dank and ruined, unfit for love any more, and absolutely deserted except for a woman, whom my father saw, all alone in a cape. After the Chapel we went to Deal for tea at Mr Brown’s Restaurant, and my mother made a row because the anchovy toast, which was famous, had run out when we ordered it. But before we went to Mr Brown’s, sir, we went to a lovely second-hand bookshop –’
‘– I know it. Just opposite the Royal Hotel –’
‘– Super place, the Royal Hotel. Almost built on the beach. But not so famous for teas as Mr Brown’s, sir, which is why we went on there from the book shop – where my mother had seen and bought a copy of M R James’ Ghost Stories of an Antiquary.
‘“I’m going to buy you this,” my mother said, “as a memento of the afternoon. And of your first ghost.”
‘“I didn’t see a ghost, mummy.”
‘“Neither did I. But your father did. That woman he told us about – in a cape, near the Chapel.”
‘“What is this rubbish you talk, Isobel my wife?” my father said. He spoke to her like that sometimes, in a Jewy sort of way, as a joke.
‘“No other explanation,” my mother said. “Where did she come from, that woman? Where did she go to?”
‘“There was another car there, Mummy. Under the bank where we parked.”
‘“Yes. But it belonged to that cross-looking man who came walking down the track, from another part of the wood, and drove away in it – alone. So that woman was nothing to do with him.”
‘“Talk about looking cross,” my father said, “that woman in the cape would have won a prize. Cross, resentful, miserable…”
‘“It must have been that Abbess,” my mother said, “the one that used to have it off in the Chapel with the Lord of the Manor. He went away and left her, so she had plenty to be cross about. Though why you saw her,” she said to my father, “and Marius and I did not, is an interesting question. And even if it wasn’t the Abbess,” she said, “this will make a nice present for Marius. They don’t do M R James in single volumes any more, only in nasty collected editions. So this is something of a rarity – and it includes his best story of all – Whistle and I’ll Come to Thee, My Lad.”’
‘But your father borrow
ed the book, you say, and took it off to Trieste?’
A breeze idled through the pines.
‘After tea, sir, on the way back to my school in Sandwich, he asked if he could borrow it. He was in a mood for ghost stories, he said. My mother told him not to be awkward: “I’ve only just given it to Marius,” she said. But when he said that the book would remind him, on the journey, both of me and of her, she gave up her objection straightaway. “Silly old Jewboy,” she said, and leaned over from the driving seat of her Lagonda and kissed him on the ear. That made me happy, sir. And then I was dropped in the school drive…and went off with my friend, Palairet…and my father took the book to Trieste. My mother told me later that she made sure to pack it for him. But we never found it after…after he was taken from us.’
‘He was not taken from you,’ commented Raisley very firmly. ‘He died. He was, in this instance, killed. Never use middle-class euphemisms, Marius. I’m surprised at you.’
‘At any rate,’ said Marius, ‘he went off to Trieste with the book and didn’t bring it back.’
‘So you’ve never read Whistle and I’ll Come to Thee, My Lad?’
‘No, sir.’
‘The story happens in a place near here,’ said Raisley Conyngham. ‘Huns’ton or Brancaster, I’d say, because there is a golf course. A don on holiday finds an antique whistle, buried near a Roman altar on a path over the golf course from the beach to the Dormy House or Hotel. That fits Huns’ton, absolutely. He tries blowing the whistle – and summons Something up.’
‘Summons what up?’
‘You well may ask, Marius.’
The breeze in the pines grew stronger. Surface sand scurried along the beach. Raisley looked towards the sea. A purple cloud was rising in the east.
‘About turn,’ said Raisley. ‘If we don’t loiter we shall have ample time to get back to the Regina before the storm breaks.’
They started back along the path at a steady heavy infantry pace.
‘What was the Something which the don summoned up with the Roman whistle, sir?’
‘No one ever found out. Not precisely. But it was some kind of…energy…that turned ordinary draperies – a curtain, for example, or a blanket – into a prowling figure, a prowling and groping figure, Marius, so that whatever it was it was obviously blind. And a good job too, because the figure had a face of intense malignance. One night a sheet got off the spare bed in the don’s room,’ said Raisley Conyngham, ‘and started groping after the don.’
Marius giggled.
‘Did it find him, sir?’
‘The don’s golfing partner, a colonel from India, came in just in time, in response to the don’s shrieks of terror, and broke it all up. You see, Marius, the energy that transformed the sheet, powerful in posse, was improperly directed, undisciplined. It just vanished as soon as the colonel came in with a candle.
‘Now,’ said Raisley Conyngham as a great portcullis of lightning forked into the sea on his right. ‘Now,’ said Raisley Conyngham again, ‘our problem, yours and mine, is, first, to summon energy, physical, intellectual and moral energy…moral in the sense that, though not necessarily righteous itself, it can move in the sphere frequented by righteousness. All these kinds of energy we must summon. Secondly, we have to make sure, Marius, that the vehicles which we employ our energy to propel do not just grope and grovel blindly and collapse as soon as challenged, but continue on their mission or missions unperturbed.’
‘We must make sure our energy has eyes to command,’ Marius said.
A grumbling blast of thunder moved over the beach.
‘Good. We must also ensure, of course, that whatever vehicle our energy inhabits and drives does not have a malignant or an evil countenance. Because if it does, someone will grow suspicious or frightened, and challenge it. We do not want it to be challenged even if it is equal to a challenge. We want it to proceed unnoticed on its way.’
‘But first we must summon it, sir. Where is our whistle?’
Raisley Conyngham gripped Marius by the shoulder and looked into his eyes. ‘I summon it – thus,’ he said. A single strip of lightning flickered, and was followed by a growl and a clatter.
‘And my vehicle…sir?’
‘Yourself…and such other as you may, from time to time, be instructed to use…or any that, on your own responsibility, you see fit to use. Thus, although you knew nothing of what was to come, you suggested that Milo be a guest in the Lodging of the Provost of Lancaster. You did not know it at the time, but you made of Milo Hedley a vehicle.’
‘What will he do to help us?’
‘He will be tactless, indiscreet and probably boastful; he will cause people to think that he is the energy and others (including you) the vehicles which he chooses; whereas you, Marius, are the energy, summoned by me; and you and I will choose the vehicles. The misconceptions put about by Milo will confuse and obscure those whom we wish confused and that which we wish obscured.’
‘They are not wholly misconceptions, sir. On your showing I am one of the vehicles.’
‘But driven and navigated only by yourself – not by Milo, as he will imply to others.’
‘And whither, sir, am I to navigate?’
‘To Canteloupe’s house in Wiltshire. Think about it, boy, and all that is in it.’
‘I do think about it, sir, and have been for some time. And one of the things that I have thought is that if my lady is brought to bed of a fine boy, then it might be convenient to some that that boy’s elder half-brother, as the world will recognize and rank him, should kiss the world goodnight.’
‘Would you yourself share some such view?’
‘Very probably, sir,’ said Marius. ‘The older boy is horrible and is apparently becoming daily more so. The younger will be my son, and I would therefore wish him a great inheritance, even though I can never claim him.’
‘You are a credit to humanity, Marius, as well as to your tutor.’
As they walked over the old level crossing, the lightning sizzled to earth beyond the pines and the thunder followed it almost instantly.
‘One more thing,’ said Raisley Conyngham. ‘We need a Prime Movement to set the train of events going. Though you are propelling and navigating yourself in your own vehicle, you will need…circumstances…to which you may respond. You will need something to suggest, or even necessitate, your first motion…after which you will readily determine them for yourself.’
‘I think that the man with the whistle should arrange the Prime Movement.’
‘So do I. Only I am to be saved a difficult exercise in judgment, as the Prime Movement will arrange itself. In August, Marius, my lady Canteloupe will be subjected to one of those clever modern tests which will determine whether she is carrying a boy or a girl. As soon as this is known, both her ladyship and the Marquess Canteloupe are going to adopt certain attitudes. If the child is to be a boy, the attitudes are going to be very simple and definite. If not, there is going to be an element of indecision. But either way, Marius, these attitudes will be enough to set you moving, and to point you in the first direction which is to be taken. Until then, get on with your work and your play…of which more presently…and forget the whole matter of the House of Sarum.’
Tessa and Theodosia walked in the Rose Garden of Canteloupe’s demesne.
‘What is that hideous noise, coming from over there?’ said Tessa, pointing in the direction of Cant-Fun, where the proles paid their mite to maintain Canteloupe.
Theodosia explained this. Then, ‘You’re not meant to be able to hear it,’ she said. ‘This place was designed to exclude all sight and sound of Cant-Fun. And it always has done. I can’t hear anything.’
‘You’d be used to it by now.’
‘But I never have heard anything.’
A uniformed nanny approached with a large black pram. ‘Sarum,’ said Thea. ‘Do you want to see him?’
‘Yes.’
Peering into the pram, Tessa saw a wrinkled little satyr with thick do
wn on his chin.
‘Hullo, Tullius,’ she said – for that, she knew, was the satyr’s Christian name.
Tullius did not answer.
‘He’s asleep,’ said the nurse.
‘His eyes are open.’
‘He’s still asleep, miss.’
‘He’s quite well, Daisy?’ said Theodosia to the nurse, who was between ginger and auburn in her colouring, and might, only a few years ago, have resembled Tessa.
‘Quite well, my lady. Even energetic at times.’ Daisy chuckled.
Theodosia did not pursue the topic. ‘That is the heir,’ she said as the pram rolled away, ‘who will be replaced by the child I am carrying.’
‘Replaced?’ said Tessa. ‘But if he is the heir now, he will remain the heir.’
‘Exactly so. Abnormal, as you saw, but perfectly well – even, as Daisy said, energetic at times.’
‘Then how will it all be arranged?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Thea. ‘I simply do what I can to oblige those whom I love. For many years I have loved Canteloupe, in a way: so when he asked me…to conceive a child by another man… I did so. What is to happen to Tully Sarum must be his decision. He ordered the creation of Tullius, out of his first wife and by an old friend, in the same way as he ordered the creation of the new child out of me.’
‘By whom?’ said Tessa. ‘You will tell me? After the promises we have made?’
‘Yes. I shall. By Marius Stern.’
Tessa gave a sudden little skip in her walk.
‘He is only fifteen.’
‘So are you. He was well up to his task.’
‘Then it should be a fine child. I should have been very jealous, once, that Marius should know your body and not mine. That you should know his and not I.’
‘I hated his knowing mine. I hated knowing his.’
‘You were…cold?’
‘If only I had been. He stirred me to the verge of frenzy. That is what I hated. That I should be in danger of losing all control of myself.’
‘But…darling Theodosia. Since I have been here, you have – several times – lost control of yourself. So have I.’
