I was not certain he was right. ‘There isn’t justice,’ I said. ‘Not like you say there is.’
He gave a faint smile. ‘Look at you, Anselm. Your whole life is before you. What is there to be so bitter about?’
‘Yes, I suppose so,’ I said, because he wanted me to.
He picked up the empty glasses. ‘Another drink?’
‘No,’ I said. The alcohol was clouding my brain, and I wanted to think. ‘Do you remember when we talked about Aldebaran’s last prophecy?’ I said before I could lose my resolve.
Jared set down the glasses very carefully and looked at me. ‘Yes,’ he said.
‘And you said you would pay money for it and so would any political man?’
‘Yes. I remember.’
‘Why would you?’
He sat down. ‘Why? Because it would be the most powerful weapon. There are people who dislike the king. Sawyer as the new chief adviser is not well liked at all. But everyone loved Aldebaran. They loved him to the point of stupidity. And I would pay money for it because other people would pay me more. I am, first and foremost, a trader.’
‘Who would pay you more for it?’
‘Well’ – he shrugged – ’other political men.’
My words were following each other now, though I hardly knew where they would lead. It was like setting out on a road in the dark; I did it with blind faith. ‘How much would you pay?’ I said.
‘Whatever it was in my best interests to pay. The thing is worthless, but not to other people – and that, Anselm, is the first principle of trading.’
‘Why is it worthless?’ I said. ‘I mean to say, if it was a real prophecy.’
‘Good Lord,’ he said. ‘You are not suggesting there is any truth in these old stories? No, it is only worth something while the superstition of the general public is enough to make it so.’
‘Don’t you believe in powers?’ I said.
‘I doubt,’ he said. ‘Because people say they are dying out, and I can’t help thinking that what is dying out is the superstition necessary to believe in them at all.’
‘But if there was a prophecy, people would believe it. You still think so?’
‘I’ll tell you what I think,’ he said. ‘I think it would save this country. I really do. I think it would give people the will to fight back.’
‘Sir,’ I said. ‘Aldebaran was my uncle by adoption. My great-great-uncle, that is. He left us a few things in his will.’
‘Yes,’ said Jared.
‘He left a prophecy to my sister, Jasmine.’
Our eyes held each other for a moment. Then he set down the glasses and lit a cigarette, but I was certain that it was just an attempt to seem nonchalant. He exhaled slowly and said, ‘Are you lying to me?’
‘No.’
‘Because if you are …’
‘I’m not.’
‘Do I trust you?’ I did not answer. ‘I’m not so sure,’ he said. ‘How do I know you are telling the truth?’
‘I can take it to someone else if you don’t want the risk.’
I had learned this trick from Mr Pascal; it was an old and hackneyed method. ‘Five thousand crowns is no risk to me,’ said Jared. ‘It’s not about the risk.’
I shrugged as though it mattered nothing at all to me.
‘I am going to tell you a fact,’ he said. ‘I will say this once only. I work with people who make the Imperial Order look like a brotherhood of monks. I know the gang leaders, the debt collectors, the criminals, all right?’
‘All right,’ I said. Already the plan was starting to taste bitter, and I half wished I had never started it. ‘But you aren’t going to sell it to them,’ I said. ‘You aren’t going to do that, are you? Because if you were—’
‘Lord, Anselm, who do you think I am?’
‘I’m sorry; it’s just—’
‘Right,’ he said. ‘Enough of this. Five thousand crowns.’
I had fixed my face carefully before he named the price, and I did not even blink. ‘What would you do with this prophecy?’ I said. ‘I mean to say, I’m willing to help the king and the government. It’s better than the Imperial Order taking over. But it isn’t really mine to give you, so—’
‘You trust me, don’t you? I have always dealt fairly with you?’
I did not answer.
‘Here,’ he said. ‘I am being generous. Take my hand and make this a bargain before I lose my patience.’
I could have turned and left. But the five thousand crowns already held me like a prisoner’s chains. ‘Go on,’ he said. ‘Just take it.’ I took his hand.
I put the paper on the table. It was strange to see Aldebaran’s writing here in the back room of Jared’s shop; it felt like selling a family member to a gang of thieves. Jared bent his head over it, fixing his expression so that I could make nothing of it. Then he nodded. He went on nodding as he crossed to a safe in the wall and began counting out notes. ‘Go on, take it,’ he said. Our bargain hung in the air for a moment, while the wind and the snow howled around the walls of the shop. Then my fingers took hold of the notes, and the deal was closed.
‘Can I go?’ I said. ‘It’s getting late, and I should get back.’
‘As you wish.’ I turned to leave. ‘Wait,’ he said as I started towards the door. ‘Are you going to walk through the city like that?’
‘Like what?’
‘With that money in your pocket. Here.’ He went to the counter, reached up, and took a pistol down from the rack. ‘Have this.’
‘It’s all right,’ I said.
‘But you must. I insist.’ He took a box of ammunition from under the counter and began loading it.
‘I can’t take it,’ I said. ‘We had a no-guns policy in the shop. I don’t want to go against—’
‘Oh, don’t act so sanctimonious. Look, you can leave the safety catch on if you want to; just take it out if anyone gives you trouble on the way back.’
‘No,’ I said. ‘I really don’t want a gun. I don’t even have a licence.’
‘No one does any more. The police cannot control it. Anselm, it is dangerous to walk about the city without a gun in these days.’
‘People do,’ I said.
‘Listen,’ he said. ‘How far away are the Alcyrian army? Answer me.’
‘Ositha,’ I said.
‘Twenty-five miles. And when they are here, those who can fight will have a better chance. I worry about you – all of you. Maria has no one to look after her.’
‘She doesn’t need looking after.’
‘I have seen invasions,’ he said. ‘I’ve traveled, and I’ve seen them. Every war-torn city on this continent. There will be fighting in the streets. People will raid the houses. You might not want to accept the situation, but it’s here, whether or not you choose to look at it straight. It’s a few miles away, with machine guns and armoured vehicles. All right?’
He held my gaze so that I had to nod. ‘So take the gun,’ he said, and put it into my hand. ‘It’s a Delmar Philippi .45. A good gun. You have heard of that one?’
People sold them at the market for a hundred crowns. I made an attempt to push it back into his hands. ‘I am not letting you walk home with that money unless you take this gun,’ he said.
‘Are you armed?’ I said.
He opened his jacket wearily, as though submitting to a search. He had two pistols and a rusty knife that looked like it could kill. I think it was then that I realized properly I had made a mistake. ‘Listen,’ I said. ‘Maybe this was all a bad idea.’
‘What was?’ said Jared. ‘Our bargain? But I’m afraid it’s made now, and sealed.’ He let his jacket fall again and put the paper with Aldebaran’s writing into the safe. ‘It’s getting late. Just go on home, and we can talk about it another day.’
‘What are you going to do with it?’ I said. ‘I just want to know.’
‘Listen,’ he said. ‘You can trust me. All right?’
I put the gun into my pocket. Ther
e was nothing else to do. ‘Good lad,’ he said, as though I was six years old. Then he raised his hand in dismissal, and I was in the road and running, the pistol thumping against my ribs and five thousand crowns in my pocket. I had known that Jared Wright was dishonest from the start. But I had not thought him dangerous. And now I was not sure. Anyone is dangerous who has no restraint, Leo told me once, when I was a little boy and too small to think him wise. Standing there with those guns in his pockets, Jared had looked like a man who was capable of anything. He had been in Lucien’s government, after all. And Aldebaran’s words were lying there on the table waiting for him to do whatever he chose with them.
I could not hold out beyond the end of Trader’s Row. I turned and ran back to Jared’s shop. The light was still burning. I hammered on the door. But Jared did not answer, and I could not see him through the glass. I only succeeded in waking half the street. The snow was falling harder now. I had no choice but to give up and go home.
I dreamed about Leo that night. He was sleeping on a bunk somewhere in a dark building, among strangers. I could see every detail of his face, the lines that had crossed his skin too early and the grey strands in his hair. I could even make out the letters on the ring on his finger: M. V. A., my mother’s initials. He was turning the ring around as he slept, and I was willing him to wake up. I was willing him, in spite of everything, to come home. I was calling his name when I woke. ‘Leo,’ I was crying. ‘Papa, come back.’ It was like when I lay awake as a small boy and wished and wished he would sense it somehow and wake and come to my side. I knew what I suspected him of, but my heart could not shake him off so cheaply.
I got up and dressed and walked back to Trader’s Row, though it was barely six o’clock and still night over the city. Jared’s shop was in darkness. I sat on the step, wrapped in my overcoat, and watched the birds cling to the skeletons of the trees, waking out of a cold sleep with their feathers ruffled. I was determined to get those papers back. But though I hammered on the door at intervals, and though I sat there over an hour, Jared did not come to the door. I got up and went round the side of the shop and looked in at the window. The shop was in darkness, and the back room stood deserted. Eventually I turned round and went home.
The money weighed heavily on my chest all through that day and the next. On the third, my grandmother said, ‘We really must pay this midwife’s bill.’
I held out for a long time without speaking. We were sitting round the table – Jasmine and my grandmother and me – while she sewed and we pretended to do our homework. ‘How much is it?’ I said eventually.
‘Two hundred crowns.’
I took a few notes out of my jacket pocket, as though that was all I had. ‘Here,’ I said.
My grandmother held the money away from her suspiciously. ‘Where did you get this?’ she demanded.
I had this plan worked out. It had to be something dishonest, because no one ever earned five thousand crowns entirely honestly – and they would know before long that five thousand crowns was what I had, even if I handed it over by degrees. ‘I won this money,’ I said. ‘Playing cards with some of the old traders.’
‘You did what?’ said my grandmother.
‘Won it playing cards.’
‘Gambling, Anselm!’
‘Who has been gambling?’ said my mother from the next room.
‘Your son has, Maria. Honestly!’ My grandmother stormed into my mother’s bedroom. ‘He gave me this money and told me quite boldly that he had won it playing cards.’
‘How much is it?’
‘Two hundred crowns,’ I said. ‘It’s for the midwife’s bill.’
My mother took the notes and studied them. ‘Oh, Anselm,’ she said, and looked at me so tenderly that I had to turn away. My grandmother tutted and marched back into the living room. ‘I suppose I should be scolding you,’ my mother said. ‘But I can’t. I really can’t.’ And she agreed to take the money.
Two days before Christmas Eve, something happened to drive the prophecy and Jared Wright out of my mind. The Alcyrians gave up Ositha and retreated two miles.
The atmosphere in school that day was like a national holiday. Sister Theresa let us leave early, and nearly all the class joined in the national anthem. A weak sun was shining over the city, making the snow glitter in crystals of lilac and blue. I could not remember when we had last seen the sun. ‘Two days until my school play,’ said Jasmine as we crossed the new square. ‘Is Mama coming?’
‘She is still very sick. But she will if she can.’
‘Do you think Papa will come back for it?’
I hesitated. I was uncertain how to answer that.
‘It might happen,’ said Jasmine. ‘Mightn’t it?’
And then my heart stopped. I was certain that I had seen Leo. People were crowding around us on every side, and I caught his cigarette smoke on the air and saw a gold-haired man turn for a second, then vanish among the stalls. I began struggling through the people towards him, dragging Jasmine by the hand. ‘What is it?’ she said. ‘Anselm, I’m getting squashed! Don’t run so fast.’
‘Come on,’ I said. ‘Stay with me. Jasmine, come on!’
The man was walking faster now, towards the edge of the market. We followed him. Jasmine ran beside me, her shawl trailing and her thumb in her mouth. He was several yards ahead, and carts were surging between us.
‘Leo?’ I said. He did not turn. I broke into a jog, trying to keep pace with him. He was almost running now, taking a watch out of his pocket every few steps to check the time. I did not recognize that watch. ‘Leo?’ I said, louder.
The man turned, and his face was wrong. ‘What is it?’ he said. ‘Are you two following me?’
He had an accent like my mother’s employer, a high-class accent. ‘No,’ I said. I could hardly speak for disappointment.
‘You were. I saw you. What are you playing at?’
‘We aren’t playing at anything.’ I took Jasmine’s hand. ‘I thought you were someone else.’
‘Anselm?’ said Jasmine timidly as I turned and pulled her back towards the square. ‘Why did you think he was Papa?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘He didn’t even look the same.’
‘I don’t know what I was thinking,’ I said.
The sun vanished behind a new bank of snow clouds. People hurried towards their houses, and the city grew empty and bitterly cold. The gunfire was clear again, if you stood still and listened. I wondered how long we would keep that meagre two miles of land. When we got home, the answer was in the newspapers. It was already lost.
Jasmine could not sleep that night. I heard her turning over and sighing, a quick impatient sigh like Leo’s. ‘Anselm?’ she said eventually.
‘Yes,’ I said.
‘Will you light the candle?’
I did it. ‘Can’t you sleep?’ I asked her. The clock in the square was chiming twelve.
She shook her head. ‘I’ve done a bad thing, Anselm.’
‘What have you done, Jasmine?’ I said, startled.
She looked at the ground, opening her mouth and closing it again. I could tell she was working up to tell me. Eventually she said, ‘I’ve lost the prophecy Aldebaran gave me.’
My heart turned over. I had been waiting for her to realize that someone had stolen it, but I had never thought she would blame herself.
‘I’ve lost it,’ she said in desperation. ‘I can’t find it anywhere.’
‘How?’ I said.
‘I don’t know. I thought it was in the box, but it isn’t. I must have forgotten to put it back in.’
‘You can’t have forgotten,’ I said.
‘But it’s not there.’
‘Maybe someone took it.’
‘Mama wouldn’t. You wouldn’t.’ She paused, then said, ‘Grandmama?’ I did not answer. ‘But Grandmama wouldn’t know about secret compartments,’ said Jasmine. ‘Unless …’ She frowned. ‘Those Imperial men might have done it. They’re always stand
ing around here, aren’t they?’
‘Are they?’
‘Yes. At night when everyone else is asleep, I get up and sometimes I see them.’
My heart gave a strange jump. ‘When, Jasmine?’
‘Just sometimes.’
‘Yesterday? Or the day before?’
‘Maybe.’ She sighed. ‘Anselm, I shouldn’t have lost that prophecy. I think it was important.’
‘Can you still remember it?’ I said.
‘Yes, of course, but—’
‘That is what matters,’ I said. ‘Uncle wouldn’t have cared about you losing a scrap of paper. The words are what count with prophecies.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes. We studied it at school, when I was at Sacred Heart.’ Before magic grew unpopular and all the great ones vanished. That was when we studied it.
‘Thank you, Anselm,’ she said, as though a burden had suddenly been lifted from her. ‘I’m glad about that.’
I felt like the worst brother in the world. Jasmine got out of bed and went to our box of books in the corner, throwing aside the old shawl my grandmother had laid fastidiously over it. ‘Will you read to me?’ she said.
‘What shall I read?’
‘A story out of the Bible. It’s nearly Christmas, and I want to hear one.’
‘The story of Mary and Joseph going to Bethlehem?’ I said.
She shook her head. She returned with my mother’s old Sunday school Bible, but she did not open it. ‘Anselm, I’m sick and tired,’ she said.
‘What of?’
‘Everything. Everything is going wrong.’
‘Everyone has to go through troubles,’ I said, though I felt the same. ‘And it doesn’t look like it now, but when they are finished again, we will forget about them. When the baby is three or four years old, we will tell him about how he was born in a country at war, and we’ll make it into a story.’
‘Anselm,’ she said. ‘Why hasn’t Papa sent us a letter?’
‘He will.’
‘Mama said yesterday that once the baby is born, we are going to Holy Island. Is that true?’
I did not know. Since that night Jared Wright had taken me to Devil’s Cross, I had hardly spoken to my mother. Jasmine got back into bed, drew the blanket up to her chin, and watched me. With only her grey eyes showing, she looked very like Leo. ‘I keep dreaming that we go to find him but we can’t,’ she said,‘so we just keep walking until we come to the sea. A horrible black sea, with ice all over it, and we can’t find Papa. Then Mama says,“Quick, the baby is going to be born. Where shall we go?” But men with guns come, and they start pushing us into the sea, and—’
Voices in the Dark Page 33
