Smoke

by Dan Vyleta

“I can’t.”

  Renfrew nods.

  “You do not lack in courage.”

  He slips a hand into his coat pocket, pulls out a flask followed by what looks like a short, wide belt with a stiff piece of tubing sewn into its leather front.

  “Don’t struggle now.”

  With utmost calm, Renfrew takes Charlie’s jaw into a viselike grip and slips the belt around his head, forcing the tubing between his lips and teeth. Charlie kicks, screams, gags on the tubing; feels a buckle dig into the back of his skull. Beyond Renfrew’s shoulder he becomes aware of Eleanor’s figure standing in the doorway. He wants to make eye contact, tell her not to be afraid, but all he can see is her feet, agitated, rubbing heel on heel. Charlie ceases in his struggles. They are hopeless, and he does not want the child to endure the sight.

  “There,” Renfrew says, “that’s better.”

  He unscrews the flask, upends the cap, and uses it as a measure.

  “Don’t choke, Charlie. You have to swallow. All it is, is salt water. Keep it down, though. If you vomit, you will suffocate.”

  Without the slightest hesitation the Master of Smoke and Ethics pours a measure of liquid down the tubing. An instant later it is in Charlie’s mouth, his whole body rebelling against the shock of salt, stomach heaving, dank brown Smoke drifting from his lips.

  Renfrew removes the gag, disperses the Smoke with the back of his hand, then pours out another measure and quickly drinks it himself, sealing his lips against the spasm of his gag. They stare at one another, teacher and pupil, each mirroring the desperation of the other’s thirst. Beyond his shoulder, Charlie is dimly aware of soundless movement. Eleanor has slipped away.

  At last Renfrew rises from the bed and walks over to the water jug and glasses. He picks up the glasses and carries them over to the night table. The water quivers as he sets it down.

  “Perhaps,” Renfrew croaks, speaking against the rawness of his mouth, “perhaps I have not explained myself sufficiently. Baron Naylor and I, we were once like father and son. We made a pact, long ago, to change the world. But he won’t see me anymore and does not answer my letters. I am fighting for change, Charlie, for virtue. All I need to know is that the Naylors are doing the same.”

  Charlie stares up at his tormentor.

  “I don’t know,” he whispers.

  “Tell me everything,” Renfrew answers, “and we will work it out together.” And then, mournfully, his cracked lips twitching with a hint of bitterness: “Why won’t you trust me, Charlie?

  “Help me,” Renfrew pleads. “Help me, Charlie, to breed out sin.”

  ф

  There is a knock at the front door, loud and insistent, three sharp raps that echo through the house. Charlie is grateful to these raps: they save him from the need to answer. It is quite dark now but for the few rays of light that creep up the stairwell from the downstairs lamp. The room’s floorboards, too, prove porous and are outlined by the faint glow of their cracks.

  When a second set of raps rings through the house, Renfrew rises, straightens his jacket, then turns back before he has reached the door. In the dark Charlie cannot see what he is doing until he feels the smooth circle of the tubing force itself back into his mouth. He is too exhausted to struggle.

  “It is better,” Renfrew says quietly, “if your presence here remains a secret until we have finished our conversation. I will see who it is.”

  A third set of raps hurries him out. The staircase groans under his quick step. A moment later he can be heard opening the door. The floor is so little insulated, each sound carries up with total clarity. It is as though Renfrew and his guest were standing in the darkness, at the far end of the room.

  “Mr. Spencer! This is a surprise. What brings you here, my boy?”

  If Renfrew’s voice is polite though strained, the voice that answers is rich with the practised insolence of master talking to servant. Even behind his gag, salt burning in every cranny of his gums, Charlie flinches at the tone.

  “Master Renfrew! What a perfectly charming cottage this is. Cozy. But won’t you ask me in?”

  “If you wish.”

  “Oh, I do!”

  Two sets of steps, and a dog’s hard-clawed paws: they pass under Charlie’s bed and walk on to the living room, on the other side of the house. From there the voices carry more dully. It’s Julius who does most of the talking.

  “Ah, that’s better. Build up the fire, won’t you, Master Renfrew? The roads have been filthy today, and I am soaked to the bone. And help me out of these boots, if you will.” A moment later he adds: “Tell me, master, is there anybody else in the house? A visitor perhaps?”

  Renfrew does something unprecedented then.

  He lies.

  “No. I am by myself. What brings you here, Mr. Spencer? I must confess it is not the most convenient of times.”

  Julius sees fit to ignore the question.

  “I heard you were living with your niece.”

  “Yes. She is spending the holidays with her grandparents, in Herefordshire. I assure you we have the cottage to ourselves.”

  “No servants, eh? Not even a valet. How awfully squalid. But never mind, it suits us, doesn’t it, this tête-à-tête? Here is the thing, Master Renfrew. I want to talk about Charlie Cooper. He came to you last night. A groundsman saw a ‘beggar’ walk up to your door last night. I happen to know that beggar was no such thing. Did he rush off right away or did he spend the night?”

  “He left at dawn.”

  The voice is confident, unhesitating, impossible to doubt. At the same time Renfrew is speaking loudly, making sure his voice will carry through the floorboards. Charlie wonders what it is about Julius’s appearance that has made such a liar out of the schoolmaster.

  “But tell me, what is all this about, Mr. Spencer? Julius. You are most unlike yourself!”

  “Am I? Well, all it is, I ran out of sweets. Ah, watch you blush with indignation! My family holds the monopoly now. We make the bloody things. Did you really think I would be ignorant of my own affairs?”

  “By rights you should be! You are a minor.”

  “I am nineteen next month and my grandfather’s sole heir. He’s been ailing of late, a growth in his bowels. He won’t see the spring. I think you will see me take my role as head of the household sooner rather than later.”

  There is a pause into which Renfrew interjects something inaudible, the tone low and warning. Julius’s voice, by contrast, is rich with the volume of his arrogance.

  “I believe you are mistaking the situation, Master Renfrew. I am not here as a schoolboy who can be ordered about. I need to know what Cooper has told you; what he has seen. And where he is headed.

  “Have I introduced you to Nótt, Master Renfrew? Isn’t she a beauty? She is out of sorts, I’m afraid. Grouchy. Hasn’t eaten a bite since yesterday. Look at her sniffing around. It’s Cooper’s stink, she’s been primed to it. There, it must be on you, too. Hold still, will you? I’d hate for there to be an accident.

  “Ah, Master Renfrew, don’t clamp up now. You don’t look well, if you don’t mind my saying. All dried up somehow. And don’t worry about your shirt—what of it, a bit of drool amongst friends, it’ll wash out. She has a good nose, though. I bet you she can smell what you had for lunch, all the way through your skin and your intestines. Meat pie, was it? Or perhaps something more frugal. Porridge? God, you really are the most disgusting prude.

  “Cooper, Master Renfrew. Charlie Cooper. What did he tell you, and whom have you told? I warn you. I am not myself these days. Look here, I have acquired a second face. I swear just now, as I was coming in, I could not remember whether I was wearing it or not.

  “You see, Master Renfrew, I find myself at a threshold. No longer one thing, nor yet another. A door has been opened in me, a hole, an abyss. It scared me at first, but I have been sneaking up to its ledge, taking peeks. And what horror, what wonder waits in its depth!

  “But all the same I am afraid, Master Renfr
ew. Afraid of what lies in wait. Help me tonight. Help me remain myself. For another hour, another day. Of all your grim-faced talk of charity, this might prove your one good deed.”

  As Charlie lies there, listening to Julius’s words, it is as though they surround him, standing in the darkness, not a yard away: here, the great bulk of the dog, its snout pressed into the schoolmaster’s waistcoat, a wet spot spreading from button to pocket; there, the head boy, first sprawling insolently in the armchair, then leaping up to march his strange disquiet back and forth between fireplace and door. And, superimposed on this scene, Charlie sees once again the tall, rigid form of his teacher, bending down over him, feeding him salt water.

  Talk to me.

  Help me.

  Why won’t you trust me?

  The hole in the gag affords Charlie but a spoonful of air with every breath. He lies in darkness and breathes hard through the nose.

  ф

  There is a change of light. The room is so dark now that its only features are the window, the door, the subtle leakage of the floor. Even so, Charlie’s senses register the change long before he can actually see her, standing by the side of the bed. Eleanor. The only part of her that has any colour is one eye, the right, which catches the night glow from the window and soaks it up into its green-and-white. She is not looking at him but into the distance. It comes to Charlie that she, too, is listening, straining to understand what is happening beneath their feet. A moment later, her hand slips into his. It happens very naturally, she simply moves forward, and searches the bedding for his palm. Manacled as he is, all Charlie can do is squeeze Eleanor’s fingers with his own. The girl does not respond.

  Again the voice draws them into its spell, softer now, oddly suspended between heckling and wheedling as though two voices were speaking in unison, their timbres matching but their moods at odds.

  “I know what you are thinking, Master Renfrew. ‘This cannot be happening.’ Or: ‘I will report him to my friends in New Westminster. We shall put him on trial.’ I can just see it! A week of debating the principles of liberalism. And then you put a rope around my neck. From reason, naturally, with regret. You might not even show. Do you know, Master Renfrew, that I have lain awake many a night, there in my dormitory bed, wondering what it would take to get you to smoke?

  “But talk, Master Renfrew, talk, I beg you. If you keep to your silence, I must don this mask. We will both smoke then. Is that how it must be? You, my Judas, my Gethsemane? Oh, I love a metaphor these days. It’s the Smoke, speaking in pictures. Look at you frown! I bet you’ve never used a good metaphor in all your life.

  “Please, Master Renfrew! You mustn’t be shy. I am your husband, you are my bride. There can be no secrets between us tonight. Tell me about Charlie Cooper. Tell me what he told you. Tell me your dreams and fears. Please, Master Renfrew, tell me.

  “Tell me, or I must set fire to our souls.”

  Eleanor starts shaking. Charlie feels it between his fingers first, then sees the whole of her bulky shadow, quivering in the darkness above him. At the same time, there begin to issue from her little hiccups of Smoke, one by one, clouding her teeth at every breath. And each time a pellet of Smoke breaks free from her, he can hear rather than see her free hand reaching for her harness, turning the screw upon her chest. After five such turns she staggers. She might squeeze herself to death.

  Charlie tugs at her hand.

  “Don’t,” he attempts to say, “don’t,” through the gag of his mouth, his own smoke shooting through the little pipe in a narrow concentrated jet. A second later he can no longer see her.

  It is then he realises he has begun to cry.

  “You must free me,” he shouts into his gag, “we have to run away,” and all that comes out is the sound of a man chewing his own tongue.

  The girl by his side gives her screw another turn.

  ф

  She undoes the manacles. He is not sure how she has come by the decision, or what it is he might have done to sway her, but all of a sudden, without any announcement or change in her aspect, she bends down to his wrists and works open the restraints, her little hands moving with the dexterity of one familiar with the interaction of buckle and strap. When he is free and has ripped out the feeding tube, the first thing he does is hug her, draw her little body tight into his own, so that the brass wheel of her harness digs itself into his chest and bruises him. She is still smoking and crying, is limp in his arms, soundless, her lips clamped shut against her sin, the Smoke seeping straight from her skin now, from her throat and cheeks and eyeballs, dying her black.

  The second thing Charlie does (holding on to the girl, her stockinged legs dangling freely at his waist) is reach for the water glass and drink. His stomach heaves when the water hits it, but he keeps it down, and a voice drifts through the floor, manic and kneedling, “Tell me, God damn you, tell me!,” answered by a silence more chilling than a scream.

  He must get her out of the house. This is all Charlie knows. He must get Eleanor out of the house and do so quickly, while Julius is distracted and his dog focussed on another task. The window opens easily enough in the room that was his prison, but beneath lies an eight-foot drop onto a ground bumpy with flower pots that he cannot risk, not with the girl clinging to him, fighting for breath against the grip of the harness and her fear. Snow enters the room before he can shut the window again, carried on a gust, along with the cold of the air.

  He turns, walks quietly, his whole body stiff from lying still all day, out into the hallway and the room across. The light shining up from underneath is brighter here, and Charlie makes sure his feet do not stray from the dark squares of two rugs. Renfrew’s bedroom is spartan, holds a cot, a wardrobe, a washbasin, and little else. The living room is close under their feet. The sounds that issue from there have moved into a realm beyond speech. They mingle with the blood pounding in his ears. Charlie tiptoes and times his steps to his heartbeat; to the moans of a man in pain and the low growl of a dog. A snowflake has caught in Eleanor’s eyelash, melts as Charlie’s breath fans across her face.

  The window is veiled in frost, disclosing nothing, but when he lifts it, carefully, quietly, it opens up over the flat roof of a shed cushioned with a foot of snow. He slides the child out first, dives after her. They swim to the edge of the roof, spilling snow. The cold is intense on his face, the roof’s edge draped in ice: it drops them onto a mound of snow at its back. From there they reach the back fence and a row of trees. Two steps bring them around the corner of the house, where a window stands brightly lit, the curtain open. Through the frost-thickened pane little can be seen other than a bit of wall across, the movement of a shadow at its utmost edge; the glow of the fire split into four tidy rectangles by the window’s wooden cross. Then it is as though someone has dumped ink into a water tank: the dark swirl of a viscous cloud takes possession of the room, drowning out the light and covering the pane until it appears to be dripping with darkness. The sound that accompanies the cloud serves to drown Eleanor’s shriek: a single protracted note so shrill it sounds as though it has been cut from Renfrew’s lungs.

  Before Eleanor can shriek again, Charlie has picked her up and fights his way through trees.

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  Perhaps he should go and find Trout. But Charlie’s wrists are sore from being tied, and his throat still raw from thirst. He won’t risk his freedom again, won’t trust another grown man’s judgement about what is right and wrong. And yet the little girl needs shelter, and her uncle needs help; the world a warning about a monster walking in its midst.

  The porter’s lodge has a hut attached to it, too squalid to be called a cottage. It is tucked away at its back, out of view from student eyes, behind a thorn hedge four feet deep. Inside—his feet nearly in the fire, a kettle hanging from a chain by his side, his head tied into a rough scarf against the draft—sits Cruikshank, the porter. He has not drawn the curtain and sheltered as it is by the hedge, his hut’s window remains clear: one can see his dirty bed
and the stacks of dishes by his sink; the crumbling dart board that hangs on one wall next to a shard of black slate that lets you mark the score. They draw close enough to touch the window and study the knotty little figure of the man, immersed in darning his socks. Charlie tries to put Eleanor down, but the girl is clinging to him awkwardly, her harness pressing into his face. Her breathing continues to be laboured. He has tugged at the contraption but has been unable to get it off.

  “Go and knock on the door, Eleanor,” Charlie whispers to the little girl. “That there is Mr. Cruikshank. You must tell him who you are and that your uncle needs help. Tell him Spencer has gone mad. It’s very important that you remember. Julius Spencer. Tell him to tell the headmaster, and to fetch a club or a knife. Can you remember all that?”

  But the girl won’t answer and just keeps clinging to him, each breath a struggle, her lips blue with cold and fear. He wrests her hands free, puts her down gently, walks with her to the door.

  Again Charlie tries to tell her that she must knock and talk to Cruikshank, that he cannot go with her. Again she huddles back into his chest, buries her face there, shivers.

  “Go on,” Charlie pleads with her. “Please. I beg you.”

  She says something in response. To catch it, he has to put his ear to her lips, so close he can feel her breath against its skin.

  “I’m bad,” she says. “I’m bad. That’s why the devil came to our house.”

  Her hand reaches for the wheel on her chest. Charlie has to force it away.

  “You are the best little girl I have ever met,” says Charlie.

  Then he slips off his belt, loops it quickly through her harness and ties her to the door knob before knocking hard against its wood. The girl starts crying as he stumbles away through the bushes, but she does not shout. She may not have the breath to do it.

  ф

  Charlie lingers on the far side of the hedge for far too long, lying flat against its base, hiding in the dark. Julius might have left Renfrew’s cottage by now. He might have seen their tracks (how much has it snowed?) or gone upstairs and realised someone was staying there. His dog might have taken Charlie’s scent. It is madness to linger. He needs to run, lose himself in the snowstorm. Go to London to report to his friends.