by Ruth Rendell
Ribbon pulled back the curtains. He sat down on the end of the bed, breathing deeply. It was two in the morning, a pitch-black night, ill-lit by widely spaced yellow chemical lamps.What he would really have liked to do was rush across the passage—do it quickly, don’t think about it—into Mummy’s room, burrow down into Mummy’s bed, and spend the night there. If he could only do that he would be safe, would sleep, be comforted. It would be like creeping back into Mummy’s arms. But he couldn’t do it—it was impossible. For one thing, it would be a violation of the sacred room, the sacrosanct bed, never to be disturbed since Mummy had spent her last night in it. And for another, he dared not venture out onto the landing.
Back under the covers, he tried to court sleep by thinking of himself and Mummy in her last years, which helped a little. The two of them sitting down to an evening meal in the dining room, a white candle alight on the table, its soft light dispelling much of the gloom and ugliness. Mummy had enjoyed television when a really good program was on: Brideshead Revisited, for instance, or something from Jane Austen. She had always liked the curtains drawn, even before it was dark, and it was his job to do it, then fetch each of them a dry sherry. Sometimes they read aloud to each other in the gentle lamplight, Mummy choosing to read her favorite Victorian writers to him, he picking a book from his work, correcting the grammar as he read. Or she would talk about Daddy and her first meeting with him in a library, she searching the shelves for a novel whose author’s name she had forgotten, he offering to help her and finding—triumphantly—Mrs. Henry Wood’s East Lynne.
But all these memories of books and reading pulled Ribbon brutally back to Demogorgon. The scaly hand was the worst thing and, second to that, the cloud or ball of visible darkness that arose in the lighted room when Charles Ambrose cast salt and asafetida into the pentagram. He reached down to find the lead on the bed lamp where the switch was and encountered something cold and leathery. It was only the tops of his slippers, which he always left just beside his bed, but he had once again screamed before he remembered. The lamp on, he lay still, breathing deeply. Only when the first light of morning, a gray trickle of dawn, came creeping under and between the curtains at about six, did he fall into a troubled doze.
Morning makes an enormous difference to fear and to depression. It wasn’t long before Ribbon was castigating himself for a fool and blaming the whiskey and the scrambled eggs, rather than Kingston Marle, for his disturbed night. However, he would read no more of Demogorgon. No matter how much he might wish to know the fate of Charles and Kayra or the identity of the bandaged reeking thing, he preferred not to expose himself any longer to this distasteful rubbish or Marle’s grammatical lapses.
A hot shower, followed by a cold one, did a lot to restore him. He breakfasted, but in the kitchen. When he had finished he went into the dining room and had a look at Saul Encounters the Witch of Endor. It was years since he had even glanced at it, which was no doubt why he had never noticed how much like Mummy the witch looked. Of course Mummy would never have worn diaphanous gray draperies and she’d had all her own teeth, but there was something about the nose and mouth, the burning eyes and the pointing finger, this last particularly characteristic of Mummy, that reminded him of her. He dismissed the disloyal thought but, on an impulse, took the picture down and put it on the floor, its back toward him, to lean against the wall. It left behind it a paler rectangle on the ocher-colored wallpaper, but the new bookshelves would cover that. Ribbon went upstairs to his study and his daily labors. First, the letter to Owlberg.
21 Grove Green Avenue
London E11 4ZH
Dear Sir,
In spite of your solemn promise to me as to the correction of errors in your new paperback publication, I find you have fulfilled this undertaking only to the extent of making one single amendment.
This, of course, in anyone’s estimation, is a gross insult to your readers, displaying as it does your contempt for them and for the TRUTH. I am sending a copy of this letter to your publishers and await an explanation both from you and them.
Yours faithfully,
Ambrose Ribbon
Letting off steam always put him in a good mood. He felt a joyful adrenaline rush and was inspired to write a congratulatory letter for a change. This one was addressed to: The Manager, Dillon’s Bookshop, Piccadilly, London W1.
21 Grove Green Avenue
London E11 4ZH
Dear Sir or Madam,
(There were a lot of women taking men’s jobs these days, poking their noses in where they weren’t needed.)
I write to congratulate you on your excellent organization, management, and the, alas, now old-fashioned attitude you have to your book buyers. I refer, of course, to the respectful distance and detachment maintained between you and them. It makes a refreshing change from the overfamiliarity displayed by many of your competitors.
Yours faithfully,
Ambrose Ribbon
Before writing to the author of the novel that had been directly responsible for his loss of sleep, Ribbon needed to look something up: a king of Egypt of the seventh century B.C. called Psamtik I he had come across before in someone else’s book. Marle referred to him as Psammetichos I, and Ribbon was nearly sure this was wrong. He would have to look it up, and the obvious place to do this was the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
Others might have recourse to the Internet. Because Mummy had despised such electronic devices, Ribbon did so too. He wasn’t even on the Net and never would be. The present difficulty was that Psamtik I would be found in volume 8 of the Micropaedia, the one that covered subjects from Piranha to Scurfy. This volume he had had no occasion to use since Mummy’s death, though his eyes sometimes strayed fearfully in its direction. There it was placed, in the bookshelves to the left of where he sat facing the window, bound in its black, blue, and gold, its position between Montpel to Piranesi and Scurlock to Tirah. He was very reluctant to touch it, but he had to. Mummy might be dead, but her injunctions and instructions lived on. Don’t be deterred, she had often said, don’t be deflected by anything from what you know to be right, not by weariness, nor indifference, nor doubt. Press on, tell the truth, shame these people.
There would not be a mark on Piranha to Scurfy—he knew that— nothing but his fingerprints, and they, of course, were invisible. It had been used and put back and was unchanged. Cautiously he advanced upon the shelf where the ten volumes of the Micropaedia and the nineteen of the Macropaedia were arranged and put out his hand to volume 8. As he lifted it down he noticed something different about it, different, that is, from the others. Not a mark, not a stain or scar, but a slight loosening of the thousand and two pages as if at some time it had been mistreated, violently shaken or in some similar way abused. It had. He shivered a little, but he opened the book and turned the pages to the P’s. It was somewhat disappointing to find that Marle had been right. Psamtik was right, but so was the Greek form, Psammetichos I; it was optional. Still, there were enough errors in the book, a plethora of them, without that. Ribbon wrote as follows, saying nothing about his fear, his bad night, and his interest in Demogorgon’s characters:
21 Grove Green Avenue
London E11 4ZH
Sir,
Your new farrago of nonsense (I will not dignify it with the name of “novel” or even “thriller”) is a disgrace to you, your publisher, and those reviewers corrupt enough to praise your writing. As to the market you serve, once it has sampled this revolting affront to English literary tradition and our noble language, I can hardly imagine its members will remain your readers for long. The greatest benefit to the fiction scene conceivable would be for you to retire, disappear, and take your appalling effusions with you into outer darkness.
The errors you have made in the text are numerous. On page 30 alone there are three. You cannot say “less people.” “Fewer people” is correct. Only the illiterate would write: “He gave it to Charles and I.” By “mitigate against” I suppose you mean “militate against
.” More howlers occur on pages 34, 67, and 103. It is unnecessary to write “meet with.” “Meet” alone will do. “A copy” of something is sufficient. “A copying” is nonsense.
Have you any education at all? Or were you one of these children who somehow missed schooling because their parents were neglectful or itinerant? You barely seem able to understand the correct location of an apostrophe, still less the proper usage of a colon. Your book has wearied me too much to allow me to write more. Indeed, I have not finished it and shall not. I am too fearful of its corrupting my own prose.
He wrote “Sir” without the customary endearment so that he could justifiably sign himself “Yours truly.” He reread his letters and paused a while over the third one. It was very strong and uncompromising. But there was not a phrase in it he didn’t sincerely mean (for all his refusing to end with that word), and he told himself that he who hesitates is lost. Often when he wrote a really vituperative letter he allowed himself to sleep on it, not posting it till the following day and occasionally, though seldom, not sending it at all. But he quickly put all three into envelopes and addressed them, Kingston Marle’s care of his publisher. He would take them to the box at once.
While he was upstairs his own post had come. Two envelopes lay on the mat. The direction on one was typed; on the other he recognized the handwriting of his cousin Frank’s wife, Susan. He opened that one first. Susan wrote to remind him that he was spending the following weekend with herself and her husband at their home in the Cotswolds, as he did at roughly this time every year. Frank or she herself would be at Kingham Station to pick him up. She supposed he would be taking the one-fifty train from Paddington to Hereford, which reached Kingham at twenty minutes past three. If he had other plans perhaps he would let her know.
Ribbon snorted quietly. He didn’t want to go, he never did, but they so loved having him he could hardly refuse after so many years. This would be his first visit without Mummy, or Auntie Bee as they called her. No doubt, they too desperately missed her. He opened the other letter and had a pleasant surprise. It was from Joy Anne Fortune and she gave her own address, a street in Bournemouth, not her publisher’s or agent’s. She must have written by return of post.
Her tone was humble and apologetic. She began by thanking him for pointing out the errors in her novel Dreadful Night. Some of them were due to her own carelessness, but others she blamed on the printer. Ribbon had heard that one before and didn’t think much of it. Ms. Fortune assured him that all the mistakes would be corrected if the book ever went into paperback, though she thought it unlikely that this would happen. Here Ribbon agreed with her. However, this kind of letter— though rare—was gratifying. It made all his hard work worthwhile.
He put stamps on the letters to Eric Owlberg, Kingston Marle, and Dillon’s and took them to the postbox. Again he experienced a quiver of dread in the pit of his stomach when he looked at the envelope addressed to Marle and recalled the words and terms he had used. But he drew strength from remembering how stalwartly he had withstood Selma Gunn’s threats and defied her. There was no point in being in his job if he was unable to face resentful opposition. Mummy was gone, but he must soldier on alone. He repeated to himself Paul’s words about fighting the good fight, running a straight race, and keeping the faith. He held the envelope in his hand for a moment or two after the Owlberg and Dillon’s letters had fallen down inside the box. How much easier it would be, what a lightening of his spirits would take place, if he simply dropped that envelope into a litter bin rather than this postbox! On the other hand, he hadn’t built up his reputation for uncompromising criticism and stern incorruptible judgment by being cowardly. In fact, he hardly knew why he was hesitating now. His usual behavior was far from this. What was wrong with him? There in the sunny street a sudden awful dread took hold of him, that when he put his hand to that aperture in the postbox and inserted the letter, a scaly paw would reach out of it and seize hold of his wrist. How stupid could he be? How irrational? He reminded himself of his final quarrel with Mummy, those awful words she had spoken, and quickly, without more thought, he dropped the letter into the box and walked away.
At least they didn’t have to put up with that ghastly old woman, Susan Ribbon remarked to her husband as she prepared to drive to Kingham Station. Old Ambrose was a pussycat compared to Auntie Bee.
“You say that,” said Frank. “You haven’t got to take him to the pub.”
“I’ve got to listen to him moaning about being too hot or too cold or the bread being wrong or the tea or the birds singing too early or us going to bed too late.”
“It’s only two days,” said Frank. “I suppose I do it for my uncle Charlie’s sake. He was a lovely man.”
“Considering you were only four when he died, I don’t see how you know.”
Susan got to Kingham at twenty-two minutes past three and found Ambrose standing in the station approach, swiveling his head from left to right, up the road and down, a peevish look on his face. “I was beginning to wonder where you were,” he said. “Punctuality is the politeness of princes, you know. I expect you heard my mother say that. It was a favorite dictum of hers.”
In her opinion, Ambrose appeared far from well. His face, usually rather full and flabby, had a pasty, sunken look. “I haven’t been sleeping,” he said as they drove through Moreton-in-Marsh. “I’ve had some rather unpleasant dreams.”
“It’s all those highbrow books you read. You’ve been overtaxing your brain.” Susan didn’t exactly know what it was Ambrose did for a living. Some sort of freelance editing, Frank thought. The kind of thing you could do from home. It wouldn’t bring in much, but Ambrose didn’t need much, Auntie Bee being in possession of Uncle Charlie’s royalties. “And you’ve suffered a terrible loss. It’s only a few months since your mother died. But you’ll soon feel better down here. Good fresh country air, peace and quiet—it’s a far cry from London.”
They would go into Oxford tomorrow, she said, do some shopping, visit Blackwell’s, perhaps do a tour of the colleges, and then have lunch at the Randolph. She had asked some of her neighbors in for drinks at six; then they would have a quiet supper and watch a video. Ambrose nodded, not showing much interest. Susan told herself to be thankful for small mercies. At least there was no Auntie Bee. On that old witch’s last visit with Ambrose, the year before she died, she had told Susan’s friend from Stow that her skirt was too short for someone with middle-aged knees, and at ten-thirty informed the people who had come to dinner that it was time they went home.
When he had said hello to Frank she showed Ambrose up to his room. It was the one he always had, but he seemed unable to remember the way to it from one year to the next. She had made a few alterations. For one thing, it had been redecorated, and for another, she had changed the books in the shelf by the bed. A great reader herself, she thought it rather dreary always to have the same selection of reading matter in the guest bedroom.
Ambrose came down to tea, looking grim. “Are you a fan of Mr. Kingston Marle, Susan?”
“He’s my favorite author,” she said, surprised.
“I see. Then there’s no more to be said, is there?” Ambrose proceeded to say more. “I rather dislike having a whole shelfful of his works by my bed. I’ve put them out on the landing.” As an afterthought, he added, “I hope you don’t mind.”
After that, Susan decided against telling her husband’s cousin the prime purpose of their planned visit to Oxford the next day. She poured him a cup of tea and handed him a slice of Madeira cake. Manfully, Frank said he would take Ambrose to see the horses and then they might stroll down to the Cross Keys for a nourishing glass of something.
“Not whiskey, I hope,” said Ambrose.
“Lemonade, if you like,” said Frank in an out-of-character sarcastic voice.
When they had gone Susan went upstairs and retrieved the seven novels of Kingston Marle’s that Ambrose had stacked on the floor outside his bedroom door. She was particularly fond of Evil
Incarnate and noticed that its dust jacket had a tear in the front on the bottom right-hand side. That tear had certainly not been there when she put the books on the shelf two days before. It looked too as if the jacket of Wickedness in High Places had been removed, screwed up in an angry fist, and later replaced. Why on earth would Ambrose do such a thing?
She returned the books to her own bedroom. Of course, Ambrose was a strange creature.You could expect nothing else with that monstrous old woman for a mother, his sequestered life, and, whatever Frank might say about his being a freelance editor, the probability that he subsisted on a small private income and had never actually worked for his living. He had never married nor even had a girlfriend, as far as Susan could make out. What did he do all day? These weekends, though only occurring annually, were terribly tedious and trying. Last year he had awakened her and Frank by knocking on their bedroom door at three in the morning to complain about a ticking clock in his room.Then there had been the business of the dry-cleaning spray. A splash of olive oil had left a pinpoint spot on the (already not very clean) jacket of Ambrose’s navy blue suit. He had averred that the stain remover Susan had in the cupboard left it untouched, though Susan and Frank could see no mark at all after it had been applied, and insisted on their driving him into Cheltenham for a can of a particular kind of dry-cleaning spray. By then it was after five, and by the time they got there all possible purveyors of the spray were closed till Monday. Ambrose had gone on and on about that stain on his jacket right up to the moment Frank dropped him at Kingham Station on Sunday afternoon.
The evening passed uneventfully and without any real problems. It was true that Ambrose remarked on the silk trousers she had changed into, saying, on a slightly acrimonious note that reminded Susan of Auntie Bee, what a pity it was that skirts would soon go entirely out of fashion. He left most of his pheasant en casserole, though without comment. Susan and Frank lay awake a long while, occasionally giggling and expecting a knock at their door. None came.The silence of the night was broken only by the melancholy hooting of owls.
