“Your father tells me you’re interested in the Crystal Palace,” I said. “I expect it’s the monsters you wanted to see—or is it the motor-racing? Or the aircraft?”
“What’s that?” he asked, pointing. His voice was clear and direct; it was a child’s voice and a child’s question, but there was something not at all childish about it.
“That,” I said, “is the South Tower. It was designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel. It’s a water tower, storing water for the fountains.”
He inspected the tower, the Palace, and the gardens in turn as though surveying them.
“Yes,” he said.
The way Paul walked was not quite right. He was too careful, as though he were walking on a slippery surface. His head turned to take in the surroundings, but he did not stare at people, only at the buildings and decorations of the park. Webster bought our tickets and we went through the turnstile into the Park. ‘To The Monsters,’ a sign invited.
“Would you like to see the monsters first?” I asked Paul.
He frowned as though this were a conundrum. I have never met the boy who did not want to see the dinosaurs in the park at once. Paul was a strange boy, but any teacher learns to read the signs. I could tell from the way he looked around that he wanted something, but did not want to tell us.
“Yes,” Paul said at last, and the three of us made our way down past the flowerbeds, moving at the steady pace of the other groups of sightseers who surrounded us.
“Paul’s an expert,” said Webster. “He’s been reading all about geology and fossils and such, haven’t you, Paul? Even made us go and dig up a few fossils.”
“The books aren’t very good,” said Paul.
“I’m sure you’ll be more impressed when you see them in the flesh,” I said.
As we approached the lower park there was a sudden squall of wind from nowhere. A lady in front of me gave a small shriek as her hat blew off, and Webster caught it as easily as he would have taken a mis-hit ball off the leg stump. He passed it back to her with a bow, and I was amazed to see that in the meantime Paul had dropped down and was cowering behind a park bench on his hands and knees.
“The boy’s scared of wind,” explained Webster simply. He took Paul by the hand and helped him up. “Come on, old fellow, nothing to be afraid of here, just a bit of wind. It’s stopped now.”
Paul looked around warily, but allowed himself to be led down to the prehistoric section.
We stopped by the first diorama: a fine pair of Iguanadons. Like the other monsters, they were sculpted at life size and set in among vegetation intended to convey an impression of the Jurassic period. Paul gazed on them, hypnotised, and a faint smile covered his features.
“What do you think of the Iguanodons?” I asked to break the silence at last.
“Not very good,” said Paul. “He’s put the spike on its nose, when it should be on the thumb.”
“Quite right,” I said. “The Victorians were not very advanced when it came to understanding fossils.”
“The shape is wrong. The posture is wrong. They did not go on all fours to walk.”
“Your Paul is quite the expert,” I told Webster. “Most lads his age just gape at them.”
“It’s the wrong colour,” Paul went on. Evidently he thought I wanted a complete review of the model. “It should be light green on top and darker underneath. It should have a covering, like feather down, not bare scales.”
“Feathered dinosaurs!” I said. “Where did you hear that?”
The boy continued round the other exhibits, pointing out some of Hawkins’ more obvious errors. The Victorian sculptor had the Ichthyosaurus basking improbably, and the real Dicynodon was nothing like the giant turtle on display. But Paul also mentioned other extraordinary aspects in the same breath, things I had never heard before, criticising the Pteranodon perched on a rock because it could only fly from an elevated site such as a cliff. He talked as though dinosaurs were everyday things that he was familiar with. I wondered at the richness of this fantasy life.
Unusually, though, this fantasy had none of the usual elements—dinosaur hunts, fierce battles—but was more in the nature of wildlife observation. And it was remarkably accurate and consistent, scientifically speaking.
“You see now what I mean,” Webster said to me quietly while Paul was admiring the Teleosaurus. “He talks like a professor. He never said two words together in front of me before.”
“Perhaps you’d better let me talk to him alone,” I said. “He may be inhibited in your presence.”
“Certainly,” he said. “I do appreciate this, Blake. You’re a real friend in need.”
Webster went off to look at the rose garden while we went to the café. I pointed out Paul’s flapping shoelace and he stooped to do it up with a peculiar knot I had not seen before. He made a loop with each end, pulled them through each other and deftly tightened the knot.
“You’re very handy with your shoelaces,” I said, trying to work out how he did it. “Did you learn that at school?”
“No,” he said, and we walked on to the café.
I sat the boy down at a table and ordered a Knickerbocker Glory and a cup of tea.
There was a family of Cockneys in their Sunday best at the next table— mother, father, and three almost-grown children, two sturdy youths and a brash young woman. They were close, but making so much noise that they would not overhear us.
The waitress smiled as she placed the treat in front of Paul, a towering confection of raspberries, ice cream, and cream with raspberry syrup, topped with a glacé cherry. It was served in an exceedingly tall glass that might have been a vase. The size was deceptive; the glass was thick and the actual quantity of ice cream modest, but it made a great show. Paul looked at it as though inspecting a specimen.
“Now, suppose you tell me what this is all about,” I said to Paul. When he did not reply immediately, I went on. “Your father is worried about you. Perhaps you can tell me why he thinks you’ve changed?”
Paul was looking out the window towards one of the ponds. He seemed distracted. I shifted my approach slightly.
“This is between you and me,” I said. “I won’t tell him anything unless you agree.”
“Mr. Webster and the others live in a small world,” said Paul. “They can’t see beyond it. There’s no point trying to explain.”
“It can seem like that sometimes,” I said. “Sometimes grown-ups are very absorbed in their own worlds and find it difficult to imagine other worlds— like the world of dinosaurs. But I’m a teacher; I’m used to seeing all of history, the whole cosmos.”
I had his attention now.
“Do you believe in life on other worlds?” he asked. It was not the remark I was expecting.
“I suppose I do,” I said. “There are so many stars it’s inconceivable that none of them harbour life.”
“Do you believe in travel between the worlds?”
“Again, looking at the course of human development—from dugout canoes to steam engines to aeroplanes and rockets—it’s hard to believe that we shan’t travel in space.”
“Do you believe in the transference of thought energy?” Paul persisted.
“I’m afraid you’re getting beyond my level of science,” I said with a smile.
He looked away, his gaze directed off into a distant corner of the pond. I feared that I had lost him. I must try something bolder.
“Paul,” I said, in a low voice. “I once experienced something like what you call thought-transference…with a being that was not human. It was the most terrifying experience of my life. Nothing you can say will surprise me, or surpass what I could tell you.”
The memory of that encounter actually made me break out in a sudden sweat. I had not thought about it for months, but there was something otherworldly about Paul that recalled it to me.
He turned to look at me again with that singular, fixed gaze. He did not look at my face but examined the pattern on my tie, his litt
le brow furrowing with concentration.
“I don’t know the right words,” he said. “But you know that a mind might travel across time and space?”
“Why not?” I said. “There are much stranger things known to modern physics.”
He thought for a minute, weighing something.
“Mr. Webster says you’re cracked,” he said carefully.
“Does he indeed?” I felt indignant, angry. I had thought that people no longer remembered the events of nine years ago, that all that had been left behind. But seemingly not. Perhaps someone overheard me talking in my room at night; that sort of thing gets around.
I wondered if my reputation for being ‘cracked’ was what Webster wanted me for: it was his desperate attempt to find someone who could communicate with the boy. Perhaps he was right; boys often feel more affinity for someone who has the status of an outsider than a conventional authority figure like a teacher. But it galled to be called ‘cracked’ to my face by a boy.
“Eat your Knickerbocker Glory before it melts,” I said. He picked up the long spoon, regarded it a moment, and proceeded to excavate the ice cream scoop by scoop. He spoke between spoonfuls.
“There is a race that lived here until fifty million years ago,” he said. “They came before the dinosaurs. They had cities and machines and vehicles.”
“A prehistoric race of men?” I said. “How extraordinary.”
I was flippant, still bitter about his gibe. But I was interested. Now we were getting somewhere. I was going to hear his story, and that would put Webster in my debt. Then I would tell him just what I thought about his tiny little world and whether I was ‘cracked.’
“This race weren’t men,” he said. “And they weren’t like any of the animals today, or like the dinosaurs. More like giant sea-urchins on land. Shaped sort of like cones. They had the power to send their minds through space and time. To swap bodies with other beings in other times and places.”
“Most impressive,” I said. “And how did you discover this remarkable race of pre-human beings? Did you read about them?”
“No,” he said. “I am one.”
It was frightening to hear this spoken with absolute conviction by a small boy.
“This body,” Paul went on, “is Paul Webster. His mind is in my body, seventy million years in the past. A city in what is now Australia, I think. And I am in his body here and now.”
Paul was quite convinced that he was possessed: of that I had no doubt. This was not just a prank. He was either quite mad or affected by something extraordinary.
“You have ice cream on your chin,” I said. He wiped it away with a napkin. When he started eating again, he held the spoon in his other hand.
The medical authorities discourage discussing a mental patient’s delusions with them, as this strengthens their grip. Instead, one should talk about other matters and bring them more back to everyday life. I’m no alienist or psychologist. My distrust of these authorities, after poor Sophie’s experience in so many asylums and institutions, was profound. Madness, or what appears to be madness, may be the result of forces outside the experience of the medical authorities. I decided to confront the delusion and work through to its conclusion.
“In that case,” I said, “can you tell me how we can reverse the process so you both return to your right bodies?”
“Yes,” he said. He seemed pleased. “It’s why I’m here. My journey here didn’t go right. This body is too young. Paul’s brain is small and I can’t think properly with it. I want to go home. I can’t do my job here.”
“Very good,” I said. “We’ll get you sent home and Paul back here. But how?”
“Do you know where the television studios are here?”
“Of course,” I said. Then I remembered his reaction on arriving. “It was the broadcast aerials you were looking at on the South Tower, wasn’t it? The Baird studios are in the Palace buildings. If you like we can see one of their demonstrations.”
“I need to use their…equipment. I can make a thing to send a signal and recall me home.”
“You can make a time machine?” I asked.
“Of course not,” he said. “But I can send a signal. I can make the—the transmitter—from parts in a few hours. I have what is needed.”
“Perhaps your father could buy the apparatus for it?” I suggested. Money was not likely to be an object for Webster.
“No, only a television studio has all the equipment and enough power,” he said. “I studied this.”
“Very well then,” I said, “We will see if we can borrow or rent some apparatus from Baird Broadcasting. And in a few hours you’ll be on your way and we’ll have the old Paul back. Is that it?”
Paul looked at the empty glass with its thick etched pattern and put the spoon down carefully.
“Yes,” he said. “I will send a signal. I will go back there. Paul will come back here.”
“Very well,” I said, and extended my hand. “If I can help you, I will.”
We shook hands solemnly. His hand was small and soft, but his grip was powerful for a boy. He was undoubtedly the strangest boy I had ever met, and I had spent several years in teaching. I had no real idea of how we would proceed, but I trusted to my ability to improvise.
“It’s a pity,” he said, and there was regret in his voice. “The chances of returning here are so bad…but this body is too young to do anything with.”
“In a few years you’ll grow up and you can do anything you like,” I said.
“No,” he said, “there’s not enough time before the—”
He stopped suddenly.
“Before what?” I said.
“It doesn’t matter,” said Paul. “It’s difficult talking through Paul. His brain muddies my thoughts.”
“What were you going to say?” I asked in my crispest school teaching voice.
Paul did not reply for a minute.
“Mr. Webster says you’re cracked,” he said at last. “Nobody else will believe you.”
I was turning things over in my mind. Not enough time before the what? The papers were full of rumours of war and the bombing of cities. A child might well spin it into a fantasy about the end of the world.
“There’s quite a ruckus outside,” said Webster. “Some Blackshirts were handing out leaflets, and they got into a scrap with two constables trying to move them on.”
This was two weeks after the so-called Battle of Cable Street, where hundreds of fascists had tried to march through a Jewish neighbourhood in the East End. They had been decisively trounced by an alliance of local people. The event had done nothing to diminish the Blackshirts’ popularity; in fact, they were more active than ever.
The Cockney family, who had finished their ices, hurried out to see the fight.
“Sorry to break in,” Webster said, looking from me to Paul and back. There was shouting outside now, and the sounds of fighting. Evidently it had turned into a free-for-all with bystanders joining in on both sides.
Paul picked up the leaflet his father had put on the table and turned it over, reading the lurid headings picked out in bold type—’The Jewish Infiltration of Sport’, ‘Bolshevik Threat’, ‘What Britain Needs Now’.
“Paul and I have been talking,” I said. “And I have an idea that might help him, if you’re willing to go along.”
“That’s wonderful,” he said. “Good work, Blake.”
At that moment two Blackshirts hurried in and took the empty table next to us, crouching in their seats so as not to be seen from outside. From their uniforms, one appeared to be a foot soldier from the rank and file; the other had some sort of insignia and was clearly the ringleader. He was a rough character, with a broken nose and a deep scar that ran all the way across his cheek from his lip to his ear. He could have been the villain in a cheap melodrama, but he did have an air about him.
Paul put down the leaflet and stared at them. The Blackshirt officer tried to flag down the waitress, who busied herself a
t the counter.
There was a mutter from somewhere behind him. I made out ‘right pair of clowns’ and someone tittered. A piece of bread roll flew past. Both Black-shirts looked round, the sitting one balling his hands into fists.
“It involves the television studios,” I said. “Paul wants to visit them and use some of their equipment—I really think it will do him some good. But I suppose it’ll take some time to arrange a visit.”
“Time be damned,” said Webster. “We’ll go today.”
The Blackshirt officer noticed Paul staring at him with what might have been wonder and amazement.
“Don’t worry about the scar,” said the Blackshirt, with avuncular goodwill. I could tell he was good with children. He was probably good with everyone: he had that confidence about him which invites easy friendship. “I got it fighting for my country. What’s your name?” He spoke well, with the easy authority of an assumed man of the people. He looked like a thug, but he sounded like a politician.
Paul did not reply. He seemed hypnotised by the scarred man.
“I’ve a daughter just his age,” the Blackshirt said to Webster in the confiding tone of one proud father to another. He had the popular touch, no doubt about it, but there was something disquieting about him too. He turned back to Paul. “I expect you don’t think much of little girls, eh? You prefer football and fighting and running around.”
“I’m interested in human evolution,” said Paul. “The future.”
“So am I,” said the Blackshirt, not put off in the slightest, even pleased at this intelligent response. “We’re all interested in the future, aren’t we? The future of our race is what we’re fighting for. You’re a wise young man—an old soul in a young body. Professor Aveling would like you. Help me, will you?”
Then he raised his voice so the whole café could hear even though he was apparently still addressing Paul.
“You like this uniform, eh? This is the uniform of British Union of Fascists and National Socialists. We’re fighting for a better Britain. This badge here? It’s a swastika, a powerful symbol for the Aryan race.” He raised his arm to show Paul the emblem on his armband. “You know what this is? It’s a bolt of lightning, because like the lightning we fascists will never be contained. Want to try it on?”
The Dulwich Horror & Others Page 21
