The Standing Water

by David Castleton

  But since I’d also been ostracised, I decided I had little to lose. Jonathon and I started with a few furtive conferences in the school field’s far corners, went together to Marcus’s pond. We got bolder. I called at Jonathon’s house; we walked to school together a few times. Davis saw us and reported it to my dad. Dad gave me a good whacking – though with the hand not the belt – but afterwards his attitude softened. After I’d copped a couple more of his, rather half-hearted, wallopings, one day when we were at home Dad said, ‘I suppose if you’re that keen to hang around with the Browning boy, I shouldn’t try to stop you. He’s usually a good lad; maybe that terrible incident was just a one-off. And if I had a brother like him, I’d have been tempted to do the same! But only if he keeps his nose clean mind! If he steps out of line in the slightest and you go on keeping him company, I’ll make sure you won’t be able to sit down for a month! Do you hear me now? Only if he keeps his nose clean!’

  ‘Yes, Dad,’ I said, though I couldn’t work out what nasal hygiene had to do with our friendship. Surely in that long wet spring – which refused to morph into summer – when we were all snuffling with colds, keeping one’s nose spotless was impossible. I told Jonathon and he took to constantly wiping and blowing his hooter, polishing it – in the end – to a beacon glow.

  ‘Aye, make sure he keeps his nose clean and it’s OK with me,’ Dad said. ‘But that brother – have as little as possible to do with that one! He was probably the cause of all this trouble in the first place!’

  All this made me feel a bit sorry for the brother. Craig’s mark refused to disappear, that pink cut stayed on his forehead – a wound which seemed to single him out for endless teasing and punches from the kids, wallopings from Weirton. Jonathon’s brow was still unblemished. It had been so long since his crime, I wondered if it might stay like that. But I suspected that God’s unavoidable justice, the Lord’s implacable revenge was working through its crooked paths, to be ready at the right time to strike down with all its fury on Jonathon.

  The next time I called for Jonathon, I found him squatting on his lounge floor, staring at a massive book which lay open beneath him. He didn’t even notice me when I entered, barely looked up when I spoke. His finger was tracing a column of tiny type, almost as small as that in the newspapers in Davis’s shop. At that column’s head, a bigger word said ‘Robots’. I repeated Jonathon’s name a couple of times, but got hardly any response.

  ‘Oh, you don’t want to worry about him!’ Mrs Browning nodded towards her son as she brought in a tray of milk and biscuits. ‘We don’t pay too much attention to his crazes. First it was set-outs then it was knights – we had to get him toy knives and swords for Christmas, which, come to think of it, I haven’t seen for a while. Lately it’s been robots this, robots that. Doesn’t he get sick of all that metal, all those wires? Give it a few weeks and he’ll be onto something else, banging on about that all the time.’

  ‘When I wasn’t allowed to play with anyone, after what happened with my brother,’ Jonathon said, ‘I was bored so I started looking through our en-cyclo-pedias.’

  Jonathon pronounced the word slowly, but correctly and with some triumph.

  ‘That’s how I got interested in robots.’

  ‘He was pouring over them all the time.’ Mrs Browning put down her tray and pointed at the row of neat heavy books that lined the living room shelf. ‘We decided to buy them because we thought they’d look nice, all those books up there; it’d be a nice decoration for the lounge. Cost a pretty penny, I can tell you. I just hope he doesn’t scuff or damage them with his constant looking through!’

  I glanced at those weighty volumes – they drew my eyes in with their big solemn letters, painted on the spines in pure gold. Maybe that was why they’d been so costly. They looked like wizards’ spell-books. My fingers itched to open them as I thought of the arcane lore their pages could hold. My arms longed to pull one down, but I thought Mrs Browning wouldn’t want me spoiling their arrangement.

  ‘The en-cyclo-pedias are great!’ Jonathon said. ‘You can learn things from them! It’d be nice if we could learn things in school.’

  ‘Listen to the little scholar!’ His mum smiled. ‘You’d better not let Mr Weirton hear you taking like that, or he’ll have your guts for garters!’

  I knew what guts were though I wasn’t sure about garters, but anyway such a punishment sounded hideous – I had images of Weirton gleefully pulling out cords of intestine. Maybe that was what happened to the worst of pupils; perhaps that had been the fate of Marcus and Lucy.

  ‘Just mind you don’t leave those books lying around,’ Mrs Browning said. ‘It was bad enough dealing with your bloomin’ set-outs!’

  Mrs Browning chuntered her way out of the lounge. My eyes drifted down to Jonathon’s book – and soon I was kneeling on the carpet, also trying to decipher those tiny lines stuffed with mysterious words. I was so curious, I eventually had to ask, ‘So, what’s all this about Robots then?’

  ‘I’ll show you in a few moments,’ Jonathon said. ‘When we’ve finished our biscuits and milk, I’ll take you out to my dad’s shed.’

  ‘You should see what he’s got in there.’ A voice spoke behind us, making me leap a little from the carpet. ‘It’s pretty impressive!’

  We looked around – the brother was perched illicitly on the arm of the sofa. I let out a gasp, jumped from my knees into a squat. My body tensed as I prepared for whatever tricks or assaults his mind was concocting. But the brother just calmly stayed on the settee.

  ‘I’ve been working on it for some time,’ Jonathon said. ‘I needed something to do when I couldn’t see anybody. Craig was even helping me a bit.’

  ‘No one wanted to see me either.’ Craig shrugged. ‘I needed some’ut to do n’all.’

  ‘Yeah, I understand.’ I said. ‘Can’t wait to see what you’ve been working on.’

  Our chat continued – my moving lips disguising my shock. I was surprised at the friendliness between the siblings. The brother wasn’t that civilised at school – he’d beaten a few people up recently though they had relentlessly provoked him. Then he’d got thrashed by Weirton, leading to more jeers from the kids, leading to him lashing out again. But here he was different, unlike in the past when he’d hounded Jonathon even in his home. And recently, at school, I recalled, Jonathon hadn’t been on the end of one of his rampages. Perversely, it seemed, since Jonathon had attempted to bump off his brother, Craig’s respect for him had increased. Maybe the brother now knew what Jonathon was capable of, making him more wary. Perhaps he strangely admired the ruthless strain he’d brought out in his sibling. It certainly wasn’t all proceeding according to the Bible’s prophecies. Maybe, as the vicar liked to tell us, God was working His will through some very odd paths.

  ‘Why’s your cut still there?’ I blurted, stupidly raising my finger to my forehead.

  If I expected an eruption from the brother, it didn’t come. He just shrugged, smiled, stroked a fingertip over his wound.

  ‘Guess Jonathon got me with a really good one,’ he said, with even a hint of pride.

  ‘Who knows?’ Jonathon said. ‘Maybe one day you’ll get me back, give me one to match.’

  The brother shook his head, continued to stroke his cut like it was one of the battle scars some people’s granddads boasted about. But I still had faith in the Bible, still knew it wouldn’t be the brother who’d brand the mark of vengeance onto Jonathon.

  Jonathon and I walked out of his house and across the little patch of lawn to his dad’s shed. Jonathon creaked open the door, and we were soon inside that wooden chamber – duskily lit by one grime-caked window, smelling of varnish and old tools. A dirty blanket lay over a table. Jonathon whisked it back.

  ‘Wow!’ I said. ‘You’re making a robot!’

  He’d already done most of one arm – two iron bars connected with what looked like a door hinge. Tangles of wires – red, green, yellow – were heaped at one side. Jonathon said they’d
be ‘nerves and tendons’, whatever those were. A metal wastepaper bin also lay on the table. This would be the head. Jonathon and the brother had cut eyeholes, a mouth, nostrils into it.

  ‘Right now,’ Jonathon said, ‘I’m trying to make the hand.’

  Another book of the encyclopaedia lay next to the bits of robot. I just hoped it wouldn’t get spotted with oil, smeared with grease or Jonathon’s dad’s belt would soon be swinging. It was open on a page that showed drawings of the human hand. I marvelled at the finger bones – so much longer than they looked when encased in flesh. I gawped at the criss-crossing swathes of muscle, the networks of arteries and veins, the delicate hinge of the wrist. I’d no idea our bodies could be so complex. Though I’d learnt a bit from Weirton’s display with Lucy, I’d always thought of humans as little more than fleshy puppets jerked around by the hands of God. But without God, what then? I put my doubts to Jonathon.

  ‘But how would the thing think, move, know what to do if God hasn’t given it a brain or soul?’

  ‘I’ve got an idea,’ Jonathon said. ‘I’ve heard a legend there are these things called computers. I’ve heard people down in London have started getting them and maybe even some of the richer people on the other side of Emberfield. A computer’s like a brain, but it’s made of wires and batteries and electronic things. If I got one, I could stick it in my robot’s head and make it come alive.’

  I nodded, but couldn’t see where Jonathon could get hold of such a gadget.

  ‘This is all very interesting, Jonathon, but why are you building a robot?’

  ‘To kill Weirton, of course!’

  I sucked in breath, my heart started to thud, but I nodded slowly.

  ‘I understand why you hate Weirton; I do too. But are you sure you want to kill him?’

  ‘We need to kill him before he kills one of us! That whacking he gave me on the bridge – I was sure I was gonna die! I was choking, the world was spinning, but he didn’t stop! He just kept on whacking and whacking and whacking me, like he’d lost his mind! I’m sure the same thing happened to Lucy and Marcus. I bet Weirton murdered them – I don’t reckon it was kids anymore!’

  I nodded again – Jonathon’s logic was convincing.

  ‘Course, I haven’t told my parents or Craig that’s why I’m building the robot. But there’s no other way we could kill Weirton – he’s just too strong. But if I make a metal man as big as him –’

  Jonathon mimed mighty hands twisting a huge neck, made a noise to mimic the shattering of bones.

  ‘Yeah,’ I said, ‘better get it done soon. One more year and we’ll be in his class. He can whack us all the time – won’t even have to walk next door to Perkins. You see how many your brother and Darren get!’

  Now it was Jonathon who nodded.

  ‘Only problem is,’ I said, ‘I don’t know how long it’ll take you to finish that thing. And you’ll need a computer – don’t see any of those turning up in our part of Emberfield any time soon.’

  ‘I know.’ Jonathon’s mouth gave a wobble. ‘But this is all I could think of to get rid of Weirton.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ I said. ‘I’ve got a different idea …’

  I explained to Jonathon all – or at least most of what – I’d heard about the gauntlet in the church at Salton.

  ‘Could be easy,’ I said. ‘All we have to do is nick that gauntlet and find a way to slip it on Weirton’s hand! Then he’ll be dead in a few weeks – long before we get anywhere near his class!’

  Jonathon’s tooth nipped his lip.

  ‘Dunno,’ he said. ‘Just think my idea’s more sci-ent-ific.’

  ‘It’s a good idea,’ I said, ‘might just take too long, and one of us could be dead by then! Being dead could be really boring – imagine if I couldn’t draw anymore and you couldn’t read or make inventions!’

  ‘Are you sure this gauntlet thing would work?’

  ‘Positive – I told you what Davis said! And you heard Weirton talk about it in the church! They’re both grown-ups – these aren’t just kids’ legends!’

  ‘So that’s the plan then!’ Jonathon nodded. ‘Just have to work out a way to steal it.’

  ‘Easy,’ I said, ‘just go up there when there’s no service in the church, sneak in and take it!’

  ‘And if it doesn’t work,’ Jonathon said, ‘I could always use it as a hand for my robot. Save me making one. So, in one way or another, that gauntlet will kill Weirton!’

  ‘Guess you could keep on making the robot,’ I said. ‘You know, in case anything goes wrong with the gauntlet. If we can’t kill Weirton with magic, we can always fall back on sci-ence. Though, of course, magic’s much more reliable.’

  Jonathon nodded once more.

  Part Two

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  So here I sit trying to write a novel. There’s something missing, but I don’t know what. I get up from the table, pace around the room. I pick up books, objects from dusty shelves, look at them, put them back. How this room boxes me! But I can’t afford much more, not in London, no way. Thirty-five, shared flat, though in this topsy-turvey city that’s not unusual. I’ll teach English at the language school tomorrow morning to get a few more pennies before coming home and trying to get something done. At least I’m published, I suppose, but the tiny dribbles of cash from the last book have now dried up completely.

  This one, I think, has promise, but there’s still something I need. Perhaps I should get away for a while, out of this maddening city. Fresh perspective, might see what the missing piece of the puzzle is. Somewhere really different – Scotland, Wales, somewhere like that. Clean air to blow away the city fumes that clog my mind. Somewhere quieter without all these metropolitan distractions. Speaking of metropolitan distractions, my knuckles ache, my fingers swell. Late night, too much drink, stuff got started. Left this bloke bleeding on the floor of the pub bogs. Staring up, surprised someone like me could have given him such a wallop. Emberfield special. There are those who think the countryside’s all chiming church bells, skipping lambs, village fetes and cream teas. They’d be shocked so many of us country lads know how to look after ourselves. Like when those four blokes tried to mug me. Went mad, plunged into some weird daze. Woozy memories of smashing heads against walls, crashing my steel-capped boots into bollocks, hearing the snap of ribs. Fucking blood everywhere. Came off badly myself, of course, got a cab to a hospital in a rough bit of town where I knew they’d ask no questions. But those bastards didn’t get my wallet or phone.

  Don’t like myself when I’m like that. Feel it’s not really me. A lot of my friends would be horrified if they knew I had such … characteristics. For them, I’m Ryan: patient, easy-going, a good host, erudite, his bookshelves lined with tomes on myth, foreign novels, poetry. The nice-guy teacher who gently guides his students. And yet, there’s this other side as well. I know violence isn’t the best option. I know plenty of people who’ve talked their way out of muggings, dealt calmly with drunk idiots. But, with me, it’s like I don’t have time to think, something just happens in my brain, some instinct clicks into action and out my fist shoots.

  Maybe that’s why I’m trying to write about Weirton. Far more difficult than I’d reckoned, but somehow I need to do it. Perhaps I’m using this book to purge a part of myself. Maybe writing it will be like performing an operation that will cut a festering cancer from my personality. That bastard! Whatever it is Weirton’s put into me, he’s hammered it in so deeply I’m not sure I can ever get it out. Even so, I’m not as badly affected as some. When I think of how Craig Browning, Dennis Stubbs, Richard Johnson, Suzie Green, a whole lot of others ended up.

  Just wish I could talk to him. Have fantasies of summoning the spirit of Weirton, summoning him back even from beyond the border of the otherworld, forcing him to explain why he behaved the way he did. I wag my head, scatter such futile thoughts from my brain.

  Have to get back to this book while I’ve still got a bit of mental fuel in the tank.
I’m well aware it can run out quickly. I sit down, pick up my pen, concentrate, try to see into the past, try my best to make sense of Emberfield, of my younger self, of Weirton.

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Having made our plan, it took us a couple of weeks to put it into practice. We were encouraged into action by some wallopings from our headmaster: two for me – one, cleverly I have to say, engineered by Stubbs – and three for Jonathon. Swinging as that palm slammed, we felt we were not only grasping for the air that hand hurled out, but grasping to keep hold of the life we could feel ebbing from us with each whack. We really had to do something to stop the teacher. So on a Saturday morning in late June we met by Marcus’s pond. Though we’d had a couple of dry weeks and the pond had shrunk a little, it was still a good-sized disc of deep-looking water. We tossed in some sweets, which were swallowed with satisfied gulps. Jonathon turned to me.

  ‘You first,’ he said.

  I started walking into the pond. Marcus’s mud oozed under my wellingtons, made grasping sucks when I lifted my feet. A stagnant stink floated up, a stench that got worse as my boots churned the matter at the pond’s bottom. My heart banged. Had we done everything to satisfy Marcus? Could I at any moment feel the grab, sweep and tug of hands or tentacles which would pull me forever under? I stumbled, wobbled, the mud went on sucking at my wellies, but apart from this no movement came from below. Yet I couldn’t chase certain images from my mind: Marcus’s slimy head thrust up the day we’d skimmed our stones, the handprint he’d left on Stubbsy after we’d ventured onto his ice. I guessed the fact I was still upright, still breathing Emberfield’s smoky air rather than having filthy water rush down my throat meant Marcus wasn’t angry at us. I waded till the pond was almost level with the top of my wellies. The sullen water sloshed as I turned to face Jonathon.