Red Shift

by Alan Garner

  “You make me angry.”

  “That stockade is pitiful: only the dead suffer by it.”

  “Why are you always right?” John was nearly crying.

  “Not to diminish you.”

  “But you manage.”

  “Stay with us.”

  “Yes.”

  “That is your head.”

  “And where is your heart?” said John.

  “In Basford and Crewe, killing the wolves around my lambs.”

  “Then why aren’t you, for God’s sake?”

  “For God’s sake.”

  “I hope so,” said John, and left the pulpit.

  “A dog that tastes blood must always be put down,” said the Rector. “Mustn’t he, John, or he’ll turn on his own flock?”

  “I’ll best you, one of these days.”

  “But cunning, as well as clever. Heart and head.”

  The church was warm and beginning to stink.

  John moved among the people, smiling, joking, talking quietly with certain men. The Rector took up his sermon as if he had only paused for breath. What he said was not heard, but his voice held the church together.

  John met Margery at the bottom of the tower stair. They had to pass each other.

  “I’m sorry,” said Margery. “For what I said. It was Thomas. Don’t bait him.”

  “Would I?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “And I’m sorry for what I said before we came to church.”

  “No need. It was true.”

  “My head, and your heart—”

  “Best not, John.”

  “—meet in Thomas. Love him.”

  “I do.”

  “For himself, as much as for me.”

  He needed the dark in the tower. The rasp of stone against his hand gave him concentration. When he came onto the roof he was himself. Dick Steele and Thomas were together. Dick lifted a finger.

  “We’ve heard them. A door’s been smashed.”

  “That’s why I said leave a few locked.”

  “We should’ve poisoned the water. We’ve always thought too late.”

  “We’re staying in church.”

  “John?”

  “It’s my order.”

  “But this was where we showed them; both sides!”

  “I remember. But we’re not up to it. We haven’t the means.”

  “So what’s the game?”

  “I don’t know yet. I was too simple. There’s a better way of stopping.”

  Dick Steele held a musket ball. “Lead stops a man,” he said. “I’ll not look further today.”

  “There’ll always be more men. It’s not men we’ve to stop.”

  “Now you’re talking like him!”

  “Chance would be a fine thing! He’s down there, singing his psalms. Yet he’s twice me. I’ve known I must best him for a long while: but I’ve just found what it is I must best. He’s a killer.”

  “Who? Fanny Fowler—?”

  John laughed. “It’s all right. I’m not deaf. And I’ve called him worse. Come on, we’re needed in church. Some of the lads don’t like the news.”

  “I bet they don’t. When you’ve made up your mind you’re going to cock your clogs—”

  “—it’s hard not to,” said John.

  “What must I do now?” said Thomas.

  “Keep watch. Don’t be seen. I’ll send someone to be with you, and we’ll organise the tower. But that musket’s for leaning on, Thomas. You don’t fire it.”

  “About when Madge came—”

  “That’s all right.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “So am I.”

  “You didn’t mean what I thought. I’ve been plundering it.”

  “Give over,” said John. “There are more important things now.”

  “Are there? All right, John.”

  Alone on the church, Thomas looked at Mow Cop. The bare rocks were red with winter sun. They did not move, but when he turned, there seemed to be something. He yawned. He could see it only with the corner of his eye. He knew there was no castle on Mow Cop.

  He heard metal clink. Thomas dropped below the parapet and scrambled round the tower three times before he could stop. He found his musket and used it to support himself. He looked out under the ear of a cat-headed gargoyle.

  The Irish were in the lane at the foot of the Barrow Hill. Some were examining the stockade, dismantled, unfinished, and were laughing. Figures moved in all the gardens, and the noise of breaking furniture began. His own house door was open.

  They had come along the lane like ferrets. Their strategy was not trained: it was natural. As men, they were ragged, without uniform, tired and starved, but they knew a discipline.

  Clothing was important. Some from the houses was already being worn.

  The main force watched the church. They would be able to see the lights and hear the service. They appeared to be relaxed, or too exhausted to care. Thomas heard their voices: his leg trembled on the stone. They were local voices, not the sing-song of tinkers. He focussed his eyes. “John!” But his voice would not speak. He knew the men. They were from Barthomley and Crewe and all the districts around. They had been gone for years, but he knew them.

  His own doorway was blocked. A man came out, but he seemed to be still looking for something, although he wore Thomas’s other shirt, the warm one, his boots and his trousers. He stood in the garden, and Thomas tried to shout. Thomas Venables. Thomas Venables. He gibbered. Mow Cop encircled him, the ruin of its castle clear in the blue and white flashes of the winter sun.

  He slumped in a corner, held his musket upright to stop the tower, but he could still see Thomas Venables in the blue and white light through the sandstone, and all the other things he saw. His fist clenched, and his finger jerked in spasm on the trigger.

  John heard the shot and ran to the stair. Margery came, silent, but as quick. The black, spinning climb broke into the redness of the sun, and opposite the tower doorhead sat Thomas, helpless, his legs straight, the musket pointing to the sky, the powder haze of the shot still in the air.

  Jan waited at the bottom of the Rectory drive. Tom was trying to get away from the Rector’s enthusiasm in the porch.

  “Thank you. Yes. Not at all—”

  “Most gratifying—the curator—extraordinary—congratulated—significant advancement—”

  “Thank you—”

  Jan broke sticks.

  “Any time, any time—keys through the letterbox—”

  “What keys?” said Jan.

  “To the church,” said Tom. “I thought I’d better stand by my original interest in his locked chapel and the monuments.”

  “Why did you have to go and see him?”

  “He’s quite a prominent academic.”

  “So?”

  “I wrote to him. He was helpful.”

  “It sounded as though you’d been the helpful one.”

  “He’s a lonely old man, and a specialist. That doesn’t give him much chance to talk.”

  “Where do you come in?”

  “Through the door,” said Tom. “You asked for that!”

  “Idiot. Two keys?”

  “One’s for the tower, but he says he can never remember which: and the view’s good, if we want to go up.”

  “Why was I kept out of it?”

  “He’d’ve felt obliged to give us coffee or something. I need to be with you.”

  “Can we sit in the church first, like we’ve always done?”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s been the worst gap.”

  “It has.”

  “What do you do with my letters?”

  “Transpose into hieroglyph on the original, and burn the decode. We forgot to change the key words last time, by the way.”

  “I’ve never wanted to write so much. It chews me up. It’s slow.”

  “There isn’t a quicker code I’d dare risk against her.”

  “And I’ve lost Orion
.”

  “I still see him.”

  “It’s the buildings.”

  “He’ll be back in the autumn. Shall we swap to a circumpolar star? They’re always there.”

  “I like Orion.”

  “How’s London?”

  “Fine. And Rudheath?”

  “The usual struggle for destruction. Your parents?”

  “I saw them on television last week.”

  “Great.”

  “Where are those monuments? What’s so special they need to be behind bars?”

  “Graffiti people, I expect. They’re by the chancel.” He unlocked the door.

  In front of them lay a facsimile of a beautiful woman, carved in white marble.

  “ ‘1887.’ I’d like to know why the Victorians were so loathsomely realistic. She doesn’t look dead. It’s more as if she’s dropped in for a kip during the sermon. Perhaps they wanted better mementoes than a photograph.”

  “It gives me the creeps,” said Jan. “The turn of her hand.”

  “Nurse! Where’s your objectivity?”

  “It went out of the window some weeks ago.”

  “These are better. They’d not hurt.” One was a knight in armour, moustaches flowing over chain mail, his feet on a small lion. “Hello, puss.” Tom stroked it. “Yes, it was graffiti that made them lock up. Would you want to hack him about so that your initials proved you were stupid?”

  “It’s only graffiti on bigger graffiti, all trying to say something.”

  “Still, who’d do that to the poor puss cat?” said Tom. “This one over here must’ve been the Rector. I could do with his skirt.”

  “Why?”

  “There’s red paint still in the folds.”

  “Why does that make it relevant?”

  “Tell you later. Perhaps.”

  “I don’t like this chapel,” said Jan. “Go now?”

  “What’s wrong with it?”

  “Perhaps it’s that dead her.”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Perhaps perhaps perhaps perhaps—”

  “It’s life,” said Tom. “There’s flux for you. Continental drift, five centimetres a year, and that—”

  “Do buildings change, or is it us?”

  “Both?”

  Tom locked the chapel. Jan went to sit in a pew.

  “It’s to be expected,” said Tom, “after last time. The pressures. I hardly dared come to Crewe. In case.”

  “I wish, I wish, I wish!”

  “That’s like ‘perhaps.’ ”

  “It’s a good job I couldn’t write it all. All the self-justification, the excuses. They caught up with me.”

  “We’d better change frequency,” said Tom. “This church used to receive. Today it’s transmitting. VHF Radio Barthomley.”

  “I want to get out.”

  “Me too.”

  In the graveyard the sun was shining.

  “Better.”

  “What did you feel?” said Jan.

  “Magnification. I think that place gives as good as it gets. Tom’s a-cold.”

  “I was afraid you might never be again.”

  “You dear twit.”

  They stood in the shelter of the tower, holding each other, rocking with gentleness.

  “I love you,” said Jan.

  “I’m coming to terms with it.”

  “—love you.”

  “But there’s a gap.”

  “Where?”

  “I know things, and feel things, but the wrong way round. That’s me: all the right answers at none of the right times. I see and can’t understand. I need to adjust my spectrum, pull myself away from the blue end. I could do with a red shift. Galaxies and Rectors have them. Why not me?”

  Jan wanted no more than to hold him. His words vented. Meaning meant nothing. She wanted him to let the hurt go. He could talk for ever, but not stop holding her. Each second made him less dangerous. And she’s not even listening. Why can’t I use simple words? They don’t stay simple long enough to be spoken. I have not come to terms with her eyes or the smell of her hair.

  “I love you,” said Jan.

  “I think this key may well fit this lock,” said Tom.

  The tower door opened. It hung badly, and jarred on the floor. A tight stone spiral stair went up to the dark.

  “You first,” said Jan.

  There were slits in the tower, but they made only fogs of light. The steps were narrow and the stone was without holds. Tom and Jan started up as if on rock, using their hands and feet on the steps.

  They climbed to the ringers’ room. A window led to the nave roof, and the bell-ropes hung in nooses. The church clock ticked, and filled the room with its clear sound: the escapement wheel jerked.

  The room above was the belfry. It smelt of grease. The bells were upright, like iron flowers. Tom kept Jan back. “Stay out. They’re set. If you touched them, they could kill you.”

  “Graffiti-people bells,” said Jan. “Even they have to be inscribed: as if they didn’t make enough racket.”

  Peace and good neighborhood attend this parish.

  We were all cast at Gloucester.

  I to the church the living call,

  And to the grave do summons all.

  “Metallic morons.”

  “Dad once tried to get the Noise Abatement Society to work on a Vicar,” said Jan. “We were stuck between a church and a kennels. They shut the dogs up, but didn’t want to know about the Vicar.”

  “What happened?”

  “Dad borrowed a loudspeaker system, nailed it on our roof and linked to the hi-fi. We had Classics on Tuesdays and Pop on Thursdays.”

  “And?”

  “He was prosecuted.”

  “He must have a great sense of humour.”

  “He needs it.”

  The steps were hollowed by use, slippery with twigs and pigeon droppings. There was no more light until they came to the top of the tower. They bent under the low doorhead and stood on the parapet.

  “Quite some view,” said Jan.

  “There’s Mow Cop.”

  They walked round, gradually losing the tension of height.

  “The secret,” said Tom, “is to look at something far away, and bring your eyes closer until you’re used to it. Then the vertical isn’t too bad. Oops.”

  Jan giggled. “Not the best demonstration.” Her hair drifted in the light wind across Tom’s face.

  “I only have to smell your hair to feel as though I’m flying,” said Tom. “I could flap my arms and go. That’s acrophobia.”

  He climbed onto the platform of the doorhead. He was above the crenellations, and only the corner pinnacle of the tower held him.

  “I’m not scared,” he said, “which is why it’s so dangerous.”

  Jan sat on the lead of the roof. It lifted gently from the parapet to the centre, a comfortable angle. “Did you bring the sandwiches?”

  “They’re in my anorak.”

  “I’m starving.”

  He jumped down to her.

  “Was I supposed to react then?” she said.

  “Yes.”

  “How?”

  “I’ve no idea.”

  “You can make Spam: I’ll say that for you.”

  They were out of the wind, in a clear sun. Jan lay back and relaxed. Their hands linked. Sounds were cut off below the parapet. They almost slept.

  “It’s here,” said Jan. “It’s come out of the church, up here: the peace: like squeezing toothpaste. Lead is a receptive metal.”

  “I’m hot.”

  “Take your shirt off.”

  She sat up and began to pull her sweater over her head.

  “Don’t!”

  “It’s all right, grandma: I thought it might be a sunbathing day.” His voice had been too urgent. She kicked at her jeans. “See?” She was wearing a bikini. “Remember when we went to the baths and had to cheat the bus fare?”

  “Yes.”

  She lay back. The warmth of th
e lead drowned her. Silence. No movement. She held Tom’s hand at peace.

  After a long time she heard him say, “You’re being either incredibly devious, irresponsible, callous or blind.”

  “What?” She felt sun-drugged.

  “No wonder we had to keep talking. It’s silence we can’t carry any more.”

  “What?” She shaded her eyes. Tom had not moved. “I don’t understand.”

  “I don’t,” he said.

  “I love you.”

  “You say.”

  “You don’t know?”

  “I know I’m a lap behind.”

  “Dear God—”

  “Someone else.”

  “You can’t be a lap behind when there’s no race.”

  “I’ll not beg.”

  “It didn’t matter,” said Jan, “before. It didn’t matter.

  “That’s right.”

  “You wanted to be with me—”

  “That’s right.”

  “—with me: not accessories.”

  “Yes.”

  “We were growing—”

  “Yes.”

  “—towards everything.”

  “Yes.”

  “Then why spoil?”

  “Fear.”

  “There’s no need.”

  “True.”

  “Then don’t try to make me perfect.”

  “It’s more a question of priorities. I’ll not beg.”

  “You’ll not what?”

  “I’ll not beg.”

  “You’ll not take.”

  “No. But I’ll not beg.”

  “Who talks like that?”

  “What?”

  “That’s not how you talk.”

  “What?”

  “Who?”

  “What?”

  “Who begs?”

  “Every Saturday.”

  “Tom?”

  “I’ve worn cans—”

  “Love?”

  “—since I was eight.”

  She pressed her hands on her eyes.

  “Saturdays and Mess Nights.”

  “Don’t say it.”

  “But you’ve no idea how much a caravan moves.”

  “Is that it?”

  “It comes to that.”

  “I didn’t think.”

  “Oh, yes you did. Bikinis because it might be hot! You’ve a flavour for it. I know!”

  “I love you.”

  “I wish you’d stop.”

  “Listen to me,” said Jan. “Being together: OK? That’s what I mean. That’s what’s new, important. The silences. OK? The bikini was a mistake: but only because I didn’t understand. Don’t cane ignorance. Please. I love you.”