Silent

by David Mellon

  The lone gull circling overhead didn’t seem to notice the long black motorcar passing below; any sound that came from the engine was swept away by the rising wind. The clear sky, so bright and hopeful that morning, had been overtaken by a summer storm. There’d been another car earlier, but the black one now had the road all to itself.

  • • •

  Halick drove as someone who was more accustomed to riding in the back. He hunched up close to the windscreen, his hands gripping tight about the wheel, his dark eyes checking the mirrors.

  “She’s a gentle person, my mother,” said Halick. “Most people don’t appreciate that about her. How many times have I seen her come upon a dead bird or a rabbit caught in a snare. Her eyes fill with tears. Days later she’ll still be going on about it. Of course, she can’t afford to show that side of herself. She is a duchess, after all.”

  Halick glanced into the rearview mirror. Adi, unconscious, was stretched out across the back seat.

  He swerved a little as his attention was drawn back to the road. There was a stone bulwark along some of the more dangerous sections, but it was unlikely that it would stop a car of this size.

  “Which is why . . . by the bye, firefly,” he continued, “I told her not to worry her pretty head about you.”

  “ ‘I’ll put her on the train,’ I said to Mother. ‘With a suitcase full of dresses and a generous wad of cash in her pocket. She’ll forget all about this little adventure of hers and start a new life far, far away.’ ”

  Halick slowed down as he spotted a number of standing stones along the cliffside. Pulling the car into an open patch across the road, he stopped the engine and sat listening to the car’s cloth top thrum in the wind. He looked over the back seat at Adi. She murmured, as in a dream.

  “Anyway,” he said, climbing out of the car, “That’s the great thing about my mother. She’ll believe any crap I tell her.”

  Halick removed his suit coat and hung it neatly over the steering wheel.

  “You see, Mother’s got plans for me. I’ve got plans for me, too.”

  Pulling open the back door, Halick hoisted Adi from the seat with no more trouble than picking up a child.

  “The thing is, the plans all work better with George drunk and bored. Really,” he said, shaking his head, “you weren’t helping there. He’s hardly had a drink since you arrived. I was watching.”

  He carried her in his arms across the road, and stood on the cliff’s edge next to the circle of standing stones looking out over the fogged-in chasm.

  Balancing on one foot, he kicked a rock. It flew high and far before it disappeared into the cloud. “Listen . . . five, six, seven, eight.” There was a distant crack.

  He sat the girl up against one of the stones and straightened her dress.

  The mist was turning to a drizzle. He did his best to pull her hair back from blowing loose in the wind.

  “Doesn’t matter.” He got up, brushing his pants off as he walked back to the car. “Idle chatter, pitter patter, growing fatter . . .”

  The seagull landed on the rocks nearby.

  As soon as Halick turned his back, Adi’s eyes fluttered open. She stared down at her lap, at her hands open upon the rocks. She’d been dreaming about the syrup from the gulab jamun staining the carpet in the library.

  She was still half asleep; her stomach felt as if it might tip over. Lifting her head, she saw before her stone and mist.

  Hearing a sound, she turned her head. There was a black motorcar across a road and some man leaning in to take something from the glove box.

  Halick? Why would Halick be here?

  He came back across the road toward her, removing a large knife from a leather scabbard. He turned the knife about as he walked, studying the gleaming blade with a curve at the tip.

  Adi’s heart heaved.

  She didn’t know if she could get up or stand once she had risen, but she knew she couldn’t outrun this man.

  In another second he would see that she was awake.

  Lowering her head, she shut her eyes and tried to quiet her breathing.

  She heard the whisper of Halick’s footsteps across the grass and then upon the rocks. Through her downcast eyes she made out the tips of his shoes standing before her. Halick dropped the empty leather scabbard on the rocks. It had long fringe and beads decorating the side, as something made by American Indians.

  “Come to watch, stupid seagull?” said Halick. “You do know that’s not a sea down there, don’t you? Come here. We’ll see how well you fly with your wings cut off.” He swished the blade through the air.

  He leaned over to Adi. She was sure he must be able to see her heart pound in her chest.

  “It’s called a Bowie knife. It was given to me by an American friend. Well, someone my mother knew. Named after some American who liked to cut people up with his big knife.”

  He reached around the back of Adi’s neck and pulled her forward, fine rain beading upon her face. His breath upon her cheek. “I know you’re awake,” he whispered. “How stupid do you think I am?”

  The fist-sized rock in Adi’s hand slammed against his head. Dropping the blade, he fell to his knees, howling.

  Adi scrambled to pick up the knife; her fingers closed around the handle. He pushed her hard onto her side and grabbed her wrist to wrench the knife away. Adi scratched at his face with her nails and raised up the blade, shimmering against the dark sky.

  Hard as she could, she slammed the butt of the knife into Halick’s temple. He dropped like a sack of flour on top of her. Unable to move the big man, she lay there gasping.

  “If you use the pointed end,” said a voice from behind her, “you won’t have to keep doing that.” Adi strained to look past Halick’s shoulder.

  Sitting upon the boulder where the seagull had been was Coal.

  Pulling his overcoat tight, he slid down off the rock. He put a couple of fingers to the lad’s neck and checked his pulse.

  “Fortunately for you, you didn’t kill him,” he said.

  Sticking the tip of his black boot in between them, he shoved the young man off of her. The body came perilously close to the edge. Before she could move, Coal leaned down and snatched the knife from her hand. Her eyes grew large.

  “What? You think it’s me you need to be worrying about, with the people you’ve gotten mixed up with?”

  Coal admired the blade for a second, and then tossed it far out over the edge. He grimaced a little as if the motion hurt him.

  Adi sat up, her head spinning, as much from the turn of events as from whatever had rendered her unconscious. She groaned as her stomach pitched.

  Remembering her watch, she felt for it around her neck. Not there! Searching through the grass and rocks she reached the edge of the cliff—and scuttled back from the precipice. There was a break in the fog. She’d had no idea what she had been lying inches away from.

  “Looking for this?” said Coal. Leaning down, he flipped open Halick’s coat and plucked out the watch and chain from a vest pocket.

  But, as if he’d picked up something hot from the stove, he dropped the watch back onto Halick’s chest. He tried to hide his reaction, but it was clear that something about the watch had startled him. Adi grabbed it and looped the chain around her neck. Pulling herself to her feet, she held on to one of the stones and tried not to look at the abyss stretching out before her.

  The rain was coming down harder, darkening the face of the standing stones. Coal reached out his hand and ran a finger around a large circle carved, ages ago, into one of them.

  “An ouroboros,” he said. “That’s what this is called. A serpent, eating its tail. Time without end. You figure you’ve got so much ‘time without end’ that you can play dress-up? And go to parties as if you were on holiday?” He pushed a thumb up under his eyebrow. His face was haggard, his eyes bloodshot. He kicked at Halick. “I should have let him cut you open. I’d be done with you now.”

  Reaching forward, he put his h
and around Adi’s neck. She tried to pull free but backed into one of the stones. He tightened his grip and lifted her from the ground.

  “Maybe I didn’t make myself clear. Those tiresome little brothers, no one is going to find them for you.” Adi clawed at his sleeve, fighting to catch a breath. “But, what difference does it make? You don’t care about them. And nobody in the world cares about you. Your handsome prince. He kissed you and ran away as fast as he could. What about your detective? Surely, he will help? But he’s not going to, Adi. His car went into a ravine and smashed against a rock. He couldn’t even save himself.”

  Coal turned to his right—Adi’s feet swung out over the gorge. The fog coiled up around her as if it might devour her. She’d have cried out if she had been able.

  “Let’s try this again,” said Coal. “This time, with a lesson in gravity.”

  He opened his hand.

  Chapter 20

  Coal looked around the room from his seat at the piano as he played a drowsy version of a ragtime tune called “Breeze from Alabama.”

  The ladies and what was left of the clientele at this hour of the morning were sitting on the plush sofas in the main room of the brothel. Some were dozing, others watched as a tall woman dressed in a man’s suit sketched a portrait of two of the girls, their arms draped about one another.

  A general, not looking well, was leaning on the piano.

  “It’s nothing to brag about,” he boasted. “At Rossignol, Joffre had thirty thousand wounded in one day. Twenty thousand dead. And that was just on our side. One day! Can you imagine?”

  Coal said nothing.

  The general had whiled away half the evening eating and boozing; the rest had been spent here at the brothel. Except for his bloodshot eyes and great ruddy nose, his coloring was startlingly gray. For the last hour or so, he had been hanging on the piano, holding forth on everything from the art of French sausage-making to the different gauges of railroad tracks being the reason Germany hadn’t invaded Russia sooner. But mostly he talked of casualty figures in the war, and his not immodest contribution to them.

  Coal didn’t look much healthier than the general. Yellowish around the eyes, his skin was ashen. In a vest and trousers with a fine white shirt, he played with long graceful fingers, though he seemed to be favoring his left side. His shirt, just at the edge of his vest, showed a wet spot above what was clearly a leaking bandage.

  The general, looking a little dizzy, plopped down next to Coal on the bench.

  “Move over, boy. I’ll show you how it’s done.” He began to play an old-fashioned waltz. Fumbling it badly, he stopped after a few bars, looking around the room.

  “Where’s that whore with my drink?” he said.

  Coal glanced over at him from under heavy-lidded eyes and resumed the jazz tune.

  “I don’t think anyone has ever gone through so many men in one day,” continued the general. “Ever. Napoleon, maybe, coming out of Russia. But that was weather and Cossacks. Not real combat. Not like—”

  “Not like we have these days,” suggested Coal.

  “No. Not like these days.”

  The general stared into space, gave a little cough.

  “Not that you have anything to be ashamed of, General,” said Coal. “For a man who has spent almost no time in real combat, you have managed to kill thousands.”

  The general was drunk but not enough to miss the veiled insult. He looked at the piano player for the first time.

  “What the hell do you know about combat?” he said, his speech slurring.

  Coal played a little trill. “Not a thing, General. I’m only the piano player.”

  “Damn right,” he muttered, pressing into his chest with the palm of his hand, his breath growing more labored.

  “I have heard,” said Coal, “that you managed to shell your own men. An attempt, perhaps, to raise your casualty figures?”

  The general stared hard at the man. “I don’t need to listen to this,” he groaned, pushing his knuckles into his chest. Attempting to stand, he fumbled his fingers along the keyboard; discordant notes soured the tune. He dropped back onto the bench, his hands falling to his sides. Coal caught him as he pitched forward.

  “Come on, General.” He slapped the man’s face a couple of times. “Not just here.”

  Pulling the big man to his feet, Coal walked him over to a wing-back chair in the corner behind a potted ficus and dropped him down into the seat. The general, his eyes bulging, struggled to speak.

  Coal sat on the footstool in front of him and, like a doctor, examined his eyes, first one and then the next.

  “Not looking so good, Ducky.”

  The general choked, “How . . . could you know . . . ?”

  Coal unbuttoned the top of the man’s tunic.

  “That that’s what your sister Colette called you? Oh, I know more than that, Ducky. Poor little Colette.”

  The general shook his head back and forth, struggling to rise.

  “Don’t bother, General. You’re all done with that.”

  The big man gave one last cough. His head fell to the side. Coal checked for a pulse.

  Back over on the couches, the artist was making a great show of applying color to her drawing, slashing at the paper with seeming nonchalance but to great effect. Powder from the pastels cascaded down the front of her vest onto her trousers. No one noticed the piano player and the general in the corner. No one saw Coal push back the man’s head, drop open his jaw, or pull something out of his mouth. They most likely wouldn’t have believed what they were seeing. The poor light. Too many drinks.

  • • •

  Though it was far too long ago to remember the where and when, Coal could still bring to mind his astonishment at seeing the event occur for the first time.

  A woman, not old, he recalled. She’d done something—poisoned her children? Her husband? Along those lines. Careless with the thallium or the potassium cyanide, she followed them sooner than she’d planned. Coal had been about to leave the house when he saw the thing creeping up out of the woman’s mouth: soot black, spider-like, but with too many pairs of legs. It stood straddled over the woman’s open eyes for a few seconds before scurrying away into the dark.

  It was some time before he witnessed this again and longer still before he could understand the type of people, the dark, damaged souls, who were likely to beget such progeny. Before long, he was collecting the things. Every one different, like snowflakes. As the creatures did poorly in company, he began separating them—hence the jars. In what seemed like no time at all, he’d collected so many of them that he was forced to have shelves made and soon entire rooms in his house dedicated to them.

  • • •

  Coal studied the thing he’d extracted from the general’s throat, a centipede with wriggling legs and a pair of dreadful mandibles. It curled and bit at his fingers, crazed at having been exposed to the light.

  Producing a small glass jar from a pocket, he unfastened the lid and coaxed the bug into it. Nearly too large to fit, it coiled like roots in an overgrown pot. Coal fastened the lid.

  Arranging the dead man in the chair to look as if he were sleeping, Coal stepped back over to the piano.

  A young woman in a camisole was there, looking around the room.

  “What happened to the general?” she asked Coal. “I’ve got his drink.”

  Coal sat down. “He’s taking a nap in the corner. He asked not to be disturbed.”

  “Well, what am I supposed to do with—?”

  “Here,” said Coal. “Give it to me, and I’ll play your favorite song for you.”

  Coal took a sip of the drink, put it down on the piano, and started to play a sad melody.

  “That is my favorite song,” she said, marveling at the trick.

  She sat down on the edge of the bench next to Coal and watched his fingers for a moment. She looked up at him.

  “I’m all done for the night, if you wanted—if you felt like . . .” She stopp
ed, noticing the bit of blood leaking through his shirt. She asked if he was all right.

  “It’s nothing,” said Coal. He glanced over at the girl, all huge eyes and sad little mouth. He gathered she was offering herself to him, though he wasn’t sure why; seemed something of a busman’s holiday for her, didn’t it? Who could know what women were about? God knows, not him.

  Coal searched in his mind for the girl. The one he’d lost. He sensed nothing. Not a surprise. In the year and a half since he’d parted company with her, she had been entirely hidden from him. Her and the damned watch. She might’ve died. But he didn’t think so.

  He had been foolish. He knew that if one wasn’t careful in the mist, instead of dropping someone a dozen feet, they would fall all the way down to the bottom.

  He’d gone back later in the day, after he’d attended to Halick. But other than what might have been a spot of blood, he found nothing.

  • • •

  The artist was done with her drawing, packing up her gear. Most of the clientele had gone home. Coal looked over at the girl beside him.

  She smiled sadly and shrugged. He finished the song with a little flourish. It was time to go.

  Chapter 21

  On a day trip to Uttar Pradesh, Adi and her grandmother had come across a young sadhu, a holy man. Sitting under a tree by the river, he wore only a loincloth of saffron and a smear of sandalwood paste across his forehead.

  For Adi, growning up in India, this was a common sight. But for Tillie, on her first trip to northern India, this was mysterious and romantic.

  Motivated by the promise of sweets, Adi had acted as translator. Unclear of the distinction, Tillie had Adi ask questions of the sadhu as if he were a palm reader in a gypsy camp: Would she have a long life? Would she find love and fortune?

  The response was unsatisfactory, as one might expect. Her grandmother, disconcerted but fair-minded, passed a few rupees into the man’s palm for his trouble.

  As Adi bowed and turned to leave, the holy man reached into the cold ash from the fire next to him. Rubbing his fingers together before her, he appeared to produce a tiny gold ring from the dust. He placed it in his palm and held it out to the girl. “How about you, sundarra ladaki (beautiful girl)? Have you no question for me? Or do you already know everything about creation?”