Wonders of a Godless World

by Andrew McGahan

  The orphan turned away, nearly frantic herself. Madness. More madness than she could bear. Ever since waking this morning, her mind had been wide open to it, leaving her defenceless. The duke and the witch were bad enough, and the archangel worse…now this shrilling anxiety from the virgin. What was happening? Where had this hypersensitivity to other minds come from? And why had it occurred with these four patients—these particular four—most acutely?

  The volcano, it had begun with the volcano.

  The virgin was moaning now, a low, barely audible mew of despair. And the archangel was praying aloud again, fervid, rocking back and forth. He wasn’t a figure of stone anymore, he was a boy and he looked like he was about to cry. He needed help. He was suffering. So was the girl. But the orphan couldn’t help. She didn’t know what it was they needed. But nor could she leave. She felt pinned by their agony and by her own indecision. She was an insect, lanced through by a needle and stuck wriggling to the floor, close to tears, her fists clenched hopelessly.

  Take her hand…

  Had someone spoken?

  Take her hand and put it in his.

  That voice, she knew that voice from somewhere! Too shocked even to think or question, the orphan obeyed. She took hold of the virgin’s hand, and lifted it so that it touched the archangel’s fingers where they clutched the cover of his book. A spark of electricity seemed to flash through the room, a stroke of blue light. And in that illumination the orphan saw the archangel and the virgin staring at each other, their eyes suddenly awake, actually seeing, for real, face to face.

  There was a heartbeat of all-encompassing silence. Then the room was dark once more. The archangel was muttering his prayers again, and the virgin was slumped back on the floor, blind. Everything was the same—except that something was very different. A searing pain had been removed from the air.

  Come here, ordered the voice.

  The orphan rose, unhurried. The pin was gone from her back, the strain and the fear and the confusion. She went down the little hall to the door that led into the furnace room. She opened it, and there in the tiny space, unmoving upon his bed, was the foreigner. His skin shone palely in the dark.

  She remembered it all then. The cold valley, the huddled village, the landslide, the man buried with her under all those piles of rock, the freezing water rising, and finally his escape, torn and bloodied. Every detail of her dream.

  It was no dream, said the foreigner, even though his lips didn’t move and his eyes were shut. It was me. You know that.

  8

  Oh, his voice. It was just as it had been in the dream that was not a dream. So clear. So crisp. A cool breath wafting through her mind, delicious.

  Come closer. Please.

  She complied without hesitation, closing the door behind her, staring at him all the while. His chest rose and fell slightly with his breathing, but nothing about him suggested awareness of her or even consciousness. It was a sign of her own madness, surely, to believe that a man could speak without moving his lips and see with his eyes shut. And yet she had no doubt about where the voice came from. It was the foreigner who spoke, as patently as if he had sat upright and opened his eyes and smiled.

  Yes. But only you can hear me. No one else is special enough.

  Pleasure warmed her. His wonderful voice—it was for her alone. And he had called her special! Not in the way that others did, where special actually meant stupid. No, he meant it in a good way, in an admiring way.

  She took one of his hands in hers, fascinated. She had touched him before, while bathing him or changing his sheets, but he had seemed inert then. Empty. Now she knew that a waking, living presence filled him, and that changed everything. She threw the sheet back and stared, taking in the sight of him, naked and entire. How had she never noticed it properly before? He was quite beautiful. So smooth, so supple…

  But then she was frowning. In her dream the foreigner had shown her a mountain falling, and a young villager caught beneath it. And she remembered that, afterwards, the foreigner had claimed a strange thing—that he was the villager. But when the orphan looked at the figure sleeping in front of her now…

  I know. I look nothing like that man anymore. But that was me, all the same. The beginning of me, and what I became, anyway.

  She believed him implicitly—a voice like his could surely never lie—but even so, a part of her was unsatisfied. The villager had torn his foot away to escape from under the rocks. This man showed no sign of any such injury. Besides, the landslide had been a long time ago. Ninety-two years, he’d said in the dream. That was forever. He should be old. Older than the old doctor even. And yet he wasn’t old…

  Don’t worry. I’ll explain it all. Eventually.

  Again, she could not help but accept this. Somehow, simply, he was young. She had hold of his wrist. She could feel his pulse. It was not erratic or sickly. It was strong and slow and regular. Like his voice. But—another question—why then was he still asleep? His body radiated health, yet it remained limp.

  You can ask me directly. I can hear you.

  And what did he mean by that?

  The foreigner sounded puzzled in turn. You don’t understand ‘directly’?

  No, she didn’t.

  Ah…I should’ve realised. You’re unfamiliar with the use of the first- or second-person modes of address. How extraordinary. But then, why should you be familiar? You’ve never spoken aloud, never had a conversation in your life.

  There was an emotion in his words she couldn’t quite catch. Was it pity? She was searching his body more closely now, running her hands over his hairless skin, looking for the vital wound that kept him sleeping.

  You won’t find anything.

  Then why didn’t he wake up?

  I was hurt. Very badly. Not just in one place, but all over. I’ll have to stay this way for some time yet. While I heal.

  She was confused. Hurt? When the mountain fell on him?

  No. This injury was much more recent, and far worse.

  Worse? But there were no scars on him. No marks.

  You wouldn’t understand it.

  The orphan withdrew her hands. So he was just like everyone else after all—he thought she was slow. And dumb. Someone to be laughed at.

  Regret. No. I’m not laughing at you. I know you’re not slow. On the contrary, you’re unique. You have such abilities. It’s just that you haven’t been taught yet.

  A memory of school flashed through the orphan. Of other children mocking her, of teachers rapping her across her knuckles and shaking their heads in annoyance, of being moved to the back corner of the classroom.

  Those people couldn’t help. But I can.

  The orphan could not stay angry with him. It wasn’t just his soothing words, it was the concern in them. She had never felt anything like it before, another person’s attention focused so intently on herself. Oh, she knew that the old doctor and the nurses cared about her, but they had never concentrated on her like this, never spoken to her so intimately, and offered…

  But what was he offering?

  You’ll see. There’s so much I can show you…

  Like the cold valley of stone? Is that what he meant? She did not want to go back there. And where was that valley anyway? It had felt real, but how could that be? There was no such place on the island, surely.

  Again, there was a bemused pause before the foreigner replied, but this time the orphan felt a sharp sensation of exposure. Not physical; it was a thing of the mind, as if the foreigner was peering inside her head, studying her thoughts and her memories, and nothing could be hidden from him.

  Oh, child. Is it true? You really have no idea that anything exists beyond this little island?

  The orphan bridled. She was no child!

  I’m sorry. You’re right. And it isn’t your fault. How could you be expected to know? Without being able to read, without being able to talk, with even TV and radio unintelligible to you, what could you ever learn of the wider world?<
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  Her anger faded once more, and she was blushing now, ashamed. Child or not, he had seen inside her, and knew exactly how stupid she really was.

  He laughed. I can prove that isn’t true. Take my hand again.

  She looked at his expressionless face. But the laugh hadn’t been cruel, or pitying, or sad. It was a laugh of…promise? She took hold of his hand.

  Now, let’s see…through the door first, I think.

  And suddenly, the room was melting away.

  No, not melting, but the walls were suddenly insubstantial, even though they were made of solid brick. In fact, the orphan had experienced something like it once before. When the volcano erupted, she had looked down into the earth and seen the chamber of molten rock below, as if the layers of stone in between had become as diffuse as a cloud. This was a similar sensation, only much more deliberate. It was happening by choice, not by instinct. It was an act of the foreigner’s will.

  And they were moving. Without standing up, without walking, they were drifting across the room towards the door. One part of the orphan could feel that she was still sitting by the bedside, and that her fingers were still clasped around the foreigner’s passive hand. But another part of her felt cut loose. Weightless. Floating. A shadow self. And that shadow self was being pulled forward by a hand far more compelling. The foreigner was leading her on, a shadow too it seemed, a ghost form with no more substance than mist—but in control of her.

  They passed through the door as if it was a film of water.

  Into the dayroom. There was the archangel, still bent over his book, in prayer. And curled in front of the dead television was the virgin. The orphan felt a stab of concern for them both, but with one look she could tell that the archangel was calmer, his prayers less fervent, and that the virgin’s panic had lessened.

  Don’t worry. They’ve discovered each other, those two.

  The orphan didn’t understand, lost in wonder at what was happening—through walls!—but her guide was already moving on.

  And now, he said, his voice smiling, we go up.

  They lifted, like a gust of wind. The orphan cried out at the thrill of it, and in a blur the ceiling and the roof of the crematorium rushed by, and then they were outside, in blinding daylight, suspended in mid-air, blue sky all around.

  The foreigner was laughing at her amazement.

  You see what you can do?

  She could fly! Or at least, he could, and he was taking her with him, for her hand was still held tightly in his. The initial leap had passed, and they were drifting more slowly now, but upwards yet, beyond the broken crown of the crematorium chimney. For a moment the orphan stared down into its choked funnel, but then they were higher, a whisper of a breeze taking them, and the whole hospital was spreading out below—the back wards, the front wards, the outbuildings, all sleeping dreamily under their grey sheets of ash. A few patients and staff were walking in the grounds, but they were oblivious to the miracle in the air above them, the two impossible birds.

  Ha! The orphan was laughing, or crying with joy, she didn’t know which. They soared higher, away from the hospital and out over the trees, towards the outskirts of town. And how insignificant the town was from the air, a tiny maze of alleyways and red dirt, dwarfed by the jungle and the plantations around it. And how drab it looked, with its rusty tin roofs and junk piles, and everything dirty with ash.

  But they were higher again, and turning away from the town. The orphan realised she could see across a great swathe of jungle—indeed, across a whole flank of the island—and it was clear that the volcano had spewed its debris down just the one valley, and even then the plume had barely reached beyond the town. Past those limits the mantle of ash petered out, and the landscape burst again into vibrant green.

  But they were turning further, coming back around over the hospital, and ahead now was the volcano itself, the summit thrust high above them even yet. It was barely recognisable as the same mountain the orphan knew so well. From down in the hospital grounds the profile of the upper peak was stern and unchanging—but from mid-air the mountain was a far more humpbacked thing, its many ridges flung across the island and its high cliffs staring out with a multitude of different faces.

  And there! High up on the mountainside was a stony ravine from which a thin smoke leaked. It was the site of yesterday’s eruption. But the wind swept them swiftly beyond it. Onwards they rose, to the volcano’s summit now, and finally, either by chance, or at the foreigner’s choosing, they tumbled a bare arm’s reach above the very pinnacle. A single twisted tree grew there, protected and hidden in a hollow. And then the orphan was staring down a dizzying plunge of stone, as the summit fell away again, sheer, into a deep bowl of jungle on the far side.

  And still they ascended, the air beginning to cool noticeably and the wind whistling with a keener tone. The orphan felt as weightless as ever—but now, somewhere in the background, she was also aware of an effort, either within herself, or within the foreigner, or within both of them, and shared through their joined hands. Somehow, this flight was costing them energy, and that energy was not a limitless thing.

  But what did it matter? Even the volcano was dwindling away below them now. And around it, slowly forming itself into a ragged circle of green, the whole island was coming into view. The hospital and the small town were barely distinguishable any longer, lost amid the jungle of the central plateau. But the big town was clearly visible, down on the coast, sitting within its own spider’s web of converging roads. Its streets crawled with antlike people and cars, and its harbour swarmed with fishing boats.

  It was the island as she had never seen it, a view full of astonishing new things. Not the big town, she already knew about that—her mother had taken her there once, for a day. What truly surprised her now was that she could see other towns—places of which she knew nothing. None of them were as big as the big town, and none of them were up on the central plateau like her own, but there were villages all around the coastline, and more farms, and more roads. So many, and she had never even suspected their existence. Why had no one told her before?

  But still the foreigner lifted her, and now the circle of land was shrunken, its coastline fringed with white surf and luminescent reefs, outside of which great ships, much bigger than the fishing boats, plied the water, leaving long wakes behind. And then the orphan’s gaze went to the horizon, and she saw at last, all around, the glittering green sheet that was the ocean.

  So immense, so shining, the waves receding off beyond sight. During that one visit to the big town, the orphan had stood with her mother upon a beach and looked out over the wide water, but she had never conceived, then or since, that it extended so far. Now it seemed that no matter how high they climbed, the ocean would simply unroll forever, wild and deep and dark, and that it was all of the world. But then the orphan caught sight of a shape on the horizon, a smudge of blue. It was an island—another island, far away. And staring in disbelief, she saw another, further on, and then, faintly, another still, the three of them in a line.

  So high now. Her own island was no bigger than an outstretched hand below, and the air was deeply cold. And it was not only effort the orphan could feel, it was something close to pain. But she ignored it. A hunger had awoken in her. If there were more towns than she had known about, and more islands, then what else might she see the higher they ascended? It wasn’t enough any longer to merely be pulled along by the foreigner, she wanted to soar by herself, faster and further. So despite the cold and the pain, she pushed upwards, and the wind shrieked as they rose.

  Sunlight glared at the edges of her vision—but yes, there were more islands out there, and beyond them, a larger, solid mass of land, reaching away unbroken. And something was strange about the horizon now. It wasn’t as straight as it had been before. It appeared to fall away. To curve. But how could that be? What did it mean? A revelation seemed almost within her grasp, and she flew, dragging the foreigner behind her, climbing and climbing, unti
l the shriek of the wind scaled upwards out of hearing and faded away. They were beyond the wind now, and the cold was piercing. Fatal, in fact. There was no way they could have survived if their real bodies were this high, instead of sitting safe in the hospital room below. But their shadow selves lofted onwards, through silence and cold and a pain that was close to agony.

  But yes! The arc of the horizon grew more pronounced, and suddenly the orphan understood that it went full circle and joined together. Why, the world was an enormous ball! All the great landmasses, all the sparkling oceans, all the sweeping bands of clouds—they were curved into a sphere. And the sphere itself was suspended in a glowing sheath of air, beyond which was only a profound and icy blackness.

  Astounding. And beautiful. And so strange that surely no one else had ever imagined it. Oh, but the pain! Its source, she could tell now, was the foreigner. It poured into her through their clasped hands. This was killing him. She had taken him too far, much further than he had meant to take her. They had to go back.

  But even then she could not surrender the vision. The sun was behind them, and as she stared at all the lands and seas glowing in the fierce light, she made another discovery—the ball turned! So slowly that it was not even visible, but her inner senses detected it. The vast sphere was revolving there in its void, rotating the lands on its surface from day into night and into day again. And the weight of that movement staggered her, so much stone and sea and air in perpetual motion. It was worth the agony to behold it just a moment longer, to feel, to wonder…

  And then the pain was too much. Someone, herself or the foreigner, cried out in surrender. Something—strained beyond endurance—snapped. The foreigner’s hand tore loose from her own, and she was alone. She was falling, in spinning silence at first, then the air was howling around her, and the ocean and the clouds and the sun were all tumbling in confusion as the land rushed up from below.

  And then—nothing. Darkness. Heat.