The day following René and Albertine’s departure, Simone and I took Bertrand to the new school-house on Grange Road, where he was auditioned for the King’s College choir. The headmaster and choirmaster together conducted us to the practice room, where they spent a little time chatting with Bertrand, in the most atrocious French, in an effort to put him at his ease. Our presence was permitted throughout the proceedings as being conducive to the boy’s composure.
They gave him a piece to sing at last, a traditional French carol, “Quelle est cette odeur agréable?” It was not a piece I knew, but it was beautiful, and poignant, and I shivered inwardly as I listened to him, to the purity and gravity of that fragile voice.
Quelle est cette odeur agréable,
Bergers, qui ravit tous nos sens?
S’exhale-t-ilrien de semblable
Au milieu des fleurs du printemps?
He sang as if without effort, and when he finished there was silence for a time, and for a little time after that. The choirmaster looked at the headmaster, and there were no words between them, but I knew they had heard what I had heard.
Bertrand had mentioned that at the Cathédrale Sainte-Marie they had chants according to melodies recorded some twenty years ago by Dom Prosper Guéranger, a monk who had refounded the monastery of Saint-Pierre de Solesmes. He had brought with him the music for a part of the Ordinary of the mass, Kyrie, fons bonitatis, pater ingenite, a quo bona cuncta procedunt, eleison, and this, at their request, he now sang in a solemn voice, lingering in long melismae on single syllables, drawing them out in note after note until it seemed each word might last an eternity. And we sat and listened as though an angel had come to the room.
I can hear him still if I close my eyes, his voice is inside me like no other voice. If all else were to be stripped away from me, leaving me naked to my soul, Bertrand’s voice would still remain, full of grace, and moving me to tears.
They did not ask him to sing again. There was no question of turning him away. For a voice like his, they would have sold the rest of the choir to the first college to ask for them. We were quietly happy as we took him home. He was silent, still unsure of himself, still awed by the school and the masters he had met after the practice. His one comfort had been the French master, a little apelike man from Lyons, M. Aristide.
That night we attended choral evensong at King’s. Bertrand, accustomed to the formalities of a Catholic mass, was bemused by the proceedings, but impressed by the high quality of the singing. The chapel itself, its ceiling trembling high above our heads in candlelight, was later pronounced by him to be the most beautiful place he had ever seen, but he did not understand why there were no statues and, above all, no images of Our Lady, for whom he had a child’s devotion. My attempts to explain the origins of our national Church were, I fear, met with incomprehension.
It had been agreed between us that Simone and Bertrand should continue to worship at the Catholic church where we had been married. The priest there, Father Cahill, was a pleasant Irish man who had no objections to Bertrand’s singing in an Anglican choir, but insisted on his regular appearance at mass. Bertrand had been confirmed a few months before his father’s death, and was, so Simone told me, assiduous in attending confession.
It had grown dark by the time we left the chapel. As we did so, I noticed a figure detach itself from the shadows of the Gibbs Building and step towards me. It was Matthew Atherton, and he looked quite ill, much changed from when I had last seen him. He came out from the shadows, as I say, and grasped my hand, and drew me tight towards him, away from Simone and Bertrand.
“Asquith,” he breathed in a harsh voice. He sounded unfamiliar to me, as though he were a stranger. I’ve got to speak to you.”
“What’s all this about?” I glanced round, catching sight of Simone. She stood a few feet away, watching us anxiously, alarmed by this precipitate appearance of a man I had told her I scarcely knew.
“I’ve been trying to find you for days,” he rushed on, breathless, almost hoarse. I could not see him well, for he had pulled me back among the shadows. His face seemed pale, and I noticed a heavy trace of alcohol on his breath. “You’ve not been in your college rooms, and every time I’ve tried your sister’s they’ve told me you’re away, you’re not to be disturbed. Then I thought of asking the porter here. He gave me your new address. Your housekeeper said I’d find you here.”
“What is it, man? What’s wrong?”
“Wrong? I wonder you need to ask.” His hand was still on my arm, clutching it tightly. I could tell he was in the grip of powerful emotions, and I dreaded what he might reveal.
“The shadows,” he said. “What else? Every night now. Sometimes during the day. On the wall, on the floor, always when you least expect them, and then scuttling away when you look at them directly. Sometimes I almost think it’s just a single shadow, that it’s always the same shadow returning. You’ve seen it too, haven’t you, you and your precious little wife? Admit it, why can’t you?”
I tried in vain to calm him, but the more he spoke, the more agitated he became. I was frightened for Bertrand, who must be disturbed by this strange man accosting me.
“Look here,” I said, feeling all the time a sickness in the pit of my stomach that I dared not admit to. This is no good. I can’t make sense of what you’re saying. Try to get a hold of yourself, and I’ll take you back to your college. You can tell me everything there. But first, I’ve got to get my wife and stepson back to Trumpington.”
I don’t know how I managed to shake him off, but after a short tussle I rejoined my family.
“It’s Atherton,” I said. “He’s very upset about something, I’m not sure what.”
“He seems drunk,” said Simone. “Is that true? Is he drunk?”
I nodded.
“Yes,” I said, “he is a little. But more upset than drunk, I think. I’ve said I’ll take him back to college, talk to him about whatever it is, do what I can for him. You’ll have to go back alone, I’m afraid.”
She did not protest. I think she was already afraid of Atherton, of the darkness that seemed to surround him.
“You will not be long?” she asked, and I could sense the thin patina of fear on her voice.
I shook my head.
“Not above an hour, I promise.”
I took them to the front gate, where a fly was already waiting by prior arrangement. Once they were settled and started off, I returned to find Atherton.
He had squeezed himself inside the doorway of the first staircase in the Gibbs Building, where he stood casting his eyes over everything that moved, whether from the chapel to his left or across the lawn in front of him. It was the dead time of day, between evensong and hall. The congregation had gone, and few people were at large in the college grounds. A heavy stillness lay across everything.
Catching sight of me, Atherton came out, and attached himself to my arm as before, making me an anchorage for his fears.
“I can’t spend long,” I said. “My wife will be waiting for me.”
We skirted the lawn and came out on to King’s Parade. From there, I would normally have made my way to Sidney Sussex by way of Bene’t Street, through the market place, and down through Petty Cury. But Atherton would not hear of such a route, preferring instead to stick to the better lighted streets as far as St John’s, turning back there at the top of Sidney Street, and so down to Sidney Sussex.
He was silent for most of our walk, but all the time kept glancing round, as though he saw something in this corner or that. His shambling gait attracted the attention of a few passers-by, but no one known to either of us was among them. I led him thus, like one leading a drunken man home after a party.
Once safely inside his rooms, he locked and bolted the door, and closed the shutters across all his windows. He would not say a word to me until he had done that and assured himself that each of his rooms in turn was empty. Back in the sitting room, he turned the gas-lights up full and sat down at last,
face to face with me in a thickly padded leather armchair that smelled of endless tutorial sessions spent wrestling with Greek verbs.
On a small table beside the chair sat a cut-glass decanter and a heavy tumbler. Atherton proceeded to pour himself half a glass of whisky. He held the decanter out to me, but I shook my head and he set it down again.
“Do you think that’s entirely wise?” I asked.
By way of reply, he drained the glass in a single mouthful. He looked at me defiantly as he put the glass back on the table.
“She’s very pretty, your wife,” he said. “You’re a lucky man.”
“Thank you. I’m sorry I did not introduce you, but—”
“Don’t bother explaining. You must find it shaming to have friends such as me.”
“Come now, don’t be absurd.”
“And the boy too. Her child, obviously. A charming boy, and pretty like his mother . . .” His voice trailed away, and for a brief interval I lost him, as though his mind had momentarily gone in search of something. Memories, perhaps. Likenesses. Other charming boys born of pretty mothers. I realised how little I knew of Atherton.
“Why have you come looking for me?” I asked.
He stirred, coming back from wherever he had been.
“I’ve already told you,” he said. His words came in jerks, as though forced out at intervals by thoughts he was unable to control. “Too many shadows. You don’t see them at first, you can’t . . . not if you’re looking directly at them. Really, they’re all one shadow . . . just one shadow multiplied. Does that make sense? Perhaps it doesn’t . . . in our world. But we aren’t in our . . . cosy little world any longer, are we, Asquith? We’re in . . . his world, we’re . . . his creatures, he makes us what we are. Eh, Asquith? You’ve seen him too, haven’t you? He’s . . . followed you as well.”
For all their stumbling incoherence, his words made the deepest possible impact on me. I had seen the shadow he spoke of, after all—and more than just a shadow.
“Calm down, Atherton,” I said. Tell me exactly what you think you’ve seen.”
He seemed to hesitate, as though my demand for exactitude threatened the imprecision with which he was protecting himself.
“A shadow, don’t you see?” he began at last. “That’s . . . all I thought it was at first. Following me everywhere. I saw it . . . I saw it the first time in the Fellows’ Garden. It wasn’t . . . apparent at first. Not to the naked eye. There was a little . . . sunlight, you see, some . . . shadows from the trees, nothing out of the ordinary. And then . . . I’m not sure . . . out of the corner of my eye . . . a shadow that . . . should not have been there. Do you understand? I . . . don’t know how I knew. I . . . looked away, just briefly, and when I looked back it had gone. I thought it nothing. Just a trick of the light, you see. An autumn shadow, between noon and sunset. But . . . it should not have been there . . .”
“You’ve been under terrible strain,” I said, lamely falling back on the weakest of explanations. The autumn light plays tricks, exaggerates distances—”
“Don’t patronise me, Asquith. Don’t do that, please. I know what I saw. Then and afterwards. I . . . saw it the second time in hall, a shadow moving when the candlelight was still. It was as black as soot, a . . . misshapen thing—but I knew it could take on shape if it wanted. The third time was near this building, at the foot of my staircase, next to Burridge’s room. It was waiting quietly for me to go upstairs. That was last night. I’ve kept it out since then, but I know it’s waiting. Evigilavit adversum te ecce venit.”
He paused, then reached forward and grabbed me hard again by the upper arm.
“You must tell me what to do,” he cried. “You have to help me keep it out.”
I remembered the text he had just quoted, and the lines that preceded it, words blacked out by Edward Atherton: haecdicit Dominus Deus adflictio una adflictio ecce venit; finis venit venit finis; evigilavit adversumte ecce venit. Thus saith the Lord God; An evil, an only evil, behold is come. An end is come, the end is come; it watcheth for thee; behold, it is come.” I shuddered, in spite of my need to preserve what appearances remained to me.
“How long ago is it since you saw him first?” I asked.
“Five days ago, or thereabouts.”
“Then you’re in no immediate danger. There’s nothing I can do for you tonight. This whole business must be tackled at its source. Stay in your rooms. Don’t go out for any reason. I’ll come back in the morning, and we’ll go to Thornham St Stephen together. Lethaby must be made to see reason.”
“Can’t you stay here?” he pleaded.
I shook my head.
“It’s out of the question. I have to think of my family. Don’t worry, the night will pass. Nothing will happen. Nothing will come.”
He remained unconvinced, and I continued to do my best to reassure him. In the end I succeeded enough to make him agree to see the thing through till the morning. He would, I knew, drink himself into a stupor anyway. Had it not been for the shadow I had seen at Ullswater, I might have put it all down to whisky. Even now, I was not sure Atherton had seen more than alcohol-induced phantasms.
He accompanied me to the door, pathetically trusting now, like a dog reassured by a careless master. My mind, I confess, was set more on the problems of finding a cab and getting home than on Atherton and his shadows. I turned as I left, and saw his pale face wedged in the crack of the doorway, his watery eyes fixed on me, as though to hold me to all my promises. Next moment, the face had gone, and I heard the sound of a key being turned hard in the lock.
The staircase was ill lit. I hurried down it and out into the court beyond, barely pausing to look into the shadows at the foot of the stairs, the spot where Atherton had fancied he saw something lurking.
The night will pass. Nothing will happen. Nothing will come.
God forgive me for those words, for the rashness and arrogance of them. Had I not spoken them, all might have turned out differently.
But I had already half forgotten them by the time I reached the open air. I did not look behind me, but scurried out of Sidney Sussex, past the porters’ lodge and into the street. It was dark, there were shadows on the moon, and a cold wind was blowing from across the fens.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Simone fell ill that night. I was awakened around two o’clock in the morning, I’m not sure by what. I remember that I had been dreaming vividly, and not, I think, of pleasant things. It took me some moments, therefore, to recover myself and to come fully awake.
When I did so, I noticed that Simone was breathing heavily, and when I moved towards her, she let out a groan.
“What’s wrong?” I asked. It was pitch dark, and I could see nothing.
“Hard . . . to breathe . . . Tried . . . to wake you.”
I fumbled for a match and lit the candle I always keep by the bedside table. When I brought the light close to her, I could see that Simone was flushed and sweating heavily, her chest rising and falling violently in her efforts to breathe. I rose at once and, waking Ned, sent him at once to Dr Willingham, a local man who attended my sister and her family. His house was not far from ours, and he arrived some twenty minutes later, rather put out to be wakened at such an hour by someone he had not previously met.
He was a bustling man of about forty, stocky, a little overweight, yet elegant in all he did. I thought him daunting at first, for he made it clear the moment he set foot inside the house that he would brook no careless waste of his time. His still, watery eyes betrayed both intelligence and impatience. He was not a man to suffer fools gladly. Nor, I sensed at once, was he a man who would stint in anything could he but save his patient.
His manner changed on seeing Simone, and he set about examining her scrupulously while I relayed questions in French. This took about ten minutes. At the end of this period, Willingham scribbled some notes on a scrap of paper and sent Ned off to his house to fetch various medicines and powders. While we were awaiting Ned’s return, the doctor
took me aside.
“Professor Asquith, I must confess that I am really at a loss to explain your wife’s condition. She has a high fever, her pulse is rapid, and her breathing is abnormally laboured. Has she been under any particular strain recently? Any excitement out of the ordinary?”
I explained that she had been bereaved, and that she and I had only recently married. Willingham shook his head.
“Yes, it’s highly possible that the rapid change in circumstances following a period of mourning may have provoked a nervous reaction. I’ll give her some morphine to steady her nerves. I find it much safer than pure opium or laudanum. She’ll also need something to bring down that fever. Watch her closely for the next few hours. I’ll come back later in the morning.”
I did not close my eyes all night. Soon after the morphine had been administered, Simone fell into a deep sleep. Nevertheless, I did not allow myself to do the same. For the first time in my life, I had someone to watch over. From time to time, if I looked up, I would see shadows in the corners of the room, and for the first time since I was a child, I prayed. Against the gathering darkness, against death, against the loss of what we love.
Bertrand too remained sleepless, although Dr Willingham’s visit had done much to reassure him. The doctor had taken him aside and spoken to him, trying to convince him that all was well, and that his mother would recover soon. I also spoke with him, but I fear I was less convincing, for I shared his fears and dreaded any worsening of Simone’s condition.
Throughout all this, Atherton and his troubles were not forgotten. If I closed my eyes for a moment, I could see him skulking in his room alone, in mortal terror of something he had but partly glimpsed. My own fears, however, were more immediate, and I would open my eyes and gaze down at Simone’s sleeping form, so still on the bed beside me, and so utterly precious.
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