Creeping Jenny

by Jeff Noon

  The coroner asked her, “There is no question of foul play, in your opinion?”

  “No. None at all.”

  “In both cases?”

  “That’s correct.”

  “What about the scratches on Mrs Sutton’s face? You mentioned this…” There was the sound of paper rustling. “In your report. Many small cuts on the face. There was a similar effect on Mr Bainbridge’s face. Can you explain this?”

  Nyquist waited to hear the doctor’s response. It took a while: “I believe they did this themselves, sir, when they collected the berries.”

  Nyquist doubted this, for he’d seen that the cuts had been recently made. The coroner shared his doubts.

  “That doesn’t sit well with me, Doctor Higgs.”

  She spoke firmly in reply. “The expected symptoms of myre poisoning were evident on both Mr Bainbridge and Mrs Sutton: broken capillaries, crooked fingers, a slight discoloring at each temple. Without a doubt they both died from the same cause.”

  The coroner sneezed, and excused himself. Then he asked, “People don’t often die from eating the berries, isn’t that true?”

  “It is. The last death in Hoxley was seven years ago. But I have treated cases of mild poisoning since then. Two or three berries will cause the body and the senses to slow down. But they taste very bitter. For that many to be swallowed, it takes an act of pure will.”

  “You’re saying they chose to take this action?”

  “I am. Both victims desired death.”

  There was a gasp from the audience. Nyquist couldn’t see the person responsible, but he could guess. Hilda. A gasp, and then a wracking sob.

  The doctor carried on regardless. “They took the berries one by one, or in handfuls, and they kept taking them until the ultimate effect had taken place.”

  “That is your professional opinion, doctor?”

  “It is.”

  “Thank you. You may sit down.”

  After a few more witnesses were called, Nyquist himself gave evidence. He made his way to the stage, helped along by a hand here and there to keep him on course. People were being kind, or perhaps they were simply agog to hear what he had to say. The fret followed him faithfully. By now he had grown used to it, as a dog will to a collar and lead. He was freshly shaved, with new stitches in his side, and a clean bandage. The painkillers that Higgs had given him were working their magic. He spoke the truth as he knew it, first telling the story of Friday night, when he’d heard a scream coming from Yew Tree Cottage, and his finding of the body of Mr Bainbridge, and his wife cowering against the kitchen wall. He described the bowl of berries on the kitchen table, and the corresponding bowl he’d seen in front of Jane Sutton in the classroom, and the stains he’d seen around the mouths of both victims. There were no more questions asked, and Nyquist returned to his seat.

  Finally, the coroner called out to the room for any further witnesses to step forward, if they had anything of import to add. A quivering voice rose out of the cloud: “I have, sir.” The coroner asked the witness to come forward. Nyquist saw him as he walked down the aisle: it was the old man who’d sat on the bench next to him, days ago, the one who had told him the name and address of the photographer. What could this old person have to say? Nyquist leaned forward in his seat, to better hear the man’s voice as it floated in along the swirls of murky air. “I was walking my dog, sir, the summer of this year this would be, in the woods, sir, out by Tatterly Edge, when I spied a couple at their business, sir.” The coroner asked him what he meant by this. The old man resorted to Latin; “In flagrante delicto, sir.” Gasps of surprise and horror went through the hall. But the old man ploughed on. “Among the trees, this was. As Adam knew his wife, Eve, sir.” The coroner interrupted him, to prevent further elaboration, and asked why this was relevant. The witness replied, “The man and woman in question sir, were Mr Bainbridge, sir, and Mrs Sutton. Hard at it–” Now the place erupted. Among the cries and moans, Nyquist could hear the bellow of Gerald Sutton and the long drawn out wail of Hilda Bainbridge. The coroner banged his gavel repeatedly on the tabletop and called out for order. Once the din had quietened, he quickly brought the proceedings to an end, announcing a verdict in both cases of “death by their own hands”, adding, “Possibly – possibly, I say – brought on by matters of a personal nature.” He finished by calling the whole affair a “very sad and cautionary tale.”

  After the inquest Nyquist went back to Doctor Higgs’s house, and they ate a meal together: beef and vegetables in red wine. Their individual frets settled one into the other at the table’s edge. Neither of them spoke much. The food was good. Nyquist had a glass of wine. The alcohol set off purple sparks of light that played in the mist. They acted more like insects than dots of light, these sparkles, flittering about at tangents to each other, and sometimes leaving colored trails in their wake.

  Fireflies, glowbugs. Thoughts made real in the air, possibilities colliding.

  Eventually he had to broach the subject, he could hold off no longer.

  “Perhaps it wasn’t suicide? For either of them.”

  “Nyquist, you heard about the affair they were having. Isn’t it obvious, now?”

  “Listen, doc. What if somebody made them eat the berries, under duress. Or maybe some other force was at play.”

  “You’ll need to explain that.”

  He thought back on what Madelyn Arkwright had told him, of somebody else being present at Ian Bainbridge’s death. “I mean a psychological force of some kind. It’s affecting people in the village.”

  “A shared depression?”

  “Or a spell of some kind. A jinx. Could such a thing take place?”

  “In Hoxley? Anything can happen, for good and for ill. Anything at all. The saints see to that.”

  “The thing is, what if this is just the start? What if more people eat the berries?”

  Higgs didn’t answer him directly. Instead she made an after-dinner pipe for herself and started to speak of the village’s history, as she’d learned it at school. The Tolly Man, the witch trials of the 17th Century, the varied saints as a protective device against evil.

  “But the thing is, there’s another way of looking at it.”

  Nyquist lit a cigarette. “Go on.”

  “Saints have been added over the years, to make up the current three hundred and sixty examples. What if they’re acting as a sort of computation device?”

  He smiled. “You mean like an abacus?”

  She shook her head. “More like a way of forcing us to experience many different kinds of behavior, a lot of it extreme in nature, on a regular basis, year after year. There are patterns in the chaos, but they never coincide, not exactly, due to the random choosing of the saints. Everything is set up to create this vast engine… I can’t think of any other word. And the villagers are the moving parts.”

  Nyquist thought about what she was saying. It was a surprising idea. “And where does all this lead?”

  “Who can tell? The engine of the saints has been running now for centuries. There must be an outcome at some point, and perhaps quite soon.”

  “I’m not sure I want to be around when that happens.”

  “Some might actively seek it.”

  “You know, Professor Bryars said something similar.”

  The doctor’s eyes perked up. “Did she?”

  “She claimed that a number of the villagers are seeking to bring back the spirit of the Clud family. The dark spirit.”

  “Oh, she’ll have us sacrificing animals soon enough, that one! Honestly, her mind takes such a fancy, it really does.”

  Nyquist left it there. He asked, “How are they chosen?”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “How are the saints chosen for each day?”

  “I can’t tell you, truly. Perhaps they draw lots? Or a pebble is chosen from a bowl.”

  “You really don’t know?”

  The doctor shook her head. “It is a private ceremony, performed each mor
ning.”

  “Can it be manipulated? So that a certain saint–”

  “No! No, no.” Her face grew quite livid. “That isn’t possible, not at all. Why, our entire way of life would be at risk! How could you even suggest such a thing?”

  Nyquist nodded. He gestured to the two frets that lingered around the table, asking, “How does this work?”

  Higgs lingered over her pipe and then answered, “All living bodies are surrounded by the fret, and are a natural part of it. Just as the fret is part of them, inseparable. But only in this village, on this day, is it visible. Glory be to Saint Athelstan in his wisdom.”

  He studied her face for signs of humor, or craziness.

  “What’s wrong? Don’t you believe me?”

  He smiled. “You know, I have seen a few strange things in my life.”

  “Yes, John, I believe that is true. For, despite the many years of your family’s exile, you are a true Hoxleyite at heart. You have carried the saints with you, inside here, wherever you have traveled.” She was touching at her heart.

  He tried to think of an offering in return, but she hushed him with a raised hand and said, “Watch!” Her hand continued outwards, into the fret. The stars within the gathered mist sparkled around her fingers. She guided them this way and that, making them dance and flicker in different colors: blue, green, yellow, red. At one point she actually grabbed a few of them in her fist and the light glowed between her fingers. Then she let them go and they fluttered away, joining their partners.

  “You see? They are joined to me. Try it.”

  He did so. But his hand caused only a few sparkles to rise. There was no dancing.

  “You’ll get it,” Higgs said. “Keep practicing.”

  But he’d had enough. He leaned back in his chair. “What time does the fret disappear?”

  “Midnight. Which is good, because it really comes alive after dark. You should join us, out on the green after nightfall. It’s quite spectacular. You will understand the true beauty of the saints.”

  He nodded. But he had a different subject on his mind.

  “Who is Creeping Jenny?”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “Creeping Jenny. It was written on the blackboard in Jane Sutton’s class.”

  It took the doctor a while to answer, as though she were gathering information from the mist around here.

  “She’s a mythological figure. Traditionally, the wife of the Tolly Man. But that idea has changed over the last few decades, giving her a more independent existence. Whereas the Tolly represents death… Creeping Jenny is the spirit of the plants, the woods, the flowers, the earth in springtime. The Green Woman. Regeneration.”

  “She has something to do with storytelling, is that right?”

  “It’s another of her attributes, the ability to join objects together into a narrative.”

  “Why was the name written on the board?”

  “John, the headmistress was teaching the children–”

  “Creeping Jenny is calling you.”

  “Yes, but–”

  “And Jane Sutton responded. She moved towards the spirit.”

  Higgs grimaced. “Now you’re worrying me.”

  “I saw it! I saw it in her eyes.”

  The doctor looked away. But Nyquist said to her, “Let me show you something.” He cleared the plates and glasses to the side, and then laid out the seven photographs that had first drawn him to this place. “You’ve seen the one of my father,” he said. “But these others were also sent to me, anonymously. They are all of Hoxley, or round about, as you can see.”

  The doctor glanced at each image in turn as Nyquist spoke.

  “This is Ian and Hilda Bainbridge, at Yew Tree Cottage. And here…” He pointed to another photograph. “Here is the corner shop. But you see the van parked outside? Sutton’s Bakery.”

  “What are you saying, John?”

  “I’m not sure. But something has to connect the two deaths. And I believe my father lies at the center of it. These…” He swept his hand along the photographs. “These are clues. All I have to do is work out their true meaning.”

  “You really won’t give up, will you?”

  “No. It’s written in the blood: never stop searching.”

  She looked at him in a curious manner, but he knew that she understood perfectly what he was saying. And then he picked up the seventh photograph, the one showing Madelyn Arkwright in the museum. “Do you know who this is?” he asked.

  “I do. It’s Madelyn. A villager.”

  “She lives here?”

  “Yes. But she’s very reclusive. In fact…”

  “Don’t tell me. She only comes outside one day a year. Saint Leander’s Day.”

  “That’s right.”

  “And where does everybody else go on that day?”

  There was no immediate answer, so he asked a more direct question. “Doctor Higgs, where did you vanish to yesterday?”

  “You know where.”

  “Do I?”

  “We met. We almost met. In the room, the crowded room. I saw you.”

  “I don’t think so. I was alone all day, and then I met Madelyn, and we talked in her studio at the Sutton house. And then I had some kind of blackout, and I imagined that I saw you, and everybody else. And then Madelyn attacked me, with a knife.”

  “Are you sure it was her who stabbed you? You didn’t see anyone else, holding the knife?”

  Nyquist hesitated.

  Higgs persisted. “I need to know, John. It’s very important.”

  “Yes. I saw Mrs Sutton.”

  “So it was Jane who stabbed you? Jane Sutton? Is that what you’re saying?”

  “I… I don’t know. I’m not sure.” His mind was clouded with shadows. He remembered the threats that Mrs Sutton had made against him, right from his first night here.

  He asked, “Where was I found?”

  “On the green. At ten o’clock. After we’d all come home.”

  “I must’ve been taken there then, from the Suttons’ house.”

  “Yes, perhaps. The family have power. And of course, a bakery van to carry you in.”

  Nyquist rubbed at his eyes, willing the memories to come clean.

  “Would you like me to give you something, John?” The doctor’s voice was soothing, overly so. “Another tablet, perhaps? Do you have a headache?”

  He didn’t answer.

  Her voice lowered to a whisper. It sounded very close in his ear, saying, “For one day of the year, we live inside Madelyn, and for the rest of the year, she lives inside us. As the village permits. It’s a pleasant arrangement–”

  “Pleasant!”

  Nyquist’s fist banged down on the table, causing the cutlery and the plates to rattle. The noise and the action broke him out of a spell.

  “John. What is wrong? Have I upset you?”

  He turned on her. “It’s one secret after another.”

  “I thought we were friends.”

  “I’ve been here for… for what, four days?”

  “Five.”

  “You know nothing about me. How can you?”

  She nodded. “I understand. But let me tell you one thing. Of all the visitors that have come to us… you, above all, have partaken of our spirit.”

  He stood up, and gathered together his photographs, one to seven.

  “John, please. Sit down. Don’t be angry.”

  It was too late. Nyquist was already walking away. He took his coat off the stand in the hallway and made his way outside. It was dusk. And although the fret stayed with him, he could see that it was changing as the air darkened. His body was warm, as though wrapped in a cocoon. It was more like a spring day, rather than the dead of winter. The mist glowed with its own light, a dusting of the moon: pale, translucent. Even more of the flickering dots of color were seen within the swirls. He tried to brush them aside, but they clung to their places, and regrouped, and shivered freely.

  He felt different. It
was a sudden effect. The anger was drifting away.

  And now he was sure of every step, avoiding the other pedestrians easily. He didn’t even have to think about it; the fret was part of his body, it did exactly as he bid. Protecting, observing, showing him within its limits the nature of his own vision.

  He was following in his father’s footsteps. But where did they lead? He recalled the one useful piece of information that Madelyn had told him, that George Nyquist had first arrived in the village on Saint Algreave’s Day. Was that a coincidence, or was his father connected in some way with the Tolly Man ritual? He felt this was the most vital question: once answered, everything else would fall into place.

  The village green filled with people, adults and children. Nyquist joined them. By now, his fret was luminous, and comforting. It was no longer fully opaque. Through its shifting veil he saw the faces of people he knew. He saw the tree named Blade of Moon, and he saw the ducking pond where Gladys Coombes had met her end. He saw the village as though for the first time. He saw that many of the villagers had decorated their frets with flowing ever-shifting bands of black hue, in mourning for Ian Bainbridge, and for Jane Sutton. The sparkles of his own fret danced before his eyes. His hand reached out to touch them, to set them trembling. He felt their heat on his palm. With a simple gesture, a mere thought even, he could make the sparks change color, from red to gold to green and back again. They were the fireflies of his own body, set loose, given flight. He was engaging with them, beyond words. And he was astonished by it, and by all that he saw.

  He walked in light and smoke and stars and heat.

  The moon bathed him.

  The night held him.

  The fret caressed him.

  Nyquist felt that his dreaming self had escaped his body, and was now enveloping him: his own dreaming self, and the village’s… and where the two dreams met, this is where he moved and breathed.

  He saw Professor Bryars approaching. But he could not face her just now, preferring to be alone with his own thoughts translated, as they were, into colors in the air. He would study them, seeking hidden connections, and find a new pathway through the maze. The idea excited him. He moved away, leaving the village green. With a simple click of his fingers he turned his fret jet black, opaque. He could no longer see ahead, but at least no one could follow him now. He would find a place of his own. He walked on, feeling the world at the fret’s limits, seeing with the mist where it touched at objects: the walls of the houses, a street lamp, and then the corner shop. He stopped here. A noise was coming from the alley at the side of the shop. It sounded like a person in distress.