The Red Door

by Iain Crichton Smith

  At dinner time he felt sick. He could eat nothing. He wanted to be really sick so that he could stay off school. He looked at the safe book he was in the middle of reading with its beautiful crisp cover – Oliver Twist. He imagined himself running through the queer air of London, pursued.

  It was so strange. Why should he not just stay away from school and listen to the noise the book made in his ear as he read and read throughout the night? He could have cursed himself. He looked through the window and saw a cornstack standing still and motionless on the ground. A fly crawled across the table. Some days he would put a knife in front of it vertically to see what it would do. Today he didn’t, he let it crawl. He thought of the Section, ragged-trousered, reddening-eyed, stupid: for he was stupid, everybody said so. The teacher had once asked him: ‘How much does a 2½d. stamp cost?’ and he hadn’t known. The class roared when they told the story. The Fairy however hadn’t roared: he had simply hated the teacher. He pushed the plate away from him, to the end of the world. His mother said: ‘Are you ill?’ No, he wasn’t ill. Anyway if he was he couldn’t tell her this kind of sickness. She wouldn’t understand.

  The bell, ponderous and huge, iron and near, swung him into his corner on the windy moor. Grass stirred greyly in the wind. The ground was wet. Pushed by his unwanted supporters he found himself unreally standing in front of the Section. He couldn’t understand what he was doing there: all he wanted was to get it over and done with and be home with his book. Someone was advising him to take his jacket off. He didn’t: he wanted to be warm. He heard one boy beside him panting with excitement but didn’t turn round to see who it was. There in front of him stood the Section, solidly, his jersey billowing in the cold wind. He was afraid to look into his face as if he would meet there some image which would finally destroy him. The ceremony had begun.

  A phantom bell rang in his brain, coldly he went forward punch-drunk into the arena. Towards him came the panther with green eyes. On the balcony the beaming emperor turned his thumbs down fatly with sadistic deliberation. Something hit him on the nose. He was terrified. He would have run away but they had closed in on him, he felt their hound breaths: they were baying: there was blood on his glove. He looked up: the green eyes were boring in on him, animal eyes: they shone like stones. The nails on the hands were dirty: the flesh was raw.

  A green figure was beating up a child on a London street. It was foggy. The boots came down heavily. He winced at the silver deliberate studs. Had he screamed? He slipped on the wet grass. The gloves had little hairs on them. They were soaked in the puddle.

  He heard voices: ‘Come on, Fairy, you’re doing fine. Hit him.’ He hadn’t hit him: not once had he hit him. He didn’t even want to hit him lest he provoke a stranger, more menacing, figure to shamble outward in front of the green cave. He wanted only to survive his punishment. He felt himself dancing like a puppet. The Section hadn’t spoken once. He just kept unslinging his stony punches at him. He didn’t dare to look at the eyes but he knew that the Section hated him. He felt this not by the way he hit him but by the service of some obscure sense, some old retainer of knowledge beyond that of the intellect.

  ‘Come on, Fairy.’ His gloves and body made beautiful ineffectual rings, away from oftener than towards. Let me not be hit: let me snuggle into my book, let me withdraw.

  He hadn’t really been punched much except for the one accurate hit on the nose. There was too much disorderly shoving and pushing for that. He heard one voice saying disgustedly: ‘It’s a slaughter. It should be stopped.’ And heard another voice saying: ‘The Fairy will get him yet. You wait.’ Nevertheless he knew that he wouldn’t win. He felt a hard fist hit him in the stomach and he lay down.

  ‘Is he all right?’

  ‘Of course he’s all right. Aren’t you, Fairy?’

  ‘Really and truly hopeless.’

  ‘Is he crying? O Lord.’

  ‘No, he’s not.’

  ‘All right, pick him up then.’

  And they had lifted him up, cold cold hands. Someone had said: ‘Are you all right?’: he had said yes and the moor emptied.

  He waited perhaps for the Section to come back and shake hands with him (wasn’t that always done?) but everyone had gone: he hadn’t fought well enough for even that. As he waited phantom hands came to lead the blind punch-drunk loser home: he would never fight again: he was finished: he should never have fought. His friends had pleaded with him not to fight; but he could not let them down. How could he? They had bet on him thousands and thousands of dollars. The ring was empty: the seats ascended rawly from the centre. The emperor stood up: he was great and glowing, magnanimous, a ruby glittered on his white toga. He was in tears. The Christians would be pardoned, he said, looking down at the prostrate but courageous gladiator. His immaculate gloved hands rested lightly in front of him. The lights darkened and the Christian in his cave in his blue tunic wriggled inwards towards his content.

  In Church

  Lieutenant Colin Macleod looked up at the pure blue sky where there was a plane cruising overhead. He waved to the helmeted pilot. Here behind the lines the sound of the gunfire was faint and one could begin to use one’s ears again, after the tremendous barrages which had seemed to destroy hearing itself. Idly he registered that the plane was a Vickers Gun Bus and he could see quite clearly the red, white and blue markings. The smoke rising in the far distance seemed to belong to another war. He had noticed often before how unreal a battle might become, how a man would suddenly spin round, throwing up his arms as if acting a part in a play: as in the early days when they had driven almost domestically to the front in buses, the men singing, so that he looked out the window to see if there were any shops at the side of the road. Released for a short while from the war he wandered into a wood whose trees looked like columns in a church.

  He was thinking of the last bombardment by the Germans which had thrown up so much dust that the British gunners couldn’t see what they were firing at and the Germans were on top of them before they knew what was happening. The only warning had been the mine explosion to their left. They had fought among trenches full of dead bodies, and grey Germans had poured out of the dust clouds, seeming larger than life, as if they had been resurrected out of the dry autumnal earth. It was after the plugging of the line with fresh troops that he and his company had been pulled out after what seemed like years in the trenches digging, putting up wire, in the eternal hammering of the German big guns, the artillery battles which were so much worse than local fights, for the death which came from the distant giants was anonymous and negligent as if gods were carelessly punching them out of existence.

  He was grateful now for the silence and for the wood which had a certain semblance of order after the scarred ground worked over and over, continuously revised by shells, so that it looked like carbon paper scribbed over endlessly by a typewriter that never stopped.

  He looked up again and as he did so he saw two birds attacking another one. They seemed to synchronise their movements and they were low enough for him to see their beaks quite clearly. The third tried to fly above them but they attacked, probing upwards from below. He could no longer see the plane, just the birds. The third bird was weakening. He couldn’t make out whether it was a buzzard or a crow. The other two birds were zeroing in at it all the time, pecking and jabbing, going for the head.

  He couldn’t stand watching the fight any more and turned away into the wood, and it was then that he saw it – the church. It was completely intact though quite small and with gravestones beside it. It was strange to see it, like a mirage surrounded by trees whose brown leaves stirred faintly in the slight breeze. From the sky above, the birds had departed: perhaps the two had killed the third one or perhaps it had escaped. It reminded him of a dogfight he had seen between a German triplane and a British Sopwith Camel. After a long duel, the German triplane had destoyed the British plane but was in turn shot down by another British fighter. The triplane made a perfect landing. The British t
roops rushed up to find the pilot seated at the controls, upright, disciplined, aristocratic, eyes staring straight ahead, and perfectly dead. Later they found the bullet which had penetrated his back and come out at the chest.

  He pushed open the door of the church and stood staring around him. He had never been in a church like this before with the large effigy of the Virgin Mary all in gold looking down at him, hands crossed. The stained glass windows had pictures of Christ in green carrying a staff and driving rather shapeless yellow sheep in front of him. In one of the panes there was another picture of him holding out his hands in either a helpless or a welcoming gesture. There were no Bibles or hymn books on the seats as if no one had been there for some time. At the side there was a curtained alcove which he thought might be a confessional. He pulled the curtains aside but there was no one there.

  He sat down and gazed for a long time at the huge golden cross which dominated the front of the church. The silence was oppressive. It was not at all like the churches at home. There was more ornament, it was less bare, more decorated. The churches at home had little colour and less atmosphere than this. He could feel in his bones the presence of past generations of worshippers, and then he heard the footsteps.

  He turned round to see a man in a black gown walking towards him. There was a belt of rope round his gown and his hands could not be seen as they seemed to be folded inside his gown. The face was pale and ill looking.

  ‘What do you want, my son?’ said the voice in English.

  He was so astonished that he could think of nothing to say. To find a priest speaking English here seemed suddenly nightmarish. For some reason the thought came into his mind of the most macabre sight he had seen in the war, a horse wearing a gas mask. ‘Childe Roland to the Dark Tower came . . . ’

  ‘You are admiring the church?’ said the minister or priest or whatever he was.

  ‘It is very beautiful,’ said Colin, and it seemed to him that his voice was echoing through the church.

  ‘It is very old,’ said the priest. ‘How did you find it?’

  ‘I was walking through the wood and I happened to . . . ’

  ‘Alone? I see,’ said the priest. ‘Would you like to see the rest of it? There is more of it, you know.’

  Colin looked round him uncomprehendingly.

  ‘Oh, it’s down below. There’s a stair that leads downwards. I keep some wine down there, you understand. If you would care for a glass?’

  ‘Well, I . . . ’

  ‘It will only take a minute. I would be glad of the company.’

  ‘If it’s all . . . ’

  ‘Certainly. Please follow me.’

  Colin followed him down some stone steps to what appeared to be a crypt which was lit by candles. The priest walked with his hands folded in front of him as all priests seemed to walk, slow and dignified.

  They arrived at a small room. ‘Here is my bed, you see,’ said the priest. ‘And here . . . ’

  All over the floor, bones were scattered, and there seemed to be an assortment of bloody animal traps.

  ‘Rabbit bones,’ said the priest smiling. ‘Bones of hares. It is not very . . . ’

  ‘You mean you . . . ’

  ‘This is how I live,’ said the priest. ‘I have no bread to offer you, I’m afraid. If you would please sit down?’

  ‘I think I had better . . . ’

  ‘I said please sit down. I shall tell you about myself. I have lived now for a year by myself. Alone. What do you think of that?’ The priest smiled showing blackened teeth. ‘You see, I couldn’t stand it any more.’

  ‘Stand what?’

  ‘The war, of course. I was in the trenches you see. And I couldn’t stand it. I wasn’t intended to be a soldier. I was studying for the ministry and they took me out here. I couldn’t stand the people one got in the trenches. I couldn’t stand the dirt and I couldn’t stand all that dying. What do I live on? I eat rabbits, anything I can find. One morning, you see, I ran away. I didn’t know where I was going. But I knew that I couldn’t stay there any longer. And I found this place. Perhaps God directed me. Who knows? I was frightened that someone would find me. But no one did. I used to hide in the crypt here. But today I felt very alone so I thought I would talk to you. Do you know what it is to be alone? Sometimes I wish to go back but it is impossible now. To hear the sound of one human voice again! One human voice. I needn’t have revealed I was here. If you had been German I wouldn’t have come out. I don’t speak German, you see, not at all. I’m not good at languages, though I did once study Hebrew. Now, shall we go up again?’

  ‘If you wish.’

  ‘I wish to preach. I have never preached. That is something I must do. Shall we go up? If you would go first? I was going to offer you something to eat but I think I should preach first. If you would please sit in the front row. You haven’t brought anyone else with you, have you?’

  Colin preceded him, knowing that he was in the presence of a madman. He sat down in the front seat and prepared to listen. He felt as if he were in a dream but then he had felt like that for a long time since he had taken the train south to join up in the first place.

  The minister went up into the pulpit with great gravity and began to speak:

  ‘I shall not pray because that would mean closing my eyes. God will understand. After all, while I was closing my eyes you might run away. I shall talk about war.

  ‘Dearly beloved,’ he began, his voice growing more resonant, not to say rotund, as he continued:

  ‘May we consider who we are? What we are? When I was young I read books as so many of the young do about the legends of Greece and Rome. I believed in the gods. I believed that we are godlike. My favourite god was Mercury because of his great speed and power. Later my favourite hero was Hector because he was so vulnerable.

  ‘I grew up innocent and hopeful. One night when I was sixteen years old I went to a prayer meeting. A visiting preacher spoke of Christ’s sufferings and his mercy so vehemently, with such transparent passion, that I was transported into that world and I suffered the thorn and the vinegar in the land of Galilee. I thought that I should lay my life at the feet of a merciful God.

  ‘At the age of eighteen I was forced into the army to fight for what they call one’s country. I did not know what this was since my gaze was always directed inward and not outward. I was put among men whom I despised and feared – they fornicated and drank and spat and lived filthily. Yet they were my comrades in arms.

  ‘I was being shot at by strangers. I was up to my knees in green slime. I was harassed by rats. I entered trenches to find the dead buried in the walls. Once, however, on a clear starry night at Christmas time we had a truce. This lasted into the following day. We – Germans and English – showed each other our photographs, though I had none. We, that is, the others, played football. And at the end of it a German officer came up to us and said: “You had better get back to your dugouts: we are starting a barrage at 1300 hours.” He consulted his watch and we went back to our trenches after we had shaken hands with each other.

  ‘One day I could bear no more of the killing and I ran away. And I came here, Lord. And now I should like to say something to you, Lord. I was never foolish enough to think that I understood your ways. Nevertheless I thought you were on the side of the good and the innocent. Now I no longer believe so. You may strike me dead with your lightning – I invite you to do so – but I think that will not happen. All these years, Lord, you have cheated me. You in your immense absence.’ He paused a moment as if savouring the phrase. ‘Your immense absence. As for me, I have been silent for a year without love, without hope. I have lived like an animal, I who was willing to give my all to you. Lord, do you know what it is to be alone? For in order to live we need language and human beings.

  ‘I think, Lord, that I hate you. I hate you for inventing the world and then abandoning it. I hate you because you have not intervened to save the world.

  ‘I hate you because you are as indiffer
ent as the generals. I hate you because of my weakness.

  ‘I hate you, God, because of what you have done to mankind.’

  He stopped and looked at Colin as if he were asking him, Am I a good preacher or not?

  ‘You have said,’ said Colin after a long time, ‘exactly what I would have said. I have no wish to . . . ’

  ‘Betray me? But you are an officer. It is your duty. What else can you do?’

  He looked at Colin from the pulpit and for the first time his hands came out from beneath the gown. They were holding a gun.

  In the moment before the gun was fired Colin was thinking: How funny all this is. How comical. Here I am in a church which is not like my own church with the golden cross and the effigy of the Virgin in front of me. Here I am, agreeing with everything he says. And it seemed to him for a moment as if the gold cross wavered slightly in the blast of the gun. But that might have been an illusion. In any case it was very strange to die in that way, so far from home, and not even on the battlefield. It was so strange that he almost died of the puzzle itself before the bullet hit him and spun him around in the wooden pew.

  Through the Desert

  He plodded steadily on through the desert. Now and again out of the corner of his eye he could see a wedding or a funeral but he didn’t stop to watch, because they were so far away and so diminutive. Advertisements in all the colours of the rainbow flashed past him. Some advised him to drink more and others to join the police. One read: Kant needs you for philosophy. He was not surprised to pass a still life with two oranges and a tomato and at other times to find a sewing machine humming by itself. All the time vultures cast their black shadows like sails over him. Once he heard two massed choirs, clad in innocent white, singing passionately about a glen: and another time he saw an illuminated horse, with TENNANTS written on it, galloping into the sunset. Later he saw a man and a woman quarrelling. The man raised his fist and the woman began to dance, like a tall red snake, eventually turning into an advertisement for Cleopatra.