Armwrestling the Dead

by Andrew McEwan

was covered.

  An animal accompanied his friend. Set in its forehead was an empty socket.

  eleven - heidelberg woman

  Jakob opened the morning paper, searched for his horoscope, couldn’t find it, turned to the front page instead.

  UFO latest, it read.

  The family business occupied three floors, two warehouses and one depot.

  Solomon Candy owned the works. His whole life had gone into building an empire of soft drinks and confectionery. And life had been kind, providing him with an heir. But his son was a disappointment. Solomon had spared no expense on the boy’s education, sending him to the finest schools, equipping him with books and pencils; only the books went unread and the pencils he used for cleaning his ears. The boy was a dreamer, he realized.

  The telephone rang. Startled, he answered. An accident in production? A threatened strike? Solomon, Solomon, it is only your wife...

  ‘He what?’

  ‘Took the car.’

  ‘Where? Did you let him have the keys? Give him money?’

  She slammed the phone down. He buzzed his secretary.

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Never mind - I mean. Never mind. I’ll take care of it myself.’

  There, that hadn’t been too difficult. He’d volunteer his son for analysis.

  The decision made, Solomon rose from behind his desk, tugged flat his waistcoat and headed out the door. It was for the best, he reassured himself.

  Walking between humming vats, each stainless steel occupant of the basement, he whistled a tune the accompanying words of which he had sung to Claudia on their wedding night. Everything had seemed fine then, the future gloriously bright. Her cheeks were rosy, their embrace a confirmation of all he believed in; this city, this woman, this business started on a homemade barrow outside the Globe picture house. He couldn’t allow Jakob to ruin that. The boy had to change, see the way forward, heal the rift he had opened, like a sinking valley floor, twixt Solomon and his wife.

  ‘The future is vital,’ he told a congregation of pipes. ‘He must be made to see the way clearly and not be distracted by every passing fancy. He must realize his position, honour the past, revere the present, and not fall prey to outrageous whims.’

  The pipes gurgled their sugar mixture.

  Solomon swung his arms behind his back, grabbed the little finger of his left hand with the thumb and index finger of his right, and continued his tour of the premises.

  The building was old and crumbling, its basement dank. A man was employed to keep the vats clean, his footprints joining puddles lit by fitful bulbs. Solomon overlaid the flat negatives of his own shoes. He bounded up a stair part submerged in packing cases, the iron railing peeling. Staff and machines chattered on the factory floor, a sublime air of chaos suffused with - and by - strawberry, lemon, pineapple, vanilla and lime. Citrus fumes gauzed lineaments made sticky via the intimacy of flesh and metal, digits and mixers, swivelling elbows and jointed pistons, bunched shoulders, fixed bellows, the cutting of liquorice and the sorting of flavours, from steaming liquids to glutinous strands.

  He loved it. He eavesdropped on the conversation between a press and its operator, shimmied through sugar clouds. In pursuit of a conveyor, soles tacky, he juggled bright constellations, stuffed his jacket pockets while fizzing orally, gums red and teeth purple, bow-tie dusted with sherbet as he chased a special edition tube of Leapers. Opening, finding the newly created cherry, he danced out the loose-hanging rubber strip doors.

  The afternoon was warm, the yard quiet. Noise reverberated only dimly from the warehouses, crawling lazily over cement and tarmac. He rubbed at a mark on his trouser leg and smelled his fingers. Orange. He heard distant tyres slide and thought of Jakob. The surrounding buildings were faced with steely octagonal mirrors. Reluctantly, he went back inside. The city was unrecognizable from his youth, a fact which saddened him. His island enclave was one of only a few red-bricked oases left.

  He traipsed to his office.

  He buzzed his secretary.

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Find me the name of a good psychiatrist,’ he asked.

  i

  The wrought-iron gates creaked open to admit a long black limousine. It rumbled across the yard and came to a halt by a bucket-wedged fire exit. A rear door popped and out stepped Darcy Rocard, smoothing his moustache, creases falling from his greatcoat. Rocard took in the scene, smiled and entered. He reached the top floor by way of the stairs, waved aside questions and without knocking turned the polished brass handle.

  Candy was a bony, surprised individual.

  ii

  Jakob, bored and restless, tooled in his mother’s jalopy, venting his frustration on other drivers as he coursed the city highways, exploring, lost, puzzled by his environment. He parked on Crimson Boulevard, peculiarly unnerved, the rapid-fire development of sparkling tenements overwhelming, the original facades vanished beneath newer ages, crazy angles and aquiline curves the present mode. The exception was a prefabricated wood and plasterboard second-hand bookshop cum cafe, the name Atlantic Tearooms in weathered veneers above the blinded, murky door.

  Curious, Jakob entered. Four men round a collapsible table paused in mid-conversation, their arms folded on a red and white check cloth upon which rested cups and plates of blue china. The plates were empty and the cups steaming. Jakob closed the door, bell chiming, and wandered deep into this rare establishment. Books, old and faded paperbacks and tatty hardcovers, lined every wall, stood in ranks on shelves and piled like sediments in niches. Browsing, he sensed the eyes unhook from his clothing, heard the talk resume, although perhaps quieter. The atmosphere was one of collusion, the gathering (men and books) illicit. He didn’t belong, they told him, first by sight, second by posture. The backs of skulls ranged against him. But he ignored them. He was captivated, immersed in fusty smells, squinting to read gilded titles and the names of unknown authors. The library he usually visited was brash and modern, its books solid and two dimensional, sharp words on dazzling paper. Here was time to a depth unimagined. He was almost scared to touch, the sweat of his palms betraying. Flushed, he eased one volume clear of its neighbours and turned the antecedent pages. There was a signature, unreadable, Alice something; an address, 20 Peach Tree Gardens, Outer Space. A drawing, part erased. The leaves were brown with age.

  ‘Try another,’ said a man, close and erudite, the youth’s left ear burning. ‘Plenty to choose from - though they might all be the same.’

  He swallowed, replaced the book and turned.

  The man wore dark glasses. ‘You’re Candy’s son, aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes,’ Jakob said, pinned against a shelf. ‘How did you know?’

  The man stepped back from him. ‘You reek of cocoa solids and glucose,’ he answered, breathless.

  One of the seated men chuckled, a sound Jakob recognized without having heard it before. The bookshop appeared suddenly larger, its echoes friendly yet intimidating.

  ‘Are you a fellow collector?’

  Jakob was unsure.

  ‘Perhaps you seek information,’ the man suggested. ‘A context? A situation?’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘Of course not, you’re indigenous; it would be unfair to expect you to comprehend such a broad band of allusions.’

  Chuckling again, all four men joining the chorus, banging their spoons and slapping the table.

  Jakob’s mouth worked but he said nothing.

  ‘What was the first thought you had this morning?’ the man asked. ‘What time did it rain...last Tuesday? You don’t have to tell me the precise minute, morning or afternoon will do.’ His glasses reflective, the youth smeared across lenses. ‘How many pickles does it take to fill a pickle jar, master Jakob?’

  ‘How many seeds does a poppy have?’ another demanded.

  ‘What is the sum of zero plus minus zero plus minus zero plus minus one?’

  ‘What colour is an egg yolk
before the egg is broken?’

  ‘How much is loose change?’

  He slid down the shelving, spine abutting spines.

  ‘Ah,’ said the man. ‘He’s fainted.’

  ‘Swooned like a debutante.’

  ‘Passed out.’

  ‘Overloaded.’

  A portrait. He saw it now, a girl’s sketched visage. Francesca, daughter of Alice Heidelberg.

  Someone was trying to reach him.

  A man? Yes, the oldest man Jakob had ever seen, leaning over him, on a couch in a small, cluttered room.

  ‘Awake?’

  He nodded.

  ‘Good.’

  Smelling tea, Jakob pushed himself up on his elbows.

  ‘Did you dream?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ he replied. ‘I think so.’

  The ancient, wrinkled man shrugged. ‘It’s not important.’ A cup shook, rattling on its saucer as it was passed. ‘You must forgive my colleagues, they can be impatient at times. Times like these.’

  ‘They asked me all kinds of questions,’ recounted Jakob, accepting the beverage. He sipped; no sugar, they way he liked it. ‘Thank-you.’

  ‘You’re welcome.’ Then, ‘This city is, as of today, thirty-two days old,’ his host continued, relaxed in an elegantly upholstered chair. ‘Thirty-one days ago the first inhabitants cut down a few trees and extended their shack, the following morning adding a second floor and a barn, a stable, a garage by mid afternoon, driving to work thereafter, no more content with their lot than your average second millennium family, complaining bitterly about taxes and visiting the ever