Darkwater

twenty-two

She took a sip of Coke and looked around. In what used to be the scullery, Tom was stacking dishes; his mother was gossiping on the telephone in the hall. The passage, Martha would have called it. Martha, she thought fondly, would have loved the phone and would have thought this a palace.

“It’s changed so much.”

“Has it?” Simon was sprawled under the tree, playing with some electronic gadget. Tom’s Christmas present. He looked up absently. “How much?”

She looked at the papered walls, central heating, TV, fridge, and laughed. “You’d never have recognized it. It was cold, dingy, ragged. There was a big range in here with a sea-coal fire. Martha wore herself out black-leading it every week. I slept in that corner.” She nodded at the TV, where a cartoon blathered unnoticed. “It was boarded off. My father’s room was your kitchen.”

Simon pressed a few buttons. She thought he wasn’t listening, but he said, “What happened to him?”

“He went back to being the great squire.” She snuggled up on the sofa, feeling relaxed for the first time in weeks. “When he got back into the Hall he tried to forget places like this ever existed. And Azrael was right about him. He was even more proud. If he saw the Hall now he’d be furious with me.”

Simon was silent. The game bleeped triumphantly.

Tom called out, “You’ll never beat my score.”

“What you said,” Simon muttered. “About that domed jar. You really saw us in there, all that time ago?”

“Yes. I saw you.”

He put the game down, in its crackle of Christmas paper. “No one else can see me.” His voice was quiet, almost a whisper. “Sometimes I think I’m not a separate person at all, as if Tom and I merge . . . and then split again.” He shook his head. “And there are times I can’t remember . . .”

“You’ll never guess what’s happened!” Paula had put the phone down and come in, her face flushed with sherry and brandy pudding.

“What?” Tom was there at once. He looked anxious, Sarah thought. In fact, he’d been edgy all day.

“Steve Tate’s run off!” Paula perched unsteadily on the arm of the sofa.

“Run off?” Tom said quietly.

“Well, it looks like it. He was supposed to be staying the night with some friend, but when his father woke up this morning there were these huge white letters painted all over the front of the post office. STEVE WAS HERE—that sort of thing. You’d think he’d . . . Well, anyway, he and his dad had had some sort of fight—between you and me, I think he helps himself pretty freely from the till. And he never went to the friend’s. Never turned up. So no one knows where he is.”

Slowly, Tom came over and stood by Simon, who glanced at him. They were so alike, Sarah thought.

“His dad must be worried stiff,” she said.

“Beside himself. Been phoning everywhere.”

Tom bit a fingernail. “Has he called the police?”

“And the coastguard.”

Sarah drank the warm Coke. “Is this the kid at the post office? The one . . .”

“Yes.” Tom frowned; she saw his mother knew nothing of how things were. “Him.”

“He seemed able to take care of himself.”

“Ah, but the cliffs are dangerous. And the old mine shafts.” Paula glanced at Tom, a swift, uneasy look, as if old memories had been opened. Sarah felt awkward. She drained the glass and put it down. “Well, thanks Paula. It’s been a lovely day. I haven’t tasted cooking like yours for years.”

Paula laughed. “Listen to you! You sound like an old woman! Get Sarah’s coat, Tom.”

As he went out, looking preoccupied, Sarah took a last look around. The cold shiver of fear that had crossed her soul so often in the last few months was back. She should have been ready for this. To go with Azrael. To die—that was the word and there was no point hiding from it. She’d had enough time to get used to it. But maybe time on its own wasn’t enough. Look at Tom. He should seem like a kid. But he didn’t. They were the same age.

There was a framed photograph on the table; an old, sepia image. She picked it up, interested. “My grandmother.” Paula collected the glasses. “Taken in about 1920.”

It showed a thin, anxious-looking woman in the loose clothes and cloche hat of the time—Sarah remembered them fondly. But there was something about the face that was familiar, and all at once she saw it, her fingers tightening on the frame. The woman’s left eye had a squint, so that she didn’t look at you directly.

“What was her name?” she breathed.

“Emmeline Rowney.”

Sarah’s breath smudged the glass. Emmeline. She had always wondered what had happened to that half-starved, tearful little waif. After a moment she asked, “Is she still alive?”

“Oh no, love. She’d be over a hundred! She died in London, just after the war.” Paula was watching curiously. Sarah put the photo down and as she opened her hand to let it go, the reflection of the cane scars, still fresh and red, crossed Emmeline’s face in the glass.

Tom walked her home. He was quiet the whole way, walking ahead on the narrow cliff path, brushing the gorse bushes. Far out at sea an oil tanker seemed still. The sea was hushed, its pounding and sloshing sounding hollow among the rocks. Above them the twilight was already dusted with stars, the long streak of the Milky Way breathtakingly clear. Sarah stared up at it, her breath misty.

“She did more than me.”

“Who?”

“Emmeline. She grew up. Scrawny little Emmeline.”

He wasn’t listening, twisting gorse spines off in his gloves. “Sarah . . .”

She pushed past, climbing the stile.

There was something he wanted to say, but it was probably sympathy and she didn’t want it. “What?” she asked, cold.

He shrugged, after a second. “Nothing.”

On the top of Newhaven Cove they crossed the plank bridge over the tiny Darkwater. Below, in the shadows of the rocks, a small red spark of fire burned. The tramp’s fire.

Sarah glared down at it. “Scrawny little Emmeline,” she muttered to herself.

He said good night to her at the front door of the Hall and waited in the shadows, hearing her climb the stairs. A light went on, then off. When he was sure Darkwater was silent he let himself in and crept down to the vaults.

As he came down the passage to the strong-room door a great terror seized him—maybe the door was open and Steve was waiting. But it wasn’t. It was just as he had left it, and that terrified him even more. He stood there, not touching it. The passage was lit by only one weak bulb, his breath condensed on the glistening stone walls, the bronze nails. It was bitterly cold. As cold as the mineshaft.

“You should have brought him some food.” Simon leaned accusingly against the wall, arms folded, wearing the sweater Tom had wanted for Christmas but hadn’t gotten.

“He never brought me any. Never came near.”

“Maybe he was scared. He may have thought you were dead.”

Tom snorted. “Him!”

“And maybe you’re scared of the same thing.”

“Rubbish!” Tom put his ear against the door. He heard nothing.

“He’ll be frozen.”

“Tough.”

“What if he is dead, Tom?”

“It never hurt you.”

Simon didn’t laugh. “Grow up. You can’t just leave him there.”

“Yes I can.”

Maybe he said it aloud, because there was a sudden faint scrabble at the door.

A whisper came through it. “Tom? Is that you, Tommy? Let me out, Tom, for God’s sake! Please, Tommy, please let me out!”

It terrified him, gave him a perverse, bitter pleasure. He turned and ran, back up the cellar steps. Simon was waiting at the top.

“Who are you?” Tom yelled. “My conscience? He’s put me through hell for years—you know that! Scared to go through the village in case he’s there, mocking, sniggering, calling after me in the street. Now let him taste how it feels! Let him lie there in the dark for three days with nothing to eat and no one knowing where he is! Let him lick the damp off the walls! He’s got it easy. He isn’t even hurt.”

“And then what?” Simon came and grabbed his arm. “What about when he gets out, when he tells everyone? What about when the police come around? What about Paula?”

“She’s who I’m thinking of!” Tom shoved past into the kitchens. “All she went through that time. He did that to her.”

“It’s stupid!” Simon raced after him. “It’s not for her, it’s for you. And this plan! What makes you think Sarah would ever . . .”

Tom whirled. “She won’t know. And you won’t tell her.”

“Me?” Simon yelled at his back as he stalked away. “I’m dead, remember!”

He didn’t want to hear. Racing down the drive under the dark trees he kept his mind off it as though it were a hot thought, a fire that would burn him. Christmas Day had seemed endless, drained of joy. All the time he’d been opening presents, eating, laughing, watching TV, it had all been poisoned by the thought of Steve in the cellar, freezing. It should have been a good thought, but it wasn’t. It was hateful. And worst of all, he didn’t know how to end it. How could he let Steve out now? He climbed down the cliff path in the dark. At the bottom the tramp sat up waiting for him, he and the dog both in an old sleeping bag.

“Well,” he said, wriggling back against the cliff face.

“Tha’s started some’at, that’s for sure.”

“You know?” Tom crouched over the flames, their redness and crackle.

“Searchers.” The tramp grinned. “Late afternoon till dark; all along the cliffs and coves. Inshore lifeboat. Tomorrow, they said, the helicopter. Lines of men beating the cliffs. God, laddie, tha knows how to take revenge.”

“It’s not revenge.”

The tramp just wheezed. “Good luck to thee, I say. He’s tormented thee, hasn’t he?”

Tom sat down. “Yes,” he said.

“For years he’s humiliated thee. He’s made thee feel that small . . .”

“He always picks on me.” Tom’s fingers gripped. “I don’t know why. I’ve never done anything to him. Ever!”

“Well, now thou has and he’s seen tha won’t stand for it.” The tramp coughed. Then he looked sideways out of his one eye through the smoke. “For Azrael, is he?”

“Yes,” Tom said instantly.

The tramp grinned, showing black teeth. “Now you’re strong. Feels good, don’t it. You’ve faced up to him. You’ve . . .”

“But maybe I should take him some food.”

The tramp spat in disgust. “What! He never.”

“I know.” He looked up. “But it’s December. It’s colder than when I fell.”

“Pushed. He pushed thee. And he’s indoors.”

“But if he dies . . .”

The tramp leaned over. Close up he smelled of beer and sweat; his hands were calloused as he grabbed Tom’s wrist. “Listen to me, lad. Don’t go soft now. Three days. Leave him there. That’s what he deserves. You didn’t die.”

Tom pulled away. “I had Simon.”

“Aye,” the tramp laughed sourly. “But make him pay, lad. Make him respect thee.”

Tom nodded. “If you think he’ll be all right.”

The tramp spat again. “That sort always are.”

“Tom?”

They both turned as one.

Azrael must have come along the cliff path. He stood halfway down the steps, a shadow in the dimness, and as the tramp and he looked at each other, only the hush of the sea moved between them. Then the tramp stood, the sleeping bag kicked away.

“Come here, Tom,” Azrael said.

Tom took a step, then stopped.

Neither of them was looking at him. The tramp stubbed his cigarette out on a rock. “Tha’s looking well, old comrade,” he said quietly.

Azrael didn’t smile. “Always, you come back. Creating evil.”

“Just passing. Seein’ a few friends.”

The firelight crackled, spitting a shower of sparks. “But don’t fret thyself.” The tramp winked. “I’ll take care of these lads.”

“Listen to me.” Azrael’s voice was low, a harsh coldness that made Tom look at him in surprise. “Leave here. Before I compel you.”

The tramp shrugged. “It’ll likely come to that. But tha knows me, old comrade. Thee and I, we were the same once, eons ago, before they cast me out, those high masters of thine. Such a fall as that was, Azrael! A fall that has no ending, down and down and still I feel myself plummeting eternally, and there’s no end to it, because tha falls into thyself and there’s no end but death. And for us, old friend, that way out’s forbidden.”

“You were the best of us,” Azrael said. “You turned away.”

“They rejected me. And now I’m the matter thou’ll never transmute. I’ll not leave what I’ve begun. In all thy Great Work there’s a flaw, and that flaw is me.”

Azrael glanced at Tom. Flame light flickered over his face; it made him look unhappy. Almost as if he suffered some unbearable sorrow. But all he said was, “Be careful, Tom. Don’t make any arrangements with him. Don’t trust him!”

Suddenly Tom felt tired. He couldn’t think. He pushed past Azrael and pulled himself up to the cliff path. “I’m going to bed.”

Below him, the tramp laughed and turned away into the dark. “That’s telling us,” he muttered.