Dialogues of the Dead

48

the last dialogue

DICK DEE: Where am I?

GEOFF PYKE-STRENGLER: Dick Dee, by all that’s wonderful! How are you, old chap?

DICK: I’m …I’m not sure how I am. Geoffrey, is that you? I’m so sorry …

GEOFF: What on earth for? Not your fault we’re here.

DICK: Isn’t it? I thought that …what is this place …?

GEOFF: Hard to explain, old boy. Not really a place at all, if you get my drift. How did you get here, anyway?

DICK: It’s all mixed up …there was this tunnel with a very bright light at the end of it …

SAM JOHNSON: How very conventional. I had bells and explosions and birdsong, bit like the 1812 re-orchestrated by Messiaen.

DICK: Dr. Johnson …you too …I’m sorry …

SAM: You will be. Oh yes, you will be.

GEOFF: Ignore him. He’s a bit down. The tunnel thingy, that’s just an impression of the process of getting here. Quite a popular one, as it happens. I meant, what happened to start the process?

DICK: I can’t remember …there was …no, it’s gone.

GEOFF: Not to worry. It generally takes a bit of time before memory comes back.

SAM: Enjoy it while you can. It’s when you start remembering that the pain starts. Oh God, here it comes. We may have left the stage but we still have the pantomime horse.

PERCY: How are things back there? Who’s got my job? I half expected it might be you.

BROSE: Can hardly be him when he’s down here with us, can it?

PERCY: You know what I mean.

BROSE: Only because my powers of interpretation compensate for your inadequacies of expression. How on earth you got to be borough librarian I cannot imagine.

PERCY: By the same process as a pipsqueak blowbag like yourself got to be the Last of the Actor-managers, I dare say. Where do you think we are going?

BROSE: For a walk by the river.

PERCY: But we went for a walk by the river this morning.

BROSE: That was when it was your choice. Now it’s mine and I choose to go there again. Anyway, there’s nowhere else. Come on, no dawdling.

PERCY: Don’t poke. You’re poking again. I promise you, if you start poking, I’ll start jerking.

DICK: I wanted to say something to them but they didn’t give me the chance to get a word in. And why are they walking so close together like that?

GEOFF: That’s how they arrived, sort of joined up. And the way you arrive is the way you stay, it seems, at least till you cross the river. You may have noticed I’m having to hold my head on, for instance.

DICK: Yes, I’m so sorry …

GEOFF: Bad habit that, always apologizing.

DICK: But your poor head …

GEOFF: I know. But look, old boy, there’s you bleeding all over the place and I’m not apologizing, am I?

ANDREW AINSTABLE: ’Scuse me, gents, but I’m looking for a bridge. Couldn’t tell me if it’s upstream or downstream, could you? I’ve got a Home Start waiting and I was due there …can’t recall when exactly, but I know he’s waiting.

GEOFF: Try upstream, old boy.

DICK: Who on earth was that?

GEOFF: On earth he was an AA man. He’s still a bit confused even though he’s been down here longer than any of us. Spends all his time looking for a bridge.

DICK: Bridge? I’d say he’s tried to swim across, from the look of him.

GEOFF: Not an option, old boy. No, that’s the way he came, dripping wet. He wants to find this bridge ’cos that’s where he left his van.

DICK: This is very confusing. And I keep on hearing music …

GEOFF: Oh yes, that’s young Pitman. He just lies around on the bank all day playing his bazouki. Seems perfectly happy and he can’t frighten the fish because there don’t seem to be any. Disappointing that. I know it’s not real-not in the real sense-but if you’re going to have a not-real river, you might as well stock it with not-real fish. Instead we’ve got that odd-coloured mist. Sort of purply. Looks industrial to me, like there’s some big plant with furnaces and such quite close. And that spells pollution with a big P. That’s what I used to love about the tarn. Creek ran into it straight from the hills. Nothing up there to pump chemicals and sewage into the water. Miss it, you know. Hope when we get across we might find somewhere a man can cast a line and hope to hook something more than an old bedstead.

SAM: My God, will you listen to him? It’s over, old boy. All that stuff belongs somewhere else. Here it’s done with, finito, kaput. The nearest you’re ever going to get again to that creek you keep on going on about is being right up it, without a paddle. Oh shit, here she comes, I’m out of here.

GEOFF: Poor chap, it’s hit him bad. You never know how people will take it. Me, remembering how things were keeps me going. Poor Sam it just drives mad. That’s why he can’t stand Jax. All she wants to talk about is the past. Jax, my dear, how are you? Look who’s just arrived.

JAX RIPLEY: Dick, is that you? Lovely to see you. Is my Wordman story still running? Do I still get a credit whenever anyone does a piece? What about movie rights? Or a TV drama-doc? It rates a drama-doc, at least. Who have they got to play me? God, I hope it’s not that girl in EastEnders, you know, the one with hair. I know she’s the right size, but everything else about her is so wrong. That mouth …!

DICK: I couldn’t really say. Jax …what happened …I’m sorry …

JAX: Are you? That’s not much of a compliment. I seem to remember really enjoying it.

GEOFF: He’s still a bit confused.

JAX: No use to me then. Unless you managed to smuggle a mobile in. No? Thought not. God, what wouldn’t I give for a mobile! Catch you later, Dick. Be good.

GEOFF: Lovely girl. Interviewed me once, you know. Thought I might have a chance afterwards, things going really well, then that blasted phone of hers rang. How about you? She seemed genuinely pleased to see you. Did you ever …?

DICK: I’m not sure …I seem to recall something …but I can’t be sure …

GEOFF: You are in a bad way, aren’t you?

DICK: I’m trying to get my head round all this. We are dead, right?

GEOFF: Got it in one, old chum. Yes, there’s no getting away from it. That’s what we are. Dead.

DICK: And this place …

GEOFF: I’ve thought a lot about that. Conclusion-it’s not really a place, it’s more a sort of state. Not like Mississippi …except insofar as it’s got this bloody great river …but like I just said, it’s not a real river either …more a sort of visible metaphor …hark at me, talking like a critic! …but you know what I mean …it helps our minds keep a hold on things …rather like you seeing dying as a tunnel …it’s all a bit hard to grasp at first …

DICK: But you seem to have grasped it better than anyone, Geoff. Why’s that?

GEOFF: Born to it, I suppose.

DICK: You mean, because you’ve got a title?

GEOFF: Good lord, no. Load of bollocks, all that stuff. It’s just that, well, I’m connected, you know. Sort of divinely.

DICK: You mean you’re God?

GEOFF: Of course not. Don’t say things like that. Got one of my ancestors into a lot of bother way back. No, but I am family, so to speak. Sort of fourth cousin, x times removed. It’s the fallen angels, you see. Some of them got the option of turning human rather than spending an eternity in hell. Hard choice to make, I should think. Back on earth, the connection’s not much help, but down here, it seems to give us descendants a bit of an inside track on things. Not that I know much more than here we are and here we’ll stay till we’re all here, then we’ll go across.

DICK: Who’s all? And where’s across? And how long do we have to wait?

GEOFF: Forget how long, old boy. No time here. Time’s away and somewhere else. Don’t know where that came from, must have been something I learned at school, but it’s true. As for all, I mean all those that the Wordman kills.

DICK: The Wordman …but aren’t I the Wordman?

GEOFF: You? My dear Dick! What on earth put that notion in your head?

DICK: I don’t know …just something …I feel responsible somehow …

GEOFF: And that’s why you’re apologizing left and right! My dear chap, rest easy. You couldn’t hurt a fly. I recall the first time I gave you a pair of trout and you realized you had to clean them out yourself. You turned white! No, you’re like the rest of us, a victim here. Look at you, all chopped about like a baited badger. Councillor, you tell him.

STUFFER STEEL: Tell him what?

GEOFF: The dear chap thinks he’s the Wordman.

STUFFER: So he is. All them buggers as work in yon poncy Centre, all sodding wordmen, never done an honest day’s work between ’em.

GEOFF: May have got something there, Councillor. But I mean Wordman with a capital W, the one who’s been doing all these killings.

STUFFER: Oh, yon bugger. No, Mr. Dee, you may be a lot of things, most on ’em useless, but you’re definitely not that

Wordman, not if that’s the bugger who killed me.

DICK: Thank God, thank God. But if it’s not me, then who is it? Who was it who killed you, Councillor?

STUFFER: You really don’t know? Aye well, fair do’s. Took me some time to twig even after I got here. I mean, you’re standing there washing your hands in a gent’s bog and you look up and see a bonny young lass in the mirror, you don’t think straight off, she’s come to top me!

DICK: A young lass …oh my God …

STUFFER: Coming back, is it now? Aye, well, I looked at her and she looked at me, this big reassuring smile on her face. And I said what the hell are you doing in here, lass? And she said, I just wanted to tell you I’ve got that dinner you asked for sorted. You know, rib beef and Yorkshire pudding and lots and lots of roast spuds. And I thought, well that sounds all right. Then I felt summat at the back of me neck and next thing I’m on the floor and it’s all getting dark. Then there was this young fellow-me-lad bending over me and asking if I were all right and I knew I weren’t all right, I knew I were on my way out, and I’d no idea why, that’s what bothered me.

DICK: And you said rosebud to him. Why did you say rosebud?

STUFFER: Don’t recollect saying owt, but if I did, I know it bloody weren’t rosebud! No, it ’ud be roast spuds! You see, what I couldn’t get my head round was why she’d been going on about me dinner. But I’ve worked it out since. She wanted me to die happy. Aye, that must have been it. She didn’t want me to die thinking, ‘Oh Christ, there’s someone here going to kill me.’ She wanted me to go thinking I was about to get me dinner. Not much bloody hope of that down here, far as I can see, but it was a kindness, aye, I’ll give her that. It was kindly meant.

DICK: And this was definitely Rye? This was Miss Pomona?

GEOFF: You know it was, Dick. It’s coming back now, isn’t it? Like the councillor says, takes a bit of getting hold of. When I saw her pointing the Purdy at me, I just said, careful, my dear. Not good form to point a gun at anyone. It might go off. Then it did. Still thought it was an accident when I found myself here, but once I got talking to the others …Well, I should have known, pretty young lass like that fluttering her eyelashes at me and saying she was really interested in night fishing and she’d heard I’d got this boat out at Stang Creek-must have heard that from you, I suppose, Dick-no, it didn’t make sense, I thought, not unless maybe she fancied me. Don’t suppose that made sense either, but I have been fancied in my time, and an old cavalry horse don’t pay much attention to anything else when he hears the bugle playing! Who knows, out in the country, snag a couple of trout, bake them over a fire, bottle of vino, anything can happen. And it did!

DICK: It’s coming back now but I still can’t believe it. We were getting on like a house on fire. She sent out all the signals. They seemed unmistakable, but I still needed to be absolutely sure. No way I wanted to risk our working relationship by giving her cause to think I was taking advantage. So I left her alone to give her time to think things over, cool off, if that’s what she wanted, but when I peeped through the door, she was standing at the window taking her clothes off. Well, that was it. Couldn’t be clearer, I thought. I slipped out of my kit in a trice, then just to keep it all light and easy, I grabbed a loaf of bread and a knife …we’d been talking about how nice toast tasted made over an open fire …and I went back in and said that I thought we’d have some toast afterwards. But she looked at me as if she wasn’t listening …well, to tell the truth it was my erection she seemed to be looking at …I was well aroused, and she seemed to be really focused on it …quite flattering, really …and she came towards me, and I felt her take the knife from my hand, and next thing I had this feeling in my stomach, oddly it wasn’t a pain, not at first, just a very strange and not at all distressing feeling which got somehow all mixed up with my desire for her, and she held me very close to her, and I felt myself beginning to go. I’d read about young women swooning with desire in Charley Penn’s books and I recall thinking, I must tell Charley it happens to fellows too, and Rye was screaming with passion, at least that’s what I took it to be though it did seem a bit strident, then suddenly it was as if I’d been grasped from behind and dragged backwards to the floor, and after that I’ve no idea what happened …

GEOFF: You got used for target practice by the look of you. Hello, what’s all that noise down by the river?

STUFFER: I’ll go and see.

GEOFF: Notice anything about the councillor?

DICK: Apart from that hole in the back of his neck? No.

GEOFF: His breath. No pong. One of the few advantages of this place. Lots of sensory switch off. All these wounds, no pain. And no smell. Plus you can see that damned attractive telly girl running around in the next-to-nothing and not get randy, though you may not feel that as an advantage. They really are making a din down there. Must be something happening. Let’s go and see.

DICK: I can’t get over it. Rye Pomona. But why …?

GEOFF: No doubt there’ll be answers by and by. Councillor, what’s going on?

STUFFER: It’s these two. They say they saw something out there on the river in the mist.

SAM: They’re right, you know. Look, there it is, looming through the mist. But let’s not be too quick to attract attention. There’s no telling what plans this guy might have for us.

JAX: Who cares as long as he’s got a mobile? Yoo hoo! Yoo hoo! Over here!

ANDREW: Is someone coming? Maybe they’ve seen my van. Oh yes, now I see him. But is it a him? I don’t believe so. This could be very helpful. I’m sure it’s that lass whose car I fixed. She must know where the bridge is. Miss! Miss! This way!

DICK: Dear God, he’s right. It’s her. It’s Rye, it’s Rye Pomona. There, I knew she couldn’t be the Wordman, else what’s she doing down here. Rye! Rye! Over here.

STUFFER: Aye, get yourself over here, my girl, I want a word with you.

GEOFF: Hold on. Hard to see with all this mist, certainly looks like Miss Pomona, but can’t spot any, you know, bumpy bits. And that funny mark she’s got in her hair, where’s that?

SAM: If it’s that girl and she’s not dead, I’m going to kill her. Rye Pomona, is that you?

SERGIUS POMONA: Pomona certainly, but not Rye. Sergius of that ilk. Raina’s twin.

SAM: Sergius …Raina …oh bizarre.

STUFFER: What’s he laughing at?

GEOFF: Don’t know but it’s good to see him a bit more cheerful. Mr. Pomona, have you come to take us across?

SERGIUS: Yes, but before I come in to the bank and you start embarking, can we get any silly antagonisms out of the way? This isn’t a large ferry and there’s quite a lot of you, so we’ll be pretty low in the water and the last thing we need is anyone rocking the boat. You do not want to end up in this river, believe me. So if you’ve got any questions, ask them now.

DICK: Yes, I’ve a question. Rye’s actions, going around killing people, has this got anything to do with that accident when you died?

SERGIUS: She told you about that?

DICK: Yes. It started with her hair. I didn’t ask but she must have seen I was curious and it all came out, how you crashed the car and two other people got killed, and you yourself of course …

SERGIUS: Ah, that’s the version she gave you, was it? A few minor inaccuracies. It wasn’t me driving, for a start. It was Rye. She was so desperate to get to the theatre for her potty little role that she’d have done anything. When I realized she was setting out in Mummy’s car, I ran after her and because she was having trouble changing up, I managed to jump into the passenger seat. She caused the crash. She killed me and those other two people. But you’re right about one thing. That was where all this started.

SAM: You’re saying because she feels guilty about accidentally killing three people all those years ago, she started bumping us off now? I hope you’ve got Beddoes over there. He’ll have loved this. It’s really Gothic!

SERGIUS: It’s a little more complicated. We were very close, real twins, to the point where we often seemed to share thoughts, and if anything happened to the other when we were apart, both of us felt it. So she was naturally devastated when I died, particularly as it was her fault, and when she wanted to ask my forgiveness, it didn’t seem silly to try and contact me via our shared thoughts as we used to when I was alive. Well, we got a dialogue going in her mind, but she was never sure if it was real or she was just making it up …

GEOFF: And was it real?

SERGIUS: How should I know? I wasn’t sure either if the dialogue I thought I was having with her was real or just my imagining. I mean, when you’re both alive and can meet to exchange notes, you can cross-check, right? But with me down here, her up there, how could either of us tell? Unless of course, we got a sign.

SAM: A sign? Oh, God preserve us from signs!

STUFFER: Aye, one thing I’ve learnt in politics is any bugger looking for signs is sure to find ’em, and there’s none of ’em to be trusted!

SERGIUS: You may be right, Councillor. Certainly once she started looking they came thick and fast. In fairness, you’ve got to understand her psychological state. It wasn’t just guilt at my death that was screwing up her thinking. It was the way her whole life had been stood on its head. Her acting career had been all she ever thought of before the accident, but after she recovered, she gave it up completely. What she told people-indeed what she told herself-was that she did it out of revulsion against the artificialities and pretences of the stage. In fact it was rather more basic. You see, she found she could no longer remember the words!

DICK: But she always had a marvellous memory for quotation.

SERGIUS: Off the stage, everything was fine, near perfect recall. But once she trod the boards, it all went.

BROSE: How awful! I once recall drying up when I was playing Mirabell opposite Dame Judi at the Garrick …

PERCY: Oh, do shut up, Brose, and let the man finish. The sooner we get across this dreadful river, the sooner we’ll be released from this most embarrassing position.

SERGIUS: Thank you, Mr. Follows. You should understand, Mr. Bird, it wasn’t just her learned lines that went, it was all vocabulary. Can you imagine what it’s like to be in a world devoid of words? Where nothing you see has a label? Nothing you feel can be expressed? Nothing you think …well, in fact, you can’t think! This is what going on the stage meant for her. This is why she became a librarian, so she could spend her life in places where they treasured words and kept them stored safe for future generations. But all the time she wanted my forgiveness. She had a memory of me lifting her from the driver’s seat of the wrecked car and laying her on the pavement, then reaching up to pluck a spray of cypress from a tree overhanging the churchyard wall and placing it on her breast and whispering a loving reassuring word in her ear before going to take my place by the driver’s door so she wouldn’t be blamed for the crash.

DICK: That rings a bell …

SERGIUS: Indeed. I expect you’re thinking of one of your friend Mr. Penn’s translations which he used to leave lying around in what was always a vain effort to engage Rye’s affections. It’s from the poem which begins “All night long when dreaming I see your face …”

DICK: That’s right. How does the last verse go?

A word in secret you softly say

And give me a cypress spray sweetly.

I wake and find that I’ve lost the spray

And the word escapes me completely.

SERGIUS: Well remembered. Pity Rye’s memory didn’t work as well. She got thrown out of the car and I was in no state to get out after her. I just slumped across into the driver’s seat and died. And it wasn’t a churchyard wall we hit, but a garden wall, and the nearest thing to a cypress tree in it was one of those ghastly leylandii hedges. But Rye had such a powerful false memory that when she read this particular effort of Mr. Penn’s, she immediately saw it as one of these signs she was always looking for. There were plenty of others. You yourself bear some responsibility in this, Mr. Dee. You made her aware of that game of yours, Paronomania, and she worked out for herself long before you told her what was the significance of the third tile rack bearing the name Johnny. Here, it seemed to her, was a perfect example of bringing someone back to life through the power of words.

DICK: But it was never like that with Johnny …I refuse to accept any responsibility here …it’s only a game …was …

SERGIUS: Of course it was. With Rye, too, it was only a game to start with. But before we leave your game, Mr. Dee, you should be aware that in fact its very name was one of the most significant triggers of her subsequent course of action. In the beginning was the word, remember? And the word in this case was PARONOMANIA.

DICK: I don’t understand. How could a name …? Ah …

SERGIUS: I think you’re getting there. After all, you too are a wordman. That’s right. Try rearranging the letters.

DICK: Oh God …Paronomania …Raina Pomona! But I can’t be blamed for an anagram!

SERGIUS: Why not? You have taken power from words and their construction, deconstruction, and reconstruction all your life. The man who splits the atom must bear some responsibility for all that springs therefrom, surely? Dear Rye saw in these and many other small signs evidence that I was trying to show her a path which would lead to direct communication with me.

GEOFF: By killing people? Don’t get it, old boy.

SERGIUS: That was still to come. The nearest thing to an unmistakable sign came the day the shelf collapsed during the grand tour of the library. Most of you were there, which of course seemed significant later on. You remember the occasion, Mr. Dee?

DICK: Indeed. It was quite comic really the way everyone scattered as the books came tumbling down.

PERCY: I didn’t think it was comic. I’ve never been so embarrassed in my life.

BROSE: Not even now, dear boy.

PERCY: This hardly counts as life, does it? So there!

DICK: But what …oh yes. It was the OED. All twenty volumes. What a crash they made! And it was this that …?

SERGIUS: Yes. Rye didn’t see an accident. She saw all the words in the language come flying off the shelves to send the great and the good of Mid-Yorkshire into undignified flight. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The path to communion with me must, she felt, lead through all these words, but how? So many, so very many …how to traverse such vast distances …she needed a chart to show her the path …and then it came to her …what if the OED was her chart …what if the limits of each volume were signposts …? A to Bazouki …BBC to Chalypsography … but how? And now she told herself, or imagined she heard me telling her, that messages to and from the dead require messengers, and for these messengers to be efficient, they must leave her living and come to me dead. These ideas were all swirling madly in her mind, and might still have come to nothing had she not driven out that fatal morning, and broken down, and saw you come bowling merrily along the road, Mr. Ainstable.

ANDREW: This is all beyond me. Is my van on the other side then, mate?

SERGIUS: Of course it is. Everything any of you need is over there. After your death, Mr. Ainstable, which she merely observed, she was almost convinced. After Mr. Pitman’s, which she contributed to but not necessarily fatally-he might after all have kept control of his bike and continued on his way home, cursing lady drivers-she felt sure that this was the path I had mapped out for her. And when you, dear lady, went on television, and practically invited her to prepare another Dialogue, everything seemed clear.

JAX: What a story! You say everything we need is on the other side. Computer terminals? Fax machines? Mobiles? That’s great! Come on, let’s not waste any more time. Let’s go!

STUFFER: Hold your horses. I want to know what she meant by scraping away at my poor old head. I mean, killing me were bad enough, that were adding insult to injury!

SERGIUS: Oh yes. That was quite amusing really. She had to mark you to get the sense of steel engraving across. But the police experts interpreted it as an attempt to inscribe RIP, in Cyrillic script. They were right about the script-a macabre little joke on my sister’s part-but in fact all she was writing was her initials, R.P., as an artist might inscribe a work of art. This was part of her desire for confirmation of my protection, for assurance of her invulnerability. Tell the world it was her; even as in your case, my lord, lead the police to the body. It didn’t matter what she did, she felt she couldn’t be caught, no matter what clues she left.

SAM: And that makes it all right, does it? So what clues did the cow leave after she did for me?

SERGIUS: Well, she left the book open at that poem about the loved, long lost boy. That was me, of course. And then there was the chocolate bar …

SAM: What chocolate bar, for God’s sake?

SERGIUS: The Yorkie bar. Yorkies have the letters of its name printed on them, one on each segment. She broke it up and rearranged it on the mantel shelf above the fire. If anyone had found your body before the chocolate melted, they’d have read her message.

SAM: Message? What message? Some reference to The Chocolate Soldier? Very subtle!

SERGIUS: Oh no. Much clearer than that. The letters read I RYE OK. Surely even Mid-Yorkshire’s Thickest would have got that? Perhaps not. I mean, none of them spotted that the illuminated P at the beginning of the first Dialogue represented a tree and there were apples among the pile of letters lying alongside the roots. Pomona, the goddess of fruit trees, remember? From the start she was telling you who she was. Later you even gave a little lecture to that young constable on why man in combinations like chairman need not be gender specific, and neither of you transferred it to wordman. But why should we be surprised? Even when the police more or less caught her in the act of slaying you, Mr. Dee, she still got away with it. Of course, love is blind, and when that poor young constable rushed in, what he saw was you assaulting his beloved. Happily for Rye, when he fell backwards in pulling you off her, he hit his head so hard, he was rendered almost senseless, a condition she maintained by breaking a bottle over his skull and blinding him with wine. It was easy then for her to make sure his hand found the knife which he proceeded to stick into you with such great enthusiasm. Not that it was necessary. You were going to die from Rye’s first blow to the stomach anyway.

DICK: But why? Why did she do it? We were going to make love. She felt the same way as I did, I’m sure.

SERGIUS: You’re right. She liked you; and she felt extremely randy; and being a modern young woman, saw no reason not to enjoy herself. But naturally on seeing the approach of the young man she really loved, she changed her mind. She’s not that modern! Then she saw you naked, and that was it. But I’m afraid it wasn’t your rampant loblance that so compelled her gaze, Mr. Dee, it was the rather large reddy-grey birthmark running across your belly. If ever a man was haswed, it was you. This was a sign from Serge, she thought. Time stopped for her. Which meant, of course, that very soon time had to stop for you also. Don’t take it personally. Do take it as a comfort, if you will, that your death affected her more than anyone else’s. And, of course, it had the bonus of giving the constabulary the best kind of ready-made culprit, a dead one who spared them the inconvenience and expense of a trial.

DICK: Oh God. You mean that’s what I’m going to be remembered for? Being a serial killer?

SERGIUS: Well, it was always your ambition to make your mark as a wordman, wasn’t it? And you did contribute to your own downfall. She wouldn’t have come to the cottage if you hadn’t asked her. And she wouldn’t have seen your birthmark if you hadn’t set out to seduce her. And the police wouldn’t have had you so firmly in the frame if you’d come forward to admit you’d been in bed with Miss Ripley the day she died. That was an amusing irony, really. Rye had actually covered up your presence there by removing your watch which you’d left under the pillow! She did it out of affection for you. But if the police had found it and therefore questioned you earlier about your relationship with Miss Ripley, who knows? Perhaps the whole course of events may have been changed. Well, that’s fate. Now, unless there are any more questions, let’s start getting you aboard. You first, Messrs. Bird and Follows, as you are potentially the most awkward …

PERCY: We will get separated on the other side, won’t we?

SERGIUS: Oh yes. Nothing Dante-esque about the place where you’re going. Now, Miss Ripley …excellent …Mr. Ainstable, perhaps you could give Mr. Pitman a hand …he’s a bit broken up …you’ll love it over there, Mr. Pitman. Very Greek. Mr. Steel …

STUFFER: What’s the nosh like, mate?

SERGIUS: Ambrosia. With chips. Dr. Johnson …

SAM: I don’t know about this …

SERGIUS: Just think of it as sailing to the rock in the ancient waves, Doctor. And there’s a young friend of yours waiting to see you. That’s right. He may have a couple of things to tell you which you’ll find surprising. There we go. Now, Mr. Dee …

DICK: Do I gather that we’ll get the chance to meet people we once knew …?

SERGIUS: Don’t worry. Young Johnny knows you’re coming. He’s very excited. Last but not least, you, my lord.

GEOFF: Oh gosh, not so much of that lord stuff, eh? Not the place to be putting on the style from the sound of it.

SERGIUS: You may be surprised how hierarchical we are. And of course when you’re connected …

GEOFF: So long as there’s a bit of good sport. Shall I push off then? Right. Here we go. Just one thing that bothers me, as they say in the tec novels. Has all this worked out for Rye? I mean, was it really you leading her on all the time? And if her motive was getting in touch with you, why can’t we hear her? Or did she have to get right through the whole twenty volumes of OED before she wrapped it up? In which case, sounds like she’s got a long way to go? And won’t the police get a bit suspicious when the Wordman killings carry on even with Dick here dead? Left hand down a bit, I think, old thing. Don’t want to hit that rock or whatever it is out there …can’t see a thing in this mist …oh yes, I can …it’s getting a bit clearer …it’s …it’s …Oh my God …!

And so their voices fade in the mist, or rather in my head, which is maybe the same thing, with Geoff’s questions unanswered.

Silence. The same silence which began as I stepped back into time and looked down at dear Dick’s ripped and bloody corpse, and dearer Hat’s pale and bleeding face.

Oh, Serge, Serge, why have you deserted me? In all the other dialogues, I heard you, sometimes faint, sometimes loud and clear, always unmistakably you. In this one I have invented words, for you, for all of them, hoping like a nurse giving the kiss of life, that eventually my breath would give you strength once more to take your own.

But here I sit in what used to be Dick’s chair, with all those old wordmen staring down at me from the walls, and I know that I am alone. Except for my memories.

Such memories.

How can I live with them?

I am of course mad by any normal standard of judging sanity.

And will be mad in my own judgment if I conclude that this has all been delusion, all done for nothing.

The questions I put into Geoff’s mouth need to be answered.

Perhaps others will answer them for me. Even if the police are so blind that they let me get away with this, theirs are not the only eyes that I have to fear.

Through the open door into the library, I can see Charley Penn sitting at his table, looking towards me with a gaze by turns speculative and sceptical and accusing, and always angry.

Beside him is that strange young man, Franny Roote, who whenever he catches my eye gives me a small, almost complicitous smile.

Or is it guilt that makes me see these things?

Something else that I can see through my open door is real enough, nought realler.

The twenty volumes of the Oxford English Dictionary sitting proudly on its high shelf.

I set out on a path signposted by the forty words on those twenty volumes.

Haswed has brought me up to the end of Volume VI.

What of the other fourteen? Do I really need to labour over that long and tortuous path to discover the truth of it all? Must I press on into Volume VII?

Or have the six brought me to my destination?

Is this silence your final message to me, my beloved Serge, saying that I need no longer strain my ears to have a dialogue with the dead because I now at last have a sufficient dialogue with one of the living?

It’s very important to know. And not just for me.

I look at the first word of the two defining the limits of Volume VII and my heart aches with love, and with fear.

For I know I have to decide very soon whether those three simple letters signpost a direction, or a destination.

Hat Hat Hat Hat

Is this the start of a new game?

Or is it simply The End?