Travels in Nihilon

Chapter 19

Hairpins chafed at his naked body. He stirred in the wide, opulent bed, and wondered where his loving boatwoman Mella had gone. He closed his eyes, bringing his knees up to his chest. No guidebook could ever have been written in a pleasanter manner. Even so, he was hungry. But he wanted to go back to sleep.

An occasional explosion rattled the windows, and when at one earthy grunt his bed vibrated, he wished they’d stop trying to kill each other and return to their coffee. Sunlight pushed at the glass, promising a fine day. Shelp was renowned for its climate, a fact which he’d already put into his guidebook notes. But ought he not also to mention the gunfire, and the tractable boatwoman? While reflecting pleasurably on Mella, he discussed with himself the hedonistic notion of breaking his contract and never going back home, as if one night of unmitigated pleasure had melted his spine. Maybe the day would return it to him.

After making love he liked to talk to his beloved, but where was she? Perhaps it was her absence that had wakened him while he was still tired. Then the door opened, and he sat up as Mella came into the room. She carried an immense sack over her shoulder, and another heavy bag in her hand. ‘What’s that?’

She put it on the bed, almost crushing his foot. He pulled it free, and she mistook the purple gloss of pain on his face for an expression of concern at the weight she carried. ‘It’s our food.’

‘What do we need it for?’

‘To eat, my love.’

‘But we’re in a hotel. I’ve already rung for breakfast. Have you never been in a hotel before?’

‘I fought for this food at the markets.’ She sat by the sack, and he kissed her in order to forestall those strong arms around him, but they held him nevertheless. ‘I love you,’ she said, drawing his face into her breasts. ‘It was such a struggle to get this food.’

‘Why was it?’ he asked in a muffled voice.

She released him. ‘Because there’s none left. All food has been commandeered for Fludd, where the dam has burst. As soon as I heard it on the Lies I ran to my boat-trolley, and went from shop to shop. We’re safe now, my love, with so much to eat.’

‘Where did you get the money? You’re only a poor boatwoman.’

‘Don’t be angry,’ she said in a stern though democratic voice. ‘I took a thousand-klipp note from your wallet, and I spent the same amount from mine.’

‘Who are you?’ he demanded, suddenly suspicious. ‘I know you’re not a boatwoman. You can’t be.’

A sharp crack against the window caused a musical sound of shattering glass, and Mella sheltered him against her. Machine-gun fire drilled along the street below. ‘We have to get out of Shelp.’

He was ashamed of his vibrating limbs, as if a wave of freezing water had passed over them. ‘What is it? What’s going on?’

‘We don’t know for sure,’ she told him. ‘It said on the Lies that the Cronacian fishermen had been defeated, but the government must be telling the truth again, which means real lies. Or maybe there is an insurrection. People have been talking about it for days. Or it’s a revolution, a mutiny, a rebellion, a coup d’état, a riot, or even an unofficial unlicensed public holiday. It could be any of those things.’

‘I want to start for Nihilon City today,’ he said, stepping out of bed to dress, as another explosion shook the whole building. She looked at him, and regretfully watched his naked body being slowly clothed. ‘There are no trains to the capital. The railway is closed for passengers. Only goods trains can get through, with relief supplies for Fludd.’

‘Or troop trains,’ he scoffed, ‘to restore order in Shelp I should think.’

‘You learn quickly,’ she said, sadly. ‘Maybe you’re a Nihilist at heart.’

‘Aren’t you?’ he laughed, fastening his tie.

‘I believe in real democracy, and love.’

‘Not that I’m a Nihilist,’ he said, kissing her tenderly. ‘I’m an individualist.’

She drew away: ‘That’s how Nihilism began. Every man for himself. I believe in honesty and co-operation, progress and humanity, goodness and life.’

‘Oh, you poor child,’ he cried, feeling older and superior.

‘You don’t understand,’ she said. ‘It’s true I’m only a boatwoman, but I’m also the daughter of President Took, the last president of Damascony.’

There was a knock at the door, and a waiter entered with a magnificent silver tray on which was spread an extensive breakfast. While eating, Mella told him that after her father had disappeared (she was a baby at the time), her mother was killed with a rifle in her hands helping to defend the telegraph office in Nihilon City. That was certain. A woman had then put Mella on a lorry bound for a remote village in the mountains whose mayor, knowing who she was, brought her up in the best traditions of Tookist liberalism. But when she was fifteen this man died, and the family began to treat her in true nihilistic manner, as a servant and field worker, gardener and water-carrier. She was even forced into a disastrous marriage with one of the mayor’s idle and vicious sons.

Luckily, as occasionally happened in Nihilon, the law was on her side, for in Nihilon a marriage licence is granted only for seven years. It then comes up for renewal, like a television licence. Those who don’t choose to renew it mutually (and she didn’t) were no longer considered to be married. She had had no children, though the law in any case said that children born within a year of the marriage lapsing would stay with the mother.

Free at last of her good-for-nothing Nihilist husband, and having heard of the democratic traditions of Shelp with regard to women, she had gone there, and found that she could only get work as a boatwoman. Already strong after her work in the country, she nevertheless found her new job almost overwhelming, though she preferred it to her recent life of semi-slavery. In time, however, she became more adept in her work than the other boatwomen, and was accepted as their leader, organizing them into as much of a union as was possible in a country like Nihilon.

At the age of twenty-eight she had met Edgar, and fallen in love for the first time in her life. All that remained for her to do was, with the help of her lover, solve the mystery of her father’s death. She saw no hope of finding him alive, but felt that her sufferings would be more than justified if she could at least discover his grave.

Although Edgar was fond of this strange and passionate woman, he did not honestly think he was in love with her. ‘I love you,’ he said to her. ‘I really love you.’

She stood up and undressed, her eyes glowing at him, so that he was obliged to do the same. ‘We’ll stay here all day and all night,’ she said. ‘Perhaps trains will be running again to Nihilon City in the morning.’

‘Aren’t there any buses?’ he asked, a forlorn hope as a hardening handsome nipple tipped at his cheek.

She pushed him on to the bed. ‘None at all. But don’t worry. We’ll go tomorrow.’ His spine trembled with renewed life, and he was soon in no condition to argue. Another explosion seemed to rend the town apart, and he felt her pulling the blankets up and over them.