The End of All Songs
BY MICHAEL MOORCOCK
Book Three of the Dancers at the End of Time trilogy
ERNEST DOWSON
The fire is out, and spent the warmth thereof,
(This is the end of every song man sings!)
The golden wine is drunk, the dregs remain,
Bitter as wormwood and as salt as pain;
And health and hope have gone the way of love
Into the drear oblivion of lost things,
Ghosts go along with us until the end;
This was a mistress, this, perhaps, a friend.
With pale, indifferent eyes, we sit and wait
For the dropt curtain and the closing gate:
This is the end of all the songs man sings.
Dregs
1899
1. In Which Jherek Carnelian and Mrs. Amelia Underwood Commune, to some Degree, with Nature
"I really do think, Mr. Carnelian, that we should at least try them raw, don't you?"
Mrs. Amelia Underwood, with the flat of her left hand, stroked thick auburn hair back over her ear and, with her right hand, arranged her tattered skirts about her ankles. The gesture was almost petulant; the glint in her grey eye was possibly wolfish. There was, if nothing else, something over-controlled in the manner in which she perched primly upon her block of virgin limestone and watched Jherek Carnelian as he crouched, elbows and knees pressed in the sand of a Palaeozoic beach, and sweated in the heat of the huge Silurian (or possibly Devonian) sun.
Perhaps for the thousandth time he was trying to strike two of his power-rings together to make a spark to light the heap of half-dried ferns he had, in a mood of ebullience long since dissipated, arranged several hours before.
"But you told me," he murmured, "that you could not bear to consider … There! Was that a spark? Or just a glint?"
"A glint," she said, "I think."
"We must not despair, Mrs. Underwood." His optimism was uncharacteristically strained. Again he struck ring against ring.
Around him were scattered the worn and broken fragments of fronds which he had earlier tried to rub together at her suggestion. As power-ring clacked on power-ring, Mrs. Underwood winced. In the silence of this Silurian (if it was Silurian) afternoon the sound had an effect upon her nerves she would not previously have credited; she had never seen herself as one of those over-sensitive women who populated the novels of Marie Corelli. She had always considered herself robust, singularly healthy. She sighed. Doubtless the boredom contributed something to her state of mind.
Jherek echoed her sigh. "There's probably a knack to it," he admitted. "Where are the trilobites?" He stared absently around him at the ground.
"Most of them have crawled back into the sea, I think," she told him coldly. "There are two brachiopods on your coat." She pointed.
"Aha!" Almost affectionately he plucked the molluscoidea from the dirty black cloth of his frock-coat. Doubtfully, he peered into the shells.
Mrs. Underwood licked her lips. "Give them to me," she commanded. She produced a hat-pin.
His head bowed, Pilate confronting the Pharisees, he complied.
"After all," she told him as she poised the pin, "we are only missing garlic and butter and we should have a meal fit for a French gourmet." The utterance seemed to depress her. She hesitated.
"Mrs. Underwood?"
"Should we say grace, I wonder?" She frowned. "It might help. I think it's the colour…"
"Too beautiful," he said eagerly. "I follow you. Who could destroy such loveliness?"
"That greenish, purplish hue pleases you?"
"Not you?"
"Not in food, Mr. Carnelian."
"Then in what?"
"Oh…" Vaguely. "In — no, not even in a picture. It brings to mind the excesses of the Pre-Raphaelites. A morbid colour."
"Ah."
"It might explain your affinities…" She abandoned the subject. "If I could conquer…"
"A yellow one?" He tried to tempt her with a soft-shelled creature he had just discovered in his back pocket. It clung to his finger; there was the sensation of a kiss.
She dropped molluscs and hat-pin, covered her face with her hands and began to weep.
"Mrs. Underwood!" He was at a loss. He stirred the pile of fronds with his foot. "Perhaps if I were to use a ring as a prism and direct the rays of the sun through it we could…"
There came a loud squeak and he wondered at first if one of the creatures were protesting. Another squeak, from behind him. Mrs. Underwood removed her fingers to expose red eyes which now widened in surprise.
"Hi! I say — Hi, there!"
Jherek turned. Tramping through the shallows, apparently oblivious of the water, came a man dressed in a seaman's jersey, a tweed Norfolk jacket, plus-fours, heavy woollen stockings, stout brogues. In one hand he clutched a stick of a peculiarly twisted crystalline nature. Otherwise he appeared to be a contemporary of Mrs. Underwood's. He was smiling. "I say, do you speak English of any kind?" He was bronzed. He had a full moustache and signs of a newly sprouting beard. He beamed at them. He came to a stop, resting his knuckles on his hips. "Well?"
Mrs. Underwood was confused. "We speak English, sir. Indeed we are — at least I am — English, as you must be."
"Beautiful day, isn't it?" The stranger nodded at the sea. "Nice and calm. Must be the early Devonian, eh? Have you been here long?"
"Long enough, sir."
"We are marooned," Jherek explained. "A malfunction of our time-craft. The paradoxes were too much for it, I suspect."
The stranger nodded gravely. "I've sometimes experienced similar difficulties, though happily without such drastic results. You're from the nineteenth century, I take it."
"Mrs. Underwood is. I hail from the End of Time."
"Aha!" The stranger smiled. "I have just come from there. I was fortunate enough to witness the complete disintegration of the universe — briefly, of course. I, too, am originally from the nineteenth century. This would be one of my regular stops, if I were journeying to the past. The peculiar thing is that I was under the impression I was going forward — beyond, as it were, the End of Time. My instruments indicate as much. Yet here I am." He scratched his sandy hair, adding, in mild disappointment, "I was hoping for some illumination."
"You are on your way, then, to the future?" Mrs. Underwood asked. "To the nineteenth century?"
"It seems that I must be. When did you leave?"
"1896," Mrs. Underwood told him.
"I am from 1894. I was not aware that anyone else had hit upon my discovery during that period…"
"There!" exclaimed Jherek. "Mr. Wells was right!"
"Our machine was from Mr. Carnelian's period," she said. "Originally, I was abducted to the End of Time, under circumstances which remain mysterious. The motives of my abductor continue to be obscure, moreover. I…" She paused apologetically. "This is of no interest to you, of course." She moistened her lips. "You would not, I suppose, have the means of lighting a fire, sir?"
The stranger patted the bulging pockets of his Norfolk jacket. "Somewhere. Some matches. I tend to carry as many necessities as possible about my person. In the event of being stranded … Here we are." He produced a large box of vestas. "I would give you the whole box, but…"
"A few will do. You say you are familiar with the early Devonian."
"As familiar as one can be."
"Your advice, then, would be welcome. The edibility of the molluscs, for instance?"
"I think you'll find the myalina subquadrata the least offensive, and very few are actually poisonous, though a certain amount of indigestion is bound to result. I, myself, am a slave to indigestion."
"And what do these myalina look like?" Jherek asked.
"Oh, like mussels, really. You have to dig for them."
Mrs. Underwood took five matches from the box and handed it back.
"Your time-craft, sir, is functioning properly?" Jherek said.
"Oh, yes, perfectly."
"And you are returning to the nineteenth century?"
"To 1895, I hope."
"Then you could take us with you?"
The stranger shook his head. "It's a single-seater. The saddle barely accommodates me, since I began to put on weight. Come, I'll show you." He turned and began to plod through the sand in the direction from which he had come. They followed.
"Also," added the stranger, "it would be unwise for me to try to take people from 1896 to 1895. You would meet yourselves. Considerable confusion would result. One can tamper just a little with the Logic of Time, but I hesitate to think what would happen if one went in for such blatant paradoxes. It would seem to me that if you have been treating the Logic so cavalierly it is no wonder — I do not moralize, you understand — that you find yourselves in this position."
"Then you verify the Morphail Theory," Jherek said, trudging beside the time-traveller. "Time resists paradox, adjusting accordingly — refusing, you might say, to admit a foreign body to a period to which it is not indigenous?"
"If a paradox is likely to occur. Yes. I suspect that it is all to do with consciousness, and with our group understanding of what constitutes Past, Present and Future. That is, Time, as such, does not exist…"
Mrs. Underwood uttered a soft exclamation as the stranger's craft came in sight. It consisted of an open frame of tubular lengths of brass and ebony. There was ivory here and there, as well as a touch or two of silver, copper coils set into the top of the frame, immediately above a heavily sprung leather saddle of the sort normally seen on bicycles. Before this was a small board of instruments and a brass semi-circle where a lever might normally fit. Much of the rest of the machine was of nickel and crystal and it showed signs of wear, was much battered, dented and cracked in places. Behind the saddle was strapped a large chest and it was to this that the stranger made at once, undoing the brass buckles and pushing back the lid. The first object he drew out of the trunk was a double-barrelled shot-gun which he leaned against the saddle; next he removed a bale of muslin and a solar topee, and finally, using both hands, he hauled up a large wickerwork basket and dumped it in the sand at their feet.
"This might be useful to you," he said, replacing the other objects in the trunk and securing the straps. "It's the best I can offer, short of passage home. And I've explained why that's impossible. You wouldn't want to come face to face with yourselves in the middle of Waterloo Circus, would you?" He laughed.
"Don't you mean Piccadilly Circus, sir?" enquired Mrs. Underwood with a frown.
"Never heard of it," said the time-traveller.
"I've never heard of Waterloo Circus," she told him. "Are you sure you're from 1894?"
The stranger fingered the stubble on his chin. He seemed a little disturbed. "I thought I'd merely gone full circle," he murmured. "Hm — perhaps this universe is not quite the same as the one I left. Is it possible that for every new time-traveller a new chronology develops? Could there be an infinite number of universes?" He brightened. "This is a fine adventure, I must say. Aren't you hungry?"
Mrs. Amelia Underwood raised her beautiful brows.
The stranger pointed at the basket. "My provisions," he said. "Make what use of them you like. I'll risk finding some food at my next stop — hopefully 1895. Well, I must be on my way."
He bowed, brandishing his quartz rod significantly. He climbed onto his saddle and placed the rod in the brass groove, making some adjustments to his other controls.
Mrs. Underwood was already lifting the lid of the hamper. Her face was obscured, but Jherek thought he could hear her crooning to herself.
"Good luck to you both," said the stranger cheerfully. "I'm sure you won't be stuck here forever. It's unlikely, isn't it? I mean, what a find for the archaeologists, ha, ha! Your bones, that is!"
There came a sharp click as the stranger moved his lever a notch or two and almost immediately the time machine began to grow indistinct. Copper glowed and crystal shimmered; something seemed to be whirling very rapidly above the stranger's head and already both man and machine were semi-transparent. Jherek was struck in the face by a sudden gust of wind which came from nowhere and then the time-traveller had gone.
"Oh, look, Mr. Carnelian!" cried Mrs. Amelia Underwood, brandishing her trophy. "Chicken!"
Mrs. Amelia Underwood, with the flat of her left hand, stroked thick auburn hair back over her ear and, with her right hand, arranged her tattered skirts about her ankles. The gesture was almost petulant; the glint in her grey eye was possibly wolfish. There was, if nothing else, something over-controlled in the manner in which she perched primly upon her block of virgin limestone and watched Jherek Carnelian as he crouched, elbows and knees pressed in the sand of a Palaeozoic beach, and sweated in the heat of the huge Silurian (or possibly Devonian) sun.
Perhaps for the thousandth time he was trying to strike two of his power-rings together to make a spark to light the heap of half-dried ferns he had, in a mood of ebullience long since dissipated, arranged several hours before.
"But you told me," he murmured, "that you could not bear to consider … There! Was that a spark? Or just a glint?"
"A glint," she said, "I think."
"We must not despair, Mrs. Underwood." His optimism was uncharacteristically strained. Again he struck ring against ring.
Around him were scattered the worn and broken fragments of fronds which he had earlier tried to rub together at her suggestion. As power-ring clacked on power-ring, Mrs. Underwood winced. In the silence of this Silurian (if it was Silurian) afternoon the sound had an effect upon her nerves she would not previously have credited; she had never seen herself as one of those over-sensitive women who populated the novels of Marie Corelli. She had always considered herself robust, singularly healthy. She sighed. Doubtless the boredom contributed something to her state of mind.
Jherek echoed her sigh. "There's probably a knack to it," he admitted. "Where are the trilobites?" He stared absently around him at the ground.
"Most of them have crawled back into the sea, I think," she told him coldly. "There are two brachiopods on your coat." She pointed.
"Aha!" Almost affectionately he plucked the molluscoidea from the dirty black cloth of his frock-coat. Doubtfully, he peered into the shells.
Mrs. Underwood licked her lips. "Give them to me," she commanded. She produced a hat-pin.
His head bowed, Pilate confronting the Pharisees, he complied.
"After all," she told him as she poised the pin, "we are only missing garlic and butter and we should have a meal fit for a French gourmet." The utterance seemed to depress her. She hesitated.
"Mrs. Underwood?"
"Should we say grace, I wonder?" She frowned. "It might help. I think it's the colour…"
"Too beautiful," he said eagerly. "I follow you. Who could destroy such loveliness?"
"That greenish, purplish hue pleases you?"
"Not you?"
"Not in food, Mr. Carnelian."
"Then in what?"
"Oh…" Vaguely. "In — no, not even in a picture. It brings to mind the excesses of the Pre-Raphaelites. A morbid colour."
"Ah."
"It might explain your affinities…" She abandoned the subject. "If I could conquer…"
"A yellow one?" He tried to tempt her with a soft-shelled creature he had just discovered in his back pocket. It clung to his finger; there was the sensation of a kiss.
She dropped molluscs and hat-pin, covered her face with her hands and began to weep.
"Mrs. Underwood!" He was at a loss. He stirred the pile of fronds with his foot. "Perhaps if I were to use a ring as a prism and direct the rays of the sun through it we could…"
There came a loud squeak and he wondered at first if one of the creatures were protesting. Another squeak, from behind him. Mrs. Underwood removed her fingers to expose red eyes which now widened in surprise.
"Hi! I say — Hi, there!"
Jherek turned. Tramping through the shallows, apparently oblivious of the water, came a man dressed in a seaman's jersey, a tweed Norfolk jacket, plus-fours, heavy woollen stockings, stout brogues. In one hand he clutched a stick of a peculiarly twisted crystalline nature. Otherwise he appeared to be a contemporary of Mrs. Underwood's. He was smiling. "I say, do you speak English of any kind?" He was bronzed. He had a full moustache and signs of a newly sprouting beard. He beamed at them. He came to a stop, resting his knuckles on his hips. "Well?"
Mrs. Underwood was confused. "We speak English, sir. Indeed we are — at least I am — English, as you must be."
"Beautiful day, isn't it?" The stranger nodded at the sea. "Nice and calm. Must be the early Devonian, eh? Have you been here long?"
"Long enough, sir."
"We are marooned," Jherek explained. "A malfunction of our time-craft. The paradoxes were too much for it, I suspect."
The stranger nodded gravely. "I've sometimes experienced similar difficulties, though happily without such drastic results. You're from the nineteenth century, I take it."
"Mrs. Underwood is. I hail from the End of Time."
"Aha!" The stranger smiled. "I have just come from there. I was fortunate enough to witness the complete disintegration of the universe — briefly, of course. I, too, am originally from the nineteenth century. This would be one of my regular stops, if I were journeying to the past. The peculiar thing is that I was under the impression I was going forward — beyond, as it were, the End of Time. My instruments indicate as much. Yet here I am." He scratched his sandy hair, adding, in mild disappointment, "I was hoping for some illumination."
"You are on your way, then, to the future?" Mrs. Underwood asked. "To the nineteenth century?"
"It seems that I must be. When did you leave?"
"1896," Mrs. Underwood told him.
"I am from 1894. I was not aware that anyone else had hit upon my discovery during that period…"
"There!" exclaimed Jherek. "Mr. Wells was right!"
"Our machine was from Mr. Carnelian's period," she said. "Originally, I was abducted to the End of Time, under circumstances which remain mysterious. The motives of my abductor continue to be obscure, moreover. I…" She paused apologetically. "This is of no interest to you, of course." She moistened her lips. "You would not, I suppose, have the means of lighting a fire, sir?"
The stranger patted the bulging pockets of his Norfolk jacket. "Somewhere. Some matches. I tend to carry as many necessities as possible about my person. In the event of being stranded … Here we are." He produced a large box of vestas. "I would give you the whole box, but…"
"A few will do. You say you are familiar with the early Devonian."
"As familiar as one can be."
"Your advice, then, would be welcome. The edibility of the molluscs, for instance?"
"I think you'll find the myalina subquadrata the least offensive, and very few are actually poisonous, though a certain amount of indigestion is bound to result. I, myself, am a slave to indigestion."
"And what do these myalina look like?" Jherek asked.
"Oh, like mussels, really. You have to dig for them."
Mrs. Underwood took five matches from the box and handed it back.
"Your time-craft, sir, is functioning properly?" Jherek said.
"Oh, yes, perfectly."
"And you are returning to the nineteenth century?"
"To 1895, I hope."
"Then you could take us with you?"
The stranger shook his head. "It's a single-seater. The saddle barely accommodates me, since I began to put on weight. Come, I'll show you." He turned and began to plod through the sand in the direction from which he had come. They followed.
"Also," added the stranger, "it would be unwise for me to try to take people from 1896 to 1895. You would meet yourselves. Considerable confusion would result. One can tamper just a little with the Logic of Time, but I hesitate to think what would happen if one went in for such blatant paradoxes. It would seem to me that if you have been treating the Logic so cavalierly it is no wonder — I do not moralize, you understand — that you find yourselves in this position."
"Then you verify the Morphail Theory," Jherek said, trudging beside the time-traveller. "Time resists paradox, adjusting accordingly — refusing, you might say, to admit a foreign body to a period to which it is not indigenous?"
"If a paradox is likely to occur. Yes. I suspect that it is all to do with consciousness, and with our group understanding of what constitutes Past, Present and Future. That is, Time, as such, does not exist…"
Mrs. Underwood uttered a soft exclamation as the stranger's craft came in sight. It consisted of an open frame of tubular lengths of brass and ebony. There was ivory here and there, as well as a touch or two of silver, copper coils set into the top of the frame, immediately above a heavily sprung leather saddle of the sort normally seen on bicycles. Before this was a small board of instruments and a brass semi-circle where a lever might normally fit. Much of the rest of the machine was of nickel and crystal and it showed signs of wear, was much battered, dented and cracked in places. Behind the saddle was strapped a large chest and it was to this that the stranger made at once, undoing the brass buckles and pushing back the lid. The first object he drew out of the trunk was a double-barrelled shot-gun which he leaned against the saddle; next he removed a bale of muslin and a solar topee, and finally, using both hands, he hauled up a large wickerwork basket and dumped it in the sand at their feet.
"This might be useful to you," he said, replacing the other objects in the trunk and securing the straps. "It's the best I can offer, short of passage home. And I've explained why that's impossible. You wouldn't want to come face to face with yourselves in the middle of Waterloo Circus, would you?" He laughed.
"Don't you mean Piccadilly Circus, sir?" enquired Mrs. Underwood with a frown.
"Never heard of it," said the time-traveller.
"I've never heard of Waterloo Circus," she told him. "Are you sure you're from 1894?"
The stranger fingered the stubble on his chin. He seemed a little disturbed. "I thought I'd merely gone full circle," he murmured. "Hm — perhaps this universe is not quite the same as the one I left. Is it possible that for every new time-traveller a new chronology develops? Could there be an infinite number of universes?" He brightened. "This is a fine adventure, I must say. Aren't you hungry?"
Mrs. Amelia Underwood raised her beautiful brows.
The stranger pointed at the basket. "My provisions," he said. "Make what use of them you like. I'll risk finding some food at my next stop — hopefully 1895. Well, I must be on my way."
He bowed, brandishing his quartz rod significantly. He climbed onto his saddle and placed the rod in the brass groove, making some adjustments to his other controls.
Mrs. Underwood was already lifting the lid of the hamper. Her face was obscured, but Jherek thought he could hear her crooning to herself.
"Good luck to you both," said the stranger cheerfully. "I'm sure you won't be stuck here forever. It's unlikely, isn't it? I mean, what a find for the archaeologists, ha, ha! Your bones, that is!"
There came a sharp click as the stranger moved his lever a notch or two and almost immediately the time machine began to grow indistinct. Copper glowed and crystal shimmered; something seemed to be whirling very rapidly above the stranger's head and already both man and machine were semi-transparent. Jherek was struck in the face by a sudden gust of wind which came from nowhere and then the time-traveller had gone.
"Oh, look, Mr. Carnelian!" cried Mrs. Amelia Underwood, brandishing her trophy. "Chicken!"
2. In Which Inspector Springer Tastes the Delights of the Simple Life
For the following two days and nights a certain tension, dissipating before the advent of the time-traveller but since restored, existed between the lovers (for they were lovers — only her upbringing denied it) and they slept fitfully, the pair of them, on either side of a frond-fondled limestone rock, having to fear nothing but the inquisitive attentions of the little molluscs and trilobites whose own lives now were free from danger, thanks to the hamper, crammed with cans and bottles enough to sustain a good-sized expedition for a month. No large beasts, no unexpected turn of the weather, threatened our Adam and our Eve; Eve, alone, knew inner conflict: Adam, simple bewilderment; but then he was used to bewilderment, and sudden moods or twists of fate had been the stuff of his existence until only recently — yet his spirits were not what they had been.
They rose somewhat, those spirits, at dawn this morning — for the beauty, in its subtlety, excelled any creation of fin de cosmos artifice. A huge half-sun filled the horizon line so that the sky surrounding it shone a thousand shades of copper, while its rays, spread upon the sea, seemed individually coloured — blues, ochres, greys, pinks — until they reached the beach and merged again, as if at apex, to make the yellow sand glare rainbow white, turn the limestone to shimmering silver and make individual leaves and stems of the fronds a green that seemed near-sentient, it was so alive; and there was a human figure at the core of this vision, outlined against the pulsing semi-circle of dark scarlet, the velvet dress murky red amber, the auburn hair a-flame, the white hands and neck reflecting the hues, delicate hint of the palest of poppies. And there was music, sonorous — it was her voice; she declaimed a favourite verse, its subject a trifle at odds with the ambience.
Where the red worm woman wailed for wild revenge,
While the surf surged sullen 'neath moon-silver'd sky,
Where her harsh voice, once a sweet voice, sang, Now was I.
And did her ghost on that grey, cold morn,
Did her ghost slide by?
Rapt, Jherek straightened his back and pushed aside the frock-coat which had covered him through the night; to see his love thus, in a setting to match the perfection of her beauty, sent all other considerations helter-skelter from his head; his own eyes shone: his face shone. He waited for more, but she was silent, tossing back her locks, shaking sand from her hem, pursing those loveliest of lips.
"Well?" he said.
Slowly, through iridescence, the face looked up, from shadow into light. Her mouth was a question.
"Amelia?" He dared the name. Her lids fell.
"What is it?" she murmured.
"Did it? Was it her ghost? I await the resolution."
The lips curved now, perhaps a touch self-consciously, but the eyes continued to study the sand which she stirred with the sharp toe of her partly unbuttoned boot. "Wheldrake doesn't say. It's a rhetorical question…"
"A very sober poem, is it not?"
A sense of superiority mingled with her modesty, causing the lashes to rise and fall rapidly for a moment. "Most good poems are sober, Mr. Carnelian, if they are to convey — significance. It speaks of death, of course. Wheldrake wrote much of death — and died, himself, prematurely. My cousin gave me the Posthumous Poems for my twentieth birthday. Shortly afterwards, she was taken from us, also, by consumption."
"Is all good literature, then, about death?"
"Serious literature."
"Death is serious?"
"It is final, at any rate." But she shocked herself, judging this cynical, and recovered with: "Although really, it is only the beginning — of our real life, our eternal life…"
She turned to regard the sun, already higher and less splendid.
"You mean, at the End of Time? In our own little home?"
"Never mind." She faltered, speaking in a higher, less natural tone. "It is my punishment, I suppose, to be denied, in my final hours, the company of a fellow Christian." But there was some insincerity to all this. The food she had consumed during the past two days had mellowed her. She had almost welcomed the simpler terrors of starvation to the more complex dangers of giving herself up to this clown, this innocent (oh, yes, and perhaps this noble, manly being, for his courage, his kindness went without question). She strove, with decreasing success, to recreate that earlier, much more suitable, mood of resigned despondency.
"I interrupted you." He leaned back against his rock. "Forgive me. It was so delicious, to wake to the sound of your voice. Won't you go on?"
She cleared her throat and faced the sea again.
What will you say to me, child of the moon,
When by the bright river we stand?
When forest leaves breathe harmonies to the night wind's croon.
Will you give me your hand, child of the moon?
Will you give me your hand?
But her performance lacked the appropriate resonance, certainly to her own ears, and she delivered the next verse with even less conviction.
Will you present your pyre to me, spawn of the sun,
While the sky is in full flame?
While the day's heat the brain deceives, and the drugged bees hum.
Will you grant me your name, spawn of the sun?
Will you grant me your name?
Jherek blinked. "You have lost me entirely, I fear…" The sun was fully risen, the scene fled, though pale gold light touched sky and sea still, and the day was calm and sultry. "Oh, what things I could create with such inspiration, if only my power rings were active. Vision upon vision, and all for you, Amelia!"
"Have you no literature, at the End of Time?" she asked. "Are your arts only visual?"
"We converse," he said. "You have heard us."
"Conversation has been called an art, yet…"
"We do not write it down," he said, "if that is what you mean. Why should we? Similar conversations often arise — similar observations are made afresh. Does one discover more through the act of making the marks I have seen you make? If so, perhaps I should…"
"It will pass the time," she said, "if I teach you to write and read."
"Certainly," he agreed.
She knew the questions he had asked had been innocent, but they struck her as just. She laughed. "Oh, dear, Mr. Carnelian. Oh, dear!"
He was content not to judge her mood to but to share it. He laughed with her, springing up. He advanced. She awaited him. He stopped, when a few steps separated them. He was serious now, and smiling.
She fingered her neck. "There is more to literature than conversation, however. There are stories."
"We make our own lives into stories, at the End of Time. We have the means. Would you not do the same, if you could?"
"Society demands that we do not."
"Why so?"
"Perhaps because the stories would conflict, one with the other. There are so many of us — there."
"Here," he said, "there are but two."
"Our tenancy in this — this Eden — is tentative. Who knows when…?"
"Logically, if we are torn away, then we shall be borne to the End of Time, not to 1896. And what is there, waiting, but Eden, too?"
"No, I should not call it that."
They stared, now, eye to eye. The sea whispered. It was louder than their words.
He could not move, though he sought to go forward. Her stance held him off; it was the set of her chin, the slight lift of one shoulder.
"We could be alone, if we wished it."
"There should be no choice, in Eden."
"Then, here, at least…" His look was charged, it demanded; it implored.
"And take sin with us, out of Eden?"
"No sin, if by that you mean that which give your fellows pain. What of me?"
"We suffer. Both." The sea seemed very loud, the voice faint as a wind through ferns. "Love is cruel."
"No!" His shout broke the silence. He laughed. "That is nonsense! Fear is cruel! Fear alone!"
"Oh, I have so much of that!" She called out, lifting her face to the sky, and she began to laugh, even as he seized her, taking her hands in his, bending to kiss that cheek.
Tears striped her; she wiped them clear with her sleeve, and the kiss was forestalled. Instead she began to hum a tune, and she placed a hand on his shoulder, leaving her other hand in his. She dipped and led him in a step or two. "Perhaps my fate is sealed," she said. She smiled at him, a conspiracy of love and pain and some self-pity. "Oh, come, Mr. Carnelian, I shall teach you to dance. If this is Eden, let us enjoy it while we may!"
Brightening considerably, Jherek allowed her to lead him in the steps.
Soon he was laughing, a child in love and, for the moment, not the mature individual, the man whose command could conquer.
Disaster (if it was disaster) delayed, they pranced, beside the Palaeozoic seaside, an improvised polka.
But it was only delayed. Both were expectant, fulfilment, consummation, hovered. And Jherek sang a wordless song; within moments she would be his bride, his pride, his celebration.
The song was soon to die on his lips. They rounded a clump of flimsy vegetation, a pavement of yellow rock, and came to a sudden and astounded stop. Both glared, both felt vitality flow from them to be replaced by taut rage. Mrs. Underwood, sighing, withdrew into the stiff velvet of her dress.
"We are fated," she murmured. "We are !"
They continued to glare at the unwitting back of the one who had frustrated their idyll. He remained unaware of their wrath, their presence.
The shirtsleeves and trousers rolled up to elbow and knee respectively, the bowler hat fixed firmly on the heavy head, the briar pipe between the lips, the newcomer was paddling contentedly in the amniotic ocean.
As they watched, he took a large white handkerchief from the pocket of his dark, serge trousers (waistcoat and jacket, shoes and socks, lay neat and incongruous on the beach behind), shook it out, tied a small knot at each corner, removed his hat and spread the handkerchief over his cropped and balding scalp. This accomplished, he began to hum — "Pom te pom, pom pom pom, te pom pom" — wading a little further through the shallow water, pausing to raise a red and goose-pimpled foot and to brush at two or three wheat-coloured trilobites which had begun to climb his leg.
"Funny little beggars," he was heard to mutter, but did not seem to mind their curiosity.
Mrs. Underwood was pale. "How is it possible?" A vicious whisper. "He has pursued us through Time!" With one hand, she unclenched the other. "My respect for Scotland Yard, I suppose, increases…"
Forgetting his private disappointment in favour of his social responsibilities (he had developed proprietorial feelings toward the Palaeozoic) Jherek called:
"Good afternoon, Inspector Springer."
Mrs. Underwood reached a hand for his arm, as if to forestall him, but too late. Inspector Springer, the almost seraphic expression fading to be replaced by his more familiar stern and professional mask, turned unwillingly.
Bowler forgotten in his left hand, he removed his pipe from his lips. He peered. He blinked. He heaved a sigh, fully the equal of their own most recent sighs. Happiness fled away.
"Good 'eavens!"
"Heavens, if you prefer." Jherek welcomed correction, for he still studied the mores of the nineteenth century.
"I thought it was 'eaven." Inspector Springer's slap at an exploring trilobite was less tolerant than before. "But now I'm beginning to doubt it. More like 'ell…" He remembered the presence of Mrs. Underwood. He stared mournfully at a wet trouser leg. "The other place, I mean."
There was a tinge of pleased malice in her tone: "You think yourself dead, Inspector Springer?"
"The deduction fitted the facts, madam."
Not without dignity, he placed the bowler on top of the knotted handkerchief. He peered into the pipe and, satisfied that it had gone out, slipped it into a pocket. Her irony was wasted; he became a trifle more confidential.
"An 'eart-attack, I presumed, brought about by the stress of recent events. I was jest questioning them foreigners — the little anarchists with only one eye — or three, if you look at it another way — when it seemed to me they vanished clear away." He cleared his throat, lowered his voice a fraction. "Well, I turned to call me sergeant, felt a bit dizzy meself, and the next thing I knows, 'ere I am in 'eaven." He seemed, then, to recall his previous relationship with the pair. He straightened, resentful. "Or so I deduced until you turned up a minute ago." He waded forward until he stood on glinting sand. He began to roll down his trousers. He spoke crisply. "Well then," he demanded, "what is the explanation? Briefly, mind. Nothing fancy."
"It is simple enough." Jherek was glad to explain. "We have been hurled through Time, that is all. To a pre-Dawn Age. That is, to a period before Man existed at all. Millions of years. The Upper or —?" He turned to Mrs. Underwood for help.
"Probably the Lower Devonian," she said. She was off-hand. "The stranger confirmed it."
"A warp in Time," Jherek continued. "In which you were caught, as we were. Admitting no large paradoxes, Time ejected us from your period. Doubtless, the Lat were so ejected. It was unfortunate that you were in the proximity…"
Inspector Springer covered his ears, heading for his boots as if towards a haven. "Oh, Gawd! Not again. It is 'ell! It is !"
"I am beginning to share your view, Inspector." Mrs. Underwood was more than cool. She turned on her heel and started to walk in the direction of the frond forest at the top of the beach. Normally her conscience would sharply rule out such obvious tricks, but she had been thwarted; she had become desperate — she gave Jherek the impression that he was to blame for Inspector Springer's arrival, as if, perhaps, by speaking of sin he had called forth Satan into Eden.
Frozen, Jherek was trapped by the manoeuvre as neatly as any Victorian beloved. "Amelia," was all he could pipe.
She did not, of course, reply.
Inspector Springer had reached his boots. He sat down beside them; he pulled free, from one of them, a grey woollen sock. He addressed the sock as he tried to pull it over his damp foot. "What I can't work out," he mused, "is whether I'm technically still on duty or not."
Mrs. Underwood had come to the frond forest. Determinedly she disappeared into the rustling depths. Jherek made up his mind to stumble in wretched pursuit. The host in him hesitated for only a second:
"Perhaps we'll see you again, Inspector?"
"Not if I —"
But the high-pitched scream interrupted both. A glance was exchanged. Inspector Springer forgot differences, obeyed instincts, leapt to his feet, hobbling after Jherek as he flung himself forward, racing for the source of the scream.
But already Mrs. Underwood was flying from the forest, outrage and horror remoulding her beauty, stopping with a gasp when she saw salvation; mutely, she pointed back into the agitated foliage.
The fronds parted. A single eye glared out at them, its three pupils fixed steadily, perhaps lecherously, upon the panting form of Mrs. Underwood.
"Mibix," said a guttural, insinuating voice.
"Ferkit," replied another.
They rose somewhat, those spirits, at dawn this morning — for the beauty, in its subtlety, excelled any creation of fin de cosmos artifice. A huge half-sun filled the horizon line so that the sky surrounding it shone a thousand shades of copper, while its rays, spread upon the sea, seemed individually coloured — blues, ochres, greys, pinks — until they reached the beach and merged again, as if at apex, to make the yellow sand glare rainbow white, turn the limestone to shimmering silver and make individual leaves and stems of the fronds a green that seemed near-sentient, it was so alive; and there was a human figure at the core of this vision, outlined against the pulsing semi-circle of dark scarlet, the velvet dress murky red amber, the auburn hair a-flame, the white hands and neck reflecting the hues, delicate hint of the palest of poppies. And there was music, sonorous — it was her voice; she declaimed a favourite verse, its subject a trifle at odds with the ambience.
Where the red worm woman wailed for wild revenge,
While the surf surged sullen 'neath moon-silver'd sky,
Where her harsh voice, once a sweet voice, sang, Now was I.
And did her ghost on that grey, cold morn,
Did her ghost slide by?
Rapt, Jherek straightened his back and pushed aside the frock-coat which had covered him through the night; to see his love thus, in a setting to match the perfection of her beauty, sent all other considerations helter-skelter from his head; his own eyes shone: his face shone. He waited for more, but she was silent, tossing back her locks, shaking sand from her hem, pursing those loveliest of lips.
"Well?" he said.
Slowly, through iridescence, the face looked up, from shadow into light. Her mouth was a question.
"Amelia?" He dared the name. Her lids fell.
"What is it?" she murmured.
"Did it? Was it her ghost? I await the resolution."
The lips curved now, perhaps a touch self-consciously, but the eyes continued to study the sand which she stirred with the sharp toe of her partly unbuttoned boot. "Wheldrake doesn't say. It's a rhetorical question…"
"A very sober poem, is it not?"
A sense of superiority mingled with her modesty, causing the lashes to rise and fall rapidly for a moment. "Most good poems are sober, Mr. Carnelian, if they are to convey — significance. It speaks of death, of course. Wheldrake wrote much of death — and died, himself, prematurely. My cousin gave me the Posthumous Poems for my twentieth birthday. Shortly afterwards, she was taken from us, also, by consumption."
"Is all good literature, then, about death?"
"Serious literature."
"Death is serious?"
"It is final, at any rate." But she shocked herself, judging this cynical, and recovered with: "Although really, it is only the beginning — of our real life, our eternal life…"
She turned to regard the sun, already higher and less splendid.
"You mean, at the End of Time? In our own little home?"
"Never mind." She faltered, speaking in a higher, less natural tone. "It is my punishment, I suppose, to be denied, in my final hours, the company of a fellow Christian." But there was some insincerity to all this. The food she had consumed during the past two days had mellowed her. She had almost welcomed the simpler terrors of starvation to the more complex dangers of giving herself up to this clown, this innocent (oh, yes, and perhaps this noble, manly being, for his courage, his kindness went without question). She strove, with decreasing success, to recreate that earlier, much more suitable, mood of resigned despondency.
"I interrupted you." He leaned back against his rock. "Forgive me. It was so delicious, to wake to the sound of your voice. Won't you go on?"
She cleared her throat and faced the sea again.
What will you say to me, child of the moon,
When by the bright river we stand?
When forest leaves breathe harmonies to the night wind's croon.
Will you give me your hand, child of the moon?
Will you give me your hand?
But her performance lacked the appropriate resonance, certainly to her own ears, and she delivered the next verse with even less conviction.
Will you present your pyre to me, spawn of the sun,
While the sky is in full flame?
While the day's heat the brain deceives, and the drugged bees hum.
Will you grant me your name, spawn of the sun?
Will you grant me your name?
Jherek blinked. "You have lost me entirely, I fear…" The sun was fully risen, the scene fled, though pale gold light touched sky and sea still, and the day was calm and sultry. "Oh, what things I could create with such inspiration, if only my power rings were active. Vision upon vision, and all for you, Amelia!"
"Have you no literature, at the End of Time?" she asked. "Are your arts only visual?"
"We converse," he said. "You have heard us."
"Conversation has been called an art, yet…"
"We do not write it down," he said, "if that is what you mean. Why should we? Similar conversations often arise — similar observations are made afresh. Does one discover more through the act of making the marks I have seen you make? If so, perhaps I should…"
"It will pass the time," she said, "if I teach you to write and read."
"Certainly," he agreed.
She knew the questions he had asked had been innocent, but they struck her as just. She laughed. "Oh, dear, Mr. Carnelian. Oh, dear!"
He was content not to judge her mood to but to share it. He laughed with her, springing up. He advanced. She awaited him. He stopped, when a few steps separated them. He was serious now, and smiling.
She fingered her neck. "There is more to literature than conversation, however. There are stories."
"We make our own lives into stories, at the End of Time. We have the means. Would you not do the same, if you could?"
"Society demands that we do not."
"Why so?"
"Perhaps because the stories would conflict, one with the other. There are so many of us — there."
"Here," he said, "there are but two."
"Our tenancy in this — this Eden — is tentative. Who knows when…?"
"Logically, if we are torn away, then we shall be borne to the End of Time, not to 1896. And what is there, waiting, but Eden, too?"
"No, I should not call it that."
They stared, now, eye to eye. The sea whispered. It was louder than their words.
He could not move, though he sought to go forward. Her stance held him off; it was the set of her chin, the slight lift of one shoulder.
"We could be alone, if we wished it."
"There should be no choice, in Eden."
"Then, here, at least…" His look was charged, it demanded; it implored.
"And take sin with us, out of Eden?"
"No sin, if by that you mean that which give your fellows pain. What of me?"
"We suffer. Both." The sea seemed very loud, the voice faint as a wind through ferns. "Love is cruel."
"No!" His shout broke the silence. He laughed. "That is nonsense! Fear is cruel! Fear alone!"
"Oh, I have so much of that!" She called out, lifting her face to the sky, and she began to laugh, even as he seized her, taking her hands in his, bending to kiss that cheek.
Tears striped her; she wiped them clear with her sleeve, and the kiss was forestalled. Instead she began to hum a tune, and she placed a hand on his shoulder, leaving her other hand in his. She dipped and led him in a step or two. "Perhaps my fate is sealed," she said. She smiled at him, a conspiracy of love and pain and some self-pity. "Oh, come, Mr. Carnelian, I shall teach you to dance. If this is Eden, let us enjoy it while we may!"
Brightening considerably, Jherek allowed her to lead him in the steps.
Soon he was laughing, a child in love and, for the moment, not the mature individual, the man whose command could conquer.
Disaster (if it was disaster) delayed, they pranced, beside the Palaeozoic seaside, an improvised polka.
But it was only delayed. Both were expectant, fulfilment, consummation, hovered. And Jherek sang a wordless song; within moments she would be his bride, his pride, his celebration.
The song was soon to die on his lips. They rounded a clump of flimsy vegetation, a pavement of yellow rock, and came to a sudden and astounded stop. Both glared, both felt vitality flow from them to be replaced by taut rage. Mrs. Underwood, sighing, withdrew into the stiff velvet of her dress.
"We are fated," she murmured. "We are !"
They continued to glare at the unwitting back of the one who had frustrated their idyll. He remained unaware of their wrath, their presence.
The shirtsleeves and trousers rolled up to elbow and knee respectively, the bowler hat fixed firmly on the heavy head, the briar pipe between the lips, the newcomer was paddling contentedly in the amniotic ocean.
As they watched, he took a large white handkerchief from the pocket of his dark, serge trousers (waistcoat and jacket, shoes and socks, lay neat and incongruous on the beach behind), shook it out, tied a small knot at each corner, removed his hat and spread the handkerchief over his cropped and balding scalp. This accomplished, he began to hum — "Pom te pom, pom pom pom, te pom pom" — wading a little further through the shallow water, pausing to raise a red and goose-pimpled foot and to brush at two or three wheat-coloured trilobites which had begun to climb his leg.
"Funny little beggars," he was heard to mutter, but did not seem to mind their curiosity.
Mrs. Underwood was pale. "How is it possible?" A vicious whisper. "He has pursued us through Time!" With one hand, she unclenched the other. "My respect for Scotland Yard, I suppose, increases…"
Forgetting his private disappointment in favour of his social responsibilities (he had developed proprietorial feelings toward the Palaeozoic) Jherek called:
"Good afternoon, Inspector Springer."
Mrs. Underwood reached a hand for his arm, as if to forestall him, but too late. Inspector Springer, the almost seraphic expression fading to be replaced by his more familiar stern and professional mask, turned unwillingly.
Bowler forgotten in his left hand, he removed his pipe from his lips. He peered. He blinked. He heaved a sigh, fully the equal of their own most recent sighs. Happiness fled away.
"Good 'eavens!"
"Heavens, if you prefer." Jherek welcomed correction, for he still studied the mores of the nineteenth century.
"I thought it was 'eaven." Inspector Springer's slap at an exploring trilobite was less tolerant than before. "But now I'm beginning to doubt it. More like 'ell…" He remembered the presence of Mrs. Underwood. He stared mournfully at a wet trouser leg. "The other place, I mean."
There was a tinge of pleased malice in her tone: "You think yourself dead, Inspector Springer?"
"The deduction fitted the facts, madam."
Not without dignity, he placed the bowler on top of the knotted handkerchief. He peered into the pipe and, satisfied that it had gone out, slipped it into a pocket. Her irony was wasted; he became a trifle more confidential.
"An 'eart-attack, I presumed, brought about by the stress of recent events. I was jest questioning them foreigners — the little anarchists with only one eye — or three, if you look at it another way — when it seemed to me they vanished clear away." He cleared his throat, lowered his voice a fraction. "Well, I turned to call me sergeant, felt a bit dizzy meself, and the next thing I knows, 'ere I am in 'eaven." He seemed, then, to recall his previous relationship with the pair. He straightened, resentful. "Or so I deduced until you turned up a minute ago." He waded forward until he stood on glinting sand. He began to roll down his trousers. He spoke crisply. "Well then," he demanded, "what is the explanation? Briefly, mind. Nothing fancy."
"It is simple enough." Jherek was glad to explain. "We have been hurled through Time, that is all. To a pre-Dawn Age. That is, to a period before Man existed at all. Millions of years. The Upper or —?" He turned to Mrs. Underwood for help.
"Probably the Lower Devonian," she said. She was off-hand. "The stranger confirmed it."
"A warp in Time," Jherek continued. "In which you were caught, as we were. Admitting no large paradoxes, Time ejected us from your period. Doubtless, the Lat were so ejected. It was unfortunate that you were in the proximity…"
Inspector Springer covered his ears, heading for his boots as if towards a haven. "Oh, Gawd! Not again. It is 'ell! It is !"
"I am beginning to share your view, Inspector." Mrs. Underwood was more than cool. She turned on her heel and started to walk in the direction of the frond forest at the top of the beach. Normally her conscience would sharply rule out such obvious tricks, but she had been thwarted; she had become desperate — she gave Jherek the impression that he was to blame for Inspector Springer's arrival, as if, perhaps, by speaking of sin he had called forth Satan into Eden.
Frozen, Jherek was trapped by the manoeuvre as neatly as any Victorian beloved. "Amelia," was all he could pipe.
She did not, of course, reply.
Inspector Springer had reached his boots. He sat down beside them; he pulled free, from one of them, a grey woollen sock. He addressed the sock as he tried to pull it over his damp foot. "What I can't work out," he mused, "is whether I'm technically still on duty or not."
Mrs. Underwood had come to the frond forest. Determinedly she disappeared into the rustling depths. Jherek made up his mind to stumble in wretched pursuit. The host in him hesitated for only a second:
"Perhaps we'll see you again, Inspector?"
"Not if I —"
But the high-pitched scream interrupted both. A glance was exchanged. Inspector Springer forgot differences, obeyed instincts, leapt to his feet, hobbling after Jherek as he flung himself forward, racing for the source of the scream.
But already Mrs. Underwood was flying from the forest, outrage and horror remoulding her beauty, stopping with a gasp when she saw salvation; mutely, she pointed back into the agitated foliage.
The fronds parted. A single eye glared out at them, its three pupils fixed steadily, perhaps lecherously, upon the panting form of Mrs. Underwood.
"Mibix," said a guttural, insinuating voice.
"Ferkit," replied another.
3. A Lower Devonian Tea
Swaggering, in torn and mephitic striped pyjamas, a three foot high humanoid, with a bulbous nose, pear-shaped head, huge protuberant ears, facial whiskers, a silver dinner-fork in one hand and a silver dinner knife in the other, emerged from the ferns.
Jherek, too, had once worn the pyjamas of the Nursery; had suffered the regime of that robot survivor from the Late Multitude Cultures. He recognized Captain Mubbers, leader of the Lat brigand-musicians. He had seen him twice since the Nursery — at the Cafe Royal, and later, in custody together, at Scotland Yard.
Captain Mubbers grunted at Jherek with something like grudging neutrality, but when his three pupils focussed on Inspector Springer he uttered an unpleasant laugh.
Inspector Springer would accept no nonsense, even when five more Lat joined their leader and shared his amusement. "In the name of Her Majesty the Queen," he began. But he hesitated; he was off-guard.
"Ood ja shag ok gongong pish?" Captain Mubbers was contemptuous. "Klixshat efang!"
Inspector Springer was used to this sort of thing; he remained apparently impassive, saying ponderously:
"That's insulting behaviour to a police officer. You're doing yourself no good at all, my lad. The sooner you understand that English law…" Abruptly, he was baffled. This still would be England, wouldn't it?" Mrs. Underwood was enlisted.
"I'm not altogether sure, Inspector." She spoke without sympathy, almost with relish. "I haven't recognized anything."
"It's a bit too warm for Bognor, certainly. I could be outside my jurisdiction." Inspector Springer sensed escape. The notebook he had begun to extract from his back pocket was now returned. Beneath his disturbed moustache there appeared a strained grin. It was weak. He had lost the day to the Lat. He continued, lame. "You think yourself lucky, my lad. If you ever set foot in the Metropolitan area again —"
"Hrunt!" Derisively, Captain Mubbers waved his remaining man forward. He came cautiously from the bushes, pupils a-dart for Springer's forces. And Jherek relaxed a fraction, knowing the Lat would be wary of decisive action until they were convinced the three were without allies.
Inspector Springer seemed ill at ease with his new and self-appointed diplomatic status. "By the looks of it," he told the Lat, "we're all in the same boat. It's no time to be raking up old scores, lads. You can see the sense of that, surely?"
Questioningly, Captain Mubbers looked up at Jherek and Mrs. Underwood. "Kaprim ul shim mibix clom?" he asked, with a nod of his head in the policeman's direction.
Jherek shrugged. "I'm inclined to agree with the inspector, Captain Mubbers."
"Ferkit!" exclaimed one of the other Lat. "Potkup mef rim chokkum! Shag ugga?" He started forward, brandishing a fish-fork marked with the prominent "N" of the Cafe Royal.
"Thurk!" commanded Captain Mubbers. He leered unctuously at Mrs. Underwood; he offered her an unwholesome bow. He took a step closer, murmuring: "Dwap ker niknur, fazzy?"
"Really!" Mrs. Underwood lost all her carefully restored composure. "Mr. Carnelian! Inspector Springer! How can such suggestions…? Oh!"
"Kroofrudi." Captain Mubbers was unrepentant. Significantly, he patted his elbow. "Kwot-kwot?" He glanced back at the frond forest. "Nizzle uk?"
Inspector Springer's sense of decency was offended. He listed forward, one boot still in his hand. "Law or no law…"
"Fwik hrunt!" spat Captain Mubbers. The others laughed, repeating the witticism to one another; but the policeman's objection had lowered the tension.
Mrs. Underwood said firmly: "They are probably hungry. We have some biscuits back at our camp. If we were to lead them there…"
"At once," said Jherek, and he began to walk. She linked her arm in his, an action which served to confuse both Jherek and Captain Mubbers.
Inspector Springer kept step with them. "I must say, I could do with a nice Rich Tea!"
"I think I've eaten most of those." Jherek was regretful. "But there's a whole box of Fig Rolls."
"Ho, ho!" Inspector Springer performed a cryptic wink. "We'll let them 'ave the Fig Rolls, eh?"
Puzzled, but temporarily passive, the Lat trailed behind.
Relishing the delicate touch of her arm against his rib, Jherek wondered if a police inspector and seven aliens could constitute the "society" Mrs. Underwood claimed as the influence upon the "morality" and "conscience" thwarting the full expression of his love for her. He felt, in his heart, that she would so define the group. Resignation, once more, slid into the space so recently left by anticipation.
They reached the rock and the hamper; their home. Kettle in hand, he set off for the spring they had discovered. Mrs. Underwood prepared the primus.
Alone for a moment, Jherek reflected that their provisions would soon expire, with eight fresh mouths to fill. He foresaw, indeed, a dispute in which the Lat would attempt to gain possession of the food. It would mean some relief, at least. He smiled. It might even mean a War.
A little later, when the primus stove had been pumped and lit and the kettle settled on its flame, he studied the Lat. It seemed to him that their attitude towards Mrs. Underwood had altered a fraction since they had first seen her in the frond forest. They sat in a semi-circle on the sand, a short distance away from the rock in whose shadow the three humans crouched. Their manner, while still what she would probably have called "insulting", was tinged with caution; perhaps awe; perhaps they were daunted by the easy way in which she had taken command of events. Could it be that she reminded them of that invulnerable old robot, Nurse? They had learned to fear Nurse. Certainly their position — cross-legged, hands on knees — recalled Nurse's demands upon her charges.
The kettle began to steam. Inspector Springer, with a courtly gesture to Mrs. Underwood, reached for the handle. Accepting the metal tea-pot from his hostess, he poured on the water. The Lat, like witnesses at a religious ritual (for Inspector Springer certainly conveyed this mood — he the priest, Mrs. Underwood the priestess) were grave and wary. Jherek, himself, shared some of their feelings as the ceremony advanced with formal grace.
There were three tin cups and a tin basin. These were laid out on the top of the hamper (which contained many such comforts). A can of milk was set beside them, and a box of sugar, with a spoon.
"A minute or two to let it brew," intoned Inspector Springer. In an aside, he told Jherek: "It's what I've been missing most of all."
Jherek could not guess if he meant the tea itself or the ritual involved.
From a box at her side, Mrs. Underwood made a selection of biscuits, arranging them in a pattern upon a tin plate.
And at length the tea was poured. The milk was added. The sugar was added.
Inspector Springer was the first to sip.
"Ah!" The sense of occasion remained. "That's better, eh?"
Mrs. Underwood handed the large bowl to Captain Mubbers. He sniffed it, blew at it, then sucked up half the contents in a single inhalation.
"Gurp?" he enquired.
"Tea," she told him. "I hope it's to your taste. We have nothing stronger."
"Tee-ee!" Captain Mubbers, quick to mine innuendo from the least promising vein, glanced sidelong (with two of his pupils) at his companions. They sniggered. "Kroofrudi." He held out the cup for more.
"That's for all of you to share," she said firmly. She waved, to indicate his men. "All of you."
"Frit hrunti?" He seemed unwilling.
She took the bowl from him and gave it to the man next to him.
"Grotchit snirt." Captain Mubbers snorted and touched his comrade's elbow with his own. "Nootchoo?"
The Lat was amused. The tea burbled as he exploded with laughter.
Inspector Springer cleared his throat. Mrs. Underwood averted her eyes. Jherek, feeling a need to extend some sort of friendship to the Lat, bubbled his tea and laughed with them.
"Not you, Mr. Carnelian," she said. "You, surely, know better. Whatever else, you are not a savage"
"They offend your morality?"
"Morality, no. Merely my sensibilities."
"It strikes you as unaesthetic."
"Your analysis is accurate."
She had withdrawn from him again. He swallowed the stuff down. To him, it seemed crude, in taste and texture. But he accepted her standard; to serve it, and to win her approval, was all he desired.
The biscuits, one by one, were consumed.
Inspector Springer was the first to finish; he withdrew a large white handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed at his moustache. He was thoughtful. He voiced Jherek's concern of a short while before:
"Of course," he said, "this grub isn't going to last for ever now, is it?"
"It will not last very long at all," said Mrs. Underwood.
"And the Lat will try to steal it," added Jherek.
"They'll 'ave a job there." Inspector Springer spoke with the quiet confidence of the professional protector of property. "Being English, we're more fair-minded, and therefore we'll keep strict control of the supplies. Not, I suppose, that we can let them starve. We shall 'ave to eke 'em out — learn to live off the land. Fish and stuff."
"Fish?" Mrs. Underwood was uncertain. "Are there fish?"
"Monsters!" he told her. " 'Aven't you seen 'em? Sort of sharks, though a bit smaller. Catch one o' those beggars and we could eat for a fortnight. I'll put me mind to it." He had brightened again and seemed to be enjoying the challenges offered by the Lower Devonian. "I think I spotted a bit o' line in the 'amper. We could try using snails for bait."
Captain Mubbers indicated that his bowl was empty.
"Crotchnuk," he said ingratiatingly.
"No more," she said firmly. "Tea-time is over, Captain Mubbers."
"Crotchnuk mibix?"
"All gone," she said, as if to a child. She took the lid from the pot and showed him the sodden leaves. "See?"
His hand was swift. It seized the pot. The other dived into the opening, scooping out the tea-leaves, cramming them into his mouth. "Glop-pib!" he spluttered approvingly. "Drexy glop-pib!"
Fatalistically, Mrs. Underwood allowed him to complete his feast.
Jherek, too, had once worn the pyjamas of the Nursery; had suffered the regime of that robot survivor from the Late Multitude Cultures. He recognized Captain Mubbers, leader of the Lat brigand-musicians. He had seen him twice since the Nursery — at the Cafe Royal, and later, in custody together, at Scotland Yard.
Captain Mubbers grunted at Jherek with something like grudging neutrality, but when his three pupils focussed on Inspector Springer he uttered an unpleasant laugh.
Inspector Springer would accept no nonsense, even when five more Lat joined their leader and shared his amusement. "In the name of Her Majesty the Queen," he began. But he hesitated; he was off-guard.
"Ood ja shag ok gongong pish?" Captain Mubbers was contemptuous. "Klixshat efang!"
Inspector Springer was used to this sort of thing; he remained apparently impassive, saying ponderously:
"That's insulting behaviour to a police officer. You're doing yourself no good at all, my lad. The sooner you understand that English law…" Abruptly, he was baffled. This still would be England, wouldn't it?" Mrs. Underwood was enlisted.
"I'm not altogether sure, Inspector." She spoke without sympathy, almost with relish. "I haven't recognized anything."
"It's a bit too warm for Bognor, certainly. I could be outside my jurisdiction." Inspector Springer sensed escape. The notebook he had begun to extract from his back pocket was now returned. Beneath his disturbed moustache there appeared a strained grin. It was weak. He had lost the day to the Lat. He continued, lame. "You think yourself lucky, my lad. If you ever set foot in the Metropolitan area again —"
"Hrunt!" Derisively, Captain Mubbers waved his remaining man forward. He came cautiously from the bushes, pupils a-dart for Springer's forces. And Jherek relaxed a fraction, knowing the Lat would be wary of decisive action until they were convinced the three were without allies.
Inspector Springer seemed ill at ease with his new and self-appointed diplomatic status. "By the looks of it," he told the Lat, "we're all in the same boat. It's no time to be raking up old scores, lads. You can see the sense of that, surely?"
Questioningly, Captain Mubbers looked up at Jherek and Mrs. Underwood. "Kaprim ul shim mibix clom?" he asked, with a nod of his head in the policeman's direction.
Jherek shrugged. "I'm inclined to agree with the inspector, Captain Mubbers."
"Ferkit!" exclaimed one of the other Lat. "Potkup mef rim chokkum! Shag ugga?" He started forward, brandishing a fish-fork marked with the prominent "N" of the Cafe Royal.
"Thurk!" commanded Captain Mubbers. He leered unctuously at Mrs. Underwood; he offered her an unwholesome bow. He took a step closer, murmuring: "Dwap ker niknur, fazzy?"
"Really!" Mrs. Underwood lost all her carefully restored composure. "Mr. Carnelian! Inspector Springer! How can such suggestions…? Oh!"
"Kroofrudi." Captain Mubbers was unrepentant. Significantly, he patted his elbow. "Kwot-kwot?" He glanced back at the frond forest. "Nizzle uk?"
Inspector Springer's sense of decency was offended. He listed forward, one boot still in his hand. "Law or no law…"
"Fwik hrunt!" spat Captain Mubbers. The others laughed, repeating the witticism to one another; but the policeman's objection had lowered the tension.
Mrs. Underwood said firmly: "They are probably hungry. We have some biscuits back at our camp. If we were to lead them there…"
"At once," said Jherek, and he began to walk. She linked her arm in his, an action which served to confuse both Jherek and Captain Mubbers.
Inspector Springer kept step with them. "I must say, I could do with a nice Rich Tea!"
"I think I've eaten most of those." Jherek was regretful. "But there's a whole box of Fig Rolls."
"Ho, ho!" Inspector Springer performed a cryptic wink. "We'll let them 'ave the Fig Rolls, eh?"
Puzzled, but temporarily passive, the Lat trailed behind.
Relishing the delicate touch of her arm against his rib, Jherek wondered if a police inspector and seven aliens could constitute the "society" Mrs. Underwood claimed as the influence upon the "morality" and "conscience" thwarting the full expression of his love for her. He felt, in his heart, that she would so define the group. Resignation, once more, slid into the space so recently left by anticipation.
They reached the rock and the hamper; their home. Kettle in hand, he set off for the spring they had discovered. Mrs. Underwood prepared the primus.
Alone for a moment, Jherek reflected that their provisions would soon expire, with eight fresh mouths to fill. He foresaw, indeed, a dispute in which the Lat would attempt to gain possession of the food. It would mean some relief, at least. He smiled. It might even mean a War.
A little later, when the primus stove had been pumped and lit and the kettle settled on its flame, he studied the Lat. It seemed to him that their attitude towards Mrs. Underwood had altered a fraction since they had first seen her in the frond forest. They sat in a semi-circle on the sand, a short distance away from the rock in whose shadow the three humans crouched. Their manner, while still what she would probably have called "insulting", was tinged with caution; perhaps awe; perhaps they were daunted by the easy way in which she had taken command of events. Could it be that she reminded them of that invulnerable old robot, Nurse? They had learned to fear Nurse. Certainly their position — cross-legged, hands on knees — recalled Nurse's demands upon her charges.
The kettle began to steam. Inspector Springer, with a courtly gesture to Mrs. Underwood, reached for the handle. Accepting the metal tea-pot from his hostess, he poured on the water. The Lat, like witnesses at a religious ritual (for Inspector Springer certainly conveyed this mood — he the priest, Mrs. Underwood the priestess) were grave and wary. Jherek, himself, shared some of their feelings as the ceremony advanced with formal grace.
There were three tin cups and a tin basin. These were laid out on the top of the hamper (which contained many such comforts). A can of milk was set beside them, and a box of sugar, with a spoon.
"A minute or two to let it brew," intoned Inspector Springer. In an aside, he told Jherek: "It's what I've been missing most of all."
Jherek could not guess if he meant the tea itself or the ritual involved.
From a box at her side, Mrs. Underwood made a selection of biscuits, arranging them in a pattern upon a tin plate.
And at length the tea was poured. The milk was added. The sugar was added.
Inspector Springer was the first to sip.
"Ah!" The sense of occasion remained. "That's better, eh?"
Mrs. Underwood handed the large bowl to Captain Mubbers. He sniffed it, blew at it, then sucked up half the contents in a single inhalation.
"Gurp?" he enquired.
"Tea," she told him. "I hope it's to your taste. We have nothing stronger."
"Tee-ee!" Captain Mubbers, quick to mine innuendo from the least promising vein, glanced sidelong (with two of his pupils) at his companions. They sniggered. "Kroofrudi." He held out the cup for more.
"That's for all of you to share," she said firmly. She waved, to indicate his men. "All of you."
"Frit hrunti?" He seemed unwilling.
She took the bowl from him and gave it to the man next to him.
"Grotchit snirt." Captain Mubbers snorted and touched his comrade's elbow with his own. "Nootchoo?"
The Lat was amused. The tea burbled as he exploded with laughter.
Inspector Springer cleared his throat. Mrs. Underwood averted her eyes. Jherek, feeling a need to extend some sort of friendship to the Lat, bubbled his tea and laughed with them.
"Not you, Mr. Carnelian," she said. "You, surely, know better. Whatever else, you are not a savage"
"They offend your morality?"
"Morality, no. Merely my sensibilities."
"It strikes you as unaesthetic."
"Your analysis is accurate."
She had withdrawn from him again. He swallowed the stuff down. To him, it seemed crude, in taste and texture. But he accepted her standard; to serve it, and to win her approval, was all he desired.
The biscuits, one by one, were consumed.
Inspector Springer was the first to finish; he withdrew a large white handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed at his moustache. He was thoughtful. He voiced Jherek's concern of a short while before:
"Of course," he said, "this grub isn't going to last for ever now, is it?"
"It will not last very long at all," said Mrs. Underwood.
"And the Lat will try to steal it," added Jherek.
"They'll 'ave a job there." Inspector Springer spoke with the quiet confidence of the professional protector of property. "Being English, we're more fair-minded, and therefore we'll keep strict control of the supplies. Not, I suppose, that we can let them starve. We shall 'ave to eke 'em out — learn to live off the land. Fish and stuff."
"Fish?" Mrs. Underwood was uncertain. "Are there fish?"
"Monsters!" he told her. " 'Aven't you seen 'em? Sort of sharks, though a bit smaller. Catch one o' those beggars and we could eat for a fortnight. I'll put me mind to it." He had brightened again and seemed to be enjoying the challenges offered by the Lower Devonian. "I think I spotted a bit o' line in the 'amper. We could try using snails for bait."
Captain Mubbers indicated that his bowl was empty.
"Crotchnuk," he said ingratiatingly.
"No more," she said firmly. "Tea-time is over, Captain Mubbers."
"Crotchnuk mibix?"
"All gone," she said, as if to a child. She took the lid from the pot and showed him the sodden leaves. "See?"
His hand was swift. It seized the pot. The other dived into the opening, scooping out the tea-leaves, cramming them into his mouth. "Glop-pib!" he spluttered approvingly. "Drexy glop-pib!"
Fatalistically, Mrs. Underwood allowed him to complete his feast.
4. A Fresh Quest — On the Trail of the Hamper
"But, Inspector, you told us that the hamper could not be removed without bringing you instantly to wakefulness!" Mrs. Amelia Underwood was within an ace of tapping her foot; there was a note to her voice which Jherek recognized.
Inspector Springer also recognized it. He blushed as he held up the wrist to which was attached a severed thong. "I tied it to the 'amper," he said lamely. "They must o' cut it."
"How long have you been asleep, Inspector?" Jherek asked.
" 'Ardly at all. A few winks 'ere, a few there. Nothin' to speak of."
"They were hearty winks!" She drew in a sharp breath as she stared around her in the grey pre-dawn. "Judging by your snores. I heard them all night."
"Oh, come now, ma'am…"
"They could be miles away," said Jherek. "You should see them run, when they want to. You did not sleep well either, Mrs. Underwood?"
"Only the inspector, it seems, enjoyed a satisfying rest." She glared at the policeman. "If you want your house burgled, tell the police you're going on holiday. That's what my brother always used to say."
"That's 'ardly fair, ma'am…" he began, but he knew he was on shaky ground. "I took every precaution. But these foreigners — with their knives —" again he displayed the severed thong — "well, 'ow can you anticipate…?"
She inspected the surrounding sand, saying mournfully. " Look at all these footprints. Do you remember, Mr. Carnelian, when we would rise in the morning and go down to the sea and there wouldn't be a mark on the beach? Not a sign of another soul! It's so spoiled now." She was pointing. "There — a fresh trail. Leading inland."
Certainly, the ground was disturbed. Jherek detected the broad footprints of the departing Lat.
"They'll be carrying the 'amper," offered Inspector Springer, "so they'll be slowed down a bit." He clutched his midriff. "Ooh, I 'ate to start the day on an empty stomach."
"That," she said with satisfaction, "is entirely your fault, Inspector!"
She led the way forward while Jherek and Inspector Springer, tugging on their coats, did their best to keep pace with her.
Even before they had entered a large stretch of frond-forest and were labouring uphill, Mrs. Underwood's quick eye detecting a broken branch or a crushed leaf as sign-posts to the route of the thieves, the sun had risen, splendid and golden, and begun to beat its hottest. Inspector Springer made much use of his handkerchief on the back of his neck and his forehead, but Mrs. Underwood would not let them pause.
The hill grew steeper. It was virtually sheer. Still she led; still she allowed them no rest. They panted — Jherek cheerfully and Inspector Springer with loud resentment. At two stages he was heard to breathe the word "Women" in a desperate, incantatory fashion, and at a third he appended another word, in a voice which was entirely inaudible. Jherek, in contrast, was enjoying the exertion, the sense of adventure, though he had no belief that they could catch Captain Mubbers and his men.
She was a score of yards ahead of them, and higher. "Nearly at the top," she called.
Inspector Springer was not encouraged. He stopped, leaning against the stem of a fern which rose fifteen feet over his head and rustled as it took the weight of his bulky frame.
"It would be best," Jherek said, passing him, "if we were to remain as close together as possible. We could so easily become separated."
"She's a bloomin' mad woman," grunted the inspector. "I knew it all along." But he laboured after Jherek, even catching him up as he clambered over a fallen trunk which left a smear of green on the knees of his trousers. Jherek sniffed. "Your smell! I wondered — I haven't quite smelt anything like it before? It is you. Very odd. Pleasant, I suppose…"
"Gur!" said Inspector Springer.
Jherek sniffed again, but continued to climb, now using his hands and his feet, virtually on all fours. "Certainly pungent…"
"Cor! You cheeky little b—"
"Excelsior!" It was Mrs. Underwood's voice, though she could no longer be seen. "Oh, it's magnificent!"
Inspector Springer caught hold of Jherek's ankle. "If you've any further personal comments, I'd be more than grateful if you'd keep them to yourself."
"I'm sorry, Inspector." Jherek tried to free his foot. He frowned. "I certainly meant no offence. It's simply that such smells — perspiration, is it? — are uncommon at the End of Time. I love it. Really."
"Ugh!" Inspector Springer let go of Jherek's foot. "I 'ad you marked right from the start, too. Bloomin' cream puff. Cafe Royal — Oscar Wilde — should 'ave trusted me own judgement…"
"I can see them!" Mrs. Underwood's voice again. "The quarry's in sight!"
Jherek pressed past a low branch and saw her through the dappled fronds.
"Ouch!" said Inspector Springer from behind him. "Cor! If I ever get back to London and if I ever lay 'ands on you…"
The belligerence seemed to give him energy, enabling him, once more, to catch up. They arrived, shoulder to shoulder, to stand at Mrs. Underwood's side. She was flushed. Her eyes shone. She pointed.
They stood on the edge of a cliff that was almost sheer, its sides dotted with clumps of vegetation. Some hundreds of feet below them the cliff levelled out to a broad, stony beach, touching the wide, placid waters of a creek whose brilliant blue, reflecting the sky, was in beautiful and harmonious contrast with the browns, greens and yellows of the flanking cliffs.
"It is simple," she said, "and it is magnificent! Look, Mr. Carnelian! It goes on forever. It is the world! So much of it. All virgin. Not even a wild beast to disturb its vast serenity. Imagine what Mr. Ruskin would say to all this. Switzerland cannot compare…" She was smiling now at Jherek. "Oh, Mr. Carnelian — it is Eden. It is!"
"Hm," said Inspector Springer. "It's pretty enough scenery. But where's our little friends? You said —"
"There!"
Inspector Springer also recognized it. He blushed as he held up the wrist to which was attached a severed thong. "I tied it to the 'amper," he said lamely. "They must o' cut it."
"How long have you been asleep, Inspector?" Jherek asked.
" 'Ardly at all. A few winks 'ere, a few there. Nothin' to speak of."
"They were hearty winks!" She drew in a sharp breath as she stared around her in the grey pre-dawn. "Judging by your snores. I heard them all night."
"Oh, come now, ma'am…"
"They could be miles away," said Jherek. "You should see them run, when they want to. You did not sleep well either, Mrs. Underwood?"
"Only the inspector, it seems, enjoyed a satisfying rest." She glared at the policeman. "If you want your house burgled, tell the police you're going on holiday. That's what my brother always used to say."
"That's 'ardly fair, ma'am…" he began, but he knew he was on shaky ground. "I took every precaution. But these foreigners — with their knives —" again he displayed the severed thong — "well, 'ow can you anticipate…?"
She inspected the surrounding sand, saying mournfully. " Look at all these footprints. Do you remember, Mr. Carnelian, when we would rise in the morning and go down to the sea and there wouldn't be a mark on the beach? Not a sign of another soul! It's so spoiled now." She was pointing. "There — a fresh trail. Leading inland."
Certainly, the ground was disturbed. Jherek detected the broad footprints of the departing Lat.
"They'll be carrying the 'amper," offered Inspector Springer, "so they'll be slowed down a bit." He clutched his midriff. "Ooh, I 'ate to start the day on an empty stomach."
"That," she said with satisfaction, "is entirely your fault, Inspector!"
She led the way forward while Jherek and Inspector Springer, tugging on their coats, did their best to keep pace with her.
Even before they had entered a large stretch of frond-forest and were labouring uphill, Mrs. Underwood's quick eye detecting a broken branch or a crushed leaf as sign-posts to the route of the thieves, the sun had risen, splendid and golden, and begun to beat its hottest. Inspector Springer made much use of his handkerchief on the back of his neck and his forehead, but Mrs. Underwood would not let them pause.
The hill grew steeper. It was virtually sheer. Still she led; still she allowed them no rest. They panted — Jherek cheerfully and Inspector Springer with loud resentment. At two stages he was heard to breathe the word "Women" in a desperate, incantatory fashion, and at a third he appended another word, in a voice which was entirely inaudible. Jherek, in contrast, was enjoying the exertion, the sense of adventure, though he had no belief that they could catch Captain Mubbers and his men.
She was a score of yards ahead of them, and higher. "Nearly at the top," she called.
Inspector Springer was not encouraged. He stopped, leaning against the stem of a fern which rose fifteen feet over his head and rustled as it took the weight of his bulky frame.
"It would be best," Jherek said, passing him, "if we were to remain as close together as possible. We could so easily become separated."
"She's a bloomin' mad woman," grunted the inspector. "I knew it all along." But he laboured after Jherek, even catching him up as he clambered over a fallen trunk which left a smear of green on the knees of his trousers. Jherek sniffed. "Your smell! I wondered — I haven't quite smelt anything like it before? It is you. Very odd. Pleasant, I suppose…"
"Gur!" said Inspector Springer.
Jherek sniffed again, but continued to climb, now using his hands and his feet, virtually on all fours. "Certainly pungent…"
"Cor! You cheeky little b—"
"Excelsior!" It was Mrs. Underwood's voice, though she could no longer be seen. "Oh, it's magnificent!"
Inspector Springer caught hold of Jherek's ankle. "If you've any further personal comments, I'd be more than grateful if you'd keep them to yourself."
"I'm sorry, Inspector." Jherek tried to free his foot. He frowned. "I certainly meant no offence. It's simply that such smells — perspiration, is it? — are uncommon at the End of Time. I love it. Really."
"Ugh!" Inspector Springer let go of Jherek's foot. "I 'ad you marked right from the start, too. Bloomin' cream puff. Cafe Royal — Oscar Wilde — should 'ave trusted me own judgement…"
"I can see them!" Mrs. Underwood's voice again. "The quarry's in sight!"
Jherek pressed past a low branch and saw her through the dappled fronds.
"Ouch!" said Inspector Springer from behind him. "Cor! If I ever get back to London and if I ever lay 'ands on you…"
The belligerence seemed to give him energy, enabling him, once more, to catch up. They arrived, shoulder to shoulder, to stand at Mrs. Underwood's side. She was flushed. Her eyes shone. She pointed.
They stood on the edge of a cliff that was almost sheer, its sides dotted with clumps of vegetation. Some hundreds of feet below them the cliff levelled out to a broad, stony beach, touching the wide, placid waters of a creek whose brilliant blue, reflecting the sky, was in beautiful and harmonious contrast with the browns, greens and yellows of the flanking cliffs.
"It is simple," she said, "and it is magnificent! Look, Mr. Carnelian! It goes on forever. It is the world! So much of it. All virgin. Not even a wild beast to disturb its vast serenity. Imagine what Mr. Ruskin would say to all this. Switzerland cannot compare…" She was smiling now at Jherek. "Oh, Mr. Carnelian — it is Eden. It is!"
"Hm," said Inspector Springer. "It's pretty enough scenery. But where's our little friends? You said —"
"There!"