To Indigo Read online

  “Use me? Well, already he does.”

  “That? Murder and madness and debauchery? The Devil does not attend to such matters. His minor demons deal in those things. Satanus Rex. He’s not called a king for nothing. His tastes are more refined.”

  “You know him well, then.”

  “All men know him. But he. He himself will condescend to know only a few.”

  Wine stood on the table in an ewer. Vilmos now, without asking, poured some into a glass, which also stood there, and drank it.

  “You’ve said he chose me.”

  “So he has. But better not be flattered, Vilmos. The Beast has selected you as a man selects a piece of bread to mop up the gravy. He will use you, consume you perhaps. He does not mean to keep or cherish you.”

  Vilmos had drained the glass. He threw it at the toad – which nimbly hopped aside. The glass, meeting instead one of the stone pillars either side the hearth, shattered.

  “I’m done with this. I’m not here for the Devil’s use, let alone yours. I’m in the world for myself.”

  “Do you think so?”

  Vilmos turned, at a loss. In the cramped windows a bloodless dawn was rising, showing the City, towers and roofs, the gleam of the dirty river, the ruined citadel on the Hill of Kolosian.

  The toad had come to Vilmos’s foot. It stared up at him. There was a poisoned jewel between its eyes. But its eyes also were like that. He wanted to kick it away. But he could not do it, just as he could no longer verbally fence with the Master.

  “Let me go,” he said.

  “Impossible. You’ve been recognised. Not by ourselves, by That we resort to. Now you’ll go upstairs. A room’s prepared. Once you swore to serve this Order. Now you shall.”

  Vilmos said nothing.

  The toad’s eyes seemed to him luminous and compassionate.

  To it, he muttered. “What shall I do?” But the Master replied.

  “You must now undergo various rituals and observances. You’ll fast and receive chastisement. When we’ve purified your flesh – your mind, heart and soul, of course, are beyond any redemption – you will be permitted certain pleasures. You will even be allowed to kill once more. The tally must comprise thirteen victims. After this you will serve, as you swore to do, the Mystery. Remember, Vilmos, Gold may be made from Filth. The Fount of Eternal Youth, the Enlightening of the Gem of the Third Eye, may be discovered, unlocked. The colours of the body pass up towards the Infinite. And, in the stage before Infinity, they cross into the physical threshold of Truest Power. Be happy, Vilmos. For you will work an essential magic.”

  “But what of me?” he asked the toad, drearily.

  It turned from him and waddled away into the shadow behind the Master’s chair. Its refusal to answer seemed now significant.

  Risen sun burst through a window, and in Vilmos’s skull the white string and the black raw coal of the migraine woke without preamble, hungry, sinking in their fangs. He barely noticed as the servants came and hauled him up the stairs.

  FIFTEEN

  On the 2nd May at 8.30 a.m., Duran arrived at the house.

  He isn’t young, though some years younger than I am, yet he retains the air of his mature youth, which I suppose was in the Eighties.

  We went round the house. He made notes on a pad from Sainsbury’s in green biro.

  The chat had been desultory. Suddenly, in the study by the computer, having asked me about virus-combatants, firewalls and so on – computer fraud and its prevention had also become an interest of his – he said, “So why this conversion, Roy?”

  “What? The security?”

  “Yes, mate. You seemed happy enough. You getting like a bit of bother round here?”

  “It’s a quiet road,” I said. “But. Well, you hear things.”

  “Yeah. But you can always hear things. What’s new?”

  Of course I had had the idea before that I might confide in Duran, ask him for advice, even help. He might know – someone. But now obviously, someone had approached me, the unsettling Cart or whatever the hell his name was. And I’d put Cart off because frankly, in those moments, I had felt more scared of him and of the consequences of using his services, than of the eccentric Sej. Now however, I still felt I couldn’t confide in Duran. Was it that I really and definitely had begun again to credit Joseph was my son?

  “Like, Roy, mate, you don’t have to tell me. Only if you felt you should. P’raps I could make you a better defence plan. For the house, I mean.”

  I looked at him. The words stuck. I said, “I do appreciate that, Duran. Thanks. But I’m just thinking of taking a break, going up north to visit an old friend. And the house will be empty, you see.”

  He chuckled. “What’ve I told you, Roy? Don’t tell no one, ever, you are leaving your property unoccupied.”

  “Right.”

  “I mean, you don’t know you can trust me. I mean, you can. But you can’t know for sure.”

  “Almost every lock and bolt in here was your suggestion. Wouldn’t you have broken in by now if I couldn’t?”

  “Well, you got me there, Roy. Maybe I’m just biding my time.”

  The other matter of Why had been satisfactorily shelved, probably let go. He was a good man, but his moral duty, even as he saw it, could only extend so far.

  When Duran and I had made the ‘defence plan’, which would be quite costly, and included sorting out a new burglar alarm that worked – “Police don’t take that much notice, unless you got one of these” – we fixed another date for Thursday, he had another coffee and then left. His girlfriend was eight and a half months into expecting their second baby. He didn’t like having to go back to Bristol on Saturday and leaving her. He said if anything got ‘stressy’ his cousin would have to lump it.

  After he’d gone I did the chores in the house. The contents of the fridge and freezer were low, but if I was planning to leave this coming Saturday, I only had a few days to cover. The thought of shopping, never a favourite task and always kept to necessities, exasperated me. I’d known for years that one day I’d be old and on my own and then I wouldn’t manage it at all. It would be some form of modern meals-on-wheels, or deliveries from some supermarket, with half the items doubtless wrong.

  But the way the world was, why assume I’d even live, or any of us would, into our ‘twilight’ years?

  In the afternoon I sat down at the machine and put in the disc for the latest due-to-be-written novel. It had the working title of Kill Me Tomorrow, which I’d lifted of course from Othello, but the publisher had pointed out it sounded too much like something concerning James Bond. I couldn’t settle to it.

  I am fairly disciplined. One needs to be in this job. But the whole rigmarole, although they’d liked and bought it, looked like twaddle to me now.

  Finally I sat, staring at the words on the screen, not seeing them, and Joseph walked forward in my mind and stood there, watching me.

  I hadn’t seen him for days. How long? Eight, nine. But he had left an indelible impression. The four circumstances of our meeting – the pub in the Strand, under the fir tree, at my door, in my hotel – had me strung up in the certain belief he might now suddenly appear – virtually anywhere, looking in at an upper window, maybe, balanced ably on a ladder.

  Or would I simply go downstairs and he’d be sitting there, in the kitchen, drinking tea?

  Why had he installed a piano, if he hadn’t meant to return into my life and house? Or was it a present, like the dustbin and the bottle of beer which, incidentally, I’d never touched.

  He’d become bored. That must be it. His warped and extraordinary mind had abruptly swerved away from me.

  I’d be glad, thankful, but only if I could be certain.

  Or would I be glad, and thankful?

  Surely, for Christ’s sake, I wouldn’t miss any of this?

  Unless. Unless he was my son.

  Odd perhaps, I’d kept the elements that would contain his DNA, to help protect me from him. Now for the ve
ry first I fully recognised they might have another purpose.

  But then, DNA tests aren’t always conclusive. And anyway, if he were mine – what would he want? And I. What would I want of him?

  At 7 p.m. the burglar alarm went off, apparently because some kids were playing football outside. Later it did it again because the bicycle boy from up the road went past. It had always behaved like this. I turned it off.

  That night I dreamed of Joseph Traskul as Vilmos, in the dim City of my imagination’s night. He lay half dead in the upper room of the Master’s house, as outlined in chapters thirteen through fifteen. In this dream-version rain was pouring in through the ceiling.

  And I went into the room and stood looking down at him and he lay looking up at me.

  “Don’t do this, Roy,” he said. “I never meant to harm.”

  But I answered in the Master’s words, a script I had learned well, that he was for the use, not of myself, but of Great Powers beyond – yet in – the world.

  And then Maureen stood beside me on the floor running with water, and she said, “He’s not worth our concern, Charlie. Bleeding bugger.”

  And I woke, and I thought, My God, can I wait until Saturday to get away?

  In the morning I called Matt.

  “I’ve got to make a trip to your neck of the woods. Are you up to dinner?”

  “I’m up to anything, Roy. I’m up to killing that bitch.”

  I thought, This then, Matt’s anti-Sylvia maelstrom of bitterness, is my alternative. Never mind. I need to remove myself somewhere.

  “Any chance I could sleep on the couch a couple of nights? These bastards aren’t paying expenses.”

  “Why not, Roy? Have the spare room. She’s had her fucking lover in there enough times. And now she’s gone. So exorcise it for me.”

  Duran was due to come back on Thursday. On Thursday morning something happened. Someone rang the door bell, obviously Duran, yet as I opened the door I thought – I thought -

  A woman, youngish, tall, willowy, stood there looking upset.

  “I’m sorry to trouble you – but my car’s stalled…” She waved in a helpless way over her right shoulder. “It’s just, my mobile’s out too. Could I possibly use your land-line? I’ll be happy to pay.”

  I looked at her, and I thought now: There have been too many things like this. Too many.

  I said, “I’m sorry, my phone isn’t working.” (This was, of course, true). “Perhaps try next door.” I indicated 76, Ian the house-husband.

  She said, looking even more upset, “I did, they don’t answer.”

  We stared at each other, she and I.

  The ultimate impasse. I didn’t believe her. I was thinking, if not coherently, This is a scam. She’s up to something, this forlorn female, coming here and saying she must use my telephone.

  And then I recalled, in the most unpredictable rush, so many incidents in my life, and how curiously I had met so many characters who were now integral, even if our time of contact had vanished away. Maureen with her dramatically sloughed lover Reg, Lynda with her broken glasses – even events, for example the urge to hurry to the hospital lavatory, missing, like some cruel train, my mother’s moment of death.

  I mustn’t be so self-involved. Everything did not revolve around myself. Everything was not a conspiracy, a plot.

  “Wait, I’ve got a mobile. You can use that.” I turned and left her by the door. I only had to go to the kitchen table. I hadn’t asked her in, nor did she come in. She didn’t look particularly strong; there was nothing to steal in the hall.

  “Oh thank you,” she said, when I gave her the phone. “What do I owe…?”

  “That’s fine.”

  Encouraged, grateful, she did step up, just into the shelter of the doorway. She leaned by the door, and pushed in numbers.

  Then she pulled a Kleenex out of a pocket and rubbed her nose, turning her back to me shyly.

  I could see it now, the white car, stalled very definitely down where Old Church Lane gave way to the Crescent. Steam rose from the bonnet.

  I walked off into the kitchen, let her mumble into the phone in private.

  As such conversations do, it took a little while. I’d better top the phone up again, to be safe.

  When I came back, she’d dropped the Kleenex on my mat and was grabbing it up. She stood clutching it and wiping her nose with it again, though now it would be less than clean. She was shaky. I retrieved my phone before she dropped that too.

  “Thank you, thank you so much. It’s OK. They’re coming to rescue me. I shouldn’t get so silly… Really, can’t I pay for…”

  “It’s quite OK.”

  She went off along the path. I wondered why she was driving through these streets, where she was going, why she’d got in such a flap. She was rather a pretty woman, only about thirty. She looked sad, sad anyway without car problems to upset her. She was wiping her eyes now. What would he have done? Asked her in and made her tea.

  I shut the door.

  It rained in the evening. The sunset was like a squashed blue plum. I’d gone out of the back door and looked at the paving, for some reason. It was beginning to crack. I suppose not unreasonably, it had been laid some years before. Built-in obsolescence, as they say. Bad workmanship, as my father would have said.

  Duran hadn’t turned up. This wasn’t like him. Nor did he call.

  I dreamed about my father that night. He was walking with me through a dark forest full of fir trees.

  “You should clear this, Roy. It’s a bit disappointing,”

  “But, Dad. It isn’t mine.”

  “It’s all yours, Roy. Everything is yours, ours. We just have to face it, show it we’re not afraid. Never turn your back on these things, Roy. They’ll only get worse.”

  My father had become the Master now. He even wore the robe.

  We reached a hill above the forest and saw moonlight rake the acres of the trees. Above, stars burned blue. It was, as dreams can be, detailed and entirely real.

  “How’s mother?” I asked him humbly.

  “Your mother?” he said. His voice grew quiet and tense. “She has a lover, Roy. She didn’t wait for me. I’m up to killing that bitch.”

  When Duran phoned me at seven the next morning I was not amazed.

  Nor, of course, when he said, “I still can’t get anything from your landline, Roy.”

  “No. Trying to get them to fix it.”

  “Gawd. Don’t hold your breath.”

  “I’m not.”

  “Look, Roy, I hate to’ve let you down. She’s gone into well – we thought it was labour and she’s not due till June. But they’ve took her in and – well, I wanna be with her,

  “Yes, Duran, of course you do.”

  “Can I call you later?”

  “Whenever, Duran. Don’t worry about that. Good luck. I’m sure she’ll be fine.”

  “Thanks, Roy. You’re a king.”

  Satanus Rex. A king.

  When I thought to look, the white car had been removed from the junction of the Lane and the Crescent.

  I was fairly sure Duran wouldn’t be calling me back, or if he did only to say he couldn’t make it. They might send her home and he must be there to look after her, not to mention their other child, who was only just at school age.

  The problem was, should I simply leave the house as it was? Presumably Joseph could break in. Or could he? Did his cleverness also lie in that direction? He gave off an almost supernatural impression of being able to manifest out of thin air, but in fact there were always reasons for everything he had achieved that way. He’d made sure I understood them. No, the house could resist him. Somehow he had got the piano speed-delivered and installed on that single day he was here before. Since then he hadn’t come back. After all he might never come back. Presumably he had achieved his purpose, whatever insane purpose it was.

  Even so, preparing to pack, I meant to put everything together again very carefully, all my documents and valued
files, placed in my holdall.

  At 9 a.m. this time Matt called me on the mobile.

  “Your phone doesn’t work, Roy.” He meant the landline evidently. He sounded aggrieved. Faithless wives, useless telephones… “I tried you yesterday. Twice.”

  “They’re being slow to repair it. As I have the mobile I’m not an emergency, it seems.”

  “You are to me. This call’s costing me the earth. And a mobile phone, did you know, can give you cancer?” he added. Gloatingly he continued, “She has one. Reason I called. I can’t make this weekend. Some old chums have turned up out of the blue. Every inch of space here is taken. I’ll be clear Monday morning, and good riddance.”

  I sensed, without any evidence, he had picked up another woman and she was staying the weekend with him. Hopefully it might defuse some of his angst.

  “Let’s make it Monday then, Matt.”

  This was better, in its way. Monday would be easier for travelling up there. Saturdays like Sundays were always chancy, trains cancelled, works on the line.

  But now I had tonight and two more days and nights here.

  When I locked up that night the top bolt on the front door seemed loose. It had a little the previous night, but this was worse. Duran had been a bit rough with all the bolts, testing them and telling me off for using flimsy things like that still, although he had installed them himself years ago. “Yeah, but Roy, things have improved. Anyone could kick this door down. Bust the locks, the bolts’d just fly off.”

  I had told him I would then hear all that and telephone the police.

  “Mate of mine,” he said balefully, “he had a break-in. The cops took an hour to get there. By which time he’d chased the burk off himself. But I don’t see you doing that. Not your style. Too much a gentleman you are, Roy.”

  I wobbled the bolt home gingerly. The lower one, which last night I’d forgotten to shoot, as I sometimes do when I’m tired, seemed conversely very stiff. I got some WD40 and squirted it, but it didn’t seem to do any good. I left it and simply locked up. Then I brought a straight chair from the front room and leaned it on the door. I felt foolish doing this, despite everything that had happened. But in any case, I couldn’t utilise the bolts from the outside, or the chair, when I left.