The Arrival of Missives (5 page)

But the German who ran to me as I struggled against the tangled nest of wire that had ensnared me – the man who picked up my own fallen gun and thrust the bayonet into my stomach, pushing down, determinedly down on the blade as if sawing wood – I see his keen face afresh every time he comes to mind. Which is so very often. I do not know why he did not simply shoot me, but I do not think he found enjoyment in the act of carving my stomach into fibrous strands that fell outwards to entangle me further with the wire. He frowned, and I saw lines appear around his mouth, so he was not a young man. A hard-working man in his middle years, I would have said; perhaps even a carpenter, which would explain his determined approach to disassembling me. He bore a fine moustache. To this day I cannot see a moustache without remembering his look of dutiful concentration as he worked upon me.

I am sorry to make this so plain. It is not, I promise you, to elicit your sympathy (which you seem happy to bestow upon me whether I am deserving of it or not, and is one of the saving graces of my current existence). I spell out in detail the nature of my injury because I wish to make it clear to you that I should not have survived. These were wounds beyond medical intervention, and I should be dead. Perhaps I was dead, because I do not remember much beyond the moustache other than a deep blue sea, warm and still and serene, into which I could have floated for an eternity.

And then I woke. Or rather, something woke me. My eyelids cracked open to behold the morass of mud and bodies that made an abandoned battlefield, alit by bright morning sunshine, with no detail spared to me. Even if my organs decorated the fence, my eyes still worked. And I knew, as I raised them up to the sky, that something was coming for me. Something beyond my comprehension.

I would swear I saw the clouds part, and those still clinging to life around me moaned as one as the object appeared in the parting. It was a black circle in that perfect sky at first, and then it grew in size as it fell down, down, down, silent in itself but accompanied by the chorus of suffering around me. I cannot tell you how I knew it was coming for me, and me alone, but I knew it. I could see the glint of the sun upon the silvery threads shot through it. I could make out the rough, uneven surface, the jagged bumps, and still it fell, until it filled my vision and the voices around me crescendoed in their fear and pain – and then it landed upon me.

I would say it did not hurt, but then, physical suffering is hard to recall, I find. I must have felt agony throughout this ordeal, surely? And yet I would swear I felt nothing, and I did not even experience a sensation of collision. Time did seem to stop. There was no time, not in that moment of merging: no time, no gravity, no laws of the natural world that applied. The object fell into the hole that had been made inside of me by that diligent German carpenter, and it filled me. I cried out as the tattered remains of skin and flesh that tied me to the wire were severed. The weight of the rock was immediate; I felt its coldness and heaviness, but I realised instantaneously that I was free, that I could move once more. So I did.

I pulled myself free, and I walked away.

I walked for miles, in the grip of nothing worse than a terrible thirst, through a forest without tracks or guidance. I was directionless, but nothing mattered. I did not look down at the rock I carried within me, and I did not attempt to touch it. I walked onwards until, by sheer chance, I came to a place where the forest ended and farmland began, and found there a collection of wooden buildings that must have once housed animals, but were now empty. They appeared to have been left that way for some length of time.

A small barn with a heavily slanted roof, the two sides raised up to a steepled peak like hands in prayer, had a rusted trough outside, into which rainfall had collected; I put my head inside it and drank deeply, uncaring of the metallic taste. Inside, a dusting of grey straw remained upon the floor, and I lay down and slept. I had no thoughts beyond my immediate needs. I think, perhaps, these were my last moments of true connection to my humanity, because humans are creatures of the earth, are they not? To drink, to sleep, to respond to these needs and think no further upon it – we are like the mice in the fields and the deer in the forest when we obey these instincts. I am not saying that the rock inside me has removed such demands; I must still eat, and drink, and take my nightly rest, of course! But I do not complete such actions without the knowledge that I must keep the remains of my body alive only for the sake of the rock, and what it asks of me.

I did not stay long at the barn. Only long enough to come to the realisation that the rock could not be removed. It was fused within me, rock melded into flesh with no discernible seam. I thought at first of trying to prise it from me, but when I put my hands upon it to make an effort I discovered the purpose of the rock. It bore a missive, activated only by the touch of my palms upon it. How can I explain it? The rock itself was a tool of communication, and it opened a…portal within my mind. A portal to the future.

I thought I was going mad, of course. It took me a long time to understand that the images I received were not originating from a disturbance within my own mind, but from the rock.

I cannot adequately describe what I see except in the most general of terms, for it makes no sense in words and my arm is already tired of writing. I will put this down, then, and rely upon your trust in me to guide your thoughts on this matter further: I have conversed with the leaders of the future. They are fearful. They plant images into my mind of the wars that await us and are befalling them, and they have devoted their lives to finding a way to end all such conflicts. They use the rock to reach back and enlist aid in their struggle. I am determined to do their bidding because I have been shown what will become of mankind if they do not succeed.

Now, my dear Shirley, I have enlisted you.

After reflection, I can recognise you now for what you truly are: you are a Godsend. I wonder if you have been presented to me as an instrument in much the same way that I was chosen as the instrument of the future. For, you see, I have been given a task that I simply could not find a way to undertake. But you – you with your charm and grace and feminine ways – will make easy work of it. And I promise you I will not ask you to do anything that will be beyond your talents.

So start by fetching those horseshoes, my most able pupil, and I will be forever in your debt. As will the world and every living thing upon it.

Yours sincerely,

Your schoolmaster and ally,

Mr Arthur Tiller, Esquire.

He ends formally as if he has written his passion, his desire to communicate these events, out of himself. Yet I find myself no closer to understanding. Am I meant to take his story literally, or to treat it as some kind of parable from which I should learn? It occurs to me that this could well be a test of my loyalty, to see how blindly I am prepared to follow.

I must also consider the possibility that he is mad. I know men have returned from the war with many ailments, including those of the mind. Mr Whittle, the publican at the Three Crowns, did not speak upon his return for many weeks, although he worked on easily enough. Men can seem able and whole, but inside something important is missing. Something that prevents them from seeing the world as an ongoing aspect of war.

Or perhaps dark times do await us on the road ahead. This, as an idea, makes much sense to me. I can picture the final remains of humanity in some terrible future, reaching back in desperation to right a wrong that never should have occurred. I think many people would wish for the ability to correct mistakes already made.

Well, he calls upon my trust, and so I will prove myself. Besides, there is no decision to be made, not yet. Thinking of it in practical terms alone, I must fetch the horseshoes; this is my instruction. It's hardly a daring dash across no-man's land. I will complete my task, yet reserve my judgement. If Mr Tiller is unsound, I will try to restore him to health. If he fights a brave and true battle for humanity, I will aid him as best I can. As befits a woman in love, I will do my best for his continued good. I will be his confidante and ally. He will soon realise that he can rely upon me utterly.

I put the letter under my nightdress, against my bosom. It will not leave the proximity of my body at any time; that is the safest way. The roughness of the paper brings with it a sudden awareness of my own flesh – the perfection of it, unmarred by injury. How clean and whole I am. Is it sinful to think so? What would I do if someone took a blade to me, sliced me through? Would I fight to live on, no matter what the cost? Would I accept strange visions and the perversion of my form as the price of survival?

I blow out the candle on my bedside drawer and nestle down. I picture Mr Tiller's smile. I have never felt so close to him. And yet it is not his body that I see, but a strong, supple one. I squeeze my legs together, feeling the shame of such thoughts. In the fevered grip of my overstimulated imagination I cannot sleep. I do not even try to sleep.

*

Saturday morning, and I am at my task.

I have always liked the smithy, which is a place of interest and excitement for irregular visitors, although I suspect it is a hell of sweaty tedium for those who work there. There has been a Redmore's in Westerbridge for an age, working alongside the farms to provide hoes, shovels and ploughs, and shoes for the horses, of course. The Redmore men all carry heavy-set shoulders and an attitude of forbearance, as if the responsibility of the smithy is a cross they must all carry across the generations.

It occurs to me, as I find the shop door locked tight and skirt around the wall to the forge instead, that Daniel does not quite fit this pattern. Yes, he has the strong shoulders, but he is not destined for this life in the same way as his older brother, Dennis. It is Dennis who will inherit, and the whole village knows that Daniel remains in school in order to work on his talent for thinking instead. Mr Redmore – their father – has plans to expand the business, it is said, and wants Daniel's learning to make him into some sort of manager. Managers wear suits and make charts, and I am not altogether sure that this will suit Daniel. But then neither would the life of a blacksmith, and so he goes along cheerfully enough, not being one thing or another, except a general annoyance to me.

I can see the glow of the forge at the centre of the open-sided stone building, and the smell of smoke and hot iron is strong. And then there is the sound: the roar of the flames, like a monster caught in a deep pit, and I see Dennis standing at it, the strings of his heavy apron caught at his back as his muscles bunch. He is working.

'Hello there, Miss Fearn,' says a deep voice behind me, gravelly with age and experience. Mr Redmore steps forward, out of the gloom; he has been standing at the back wall of the forge the whole time, and I did not see him. 'It seems a time since I've seen you here.'

'It has been a fair while,' I say. He went away to fight, but returned unhurt. I remember I saw him in church on the Sunday after his return, but he has not attended since.

'Farm business? Or have you come to see Daniel? He's gone to Taunton to make a delivery.'

'No,' I say, quickly, and Mr Redmore moves further out, into the light, and smiles at me in a knowing way that I do not much like. 'I am on business for Mr Tiller, in point of fact.'

'Indeed? He has you running errands, has he?'

There is a tremendous noise, like a great bell ringing close by, making me start. Mr Redmore does not even flinch. He flicks one hand towards the forge; I follow the gesture with my eyes and see that Dennis has moved to the anvil and is hammering at heated metal with a patient, steady stroke, moulding it to his will. He pounds in a rhythm over which I must shout to be heard.

'For May Day. Horseshoes.'

'Of course, of course.' Mr Redmore nods. 'Do you want to take them now? They'll be heavy, though. I can get Daniel to carry them to wherever you would like when he returns. It'll be a few hours yet.'

'I can manage myself,' I say.

He raises his eyebrows, then turns away and walks back into the darkness of the building, and I can see that he has become so much older since I last saw him, stiff in his gait. Perhaps it will not be long until Dennis takes over the running of the smithy. It makes me sad to see the slow, painful tread of his feet over the well-worn floor, and the way his hair thins at the back and looks threadbare where it meets his collar.

If I could see my own parents with such objectivity, would they look so much older too? What, then, would they think of such changes in themselves? Do they hate the passage of time, or will that emotion shrivel along with their bodies?

Perhaps all old people look upon the young with envious eyes, and give their orders to reach beyond their natural time and steal from ours.

These thoughts are uncomfortable, so I put them aside in order to concentrate on my mission. Mr Redmore emerges with a wooden box in his hands that does not look too heavy. He walks past Dennis, who ceases hammering as he looks up at his father, and then sees me with a frown. Dennis is only two years older than me but he has always kept a distance, as if we are not meant to socialise. It always seems to me that he acts as if he has a secret knowledge that he imagines I could not possibly understand, even though I am the better learner by far within the confines of the classroom.