The Haunted Storm (21 page)

I heard you were staying with Harry. Elizabeth told me. Perhaps we ought to get together again.

I’d like to see you. How about Wednesday? I’ll meet the three o’clock bus, would that suit you?

Give my regards to Harry. All the best,

Your brother,

Alan.”

And so now he was standing in the bus station. How could you tell if what you thought you saw in a man’s face was really there?

Alan was in his thirties. His blond, almost yellow hair was dark at the roots. Certainly Matthew didn’t remember him as being blond.

The outlines of his face were similar to Matthew’s. They
were
brothers, quite obviously. The line of the jaw was the same, the nose was the same; the eyes were more hooded in Alan but they had the same curious roundness. His face was more heavily fleshed than Matthew’s, as he was bulkier and more muscular altogether. His hands were powerful and thick, the fingernails chipped and dirty.

And his voice: it was effeminate! He had a London accent, overlaid with a honeyed, caressing intimacy – but no, it was difficult to be sure of it, he’d only said two words. And in any case it was harsh too, half-mocking.

The one amazing thing, the quality which Matthew found impossible to reconcile with the rest of it, was the sheer intelligence of his expression. He had seen it in certain great portraits, but never in a living face, this vivid air of responding immediately and accurately and of moving swiftly to conclusions, of dominating (that was Elizabeth’s word! Yes, she was right) of dominating the world, matter, ideas, the substance of everything that existed: quite simply, of
facing
it.

What else was there? It was a sensualist’s face. There were lines around the eyes and a thickness of the lips which Matthew interpreted as being the marks of a man who knew extremities of sensual greed. And yet paradoxically the predominating
impression
that Matthew had was one of asceticism, a purposeful and willed refraining from, holding back, controlling. What made it so difficult to interpret was the evident fact that what he held back was not a stream, not a constant steady flow, but a flood. If for one moment he let go, thought Matthew, he would perish and decay of over-ripeness.

It was the face of a man who lived in a perilous balance between exhaustion and mania. Yes, it was perilous, it was razor-thin, but it was also – Elizabeth’s words again – absolute, still, powerful, iron.

Well, she had seen so much of him: now, what more could
he
see?

“All right, I’m sorry I panicked,” said Matthew. “I didn’t know what to say.”

“Nor did I,” said Alan. “It doesn’t matter. Let’s go for a walk.”

They went out of the bus station and set off slowly down the street. Matthew felt the slight breeze on his face, and smiled to himself. It felt cool and delicious.

“What did you want to see me for?” he asked.

“I thought we could have a chat. See how you’re getting on.” The banal and slightly patronising phrases sounded laden not with self-mockery so much as self-consciousness. Alan was conscious of what they meant: and he meant them, literally. That was all.

“Ye – es,” he said “…now there’s no need to beat about the bush, is there? I know what you mean, and I approve of it. So I’ll take everything you say quite literally, even the cliches. You’re more intelligent than I am, and I’ve never said
that
to anyone before; so if you say something you must mean it, and I’ll answer it honestly. Your friend Canon Cole had to tell me to take everything he said literally; perhaps he didn’t realise that I was going to anyway… I’ll tell you something else: I’m talking like this only because I’m nervous. I’d far rather hear what you’ve got to say. But as for how I’m getting on: well, I’m very near nowhere at all. But I know it, you see, that’s the point, I know that I’m nowhere. Do you understand?”

Alan nodded, smiling, and said nothing. Matthew went on:

“But what about you? That’s what I’m really curious about. You’re a complete mystery. Do you know they haven’t mentioned you at home since they threw you out? But
did
they throw you out? And if they did, why? Because I don’t know, you see, they never told me.”

“I’m not surprised. They were so embarrassed that they didn’t look me straight in the face once. They thought I was homosexual, because the headmaster thought I was. So did the boy I was sleeping with; so did I.”

“I guessed it was that… but you’re not homosexual, are you?”

“I don’t think so. What does the question mean?”

“Well, you’re right, it’s meaningless. So what did you do then?”

“I worked.”

“Whereabouts, though?”

“I did all sorts of things. I tried to keep moving. As soon as I began to like a place, or started accumulating things, or got offered a better job, I left, and went somewhere else. Once I was in hospital for a year.”

“A psychiatric hospital?” That was clairvoyance; he knew the answer as he asked the question.

“Yes.”

“What was the matter with you?”

“Obviously I was mad.”

“What did they do?”

“Nothing much. They gave me drugs and E.C.T. That’s electric shock. The drugs made me sleepy and the E.C.T. gave me a headache, but it was comfortable and free and I had plenty of time. It was enervating, though. I was getting lazy. So I discharged myself. And then I tried to join the Army, but they wouldn’t have me.”

“Yes, yes… I forget who it was: someone said that nowadays it was possible to say to someone, yes, you have a job, you have a family, you live in such-and-such a place and do whatever it is for a living, but what do you
do
? Well, that’s missing in what you’ve said, too. What are you doing?”

“That was H. G. Wells. And I’ll tell you what T. E. Hulme said: the world lives in order to develop the lines on its face. I’m not doing anything; it’s a meaningless question.”

“I can’t think of another way to put it.”

“Well, I’m answering it all the time.”

There was an air of gentle courtesy about the way he spoke. Matthew felt that he was wasting Alan’s time, but that his brother was taking trouble with him, for some reason.

“All right,” he said, “I’ll try, yes, I see what you mean, I’ll try and get to it. But tell me, why are you bothering with me?”

Alan considered this before he spoke, and put his hands in his pockets. They were walking slowly; the streets were quiet, and Matthew found himself sensing, like cool water on his bare flesh, the far-off delicate erotic movements of summer in the atmosphere and the countryside around the city. For a second he had the sensation of looking-two ways, at himself and at the world simultaneously. But what he saw was also the city and the country, the past and the present, the past and the future, Elizabeth and Alan, the desert and the brothels, Egypt and Tibet: pairs, but not contraries. It only lasted a second, and then it disappeared, and he was back with Alan.

“Because,” said his brother, “I was curious. Elizabeth told me you were here. And if you wanted to know why I was curious, it’s not flattering; it’s quite simply that you’re my brother and I was interested to see how like me you were.”

His manner – it was partly this which produced the double-vision in Matthew. He sounded infinitely weary: and screwed up to a pitch of enormous tension. He spoke harshly, coldly, indifferently: but there was still the disconcerting silky intimate timbre in his intonation, the effeminacy.

“Yes,” said Matthew, “that’s why I came,
I
suppose… it’s the only reason I look at anyone, to see how like me they are.”

“What if they are like you?”

“Well, good! I don’t need them, in that case.”

“And what if they’re not?”

“Then they’re on the wrong track, and I needn’t take any notice of them.”

Alan smiled. “Yes, that’s right,” he said.

“And am I like you, then?”

“No; you’re too nervous, just now. Don’t bother about it. If I hadn’t seen it was worth it, I’d have told you to fuck off ten minutes ago. It doesn’t matter if you talk or not. Look; there’s a museum here. Let’s go in there for a while.”

Matthew scratched his head. “I’ll have to fall in with what he wants, I’ll have to go at his pace, or I’ll lose him,” he thought. And if this meant being silent, or walking about the streets for hours going nowhere, then let it.

They each paid for a ticket and went into the museum. It consisted of a single large room with a gallery around the upper part of it. The roof was made of glass, and the light was dim and cool, like an aquarium. The floor was crowded with dusty glass cases containing fragments of Roman pottery, flint tools and weapons, models illustrating siege war fare in the middle ages, and so on. There was no one there but themselves.

They wandered idly up one side of it, saying nothing, Matthew tried to restrain the numerous questions that surged up in his breast, and tapped his fingers on the glass cases or whistled softly in irritation. Alan seemed disposed to linger there all afternoon. He stared at each exhibit in turn, taking his time, going from ancient British sling-stones to medieval cooking utensils, staring for a long time at a book case containing the works of some long-dead local author and a facsimile of one of his manuscripts.

At last Matthew’s frustration burst into words. He said the first thing that came into his head.

“I went to the police the other day.”

Alan turned round. “Did you? Why?”

“It was – you know, this – this murder, in Barton, there was another one on Saturday – well, you must have heard about it – and I was there, you see, and so I went to the police on Sunday morning, and told them what I’d seen.”

Alan nodded.

“It was in case they – well, I was afraid that if I didn’t, you see, they’d come to me.”

“Ah,” said Alan softly.

It was on the tip of Matthew’s tongue to say “I went because I thought I did it –” but he held it back. Alan was looking at a plaster model of a hill-fort, with a cutaway section to show what the excavations had unearthed. “Have you been in here before?” he said instead.

“Once or twice,” said Alan.

“I didn’t even know it was here.”

“Most cities have a museum somewhere.”

He moved further on, down to the end of the gallery, and stood looking at a glass case containing photographs and drawings of Roman inscriptions.

“You know what that means, do you?” he said, pointing at one of them.

Matthew recognised it instantly, with a flutter of excitement.

“Deo Invicto Mitrae – of course I do, yes, it means to Mithras, the invincible god. Why?”

“And you know what ‘ignoto’ means?”

“Ignotus – what’s that – unknown. Yes.”

“Good,” said Alan, smiling.

Matthew was baffled. “What’s it all about, then?”

“This well,” Alan said quietly, so quietly in fact that Matthew could hardly hear him. But he didn’t think Alan was being secretive: the thought struck him suddenly that his brother was dazed for lack of sleep. Or drugged! That was it.

“Do you use benzedrine, or something?” he said. “To keep you awake?”

“I have done. I’m not using it now. There are too many…” he broke off for a moment and stroked his chin. “There are too many things to be controlled, at the moment. I’m moving slowly; I’m ticking over, if you like. Okay; let’s talk a little more, then. I’m not under the influence of anything now but myself. I haven’t been to sleep for two days or so.”

“Where are you working now?”

“In the Bell Hotel. I’m a porter.”

“You’re not working today, then?”

“It’s my day off. I work nights mostly. I’m hungry – let’s go and eat something… coming?”

“Yes, all right.” Matthew took a last look at the photographs in the case and glanced at the handwritten card, in faded brown ink, that explained them.

“The Mithraeum,” he read, “was more often than not situated underground, whether naturally, in a cave, or artificially, in a hollowed-out subterranean chamber. Some of these, notwithstanding the evident structural limitations in respect of size, were of elegant and even noble proportions, calculated to induce in the novice or aspirant to the mysteries an impression of awe and grandeur…”

Alan was waiting patiently. Matthew joined him and they left the museum, blinking in the sunlight.

“Tell me about this well, then,” said Matthew.

“All right,” said Alan as they moved off down the street.

Matthew waited, but he said no more.

They came to a cafe near the railway station. Alan opened the door and went inside. The smell of fried food was overpowering. Most of the tables were empty, but there was a group of workmen seated near the door, playing cards. One of them was black.

Alan looked around, and without hesitation walked straight out again. Matthew followed him; he was beginning to acquiesce in Alan’s odd, dreamlike mood, and accepted the sudden decision without thinking.

Past the station they found another place, and went in and sat down. It, too, was nearly empty. They sat next to the window, in the sunlight.

“What d’you want to eat’?” said Alan.

“I’m not hungry; I’1l have a cup of tea.”

“Okay.” Alan got up and went to the counter to order his food. He came back with two cups of tea and sat down again.

“What was wrong with the other place?” Matthew asked. “Was it because that guy was black?”

Alan nodded.

“What’s wrong with that?”

“It would have been the same if he was Jewish.” Alan spoke ironically again; he was quite well aware, to judge from the half-smile on his lips, that this was no answer at all.

“So you’re a fascist,” said Matthew.

“Be precise,” Alan answered. “What does fascist mean?”

“All right; racist, then.”

“That’s clearer. Yes, I’m a racist.”

He stirred some sugar into his tea and looked out of the window. The sun fell full into his eyes, but instead of screwing them up against it he merely lowered his eyelids a little way.