The House of Sleep (23 page)

‘What about it, then?’ the doctor said. ‘Are you game?’

‘Pardon?’

‘For a swim, man, for a swim.’

‘Isn’t it a bit cold?’

‘Come on, you big Jessie: off with your kecks. Two fine, full-grown men, naked beneath the moonlight: wouldn’t that be something for the heavens to look down on tonight?’

‘It’s pretty rough out there.’

‘I’m not a bum-bandit, you know. You’ve nothing to fear on that account.’

‘I can’t swim,’ Terry protested. It was an unoriginal lie, but an effective one.

‘Well, you’ll be missing a treat. Keep an eye on my clothes.’

This was an odd request to make, late at night on an empty beach, but Terry nodded his assent and then watched as his companion trotted down towards the sea. As soon as that pale, furry backside was out of sight, he made a grab for the doctor’s jacket, found the two golden keys and removed them from their chain. It was a good job he did this quickly, because in less than two minutes Dr Dudden had returned, shivering violently and wheezing harder than ever. His lips had turned blue and his penis was shrivelled to the size of a button mushroom.

‘Ye gods,’ he moaned, struggling into his wet underpants, and forcing his sand-encrusted feet into the legs of his trousers. ‘That was bracing. That’s the sort of thing that puts a man’s mettle to the test.’

‘Are you all right?’ said Terry, helping him on with his shirt. Dr Dudden’s hands were shaking so much that he could hardly do up the buttons.

‘Me? All right? Of course I am. They make them tough in Tayside, you know. It’s not the first time I’ve done this.’

‘It may be the last if we don’t get you home soon.’

‘Nonsense, man,’ said Dr Dudden. But he lost no time in climbing up the path, all the same, and was still shivering when they reached the hallway of Ashdown and it was at last time to say goodnight.

‘You’ll be late getting to your bedroom,’ he said, dripping pools of salt water on to the flagstones. ‘Apologize to Lorna for me. Tell her that I kept you talking.’

‘I will.’

‘And think about what I’ve said to you. I’ll be away tomorrow, just for a couple of days: so you don’t have to rush into a decision.’

‘All right,’ said Terry. ‘I’ll think about it.’

Dr Dudden held out his hand, yawning loudly. ‘Goodnight, then.’

‘You’re going to bed already?’

He looked at his watch. ‘Only for four hours. I shall be setting the alarm for three o’clock. Three-ten, to be precise. It
can
be done, I know. You’ve proved that to me.’

Terry smiled, shook the doctor’s hand, and watched as he disappeared up the staircase and along the first-floor corridor. He waited for another minute, hearing the bedroom door open and close. Then he crossed the hallway and stealthily descended the stairs that led to the basement.

He had taken the precaution, of course, of memorizing the eight-digit code that unlocked the door to the laboratory, although it had been hard work keeping it in his head under the combined onslaught of the alcohol and Dr Dudden’s ranting. The laundry was deserted now and it seemed quiet, shockingly quiet, in the basement corridor as he keyed the number in. He sensed the flurry of animal excitement as soon as he opened the door, but tried not to look at the tanks while passing between them. He could hear the slapping of tired feet against the turntables. Then, having reached the furthest wall, he ignored the left-hand door and made straight for the one that Dr Dudden had declined to open for him earlier in
the day. It unlocked easily, and when the latch clicked back, an overhead light turned itself on.

At first Terry did not understand what he saw, for he seemed to be looking at some sort of room-within-a-room. Immediately in front of him was a thick sheet of perspex, and about ten feet beyond that there was a partition – made of chipboard, by the looks of it – upon which three appliances were ranged: a fridge, a washbasin and a toilet. An inch or so beneath the partition, there was a large, semi-circular wooden platform, raised some two feet above floor level. The area between the platform and the floor was filled with blue, chlorinated water.

What Terry was looking at, he soon realized, was an enormous perspex tank or cage, almost as big as the room in which it was housed. It was possible to walk all the way around the tank, thereby discovering – as he might have expected – that it was divided into two identical chambers, each containing the same basic equipment designed to render them fit for human occupation. High up in the partition a hole had been drilled, from which there dangled, on either side, a long cat’s cradle of wire, culminating in a set of electrodes. This, in other words, was a large-scale version of the apparatus in the laboratory, holding a turntable big enough for two human subjects.

‘Insane,’ Terry whispered to himself, as he completed his third circuit of the tank, peering into it with a mixture of awe, fear and stupefaction. ‘Totally, totally insane…’

He reached into his trouser pocket and pulled out a crumpled note: the note that had been sent to him anonymously, almost a week ago, in the form of a paper dart. ‘
ASK HIM ABOUT STEPHEN WEBB
’. Instinctively, Terry knew that there was a connection between this message and the monstrous room in which he now found himself. Stephen Webb – whoever he was – had been here, had taken part in one of Dr Dudden’s experiments. And then what? An accident, perhaps, or even a fatality (yes, Dudden had used that word)
which someone was now urging Terry to investigate. The doctor had enemies in this clinic – many enemies, probably – and Terry was being asked to align himself with them. It seemed that they were, in some sense, counting on him.

He left the room, and left the laboratory, closing both doors behind him. He decided to try to forget the eight-digit code. He didn’t want to go down there again.

As he tiptoed up the stairs towards the ground floor, Terry thought, instead, about his missing photograph. He thought about the possibility that he might soon begin to sleep and dream again. Doubtless there was an important story to be told about Stephen Webb: but he was a film critic, not a news journalist. He simply wasn’t the man for the job.

Besides which, he was already an hour late for bed.

11

ANALYST
: Describe your feelings for Robert.

ANALYSAND
: He was the only person I could be completely honest with. I trusted him and […] felt I could tell him anything.

ANALYST
: And yet he was never your boyfriend?

ANALYSAND
: No. He was more like a sister to me. I mean a brother.

ANALYST
: You said like a sister.

ANALYSAND
: I meant brother.

ANALYST
: Do you have any brothers and sisters? You never talk about them.

ANALYSAND
: One sister, yes. She’s eight years older than me, and she emigrated when I was only thirteen. It was rather a sudden decision.

ANALYST
: And Robert, I think, also vanished abruptly from your life.

ANALYSAND
: Very abruptly.

ANALYST
: Well, now we are making progress.

From the cliff path, they could see Terry sitting at his bedroom window, crouched over his desk, the gleam from his desk-lamp shining out like the beacon of a tiny lighthouse. They waved up at him but he didn’t see them, or didn’t feel like waving back.

They walked on. From time to time, Robert ventured a glance at Sarah’s eyes: not because he wished to look into them (although he never tired of doing that), but because he wanted to mention them in his poem, and was stuck for a description.

In your something something eyes I spied
…

In her… soft and gentle eyes? “Warm and sparkling? Clear and present? Hale and hearty?

No, these wouldn’t do at all. He tried to shake the problem from his mind and concentrate on what she was saying: something about an item of clothing Veronica had bought recently, to which Sarah appeared to have taken exception; and something about a letter Veronica had received, which she had then hidden, refusing to discuss its contents. Sarah was quite agitated by both of these developments, obviously. Robert was doing his best to understand why.

‘Have you told anybody else about this?’ he asked.

‘Of course not. You’re the only person I can talk to. Who else could I tell?’

‘I thought you might have said something to Terry.’

Sarah laughed humourlessly. ‘I couldn’t get him to listen to
anything
unless it was about a film. You won’t mention it to him, will you?’

‘Of course I won’t,’ he said.

‘Only I know how close you are.’

He looked at her eyes again and tried to decide whether they were blue or grey. Blue, definitely.

In your blue and something eyes
…

They climbed over the stile and came to a fork in the path. One route led along the cliffs and into town, a distance of about two miles. The other led towards the main road, where they would be able to get a bus. They decided it was too late to walk all the way, and headed off towards the road.

Blue remembered eyes
?

No, it was hills that were blue and remembered, not eyes. Anyway, they were probably more grey than blue.

‘I’m sure there’s nothing in it,’ he said.

‘You’re right. I dare say I’m overreacting wildly.’

‘After all, all she did was buy some clothes, without asking your opinion. There’s no real harm in that.’

‘Yes, but it was a
suit
, Robert. A horrible, prim, formal
little suit. She knows that’s the last thing I’d want her to wear.’

It was details like these – the small ones – that Robert found hardest to bear. The idea that Sarah and Veronica even dressed to accommodate each other’s taste maddened him, and he found that he couldn’t keep the words back: ‘That’s a pretty trivial issue, though, isn’t it?’

‘No, Robert, it isn’t
trivial.
’ All the sharpness in her, the part of her he feared most and yet was most fascinated by, rose to the surface at once. ‘It’s a symptom of something. It’s a sign we’re getting further apart. I’ve put everything I have into this relationship and if it’s starting to collapse… I don’t know what I shall do.’

‘I’m sure it isn’t starting –’

‘This isn’t some
fling
, you know, Robert. This is my future we’re talking about. It was a big decision for me, going out with Ronnie. The biggest I’ve ever taken.’

‘I know that. I know.’

In your grey, reflecting eyes
…

Reflecting? Reflective? Neither seemed especially suitable, now that he thought about it.

‘I mean, it’s not just this stupid suit,’ Sarah continued. ‘We hardly communicate about anything at the moment. All those ideas for next year… I can’t seem to get her interested in them.’

Sarah was still hoping to find a job at a local school, and to rent a house with Veronica who would then, in theory, try to get her much-discussed theatre group off the ground. But it was getting late to put these plans into action. Term was officially over, finals had been taken, results announced, and in just a few days they would all be leaving Ashdown for good. Time was running out: not just for Sarah and Veronica, but for Robert as well.

Trying to ward off this realization, and the panic associated with it, he said: ‘Well, I don’t think you have to worry about that. She seems more keen on the theatre than ever, as far as I can see. Last time I spoke to her – it was just the other night,
down at the Café – it was all she’d talk about. This woman who’d given a workshop at the Arts Lab – Celia something…’

‘Celia Blake!’ Sarah rounded on him and almost shouted this name. He was startled to realize how tense she had become lately, how quick to anger. ‘Oh yes, she’s keen on
her
all right. Keen enough to go all the way to bloody London last week to see her in some play; and meet her backstage afterwards, probably.’

‘Who is she, anyway?’

‘They were at school together. Three years apart, or something. And now Celia’s semi-famous and so she came down here to give this workshop, and when it was over Ronnie introduced herself and she remembered her and now we’re never going to hear the end of it.’

‘Is she gay? Celia, I mean.’

‘I expect so.’

There was little traffic on the road. Sarah leaned against the bus stop, sighed deeply and raised her face towards the setting sun. Now her eyes looked neither blue nor grey. There almost seemed to be a greenish tint to them.

In your multicoloured eyes
…

No, that was awful. He quite liked the rhythm of it, though: he liked the idea of using a single, four-syllable word, instead of those two flimsier, weightless ones.

In your polymorphous eyes
…

In your diatonic eyes
…

Getting closer, maybe. But before he could think of any more alternatives, Sarah had turned towards him again: she was still brooding over Veronica’s behaviour and her expression was now narrow and accusing.

‘Shit,
that’s
why she bought the suit, you know. To go and see her in London. I bet she got herself all tarted up just so she could go backstage at some West End theatre, and then on to a swanky restaurant.’

‘Was she wearing it when she left?’

In your antiseptic eyes
…

‘I didn’t see her that morning. Nor when she got back.’

‘Did she stay overnight?’

‘With her cousin. So she said.’

Or even –

In your narcoleptic eyes
…