Frank Baker Read online

  I was moved. This world—so different from what I had just left—had nourished and bred me. All my young dreams had risen from those streets; I knew every turning in the tangle of houses beneath me.

  Then, almost feebly, another voice cried, “It is stupid, meaning­less, stifling. Here is no freedom, no spirit, no peace.” I told myself it was ephemeral, whereas the scene from Cader was eternal. I re­minded myself of the conclusions I had reached on the mountain; of the great dreams I had made of my future, away from the City, with a lover. Yet within a day of my returning to London a deadly apathy seemed to have made all movement impossible. I forced my thoughts upon Olga. To-morrow, I decided, I would go to the café on the chance of seeing her again. I would make myself talk to her, then I would know whether she was really the person for whom I sought. I deliberately made up my mind. “You must go to the café to-morrow,” I said.

  I looked at the scene again, and I saw that it was dead. Nothing moved; there were no rivers, no fields, few trees. I was looking upon the work of man, and my thoughts stopped still at the word death.

  “Olga, Olga,” I murmured, as though I could send my voice away to summon her to fuse new life into me.

  Thud, thud—answered the hollow neck of the headless tower. Thud, thud——

  As I turned to go, in the darkening air above me I was vaguely aware of a small shape, fluttering sharply from angle to angle, like a bat. But it was larger than a bat. I remember quite clearly saying to myself with a cynical little laugh, “You’re nothing, you’re nothing; you’re nothing but a nothing.” The words stay in my mind. They were associated with a little cinema fan­tasy: a story of a mouse who wanted to fly. But when his wish was granted and wings sprouted from his shoulders, he became a bat. Then a company of large and hideous bats bawled these derisive words in his frightened face: “You’re not a thing at all.”

  A strange hopelessness overcame me. On the mountain I had been a bird; here I was a bat, foul and blind.

  And while I thought all this, above me fluttered the hovering creature like, as my mother had said, a dark blot in the air. I was hardly aware of it. Though deep down I must have known it, I would not admit the fact that my turn had come; that there was no longer any escape.

  I came to the Palace gates. It was dark now, the lights in the semicircle of shops were lit, and loud voices and drunken laughter sounded from the tavern across the road. A tram waited, slung its trolley-arm over in the opposite direction, and jangled away to­wards Tottenham. Four roads converged here to an open space where, in the middle, a small patch of railed grass forlornly spoke of a time when this had been a quiet village. One of the roads on my right was a very steep hill lined by heavy old-fashioned houses. It was a dangerous hill for traffic. But the driver of the car which suddenly came flying wildly down the hill, swaying uncertainly from side to side, did not seem to know that. It passed me in a flash, nearly mounting the pavement in a great swerve and a hollow rattle of ill-driven gears and brakes. Something clung to the black hood, but I could not catch sight of it clearly before the car vanished in the same direction as that taken by the tram.

  Somebody shouted, the usual policeman appeared.

  “He had no lights,” cried a fellow selling matches outside the tavern. “No lights I say, no lights.”

  I ran home. I wanted to be indoors behind a closed window.

  *

  From that night I was oppressed and haunted by the form of a bird which seemed to have the power at any moment to materialize in the air around me. I never saw it as a clear solid figure like the other birds who flew about the City; to me it was always a phantom, more felt than seen. It was something that I possessed and could not shake off; in my very efforts to rid myself of it I was aware that it wanted to become a part of me. I thought again and again of the small bird crouching on the poet’s shoulders; of the old woman who had been carried away from the telephone-box; and of hundreds who had met their deaths through attempting to destroy the birds. Remembering these cases, I did not try to beat it away. But I could not, I dared not face it. I was filled with terror at the thought of ever meeting it face to face. I tried desperately to disregard it. The heavy sense of dread and anguish with which its presence filled me, was appalling. I could not sleep in a room with open windows, for I had a terror of waking to find it flying round the room in the darkness, or worse, sitting on my chest, look­ing at me with inhuman penetrating eyes.

  Every day now I saw horrible and savage tragedies. Slowly, man by man, the world was going mad. “A wave of suicides,” commented the papers. And it was the truest thing they ever wrote, though they did not realize the full meaning of it.

  I saw a fat old man pressed face downwards over a drain in a gutter near Stroud Green Station; he was writhing and screaming in anguish, his fingers clawed into the hard pavement as though he were trying to burrow into the ground, his knuckles torn and bleed­ing. I hurried on, away from the sickened crowd that gathered.

  I saw a priest in his cassock running down a moving staircase with such violent agitation that he crashed face downwards on to the ground at the bottom. A bird swooped on to him; a bird that seemed to be nothing but scraggy wings, covering him in a network of black gauze. The priest’s cries were lost; he shuddered and died.

  Face downwards . . . face downwards. Always I have a picture of people lying on the ground with their faces buried away from the terror above them. Yes, the world was going mad. Yet—how strange it seems—the Press still bore us news of the fighting in Africa. People used to talk about the war almost eagerly, using it as a blanket to cover up the inmost dread of their minds. And in spite of so much horror, there was much to laugh at. How curious, for example, was the placid, epicene bird—not unlike a drab dove—who attached himself gently to the chasuble of a Catholic priest saying Mass in a church I visited one Sunday. The creature blended so perfectly with the cream silk of the vestment that nobody realized his presence, until at the words “et in Spiritum Sanctum”—which occurred in a table of Christian belief—the soft little thing cooed succulently and flew round and round above the vessels on the altar, to the consternation of priest, people, and acolytes.

  They were very subtle creatures. Once they assembled and waited for hours on the steps of a famous club in the west end of London. Inside, whiskered old lords, military celebrities, bishops, judges, and other important persons, fumed petulantly all day, unable to leave the place. Having kept them there well into the night, the birds flew away at three o’clock in the morning without having done any damage whatever.

  Often they were playful. They seized fruit and eggs from shops and dropped them over the streets. I shall never forget the rain of hen’s eggs and oranges that pelted down over the City one afternoon. Silk hats, fashionable toques, bald pates, shampooed hair—hardly a hat or a head escaped this bombardment.

  One of their most effective attacks was launched upon a number of shops held in some disrepute. They entirely overpowered the assistants behind the counters and carried away a great load of contraceptives and surgical instruments. Holding these articles between their beaks, they made an organized invasion upon a place called Ritz, where persons of importance were eating dinner. The birds did nothing more than drop their unwelcome missives upon the tables of the diners. Having executed this errand they departed quietly, without attacking any one. There was, of course, a panic in the room. But the panic was hardly commensurate with the shocking embarrassment of an old roué of the highest aristocracy who was left gazing with horror upon a number of tablets supposed to rejuvenate sexual power, which lay scattered blatantly over the spotless tablecloth.

  The pests showed a remarkable capacity for embarrassing people of all types and classes. I saw a small bird sit for several minutes on the legs of a supposed paralytic who wheeled himself about in a chair and sold matches by a place called Change Alley in the City. The old cripple had sat there for years. I remember his u
nvaried call, always delivered in a thin, piping voice: “Kind friends, buy a box o’ lights f’r the po—or maimed.” Nobody had ever doubted the impotency of his hunched legs, swathed in rugs, until this impudent bird, after ten minutes’ playful jabbing with his beak, shot the paralytic out of his chair, upset his matches over the pavement, and sent him scuttling as fast as his legs could carry him, along Cornhill. That was the last we saw of him.

  On the evening of the day after I had first become aware of my familiar attendant, upon the terrace of the Alexandra Palace. I walked up Cheapside, hemmed in by crowds of people hurrying on to buses and making for under­ground railways. About two or three hundred birds flew in a direct line for the ball and cross that capped the dome of the Cathedral. They did not attract very much attention. I stopped to read the announcement on a board in the churchyard of the service of intercession which was to take place in a few days. The Archbishop of Canterbury himself was to be present; the Lord Mayor and the Corporation of London were to help in sending their weighty words up to the heavenly throne; a chosen selection of choirs was to sing hymns and psalms under the leadership of a renowned church musician. Evidently it was to be a national approach to God. All the best that we could produce was to be paraded in the hope that he could not fail to be touched by the sight of so much collec­tive piety.

  As I studied the notice, more and more birds flew, with a harsh sniggering sound, high up on to the dome. Then one detached himself and flew low over the narrow street by the side of the Cathedral. A big bird; bright green with glittering tail-feathers, very small eyes, and a curved, predacious beak. Several people cried and shouted as he came lower and flew amongst them. Somebody struck at him. He disregarded this assault, and as though he had found his destination, flew straight into the open doorway of a large shop where women’s hats and other articles of apparel were sold. I waited, curious, slightly amused; for the moment lifted out of my own black thoughts. It was not long before a number of women emerged from the shop. They came running out like frightened hens, some with their hats torn off and hair dishevelled, gabbling and gesticulating wildly. Last of all to come out was a woman who had apparently been buying coloured ribbon, since she was entirely swathed in twisted strands of the material. She looked strangely like a richly embalmed corpse who had come to life. Yards of the ribbon trailed behind her, dragging with it a various assortment of pins, brooches, hooks, buttons, and decorative clasps. She was a large woman with a soaring bosom, a heavily powdered face, and masses of orange-coloured hair which flowed about her head and was almost indistinguishable from the ribbon.

  With a scream of rage she leapt to the door of a fat slug-like car which stood by the pavement, and cried to the chauffeur to drive off. The man, however, unused to this sort of behaviour from his mistress, and as yet unaware of the bird who pursued her, failed to start his engine in time.

  The group of gabbling women in the doorway parted aside with piercing shrieks. I heard a swish of horny wings and a high scream of devilish merriment. The bird, large as a raven with ribbons streaming away from its hooked talons, flapped violently through the window of the car and pounced with outspread wings upon the woman who had just entered.

  Not until then did the panic-stricken driver start the car, in his agitation pressing the accelerator much too forcibly. The machine lurched forward. Inside, all I could see were twisted strands of coloured ribbon, a fluttering canopy of long green wings, a vast swaying form. Then the car hurtled towards Cheapside at a furious pace, scattering people right and left.

  Above, the birds from the dome flew round and round; shrieking, whistling, croaking. Revolted by what I had just seen, heavy with apprehension, I moved away from the Cathedral, walked down Ludgate Hill and thus towards the west of London, hardly daring to raise my head to the sky.

  Last night I struggled inside this young man I have tried to present to you. This young man who, so many years ago, saw the end of his civilization. I suffered the same misery as he did, my spirit departing from me as I contemplated a day so black with despair that the memory of it almost caused me to abandon his story.

  To-day, I am with him still. He has little connection with the old man who sits here speaking these words; yet, he is always in me. And I feel again the burden of his misery. I am with him as he wanders on like a lonely ghost, trying to find his home. I am with him. I cannot help him, cannot guide him. But perhaps his presence can guide me, has something to tell me, the old man who now speaks this history to you.

  He is in a café, somewhere in the heart of London, very near the statue of young Eros. As the evening advances he knows that he must go into the other café, there to wait upon the slender chance of seeing a woman with black hair and deep eyes whose name is Olga. The thought of this possible meeting fills him with trepidation. He is nervous to the point of stupidity.

  For the last ten minutes he has been studying a menu. Although he is hungry he is unable to decide what he shall eat. But the question of what he shall drink is even more insoluble. Because drink is expensive, and by what a man drinks shall a waiter judge him.

  The café is below the streets. A large room with small tables placed in a long line down the centre. At one side is a bar over which alcoholic drinks may be obtained. The opposite side a similar counter displays a variety of cooked and uncooked foods: hams, joints of beef, pies, dishes of fruit and much else. An indi­vidual called “chef” can be seen bobbing about in the back near the stoves. This is one of the cooks. He wears a tall white hat and a white costume, and often grows to resemble the food he cooks, becoming, as years go on, a sort of apotheosis of roast pork. There is a little platform in a corner where four men produce with an air of in­difference a dreadful sound called music. One man snaps his hands over a piano; another plucks the strings of a guitar; another would be seeming to tear his talonous fingernails on a banjo; and a fourth—most curious of all—shakes peas in a drum. The four sounds combine to produce a most melancholy noise.

  In order to hear themselves speak, the people eating and drinking have to shout above the din of this music. The room is full and so thick with the smoke of tobacco that a blue haze clings high up around the lights. Our young man is wedged at a table between two others, one of the long line that runs between the bar and the food counter.

  As we noticed before, he seems anxious about his drink. Several times the waiter has come to take his order. Suddenly a decision is reached.

  “Bring me,” he says, with an air of nonchalance that only partially conceals an evident self-consciousness, “half a bottle of Liebfraumilch. Nothing to eat.”

  The waiter hurries and returns presently with a fine thin bottle of German wine which is examined carefully and ignorantly by our youth. Pouring some out, he drinks languidly, holding the glass high and studying the clear yellow liquid through the light. His attitude is that of a person who wishes to impress his imme­diate neighbours.

  Now and again he lifts his head with a thoughtful expression and writes in a book. He is alone at the table. One would hardly remark him. He is dressed in the same quiet manner as all the other males, though there is a certain negligence about his shirt-cuffs, a slight air of arrogant individuality about the white handkerchief which splashes conspicuously from his breast pocket, which would cause the acute observer to study him more closely. He would then find, however, nothing more than a well-featured face, thick, rather curly hair, a slight, slim body, and well-shaped hands. The brow is frowning. He laughs and dashes down something in his note­book. He drinks more eagerly; runs his fingers through his hair.

  Presently the young man pays his bill, and walks slowly to a leather upholstered seat. There is a precision in his movements which we would not have noticed an hour previously when he entered the café. He stops on his way to look at some one who in­terests him. Then he sits down on the seat, takes out his notebook, and appears to fall asleep.

  A sudden crash of music-noise awak
es him, if indeed he ever was asleep. He becomes interested in the man shaking peas in a drum. Waiters carrying trays pass in front of him, sometimes tripping over the legs that cross their path. But he does not change his attitude. As he writes again in his book, bites his pencil, and chuckles loudly, he is conspicuous.

  He watches the man shaking peas in a drum. He is dressed in a blue silk blouse, with long full sleeves; baggy knickerbockers of the same material, with a red sash round the waist; red boots reaching to the knees.

  A splendid costume. He shakes peas in a drum.

  This fact would appear to excite our young man who, scribbling furiously, looks up with a twinkling smile in his eyes.

  Suddenly his manner changes to one of gloom. Almost furtively he rises, puts on his hat, and dodging between tables with an unnatural skill, makes for the staircase out. He looks quickly up to the roof and down again. About his walk there is a lightness, an unconsciousness, which is quite foreign to him. He collides with somebody and does not even murmur his regrets. By the top of the stairs he stops, looking down. The noise of the peas—a shuffling, a shaking, a clattering—drives insistently in his ears.

  He runs out to the brilliantly lit and crowded street, blinking stupidly as he faces the electric-blue lettering on a theatre opposite. A slight, swaying shape mounts from behind him and flaps un­easily in the air. He does not look at it although he knows it is there. It is so hot on the pavement he wonders whether he has come out of the café or not. He lurches a little, feeling sick.