Frank Baker Page 18

  Suddenly she noticed that my tie was hanging loose, my collar open. “You look as though you’ve been fighting,” she said, “or making love. Which, son?”

  I hesitated. Fighting? Yes, I had certainly been fighting. But when it came to telling her about the nature of that struggle, I could not. There was Olga; I could talk about her.

  “I got so hot,” I said, “I took off my tie. As for making love—yes, Mother, you’re right. I was up on Hampstead Heath. Mother—do you remember the other night when I came in late? I wanted to tell you that evening, I went to out to see—somebody, and I was too drunk to talk to her. To-night I have seen her. And it’s all right—it’s all right.”

  “You’re badly in love, aren’t you, dear?”

  “I’ve never felt so happy in my life.”

  “Well, tell me her name then.”

  “Olga.”

  My mother repeated the word carefully. “Olga? Yes, I like that. But it’s Russian, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, she’s Russian.”

  I told her all I knew about Olga. At the end I said, “I want to take her away from London, Mother. She’s unhappy here. And so are you. I want us all three to get away, far from London.” As I spoke I laid my hand on her forehead. But now her mood changed and she made no answer.

  “We can’t stay here any longer,” I spoke eagerly and quickly as though I could capture her with the strength of my words; “we’ve got to get away. It isn’t safe for you here. You’ve got to come.”

  “Who says I’ve got to come?” Her voice was sullen.

  “I only want your good.”

  “Don’t argue about it now, son. It’s not the time. It’s very late, and you ought to be in bed.”

  I walked over to the windows, wondering how I could ever convince her of the truth.

  “Mother, this room is so hot. It isn’t good for you. Why don’t you open the window?”

  She turned sharply and raised herself. “No, no! Leave the windows alone; go to bed.”

  I drew the curtains a few inches.

  “Leave them alone,” she cried. “Who are you to interfere with me and tell me what I shall do?”

  “I only know you ought to have these windows open——”

  As I spoke I saw a pale, spectral shadow, like a withered hand, rise towards the window-pane. It had no power to touch me, I knew that. But what dreadful power had it over my mother? Hastily I drew the curtain back again before she should see what I had seen.

  “Yes, you’re right, Mother,” I said. “I’m sorry. I have no business to interfere with you or anybody.”

  I bent over and kissed her good night. She held my head in her hands and looked at me.

  “What’s happened to you?” she whispered. “You’re different. Is it—that girl?”

  “No, it isn’t only that, it——”

  “Well, what is it? Tell your mother. She has a right to know.”

  “Mother, do you want me to help you?”

  “How can you help me?”

  “You’re unhappy and I can help you to be happy.”

  “I don’t care about myself,” she muttered. “I don’t care any more. It’s you—you I think about. When I think about you, I can forget myself. Now you don’t want me any more. You’re changed.”

  “Yes, I am changed,” I said. “But it isn’t true, to say I don’t want you any more. I am changed. I’ve found something.”

  “Well, tell me. Don’t speak so strangely.”

  The tapping came at the window; she fell back into the pillow. “I can’t easily tell you what I have found, Mother. You must trust me. I can only tell you with all my soul that if you want that tap­ping to stop, you must open the window and let it in——”

  “You’re mad—mad to speak to me like that!”

  I saw it was impossible to thrust the truth upon her like this. As Olga had done to me, I could only indicate where her path should lie. Acceptance of her fate must come out of herself, not be driven in by me.

  I argued no more but went to my room, opened the windows, took off my clothes, and lay naked on the bed, rejoicing in the feeling of ease and contentment that flowed over my body.

  I put my hand to my chin and felt the dried blood where the wound from the bird’s talons had already begun to heal. I looked at the scar in the mirror. Here, on my chin, some malignant creature had pressed his claws, taking blood from me. This was the only evidence I had of a fact that seemed like a dreadful nightmare. To this day I carry that scar on my chin to remind me, if I ever need reminding, of something that fought its way back into me all those years ago.

  *

  What I now have left to relate are the events of the three days that followed upon my meeting with Olga and my experience on the heath. Each of those days stands clear before me, perhaps because they were so sharply contrasted; perhaps because they were so much more lived than the days which preceded them. It has not always been easy to describe my behaviour and activities in those evil days when I was haunted by my Demon, as thousands were haunted. The mind does not so easily retain grief as joy. And because—in spite of the final collapse—I was happier in those three days than I had been for months, I can remember almost every detail of them. Although I saw death and tragedy around me, I was filled with a conviction that the eternal things could never be touched; that, whatever was to happen, I could return again to some such place as Cader, and still see the essential world alive and joyous before me.

  The morning of the first of those three days, I came out of the house with a light heart. There was a new world given to me, which I could learn to enjoy.

  Then I stopped in my path up the hill, driven out of these blithe thoughts by one of the most preposterous sights I had ever seen.

  A number of men were walking towards the station. I recognized most of them, for they went that way every morning. In the wake of each one was a large bird, flying a few feet behind and above their heads. Nor was this all. For outside the doors of many of the houses, solitary birds were stand­ing, as patient and melancholy as herons, waiting for the inmates to emerge and walk up the hill. By one house there were two birds. As I passed, the door opened furtively and two men, one old, one young—perhaps father and son—came out and closed the door quickly behind them. Like obedient clockwork figures, the two birds immediately rose and followed them. The whole ritual was conducted quietly, the birds making no attempt to attack or disturb the pedestrians. Thus they went up the hill towards the City, men and birds, the men with their faces inclined to the ground, walking heavily.

  There seemed to be an unspoken conspiracy to take no notice whatever of the birds. Nobody looked up or spoke about them. The more I studied this curious procession, the more I noticed that in a most subtle way each bird seemed to mimic, by its flight, the actions of the person it followed. One bird, for example, following a red-faced, corpulent old gentleman, flew in lethargic downward and upward swoops as though it were a hollow feathered bag, swaying in the air, and having no power over its movements. Another, close behind a dapper little man with tight spectacles pinching into a almost bridgeless nose, flew in spasmodic jerks in a perfectly straight line, stopping for a second regularly, every few feet, then propelling itself forward again with the tethered impatience of a cork released on a string from a child’s pop-gun. In various ways each bird flew differently, although their appearance was identical in almost every other respect.

  I reached the station and the train came in. Although the roofs of the carriages were dotted with birds, nobody showed surprise. The birds which had followed the pedestrians made no attempt to enter the carriages. They seemed perfectly content to join the others on the roof. So this singular train-load steamed out. Not a word was spoken in the carriage in which three or four men sat with me. Newspapers were solemnly read, pipes and cigarettes smoked. I felt as though I were the only person w
ho had seen the birds.

  In the City, exactly the same sort of thing was to be observed. No omnibus passed without its sullen roof-load of birds who would not leave until the passengers left.

  I passed a few who were not thus attended. I remember a nun with a bewildered expression on her face. Stark and severe, she moved like a wraith along Broad Street, her lips twitching with repeating some religious devotion. No bird hovered over her. In a curious way this seemed to have robbed her of life. She looked un­utterably miserable. And nuns, though often empty of countenance, were seldom miserable. Poor woman. She was so alone in that crowd of harassed humanity. I believe she prayed for a bird, for no incipient saint had ever been known to resist a chance of trial or temptation.

  It was very quiet in the underwriting-room. I did not talk much to the others. I was embarrassed by the contrast between the elation of my spirit and the apathy of my friends. It was hard to know how to talk to them.

  The Underwriter arrived very late, driving up to the office in a taxi from which he stepped with a furtive and almost hopeless air. I saw him hurry to his room and quickly close his door. He hardly came out of the room for more than an hour during the day.

  I phoned Olga at the dress-making shop where she worked. She knew at once from my tone of voice what had happened to me.

  “You are—not frightened any more?” she asked.

  “No. I did what you told me, Olga.”

  I said she had saved my life.

  “No,” she said. “You saved your own life.”

  And she began to laugh—gentle, low laughter, beautiful to hear. I asked her when we could meet again; there was so much now that I wanted to talk about. To-morrow?

  She could not come out to-morrow, she had special work which would occupy her all the evening.

  “But, Olga, what does work matter now?”

  “It is extra money, and money is useful. No; it must be the next day.”

  She told me to come to the shop about five-thirty. And because I felt annoyed with her for not putting her work aside for me, I said I doubted whether I could get away as early as that, knowing, of course, that I would.

  She laughed again. “Very well,” she said, “you impatient boy. I will wait for you. I will wait all the evening if you wish.” Then I assured her I would be there. We paused for a moment, and I was about to ring off when I heard her voice, very low and trembling: “I am so glad—so glad.”

  In the lunch-hour I went to Leicester Square and met my old friend whom I had not seen since my holiday. There were now not so many birds flying over the streets as earlier in the morning, though many people were still followed.

  We sat in a small tavern, drinking beer, eating sand­wiches, talking. I told him about my holiday, but he did not seem interested. There was something restrained about him. I knew the reason.

  “You’re unusually quiet,” I said.

  “And you,” he returned, “unusually and damnably good-tempered.”

  Then he told me what I knew.

  “It follows me about, like everybody else. And it’s so stupid,” he complained, “so damn silly. These things come from somewhere, they go somewhere, and I won’t rest till I find a perfectly sound physical explanation of them.”

  “They go somewhere,” I said, “that’s true.”

  “You seem to know something about them,” he said quickly. “Aren’t you pestered too?”

  I hesitated. If I told him the truth, would he ever believe it?

  “Look here,” I said, “you can get rid of this thing if you look it in the face.”

  “In the face!” He was silent for a moment. “I don’t know whether it’s got a face,” he added in a low voice.

  We came out from the tavern.

  With an effort he recovered something of his old jaunty manner. I tried to explain that if he looked the bird in the face he would see something dreadful there, the creature would vanish, he would never suffer it again.

  “A lot of fake mysticism,” he objected. “I suppose you’re aware that people have been killed by these things?”

  “Yes, and do you ever remember a dead bird or even a feather being found? Is that fake mysticism?”

  No, he did not remember, but there must be a natural explana­tion for that too. He seemed determined to prove that the birds were part of the natural system of creation.

  “Then why don’t you catch and kill the one that’s worrying you?” I suggested. He had no answer.

  I said, “Fred, if you want to come out of this business alive—stop asking for a natural explanation; look this thing in the face and let it do what it likes with you.”

  Our attention was drawn to a crowd gathered round a figure standing on a box near the National Gallery. The man was short, eccen­tric in appearance. I recognized him at once. He had a great mop of sandy hair falling down to his shoulders; a shirt with an open neck, exposing a bony, pink chest; and a fierce, bright expression on his small, foxy face.

  “Why,” I said, “it’s the fellow we saw in the café the other night. The chap with the hair.”

  “He’s found his vocation at last,” said Fred. “Let’s stay and listen.”

  We drew nearer. The man was preaching; flinging his arms about, clapping his chest, and shouting in a stri­dent voice at his unmoved audience. “What did God send to the Egyptians? Lice, caterpillars, frogs. What does God send to you? Birds—birds! And what do they mean, my friends? They mean that you’re a lot of miserable fornicators caught in a net.”

  There was a placard beside him, bearing the scarlet words—“DEATH AND JUDGMENT COME TO ALL.”

  As we watched, he induced himself into a veritable fury of scorn and denunciation, abandoning himself to that semi-insane state known as hywl. But a sublime allegiance to hywl depends upon the ecstatic support of a Celtic audience. Londoners were not so easily infected. Some heckled him, but he took no notice. His voice rose to a scream until we thought he would collapse in a fit.

  “Serpents! Whited sepulchres! Hypocrites! What abideth? Faith, hope, and charity? Not in this new Babylon. Naught but sounding brass and tinkling cymbal. The spectres of the Apocalypse stalk in the land, and who heeds them?”

  Phrase upon phrase from the Pauline tautologies, coupled with the semi-delirious but poetic ravings of John, the mystical friend of Jesus, tumbled indiscriminately from his mouth. There was something demoniacal about the man.

  Near by was a statue; on this statue sat a large, black, skinny bird, not unlike a cormorant, only leaner and drabber, with a very foul smell. The preacher cried: “The birds are a judgment, fools—the birds are a judgment!” The solitary watcher flapped heavily into the air, fell upon the preacher, obscured him. . . .

  The crowd drew away, women screamed. The inevitable ambulance arrived. I turned to Fred, “Do you still believe in the fortuity of these natural birds of yours?” Then I shook his hand and said good-bye, thinking I might not see him again. I actually never did see him again, though I have an instinctive and reasoned belief that he came out safely and re-established himself somewhere, as I did. For all I know, he may still be alive in some corner of this island, and wondering similar thoughts about me.

  When I returned to the office later that afternoon I was long overdue my time. The Underwriter had been working himself up into a fury over my absence. My friends told me I was in for trouble, and I took a delight in preparing the words I should say to him. But when it came to the point, all my fine speeches melted away. He summoned me into his room about five, when the brokers had gone and he was alone. He asked me what I meant by continually absenting myself from the office. He said he could not tolerate my insolence any longer; he would have me moved to another department, where a strict watch should be kept on me. But the force of his words was entirely mitigated by the incessant raising of his head to the ceiling, by the wild and pathetic roving of
his little eyes. In that last desperate assertion of his authority as my employer there was some vestige of manhood which I was compelled to admire.

  I did not refute his accusations. But when he said, “I will have you moved to another department,” I interrupted quietly:

  “I shan’t come to the office after to-day.”

  Though I knew it was cruel I could not resist. “Neither will you for much longer.”

  “Get out.” His voice was thick, tied up in his throat. “Get out.”

  A practical sense of my position came to me. We were within a week of pay-day; I should need all the money I could get.

  “There will be a month’s salary,” I reminded him.

  His hand trembled. Suddenly I was sorry for him.

  He wrote on a slip of paper and gave it to me. “Give this to the secretary,” he said.

  I left the room with the chit for my wages in my hand. It was the last time I should see the place, and suddenly I felt affectionately towards it. There was so much of me in this prison, so many dreams dreamed over that long desk, so many poems written under cover of a register. I collected together pens, pencils, and various small belongings that were my property. I lingered upstairs washing my hands, looking out of the window over the roofs to London. I came down again, said good-bye to my friends, and was sad­dened by their apathetic reception of my news. Nobody cared. Why should they? I was foolish to prolong my stay another moment. With a sentimental gesture I took the pencil and signed my name in the book for the last time.

  I came to the lift and thought for a moment to go down and say good-bye to the old book-clerk. But I dismissed the idea. It was idle to look an inch into the past; already, all this was dead.

  As I came to the door I saw a taxi waiting. On the roof was a small fussy-looking bird, preening its feathers in an endeavour to induce them to cover up a large bare patch near its tail. I had never seen a bird quite like it. It was a dull yellow in colour, with a very skinny breast and small legs. Its head was fat as a plum and quite as bald. It seemed top-heavy.