Figures of Fear Page 9

  At other times, he was captain of a U-boat trapped thousands of feet below the surface. He would have to squeeze along cramped and darkened passageways to open up stopcocks, with water flooding in on all sides, and elbow his way along a torpedo tube in order to escape. He would come up to the surface into the chilly air of the bedroom, gasping for breath. Then he would crawl right down to the very end of the bed, where the sheets and the blankets were tucked in really tight. He was a coal-miner, making his way through the narrowest of fissures, with millions of tons of Carboniferous rock on top of him. He never took a flashlight to bed with him. This would have revealed that the inside of his space helmet didn’t have any dials or knobs or breathing tubes; and that the submarine wasn’t greasy and metallic and crowded with complicated valves; and that the grim black coalface at which he so desperately hewed was nothing but a clean white sheet.

  Earlier this evening he had been watching a programme on potholing on television and he was keen to try it. He was going to be the leader of an underground rescue team, trying to find a boy who had wedged himself in a crevice. It would mean crawling through one interconnected passage after another, then down through a water-filled sump, until he reached the tiny cavern where the boy was trapped.

  His mother sat on the end of the bed and kept him talking. He was going back to school in two days’ time and she kept telling him how much she was going to miss him. He was going to miss her, too – and Tiggy, their golden retriever, and everything here at Home Hill. More than anything, he was going to miss his adventures under the blankets. You couldn’t go burrowing under the bedclothes when you were at school. Everybody would rag you too much.

  He had always thought his mother was beautiful and tonight was no exception, although he wished that she would go away and let him start his potholing. What made her beauty all the more impressive was the fact that she would be thirty-three next April, which Martin considered to be prehistoric. His best friend’s mother was only thirty-three and she looked like an old lady by comparison. Martin’s mother had bobbed brunette hair and a wide, generous face without a single wrinkle, and dark-brown eyes that were always filled with love. It was always painful, going back to school. He didn’t realize how much it hurt her, too; how many times she sat on his empty bed when he was away, her hand pressed against her mouth and her eyes filled with tears.

  ‘Daddy will be back on Thursday,’ she said. ‘He wants to take us all out before you go back to school. Is there anywhere special you’d like to go?’

  ‘Can we go to that Chinese place? The one where they give you those cracker things?’

  ‘Pang’s? Yes, I’m sure we can. Daddy was worried you were going to say McDonald’s.’

  She stood up and kissed him. For a moment they were very close, face to face. He didn’t realize how much he looked like her – that they were both staring into a kind of mirror. He could see what he would have looked like, if he had been a woman; and she could see what she would have looked like, if she had been a boy. They were two different manifestations of the same person, and it gave them a secret intimacy that nobody else could understand.

  ‘Good night,’ she said. ‘Sweet dreams.’ And for a moment she laid a hand on top of his head as if she could sense that something momentous was going to happen to him. Something that could take him out of her reach for ever.

  ‘Good night, Mummy,’ he said, and kissed her cheek, which was softer than anything else he had ever touched. She closed the door.

  He lay on his back for a while, waiting, staring at the ceiling. His room wasn’t completely dark: a thin slice of light came in from the top of the door, illuminating the white paper lantern that hung above his bed so that it looked like a huge, pale planet (which it often was). He stayed where he was until he heard his mother close the living-room door, and then he wriggled down beneath the blankets.

  He cupped his hand over his mouth like a microphone and said, ‘Underground Rescue Squad Three, reporting for duty.’

  ‘Hello, Underground Rescue Squad Three. Are we glad you’re here! There’s a boy trapped in Legg’s Elbow, two hundred and twenty-five metres down, past Devil’s Corner. He’s seventeen years old, and he’s badly injured.’

  ‘OK, headquarters. We’ll send somebody down there straight away.’

  ‘It’ll have to be your very best man – it’s really dangerous down there. It’s started to rain and all the caves are flooding. You’ve probably got an hour at the most.’

  ‘Don’t worry. We’ll manage it. Roger and out.’

  Martin put on his equipment. His thermal underwear, his boots, his backpack and his goggles. Anybody who was watching would have seen nothing more than a boy-shaped lump under the blankets, wriggling and jerking and bouncing up and down. But by the time he was finished he was fully dressed for crawling his way down to Devil’s Corner.

  His last radio message was, ‘Headquarters? I’m going in.’

  ‘Be careful, Underground Rescue Squad Three. The rain’s getting heavier.’

  Martin lifted his head and inhaled a lungful of chilly bedroom air. Then he plunged downwards into the first crevice that would take him down into the caves. The rock ceiling was dangerously low, and he had to crawl his way in like a commando, on his elbows. He tore the sleeve of his waterproof jacket on a protruding rock and he gashed his cheek, but he was so heroic that he simply wiped away the blood with the back of his hand and carried on crawling forward.

  It wasn’t long before he reached a tight, awkward corner, which was actually the end of the bed. He had to negotiate it by lying on his side, reaching into the nearest crevice for a handhold, and heaving himself forward inch by inch. He had only just squeezed himself around this corner when he came to another, and had to struggle his way around it in the same way.

  The air in the caves was growing more and more stifling, and Martin was already uncomfortably hot. But he knew he had to go on. The boy in Legg’s Elbow was counting on him, just like the rest of Underground Rescue Squad Three, and the whole world above ground, which was waiting anxiously for him to emerge.

  He wriggled onwards, his fingers bleeding, until he reached the sump. This was a ten-metre section of tunnel which was completely flooded with black, chill water. Five potholers had drowned in it since the caves were first discovered, two of them experts. Not only was the sump flooded, it had a tight bend right in the middle of it, with rocky protrusions that could easily snag a potholer’s belt or his backpack. Martin hesitated for a moment, but then he took a deep breath of stale air and plunged beneath the surface.

  The water was stunningly cold, but Martin swam along the tunnel with powerful, even strokes until he reached the bend. Still holding his breath, he angled himself sideways and started to tug himself between the jagged, uncompromising rocks. He was almost through when one of the straps on his backpack was caught and he found himself entangled. He twisted around, trying to reach behind his back so that he could pull the strap free from the rock, but he succeeded only in winding it even more tightly. He tried twisting around the other way, but now the strap tightened itself into a knot.

  He had been holding his breath for so long now that his lungs were hurting. Desperately, he reached into his pocket and took out his clasp knife. He managed to unfold the blade, bend his arm behind his back and slash at the tightened strap. He missed it with his first two strokes, but his third stroke managed to cut it halfway through. His eyes were bulging and he was bursting for air, but he didn’t allow himself to give in. One more cut and the strap abruptly gave way.

  Martin kicked both legs and swam forward as fast as he could. He reached the end of the sump and broke the surface, taking in huge, grateful breaths of frigid subterranean air.

  He had beaten the sump, but there were more hazards ahead of him. The rainwater from the surface was already beginning to penetrate the lower reaches of the cave system. He could hear water rushing through crevices and clattering through galleries. In less than half an hour, every pothol
e would be flooded, and there would be no way of getting back out again.

  Martin pressed on, sliding on his belly through a fissure that was rarely more than thirty centimetres high. He was bruised and exhausted, but he had almost reached Devil’s Corner. From there, it was only a few metres to Legg’s Elbow.

  Rainwater trickled from the low limestone ceiling and coursed down the side of the fissure, but Martin didn’t care. He was already soaked and he was crawling at last into Devil’s Corner. He slid across to the narrow vertical crevice called Legg’s Elbow and peered down it, trying to see the trapped boy.

  ‘Hallo!’ he called. ‘Is anybody there? Hallo, can you hear me? I’ve come to get you out!’

  Martin listened but there was no answer. There wasn’t even an imaginary answer. He forced his head further down, so that he could see deeper into the crevice, but there was nobody there. Nobody crying; nobody calling out. No pale distressed face looking back up at him.

  He had actually reached the bottom of the bed, and was looking over the edge of the mattress, into the tightly tucked dead-end of blankets and sheets.

  He had a choice, but there was very little time. Either he could climb down Legg’s Elbow to see if he could find where the boy was trapped, or else he could give up his rescue mission and turn back. In less than twenty minutes, the caves would be completely flooded, and anybody down here would be drowned.

  He decided to risk to it. It would take him only seven or eight minutes to climb all the way down Legg’s Elbow, and another five to crawl back as far as the sump. Once he was back through the sump, the caves rose quite steeply towards the surface, so that he would have a fair chance of escaping before they filled up with water.

  He pushed his way over the edge of Legg’s Elbow, and began to inch down the crevice. He could slip at any moment, and his arms and legs were shaking with effort. He could feel the limestone walls starting to move – a long slow seismic slide that made him feel as if the whole world were collapsing all around him. If Legg’s Elbow fell in, he would be trapped, unable to climb back out, while more and more rainwater gushed into the underground caverns.

  Panting with effort, he tried to cling on to the sides of the crevice. There was one moment when he thought he was going to be able to heave himself back. But then everything slid – sheets, blankets, limestone rocks, and he ended up right at the bottom of Legg’s Elbow, buried alive.

  For a moment, he panicked. He could hardly breathe. But then he started to pull at the fallen rockslide, tearing a way out of the crevice stone by stone. There had to be a way out. If there was a deeper, lower cavern, perhaps he could climb down to the foot of the hill and crawl out of a fox’s earth or any other fissure he could locate. After all, if the rainwater could find an escape route through the limestone, he was sure that he could.

  He managed to heave all of the rocks aside. Now all he had to do was burrow through the sludge. He took great handfuls of it and dragged it behind him, until at last he felt the flow of fresh air into the crevice – fresh air, and wind. He crawled out of Legg’s Elbow on his hands and knees, and found himself lying on a flat, sandy beach. The day was pearly-grey, but the sun was high in the sky and the ocean peacefully glittered in the distance. He turned around and saw that, behind him, there was nothing but miles and miles of grey tussocky grass. Somehow he had emerged from these tussocks like somebody emerging from underneath a heavy blanket.

  He stood up and brushed himself down. He was still wearing his waterproof jacket and his potholing boots. He was glad of them, because the breeze was thin and chilly. Up above him, white gulls circled and circled, not mewing or crying, their eyes as expressionless as sharks’ eyes. In the sand at his feet, tiny iridescent shells were embedded.

  For a moment, he was unable to decide what he ought to do next, and where he ought to go. Perhaps he should try to crawl back into the pothole, and retrace his route to the surface. But he was out in the open air here, and there didn’t seem to be any point in it. Besides, the pothole was heavily covered in grass, and it was difficult to see exactly where it was. He thought he ought to walk inland a short way, to see if he could find a road or a house or any indication of where he might be.

  But then, very far away, where the sea met the sky, he saw a small fishing boat drawing in to the shore, and a man climbing out of it. The fishing boat had a russet-coloured triangular sail, like a fishing boat in an old-fashioned watercolour painting. He started to walk towards it; and then, when he realized how far it was, he started to run. His waterproof jacket made a chuffing noise and his boots left deep impressions in the sand. The seagulls kept pace with him, circling and circling.

  Running and walking, it took him almost twenty minutes to reach the fishing boat. A white-bearded man in olive-coloured oilskins was kneeling down beside it, stringing fat triangular fish on to a line. The fish were brilliant, and they shone with every colour of the rainbow. Some of them were still alive, thrashing their tails and blowing their gills.

  Martin stopped a few yards away and watched and said nothing. Eventually the man stopped stringing fish and looked up at him. He was handsome, in an old-fashioned way – chiselled, like Charlton Heston. But his eyes were completely blank: the colour of sky on an overcast day. He reminded Martin of somebody familiar, but he couldn’t think who he was.

  Not far away, sitting cross-legged on a coil of rope, was a thin young boy in a hooded coat. He was playing a thin, plaintive tune on a flute. His wrists were so thin and the tune was so sad that Martin almost felt like crying.

  ‘Well, you came at last,’ said the man with eyes the colour of sky. ‘We’ve been waiting for you.’

  ‘Waiting for me? Why?’

  ‘You’re a tunneller, aren’t you? You do your best work underground.’

  ‘I was looking for a boy. He was supposed to be stuck in Legg’s Elbow, but … I don’t know. The whole cave system was flooded, and it seemed to collapse.’

  ‘And you thought that you escaped?’

  ‘I did escape.’

  The man stood up, his waterproofs creaking. He smelled strongly of fresh-caught fish, all that slime on their scales. ‘That was only a way of bringing you here. We need you to help us, an experienced tunneller like you. What do you think of these fish?’

  ‘I never saw fish like that before.’

  ‘They’re not fish. Not in the strictest sense of the word. They’re more like ideas.’

  He picked one up, so that it twisted and shimmered, and Martin could see that it was an idea, rather than a fish. It was an idea about being angry with people you loved, and how you could explain that you loved them, and calm them down. Then the man held up another fish, and this was a different fish altogether, a different idea. This was a glittering idea about numbers: how the metre was measured by the speed of light. If light could be compressed, then distance could, too – and the implications of that were quite startling.

  Martin couldn’t really understand how the fish managed to be ideas as well as fish, but they were, and some of the ideas were so beautiful and strange that he stood staring at them and feeling as if his whole life was turning under his feet.

  The sun began to descend towards the horizon. The small boy put away his flute and helped the fisherman to gather the last of his lines and his nets. The fisherman gave Martin a large woven basket to carry, full of blue glass fishing floats and complicated reels. ‘We’ll have to put our best foot forward, if we want to get home before dark.’

  They walked for a while in silence. The breeze blew the sand in sizzling snakes, and behind them the sea softly applauded, like a faraway audience. After four or five minutes, though, Martin said, ‘Why do you need a tunneller?’

  The fisherman gave him a quick, sideways glance. ‘You may not believe it, but there’s another world, apart from this one. A place that exists right next to us, like the world that you can see when you look in a mirror … essentially the same, but different.’

  ‘What does that have to do
with tunnelling?’

  ‘Everything, because there’s only one way through to this world, and that’s by crawling into your bed and through to the other side.’

  Martin stopped in his tracks. ‘What the hell are you talking about, bed? I tunnel into caves and potholes, not beds.’

  ‘There’s no difference,’ said the fisherman. ‘Caves, beds, they’re just the same … a way through to somewhere else.’

  Martin started walking again. ‘You’d better explain yourself.’ The sun had almost reached the horizon now, and their shadows were giants with stilt-like legs and distant, pin-size heads.

  ‘There isn’t much to explain. There’s another world, beneath the blankets. Some people can find it, some can’t. I suppose it depends on their imagination. My daughter Leonora always had the imagination. She used to hide under the blankets and pretend that she was a cave-dweller in prehistoric times; or a Red Indian woman, in a tent. But about a month ago she said that she had found this other world, right at the very bottom of the bed. She could see it, but she couldn’t wriggle her way into it.’

  ‘Did she describe it?’

  The fisherman nodded. ‘She said that it was dark, very dark, with tangled thorn-bushes and branchy trees. She said that she could see shadows moving around in it – shadows that could have been animals, like wolves; or hunched-up men wearing black fur cloaks.’

  ‘It doesn’t sound like the kind of world that anybody would want to visit.’

  ‘We never had the chance to find out whether Leonora went because she wanted to. Two days ago my wife went into her bedroom to discover that her bed was empty. We thought at first that she might have run away. But we’d had no family arguments, and she really had no cause to. Then we stripped back her blankets and found that the lower parts of her sheets were torn, as if some kind of animal had been clawing at it.’ He paused, and then he said, with some difficulty, ‘We found blood, too. Not very much. Maybe she scratched herself on one of the thorns. Maybe one of the animals clawed her.’