XLVII

WHEN DEATH CAME to Calf Island, it came anticlimactically, without any warning, wearing soft shoes; it was even a beginning rather than an end. It came matter-of-factly, as though it had been there all the time and had merely decided to make its presence felt; but the consternation it created was entirely undiminished by its manner of arrival. Flapping Eagle returned from his walk to find a small crowd gathered outside the Gribb home. Norbert Page was there, and Quartermaster Moonshy. Irina Cherkassova stood still at the front door, as though mummified at the moment of entry. She moved mechanically to let him through. No-one spoke to answer his questions.

Count Aleksandr Cherkassov sat perspiring on the chaise-longue; he had picked up Elfrida’s petit-point and his hands toyed with it absently.

—What has happened? asked Flapping Eagle.

—We heard a scream, said the Count. One long scream.

Flapping Eagle looked around at the silent, empty room.

—WHAT HAPPENED? he shouted. Where is Elfrida?

Cherkassov nodded towards the study. —One long scream, he repeated.

Flapping Eagle lunged at the closed door and into the study. In the silence he imagined he could hear a whine in the corners of his mind.

The shutters on the window were closed, so that the only light in the room entered with Flapping Eagle through the door. There was Ignatius Gribb’s desk, littered with papers and files, quills and home-made ink. There were his books, scattered on desk-top, chair, floor, falling out of shelves and off ledges. The untidiness alone was a scandal to the eye in this house.

The bed was immediately beneath the window. A figure lay upon it, still, dead, shadowed in the shuttered gloom. Another figure stood by the bed, still, alive, also shadowed. An unlit candle stood at a table by the bedside.

The figure on the bed was the short, bent corpse of Ignatius Quasimodo Gribb, sometime professor of philosophy, bigot and sage.

The standing figure was his newly-widowed wife, Elfrida Gribb, who had been Elfrida Edge, who had thought her falling father was a chimneypot.

—I killed him, she said. It was me.

Flapping Eagle closed the door behind him. The room darkened; he moved to the bedside. There were old coins on Ignatius Gribb’s closed eyelids.

—His eyes were open, said Elfrida. I had to close his eyes.

He held her shoulders in his hands. —Look at me, he said. She continued to hang her head. —Elfrida! he said sharply and it lifted slowly.

—One less secret, she said. I love you.

He was looking at Ignatius Gribb’s body. It wore, spotlessly, a silk shirt and cravat, a smoking-jacket, a rather incongruous pair of very aged cord trousers and carpet slippers. Its mouth was puckered and slightly open, like a fish.

—Death with dishonour, said Elfrida. He didn’t just lose his life.

—There are no wounds on the body, said Flapping Eagle. No marks.

—Not his body, she said dully. I killed him in the head. I had to close his eyes. After opening them.

She broke down; the glacial control slipped; the tears flowed. She clutched at Flapping Eagle. —I love you, she said. I love you, I love you, I love you.

—You told him, didn’t you? said Flapping Eagle, understanding.

—Yes, she said, in a tiny whisper. I killed him.

It was not hard to reconstruct what had happened. Elfrida, goaded by jealousy, had taken the plunge she had fought so unwillingly but so effectively for so long. But, being Elfrida, the plunge had to be as final, as irrevocable as her previous dedication to Ignatius. So she had refused to accompany Flapping Eagle on his walk and while he was safely out of the way had bearded her husband in his lair and told him she no longer loved him. In Virgil’s terms, she had transferred obsessions from Ignatius to Flapping Eagle. Who thought: guess whose fault that makes it.

It had transfixed Ignatius like a thunderbolt. Even away from Calf Island it might well have broken him. These two had survived by their mutual interdependence, shielding each other from the wounds and calumnies of the world, two vulnerable people lying back to back in a marriage bed, for safety. No doubt her love had been the entire foundation of his arrogant air of self-certainty. The love of a beautiful woman can easily provide such a support for a stunted man. He had drawn from her the strength and courage which enabled him to form and hold, not just his theories and opinions, but his entire personality. She was his peace of mind, his alienable crutch, his perfect match, and she had withdrawn. Men had done away with themselves for less.

But this was Calf Mountain; and in the field of the Grimus Effect, suicide had been unnecessary. Flapping Eagle could almost see the gutted brain within the coined head. Because Elfrida’s words had done more than upset Ignatius. They had broken through the unconscious, ingrained defence mechanism, the mental barrier he had built for almost every member of the community of K. Elfrida’s withdrawal had removed the cornerstone of the persona he had built; and in that instant, when everything which had seemed sure was suddenly flung into a state of flux, the fever of the Inner Dimensions had swarmed over him.

What must he have felt like, Flapping Eagle asked himself, at that second, as he felt that inner multiplicity seizing him, soft and unprepared and unable to control it as he was behind those broken defences? What must it have been like to be possessed and annihilated by the very force whose denial he had made his primary contribution to the town? Death with dishonour indeed.

And what of K itself, K which rested on Gribb’s theories, on his technique of Prime Interest and on his preoccupation with the here-and-now of life? Ignatius’ death had shown that there was a Something, an invisible force at work upon them, and it had destroyed its arch-opponent with terrifying swiftness. Could their minds remain shut in the face of his death? Flapping Eagle was certain that some at least would not be able to remain so.

Guilt descended upon him like a soft dark avalanche, breaking the pale magical spell Irina and Elfrida had woven. He flagellated himself more cruelly than O’Toole could ever have managed. He, who had fallen so willingly into the way of K, subscribing to the illusion of permanence, betraying his own experience for the sake of a home and a triangular love. He, who had despised the man who had shown him the true nature of the island and helped him to survive it. Was social acceptability and the companionship of two beautiful women worth the damage he had wrought? Patently not; and even that was lost. Flung out by Irina, faced with a changed Elfrida, he was probably also in danger of his life. He shrugged. He could not find it in him to value his life very highly, not now that his ability to bring disaster upon those around him had reached this new peak. Selfish, Jocasta had said. That was the understatement of all time.

—I’ll look after you, Elfrida was saying. I promise. I’ll look after you for ever. If you will look after me.

—Elfrida … he said helplessly, but his voice trailed off into silence; he could think of nothing to say.

—I love you, you see, she said. You don’t need anyone else. You don’t, do you?

Light came in to the room. Count Aleksandr Cherkassov stood in the doorway. There was a curl of distaste on his lips, overlaying the shock in his eyes.

—It’s not murder, said Flapping Eagle. She didn’t murder him. There was no violence.

—Was there not, said Cherkassov and left the house.

Elfrida Gribb clung to Flapping Eagle as if her life depended on it. Which, in a sense, it did.

He held her there, and they stood for a long time by the corpse of the Way of K.