Текст книги "Summon the Bright Water "

Автор книги: Geoffrey Household

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 12 (всего у книги 13 страниц)

It was my failure to see how the commune made a profit which had first set me off. Elsa was not so astonished. She knew her uncle did sell his wares, but no more than that. Whenever Broom Lodge needed money, it had been transformed from Marrin’s personal account which she never saw.

‘No reason why you should. Laundry. Catering. Sales of meat and vegetables. Shoulder to cry on. But uncle’s private account not your business and not the commune’s.’

‘You mean that all his work in gold had a market?’ Elsa asked.

I didn’t see why she should look at me with such sudden intensity, but the major was prompt to understand.

‘Give us half. Instalments as and when. Is it a deal?’

‘Done! But there isn’t a goldsmith among the lot.’

‘Will be, if I have my way. What do you think I’ve gone bald for, Piers?’

‘God knows.’

‘He does. You’re right. Solidarity, that’s why. I’m showing sympathy with the opposition. Beats them! They’re as curious as cats. Look here! All those decent chaps at Broom Lodge haven’t any religion. A pity, but there it is! I’d call ’em well-meaning agnostics. All that reincarnation stuff just makes them feel good. The only truly pious are the druidicals and myself. Their religion is sincere but their rites are degrading. How do you think the missionaries converted the Saxons? Started with a pagan priest of course. Converted him, and the other fellows followed.’

‘Elsa!’ I appealed. ‘Will you please tell me what the hell Denzil is talking about?’

‘But it’s simple, darling. You haven’t a business mind. We’ve solved the problem of getting rid of the gold without certificates and all sorts of papers we can’t get. Half for Broom Lodge. Half for us.’

‘But what has it got to do with goldsmiths?’

‘I’ll take ’em off wrought iron and give ’em six months training,’ Denzil explained. ‘Elsa supplies the gold. When we sell the gew-gaws, half the proceeds to Broom Lodge. Half to her. Have to work it out.’

‘Suppose what they make isn’t saleable?’

‘Who cares? It’s bought for the gold. For all I know, the buyers throw the rest away.’

Now that was close to what Marrin had actually told me.

‘But it all depends on your mission to the pagans.’

‘That’s where solidarity comes in.’

‘You’ll fetch up on the altar at Wigpool.’

‘Not if I can work a miracle.’

‘I don’t wonder a theological college threw you out. In the Middle Ages you’d have been flayed alive for blasphemy.’

‘It’s not blasphemy at all,’ he answered indignantly. ‘To convert the heathen a miracle is permissible. At least two saints crossed the Irish Sea on stones that floated.’

‘And if you can pull it off, are you going to be abbot of Broom Lodge?’

‘Not me. Raeburn has the makings of an abbot. He’s deeply religious and the sort of chap I’d go into the jungle with.’

‘And not come out.’

‘I think that if I returned the cauldron…’ Elsa began.

‘Good girl!’

‘And if I could return it in such a way that you had your miracle…’

‘Better and better!’

‘Pity it won’t float,’ I said, ‘but we might send it over the river in a toy boat.’

He was really angry with me now.

‘Not a game! It’s not a game at all. There must be true reverence.’

‘For a fraud?’

‘For what it creates. Simeon knew that.’

‘Don’t fuss, Piers!’ Elsa ordered me. ‘You aren’t the bloody inquisition. Dear Denzil, are you sure you can make them start training to be goldsmiths?’

‘No. But you can.’

‘How long must I stay?’

‘A week should do it. What do they call that thing which turns one stuff into another? A catalyst, that’s it. Well, you’re the catalyst.’

I was frankly shocked, but realised that with St Elsa’s help our fifth-century Paladin might be able to pull off his revolution. The druidicals were in disarray. Their high priest had died; his successor had been drowned; the gods were angry. While the rest of the commune was indifferent to any nonsense they might get up to, the major at least showed a sign of sympathy by his shaven head.

Denzil no longer believed that the cauldron was the Grail, but he did in some sense believe that its shape and its strange gold partook of the ancient myth. That was what the druidicals, encouraged by Marrin, had believed. So the violently heretical Christian and the pious pagan could agree on its sanctity so long as neither insisted on exact definitions.

Take my old friend Nodens as a half-absurd example. Whether I call him Nodens or an angel makes no difference to anybody. The essential is that I do not wholly deny a Something Else able to influence me. On that Something Else a fifth-century missionary could build, whereas he would have been helpless before a pure materialist – who didn’t exist anyway.

This attempt to comprehend the incomprehensible major by way of Nodens brought the god to mind. Spirit of land and river, healer, restorer of lost property and in his relations with me undoubtedly a god of mischief, he should find a miracle within his powers. Summoned by my thought of him, he remarked – as always through my imagination – that druids were not likely to be familiar with diving and it might be possible to stage a marvel more convincing than a toy boat – or a stone one if it came to that.

The major hurried back to his secular duties, which he was taking very seriously. He only knew a little about agriculture and nothing whatever about the crafts, but his military life had taught him that discipline can be imperceptible. He made no attempt to replace that benevolent dictator, Marrin. He merely organised committees and stood back.

‘You shouldn’t have been so rough with him,’ Elsa said. ‘You know he’s crackers.’

‘He’s not crackers. You just have to decide which century his memory is in while the rest of him is here and now. One half sees pets. The other half commits burglary.’

‘Anyway he saw how we could get rid of our gold before you did.’

‘If he can get his amateur alchemists to work. And that depends on the miracle.’

‘But I’ve made our fortune, Piers! And you aren’t excited, just dreaming.’

‘I am wondering what can give me the exact time when half the blasted Severn is going uphill to Gloucester and the other half going downhill to the Shoots and it’s high water at the Box Rock. Nodens and I will then produce a miracle while you, sweet St Catalyst, do your vestal-virgin stuff on the bank. So back to London and get the Grail out of pawn!’

I have an old friend whose hobby is vintage cars. By day he is an archaeologist, at night a motor mechanic. It seems to be a point of honour that one must rebuild every part as it originally was. To put in a new engine, new gearbox or anything new is as disgraceful as to salt a dig with bones which don’t belong to it. Consequently his workshop is a museum of bits and pieces.

I called on him with Elsa. It was the first time she had appeared to a normal friend in my normal life. She was looking as innocently alluring as an advertisement in a Sunday supplement and he couldn’t take his eyes off her.

‘I want a thin steel rod,’ I told him, ‘painted black and about ten feet long, firmly fixed to a plate at one end with a quick release clamp at the other.’

‘What has the clamp got to take?’

‘The bottom rim of this, and it had better be padded.’

I took the cauldron out of its hat box and showed it to him.

‘What an exquisite thing!’ he exclaimed. ‘Persian and about sixth century B.C., I would say.’

I was glad of that. It showed that a better authority than I could be taken in. I had been feeling a litle humiliated since the verdict of the British Museum.

‘It’s only a modern replica. Gold-plated lead.’

‘But what for?’

I was momentarily stuck for a lie, but Elsa was not.

‘My cousin’s birthday,’ she said. ‘They’re filthy rich, jet set and all that. So I had to have something original.’

He looked at me ironically as if wondering how a serious economist could have got mixed up with a crazy bunch of conspicuous consumers.

‘I’ve got a bit of just the right rod. Strong as a Toledo blade. Come and have a look at it, Piers!’

He led me through a pool of oil round the back of a vast landaulette.

‘So you’ve been out baby-snatching! What a stunner! She looks like the Dea Roma on holiday.’

‘I’m the baby more often than not.’

‘Where did you find it?’

‘Salmon fishing.’

‘Not your style unless you were trying to find how much Julius Caesar paid for a pound. When does she want this device of hers?’

‘As soon as possible.’

‘She would! Well, it’s all straightforward except for the quick-release clamp. I’ll have to look around for that.’

‘And you must let me make a subscription to your old-age pensioners.’

‘It won’t be expensive. But this one would be grateful, wouldn’t you?’ He slapped the glossy flank of the landaulette. I wonder he didn’t blow up its nose.

When we were home again (what enchantment to be able to write ‘home’ instead of ‘my flat’!) Elsa’s curiosity was of course unbounded, but I refused to tell her what I was planning.

‘Because I need your inspiration when you see it for the first time. That’s decisive – far more important than anything else. Is it a miracle or is it not? If there’s any doubt, we’ve had it and you might be in trouble.’

She accepted this nobly and I was allowed to spend a few evenings in the home for senile motors, making a light raft with a float attached to each side to keep it level. When the ten-foot rod was ready, with its plate at one end and its clamp at the other, I tied the lot on top of my car, recovered the cauldron from the bank and told Elsa it was time to go down to Gloucester.

‘Oh, not Gloucester again!’ she exclaimed.

‘Well, the Thames is too crowded. But up the Severn somewhere we ought to find a bit of peace in the dusk.’

‘Thank God it’s not that horrible tideway!’

‘Not yet. And if all goes well and you approve, we’ll stay the night and have a conference with the major next day.’

The map suggested that the Haw Bridge, some six miles above Gloucester, might do for the rehearsal of my experiment. When we got there, the evening river was not so peaceful as I expected, so we walked along the bank carrying with us the raft, the rod, the hat box and all my equipment for diving until we found a spot a little upstream from the bridge where no pleasure cruisers were moored and there was a good screen of bushes between the tow path and the fields. I asked Elsa to cross the bridge, follow the far bank until she was opposite to me and then to watch the gently flowing current and report what she saw.

Meanwhile I changed and assembled the miracle – a mere matter of screwing to the centre of my raft the plate at the bottom of the rod and clamping the cauldron to the top. Then I pushed the raft out to deep water and reduced the pressure in the floats until the rim of the cauldron was just awash.

It was now dusk, permitting no clear view at a distance but quite enough light to see any floating object. Keeping on the same level as the raft I pushed it in front of me underwater until it grounded. That did not matter. It would never ground at all off the Box Rock.

I stood up and removed the mask, waiting for the vital comment. Elsa was clapping.

‘I could swear it floated across the river on its own. I could just see the rod once or twice but I’m sure I wouldn’t have done if I hadn’t known it was there. And on the tideway, ripples and a bit of spray will hide the bottom. It left a little wash behind even on the calm river. Denzil will believe it’s a real miracle. Dare we let him?’

I said I’d love to – his reactions would be so fascinating. But he had to be in the secret in order to organise the reception party.

We returned to our hotel, where Elsa called up the major to make an appointment for next day. He said that he would meet us in the afternoon at the sapling stump – which indicated that by now the druidicals had returned to the routine of the commune instead of wandering disconsolately through the woods.

In the morning I visited the port offices to find out when it would be high water at Box Rock – a question apparently that only the river could answer. I was told that at Sharpness and Lydney there could be no doubt, but within the horseshoe bend it might depend on the wind. Since the tides were now neap there would be little or no bore. At the Box Rock and Bullo the top of the tide – give or take ten minutes – should be about 8.50 p.m. the day after tomorrow and the slack water wouldn’t last long. It would not yet be high tide at Gloucester, but the ebb would certainly have started below the Noose.

We found the major at the sapling stump, looking military but not to the extent of visionary stirrups. I explained to him how the cauldron would cross the river and asked if he could guarantee that his six pagans would be on the bank just upstream from the Box Rock on Thursday at half-past eight; they might have to chant or meditate for half an hour or more until the dusk was of the right texture.

I could see that his conscience bothered him. A miracle he had asked for, but not such a bare-faced miracle. He sighed but, yes, he was sure the party could be arranged at the right time provided Elsa returned with him now to Broom Lodge and mixed normally with the colonists.

‘Carry on as if no inner circle existed, just like your uncle.’

‘Are they likely to bow to me as they pass?’ Elsa asked.

‘I’ll settle that with Raeburn.’

‘Good God!’ I exclaimed. ‘Is he installed already?’

‘He is high priest. The rest will follow.’

‘Has Elsa got to preach to them?’

‘Not her job, old boy! That’s where I come in. All Elsa has to do is to visit the blacksmith’s shop and tell them they must learn to work in gold, that gold came before tin and is far more sacred. She will show them a sign.’

‘What about the training?’

‘Club porter. Nothing he doesn’t know. I’ll ask him to find me a young goldsmith who’d like the job. And must be an earnest Christian.’

‘We have to find a way of delivering the raw material.’

‘Darling, the priestess looks after that. I think the cauldron should not be empty. We’ll put a few ingots in it and I shall scatter them in the meadow like Flora with a cornu-what’s-it.’

‘But we haven’t any ingots with us.’

‘Yes we have. I always carry three in my bag for luck.’

I told the major to see that their torches were alight, and flaming red. As the marvel approached, Elsa would walk into the water, being very careful not to step over the edge into the Box Hole, undo the clamp – she had already practised that – and display the cauldron.

‘Do I beckon to it, or what?’

‘Just hold out your hands as if you knew it was coming. Do whatever you feel like. You were so magnificent at Wigpool. Nothing that I suggest could be as good.’

‘Never did like night operations,’ the major grumbled. ‘Always go wrong.’ But it was not really the operation which was disturbing him. ‘Tell me, Piers! In your heart do you believe I am justified in this grave step?’

‘I do. The end justifies the means. What would Arthur have been without Merlin? And how would the Household Cavalry impress the public if they rode in battledress instead of the masquerade of plumes and breastplate?’

That cheered him up a bit, and so we parted. The next I should see of Elsa – well, I should never see her at all until it was safe to show my head above water. I comforted myself with the thought that if the miracle misfired we could always swim to whatever safety the Severn offered.

On Thursday evening I drove to Arlington and down the lane to the river. When the few tourists had gone and my car was the only one left, I walked along the embankment till I was above the tail of the sands and nearly opposite the Box Rock. The tide was rising fast over a good stretch of muddy beach and, as usual, I was quite alone. Two journeys brought out from the car my underwater gear, the cauldron and its raft.

After sunset I had a lot of work to do on the floats. On the upper river I had taken the cauldron across empty, not remembering that in the tideway it would soon fill with water. Since I could not tell how much would splash into it, I filled it full before the start and added Elsa’s ingots.

The distance across the river to the Box Rock was rather more than half a mile, of which the last three hundred yards were deep water and the rest shoals. I had to walk or swim over these banks until I could reach the channel. That was a difficulty I had not foreseen. The force of the tide was too great for it to be done, and there was not enough water to float the raft at its proper depth. The only hope was to go in much further down-river, where the channel swung over to the left bank, and allow the tide to carry me up.

This move towards Hock Cliff wasted more time but was all to the good, for the summer evening was still too light for my purpose. I came to rest on the sands opposite the Box Rock and looked across the river to the meadow alongside it. I could distinguish no more than moving figures, among them one in white which had to be Elsa. So it was safe to stay where I was, showing only head and shoulders, until slack water at the top of the tide when I could be sure of keeping a straight course to the rock or very near it. Dead calm was essential, for I dared not show my head.

Once I had set off and was under water I was desperately convinced that this blind navigation could not possibly work, but more or less it did. I knew that my former, deadly exploration of the Box Hole would be useful, and kept sounding for depth, allowing cauldron and raft to float on by themselves. I hit the rock too far upstream, turned along it and then had difficulty keeping the raft close enough in, so that I knew I must be right over the Box Hole and that the ebb had begun. I felt the raft tip a little. That ought to be Elsa removing the cauldron and deliberately shaking the rod to let me know. At once I threw my weight – nearly neutral but just enough – on to the raft in order to sink the top of the rod below water. Looking up, all I could see was a rippling surface tinged with red from the torches.

Curiosity was uncontrollable. I could not bear to be blind any longer. I felt my way inshore to a point where the bank was lower and I could see round the back of the rock to the meadow. Folly! But I hoped that in the fast-failing light I would be mistaken for a tree trunk if anyone glanced my way.

I need not have worried. The scene was beyond my fantasies, and how many faiths and legends were embodied in it was beyond conjecture. The torches flamed red in a semi-circle, and in front of them Elsa, spreading the white wings of her sleeves, was holding out the cauldron to Raeburn who was on his knees. The major too was on his knees. I cannot guess in what time his mind was. His mission, in his dreams, was to the pagans. It was now so in reality. I suppose that symbols are what you make of them. For the moment the Guardian of the Grail was present at its return.

Gravely Raeburn distributed the ingots. More effective and more hopeful that was than the Flora act which Elsa had contemplated. There was some conversation. Elsa appeared to dismiss the party and to bless them. She stood on the rock, still and statuesque, until they had crossed the railway embankment and were out of sight. I appeared from the mud. If there had been anyone to see us it would have been thought that she had summoned her tame sea monster.

She was overcome with the splendour of her own impersonation, nervous as an actress in the wings after triumph in a profoundly emotional scene. I wished I had champagne and half a florist’s shop to go with my congratulations.

‘Nearly disaster! So nearly!’ she cried. ‘The rod rose too far out of the water. I covered it by flapping my sleeves. Then you must have dragged it down again. Thank God we have got away with it and they’ve gone!’

‘But how did they think you would get home?’

‘Saints don’t take cars, darling. Think of me sitting in the back and chatting all the way to Broom Lodge! What shall we do?’

The ebb was running dangerously under the rising moon. It was impossible to swim across, but Bullo with Marrin’s two boats on their moorings was less than half a mile away.

‘We’ll swipe the rowing boat. I can make it look as if the painter had chafed and broken.’

The tide swept us from the pill, round the sands and softly under Hock Cliff where I chose the steep beach of shale, its top just showing, rather than the shelf of rock which I knew too well. I set the boat adrift and we began to walk along the embankment towards the track where I had left my car, over grass, here long and studded with wild flowers, while the power of the fast ebb slid by our feet without sound or ripple. Her robe was wet and heavy at the hem. She took it off, flung it over her shoulder and after a few strides let it drop to the ground.

I remember how in that moment desire for her was most strangely mixed with awe, for she looked like a spirit risen from the depths of the Severn, still impatient for more worship.