The Silent Land, page 18
‘Take the tarp. Skillet.’
‘What?’
She blinked at him. She didn’t feel at all hungry. ‘Could we have the breakfast first? Before you go out?’
He smiled. ‘Sure.’ He sidled over to her and pulled the duvet around her shoulders and put his arm around her, trying to pass on some of his warmth. He held her tight but he seemed to drift off somewhere, deep in his own thoughts.
Her shivering had subsided. She could feel the heat of the fire now. She looked at Jake. ‘You okay?’
‘Yes. Why?’
‘You look—’
‘I was just about to do something and I couldn’t remember what it was.’
‘You were going to cook breakfast. On a skillet. Over the fire.’
‘I was?’
‘Yes.’
‘That’s right. I was. Funny. Funny how it comes back.’
He got up and headed off towards the kitchen and she watched him go. Something about his demeanour wasn’t right. She wondered if he’d taken a knock to his head during the avalanche that had affected him. His eyes still hadn’t recovered from being bloodshot. It was the sort of thing you would get checked out in a hospital. But here there was no hospital, no doctor, no nurse. She didn’t even know if or how much you could hurt yourself in this place. She thought about the baby growing in her belly.
Jake came back with a large, oiled frying pan, plates, bacon, eggs, bread and set about making a flat bed of the burning logs so he could heat the pan. ‘The freezer has shut down. We should eat this bacon while we still can. Everything is going to decompose and after a few more days we’ll be eating out of tins.’
He laid out strips of bacon on the pan. ‘Hungry?’
She pretended she was.
‘It’s like camping,’ he said.
She watched him carefully steering the pan into the flames and had to fight back tears.
They ate breakfast in silence, until he said, ‘Remember it for me. Remember the taste of bacon.’
‘Well. You were a vegetarian when I met you.’
‘Was I?’
‘I converted you.’
‘Really?’
‘Are you serious? You don’t remember that? You must remember that!’
He looked pained. ‘I seem to be forgetting so many things. I try to recall it but it’s just not there. I listen to you telling me stories about things we did together, and it’s as though you’re talking about someone else.’
‘It was a couple of months after we’d got together. We’d spent forty-eight hours in bed together at my flat. We’d only got out of bed to go as far as the toilet. It was shocking. We couldn’t tear ourselves away from each other. We’d been fucking all day and all night and snoozing in between and we’d eaten nothing. And I said: right, that’s it. I’m having a bacon sandwich, and you said, can’t, vegetarian and all that. I said too bad please yourself and I went down to the kitchen and made a bacon roll dripping with bacon fat and tomato sauce and brought it back up and you watched me eat it, and then when I’d finished it I said too bad you can’t kiss me now cos you’ll get bacon fat in your mouth. Disgusting you said, that’s disgusting; and then you kissed me. And you drew your head back and licked your lips and you said, right that’s it.’
‘I said “right that’s it”?’
‘You said right that’s it, nine years of vegetarianism and that’s an end to that, can you make me one? And I did. That’s it.’
‘Must have been a hell of a kiss.’
‘It was. A carnal kiss. You loved it.’
‘Anything else you converted me to or from?’
‘You were teetotal.’
‘You’re joking!’
‘Yes, I am about that. You really don’t remember, do you?’
‘Yes. No. I don’t know. There’s so much I seem to have forgotten.’
She was deeply worried about him but she said, ‘It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter because everything you can see or touch or hear or smell has a story attached to it; a story I can tell you. If you say bacon I can tell you a story. If you say snow I can tell you a dozen different stories. This is what we are: a collection stories that we share, in common. This is what we are to each other.’
He stared hard at her, his bloodshot eyes full of love and admiration for her. Then he stood up.
‘Where are you going?’
‘I’m going to get some wood, to keep you warm. What we have here won’t last the rest of the day, let alone the night. I’ll go straight there, get the logs, and I’ll come straight back.’
He bent down to kiss her and then froze and pulled back.
‘What is it?’
‘The taste of you. It came back.’
He kissed her again and then stood up quickly. He grabbed a corner of the tarp and flicked off the few remaining logs before rolling it under his arm. Then he went out through the lobby doors and set off into the thick mist, small flakes of snow billowing about his ears.
Zoe banked up the fire with logs and waited. She did nothing but gaze into the flames. After a while she became anxious. It felt as if Jake had been gone a long time. She took the breakfast plates and the pan away to the kitchen and washed them. When she came back to the lobby it was thronged with people.
It was the same people as before, crowding the lobby all over again. They chattered excitedly. The place was packed. People were standing in line for the reception desk, waiting to register. The three receptionists were busy all over again, one on the telephone, one processing a credit card and a third frowning and struggling to hear what her grey-suited manager was trying to say above the din. The exact scene was replicated in minute detail.
There was the sneeze of air brakes from the luxury bus. Here was the man who passed her, winking suggestively as he went by. Here was the whiff of his cologne.
It was all being repeated, all over again.
Zoe heard the word ‘avalanche’ mentioned by a woman at the reception desk. She looked up and her eye was caught by the bald-headed concierge, who was waving at her, beckoning her to come across the lobby to him. ‘Madam!’ he called. ‘Madam!’
But Zoe was paralysed. She couldn’t move a muscle. The scene, played before her for a third time, began to take on a menacing appearance. Even though the people looked at ease, their animation and the enthusiasm of their chatter made her bowels churn.
The concierge in his maroon and grey livery saw that she was stuck. He smiled encouragement. Then he picked up a brown envelope and waved it at her.
Zoe shook her head.
The concierge said something to another resident and started to make his way through the throng towards her, all the time waving the envelope.
‘It’s not for me,’ Zoe said. ‘It’s not for me.’
‘But Madam!’ said the concierge as he closed in on her.
Zoe shut her eyes.
And when she opened them again, the concierge was gone, and all the other residents chattering in the lobby had gone, and the three receptionists and the English women and the bus with all its new arrivals. All had vanished.
Zoe closed her eyes once more, this time for a count of ten. When she opened them she was relieved to find the lobby still empty, still deserted. Whatever she was being shown in this repeated vision, she didn’t want it. She vented a huge sigh and, still trembling from the shock of the repeated but utterly lifelike vision, went to the window and peered outside. The mist seemed to be lifting, just a little. The snow flurries had diminished, but visibility was still low.
She returned to her place in front of the fire. Then she got up again and revisited the window. She looked out, and there she saw a slight movement.
It was difficult to see anything beyond twenty or thirty metres. The mist was drifting now, with gusts of wind opening up visibility here and there for a few brief moments. But she glimpsed a grey wolf-like shape, and again a movement that suggested something was out there.
She peered hard into the mist, wishing that Jake was back. Then there was another gust of wind, and as the mist lifted she saw the men.
There were three of them. They were assembled in a group, though one of them was in a crouched position, elbow on his knee. The wolf-like shape. He was smoking a cigarette and staring back at the hotel. They were all smoking cigarettes. As the mist billowed around them, she saw the embers of a cigarette spark as one of them inhaled; and she saw the plumes of smoke as others breathed out. They all smoked and looked back at the hotel. Not at her, exactly: they hadn’t spotted her. They were all smoking and gazing back at different aspects of the hotel.
She ducked her head. Her heart slapped like a piston inside her and her breath came short. She slithered to the floor. After a few moments she collected herself and crawled to another part of the window where there was a curtain, and from there she was able to use the crack between the curtain and the wall to observe the men.
But they barely moved, other than to lift their cigarettes to their mouths or to blow out smoke. One man threw his cigarette to the ground and stamped on it. A few moments later he produced a packet and got another cigarette, taking a light from one of the others. The third member of the group remained in a crouched position, scanning the hotel, always scanning.
She thought of Jake out there. He would be returning at any moment with the wood. They would see him. They would see him coming back with the wood.
She tried to still her heart. Think, she said to herself. Think. She had to find a way to warn him. Had to find a way that didn’t reveal to the group of men that they were there, that they were holed-up in the hotel. She had to get to Jake and warn him.
A back way out of the hotel. Though she had never used it, there had to be a back way out of the hotel. Maybe a fire exit. Or a door from the kitchen – yes, that was it. She had seen a door from the kitchen. Jake had used it to take out the garbage. She could go out of that door and make her way around the side of the hotel. From there she could get to the road. That was it; that was what she had to do.
She hunkered down and crawled beneath the windows, hugging close to the wall. When she’d cleared the windows she was able to stand upright and make her way through the restaurant with the certainty of moving unseen. From there she stepped through the swing doors of the kitchen.
It felt even colder in the kitchen. She realised she’d left her coat by the fire.
She decided to go without her coat. She crossed the tiled kitchen floor and found the rear door unlocked. Once outside, she picked her way between the rubbish bins and the garbage skips. From there it was possible to creep silently around the side of the hotel to get to the road.
But once she drew level with the road she saw that there was a vista of maybe fifteen or twenty metres, between the hotel and the building diametrically opposite the hotel, where she would be exposed. She could see the three men, immobile, still surveying the hotel,still smoking their cigarettes. It was too far to run. They would easily spot her flitting across the street.
But as she pressed her nose against the wall, trying to keep out of sight but at the same time to spy on the men, there was another flurry of mist, almost but not completely obscuring her view of them. The mist drifted before them like smoke: now they were there, now they were not. She knew that if the mist were with her, she could race across the road unseen.
She waited for her moment. It was maddening. The mist hung in the air like a prancing unicorn or a chimera, partly obscuring her view of the men, but not fully. She could see their legs, or their covered heads, as the mist broiled this way and that. Their patience was terrifying. They simply watched, waiting, smoking.
At last the mist roiled in with a new flurry of snow and Zoe put her head down and ran. She ran in the icy snow, her feet slipping; but she recovered, launching herself to the other side of the road where the men would not be able to see her.
Panting heavily she pressed her back against the wall, steam escaping from her mouth. Then she hurried towards the house where Jake had gone to fetch the wood. It took her no more than two minutes. When she reached the now depleted log pile she found the tarpaulin heaped with logs, but no sign of Jake.
She was afraid now that if the men did leave their station they might spot her, so she went inside the house, hoping to find Jake. As before, the door opened freely onto the dark kitchen. Dull light reflected from the old mirror above the mantelpiece. Her eyes were drawn to the cabinet-maker’s workshop, with its available coffin. She stepped towards the workshop and then turned suddenly to see Jake. He had his back to her and he was looking at the wall.
‘Jake! There are men.’
Jake turned to face her and put a finger to his lips, to hush her. Then he turned back to the wall.
She bustled over to him. ‘Three men.’
‘Are you sure?’ He seemed to be in a trance.
‘Of course!’
‘Look,’ he said, unimpressed by her report. ‘Look at the photographs.’
She gasped.
‘How long,’ Jake said, ‘how long ago was it that we were here in this house?’
‘It was only … yesterday. No. Wait, that’s right. It was yesterday.’
‘It feels to me like such a long time since we were here. Weeks. Months.’
‘No! It was only yesterday.’
Jake was still gazing at the photo frames. Where Zoe recalled the generations of families represented by formal, sepia portraits and modern, fading snapshots, there were now none. The photographs had all gone from the frames. All of the frames, whether mounted on the wall or resting on flat surfaces, were empty. It made her blood sting with cold. It made her skin prickle with heat.
‘The men, Jake! There are men watching the hotel.’
He seemed utterly unafraid. ‘Let’s go and talk to them.’
‘No! We have to get back inside the hotel!’
‘I don’t know about that.’ He still seemed to be in a daze. There was almost a slur to his words. ‘If there are men, I have to talk with them.’
Zoe slapped Jake’s face, hard. ‘I won’t let you. I won’t hear of it! You are not to go out there!’
He looked at her and smiled. Then he cupped her cheek with his hand, a tender mirroring of the mighty slap she’d given him. He turned and went out, and she followed at his heels. Outside, the mist was still so thick that visibility was back down to a few metres. He took the corner of the tarpaulin loaded with logs and began to drag it back to the hotel.
‘Leave it. We don’t need it.’
‘We have to keep you warm,’ said Jake, almost distracted. ‘We have to.’
‘We can go in by the back way. The kitchen door. If we can get across the road without them seeing us then we’ll be fine.’
The mist was thick, and Zoe prayed they could get back to the rear of the hotel without being spotted. The tarpaulin dragged noisily against the snow in a way that she thought the men must surely be able to hear. She grabbed two corners and made Jake lift it at the other two corners so that they could carry it silently.
When they came to the exposed position, the mist was thick enough to give cover, and though she couldn’t see if the men were still in position, she sensed that they were close. The tarpaulin was heavy with its load of logs and they made ungainly progress; but the distance was a short one and within a couple of minutes they were at the rear entrance of the hotel, carrying the load into the kitchen. Once inside Zoe banged the door shut and locked the security bar into place.
‘Where are they?’ Jake said.
‘Watching the front. There are three of them and they’re watching for movement.’
‘I have to go and speak with them.’
‘Please don’t do that! Please don’t!’
‘I have to.’
‘You don’t have to, Jake! We can stay here! We’re safe here! We can stay warm! We have enough food! We don’t have to do anything. Please don’t go out to them.’
He ignored her and set off through the kitchen, paced through the restaurant and out into the lobby area, all of the time with Zoe trying to pull him back by his sleeve. He went over to the fireplace and picked up the axe from where he’d been chopping wood. Then he made for the door. Zoe ran after him and flung herself between him and the thick glass doors of the lobby, crying, begging him not to go outside.
‘Don’t you see why I have to go and find out what they want? Don’t you see that? Now listen. It will be fine. You can stay here, or you can come with me. But I think you should stay here and in a minute or two I will come back and tell you what they want.’
With her hand pressed to her mouth she watched him go out, walking into the mist that had become a fog, the axe gripped in his hand and swinging at his side. He stepped into the fog and was swallowed up.
Zoe stood behind the glass doors, her eyes fixed on the point of invisibility, counting the seconds. She waited a minute, two minutes perhaps, but then she couldn’t bear it, she couldn’t bear to watch and wait. She ran out of the doors and after him, calling his name, running through the fog, until at last she saw him, standing immobile, the axe held still at his side.
She ran to him, flinging herself at him.
‘Where?’ he said. ‘Where were they?’
‘They were right here. I swear it. Right here. One was leaning against that boulder. Another had his foot up on that rock. Look! Here’s one of their cigarettes! It’s still smoking. They’re here, Jake, they’re here!’
She picked up the smoking cigarette end and showed him. The residual tobacco sparked dimly in the freezing, swirling air.
‘Well, maybe they were here, but they’re not here now.’
Jake put the axe under his arm and cupped his hands again like a megaphone. ‘Show yourselves!’ he bellowed into the fog. ‘Show yourselves!’ But his cry had no carriage, no timbre in the freezing mist, and it crashed back to earth. He weighed the handle of his axe again in his hand and took a few steps forwards. The glacial breeze flicked at his hair and the mist went billowing.
‘Don’t step out of sight!’ Zoe shouted to him.
But he moved a few metres forwards and to the left, scanning the smoky mist, finding nothing, moving across and almost out of her range of vision, mist coiling around him. Zoe turned to look back at the hotel. A face loomed at her, centimetres from her cheek. The mouth was partially covered by a scarf. Eyes peered from deep sockets. The breath from the gash-like mouth above the scarf congealed on her cheek.
