Little Egypt (Salt Modern Fiction) (25 page)

I wasn’t cold; oddly
it
wasn’t cold, though Osi was, chill and absolutely stiff. The shadows were more solid than the light. There was a secret language in the creaking and the clicking of the shrubs trying to right themselves after the catastrophe, and the bush that Osi broke breathed sourly from underneath him. Nine came picking through the shrubbery to see what was happening, sniffed Osi’s scalp, marbled her eyes at me and stalked away, tail lifted in eloquent disdain.

And then I heard ‘Sisi,’ and a battering in my chest swept away my breath, until he called again and I recognized the voice as Spike’s. I got up, so stiff, chilled after all, sitting in the damp for hours, perhaps, I don’t know, time gone strange and slippery.

Spike was on the other side of the gate. Rust on the bars, you could taste it on the air, reminding me of the old gate where I used to swing – that would be right in the middle of the dual carriageway now – the ghost of a girl swinging, longing for a motorcar to come, as the traffic ploughed right through her.

‘I came to say I’m going home,’ said Spike.

He looked different in some way; I couldn’t place it. In the bright light I could see a spot beside his mouth and a sprouting of young blonde whiskers.

‘Home?’

‘The States. Are you OK?’

I looked down at my filthy self, crusted white with bird all on my clothes and Lord only knows about my face and hair.

‘You are an angel, dear,’ I told him.

He looked a little shifty, embarrassed. ‘Thank you, Ma-am.’

‘Is there anything you want?’ I said. It was the stud on his eyebrow that had gone, all the studs taken out, leaving him punctuated with tiny holes.

‘See.’ He bit savagely at his thumbnail. ‘See, I wondered if, you said I could take anything I wanted from the house, well if you had something I could sell, then I could buy my ticket home.’

I was touched that he asked. He could have taken anything. Stolen anything from me. You hear the vilest things on the wireless. Talking to him through the bars it seemed as if one of us was imprisoned.

‘I don’t want to ask my folks,’ he said.

I could see that, after all his anarchist bluster, to have to crawl back with his tail between his legs would have been humiliating.

‘I’ve
got
a
little
job
for
you,
and
in
return
you
can
take
anything
you
like,’
I
said.
‘There
isn’t
a
fat
lot
left
of
value,
but
there’s
still
some
pieces,
some
jewellery
of
Evelyn’s
–
my
mother’s,
that
is.’

‘Pleased to oblige,’ he said. His hands were curled around the bars of my portcullis.

I went into the house to get the key. My legs were soft, knee jagging viciously, hot while the rest of me was cold. Everything takes so long now. Oh how I used to flit about when I was a girl, everything working without having to give it a thought. Moving around now is like operating a complicated machine, one that grows stiffer with every passing day.

‘It’s Osi,’ I told him as I opened the gate.

He blenched but said, ‘Sure, no problem.’

‘Come on,’ I said.

Without another word he followed, and took my arm and helped me struggle through the undergrowth. I don’t know what he must have been expecting, but when he saw Osi flung face down in an attitude of flight he gave a startled yelp and dropped to his knees.

‘He flew,’ I explained, deciding that he might just as well understand the logic of it. ‘Horus rescues Osiris from death, you see, the falcon, see his beak.’ As I spoke I saw the paling of Spike’s lips and added swiftly, ‘Of course,
I
know he is a man, really, but that is what he thinks, thought, I’m sure of it, so you see for him it was a good end and not as bad as it might appear.’

His lips moved silently.

‘So you see, it’s quite all right,’ I added.

After a few moments he gathered himself enough to ask, ‘Have you called the cops?’

‘No dear, no need for that. You see, I know what he would want me to do now.’

It was difficult to convince him that there was no need to bring any authorities in. It took time. I was surprised how law abiding he was deep down. But with the promise of items to sell to fund his journey home, he overcame his scruples. Though he was slightly built he proved strong. I could not look or take part while he shouldered Osi and took him down the garden.

It took us hours to uncover the icehouse door, or took Spike hours, it was too much for me. Brambles had grown over the icehouse like a crown and what a shame it seemed to rip them up, disturb the creatures: a hedgehog, centipedes, birds’ nests and all manner of scuttling, buzzing creatures; quite a little world destroyed. And Mary’s resting place. The padlock was still there and still locked, but the wood of the doorframe had rotted and Spike managed to prise it open. No bad smell came out, I’ll have you know, only the scent of earth, of darkness; breath of the end.

I could not be there when he put Osi inside and it took all my flagging strength to carry things out of the house and down the garden ready for the burial: three tins of pat
é
, some Dairylee, there were no cream crackers left so I brought oatcakes. I brought the tin opener and a gravy boat that might be silver. I lugged out some of his more portable artefacts and a few books, including
The Egyptian Book of the Dead
, which would surely be useful. Hastily I cut a row of hand-holding shabtis. I brought out soap and a pair of Arthur’s cuff links, silver with a greenish stone. I put these offerings on the ground while Spike worked away, ripping his forearms on the brambly thorns.

During the work he stopped every hour or so to smoke a cigarette, rolling a big one and adding herbs to it. Each time he stopped I offered to make tea, but he would drink nothing except water from his own bottle. His eyes were red, and dusk was falling by the time Osi was safely tucked away down there with Mary and Dixie (I did not stay to watch for that) and all his grave goods with him.

For Osi to join Mary in the Afterlife (
his
Afterlife, I want no such thing) is
correct
and I know it from the peace that settled right through my bones when Spike had hauled the brambles back across the icehouse, obscuring it from sight.

He’d worked all afternoon and I was touched by the scratches on his arms and cheeks, the leaves caught in his snaky hair, his
breathlessness,
and all on my behalf. You see, Spike was like an angel, to me, setting me free. And once it was done he consented to stay for tea, though insisted, while he was rinsing his hands, on washing some cups and plates in readiness. I endeavoured not to take offence. We dined on blackcurrant tarts, feta cheese, spicy peppers from a jar and, as well as tea, drank gin and tonic, ready-mixed in handy tins. I lit the lamps and the candles to dispel the gloom and it was a pleasant and melancholy little wake we had in all the flickering. I didn’t want him to go. I didn’t want to be alone in the house, not that Osi had been any company at all, but still he had been
there
.

‘Go upstairs,’ I told him, and described where he would find Evelyn’s jewellery box, in the bottom of her wardrobe. He was rather reluctant to go upstairs in the dark, what with the pigeons, but went off with an oil lamp and I heard a creaking to tell me he was upstairs and he was up there long enough for the house to start up its whining and wingeing and for tiredness to roll over me in waves. There were tears like beads of wax stuck in my eyes but they wouldn’t melt till I was alone. My knee throbbed and the house throbbed along with it as if it was the centre, the heartbeat, and Mary was there, scolding me for something with that flick of dimple and when I was a girl I used to hold pencils to my cheeks, digging hard in to train dimples in, but all I got was graphite smudges.

Spike drove Mary away by coming in surrounded by a cloud of bird stink, bearing the leather box in his arms like one of the three kings, I thought,
bearing gifts from Orient are
and the tune of that got in my head. When Grandpa was still alive and all the servants, there used to be a Christmas party in the ballroom, oh that fox with the feathers in his mouth, oh my poor dear spudgies.

In the box were necklaces with glittering stones, a scarab brooch, a bracelet that looked like diamonds, but surely not? Rings and earrings, pearl and jade and amethyst. Evelyn rarely wore a jewel but for her plain gold wedding band and where had that gone? Stolen by some Egyptian devil, I must suppose. Victor’s medals were in the box too, tarnished against their stripy ribbons.

We spread the treasures on the table amongst the crumbs, and in the waxy light they glittered and gleamed. Nine sprang up to look and sat, neat chinned as an Egyptian cat, as Bastet, eyes aslit, tail tidied round her legs.

‘Are you sure?’ Spike picked out a pair of dangling ivory earrings.

‘Take them and that and that,’ I said. In truth I didn’t care; the things were jabbing and pricking and pinching at my memories of Evelyn and her distance; anyway, she never liked them very much, only wore jewels when she dressed up and that was seldom.

‘My mom would love these.’ He was dangling a smaller pair, garnet and gold, shaped like tiny birds, up to the light.

‘Your
mom?’
I
repeated,
and
oh,
he
looked
so
young
then,
such
a
silly
baby
boy
run
away
from
home.
‘Give
them
to
your
mom,
by
all
means,’
I
said,
‘but
take
something
else
to
sell
for
your
ticket.
This,
maybe?’
I
held
up
the
bracelet.
What
if
it
was
diamonds?
Surely
Evelyn
would
have
sold
it
to
fund
her
wild
goose
chase.

‘Tell me about your mom,’ I said. What a sweet little bob of a word. Evelyn never even let us call her mother and that was mean of her, when we, or I at least, so wanted to. ‘Mother,’ I said now.

‘Pardon?’ said Spike.

‘Tell me about her,’ I said. ‘Your
mom
.’

Spike shook his head, making the snakes dance. ‘Oh she’s OK, she’s cool,’ he said, and looked as if he might be fighting tears. I averted my eyes to allow him to compose himself. He took a sip from his tin before he continued. ‘It’s my pop that’s the prick, excuse me, Ma-am.’

‘Prick,’ I repeated and laughed.

‘He sells white goods,’ he said. ‘Washers and dryers and dishwashers. Kitchen stuff. Iceboxes, microwaves. Wants me to join the firm.’

‘So you ran away.’

He looked abashed. ‘Didn’t go home,’ he corrected. ‘And fought with my brother who’s all like
yes sir, anything you say sir
.’

‘Make it up,’ I said. ‘You need your family.’

He had blackcurrant in the corner of his mouth and a blurring in his eyes. ‘OK if I take these?’ He lifted the bird earrings and the diamond-effect bracelet.

Stephen had told me that once I’d signed over Little Egypt I’d never need another penny in my life. U-Save would take care of all my bills, all my living expenses. I didn’t need this stuff. ‘Take it all,’ I said, then changed my mind, ‘I’ll keep the scarab,’ I decided. It was carved from a dark stone inlaid with carnelian, jasper, lapiz. If I’d known that it was there I would have sent it off with Osi, but too late. And Osi had flown away on falcon’s wings.