Vicious Circle

I strolled across to a crash barrier that offered a scenic view of the westbound carriageway, and leaned against it, just taking in the sights for a moment while I got myself into the mood. It had turned into a crazy day, and an even crazier evening. I ought to be curled up around a half-empty bottle of whisky right about now, but here I was with miles to go and promises to keep. The dull ache in my head and neck had come back, too, and there was a hot, itchy feeling behind my eyes. I was definitely coming down with something, and I wished I knew what the hell it was.

There was a faint smell of wood smoke on the wind, as though someone was burning a bonfire in one of the gardens nearby—kind of an odd thing to do in May, though, and just for a moment it gave me an odd, dizzying sense of rushing forward through time. Like I’d only been here five minutes and already it was autumn.

I fished the doll’s head out of my pocket. Tentatively, I traced the line of the cheek with the tip of my little finger, feeling the tiny roughnesses where the glaze was starting to crack. It was a miracle it was still in one piece, given the kind of day I’d had. As soon as I touched it, Abbie’s unhappiness welled up and overflowed, traveled up my hand and arm by some sort of psychic capillary action until it filled my head. That was all I needed, really: just a top-up, so I knew exactly what I was aiming for.

I stowed the doll’s head again and took out my whistle. The contrapuntal lines of yellow and red headlights were a little distracting, so I closed my eyes, found the stops by feel and let the first note unfold itself into the night.

For a long time, nothing: just the slow, sad sequence of sounds endlessly descending like a staircase in an M.C. Escher drawing that never really gets to where it’s going.

Then Abbie answered me. Just like the two previous times, I felt her distant presence stir at the limits of my perceptions—a tropism, a blind turning to the music that was herself. Maybe because my eyes were closed I felt it more strongly this time; or maybe ghosts have tidal rhythms that move them like the moon moves the sea. She was there: a long way away, in the dark, but separated from me by nothing except that distance. It was as though I could reach out, pull the city aside to left and right like curtains, and bring her through.

The cutoff, when it came, was instantaneous, but I was ready for it this time, and going by some instinct I couldn’t have explained I banked the music up into a crescendo the instant the contact failed. I can’t say whether or not that made a difference, but it felt like throwing a spear after the fish has broken your line. The sense of direction I’d already got crystallized into something almost painfully precise. Abbie and me, hunter and hunted, caught on opposite ends of the same rigid splinter of sound.

For a long time after I stopped playing, I kept my eyes tight shut and listened to the echoes in my mind. They were still strong. I’d come very close this time, and I had no doubt at all that Abbie had not only heard me but seen me, too. Across the night, across the city, we’d stared into each other’s eyes.

“I’m coming for you,” I murmured. “Don’t be afraid. Whatever you’ve been through, little girl, it’s almost over now. I’m coming to find you.”

“Lovely,” said a man’s voice right beside me. “Can I quote you on that?” My head jerked around so fast it almost came off my shoulders—or at least, that was how it felt; the ache seemed to have become both sharper and deeper.

The man leaning on the crash barrier next to me had a slender, hawk-beaked face, black hair as slick as an otter’s arse, and the sour, what’s-this-stink-under-my-nose expression of a hanging judge faced with a drunken football hooligan at a Saturday night remand hearing. He had the kind of build that people call wiry—skinny, but the overall impression was of a stick that’s been sharpened for a purpose, not something that’s just wilting for lack of sustenance. His white raincoat was pristine, and it contrasted so boldly with the black suit underneath it that I found myself thinking of a priest’s robes. Yeah, that was it: not a judge, a priest taking confession. Your sins will be taken down and may be used in evidence against you.

“Felix Castor,” he said. His voice was soft and cultured, and so empty of emotion it reminded me for a moment of the programmed voice of Stephen Hawking’s vocoder.

“Hey, me, too,” I answered, holding out my hand. “What are the odds on that?”

He looked at my outstretched hand for a moment, then studiedly looked away. Pity. Skin contact might have told me a lot, and I could have done with some crib notes right about then.

“Playing it for laughs,” he observed. “Well, why not? The gift of laughter enriches life. No, you can call me Gwillam, if you want to call me anything. And my sense of humor mostly turns on things that would make you weep.”