Free The Beating of His Wings by Paul Hoffman

in which, and I mean this kindly, you are sorely lacking.’
    At this last offering, Cale pretended to be asleep, accompanied by exaggerated snores.
    But drifting into the past was a place full of traps. He wanted to remember the first time he had seen Arbell naked – bliss it was to be alive that night. But the pleasure and pain, love and anger, lived too much cheek by jowl for this to take him into another world. Better to stick to wonderful meals, to memories of teasing Vague Henri about the enormous size of his head, of listening to IdrisPukke and getting the last word with everyone. But also he would think and argue with himself and try to work out what he really knew: that the world was like a stream full of gyrations, twirls and weedy entanglements, and that wherever you went the water always leaked through your fingers.
    The room they had now given him was simple enough: a reasonably comfortable bed, a chair and a table, a window that looked out over a pleasant garden full of slender elm trees. It had two luxuries: he slept on his own and he had a key to lock himself in and everyone else out. They’d been unwilling to provide one at first but he had insisted with a degree of vague menace and, having asked the Director of the Priory, they had warily given him what he wanted.
    There was a light tap on the door. He looked through a small hole he had drilled through the thinnest part of the door and, satisfied, he unlocked it with a quick twist and stood well back. After all, you never knew.
    Suspicious, the Priory servant stayed where he was.
    ‘There seems,’ he said, ‘to be a hole in the door.’
    ‘It was like that when I got here.’
    ‘Sister Wray has asked to see you.’
    ‘Who?’
    ‘I believe she has been asked by the Director to investigate your case. She is very highly respected.’
    Cale wanted to ask more questions but as is often the case with awkward people he did not like to appear ignorant tosomeone who clearly disliked him – and for good reason, as this servant was the very person Cale had menaced about having the key. ‘People with charm,’ IdrisPukke had once said to him, ‘can get others to say yes without even asking the question. Having a real talent for charm is most corrupting. But don’t worry,’ he added, ‘that’s not something you’ll ever have to worry about.’
    ‘I’ll take you to her now,’ said the servant. ‘Then I’ll see about the hole in the door.’
    ‘Don’t bother. It creates a nice breeze.’
    He put on his shoes and they left. The servant was surprised to see, given all the fuss he had made, that the obnoxious young man did not bother to lock the door behind him. But as long as he was not in there Cale couldn’t care less who else was.
    In silence they walked through the Priory. Some of it was built recently, other parts were older, other parts older still. There were tall and grim-looking buildings with gargoyles grimacing from the walls, then a sudden change to the elegant and well-proportioned, mellow stone structures with large windows of irregular glass that in one piece reflected the sky and in another the grass, so various and changeable that the building seemed to be alive inside. Eventually, through passages in great walls, the silent pair emerged into a courtyard more pleasing in its scale and engaging simplicity than anything Cale had seen even in Memphis. The servant led him through an arch and up two flights of stairs. Each landing had a door in thick black oak to either side of the staircase. He stopped outside one on the top floor and knocked.



PART TWO

 
 
Lest we should see where we are,
Lost in a haunted wood,
Children afraid of the night
Who have never been happy or good.
    W. H. Auden, ‘September 1, 1939’
     

7
     
    ‘Come in.’ It was a soft and attractive welcome. The servant opened the door and stood back, ushering Cale forward. ‘I’ll be back in an hour exactly,’ he said and pulled the door shut.
    There were two