He dug his heels into the mule’s flanks. She took a step. He dug his heels in once more. He no longer knew the why of it. Not the French, not the gold. Not the ghost he carried on his back. But on they went, across the barren plain, their shadow slowly overtaking them.
The sun was high when they cut his father down. But he had not been looking at his father. He could not. Instead he had been looking at the man who was sitting by the fire. Staring at the man. A tightness reaching from his stomach to his throat. A tightness that was like an ache. The man had a length of metal, not much longer than a toasting fork, and he was holding it over the flames. He watched it carefully, head tilted on one side, eyes narrowed against the smoke, turning it and turning it in the hot part of the fire, as if he were cooking some tender morsel and it had to be done just right. The two other men brought his father across the grass. His father breathing hard, as if he had been running. But his legs dragged, and the toes of his boots pointed at the ground. They took his shooting hand, told him to make a fist and raise his thumb. The Marshal stood some distance off, among the trees. He was staring out across a stretch of open country, a cigar wedged horizontal in his mouth. Smoke curled, almost slavish, past his face. He did not acknowledge it. The two men held his father by the upper arms as the rod was lifted, glowing, from the fire. A quick hot sound: one raindrop landing in a pan of fat. His father struggling, and then still.
The Marshal stared out across the open country.
Be a lesson.
His shadow lengthened on the ground. He was heading for a gap in the mountains, a gap he thought he recognised. Looked like the space between fingers and a thumb. But the plain laid out in front, of him seemed endless. Mind the only thing moving. Turning and turning in a fire. Man on a doorstep, fat in a pan. He was seeing white hills, the Cajon Pass in February. Ice hanging from the bridle bits. Teeth chattered in your mouth as if your head were bone and nothing else. You could not get the shiver out of you. And riding north, towards Alaska. Worse. The winter plains, smooth as ironed linen. Soot-grease smeared beneath your eyes against the glare of snow. You had to paint your canvas overcoat to keep the east wind out. Seemed like a kind of heaven to him now. Mind turning in a fire. A quick hot sound. The smell of sealed meat. A ghost clung to his back, delirious. Her shoes swung from the saddlebow. He could not look. The hoofs of their four horses dwindling, his father lying in the grass. His back a mesh of red against the green. And they had written on his thumb. Letters that would bind their lives together. ‘Happy Times,’ his father would always say. ‘That’s what it stands for. Happy Times.’ He could not look. Her laces threaded neatly through the eyeholes. Her heels shaped like sheaves of wheat. He had helped his father to his feet, laid cool dock leaves on the wounds. His father’s eyes more painful than his back. Grapes without their skins. A layer gone, the nerves exposed. All the hope drained out of him. All the pain of that moment facing out.
He could not look.
He thought he must have missed a turning in the dark and ridden into hell. A church was burning. He could see the leap of flames inside. The walls glowed red.
He did not stop.
Windows burst as he passed by. Stained-glass lay in fragments on the street; the mule’s hoofs crunched over it — saints’ haloes, a disciple’s agony, the Lord Himself.
The night was being held against a branding-iron; he could feel it trying to twist away, avoid the crimson tip. Men stumbled past him with blood and ashes on their faces, the corners of their eyes and mouths pulled wide. Two humorous sounds: a pop and then a twang. Something bright flew past his ear. And then a jangling, a splintering. He looked over his shoulder, saw the spire lean down.
A man ran up to him. He was brandishing something that Wilson mistook for a rifle. Only it was golden. The man was shouting.
‘Look,’ he was shouting. ‘I’ve done it. Look.’
He smiled down at the man and nodded, then he pushed the heel of his boot into the mule’s ribs. There was only one destination, and this was not it. He could not stop now. If he stopped, he might never make it.
The ground tilted upwards. All the shouting faded.
Then a face swooped out of the air. No body, just a face. White under its black hat. Skin looped beneath the eyes. He could not remember the face’s name.
‘It’s a miracle. We had given up all hope.’
Hands were fumbling at his clothes. He fought to lift his head. To tell the truth.
‘She’s dead,’ he said. ‘I buried her.’
Another face. Another language. The words that she had murmured. French?
‘I found her. We rode to the water. Then I buried her.’
His vision cleared.
He saw the faces that surrounded him, still as moons in the black air, and awful in their stillness. Only the red light flickering across their foreheads, cheekbones, jaws. His own fingers playing some fast piece. But there was no music that he could hear, no tune.
‘She was sitting right behind me.’ He reached backwards with his hand. Set her straight in the saddle. ‘She was sitting right there.’
Only the faces, hanging in the darkness.
‘You don’t believe me? Look. I’ve got her shoes.’
Still the faces.
He began to laugh. ‘Did it rain here?’
July
Chapter 1
2nd July, 189 –
My dear Monsieur Eiffel,
I scarcely know how to begin. During the past few days we have been exposed to scenes of barbarism and destruction the like of which I hope never to see again. The church is damaged beyond repair. I find it almost impossible to accept that all our good work has been undone.
Then, as if that were not catastrophe enough, Madame Valence disappeared. She was out riding when her horse, startled by gunfire, bolted into the inhospitable desert behind the town. She was missing for a full three days, and would certainly be dead by now, but for the valiant efforts of an American, who knew the country and was prepared to risk his life on her account.
There is little more to say. I am taking her away from this place. We are leaving tomorrow, on a steamer bound for Panama. If news should reach you before I do, I beg you to give it no credence. The events that have befallen us are terrible enough already, without the distortions and extravagance acquired by numerous tellings.
I trust that you will forgive the incoherence of this letter, taking into consideration the utterly dispiriting circumstances under which it was written. Only know that I remain your most humble and obedient servant, and that I have done my utmost on your behalf.
I am yours, respectfully, etc.,
Théophile Valence.
Chapter 2
Through a light curtain of dreams Wilson heard a ship’s siren. The first note short, the second longer. Then, some time later, two more notes, of equal length, but fainter. Opening his eyes he saw windows high up in a pale-yellow wall and a fan revolving slowly, like a piece of hypnotism. The air feathered down on to his face.
‘Ah. Monsieur Pharaoh.’
The doctor was standing at the foot of his bed. He was wearing a waistcoat that resembled a garden in summer: pale-gold roses planted in a field of green.
‘It is I. Dr Bardou.’
Wilson smiled faintly. ‘Who else would wear such a waistcoat?’
‘Why, Monsieur Pharaoh,’ the doctor said, laughing, ‘you are certainly making an excellent recovery. Nobody would ever guess how close you came to death.’
But Wilson’s eyes were still absorbed by the pale roses. ‘I thought they’d all been stolen.’