There is no reply so he tries again, knocking even harder. He waits. Hammers the wood again. On the other side of the door, he then hears a voice, or at least a groan. After knocking again and listening hard for a response, he tries the door handle. It creaks around one full turn and the door opens. Wiping his brow, Dante walks into the dark humid office.
Something stinks in here. In Eliot's undersea world, the fumes of stale booze and unwashed skin fill the air. Dante nearly gags, coughing instead to clear his throat. In response, there is a slow movement over by the desk. Someone moans and shifts their weight in a chair. Squinting through the gloom, he tries to identify the fuzzy shape in the dark corner. 'Eliot?' he whispers.
Only a little sunlight struggles through the curtains behind the desk, but in it he can see the shape of a man, slumped across books and papers, with one arm stretched out beside the silhouette of a whisky bottle. 'Eliot?' Dante asks again, tottering further into the dank study. He bangs his leg against something before the desk and staggers sideward. Thinking better of swearing, he moves around the chair he's stumbled over, and makes his way to where Eliot sleeps. 'Eliot. It's Dante. We need to talk.'
A messy grey head rises off the desk into a band of sunlight made grubby by the unwashed drapes. Coughing, the figure shifts about on the chair before pushing its legs out. This is not the confident figure that strolled the length of a pier or sent his debunkers running for cover, but a sunken, waxy-faced drunk. After belching, Eliot chews something that has gathered in his mouth. Dante winces at the smell emanating from his dishevelled clothes — the same linen suit he wore to the Orientation. One lapel is now streaked with a stain. 'You all right?' Dante asks.
'Water,' the deep voice gasps, before losing itself in a second ragged fit of coughs. Preferring the stale basement air to the stench in Eliot's room, Dante wanders back down the corridor and finds a bathroom on the left side. From the waste-paper bin, he grasps a plastic cup and fills it with water. Stumbling back to the study, he spills half over his hand. Upon re-entering the room, he watches Eliot attempt to stand. When he succeeds in getting his back straight, Eliot then clutches his forehead and slumps back into his chair. With reluctant fingers he proceeds to pull something from his mouth that looks like a tendril of wet hair.
Wiping his nose, which drips with a milky sweat, Dante places the plastic cup before Eliot. With a shaky hand, Eliot cradles the cup from the desk to his mouth and gulps at the water. When it is gone, he drops the cup on the floor. Turning in his chair, Eliot fights with the curtains and unlatches a window. The curtains sway and Dante is instantly glad of the cool breeze that slips through. Muttering, Eliot pulls the curtain aside to illumine the stranger in his study. With Dante suddenly swathed in white sunlight, Eliot makes no effort to speak or move. Breathing heavily, he just stares at Dante, his weathered face etched with surprise, or is it disappointment?
Swaying from side to side, with the fever now coating his entire upper body with sweat, Dante leans against the desk. 'We need to talk. About Beth.'
'Not now.'
'Yes,' he says. 'I'm worried.'
Eliot stares at him. Yes: it is dismay he can read in Eliot's expression. 'Is there a problem?' he asks, looking nervous, or agitated.
'Maybe.'
'I only asked you to spend time with a beautiful woman. Do you like girls, Dante?' The voice is stronger now, bassy and verging on impatience, as his worn face begins to clear of its initial bewilderment.
'That's not the point. Is she all right? I mean, does she need help?'
Eliot slouches in his chair. After a moment of silence he begins to laugh derisively, and his pointy body shakes beneath the greasy shirt and loose tie. Tottering on the spot and wiping the sweat off his top lip, Dante flushes hot, but not from the fever. 'Sit down and have a drink,' Eliot says, with what appears to be amused despair, which makes Dante feel ridiculous. But of more concern than the impression he is making with Eliot is the illness, and he begins to wonder if he'll even make it back to the flat without fainting in the street. Nausea forms a slick in his belly.
'Sit down before you fall down,' Eliot says, in a voice that seems to be travelling to him from a great distance. Briefly, Dante's vision breaks up into white pinheads of light. A fresh convulsion lurches in his stomach. He claps a hand over his mouth and runs to the bathroom.
Gripping the cold porcelain of the toilet bowl, he vomits. Gasping for air, fearing suffocation, and aware of his disgrace, Dante presses his forehead against the rim of the bowl and spits a bitter residue off his bottom lip. His stomach, now empty, still insists on contracting to release a series of dry belches up through his body.
Moving across to the sink, he dunks his head under a stream of cold water and splashes it down the back of his neck. It runs under his shirt and freezes against his spine. Feeling a little better, but astonished at the sudden attack of nausea, he drinks from the cold tap and yanks a dozen paper towels from the dispenser to mop his face.
When Dante re-enters the study, too delicate to feel shame, the window is wide open and the curtains are drawn, halfway across the rail. The whisky bottle is uncapped on the littered desk and he can smell fresh alcohol fumes. There is another spasm in Dante's stomach but nothing follows through. 'Came down with something last night. And these dreams I get… I need to go home.'
Eliot just stares at him, but if Dante isn't mistaken, the man now looks alarmed. Pushing himself away from the chair that he holds to support his weight, Dante turns back toward the door. Every careful step sends a shudder of agony through his head.
'Beth is a strange one,' Eliot says, his voice uncertain. 'Maybe she's hasty. It'll be good… for all of us, if you accept her.'
'She was not alone last night,' Dante mumbles over his shoulder, wanting nothing more than to reach the door. 'I could swear she brought something… someone with her. She made me feel strange. She made me sick.' When he turns in the doorway, he doubts whether he is making any sense, but some part of him still hopes for a response.
Eliot's face is ashen. With his eyes downcast, the man reaches for a glass of whisky, his scarred hand unsteady.
Another ripple of nausea passes through Dante. His skin goes cold all over. As he crosses the threshold of Eliot's study, he thinks of hospital. The room now seems to darken again as if something has moved in front of the sun. He cannot remember ever feeling so weak and now the desk seems so far away too. As he tries to focus on the distant figure of Eliot behind the desk, the light snaps out in his mind.
How he has come to be slumped against the secretary's door is a mystery, but now someone is speaking into his ear. They are shaking one of his shoulders too and holding the rim of a mug to his lips. He guzzles the water, having lost so much fluid with the sweats, and thinks he'll die without the mugful of liquid in his stomach. Gradually, his vision clears and he stares up at Janice Summers. She is crouched over him, her handsome face stricken with worry, and she holds a hand against his forehead. The palm feels cool. He reaches for the hand. In his delirium, it flatters him and pleases him that she would care. An enemy.
'You're not well. You should go home. You are not to come here. Do you hear me?' She speaks quickly, her lipstick-tinged breath especially sharp in his nose. When he tries to move, every joint screams along his back.
'Can I get you a cab?' she asks.
Dante shakes his head and forces himself to his feet. His head weighs nothing and a river of perspiration turns cold between his shoulder blades. 'I'm going home,' he says, and moves away from Janice.