He pointed them out to Cadell. The Old Man’s face greyed.
“Yes, I see them. In truth, I’ve been ignoring them. They are the mute ruin of peoples’ lives, rising up like a cruel ghost. I hope some people managed to escape.” He shook his head, as though he thought it unlikely, and turned his gaze once more in the direction they were headed and mumbled, half to himself. “The world just keeps getting worse. But then that has been the case for a long time now. The question is, did Chapman hold out?”
After seeing those silent columns of smoke, a taciturn gloom settled on them that nothing was able to break. David was almost happy when darkness descended obliterating the sight. Until a hot storm came with it and their clothes were again soaked to the bone.
However, as the rain came in and the night, Cadell’s mood changed. He became nervy, not exactly afraid, but close to it.
The thought of something that could rattle Cadell was enough to worry David. Quarg Hounds and Roilings had been dealt with almost without blinking and yet their approach to Uhlton was being met with such trepidation.
“We’re getting close,” Cadell said, his first words in hours, and fell into a kind of disturbed silence broken by interludes of nervy mumbling that kept David on edge.
Which was, perhaps, why David saw Uhlton first – well, the few specks of light that betrayed its existence in the rainy murk of evening. He thought of the sleepy village he had seen in maps (and with the powder), built above the river. A place far from politics and Vergers, somewhere he might manage to score some Carnival – if he could just slip away.
“I can see it,” he shouted, hoping to lift Cadell’s spirits, and because he was genuinely excited. “There, to the south west, the town of Uhlton.”
“Good,” Cadell said. “How very clever of you. We’ll be there soon”
“And where in Uhlton is there?” David asked.
“Never you mind,” Cadell mumbled. “Got to keep some mystery in your life.”
Uhlton was not as David imagined. Built on a ridge above the swollen lake, it was a cramped and crowded village, and anything but sleepy. Steamers docked and undocked at a long quay, men shouted and swung thick ropes around bollards as they guided their pilots with hand signals and curses, working busily even at this late hour. The river seemed almost as busy as Mirrlees itself.
The roads leading to the town were in poor repair. The River Weep sustained this township as it did Mirrlees and Chapman. Around Uhlton, besides a few tilled fields, the land was bare or forested, without the river the town would die.
As they approached, someone released a flare into the sky; blue flame illumined the sky like a third moon. Cadell slumped down on a large pale stone, marking the edge of the town. Dim double shadows stretched behind him. He let out a long, resigned breath and rested his chin on his hands.
“They’ve seen us now,” he said. “There’s little reason to go on. They will come and get us, and I am too weary. We will wait here.”
A second flare rocketed skywards. From the township rolled a horse-drawn carriage, its driver tall, lamps dangled from its corners.
Back the way they had come lightning scarred a black and starless sky and the northern horizon rumbled and boomed. Though they were scarcely more than a hundred miles from Mirrlees it was as though they stood in another land entirely.
The carriage came to a halt beside them and the driver cracked his whip in the air – the horses didn’t blink, he obviously did this a lot. “State your business in Uhlton,” he said curtly, swinging the whip in lazy circles around his head.
“I have an appointment with the Mayor and his second in command,” Cadell said.
The driver laughed, and there was threat implicit in that sound as much as any cracking whip. “Mayor? None go by that name here, kind sir.”
Cadell grinned, an equally threatening grin. “Don’t be so disingenuous; you know who I need to speak to. And you’d best hurry, I am hungry.” Cadell flashed his teeth. “I must talk to Buchan and Whig. Unless of course, they have passed away or been driven out.” Cadell sounded almost hopeful.
The driver’s eyes narrowed, and he peered at them through the gloom, one hand lifting a lamp to better aid his scrutiny. David’s eyes watered in all that light.
“They’re here,” the driver said, clearing his throat significantly. “But not for much longer.” Then he whistled, his eyes widening then narrowing, expressions so bordering on caricature David couldn’t tell if he was serious or taking the piss. “Oh, I know of you, you’re that Engineer, the one with the cruel sense of humour and the taste for Vergers. We’ve a portrait of you on our dartboard. Buchan would speak to you, yes indeed.”
Cadell looked up at the driver, irritation passing across the Old Man’s face like a storm, he stood taller and taller, and the driver seemed to shrink.
“We are tired,” Cadell said sounding at once tired yet energetic enough to possibly rip off a certain driver’s face. “Very tired. Take us to the village or strike us with that ridiculous whip, just do something! I’ve no patience for this.”
The driver nodded at the door to the carriage. “Get in,” he said quietly.
David and Cadell clambered inside. The cabin was musty, though the seats were clean. David could not understand what had just gone on, he looked to Cadell for explanation and Cadell stared back at him stonily. “Our greeting here may be less than civil, but then it is my fault.” His voice softened as though to reduce the blow of the words that followed. “People have invested rather a lot in me, and I have yet to deliver.”
David could understand that bitterness. He possessed a fair share of it towards Cadell, himself. However, perhaps he shouldn’t have nodded so readily in agreement.
Cadell glared at him, but it lacked even the pretence of self-righteousness. “David, there are some things over which I have little control. Certain liberties wrested from me in ages past. Makes me grumpy. Makes me dangerous. I am not one whom most people would be comfortable knowing, and I don’t blame them. I gather hatred like a coat gathers dust.”
The carriage bounced into the town, David always watching with an addict’s hunger, seeking out places he might score Carnival. The pub, a back street. He cast his gaze about the people at work, dismantling the town in most cases it seemed, looking for the tell-tale signatures of Carnival addicts. The slightly jerky walk, the dull smile.
In catching its suggestion (here, a man wandering aimlessly down Main Street. There a fellow pausing languidly between swings of an axe) he felt at once excited and disgusted with himself. He knew that Cadell had been deliberately lowering the amount given. A week or two at that rate, and he might not need any of the drug at all. The thought terrified him.
The carriage stopped at the front door of what David took to be the town hall. He’d seen his fair share, dragged to this outlying township or that with his father.
Cadell got out, doffed his hat at the driver and walked over to the door. David followed.
Cadell raised a fist to knock but before he struck wood, the door swung open. Framed in the doorway was a man seven feet tall at least. He reached down and shook Cadell’s hand, enclosing it completely in his grip as he did so.
“Cadell!” He cried. “It is so good to see you. It has been far too long.”
Cadell nodded. “Far too long indeed,” he said absently. “Is he in?”
“We were wondering if you might come a calling after what happened with the Dolorous Grey. Trouble does follow you, sir.” He turned to David and shook his hand warmly. “And you must be Mr Penn, it’s an honour, sir. I’ve heard so much about you, your father was so proud. Oh, but I’m getting ahead of myself. I am Mr Eregin Whig.”
“ The Mr Whig?”
Mr Whig blushed, a truly remarkable glow because his face was so pale. “If by that you mean, once deputy Mayor of Chapman, yes. Now I am just an exile.”