Sacrament

Once again, he longed to luxuriate in the feeling; but he had no time for such indulgences. He had to keep to his purpose. He stepped away from the wall and perused it. Where his fingers had pierced the soil a tempting luminescence was spilling out. This isn't something my mind's inventing, he thought to himself, his certainty as sudden as it was absolute. The earth and the light it concealed, the fish and the fruit lying on the ashes, all of it was real. Charged with new confidence, he crossed to the nearest door (the room had three) and entered a narrow but immensely tall passageway, which was so clogged with rubbish in one direction that it was impassable. He headed in the other direction for maybe twenty yards, thinking as he went that either the House occupied the entire summit of Kenavara to the limit of the cliffs, or else it was somehow constructed in defiance of physical laws and contained an immensity belied by its perimeters. He was about to turn into another chamber when he heard the sound of somebody sobbing further down the passageway. Following the sound, he passed through a small antechamber into the largest room he had yet discovered; and the most littered. There were heaps of rubbish everywhere, much of it, as before, unrecognizable. But there was also evidence of somebody having tried to make some order of the chaos. A table, with a chair set close by; a pitiful nest of twigs and leaves made in one of the corners, with what looked to be a garment rolled up for a pillow.

He didn't have to look very far to find the man whose dwelling this was; the fellow was kneeling across the room from the door through which Will had entered. There was an elaborate arrangement of rubbish on the ground in front of him, which he was studying as he sobbed, his hands to his face.

Will got halfway across the room before the man looked up. As soon as he did he was on his feet, his hands dropping from his face, which was filthy, but for the places where his tears had run. It was hard to judge his age when he was in such a pitiful condition, but Will guessed him to be less than thirty. His bespectacled features were gaunt, his clogged beard and moustache in severe need of trimming, his greasy hair the same. His clothes were in as beleaguered a state as the rest of him; his threadbare shirt and jeans glued to his malnourished body with filth. He looked at Will with a mingling of fear and disbelief.

'Where did you come from?' he said. By his accent there was a welleducated Englishman under all the dirt.

'I came from ... out there,' Will told him.

'When?'

'Just a few minutes ago.'

The man got to his feet, and approached Will. 'Which way did you come?' he said. Then, lowering his voice, 'Could you find your way back?'

'Yes, of course,' Will replied.

'Oh God, oh God...' the man started to say, his breathing getting faster '... this isn't some trick, is it?'

'Why would I trick you?'

'To make me leave her.' He narrowed his eyes, studying Will with some suspicion. 'You want to have her for yourself ?'

' Who?'

'Diane! My wife!' His suspicion was plainly deepening into certainty. 'Oh that's it, isn't it? This is Rukenau's idea of a bloody joke, trying to tempt me away. Why's he so cruel? I've done everything he asked me, haven't I? Everything. Why can't he just let us go?' His pleas hardened into assertions. 'I'm not going anywhere without her, do you hear me? I refuse! I'll rot here if I have to. She's my wife, and I'm not leaving-'

'I get the picture,' Will said.

'I mean it-'

'I told you: I understand.'

-and if he wants to make me-'

'Will you shut up a minute?'

The man stopped his protests, and blinked at Will from behind his spectacles, his head cocked a little, like a bird.

'I just wandered in here three minutes ago. I swear. Now, can we talk sensibly?'

The man looked a little embarrassed at his outburst. 'So the place caught you too,' he said softly.

'No,' Will said. 'I wasn't caught. I came in of my own free will.'

'Why would you do that?'

'To find Rukenau.'

'You came looking for Rukenau?' the man replied, as though this were tantamount to insanity.

'Yes. Do you know where he is?'

'Maybe,' the man said testily.

Will approached him. 'What's your name?'

'Theodore.'

'Do folks call you Theodore?'

'No. They call me Ted.'

'Can I call you Ted, too? Is that all right?'

'Yes. I suppose so.'

'That's a good start. I'm Will. Or Bill. Or Billy. Anything but William. I hate William.'

'I ... hate Theodore.'

'I'm glad we've cleared that up. Now, Ted, I need you to trust me. In fact, we have to trust one another, because we're both in the same mess, aren't we?' Ted nodded. 'So. Why don't you just tell me about-' he was going to say Rukenau, but he changed his mind at the last minute and instead said -your wife.'

'Diane?'

'Yes, Diane. She's here somewhere, you said?' Again, the downcast eyes and the nervous nod. 'But you don't know where.'

'I know ... vaguely.. .' he said.

Will lowered his voice. 'Has Rukenau got her?'

'No.'

'Well, help me out here,' Will pleaded. 'Where is she?'

Ted's mouth grew tight, and his eyes narrowed behind his smudged spectacles. Again, that birdlike glance up at Will. Then he seemed to decide that he would speak; and out it all came. 'We didn't mean to come in here. We were just out walking, you know; on the cliffs. I liked to birdwatch before I got married and I persuaded Diane to come along with me. We weren't doing anything we shouldn't. We were just walking, watching the birds.'

'You don't live on the island.'

'No, we were on holiday, going from island to island. A sort of second honeymoon.'

'How long have you been in here?'

'I'm not exactly sure. I think we came in on the twenty-first.'

'Of October?'

'No. June.'

'And you haven't stepped outside since?'

'Once I found the door, purely by chance. But how could I leave, with Diane still here? I couldn't do that.'

'So is there anybody else here?'

His voice dropped to a whisper. 'Oh yes. There's him-'

'Rukenau?'

'And there's others too. People who came in like Diane and me, that he's never let out. I hear them, now and then. One of them sings hymns. I've been trying to make a map-' he said, casting a glance down at the arrangement of rubbish on the ground. The twigs and pebbles and little heaps of soil were apparently his attempt to recreate the House in miniature.

'Tell me what's where,' Will said, going down on his haunches beside the map. He felt like a convict plotting an escape with a crazed felon, an impression that was only strengthened by the gleam of pride on Ted's face as he crouched on the other side of the model and proceeded to explain it.

'We're here,' he said, pointing to a spot in the maze. 'I've made this my base of operations. This little white stone over here is the man who sings the hymns. As I said, I've never seen him, because he just runs away when I go near.'

'And what's this?' Will asked, directing Ted's attention to a large space which was criss-crossed with lengths of thread.

'That's Rukenau's room.'

'So we're not that far?' Will said, looking round at the door that he guessed would lead him to Rukenau.

'You don't want to go there,' Ted said to him. 'I swear.'

Will got to his feet. 'You don't have to come with me,' he said.

'But I need you to help me find Diane.'

'If you know where she is, why haven't you fetched her yourself?'

'Because the place she's gone ... it's too much for me...' He looked embarrassed to be admitting this. 'I get ... overwhelmed.'