“No, it is not my wish,” my brother mumbled.
“Yet you sit here willing to violate that historic trust with an act of such foolhardy impetuosity as to rate amongst the most dangerous feats of irresponsibility conceivable. This is why highly trained, level-headed and seasoned brokers do our bidding — why they and they alone are responsible for the interaction of trade which sustains us.”
“Frederick is right, dear,” said Charlotte to her gloomy-faced husband. “It is madness. Don’t think of kidnapping an Outlander even another moment. I’m going up to bed.” With this, my sister-in-law took her yawning leave.
I thought that Charlotte’s summary ruling had put a finish to the debate. Perhaps it had. Perhaps what was subsequently delivered by my irascible brother constituted merely some form of grumbling afterthought: “I don’t purchase your theory, Freddie.”
“What theory is that?”
“The one that states with unequivocal certainty that we would flounder and die in the absence of outside trade. As I see it, nearly everything we take from the Beyonders could be relinquished without insurmountable difficulty. We could easily do without the bananas, the India rubber, the calico and…”
“And tea?” I interrupted. “I see, dear Gus, that you gulp yours down as if it were some life-sustaining elixir.”
“Yes, even my tea. And every other indulgence that makes our lives more agreeable and convenient.”
I was set to counter that not all of our imports could be categorised as superfluities, but my brother gave me no opening, continuing in the same vein, scarcely taking breath. “Why, every milk cow could drop dead to-morrow morning and we would still make our lardy butterine, which tastes exactly the same as the dairy version. No more cotton? We shall wear more wool! No paper? We shall turn our leather into paper-thin vellum, our sheepskin into parchment! We have come a very long way toward total self-sustenance, brother. Apparently you haven’t taken notice.”
I pushed my own cup of tea away, some of it sloshing over the rim. “Why not, then, kidnap the whole lot of the tradesmen, and exact every atom of the information you require?”
“Don’t mock me.”
“I am not mocking you, Gus. I’m attempting, however unavailingly, to demonstrate the ridiculousness of your position. And you should be grateful that Alice isn’t here to see her father in such a puerile state, so as to give further cause for her rebellion.”
“She’s rarely around, so the point is moot. This night is the third in a row that she has spent with her friend Cecilia Pupker. The two have become inseparable.”
A moment of silence ensued. I took breath and pursued in a now somewhat less vexed tone: “Gus. I cannot stress more strongly how grave the consequences should be if you attempt anything that endangers our trading arrangements with the Outlanders, setting aside the fact that you’d be thrown into a gaol cell and never let out again. Perhaps you’ve forgotten, by the bye, that it’s against the law for an unlicensed Dinglian to be found anywhere within the vicinity of the Summit of Exchange on fortnightly Mondays.”
“Then how did you receive special dispensation to go and talk to them about Newman?”
“Muntle.”
“And just how were you able to persuade our ‘shire reeve’ to permit this circumvention of the law?”
“Don’t you recall that the man’s own brother left the valley when he was a boy and never returned? If anyone were able to compassionate your loss, it should be he.”
Augustus nodded.“It was so long ago that I had forgotten. The ones who leave us — we mourn them and then over time the memory of them fades.”
“Muntle’s memory of his brother hasn’t faded. The same way that— well, I shan’t say it. The upshot is that Muntle understands what you and Charlotte are feeling. But he still won’t permit either of us to tread upon our sacred privilege of contact with these Beyonders and would, no doubt, be seised by apoplexy should he learn what you are presently scheming to do.”
Gus sighed and lowered his eyes. “I confess that I did not believe you’d purchase even a small portion of the plan. It was born within a father’s desperate heart and there it will die.”
I placed a comforting hand upon Augustus’ shoulder. “I know that desperation and despair will make a man think and say things that aren’t his wont. And I know as well that sane and sensible men will check themselves.”
Here I told the truth. A part of me did know that Augustus would never have carried out such a dangerous plot — no matter how tormented his state of mind. Augustus wasn’t one to weep, and he remained true to form here, although I would easily have acquitted a deluge of tears from my older brother if he had been at that moment so disposed. These were terribly rough waters that Augustus and Charlotte now found themselves attempting to pilot, and there was no passage in their journey that would not rock and buffet the soul. Charlotte, for the time being, lay deep in slumber upstairs (for I could now hear her stertorous snoring). I guessed that it was probably laudanum she had taken for her nerves, and that it was now doing its quick business. (I didn’t remind my brother that a cessation of contact with the tradesmen carried with it — over time— depletion of all of our medicinal stores, for well nigh all of our drugs came from outside the Dell, including laudanum and every other opiate derivative which had served as effective anodyne to suffering Dinglians for decades.)
The room grew quiet, the Dutch clock, insensitive to all that had previously been bawled and exclaimed and remonstrated, ticking away in automatonic fashion without care or investment. Breaking this interlude of relative silence, Augustus turned to me and said, “Have I permission, Freddie, to come with you on Monday?”
“Muntle presumes that it is only I who will be climbing the ridge for the purpose of colloquy with the tradesmen.”
“But would he raise objection to my joining you?”
“Perhaps I would raise objection. You’re still liable to do something in your present discomposed state that would not be wise.” I did not believe this for a second, but it was important to keep Augustus in league with the narrow purpose of my anticipated meeting.
Augustus shook his head with more force than was his habit.“I promise to let you ask the questions. I will recede. But being allowed to come with you will leastways give me the feeling that I am doing something that may ultimately bring my boy home.”
I agreed to let my brother Augustus enlist in this dubitable cause, and accompany me to the crest of the ridge, the place where Beyonders came fortnightly to give us things.
Would that someone could give us information on Newman. Would that we could learn what had become of him.
Chapter the Eighth. Saturday, June 21, 2003
hat I did not know was this: my nephew Newman was indeed in the Outland — quite alive and quite well. Turn the hour hand of the clock back to eight o’clock that same morning and one gifted with accurate divination would find him in a queer bedroom in a queer Outland house, sitting a bit uneasily upon a queer and unfamiliar bed.