A Madness of Angels: Or the Resurrection of Matthew Swift (51 page)

thing that was done
, and because our stay in hospital had taught us that ice cream was a thing never to be refused, in any weather. Then we stood out on the balcony and watched the reflection of the tourist cruisers’ lights on the river, the buses on the bridge, the tracery of little blue lamps in the trees along the bank, and listened to the comments of other people with their ice creams on the terrace below.

 

“Well…”

 

“… yes…”

 

“I think
he’s
awfully good, don’t you?”

 

“Well…”

 

An audience of disconcerted people, I decided – they didn’t know if what they were seeing was good, bad, clever, inane, witty or crude, and this was, I decided, probably a good thing. They could walk away after the second half and not know what to think, and for that, they would probably think about it all the more.

 

The bell rang for the second half. I filed back in and resisted the temptation to press the big red button, until my fingers itched with desire. There was a buzz on the air, a tingling all of its own quality, a thick swish of bronze potential, elusive, edgy, aware, as the play resumed and all those minds concentrated on a small space with three shouting men in it, a focus and a magic so absorbing that we almost didn’t notice ourself being sucked in, becoming part of that state of crackling hot thought that filled the theatre.

 

Just an edge, just a moment, a blink of green awareness, a flash of a thought not entirely directed on the play?

 

Hard to tell.

 

The play’s hero, although it wasn’t a term that could really be applied, murdered his brother for killing by stories, and was eventually shot for his pains. A nicer outcome didn’t seem…
right
, although we couldn’t say why. The bad cop turned out to be not such a bad cop; though, again, “bad” left no space for the imagination. We decided that the best thing was not to try to guess, and to be unsettled. It was, strangely, a sensation we enjoyed, although we could not understand why we should be elated by such unease and uncertainty about the last three hours’ experience, as if it was the adrenalinrush of fear.

 

When the lights went up and the applause faded down, the lady to my left said, “Well!”

 

The man to my right said, “Interesting.”

 

The tubby woman in the row in front of me said, “Oh,
he
was really very good!”

 

I picked up my coat and bag and joined the long shuffle of a large audience trying to get through a small door to fresher air. As we walked past the big red button, our hand reached out instinctively and, as fast as only the spark can fly, we pressed it.

 

Nothing happened.

 

My face turned red and, head bowed, we sidled away, feeling all the more bemused.

 

I felt no desire to wait and see if anyone might approach me in that place – after such a sleepless night, I wasn’t in the mood for games or deceits. Besides, there was a safety in the crowd; I doubted Bakker would be interested in harming me in front of so many people, assuming he could spot me at all.

 

A flash of awareness, a bright spark of familiarity among the buzz of voices.

 

“Yes, obviously a use of religious imagery…”

 

“… very interesting…”

 

“… what have we seen
him
in?”

 

“Come be and be…”

 

I turned on the stairs and nearly walked into a lady with curly white hair wearing more padded silk than it seemed plausible that her small, bony frame could support without tottering or getting a rash. I apologised and kept moving with the flow of the crowd down the stairs. At the bar in the halfway foyer I paused while waiters swept away used plastic cups and champagne glasses, and scanned the crowd; but the density of people I had counted on to protect me also obscured anything that might be familiar. I kept walking. On the ground floor, a sign said, “If your bag is bigger than this” – a square the size of a small suitcase – “you MUST leave it at the cloakroom.” I patted my satchel, roughly twice the size indicated, which had stayed next to me all the time, and felt a thrill of guilty, criminal pleasure.

 

I let out a long breath and tried to clear my head. The difficulty I had in focusing on anything other than stories and images and happy green pigs – another theme of the play – hinted at a further reason why Bakker’s note had suggested the theatre; it was hard to sense any power in that place, that didn’t flash in the crowd itself with a transient glow. A trick, perhaps, to lure us to a place where we, more than ever I would have been before, risked becoming lost in a stranger spell?

 

“Mr Swift?”

 

The voice came from behind me, and our immediate instinct was to throw our bag at it and worry afterwards about what spell could follow. However, the owner of the voice looked too bemused and unarmed to merit the black eye that our jerking elbow desired to give, being a young woman wearing the heavy, slightly embarrassing T-shirt of a theatre stewardess. She said again, “Mr Swift?”

 

“Yes?” I stuttered, surprised to find I hadn’t answered already.

 

“Your uncle asked if you could help him.”

 

“My…?”

 

“With the wheelchair.”

 

“Right. Yes. Of course. Where is he?”

 

“He’s attending the sponsors’ drinks.”

 

“Sponsors…”

 

“Mr Swift?”

 

“Yes?”

 

“Are you all right?”

 

“Yes. Fine. I didn’t realise he was such a patron of the arts.”

 

“He said to tell you not to mind the crowd. He was very insistent I said so.”

 

“I’m sure he was. Could you show me the way?”

 

 

The sponsors’ drinks were in a bar with almost no windows, and a lurid decor of mirrors, uncomfortable furniture and odd angles. Men in black and white served champagne, and nibbly things made from tiny slices of fish and puffs of pastry. The theatre clearly needed a lot of sponsors to fund its plays, and some of the rich and the cultured had spilled out onto the landing. There, they sipped their drinks and indulged in banter about how
he
had actually slept with
her
back when
they
were running the theatre, and the only reason
they
put on such old-fashioned plays was because of the influence of
them
.

 

In the face of so many people’s importance, we felt small – and so, rebellious. We were pleased that our coat was scruffy, stained with faded paint, that our satchel was soaked through with ink marks and that our hair was badly combed; we were grateful for the looks of uncertainty and unease in the face of our charity-shop trousers and thrown-away trainers; and I was glad, just a bit, to see how one or two of the more discerning theatregoers flinched away from the blueness of our eyes.

 

In one corner a cluster of champagne-quaffing men and women were gathered round a shape. I went towards it, knowing instinctively what was behind that wall of silk and linen. As I approached, I heard the voice, still rich and wry like it had been when I was a boy, with that humorous air of putting on a performance and loving it, the attention and the buzz of being admired, that showmanship he’d always relished, back before he was in the wheelchair: “Tell me if you spot an anonymous, we can ask if they’re in it for the drinks as well.”

 

I leaned past the nearest member of the crowd, and looked down.

 

It was a new wheelchair; odd, perhaps, that this should be the first thing I spotted. Perhaps other realisations were also there in my unconscious, but too afraid to come out and make themselves known – whatever the explanation, that’s what I saw first. It was a stylish thing, all light titanium and smooth edges, tailor-made to his shape, unlike the crude hospital wheelchair I’d last seen him in; he wore it like a model might wear a pair of glasses, as if at any moment he might leap out of it to a cry of “Why, Mr Bakker, you’re beautiful!”, and amaze the audience with his agility and strength. It didn’t look like a tool for dealing with his paralysis, nor the thing in which he would almost certainly die, but just a piece of metal clothing, or some family-inherited piece of furniture that he’d sat in as a lively child.

 

We were surprised at how relaxed and friendly he looked: a rich old gentleman who loved the theatre and wanted to spread that love. Despite my memories of how he once was, throughout years and years of acquaintance, the sense we’d had of him when he’d called to us in the telephone and begged us to come and give him some of our strength had been of a withered, hulking thing, a black spot of consciousness just beyond our reach, who we had shied away from as he extended his thoughts into our domain. But here, we were astonished to see his smile, even brighter than the sense of his magic that we had tasted in the past.

 

He noticed me the moment I saw him. He kept on talking, eyes darting to my face, and then away, smile still in place, chatting to a lady in gold earrings and a shimmering dress to match, about the tragic trend towards revivals rather than original art in the West End, and whether the dumplings in Chinatown were to be trusted. To our surprise, we found ourself getting interested, curious to hear his opinions as he talked on about theatre and music and food – things that I’d always meant to learn about, but had never had the time.

 

It was only at a natural pause in the conversation – and it was quite clearly a full stop imposed politely at the end of a theme – that he looked us straight in the eye and said, “Hello, Matthew. I’m glad you could make it.”

 

“Hello, Mr Bakker.”

 

“I don’t think you know anyone here, yes?” The smile, still bright, a little laugh as he looked round at the people gathered around his chair and, God help us, they laughed too, feeding off his presence and character as if he was weaving an enchantment even then – and perhaps he was. There was a gentle tracery of power about him, subtle and hard to distinguish – but they laughed when he laughed, even though they did not know who I was or why I looked afraid.

 

“No. I don’t think we’ve met.” We sounded empty. We didn’t know what we were meant to put into the words.

 

“I may be rude, then, and skip the introductions; good manners are important but when there’s this many people the names tend to just blend into one unless you know who you’re talking to. Everyone, this is Matthew – my nephew, in a way.”

 

“‘In a way’?” said one lady in a voice that could have resonated glass, and now I noticed the little tape recorders in odd pockets, hints and clues that this night was about more than the drinks and that everyone was on display. Another reason, perhaps, to feel safe in the crowd? I couldn’t imagine Bakker doing anything in front of the press – however, I still didn’t feel inclined to sample the champagne.

 

“A sort of godson, nephew, surrogate cousin relationship,” explained Bakker airily. “I knew Matthew when he was just a spotty kid, didn’t I?”

 

“Yes. You did.”

 

“Do you like the theatre?” asked the same woman, favouring me with a glance like two hot needles in the eye.

 

“What we’ve seen, very much, although it is a little frightening. I never really got into it in the old days.”

 

“Frightening?”

 

“You let yourself fall into a spell, willingly,” we explained. “You know that it is there and you allow yourself to be deceived. It is a powerful magic that can enchant someone who is knowingly aware of the illusion.”

 

“The magic of theatre!” chuckled a man through a monstrous fly-trap of a moustache.

 

“Even bad plays?” asked the woman.

 

“We don’t really know how to judge.”

 

“Matthew,” said Bakker quickly, “would you like something to drink?”

 

We met his eyes squarely. “No. Thank you.”

 

“To eat? I think there’re vol-au-vents of some kind.”

 

“No.”

 

“Well, please yourself,” he said with a shrug. “Forgive me, all – Matthew, could you wheel me in the direction of the bathroom, please?”

 

 

I did wheel him in the direction of a bathroom, but took him no further than the foyer outside. We were still in comfortable proximity to the buzzing noise of sociability, but far enough away so that the conversation was merely a pitch and yaw of polite sound, rather than distracting words and sentiments to be understood. He put on the brakes of his chair and smiled at me, gesturing at a staircase with an inviting hand. I sat down on one of the steps so that my face was level with his, leaning my elbows on my knees and bending in towards them to create a small target, huddling like a child, like I’d sat in front of him all those years before.

 

He didn’t speak, just sat in the chair and studied me head to foot, the smile not fading as he raised and lowered his head, quite clearly observing my clothes, my face, my eyes, my expression, reading everything about me and taking it all in, without a glimpse of feeling either way. We let him look and waited, patiently.

 

Finally he said, “You look well.”

 

I grunted, unimpressed.

 

“You probably need a haircut,” he added.

 

I resisted the temptation to run my fingers through my hair at his glance, but only just.

 

“Your coat – it’s not quite the old one, is it?”

 

I shook my head.

 

“But still enchanted. A delicate, subtle whiff, yes? Anonymity, the beige jacket of anyone in the crowd. Not quite invisibility – but close enough.”

 

“It’s been to the cleaners a bit.”

 

“It’s a good coat. A sorcerer should always have a good coat, with deep pockets and proper waterproofing. Only an idiot wastes their time trying magically to ward against the rain – getting soggy socks is important.”

 

“Why?” I said, knowing the answer from the olden days but still wanting to ask.

 

“So that when you get home you can take them off and put them up in front of the fire and let your clothes steam, while drinking a hot cup of tea and feeling your skin dry out of all its wrinkles.”

 

“That’s important?”

 

“Of course it is,” he said with a tight smile. “It is a reminder that we are part of our own flesh, not a blazing magical fire in the sky. Or a signal in a wire.”