The Flame of Life (24 page)

‘You'll get no change out of sponger,' Mandy laughed. ‘If he doesn't vote with us he won't get another crust.'

‘He'll feel that bloody road under his feet if he does,' said Handley.

Dean knew he shouldn't smile, but was unable to do anything else to save face. His narrow eyes had no smile in them, only a desire to explain to Handley the truth about his position. He disliked all of them except Enid, but couldn't say so because the idea of pushing on to the Smoke didn't seem so good compared to the lotus-ease of this slack mob. He cunningly kept silent, knowing she would stick up for him.

‘He votes how he likes,' she said to Handley, ‘so stop badgering him. It's wonderful how nasty you can get when you think somebody might be trying to take your power away.'

‘How will you arrange the work?'

‘I've planned it already,' Myra said. ‘There are twelve of us, so three can be on duty every day. That means you work one day in four, which isn't so bad. It should be feasible, with good will all round.'

‘There are thirteen of us,' he pointed out.

‘Dean's not part of the schedule,' Enid told him, ‘being the general caretaker and errand-runner. He'll have plenty to do, don't worry.'

‘He's stunned with drugs most of the time,' Handley said. ‘All he's fit for is sleeping in the car like a dog, on a bowwow trip to the bone factory. I've noticed Cuthbert's not above a little pull at the old weed now and again. Nor is Mandy. Oh yes, I've seen you at it. I know you think I'm a tight-arsed reactionary, but your brains'll get softer than they are already if you keep on with it. You should have more sense than to drag that crap into your lungs. I'll tell you another thing: if anybody in the village gets a whiff of it you'll have the bloody constabulary down on us like a pack of elephants. And if it spreads at the rate it's going, this house will be belching it from the chimneys for everybody to flake out at.'

‘It relaxes you,' said Mandy. ‘Why don't you take some? There'd be more peace in the house.'

There was a glint in Handley's eyes. He had diverted them from the main issue – though this was serious enough. ‘I'm proposing,' he said ‘that we put it to the vote: do we allow drugs on the premises, or not?'

‘It's a matter of free will,' Myra said. ‘If they want to smoke pot there's no harm in it.'

‘If I'm honest with myself,' Handley said, ‘I agree with you. But you're the official householder on this compound, and if the coppers find grass and such stuff they'll get you in court.'

‘He's right,' Dawley said.

‘I smoked it in Tangier,' Myra told them, ‘though I didn't let it get a grip. It's a stupid law that says you can't smoke it, and the general policy of the community is, as I've always understood it, that such rules aren't to be taken notice of. The good laws of society might be necessary from time to time, but not those that try to tell us what we can and can't do with our own minds and bodies.'

‘Hear, hear,' said Richard.

‘I had a smoke the other night,' Enid told them, ‘but it gave me stomach ache.'

Ralph came in with the coffee.

‘I expect he has, as well,' said Handley.

He smiled. ‘Often. I smuggled it when I was on my world trip three years ago.'

‘Everybody smokes it now and again,' said Adam.

‘You too?' Handley demanded.

‘Not much. But I have. Haven't we, Richard?'

Richard reached for a cup of coffee. ‘We had a smoke-in with Maria and Catalina last night, in the Operations Room.'

‘That's why they're always so bloody dopey then,' said Handley. ‘I expect you mix a bit with Eric Bloodaxe's food. He has been a bit quiet lately.'

‘It's an idea,' said Cuthbert.

‘You keep off him,' Handley shouted angrily. ‘That dog's as innocent as driven snow.'

‘In Malaga,' said Maricarmen, ‘there are vendors on every corner selling it. It comes from Morocco, just over the water. It's the peoples' opium though. I hate it.'

Handley lit a cigar. His plan was broken. ‘Don't think you shock me. But don't go smoking it in the shop or pub. I don't mind us being had up for poaching or any other honest to God escapade. We can handle that. But the bastards are red hot on this stuff.'

‘About this domestic issue,' said Enid. ‘Who's in favour of work being shared equally as a duty between men and women?'

Handley stood. ‘Before we go through' with this farce, let me say something else. With thirteen pair of hands there'll be more people than there's work for. So on the grounds of general economy I think we won't be needing the help of Maria and Catalina' – believing that if he could get them sacked before the vote was taken the women might not have a majority.

‘If they go,' said Myra gently, ‘you'll work one day in three instead of one in four, because we'll still win by a small margin.'

He sat down. ‘A bit of good old healthy ballot-rigging has been going on, has it?'

Enid, Myra, Mandy, Ralph, Maricarmen, Dean, Maria and Catalina voted in favour. Handley, Cuthbert, Dawley, Adam and Richard cast against – a majority no one could gainsay.

‘This is the end of peace,' said Handley, before walking out of the room. ‘I don't expect I shall ever paint another picture!'

Everyone was so excited about the new regime that Shelley's notebooks were forgotten. Handley had remembered them, but thought they could stay where they were. Who knew what other bright ideas they might give Maricarmen?

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Dean strolled across the yard and sat by Dawley in a friendly unassuming manner. He lit a cigarette, so that the sweet vegetable pungency of pot flowed from between his lips in pale blue shades. He didn't even smoke it properly, Frank saw, who had done so when he was wounded in Algeria, and it was the closest he could get to anaesthetic. If he inhaled to his toe-nails it would come out the colour of steel, but when he went on to do so Dawley saw that he wasn't such a novice after all.

Had William Posters ever been one? His children certainly were brought up on the art of survival. ‘You've found quite a resting-place here.'

Dean's eyes turned on him in the half darkness: ‘I like it. People help each other. That's good.'

‘You smoke that a lot?'

‘While I've got it. I invested my post office dough in it before I kicked Nottingham. I gen Cuth some this morning, and he's bin stoned all day. He's a good bloke, Reverend Cuth is. Says it's changed 'is life!'

Dawley laughed. ‘He's having you on. He's not new to it. Smoked it at his college.'

‘You want a bit of the old straw?'

‘No thanks. I'm not bleeding to death. Why don't you read a book or two? There's plenty in the house.'

‘Girlie mags?'

It might be a big change if young Bill Posters read a few things. ‘Good books. Go and look.'

‘I'm travelling,' Dean said. ‘I learn a lot from that. My old man says he's allus wanted to travel.'

‘He was too busy running away,' Frank said. ‘You always get back to the same place.'

Dean laughed, and took another long pull. A few minutes passed before he could answer. ‘Ask me in five years whether you do or not.'

He liked his open, ignorant and generous nature. ‘I expect we'll bump into each other somewhere in Nottingham.'

‘Not me,' Dean said, dreamily confident, his words meandering out. ‘I'll never see that Dracula-castle again.'

‘What makes you so sure?'

‘I'm moving.' A minute went by. ‘Moving, I tell you.'

Frank threw his fag-end towards the setting sun. ‘You're sitting still, at the moment.'

A few minutes of peace passed.

‘I'm still moving, though.'

It was no use arguing. Only smoke was moving, and that was a fact. He was too young to reason with. And when he was old enough he'd be too set in his ways. He hadn't had time to get frightened yet. Frank hoped he never would, felt enough of the old Bill Posters in himself to know all about the man on the run from his own spirit and the world that wanted to crush it. It was a perpetual motion of the heart, until the mechanism seized up.

‘What you goin' ter do?' Dean asked.

The question startled him because he often asked it himself. ‘Stay here for the time being. It's a good place to recover in.'

‘What from?'

‘Too much running. I'm trying to get out of the same old track and circle.'

‘I'm in a circle now, and can't get out. Floating. Moving. Flying, I tell you.'

‘That stuff'll kill you,' Dawley said. His words were wasted, and he was tempted to ask for a puff. ‘You'll get softening of the brain. It drugs people who might ask awkward questions.'

‘I'm coming back to life.'

‘Wearing off, is it?'

He stretched himself on the ground. ‘I'm me, now.'

‘Enjoy your kip,' Dawley said. ‘But don't stay long or you'll get pneumonia.'

Not too stoned to ignore the advice, Dean stood up and rubbed his eyes as if he'd been asleep ten hours. ‘Go into the caravan and use the bunk,' Dawley said.

‘Where are you going?'

‘Across to the house.'

Dawley strolled to the steps and leaned against Handley's darkened studio backing on to the paddock. Not smoking or moving, he looked up the slight rise of land towards the skyline and pale stars. An elderberry bush veiled him from the gate, a bush that had proliferated so much since spring that he decided to come and saw it down next morning.

A muted noise drifted from the kitchen, but it was quiet where he was, a necessary peace as long as it didn't mean sloth or idleness. At thirty he felt old enough to be Dean's father – and found the coincidence of the name with his favourite working-class mythological character amusing. Even the William was prominent in it, William Posters Junior who, right from the start, would put up with none of the crap and had slung his hook at so early an age that he would do little damage to himself or others.

Was the world changing after all? Not much. But he felt that he had altered a bit in the three years since leaving home and factory, a short enough period when he looked back on it, though he didn't doubt that time's laws would make his Algerian trip similarly brief when he tried to recall it from the future of ten years ahead. Part of his life was coming to an end, and not knowing how or exactly when almost frightened him in the warm evening air: he was worried about the future, as any self-respecting man ought to be.

Two people walked up the path. He'd been so deep in his problems that they were too close for him to announce himself, and after their first words it seemed rather late to do so.

‘When can you get it?'

He was shielded by the bush, as long as he didn't move. He had learned to keep still in the desert.

‘Any time,' Cuthbert drawled. ‘Why didn't you bring one from Spain? You could have.'

She spoke in a quieter tone, as if afraid someone might listen. ‘I didn't want it in my luggage. If the customs find a gun in your case you're in trouble.'

‘When do you want it?'

‘Whenever you can get it,' she said, and in his animal-like immobility Frank sensed her tone had become more urgent. She didn't want Cuthbert to see how anxious she was. But he spoke the question that Dawley wanted to ask: ‘Why do you want it?'

‘To take to Spain. It will be useful there.'

Cuthbert pulled on a cigarette, the glow hidden by his hand. ‘Why did you come to England?' he asked suddenly.

‘To get Shelley's papers to a place where they'd be safe.' Dawley wanted to join the talk and his heart beat faster. She turned to a bush and broke off a twig, cracked it to pieces as if it were an insect. Her hand nearly touched his face.

‘Uncle John had a revolver and half a dozen bullets, I know where they are. But when you take it to Spain, for God's sake be careful. I don't want you to get caught.'

‘Don't be silly.'

‘I'd perish if anything happened to you.'

There was a rustle of clothes as they kissed. ‘I can take care of myself. I've done it often.'

Cuthbert's laugh was the nearest he could get to expressing concern for her and love for himself in the same breath. ‘Perhaps I'll go with you.'

‘What for?'

Dawley caught the suspicion. Nobody trusted Cuthbert, but they all had different motives. ‘To save you doing anything foolish.'

‘I won't. I'm an ordinary person with everyday desires – as Shelley used to say.'

He clicked his tongue, irritated at her old boyfriend coming into the talk, even though he was dead. ‘If I'm with you, you won't get into danger.'

‘I don't let people make plans for me.'

His loud laugh startled Dawley. ‘You're a lone wolf, and so am I! One lone wolf attracted to another. We'll have to get married!'

‘Why? Don't you like being a lone wolf?' Dawley imagined her smile.

‘I'm willing to give up a lot.'

‘Get me the gun,' she said.

‘What do you want it for?'

‘To kill someone. What do you usually do with a gun?'

‘Who?'

‘I was joking,' she said. ‘I don't trust anyone who has no sense of humour.'

‘I don't trust anyone who has. Which cuts both ways.'

‘I like you.'

‘It's a dry night,' he said. ‘Let's go into the paddock.'

They stood with their bodies pressed together, and Dawley heard her heavy breathing above that of Cuthbert's.

He moved silently, getting the stiffness out of his legs as he walked towards the house. Who, of all people in the community, was she planning to kill? Maybe she did want to take it back to Spain. There were many uses for guns there. With Franco's fascist regime they were a way of defending oneself, the only vote that meant anything. He couldn't argue against such reason.