The Inner Landscape Read online

  THE INNER

  LANDSCAPE

  by

  Mervyn Peake

  J. G. Ballard

  Brian W. Aldiss

  A KINNEY SERVICE COMPANY

  NEW YORK

  Contents

  BOY IN DARKNESS Mervyn Peake

  THE VOICES OF TIME J. G. BALLARD

  DANGER: RELIGION! BRIAN W. ALDISS

  PAPERBACK LIBRARY EDITION

  First Printing: June, 1971

  Copyright © 1969 Allison & Busby Limited Boy in Darkness © 1956 Mervyn Peake and © 1969 Maeve Peake The Voices of Time © 1961 J. G. Ballard Danger: Religion! (this version) © 1969 Brian W. Aldiss All rights reserved

  This Paperback Library Edition is published by arrangement with Allison & Busby, Ltd.

  Paperback Library is a division of Coronet Communications, Inc.

  Its trademark, consisting of the words “Paperback Library”

  accompanied by an open book, is registered in the United States Patent Office. Coronet Communications, Inc., 315 Park Avenue

  South, New York, N.Y. 10010.

  BOY IN DARKNESS

  Mervyn Peake

  The ceremonies were over for the day. The Boy was tired out. Ritual, like a senseless chariot, had rolled its wheels —and the natural life of the day was bruised and crushed.

  Lord of a towered tract, he had no option but to be at the beck and call of those officials whose duty it was to advise and guide him. To lead him hither and thither through the mazes of his adumbrate home. To celebrate, from day to day, in remote ceremonies, the meaning of which had long been forgotten.

  The traditional birthday gifts had been proffered him on the traditional gold tray by the Master of the Ritual. Long lines of hierophants, knee-deep in water, passed before him as he sat hour after hour by the margin of the gnat-haunted lake. The whole occasion had been one to try the patience of an equable adult and for a child it was hell.

  This, the Boy’s birthday, was the second of the two most arduous days of the whole year. On the previous day he had been involved in a long march up the steep flanks of a hill to a plantation where it had been necessary for him to plant the fourteenth of a group of ash trees, for today he was fourteen years old. It was no mere formality, for he had no one to help him as he worked, in a long grey cloak and a hat rather like a dunce’s cap. On his return journey down the steep hill he had stumbled and fallen, bruising his knee and cutting his hand, so that by the time he was at last alone in his small room overlooking the red-stone square he was in a frame of mind quite savage in its resentment.

  But now, on the evening of his second day, his birthday (the day of so many idiotic ceremonies that his brain throbbed with incongruous images and his body with fatigue), he lay upon his bed with his eyes closed.

  After resting for some while he opened one of his eyes at what sounded like a moth fluttering against the window. He could see nothing, however, and was about to close his eyes again when he caught sight of that ochre-coloured and familiar patch of mildew that stretched across the ceiling like an island.

  He had stared many times at this same mildew island with its inlets and its bays; its coves and the long curious isthmus that joined the southern to the northern masses. He knew by heart the tapering peninsula that ended in a-narrowing chain of islets like a string of discoloured beads. He knew the lakes and the rivers and he had many a time brought imaginary ships to anchor in hazardous harbours, or stood them off when the seas ran high where they rocked in his mind and set new courses for yet other lands.

  But today he was too irritable to make-believe and the only thing he stared at was a fly that was moving slowly across the island.

  “An explorer, I suppose,” muttered the Boy to himself —and as he muttered there came before his eyes the hated outline of the mountain and the fourteen stupid ash trees, and the damnable presents that were handed to him on the golden tray (only to be returned to the vaults twelve hours later) and he saw a hundred familiar faces, every one of which reminded him of some ritual duty so that he beat his hands upon the bed, shouting, “No! No! No!” and sobbed until the fly on the mildew island had crossed from east to west and was now following the coastline as though it had no wish to venture out across the ceiling-sea.

  Only a little part of his consciousness was taken up with watching the fly, but that little was identifying itself with the insect so that the Boy became dimly aware of exploration as something more than a word or a sound of a word, as something solitary and mutinous. And then it came, all at once, the first flicker of imperative rebellion, not against any one particular person but against the eternal round of deadly symbolism.

  He longed (he knew it now) to turn his anger into action—to make his escape from the gaols of precedent, to make a bid if not for final freedom then at least for a day. For a day. For one tremendous day of insurrection.

  Insurrection! It was indeed nothing less.

  Was he truly contemplating so radical a step? Had he forgotten the pledges he had made as a child and on a thousand subsequent occasions? The solemn oaths that bound him with chords of allegiance to his home?

  And then the whisper that breathed between his shoulder-blades as though urging him to fly—that whisper that was growing in volume and intensity. “Just for a little while,” it said. “After all, you are only a boy. What kind of fun are you having?” He heaved himself over in bed and gave out a great yell.

  “Oh, damn the castle! Damn the Laws! Damn everything!” He sat bolt upright on the edge of his bed. His heart was beating fast and thick. A soft golden light was pouring through his window in a kind of haze and through the haze could be seen the double line of banners that shook along the rooftops in his honour.

  He took a deep breath and looked slowly around the room and was then suddenly arrested by a nearby face. It stared at him fiercely. It was a young face despite the fact that the forehead was puckered up in a deep frown. Hanging on a cord around the neck was a bunch of turkey feathers.

  It was more by those feathers that he knew that he was looking at himself and he turned away from the mirror, tearing as he did so the absurd trophy that hung around his neck. It was for him to wear the feathers all night before handing them back on the following morning to the Hereditary Master of the Quills. As it was, he slid from the bed and trampled upon the rotting relic and then kicked it into a far corner.

  Then came the upsurge again! The thrill and speculation of escape. Of escape to where? And when? When should it be? “Why, now! now! now!” came the voices. “Be up and be gone. What are you waiting for?”

  But the Boy who was so fretful to be gone had another side. Something more icy, so that while his body trembled and cried his mind was not so childish. Whether to make his bid for freedom at speed and by daylight or during the long hours of darkness was not easy to decide. At first it seemed the obvious choice was to wait for the sun to sink and, taking the night for his ally, to beat his way into the fastness while the core of the castle lay heavy with sleep and smothered in ivy like a bitter veil. To creep through the labyrinthine lanes that he knew so well and out into the draughty starlit spaces and on . . . and on.

  But in spite of the obvious and immediate advantages of making his escape by night, yet there was the dire peril of his becoming irrevocably lost or falling into the hands of evil forces.

  Fourteen years of age, he had had many opportunities to test his courage in the tortuous castle and he had on many an occasion been terrified, not only by the silences and glooms of the night but by a sense of being watched, almost as though the castle itself or the spirit of the ancient place moved with him as he moved, stopped when he stopped; forever breathi
ng at his shoulder-blades and taking note of every move he made.

  Remembering these times when he had lost himself, he could not but realise how much more frightening it would be for him to be alone in the darkness of a district alien to his life, a place remote from the kernel of the castle where, although he detested many of the inhabitants, he was at least among his own kind. For there can be a need for hateful things, and a hatred of what is, in a strange way, loved. And so a child flies to what it recognises for recognition’s sake. But to be alone in a land where nothing can be recognised, that is what he feared, and that is what he longed for. For what is insurrection without peril.

  But no. He would not start away in darkness. That would be madness. He would start a little before dawn with most of the castle asleep, and he would run through the half-light, and race the sun—he on the ground and the sun in the air—the two of them, alone.

  But how to bear the cold slow-footed night—the interminable night that lay ahead? Sleep seemed impossible, though sleep he needed. He slid off his bed and walked rapidly to the window. The sun was not far above the notched horizon, and all things swam in a pale translucency. But not for long. The gentle vista took, all of a sudden, another aspect. Towers that a moment ago had been ethereal, and all but floated in the golden air, had now become, through loss of the sun’s late beams, like black and carious teeth.

  A shudder ran over the darkened terrain and the first of the night-owls floated noiselessly past the window. Far below him a voice was shouting. It was too far away for the words to be decipherable but not too far for them to be coloured with anger. Another voice took up the argument. The Boy leaned over the window-sill and stared down vertically. The antagonists were the size of sunflower seeds. A bell began to chime, and then another, and then a swarm of bells. Harsh bells and mellow ones: bells of many metals and many ages: bells of fear and bells of anger: gay bells and mournful: thick bells and clear bells . . . the flat and the resonant, the exultant and the sad. For a few moments they filled the air together; a murmuration; with a clamour of tongues that spread their echoes over the great shell of the castle like a shawl of metal. Then one by one the tumult weakened and scores of bells fell away until there was nothing but an uneasy silence, until infinitely far away a slow and husky voice stumbled its way over the rooftops and the Boy at the window heard the last of the thick notes die into silence.

  For a moment he was caught up in the familiar splendour of it all. He never tired of the bells. Then just as he was about to turn from the window there came another peal of such urgency as to make him frown, for he could not think what it could mean. Then came another peal and then another and after the fourteenth had ended it was clear that he was being saluted. He had forgotten for a little while his status, only to be reminded with a jolt. He could not escape his birthright. It might be thought to have such deference shown him could not but give pleasure to a boy. But it was not so in the case of the young earl. His whole life had been swamped with ceremony and his happiest moments were when he was alone.

  Alone. Alone? That meant away. Away, but where? That lay beyond his powers to imagine.

  Beyond the window the night was heavy with its own darkness, only interrupted by the pinpoints of light that flickered along the backbone of that same steep-sided mountain he had climbed and in whose flank he had planted the fourteenth ash tree. These distant sparks or embers burned not only on the mountain but along the periphery of a great circle—and it was in obedience to the beckoning bonfires that crowds were beginning to form in a score of courtyards.

  For tonight was the night of high barbecue, and within a little while long lines of hierophants would be on their way to one or other section of the circle. The castle would empty itself and men on horseback, men on foot, mules and carriages, and all sorts of vehicles. And leaping to and fro in anticipation, a crowd of urchins screamed and fought, their cries like the cries of starlings.

  It was these cries that now rose through the dark air that upset whatever plans he had formed and whatever wisdom the Boy possessed. They were shrill with the excitement of childhood, and standing at the window he suddenly and without conscious thought knew positively, knew absolutely, that he must escape now: now in the thick and turmoil of it all. Now while ritual rang with bells and bonfires: now, on the crest of decision. Leaping to the door, he flung it wide and ran. He was agile, and he needed to be, for the course he set for himself was hazardous. This was no mere matter of rushing down long flights of stairs. This was at once something faster and more secretive.

  For many years he had, out of sheer inquisitiveness, pried here and there among the dust-filled rooms of his seemingly endless home until he had discovered a dozen ways of reaching the ground without touching the main stairways and without being seen. If there was ever a time for him to use his knowledge this was it; so at the T-shaped ending of the forty-foot corridor along which he was racing he turned neither right to the northern, nor left to the southern stairs that swept down, down, down, in scything curves of worm-riddled wood, but instead he jumped for a small glassless window immediately overhead, and catching hold of a short stub-end of rope that protruded from the window-base he hauled himself up and through. . . .

  Stretching before him was a long attic, the beams of which were so low that to make progress there was no question of merely stooping, let alone walking upright. The only method was to lie flat and wriggle on knees and elbows. This could be a wearisome business, for the attic was extensive, but the Boy had reduced the process to such a rhythmic science that to see him would be like watching a mechanical toy.

  At the far end there was a trap-door which when pulled open on its hinge disclosed, from above, a long drop to an outstretched blanket like a huge blue hammock. The comers were tied with cord attached to the low beams; the belly of the blanket swung free of the ground.

  Within a few moments he was through the trap:door and had bounced from the blanket onto the floor like an acrobat. This room must once have been cared for. There were signs of faded elegance, but the high, square room now breathed a forlorn and dismal air.

  Had it not been that the window of this room was thrown wide to the night, the Boy might by now have been finding it impossible to see his hand before his face. But the window made a rectangle of dark grey that appeared to be let into the surrounding blackness of the room.

  Moving rapidly to the window, he edged his way over the sill and out into the open air, and now began the long swarm down a hundred feet of tough grey rope.

  After what seemed to be a long while he reached another small window in the enormous expanse of the wall and he wriggled his way through this disused opening and left the long rope swinging aimlessly.

  Now he was on some kind of a landing and a moment later he was pounding his way down flight after flight of stairs until he came to a derelict hall.

  At the Boy’s approach a husky scuffling soimd suggested that a number of little creatures had been startled and were making for their lairs.

  The floor of the one-time hall was not a floor in the ordinary sense, for the floorboards had long since rotted away and where they should have been the grass grew luxuriantly and a host of molehills filled the place as though it were an ancient burial ground.

  For a few moments, not knowing why, he stood still and listened. It was not the kind of place for racing through, for there is a certain grandeur in decay and in stillness, which slows the footsteps.

  When he halted there was no sound at all, but now, as from another world, he heard the faraway voices of children, so faint that at first he thought it was the soimd of a beetle rubbing its thighs together.

  He turned to his left where there was once a door and at the far end of the corridor he saw the small square of light no bigger than a fingernail. He began to make his way down this corridor, but there was a different air about him now. The madness had gone out of his flight. He was moving gingerly.

  For there was a light at the far end of the corri
dor. A dull red glow suggesting sundown. What could it be? The sun had sunk long ago.

  Then came far shrill voices again, this time louder, although no single word could be recognised; and then he realised what was happening.

  The children of the castle were at large. It was their night of nights with torches blazing: their voices grew louder as the Boy advanced, until he saw them through the archway and they covered the ground, an army of wild children, so that he found no difficulty in slipping unobserved through their teeming ranks. The torches flared in the voice-filled night and the light of the torches shone on their wet foreheads and Hashed in their eyes. And the Boy marched with them until, realising that they were making for the traditional Torch Mountain, he gradually dropped behind and choosing his moment he sheered off at a junction where the trees grew thickly among high mounds of masonry and he was, once again, alone.

  By now he was several miles from the castle itself and deep into less obvious territory. Less obvious but still recognisable by reason of the occasional idiosyncrasy of stone or metal: a shape protruding from a wall, a jag or jutting that rose to the brink of memory.

  So the Boy moved on and on, catching glimpse after glimpse of half-remembered, half-forgotten shapes; but these shapes that clung to his mind because of their peculiarities (a stain across the ground the shape of a threefingered hand, or the spiral movement of a branch above his head) became, as he proceeded, farther and farther apart and the time came when for a quarter of an hour he was alone with no mark or sign to guide him.

  It was as though he had been descried by the outriders of his memory and a wave of fear flowed over him like an icy wave.

  He turned in the darkness, this way and that, flashing his torch along the endless walk to set the webs of spiders in a blaze or blind a lizard on its ferny shelf. There was no one about, and the only sound was the slow drip of water and the occasional rustling of ivy.