Submersion Page 4

  Elinor’s death meant we frequented my Aunt Agnes’ house more often. Mother insisted there was a lot more to do, now that Agnes had gone, but that seemed strange to me. There had been three in their house – Agnes, Elinor and Tristan, Aunt Agnes’ boyfriend, although I’m not allowed to say that in front of Aunt Agnes, either. With Elinor gone and only two residents, surely there would be less to do? But I didn’t question Mother; it’s not something she rewarded. So, we started to go round to my aunt’s more frequently. Initially, we stayed for three days - me sleeping in my cousin’s room, which was creepy knowing she had gone so suddenly. But something I did caused an argument and my aunt sent us packing.

  Something Old Man Merlin and I found.

  The old man wasn’t a stranger before Elinor died. She and I would often go down to his house when I visited my Cedar Street relatives.

  Are you two going to visit that old hoarder again? my aunt would ask, tutting and smiling together, whenever Elinor and I said we were off to the Cadley residence.

  In my day, we didn’t let young children mix with strange men, my Great-Aunt Penny would offer. It wasn’t considered healthy.

  That was in your day, I wanted to say to her, and your day has gone. But I didn’t. It was the kind of thing Elinor might have said and been scolded for, but I wasn’t one to speak out-of-turn to elders.

  Aunt Agnes was right though, about Old Man Merlin; he was a hoarder.

  His house was at the very end of the street. A new build, Grandad Ronan called it. Although, it didn’t look very new to me; its bricks crawling with dirt, moss and algae, its window frames a little rusty, their glass frosted with condensation between the panes. Just like all the other houses down that street. But it was different in other ways.

  It was above the water, to start with; a house built on steel stilts that elevated it, meaning the river road flowed beneath it, rather than through it. Also meaning it was flood-fit, another phrase from Grandad Ronan - unlike our homes, whose foundations sank deep into the water and constantly needed attention and fixing to survive the creep of the wet.

  There were five separate storeys to the old man’s place, with each floor getting smaller as you went up, so the space at the apex was a single room in the eaves of the roof. The five levels lent the old man plenty of space in which to keep his store of treasures.

  Junk, Elinor had commented when she first saw it all, unkindly I felt, yet she was fascinated all the same. And it was this trove of trash that drew us back again and again.

  Grandad Ronan told me that the Cadley residence was purpose-built; built to keep the dogs out, he said. That’s why it was constructed on top of the steel stilts. When the floods came, it served to keep the water out too and Old Man Merlin had a platform attached to the very front, like a small jetty. Here, he moored his small boat; it also served as a ledge between the river road and the entrance to his house.

  The ground floor of the Cadley home was packed with what old Merlin called white goods, yet it didn’t seem a valid description to me, as they were brown with dust, grime and rust.

  ‘They were all white once,’ Old Merlin offered, on my first visit, as if that explained the labelling, before talking me through his vintage collection. The way he spoke, the sparkle that moistened his eyes; you’d think they were expensive cars he had collected and preserved, not the corroded casings of defunct domestic goods.

  His collection served every kind of household need you could ever imagine. As he walked us through them on our first visit, he passionately reeled off their type, make and model like he was reciting poems. The front two rooms were packed with big items: washing machines, tumble-driers, dishwashers, refrigerators, freezers, fridge-freezers. The machines were stacked at least two high, where he had run out of floor space to store them.

  ‘This is a rarity,’ he told us, stopping by one item, covered in an old, worn, velvety throw. He pulled this off, like a magician revealing a trick, and gave it an affectionate rub. ‘Known as a twin-tub,’ he gleamed, clearly proud of the item.

  Elinor had raised her eyebrows at me: he’s clearly mad, she signaled.

  I shrugged, unsure. Maybe he had a point; maybe we just didn’t understand it, that’s all.

  As well as the bulky white goods, as Old Man Merlin continued to refer to them, there were smaller items: microwaves, electric kettles and toasters, various food preparation devices and one devise called a teasmade that made him chuckle to himself. Further, various species of tubing and electrical leads snaked their way throughout both rooms, some coiled up in piles, others weaving in and out of the hoard. We had to be careful not to trip.

  ‘Would you like to see more?’ he had asked us, as we came out of these rooms and into his hallway. Not waiting for an answer, he strode towards the rear of his house, expecting us to follow. ‘If you liked it there, you’ll love it in here.’

  Doubt it, Elinor mouthed, but he was right: we did love it.

  ‘Televisions!’ I exclaimed, coming into the room first. Televisions were everywhere. About fifteen different screens. Some oblong and flat; others a bulky box shape, more like the microwaves I had seen in a previous room. Some had plastic black casings, others were colourful: one was orange; two had fake wood-effect shells.

  I had seen one before – Papa H had showed me one he kept in a cupboard – a small, clumsy one, with a circle of wire attached to the top as an aerial – but it hadn’t worked. Doesn’t even spark up, Papa H had explained, not that we get any transmissions or signals anymore. I had asked to see it again, about a month later, but he said he had thrown it out. No use in keeping old rubbish, he’d said, but Old Man Merlin obviously had a different view.

  As I watched in awe, the old man flitted around and switched on each and every machine. Within a minute, all the televisions were lit up – most in colour, some in monochrome. Every other screen was showing a movie – people on a space ship, fighting with laser guns; the remaining ones displayed a snowy scene of white dots against a blue or black background.

  ‘I’ve some work to do on the others,’ the old man explained, apologising for those not exhibiting the film, but there was no need for an apology.

  ‘He’s never let me out here before,’ Elinor mouthed to me, just to make it clear she hadn’t been keeping this wonder a secret. ‘Didn’t have a clue about it.’

  I was so transfixed by the screens and their digital spectacle that it was of little concern.

  Then she turned back to Old Merlin. ‘Can you turn up the sound?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Old Merlin said and he handed Elinor a black plastic bar with colourful buttons on it. ‘It’s a remote control, for one of the televisions. Point it at a screen, press a button and see what happens.’

  Elinor glanced at me and grinned: it was like he had passed her a bar of precious metal.

  ‘Go on!’ I urged, excited to know what would happen.

  She pointed, pressed and the screens went dead.

  A chuckle in the sudden, shadowy darkness revealed Merlin had planned this trick all along.

  ‘What did I do?’ Elinor asked, a little afraid she’d broken something, despite the old man’s signal of humour.

  ‘Press it again,’ he urged. She did and, one by one, the screens flickered back to life. ‘I’ve got them all hooked up to the one control,’ he explained, as a relieved Elinor readily handed back the hand-held mechanism. ‘Right, you asked for sound, didn’t you?’

  That first visit, I ventured no further. The old man got us both a stool each and we sat in front of those screens, transfixed, eyes glazed over in awe of the colourful spectacle, unable to believe the magic conjured before us; frightened to leave it in case the blink of an eye cut it out, like Elinor pressing the button.

  ‘What did he say that film was called again?’ I asked Elinor, as we rowed our small boat the few metres back to her house. My voice was muffled through my facemask, but she understood me clearly enough.

  ‘Return of the Something, I think,
’ she replied, shrugging and adding: ‘Special Edition, whatever that means.’

  ‘It was special though, wasn’t it?’ I said, the sparkle clear in my tone and features, despite the rubber visor.

  ‘Yes,’ she smiled, her own joy effused through that single word.

  We both rowed on in pleasant silence; a silence that was only interrupted by the ripple of the road river and a single word that Elinor expelled when it finally came to her, inches from her house: ‘Jedi!’

  After that first visit, it was another two weeks before we visited the old man again. The occasion was a family gathering at Aunt Agnes’ and the general rule when the entire family was round was no-going-out.

  ‘Your great-aunt, great-uncle and Ronan are here, they want to see you,’ Mother would insist and I’d have to stay in, hanging around for the odd, dull question I was certain they asked out of necessity, embarrassed by the boy who lingered at his mother’s request alone. How is school? What are you studying this term? And the most pointless of them all: what do you want to be when you grow up? But Mother was insistent with her rule: people wanted to see you so there was no going out, understood?

  But Aunt Agnes had intervened on this particular occasion.

  ‘Why don’t you both go out in one of the boats for a bit, get some fresh air,’ she said, a family joke that always made me smile, particularly when she delivered the line and the gasmasks simultaneously. Yet I failed to smile on this occasion – I was under strict instructions to stay put and be seen. ‘I’ll say I insisted, forced you out from under my feet. Now, put on your outdoor clothing and off you go.’

  Once we were in the boat, there was no question as to where we were heading.

  On our second visit together, the old man didn’t invite us into the rear room with the television trickery.

  ‘Oh, it’s all a mess in there, parts all over the floor, no, you’re to stay out,’ he told us, a little grumpier than he had been the last time. I had the sense we had interrupted his work, and that we were less welcome, but if Elinor noticed, she didn’t let it affect her.

  ‘Can I show Billy the other rooms?’ she asked him and he nodded and muttered in irritated agreement, before heading out to the back room again and shutting the door.

  ‘Just keep out of my way,’ he called back and I sensed a little of the friendliness return to his tone. I comforted myself with the belief that we weren’t so unwelcome after all.

  ‘Come on,’ Elinor urged, leading me on, her eyes bright with adventure, eager to unveil further riches that were scattered about Merlin’s lair.

  Central to the building’s structure was a spiral, steel staircase that twisted its way up to the very apex of the house. The twisting steps did not stop at any of the floors, so you had to hop off at each level, alighting onto a circle of landing that would lead to the rooms. Only at the very top did the stairs cease, taking you straight into the single attic room.

  On the first floor, there were three rooms. Elinor ventured ahead of me and, as she reached the first of the doors and turned the handle, she looked back and her face burst apart with a grin. Just toys! she mouthed an exclaim. Nothing but toys!

  It was a large room, with no window as far as I could see. All four walls were fitted with shelving, shelving that was, in turn, packed with box upon box of children’s games. Board games, mainly. Some were versions of games we had at home or at my great-aunt’s: draughts, chess, dominoes. Likewise, there were several packs of cards and a couple of books on different games and tricks you could play with them. However, this wasn’t the draw for us; what lured us in were the colourful boxes with games that had somehow remained a secret to our childhoods so far.

  As Elinor had been there before, she introduced me to her favourites at the outset.

  ‘I love this one,’ Elinor had enthused, grabbing a box from one shelf and placing it on the floor. With the lid off, she took out a cylindrical tube, into which she plunged a series of colourful sticks and topped with marbles. ‘You take turns to pull out the sticks and eventually the marbles fall down to the bottom. The winner is the one with the least marbles at the end. Oh, and you shout Kerplunk! when the marbles come tumbling,’ she added, explaining where the pastime got its name.

  I won the first round, frustrating my cousin, who yanked out the sticks with relish and speed, while I took my time, careful not to unsettle any precariously balanced marbles. The game was over in minutes, taking less time to play than it did to set up.

  Elinor quickly pushed my victory and the box aside and took another from the shelf.

  The second entertainment was titled Frustration, which was apt. In order to start the game, you had to hit a plastic dome in the centre, which in turn popped a dice. You needed to get a six to start and Elinor became quite vexed as this particular number eluded her, giving me a head start. Once you got a six, you were free to move one of four coloured pegs around a board; the first one to get all pegs home was the winner. Along the way, you could land on your opponent and send their pegs back to the start; a regular achievement on my part that also left my cousin aggravated.

  We played two more games of a similar quick-paced nature – Buckaroo and Mousetrap – and, after her third and fourth defeat, Elinor lost interest and occupied herself with a dressing-up trunk in one corner of the room. I tidied away the games we had played, carefully putting the items back in the plastic molds that kept them orderly, placing the lids on each box and returning them to the shelves from which they came. I scanned the shelves, reading the names of all the other activities they contained: Cluedo, Monopoly, Pictionary, Trivial Pursuit, Articulate, Yatzee; some of these I had heard mention of, but many were new to me. I wondered why Old Man Merlin had such an archive, when so many things, not just toys and games, had been lost – drowned, confiscated – over the years. I made a note to ask him.

  ‘Right, follow me,’ Elinor instructed, suddenly at my side. I looked at her and took in her face and costume. Her lips were curled into a giddy grin, a reflection of her joy at being dressed as a witch: a pointy hat and long purple velvet cloak. ‘There’s allsorts in the box. Have a look in a bit, but first follow me.’

  She led me back onto the circle landing and into another room, adjacent left. It was smaller and less cluttered than the games room. Elinor switched on an overhead light that hung, bare-bulbed, in the middle of the ceiling. In the centre – and taking up the vast majority of the space – was a large, oblong table with what appeared to be a model of a landscape, with a miniature rail-track running throughout it. I stared at it in silent wonder, my eyes absorbing every amazing detail. I had never seen anything quite like it. The track was laid out in a figure of eight; landmarks were sign-posted by tunnels, bridges, and four stations. The peripheral area was mapped-out with miniature trees, several buildings, including a windmill, and a lake. There were four tiny trains and each appeared to be hand-painted: one silver, one red, one black and one metallic-blue. The name Xavier was inscribed in gold paint on each vehicle; it wasn’t a name I was familiar with. A noise and sudden movement drew me from my thoughts: Elinor had flicked a switch, hidden under the table, and all four trains began to move along the circle of eight tracking. When each train reached a station, it stopped for a second, picking up invisible passengers and then continued on its way. There were sound effects, too: a warning horn was triggered when a train passed through a tunnel and a toot-toot when the trains crossed each other at a bridge – one travelling under, the other over.

  I could have stayed and watched the trains go round and round all day, but Elinor was keen to show me the rest of Merlin’s hoard. After briefly checking out the third room – another small room, populated with two fat arm chairs, shelves crammed with books of all height and thickness, their kaleidoscopic spines creating a pictureless wall-to-wall mosaic – she headed back to the iron spiral staircase and stepped up to the next floor.

  ‘He really doesn’t mind,’ Elinor reassured me, sensing my hesitation. This was only my se
cond visit to the house and, unlike my cousin, I hardly knew this strange old man. ‘I pretty much have free range here. Come on, just to have a look. Then we can go if you’re still not happy.’

  So, I followed her up to the third storey.

  On first inspection, this level was less exciting. Whilst there were three doors leading off the landing, one was a cupboard housing a jumble of tools, tins, jars and little storage boxes. Of the remaining doors, one led to a small study, occupied by a stout, oak desk, littered with papers, and various grey, metal cabinets that I guessed contained even more paperwork. We didn’t get to confirm this, as the drawers were locked. The final room on this floor, like the small library on the second floor, was home to another pair of plumped, comfortable armchairs.

  ‘Sit down,’ Elinor instructed and I did as I was told, instantly swallowed up by the enveloping comfort the chair provided. ‘And listen,’ she added, heading towards one of two dark wooden cabinets opposite the chairs. Turning a small key, she unlocked and opened the doors to one and revealed a stack of black electrical equipment. After pressing a few buttons, she withdrew, joining me in the second chair. In her hand, she held a remote control, similar to that which had operated the televisions on the ground storey. Pressing a button, the purpose of this exercise was revealed: recorded music filled the room, a surround sound that I couldn’t locate the source of. ‘Hidden speakers,’ Elinor explained, although she had no idea where they were. More magic from Old Merlin.