Submersion Read online

The locked cabinet, however, revealed something very different looking than its counterpart. At the top of the cabinet was a shelf on which sat a device not dissimilar to the music box in the other cabinet; at a first glance, in any case. In the main, it was a black, oblong machine, with functional buttons across its front. Yet, it had a lid on top, which Old Man Merlin flipped back, revealing a rotating table; adjacent to this, on the right, was a mechanical arm, which he explained held the needle that played the records.

  ‘Records?’

  ‘Yes, this is a record player. You must have heard…?’ he questioned, but upon the shaking of my head, he let it trail away.

  Below this top shelf were two additional shelves. What they displayed appeared to be a library of files; like very tall, very thin books, they had colourful spines with tiny writing that indicated their contents. But they were not books at all.

  ‘Vinyl,’ the old man disclosed, his tone exposing the reverence and relish with which he eyed these items. Realising his words of late – records, vinyl, stereo – meant little or nothing to me, he pulled one of the files out to reveal exactly what he meant.

  A wafer thin, black disc of plastic, exactly twelve inches across – according to Merlin – marked with narrow circular grooves, with a colourful label at its centre, where the artist and title were displayed, amongst other things. There was a small hole right in the middle and Merlin showed me the purpose: placing the delicate disc onto the rotating turntable on his stereo, a small peg went through the hole, keeping the record in place. Next, Old Man Merlin lifted the arm that held the needle in place and gently dropped this onto the edge of the vinyl circle.

  ‘Won’t it scratch it?’ I asked. Merlin nodded with a smile, as if that was the whole point, then held a finger up to his lips to indicate I should be silent.

  ‘Listen,’ he whispered singularly and I obeyed.

  I think I stayed for an hour. Merlin played about a dozen different records and introduced me to alien artists that have now become familiar – The Beatles, Bowie, Pink Floyd, Eurythmics, Kate Bush, the Rolling Stones – the classics, as the old man referred to them. Eventually, I would find my own favourites, but for now I adopted his. Aside from the music, which came flooding in from the same hidden speakers as before, I was fascinated by the mechanism itself. Watching the arm move across the black circle, spiraling in closer and closer to the centre, it was hard to equate this simple, primitive action with the beautiful sound that enveloped us.

  ‘Any less believable than that producing music?’ Old Man Merlin chuckled, pointing to the digital box Elinor and I had played with on many previous occasions.

  Yes, was my answer. Yes, because the contents of that black box were unknown, a mystery; so we could believe everything and nothing of it. But with the record player, the stereo, as Merlin had started calling it, there was less mystery, less magic – and yet somehow less to believe. Surely the union of a plastic circle and a mechanical arm with a needle attached couldn’t result in this unearthly, melodic swamping of our senses?

  ‘Believe it,’ Merlin insisted, still jovial, amused by my disbelief. ‘It’s exactly what’s happening. Happy to go through the science again,’ he offered. But I declined. I was enjoying myself too much; why spoil it with a little educational instruction?

  I left soon after that – I had been absent much longer than I intended and I knew Mother had a new found sense of anxiety tugging at her. News of missing children did that, Tristan explained to me later. Every parent who has heard the news will be keeping a tighter reign. Have patience. I promised Merlin I would be back, probably the next day, I was certain.

  True to Tristan’s warning, Mother was on tender hooks when I returned to Aunt Agnes’ house, waiting on the steps in her protective mask, glancing up and down our road. She had probably done this at regular intervals, looking for sight of her one and only child, her anxiety building at each peep. Seeing me unmoor the boat and row back towards her, her body relaxed for a split-second, relieved, then tightened up again, functioning like the pressure cooker Aunt Agnes used to steam vegetables: compressed, boiling.

  ‘What was I supposed to think, eh? Your cousin goes missing and then you swan off without a word? What was I supposed to think? You could have drowned too! Haven’t your aunt and I got enough to worry about? Now, get in and get out of that gear! You can help me with the cleaning!’

  I always hoped the scolding would be followed by a sweep of arms and a warm hug that would reveal the true source of her fury: love. And that was the one thing I kept: hope. Hoping, always.

  Cleaning was something that my mother appeared to openly love. It wasn’t just a habit that kicked-in to replace tears or grief; she indulged her domestic need during happier moments as well, and our own home was immaculate as a consequence, despite the grimy waters that surrounded us. But Elinor’s disappearance was a gift to Mother; a way to get her hands on what she privately called other people’s dirt. And so, whilst my aunt grieved silently for a daughter that was simply missing in her eyes, my mother donned an apron and an old worn pair of grey rubber gloves (‘They were yellow when I first got them,’ she had informed me once) and got to work washing floors, cleaning windows and rinsing nets. And that was just the first morning.

  After my extended absence at Old Man Merlin’s lair, I was sent up to Elinor’s room with an old sack. Start with a clear-out of all her rubbish, then come back for next instructions. I knew it was wrong; a sickness churned in my stomach as I ascended to the second story of their house. I entered Elinor’s room with the full knowledge that Aunt Agnes was next door, possibly asleep, but awake or not, she was mourning her loss. Clearing up what remained of that loss seemed out of place, mistimed.

  But on entry, I made a discovery that thwarted Mother’s mission: Tristan was sat on the bed.

  ‘You can forget that right off,’ he told me, nodding at the sack in my hands. ‘You’re not to touch a thing and you can tell your mother I told you so. I heard her instructions downstairs. You hear me? Not to touch a thing.’

  I dropped the sack and grinned. I hadn’t really seen Tristan since the first night of Elinor’s absence. He had been out for most of the time, with Uncle Jessie.

  They’re up to something, I heard Grandad Ronan discuss in sharp whispers with Great-Uncle Jimmy. Thick as thieves, they are.

  Great-Uncle Jimmy had something different to say: You’d think his priorities would be elsewhere, wouldn’t you? You’d think he’d put my niece first?

  Mother and Great-Aunt Penny had nothing to say about Tristan’s priorities; I think Mother relished the absence of his dirty boots and my great-aunt was never keen to discuss Tristan’s association with the house. Living-in-sin was her favourite whisper on the subject, though she never said anything out-loud or to anyone’s face.

  I wanted to ask Tristan where he had been, whether it was true that he and Uncle Jessie were up-to-something, but instead I sat next to him on Elinor’s bed and asked him for a story. Tristan was full of them, famous for his story-telling ability and he smiled, glad to be distracted from whatever was occupying his mind and time.

  ‘I’ll tell you about the White City,’ he said.

  ‘Or one about the dogs?’ I suggested, eagerly, for whilst Tristan’s darker tales frightened me, I shared my cousin’s sinister fascination with them.

  ‘The dogs it is,’ he agreed, smiling, sitting up straighter to ready himself. ‘Just no telling that mother of yours.’

  The storytelling had a consequence: Tristan was still resident when my aunt woke and when Mother and Great-Aunt Penny served dinner. His presence at the meal table created a frostiness with some – specifically Mother and my great-aunt – but the chilly atmosphere was worth it to see a trace of a spark in Aunt Agnes’ eyes.

  When I woke on the third morning, Tristan had gone again.

  Fearing another attempt by Mother to enlist me in transforming my aunt’s cosy home into something quite the opposite, I escaped as early as possible to what
had become my regular haunt: the Cadley house. I was thoughtful enough, this time, to leave Mother a note, explaining where I had gone, so as not to worry her unnecessarily. I just hoped she didn’t send Great-Uncle Jimmy down to haul me back.

  She didn’t.

  As usual, upon hearing my entrance, Old Man Merlin popped his head out from the back, just to check if the young man pulling off his safety gear was friend or foe.

  ‘Just to be safe,’ he explained, habitually. ‘You can never be too careful.’

  Then he was off again, leaving me free roam of his den.

  And for the majority of the day, I was left to my own devices. In the music room, the second cabinet – the one that housed the records and their playing machine - was locked again, but I was still able to operate the digital box in the other cabinet. I had the idea to find The Count of Monte Cristo from the library and take it up to the music-filled room, combining my favourite Cadley house activities.

  The games room I ignored; Solitaire aside, there was little I could do by myself and the mere sight of the dressing up box put me in mind of Elinor. I had already grown tired of the model railway, and the room with the dead computers served no interest at all.

  So, I submerged myself in reading and music, quickly oblivious to my surroundings, distracted from my family tragedy for the vast majority of day. Even Old Man Merlin kept out of sight, busy with his televisions, no doubt.

  That is, until quite late in the day.

  If the old man hadn’t come storming up two levels of the spiral steps in search of me, I may have completely lost track of the time. Other than to change the music – I was finding my favourites, the Beatles in particular – I kept to my spot in one of the comfy armchairs for the entire stretch of the afternoon.

  ‘Boy, boy!’ he cried, dashing into the room, a look of alarm in his face. ‘Found something, come on!’

  And he was out the room just as quickly, disappearing down the steel spiral in a whirl, moving at a youthful speed that defied his years.

  ‘Follow on!’ he insisted, as he stepped into his rear quarters, sweeping through the area swamped with televisions and to another smaller, narrower fourth ground-floor room beyond that I hadn’t really noted before. It was somewhere between a kitchen and what I imagined a science laboratory would look like – science laboratories feature frequently in Tristan’s stories. It was a thin room, with cabinets and appliances to the left and right and a path of brown tiles down the middle, leading to a rear door, which appeared to lead outside. As well as a cooker, a refrigerator, a kettle and a toaster, other smaller apparatus occupied the sides. Tubes and jars, some empty, others with liquids and powders in them, a compact microscope and a trio of gadgets that Merlin later identified as Bunsen burners. Yet, the item that had triggered his urgency was none of these – it was a small plastic container, with the lid sealed.

  ‘I found this on my back step,’ he explained, pointing to the rear door.

  I couldn’t see much beyond it, but I guessed the old man had a rear veranda. Some of the newer houses, those built with the floods in mind, had steel decking in place of gardens. At my house and at my aunt’s, we had simply lost our gardens to the river.

  Old Man Merlin peeled off the lid and revealed inside the corpse of a rat. Dead, it looked smaller, its long tail curled underneath its body. Whilst Merlin had placed it carefully in the plastic coffin, the cause of death was clear to see – it had been bitten in two, its head torn from the body.

  ‘Why would someone do that?’ I asked.

  ‘What would do it, is the right question, boy,’ Merlin responded, putting the lid back on quickly, lest the small creature escape. ‘You must take this to Tristan, you understand? Tristan. No one else, just him. Is he home today?’

  ‘He should be, yes, he should be by now,’ I answered, suddenly caught up in Merlin’s urgency, sensing a little fear creep under my skin; a fear I also sensed in the old man’s voice.

  ‘Then take it to him now, and tell him where I found it. He’ll know what to do. But only him. Is that clear?’

  Yes, I told him. It was very clear.

  ‘Good, on your way then.’

  But it didn’t happen quite like that.

  When I reached my aunt’s, Tristan wasn’t there to start with. He was out with Jessie again – Mother’s words, finding as much disapproval in his absence as she did in his presence. This was quickly followed by: And what have you got there?

  I had placed the plastic box containing the rat on floor whilst I’d removed my mask and outdoor garments.

  ‘It’s for Tristan,’ I began, but she was onto to it before I had a chance to stop her. Not that you could really stop Mother doing anything, once she put her mind to something.

  Whilst Mother was disturbed and cross with what I had brought across the threshold – a threshold she had been scrubbing and polishing for the last three days with ceaseless vigour – it was Aunt Agnes’ limitless fury that shattered us. She wanted us all gone! All of us! She was sick of the interference, suffocated by having so many people milling around her. And this! she had hissed, pointing at the rat, this! Do you think I need to be reminded of death? You stupid, stupid child!

  In the midst of my mother’s packing, my aunt’s fury and my slow tears, ignored by everyone, Tristan finally returned and restored some calm. My aunt still wanted us all gone – including him – but Tristan helped reduce the sting her words and anger had unleashed. He did simple things – helped Mother with her bags, put the lid on the plastic box and took it from our sight, reassured Aunt Agnes that everyone understood and would comply with her wishes. And, whilst he instructed me to stop crying and help my mother, he took a moment to dry my tears with a rag from his pocket.

  Within an hour, it was over. Mother and I were back in our boat, with my great-aunt and -uncle following behind, rowing ourselves along the two streets until we reached our home again.

  Tristan was the last to leave, the gatekeeper of Aunt Agnes’ demands, ensuring we all kept to our word. I noticed he wasn’t wearing a mask, and I asked Mother why.

  ‘Because he’s a fool,’ she had replied.

  I also noticed he had the rat box in one of his hands.

  ‘I’ll just be next door,’ he called back to my aunt, closing her door.

  Then, he hopped from Aunt Agnes’ doorstep to Papa Harold’s, inside the old hermit’s house in seconds.

  It was a while before I went back to Old Man Merlin’s. He had set me the simplest of errands and I had failed. I feared his disappointment; maybe I had lost his respect, his trust. Mother visited Aunt Agnes, as did my great-aunt, but I was left at home. We don’t want a repeat of that business, Mother had scolded. Your aunt could do without that, clearly.

  But something drew us all back one day, a month after Elinor had first gone missing: the prospect of a memorial service for Elinor. It wasn’t something my aunt had requested or suggested in any way, I’m certain. No, Mother and Great-Aunt Penny had conspired to descend and rally her round through a variety of tactics. Mother wasn’t sure just how long this could take – although I could have suggested forever, guessing just how resistant Aunt Agnes would be to the idea – hence her decision to bring me along this time.

  On arrival, Mother had instantly dismissed me, actively encouraging a visit to Old Man Merlin’s. Given my concerns about seeing my friend again, I’m not certain I would have returned to him that day, had she not insisted.

  Whilst I was in the habit of letting myself in, as I hadn’t been at the Cadley residence for some weeks, I decided to knock first, waiting on his platform out the front. Yet, after several raps, there was no response. So I simply went in.

  Usually the rustling sound I created as I stripped out of my protective gear was enough to alert the man. But, on this day, I heard nothing from him. Deciding it wouldn’t be right to simply ascend to the upper quarters, I went in search of him.

  I found him as I expected: in his back rooms, pottering, it seemed at fi
rst. Yet, his puzzled, crunched brow suggested deep concentration, as did the fact he failed to see me for some minutes.

  He was working in his kitchen area. He had the back off an old radio and was fiddling with a screwdriver, putting wires back in place, from what I could see. Without replacing the back, he turned the item round and turned a dial on the front with his right hand, whilst wiggling its aerial with the other. Eventually, a sound came through, a sound he was clearly searching for, as he celebrated with an exclaimed ‘ha!’

  Voices came from the radio. Not the sort of voices I heard at Papa Harold’s, when he got his old radio out. Papa H’s radio voice had told stories, occasionally news, if you tuned in at the right time. At Aunt Agnes’ there was also a radio, but that mainly played music, like that I heard in the music room at the Cadley residence. But the voices on that day were different: they were official voices. That was the best I could assume. Official voices – maybe police, maybe government or other official voices. One thing was clear: we shouldn’t have been listening. And, when I decided it was best to back away, sneak off unseen, and bumped into a table behind me, rattling a jar of screws, finally catching Old Man Merlin’s attention, the look on the old man’s face and his subsequent reaction confirmed this.

  ‘How long have you been lurking there?’ he accused, coming forward urgently, his voice fraught with fear and anger. ‘How long have you been listening in, boy? What did you hear? Tell me, what did you hear?’

  Had I wanted to flee, I couldn’t: he had me by my wrists, gripping each with considerable strength given his age.

  ‘Just voices, that’s all,’ I winced and seeing my pain, his grip lessened, as if instantly he realised he was scaring me. ‘I’m sorry. I just came to say hello.’

  He turned from me, rubbed his chin and paced a little, thinking through his next move.

  ‘I have to know I can trust you, boy,’ he eventually said, turning back to me, with eyes sharp and serious. ‘If you are to come here, if you are to know my secrets, I have to know I can trust you. You understand?’