Doctor Who_ The Hollow Men - Keith Topping [5]
He walked slowly down the corridor, towards the library and the source of the music. He strained his ears to hear.
The ninth and most famous variation, „Nimrod‟, was just beginning. The strings ebbed and flowed, like the song of an angel, or those rare dreams of light and life that he wished he could dream again.
He pushed open the door, and stepped into the library. At the bottom, on a low table covered with the previous day‟s newspapers, stood an enormous ghetto blaster, garishly painted and like none that the boy had ever seen before. In front of it, his back to the boy, sat a small, dark-haired man in some kind of pale suit. An array of charts and photocopied sheets surrounded him, propped against the beatbox and strewn all over the floor. He seemed to be taking notes, but had stopped, his head aloft as if he‟d heard the boy enter.
Just for a moment the head dipped, as if bowed down by some vast pressure, and then rose again as the music swelled.
„I‟m sorry if I woke you,‟ said the man, without looking round.
The boy paused. He didn‟t know the man, but he obviously wasn‟t an intruder. Presumably he could be trusted.
Certainly his voice, somehow warm and dark at the same time and with a Scottish burr rolling the consonants, seemed... reliable. Despite his size, he was clearly a man of great authority.
„Elgar,‟ said the boy at last, walking towards the man. „One of my favourites.‟ He paused, thinking of the reaction of his friends and enemies. „I mean, don‟t get me wrong, I like rock and roll, too. New Order, the Fall. Me ma used to call it
“hooligan music”. She‟s -‟
„You don‟t have to justify anything to me,‟ said the man.
The boy sat down, surprised by what he‟d already said. He hadn‟t mentioned his mother in weeks; indeed, he had tried actively to banish her from his every waking thought. But the man‟s very presence seemed to enforce honesty.
„Pretence saddens me. So does fear. And hurt,‟ continued the man. His words were strong and confident, but there was an underlying melancholy, so palpable the boy felt he could reach out and touch the man‟s own anguish. What was all the more surprising was that the man‟s face was wet with tears, but he was talking perfectly calmly, as if nothing was the matter. „Life is complicated enough without adding to its problems,‟ he concluded with a half-hearted grin.
The music from the ghetto blaster swelled again, reaching its conclusion.
The man pointed, as if the rising strings and brass, the rolling drums, the very essence of the music, was something tangible. „Here. Listen. Just as you expect an overblown conclusion... It fades away with only the string section. It‟s like a butterfly you can‟t quite grasp. Elusive. It‟s so beautiful.‟
The boy listened intently. It was like hearing music for the first time.
The man introduced himself as the Doctor. „I‟m a sort of governor here. I often come to the library to clear my head.
It‟s so quiet you can even hear the past, the heritage of this lovely old building.‟
The boy wasn‟t quite sure what he meant, but he nodded anyway.
„And you are?‟ the Doctor asked politely, smiling. „Shanks, sir,‟ replied the boy without thinking. He was about to add his Christian name, too, but the Doctor seized on this revelation as if that was all he needed to know everything about him.
„Shanks,‟ said the Doctor, turning the word over a few more times. „Shanks. Ah, yes.‟ Doubtless he was familiar with the names of the students, and was ticking off some kind of mental register. Shall we go for a walk? I find sleep...
troublesome.‟
Shanks hadn‟t even mentioned his nightmares, but it seemed that the Doctor knew most things without their having to be spelled out. The boy nodded dumbly, and, some time later, found himself walking around the school grounds, pouring out his heart to a complete stranger. The