The Bookman - Lavie Tidhar [20]
The fat man stirred in his armchair. "Pay them and get rid of them," he said to the doctor. "You must try the procedure again."
Then he turned his head towards the door. He seemed to be looking directly at Orphan.
Orphan froze. Then the fat man shook his head, minutely, as if saying, "This is not for you," and he lifted a cane that rested by his side and made a motion with it, and one of the men moved against the door and blocked Orphan's view. Orphan ran from the door, but it remained unopened. No one was pursuing him.
Did the fat man know that he was there? He had warned him away. Hadn't he? Did he know him? He shuddered, suddenly feeling the cold. He felt entirely awake now. The body-snatchers will come out any minute, he thought. He did not want to be there. The cold overwhelmed him, made his teeth chatter. Everywhere he turned there was death.
He turned and ran away the way he had come, his feet noiseless on the stone floor.
Away from Guy's, away from its ghoulish dreams, its baroque mysteries. Away from the hospital with the falling of night, through the cobblestone streets and onto the south bank. The fog intensified around him, became a thick screen that blotted out the stars and erased the city as if it had never existed. Orphan hurried, shivering despite his coat. The lonely sound of his footsteps was muffled by the fog.
He walked past streetlamps that bled a wet yellow light, making his way by memory rather than sight. A chill wind rose from the Thames and pummelled him, and he drew the coat tighter around himself and turned away from the river bank, until at last he reached the great edifice of Waterloo Station, jutting out of the fog like a dark citadel. It seemed to him a living thing then, a grotesque, giant face that breathed loudly, the sound of its inhaling and exhaling composed of the steady rhythm of trains. He skirted the station, encountering few people. Those who were out in this foul weather hurried past him without glancing his way, and Orphan had the sudden feeling that he was invisible, a ghost wandering in an unreal world.
He stopped by one of the great stone arches. A lonely figure lay huddled on the floor, wrapped in grey blankets. Orphan crouched down, and the figure stirred. A mane of shaggy hair emerged and two large eyes, milky-white and unseeing, stared up at Orphan. "Spare some change?" the beggar said hopefully.
Orphan was startled. He had almost, for a moment, believed it was Gilgamesh, returned. "What is your name?" he asked, and he reached into his pocket for what money he had.
He dropped the meagre coins he found into the beggar's bowl. The man raised his face further; his blind eyes seemed to search Orphan's face, to study them. Then the unblinking eyes grew wider, and his pale face turned paler still, and his breath caught in his throat; and Orphan, worried for the man's health, grabbed him by the shoulder and said, "What ails you, my friend?"
The beggar moved away, as if the touch of Orphan's hand was more than he could bear. "Not so much noise, my lord!" he hissed. "Sweet prince, speak low: the King your father is disposed to sleep."
Was the man a failed Shakespearean actor? Orphan wondered. He said, gently, "My name is Orphan."
The beggar did a thing that startled Orphan. He laughed. It was a curious sound, hoarse and weak like a failing engine. Then he said, "Sweet prince, the untainted virtue of your years hath not yet dived into the world's deceit, nor more can you distinguish of a man than of his outward show."
He spoke, it seemed to Orphan, with great intensity, as if his words carried a meaning far beyond their stageuse. But, "I'm sorry," Orphan said, "I don't understand."
Sighing, he rose to leave. He was already late for his meeting with the Inspector.
The beggar bowed his head. Then he said, half-muttering before retreating back into his blankets, "Now cracks a noble heart. Good night sweet prince: and flights