The Illustrated Gormenghast Trilogy - Mervyn Peake [345]
‘O Doctor,’ she said, ‘thank you. That is very, very kind and funny.’
She had turned her head away, but now she looked up and found he had already disengaged himself of the curtain and was pushing a chair towards her.
‘What is worrying you, Fuchsia?’ he said. They were both sitting down. The dark night stared in at them through the curtainless windows.
She leant forwards and as she did so she suddenly looked older. It was as though she had taken a grip of her mind – to have, in a way, grown up to the span of her nineteen years.
‘Several important things, Doctor Prune,’ she said. ‘I want to ask you about them … if I may.’
Prunesquallor looked up sharply. This was a new Fuchsia. Her tone had been perfectly level. Perfectly adult.
‘Of course you may, Fuchsia. What are they?’
‘The first thing is, what happened to my father, Dr Prune?’
The Doctor leaned back in his chair, as she stared at him he put his hand to his forehead.
‘Fuchsia,’ he said. ‘Whatever you ask I will try to answer. I won’t evade your questions. And you must believe me. What happened to your father, I do not know. I only know that he was very ill – and you remember that as well as I do – just as you remember his disappearance. If anyone alive knows what happened to him, I do not know who that man might be unless it is either Flay, or Swelter who also disappeared at the same time.’
‘Mr Flay is alive, Dr Prune.’
‘No!’ said the Doctor. ‘Why do you say that?’
‘Titus has seen him, Doctor. More than once.’
‘Titus!’
‘Yes, Doctor, in the woods. But it’s a secret. You won’t …’
‘Is he well? Is he able to keep well? What did Titus say about him?’
‘He lives in a cave and hunts for his food. He asked after me. He is very loyal.’
‘Poor old Flay!’ said the Doctor. ‘Poor old faithful Flay. But you mustn’t see him, Fuchsia. It would do nothing but harm. I cannot have you getting into trouble.’
‘But my father,’ cried Fuchsia. ‘You said he might know about my father! He may be alive, Dr Prune. He may be alive!’
‘No. No. I don’t believe he is,’ said the Doctor. ‘I don’t believe so, Fuchsia.’
‘But Doctor. Doctor! I must see Flay. He loved me. I want to take him something.’
‘No Fuchsia. You mustn’t go. Perhaps you will see him again – but you will become distressed – more distressed than you are now, if you start escaping from the castle. And Titus also. This is all very wrong. He is not old enough to be so wild and secret. God bless me – what else does he say?’
‘This is all in secret. Doctor.’
‘Yes – yes, Fuchsia. Of course it is.’
‘He has seen something.’
‘Seen something? What sort of thing?’
‘A flying thing.’
The Doctor froze into a carving of ice.
‘A flying thing,’ repeated Fuchsia. ‘I don’t know what he means.’ She leaned back in her chair and clasped her hands. ‘Before Nannie Slagg died,’ she said – her voice falling to a whisper – ‘she talked to me. It was only a few days before she died – and she didn’t seem as nervy as usual, because she talked like she used to talk when she wasn’t worried. She told me about when Titus was born, and when Keda came to nurse him, which I remember myself, and how when Keda went away again to the Outer Dwellings, one of the Carvers made love to her and she had a baby and how the baby wasn’t really like other babies, because of Keda not being married, I mean, but different apart from that, and how there were various rumours about it. The Outer Dwellers wouldn’t have it, she said, because it wasn’t legitimate, and when Keda killed herself the baby was brought up differently as though it was her fault, and when she was a child she lived in a way that made them all hate her and never talked to the other children, but frightened them sometimes and ran across the roofs and down the Mud chimneys and began to spend all her time in the woods. And how the Mud Dwellers hated her and were frightened of her because she was so rapid and kept disappearing and bared her teeth. And Nannie Slagg told me that she left them altogether and they didn’t know where she had gone for a long time, only sometimes they heard