I Hear Voices Read Free Page B

him?
    Temporarily at ease, now that I know the mission is under way, I sit comfortably back in the splendid machine and watch the passing scene. It passes rapidly, mostly brown or pinkish but some is rather rough still. Someone swoops past on our left, leaving a howl fading in our ears. A merry party severs itself from a hoop and drums towards us. I have not seen any people yet but rather an abundance of dials. Suddenly, I am forced to look at Arthur reproachfully.
    “It’s on the way, old chap,” he pleads. “I don’t want to come all the way back. We’ll only be a few minutes.”
    There is nothing I can do but follow him and, as I feared, the convivial affair soon engulfs us.
    Our hostess sings the introductions.
    “Have you met—Colonel Balder?
      Very proper, very smart.
      Have you met—Sally Punter?
      She’s a dear.
      Have you met Fred and Ted?
      They’re both frightfully ill-bred—”
    Her voice continues to reach me in snatches as I am separated from Arthur, whom I last see searching the room, with eager glance, for something which the very intensity of his search makes it seem unlikely will be there, and borne by the current to different parts of the room. I visit Ermine, the sullen queen who rules a tongueless people. I visit Koko and Jabwort who fight an eternal duel with bladders. Each time they smite, they turn to the nearest attendant slave-girl and explain that but a few more blows and the long contest will be at an end.Then, they intimate, with rolling eye and dangling tongue, what sport, what animation! I visit Martop, the recluse, who has retreated from the tumult to reside permanently in some barren corner of a divan. The results of his scornful reflections are not to be had for less than a casual greeting or passing remark. I visit Cortex the Statue, full-fleshed and heavy-headed , who, having already been exalted by all those present, need do nothing but manifest a presence. I visit Finway, the fluent, the knowing, who lies back educating, with a stream of sophisticated anecdote, Clearleaf, the enthusiastic, and Bell-like , whose girlish tinkle indiscriminately accompanies, even to his occasional consternation, all that Finway says. I listen, trying at the same time to keep my attention fixed on Arthur, who keeps disappearing, foraging ever more desperately through the room, and then reappearing, but always a long way away.
    “Arthur?” I call finally, “Arthur, don’t forget. We must be leaving soon.”
    “I know,” he shouts back at me, but there is an impatient note in his voice that makes me fear for the occasion. “I haven’t forgotten, but leave me alone a little! Amuse yourself. Finish that egg.”
    The egg is cold and viscous now. However it expects to be eaten and has poised itself cleverly towards me, drooping over the cracked tray. The room is shivered too and I hardly believe in the light. Once there was Cousin Susan. Once I was injected and I sting in every nerve from that intrusion. Oh, they’ll stop at nothing. There are those who wear the face of men, who use the speech of men and pad amongst us. Are they corks? Are they agrometers? Do they know that other haven? And now I hear a step.
    “Draw my curtains!” I cry. “Please. Please. Someone. Come and draw my curtains!”
    But they don’t come. The foot descends, slackens away intosilence and I know that no matter how I shriek and wail they still won’t come. And I am left lying helpless in the terrible anguish of helplessness and still they won’t come. And from the void, spiraling towards me like an arrow of light, comes a thought which drains the breath from my body:
    “What if they never come? What if there is no one to come? What if there is only need and no succor forever?”
    “Good morning, Colonel Grözer.”
    Addressed thus, Maria just sighs and goes on drawing back the curtains. But a moment later my sally works through to her although she had thought herself, by now, immune to my drolleries. A